Tag Archives: postaweek2012

Travel Theme: Couples, Take Two

Posted on October 25, 2012 by | 43 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

Ailsa’s travel-themed photo challenge this week is Couples.

Ah, the romance of shared travel by kayak! And what better to ensure that shared togetherness than a double kayak?

Soon arguments break out, and loud words carry over the water, to the secret amusement of other paddlers.

“Shouldn’t you be steering more to the left?”

“I know where I am going!”

“I thought we agreed to stop on that beach over there!?”

The couple have trouble paddling at the same rate and synchronizing their strokes…

and both feel that they are doing all the work

until they both just put down their paddles in frustration

No wonder double kayaks are known as “divorce boats”!

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The last photo features another prominent couple in the background. And a couple of other “Couples” are here and here…

43 Comments

Posted in Kayaking, New York City

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Travel Theme: Couples

Posted on October 21, 2012 by | 59 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

Here’s another response to Ailsa’s travel-themed photo challenge this week, Couples. (The first response was here.)

This was just one moment in a long, elaborate dance that this pelican couple performed for the camera…

You can just hear what these couples are saying to each other, can’t you?

59 Comments

Posted in Nature, Photography

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Weekly Photo Challenge & Travel Theme: Couple in Silhouette

Posted on October 20, 2012 by | 37 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

The Daily Post’s Photo Challenge this week is Silhouette. And Ailsa’s Travel-Themed Photo Challenge is Couples. Here’s a photo that combines both themes…

Additional interpretations of “Silhouette” are here and here. And of “Couples”, here and here.

37 Comments

Posted in Photography

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Weekly Photo Challenge: Silhouette

Posted on October 19, 2012 by | 84 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

This week’s Photo Challenge is Silhouette.

Wait, didn’t we already do that theme just a little while ago? Yes, back in August. But that was not the Daily Post’s challenge—it was Ailsa’s challenge on Where’s my backpack?, ahead of the game as usual… (Ailsa herself posted some fantastic silhouettes that you should definitely check out!)

In any case, here are some more silhouettes, or near-silhouettes. A hard-edged one in the late-afternoon sun…

and others softened as the sunlight filters through early-morning fog…

More photos from that trip are here. A second interpretation of “Silhouette” is here.

Continue reading →

84 Comments

Posted in Kayaking, New York City, Photography

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Travel Theme: On Display

Posted on October 12, 2012 by | 30 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

This week, Ailsa’s Travel-Themed Photo Challenge is On Display.

And it’s that time of year again…

This was the display last year (more photos are here). This year’s display is already starting to go up. Watch this space in a couple of weeks!

30 Comments

Posted in New York City, Photography

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Weekly Photo Challenge: Big

Posted on October 12, 2012 by | 74 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

This week’s Photo Challenge is Big.

It’s big…

… but it always amazes me how tiny it appears when we turn the corner and see it across the harbor, against the immensity of the sea and sky. There it is, just to the left of the sunlit section of the city ahead…

It’s a matter of perspective.

74 Comments

Posted in Kayaking, New York City, Photography

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Weekly Photo Challenge & Travel Theme: Happy Animals

Posted on October 5, 2012 by | 73 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

The Daily Post’s Photo Challenge this week is Happy. And Ailsa’s Travel-Themed Photo Challenge is Animals. So…

Zhuangzi and Huizi were strolling along the bridge over the Hao River. Zhuangzi said, “The minnows swim about so freely, following the openings wherever they take them. Such is the happiness of fish.”

Huizi said, “You are not a fish, so whence do you know the happiness of fish?”

Zhuangzi said, “You are not I, so whence do you know I don’t know the happiness of fish?”

Huizi said, “I am not you, to be sure, so I don’t know what it is to be you. But by the same token, since you are certainly not a fish, my point about your inability to know the happiness of fish stands intact.”

Zhuangzi said, “Let’s go back to the starting point. You said, ‘Whence do you know the happiness of fish?’ Since your question was premised on your knowing that I know it, I must have known it from here, up above the Hao River.”

The Happiness of Fish

I don’t know about fish, but these squirrels sure look happy to me…

 

A second interpretation of “Animals” is here.

73 Comments

Posted in Nature, Philosophy, Photography

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Favorite Spot

Posted on October 2, 2012 by | 54 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

Jakesprinter’s Sunday Post theme for this week, Favorite Spot, and the Weekly Photo Challenge theme, Mine, come together in this post…

On Sunday, Johna and I visited one of our favorite spots, New York City’s Central Park.

The trees are still mostly green, and late flowers are in bloom. But subtle signs of fall are everywhere.

We saw a late monarch butterfly, flitting from flower to flower.

Wandering through the park, we made our way, as we usually do, to our really special spot—the plot of ground that some time ago we picked out as the place where we could learn to observe and to see. And indeed, we saw there…

… a belated dandelion

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… somebody’s eggs

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… a strawberry?!

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It sure looked like a strawberry—a last lone strawberry at the cusp of fall.

We thought of how sweet ripe wild strawberries can be… And so, despite some contraindications —the strawberry plants bore, here and there, yellow, rather than white, flowers—Johna ate the strawberry.

It had very little taste. It wasn’t a true strawberry, but (as we determined afterward) a mock strawberry.

Still, it was a lovely early fall day at our special spot in the park…

54 Comments

Posted in Nature, New York City

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Weekly Photo Challenge: Mine

Posted on October 1, 2012 by | 102 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

This week’s Photo Challenge is Mine.

This was Sergei, my cat. Sadly, Sergei is no longer with us…

102 Comments

Posted in Life, Photography

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Travel Theme: Foliage

Posted on September 28, 2012 by | 81 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

Ailsa‘s Travel-Themed Photo Challenge this week is Foliage.

Looking through my photos, about half of them seem to be of foliage (the other half, of course, kayaking…). So it’s very hard to choose! Still, here are a few shots of the foliage in NYC’s Central Park through the seasons…

81 Comments

Posted in Nature, Photography

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