Tag: Blogathon 2009 Posts

This entry represents post 18 out of a total of 49. So, I still have a fairly long ways to go. To be honest, I was pretty beat when I woke up, and feeling pretty worn out around 9:30am or so, but thankfully I seem to have gotten another wind. I’ve been consuming diet pop like it’s going out of style, so that might have something to do with it. Or perhaps, it could be the big bottle of water I also started drinking in an effort to rehydrate myself. Whatever it is that’s keeping me going, I sure hope it lasts for a while. Photo by John Biehler Various friends of ours have been swinging by and dropping off goodies, so right now I have 2.5 L of diet pop in front of me, as well as some candies. So, I’ll be slowly consuming that over the course of […]

Without a doubt, one of my favorite events to shoot is a sunset. I used to live a stone’s throw away from the Pacific Ocean, and walking down and watching the sun set was pretty much a weekly or a semi-weekly event during the summers. I know that many photographers think that sunset photos are a bit cliche, but I’ve never thought so. To me, watching the sun set highlights some of the real beauty of this world, and reminds me of all the great things that bring me joy in it. So, here are a few of my favorite sunset photos that I’ve taken over the years:

I just wanted to personally thank everyone who has donated to my Blogathon campaign so far. I’ll list the people who have indicated that they don’t mind their name being given out. Right now, I’m sitting at about the $750 mark $1,000 mark, which is great considering I’m only about 1/3 of the way through the event. Here’s a list of the current donators: Tia & Richard Everitt Darren and Nicole Johnston Tom Storey Raised on Indie Cathy Webber Jane Smith Lorraine Toor Kimberley Schellenberg Jamie Billingham Peter Andersen Kasia Finkelstein Paul Schaap Keira-Anne Mellis Austin Paul Eileen Good Amanda Finnigan Val Storey Jeff Black Dan Lazar Jennifer Stoddart Melanie Karlik Matthew Hawkins Thank you very much everyone — your contributions will go directory to the kids at the BC Children’s Hospital, and help make a difference. If you’d like to contribute, please do so by visiting my contribution page. […]

A lot of my fellow bloggers around here have installed WordTwit today so that they can have their WordPress posts automatically show up on their Twitter feeds. While WordTwit doesn’t officially support hashtags yet (those crazy things that look like #someword on Twitter), there’s a quick little work around for events such as Blogathon. First, navigate to the WordTwit administration panel. Typically you’ll see something like this under general options: The trick is to edit that text such that the hashtag you’d like to be added is automatically inserted after each post. So for the case of Blogathon, you can simply add a “#blogathon” to the end. It should look like this when it’s all done: Just remember to remove the hashtag when your event is over. Hashtags will be officially supported on a per-entry basis in the future, but for now this is a decent enough work-around for events.

A bunch of us are currently hanging out down in Gastown at a little place called Workspace. Because of how important Blogathon is and the amount of dedication involved by the participants, several organizations have offered to sponsor the event, namely in the area of food. The first sponsor of today’s event is Dairy Queen, and they’ll be supplying all of us with burgers, fries, chicken strips, sundaes, blizzards, and onion rings. Back in high school, I had a bit of a crush on a girl who worked at Dairy Queen. Given that we went to different schools, and the only chance I’d have to run into her was at Dairy Queen, I’d usually convince my friends to go for ice cream from time to time, something they grew very sick of very quickly. So I just wanted to thank Dairy Queen for making it possible to see that cute […]

I’m no old timer yet, but I’m definitely past the point where’d I’d consider myself a spring chicken. This year is really the first year where I’ve noticed any grey hairs, and is also the first year where I’m starting to recognize the odd pain. One in particular, a sharp pain in the heel on my left foot, tends to cause me some grief. Years ago I jumped off a big wall and landed pretty hard on my feet. I never got it looked at, but I’m fairly certain I cracked my heel bone, since I basically had to limp for around four weeks. Unfortunately, I now wake up with a sharp pain in the same area, one that takes me about five minutes to walk off in the mornings. I also seriously injured my knee on the West Coast Trail years ago. I never got it officially looked at, […]

Another great city that I’m fortunate enough to spend a lot of time visiting is San Francisco, California. I was recently down there in June for a big WordPress conference, and will probably be down there again in a few months I imagine. Here’s a shot I took of San Francisco about a year ago from just north of the Golden Gate Bridge. I also just picked up a few diet cokes. Which means that today so far I’ve had three coffees, and one 500ml diet coke. Here’s a shot of the current carnage:

When Apple introduced the iPhone 3GS, they added a new piece of hardware: a magnetometer. That little do-dad can pick up magnetic field lines, and basically act as a virtual compass. While kind of a neat feature, I don’t think it’s very practical. I mean, pretty much every iPhone 3G user I know has the data plan, which basically means they can access Google Maps whenever they want. Yes, you can’t get a real time indication of your direction using Google maps, but if you move around you can obviously watch what happens and see which direction you are facing. But to be honest, it’s pretty rare I ever give or receive directions of the sort “you go down that street, and then turn due east.” Most directions are made in relation to landmarks or streets, both of which are direction independent. The feature I really would love to see […]

A few months ago, another event occurred that was intended to help raise money for the BC Children’s Hospital Foundation. That event was the Chip’s Not Dead Yet memorial mile. Here’s a little quote from the BC Children’s Hospital Foundation as shown on the Chip’s Not Dead Yet site: The Chip’s Not Dead Yet Memorial Mile supports BC Children’s Hospital and the uphill battles faced by children who are trying to get well, and the medical staff who are trying to make miracles happen. Children are precious and the most vulnerable members of our society. They rely on us to care for them. We also know today that most of the common adult diseases find their origins in early childhood and by investing in the health of children we are investing in the future health of the entire population. Joining with Chip, we share the responsibility for seeing that nothing […]

A bunch of us are currently down at Workspace in Vancouver, which is a shared office space situated right on the water in Gastown. I have a rather great view of the North Shore mountains along with the cruise ship terminal at Canada Place. One of my favorite photos is this next one from Gastown I took last year from the lookout at Harbour Center: I actually shot the photograph through a window, so it’s surprising that you can’t see any glass. But I’ve always liked all the angled lines in the photo, and of course the film-noir type lighting. If you’re ever in Vancouver, make sure you head on up to the view point and check out the view.