Archive for September, 2007

The USS Sequoia

September 25, 2007

JFK had his last birthday party there. President Clinton, and Russian President Gorbachev have hosted parties there, and on saturday night, a very close and wonderful family friend had a birthday party there.

Where is there? There is aboard the USS Squoia Presidential Yacht.

It was amazing to be on board vessel that has so much history. Kathy had her birthday party on borad with a close few friends, and i was asked to come along and shoot the photos.

As we sailed up and down the Potomac, we listened to wonderful piano, had an amazing dinner, and enjoyed eachothers friendship.

I’ve known Cathy 17 years, and actually grew up riding with her niece, who was always at her aunts side. But over the past few years, Cathy has spent more and more time in Washington DC, and so it was a great party because there were old friends and there were new friends.

AS Cathy walked up the gangplank, the piano player started singing Carly Simons #1 hit “You’re So Vain” and everyone started to sing until the end of hte first line where it says “You walked into the party like you were walking onto a yacht.” at that point everyone began to laugh and talk, and the song never got finished.

It was one of the most fun events that I have had the chance to photograph this far, and that has to be because she is such a good caring friend.

So here are a few from the night…

Cathy walking up to the ship.

Cathy and Alec boarding the USS Sequoia

An unbelievable cake (soon to find out who made it)

An end of the evening group photo on board.

That last photo was taken with one sb800 up and back on camera left, and fired with a nikon d200

In memory of that great night, todays video is Carly Simon “You’re So Vain”

Great Advice

September 21, 2007

So a friend sent this to me recently, and with all the time it takes to build a great portfolio, I thought that this might be useful to some of you.

Subject: Retirement Advice

If you had bought $1,000.00 of Nortel stock one year ago it would now be
worth $49.00. With Enron, you would have $16.50 left of the original
$1,000.00. With WorldCom, you would have less than $5.00 left.

If you had bought $1,000.00 worth of Budweiser (the beer, not the
stock) one year ago, drank all the beer, then turned in the cans for the
aluminum recycling price, you would have $214.00

Based on the above, my current investment advice is to drink heavily and
recycle. This is my new retirement program.

I call it my 401-Keg program

If that doesnt work for you, Gary Fong did the next best thing. He took the money he made from photography, started small businesses, and now own amazing rental property’s… His is probably a more consistant plan, but the 401-Keg sounds like much more fun.

I am getting ready to head off to Washington DC to shoot a birthday party on the USS Sequoia on Saturday. The Sequoia is a presidential yacht that is on the Potomac River in SE DC.

Pics will follow after I get back…

The Sonrise School and Uganda

September 18, 2007

So today I was able to spend a beautiful day outside with good comapny. What more could you ask for? It was a beautiful fall day that started brisk and ended up getting warmer as the day went on.

Sheena and myself went to McConnels Mills which is a park of sorts. When there is water in the stream, it is a fun kyaking spot, but at the moment the water is so low that it would be useless to attempt it. We just walked on the trails, and talked about Africa. Sheena is trying to put together a missions trip to Rwanda to visit the Sonrise School which is where i was durring my first trip to Africa.

It is amazing how God places people in your life at certain times, because I met Sheena while I was in the local Verizon store looking at new phones. As i was checking out, we somehow got onto the topic of the documentary that I am working on in Uganda this winter on eduacation, and she mentioned that she wanted to got to Rwanda. I took a stab at where she was going, and it was right on the money.

So we spent a great day talking about the projects, and getting to know eachother.

Here are some pics from the day:

Sheena playing with her new camera.

The Mill behind the covered bridge.

A couple enjoying the day.

Small falls going down to the stream.