New Beginnings

Someone I ran across this weekend suggested that I start each day off with some meditation. It's been my habit to start each day off with some social media gossip browsing, and I've noticed of late that habit has a tendency to grow over time. I took up the meditation suggestion, and it's early in the experiment, but I think the initial results indicate a potentially positive direction.

Heading Out - Capital Rowing Club Sunrise Practice - Washington, DC

I'll give it another round tomorrow, but starting the day that way seemed to put me in a mindset where I was more open to taking a slightly different direction and finding myself with the sunrise rowing practice above cross my path. Perhaps it was just luck of the draw, but I don't think so. I'm beginning to believe that if you reach out to the universe, the great powers that fuel the race of the planets often reach back.

Heading Back - Capital Rowing Club - Washington, DC

Some items that have been percolating for awhile should start making some progress toward closure tomorrow. Today, I'm practicing letting the outcome of those discussions fall where they might. I've done my best, and I've not harmed anyone as far as I know. All that's left is to live out the adventure as it presents itself in the morning...or maybe the afternoon.  Until then...Cheers.

...and it happens every day!

I woke up at a little after 4 am this morning, promptly hit the snooze button, and said to myself "just seven more minutes." Two and a half hours later I jolted awake in a panic because I knew I'd removed any reasonable possibility of making the first scheduled meeting of the day. The panic morphed a little as I plodded downstairs and beheld the fact that a Leprechaun had sprung the trap that my daughter had set for it the evening before, and instead of leaving a pot of gold, he had eaten the carrots, chicken, and most of the chocolate used for bait, he'd slept in the barbie bed, and put little green footprints all over the kitchen floor.

Between the late awakening and the chaos of the Leprechaun, St. Patrick's Day 2016 had gotten off to an inauspicious start.

Events, as they are wont to do, unfolded in a slightly more organized fashion and I was able to see a friend of mine from college who I have not seen in person since 2004 because he went out of his way to drop by my office on his way to another event. I pushed some paper through the process at work because that's what I get paid to do, and I hit the trail in the afternoon with a little bit of relatively comfortable jogging to test out the foot.

It was also a pretty good day to capture photos of the grand ol' lass of the Anacostia as the time of her departure draws closer.

Another Skyline with USS Barry

The USS Barry has become such a centerpiece for quite a bit of my photography during walks that I'm not sure how it will sit with me when she leaves in about six weeks.

Anacostia Afternoon with USS Barry

As I've probably mentioned before, she's been here in DC for about three decades now.

USS Barry and Vietnam era Swift Boat

These two pictures are the first time that I remember taking photos of Barry from the starboard side of the ship. I'm not sure why my habit to date has been to capture only the port side. It's an odd but enduring habit that I thankful to have broken today.

USS Barry and WNYD Saluting Battery

Just after I snapped the series of pictures for this panoramic view, a very large fish jumped right at my feet (I was on the water side of the pedestrian safety chain), and the sudden splash startled me enough to just about cause me to fall into the river. Thankfully, I managed to regain a modicum of composure, although my pride was pretty well shot at this point.

After completing what felt like an overly long commute, I wound up in Annapolis at just the right moment to capture the sun setting over College Creek. This just goes to show that if you let it, the universe will conspire to make you successful in spite of your best efforts to the contrary. Thanks to long lines of traffic, I arrived in the right place at just the right time to capture the following shots.

College Creek Sunset Panorama

This panoramic mashup created by Google Photos captures the scope of the vista pretty well, but the color has shifted enough that it doesn't quite capture the feel of the scene. I'm glad it was made for perspective because the sweep of the sky and the water just can't be adequately expressed in a single framed photo from this vantage point.

College Creek Sunset #2

This image is true to the colors of what greeted me on arrival in Annapolis after sitting in traffic for a little over an hour. The wait was worth it.

College Creek Sunset #3

A friend of mine remarked that this was "Amazing." I responded, "...and it happens every day." Some solar events are more flamboyant than others, but if you're lucky enough to experience one, they are all unique and pretty special...at least they are to me.

I've been very lucky over the last six months or so, and I'm looking for that good luck of good experience and a sliver of planning and action to pay dividends again tomorrow.

A Different Perspective

This evening there was no desire to cook to be found anywhere in the household, so I fell back on the old standby of take-out Chinese. We normally go to a place that isn't "knock your socks off" fantastic, but they deliver pretty good on a consistent basis.  It's just the kind of place that when you say to yourself, "Self, sauteed chicken breast and broiled asparagus doesn't seem like it's worth the trouble of dirtying the pans," that you'd pick for reliability and speed.

One of the things I like is that they "give" me a handful of fortune cookies with my family feast. The first fortune cookie that I opened suggested that, "You will gain a different perspective." Resisting the urge to append either "in bed" or "in jail" to the end of the fortune, I realized that I'd already experienced a different perspective of sorts on my way home from work.  As part of my practice, I'm trying to take a daily photo of the USS Barry at the Washington Navy Yard every day that I can until the ship departs the Anacostia River bound for the breakers scheduled for 07 May 2016.  I was running late, one of the reasons that cooking was off the table, and stopped my car in a parking lot and snapped some shots through a fence.

USS Barry - A Different Perspective

It's a good angle to capture the ship I think, and certainly a perspective that I've not paid a great deal of attention to in the past.

The second fortuned I unearthed suggested that, "You will come to possess bushels of gold." Given the realization of the first fortune, I'm even more excited to see just what will unfold tomorrow.

Surrounded by Good People

One of the things I really grateful for today is that I'm surrounded by good people working very hard at a difficult job at work. We manage to make quite a few things happen, and it's fulfilling to see a team gel and things that we've been pushing for quite awhile really start to mature.

It was a good day, and I'm looking forward to what the next one may hold.

Running on Empty

Rory Conlan likes to advise folks that they would be well served if they run on the top half of their tank of gas and the bottom half of their bladder. This is sound advice, and for some reason this week, I've been mostly heeding the second half of that wisdom and must have been largely ignoring the first of it.

I'm tired. No picture this evening, and my pedestrian contribution today has been less than stunning. Both my writing and walking have been sufficient to provide the barest of maintenance to the daily practice. Sometimes good enough just has to be good enough.

I'll be back up in the air again tomorrow, and I'm looking forward to whatever comes.

P.S. - Pretty sure I wasn't one of the three winners of yesterday's lottery jackpot.