Misty and Liza

Originally uploaded by Geof F. Morris

Earlier, Misty tweeted: My birthday: day of disappointment and suffering for my family & friends. it sucks! And heck, that’s an understandable reaction to have, given what’s been tweeted in her world today.

I responded: I’m with [Amy]. I may be bitter, cynical, & frustrated, but you always listen and provide perspective. And are a lot of fun.

Misty is, undoubtedly, one of the better friends that I have. When she thinks that I’m wrong about something, she’s not in my face about it; she says it in a gentle, correcting way, trying to provide me some perspective. I value that, because we … do. not. think. alike. And that’s a great thing.

I am better off for knowing her. I can think of few ways to state the value of someone’s friendship than that.

Happy birthday, dear.

Parents-to-be

Originally uploaded by Geof F. Morris

I think that I always capture this look on Rick’s face in non-laughing photos. It amuses me greatly.

Misty had her nice Digital Rebel XTI [and the f1.4/50 I lust for], and I just had my iPhone, but I took a few photos of last night’s baby shower. This notice is primarily for my mother, but if I can’t blog for Mom, who can I blog for, people?

Too Darn Hot

Originally uploaded by Geof F. Morris

This is the temperature gauge on my WRX as I pulled into my driveway. It’s been 100F+ every day for a week, but this is the first time it’s been 104F after driving around for a bit and moving air across the thermometer.

I am so thankful that the air conditioner in my house is working. The system at work is unable to keep up with the thermal load being thrown at it: I start the day at 74F or so, and after noon, I’m above 80F. Suffice it to say that I come home sweaty every single day. Feh.

Now, it’s time to settle in and watch STS-118 go to orbit. My group at TBE built the carriers for Battery Charge/Discharge Unit and the Control Moment Gyroscope that are riding on the External Stowage Platform-3 at the rear of the Endeavour’s payload bay. [If I lapse into acronym speak: TBE built the BCDU and CMG FSE flying on ESP3 attached to the ICC. ]

Go, Endeavour, go! I need something good today after an otherwise craptacular one.

My aunt [okay, okay, my second cousin once removed] Donna sent along this photo on Sunday of my grandmother and one of my … hold on … third cousins, once removed. [I think.] It was too priceless not to share. Even though it wasn’t taken today, that smells “Happy Independence Day!” to me.

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Originally uploaded by Geof F. Morris

Look at me, being all arty. I sat there while little Emily cried, thinking, “How can I take a cool shot in here?” I finally decided to hop up on the windowsill and shoot past Ashley to Jonathan and Emily. Predictably, I played with the focus so that I could get some of each.

Anyhow, the full set of photos I took is available on Flickr. Go knock yourself out.

I hope Emily’s gotten some rest. She really hadn’t had much uninterrupted sleep since mid-afternoon, so by the time I got there around 1900, she was just inconsolable. Finally, Jon could get her settled down by walking back and forth in the room. Hopefully he’s not going to have to do a ton of that, but if he does, well, I don’t think he’ll have to pick up jogging again—he’s gonna get enough walking in!

So … yay. Congrats to the Creekmores. We’ve got us another sweet little girl to watch over in our local brood.

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Originally uploaded by Geof F. Morris.

It wasn’t the best-kept secret ever, but … Derek Webb recorded with Caedmon’s Call for their upcoming album.

Yep.

I took a bunch of photos when I was in the studio, and they’re available in a photoset on Flickr. But Derek and Andy, together? This is a beautiful sight to my eyes. It’s great to see this, for me. You may not feel the same way, and you know … that’s okay with me.

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Originally uploaded by misty.granade.

Any time your friend calls you and invites you to come take photos of his newborn daughter, you haul ass. Or at least you do if you’re me. I was feeling pretty crappy when I left work today, so I was dozing a little after five when Stephen called. I had my phone on my nightstand, as I’ve had it all week in anticipation of Liza’s arrival, but this time, it was on vibrate. It registered, though, and when I checked the voicemail, it was the message I wanted to hear—they were ready for visitors.

I’m just plain happy for them, y’all. This has been such a screwball year in my life [and the life of my family], but … this makes it feel a whole lot more right. And the great joy is that we’ll be doing much the same thing again in a couple of weeks with baby Emily and in a few more months with the Kings’ baby.

Welcome, Liza.

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Originally uploaded by Geof F. Morris.

Well, as I’m doing 24 Hours of Flickr, my mind is on photos, so I took some time to sort photos for the 19 Apr 2007 Derek Webb show down in Birmingham.

I love that the UCF House had some color-changing on their lighting system—it gave me reason to take more photos than I might normally take. I love how the blues and the greens came out in this set. Now if I’d only had a 105mm lens, I might have had some even better shots … ah well.

Because taking photos is, apparently, easier for me to do right now than write—and I originally wrote that as “write now than right”, so I’m not kidding, folks—I’m giving 24 Hours of Flickr some strong consideration. I’m already going to shoot a crapload of photos at the Eric Peters and Randall Goodgame show on Saturday night, and hey … I can take plenty of photos earlier in the day. And then heck, just fire up FlickrExport for iPhoto and cull the crappy shots later, right? Or maybe focus on taking fewer shots of higher quality? I find myself doing that more now that I’m more comfortable with my equipment. I mean, I’m just your average dink with the budget to buy a DSLR, but I sorta enjoy it.
Maybe it’ll snap me out of this creative funk I’m in.

Bootleg Cover Art

Originally uploaded by gfmorris.

Last [er, Friday] night, I drove up to Nashville to go see Sandra McCracken play a show at The Rutledge. It ended up being an interesting night: she and Drew Holcomb were the late show, so I had to go to the Mexican place next door to kill some time. [Let's not discuss how I got to the venue four hours before the show, shall we?]

I learned a lot of things, though:

1. Fiesta Mexicana, despite having a fully Hispanic staff, serves Tex-Mex and not authentic Mexican. [That, or they can't handle chile relleños well. Like my mother, I use chile relleños to judge a Mexican restaurant's value.] It’s reasonably priced, but it’s pretty meh.
2. Watching March Madness is a lot more fun when you only spent five minutes on your bracket and can’t remember that you had Illinois picked to upset Virginia Tech while you’re watching the Illini blow the upset. [Sorry, Mark.]
3. Those signs about how they tow cars in the vicinity of The Rutledge? They’re not shitting you, people. I watched them tow three cars in the 20 minutes I sat in my car after eating dinner.
4. When you load in for a pregnant singer/songwriter, she guestlists you.

Turns out that, as I sat in my car waiting for the early show to end, Sandra pulled in next to me to park. I waved, hopped out of my car, and offered to load in, knowing that she’s about six months along at this point. “I love this part of it!” she beamed. “I haven’t loaded in for about four months, other than maybe a guitar.”

I didn’t realize that this show would be with a full band—Kenny Meeks on electric, Mark Polack on bass, and Garett Buell on the drum kit—so it was doubly awesome. I got to catch up with GB on the Caedmon’s tracking, talk with Mark briefly, and share an awkward “we’ve never been introduced, but we’re still both too ‘guy’ to introduce ourselves” moment with Kenny to talk about hockey. To say nothing of how great it sounded. I was just above the sound board, so I bet my recording kicks ass. I’ll find out later today … for now, I think I ought to go to bed, as this is two nights in a row up this late, and I have to sing at both services today.

We Have a Winner, People

Originally uploaded by gfmorris.

I remember trying to capture this, hoping that I got it. When I saw it import in iPhoto early Friday morning, I jumped up and let out a small whoop.

Yeah, I’m a dork.

I’m still having a hard time fully grasping that I drove three-and-a-half hours round-trip for what amounted to be a forty-minute set. It honestly doesn’t faze me, though; it was good music, I got to see a bunch of people I don’t often get to see [including Caedmon's Call's Cliff Young, whom I never see outside of CC shows], I got a good recording [other than this cut that I induced that I'll self-flagellate over for another week or more], and a good bunch of photos that I liked.

It’s not like I was going to do anything cool on a Thursday night anyway.

All my photos from Thursday are available in a slideshow on Flickr.

Stephen Lamb

Originally uploaded by gfmorris.

I get by with a little help from my friends. Always have, always will.

Here’s Stephen Lamb, a guy I’ve started to get to know this year. He lives up in Nashville and works hard making and arranging music. He tells me some of the hours he works when things are busy and I feel like a slacker.

If you’ve heard some of my bootlegs, you know that I often get really great recording spots at shows. Stephen is one of the reasons why—he and his friends are ruthless at getting very good seats, and I think he has held on to my MicroTrack during recording about as much as I have.

Thanks, Stephen, for all your help. I couldn’t do it without you.

[Step on through to Flickr to see all my photos from the 10 Oct 2006 Square Peg show.]

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Originally uploaded by gfmorris.

Good gracious, I’m more than a bit behind the times in posting these photos. Only … three months late. [Let us not speak of the backlog of audio I've yet to post, either.]

Yesterday and today, I tackled about 700 photos in my set of photos from the 19 Sep 2006 Square Peg Alliance show in Nashville. This one is one of my favorites, and it allows me to tell a story:

Matthew Perryman Jones (left) was brought up to sing just one song, and he chose “All the King’s Horses”. At the time, I was very much into his Throwing Punches in the Dark, and … well, I started softly singing the harmony lines at my seat, a row back and off to the side. Apparently, I wasn’t singing nearly as soft as I thought, because as he started the second verse, Jones was totally thrown, asking “whoever’s singing this on stage, come up here and sing this with me”. Well, it wasn’t anyone, so after a few seconds, Andrew Osenga (right) hopped up to sing BGV’s with him.

After the show, I sheepishly went up to Matthew afterwards and admitted that I was the one singing. He then said, “Well, next time, just come on up there.” So I might.