Posts filed under 'Anything goes'
Hi all
I just thought I would let you know that today I went to PADSTOW with my Mum, DAD and little boys.
We got there and waited. When I arranged this meet up I said to my dad “I WILL MEET YOU IN THE FIRST CAR PARK AS YOU DROP INTO THE TOWN”. I got there early and got my boys into thier winter cloths, it was bitter today.
11:00 was the meeting time and we were ready and waiting. 11:05 phone rang “WHERE ARE YOU?” We were in the first carpark, but not the right one!!
Any way, we fianlly met up and had a great day. We visited Rock on the ferry ( my lads just wanted to go there) We had a pub lunch, that was really good and filling. We then wondered around in the town for a while before we headed home.
Padstow is a great place for a visit. Rick Stein has helped make the town in recent years. He has made a difference although the towns folk may not agree. The food is great. The town is clean and the sea smell great.
November 18th, 2006
Photos are a great way to share your travel experiences with family and friends. Here are a few suggestions to help you capture vacation memories you will treasure for years to come.
PLAN AHEAD
Make sure your digital camera is in good working order before you go, and keep it in a water- and shock-resistant case. Bring two sets of rechargeable batteries and don’t forget the charger and relevant cords. Make sure your camera has enough memory. Packing an extra memory card is wise, as there is nothing worse than running out of room for pictures halfway down the Grand Canyon. It may be tempting to lower the resolution so you can store more pictures, but you will regret this later as it may result in poorer quality prints, or you will be limited to smaller size prints. Set your camera at its highest quality JPEG setting and get more memory if you have to. You will appreciate this when you’re viewing and printing your photos after your trip.
TAKE LOTS AND LOTS OF PICTURES.
With a digital camera you can always erase the photos you don’t want. Take pictures of anything you find interesting and try to focus on some of the details such as an attractive doorway or a colorful market, not just panoramic scenes or major landmarks. Let your pictures tell a story by creating a visual diary of your trip. Include street scenes, interesting signs, people you see along the way. For variety take both vertical and horizontal pictures.
READY FOR YOUR CLOSE-UP?
When taking people shots, don’t make the mistake of standing too far away. You want to be able to recognize the people in your photos. Get close enough so you can see the expressions on your subjects faces. Zoom in on individuals or capture them from the waist up. Pictures are often more interesting when you can catch people at candid, un-posed moments. In posed photos, try to incorporate some of the background into your shot. Try snapping from interesting angles rather than simply head-on.
USE YOUR FLASH
When photographing in bright sunlight, setting your camera’s “fill” or “forced” flash is very helpful, particularly when photographing people. Brilliant sunlight often makes people’s faces look harsh, casting dark shadows under the eyes and accentuating wrinkles. The daytime fill-in flash will soften the lighting and make the images more flattering. Your family and friends in the photos will thank you!
EDIT AND ENHANCE YOUR FAVORITE SHOTS
When you get home you can edit, crop and enhance your favorites using photo editing software such as Foto Finish, Ulead or Photoshop Elements. Consider adding drama to your images by turning some of your color photos into black and white or sepia tones and then upload all your images to an online photo printing service like Ofoto or Shutterfly for fast and convenient prints. You can take your best snaps and use your photo editing software to create a photo calendar or make photo cards for personal notes, or to email your favorites to family and friends.
Most of all have fun with your camera!
About The Author
Valerie Goettsch publishes the digital photography website http://www.digitalphotos101.com featuring reviews of photo editing and album software and digital photo printing services.
November 5th, 2006
by: David Leonhardt
Ever since I began working for that Florida vacation rentals website, I have been plagued by recurring nightmares. I am haunted at night by the spirits of hotel rooms past.
There was a time when I traveled quite a bit on business. Thankfully, I don’t hotels hop any more. But at night I float off to a hotel room far away in time…
The day’s work done, I phoned home to check up on the kids. It seems there was a shouting match going on in my absence. It sounded like Pandemonium was winning, but Total Bedlam was making some noise, too.
“Can you just quiet down a bit,” I said into the phone.
“YOU shut up,” I heard the man in the next room growl.
I chose to ignore him. “Come on guys. Can’t you just stop fighting for a minute?”
“I’ll show you what fighting means” I heard through the wall.
“Geeze. I can’t even here myself think,” I complained into the phone.
“Hey! I’ve had just about enough of you,” the guy on the other side of the wall screamed.
Suddenly I got very scared. I pictured a burly, six-foot-two weightlifter smashing his fist through the wall. I hung up the phone, wondering how thin the walls were.
Nothing happened. No fist. No smashed wall. No burly, six-foot-two weightlifter.
I decided to go downstairs for a stress-relief stroll. As I was closing my door, the man from the next room emerged.
Fortunately, he was no weightlifter.
I was about to ask him why he had shouted at me through the wall while I was trying to discipline my kids, when he called to me, “Hey you. I was on the phone with my wife. Why did you have to heckle me?”
All of a sudden, I knew how thin the walls were.
In fact, I discovered that hotel walls come in two thicknesses:
If you’re lucky, you get “Turn down the volume on your TV!” walls. If you are less fortunate, you get “Turn down the brightness on your TV!” walls.
Fortunately, hotel rooms are immaculately clean. It’s true. The sign says so. Just as long as you don’t look under the mattress to find a 1976 copy of Businessweek Magazine and theatre tickets to a 1982 showing of The Music Man.
I don’t know why hotels pretend to be so spotless. All that junk under the bed could be used as a marketing tool. “Stay at the Hilltop Hilton and join in our under-mattress-scavenger-hunt.”
If the hotels don’t catch on, sooner or later the motels will. They can turn anything into a sales pitch. Like, for example, “Color TV” (Ooooooohh.). And “Outdoor Pool” (I think the “outdoor” feature is a nice added touch, don’t you?) And how about “Free Parking” (which is really a way of saying, “You don’t have to park your car in your room.”).
What worries me most about hotels is what they keep in the drawers. Did you ever notice there is always a bible in the drawer? Why?
When you buy a car, there is no bible in the glove compartment, although the road is where you need prayers the most.
When you dig for the prize at the bottom of the Cracker Jack box, it’s never a bible.
Even in hospitals, where a prayer might be all you have left, there is no bible in the drawer.
Only in hotels and on death row do bibles come as standard equipment.
And why just the Bible? I have had plenty of spare time to search for Torahs and Korans in hotel rooms, and I have never found any. Do Jews and Muslims not stay in hotels? What do they know that I don’t?
Fortunately, I don’t have to stay in hotels anymore. I don’t have to endure shadow-puppet shows from the guy on the other side of the wall. I don’t have to keep from reading over his shoulder. I don’t have worry about what he ate for dinner.
And I don’t have to listen to his snoring. I can enjoy my own nightmares in peace.
November 5th, 2006