friends « Kenny Smith | A remarkable thing happens …

friends

Some Auburn weekend notes

Back at it again, then:

Brian came down this weekend. He pronounced the scoreboard large:

That’s been the attraction this year. The football team has struggled and continues to do so. They got outpaced in the second half by Ole Miss on Saturday. Can’t move the chains, kicking a lot of field goals, struggling to stop talented teams. It doesn’t feel like 4-4, but that’s what the record says.

But that scoreboard! And the eagle flights, of course. Here’s Spirit’s flight from before the game. Note the alternating sections of orange and blue. Looked pretty good on TV, I’m sure.

I just threw that video online without slapping a URL or any other branding on it. How daring! We walked up just in time to get a good spot near her cage, obviously. And then you can see she went all over the stadium. Spirit resides at the Southeast Raptor Center. He has a beak problem that requires regular maintenance, so she’ll always live there and do cool shows and flights like this.

What is interesting to me, the second and third time I watched that video, is the camera work of the production staff. I shot that on my phone, so the lens is wide and has practically no focus. But they’re following her all over the stadium. (When I lose her, just look at the giant scoreboard.) They do a nice job of keeping her in the frame too.

Hey, this is a wild animal. She can, and has, gone all of the places except the ones you expect.

It is a cool thing to see. Scoreboard isn’t bad, either.

adventures / friends / photo / weekend — Comments Off
16
Aug 15

Catching up

We went to a wedding last night. A dear friend, a sister that should be. We’ve known each other for 12 years and she’s just about the sweetest, nicest, hardest working person you could ever hope to meet. I’d go on and on. She’d hate that. Anyway, Elisabeth and Chris said things in front of people and signed documents and now it is official.

They’re a sweet couple and they had a lovely wedding and a terrific reception.

Everyone just went on and on about it, as they do. And we all enjoyed meeting the people that helped shape the people we were there to celebrate. It was pretty much what these things should be. And delicious food. Also, there were rubber duckies:

Here’s the shirt from yesterday’s race. Awesome design, very yellow.

friends / memories / photo / Thursday — Comments Off
13
Aug 15

Folded re-discovery

I was looking for my other microphone, my Sennheiser classic, which meant I had to go through this box in that closet and then another box and so on.

What? You don’t have more than microphone at home? The Sennheiser records a better sound than my newer, cheaper microphones.

Anyway, just before I found it I ran across my origami collection in a box of desk supplies. Kelly made these for me years ago. (There’s no medium she can’t conquer, it seems.)

I had always intended to use them here, actually, but as an under construction place holder. I just never really built a site so intense as to make use of them in that way. So I put them in my homemade diffuser box that I’ve been tinkering with recently. It isn’t perfect, but it does help make a neat picture. These are with my phone, even:

adventures / friends / photo / Wednesday — Comments Off
21
Jul 15

I encourage you to sign up

I’m putting this link at the top and the bottom of the post for a reason.

A few weeks ago we were on our way to dinner when we heard the news. The darling little boy of some of our friends had been diagnosed with a rare form of leukemia. News like that takes it out of you. But, as we were being sat at the restaurant I walked to the restroom to wash my hands.

On my way I googled the disease and found out it is rare, but highly treatable and with great success rates. That made it better, but it didn’t make the road ahead of the kid any easier. (He’s doing pretty great as of this writing, by the way.)

So people started doing what people do in those circumstances, because people can be awesome about what they do. The day after we heard the news Facebook groups sprung up, fundraisers were organized and we — and plenty of other people — sent away for bone marrow registries.

The free package arrived this weekend and weekend and we’ve sent them back. I wanted to tell you how easy this was.

There are three stickers you have to fix to various envelopes and paperwork. This is the most challenging part, because the directions weren’t especially clear. Then you take two long Q-tips and swab one on the inside of your cheeks for 30 seconds each. Put that and the paper form in the provided return envelope and drop it in the mail, postage free. In a few days we’ll be on the Delete Blood Cancer DKMS registry.

In finding that link I learned that every three minutes there’s another blood cancer diagnosis and that six out of 10 patients will not receive a bone marrow transplant they need.

Friends, think about that. A cheek swab, the possibility that one day you take a little trip and have a minor procedure to help someone as precious to their family and friends as the little boy we know, is an easy thing to do.

I hope you’ll consider registering today.

adventures / friends / London / memories / photo / weekend — Comments Off
28
Jun 15

Just good enough for a national museum’s front porch

Here we all are, getting set to learn what it means to be British at the British Museum.

That’s not what you learn at the British Museum, actually, but we saw a lot of great artifacts. Here is a selection I shared on the site last month.

We were very pleased that Adam got to come and traipse around London with us for a weekend. Always nice to hear another accent you understand. We also got to see where seven-times or so removed ancestor immigrated from. Mostly we were just happy to see our friend.