Friday, July 17, 2009

Pruning the Sidebar and Miscellaneous Pictures

I'd say the time had come for my annual sidebar pruning, but I don't know that it's an annual event. I did find myself going a little bonkers, though, when clicking on links I had there to blogs whose owners apparently just stopped writing, so for my own sake I had to get rid of them. I had no secret formula such as the one Google uses to determine ranks of websites. I simply rolled through my head a number of factors before deleting the ones that didn't make the cut such as how much I liked the blog, how long it had been since it was updated, and if updates were few and far between but more or less regular in spite of their infrequency.

Further, to spare myself from constantly clicking on my own links in hopes of finding something new on the other end, I added the feature that notes below each link how long it's been since the blog was updated. I love this feature though switching to it was a tedious process of copying each one into the new format. Now the more productive writers will have their rightful places at the top of the blog roll, and the busies or lazies will drift to the bottom.


I took a bunch of pictures yesterday, intending to use them here, but then the plane pictures trumped them. I did ride today for a while, but didn't find anything photo worthy so here's what you missed yesterday...

I never noticed this curve on the BV before. Pretty. Don't you think?


I'd hoped to catch up with the short line's engine that was running along the lower track behind the house, but it was already past the most likely place where I might have intercepted it, here where a few Corona bottles on a poster made an amusing backdrop.


A run through the mall parking lots for want of anywhere better to roll brought me to Best Buy just as the Geek Squad guys showed up to load up their trucks. I pulled up to one of them and asked if he'd be so kind as to get a picture of me posed beside his truck. He obliged with a chuckle. Too bad I wasn't wearing my own Geek Squad tee shirt!

Photo by Shawn of the Geek Squad

I took this next picture mindful of my Art 101 class at college in which we had to do works with lines at the outset. I liked how the bleachers formed a blind effect with the BV behind them, but I'm not sure why I threw myself into the shot.


A picture of me posed in front of the iron sculpture that I visited quite often last summer when I wanted to talk on the phone while off the bike. I'm not sure why I haven't been there yet this summer until yesterday, but it's as pleasant a place as ever, conducive to thinking and simply enjoying being alive and well.


The day ended very nicely at my Uncle's annual (Yes, this one is annual.) Christmas in July party. I called my sister in the morning to ask if we needed to eat supper before heading there or if there would be food as there is for his real Christmas party (The one in December.) and she said, "It's just beer on the porch." Indeed, it was a veritable smorgasbord of classic and some newfangled beers on Uncle Slim Dog's front porch. I enjoyed a few cold varieties of Stegmaier and the company of family and some old and new friends.


Every kid should have been so lucky as to have had an uncle like this guy when he was growing up!


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