September 2, 2024

Carolina Renaissance Festival

Hi de ho all. Well, tryin’ to get back on the horse a little bit, posting more frequently. Anywho, last year, before our scheduled house move in, Jourdan and Stefani invited us to come down to Durham the week of my birthday, and we would go to the Carolina Renaissance Festival. This was to be a rather tumultuous time in our schedule as we were literally planning to move from Fairfax to Williamsburg the week before. Unfortunately the house wasn’t quite ready yet (no occupancy permit, and as of this time no gas), so it was going to be a bit of a juggle. To add fun to the mix…

August 7, 2024

Luray Caverns

Well, firstly, Mea culpa. I’ve completely forgotten you over the past several months. My apologies. I honestly have no excuse whatsoever. Just a general lack of motivation. In times past, I would sit at the bar on Sunday morning (ish) and craft a blog message for my faithful followers, which I’m completely certain have all disappeared by now. Now that every day is weekend, it’s completely fallen off the map. Anyway, as the move in day approached last year, we started looking at things to do in the area, Northern Virginia, that might not be so easy once we were in South-Eastern Virginia. I pinged Meghan to see if’n she…

February 27, 2024

The Allegheny Special

Well, this has been a thorough goof up. Typically I try to present photos in the “relative” order that they were taken. For whatever reason, I’ve managed to completely hose that up. Let’s just say things are out of order and get on with our lives, shall we? My wonderful children went looking for something nice to do in celebration of my retirement last May. What they found was The Allegheny Special. I’m fond of old trains and scenery, and it seemed like a really good photo opportunity. So, the tickets were procured for the July 4th weekend as Jourdan and Stefani were planning on being in town. Let’s preface…

August 27, 2023

Apple Blossom Festival

Well, this is a bit awkward…. Completed missed this opportunity to yapp about a wonderful experience. H’mmm, “old-timers” disease perhaps? Well, we’ll leave that discussion for another day. As part of my retirement celebration, the kids and I decided to visit the Apple Blossom Festival in Winchester, VA. It’s kind of an odd thing, as this is held at the same time as the Wine Festival in Winchester. The difference is the Apple Blossom Festival is free to enter while the Wine Festival is a paid entry. It made for an interesting situation getting around in Winchester, and it definitely wasn’t an ideal situation. Hopefully the Winchester folks can see…

August 16, 2023

Fairfax Cemetery

A couple of weeks ago, I grabbed the Fuji X100f and headed out for a walk to the Fairfax Cemetery. I’ve walked through the cemetery a couple of times before, but this trip was solely for photographic purposes. It prolly wasn’t the ideal day for photography as it was very bright and sunny that day. I’m fond of dark, contrasty imagery, and that can be a challenge in the bright sunlight. Oh well. The cemetery is about a mile away on the other side of the Fairfax Courthouse. An interesting factoid about the Fairfax Courthouse is this is where the infamous Johnny Depp-Amber Heard trial was conducted. Don’t ask me…

August 6, 2023

Udvar-Hazy

One of the amazing benefits of living in the WMA (Washington Metropolitan Area) is the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center of the National Air and Space Museum. We’ve been to the center a couple of times, but it has been a number of years since our last visit. Jourdan and Stefani were in town for the 4th of July holiday, and seeing as it will be the last time that we will see them up here in the WMA, Jourdan and I decided to visit the center. It was a busy 3rd of July at the center as most folks had the day off in advance of Independence Day. There wasn’t…