I went to Denver for my stepuncle’s stepdaughter’s wedding (my step-step-cousin, I suppose) a couple weekends ago and hauled my camera along with me. I also got to see my cousin Jeff for the first time in about six years, and there’s some pictures of his family in here as well (or at least the members of his family who weren’t off at college or work).

If you can’t see the images below the set’s also available here at Flickr.

Photographically, I focused mostly on the drive through Nevada this time, which is through an otherworldly beautiful part of the desert where there is literally nobody around for hundreds of miles. So spectacular and incredibly relaxing.

There’s also some good shots from my hike to Titus Lake with my dad. For two people whose combined age is 100 and who have two good legs between us, we did pretty damn well.

Photos are from my D50, but a bunch of fun ones from the iPhone mixed in. If the slideshow below doesn’t feel like cooperating, the set is here on Flickr.

Well, I’m now pretty damn glad I got the iPhone.

I’m leaving tomorrow to visit dad and Ray Ann in Idaho and of course, last night one of the speakers on my laptop decided it didn’t want to go on the trip.

A few seconds of popping, and then an unbelievably high pitched squealing that did not stop until I turned the computer off were all I needed to send me running to the Apple store.

I knew I was probably going to lose the computer for a few days for the repair, so I ran a backup and went to do one final sync of my iPhone…and the whole thing went nuts.

The phone didn’t sync right, I had to restore from a backup, the whole thing was just so annoying. Luckily after considerable fiddling I got it to work, but I was still re-syncing all my music when I got to the Apple store.

The speaker was pretty clearly a hardware issue, so they’re going to fix it. Of course, it’s a 5-7 day turnaround, so I just sucked it up and handed over my computer, asking them to run every diagnostic they has so if anything else was screwy, it’d at least get fixed now.

Godspeed, little computer.

So now I get to have another laptop-less vacation because of a hardware issue (my video card crapped out at Christmas, if you recall).

I think this one will be a little more survivable for 2 reasons – the iPhone is considerably easier to use as a standalone device than the crackberry was, and the fact that it’s Idaho instead of Connecticut also helps.

It’s biking and hiking and fishing and rafting, and not sitting and eating and sitting and eating. It’s the fact that I’m driving and can hop in my own car if my folks start to drive me nuts and just go out.

All that to say: I’m off to Vegas tomorrow morning, then up to Idaho on Wednesday. Hope you all have a good week, and I apologize if I’m slightly incommunicado.

Six years ago tomorrow, I was driving a rented Budget 15-foot truck across Illinois, Iowa, and Nebraska. My co-worker/building mate Jen, who was also moving to LA and whose stuff occupied half the truck, drove her brand new Mitsubishi convertible along with me.

We’d left Chicago at 6 in the morning to avoid the rush hour traffic, and we were making pretty good time. All those states being relatively flat, the truck could go about 75 or 80, and Jen could take her car out a couple miles at ridiculous speeds, then slow down and wait for me to catch up.

We had a set of little walkie talkies we could use to communicate with each other over a distance of about four miles, and we’d use them to try and time food, gas, and bathroom breaks.

We actually made it all the way across Nebraska. We’d started so early and the sun stayed up so late that even when we got to our “It would be great if we got to…” point of Sidney, Nebraska, we decided to go on to the next exit at Kimball, putting us spitting distance from Wyoming.

When we got to Kimball, I went to call my anal-retentive parents and let them know we’d arrived in one piece, and I couldn’t get my mom, who was in D.C., on the phone because the circuits were overloaded.

I can’t remember if we just happened to turn on the TV or if my dad told us about it when I called him in Atlanta, but that’s when we found out what was happening on most of the East Coast that day: A fucking gigantic blackout.

I don’t remember why I wasn’t listening to the radio – something in the back of my mind tells me I’d managed to hook some speakers up to a portable CD player, this being the dark ages before I had an iPod, but long after I’d given up finding any radio worth listening to on cross-country drives.

I did somehow manage to get a blog post up that night, maybe off the hotel’s computer, but it sheds little light on what the hell happened, and it raises the question of what election I’m talking about, because I have absolutely no idea.

It’s weird to me to see pictures of it now, because I was so wrapped up in the process of moving that I really don’t remember that story the way I do most big news stories. I was detached from the internet and the news, detached from the world in a way I rarely am anymore, and certainly wouldn’t be if I were making the same move today.

I was reminded of the date by a website that linked to someone’s tweet about their blog post about the blackout, and went down a minor internet rabbit hole remembering, and often learning, what happened that day.

Some pictures from my travels in New York City and Northern New Jersey, including the first time I’ve ever actually seen the Statue of Liberty in person as I rode the ferry to Sandy Hook. Flickr here, slideshow below (click “notes” for a fuller explanation on some of the items):

Special thanks to Lummis, who lent me a place to crash on Friday night, and to Lisa and Matt for getting married and giving me an excuse to get the fuck out of L.A.

I used to post notes when I went out of town that posting would be less frequent when I’m gone, but there’s just been so damn little going on lately that posting might actually increase.

Gone to a wedding. Back Sunday.

Special thanks must go out to Laz and his lovely wife Christin for haranguing me into getting the fuck out of Los Angeles for a couple of days, and letting me crash on the couch in their room at the Encore so my broke ass wouldn’t have to shell out for a hotel room.

I really had a good time, though I’ll admit my legs are a bit sore still from all the walking. We walked from Encore down to New York New York and the MGM Grand, which looks like a 2 mile walk on Google Maps, but GMaps doesn’t account for all the detours you take into and around casinos. Next time I go to Vegas, I’m going to bring a pedometer so I can figure out exactly how far I walk.

I also need to be a bit more careful about how much food I shove down my gullet at a buffet. We went to the excellent Spice Market buffet at Planet Hollywood, and I stuffed my face to such a ridiculous extent that my appetite is still off more than 30 hours later. That’s probably a sign I shouldn’t have eaten that much.

Once again, thanks to Laz and Christin, who had to put up with me doing this for a couple days. The results of all my photography are below in slideshow form or at my flickr.

Chaplin’s procedure went well this afternoon, so there’s a good possibility he won’t need any more surgery! And even if he does, it’s surgery that sounds a lot less severe and complication-ridden than the worst case scenario that they were discussing.

I can’t even describe what a weight this is off my mind, and how it lets me leave for Connecticut in relative confidence that he’ll do okay just hanging with the people at the animal hospital for a little while, so I can go focus on my aunt and the rest of my mom’s family.

I was being superstitious and not packing until I heard one way or another, so I’m afraid I have to cut this short and, you know, pack and otherwise prepare my house for the fact that I won’t be here for a bit.

Thanks so much to all of you who’ve been keeping my little guy in your thoughts, I really appreciate it.

I hope all of you have a very Merry Christmas and Happy Channukah, especially those of you who have also been going through a really, really trying time. I know I’m not the only one.

Joanna’s wedding was lovely. Very nice, very low-key, and a fun reception. I will say: I was impressed with the swiftness of the ceremony. I have been to at least five weddings of various friends and family where the vows alone were longer than the entire ceremony was here. An excellent strategy for preventing weeping brides (and grooms, and parents of the bride, etc).

Got to buy the father of the bride a shot of good scotch at the after-party. Got to drink enough beer to make me not want to drink another beer for at least another few weeks.

Got to see some folks I haven’t seen in a long time, several of whom are now significantly taller since the last time I saw them, they were twelve. Got to do a lot of catching up with D.C. folk I hadn’t seen in forever, since I haven’t actually, you know, been to my evil hometown in forever.

Joanna’s house is outstanding. She and Matt bought a run-down Victorian about 30 miles outside of Albany a couple years ago, and with the help of Matt’s contractor dad, did their very own Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. They showed us the before pictures when we visited Saturday, and it looks like a totally different house.

I still can’t get over how weird it is that she’s married and owns a house now. Joanna and I have been friends since the fifth grade, when we were both 10 years old. We have known each other for seventeen years. It’s so strange to realize people you grew up with are now…grown-ups.

Although I will admit, the fact that the newlyweds, the best man, myself, and Rachel (another friend from High School I roomed and split a rental car with for the weekend) spent Monday afternoon at a School Bus Demolition Derby probably did not help in my efforts to convince myself that we are all adults now.

It was, however, the completely fucking awesomest post-wedding activity I have ever encountered. Dude, a school bus got flipped on its side a minute into it! How can you NOT love such an event?

Particularly since the winner of the derby was a politician running for local office. I tried to find out what local office he was running for, but he has the same name as a (female) porn star, and she’s all that comes up when you Google his name.

All in all, a rather entertaining weekend, capped off by a trip through the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport, completely drowning in Republican-conventioneer-targeted advertising, and approximately the size of the state of Rhode Island. I wish those of you covering the Convention luck in figuring out where in the fuck your gate is when you’re trying to leave.

I’m off to Albany, New York for the first wedding of one of my high school friends, which is really, really weird. Actually, I’ve known Joanna since we were in 5th grade, which makes this whole endeavor even fucking weirder.

Her brother, who I still picture as the eleven year old he was when we graduated from high school, will be picking me up from the airport. This weekend is going to be hilarious.

Well, except for the five hour layover I have tomorrow between 5-10am in Detroit. That’s just going to be brutal. Thanks for changing the schedule on me like 8 times, Northwest!

* – Where the title comes from.