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More photography news… June 16, 2006

Posted by Patrick in : Photography , add a comment

This snippet about the largest pinhole camera is pretty sweet. From Boing Boing via the Associated Press:

“This project is about being deep inside photography, in the sense that you can walk inside the camera. It’s the origins of photography and we’ve been living in it for weeks at a time,” said Doug McCulloh, a photography teacher at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art…

The photographers are using a nearly 31-by-111-foot piece of white fabric covered in 20 gallons of light-sensitive emulsion as the “negative.”

After exposing the fabric for up to 10 days, they will develop it in a huge tub made of pool siding, using 200 gallons of black-and-white developer solution and 600 gallons of fixer.

Pittsburgh pools open today

Posted by Patrick in : Sports, Pittsburgh , 3 comments

Pittsburgh outdoor fun turned up a notch today when the eighteen outdoor pools opened their waters for the summer. I never knew how much of a deal these pools are. I bought a pass this week for $30. It gives access to any of the eighteen pools during the summer and access to the Oliver Bath House (not like the Roman baths) through the other three seasons. Such a deal!

My new interest in swimming has come about because my roommate convinced me to train for the Pittsburgh Triathlon, which is on August 6th. It’s an olympic one, which means a 1.5 km (1 mi) swim, 40 km (25 mi) bike and a 10 km (6.2 mi) run. Swimming will be the most difficult for me. So, I want to get out to the pool at least three or four times a week before then. The actual swimming for the triathlon is in the Allegheny river, which should prove to be quite an experience.

Taking photos (again) June 14, 2006

Posted by Patrick in : Photography , add a comment

Photography always goes in spurts with me. One week, I’ll bring my camera when I pick up groceries. While next week I’ll forget photography altogether. This week has been a photo week - not so much taking photos, but finally posting them on my flickr account. Some of my recent sets are: super bowl, Karen’s going away party, Arizona/LA trip, and the C&O bike trip.

My namesake does not disappoint June 8, 2006

Posted by Patrick in : Music , 1 comment so far

Andrew Bird’s whistling shooed the rain away last night. It was the third time that I saw the man, and probably my favorite yet. He was less experimental than when I saw him last November, which I appreciated. A few friends and I walked over around 7:30. The weather was really great, which made the night quite relaxing. I brought my camera, but did not take any photos of the stage. So I probably won’t be posting anything. After the concert, we ate a few bites at Finnigan’s Wake on the North Shore. Fun evening.

Act IV: Hurry, buy part! My wounded knee! June 6, 2006

Posted by Patrick in : Travel, Friends, Cycling , 3 comments

Okay, sorry that was a little lame.

My legs felt like stilts. Hobbling around our hotel room in Meyersdale, PA, I was having serious misgivings about the 100 miles that lay in front of us. An acute pain started in my left knee and I had a feeling that six Ibuprofen would not cure this problem. I could still bend it, but it was painful. I hoped that it just needed some good old stretching.

Walt and I shoved off around 8 in the morning. We visited Sheetz to pick up a quick breakfast. He dared to eat the shmonster, while I went for two shmuffins. We were definitely on the trail by 8:30. The knee started to feel a little bit better as I started to move it. But every so often, it still felt like someone jabbed a #2 pencil right next to my kneecap. Needless to say, my attitude started off a little sour.

Since being off the C&O, and on the Great Allegheny Passage, there were a few noticable differences. For one, the path itself was a lot nicer. Chipped limestone instead of dirt/gravel. This made biking much easier and faster. And because of the towns, the stops in between were much closer together. Plus, there seemed to be a waterfall every half of mile or so.

We were making pretty good time. Our first major stop was the town of Ohiopyle, which was about 40 miles from where we stayed. We arrived a little after noon. The sun was warm, and the skies were clear. But, we knew a storm was approaching from the West.

While in Ohiopyle, we met a kind older couple in their late 50’s, early 60’s. They flew from Colorado to Pittsburgh, so that they could bike to DC. The guy had a huge GPS system mounted on his bike that told you everything you wanted to know about your current position. And one very helpful piece of info was its doppler radar. And it looked bad. You could see a map of where you were at, with a huge green blob of rain moving from the west. And we were heading right into it.

At this point, we sat 60 miles from home. And our hour+ of lounging and chatting at Ohiopyle was not moving us any closer. So we hit the trail again at 1:30. And there it was again. Sharp pains from my inner left thigh. It just needs to warm up, I tell myself.

About six miles from Ohiopyle, we hear what sounds like a rifle right behind Walt’s bike. Our heads turn to see Walt’s rear tire draped loosely around its wheel. Okay, minor setback. Remember, from day one. We packed a spare inner tube. This will only set us back 20 minutes, and we’ll be back on the road again.

So, we detached the tire and inner tube. Then, we took out the new one and placed it between the wheel and the tire and started to pump. Eager to leave, I started to get my stuff back in the saddle bags. At this point, I was munching on a handful of peanut M&M’s as I watched Walt retread his wheel. But now we learned that it was just not the tube.

The tube that Walt just inflated started to push away at the gouge in the actual tire. Bad news. We don’t have an extra tire. The nearest town was Ohiopyle, which was six miles away. Quick thinking told Walt to grab my bike and sprint towards it, buy a new tire and sprint back. I lay down on a bench close to our incident and attempted to nap.

Walt returned an hour later, a little winded, and a new tire slung around his shoulder. He wrapped the new tire over the inner tube and placed in on the wheel. He then inflated it, and found the source of the blown tube. The rear brake rubbed against the side of the tire, which finally ate through the rubber, which caused the hole, and the tube to pop. All this happened because the wheel was not true. And unless we wanted to spend all day fixing Walt’s wheel, we knew that we could not true it ourselves. So, Walt disengaged the rear brake and decided to suffer the wobbly wheel for the next fifteen miles until we hit the town of Connellsville, where hopefully we’d find a mechanic to fix it.

So, we were off again, with the wheel fiasco putting us back about 1½-2 hours. It was almost five o’clock and we were still about fifty miles from home with a semi-broken wheel. Not to mention, the knee screamed again from pain. Sometimes, every crank of my left leg caused me to utter some groan that Walt probably grew tired of hearing.

Around 5:00, we pulled into Connellsville. A bike shop was literally right along the trail. And it was open for one more hour. We peeked our heads in, and the owner agreed to fix the wheel right up. Praise God! He also pointed us to an italian place across the street so we could have both our lunch and dinner. We each bought a full hoagie and brought it back to his shop.

The married couple who owned this shop were very generous and helpful. Definitely visit it! They invited us behind the showroom to the shop, where we could sit down and enjoy our hoagies while they worked on Walt’s bike. We devoured these sandwiches as we tried to make conversation between bites with the lady of the shop. Walt’s bike was back within 10 minutes, with a tuned up rear wheel and brake. They even gave us a taste of her very own beanless chili. They swore that one of the restaurants around town stole the recipe and was using it as their own. And not only did they give us chili, but they equipped us with trash bags for the monsoon that was approaching. We cut out some neck and arm holes and made some excellent ponchos.

Around 6 o’clock, we waved bye to our friends at Bikes Unlimited and got back on the trail. 40+ miles to go. And then, the rain started. Walt, being the smart one, put on the poncho immeadately. I waited a bit to see if things would tide over. They didn’t. It started to pour on us. And the temperature started to drop. Not only because of the rain, but also because nighttme was approaching. At this point, it was probably in the low fifties. We put on our pants and tried to fight the headwind pushing from the northwest.

We must have looked ridiculous out there. We were definitely the only people on the trail. Probably, the only people outside, period. And we had these big garbage bags draped over us. My knee continued its frequent stabbing pains. We biked the next few hours with sometimes very low spirits. Walt seemed to maintain a hopeful outlook, which encouraged me. Sometimes, the rain mixed with the cold and the knee, just got to me. It caused us to stop more often, especially under shelters and bridges, to escape the constant barrage of rain.

Every so often, especially as we approached the next to last town of West Newton, memories and quotes from Eric Liddell and Chariots of Fire spurred me on at some points. Even after drafting me at one point, Walt asked, “Where did all the energy come from?” Because at this point, we were both wiped. This also reminded me of one of my favorite sermon series preached by Keller. It was on Christian hope. And he defined hope as our believed in future and ultimate reality. And that the way we live now is not determined (as we may think) by our present circumstances, but rather by what we believe our ultimate future (or reality) to be. This trail of thoughts would sometimes add the much needed fuel to my heart.

We arrived in West Newton around 8:00. Now, we were 30 miles from home. We beelined straight for the Quik Stop right by the trail. We both happily gulped down large hot chocalates. And after the owner taking pity on us, she gave the drinks to us free.

We left around 8:30. By this time, it was dark. So, we put on our headlamps and biked through the rainy dark night. At one point, unbeknownst to me, Walt was drafting behind me. And since our vision was quite limited because of the dark, I thought we were approaching a gate fairly quickly. So I called out “GATE” and slammed on the brakes. Suprising Walt, he quickly veered to the left and crashed into a pile of weeds. Now, we each have taken a spill.

There’s not a lot to say about the next few hours, other than that it was dark, rainy and cold. And for me, quite painful. My knee was very painful, and I could only envision the days of recuperating afterwards. We neared McKeesport around 11 o’clock. Walt’s buddy was supposed to pick us up around midnight. Maneuvering to the town proved to be a bit tricky. Some truck drivers smoking on the side of the road had to point us in the right direction.

Now, only a bridge stood in our way between us and our final destination of McKeesport. We put the blinking lights on the back of our bikes and fired up the legs for one quick sprint. I was now screaming out loud because of the oncoming pain. When we reached the town center around 11:30, I literally could not bike another mile. We collapsed near a GetGo. The friend we were meeting couldn’t bring our bikes back to the house, so we chained them up next to a bank hoping that it would ward off any potential thieves. Scott arrived just after midnight with a fresh dozen of Krispy Kreme donuts. It was heaven. I just remember the glory of sitting in the cushy rear seat of a Chevy Lumina pounding those sugar laden doughnuts with my head against the back of the seat. We finished.