You Know Where

Random pretty picture of You Know Where. This was taken from the High Point on Halloween.

Sunday Style! (Halloween Edition)

Thought I'd feature my friend JB this week, since she really dressed for the occasion when we went to Evergreen Cemetery to watch the Frankenstein production (HERE, if you're curious). She made that cool cape herself, isn't it awesome?

Halloween on N Tejon Street (Part 2)

Here are the rest of my images from N. Tejon Street a few days ago. As Count Floyd would say, "Ooooo scary scary!" Which house is your favorite?

Halloween on N Tejon Street (Part 1)

As promised, some of Tejon Street's lovely old Victorian mansions all duded up for Halloween! Some of the homeowners really go all out with the spookiness, and others just hint at it. More tomorrow.

Okay this one's not so spooky, I just thought it was funny that the squirrels have obviously been taste testing this pumpkin.

Red and Gold

Today I wandered up and down North Tejon Street in the Old North End with Frodo, our dog, for the express purpose of snapping photos of the Halloween decorations that this avenue is known for every year. Surprisingly, I found fewer than normal. It doesn't look like the residents of North Tejon are as in to Halloween this year as they usually are. That said, there were a few standouts and I'll share those pictures with you tomorrow and/or the next day. But first, this pretty moment as we were making our way back to the car. I love the light this time of year. I love this time of year, period.

A Performance of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein

For the last few years around Halloween, Evergreen Cemetery has presented live theater productions of classic horror works as a way to raise funds. Last year it was Dracula, and this year it was Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. After a hostess in period dress greeted us in the cemetery's historic Victorian chapel (above), "Percy Shelley" took the stage to chat about his wife Mary and their relationship. "Mary" then took over, describing her experience of writing Frankenstein. We were then ushered through the basement and onto a flatbed truck for a nighttime hayride through the cemetery, stopping periodically to be entertained by local thespians playing the parts of the characters in the book. (I didn't get many good pictures because we were seated behind a couple of stupid hipsters wearing big hats. Ha! You can see them in these photos.) I'd say that the actor who played Dr. Frankenstein did the best job, but the Frankenstein monster was also very entertaining. Just like last year, I had fun! I can't wait to see what they come up with next year.

Cripple Creek Spookiness and Other Stuff

Yesterday was kind of awful, to be honest, and I didn't have a chance to do a blog post, so hopefully this makes up for it. In our leaf peeping adventure last Friday, my friend JB and I drove through Cripple Creek in search of Sunnyside Cemetery. I had forgotten that it's in Victor, so we were in the wrong town, but only about four or five miles separate Cripple Creek from Victor -- no big deal. Anyway, before leaving Cripple Creek we stopped for a couple of snapshots. This house sure had the Halloween thing going on! What fun!

By the way, you may have heard that tiny Cripple Creek was in the national news today, but not for a good reason, unfortunately. There was an elevator accident in the historic Mollie Kathleen mine, resulting in one fatality and almost two dozen people being trapped 1,000 feet below the surface for several hours. You can read about it here.

The cute house next door.

The even cuter house next door to the cute house next door.

Happy Halloween!

I spent the evening of October 14th at Evergreen Cemetery with my friend JB, attending "Beyond the Grave: An Evening with Bram Stoker." This ensemble performance featured local actors playing the part of the man himself and the main characters from Dracula. The night started with "Bram" taking the stage in the cemetery's historic chapel, delivering a long soliloquy explaining his life story and how he came to write his famous tome. Afterward we were ushered into the basement, where we were greeted by a coffin, a small room with large stone balls lying on the floor (creepy!), and refreshments. Then we all boarded a flatbed for a hayride through the cemetery in the dark, where we stopped at several preordained stations among the graves to be entertained by thespians acting out scenes from Stoker's book. It was really fun! Although I wished that I had remembered to wear gloves. Next year I will.

Sunday Style!

Halloween style! This cute sales clerk, Kirsten, at the Walgreens drugstore near my house had her exotic cat game on point yesterday. She even drew leopard spots on her temple. Rawr!

Leftover Halloween shenanigans

I spotted this car in traffic yesterday afternoon. A dog napping peacefully in the rear window when there's obviously a corpse in the trunk? What kind of sickos are these people, anyway? ;^)

November 2016 Theme Day: Out of Focus

It's the first of the month, that means it's Theme Day for City Daily Photo bloggers! This month's theme is out of focus. Alas, the first of the month also means that my studio rent is due, so yesterday afternoon I stopped by my landlord's house to drop off a check on my way home. He lives on North Tejon Street in the Old North End. Many of the residents of these few blocks go all out for Halloween; along with Wood Avenue, North Tejon is pretty much Ground Zero for hordes upon hordes of trick or treaters that descend upon the neighborhood every October 31st. Which brings us to this picture of the fence around Doug's beautiful old house. Yes, it's in sharp focus, but what is that blurry red and black blob in the background? It's Carmen, his daughter, dressed as Minnie Mouse and waiting for all the little ghouls and goblins to come!

I hope you had a fun and memorable Halloween! For more Theme Day pictures from CDP bloggers all over the world, click HERE.

A sad addendum

Last Sunday, November 1st, was Theme Day for City Daily Photo bloggers. If you're a regular follower of this blog, you know that on the first of each month, all the CDP bloggers post pictures from their city of a common subject. November's theme was ephemeral, and I posted a number of photos of roadside memorials. The text of the post reflected on the ephemeral quality of life. To quote myself, "no matter how long someone lives, it almost always seems not long enough." I had pre-blogged the post days earlier, scheduling it to "go live" early Sunday morning, since I knew in advance that I'd be out of town. Little did I know that my musings would be posted in the aftermath of a mass shooting in my own city.

Saturday the 31st was another beautiful fall day. The gorgeous, unseasonably warm weather had held up for Halloween. For reasons we'll never understand, Noah Harpham got out of bed that fine morning, gathered up his guns, went outside, and killed anyone that he saw. His first victim was a guy who just happened to be cycling past, 35 year old Iraq war veteran Andrew Myers. The neighbors, who had called the police when they noticed Harpham pacing around armed, bore witness to a man begging for his life. He was gunned down on the spot. Then Harpham took off toward Platte Avenue, a block north. For those unfamiliar with the city: Platte Avenue is a major street with heavy traffic at any time of day. Harpham headed west on Platte, soon coming across two women who had the unfortunate luck of being on their front porch at that moment. He immediately murdered Jennifer Vasquez, 42, and Christina Baccus-Galella, 34. Both women were in recovery from drug or alcohol addiction. They were residents of the sober living home upon whose porch they were killed.

Harpham then made his way toward Wahsatch and Platte, a busy intersection with a Wendy's restaurant on the corner. It was there that the police caught up with him. A brief gunfight ensued, and Harpham was killed. (It bears mentioning that the Palmer High School gymnasium is "catty corner" from the Wendy's. If this had happened on a weekday, there would have been dozens of students about.)

None of these people deserved to die the way they did. Mr Myers had survived three tours in Iraq, only to be gunned down as he rode his bike in a quiet neighborhood in Colorado Springs. Ms. Vasquez and Ms. Baccus-Galella had both worked hard to conquer their addictions. They had hope for their respective futures. I'm outraged and I'm sad. This is the kind of incident that you read about in the news -- happening in some other city. Not your own city. I didn't blog about it until now because I was so angry. I had no stomach for making photographs of the crime scene. It took me until Thursday to will myself to do it. As I drove to Harpham's house, I kept an eye on my car's odometer. Exactly 1.8 miles from my front door to his. It was easy to locate, because a memorial to Mr. Myers was sitting right in front of it -- a sad addendum to my Theme Day post. The neighborhood is called Deaf and Blind, because the Colorado School for the Deaf and Blind sits in the middle of it. I shudder to think if Harpham had headed east instead of west. It could have been even more horrible. Too horrible to contemplate.

As I snapped pictures, a TV news reporter stood a few yards away, talking dramatically into a camera and gesturing toward the house. Meanwhile, cars drove slowly down this normally quiet street lined with 100 year old bungalows. Each driver paused before 230 North Prospect to stare. To see where the monster had lived, where he had claimed his first victim. One guy in a black Audi drove past, then went around the block and did it again. He stopped his car to ask me, "Is that the house?" I can only describe the expression on his face as sickened, dumbfounded. When I confirmed that he was correct, he said what we've all been thinking: that he had lived here all of his life, and he can't believe that something like this happened in our city. All I could do was nod in agreement.

The warm weather held until yesterday. Then the wind came. It's winter now.

Mr. Harpham lived upstairs in this unassuming old home. It looks like it might have originally been a mercantile of some sort.

A note on the gate addresses the police, giving them a phone number to call for access to Harpham's apartment.

Weekend in Vegas! (Part 3)

After the vow renewal ceremony at the Elvis Chapel (see yesterday's post), my clients, who were elaborately dressed in steampunk garb for Halloween, wanted to do some cool portraits around the many extravagant casinos on the Vegas strip. We did quite a few pictures at the luxurious Wynn and Encore. I've learned over time that it's fairly fruitless for me to try and take pictures for the blog when I'm working, because I'm so focused on the task at hand. But this time I remembered to get a few for you that weren't just test shots. Miracle!

At the top of this post, the entrance to the Wynn. Above, this giant hot air balloon greeted us as we entered. It was constructed entirely of live flowers.

Tulips by Jeff Koons sits right in front of the theater inside the Wynn. This sculpture is valued at $33.6 million.

I had a distraught moment when I saw these exquisitely chic shoes in a shop window at the Encore, and realized that they probably cost more than what I was being paid to fly to Vegas and shoot this wedding. ( *sob* )

Another shop window at the Encore. Some lucky child will get this charming giraffe to decorate their room I'm sure.

Weekend in Vegas! (Part 2)

Last Saturday I shot a renewal of vows at the Elvis Chapel in Las Vegas, Nevada. All but one of the images in this post were shot with my cell phone, because the Elvis Chapel doesn't allow photography with "real" cameras inside. I even had to shoot the ceremony with my cell phone -- that was a first! The photo above was taken from the limousine as we drove to the chapel (you can see the limo reflected in the windows). Here are a few more fun pictures from the day.

All of the employees at the Elvis Chapel were in costume for Halloween.

For your amusement, here's a picture of me with Elvis. I dressed as Wenda from the Where's Waldo? books.