Food photography is dangerous

Those of you who have followed my photographs for some time have surely noticed a recurring theme—that of food.

This past weekend I found myself in Old Town Alexandria, VA at the Chart House restaurant with good friends Ron and Pat Faquet. My hubby Shawn ordered the most amazing dessert I've ever seen (click photo for slight enlargement).

This was taken with the kit lens on my Canon Rebel XTi. The only thing I did in post was adjust the white balance in Lightroom. No sharpening, no additional color correction, no cropping.

Now I'm craving chocolate, and I hope you are too :)

A night with the Dodgers

After flying out of Dallas en route to LA in the midst of multiple killer tornadoes (seriously) I arrived in LA to speak at the Travel Writers Editorial Conference. I sat in on a panel about crowdsourcing and how iStockphoto is a crucial image resource for publications with declining budgets.

The only saving grace of the hotel I ended up in (and I won't name names) is that it was smack dab in the heart of the jewelry district. Whee! The downside is that means I was also nestled snuggly in the hood downtown. Needless to say I did not walk around at night, but one afternoon I had a ball at a huge jewelry store where there are a gazillion independent dealers and the point is to haggle prices until you get a great deal. Very fascinating and lots of fun.


It was a fun trip, albeig a bit whirlwind (2 days) and to my surprise, I was taken to a Dodgers baseball game! I'm not a huge baseball fan but I'm always up for an experience and thus I enjoyed the trip. We were treated to a VIP dinner complete with cocktails before the game and had a group of very nice seats on the terrace overlooking left field.

An afternoon off

After finishing work early, I decided to take a much needed break and retire to Kat's back yard in Fort Worth with my Rebel XTi and all her animals (click this picture to see the whole gallery). The acoutrements in this photo just made the afternoon that much more enjoyable.

I think I just needed to sit and *be* for a bit as I'm feeling a little weary from all the back to back travel recently, plus I miss my husband and my kitties. I'm also a little more homesick than I realized for my home state of Texas and the area I lived for so long now that I'm actually back here, and super bummed that I have to leave for LA tomorrow afternoon to speak at a conference of travel writers where I will know not a single other soul.

Arg.

My Lone Star Amazon Girls

I'm in the Dallas/Fort Worth area this week and am *loving* getting to spend some time with my great girlfriends, Kathryn and Missy. Kat is a graphic design teacher at UTA and was honored to drop in on her class and spread the iStockphoto faith.

This shot is of Kat, Missy, and I after we sauntered up to one of our favorite night spots, Ten, a martini bar near the Stockyards area of Fort Worth. It's a small little bar down the street from one of our longtime hangouts, Pop's Safari Cigars & Fine Wine. (Here's to the many fine cigars, mates, and sinfully delicious glasses of port that have come and gone at Pop's over the years between the three of us!). Kat and Missy are over 6 feet tall, we're an amusing threesome to see walking down the street.

At Ten, we imbibed some fine martinis and I basically sat on a couch across from everyone and snapped pictures half the night. Just click on the photo above to see the whole gallery.

Would you spend $25 a year to avoid waiting in line?

Of course you would, and so would I. Most recently, I donated $25 hard earned bucks to get my name onto The Great Gold Board in the Sky.

I'm speaking, of course, of the Hertz Gold Canopy board. This board entitles me to bypass the long line of other equally tired/hungry travelers and proceed happily to the car parked in the numbered spot listed next to my name without actually having to engage in conversation with other humans (sometimes I like this when I travel).

Seeing my name on the board was especially blissful because I joined the fracking' Hertz Gold #1 Super Duper Club last December and for some reason it's taken 7 or 8 Hertz Rental Situations to actually make the Gold Canopy bit happen. Who knows why, but it looks like it's all worked itself out now.

And yes, I really did look like the world's biggest goober for taking this picture :)

Apple testing labs visit!

Today we drove to Palo Alto and met up with Dave Martin and his beautiful girlfriend Peggy. After ogling Peggy's gorgeous backyard--complete with orange trees, herb garden, beautiful flowers, and a wine closet!--we headed off to the Apple testing lab where Dave works.

And *WOW*, we saw some incredibly cool products er I mean testing equipment (including the Chamber of Horrors) and I was lucky enough to touch er I mean take a few photos. Be sure to click either of the photos in this post to see the whole gallery! Hope you enjoy the pictures and all I can say is WOW ;)

After our tour we hopped over to Castro Street for lunch at Cascal, a delicious Tapas restaurant, had some drinks then headed to the outlet mall in Gilroy. A couple of Coach bag (and bagette) purchases later we drove over a beautiful mountain and visited Peggy's beach bungalow, then arrived at the Shadowbrook Restaurant in Capitola (by the Sea, they call it). We descended down many steps into one of the most beautiful bar areas I've ever seen. We had a fantastic dinner in the garden room and afterwards road a gondola back up the mountain to fetch the car.

Another perfect day in SFO, thanks to Dave & Peggy :)