SUNNY MORNING ON MY MOUNTAIN

I used to read a lot of Peanuts comic books borrowed from the public library.  For me, one of the memorable strips had the phrase "It's raining in my valley tonight."  Talk about having all the bad stuff happening at the same time.  Rain, low land, dark sky.  Perfect view of life if you are a pessimist.  Well,  for me this day the phrase is "It's a sunny morning on my mountain!"

My little strip of land in the backyard finally yields some fruits, or melons, to be exact.

There was no place for the viny melon to crawl so I guided it atop my shack.

A little melon grows between the fence and the shack.

I also threw a vine over the fence and a melon grew there.

For a while, I was having fun spelling out words and phrases using my Garmin GPS watch.  Then the strap broke.  I made do for a while and finally gave in and contacted Garmin about a replacement band.  They took it back and it just came back to me, looking almost new.  The next day, I took it out and spell "GARMIN", of course.

New strap, looks new to me.

Thank you, Garmin!  I tried to add the triangle above the N, which is part of the Garmin logo, but it didn't work.

Speaking of GPS arts, some time before I sent the watch back to Garmin, I made the words "Jack Rabbit Sports" for the triathlon chain of stores, or in particular, the one in Park Slope.  They let me have a poster-size version of the picture on their storefront window.  Nice!

I am still healthy enough to run 8+ kilometers most mornings.  Last but not least, I'm starting a new full-time job this week!

MEN WITH HATS

My Vietnamese name, LONG, sounds the same as another Vietnamese word, LÔNG, which means "body hair".  (In the North of Viet Nam, the two words may be pronounced differently, but in the South they are all the same.)  In English, the little mark above the O is called a circumflex.  In Vietnamese, it's thought of as a head gear or hat, or nón, so that a fun name for someone named LONG would be "Long Đội Nón", meaning "the LONG with the HAT", or LÔNG.

I don't consider myself a hat person, but in reviewing my photo collection I noticed that I do have some photos with head gears.  Different head gears serve different purposes.  In these photos, can you tell what occasions the "hats" were for?  

Hint: Battle of Brooklyn 10-Mile/Relay, presented by Jack Rabbit Sports.

The abbreviation does have something to do with Brooklyn.

The T-shirt design may be too much of a hint.

Hint: I think a girl in the background was carrying a plastic pumpkin.

In case anyone is looking forward to the free My Coke Rewards code, here it is:

TMW5XB6 599N075

It's from a Minute Maid bottle, which I believe at this time counts as double, so you are looking at 6 points, not the usual 3 points.

TORTOISE AND HARE 10K, BATTLE OF BROOKLYN 10M, BUSY WEEKEND!

This past weekend was a busy one for me.  Saturday was NYCRuns' debut Tortoise & Hare 10K in Van Cortlandt Park, first time the race management company did a cross-country (read: trail run) event.  For some people in the NYC metro area it must be difficult to travel all the way to the northernmost region of New York City, almost to the border between Yonker and the Bronx.  It didn't help that the 1 train didn't run all the way to its terminal as usual and was replaced by a shuttle bus.  Still, some 130+ people made it to the race, ran on the track, then the trail, then back to the track for one more loop, only slightly different from the first loop though.  Last time I ran Van Cortlandt, with the Holiday Marathons folks, I got lost somewhere and ended up running a shorter course.  This time I stayed at the Start/Finish line and got some photos every now and then.

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10151810389251335.1073741838.679001334&type=1&l=068a0e520c

The next day I was in Prospect Park for the Battle of Brooklyn 10M/Relay, presented by Jack Rabbit Sports.  In addition to a T-shirt and, in some case, tricorn hats, the volunteers were offered store credits with Jack Rabbits Sports.  Good way for the runners to support their destructive addiction, I think.  Just kidding!  I was at Water Station 1 and found some time to squeeze in a couple of photos.  The highlight of the event was when I was picking up discarded paper cups during a lull, a woman passed by and asked if I am Qaptain Qwerty and that she liked my pictures.  Since I haven't drawn that many cartoons lately, I suppose she meant the photos.  Or maybe the GPS arts.  Whatever the case, it was nice that my cyberspace name got matched to the meat-space person.

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10151811358731335.1073741839.679001334&type=1&l=0212231396

It was a busy weekend!  After supporting the two races back-to-back, I had the pleasure of playing tourist in Red Hook.  I was afraid that Fairway's parking lot would be too crowded but luckily I happened to see the overflow lot and found a spot.  I only visited Fairway for the deli and outdoor grill. We enjoyed our food under an overcast sky that did turn into a drizzle, even a light rain, but luckily nothing more.  In my last visit to the area, I thought the waterfront ended with Fairway, but this time I chanced upon an entrance to the waterfront beyond Fairway's overflow parking lot.  It didn't go too much further, but the view was still nice.  I wanted to visit that famous key lime pie place but didn't know where it was.  Luckily, as I purposely avoided getting back to Van Brunt Street, the main artery of Red Hook, just to wander a bit, I saw signs that led me right the place.  I have a sweet tooth but also love cold desserts.  I found Steve's Key Lime Pie delicious!  After the treat, we walked a bit in nearby Valentino Park and Pier.  Another gorgeous view of Statue of Liberty, even if she comes out small in photos!

Kayakers in Red Hook, Valentino Park's cove, with Statue of Liberty in the background.

I love public art! 

Corn on the Internet!

Key lime pie the authentic stuff from Steve's, yummy!

Lovely buildings, quaint beach...

The great day didn't end with the trip to Red Hook, as my son and I had our first bike trip together in Prospect Park.  We made only one loop of the park because it was getting dark, but it was great to spend some quality time together.

JACK RABBIT SPORTS ART NIGHT

I sometimes fancy myself an artist.  I have no formal training whatsoever, the closest I got to an art school was when I attended Cooper Union's Engineering school, across the street from the Foundation Building, which housed classes for Arts and Architecture students.  But I can draw pretty well and of late took an interest in modular origami.  Sure I've been making sonobes and giving them to friends etc but I can use more exposure.  When I learned about Jack Rabbit Sports' Art Night at Union Square, I immediately signed up.  There's no fee to enter and there's a prize of $50 gift certificate, plus wine, cheese, and crackers as refreshments.

It was an interesting experience, especially for someone totally new to the "gallery" scene, that is, displaying one's work for others to see.  I mistakenly thought that the artworks would be clustered around the back of the store, perhaps on several tables.  Instead, the different works were scattered in many locations throughout the store, which was a good thing as more than ten people brought in stuff to exhibit.  Some works were put on horizontal surfaces like tabletop or cabinet-top, while others were placed on easels.  There was even a video and it was displayed on a TV screen connected to a laptop.  Each exhibit was assigned a number then customers, friends of exhibitors, etc voted for the winner of the evening.  I happened to have arranged to meet a Freecycler at the store, to give away a LaCie external hard drive.  She voted for me so I at least had two votes, but it was not enough to win, heh heh.

One thing I learned from the exhibit was that you need to have contact info readily available.  A few artists had business cards placed near their work, should anyone want to contact them afterward it would be just a phone call or email message away.  On the days leading up to the event, I spent much time designing the images on the sonobes, but did not once think about having business cards to go with my exhibit.  At the end of the event, a neighbor exhibitor wanted to keep in touch with me, so I wrote my email address on a spare sonobe module for her.  That's it!  Next time I'll have my contact info pre-printed on a bunch of sonobe units, all kept inside a half-finished sonobe, which will look like a bowl.

I walked around a bit in the beginning and took the photos below.

I took this photo at an angle to show that it's a piece of wood with depth.  The picture was burnt onto the wood, no mistake to be made!  Note that the design around the picture was cut through the wood. Note also the business cards on the side.

My PPTC team mate loves bridges and painted a picture of her favorite bridge, the Brooklyn Bridge.

Illustrations by Eileen San Felipe.  I tried vector drawing and never got far.  Why, I didn't get too far with bit-mapped drawing on the computer either.  I still do pencil-and-paper, or of late, white-board and dry- or wet-erase markers.

My very own sonobes!  From right to left, the unfolded papers, 6-unit sonobe (cube, duh!), 12-unit piece, and 30-unit piece.  The larger pieces feature various photos and text related to running.  For brownie points, I also showed the Four Jacks, which shows the address and phone number of the four Jack Rabbit Sports stores in New York City.

See the complete collection of all the works exhibited at

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10151485803853713.1073741825.48482283712&type=1

courtesy of Lorena from Jack Rabbit.