eclecticism

197, originally uploaded by generalchaos.

No, mine aren’t ready yet (really, I’m about to get started on them, I promise), but here’s a nice group shot of the group in the truck by generalchaos.

Sometime between June 30th and July 1st, I thought this stuff was interesting. You might think so too!

• Obama to expand Bush’s faith based programs: I've got to admit, this is disappointing and worrying. On the one hand, I can't see myself voting for McCain or 'throwing away' my vote on a candidate who has no hope of winning. On the other hand, sometimes I really don't like what Obama's doing.
• Seattle Gothic Pageant Presents - GOTH PRIDE 08!: stillbourne's roundup of Goth Pride photos (so far). I really need to get to work on mine…
• Photos of last night’s heat lightning storm over Seattle: I missed it, so these photos are great to see. Most impressive (to me): the first two shots are two views of the same lightning strike, from different viewpoints. Really cool.
• World’s fastest man: Tyson Homosexual: Apparently, [rabidly anti-gay website OneNewsNow] have set a filter to change many instances of “gay” to “homosexual,” which is how Tyson Gay, who set a record in the 100-meter dash this weekend, changed his name.
• Eye on the Universe  (July-August 2008): [Harvard Magazine] asked a few [astronomers] to choose their favorite images, photographs that have been important to advancing humanity’s scientific understanding of the universe.

Sometime between June 27th and June 30th, I thought this stuff was interesting. You might think so too!

• Top 10 Strangest Anti-Terrorism Patents: Technology has always played a big role in fighting terrorism. Some inventions are truly useful and will undoubtedly save lives, whereas others are so bizarre that one wonders how in the world they got patented.
• The best God joke ever - and it’s mine!: Once I saw this guy on a bridge about to jump. I said, "Don't do it!" He said, "Nobody loves me." I said, "God loves you. Do you believe in God?" (Obviously, that's not the whole joke. Click through and keep reading.)
• Metafilter looks at ‘Christiane F’, or ‘Wir Kinder vom Bahnhof Zoo’: We watched the film in my high school German class, and though I've not seen it since then, I've never forgotten it. Probably a prime reason why my experiments with drugs never went as far as shooting up.
• Presbyterian assembly votes to drop gay clergy ban: The denomination's General Assembly voted 54 percent to 46 percent today to drop the requirement that would-be ministers, deacons and elders live in "fidelity within the covenant of marriage between and a man and a woman, or chastity in singleness."
• The Presurfer: Oops!: Some ladies wanted to thank George Brownridge. They soon realized their mistake and the next day this advertisement appeared.

Pride yesterday was a lot of fun. Every other year I’ve gone, I’ve shot from the sidelines, doing my best to get an overview of the entire parade and all the different groups. This year, I decided to try something different. A few weeks ago at the Mercury, dizzy88 recognized me from my Flickr account and suggested I ride along with the Goth Pride float and shoot for them this year. It sounded like a good plan to me, and definitely a different vantage point than I’d had before, so I decided to take that approach.

Prairie needed a day of rest, so she stayed home while I grabbed a bus downtown in the morning. Since the Goth Pride float was towards the end of the parade, I spent some time wandering up and down the staging area, grabbing shots of the various groups as they got ready to go. Once people near our group started moving, I hopped on board the truck, and rode the parade route from there, shooting the crowds to either side of the truck as we made our way along. Much fun, especially as the brakes on the truck were “either on or off,” so any acceleration or deceleration had a tendency to throw us all stumbling from one end of the truck bed to the other. No injuries, but a lot of laughs!

I’m a bit behind in my picture processing right now (I haven’t even gone through what I shot on Memorial Day yet), but I’m hoping to get to my shots later on this week sometime. In the meantime, midnytetragedy has posted her shots, and I’m sure other people will be posting theirs before too long.