early november mixed up assortment
Here's an interesting story that nobody should fine offensive, but it is a little scary in a modern and futuristic way:
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And here's one for all who love baseball and have ever used chopsticks. It's not exactly, but sort of like swords to plowshares
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Two weeks ago my daughters were eating lunch in the Rockridge area of Oakland and came upon this on the sidewalk:
My dad, Carl T. Petersen, was living around there before he bought a house in 1954, and though no Kilroy, he had a thing for branding or carving in his CTP monogram on wooden tool handles, and etching it on metal ones, and he was a mechanical engineer and had ways to make stuff like that, so I'm declaring to the world that it's him, so--there. I hope they never tear it up, but if they do, I want the chunk. I KNOW it's him. He never struck me as a tagger, and I'd like to know whether he knew that spot was going to get paved, so he made the stamper thing, or whether he already had it. If he were still alive, he'd be 97, and I'd ask him what time of day or night he did it. I'm guessing it was after the work day, so it had 12 to 14 hours to harden. I will visit it and shoot it on film, and have it mounted and hang it up in my house. I can't wait!
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Will's dad sent him a fancy film camera from the recent years of yore. His dad used it in is architecture business, and now it's Will's, and he's delighted with it and shooting up a storm.
Superfriend and shipper-before-Jenny Vaughn came by and posed for Will, continuing his storm.
Earlier that day he'd climbed Mark's Hill in Briones, and the last guy to climb it, it gets to be their hill, so now it's Diffy's Hill. Vaughn goes by Diffy. He rode a small Gus Boots-Willsen, a blue one.
Will and his serious Fuji 6x8 film camera. He has it all down now. Hmm. I don't think he's ever peeped one word about the Giants, baseball, or sports at all, but he likes the hat. Have I shown the one below before?
This is what happens a lot with me and my pictures. You can still see that hat, tho. The thing is, we're all too used to looking at perfectly sharp images, and seeing something lousy like this is kind of relaxing. Nostalgic, in a "crummy photo" way. Easy on the eyes. I LOVE these failures! The exposure and composition are fine, and that's what counts most. Blur and grain, who cares? The best thing about film is that it doesn't cover up and compensate for you. Sometimes you WANT the certainty of digital, but not always, you know. A fouled up film photo can be better than the intended one.
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Here's a photo from about 5 years ago of Annna-then-19 at the beach in beachwear, and you can tell what she's doing if you at the reflection in her right lens.
She's reading The Return of the King.
Hasselblad with 100mm lens and probably FP4 (iso 125) film. If you know FP4 or even what that means, you don't need the explanation that it's an iso 125 film. It may be irritating to read that if you're not into it, but if you ARE then it's interesting to know what camera-lens-and-film were used.
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Here's an old S240 (bike camping photo) from about 2006, the windiest one of more than 100 I've been on. That's Sean in a flattened tent, wind still blowing, at about 3am. The tent was flapping about zero to six inches away from our heads the whole night, until we left it and tried to sleep on a footpath down the side of the hill.
Those are John's Irish staps guying the tent to bike.
Cosina Voigtlander Bessa L with probably HP5 film, definitely 25mm lens and a flash.
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My sister just gave me some bummer news. She (also) was super-jazzed about our dad's marking, and she investigated and found out there was a sidewalk maker guy named Carl T. Petersen, who made a bunch of sidewalks in the Berkeley-Oakland are between 1940 and 1960. Shoot. Dang. Crud! It's still fun, but yeah. Man.
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GETTING FANCY
Dan and I went riding a few days ago and I produced and directed and filmed this phone-video. Do videos work here? I'll try, maybe with Roman's help. It's a whalloping descent leading to ...Diffy's Hill.
It looks like he slows down fast, and he does, but the hill gets really steep there, and he's still made it about 15 farther up than I have. Only Mark and Vaughn/Diffy have ridden the whole thing--among my friends, at least.
Dan's riding a prototype Gus Boots-Willsen.
iPhone6S
All for now. I'm still bummed about my dad not being that guy. I'll take a photo of it and frame it and give it to my sister, though...anyway. One for me, too.
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The old SaddleSack medium that I have three of and use every day of my life...has been replaced, is in the process of being replaced, no, it really IS being replaced but we just don't have them yet.......with the Sackville Happisack:
It's the same size. It's now a single-strap closure with a wooden dowel, the way we're going to on some other bags. It's no better or worse, but it costs less to make and it's even faster. The back flap lost one set of D-rings, but there are still enough for any lash-on jobs. It no longer comes with a Kangaroo pouch (the snap-on poquet), but that allowed us to keep the price instead of jacking it up (our costs have increased).. and we'll offer the pouches separately, so you can have great fun with contrasting (or matching) bags and pouches.
I believe that this Happisack (named after The Who song) is as good a saddlebag as any in the universe. The refinements of the past 3 years have made a near perfect bag better. We will have them in stock by Dec 1.