Camera Happy

CRAP!! I did it again!! I have GOT to figure out what changed in this blogging program or on my computer that I can no longer move photos around! Grrrr!!!! Well, anyway. This shot comes after the museum shots, which you're about to see. I really liked the colors of the posters, the books, the brick, the paint, etc. at (again) Catalina Coffee. It's just such a great, authentic little coffeehouse. And yes, this time I did actually splurge and buy a coffee. A cappuccino, to be precise.


Tim had gotten a buy-one/get-one off Groupon to use anytime during the show's run, so we picked today, hoping that most Houstonians and out-of-town guests would be at all the NCAA festivities downtown. I wish that, like European museums do, I could have taken pictures of some of the works of art. I was very pleased to see that I knew quite a few of them and was excited to know that I was getting to see, in the flesh, very famous paintings by Monet, Cezanne, Rembrandt, Degas, etc. At one point early in the exhibit, Tim and I were both pointing at a particular painting, when a guard came scurrying up and told Tim quite firmly that he was not to get so close to the works. I said, "you're kidding!", cause we were only pointing, to which she replied that we were to point no closer than 12 inches! I again said you're kidding and she laughed and said it wasn't her rule. I asked her if they were scared that dust was going to leap off our fingers onto the paintings and she just stated it was museum policy. Ridiculous.


Tim is a bad wingman. After the museum, he let me walk into Catalina Coffee with my museum sticker still on my shirt. It says, "MFAH", though in this shot it's reversed cause I took it with my camera phone.

As part of the exhibit, they have plaques under some of the pieces that have a phone number and item number that you can enter to hear on your phone an explanation of that particular piece. Well.... if youre going to allow me to have my phone out, I can sneak a pic of Mr. Rembrandt without you really knowing about it as I pretend to be dialing the number to listen to the recording :-) My karma for sneaking a shot was it turning out blurry. Oh well. It's still fun.

After the museum it was off to Catalina, as seen in the first photograph. My cousin, Amy, did a documentary about cappuccino's a few years back and actually got invited to show it in Houston then. She's been posting on FB that she got invited to a film festival in Oakland, CA and that made me want to watch it again a few nights ago, and also made me want to have another cappuccino. So I did :-)

 
I was sitting at the bar looking out onto the street and liked all the grey in this shot with just the one bright orange spot of her purse.

 

This is really starting to tick me off. And as my friend Jim told me the other day, "that's a pretty shallow pool." But anyway, this was a nice shot of a young family having their afternoon coffee at one of the sidewalk tables. I liked the bright colors of both the mom's and little girl's clothing contrasted with the greyness of the day.

And this one just seemed.... wrong. What IS she wearing? Trying to be totally hip, urban, artsy - I don't know.

I drove by this particular bunch of Buttercups for the past several days and couldn't decide if I actually wanted to stop and get a shot. So many times flower shots just turn out boring. But this time I think it turned out particularly nice.


To the tune of either 3 or 5 million dollars, the grand City of Houston put in this new footbridge over Buffalo Bayou. It actually is a pretty cool design, as it forms a "Y", with the base on one street (Allen Parkway), then rises to the split with the left arm of the "Y" going over the bayou and landing just over the bayou, while the right arm continues over the bayou AND over Memorial Drive as well. So you can "land" on either side of Memorial Drive if you chose. It really is a good design, just don't care much for the aesthetics of the stainless steal railing over the top of the iron girding. Oh well. Like in most city decisions, they didn't consult me. It very recently opened after being under construction for what seemed like forever (6mo or so?).

At the base of the "Y", on the Allen Parkway side, sit these 7 statues. They are made up of all sorts of symbols and letters from numerous languages. I think they look quite creepy, like some sort of alient in some worship position. Im just glad they're all basically facing south and not east.

And finally, here's a very nice view of the Houston skyline from the footbridge as the right arm of it goes over Memorial Drive. That's the road I take every morning on my way to work. I'm very blessed to such a great view first thing in the morning. :-)