[bristol]party

a friends 40th birthday party lead us to a new part of the state last month.  slightly short of a two hour drive we discovered the area known as seal cove next to the town of south bristol.  it was a wonderful little day trip and allowed us to have another great weekend enjoying the summer with friends near water.

sunset [peaks]

i don't normally enjoy or take pictures of sunsets.  one reason is because everyone AND their dog takes sunset photos; they're horribly unoriginal.  another reason is because, i've rarely seen a picture of a sunset that does the actual scene justice.

all that being said; here is a sunset photo i took. 

i along with about 30 other people...and a couple dogs, took a picture in that moment and yes, it does a poor job representing what we all actually saw, but it still represents a great summer night with friends...and that is priceless.

snap[chat] out of it

being away from your home for a long time is a strange feeling.  going back home is a strange feeling as well.

for the first time in nine months, i traveled back to kansas to celebrate thanksgiving with my family.  the minute i was in town, it felt like nothing had changed and this whole [portland] thing had been a dream.  making the rounds to my favorite spots, i was recognized and greeted by friends and people who knew me.  a feeling i hadn't had in a while. from bars and restaurants to shops, i constantly ran into wonderful people who had been a part of my life for a long time.  after being in a desert of anonymity for the past nine month, i was flooded with the feeling of being recognized.

i can't lie, it was a wonderful and warm feeling i missed.

i cherished every minute spent with family and friends. a perspective you only get after months out of eyesight from them.

days later i returned [home] to maine and slowly got back into my routine here. i found myself  looking back through my snapchat memories and the whole wichita trip now felt like its own dream.

and that's a thought i'll hold on to.  i'm lucky enough to be between two dream worlds.

here are a few of my snapchat memories, in their wonderfully raw quality.

 leaving the northeast

 airplane sketches

 

arriving in the midwest

 

wichita airport

 

 friday night crew

 

 friday night standard order

 

 board games

 an ace player

 kansas running

 pho sure

one of my favs

the [cape] escape

being new to the area, there are many three hour road trips i could take and not have a clue what i would find.  last weekend my fiancee and i took one of those three hour trips to visit cape code.  we were attending a wedding of a friend but took time on either side of that event to explore the cape.  i could go on and on about how i'm still blown away with the amount of history there is here on the east coast and how looking out at the sea is still an incredible experience for me, but by now you all get it. so for this post i'll just hope the pictures speak for themselves.

side note, this was a trip were i purposely brought my dslr camera which has been absent in my life the past few years.  i absolutely love the instant social gratification the iphone gives you, but in a world filled with camera pics, the warmth and feeling of a better camera is priceless.

i'm curious if anyone else can tell the difference.

the [new] old fashioned way to travel

now, more than ever, i'm convinced smaller cities must embrace technology to compete in the tourist game.

that...and city pride.

memorial day weekend, my girlfriend and i, traveled to tulsa, oklahoma for a little trip. we started out finding a great deal online on a great downtown hotel; from there we left the weekend to chance...well chance...and social media...and iphone apps.

upon arriving in tulsa, lunch was chosen using yelp.  while at the restaurant, we decided to visit a local brewery i follow on twitter.  as we tried the many samples of amazing beer, we got back on yelp to locate a place for dinner that night, easily finding which restaurants included gluten free items.  minutes after checking into our hotel we added the hotel's wifi password onto our iphones.  we got our bags settled and changed for dinner.  not knowing exactly where we might need to park for dinner, we checked to see if uber was available; it was.  while on the elevator we set our location and a minute after reaching the lobby, our driver was there.  ironically during the uber ride, technology took a back seat as our driver told us other locations to try near our destination.

the rest of the weekend followed suit.  finding places to eat, drink and visit using facebook, twitter or yelp and uber-ing our way there.  however once at those places, conversations we had with bartenders, waiters and drivers led to other great places to visit around town.

it's easy to know where to go in larger cities. anyone could name off several places they'd visit in new york, la, chicago and paris, however i'm not sure the same could be said about cities like tulsa, lincoln or wichita. it's harder to know where to go, but thankfully technology changes that, but it's not everything.

tulsa was a fantastic weekend getaway, in large part because of the information we had available at our fingertips.  even with technology helping us find the little jewels of the city; the people encountered at those places let us know why those jewels shine and help make tulsa a great place to visit.

[neglected]flix

abandoned star-vue drive-in near anthony kansas

new york state of [marriage]

i attended a great wedding last weekend.

it deserves this title for several reasons. first of all i've known this couple for a long time. he is one of my best friends and over the years his wife has become one as well.  it was intimate. the couple decided on a very small guest list choosing to celebrate this wonderful occasion with those people who had a direct part of their relationship. next, it took place in new york, a city they've come to love, and a place that helped foster their love for each other. finally, the whole weekend perfectly and beautifully reflected the couple. it was personal, elegant, meaningful, minimal and incredibly well designed, placing the importance on the essential. just the way a relationship should be.

congratulations adam and angela, love you both.

[equinox] girls

for the past few years i've hyped up wichitahenge, a play off manhattanhenge.  which is the phenomenon where the setting sun perfectly aligns with the grid of manhattan, new york.  granted the streets of manhattan are skewed causing this to happen on a very specific date, so wichita's version isn't as unique, falling exactly on the equinox, but it's still really cool to see.  the last few years i've photographed this event and invited other people to do so as well. although after three years of hoping to see crowds of people downtown with cameras in hand, this year i heard regina george's voice in my head saying,

"stop trying to make "wichitahenge" happen, it's not going to happen."

although there aren't mobs of people trying to get the perfect witchtahenge shot, there are a few pics from other photographers out there.

here's one from my friend brad ruder:

another from leslley anne scotte i found online:

maybe in a few years it'll take off.  as for now, this yearly quest, is just a simple reminder, summer is over. it's time for fall.