Pouring My Art Out

The Bay Area Christmas adventure… part 2…

Posted on January 1, 2020 by pouringmyartout

a 1

More photos, in random order, of our Christmas in the Bay Area.

a 2

Two of my daughter’s best friends came and stayed with us at my mom’s house, between Christmas and the New Year.

a 3

We went out to dinner at a local pub with some of my friends from when I was younger than the girls are now. I hope they are still friends when they get to be my age.

a 4

You should keep a few friends that knew you before you even knew yourself.

a 5

That is my opinion.

a 6

So do stuff with your friends.

a 7

Keep that bridge open. Ha! See what I did there?

a 8

Okay, I promise that the next post in this series won’t be of the Golden Gate.

a 9

Or a Civil War fort under a bridge.

a 10

Or pictures of the city taken from the bridge.

a 11

But I do have a few of these left.

a 12

Look, the spot on my lens moved… what the heck?

Posted in My travels, Stories of my life | Tagged america, art, bay area, golden gate bridge, humor, Northern California, photography, san francisco, san francisco bay, san francisco bay area, travel | 12 Comments

New York City… day 3… part 15… a drunk blogger with a head full of crack squirrels and a camera, what could possibly go wrong?… part 2…

Posted on January 1, 2020 by pouringmyartout

a 1

Meeting my older daughter and her husband for fancy drinks in Manhattan. Everybody was feeling good.

a 2

I was feeling particularly good…

a 3

We was gettin’ our drink on!

a 4

I took some normal pictures.

a 5

The view was spectacular.

a 6

But then I noticed something…

a 7

It was the weird lights on the ceiling of the fancy bar, reflected in the windows.

a 8

I tried to focus on the view as the sun set.

a 9

I tried to be a normal human being.

a 10

But the lights and the reflections triggered the crack squirrels living in my head…

a 11

I started taking some of my ‘wiggly light’ photos… where I use the longer shutter time of low light to wiggle the camera to achieve weird effects.

a 12

And I was having fun… the squirrels were satisfied.

a 13

I was making art out of darkness and light.

a 14

Or maybe I was… you never know until you look at the photos.

a 15

a 16

But now my family was pretending that they didn’t know who this strange fellow was, who was wandering around the bar, wiggling his camera about.

a 17

Story of my life.

Posted in My travels, Pictures of me, Stories of my life | Tagged america, art, drinks, family, humor, lights, New York, photography, travel | 4 Comments

The Bay Area Christmas adventure… part 1…

Posted on December 31, 2019 by pouringmyartout

a 1

There I am. Can you tell where I am standing?

a 2

Right! Smack dab in the middle of the Golden Gate Bridge.

a 3

My daughter, Mollie, the one studying pre-med, looking at the bridge.

a 4

I just got back to San Diego, and finished unloading the car. Because I am still posting pictures of our adventure in New York, way back in October, and because, unusually for me, I am doing that one in order, I decided to do all the Bay Area posts and pictures in random non-ordered order.

a 5

A red tail hawk, taken with my telephoto lens, from the cliffs overlooking the bridge and the mouth of the bay.

a 6

I love that lens. It is like having a superpower.

a 7

This trip was a little weird. I didn’t go down to the dog park and take pictures of dogs, even though I missed my two dogs terribly. I didn’t take any flower pictures. I didn’t go up to the top of the Berkeley hills and take photos of the sun setting behind the Golden Gate.

a 8

But we did do a lot of fun stuff, and the Christmas was awesome.

a 9

Alcatraz, the famous old island prison.

a 10

A quintessential photo of San Francisco, from the bridge, on a foggy, drizzly day.

a 11

A cormorant, taken from the bridge with the big zoom lens.

a 12

And Fort Point, an actual Civil War fort nestled under the footing of the bridge. Okay, see you soon, for more Bay Area adventures… and New York adventures… and whatever else happens.

Posted in dogs and other animals, My travels, Pictures of me, Stories of my life | Tagged america, art, golden gate, golden gate bridge, hawks, humor, nature, photography, san francisco, san francisco bay area, the bay area, travel | Leave a comment

New York City… day 3… part 14… a drunk blogger with a head full of crack squirrels and a camera, what could possibly go wrong?… part 1…

Posted on December 30, 2019 by pouringmyartout

a 1

Oh yeah, let the consumption of adult beverages begin! As evening fell, my wife and I met our daughter Jessica and our son-in-law Jason at a fancy place called The Aviary. They had been working. We had been all over Manhattan.

a 2

There were many fancy, overpriced drinks served and enjoyed.

a 3

My main adult beverage involved fancy booze in a round bottle with a ship in it, and a candle.

a 4

You heard me. A glass boat, floating in a fancy drink inside a glass bottle… and a candle.

a 5

So this guy comes to the table and sprays some smoke-extract stuff inside a drinking bowl, and uses the candle to light the smoke stuff on fire.

a 6

Then, he pours my drink into the still smoking bowl filled with smoke-flavored smoke.

a 7

Then, I drank from the bowl.

a 8

And I swished the smoke-scented beverage around in my mouth.

a 9

I and the crack squirrels living in my cranium were pleased.

a 10

Oh, there were also some light snacks.

a 11

Yup.

a 12

Uh huh.

a 13

Well, guess what…

a 14

It turns out that fancy, overpriced adult beverages get you just as drunk as the cheap ones do. So, the rest of the pictures of the last day of our three-and-a-half-day New York adventure might be a little weird… even for me.

Posted in My travels, Pictures of me | Tagged america, art, booze, drinking, drunk, humor, New York, photography, travel | Leave a comment

We interrupt our series of posts about my adventures in New York to start randomly adding in posts about my Christmas adventures in the Bay Area, which is where I am now…

Posted on December 29, 2019 by pouringmyartout

a 1

See, there is the table at my mom’s house, set for Christmas dinner, just like I post about every year.

a 2

And that looks like…

a 3

Could it be???

a 4

Yup, it’s San Francisco!

a 5

And that is… well… hard to explain, but it is splashing water and a big Christmas tree, a photo I took after drunk bowling… so… uh… yeah…

a 6

There, on the old player piano, nestled among other weird art, is that orange vase I made for my mom back when I was taking glass blowing lessons.

a 7

And just like every year, the two tikis I carved for her get their Christmas crowns.

a 8

Hey, you don’t mess with tradition.

a 9

My older daughter, Jessica, and her husband, Jason, are the ones whom we visited in New York… which is good, because I am still going to finish the posts about that as I start doing the Christmas ones. And Mollie is still in college, studying pre-med.

a 10

Same table setting every year. Same food served. Only the candles change.

a 11

Flaming plum pudding, with the usual bad photo due to low lighting.

a 12

Jason, doing something that is way beyond my understanding.

a 13

And why the bad photo of Jess? The shadow on her chest is a good hint. It is the very first time I used one of my new Christmas presents. Here are some more hints…

a 14

That looks like me and Jason. What are we up to?

a 15

And why are we getting smaller?

a 16

And why haven’t I upgraded this blog so I can post videos? These and more questions will be answered soon… maybe…

Posted in My travels, Pictures of me, Stories of my life | Tagged art, christmas, family, food, humor, photography, san francisco, san francisco bay area, the bay area, travel | 2 Comments

New York City… day 3… part 13… why am I making that face… (or): a dick named Rump lives in New York…

Posted on December 28, 2019 by pouringmyartout

a 1 b

Why am I making that face?

a 1

Because after my wife and I left Central park to meet my daughter and her husband for fancy drinks, we passed this place.

a 2

Technically, the name Rump has a ‘T’ in it somewhere, but it still made me think of a huge ass.

a 1 a

So there you go.

a 3

It even looks a little like Sauron’s tower.

a 4

And passing through a mall to get to the fancy drink place, we saw the man himself! Hello, Mr. President.

a 5

I thought it would be more mushroom-shaped, but it does look like it has been polished by more than one porn star.

a 6

Okay, that isn’t really Donald Rump. My daughter told me about this statue, after she heard the story of my son-in-law and I at the Museum of Modern Art, and all those penis photos I took there… and posted here… and she said this one was actually famous. So many people were rubbing his junk that it got shiny. That guy to the left might actually be a security guard who is supposed to keep people from touching the junk. Watch out for that lady over there!

a 7

I am pretty sure that is the last photo of a penis that I will be sharing… from this trip…

a 8

Bye, Mr. Rump!

a 9

Now, off for some excitingly overpriced adult beverages at… a place whose name I do not remember…

a 10

But it was the kind of place that had a thing like that hanging from the ceiling.

a 11

And a thing like that by one of the revolving doors.

a 12

The kind of place that caters to the upper crust, who arrive by carriage.

a 13

The kind of place where rush hour has more horses than cars.

a 14

The kind of… hey, I petted that horse!

a 15

Okay, they might let a Bentley sneak in now and then.

Posted in My travels | Tagged america, art, cars, horses, humor, New York, penises, photography, travel | Leave a comment

Christmas is for the birds… part 2…

Posted on December 28, 2019 by pouringmyartout

a 1

I already explained why I am posting pictures of birds in part 1…

a 2

So just enjoy a few more of them…

a 3

a 4

a 6

a 5

a 7

Okay, just so you know…

a 8

The turkeys were not in my mom’s backyard, they were on the street out in front.

a 9

a 10

a 11

a 12

Okay, back to our regularly scheduled birds.

a 13

a 14

a 15

a 16

a 17

I actually know the names of all these birds now, thanks to my mom.

a 18

That one’s name is Joe. No, not really. I meant I know what kind of birds they are. But his name might be Joe. He looks like a Joe.

a 19

And that’s Jay. Ha! See what I did there?

Posted in dogs and other animals | Tagged art, birds, humor, nature, photography | Leave a comment

Christmas is for the birds… part 1…

Posted on December 28, 2019 by pouringmyartout

a 1

I am back at my mom’s house in the San Francisco Bay Area.

a 2

That means that we fill the bird feeder, and I sit in the yard with my camera with the zoom lens, and take pictures of the birds we lure in.

a 3

My mom loves birds, and I have come to love them too.

a 4

But my mom is 96, and her eyes aren’t what they used to be.

a 5

So I crop the photos down to just the birds, and show them to her on the laptop, and she tells me all about them.

a 6

Don’t worry, I have lots of Christmas pictures too.

a 7

And I am still not done with the New York adventure from last month.

a 8

And I am having more adventures as we speak. Well, not right this second, but…

a 9

But anyway.

a 10

Yeah, birds.

a 11

a 12

a 13

a 14

a 15

a 16

a 17

Posted in dogs and other animals | Tagged art, birds, humor, nature, photography, travel | 2 Comments

New York City… day 3… part 12… the last of Central Park… (or); okay, fine, this is just a travel blog now, dang it…

Posted on December 27, 2019 by pouringmyartout

a 1

I petted that horse. That was a nice horse.

a 2

I could have taken my wife for a carriage ride on the last full day of our 3-and-a-half-day adventure in New York, but we had a few more things to do.

a 3

The colors were truly amazing.

a 4

I loved Central Park.

a 5

I highly recommend it.

a 6

a 7

a 8

a 9

Well, that is it for Central Park, except for the pictures on my phone, which I will get to sometime.

a 10

We are now on the edge of the park. I did jump ahead to some of these photos, for the bird post a while back.

a 11

a 12

a 13

Like I said, we had some place to be.

a 14

We did hang around and listen to these guys for a while.

a 15

I wish I had upgraded this blog so I could post videos. so you could hear this band.

a 16

They were very active, but the music was awesome.

a 17

Okay, two more adventures and we will finish this day up. I am actually sitting in my mom’s house in the Bay Area, after the Christmas bustle, so I have more things to mix in with the end of the New York trip. I will try to make it as confusing as possible for you. Ha!