Yes, I’m still digging through previously unshared photos of note on my various portable devices.  Here are a few more:

 

This cloud dropped a column of rain, but technically you’d call that virga.

 

That actually isn’t the only cloud doing so.  I had to pull over and do a quick pano to get it all in.

 

We don’t do Halloween at our house.  We don’t have to; costume days are frequent without need for a holiday.  Bad guys beware!

 

The town of Fairmount, located in the southeastern corner of North Dakota, nearly had the top of its municipal water tower ripped off by one of the many wind storms that roared across the state this summer.  The only thing preventing this from ending up on the school grounds or somebody’s back yard was the ladder.  A replacement was fabricated by a company in Devils Lake and installed after a few weeks.

 

Getting ready for a climb.  While I didn’t get to go all the way to the top of the boom, I did get to hike up a ways.  I’m still kicking myself for not taking the one opportunity I’ve had in my lifetime to walk all the way to the top.  I was working, shooting stills and photos, and I wanted to get a compressed telephoto shot of the worker doing a regular inspection of the boom, and before I realized it he was halfway up and I was stuck at the bottom.  Someday…

 

TJ Maxx is making darn sure that rock gets watered.  Maybe it started out as a pebble?  Maybe it’s one of those spongy things that expands when it’s wet.  I don’t know.

 

That’s all I have for this blitzkrieg of mobile device photos (“cell phone” really doesn’t cut it these days), but I plan on going even further back in time.  I know there are plenty of gems that need to be shared.  Hopefully I’ll have some new photos from the “big cameras” to share in between.

The blitz continues as I look through the archived photos from my various iOS devices, phones, or whatever portable thingamajig doesn’t qualify as a professional camera.

I hadn’t seen this truck in a while, but it was parked at the Little Cottage one day as I went by.  The back says “This Truck Contains Obama’s Stimulus Package”.

 

I took my family to see the Medora Musical this summer.  It’s celebrating 50 years.  It’s a great show and a great experience, but I just can’t enjoy it the same since my friend “Gentleman Wade” Westin passed away unexpectedly.  He was a fantastic Musical host and a remarkable man.  For the longest time I couldn’t even bring myself to see the Musical.

 

Getting ready for the football show.  Plenty of junk food on hand, of course.

 

I’m training some future photographers in my family.  Alliteration unintentional.

 

This was certainly eye-catching.  It looked as if someone yanked the chassis right out from under this Suburban.  I absolutely had to take a closer look.

 

I’ve never looked into all that’s required to do this sort of suspension modification to a vehicle, but I’m guessing it takes a lot of ingenuity.

 

Yes, I still have more.  Stay tuned!

Here are a few more photos in my latest batch of cell phone / iPod / iPad collection. It’s cool to always have a device handy to snap shots of whatever catches my eye, even when my 20-pound camera bag is at home or in the truck.

I posted some photos of this with my big camera, but I also snapped some with my phone.  It’s a tree that grew through the gaps in a picnic table, and it happens to look like a butt sitting on the wood.

 

I found myself at the state capitol one day, and I always have to take this shot.  I had a fantastic sky to work with that day.

 

Memorial Hall at the capitol.  I made the mistake of referring to it as the Great Hall one day, since that was how I’d seen it in some SHSND literature, and I was sternly corrected by a veteran on the Facilities Management staff.  Rightfully so…now I get it right.

 

I’ve had media credentials for the legislature for the past five session or so.  Here’s a quick pano from the gallery of the state House of Representatives.

 

I took my kiddos to watch a local R/C airplane club enjoying a day of indoor flight.  This is a dogfight in which the planes pull tissue-paper streamers, and they slice through each other’s streamers as they wage combat.  Pretty slick.

 

I like gourmet sodas, and Mac’s Hardware is the place to go.  Runnings used to have a decent selection, but not the past few times I’ve gone through there.  Mac’s, on the other hand, has expanded their offerings.

 

Think I’m done?  Not hardly.

Sometimes even I don’t have a camera handy, and all I can do is make a quick grab with my cell phone. I don’t have an iPhone (yet) so the quality isn’t what I’m used to, but sometimes simply getting the shot at all is the best you can hope for. Here are some tidbits from a while back:

At the state EMS banquet last spring, a table of honor was set for those first responders who lost their lives – some in the act of protecting or assisting others.

When you’re a little boy, watching cars go under the skyway can be entertaining for a long, long time. Especially if you count the yellow ones.

A trip to the capitol over lunch brought a surprise discovery – a Lotus! I’ve driven one of these many times…on my Xbox.

Shootin’ the Eric Sevareid Symposium at the Belle Mehus. I made the DVD set of the keynote and other festivities from the week. Everyone apparently tried to ignore the fact that participant Dan Rather used forged documents to try to affect the outcome of a presidential election when he was CBS News’ anchor.

The Great Hall of the capitol. Soon there will be an enormous Christmas tree here.

Lowes was ready with plenty of Shop Vacs after the flood.

The Playstation 3 truck was in town, its driver apparently staying at the Kelly Inn.

It’s not every day you see a Blackhawk helicopter buzzing the lawn of the capitol mall. It’s even rarer to be standing beneath it!

Two down, one to go.

My little boys are absorbing their Daddy’s love of photography. Their toy cameras are starting to bore them; they more frequently ask to use one of my “big cameras.”

This is a picturesque section of the Badlands National Park near the entrance in Cactus Flats, South Dakota. Right after this a wind storm blew in that literally ripped campers and motorcycle trailers apart on the interstate as we drove toward Pierre! I have pics of those, too.

Eight bucks is just too darn much for a movie ticket, but if you’re going to spend eight bucks it had better be at the Grand Theaters. At least they built a facility that gives me the impression that they value my eight bucks. They make going to the movies an experience.

I ran top camera as well as ringside camera for the Mixed Martial Arts thing that came to town. It was quite a ride. Two heavyweight fighters rammed into the chain link wall of the Octagon so hard that it bowed out far enough to bonk my video camera! Thankfully the viewfinder didn’t give me a black eye…we’ll save those for the guys inside the ring.

North Dakota continues to have the best skies. Of course, I give all the credit to the God who created them for His pleasure (Revelation 4:11).

A couple of Christmases ago I was able to ride my motorcycles and document the occasion. It was a little icy in places but that’s no problem.

I built this little electonic “cricket” that chirped until it sensed light. I then deposited it at a friend’s house, who proceeded to check all his smoke detectors and stuff like that before finally discovering it. I score myself pretty highly on this one, but the victim is actually the guy who gave me the idea when he built one a long time ago to use on our coworker. Things came full circle for him, and now I’m the one watching my back!

Of course I’ve got to have a picture from the handgun range. I don’t spend nearly as much time here as I did when I was young and single, but I’m still quite handy with a pistol.

I did lots of photography for the event when Jason Britton (of “Superbikes” on the Speed Channel) came to town. He and his buddy Tony did lots of stunts during the July 4th Parade last year and I was along for the ride. This is after the parade, riding the Cycle Hutt float back to the shop with Jason. That’s Amos (of the 5-Oh variety) in the foreground.

I’m all for a funny license plate; I’ve had a few myself! Guess what? We’re all CO2 emitters. Climate change is a hoax. And some people are able to have a sense of humor about it. Good on ’em.

The Red Dragon. No, I’m not referring to the Thomas Harris novel. This particular dragonfly stood so still at the Game & Fish Headquarters OWLS lake that I was able to take pics with my camera and my phone.

That almost exhausts my noteworthy cellphone photos. Almost As luck would have it, interesting and quirky things present themselves to me on a daily basis (especially the mirror) and I try to capture them the best I can. More to come…