Showing posts with label geography. Show all posts
Showing posts with label geography. Show all posts
3/26/17
11/2/12
8/31/12
Legacy Of Santayana
Oft repeated aphorism a reality not a cliche...
Bookshelf lined with leafs of tomes
recounting history, an interpretation.
Geography of the past.
Guideposts of what occurred
foretelling future, prediction of destiny.
Roadmaps for the present.
When read with eyes wide open and aware,
mindful there are no new stories, simply
directional variations on ancient themes.
Blueprints for the here and now.
Bookshelf lined with leafs of tomes
recounting history, an interpretation.
Geography of the past.
Guideposts of what occurred
foretelling future, prediction of destiny.
Roadmaps for the present.
When read with eyes wide open and aware,
mindful there are no new stories, simply
directional variations on ancient themes.
Blueprints for the here and now.
3/16/12
Sitting and Resting My Booted Feet
In quilted emerald fields of desert clover...
I've been trampling long over high desert terrain
A range covering dry sand and silt alternating gravel and rocks,
Sockets of arid thistle, punctuated with prickly pears and creosote.
Trudging, mostly looking at the ground to avoid the sun,
In a slow ocular dawning my eye corner notices a damp wash.
A centerline trickle of water causes my head to tilt and squint in the sun.
Ah ha! The wash widens ascending down with alluvial fan's beaded streams,
Pouring from mesa lined with deep tap rooted bushes and in between
A rich overlay of desert clover to rest my feet while sitting on a boulder.
Enveloping my boots it tantalizes my feet before being soaked in cool water.
I've been trampling long over high desert terrain
A range covering dry sand and silt alternating gravel and rocks,
Sockets of arid thistle, punctuated with prickly pears and creosote.
Trudging, mostly looking at the ground to avoid the sun,
In a slow ocular dawning my eye corner notices a damp wash.
A centerline trickle of water causes my head to tilt and squint in the sun.
Ah ha! The wash widens ascending down with alluvial fan's beaded streams,
Pouring from mesa lined with deep tap rooted bushes and in between
A rich overlay of desert clover to rest my feet while sitting on a boulder.
Enveloping my boots it tantalizes my feet before being soaked in cool water.
10/23/11
Get Your Kicks
On Route 66...
Road Trip!
Leaving for the week on a road trip to Northern Arizona to shoot photography and video as well as do some historical and geographical research. Taking state highways to Paulden, the back road from Drake to Flagstaff. Then west to Williams on I-40 through to Ash Fork and at Seligman picking up Route 66 to Kingman. Return trip on the infamous "Highway of Death" US 93 back to Phoenix. See you later!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dCYApJtsyd0
Road Trip!
Leaving for the week on a road trip to Northern Arizona to shoot photography and video as well as do some historical and geographical research. Taking state highways to Paulden, the back road from Drake to Flagstaff. Then west to Williams on I-40 through to Ash Fork and at Seligman picking up Route 66 to Kingman. Return trip on the infamous "Highway of Death" US 93 back to Phoenix. See you later!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dCYApJtsyd0
9/23/11
9/22/11
Purple Sage
Riders of the Range...
Out West in America means Big Sky and Wide Open Spaces.
This is true from the northern reaches of Montana to the southern ends of Arizona and New Mexico and relates to perception. Many of us see the vista as an expansive range of opportunities whereas some people feel small and engulfed. How someone perceives the landscape is an indication of individual perspective as well as point of view and to me provides an insight into the essential nature of someone's soul. Do they sense fearlessness or fearsome, awed or overwhelmed? How they ride through the range and react to it hints at their comfort with themselves, the geography they're surrounded by and ultimately their interaction with people and perception of reality in the world.
In this photograph in the highlands of southwestern New Mexico I am experimenting with impression through grain and color. In the foreground is purple sage muted rather than bright and the grasslands are a sandy color rather than a richer green amber hue due to the dry conditions at end of hot summer. Distant mountain ranges are characteristically pewter beryl dividing the picture by the toned down big blue sky with white clouds caused by a light storm of rain mixed with dust that had passed through a few hours prior.
Out West in America means Big Sky and Wide Open Spaces.
This is true from the northern reaches of Montana to the southern ends of Arizona and New Mexico and relates to perception. Many of us see the vista as an expansive range of opportunities whereas some people feel small and engulfed. How someone perceives the landscape is an indication of individual perspective as well as point of view and to me provides an insight into the essential nature of someone's soul. Do they sense fearlessness or fearsome, awed or overwhelmed? How they ride through the range and react to it hints at their comfort with themselves, the geography they're surrounded by and ultimately their interaction with people and perception of reality in the world.
In this photograph in the highlands of southwestern New Mexico I am experimenting with impression through grain and color. In the foreground is purple sage muted rather than bright and the grasslands are a sandy color rather than a richer green amber hue due to the dry conditions at end of hot summer. Distant mountain ranges are characteristically pewter beryl dividing the picture by the toned down big blue sky with white clouds caused by a light storm of rain mixed with dust that had passed through a few hours prior.
4/26/11
If You're Looking for a Road Map
In the New Economy you won't find one...
Use your inner compass; be your cartographer.
There has never been a better period in my lifetime for an individual to be able to have a chance to cut a swath for their own path. There was a moment in time in my young life, the late sixties and early seventies, when opportunity to become my own person, create my own road, direct my life in any direction any way I wanted to. Most of that had to do with my youth and part of it was the times. Fortunately I was free to make decisions that were appropriate for me but some previous options available to me vaporized a decade later due to the juncture of history we were in. The eighties were a period that recalled an earlier era, since the turbulence of the two previous decades had unsettled so much without satisfactory resolution, that most people wanted a return to "stability." Stability meant going back to values that were not bad and were likely necessary at that interval. Technology had not reached a point where it could change or improve our lives or the world.
The nineties became a transitional era when technology, especially communications, the internet, medical and other sciences became highly developed and rapidly advanced as well as methods of doing business began to change. It was a time of duality of good and bad to be followed by a decade when much of what had occurred was assimilated, digested and culminated in an economic disruption that was inevitable. We were moving unaware from the Old Economy to a New Economy which inescapably impacted the social and geopolitical elements of daily living. Consumerism and the accompanying debt load that came with it, the old conservative structure cracked and the hankering for a new form of politics that we have discovered does not lie in the opposing progressive liberalism. In the US we voted for a President who had the image of change but not the substance of it. Far from it, what looked like what we were hoping for did not actually hold the values we desired. It was a valuable lesson for not only the United States but for the world.
For those of us forced out of our former careers and way of life, we need to go beyond what we used to be and get on with what we are becoming and going to be.
Now, more than ever is the time to have that second chance, another shot at a "do over" at life. Where there is adversity, difficult times and a seeming downfall from former success there is opportunity. We are never likely to see such a significant change in the economy, political world and society as there is now as long as we are not blind to it. Especially for those of us in our mid-forties and fifties, we are old enough to know a lot more than we did and not too old to recover and recoup what we may have lost. More importantly we have the chance to recreate our lives more like the image we envisioned when we were younger, before life took us in directions that we didn't think about and opportunities we didn't have. The former trails are still there, well worn and found just as easily as a long driven US Highway long ago replaced by an Interstate, themselves showing the wear and tear of age and also not travelling at the high speed of broadband internet. The time is now for us to rethink what we want to be for the remainder of our lives, choosing wisely and creatively the New Economy road we want to build to reinvent ourselves and lead us in new and more satisfying directions, since the existing highways and byways belong to Old Economy of yesteryear.
Use your inner compass; be your cartographer.
There has never been a better period in my lifetime for an individual to be able to have a chance to cut a swath for their own path. There was a moment in time in my young life, the late sixties and early seventies, when opportunity to become my own person, create my own road, direct my life in any direction any way I wanted to. Most of that had to do with my youth and part of it was the times. Fortunately I was free to make decisions that were appropriate for me but some previous options available to me vaporized a decade later due to the juncture of history we were in. The eighties were a period that recalled an earlier era, since the turbulence of the two previous decades had unsettled so much without satisfactory resolution, that most people wanted a return to "stability." Stability meant going back to values that were not bad and were likely necessary at that interval. Technology had not reached a point where it could change or improve our lives or the world.
The nineties became a transitional era when technology, especially communications, the internet, medical and other sciences became highly developed and rapidly advanced as well as methods of doing business began to change. It was a time of duality of good and bad to be followed by a decade when much of what had occurred was assimilated, digested and culminated in an economic disruption that was inevitable. We were moving unaware from the Old Economy to a New Economy which inescapably impacted the social and geopolitical elements of daily living. Consumerism and the accompanying debt load that came with it, the old conservative structure cracked and the hankering for a new form of politics that we have discovered does not lie in the opposing progressive liberalism. In the US we voted for a President who had the image of change but not the substance of it. Far from it, what looked like what we were hoping for did not actually hold the values we desired. It was a valuable lesson for not only the United States but for the world.
For those of us forced out of our former careers and way of life, we need to go beyond what we used to be and get on with what we are becoming and going to be.
Now, more than ever is the time to have that second chance, another shot at a "do over" at life. Where there is adversity, difficult times and a seeming downfall from former success there is opportunity. We are never likely to see such a significant change in the economy, political world and society as there is now as long as we are not blind to it. Especially for those of us in our mid-forties and fifties, we are old enough to know a lot more than we did and not too old to recover and recoup what we may have lost. More importantly we have the chance to recreate our lives more like the image we envisioned when we were younger, before life took us in directions that we didn't think about and opportunities we didn't have. The former trails are still there, well worn and found just as easily as a long driven US Highway long ago replaced by an Interstate, themselves showing the wear and tear of age and also not travelling at the high speed of broadband internet. The time is now for us to rethink what we want to be for the remainder of our lives, choosing wisely and creatively the New Economy road we want to build to reinvent ourselves and lead us in new and more satisfying directions, since the existing highways and byways belong to Old Economy of yesteryear.
12/30/10
Economic, Social and Geopolitical
Mortgage Foreclosure Tsunami...
Delayed and forestalled Double Dip will occur in 2011
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ze9MyGB2tBc
Reference:
"Home Prices Are Still Too High" by Peter D. Schiff WSJ (subscription required) http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304173704575578190261574342.html
"Dr. Doom Predicts Another $1 Trillion In Housing Losses" [Nouriel Roubini] NYT
http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2010/12/06/dr-doom-predicts-another-1-trillion-in-housing-losses/?ref=foreclosures
"US mortgage foreclosures rise sharply" FT.com (subscription required)
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/3825f4b8-1387-11e0-a367-00144feabdc0.html#axzz19iRnoxL6
Delayed and forestalled Double Dip will occur in 2011
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ze9MyGB2tBc
Reference:
"Home Prices Are Still Too High" by Peter D. Schiff WSJ (subscription required) http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304173704575578190261574342.html
"Dr. Doom Predicts Another $1 Trillion In Housing Losses" [Nouriel Roubini] NYT
http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2010/12/06/dr-doom-predicts-another-1-trillion-in-housing-losses/?ref=foreclosures
"US mortgage foreclosures rise sharply" FT.com (subscription required)
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/3825f4b8-1387-11e0-a367-00144feabdc0.html#axzz19iRnoxL6
10/25/10
Arizona Landscape
American Recovery and Reinvestment Act...
Putting America To Work
By the Dawn's Early Light
Putting America To Work
By the Dawn's Early Light
10/22/10
6/17/10
Yuma Territorial State Prison
Country Club or Hell Hole?...
To say that Yuma is an arid climate would be an understatement, it is one of the hottest cities in the US. It does have redeeming features since, unlike Phoenix, it doesn't have the Urban Heat Island effect. Actually for most of the year, the weather in Yuma is about the same as Phoenix. Yuma has several advantages also, it's the confluence of the Colorado River and the Gila River with water still running in them, the deserts cool at night as well as it has has very mild, pleasant winters.
Detailed forecast: The Weather Channel - Weather Underground - AccuWeather
All of that was moot to the residents of Yuma between 1876 and 1909 when the Yuma Territorial Prison was in operation. Originally built when Arizona was still a territory and county jails were inadequate to keep prisoners, the prison was built mainly for that purpose. Construction was done by the prisoners.
In that era electricity, much less fans and blowers, were not available to the population of the town of Yuma. Not so on the hill where the prison was into a hard rock cliff. The prison had electricity and primitive blowers, a library and hospital and townspeople referred to it as "The Country Club." The prison in reality was an awful place but depending on how hot the day, how deep it was into summer, the view of it depended on which side of The Wall you were on. Inside, prisoners referred to it as The Hell Hole.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6pS7BloOA1U
http://www.youtube.com/AZStateParks
To say that Yuma is an arid climate would be an understatement, it is one of the hottest cities in the US. It does have redeeming features since, unlike Phoenix, it doesn't have the Urban Heat Island effect. Actually for most of the year, the weather in Yuma is about the same as Phoenix. Yuma has several advantages also, it's the confluence of the Colorado River and the Gila River with water still running in them, the deserts cool at night as well as it has has very mild, pleasant winters.
86°F | °C
Current: Clear
Wind: SW at 9 mph
Humidity: 14%
Wind: SW at 9 mph
Humidity: 14%
Wed
103°F | 71°F
Thu
103°F | 72°F
Fri
104°F | 73°F
All of that was moot to the residents of Yuma between 1876 and 1909 when the Yuma Territorial Prison was in operation. Originally built when Arizona was still a territory and county jails were inadequate to keep prisoners, the prison was built mainly for that purpose. Construction was done by the prisoners.
In that era electricity, much less fans and blowers, were not available to the population of the town of Yuma. Not so on the hill where the prison was into a hard rock cliff. The prison had electricity and primitive blowers, a library and hospital and townspeople referred to it as "The Country Club." The prison in reality was an awful place but depending on how hot the day, how deep it was into summer, the view of it depended on which side of The Wall you were on. Inside, prisoners referred to it as The Hell Hole.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6pS7BloOA1U
http://www.youtube.com/AZStateParks
Video produced by John Booth for AZStateParks.com
5/10/10
California Dreamin'
There is a lake in California...
In a Jeep with a name: "Dusty"
It's summer for all practical purposes here in the desert and I will be making my annual trek to the high desert of inland California very soon to visit my friend there. We shoot and edit video, play music and sing as well as laugh and dance...heat be damned!
Here is a replay of a video from last year's trip taken on the way, at a stop at Ford Dry Lake during the peak of heat, in August.
http://www.vimeo.com/9262701
There Is A Lake in California... from JR Snyder Jr on Vimeo.
A visit to Ford Dry Lake in California in August, peak heat of the year. In the desert, things are not always what they seem.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________
In a Jeep with a name: "Dusty"
It's summer for all practical purposes here in the desert and I will be making my annual trek to the high desert of inland California very soon to visit my friend there. We shoot and edit video, play music and sing as well as laugh and dance...heat be damned!
Here is a replay of a video from last year's trip taken on the way, at a stop at Ford Dry Lake during the peak of heat, in August.
http://www.vimeo.com/9262701
There Is A Lake in California... from JR Snyder Jr on Vimeo.
A visit to Ford Dry Lake in California in August, peak heat of the year. In the desert, things are not always what they seem.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________
4/28/10
4/24/10
4/22/10
Earth Day 2010
Be kind and love the desert...
_________________________________________________________________________________________________
4/19/10
YadaYadaYada
While we admire the problem...
Stop talking, being a distraction and take action.
There is too much YadaYadaYada in the echochamber of self appointed trouble shooters who are excellent at admiring the problems.
I've determined that the majority of time spent on social media is a distraction, ineffective and a poor return on investment. Studying economics, politics and history, sociology, geography, science and the arts are good purchases for understanding this era and a solid grasp of them will go a long way.
We waste time talking about issues. Resolution of issues are not neatly wrapped up in seminars, camps, conferences and "presos" with a list of Action Items. You can dream but you have to get out of bed. Also spare me your networking groups and mixers, excuses for drinking too much and bedding someone.
Nothing is really new, everything has happened at least once...it's still about the social, economic and political of what is going on in the current time and geography and history can tell us a lot about what action to take. Look what a volcano (geography and science) in Iceland has done to disrupt Europe socially and economically and ultimately politically. We have recent history from airline disruption on 09/11/09 to consider.
Don't wait for someone else to start or lead the process, start it yourself. Take action, listening to people who you respect, have track records, are feet on the ground people. Do not confuse committees with real teamwork, a good component of taking action. Committees are not teams but a group of people with hidden agendas, if you form a committee you will get a donkey, not a horse.
Taking action may mean learning from mistakes but that is better than mulling it over and doing nothing at all. Don't operate on fear of failure, fear can be a gauge if you're going in the right direction and an indicator to change gears, it's terrible as a driver though.
It's always one foot in front of the other because if you stop you may never get started again.
Stop talking, being a distraction and take action.
There is too much YadaYadaYada in the echochamber of self appointed trouble shooters who are excellent at admiring the problems.
I've determined that the majority of time spent on social media is a distraction, ineffective and a poor return on investment. Studying economics, politics and history, sociology, geography, science and the arts are good purchases for understanding this era and a solid grasp of them will go a long way.We waste time talking about issues. Resolution of issues are not neatly wrapped up in seminars, camps, conferences and "presos" with a list of Action Items. You can dream but you have to get out of bed. Also spare me your networking groups and mixers, excuses for drinking too much and bedding someone.
Nothing is really new, everything has happened at least once...it's still about the social, economic and political of what is going on in the current time and geography and history can tell us a lot about what action to take. Look what a volcano (geography and science) in Iceland has done to disrupt Europe socially and economically and ultimately politically. We have recent history from airline disruption on 09/11/09 to consider.
Don't wait for someone else to start or lead the process, start it yourself. Take action, listening to people who you respect, have track records, are feet on the ground people. Do not confuse committees with real teamwork, a good component of taking action. Committees are not teams but a group of people with hidden agendas, if you form a committee you will get a donkey, not a horse.
Taking action may mean learning from mistakes but that is better than mulling it over and doing nothing at all. Don't operate on fear of failure, fear can be a gauge if you're going in the right direction and an indicator to change gears, it's terrible as a driver though.It's always one foot in front of the other because if you stop you may never get started again.
3/21/10
Up and Away
Paraglider Over Ahwatukee...
A paraglider floats over Ahwatukee, this video was shot from the communications towers area of South Mountain. Ahwatukee is a community of Phoenix that is physically separated from the rest of the city since it is located on the south side of South Mountain.
Paraglider Over Ahwatukee from JR Snyder Jr on Vimeo.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
A paraglider floats over Ahwatukee, this video was shot from the communications towers area of South Mountain. Ahwatukee is a community of Phoenix that is physically separated from the rest of the city since it is located on the south side of South Mountain.
Paraglider Over Ahwatukee from JR Snyder Jr on Vimeo.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
3/19/10
3/18/10
Ocotillo Splaying Green in the Desert
Blooming is just beginning...
Ocotillo (Fouqieria splendends), also known as Coachwhip, grows mostly on stony slopes in the desert southwest of the US at altitudes around 3000-3500 feet. Like Saguaro, it is most frequently located in Arizona and factually is not a true cactus. Growing in the shape of an inverted funnel most of the year it is dry and appears as a large shrub of sticks with spines. These sticks are frequently used as handy poles for fencing, wired together to make sturdy structures as wind barriers and to keep animals in and out.
The leaves are present most of the year but are small and tiny but in the wet season become evident by turning very green and large. The rainy winter Phoenix has experienced this year is bringing the leaves out magnificently now. Soon the red flowers, which are pollinated by hummingbirds and carpenter bees, will become much more abundant and larger.
This promises to be a gloriously green and colorful desert spring in the southwestern US.
Ocotillo (Fouqieria splendends), also known as Coachwhip, grows mostly on stony slopes in the desert southwest of the US at altitudes around 3000-3500 feet. Like Saguaro, it is most frequently located in Arizona and factually is not a true cactus. Growing in the shape of an inverted funnel most of the year it is dry and appears as a large shrub of sticks with spines. These sticks are frequently used as handy poles for fencing, wired together to make sturdy structures as wind barriers and to keep animals in and out.
This promises to be a gloriously green and colorful desert spring in the southwestern US.
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