Stressing a bit about the upcoming reception. Nothing seriously wrong, just enough going on that’s out of my control that I get stressed. But I stumbled on this a few minutes ago at our photographer’s website:

Pretty pictures take my mind off everything else that I should be working on.

The photographer who will be working at our reception, Bryson Kim, has an gallery of his work at the 5th Annual Fire Knife Competition at his site, Island Pix. I always love watching these guys in action, and Bryson did such an amazing job capturing the motion in still images that I had to give a shout from here.

Wow!  Amazing perspective from the 10m diving platform.  Found myself getting a little anxious even though there’s no way of falling off from here.  [via]

The official t-shirts of the 2008 Slackathalon came in today. This ended up being a fine Slackathalon season, possibly the best yet.

Obviously, the wedding almost resulted in disqualifications of all participants, but the sheer lack of planning involved in the event resulted in a waiver by the Slackathlon’s presiding official, Party D.  The fact that the finish line photos were taken while your blogger was flat on his back watching Voyager reruns on a weekday afternoon showed a dedication to slacking that far supersedes any momentary rush of emotion, adrenaline and hormones.

Thanks to everyone who helped make this season such a blast and provided the distractions that kept so much meaningful work from getting done.  You’re enablers, each and every one of you, and we’re proud to have you in our lives.  I’m sure Spinner will have some thoughts of his own posted eventually.

Diego and I are on our own for a few days while Randy and my camera cavort around Miami.  Snacks wherever we want and lots of scratching ourselves in inappropriate places until Tuesday night.  We bond well.

I started off the time alone by attempting to make some long overdue upgrades to the photo gallery look and feel.  The gallery’s been powered by Coppermine since it started in 2005, and while the template’s never been exactly what I wanted, it worked and I was never able to figure out their coding.  Now, after a couple of days of dedicated tweaking, I’m thinking that I never will.  Gawd what a mess, and I’m now pretty sure that the reason it wouldn’t bend to my will isn’t a lack of skill but a lack of flexibility in the core of that program.

Been experimenting with Gallery 2 as an alternative, and so far I’m favorable impressed.  I remember comparing them back in oh-five, and deciding that Coppermine was the better option then, but Gallery seems to have more than made up the difference in the last three years.  Expect some changes on that side of the site in the near future. 

Be happy to hear any comments about other experiences with the packages, or other self-hosted photo galleries, but as was pointed out to me (again) this last week, I”m too much of a control freak to ever turn over a portion of the site to Flickr or some other third party again.

It’s been kind of a mind-numbing blur of a week.  Ignoring the phone and letting iTunes’ Party Shuffle drag me around my collection by my ears this morning.  It seems to be working.  Lots of blues.  A bit of jazz.  Classics.  One more hour in the office than off for some photography – time to make Spinner’s kids look like they’re having fun for an Open House multimedia presentation.  Any input on the best photoshop filter for removing Tazer marks? 

What I should be doing: writing something other than posts for Howling Point.  Wills and trusts, an offer to settle, and something witty for KPBS all come to mind as possiblities.

What I want to be doing: Going through the rest of the photos from Crew Classic, and making certain I’ve purged all the hacker damage from my site.

What I am doing: Working through the fuzziness that comes from overdoing things yesterday.  Walking too much, exacerbating the plantar fasciitis that’s kept me out of the gym and pool for weeks now, is not what I should have done, but I did it and there are consequences.  Fuzzy consequences, like pain meds and puppies who know when I’m vulnerable.

Early court appearances lead to long, long days, but it’s been a good day.  Lots got done, and now that hump day is over I’m ready slide into Crew Classic weekend, always a good time.  Even better since the alums are comping my admission in exchange for some photography. 

One of my gripes about San Diego is that the city is really good at promoting huge for-profit sports franchises, and really horrible about promoting the countless other sports and cultural events around town.  In my gut I think it’s true of most cities, but now that I’m in my seventh year here I notice it more than I have anywhere else.  That comes with being professionally homeless (a term from the Foreign Service days) for so long – no long-term memory of the annual events and not enough time to find all the hidden treasures.

So even though it was on my calendar, it was great to have the local alums remind me last night about the upcoming Crew Classic regatta.  Not that I would have forgotten, but they were using my photographs from last year’s regatta in their plea for housing for the visiting athletes, and the ego boost from that helped brighten the morning. 

 Weather permitting, April 6th will be my seventh Crew Classic.   My first was in 2002 and I haven’t missed one since.  The alumni tents, particularly Cal’s, are first rate venues to relax and catch up, with occasional walks to the shore to yell and cheer when the good races are on.  The competition brings together the best collegiate rowers in the county in spring weather that only San Diego can offer.  Still not sure?  Check out the photos from 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2007.  Even though San Diego’s not going to promote it, we will.  Come join the thousands of fans, have a beer and some meat off the grill, and watch the races.

… a tired puppy.

Happiness is also knowing that there are really cool people and dogs out there on the internet like KipEsquire and Diamond. Thanks from all of us.

Blogosphere, meet Diego.

Diego, meet the blogosphere.

Diego was adopted today from the San Diego Humane Society, and will be splitting his online residences between the Howling Point and Spinnerdude. He weighs 18 pounds and is a mix between a Maltese and godonlyknowswhat, aka, a purebred Mutt (to use the AKC designation).