1. We’re super short handed at work which means I don’t get the vacation over Thanksgiving week I had been expecting to take.
2. Got news a few days ago that my dad no longer has a job.
3. I’m sick with Ye Olde Annuale Novembere Flue.

At least there’s Monty Python to make things better.

Or at least less worse.

Or slightly better than a sharp stick in the eye.

Nah… I’ll go with better.

I mentioned revamping BHN a little while back. That’ll probably happen in the next couple of weeks. I think I’ll move the current iteration of the BHN blog to another domain, and use this domain to pull all my various web activities together under one roof via a lifestream, so that anyone who’s interested in whatever I’m doing can find it all in one spot without having to know where I’m expending my online energy. I’m currently testing a few different means of aggregating the various sources together, and I expect I’ll figure out which direction I’m going soon enough.

I’ve been enjoying a lot of roasted vegetables lately. Roasting does something magical to almost all vegetables. I figured it was worth a shot, so during my next trip to the grocery store, I bought a couple pounds fresh.

My first attempt was pretty simple:

1. Preheat the oven to 450.
2. Cut off the root end of the sprout and remove any loose/ugly/dirty leaves. You’re looking to end up with a tight ball.
3. Halve the sprout lengthwise.
4. Put foil down on a cookie sheet, and oil the foil with something that can stand up to the high heat in the oven… I used peanut oil.
5. Place the sprouts cut side down on the foil, and season with a bit of salt (kosher works great).
6. Roast for 25 minutes or so.
7. Top with butter and a sprinkling of Parmesan cheese. Serve.

During the cooking process the kitchen smelled of popcorn and roasted pumpkin seeds. Some of the looser or detached leaves crisped up… and again, tasted like pumpkin seeds. The cut sides turned a rich golden brown and developed a wonderful crust. It was truly a delicious meal… I made nothing else for dinner that night.

My second attempt was a bit more involved, but still, no big deal.

1. Start by removing the casings from a couple of mild italian sausages. Cook the sausage in a skillet until done.
2. Clean and cut a couple pounds of brussels sprouts as above (cut the root end, remove the bad leaves), except this time cut the sprouts lengthwise into quarters or eighths. Keep any loose, clean leaves. They’re fine for this method.
3. Drain the sausage and reserve a few tablespoons of the drippings and all of the crusty bits in the skillet.
4. Add the cut sprouts to the skillet and saute until done (5 to 10 minutes).
5. Add back the drained sausage to reheat. Once done, transfer the sprouts and sausage to a bowl.
6. To the remaining drippings and crusty bits, add a generous amount of balsamic vinegar (1/3 to a 1/2 cup) and a couple tablespoons of brown sugar.
7. Reduce over medium high heat to a glaze and pour over the sprouts and sausage.
8. Toss to coat and serve.

This variation was magical… it hinted at an upscale version of the wilted lettuce I relished at my grandmother’s house.

So, as I’ve told Dave, brussel sprouts are my new favorite thing. Be careful if I invite you to dinner… I just might make some for you too.

If you play, post your final score in the comments.

UPDATE: I just made the leader board with a 2.58, baby!

I’m so l33t right now, it hurts. h00t!

Maybe I noticed it more because I’m wrestling with a few things right now.

At one point during dinner, I made a comment about how my photographic output is disproportionate to the amount of gear I have. Put another way: I’ve got way too much gear to be producing as little as I do. That’s been bothering me a lot lately in a roundabout way. My answer to the rhetorical pronouncement: I’m buying more gear.

I’ve been thinking about a new camera body for at least the last six months or so. It was hard to justify the extra cost in the lead up to the wedding after I bought my last lens, but after the wedding I realized I really should have just taken the leap. My 10D is a solid camera, but it’s old and its limitations are becoming more and more evident every time I use it. I survived the wedding with it, no doubt, but it would have been nice to have had a rig that could keep up the pace. I bought the 10D five years ago just before Hurricane Isabel huffed and puffed her way through the region. In tech years, it’s ancient. I’d given serious consideration to the forthcoming 5D Mark II, but the price tag is a bit severe even for me (though when you consider what it gets you…). So, I’ve settled on the 50D, yet settled is hardly even the right word.

It’ll be here tomorrow, by the way.

I haven’t been a regular shooter for quite awhile. For the last couple of years, all of my artistic pursuits, least of all photography, have existed mostly in fits and starts without any real consistency. So how do I justify another camera? A benefit of not having anyone to answer to but one’s own self is that I don’t really have to justify myself to anyone else. But, since I’m alluding to issues of self discovery and personal growth here–regardless of how tangentially–stick with me a moment or two.

Saturday evening’s dinner conversation crystallized a few things for me:

1) Maybe it’s my age and/or some age-related milestone freak-out rearing its head, but I’m freely admitting that I’m a classic underachiever. I know it. I’m about to turn 35, and I have very little in my life that I’m especially proud of or can point to as an accomplishment. Sure, I have a good job where I’m genuinely valued by the people I work with and I make decent money, but there’s something missing and it’s more than just a wife and/or kids.

2) I’m good at a lot of things, but I’m not really great at anything in particular. I’m the proverbial Jack of All Trades, Master of None. That’s okay at work (actually, at work my broad skill set is a huge asset), but in my personal life I want to grab hold of something and become great at it.

3) When I look around me, I see things I could be great at if I only committed myself. Whether I should or shouldn’t compare my skills to Dawn’s, is beside the point. She’s a much better photographer than I am because she puts in the work. Disregarding the f’d up politics and whatever else was wrong with kiting, I could have been a great kitebuilder… but I didn’t put in the work.

It all comes down to doing or not doing. Sometimes the best course of action is to do nothing… this isn’t one of those times. So I’ve bought a new camera. I’m rededicating myself to photography and I’m going to put in the work.

Chances are good I’ll revamp BHN in the process. I’m not sure to what extent (I may even shutter it for a time), but part of refocusing for me comes down to reducing the number of things that command my attention. Even if I haven’t been posting here, there has been occasional guilt over the scarcity of anything new. I’ve secured a new domain (brucehartmanphotography.com) and will probably begin a photography-centric blog there. I’ll be giving myself assignments over the coming months, and I think others might find the exercises useful. Even if I’m wrong, I know it’ll be helpful to me to document things.

So, there you go…

These are some of my favorites so far.

On the photography front, I think I did pretty well. I got most of the shots I hoped to get. Some of what I expected to be the best shots of the day are okay (as in, not as good as I hoped), but will require a lot of post work. Nic and Brandy are very happy with what they’ve seen so far, and once we get down to identifying what they want for prints, I can begin the process of bringing those frames up to snuff.

As for my future as a wedding photographer: I don’t think I have one, at least not any time in the immediate future. It took me two days to recover to passable. My knees are still sore, and will require another day or two of taking it easy before I feel like I’m back to my old self. If I can get to a reasonable weight in the future, then it might be worth considering, but as of right now, the physical demands of wedding photography are just too much for me. Shorter couple-hour-at-a-time sessions are doable (and desired), but anything much more than three or four hours will be a pass.

I can’t even describe how indebted I am to Dawn. She was a huge help and the single contributing factor to my staying sane. Knowing she was along for the ride allowed me to not worry, as I’m known to do (often without real cause). I’ve recommended her here before, but after working with her and seeing her in action, I can say nothing but the best about her. She’s a skilled photographer, and anyone would be lucky to have her shoot them. Book her now.

We worked well as a team, planning as much as we could when appropriate and improvising when that was called for. During the ceremony itself, for instance, I had committed to shooting Brandy’s face from the behind the wedding party to ensure I got her expression during the presentation of the rings. This, of course, kept me pinned down for the duration. Dawn, on the other hand, floated around the spectator-side and even got some shots from one of the balconies on the back of the house. The reception was much easier… I spent most of my time stalking Brandy as she made the rounds.

The formals went well, all things considered. Dawn corralled the people and handled the shot list, while I ran the camera. All was good until the end, when I nearly passed out from heat exhaustion (I hadn’t been drinking my water, and it was incredibly humid and surprisingly hot with no shade to speak of). I handed her the camera with a few shots to spare and made it into the house before keeling over. She photographed the remaining five or six poses while I took a break and got some water. Before too long, I was back in the game and doing fine.

Everything started to wrap up around 7:30 or so, and I was on the road by 8:00 PM. I stopped at Mom’s house in Chesapeake and considered taking a nap, but decided to make the rest of the trip to my own house. I was home just shy of midnight.