Of Lucky Scarves and Speeding Trains

As is so often the case here in New England, the weather just couldn't make up its mind what it was going to do yesterday. It was sunny! It was overcast! It was sunny again! It was overcast again! Sigh ...  Oh well, there's not much you can do about the weather except adapt so once I finally made up my mind that yes, I was going to go try to get a train picture or two, I decided the best way to go about it was to bundle up before heading out.  Layers are definitely the way to go and it also helps if you have a really nice scarf that was sent to you as a surprise gift (thanks again, Sheila!).

It was almost noon-time so I decided to head down to Stoddard Hill where I had gone a couple times before and come back with pictures of the lovely swans that reside there but no trains.  I was hoping my timing might be a little better this outing as I was taking the advice of Tom Nanos, a local photographer who takes some amazing railroad pictures that you can check out for yourselves if you'd like to visit Tom Nanos' Railroad Photography Blog.  Trust me, it's well worth the click!

Tom stumbled onto my blog through a Google search and has been giving me some helpful email hints on when/where I can possibly catch a train.  It's also been very helpful for me to study the pictures on his blog to see exactly where he was (and what time it was) when he took a particular picture.  I've been following that up with a few reconnaissance missions down by the Thames River in order to scope out the area ahead of any attempted photo-hunts.  I've really been enjoying the challenge of railroad photography but I gotta tell ya, I'm going to like it a lot better when the weather warms up!

Anyhow, back to yesterday at Stoddard Hill and the side of the Thames River!  When I got there it seemed like the best I was going to get was a few pictures of empty railroad tracks as it was just a little too windy and overcast for me to want to stay out by the river for too long.  The sun was playing peek-a-boo with the clouds and was in more than it was out no matter what you might think by looking at the sky in this picture!


 Just as I was about to pack it in for the day and continue down to Groton to get the other pictures I needed for a future post, I heard a train horn in the distance. Could it be? Were the Train Gods with me for a change?  Perhaps Sheila's scarf had brought me some luck!
 Sure enough, as I looked south I was rewarded with the sight of a Providence & Worcester train coming around the corner and towards me. Woohoo!

 It wasn't exactly a very long train but I wasn't complaining - it was A train!

 I've gotten used to trying to take pictures of NECR trains which move a lot slower than this P&W one was going so I knew I was going to be lucky to get maybe one or two good shots before the train was past me.

 I think perhaps this one above qualifies as a decent shot - least ways I was pleased with it!

Bringing up the rear of the train was another engine which had zoomed past before I knew it!  

At least now I've got a good idea of how fast the trains move as they head towards Norwich and points north so perhaps I'll be able to get a few more shots off next time as you know that I will definitely be trying again before too long! And you can by-golly bet I'll be bringing my lucky scarf along, too!

Creative Photography

I've missed out on joining in with Roger's Creative Photography Meme for the past couple weeks as I just flat out kept forgetting to get a picture posted on time. I am beginning to seriously think that I need some of Miss Bee's fish oil what with this increasingly faulty memory of mine! Problem is, I keep forgetting to pick up any when I go to the store!

Speaking of Miss Bee, she's been "threatening" her readers-but-not-comment-leavers over at her blog and it's been working beautifully for her! I've been wondering if I should resort to the same sort of shenanigans that she pulls in order to get more of my lurkers to leave a comment or two ... after all, she's an Empress and I'm a Duchess so it may just be one of those royalty things. Hmmm ... Ah well, while I mull over what might be a good incentive to get some of you folks to leave a comment or two please take a gander at my pictures for this week's Creative Photography Meme!

This neon sign at the Green Onion pizza restaurant up the road from us in Lisbon, Connecticut caught my eye last night while Amanda and I were waiting for our order so I popped out to the car to get my trusty Nikon in spite of Amanda's eye-rolling. Ah, teenagers, it's great when you can embarrass them in public! Makes up for just a little bit of the hell they put you through, doesn't it?!

Obviously because I took the shot from inside the building the words are backwards but I thought it looked pretty cool from that angle and I guess if you want to hold your computer monitor up to a mirror, you could see it forwards if you'd like! Once I got home, I used some of the new photo-editing tools at Photobucket to invert the colors and this is the result -

I think it definitely adds a different sort of look to it and just might qualify as "creative"! For more great creative entries, be sure to swing by the Creative Photography blog and check out the links - there's some pretty cool stuff over there!

Creative Photography

I thought maybe I'd take some time out to post my entry for this week's Creative Photography Meme hosted by Roger of Idaho Daily Photo.
I sort of forgot to do an entry last week what with the last-minute Christmas stuff that needed to be done and all but this week I dug through my archives and came up with the following picture that I have titled "Making Tracks" ...

Almost makes me want to go out and walk the tracks to see where they lead - or better yet hop aboard a train and see where it takes me à la hobo style!
If you'd like to see more great Creative Photography Meme entries, make tracks over to the Creative Photography Blog and check out the links!

Creative Photography

This past Friday a lot of people got to see the biggest full moon that was going to appear in the sky until 2018 ... I didn't. Well, I mean, I did but not until I got out of work at 11:00 and by that time it was so high in the sky that trying to take a picture of it would have been totally futile unless I had some amazingly huge telephoto lens ... which I don't.

I hear it was quite the sight to see and I'm really sorry that I missed it though I've seen some very nice pictures on other people's blogs who were not only fortunate enough to see the moon but also to take some pictures of it.

Moon photography - as I'm learning - is really quite tricky, though and even if I had been able to try to capture some pictures, I have a sneaky feeling that they wouldn't have come out right. Or at least not as "right" as I would have liked them to.

The picture that I've chosen for Roger's Creative Photography Meme this week is one that I took on Sunday morning whilst on my way into work. It was about 6:30 in the morning but the moon was still very bright in the sky and I decided to at least try to take a quick picture of it from the driver's seat of the car (I was pulled over at the time!).

The tree branches aren't exactly what you would call sharp but I kind of like the fuzzy look, it makes it look more three-dimensional to me - well, either that or my aging eyes just make everything look that way!

Don't forget to check out the Creative Photography blog if you'd like to see some more great pictures or if you've got one you'd like to enter yourself!