Hello, all. I am writing this post from the internet kiosk in the lobby of a Super 8 in Modesto, California. This is for a few reasons:

1. They have a giant monitor that makes it a pleasure to write posts (as in, I need to get me one of these). In actuality it’s probably like a 21″ screen, but it feels quite a bit bigger than mine.
2. They have a fast, hardwired, internet connection. This is always a good thing.
3. I haven’t yet figured out the best way to write a post via my iPhone and I’m not really sure I’d want to even if I could.

Modesto, in case you were wondering, seems to be a rather non-descript central valley California town. It has a mall (yeah…), your typical collection of restaurants, and other whatnot. It also has gasoline for $4.17/gal — some of the cheapest yet found in California. Modesto also happens to be approximately two hours from the West entrance of Yosemite.

I’d post photographs from the trip, but I shoot in Camera RAW, so there is no way to interpret the photos, let alone upload them. Geezus I need a laptop (Macbook Pro in case someone with deep pockets is reading).

That’s all for now. Furthermore, it’s unlikely that I’ll be able to post during my stay in Yosemite. There is extremely limited Internet access and I just don’t feel like fighting for it or — even more importantly — wasating my time writing posts when I could be taking photos and seeing the sights.

Tomorrow morning — and by tomorrow I mean, today — I leave on a road trip to Yosemite National Park. Yosemite is arguably one of the most photographed outdoor areas on the face of this planet. It has the distinction of being America’s first National Park and also the common subject of Ansel Adams. So, with that, I am going there to take my own photographs. It’s likely to be perfectly clear skies and tourist packed and I’m going armed only with my regular zoom lens and (thankfully) a circular polarizer. With luck, the waterfalls will be at peak summer discharge and I’ll get some shots of that.

Stay tuned for the results

Yosemite at Night (MumbleyJoe via Flickr)

I finally got the weather break that I was looking for as well as all the technical stuff sorted out. Thank you to all on Facebook for your ideas, I appreciate them. Additional thank you to my assistant — Kurt — For everything except zapping me in the eyeball with the flash; it caused me to see a red rectangle for the next hour. The resulting photograph (seen above), will be used to help sell that bicycle.

Interestingly enough, my bicycle support mechanism was not photoshopped out. A weird floating umbrella rod was, however… Kudos if you can point out where some selective cloning (and select/copy/paste/blend) occurred.

Galleries are up! I’m not sure it’s the permanent solution (is anything?), but it’s what’s going on right now. Check ‘em out:

I realized that I should really post some photos on this site, because, well that’s what it’s about. Actually, the site is about me, which although being somewhat presumptuous, is true… That’s why I named it tddewey.com.

Anyway, I greatly dislike this gallery thing on wordpress, so I’m only using it for the sake of getting some photos here until I can figure out a real solution.

Geez. Why have I Always. Always. had problems with online photo galleries? Is it because my expectations are different then everyone else? Or perhaps because they are ill-defined.

In the past I’ve resorted to hand coding PHP stuff to deal with the gallery the way I wanted. This time around, I just can’t find the plugin that does exactly what I want. It’s out there, oh, I know it is… And I will find it.

And when I find that plugin/code I will have a photo gallery on this site that looks nice, is functional and easy to use and displays images the way I want them to be displayed…  Big! (BTW: the built in WP gallery shortcode doesn’t work the way I want it to.)

Maybe I have to create a custom wordpress theme to accomplish this. I’d rather not. But if I have to…

I just want to point out that Comcast (broadband) is crap. And, while I realize that there are plenty of other people that might have the same thing to say, I want to share my little list of reasons why:

• In many areas they are your only option for high speed internet.
• As a result of the above, they feel the need to charge an arm + leg.
• They built their networks on public infrastructure, but give nothing back.
• Their rates are high for sometimes intermittent or slow service
• Much of your money does not go to service or infrastrucutre, it goes to advertising.
• As a result of the above, your mailbox is packed with ads… all the time. NO, I do NOT want your phone service!
• Bandwidth throttling without telling people is evil.
• They charge you to pay your bill in certain ways.
• And most of all…. my upload speeds are awful! Including right now, when I’m trying to upload some new plugins… we’re talking 1.5Mb timing out. Gah

If I had a choice, I would be with a different evil company to get broadband internet. How I wish I lived in some socialized european country that has free, state-run, blazing fast broadband at every house.

I’ve posted a new logotype, you’ll notice the ‘T’ got closer to the “DD.” and that the “DD” became interlocked instead of simply overlayed. I also took the time on the back-end to make it a vector image and a custom shape in Photoshop. Soon I shall have business cards… and soon I shall rule the world.

Also, the image header will cycle randomally, which means that the little tagline thingy will also change. I couldn’t decide on just one. So. The first random tagline is “do the funky chicken, white boys.” Don’t ask, I have no idea…