Self-Portrait 

I love fire trucks! Here are a couple from just up the street at the Sparks Nevada Fire Station No. 5.  

Here is the new ride. I got rid of the Magnum because it was bad in the snow. I went down and test drove the new all drive Magnum but found this beauty instead, a Dodge Ram 1500 Hemi Megacab.

I was at "A taste for Art", a Nevada Museum of Art wine tasting last Friday night and when I left I saw Peavine Mt. on fire. Check out this photo of what I saw. photo by Deb Haas 

A friend, DB, of mine got this phone image Saturday night of the hills right behind work. I went out this morning and the whole hill is burnt black.  

Hot August Nights came around to Reno this last weekend and I went to the Atlantis, the Reno Hilton and Downtown Sparks to see a ton of great cars. I took photos of mostly corvettes, 1958-1962 of course, which you can go over to the Vettmon blog and take a look. 

This last Friday night we had a wild lightning storm that brought on hurricane rains. I got out the camera and did some long exposure shots to see if I could snag some lightning and after about 200 shots I got 4 or 5 good ones. 

The bamboo garden is doing great!. I have almost 20 new culms from 4 groups. The most, 9, is coming from one Phyllostachys nigra (Black Bamboo). The black bamboo is seen as the tall dark lines in the back and the rest is Golden bamboo.

Guess where I went this weekend. Napa, one of my favorite places. I went with my wife Krissy and her sister Linda and husband Jerry. Lots of vines at this time of year. We tasted lots of great reds and whites. Reds Rule! I did find a favorite at the Vincent Arroyo Winery. I bought futures in the some of the wines in the barrel. Shhhhh its a secret. Another of my favorites Silverado Winery and their view from the tasting room.  

Here are some images from my garden.

1960  

Rocketboom has a great closeup of Amanda Congdon ranting about "Snakes on a Plane" movie. Great pic.  

Last week a friendly snake came through the yard. I don't know what kind of snake this is but it was fairly friendly. 

Spring is here! Look at these images from the garden.  

At the Sparks Marina, Reno Mountain Sports had a Kayak test event. This is where you can test out all the newest kayaks available. The event stated there would be 75 different Kayaks but I only saw about 25-30. No worries! I had plenty of time on all different types and found several that I thought would fit my needs. Here are several images from the event. Here are the main tents that had event checkin and different vendors. This is the event from the water.Dean came to the event as did James and his family. They took some great images of me and my daughter. Having a great time. I would like one of these for my birthday.

Kayaking on the Sparks Marina. James got a kayak this last year and called me down on Sunday to take it for a spin. I am getting ready to splash James on shore. Here is James showing his skills at paddling and lifting.  

I had the muffler replaced last weekend and here is a shot of the split. Shorty said that it was from a backfire. Hmmmm 

The exaust sound was not sounding good, I took it in to see about a new mufflers. In this second shot you can see the problem. The side of the muffler is completely ripped open. This is kind of a bad photo, from the Motorola razor phone, but I think you kan clearly see the problem. The question is Magnaflow or Flowmaster? They are getting the parts and going to let me hear the diffence on the car. Cool.

The great view from my hotel in Portland. Makes you want to stay.

and the kids find sea shells.