From West to East

This is a little out of order in terms of timing, but when I was on my way home to Michigan over Labor Day weekend, I had the coolest flight path back east. My flight from San Jose went to LA, and then cut up across the American west in a northeast direction. We flew over Las Vegas. I saw Lake Mead, I could just barely make out the Hoover Dam. I even saw my field area where I did my masters thesis! I just made out the western portion of the Grand Canyon as we continued on. Then we flew over Zion National Park (I'd recognize those red cliffs anywhere) and over either Cedar Breaks National Monument or Bryce Canyon NP. I think it was the latter but I couldn't tell for sure. We flew over Capital Reef NP and the eastern part of Canyonlands, and I saw Dead Horse Point State Park. I was looking for Arches NP, because I know it was right there, but I didn't see it for sure. I did however find the rock formation that the arches in Arches are made from and got a couple of shots of those. (They form what are called fins, or from up high they hind of look like plates resting in a drying rack. Then eventually the wind wears away the center and an arch is formed.)
After that is got cloudy and I couldn't see much, but isn't that still pretty great? I had a free aerial tour of most of the national parks in Utah, and quite an entertaining flight. My good camera was in the overhead bin, so I took all of these with my iPhone. Enjoy!

Morning Clouds over LA

Lake Mead

Zion NP

Bryce Canyon NP or Cedar Breaks NM

Capital Reef NP

Fins belonging to the same formation as rocks in Arches NP

Canyonlands NP

Canyonlands NP

Dead Horse Point State Park

Arches NP is in the background there somewhere!

Maybe part of Colorado NM?

Sunset over Michigan

Fallen Leaf Lake, CA

If Fallen Leaf Lake was anywhere else besides right next to Lake Tahoe, I am sure it would be considered one of the prettiest lakes in all the Sierra. The haze is smoke from the Rim Fire down south near Yosemite.

Week 2: Packers vs Redskins

Some of the stars from Sunday's game:
Nelson, Starks, Rodgers
(Borrowed from Packers.com)

Everyone did pretty great I thought. The Rodgers to Cobb pass on fourth down was pretty fantastic. I like that they went for it on 4th instead of punting it away.
Starks had a great run in the beginning of the game, and then filled in for Eddie Lacy, and had the best run game for the Packers in over three years! Nice job Starks! It reminded me of our Super Bowl Run a couple years back. How excited would I be if our run game came online? VERY.
The helmet-led hit by Brandon Merriweather on Eddie Lacy took him out of the game with a concussion. It looked pretty awful in slow motion, and I hope Lacy is OK. And not that concussions are no big deal, but I'm glad that it wasn't a season ending injury.
Merriweather took himself out of the game with another simmilar hit on Starks a while later. Luckily Starks was OK, but someone really needs to talk to Merriweather, and explain to him the 2013 NFL rule book.
Rodgers had some really nice passes to James Jones, who is getting better and better every year. I like his attitude, work ethic, and the fact that he actually catches most of the balls thrown to him. I know he got that touchback later in the game, but I really don't think that was his fault. He was doing exactly what he was supposed to, and trying to score and the ball was wet. It could happen to anyone.
There was a beautiful Nelson TD called back because Josh Sitton got called for holding. But Rodgers connected with him again and got the 6 back. I don't know what's going on with Sitton. That's four holding calls in 2 games. Not cool dude.
Jermichael Finley and Randal Cobb both had a nice game. The jump for the TD by Finley was pretty great. His Lambeau Leap however, left something to be desired. That's fine by me, I'm just saying.
Davon House got a nice Sack on RGIII. I think our pass rush was a little weak, but I guess they did OK. Perry had some nice plays, as did Hawk. Sam Shields had a great game! He didn't get an interception, but he broke up at least 4 plays that I can remember. I was really impressed.
Mike Neal had a nice interception on the Redskins attempted 4 down conversion.
I missed most of the third quarter because I was rushing around getting dressed, then we had to head into town and find a bar that was playing the game. But I caught the fourth quarter, and it was more of the same.
The Packers showed up, and had a really good game.
But I realize the Redskins are not a very good team, and so while I'm encouraged, I'm not getting too ahead of myself. We still have some work to do in our secondary. And Rodgers did get sacked 3 times, so the offensive line needs some adjusting as well. And the running backs need to block better. Starks is pretty terrible at blocking, but if they could help out the offensive line, I really think it would give Rodgers time to connect more smoothly down field.
But I'll take a win any day! Can't wait until next week! Go Pack!

Dear Fox Network,

You suck. We saw that you were playing our game on national TV, so we didn't go out to a bar but chose to stay home and watch the game. Then half way through, you just decided, (since we were winning by a lot), that we didn't need to see our team do well and that you would just switch to the Cowboys game without any regard to all the people who were watching the game YOU said you were going to play. Would you just walk into a room full of people and switch the channel from the show that they were watching? Because that's what you did to millions of fans. It was terribly RUDE. Booo. So instead of watching the third quarter, we had to scramble, get dressed, and run out to a bar to watch the rest of our game. I was really upset. And you were really uncool. Don't you know that anyone who wanted to watch the Cowboys was already at the bar or found somewhere else to watch it, and those of us who were watching the Packers were home and left to scramble because you went back on your word? Is this a way to treat your NFL fans? Shame on you FOX. Perhaps this is why you don't host the Super Bowl. I mean who knows? Maybe you'd switch to an old Family Guy episode if the score wasn't close enough for you to deem worth watching. I certainly wouldn't put it past you. Clearly you don't understand what it means to be a sports fan, or how to treat one.)

A Disgruntled Packers Fan

Night Sky

I've been experimenting with my astrophotography photos, and here are the two best ones I got from my trip to Tahoe. I think I need to do a little more research on how to take different kinds of night sky photo's. At the campground the Milky Way was bright and visible, but when I tried to photograph it, it didn't show up. I had to leave the shutter open long enough to form star trails to see it, and even then it just looks like clouds (see second photo). I'd like to work on my technique a little more, and then maybe plan a trip to Death Valley or somewhere really dark and try again.

Polaris

The Milky Way

Tahoe Blue

Last weekend I went camping in Tahoe with my brother and some friends. We stayed at Fallen Leaf Campground, and it was pretty nice except for the yellow jackets.
One of the days we were there we decided to go hiking and ended up on the Lighthouse Trail at D.L. Bliss State Park. It was a warm day, and the lighthouse itself was pretty disappointing to look at (it looked more like an outhouse with a window), but the trail itself was really nice, and the views were out of this world! Usually I'm at lake level when I look at it, but the trail was up higher, and the blues and greens really popped out and were so incredible! Now I know what they mean when they say "Keep Tahoe Blue". They are some of the most brilliant, rich, deep blues I've ever seen in nature.
The trail went along the waters edge, and eventually came to a parking lot (at the north point) and there was a trail down to a very nice beach. I hadn't worn my bathing suit, but that didn't stop me. I just went in anyway, with all of my clothes on. Ha! Sometimes you just have to do crazy things! It was totally worth it too. The water was as refreshing as it was clear.
Here are a couple shots I took along the trail. The haze in the background is the smoke from the big Yosemite Rim fire. When the wind was blowing from the south it was pretty thick all over the lake. But even so, it was really beautiful.

Week 1: Packers vs Niners

Offensive Line 2013: So far, so good.
(Borrowed from www.sportsmedia101.com)

I'm late in writing this, so I'll make it brief. We lost to the Niners...again. Sigh. We really didn't have a terrible game, but they were just a little too good, and Anquan Boldin had a field day with our secondary. I can't even remember how many catches he had, but it was a lot.
Highlights of the game for me:

Jordy Nelson's beautiful catch and toe drag for a critical first down.
Offensive line held up pretty well, including rookie Bakhitari, and that is a relief.
We kept the Niners run game to almost nothing. GOOD.
Eddie Lacy looked like he was getting the hang of things.
Matthews sack on Kapernick. (Yes, even the late one.)
Rodgers had a pretty good game.

Anyway, I hope we meet the Niners again in the playoffs. And unlike last year, I hope we win.