High School Proms

The month of May can mean so many things, but for those with high school students it means prom. I managed to get a few pictures of my brother, David, before his Senior Prom (he was on his way to pick up his date, so she is not pictured). Click on the picture to see a short slideshow of images.

Austin Postcard

Like me, you may have never heard of "Big Letter" postcards, but I'm sure you've seen them.


Our final for my Illustrator class was creating one of these postcards for Austin. You'll find mine below. Nothing spectacular. Our only constraint was that (1) we had to use actual bitmap photographs (we could not convert to Live Trace, for those who know what that is), and (2) we had to use Illustrator's Extrude effect to make the letters look 3D. I used 3 extrude effects here, even though most people only needed the 1. The reason is because I wanted to include wireframe shading on the letters in addition to the diffuse shading that is default when you Extrude.

The tagline "The Greenest City in America" is an actual fact. I pulled it from an MSN article.

Can you tell where all the pictures were taken?
Also notice that the cut-out in the "N" is the UT tower.

5k Fever

So after running a Zoo Run Run with my sister (see photo to left) and realizing how gratifying it is to fly past grandmas and 6 year olds, I got this itch to run a 5k every weekend. So I signed us up for the Texas Round Up the following weekend. The Texas Round Up is something that Governor Perry started 5 years ago as a health and fitness initiative for Texans. I heard about it mainly through my work at TxDOT but had never participated in the actual 5k event. Now that I no longer work there, it seemed only logical to get involved, ha.

The course has you running south down Congress Ave and then north up S. 1st street. Running down two major streets that have been closed down for a race is always neat, but the fact that we got to cross the Town Lake twice!... that was memorable. I managed to snap one picture while I was running, a picture of all of us running down Congress with the Capitol in the background. For some reason, as you can see in the picture, I was running in front of a man dressed up as The Hulk. I saw no one else dressed up. Of course, this is Austin, which may also explain why several people ran with their dogs alongside them.

Our finishing time was 2 minutes faster than the previous weekend. Considering that we had to stop for a Rev-Potty-Break during the race, and then find an off-course trash can to throw away an applesauce container, I was pretty happy with our time. I was feeling awesome until I hear the announcer (who was announcing people as they crossed the finish line via their bib number) say something that would bring me back to reality. He announced that the Governor of the State of Texas was crossing the finish line as well, only he had run the 10k. Sure, the 10k-ers started the race 10 minutes before the 5k-ers, but still. It took a middle aged politician 10 minutes longer to run a 10k than it took me to run a 5k ... doh! Still, it was enjoyable.

After the race, we got to enjoy free food and music on the steps of the Capitol. Rev saw kids getting their face painted, so he got in line. The lady asked "What would you like on your face? A tiger? A truck?" Rev looks up, usually very shy, and without reserve tells her: "Green." Hah. For several seconds the lady wasn't sure what to make of that request, but I suggested giving him some camo face paint, and Rev loved it. The whole day he kept asking if his "army face" was still on.

I skipped out on an opportunity for a 5k in Round Rock this past weekend, so already my a-5k-every-weekend plans have gone to shambles. On Saturday, Rev woke up very concerned, "Mom! We forgot to run our race today!" haha

Long Overdue: Hair Story

A slideshow of my hair-shaving experience. Photos courtesy of a friend from class. Granted this occurred over 6 months ago, but there may be anywhere from 1 to 2 people who might find that worth viewing.

boys!

I recently had the opportunity to house-sit for a friend, which not only meant access to a full-sized kitchen, but also close proximity to several playgrounds. Being in walking distance to a good playground is one of the biggest things that I miss about living in a house. ... I also miss the having-a- house-to-live-in part. I've put a slideshow of these pictures on my website since I can't figure out how to incorporate SWF files into blogger.

This is Rev and his cousin Isaac, almost exactly 1 year apart. This is also Rev's favorite mode of transportation. On some days you can find him peddling down aisles in HEB, along Congress Ave, around the Capitol, down a flight of stairs (he won't try that again, though, for some reason), or down the block to any nearby playground. I'm not sure what we will do when he outgrows that trike. I'm also not sure when to consider him "outgrown"... as it is, his knees hit the handle bars...