I love how the sun plays with our architecture in the house. Today, it got gorgeous, stunning really. Spun and I sat out on the curb, watching minivans go by, browsing through junk mail, bathing in fresh air and warmth.

The sun’s azimuth sometimes passes in perfect alignment with the angle of our railing heading upstairs, casting lengthy parallel shadows down out burnt orange wall. Today was that day.

I love how much the sun loves our home’s revitalized architecture.

If you’ve taken the Seattle Underground Tour, you know that much of the older portions of downtown, specifically Pioneer Square were originally built a story lower. Due to a number of reasons Seattle was forced to build the streets up a full floor leaving bizarre remnants of window frames buried in alleys. This one was so close to having some light shine through, but instead was bricked up and paved over, never to be open again. Thankfully, just out on the main street, there are a ton of the original purple squares of glass, allowing light down into Seattle’s catacombs.

The ivy on a Viaduct column.

Washington State Convention Center for sic://2011. Solid first day of speakers. Best quote of the day: “Sharepoint is where documents go to die.”

One point perspective hard at work. Central park at Columbus Circle.

I love the Lenora St Lookout. Spun took me here early on in our relationship for a late night walkabout of Belltown and her favorite spots. This spot, albeit frequented by a lot of homeless who love to leave overnight gifts on the stairs for early morning commuters such as myself, is flanked by gardens and ends up jutting out to one of the best views of the Puget Sound, Olympics, and West Seattle in the city.

For the past two years and I’ve been watching these vines grow. They take over the trees, flow off the side of the bridge and have made for review cycle metaphors. Today, like most days when I walk down the stairs, I was checking to see if the light was right to shoot up at the hanging vines. I’ve been wanting a shot of this for some time now because they hang about two to three stories from above, swinging in the cool morning breeze. Perfect. But alas, I didn’t have the right lens … so I improvised and shot something more geometric than literal, using the Viaduct, pillar, and bridge above to create a sweet negative space. I’ll likely post up some of the graffiti from here next week. There are two pieces I’ve been meaning to share for some time now.

A record pop. Dust on film. Artisanal food. Our culture is craving nostalgia on a temporal, iAge of pixels and clouds. We require immediate gratification, yet yearn for things that show character and took time to mature. The pops on records (hell, records in general) show a uniqueness that MP3s cannot muster. The imperfections help us see the world through the non-glossy lens our minds need, when everything else has a faux-sheen veneer applied to look new and important. The massive megapixels shoved into tiny devices need to be manipulated to show a harkening to an analog age for significance. We are bound by our nostalgia and for the first time ever have the ability to fuse the now and the then. But is it cheaper as a result? Take today’s photo for example. It’s a parking garage ramp. The photo itself was mediocre. Intentionally shot that way too. Perhaps it’s composed decently…nothing too impressive, but the light flare, grime, soft filter, color shift make it so much more, by making it so much less of a representation of what was actually there this morning. We’re drawn to the fascination of memories. I love that our phones have helped us communicate our worlds around us more now than ever before. Even though I can’t recall the last time I had an actual phone conversation.

On our drive home from Vancouver this weekend, we listened to an episode of This American Life entitled “Act V” where security level 4 prison inmates were concluding their final act of Hamlet by Shakespeare. Their story, as always with This American Life, was amazing. They, more than anyone else who had played Hamlet, actually lived the part. Give it a spin. Totally worth hearing how drama has changed the lives of these men. Definitely begs the question of whether or not we can truly shake off who we once were for who we are today. I believe we can, what about you?

As I was wishing my grandma happy birthday, on this her 90th, I paused for a few moments in the middle of Harbor Steps. The sun was just cresting enough to catch the edge of the stairs. Gorgeous. As I wrapped up the call, all smiles and happiness, there were big shafts of sunlight coming down through some dense fog. Loved the repetition, light differences, etc. Happy birthday grandma. Seattle loves you very much.