Monday, October 16, 2006

Why I'm Blogging So Much On Vacation

Update on 3/25/07

What the hell? I added labels for this post and blogger erased it!

Essentially, the gist was it was raining a lot so after the earthquake we still couldn't do anything.

And I had this video of the rain outside our condo.

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I Wanted To Sell My Photos!

As I was watching all those people line up to buy grilled chicken, I thought to myself, "Gee, I think I'll get some pictures of this and maybe sell it to a newspaper or something."

It had kind of a human interest element to it. People were hungry, they couldn't cook and they couldn't go to restaurants. Grocery stores were closed so buying non-perishables there was out of the question. Some guy with a gas grill was obviously going to have a great day at work and make a ton of money because of that.

I grabbed my point and shoot digital camera (which actually takes pretty good pictures) and wandered over.

I snapped a couple photos of the grill. Got a picture of some lady making a purchase. And took some pictures of people standing in line. This is one of the pictures I take:

I've got some decent stuff. I start to look at the scene a little more creatively and I spot some guy pulling his professional camera gear out of a bag. I watch him walk over and start taking his own pictures.

I recognize his style and attitude as a professional news photographer. Damn! Why'd he show up?

I figured he worked for the local newspaper. So much for me selling my photos. I walked away. As we drove off a few minutes later, I looked over and he was getting some high angle shots of the line...Yep, he works for someone. Too bad for me.

So imagine my surprise when the picture that the Associated Press picks up is this:

Well, crap! Mine is identical! Granted his gear was a lot better than mine. But after being compressed and sent out, the quality will be just about the same.

Next time I'm on vacation and national news happens, I want all AP photographers to stay away from me. OK?

I did an internet search on the photographer - his name is Joe Kaczmarek - and he is a talented NPPA photographer who lives in Philadelphia. He must be on vacation here just as I am. I guess I'll start travelling with my video camera so I can write off my trips just like he's going to now.

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Sunday, October 15, 2006

How I Survived The Hawaii Earthquake

I went outside.

Of course I'm on Maui which is one island over from the epicenter. Most of the real damage was over on the big island. By the time the shaking hit our side of Maui I think it was losing a lot of its energy.

First the condo shook a little bit. It felt like someone had started digging up the ground right behind our building with some heavy machinery. So I was slightly annoyed because it was way too early to do that on a Sunday morning. But I was also curious because there was something not quite right about how it felt. But when the rhythmic rumbling quickened into a strong shaking and the floor and windows started rattling, I recognized that we were in an earthquake.

I hollered over to my beautiful wife "OK, let's go" and darted out the bedroom and down the stairs and into the courtyard. Most of the other residents of this little complex were standing around wide-eyed. It lasted a total of maybe 15 seconds.

An aftershock hit a few minutes later that wasn't bad. Minimal damage in the condo. We did find out from a battery powered radio where the quake hit and that there was no threat of a tsunami. The power was out for about three hours so we couldn't eat at home and couldn't eat at restaurants.

There was a little place grilling chicken with a gas spit that was making a killing down in the town of Kihei. Every tourist and local wanted to get a grilled chicken dish but the line was about 150 - 200 people deep so most of us just kinda wandered and hoped the power would come back on.



The power eventually came back after about three hours and we could eat and everything was mostly normal the rest of the day.

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