2009 : In Photographs

2010.01.03 in personal, photography, and thoughts

I took thousands of pictures this year (not including well over 20,000 timelapse stills for my final video project). I've pulled a few out of that batch which represent particular moments (unfortunately there are no pictures of Kaitlyn and I, something I'll have to remedy for next year!). A lot of these have already been posted here; this is to collect them together to make myself realize that these are all moments from the last year. Also, you'll have to differentiate between the two Amys yourself (it should be obvious in most cases); every time I add initials like we do in real life, the words look funny on the screen! They're in almost-chronological order (the vertical pictures mix this up a bit):



rms came and stayed with Matt (right down the hall from us) while at the RPI stop on his lecture circuit. It was quite an enlightening evening, to say the least. I've also been told there's a semi-significant possibility it's going to happen again this year! The picture is of Matt's signed ThinkPad lid. bigger



I finally gave up on Jayne mk. I (because of heat and expandability issues) and built a monster mk. II to replace it. Currently has a total of 6TB of storage, 8GB of RAM, and a nice 4890. Good, solid machine! bigger



RPI's administration had their share of issues this year, with the student body protesting over transparency within the 'tute's decision-making process. I'm afraid the issue is far from resolved at the moment, and I don't expect to see anything change during my stay in Troy. Luckily, I'm in the group of people affected the least by all of the decisions (I don't want to take foreign language classes, I don't eat at Commons, I live off campus, I don't want to be an RA, etc.), but I feel bad for those who are! bigger



Dad and I made a spur of the moment trip down to Cape Canaveral in hopes of seeing one of the last few shuttle launches. Unfortunately, some sort of leak caused a delay, and we weren't able to see the launch. There are still a few left, but I'm afraid we're going to have to settle for a Constellation/Orion/Ares launch instead. bigger



On the left, Matt sits depressed (not really, I promise!) in the hall in Davison as his Welcome Wagon and plastic flowers fail to lure Amy away from Nate. Not that that was his intent, or anything! bigger

On the right is the Girellis' dog, Bongo, who we all became good friends with while he stayed with his grandparents, across the street from us. He's grown to a slightly-less adorable size at this point, but we have lots of pictures of him from the good old days — and he's still very friendly! bigger



This remains one of my favorite pictures from my big lens — a happy, adorable Carol waving to us on a gloomy Troy day. She's the only one besides Matt who'll ever pose for pictures, so I take every opportunity! Hi, Carol! bigger



Some manner of hat epidemic broke out late in the spring semester; Matt, Nate, and Robb together purchased enough hats for a few small families! (this might be a slight exaggeration, depending on your definition of a family, but there was more than one hat per person) Matt, of course, acquired a red fedora. bigger



Carol, Connor, Ben, Andrew, and I (along with dozens of classmates) spent a good chunk of the semester toying with 8051s in hopes of stabilizing one of the LITEC blimps; this is a shot of some of the blimps resting on their moorings. We all eventually succeeded (some *ahem*Carol*ahem* with only moments to spare) — yay! bigger



Matt went to visit Mary at Amherst; he decided that he didn't know the way to the bus station, so I accompanied him to Albany. Unfortunately, we were very, very short on time, so we ended up running down the hill from Empire State Plaza (to shouts of "run, Forrest, run!" from bystanders) to the Greyhound station. Ended up succeeding, and Matt (I hear) had a nice weekend with Mary. I had to climb back up the hill to get to my bus home, so I took some more pictures around the Plaza while catching my breath and waiting for said bus. bigger



ISS became the third brightest object in the sky (after the Sun and Moon) this year; shortly afterwards, I made it my mission to capture it on its way overhead. This is my best shot of many as it streaked across the Colchester sky. bigger



In June, I traveled further from home than I'd ever been — and alone! I attended the Ubuntu Developer Summit for the Karmic Koala release, in Barcelona. I had a lot of fun, and (unlike some people who were there with me...) toured around the city in my free time. Sitting at my desk right now I have a hard time believing that I actually made it there and back and was outgoing enough when I needed to be and didn't die on any of my solo treks into the city... certainly a learning experience! bigger



For whatever reason, I took Amy's senior picture this year. I think it came out quite well; there are a bunch of alternatives, too, but this is the one she used. At the time, Mom was trying to pose Amy on various rocks and things around Airport Park; we saw this post and just had to run off and take some shots there; and they stuck! bigger

On the left is some of Amy's beading, which she's been spending a good bit of time on this year, as she makes all sorts of awesome little things for various people. It's also fun to grab the macro lens and take pictures of tiny little beads and intricate wire patterns! bigger



Another example of Amy's increasing craftiness; she made a beautiful rendition of the BSG logo out of chocolate on my birthday cake; she has since made many, many more awesome chocolate-based cake designs for various occasions. bigger



Over the summer, the four of us visited Boston to tour various colleges for Amy (and to hang out in Boston!). She got totally sold on MCPHS while we were there, and has since been accepted! So hopefully (the only roadblock being Mom, worried about her being so far away) by the next time I'm writing a wrapping-up-the-year blog post, Amy will have had a whole semester cozily settled into a dorm on The Fenway. bigger



Matt, Mike, Nate, Robb, and I all moved out of RPI's dorms and into an apartment; we've been there for a whole semester now, and it's been great! We've got a lot of space now, and best of all, a kitchen! The lack of dining halls is a little strange, sometimes, but I can't say that I miss Commons' food. bigger



A very significant part of my time during the fall semester was spent working on projects for Intermediate Video (1, 2, 3); it was well worth it, for sure — I had a lot of fun, got an A, and only irritated Matt a little bit with the constant (every 30 seconds) shutter clattering for two or three weeks on end. bigger



Matt acquired ants to fill an ant farm he'd had sitting around from a few Christmases ago; someone (Mike, I believe) got the great idea to set up a webcam on the ants and post it to reddit. Nate then plopped his laptop on its side behind the webcam and the ants, blaring Cascada and running the iTunes visualizer as a backdrop for the dancing ants (unfortunately, this part is not pictured). Amy was visiting at the time, so she might have gotten a slightly skewed idea of college life. Two or three weeks, a few thousand justin.tv viewers, and hours of — quite literally — laughing out loud later, we ended up shutting off the webcam. Some clips appear to remain on the site, and we have a nice reddit thread, too. bigger



"Get up, get out of bed, and get in the car." "O...K...?". Carol and Hana dragged me to Larkfest, Albany's (apparently) annual street fair. I wasn't sure what was up at first, but ended up having a great (if slightly shy, at times) day out with the girls, wandering the street (and hiding, while they shopped for jewelry) and consuming gigantic burritos. More pictures on Flickr, and there's a picture of the three of us on the Times Union website, too! bigger



Matt had a particularly unhappy day, so Nate and Mike went out and bought him a tiny orange betta fish, named Wanda (after the Gnome mascot, not the movie, though I'm sure there's a relation there!). Wanda's still happily swimming (though she took quite a long car ride home to Boston for both Thanksgiving and Christmas break, she survived somehow!) and providing Matt with dozens of hours of entertainment. bigger



Every year, Gnome holds a developer summit at MIT in Boston; this was the second year that Matt and I were in attendance. We spent a significant part of this conference hanging out (and discussing the finer points of the future of Gnome) with Jason, who I worked with over the summer on gnome-games. The picture is of after the conference (I'm too shy to take lots of pictures of people I only know from the internet!), when we went to visit Amy in Davis Square. It's got a little of everything; a classic Matt pose, Amy ignoring Matt, random strange bystanders, etc. bigger



Awwwwwwwwww. 'nuff said. All things grow with love! bigger



And that's it! The end of the year; a Christmas Poinsettia! bigger

What a great year :-)