So driving around town the other day, I started to notice these signs posted along the side of the road advertising a “pet detective.” Like a for-real tracker of lost animals? Stepping straight out of a Jim Carrey movie and into the real-world streets of Lebanon. Sure.

I’m half tempted to pick up the phone just to see what it is this agency does.

Jamie and I often visit Memorial Lake, which is at the Indiantown Gap, PA. We’ve been visiting that spot for years.

I just got back from our Thanksgiving trip out to Chillicothe, Ohio, to visit family and enjoy some vacation time away from work. And stuff my face, make no mistake.

It’s quite a haul out there… at just over 8 hours driving time, you pretty much need a few days in between arriving and leaving to sort of reorient yourself to a normal schedule. Naturally, I enjoyed spending some time with some of the family members that I don’t get to see very often, like the little one above, Jamie’s brother, and Jamie’s sister’s family. She’s such a trip, that kid… almost makes me want one of my own.

We went out to the Pennsboro Pumpkin Fest today, which is out in Enola somewhere. Drea, Tim and Ryan were all old friends from high school… basically, Drea is Jamie’s best friend from 9th grade on, Tim is her boyfriend and Ryan is our good friend that we shared a few art classes with.

The three of them comprise a band named Adamo Drive who’ve played dozens of shows around the area… and by area I mean anywhere between Ohio and Maryland. They’re pretty feckin’ good.

It’s interesting to see who you still know 10+ years out of high school.

I guess I’ll never understand the moving soapbox medium known as bumper stickers. In one aspect, it does make sense to want to use the back of your vehicle to push your own thoughts and beliefs into the faces of anyone who might be traveling behind you at the time. During my daily commute to work and back, I’ve seen my fair share of messages, most of which were probably something that the driver of that car wouldn’t even say to anyone’s face.

It’s been my belief that if you strongly believe in something, sort of like the above example, you should be telling people about your thoughts and beliefs. What do you have to lose? After all, what does it really mean to you if you aren’t 100% convinced that you believe in the things you post on the outside of your truck?

Stand up for yourselves.

Even when I was very young, I’ve always had a place in which I can sit and work. Granted, the tools that I have had at my disposal have changed over the years, from crayons to pencils to tech pens to computers… but I’ve always had a flat, clean surface to work at with all of my favorite items assembled in one place.

Even as I look at the photo above, the warm light of my desk lamp illuminating the scene, reflections captured in the deep indigo blue of the top of my laptop, I’m filled with a sense of comfort. It feels like going home, if such a feeling does in fact exist.

It was one of those cold nights and I was improvising some experimental shots without a tripod. That pretty much left me placing the camera on the ground (which was just a Fuji point-n-shoot) with a pebble wedged underneath it to provide some angle. There wasn’t really anything in particular that inspired me to pose as such, it just sort of happened. I can remember it was cold as heck, though.

There are several sections of Harrisburg that are going though a period of renovation. And on a past Flickr meetup photo-walk, our intrepid group boldly traipsed through said (very rough) streets of midtown, snapping photos and wondering briefly what all of those spray-painted (C)’s meant.

Moments after I snapped this shot (the yellow paper drew my eye, obviously), we passed another building with an open window that apparently doubled as a door, since someone walked right through our group and climbed through that window to get something inside. I had to wonder if they just didn’t want to bother with the lock on the door or if they were just going to crash there for a while. Awkward.

Yes, as you can see, for a short time in my life I was a coffee shop barista. Dark lord of the roast… monarch of mocha and duke of demitasse, I ground, brewed and frothed many a latte for almost an entire year on evenings and weekends.

I suppose it was need for a bit of “comfort money” that drove me to look for a part-time job in the first place. I was already working full-time as a graphic designer at D&H Distributing in Harrisburg, PA. And though it wasn’t a bad-paying job, I had found myself struggling to keep up with bills and still have a comfortable amount of money left over at the end of the month. If anything major would have happened at the time, like needing a big car repair or medical emergency, I would have been SOL, since I was just squeaking by.

That worried me. So I decided to snag a part-time job to occupy my time after work and on the weekends, when I was just sitting around doing nothing while Jamie was at work most weekends, anyway. So after a couple of failed attempts at finding employment (even Lowe’s didn’t want me… and you should see some of the people that work there) and a couple embarrassing interviews later (being on an interview for teenager-type jobs when you’re 25 is humbling) I was finally offered a job at the Mad Hatter in Cleona.

After I got the hang of things, I was running the place by myself. I had regulars that came in and knew me by name. I knew what they wanted before they did. And I was good. Never had a complaint, never had a return. Maybe they were easy on me… I mean, we are in central Pennsylvania and not in some posh city scene where someone would complain about a 10 degree difference in the milk. But still, it was quite an interesting time, working with the ‘public’ again. If you close your mouth and just listen to people, it’s amazing what you’ll learn about them, even if they’re not trying to give anything away.

This photo is one of me in my typical ‘at-the-ready’ stances, clutter and controlled chaos all around me. I was probably waiting for a customer to come in while brewing a fresh batch of coffee or waiting for raisin scones (made from scratch, mind you) to cool. If I didn’t have to work full-time now and could actually make a good living serving coffee, I’d probably still be doing it.

Though I do like my sleep-in Saturdays…

You’re looking into the apparent abyss that is the canal running through the city of Lebanon, PA. I can’t remember if it was used for anything other than drainage, or if this was the same canal that they used to use as a small shipping lane for donkey-drawn boats. Either way, I was compelled to crawl down the concrete embankment and take this shot from under the bridge.

I like the way that there was enough murky water in the canal to perfectly reflect the poles and fencing above, creating a dark reflection of the surroundings, only to be destroyed by a mere drop falling into the beautiful facade.