PPD 78

Another shot from the free day at the gardens last Sunday. Everyone else was walking around looking at the flowers and sculptures. So naturally I sat down and took twenty frames of... a bench.

But it looks so cool!

PPD 77

Normally I'm not a fan of pictures of flowers, but this one has an otherworldly feel to it that I really like.

Taken: Sunday, April 22nd

Sidestreet Denver

I've always liked exploring the areas of cities. When I lived in Minneapolis I had a pretty nice mountain bike and nowhere to ride it, so I started doing urban offroading (my own made up name). Basically going into all the areas that most people don't go - industrial parks, alleys, under bridges, down railroad tracks and service roads. Anything that looked interesting.


Since then I've moved to Denver, taken up photography, and stopped biking so much. But I still like to go down alleyways and weird areas, so I end up with lots of offbeat photos. Not necessarily good photos, but maybe funny, or weird, or interesting. And maybe sometimes good.



Most of these photos aren't good enough that I want to post them in my PPD series. In fact I usually don't want to put any effort into them at all, beyond the taking of them. But I'd still like to share them, because I'm conceited enough to think that all eight of you reading this are interested. So to that end I've create a new SmugMug gallery, Sidestreet Denver. All this kind of stuff will get added to that, but I don't plan to mention any of it here. So if you're into that sort of thing I encourage you to go subscribe to the feed. Using of course.

PPD 76

I ran across this scene in the dooryard of the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception on Colfax. There was a service about to start and a number of people hurried past on their way from the parking lot. Nobody paid any attention to this homeless man napping on the bench.

Update 04/18/2007: Argh, I just noticed that Blogger was cropping off the sides of the picture! I changed it to a smaller version, but I encourage you to click through to the full size.

I guess that's what I get for not looking at these after I posts them. [sigh]

PPD 75

PPD 74

So fat... so very fat... A big fat cat, sitting in a big fat sunshine spot. He really seemed to like it too - he sat still long enough for me to get off my bike, snap seven pictures, and ride away.

Taken: Sunday, April 1st
Edits: Cropped, saturation up

PPD 73

 

Morning sun shining through late season icicles.

Taken: Friday, March 30th
Edits: Cropped

PPD 72

"Best for Wear and Weather" eh? Looks pretty faded to me. Althoug that sign above is in even worse shape, so maybe there is something to that.

Taken: Friday, March 30th
Edits: Cropped, brightness corrected

A Sunday Walk

 Since Sunday was such a nice day here in Denver I took a long walk through downtown. This is a very short of photo journal of a fairly long walk.

Walking north from my house I headed into the Five Points area. It's not exactly the nicest area, so this picture seemed appropriate. Although really it is a bit nicer than this might lead you to believe.

Heading north I came upon this antique truck. It's a pretty truck, but I was mostly amused by an antique truck parked in front of a building with not one but two satellite dishes. Yes, I'm easily amused. (Also, my time at Echostar tells me that one on the balcony is a Dish 500, probably covering the 110 and 119 degree orbital slots, and the one on the roof is a Dish 300 wingdish pointed at 148. Stupid Echostar.)

Further up the block I found this bird's nest "floating in the clouds".

Farther north is a light industrial area around Walnut Street. I like the area because there are some interesting pictures to be taken. Also, there aren't a lot of people around on the weekend, so there are less people looking at me funny for walking down alleys taking pictures of smokestacks and grafitti.

There are a lot of storage lots in the area. This one stored a lot of PVC.

Heading towards downtown there are scattered lofts being developed. This building is being rebuilt, probably to serve the new residents. You can see where a window was bricked up, painted over, and is now being revealed again by the removed paint.

Downtown trivia: there's half a block covered in rusted out, graffiti covered double-decker buses.

Coors Field has acres of parking lots, nearly deserted on a Sunday with no game. The only activity is a teenager using all that empty space to practice driving.

After an interminable trudge across the empty parking lots, I finally ended up downtown across from the Denver Chophouse. The side of the building contains this dedication which, while touching, is oddly placed facing a bus-only entrance ramp you can see in the reflection. There's also some irony to be had in the backwards "Wrong Way" sign reflected in the window.

PPD 71

I like this picture because the bushes just look like summer... or maybe I need to put down the bong. Also because it looks like it could be out in the country somewhere, when in fact it's at 24th & Ogden.

Taken: Sunday, March 25th