Category Archives: Michigan

I live in Michigan, been there all my life, generally in the Detroit or East Lansing areas.

Curious Praying Mantis Video

I caught this crawling away from the corner of the garage and it looks like some spiderwebs from the corners and some grass clippings were stuck. Not sure if that was slowing it down or was just super curious.

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I was watching it for a while but a lot of the video or photos wasn’t in focus so I didn’t use it. Here’s some video I took, actually a few short ones edited together.


What was that noise at 5 seconds in?!?!?

I’m not sure if this insect was hurt or not. I let it crawl up on to a shovel and then carefully carried it outside. I think it just had too much crud stuck to it or it was wondering what I was doing…?

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You can click to enlarge the photos. Please correct me as to the correct name of this insect if I got it wrong.

FYI, I created this video with the YouTube Video Editor which is VERY easy to use. (I uploaded the videos, dragged them in order, trimmed a little off the ends and voila!

Back to Michigan from Canada, Alaska, Chicago and everywhere in-between.

So we got up this morning and boarded a chartered bus from Chicago and back to the Detroit area. It was a long bus ride and we arrived tired and I recall it being really really hot when we arrived (a bank parking lot in Pleasant Ridge, the same spot we left from). I’m thinking it was kind of hot on the bus, so maybe something was broken(?).

Nothing else exciting, we stopped somewhere for lunch but no photos from today (sorry). I’ll scan those other pictures eventually (the two nice group shots and some black and white photos), hopefully more sooner than later (I did start making room for the scanner). I never found the photos that I took with the 110 camera, I looked all over for them but sadly never found them. I even looked for the pewter bear that I bought as a souvenir in Alaska, but no luck there either…

Since I don’t have any photos from today, here’s a few panoramic photos that I don’t think I posted here (a few might have been posted to Facebook already). I just tried to pick random ones but they’re mostly from Banff National Park and some glaciers in Alaska.

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Mendenhall Glacier.

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Near (in?) Banff National Park.

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In Banff National Park near the Chateau Lake Louise.

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Near Banff National Park.

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Glacier Bay.

It was a great trip and I really enjoyed reliving it while sharing it with you all here.

If you’re reading this post out of context, this is me re-journaling a trip to Alaska from when I was a kid. You might want to click the “trip to Alaska” link and go to the bottom and read them in order. I’m posting each entry on the same day that it happened years ago.

Biking on Hines Drive today

So it’s Saturday and I was biking Hines Drive (again). It was extra windy so it was ext a difficult biking, but I’d got the 25-mile Tour de Troit next week so I thought maybe I should do the whole 15-miles today.

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It was extra green today, so that was nice, summer has been so dry, the grass has looked like straw and I’ve been waiting for tumbleweeds to roll out in front of me.

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I did get to see a dear running (galloping?), I had seen it a few minutes before and waited for it to come out the woods, but it didn’t so I started biking and it caught up to me again. I didn’t even stop to take this one, it’d have gotten away if I had!

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I saw this guy go zooming by on his Lightning F40. He was flying (I didn’t stop to take this one either) I saw him pass the bikers in the distance and look how far away they are still! He was flying!

The Fisher Building

I’ve got this huge painting of the Fisher Building. It’s got to be six feet high and it fits perfect in my condo. I get lots of compliments all the time on it. The first few years I had it, I hadn’t even realized it was the Fisher building.

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It’s up very high on the wall (the bottom is at least eight feet up?) so I couldn’t get a straight on shot. But this didn’t come out too bad for my iPhone with the flash in a very dim room!

I’m mentioning this today, because I made a panorama of the Fisher building while downtown.


I was a little too close, I’ll do one on a nicer day later and try to stand back a little farther for the whole effect.

Does anyone know if there is a restaurant or viewing platform up top?!?

Microsoft PhotoSynth is AWESOME!

I have a confession to make. My favorite iPhone app is made by… (wait for it!) Microsoft! Yes, I said the “M” word! This program is awesome and easy for creating 360° panoramas, it’s called Photosynth. Actually, it’s more than 360°, it’s right/left and up/down and all the pieces in-between. I’m going to call it 720° panoramas, okay?

This is the last one I did, and it’s actually one of the better ones. Other than looking straight down, it’s pretty much perfect. Just so you know, the app calculates everything on the phone before you upload and share it. Plus, it tags it with your location. Once it’s on the website you can point out certain highlights (buildings, bridges, etc.). It’s amazing!

Direct link to the Hart Plaza 720° Photosynth.

To view them, it appears you need MicroSoft Silverlight or HTML 5 (at least the latter is why I think you can view it on an iPhone that does not have the app installed).

You can view all of my Photosynths at the Msoft Photosynth site.

Also, from the web site, you can specify where you were and what you were facing, I see that making for some interactive hopping from Photosyth “bubble” to “bubble”…

Direct link to the Deserted Warehouse 720° Photosynth.

The second one is a deserted building that I like in Downtown Detroit. It’s where I took the lost bride photo

This is the first time I tried to embed them and it looks pretty good so far. Please let me know if you have problems viewing them. And I’m also interested in how they might view on your mobile devices.

Update: I couldn’t view the embedded Photosynths on my iPhone so I added direct links. Those seem to work fine.

Deer running along Hines Drive

I was out biking this weekend (again) and was playing with a new camera (not mine) and as I was biking along I saw a dear up ahead.

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I got some stills and some video. But I was still standing there on the bike so I’m not the steadiest I could be. At the end I was at 14x which also contributes to the extra shakiness and I didn’t have glasses on so I couldn’t really see how focused it was.


Direct HD link on YouTube

This is not a soundtrack I added later, it just happened to be what was playing on my bike stereo when I saw the deer, I thought it worked out well…

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The last one turned around and went back (after already crossing the road), I’m not sure why he got spooked when the others didn’t. I went over to the side of the road and sat down for a bit, but never saw any appear on either side of the road again.

(This was on Hines Drive between Inkster Rd. and Middlebelt Rd.)

Glass Totems in Dearborn – Day 10 of 31 photos in 31 days

I like these “glass totems” but whoever put them here did not position them for optimum sunlight and there isn’t any lighting for at night. They’re part of a Dearborn Outdoor Sculpture Exhibition enrichment that they’ve done for a few years with the Midwest Sculpture Initiative.

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While I wouldn’t pay $8,000 for these, I get to see them for free and when I’m bored of it in a year, it’ll be gone, possibly replaced with something else.

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This is for my 31 photos in 31 days project today.

Hart Plaza Reflection – Day 9 of 31 photos in 31 days

I was out roller blading again down by the Detroit River and I got this shot totally by accident at least the reflection part was by accident, I was aiming at the rest. Next time I’ll do some more like it on purpose, but this one was a happy accident.

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I was standing on my tippy-toes to get this photo of the fountain over the stairs (by the Underground Railroad memorial) and I got the reflection off of the marble and I really like the way it came out. This is for my 31 photos in 31 days project today.

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This is the Detroit Princess Riverboat they run all sorts of trips on the river (starting at $20) and private party rentals. This was taken outside Cobo Hall.

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THe is the old Parke Davis & Co. building. It’s now a hotel and this is an area they have with benches outside. It’s about to start raining (yes, I got a little wet) so no one is out there right now…