Toby the Bear and Discovering Rastafari!

When I wasn't diagnosing PHP, include, widget and JavaScript code problems related to this broken blog over the weekend, I did manage to get out to the Nature’s Best Photography Windland Smith Rice International Awards Exhibition 2007 at the Smithsonian National Museum of National History. There were some great photos with fascinating narratives about the technical aspects of each photo or a story behind the winning images:

"The Buffalo Zoo is very fortunate to have a particularly handsome Kodiak bear named Toby. On a late summer morning I discovered Toby being annoyed by some pesky bees. As they continued to fly around his head I took a series of shots and this was one of my favorites. Toby had a worried look on his face, wondering if that bee was going to get any closer to his nose."

The photos were fantastic but the exhibit left me feeling inferior about my camera. Now I have camera envy.

After that we went to see Sea Monsters 3D which was fun but not that enlightening. I learned a lot more at the Discovering Rastafari! exhibit, but I didn't understand why it was at the Museum of National History. Perhaps there's wildlife living in those dreadlocks.

After that I met up with Jessica and many of my fellow returned Peace Corps Volunteers who served with me in Kazakstan in 1996-1997. Jessica has been living on the island of Sri Lanka and has some very interesting photos on her Flickr account.

I was tricked again by TJ into going to another realtor party tonight. When people start talking about flipping, gutting and pointing a property I'll just go to that happy space inside my head where people don't talk about such things. I went last year and it actually wasn't so bad. When realtors are around each other they don't feel compelled to try the hard sell on you or bore you with fantastic house-flipping stories. Perhaps there's some realtor code of honor that they don't breach the topic when there are more than two realtors in one room.