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There’s just no way to sugar coat a blah grey day like this!

I am predictable!

Here we are all dressed up!

I see a dolphin and a seahorse. Go…

My first storm that I was able to follow was a blast. Had a few hiccups in the process, one being I forgot my camera so all I had was the one built into my phone. The other issue being that I was unable to get a hold of our local Skywarn net operators so I had to crank up my radio and talk with the central Indiana net. Once they got used to the fact that I tend to ramble we all got along great.

I did get to follow a cell that had rotation and even managed to generate a funnel but it never got past that stage. Probably a good thing considering the communication issues I was dealing with. So, lets get to some photos:

This is the cell when I started

Heavy precipitation, but still disorganized

Promising

Funnel as it was dying

Let me just take a moment to say that I was annoyed at this point. I had nowhere to pull off and my phone had slid off to the side. The funnel was quite impressive when I first spotted it.

Front of a new cell, cool look

I could have continued chasing but I was tired, mentally and physically. That precipitation in the distance was hard, fast, and as I found out, packed with pea size hail. I just sat on the side of the road and enjoyed the clattering on the roof of my truck till I could see the road again!

Fair time is coming. Rides are being setup as I type this. I usually am rather excited about this, not so much this year.

Maybe by the time it actually starts my enthusiasm will return but for now, I just don’t feel it. Not sure why, it’s a cornucopia of photography subjects just waiting to be shot.

Maybe, just maybe, it has something to do with the fact that it’s going to be hot as blazes out there the entire week. Maybe I’m just getting too old to enjoy it. Maybe my health has something to do with it.

Anyway, I need to go shake myself out of this funk. Going to go find someone to talk to on my radio.

73′s

Well?

Yes it was time for my annual “volunteering” to photograph at the Indiana para-transit roadeo. As usual it was a lot of fun and as usual I took way too many photos. It took forever to sort through them and pick the ones they would want versus ones that I shot more for myself.

Finally done with that portion of the task and now I have to burn them to disc and distribute them. I am going to share one of my favorites now and get off here so I can watch the storm that’s getting ready to hit!

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I’ll warn you now, this post may get a little boring!

First photo up is my old school, North White. I tried to close crop it since they have built on a lot since I went there. Matter of fact this building used to be the whole school, now they have separate buildings for everything. I guess my little school grew up!

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Next up is the Monon theater, It may not look like much but to me it was an escape. At one point my dad ran this theater. He let me run the projectors for awhile, my first real job. There were perks to having my dad run the theater, not the least of which was the free popcorn!

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Now lets take a look at a place I have mentioned here before, Querry Pharmacy. I have so many fond memories of the place that I can’t possibly recall them all here. They had a soda fountain with the best root beer in the world! They had a rack of comic books and magazines which I was constantly picking through. They sold 45′s (yes that’s dating myself a bit) I love music so after the comics were all perused I went straight to the music section. It has been stripped of it’s former glory, all that remains is the word Coca Cola painted onto the window. Oh yeah, here’s the photo:

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Lets look at a mural, not just any mural mind you, but one the high school painted to celebrate the bi-centennial in 1976. I remember that year, the celebration was over the top, especially for such a small town. They had live music, vendors, rides, and games all set up in the middle of Main street!

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Monon was pretty much based around the railroad for the longest time. I’m sure you’ve heard of or seen a Monon railroad reference, or maybe not. This was the towns identity for the longest time until people stopped riding the trains everywhere. Soon a large company formed there called Monon Trailer. It soon became the towns identity, they were proud of their factory. It kept the town alive for many years, then it faded away. There was some scandal, maybe a little borrowing of money from the till and it was gone. Others tried to take it’s place but it was never the same. Now, Monon has taken back it’s railroad identity, much less embarrassing!

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I was going to do a big spread on the town park, that was my favorite place to go when money was tight. I loved the playground, now most of it’s gone, replaced with some monstrosities that they deem “safe”. There was a horse corral where they had regular horse shows, gone! You used to be able to go out into the woods and hike, now private property. So what was left of the park for me, not much. Just this broken down old bridge, I totally identify with it now!

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~FIN~