But I’m back to blogging!
Well, much has happened lately, but 90% had zero to do with photography and everything to do with life/family. In fact, I’ve only been shooting three times in almost six months. First, we relocated to El Paso, Texas from Yokosuka, Japan after my wife retired from the US Navy (couldn’t be more proud of her!!). It’s a major transition for our family to say the least. Part of that trip from Yokosuka will likely be my next post, watch for it, it’s interesting and falls sternly in to realm of Murphy’s law. Then, after settling in Texas, we bought a new home and that process in itself was no simple task. With moving, being boxed in again after moving to a new house, unpacking hopefully for the last time, getting the former house ready to sell, and all that comes with getting reintegrated in to family here while adjusting to civilian life, means there’s been big things happening. I retired after a 30 year naval career myself, then spent the last ten as a military dependent. My wife retired after a 26 year naval career, so our kids have grown up in the military since birth and this transition has been huge. That means photography hasn’t been a priority, we’ve had bigger fish to fry. This morning is the first time I’m getting in my Jeep and going out shooting, no plan, no idea if I’ll get shots (or not), but just heading out to shoot with no agenda and it feels great! The one thing I do know, I have a full tank of gas. π
I’ll be back blogging here so don’t write me off just yet. Just trying to get settled as a family, make new friends at 59 years old which is harder than it sounds, and find my place in life’s next chapter. Below are just a few photos I’ve taken since coming back to the US and hoping to have many more soon. As always, I appreciate your support!
Β was taken at one of my little stops when I’m out shooting here where I currently live. Β It’s in an alley just off Blue Street in Yokosuka, Japan at a yakitori stand where they grill meat in front of you and you stand in line and eat. Β Each piece of meat is on a kebab stick, eat as much as you want, they count the sticks at the end. Β 80 Yen per stick or about 75 cents in US Dollars, not bad. Β Love eating here! Β I chose to shoot this at night because I wanted to capture just a little motion, also it’s just more colorful in the evening with the lights and coffee machine.
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Β received a new lens in the mail (Tamron 150-600 G1) and my girls wanted to go to the beach, so we went and I let them run while trying out the lens – win/win! Β This photo, taken at 
I was living in Italy and shooting with film was crazy expensive, plus I was a really crappy shooter. To save money, I sent my film to a company in California, they would develop the film as slides and send them back; it was cheap. Then I could pick out the keepers, send back the slides, and they would return the slides with prints. Why all this? Well, it prevented paying for multiple blurry photos shot with different settings (the crappy shooter thing) but it also took weeks to get prints. At just twenty years old, living in Italy, I wisely chose sell the camera gear and spend the extra cash on Napolitan pizza, pasta, and European beer. In the last years of my Navy career, I took up photography again with a little 
and eventually moved to DSLR’s. This photo of Mount Vesuvius, at right called 
minutes from a half dozen Civil War battlefields, the Smithsonian Museums, near the colonial city of Alexandria, and everything that comes with Washington, DC! The last blog post in September 2017 was 
Since then it has taken off in a big way, it has become a small business. Stock photography is tricky and it’s difficult to know where photos are used unless I search or someone tells me. By the time the blog died in September, I discovered one of my photos had been used on the cover of 
F8 & π there 