Adrian Ziemkowski's LiveJournal

4th of July

2007-07-05T11:52:00Z

We got married on the 4th of July so that we can always have fireworks on our anniversary.

It was raining too much to go to the city show this year, but lots of people were launching their own. Having grown up in Arizona, a state that made fireworks illegal, it is strange to witness. Fireworks are constantly going off in every direction, creating a thick smoke haze.

As you can see, some of them are quite impressive for DIY fireworks.

See the other fireworks being launched from two spots? On this small street there were three groups of people all launching their own fireworks.

This was what it looked like a few hours earlier after the heavy rain. Unfortunately all this rain has been missing the lake that all of South Florida lives off of, so we're still in a bad drought.

I built Karen a bookshelf!

2007-06-04T00:53:46Z

You can get a bit of an idea of what it looked like before. It used to be an opening to the room next to it, but a previous owner made a wall, but only had it flush to the small room, leaving a recess in the master bedroom... perfect for a bookshelf!

Rounded edges of course. The 45-degree corners are a nod to Battlestar: Galactica's cut corners theme.

I'm also replacing all the baseboards in the house. It makes the house look a bit messy, as you can tell on the right where the wall has no baseboards. I'm getting close to done, you can see all the corner pieces to the right of the chair. Once done, I'll caulk the tops and edges and grout the bottoms on the tile. Finally I'll seal all the grout in the house to give it that nice glossy look and to prevent discoloring or cracking. If only I had more time to do all this!

Working with power tools is quite satisfying, which in itself is rather relieving considering the amount of classical music and opera I listen to in the car! The garage is my work area:

The miter saw was essential because of the BSG corners, which required the round edges to match perfectly. Before this project, I used to cut baseboards with a handheld jig saw, which was not only laborious but subject to many more errors.

After all the pieces were in place, it was time to prime it. I thought that 6 shelves would be ideal and evenly spaced them. The stud finder I have for the baseboards was a great help because it also has a laser level, which was quite useful when aligning the mounts on the sides (which each have two heavy screws going into the studs of the frame), which you can see in the photos above.

After another coat of primer and two coats of high gloss (that I then let dry for two weeks to keep the books from sticking to it), it was ready to use:

(see it on Flickr with descriptive notes)

I was only allocated the top shelf (because Karen can't reach it!), but ended up also using the left half below the top and the left part above her shoes for text books. I'll probably thin down mine to at least one and a half rows. Karen has a lot more books at her parents' house still, so soon it will be completely full!

Photos of Jason & Luciana

2007-04-20T12:36:07Z

Wednesday we met up with my friend and co-worker Jason Pirkey and his wife, Luciana, for a photo shoot at the Hillsboro Pier in Deerfield Beach.

Gotta love magic hour!

New Website Published!

2007-02-05T00:50:08Z

Check it out:

I think it does a much better job representing what you get with us. I'm excited!

So if you sit and watch or go through the introduction flash you'll see most of the photos, but you can also see them (and some more) on any other page on the site as we have a sidebar with random photos. Click on any photo on the sidebar to reload it, or just wait and it'll refresh every minute... for example, see the Packages & Rates page.

Still processing images for it, especially for the front page.

I'll make the blog match the site later tonight, and hopefully create an "About Us" page with a photo from our own wedding.

Western Vacation: Highway 89 and Horseshoe Bend

2007-01-03T03:47:04Z

The trip up Highway 89 to Page was beautiful, though difficult to photograph. I saw this vista out the window and pulled over for some shots. I set the camera on a guard rail with the lens on a rock and took this timed photo.

I tried to frame the famous shot you see of Horseshoe Bend, but the evening sun was right in the lens and the 17mm focal length made it hard to avoid a bad lens flare. We're going back tomorrow after Antelope Slot Canyon as we head back down Highway 89 towards the scenic Highway 89A and the Vermillion Cliffs, as the lighting will be ideal and won't require HDR magic (at least not as much).

I forgot to post this yesterday, so here it is...

Karen Standin' on the Corner in Winslow, Arizona.
We were only a half hour away from Winslow while visiting Meteor Crater, so Karen insisted that we head there and visit the famous landmark from the Eagles' song "Take it Easy", even though it was pitch black outside.

Don't miss my previous post or my Flickr photo set of our Western Vacation so far!

Our Western Vacation (so far)

2007-01-02T05:07:20Z

Here I am sitting on a ledge on the south rim of the grand canyon.

I got to introduce Karen to snow, which was a lot of fun. Karen absolutely loves the snow and still gets excited whenever she sees snow on the side of the road.

Our "western vacation" was then paused for 5 days for my sister's wedding, which I'll post about when I get home.

Here you can see Karen chimping on the side of the road and our rental car (the horrible horrible horrible PT Cruiser, which was clearly designed by monkeys).

We climbed the "mountain" (yes, we're from Florida) a couple hundred feet and it qualified as Karen's first real rugged hike. These shots are wonderful and I look forward to posting them when I get back to Florida (and back to using Aperture on my Mac Pro and not a laptop!).

After a night in Prescott with my mom, we drove over Mingus Mountain to Jerome and then Dinner at John's parents' place. We were delayed though because after helping Karen up from sitting in the snow, I helped pat the snow off and my wedding ring went flying! Unfortunately it wasn't virgin snow, so there was no way to tell where it went. I kicked around the snow for a while and then as I was giving up, I kicked one last bit and Karen saw something... sure enough it was my ring! Lucky lucky!

Last night John came up and stayed with us at a hotel in Flagstaff and we went and played pool downtown until midnight, when the giant pinecone was lowered and everybody went wild.

Today we tried to go to Snow Bowl but apparently they close the road when the ski resort is closed, which is rather annoying and disapointing (my tax dollars not at work). I wanted to show Karen more snow.

Afterwards we went to Meteor Crater. On the way we saw a sign for Walnut Canyon National Monument. Since we had time and we are going around looking at parks and what not, we checked it out and were quite amazed.

Still in love with snow after a week, Karen was tossing snowballs around and covering herself with snow.

I'll post photos from the monument after I get back to Arizona. It's an absolutely beautiful place that we just randomly decided to visit when we saw the sign on the way to Meteor Crater.

We loved it. I don't know the last time I've been outside and really didn't hear anything at all.

Tomorrow we're going to Page, Arizona, and around the local monuments and parks. The next day we're taking 89A up to Zion National Park, with a stop at the Vermillion Cliffs National Park. I've taken Route 89 there before and that was amazing, so I can't wait to experience 89A past Page... the stretch of 89A near where I grew up through Sedona / Oak Creek is amazing and not to be missed, so I'm hoping for the same. The next day we're going to Hoover Dam to drive on it before they close the road for security reasons, and then reaching our final destination at Paris, Las Vegas.

I love that I get to do all this with Karen and be her guide to the west.

Three brothers

2006-10-09T18:25:35Z

Yesterday we had a portrait shoot with three adorable brothers, two of them twins.

One of the twins was also named Adrian, which made him feel rather affectionate toward me:

Peter & Judy

2006-09-07T12:40:28Z

Peter & Judy by Adrian Ziemkowski.

We took some photos of Karen's parents at their house after dinner last night. We had a lot of fun. I like this one as it feels like a special moment with the way my father-in-law is looking at his wife.

My Day Job

2006-08-26T00:37:05Z

So when I'm not taking photos or writing software, I'm working at S&H Solutions. I thought I'd take some photos of S&H for my friends and family...

The building is right next to I-95 just south of Linton in Delray Beach and the logo can be seen as you drive by.
I'm on the second floor.

Demo Platform for our S&H Greenpoints customer loyalty program.

Everywhere you look we have old branding items.

This one is quite old. It's a catalog you can flip through by pressing the brass lever at the bottom right.

Jason sits in his cube, next to mine on the right.

My workspace with a photo of Karen, an ISS desktop picture, SETI mouse pad, and diet cherry coke (because they were out of diet vanilla cherry coke). I have headphones on the desktop but I rarely ever use them.

Frank Fradella and the Valley of Shadows

2006-08-08T16:07:20Z

Frank Fradella and the Valley of Shadows by Adrian Ziemkowski.

Sunday night I went on a shoot with Karen's friend and a published author, Frank Fradella. His fun and engaging personality lent itself well to the shoot, as we took lots of off the wall photos, some with wine and a cigar. This photo shows him with probably his best known book.

I'll probably post a few more fun ones to Flickr and deviantArt, so add me as a friend on either if you're interested.

We also took some serious photos, one of which he's using on his next book's cover, Speaking in Tongues.

The Caribbean Princess at St. Thomas

2006-07-26T01:40:29Z

The Caribbean Princess at St. Thomas by Adrian Ziemkowski.

This is our ship at our first port of call, St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands in the Eastern Caribbean.

We've had such a wonderful day today and the entire trip so far has been absolutely perfect!

More photos in Karen's Flickr.

The Fourth Company

2006-06-24T00:45:15Z

So I've just incorporated my fourth company and my second active one; Táve Corporation. It's my first C-Corporation, which is both exciting and daunting.

My Corporations:

Ziemkowski Visions LLC, 1997-2000, Arizona LLC
d/b/a ZVNet (IT consulting)
d/b/a Comperfect (PC Repair)
d/b/a Táve Software (Photo Software for BeOS)
BeNews Corporation, 1998-2000, Delaware S-Corporation
Ziemkowski Visions LLC, 2005-Today, Florida LLC
d/b/a The Solardust Emporium
Táve Corporation, 2006-Today, Florida C-Corporation

Today our Articles of Incorporation were approved by The State of Florida. We have our EIN as well. The rest of the formation process will be slower going, but this is half of the important work.

The next important task is to register the 9-year-old logo with the USPTO this weekend.

I can't believe it has been 9 years since Táve was born. It's sad that it took this long to find an idea that would work. We got close with Táve Imagination, but a series of unfortunate events and decisions kept us from making it.

Now the tough part... releasing a product by the end of the year.

Woops!

2006-04-26T00:34:10Z

So after going out early on Sunday for the balloon "race" I mentioned in my last post, we went to the photography meetup in miami beach with dannyhammontree and vividlilac.

I saw several helicopters fly by and heard lots of loud noise that sounded like boats at full throttle. So I took my camera and went to investigate. Turns out there was a boat race in progress, so of course I snapped a few photos.

After getting all that I could get from way up on the edge of the beach, standing on a cement ledge, I decided to go up to the water and take some closer shots. But on jumping down, I snapped something other than a photo! I wasn't able to walk and had to use a monopod as a cane to get back to the car, and Karen had to drive back to Coral Springs even though she shouldn't be driving for another week or so.

At the ER I learned that I had ripped a tendon and broken a bone. They gave me meds and put my right foot into a half-cast splint.

I've spent the last two days laying on the couch with my foot up, mostly sleeping and in a decent amount of pain when not.

Today I saw a sports medicine doctor, who thinks the ER was a bit wrong. He thinks I damaged all three tendons in that area on top of ripping off the top of the bone, so he ordered an MRI and I went next door to the hospital to have that done. Lots of firsts—first broken tendon(s), first broken bone, first time on crutches, first MRI... oh how fun.

Regardless, I'll be in crutches for all of May. I probably won't be able to drive for another two weeks, which is troublesome since I work 20 miles away.

No power, but we're returning to reality

2005-10-26T23:06:51Z

So Karen's parents now have power and thus I'm able to update LiveJournal.

Here's our big tree that I've always been afraid would fall on our house in a hurricane:

If it had happened after the eye passed over us, it would have fallen on us. Luckily it was down before the eye passed! I actually took this photo inside the eye of the hurricane. About 15 minutes after I took this the wall you see in the background reached us and the winds were back up to 110mph with higher gusts, which caused the roof to make lots of noise as the rain gutters ripped off the building (slamming on the roof in the process, talking about stressful!) and causing the windows to start bulging so much some were pulling out of their frames.

We don't have power yet, and there is tons of damage to the community, but we did a lot better than others in the community that had serious structural damage.

Here's a photo that I took before the eye hit. You can see a large trampoline being blown across the street, dragging a shrub that it was attached to with it. You can see some of our shrubs blowing in the wind at the bottom right. Rain was "falling" horizontally, thus the door window was soaked and covered in leaves... even the roof above the door had leaves stuck to it after the storm.

I'll post a collection to to the web once we get power.

What an experience!

Eek! Hunker Down!

2005-10-24T10:36:53Z

The wind is going crazy! Trees are lopsided, stop signs shaking like no tomorrow. This is only the outer part of what looks like a direct hit! The power keeps going out.

Hurricane Wilma

2005-10-23T20:29:31Z

The shot of the everglades on the right was taken yesterday, when we already had feeder bands soaking us while the eye was in the Yucatan.

So we're less than 24 hours out from a potentially devastating storm. It will be weakened because of passing over the Florida peninsula, but will likely still be a Category 2 storm when it passes over us. Broward County, where we live, is a potential target. I locked down the shutters and brought in some stuff from outside. Now it's just time to sit it out, working on the computer and watching movies.

Last night I redid the front page contents of The Solardust Emporium. It no longer shows actual products on the first page and it shows a different model shot on each load (reconfiguring the layout slightly if needed). Only two up so far, but I'm getting close on a third. Photos with people take a while to process, especially with a light shirt on a white backdrop.

I've been making changes to the site here and there when I get a chance. The email list sign up page and the shipping page are both new.

Now that's housework

2005-07-18T02:46:52Z

So much to do in the house! Boxes everywhere, junk everywhere. I just want it to all be put away and everything to be spotless.

I've already put up a good deal of the baseboards, but I'd say I have another third of the house to do. Once they're up, I'll still need to caulk them all, cover the nail holes, and add grout bellow the boards in the tiled public areas.

It really has been slow going now that we're in the house and we have all the amenities of a lazy life. I hate that though, because I just don't feel good when I see the messes and the incompleteness of it all.

The mess has been made much worse because I moved all of the boxes out of my office and into the dining room.

Bringing down the house

2005-06-01T00:16:09Z

We closed on our house on Friday!

The next day was spent ripping up the carpet and trying to figure out what to do about the tile. The garage is absolutely unbearable because of the carpet; it smells like dog pee. I also had to vacuum inside the air conditioning intake, because their filter was so saturated that it was pulled apart for air to get through (it had over an inch of gunk). All in all, the house smells a lot better now!

On Sunday, we rented a chipping tool for 48 hours from Home Depot. I got right to work, and by Monday night, had all the tile in the house ripped up (well, except for the bathrooms). We'll have to rent the tool for one more day so I can clean up the bonding a bit. Karen was working quite hard too, cleaning up the tile and brushing debris from where I was working. She has also been fixing up holes in the walls.

We're going to be installing larger 16-18" tile, painting the entire place, and putting in new floor boards. The master bedroom and Karen's office will be carpeted. We're leaving the floor in my office alone to save some money.

I'm so sore today, that I couldn't go to work. I'm feeling better though, so I'll be good to go tomorrow, and to start work on the house again.

Certainly Not a Major Update

2004-01-24T08:26:52Z

As I mentioned several hours ago, Fox Searchlab has posted the short I was a part of on the Fox Studio Backlot.

The reason I found it was because I was working on some updates to adrian.ziemkowski.com. I updated my filmography and put up pages for The Ilene Silverman Show, Wedding Dreams, and added the Gainesville Today ad to the WGFL page. Once I discovered that the Searchlab short had been put up, I downloaded it, watched it, took screenshots, and made a page for it too. It has several old digital photos from it too.

Here's one of the screenshots:

Check out adrian.ziemkowski.com! I changed out the generic flag with something a bit more fun. I also added Recent Filmography Additions to the front page.

On a side note, Karen the icon maker, made two for me. One is used on this entry, and the other is just a fun one:

Certainly Not a Fairytale

2004-01-24T02:30:01Z

Fox Searchlab finally posted Certainly Not a Fairytale, the short film I did Boom for on the Fox backlot, thanks to curley. I need to submit it to IMDb now that I know the credits, then I'll have two entries on my entry.

Apple hosts their video files, so it's rather complicated to actually save the file, which is extremely frustrating. While you're watching it, imagine me just under the lens right next to you, reaching out with the boom pole.

The film was shot by Vivi Friedman. She was a lot of fun; I'll never forget the vodka chocolate she handed out.

Tom took this photo of me on the Fox backlot:

I (heart) Film

Meet Maya!

2003-11-23T18:00:03Z

Athena is going to be staying with Karen's parents and her new brother, Sparky. Karen was really looking forward to having a new puppy, so Karen's parents let us go out and find one, since we would no longer have Athena around. We had the choice of two long-haired dachshund girls, a more traditional black and tan one, and a silver dapple. The litter is almost 3 months old. Karen quickly fell in love with the 'unique' one, the dapple. She has beautiful blue eyes (it's rare to find both eyes being blue, often you'll find one blue eye and it'll darken with age, whereas hers shouldn't). Since she has a painted look to her, and it has geeky connotations, we named her Maya (we probably would have named her sister, Pixel).

Click the image for more photos, details, and comments...

Our Engagement -- Official at long last!

2003-08-04T02:39:16Z

Details in photos!

The Flash Mind Reader

2003-02-19T23:28:03Z

So I've received a handful of questions about how The Flash Mind Reader, by Andy Naughton, works (probably because I'm a computer geek?). So I've made a nice little page that explains it:

Numeric Mind Reader Demystified

Feel free to share the link with anybody you think would be interested! Spam it to journals, friends, etc!

A public service of yours truly.

Space; The Final Frontier

2003-02-02T00:36:48Z

In trying to do something to avoid a panic about my computer being down, and therefore preventing me from working on my reel (which is vital for my upcoming job interview), I made this graphic in memory of STS-107, using a photo taken by Karen at the launch:

Just two weeks ago, Karen and I went down to Cape Canaveral to watch this shuttle launch. It was a beautiful day and a beautiful launch against the gentle blue sky.

It was extra special for us because of the first Isreali Astronaut onboard, since Karen is Jewish and I’m starting the processes of conversion.

Space has always held the interest of my heart and mind.

As a child, I'd sneak into the living room to watch Star Trek: The Next Generation. I remember when my Mom took my sister and I to Washington DC, where we toured the Smithsonian's Air & Space Museum. Rocketry was an especially fun hobby growing up, when I wasn’t making models of spacecraft and airplanes.

Now, I regularly stream NASA TV from the web, watching activities on shuttle missions and aboard the International Space Station. I find enjoyment from reading about the space program, both past and present. I try to watch launches when possible, STS-107 being my third (from the Cape).

My mom's boyfriend, Dan, is an aerospace engineer and actually watched Apollo 11 launch from Kennedy Space Center, and even visited the rocket while it was fully fueled.

No matter what it is I'm doing twenty years from now, it will undoubtedly include space. Whether it’s scientific or theatrical, space is in my future.

Space is in our future.

With China building a space program hoping to not only mirror our accomplishments in space, but to go where no American has gone before, I'm confident that the space program won't be lost. I hope it doesn't take a foreigner standing on the moon to make us realize we've dropped the ball though. Our species, our future children, will depend on our ventures into space now.

We, must go back, and we must go back with more determination and energy. The future is ours to mold.

Gator Football, Harry Potter, and Ice-cream

2002-11-17T05:05:11Z

Thanks to erincita, who was nice enough to give us tickets, Karen and I went to the University of Florida football game. It was quite a lot of fun! It was sprinkling all night (in California we'd say it was raining), so we were rather cold, but still had a blast.

More in beautynthegeek

Isn't my lovely gegenschein absolutely adorable? I love her to death and cherish every moment. Her smile melts me.

So apparently there's something funny after the Harry Potter credits, so we'll have to go watch it again sometime. We don't mind, we had an awesome time the other night watching it. Chamber of Secrets is awesome.

PS. For a good time, try "Adrian's Peanut Butter Mudslide" at Coldstone Creamery...
- Peanut Butter Ice-cream
- Lots of Peanut Butter (flirt to get extra. If they use a plastic spoon, ask for it!)
- Fudge
- Caramel
- Whipped Cream
- Oreo Cookies
- Cookie Dough
- Baked Almonds (I think Walnuts would be better, but haven't tried it yet)
- Medium waffle bowl (don't get it dipped; break up the cup as you go)