Favorite Photos of 2019

Happy New Year, everyone! 

This has been a year in which Sally and I have mostly kept on keeping on.  Arguably the biggest changes in my life were my decision to commit to skiing more last winter, taking up photography early in the summer, and writing a Hell of a lot for As For Football. 

This post is most obviously about the photography.  However, it's influenced by all three.  First, I wrote so much for AFF that there's really not enough material from the blog to do a best-of retrospective for 2019.  That's been a long-running series here, and I'm sad to skip it, but there's just not much point.  Luckily, I have these pictures to show, so it's not a total wash.  A good number of these come from shots taken for AFF, so before we bemoan the lack of additional writing, it's worth remembering that the As For Football crew sent me to a heck of a lot of really fun football games this year. 

That's not nothing.

The one regret that I have with this is that it's tough to show size and aspect ratios via the blog.  Some of these ought to be shown big and others are just wide or skinny.  None of that comes across in this format.  I'd like to have a little show in our backyard, but that's definitely a project for the spring or early summer.  Paired with beer tasting and a friendly audience, it could be fun.  We'll see.

Let me just say, too, that I don't know that I'm necessarily good at this.  However, I enjoy it, and I've never been shy about showing my work to others.

For all of these, you can click the pics to them at full size.

Magic Mountain, Vermont

We finally got out to Magic Mountain this week.  We skied Mount Snow on Christmas Day and then Magic on the day after Christmas, hoping to avoid the post-Christmas crush.  

The Red Line Lift at Magic Mountain

This turned out to be a great idea.  Magic was awesome!

Merry Christmas from Mount Snow

Merry Christmas, friends.

The girls and I are up at Mount Snow today, staying for a few days at the Sterling Ski Club’s Mount Snow Lodge.  

Sally and I both sometimes get a little depressed at Christmas.  My family has all passed save for my wife and kids, and Sally’s family has never been anyone’s ideal.  But we are truly blessed to have found each other, to have the mutual strength to break the cycles in each of our families’ lives, and to have the opportunity to spend the holidays in the mountains in Vermont.  Whatever else happens, I will always be grateful for the love, strength, and support to meet challenges head on.

It’s been an interesting year at Casa Cabeza -- in a good way.  I’ll spare you the stories, but we have a lot for which we are thankful.  We hope that you and yours are richly blessed in the year to come as well.

Twitter is Not IRL

I saw a couple of interesting articles about the Democratic primary election this week, one from the NY Times and one from the Atlantic.  Both papers are struggling to understand the Democratic electorate in the Twitter Age. That’s no easy task.  Bottom line, though, the Young Left of Twitter (YLT) has decided that it hates Mayor Pete Buttigeg of South Bend, Indiana, with an abiding passion.  Apparently, this is because he is either too successful personally or else he’s not far enough left.  Or perhaps both.

My message to those I meet is simple: "este país es tu país."

This country is your country. Everyone who has made the United States their home deserves to participate fully and freely in their communities.https://t.co/sMRkVfwFwF

— Pete Buttigieg (@PeteButtigieg) December 17, 2019

Skiing at Stratton

Sally and I took the family to Stratton Mountain last weekend. We drove up on Friday afternoon after Thanksgiving, stayed overnight, and skied Saturday. This marked both our first time at Stratton and our first time skiing Thanksgiving Weekend. 

Family selfie at Stratton's summit.

TRON Reconsidered

I didn’t love TRON when I first saw it in theaters. Mostly because I’d had enough programming at the time to understand that, “This is not how computers work.”  Partly, too, because the movie is deliberately weird.

Alas, I missed some of the film’s subtler themes.

#Beertography: Recropping Old Photos

Sally wants me to write a grilling cookbook.  Been after me to get started for years. 

I have the first ten thousand words down in draft, and I have an idea how I want move forward.  That's all good.  However, the working version reads more like a grilling memoir than an actual cook book, to the point that I felt like I needed to spend some more time grilling before pressing into the meat of the story.

See what I did there?

15 Must-Watch Movies from Disney+

Disney+ is coming next week, and with it comes a bunch of old movies.  

This is my initial recommended watch list.  I’ve tried to go heavy on relatively older movies for the benefit of younger viewers who maybe missed some of this when it first hit theaters.  Hell, I saw at least half of these on VHS back in the day.  Lots of you weren’t around for that, I know.

I’ve tried to skip the obvious.  You don’t need me to tell you about Star Wars or a blockbuster that came out just five years ago.  Most of these are favorites from when I was a kid, meaning the late 70s to early 90s.  That doesn’t seem that long ago to me, but I’ve got teenagers myself now, so I know it seems like an unfathomably long time to some of you.  The newest entry on this list is 2008’s Bolt.  That might be a little too new for the criteria, but what can you do?

After some internal debate, I’ve decided to list these in the order in which I intend to watch them.

Enjoy!  And feel free to add on if you’ve got something I missed.

13 Essential Books – 2019 Edition

Been meaning to do this project for a while, but I just haven't had the time.  Finally decided to just make it happen.

These are presented in no particular order.  I personally enjoy science fiction and especially fantasy adventure stories, but I’ve tried to include a mix of other genres and types of books in deference to my audience. The second part is a (much shorter) list of books that I still need to read myself.  If you've got one for that list, please let me know.

Some Thoughts on Getting Older as an Adult Athlete

I put this up on Twitter and as an extended Instagram story.  No idea how many folks read it or cared, but I'm still feeling it, so...

The hardest thing about being an adult athlete – about getting older – is managing rest and recovery. Alas, your time as a collegiate competitor is poor preparation. To be good in college, you have to grind everyday like you’ve got a mental illness. Go full-gas all the time, or somebody’s gonna take your spot. Sometimes that sucks, but it’s rarely complicated.

Pics from Round Pond and Army vs. Tulane

It's been a week.  I know.  But better late than never, right?

Before we get started with these, let me stipulate that I definitely need to read more about how and why we edit photographs, especially with filters.  I've read a few Internet articles, but that's not the same as understanding of the process.  I've learned a few things, but I like to understand why things work.  I need more theory.  I did most of these based solely on "feel," and in a lot of cases, that means that I know something's wrong, but I can't put my finger on what or how to fix it.

I took about half of these.  My wife took the ones from Michie Stadium and of the game.  She also, obviously, took the one of me.  I took the landscapes from Round Pond.

Technical note: to see full screen versions, click any picture.  You can even scroll through from that view.

Ready?

Let's get it on.

Friday Night Lights: Stratford Red Devils

Sally and I went to our first high school football game as high school parents last night.  That was so much fun.  Our daughter Emma plays in the band.  Her night was actually ludicrously complicated, but for Sally and me, well, we just sat there and watched the game.

End zone shot at the start of the second quarter.  Stratford got a pick in the end zone right after this, drove down and scored.  That made it 14-20.

The Red Devils were at home against Notre Dame Catholic.  Notre Dame ran a run-heavy read-option set against a decidedly undersized Stratord defense.  Alas, the Red Devils really only have a handful of talented players.  They had trouble stopped Notre Dame's power running up the middle, let alone containing the misdirection plays outside.  However, they made some plays on offense through sheer team speed at the skill positions.  Basically, they tried to run some kind of sweep run on almost every offensive snap, hoping to get one of their speed guys in space on the outside while mixing in the occasional play-action pass.

This worked well enough that Stratford was down just three at halftime.  Alas, the size disparity along the lines started to show in the second half, and they wound up dropped the game 41-25.

More pictures are after the jump.

CFB Games of the Week: Week 2

Y’know, I was only partially right about Tennessee last week.  I was right that they would start ugly.  I was wrong, though, about exactly how ugly they’d start.  

They’ve had a bunch of kids enter the transfer portal this week, so it looks like the wheels may be coming off down in Knoxville.  Yikes!

Don't you just love college football?

Pics from Rice at Army

I took 109 pictures at Army's first home game.  Three-quarters of them were total garbage, even for me, but I liked a few.  A few of my favorites are below.

Tailgating with friends.

I edited these rather indulgently, so have some patience, okay?  I mean, I didn't have to crop everything 16 x 9, but I wanted to, so that's what I did.  

Be thankful they're not all sepia-toned.

CFB Games of the Week: Week 1

Before we get started, did you see Tulane last night?  Wow!  The Green Wave look legit my friends.  Been sayin’ it all offseason, but actually seeing it was something else.

My games of the week are below.  Times and channels via 506Sports.Com.

CFB Games of the Week: Scoring Week 0

I went 2/3 in Week 0.

I went 2/3.
• Colgate (-3.5) ❌
• #MIAvsFLA Under 46 ✅
• Hawai’i (+13) ✅

— Danno E. Cabeza (@Dan_T_Head) August 25, 2019

I feel like she missed an opportunity...

I'm a fan of Brennah Black on Instagram, but she could've done a little more with this shot.

CFB Games of the Week: Week 0

If you missed it, As For Football launched a new podcast this morning called College Football Roundtable.  We’re using a gameshow-style format for a 30-minute discussion of the happenings in college football beyond the Army Team, and although I’m no unbiased observer, I was super-pleased with the way the new show came out. 


 

Short Swimming Story

A friend asked me recently why colleges have such a hard time recruiting kickers & what’s so hard about kicking.

Digital Camera Experiments, Ver. 3.0

This photography thing has become a legit project.  I need to take a class, though, to get better at the craft.  Any pro's looking at these are undoubtedly shaking their heads in frustration.

What can you do?

This first set come from our trip to Mt. Snow last month.  These are the last from this particular trip.

At the summit, coming off the North Face.

Giant-Watch: Preseason Game #1

I don't know how good the Jets' defense is, but Giants rookie QB Daniel Jones looked about a million times better than I thought he would look in his preseason debut.  The Giants' O-Line looked better, too, even when the Jets brought extra pressure.

Pics from the Swim Across the Sound

Team RBG 2.0 swam across Long Island Sound yesterday, raising more than ten thousand dollars for St. Vincent's Cancer Center and placing second overall in the Classic (No Wetsuit) division.  We beat the Sacred Heart University team among others, and everyone swam really, really well.  I was pretty happy about how it came out.

Some pics are below.

An early Sound crossing to get to Long Island.

Digital Camera Experiments Revisited

The more you learn, the less you know.  I really need to get down to the library to get a couple of books on photography, but I just haven't had time.  That hasn't stopped me from taking pictures.

I took this on the drive into the office during the heat wave last week.
It's heavily filtered, obviously.

Digital Camera Experiments

One of my projects over the offseason has been trying to improve as a photographer.  I've taken half-a-million pictures at Army Football games, but I don't feel like I've ever successfully captured the experience of being up in the stands at Michie Stadium.  That needs to change.

Alas, photography is a fully-formed and complex art form.  People spend their lives trying to take better pictures.  I'm not going to necessarily get where I want to be in a couple of weeks.  And yet, there is an enormous difference between wholly self-taught swimmers and those who've spent just a single year on an organized team.  I'm not looking to shoot at the Olympic level, but I would like to approach the comparative competence of a low-end high school letter-winner.  That seems doable, though maybe this is one of those occasions where I don't know what I don't know.

Seems possible.

My buddy Andy took this one at the 2018 Armed Forces Bowl.  He did a great job capturing the action, though I cropped it quite a bit for emphasis.  I also dialed the colors down a little to try to emphasize the drama of the action.  I like this 16:9 format, especially for football, because I feel like it gives the scene a scene of perspective and impending action.

Pics from Rhode Island

Sally and I went camping up in Rhode Island last week while our girls were on a mission trip to Philadelphia.  We stayed at a campsite maybe five miles north of Newport.  We were only up there for three days, and it felt like we spent half our time setting up or tearing down, but it was still nice to get away.  We spent a day at the beach and a day out on the bikes, and I cooked a lot on the travel grill.  The trip itself was a lot of work, but it was also fun.  

I took this one for the Grill Geek Instagram account.  I took it myself using my
camera's ten-second count-down timer and Night Portrait mode.

World Cup celebration.

I took these pictures with the camera I got for the coming Army Football season.  I was originally looking just for a simple point-and-shoot, but on my friend Matt's advice, I bought used and went a little upscale.  The camera itself is 2014 tech, but I prioritized optical zoom and wound up with a decent piece of entry-level equipment.  I'm not some great photographer, but I read the manual cover-to-cover, and I then spent a good amount of our trip playing with the settings.  Results are below.

Team RBG 2.0 & the Swim Across the Sound

Friends,

As many of you know, I'm competing in this year's Swim Across the Sound to support St. Vincent's Hospital's Cancer Center.  The Swim is a 15-mile open water event that starts in Port Jefferson, NY, and finishes on the far side of Long Island Sound in Bridgeport, CT.  Team RBG 2.0 is entered in the Classic (No Wetsuit) category, which means that we'll swim as a relay, taking half-hour pulls while a boat motors slowly alongside us.  We have a team of legitimately talented swimmers -- Andy and I both swam for the Army Swim Team, Class of 1995, while Chris and Stephen are experienced triathletes (and Navy vets).  However, we'll have the tide against us this year, making this a serious challenge.

We're going to beat it, though, and we're going to beat cancer, too.

The Disappearance of Jaxon Carrows

Over the past several months, the port town of Breakwater Bay has lost a number of small fishing boats.  The disappearances have put the local fishermen on edge, so when Captain Jaxon Carrows and his boat Salty Dog go missing, the Breakwater Bay town council approaches the party to find out what’s happening.  Over the course of their investigation, the party discovers a sahuagin cult moving into the local waters, opposed by a tribe of lizardfolk.  The lizardfolk make good would-be allies if the party can convince them of the value of an alliance.

The Disappearance of Jaxon Carrows is designed for a party of four to five player-characters of 3rd or 4th level.  It’s meant as a one-shot, running from four to six hours depending on your pace of play.

Note.  This adventure is based loosely around the Ghosts of Saltmarsh adventure Danger at Dunwater.  The changes I’ve made change Dunwater’s overarching plot idea into a slow reveal mystery.

The Disappearance of Jaxon Carrows (PDF via Google Drive)

Dan’s Rules of Writing

I never thought that I would need to publish my "Rules for Writing," but here we are.  I've found myself in an editorial role often enough of late that having a few rules written down will--hopefully--make explaining how to write a little easier.

Got thoughts?  Let me hear 'em.

Rules are after the jump:

D&D: Swordmage Revisited

Dungeons & Dragons’ 4th edition had a huge array of classes divided up into four main party roles--Leader, Defender, Striker, and Controller.  The different classes allowed for different expressions of core party responsibilities within a wide variety of potential character themes.  Leaders healed, Defenders were tanks, Strikers assassinated single targets, and Controllers shaped the battlefield, generally through area effect burst or blast-type spells.  The upside of this was that not every party had to have a Rogue or a Cleric in order to pick locks and/or stay alive in combat.  The downside was that over time, a lot of 4e’s classes started to look basically alike.

5th edition is generally more like 2e than 4e, but it hasn’t gone completely away from 4e’s role versatility in classes.  The game’s current edition offers a few ways to tank like a Defender, for example, in the Fighter, Paladin, and even Barbarian classes, and the Bard and Cleric are still both designed basically in the Leader role.  However, there still not a great way to tank with an arcane class, and though this is far from a game-breaking failure, it is an issue that Wizards of the Coast (WotC) has tried to address.

Just a swordmage, fighting a dragon. Nothing to see here except beautiful, stylish fantasy art by Raiddo.https://t.co/UzA5pPxb8K#dnd #dnd5e #dmsguild pic.twitter.com/h682HVqegk

— Jean Lorber (@jlorber4) November 25, 2017

CFB Roundtable: Duke at Pitt, 2018

The Yankees played a doubleheader yesterday, and I cooked dinner on the grill in between the games.  I put Duke at Pitt, 2018, on outside while I cooked, and man, am I ever glad that I did.

Is Writing Even Worth It Anymore?

Yesterday's Ross Tucker Football Podcast featured Chris Horwedel, founder of The Underdog Sports.  Good interview.  Horwedel talked about getting his start as a teenager writing about sports and hosting a podcast and how he'd been a little lucky -- and obviously very good -- in terms of finding collaborators and getting his business of the ground.

#GrillGeek: Grilled Swordfish with Pineapple Salsa

4 swordfish steaks (½” to 1” thick)

1 cored pineapple
Chili seasoning (optional)
Medium salsa
Oil oil
Salt
Pepper
Oregano or Italian seasoning
Hot sauce (optional)

#GrillGeek: Simple vs. Easy

I don’t know if you guys know this, but I’ve been working—very occasionally—on a grilling cookbook for the past eight months or so.  I got the first maybe 10K words down and ran into something of a wall.  I realized that I needed to experiment more, that I’d gotten stuck too deeply in a rut with my grilling to write an interesting full-length story.  

I needed time and space to experiment.

Quick Thoughts: Endgame and the MCU

Finally saw Avengers: Endgame over the weekend.  My kids and I felt very much like the last people on Earth to get to the movie, but I know that’s not true.  In fact, I work with a couple of guys who’ve never seen any of the Avengers movies. I mean, I know it feels like Marvel have taken over the movie world, but it’s still a specific niche, believe it or not, and there are plenty of folks who aren’t paying attention.  It’s just a very loud kind of niche.

Lots of folks have published thoughts about Endgame.  It’s unclear that the world needs mine.  I’m gonna give them to you anyway, though, mostly because I’ve not yet had any time to grill or to think overmuch about how I’m going to write about grilling.

*big-time spoilers ahead*

CFB Roundtable: Final Thoughts on Daniel Jones and the NY Giants

I’ve been back and forth in my head about whether or not to write this.  On the one hand, the Giants draft infuriated me so badly that I feel like I have to talk about it, or else I’ll scream.  But then again, everybody and their brother has already written something about the draft.  It’s not clear that the universe needs my particular thoughts.

Part of the reason that I’m actually doing this, and that I’m doing it here, is that we’ve been over this at some length as an As For Football (AFF) staff, and not to put too fine a point on it, but nothing that’s not directly tied to Army Football is really on the menu over there.  We’ve got two sponsors now, and we’re growing, and things are generally pretty great.  However, our audience is a distinctly Army Football audience.  My dream of doing a weekly CFB Roundtable podcast are on indefinite hold, and any coverage of other teams and/or other aspects of the sports are also out at least for the foreseeable future.  My long-term goal for the site is to cover not only Army Football but also the football that Army fans are watching.  But there’s no consensus as to exactly what that means, nor has any of that stuff drawn enough interest to make it worthwhile.  Meanwhile, we need to actively resist taking focus away from stuff that’s actually working.

I’m not sure how to handle it.  Part of me feels like I should just do CFB Roundtable here, and if there’s an audience for it, maybe that will create some kind of opportunity.  We’ll see how it goes as the season progresses.

More Pics from Water Island, USVI

Finally got a chance to pull the pictures from our trip to St. Thomas and Water Island, USVI, off of Sally's digital camera.  There were nearly 360 photos on there.  These are just some of my favorites.

On the ferry to water island right after our plane landed.

4500 Yards Swimming (+ Basic Body Fat Analysis)

Long swim today.  And then I decided to rough-calc my body fat percentage.

If that sounds fun, read on!

Just when you think maybe the Yankees have turned the corner...

...you get a night like that.

"fuck me, god damnit" pic.twitter.com/B19CwSvP8T

— Jomboy (@Jomboy_) April 19, 2019

Gardy Goes Yardy!

Brett Gardner: Slam Poet. pic.twitter.com/QsXB56PFlv

— New York Yankees (@Yankees) April 18, 2019

The Yankees swept the Boston Red Sox in the Bronx off on this Grand Slam.  After a miserable, injury-plagued start, it looks like the Bronx Bombers have maybe started finding their footing.  They're a game under .500, James Paxton and J.A. Happ have started to look a bit more like professional baseball players, and the team has started hitting some.

Hope springs eternal in the Bronx.

Some Thoughts on Titans and the New DC Universe Streaming Service

I bought our daughter Emma a subscription to the new DC Universe streaming service for her birthday.  She is a monster comic book fan and a superfan of the DCU’s Young Justice animated show, and it’s been great because we’ve been watching a ton of TV together since getting the subscription.

Source: "Why Wolfman and Perez's THE NEW TEEN TITANS Is a Must-Read"

Totally worth it from that standpoint.

Reliving Water Island

We’re back from the Virgin Islands, and it’s a Monday.  I’m dealing with it, but man, this time yesterday I was waking up in an entirely different world.

Sally and I flew out of JFK.  With that we got a cheaper flight that went direct, but I have to be honest and say that the airport itself was a pain in the ass.  Considering the number of people and planes they process on a day-to-day basis, they do a decent job, but there’s still no getting around the fact that 8.5M people live in New York City and maybe 25M live in the greater NYC metropolitan area, and that’s a lot of folks.  Add in tourist traffic, and yeah y’know, it was a whole deal.  We must’ve walked a mile and a half from security to our gate and from the gate back out to the street when we got back. 

Sally at JFK waiting for our flight.

That airport is amazing.

Going Back Online

I'm back.  I don't know for how long or how often, but for awhile anyway.

A couple of things happened while I was away.  First, the revenue on the blog spiked to $63!  That means I only need another $37 to get an advertising check from Google.  That's doable.

Announcement

I’m done. Whatever it was that I set out to say, I feel like I’ve said it. I hope you’ve enjoyed the blog, but it’s done regardless.

Thanks.

Have a nice day.

5 Things on a Friday: News Plus Podcasts

Hey folks.  Happy Friday!

Crunch: Weights, Swimming, & Recovery

I went into the Crunch gym in Stratford last weekend, and the guys at the front desk kind of gave me a hard time.  "Hey, we haven't seen you in here this year."

It's true.  Time really got away from me in the later part of the year.  With that, I leaned into the pool more than the weight room, and I swam okay, but that's about all I could say for myself.  I'm still battling a little hamstring pull, and that makes running tough, and between rain days and Christmas vacation, I wasn't even bike commuting over-much.  For several weeks, it was pretty much just swim-or-bust.

I finally got back into the weight room on Sunday, January 8th.  I kept it simple, but at least I went.  I then had class Tuesday night, and we shot the AFF podcast Wednesday, but with Sally's encouragement I went back to the gym Thursday, doing a slightly longer back/biceps workout.  I did a long set of pull-downs, some bent-over rows, and a few sets to work my core and lower back.

5 Things on a Friday: Trying to Move On

Back to work this week.  It hasn’t been an easy transition, and yet here we are.

I hope you all enjoyed your time off.  I know I did.  I already miss skiing.

The Mermaid: A PC Race Design for D&D

We have a rule at our house.  Everyone in our family has to make a Christmas gift for everyone else in the family.  My daughter Hannah has been clamoring to play D&D as a mermaid for months now, so this design for a Mermaid Player-Character race was my made-gift to her.

It's pretty simple, but she was delighted with it, immediately launching into a deep discussion of the four sub-races of mermaids--arctic, tropical, river, and deep--and their shared history, theology, and lineage.

We may publish an update with the four sub-races.  Who knows?

Swimming: New Year's 5000

My good friend Dave got this workout from his Master's coach.  It's 100 x 50.  I'd planned to do 50 x 100, but this was much more creative than what I had planned.  My stuff always tends to be grinding aerobic-tempo distance work.  This was more a mix of stroke and speed work.

All things considered, it went better than I had an right to expect.  The second set was the hardest.  After that, I think I did okay.

Goals for 2019

I refuse to call them "resolutions".