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My dad was out here just two weeks ago for a visit. I had to do some errands at first on Friday. But, after that, I took him to Baker California for lunch at Big Boy and to see the worlds tallest thermometer and Alien Jerky. Alien Jerky is an odd store. They're draw is jerky, different kinds of jerky, pricey jerky. It's good stuff, I bought some a few months earlier, but it's not worth the drive and the $8.00 for a few strips. They also have in their store an entire wall of hot sauces. Now I'm pretty sure there are not that many types or versions of hot sauce out there. But, there certainly are a lot of different labels for it. There are very few duplicates on the shelf. Names like "Colon Cleaner", "Searing Sphincter", and "Kiss Your Ass Goodbye" were some of my favorites. The list goes on and on. The wall is covered. I really don't know how many people actually buy them. They are fun to read though.

We came back to Vegas then, picked up Michele and showed him our top choices from the homes we have been looking at. Our favorites so far are a three story about 2 miles east of us and a town house just about 500 feet away in the community they have been building right next to our neighborhood.

My dad said that he had never been to a national park so on Saturday we took him to Zion National Park in Utah. It was a bout three hours each way, with stops, so we spent a lot of time in the car but it was worth it to show him the park and to show him just how much nothing there is in Nevada as we headed there.

On the way to the park we also stopped in Virgin Utah at a trading post where they had a petting zoo and a small mock-up of a town.

Michele had sown him an add for flights on warbirds, planes from WW II where, for a time-based fee, you can take a ride in one of them. Well my dad chose 30 minutes in a T6 trainer. We went to the Boulder airport on Sunday and my dad hopped in to the cockpit and took off with the owner of the plane. While he was up there he got to fly it for a while. It is really the happiest I think I have seen him in some time. I'm glad he got to do it.

Monday was a slow day with just some putt'n around. We went to a camera store to get some prints of his flight and for me to look at some lenses. We went back home and got to watch some of Transformers before it was time to go to the airport. I look forward to my dad's visits here. I can't wait till the next one.

As promised, here is a shot of the turtle basking under his UV light. He actually rotates his back feet so that they lie flat but do not touch the rock he is sitting on.

I caught him in the act this morning.

And another shot I dug up from earlier this month.

My first wedding album is now on its way to the printers. My couple in April just picked their photos for their album. I did the page designs and just got it off to the printers tonight. It's not your standard paste-up album where you would just insert photos. Instead it is made up of full page layouts with backgrounds and the photos are laid out overlaying it. These are some of the two-page spreads.

I think it turned out nicely.

They are printed on matte papers with a glossy hard cover and slip case. I'm having them put the couple's names on the slip case in gold. These are more like very high-end coffee table books when they are done.

I am now officially in business according to the city of Henderson here in Nevada. Michele took my paperwork in on Friday and now I have my business license so I can operate as a photographer here and advertise without getting fined. Whoo Hoo!

I will be updating my site and I will be advertising in print soon locally and then in national magazines for fine art prints. Locally I am going for wedding photography.

http://www.davidclittle.com/

Now for the sucky part. My successful application for a business license is now known to everyone that watches the list of new businesses. So now, my cell phone and mail box, just over the weekend, are flooded with calls and junk mail for credit card processing, pay-role, accounting services, web hosting, editors, insurance, etc. The phone stuff bugs me a lot so I am trying to get on a do not call list here but the mail stuff you can do something about.

Most of it comes with pre-paid postage envelopes. You know the ones, "No Postage Nescissary if Mailed in the United States." These are the best.

I have been mailing these things back loaded with my trash. But you can go one step further. You can attach these envelopes to any thing that does not exceed the maximum length and girth measurements or 72lbs in weight. These are the restrictions set by the USPS

So! Find yourself a nice box to fill with old magazines and tape that envelope to it. They have to pay higher postage for weight then. One of my friends had done this a while back with a cinder block.

In any case, I'm open for business now. Tell your friends. And they'll tell their friends, and they'll tell their friends. Promote me, that is if you like me and my photos.
I want to sell some prints!

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Well, it's now official. I have a new job. I am going to be a designer for the Australian based gaming company Aristocrat. I will be on a design team here in Vegas, at their headquarters here in the Americas, creating themes and pay symbols for video slot machines. It's been in the works now for almost three months. They are slow and picky with their interviews. But I think it was slowed down even more by the fact that the job posting was through a staffing company. Michele found this little gem and forwarded it to me. The staffing company has made their presence known throughout the entire process. Even now they want to know how it's going even though the offer has been made and the paperwork done.

My last hurdle was a full background check and drug testing. I got word this morning that I was good to go and I tendered my resignation at Suburban...sadly so. I am really going to miss it there. I rate whether or not I like a job based on the people I am working with, not the job. I really like the people in the art department there and will miss them. Don't get me wrong. The work is great too. I was back in a creative position, something I had been hunting down for seven years.

It's a really great move. Considerable raise in income, great benefits, more vacation time and other perks. It's closer to home, about five blocks away and no highway to drive on. They have a gym. And, at some point I will get to go to Sydney for some training.

So, I am psyched but also bummed. As I said, I'm attached to the people there at Suburban. The 25th will be a hard day for me.

Hi yall,

Again, behind with the typing an-dat....yoi.
Well there has been a lot going on, some of which I will talk about later in the week. But, first, it's all about the reptile.

If you've been reading Michele's blog then you know we have a turtle as a pet. I won the little guy, hope he's a guy, at a county fair in Winnemucca Nevada. The second ping pong ball I tossed landed in his bowl making him the prize of the carelessly aimed, and never intended to win, toss. He cost $2 to win.

In the past two months he has totaled about $175. He was won, and traveled in, a small 3"x4" clear plastic box with some water and a micronized iridescent green palm tree. He sat on the dashboard and watched traffic, or us, for the whole Labor Day weekend. We got him a bigger box when we got home. But, I started reading about this little guy, hope he's a guy, on the internet. I found out he is a Red Eared Slider. He is semi-aquatic spending most of his time in the water and sunning on land. You can find out all you ever wanted to know about these turtles here http://redearslider.com/

I have plenty of pictures of him too...go figure.

These shots are from a week and a half ago. He is a little bigger than a quarter when viewed from above. He has taken a real liking to eating feeder fish. We get him these little bitty gold fish. It's really a mix of gold fish, comets and koi fish. In any case, he digs 'em...allot. I had a huge can of cheese balls, that took two weeks to consume, it is now the home of the feeder fish. It holds about 3 gallons of water and has a filter and everything. It is home to about a dozen or so fish and when it's feeding time, we just toss ping pong, that's his name, into the jug. Once in there he eyeballs a fish or two and starts following them around in there until he gets close enough to take a chunk out of them. Then it's go time.

You can see that he has graduated to much better surroundings than a plastic box. He is in a 10 Gallon tank with a submersible pump and filter. The filter in the feeder tank is one that I built. It is made from a small water bottle and has an air stone in it. As the bubbles rise through the bottle they drag water with them creating an upward current. There are holes in the bottom of the bottle that let water in. The water then passes through some filter media that I put in there to do the job.

The air comes from a small air pump out side the tanks. It is split and goes into both tanks. The main reason for getting this thing was to keep his food alive.

The filter in his tank was an absolute necessity. He is one dirty turtle. He poops indiscriminately and he has no lips so his food floats everywhere. The last time I pulled the filter out it became apparent how much he likes fish. The bottom of the filter looked like a Lego box of fish parts just randomly stuck to the intakes. All together it looks like he's killed over twenty fish in the past three weeks. We watched as he ate the last one like a cookie. Taking only the edge off all the way around the fish. Morbid, but entertaining none the less.

Here's some shots of the action!

He has a rock to sun himself on and he does so underneath a 60W UV bulb that provides A and B. It makes him absorb calcium for his shell and makes him hungry too. If I can get a good shot of it I'll post him when he's basking under the bulb. He sits on the bottom of his shell with his neck and feet out as far as they will go with his toes spread out. It's supposed to be a normal behavior for these turtles. It looks totally goofy.

I really am fascinated with this little guy, hope he's a guy. If he's not a guy, I'm gonna need a much bigger tank in the end as it will grow to about 9-11 inches long instead of about 5"-7" if "he" is a male. The bigger the turtle, the bigger the tank for swimming, sunning and territory.

I have to say I love having an aquarium. I will admit that this turtle is one dirty little pet. He makes a royal mess in there and keeping him requires allot of work in the tank but it's worth it. He's neat to watch in there doing, his... turtle business.