PAW: Halt for Halloween

Inebriated Halloween revelers control traffic on Mountain View's Castro St. around 11:00 pm on Saturday, Oct. 29th.

The CAKE was not a lie

Busy as always. Here's a sneak peak at the last two days.

Candles burn into the night, throwing light on flower petals and other decorations during Google's celebration of Diwali this past Thursday, Oct. 27th.

A Googler brandishes his fangs as another looks on during Googleween, celebrated on Friday, Oct. 28th.

An assistant checks frontman John McCrea's guitar in preparation for CAKE's performance at Googleween on Friday.

PAW: bjones minus bjones

Title inspired by garfield minus garfield.

Fellowship

If you're jealous, I totally understand. It's not every day when you get to see The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring with music performed live by a full orchestra and two choirs.

If you must go and are in the area, the final performance is later today (Sunday), at 6:00 pm at Sacramento's Power Balance Pavilion. Click here to hop over to Ticketmaster.

Portraits

I've been busy doing stuff :o) Still putting things up here and there. Here are two portraits

A firefighter sits in his engine during the Half Moon Bay Art & Pumpkin Festival, held Oct. 15th and 16th this year.

Two friends dance during a mid-afternoon performance by Lavay Smith & Her Red Hot Skillet Lickers at The Googleplex.

Full Service

Thanksgiving was celebrated this past Monday, Oct 10 throughout Canada. To visit some friends and join in the celebration, I took a short trip up to Vancouver over this past weekend. While waiting to get on the plane for SFO->YVR, I pulled out my camera and managed to spot some neat stuff.

It had never even occurred to me that jetliner windscreens get dirty until I spotted someone cleaning one. When flights are delayed and travelers are weary, it's all too easy to forget all the different folks who help turn around an aircraft as quickly as possible. In the spirit of Thanksgiving, I hope this serves as a small reminder.

This is (I believe) an Asiana Airlines 777-200ER which was parked at the gate next to mine at SFO's international terminal. The windscreen cleaner used a high-mechanical-advantage handcrank to open and close the windscreens. Below and to the left, the guy in yellow is unloading bulk cargo from the front cargo hold. At the same time, folks are restocking beverages and snacks from the SkyChefs scissor truck. I believe other folks had already finished unloading passenger luggage from the aft cargo hold by the time I shot this.

Two members of the ground crew greet each other with a hug while waiting for a bulk cargo pallet to be loaded and secured on the trailer in the top-right of the image.

An Air Canada crewmember for my flight does her hair as she and the other cabin crew chat while on their way to the gate.

Canada bound! A quick photo of a cup against the sky as a backdrop.

Google Mela 2011

Google Mela is an annual cultural celebration which is timed to coordinate with the Indian Independence Day, which is celebrated on August 15th. "Mela" itself means "gathering" in Sanskrit. This year's event took place on August 18th. Click on any of the photos to jump to the full set of 30 images.

Above, Googler Stephanie Chiang performs a belly dance routine during this year's celebration.

Audience members nearly fill the Charlie's cafeteria patio area during a performance featuring Bollywood-style dance. The group was organized by perennial dancer and dance promoter Anna Botelho.

A woman spins her parasol while facing away from the audience at the start of a second Bollywood performance, later in the event.