About this blog title

I cannot tell you how many times I have shown up at events with a couple of cameras around my neck, a gadget bag full of odds & ends and a lighting kit and have been asked that question. If it happened once every few years, that would be one thing. But it happens a LOT. It's like getting pulled over by the police and he's standing there with uniform, gun, flashing lights and asking him "Are you a cop?" I would love to come back with a witty reply, such as "No, I am Jesus. Don't you recognize my beard?" However, I cannot be that rude.


Friday, January 4, 2019

Friday January 4 2019: Grilling Jamaican Jerk chicken wings

Basting chicken wings with additional jerk sauce in January, Chaumont NY 

It was a sunny and warm day, hitting a high of 40 degrees, here in Chaumont NY. Pleasant for January 4. My brothers A & R came by in the evening and we grilled some chicken wings. The wings had been marinating in a Jamaican Jerk sauce for 3 days. The main ingredient being scotch bonnet peppers, or more properly, Habanero peppers. We also had some guacamole from my own recipe. The avocados were of high quality and the perfect degree of ripeness which made for a most delicious result. We washed it all down with Sierra Nevada Torpedo IPA which is probably my all time favorite beer. Brother R, the carpenter, however chose Pabst Blue Ribbon beer. The jerk sauce recipe came from a book by Dunstan Harris titled Island Barbecue with illustrations by Brooke Scudder. Published by Chronicle Books. It is a great little cookbook. Click the link for a good article by the Baltimore Sun about Jerk cooking that includes a jerk marinade recipe.

Brother R the carpenter at left, and myself in Chaumont NY. The Brinkman smoker/grill
is loaded with jerk chicken wings


My celebrity brother A, left, me in the middle, and the carpenter R enjoying wings in beer, Chaumont NY. 

Sierra Nevada Torpedo IPA beer, jerked chicken wings and guacamole made for a nice little munch out at our home
inChaumnt NY on a rather mild January evening. 

Wednesday, January 2, 2019

Sunset photos on the St. Lawrence River, Cape Vincent, NY December 29, 2018 Sony a6000 camera

Saturday, December 29, 2018, I take a drive to Cape Vincent, NY, a picturesque village on The St. Lawrence River, about 12 miles from our home in Chaumont. The tree photo was snapped with my iPhone 6 and then cropped and filtered with the Instagram app. The giant su setting on the water with some birds was taken with the Sony a6000 camera and a Minolta 500mm f8 auto focus reflex lens. The LAEA4 lens adapter was used to mount the lens to the camera.
Sunset on the St. Lawrence River, Cape Vincent, NY.                     iPhone 6 photo by Gary Walts
Sunset on the St. Lawrence River, Cape Vincent, NY.  Sony a6000 camera with Minola 500mm f8 lens.   photo by Gary Walts

Tuesday, January 1, 2019

Gary Walts log: New Years Day 2019

My whole life I hate to go to bed at night and hate to sleep in in the morning. As I have gotten older I have tempered that and realize the importance of proper rest for ones physical health and creativity. So last night, New Years Eve, I didn't get to bed until 12:30. We watched TV coverage of the ball dropping in Times Square, NY City. BTW, The Better Half's daughter B & her husband M were at Times Square. We saw no glimpses of them on TV. In bed I fall asleep reading. I awoke at6:00 and know that I need more sleep. I doze back off and experience a lot of weird dreams. The next thing I know it is 9:00 so I bounce out of bed. I rarely ever sleep that late. But I really needed it. I practice guitar for an hour or so. I have some fried eggs, sausage rolls and potato salad for breakfast. Then I fritter away my time trying to come up with and ad for guitar lessons. I have two vacant apartments that need to be spruced up so I cab get them rented. They have been unoccupied since September. My fault for procrastinating. As the day progresses I become very antsy. Finally I get outdoors for a couple of hours and tend to some odds & ends around the house. I did some target shooting with my air rifle ( a Gammo break barrel, 1000 foot per second) which is a most satisfying distraction. I enjoy shooting a lot, but do not often indulge in it. I found a block of ice about 4 inches thick in the bottem of a 5 gallon pail and set that up as a target. What fun it was to see the ice shatter and chip away bit by bit with every shot from the Gammo. By evening we have a dinner of pork chops and play a game of Trivial Pursuit. I ended the night watching a documentary on Netflix about Polish sculptor/artist Stanislaw Szukalski. Never heard of him before. Most interesting. I highly recommend learning about him. Amazing, weird, and strange. It's now 11:30. Good night.

Friday, December 14, 2018

September 11, 2018 guitar gig at Clayton Yacht Club, Clayton NY

Had a wonderful evening last night playing guitar at a private birthday party. The event took place in the upper cub house of the Caytn YachtClub, Clayton NY. It is situated on th St. Lawrence Over. The upper club house is a rustic old cottage with green shutters. The party was hosted by ET. This is the 2nd time she has hired me for her birthday. Among the guests this evening was famed underwater photographer David Doubilet. evidently my playing made an impression upon him. It turns out that he isa guitar and banjo player. We had a nice chat afterward.

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photos by Gary Walts

The village of Clayton NY hosted their annual Christmas parade Saturday, December 1st. Local TV celebrity Mel Busler emcee'd the event. Below are some photos I snapped of the event.
Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

TV celebrity Mel Busler, emcee of the Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Clayton NY Christmas Parade 2018 photo by Gary Walts

Thursday, November 22, 2018

The Day Before Thanksgiving, November 21, 2018 (Better Half Goes to the Hospital)

Our plan for Thanksgiving was to cook an early turkey dinner, eat it, then go visit her daughter's families. We would start by making some of the side dishes the day before. Here is how the day went. I got up and had coffee with some guitar practice for bit an hour. I gather some kindling wood and get the wood stove fired up. I worked for a bit on a jigsaw puzzle Copely House. Then I get a call from brother R. He needs to work on his truck, changing the water pump, and would not be able to feed our mother lunch. "Can you go up there?", he asked. Of course I can, but that wasn't part of my plan for the day. (I don't tell him that) The Better Half and I go to visit my mother at Hospice of Jefferson County. We get there at noon and find the staff fed Mom lunch a little early. No problem. We try to initiate some conversation and just sit with her for an hour or so.
Jig saw puzzle in progress at our home in Chaumont, NY. 
while waiting for the stove fire to get going strong. I was also eating bologna sandwich.  At 10:00 I have a guitar lesson with a 9 year old boy at the
My mother and The Better Half at Hospice of Jefferson County, Watertown, NY.  iPhone 6 photo by Gary Walts
On the way home we stop at Dollar General story for a couple items we had forgotten to get earlier in the week. One of those items were Klondike Bars, those really delicious chocolate covered ice cream squares. Now let me back up a bit. The Better Half has had some problems for the last couple weeks with diverticulitis, an infection in her colon. She has had problems eating because most foods irritate her and cause her discomfort. Ice cream has been quite agreeable with her. We each have a Klondike Bar. Then she begins making stuffing for Thanksgiving. However, she has started feeling uncomfortable. I should note that she had also taken some Milk of Magnesia. She's not sure what is causing the discomfort.As she wrks in the kitchen it gets worse so she lies down to relax a bit. I start make a Cole Slaw for tomorrow. Then a I cut in half some acorn squashes and slather them maple syrup, salt & pepper, pop them in the oven. Next, I put some sweet potatoes into a pot of boiling water. Soon the Better Half says she thinks we nee to go to the emergency room. She is getting a serious diverticulitis attack. So off we go. My sweet potatoes are only half cooked. I drain them. We leave. At the hospital she has a number of tests, and different things and before you know it, it's 1:00am. She will be admitted to the hospital. By the time I get home it is 2:00am and all I've had to eat was that bologna sandwich back in the morning. I take care f a few things in the kitchen and hit the sack. What a long day it turned into.

Thursday, November 1, 2018

Halloween 2018

Well, we had nice Halloween at our home in Chaumont, NY. The weather lately has been cool and rainy. Last evening however was mild, and a little bit of rain. Temperature was about 53 degrees. Very pleasant for these parts. We had 107 trick or treaters. We keep tally every year. One year we had 134.It's always over 100.
Self portrait with a Dogfish Punkin Ale at our home n Chaumnt, NY.
I like to have a Halloween themed beer on hand for Halloween. Just to add a festive touch. Most of the pumpkin beers I try I find are mediocre. This year I picked u a 6 pack of Dogfish Punkin Ale. It was smooth and pretty good. Son in law D however took one sip and declared it horrible!  Our group was a bitt small this year. For food we had pizza, Croghan bologna, various cheeses, spinach artichoke dip, and a chili cheese dip.

Saturday, September 29, 2018

september 28, 2018 Cleaned wood stove, PlutoTV,

Had a productive day today. Up at 6:30 and put in 2 hours of guitar practice. breakfast was a salami & Swiss cheese sandwich on rye bread with a sliced avocado. I then set about cleaning the flue pipe and chimney of the wood stove. In the course of that I discovered the chimney cap came loose and was ready to fall off. I cannot understand why that came loose unless it was from something the roofers did earlier this summer.  I have 32 foot fiber glass ladder I used to reach the top of the chimney. That ladder weighs 75 pounds and is bulky, clumsy to maneuver. It's a work out at this age just to get it in place. But what a terrific ladder! It's worth every penny I paid for it which was about $300.00 a number of years ago.
After that I resumed work on the front porch. That has been an ongoing project this summer. On this day I replaced a few pieces of decayed wood on the roof and patched it with some tin. A week from now I'll paint the roof and no one will ever know there had been a repair made. Anyway, the took me until 6:15pm. I cleaned up from that and went to the Crescent Restaurant in Chaumont with the Better Half. She had a burger with fries. I had a special they called cottage pie, a shepherd's pie variant. It was very good but rather small portion. She had a cranberry juice & vodka, I had couple of IPA beers.  The tab came to $35.00 and change.
When we got home I stumbled upon a 1995 movie title The Professional. It was on Roku's Pluto TV channel. It was not a great movie, but entertaining. Somewhat far fetched. a drug dealer, crooked cops, hit man flick with a lot of shoot 'em up going on.

Tuesday, September 25, 2018

Photos of 5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival, Clayton, NY September 1, 2018

Here are some photos of 5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival, Clayton, NY September 1, 2018. I had the honor of taking first place in the invited artists category.

5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival, Clayton, NY

5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival, Clayton, NY

5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival, Clayton, NY

5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival, Clayton, NY

5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival, Clayton, NY

5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival, Clayton, NY

5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival, Clayton, NY

5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival, Clayton, NY

5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival, Clayton, NY

5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival, Clayton, NY

5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival, Clayton, NY

5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival, Clayton, NY

5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival, Clayton, NY

5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival, Clayton, NY

5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival, Clayton, NY

Wednesday, September 12, 2018

September 11, 2018 Guitar gig at Clayton Yacht Club, Clayton NY

Had a wonderful evening last night playing guitar at a private birthday party. The event took place in the upper club house of the Clayton YachtClub, Clayton NY. It is situated on th St. Lawrence Over. The upper club house is a rustic old cottage with green shutters. The party was hosted by ET. This is the 2nd time she has hired me for her birthday. Among the guests this evening was famed underwater photographer David Doubilet. evidently my playing made an impression upon him. It turns out that he is a guitar and banjo player. We had a nice chat afterward. For the most part my confidence level was high and I did a good job playing my repertoire. ET and her guests were pleased.

Sunday, September 2, 2018

I win 100 Bucks in Clayton Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival 2018

I was one of the invited artists for the 2018 Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival in Clayton, NY. The event was sponsored by the Depauville Library. I happily won first place and received the $100.00 cash prize.
My first prize in the invited artists division, 5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival in Clayton, NY.  Gary Walts September 1, 2018


My sidewalk chalk art that won first place in the 5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival in Clayton, NY.  Gary Walts September 1, 2018

My sidewalk chalk art that won first place in the 5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival in Clayton, NY.  Gary Walts September 1, 2018 
Detil of my sidewalk chalk art that won first place in the 5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival in Clayton, NY.  Gary Walts September 1, 2018

My sidewalk chalk art that won first place in the 5th annual Sidewalk Chalk Art Festival in Clayton, NY.  Gary Walts September 1, 2018

Instagram filters version of my sidewalk chalk art.  Gary Walts September 1, 2018