January 2009 Archives

I came to the blog to do something about family, perhaps post a photo or two, but just can't get myself to do it. Not really in the mood, I suppose. Instead, I think I'll simply toss a few bits of information about some of the stuff I'm working on this week.

Having just finished the Alabama Association of RC&D Councils annual report, a nice 44 page book that I've done for them every year for the past 8 or so, I am delighted to find myself developing a website for another one of the individual councils that makes up the association: MidSouth RC&D. That brings the RC&D websites I maintain up to four (Cawaco, Ala-Tom and Tombigbee being the remaining sites). I've always enjoyed working with these guys. Nice, good folks all. I hate to see when they are, as is sometimes the case, taken advantage of by the less scrupulous web designers (and I use that term loosely) of the world. Watch for their site coming soon!

I've been working on a redesigned website for Tyler Eaton Court Reporters, a longtime client. That should be coming online in the next two weeks. I updated the Alabama Front Porches website and have added another blog to our Black Belt Blog list: Off the Porch. A husband and wife team are providing outdoor adventures in the black belt. Good stuff, I think. They've sent 2 installments so far.

And there's more, but I think I'll skip that. I did post some additional photos of last week's trip to my flickr page. You can visit it here.

Well, honestly, I've been a bit lax on updating my blog of late. I've really got to get back into the habit of the thing. I'm working on it. I have been really busy for the last couple of weeks. I've finally finished the annual report I do for the Alabama Association of Resource Conservation and Development Councils (RC&D). I've been updating my Your Town Alabama blog, my Alabama Front Porches Blog and created another blog for others to post to called "Off the Porch," tied to the Alabama Front Porches website project.

I'm in the process of redesigning a website for Tyler Eaton Court Reporters--still a work in progress, but I did the old site as well. I'm getting ready to do some heavy lifting on the AIA Birmingham website: just lots of updates and an upcoming newsletter. I've been pretty busy getting the Bromberg's website situated--an old client that I lost to a big agency several years ago (though I didn't do their website in those days) that has just returned! Lots to do. (Oh, and I'm totally addicted to Facebook and Flickr.)

Had some great fun on Thursday of this week when my buddy Ben Burford and I took a daylong trip to the Black Belt for a photo tour. Left around 6:30 in the a.m. and back around 7 p.m. Took around 400 photos. We drove down I-59 to Eutaw and left the interstate world behind for almost the rest of the trip. Stopped at several historic homes, dilapidated shacks, downtowns, had a typical lunch of fried, fried, fried fish as Ezells and then bounced over to Marengo County for a quick stop by my homeplace in Octagon, Alabama before heading to the historical beauty of Gaineswood, Bluff Hall and the general granduer that is Demopolis. A quick stop for some of the Bird family road art and on towards home.

Here's a collage of some of the photos. I've uploaded a few more to my flickr account here.

Photo on Left:
Margaret, Clark Watts (Papa), Joe Watts, Inez Watts (Mama)
Photo on Right: Uncle Edward Waddell, Joe Watts, Aunt Gladys Watts Waddell

Wow. Ever feel tired? Think you've got a little too much to handle. Imagine how my parents felt!

Here is the full Watts Family:
left to right: Suzanne Watts, Cynitha Watts, Julia Watts, Madeline Watts, Clark Watts, Joe Watts (adorable infant), Inez Watts and Margaret Watts

Well, I've officially been overwhelmed this week with work. I try very hard to avoid working after 5 p.m., but sometimes I manage to work a little late--I tend to make up for it by working, as I am this morning, early and on the weekend. I completed a complete redesign for American Mining Insurance Company's online newsletter,  www.americanmining.com/newsletter/, I just completed my 38th (I think) Alabama Sierra Club newsletter, I've just about finished an annual report for the Alabama Association of RC&D Councils, I started working on a new client website, brombergs.com and, well, I guess the list just seems to go on and on.  I'm very pleased with the masthead I created for American Mining's online newsletter, though. We went through several revisions, but the end one really turned out best. Here it is:

Have been wanting to scan a few of our photos in from this trip. I added an entry about our Honeymoon trip to Alaska a few months ago, but never got around to scanning in photos. I just scanned in these two this afternoon--boy was I thin! That has got to be the best hat I have ever had--and if you've read much of my blog, you know I have a certain interest in hats. The Outdoor Research Seattle Sombrero was awesome. It kept me dry in Alaska. It kept me dry on my trip to Minnesota several years ago. I still reach for it when I think I may get wet.

Ann, of course, looks the same--a little better, actually!

I pulled out the photo album of our trip to Alaska to contemplate scanning in a photo or two just to put something onto the blog. Instead, I discovered 5-6 old family photos that I really don't know how they ended up there. Here's one of me all bundled up and working with Papa, my father.

Looks like I loved to dig and plant even back then. Good thing I was all bundled up!

Update: just posted some of my favorite photos from the trip to my flickr account.

Haven't really been doing a lot of posting this week. Have been doing a lot of work. Trying to wrap up an annual report for the Alabama Association of RC&D's, picked up a nice new client this week, took a trip to the Black Belt to work on an Antique Trail along Highway 14--a three-day festival in the fall that I'll be developing a website for. To many irons in the fire....

Here's the Greene County Courthouse in downtown, Eutaw, Alabama. I do find the Veterans monuments in each county interesting--I consider the one in my home county of Marengo to be one of the better ones I've seen so far in my travels--but I may be a bit prejudiced. The courthouse is in disrepair and surely needs some love. More photos to come.

We watched A Christmas Story over Christmas this year. If only that BB gun had been as cool as the one I had--inherited from my sisters. It was a pump action and it could hurl bb's almost as hard as you could throw them. But boy was it cool. Here I am preparing for the coming invasion.