More testing, I will get this yet

Yes, I am still in the tinkering phase somewhat when it comes to this page. Sure the amount of content has increased, but I still haven't learned everything I need to know in order to make a blog that I am happy with. One thing I haven't learned is how to place photos within a blog, so with that in mind I picked up the camera and went on my normal Sunday walk to see if I could snap a few pictures and see what would happen.





 So I thought I would start with some pictures of fish.  Well I didn't plan on taking pictures of fish, but as I was walking by the water gardens outside Phipps Conservatory I happened to peer into one of the gardens and saw some goldfish swimming around amongst the plants and figured that would be as good a place as any to get some new photos to try and add to the blog.





Of course if I made it no further than Schenley Park, it wouldn't be much of a Sunday walk, so I cut through the park and over to Carnegie Mellon University, where I got to see a little of the school's football practice, as well as plenty of freshman students milling about for their orientation. 







 Also on the CMU campus is this statue, located across the street from the intersection of Forbes Avenue and Morewood Avenue.  Since I had it in my head by then that I wanted to walk into Norrth Oakland and get something to eat, Morewood Avenue seemed as go a way as any to get there.




This is where I run out of pictures for a moment, see the plan was I would go grab a late lunch, early dinner from Michael's (formerly G's) and grab a cheesesteak sandwich and fries.  Michael's had, in my opinion, the best cheesesteak sandwiches in the area, and I was hoping I could get some pictures of the interior of the place as well as the awesome goodness that I expected on my plate.  Problem is, apparently Michael's no longer exists, replaced by a place called Amazing Cafe.  Sure, Amazing Cafe was open, but I would not want to take pictures of it after having been inside.  I placed an order to go and then proceeded to look around and there were tables that were wiped off, have drunk pitchers of beer still on some of the counters, even though the connected bar (Mitchell's) hadn't been open since the previous evening (it was 3:30 in the afternoon during my visit, plenty of time to clean up one would imagine), so I just got my food to go (the cheesesteak wasn't bad, but not as good as it used to be) and continued with my walk home.


This would seem to be a relatively innocent and rather un-photograph worthy spot, so one may be wondering why I would take this picture.  The thing is, they used to be a little whole in the wall type bar there called "Aces and Dueces".  Can't say that I ever had a drink there, or even went inside the bar for that matter, but what makes that spot noteworthy, or more to the point, the spot I am standing when I took this picture is that this is right about where I was standing years ago when I witnessed a drive by shooting, an event that would see two people get shot, one of whom would die from their wounds. 

Okay, this is a little less depressing, a shot of St Paul's Cathedral here in Oakland, probably the largest Catholic Church in the area.  This is as close as I will get to the church because if there is a God, then I am sure I will get struck down where I stand, and if there isn't a God, that doesn't mean that the priests aren't still going to be pawing at people of the male persuasion.  Thanks but no thanks to that.

The front steps of the Mellon Institute.  As to why I took this picture, well to some of you these steps will look familiar, this is where they shot the scene in the Batman movie with Batgirl riding down the steps on the Batcycle.  And why is it that everything in the Bat Universe has to start with the word Bat.  Is the audience really that stupid that we couldn't figure out Batman's car without calling in the Batmobile?  Or his bike without calling it the Batcycle?  Just saying!!!

Last photo to this entry is just a good old standby from picture taking perspective around here, go get a picture of the Cathedral of Learning.  What can I say, it is the landmark in my neighborhood, so maybe I should go walking in other neighborhoods for a while.







Anyway, time to see if I can actually do this.  If it works then I guess I taught myself a little something new about Blogger, if not then it is back to the drawing board.