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This is what vacations are good for…

3 minute read

May 18, 2011, 11:34 PM

Vacations are great for Schumin Web. Usually, every time I take a vacation, I manage to finish a photo set. This time, it’s Plungefest 2011. Normally this wouldn’t be notable, except that I ran out of time to finish this “in-studio”. See, I normally do all my photo sets at home, on my real computer. However, I ran out of time on Tuesday night, and I had planned a trip to Stuarts Draft from Wednesday to Friday. So first of all, hello from my parents’ house in Stuarts Draft. Thankfully, I was able to complete enough of the set on Tuesday night that I could do the rest of the work on the road from the netbook. So I did all the captions on my parents’ couch, and then pulled the covers off the menu entry, and then voila! Done.

On that last part, that was kind of interesting. Before I left the house, I put the menu entries in and then commented them out. Kind of reminds me of when banks change names, which, as you know, happens on a fairly regular basis anymore. They change the signs ahead of time, and then put a cover over the new sign with the old logo on it. I believe Wachovia is in this process right now, with their eventual change to the Wells Fargo nameplate. Then when the time comes, they just yank the cover off and the name is changed. Same here. I just removed the comment tags, and boom – the menu item is revealed.

Of course, this kind of stuff will all change when I eventually convert the site to WordPress. Then I’ll be able to do all of the site from anywhere, rather than the current situation of being restricted to my home computer for some parts and being partially mobile for others. I’m looking forward to that, but it’s going to be a long time still before that happens.

Otherwise, though, the trip to Stuarts Draft was kind of hot-and-cold. It was pouring buckets when I left the house and going all the way through Fairfax County. Then it was clear skies, dry pavement, and smooth sailing until literally right on the boundary between Albemarle County and Greene County. Literally right on the boundary. I commented that it’s like the storm was on probation or something and couldn’t leave the county. As soon as I crossed into Albemarle County, it was raining hard, and stayed raining until I got to the Charlottesville city limits. That boundary is at Hydraulic Road – thus everything north of Hydraulic Road, including Kmart, the mall, Walmart, Sam’s Club, Target, and the airport, are technically not in Charlottesville, but rather in unincorporated Albemarle County. Then it was again clear skies the rest of the way to Stuarts Draft – even on the mountain. I was expecting conditions on Afton Mountain to be poor, as the mountain normally fogs up whenever it rains. But the mountain was clear and sunny. I definitely hit it at the right time. Then once I was on 340, I discovered that people in Stuarts Draft don’t know how to drive. I think after seeing the way some of these people drive, I was saying words that would make a veteran sailor blush. But there you go.

Then later this evening, Dad and I went to El Gran Puerto, a Mexican restaurant in Stuarts Draft. We must go there more often. Good place. And Dad and I had a great time.

Then tomorrow, I’m not quite sure yet what I’m going to do. Depending on the weather, I’m possibly going to go up on the mountain to formally re-photograph the abandoned buildings on Afton Mountain, which I originally photographed back in 2003. I also want to photograph the “anatomically correct bull”, which, upon drive-by in February, I noticed had lost its nuts (yes, this bull statue had them). So I want to verify and photograph. The way I figure, the “anatomically correct bull” is a local landmark (just say it and everyone knows what you’re talking about), and so if this bull is actually now a steer, that’s notable, you see.

So there you go, I suppose.

Web site: Tornado damage in Stuarts Draft from a few weeks ago...

Song: Probably the most embarrassing moment ever...

Quote: And of course, if you Google "anatomically correct bull" and "Stuarts Draft", all you get is me. Trust me on this, though, that even though I'm the only one to discuss it on the Interwebs, that this is a local landmark.