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Here In Oakland

Art & Life


   



October 22, 2016

Television

Saturday. Lights out by ten leading to a reasonably decent night's sleep, awakening at six. Just like that. Another clear day, not as warm as it was yesterday, the weather people are saying, and so something to look forward to starting with a Black Panther Party 50th Anniversary gathering at Frank Ogawa Plaza in downtown Oakland at eleven. Pictures, in other words.

Dark, walking to breakfast half an hour before sunrise. A two strips of bacon, scrambled eggs, country potatoes, sourdough toast, mixed fruit cup and coffee for breakfast because that's what I ended up ordering. If I'd been thinking, I'd have gone with the plain waffle with fruit and not gambled on an ocular event with the bacon, but that opportunity is gone and we'll not worry about one coming back later.

The stairway next to the Grand Fare Market seems to be close to being finished. The market itself is open and operating, although I'm not sure how it's doing, having closed due to lack of business after its start some time back. It gives me the mental image of a jumble, a junkyard filled with expensive “junk”, from coffees and cheeses to potted plants. More a comment on me and my limited world view than anything else. All jumbled together, anyway, and here I am talking about them without ever actually having been inside.

Maybe best to keep our trap shut.

Well, maybe saying it out loud will be embarrassing enough to get me to go inside the place, at least see what they have on the delicatessen side. There are, after all, tables out under an open roof. I say I prefer open places to eat, so maybe I'll go and see if all this is just unfiltered babble and sour grapes.

Later. A bus downtown to Frank Ogawa Plaza, arriving just before eleven to find people setting up for the Black Panther Party 50th Anniversary gathering, the crowd still small, and so a walk to the bagel shop in the City Center next door for a bagel with cream cheese and coffee. Not overly hot, sunny, a good day for pictures.

Spent two hours shooting, getting enough pictures for a decent web section, and so we'll process them this afternoon and through the rest of the weekend. One or two good ones, the rest OK. The one speaker that kicked it off and then the performers that followed were quite good. Happy to have made the scene.

Evening. I've only processed half a dozen photographs through the evening. Tired, I guess, opting to watch episodes of Law & Order while vegetating in a chair in front of the set. Well, two hours of running around (less time to eat) taking pictures can be tiring, at least the way I do it.

To bed early, no interest in the tablet after spending all that time on television.

The photo up top was taken at last year's Fruitvale Dia de los Muertos Street Festival with a Nikon D4s mounted with a 70-200mm f 2.8 VR II Nikkor lens.


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