We have been trying to desensitize “Bear” to going for a ride in the SUV. She usually gets a little hyper when she thinks she’s going for a ride. Since we’re planning on taking her on our next vacation, we have been getting her to take short rides so she can (hopefully) get bored with it and just enjoy the ride with us.

I took this picture after she finished her ride while we were on the front porch. Click for a bigger picture.

We diverted from our usual Saturday errands when we saw that there was a LA County Fire Department Expo in progress at the Botanic Garden. This giant American Flag was suspended between a fire department crane and a hook and ladder truck’s extended ladder. Click the image for the wide angle view.

Actually, it’s the other way around - the sand art of essence.

When we season meat, poultry, seafood and other food items, we like to use a concoction of spices that Emeril Lagasse calls ‘Essence,’ or ‘Bayou Blast,’ consisting of several different and complimentary herbs and spices. I added each item into a spice shaker and after I added the last one, I noticed the resemblance of my creation to sand art.

I paused to take this photo before blending the ingredients together. Click for bigger..

Grab your 3D glasses and check out this stereoscopic view of the Gazebo at Malaga Cove, Palos Verdes Estates, California. This photo was taken at Roessler Point, a scenic overlook of the spectacular so-called “Queen’s Necklace” vista of the lower Santa Monica Bay.

We come here occasionally for the photo-ops when the smoky skies of the South Bay give way to the azure ones.

Click on the image above for the bigger picture. You will need 3D glasses to view the image in 3D. If you don’t have the 3D glasses handy, you can see the 2D version here.

One of the things we love to do in the evenings, is to watch a DVD on the flat screen TV. Verna has an extensive DVD collection with an eclectic assortment of titles in all genres. We are constantly adding to the collection, as well as retiring DVDs that we will probably never watch again - we donate them to charity.

Last week, she acquired “Journey to the Center of the Earth,” an action/adventure movie that included a copy in 3D - complete with the nerdy colored glasses. We first watched the movie in standard format; as we watched, it became clear that the producers were obviously accentuating some of the scenes for 3D. After numerous such scenes we resolved to watch the movie again - this time in 3D. It was quite spectacular, actually. Lots of stuff came flying out at us - from birds to giant dandelion seed pods and from flying fish to T-Rex dinosaur slobber (really). It was a lot of fun.

Click on the thumbnail image to get a closer look at a couple of 3D nerds and don’t forget to visit the 3D Stuff pages.

Somehow, these lovely little pink phalaenopsis orchids jumped into the shopping cart when we were in the garden shop over the weekend. I’m glad they did, though. Click on the image below for the bigger picture.

I’m still going through some of the images from our summer vacation. I took a number of panoramas and ‘pairs’ to be merged into 3D anaglyph red-cyan pictures. I have shown a number of panoramas but this is the first summer vacation 3D picture to get posted.

This is the result of a pair I took of the ‘Hopi House,’ one of the five Mary Jane Colter buildings at Grand Canyon. The Hopi House is located at Grand Canyon Village near the famous Bright Angel (another Colter building) and the El Tovar Lodges. Click for the larger ‘PNG’ (better resolution) image.

You will need 3D glasses to view the image and the PNG above. If you don’t have the 3D glasses handy, you can see the 2D version here.