Central Park runner – B/W version

Some cool help me lose weight images:

Central Park runner – B/W version


Image by Ed Yourdon
Having seen a Photoshopped color version of this photograph (located here on Flickr), my instructor in a March 2009 street photography class suggested that I convert it to black-and-white to accentuate the vertical shapes of the fence behind the runner.

I’ve done so here, using Apple’s Aperture program, and with a yellow filter applied to the initial image. I think the result is interesting, and I’ll try to keep an open mind for a while before deciding whether I like it better than the color version. However, if you have strong opinions one way or the other, I’d enjoy hearing it; leave me Flickr-mail or email me at ed at yourdon dot com

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I was walking south along the bridle path that circumnavigates the reservoir in Central Park; and the view here is basically south, with the CitiCorp building and varous other New York City skyscrapers in the background. The reservoir is enclosed by a fence (presumably to keep people from falling in, or jumping in to swim, or perhaps even attempting to fish), and there’s a jogging trail that runs along the fence; so scenes like this are pretty common.

I hadn’t taken the sun into account when I took this picture; during this season, it’s pretty far south, and for whatever reason, it left the runner in pretty dark shadow. I tweaked it a bit, and hopefully didn’t distort the background too badly. I also replaced the grayish-white hazy sky with a bluish gradient fill …

Note: the color version of this photo has been published twice, as of March 14, 2009: in a Feb 26, 2009 blog article titled "How to Intensify Your Running and Lose More Weight.." and in a blog article (allegedly published on May 21, 2006 – which is difficult to imagine, since I didn’t take the picture until Nov 21, 2008) entitled "Burn Twice as Many Calories Running."

This B/W version of the photo was published in an Oct 14, 2009 blog titled "Egyedül vagy társasággal?" And it was published in an Apr 22, 2010 blog titled "Demand Justice For the Wrongfully Convicted Central Park Five." It was also published in a Jul 15, 2010 blog titled "Let AudioTechnica help you run longer…"

Me in dark w/ blue light in mouth (or 16 random things about me)


Image by Daniel Greene
View On Black

I’ve been meaning to do a self-portrait with this blue lighted pendant ever since I got it as a freebie at the Coldplay concert last November. And, since I was tagged a couple of weeks ago to do 16 Things About Me, and since it seems that a few several of my contacts have done their 16 things today, I figured I may as well do what I’ve been putting off.

1. I was born in Flushing, New York. Yes, Flushing like flushing the toilet.

2. My parents met when I was one, married when I was two, and divorced when I was five. My biological father was out of my mother’s life before I was born.

3. I was called "The Cootie Man" from my very first day of school until I switched schools two years later. All due to a misunderstanding over a pile of dog poop. What happened, you ask? My mom and her boyfriend were helping this girl Risa’s mom and dad with their car. My mom asked me to take Risa up to our apartment so Risa could use the bathroom. On the way to the bathroom, we passed by my bedroom. The door was open, and inside my bedroom, Risa saw a pile of poop that our dog must have dumped while we were outside (nervous dog in a new home, I guess). Risa said, "Ew, poo! Who did that?" I thought it was a stupid question (didn’t she know we had a dog?), so I turned to her, with a withering stare that I thought I had calculated to say, "you idiot," and said, "I did." Turns out she believed me.

4. The very first 45 (vinyl single) I bought with my allowance was "Dancing Queen" by ABBA. Two years after I bought my first 45, I sang "I Believe in Angels" with ABBA in a childrens chorus when they came to San Diego on the Voulez Vous tour.

6. The very first record album I bought with my allowance was Love Will Keep Us Together by Captain and Tennille. Ten years after I bought my first vinyl LP, I met Toni Tennille at J.W. Robinson’s in Beverly Hills, where I worked at the time.

8. The very first CD I bought (a two-disc set, as it turned out) was Liza Minelli’s Three Weeks at Carnegie Hall. The same year I bought that album, I met Liza Minelli at J.W. Robinson in Beverly Hills.

10. In my adult life, my weight has fluctuated by 100 pounds. I got into a fruitarian, raw, vegan diet when I was 20, and by the time I was 21, I got on the scale one day to realize that I had whittled down to 95 pounds. I said, "F*ck this sh*t!" and decided to eat whatever I wanted from the health food co-op where I worked. In two weeks, I gained 50 pounds; I kid you not. At 145 pounds, I was 5 pounds heavier than I’d ever been in my life. I lost and gained weight several more times due to fruitarian health kicks. And I’ve gotten pudgy a few times by eating whatever I want. Right now, I’m at what feels like a healthy weight: 175.

11. I seem to keep taking the lead in various organizations. I’ve been a co-chair, secretary, bylaws chair, membership chair, webmaster, newsletter editor, and here on Flickr I’ve created several groups that I administer (I also moderate a couple). I get tired of the responsibility sometimes, and say I’ll take a break, but that never seems to last long.

12. Without going into too many details, suffice it to say that I did more than my fair share of partying and promiscuity before settling down in my mid-thirties. Most people think that I’m conservative, and in many ways I am, but I do believe in experiencing life, and you can believe me when I say that I’ve drunk deeply from the cup of it.

13. I’m now a middle-aged married man with a husband, a house, and two dogs, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

14. Did I mention I was married to a man? And that I’m a man? Yes, that would mean that I am, as Margaret Cho’s mother would say, "The Gay." When I came out at the age of 15 going on 16, it felt like a loooooong time coming. Why, one day, when I was 5, a girl asked me, "Why do you always play with girls and play girls’ games with girls’ toys?" And I answered, in all of my five-year-old wisdom, "Well, you know how there are some girls that are called Tomboys? Well, I guess you could call me a Marygirl." Little did I know that less than twenty years later, my friends and I would sometimes call each other girl and Mary!

15. I learned through much group therapy that I suffered much of my life with the feeling that I was unique. I thought I was happier, sadder, wiser, dumber, better, worse… than anyone in the whole world. I saw myself as either a ten– or a one. Then someone pointed out that maybe I was one among many fellow fives. Although I am no fan of mediocrity, I’ve come to realize on a very deep level that I am not alone, and that I am never as inferior or superior as I might feel among others at any given time. This has been one of life’s biggest lessons for me– and one that I am still learning.

16. My husband sometimes gets crazy over my habit of turning my plate around so that whatever I want to eat at the time is facing me. I may as well eat off a lazy Susan!

Spinach infused yogurt smoothie


Image by This Year’s Love
I feel skinnier already. The whole exercise thing helps, too.
It’s amazing that in three days of continued working out and eating better (well, I’ve been eating better for about a week now) I’ve already lost weight and feel like I’m a size smaller. I know I’m not, but I FEEL like it, so it counts. Anything to keep up the motivation.