A 'lil HooHaa

Messing with the blogging world since 2005

north east bloggers network

Northeast Bloggers January photo challenge: Snow

Snow and winter and covered bridges.

Snow and winter and covered bridges.

As you all know, I’m a sucker for photo challenges.

One blogging group – The Northeast Bloggers Network – that I am part of has a monthly photo challenge. One photo with a theme.

This month’s theme? Snow. Like I had an issue with finding something in regard to that, right? There’s plenty of snow around here. However, I’ve decided to go with one photo that has snow … but it’s more of a winter scene I love to try and capture each year.

nephotoIn our area, we have some great and historic covered bridges. I’m a huge fan of these bridges and always love to try and capture them in every season. As I was driving home from work, I passed this one and saw this picture.

I had to turn around.

Of course I snapped a bunch of photos with the phone (and shared on Instagram), but I also pulled out my main camera and did some shots, trying to capture the winter feel of it being cold and crisp, which I think I did.

I always think winter helps the blue sky pop that much more and I’m quite happy I turned around. The sun was in a perfect spot, the sky was brilliant and the snow was enough to give a winter feel, but not hamper the shot. Though, I can’t lie, I would have liked to have seen a little more snow on the road as I think it would have added just a bit more to the photo.

In the end, I am quite excited with the shot and can see me blowing this one up and framing it to hang down the line.

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog [at] gmail.com. Also, please “Like” HooHaa Blog on Facebook!

Northeast Bloggers October photo challenge: Movement

It’s been a few months since I participated in the Northeast Bloggers Network challenge, so I wanted to get back in it this month.

When I do a challenge or a linkup, I like to make sure it’s a blog post and not just a link to an image somewhere. It makes it feel more like a challenge.

This month’s theme was “movement.”

For it, I decided to keep it a bit simple.

A couple of weeks ago, I was in South Jersey for a few days. A couple of those days were spent at the Cape May County Zoo, which has several baby animals that have been born in the past few months.

The one I really wanted to see was the baby giraffe, which was born on Sept. 2. Of course the first day we went, it was rainy. So the baby (or any of the giraffes) wasn’t out. We went back a day or two later and we got the chance, thankfully, to see it.

This photo shows the movement.

Basically, the mother giraffe was nudging the little one along to get walking and explore. It was fun to watch.

Mother giraffe nudging her newborn daughter to move along.

Feel free to stop over at the Northeast Bloggers Network blog to see who else participated this month!

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog [at] gmail.com. Also, please “Like” HooHaa Blog on Facebook!

Northeast Bloggers May Photo Challenge: Summer

I’m a day late on this one as I thought, originally, it was to be posted Friday.

Better late than never?

I sure hope so.

Anyway, this month’s photo challenge for the North East Bloggers challenge was summer. And what better way to cover that topic than with some baseball-related things?

Exactly.

This image was taken with my iPhone at a recent baseball game I attended. It was the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Rail Riders taking on the Norfolk Tides.

Baseball, a cold beer and my scorebook … yep, pretty much a perfect summer night.

What a summer night!

Look for the photo challenge I run to run Sunday, too.

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog [at] gmail.com. Also, please “Like” HooHaa Blog on Facebook!

Northeast Bloggers May Photo Challenge: Color

Just what I need — another photo challenge, right?

This one isn’t too bad.

It’s a monthly challenge at the North East Bloggers Network, where there’s a theme and you have one photo to take.

This month’s theme is color.

Unfortunately, my photos are all over the place on memory cards and other spots as I try and organize and find storage space. So I went with a Hipstamatic image I took earlier in the month with the iPhone.

I think it covers the “color” theme well.

I just wanted to know what in the heck one shoe was doing on this picnic table in the park. Seems like there has to be a story, no?

Colorful shoe.

I’ll have another photo challenge posted Friday.

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog [at] gmail.com. Also, please “Like” HooHaa Blog on Facebook!

It’s all about getting to know somebody and their blog

Those who know me — and my blogging practices — know I don’t usually get into the “know me” sort of thing.

I always figured one could see what I was like through my writing or my photography etc. However, I recently joined up with the North East Bloggers Network, a group of — you guessed it, bloggers — who reside in the Northeast.

This gazebo is one of the most well-known items in my town as it once appeared on the cover of the Saturday Evening Post.

Check and check.

First, I realize I’m a minority in this group as I’m one of only a couple male bloggers here. At least that I’ve seen. It’s funny because you can see differences in blogging style and such. But the beauty of the blogging world is all the different styles and such. This group, thus far, has been a lot of fun to be involved with.

Anyway, on with the show…

I’m based in upstate New York. It’s a small town, but I usually tell people I’m not far from Cooperstown. It’s a good bridge. If somebody is a baseball fan, that’s an easy connection. If not, most have usually heard of it. In theory, my area is also at the middle of the bottom of a triangle with Syracuse being the point and Binghamton and Albany being the bottom points.

This area is really nice for a lot of reasons. We’re engulfed in mountains and rolling hills. It’s pretty simple in regard to life. People know each other, most are friendly and it’s a great place for kids. That being said, it’s not always the best for activities. You need to pretty much travel 30 minutes if you want to do anything such as a movie, shop or things like that.

If you are into the outdoors, though, this whole area is great.

There are plenty of places to investigate for hiking, photography, biking and whatever else you might like outside. Though I don’t participate in them, fishing and hunting are massively popular around here.

As for me, I love being outside (in good weather). I’m an avid geocacher, love photography and really like getting out and exploring through hikes. I enjoy a bike ride and really can handle just going for a drive with my camera close by so I can see what kind of things I can capture. This area offers said opportunities. I’m also a softball junkie in the summer, play disc golf and just really enjoy trying to be as active as I can.

Blogging outdoors can be a way to get into a groove.

This area also is a great place to be able to get outside and blog. With a plethora or pretty quiet parks and areas, during the warmer months, I love to try and get out and blog in the outdoors. Of course I have to watch battery life, but it’s still nice to be outside and do some writing. Plus, it gives me a chance to people watch, which is also a fun thing.

My blog, which I’ve run in some form or another since 2005, is a potpourri of my life. There’s going to be photography, some sports stuff, geocaching, disc golf, happenings in my life, stories of my attempt to home brew and whatever else. Sometimes it’s serious, sometimes funny, sometimes in between. Kind of like life. I even throw in a journalistic style story on occasion. I don’t consider the blog to have any one style, but more of a personal reflection sort of thing. I usually try and stay away from controversial things, however.

As for why I blog, well, I’ve always been a writer. I’ve written for newspapers for the majority of my career, have worked in public relations and have always been involved in communications. The thing is, when I do things like that, it’s for a living. When I blog here, it’s about my writing and things I want to write. I like it that way because I’m a little more free to write about things such as that.

I’m a fan of photographing waterfalls whenever I can. This is Taughannock Falls, outside of Ithaca, NY.

Truthfully, it’s a way for me to just write about whatever. Sometimes I get more views than others. Same with comments. But I keep typing away knowing one day in the future, I’ll be able to spend a weekend starting from the beginning and read all the way through this blog and smile. I’ll have gone through many things in that time period, so it will be fun to see the things I wrote.

I will also try and interject photography as much as possible, whether it be nature, everyday life, sports, covered bridges, waterfalls or whatever else.

I’ve also met a lot of people through blogging who I never would have met otherwise. There are some great people doing blogs. One day, I hope to hit up a blog meet or conference or something as I’d love to meet some of these bloggers face-to-face instead of just behind the screen! This community is pretty fun, though, and it’s one I like being a part of for sure.

It would take forever to go through all my posts and find every favorite one I’ve done, so I’ve gone through and picked a random sampling of those I have really enjoyed writing. If you want to see some more of my stuff, click the links below:

It’s nice to have found a smaller group such as North East Bloggers. Some of the others I’ve joined are bigger and everyone gets lost in a massive pond. This group has really been fun so far and I hope it continues that way.

Fundraiser: I am, again, trying to raise money for the Relay For Life. If you donate to me — a minimum of $5– you will be entered to win a super-sweet quilted lap quilt or pillow. Click here for all the information!

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog@gmail.com. Also, please “Like” HooHaa Blog on Facebook!