Oddly enough, the picture of the San Xavier mission (shown below) is the most viewed photo I have on Flickr.

Not sure if there’s a natural interest in this photo, or if it’s because it’s the first one I added to a Flickr map.  Either way it’s kind of nice to know that so many people are coming across San Xavier on the Internet.

As some people may know, I created an online photo gallery at www.kerryandwillie.com/gallery/ for my sister’s upcoming wedding. 

Late this evening my mom pointed out that you could only see a small square image if you clicked on a photo.  So instead of seeing the big photo (shown at bottom), you’d see the small photo (shown below).

  

Not good, and Gallery offers little support for small problems like this.  I found a solution so I figured I’d share it here.

I began by Googling “gallery menalto thumbnail” and came up with this page:

Not sure if this is a feature or a bug, so I’m posting here

If you set the permissions on a gallery such that guests can only see the resized images, and the original image is smaller than the resize limit, then when the guest clicks on the thumbnail, they only get to see the thumbnail again, rather than the larger image. E.g. if the resized file is max 800 x 800, and the original image is 640 x 480, then the 640×480 image can never be seen by the guest – only the thumbnail.

http://gallery.menalto.com/node/42042

So, I knew it had to do something with the “resized images.”  I now thought, “WTF are resized images???”  There’s little to no documentation on what they are, but playing around with the Gallery admin form showed that you could see the original image was still there, but “guests” (i.e. people not logged in) could only see the thumbnail view.  So clearly there had to be some setting that would let guests see the original image.

With Gallery, you can set permissions on individual images or on an album.  As it turns out, you need to follow a ridiculously non-intuitive series of clicks to fix the problem.  The steps I took were:

1. Log in and go to the album with the “thumbnail” issue.
2. Click on “Edit Permissions.”
3. Click on “Remove” to the right of “View resized version(s).”
4. Scroll down below ‘New Group Permissions.”  Click in the text box, type “Everybody,” and select “[core] View original version”.  Click “Add Permission” to add this permission to the album

Basically what this does is let “Everyone” (i.e. all guests, who aren’t logged in) to view the original image.  For some reason, this fixes the problem.

I’ve started saying rosaries in my spare time – walking to the T, striding to Trident bookstore, and driving to and from Newburyport.  I find saying the rosaries calms my thoughts and puts me in a meditative mood, rather than letting my brain run away with thoughts about my job, all the stuff I have to do.  I also believe in the power of prayer and it’s nice to “multitask” during my down time.

I have a couple of rosaries, but I prefer to just count on my fingers so I can start or stop at any time.  An “Our Father,” 5 fingers lifted, 5 fingers curled for the decade, and a “Glory Be” to finish.  Repeat 5 times and finish with the Hail Holy Queen.  It’s a nice way to begin the day.

Right now I’ve gotten very good at reciting the rosary; my next step is to memorize the mysteries and meditate on them while saying the prayers.  I’d also like to be able to concentrate on a specific intention while saying the full decade – right now I think of an interntion at the beginning of a decade, but lose it when jostling with other T passengers or cutting off people in traffic.

When I was a kid I used to think the rosary took a long time, but I’ve found that I can say a full rosary (somewhat quickly) in about 12 minutes.  I can usually get two full decades in between my front door and the T, and a full rosary in if I’m driving to Boston.  Overall I’ve gotten better about managing my time and it’s interesting to see how little time it really takes to say.

Next to speak was Jane D. Marsching. Marsching’s work can be seen at http://www.climate-commons.net - the logo on the “Climate Commons” page is actually a top-down view of a table that splits apart (each circle is one of the seats).  Each piece of the table had a computer terminal that displayed information on the melting ice in the Arctic.

 

 In the piece below (one of about four, each one about five feet by six) the background is completely rendered in 3D, and the people are photoshopped in.  The piece was inspired by records of explorers to the arctic landscape, who would perform theater and have concerts on the ice to entertain themselves. I found myself more interested in the methods used to create the pieces than the pieces themselves, but it sounds like part of appreciating contemporary art is understanding the choice of materials and method.

I actually like the “Weight of God” piece on her web site more than her ICA exhibit, but I thought it was cool that she printed business cards for the piece that provided a link to the Climate Commons site.

Yummy Frittata, ordered at Trident Bookstore in Boston. Bacon, scallions, and potato fried in egg. Filling and great with my weekly tradition of a coffee at Trident.

Click on the photo to see a Flickr map where this photo was taken, as well as other photos I’ve taken around the country.