I happened to be in Minneapolis over the weekend and was able to experience the annual Mayday parade, ceremony and festival. It was fantastic– Complete with bureaucratic puppet heads (above) and blood donations to save those addicted to oil (below).

This year’s theme, A New Bridge: Infrastructure for Future Beings, was an obvious call out to the spending of funds to re-build other countries rather than on the infrastructure needs in the U.S. Still fresh on the minds in Minneapolis was the I-35 bridge that collapsed last year. Still, we are too busy chasing the carrots that our promised in front of us.

I also took audio, and will let you know when I get something put together for a quick slide show.

Take this test. It is short. It has everything to do with seeing. Used here to promote driver awareness of bicyclists. www.dothetest.co.uk

It is also reflective of photography as a practice of seeing the complete picture. Seeing the unexpected. Seeing the subtle. Seeing, and capturing, what otherwise would be missed. It is a practice.

Just like driving.

Last month I spent a day witnessing the making of cheese. The story ran in yesterday’s Detroit Free Press. Basically, the process I saw was a few hundred gallons of milk slowly being stirred into a curd, poured into forms and then pressed into wheels that will become what was voted last year as the “best of show” at the American Cheese Society’s annual competition. Basically, making it the best cheese in the country. Not bad for a company with three employees.

The Leelanau Cheese Company is located in Suttons Bay, Michigan. The owners, John and Anne Hoyt make their artisan raclette in large batches that are aged around 8 months. The Free Press’s Sylvia Rector did a nice job describing the process, but also captured the uniqueness of the Hoyt’s mission–fine cheese, made right, from the cow to the plate.

See more pictures, and read her article online at: It’s the best cheese in America

Below, John Hoyt squeezes excess whey and water out of a fresh wheel of cheese. The cheese will sit with weights on top of it for another 12 hours before being placed in a cellar for 8-10 months.

]]> http://lifeonearth.gatheringblogs.org/archives/158/feed/ http://lifeonearth.gatheringblogs.org/archives/157 http://lifeonearth.gatheringblogs.org/archives/157#comments Fri, 28 Mar 2008 19:57:32 +0000 gary Journal http://lifeonearth.gatheringblogs.org/archives/157

I can see the light! Yesterday the winter tires came off and spring is here! Right? …..

Although i haven’t been posting to the BLOG of late, I have been shooting more than usual for this time of year. Some of the jobs I’ve are below.

The New York Times covered a Home Repo Tour that I covered, the Detroit Free Press ran a snowmobile article on the front page and a new magazine, Edible Grande Traverse, launched and can be picked up around the region. My first of hopefully many assignments with them was a profile of Grand Traverse Resort Chef, Ted Cizma. In addition, there is a stock image in the March issue of Traverse Magazine (try to find it) and Dome Magazine ran a cover portrait of a Traverse City mover-and-shaker.

Now, it’s time to get out there and shoot. Do you have any ideas?

Q&A with Chris & Jody Treter of Higher Grounds Trading Co.

I’m still trying to post some work from my January trip to Colombia with coffee roasters Jody & Chris Treter. I’m working on a slide show to post soon. For now, if you want to learn a little more about what we were doing in Colombia, listen to this radio interview that will air on Radio Anyway on February 16, or you can listen to a clip of it here: Q&A with Chris & Jody Treter

(Above) Chris and Jody introduce themselves, and their mission of high quality, Fair Trade coffee, to a community of coffee farmers in the community of El Maco. The group is a part of the producer cooperative, Fondo Paez.