I took lots of photos on my trip, of course, but mostly the gray Seattle weather seemed to follow me to New York, which is not so good for shadows. But one lovely afternoon we were walking around the Upper West Side and the light coming through the trees in Central Park across the street was just perfect. I can’t decide which photo I like best, so please help me choose. Long shot, or closeup?

For more excellent shadows seen in the most unlikely places, click HERE.

And for more scenic shots, click HERE.

Here’s a New York City shot for you. There was one perfect sunny day and I took advantage of it. I used to work in this building on the 53rd floor, so many years ago. The windows opened and you could hear the traffic like it was at street level, surprisingly.

Romantic note: My neighbors just got back from a trip to NYC and he proposed at the top of it!

For more skies around the world, click HERE.

I was in the mood to show a few pix from that Arizona trip we took. There were many photos I really loved but I’ll just show three. These are from the St Xavier Mission outside of Tuscon. The sky was really that blue. For contrast, below are some of the candles lit by the faithful in the church’s exquisite interior.

For more skies around the world, click HERE.

Belltown is a sort of hip and trendy area in downtown Seattle. I thought I’d post something a little different for Ruby Tuesday, the view down from sidewalk level to the parking lot near the cafe where I met someone for coffee. Note the very green weeds! A bit gritty, but the scene’s still vibrant and creative, doing that urban juxtaposition thing.

For more visions of red around the planet, click HERE.

This photo was taken at the new sculpture park downtown maybe last summer, with the city’s signature Space Needle (left over from an old World’s Fair) framed against the sky. It always makes me feel like the martians have landed. The big red thing is part of a huge sculpture that looks like it’s flying, by Alexander Calder. If you go to Seattle, you should visit the Olympic Sculpture Park, absolutely. It’s a kick.

For more things ruby red everywhere, click HERE.

I hope this is OK for Flowers for Today as they are only sort of flowers, but what an effect! On Friday I went to the Northwest Garden Show in Seattle. This might be the show’s last year, and there were scads and scads of people, even on a Friday. I thought I’d show the giant “flowers” from the show entry. These were at least 15 feet (5 meters) across, maybe bigger. They were enormous and so beautiful! Kudos to the people who created them.

For more flowers around the world, click HERE.

Yesterday I was driving towards downtown, Puget Sound just out of view on my left, and saw this sky. Hope you like it for Skywatch Friday.

For more skies and skywatchers everywhere, click HERE.

I keep looking at the photos I’ve taken in Arizona when I think of shadows. This time I’m including a zoomed-out one so you see what this place is like. Jerome, Arizona is a neat, touristy but artsy town way up in the hills a few hours north of Phoenix. Since there are ruins I figure the town’s been there awhile. The middle photo is a restored tin ceiling in a cafe. And the bottom one is the real shadow shot, taken about a week before the solstice and pretty far south, so that shadow is dark and short. This was taken just walking down the main street. A good shadow, I think! For more fascinating shadows from all over the world, or to post your own, click HERE.

This is a roadside glimpse of shadows, so easy to find in Arizona, so much harder up here in Seattle. It was almost like artwork on the walls, I thought. Take a look at other interesting views of shadows HERE.

Since I came to Seattle, I appreciate sunshine far more than ever before. Even though it’s mostly rainy out right now, here’s a photo from this time last year, taken of the Viaduct in the late day sun. Hope you like it.