Rocco Galatioto, nice photos and good food

I shot the candid of my aunt Grazia in my home in Sicily. She was a truly great woman and she loved me just like a son and I in turn loved has as a second mother. I miss her dearly but she will always live in mu heart and my pleasant memories.

I know that winter is not even here but I'm going through my vast archives of negatives and scanning what I like. It's a daunting job but I will go on until I'm no longer capable of doing so. This image is from a color negative, a very hard type of film to scan well. I think I succeeded here.

I used to love walking on the Brooklyn Bridge but after 9/11, I stopped. I could not bear to look at the skyline. These shots date from January of 1998, early morning with light snow. So many memories.

The trivialization of  holidays has been going on for some time. I believe that Thanksgiving has become the perfect holiday for the society of efficient consumption. An excuse to buy unneeded items. But to each his own. Some may make the usually trite platitudes about being thankful but most would not even go there. So the front yard gets a blow up figure to keep Our Lady of the Bathtub company. Go figure. Happy Thanksgiving. BTW, this is not my home.

I really hate the noun icon or the adjective iconic, they are so overused and inappropriately so that I cringe. However the word icon applies to the Brooklyn Bridge. All over the world it's recognized as being as New York as it gets. These photos were all shot on color negative film and scanned on an inexpensive Wolverine SNAP 20 MP scanner. It's fast and very usable when trying to go through what appears to be a limitless archive. The period was the late nineties when people still used cameras and there were  no smart phones.

This was the greatest dog I ever had the honor of having as a friend. I love my present Charlie, the Catahoula but Mookie was super special. Just look at his features, his eyes, his look and you will agree. As a hairy Belgian Sheep dog he was in his element on cold days and especially in the snow. There's a special place in my heart for him. Some of you may say he's just a dog, but true animal lovers will understand.

When immigrants arrived in New York, they came over on boats so the Statue of Liberty was what they first saw and it was their symbol of America. Now most come through JFK so when they go to their new destinations  they see the Unisphere at Flushing Meadows Park and in a way that is the new symbol of America.