Laura and I just watched an amazing movie. If you haven’t seen it, there is literally no better time than now. Considering the historic election we just witnessed here in America, the movie is remarkably poignant. I couldn’t help but realize several remarkable details. There is a moment in the film where Sidney Poitier is speaking with Spencer Tracy about the future possibilities for his potential children with Katharine Houghton’s character and he says she believes they’ll “be president of the United States and they’ll all have colorful administrations.”  It blows my mind that this film was made in 1967, six years after the birth of President Elect Barack Obama.  Who could have ever imagined that Barack Obama, a real-life example of the fiction in this movie, would later be elected President of the United States?  It is amazing to see what can happen over the course of a lifetime.  I’m still young, and I can only marvel at the looks on the faces of those older and more experienced than me.  When made, this movie was probably considered a bit of science fiction.  Now, that science fiction has become reality.  Amazing.

Finally, for a recent article further relating this movie to the Presidential Election, here’s something from the November 2, 2008 New York Times.

Panoramic view of the inside of our garage here in Nashville …

I realized I forgot to include one final panoramic image from our new house here in Nashville. It’s a place of the home that has been requiring a lot of attention (no, not the yard). The garage! I’ve spent a lot of time out there, organizing and cleaning, and still have a lot of work ahead of me. Regardless, here’s what the garage looks like today. Enjoy!

The view of our old building as seen from Main Street, Cold Spring, New York …

Today I spent some time creating panoramic photos of Cold Spring, New York.  In the midst of all the packing and mortgage mayhem I really wanted to take a few sentimental panoramas of our tiny town on the Hudson.  On the morning of September 13, at about 7:30AM I managed to take pictures for a few panoramas.  Now, 1,000 miles away in Nashville, I found the time to piece the images together.  Once again, you’ll need to be logged in to flickr to see these.  Enjoy!

Time for a special edition, Presidential Election, update to the blog.  It’s a momentous day in America - the race for the Presidency all boils down to today.  I am happy and proud to say that I cast my ballot early here in Tennessee, locking in my vote about 10 days ago.

It was a beautiful day with the fall in full swing here in the South.  With that in mind, I took some panoramic photos of our new house.

You’ll need to be logged in to Flickr.com to see these.  Please click the link below and scroll to the end of the list to see the 9 panoramas I made of our house today.

Hello everyone!  I’ve decided to start a blog.  I didn’t really think that much about it, basically just decided to go for it.  Here’s what I’m thinking: I’m gonna use this space to keep a journal of my work on the family archives.  Even I forget what kind of work I’ve done or what I intend to do when it comes to the family archives.  I’ve decided to just start referring to the entire project as the family archives.  It’s just a lot easier than having to describe the audio tapes, the film negatives, the slides, the knick-knacks, coin collections, personal memorabilia, video and film reels, etc.  So, here at cityofthedes.tumblr.com I intend to keep a running journal of my work on the archives.

Today I spent a little time organizing family audio tapes.  I inherited a bunch of tapes of Emil and Ella Ekwall, Jewell Benson, Edna and Chris Nielsen, Ken Ekwall, Velma Lundstrom, and various Thede family (Larry, Laurie, Adam, Emily, and Rosie) tapes.  I’ve already digitized a majority of them.  However, I’ve still got a lot of computer work to do on the audio files before I can start putting them on the web or on to CD.  I’d like to clean up the audio a bit, and break the files into 10 minute segments (or shorter), or whatever makes the most sense for public distribution.

At the local thrift store I found an audio tape rack and 90 cassette tape cases all for the grand sum of about $12.  I’m really excited about the find, because I feel the tapes need some decent protection for storage.

Here’s a before shot:

Here’s the final product … I also decided to print out labels for all of the cases.

So there you have it.  Today’s work on the family archives.  I’m already looking forward to my next addition to the blog.