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You don’t know what you got…

The Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco, California 

… ’til it’s gone. These words of the song sung by Joan Jett and the Blackhearts have been running through my mind this morning, even after I looked at my Web site usage reports. We call that “an earworm.”

One of my goals in writing this blog/photoblog is “that the blog should contribute something, and not be another waste of bandwidth in cyberspace.” I think that the blog is starting to accomplish that aim. The Mission Statement of Cheshire Cat Photo is: “To showcase California through photography.” I am not saying that we Californians do not know what we have. I am saying that, like everyone else, Californians are so busy working that they don’t always have time to “stop and smell the roses.” The roses are plentiful here, and pretty obvious to a midwestern boy like myself whose life’s path brought him to the West Coast.

The Mid-West also has more than its share of attractions and unique features. I did not realize that we had never visited The Great Serpent Mound, in Adams County, OH, until I found myself in Wisconsin (with its own rich history of effigy mounds, even on the University of Wisconsin, Madison campus). The next time we found ourselves living in Ohio, we visited the Mound. Other times that I realized that I did not know what I had were when I found myself separated from long-time friends by thousands of miles and 30+ years….

I want to say hello to some people who are relatively new to this site: the folks with ISPs (Internet Service Providers) in Naperville, IL and Crystal Lake, IL. I also want to thank CNN for bringing some of you here, because of my blog entry on earthquakes, both here in CA and recently in Illinois. Some of you from Saint Louis, Mo may also be here because of CNN.

I also want to welcome the ever-increasing numbers of readers/viewers from GermanyJapan, the UKItaly, and of course, Canada (second only to the U.S. in visitors to this site). I met Italians at Point Sur. I met travelers from Germany at Mono Lake, and when I stopped to photograph Northern Elephant Seals at the Piedras Blancas Rookery, the language that I heard from a group of visitors on rented Harley Davidson motorcycles was German! I thought, “How many American motorcyclists (including myself!) have never ridden their bikes through Big Sur, from Carmel to Cambria?”

Speaking of Cambria, there is a lot of new traffic coming through Yahoo in Cambria. I think that you folks in Cambria really DO “know what you got” <sic> in your beautiful town by the sea. Thanks for reading and viewing! There are some other folks with increasing readership in San Diego and LA. Folks from San Diego, you may have read the recent comment from Peter in Chicago who is now starting to think hard about the beauty and climate of your city.

No matter where we find ourselves, it is very important to realize what we have. Life is very short, and there is always less time to “smell the roses” than we would like. I hope that this blog/photoblog allows many of you to smell the California roses over the Internet, and when you have time, or your path brings you here, that you will smell the California roses in person.

-Bill at Cheshire Cat Photo™

You can view higher-resolution photos (*generally* 7-30 megabytes, compressed) at the Cheshire Cat Photo™ Pro Gallery on Shutterfly™, where you can also order prints and gifts decorated with the photos of your choice from the gallery. Apparel and other gifts decorated with some of our most popular photos can be ordered from the Cheshire Cat Photo™ Store on CafePress®.

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