The Photographic Stylings of Matt Viel

We lived in the Tierrasanta area of San Diego several years in several rental homes. Matthew was on a magical memory tour today with Diana starting with 3 of the 4 homes we lived in there. The first home he shot was the last one we lived in on Carroza Court. It was a nice home with many happy memories. The home we were in when I had my left hip replaced, Sharyn got Carlos to build a walk in bird cage where we bred a few love birds, Andrew winning a line guided airplane race, Steven and Matt graduating high school, Peter dating Nikki and the Indian Family coming by every year to get some banana leaves for a traditional celebration.


I'm not showing both of the other homes because they looked exactly alike and were in a nice area in Tierrasanta called Portofino. The area was concentric circles of streets with common areas and green spaces between the townhouse styled homes. It's a very nice area and the first place we moved in when we came to San Diego from Utah.


Mission Trails Park was largely undeveloped when we moved to San Diego and now it has a visitors center...


... with all kinds of aesthetic enhancements including a cute Belgian woman...

...and a metal eagle.


From the Tierrasanta area Matt and Diana went to Balboa Park. This is their Natural History Museum.


I'm not sure where Matt found this rather amazing tree with roots that look like flowing waterfalls.


Just so you can appreciate the size of these roots I through this picture in for effect.


Balboa Park is on a hill and right next to the landing pattern for Lindburg field.


And speaking of airplanes it also houses the San Diego Aerospace Museum and the International Aerospace Hall of Fame. The airplane in front is a Sea Dart designated F2Y and built by Convair which later became the Coinvair division of General Dynamics that I worked for in San Diego. It's also the same division that developed the Cruise Missile.


The Organ Pavilion in Balboa Park is still in use for concerts.


This building houses the Visitors Center for Balboa Park and the Prado Restraunt.


This is the Balboa Park Arboretum and it's a beautiful building for anyone who loves flowers and all kinds of exotic flora.


Near the rose garden is a great desert area with cacti and desert plants of many varieties.


What an amazing tree with a hollow large enough for Matthew to climb into for a look. Thanks Matt for the photos on a day when I didn't get one shot.


No Scrabble

Quote of the Day

"Be daring, be different, be impractical, be anything that will assert integrity of purpose and imaginative vision against the play-it-safers, the creatures of the commonplace, the slaves of the ordinary." - Sir Cecil Beaton

Sir Cecil Beaton's most spectacular talent is little known in the present day. We know him, of course, as a prominent society and fashion photographer of the 1940's; we know his photographs of Prince Charles as a baby, of the wartime Churchill in various bulldog poses, of St. Paul's Cathedral in ruins, of thickly made-up socialites, and flocks of storklike models in Charles James evening gowns. We know him also as the Oscar-winning designer of Audrey Hepburns's fantastic costumes in My Fair Lady. He was also a gifted writer. He also had a well know relationship with Greta Garbo.