The nightly rain I mentioned yesterday, fell until about 2 a.m., after which a perfectly out-of-sync orchestra consisting of a wide range of anonymous local nocturnals played a cacophony of sounds – mostly deep growls, mock roars, high-pitched screeches and a few lonely whines – all pretty much right just outside our tent. It took me a while to fall back asleep after all the racket – mostly because I kept trying to figure out who was making what sound. Unreal.

Capturing the cubs above was shear luck. We’d caught the sunset, spent some quality time with a about 700 common zebras, enjoyed breakfast on the hood of the Landrover – among impalas – and then our excellent driver, Robert, heard from a colleague on his cellphone that there was a lion pride not too far from where we were. I’ve shot several gigabytes of stills and footage with more than two dozen cats today – including a young lion couple in serious need of marriage counseling and two utterly disinterested, albeit gorgeous cheetahs.

Tomorrow I’ve asked Robert to focus on tracking leopards and rhinos. He seems confident on finding the former but only carefully optimistic about locating the latter.

It’s been a staggering seventeen years since my last visit to Kenya. And this is my first time ever experiencing the country’s notoriously intense capital, Nairobi. I took the shot above early this morning about half an hour before traffic congests the city’s busy surface streets and highways. I would of stayed until the sun rose, but my driver insisted that we leave before its ascend or face the consequences of losing at least an hour in traffic on our way back.

We’re staying at the legendary Muthaiga Country Club for a few nights before flying south to the Masai Mara and an equally well-known fixture in the safari sphere, Governors’ Camp. There, for the second time in four years, I’ll be documenting what I’m hoping will be an an extraordinary amount of wildlife, hopefully joining the exclusive club of photographers that have captured images of the “Big Five” during a single game drive.

As much as I hate, hate, hate all the ridiculously misguided and downright inappropriate junk that lands in my inbox every few minutes, I still prefer plain old email as my primary communication tool.

That’s not to say I don’t text or sms – I do! But for that type of “talk”, I use Apple’s often confusing, yet still reasonably useful app, Messages.

But lets get back to email – and more precisely, the default client on OS X, Mail.

See, I love Mail. Far beyond its intended use, even. Way, way, beyond, actually. Fact is, I’m writing this very post in Mail. And most of everything I’ve ever written these last five or so years were typed in an ordinary email window.

So, why is Mail my go-to app for hammering out more or less cohesive ramblings? There’s at least a dozen professional programs out there with tons and tons of super-duper features and amazing editing and formatting capabilities.

Three reasons. Three.

One.

The general interface of Mail is pretty clean – and if I close the app’s main window with all its busy mailboxes, columns, rows and icons, my writing environment instantly becomes spectacularly minimalistic.

Two.

Mac OS X has a phenomenal dictionary and thesaurus that can be accessed in just about any app and in Mail, all you have to do is highlight a word and…presto! You get a gorgeous selection of apt definitions, synonyms and antonyms.

Need a word from Wikipedia, Brittanica or the Urban Dictionary? No problem! Highlight a word, right click and boom! You’re browser immediately opens a page with Google’s slew of alternatives – waiting for you to copy and paste.

Three.

Ok, so this isn’t really a benefit of Mail’s…but the simple answer is, I just don’t like Pages, Word or any other word processor that I’ve come across (or, been forced to use). I’m sure they work just fine for most people. But I get so darn easily distracted when I’m writing and if the interface is in itself a distractor, well, the writing is inescapably going to suffer.

One day, when I get around to writing that book I’ve been thinking about since way back when, I probably won’t write it in Mail.

Or, if only to prove a point, maybe I’ll do just that!

Every several years, I return to Sidney Lumet’s “The Verdict” – just to remind myself of what really good cinematic storytelling and excellent cinematography looks like.

Not only does Paul Newman, Charlotte Rampling and the always marvellous James Mason turn out brilliant performances – everything from the choice of film stock, masterful camera angles and lighting to the perfectly modulated sound quality, makes this a film worth benchmarking others against.

I can imagine that many have been so inspired by “The Verdict”, that they eventually decided to become lawyers.

Come to think of it, I now remember having naively high hopes for a friend, who at the time of the film’s premiere was studying law, – would become a smart-mouthed, kick-ass defense attorney knocking off one important battle after the other against teams of corporate lawyers and pompous, unjust prosecutors.

He eventually did go on to become a successful judicial practitioner, but I’m sure he’d prefer to see himself as Ed Colcannon, James Mason’s portrayal of the ruthless, cynical, senior lawyer in “The Verdict” than Paul Newman’s underdog character, the self-pitying, womanizing drunk, Frank Galvin.

Curiously, one of the extras in the final courtroom scene, which is when Paul Newman makes his poetic, closing argument, is none other than a young, Bruce Willis – whom I was hired to be stand-in for and extra during the 1986 fall season of the then extremely popular sitcom, Moonlighting.

A stand-in is someone that replaces the principle actor in scenes where only an arm, hand, leg or foot will be visible. Like opening a car door, stepping onto an escalator and so on.

So, while Bruce and Sybille (Shepard) were in their trailers reading scripts and eating catered delicacies, parts of my body were busy playing the role of David Addison’s body parts.

As fun as it initially was to work on that show (and a few others, like Cagney & Lacey, Hunter), in all honesty, nothing can possibly be more monotonous than being a peripheral cast member on a television sitcom or drama series. Twelve hour days with short spurts of activity followed by endless hours of more waiting. Only watching wet paint dry could be more tedious.

The experience did, however, offer some insight to what it’s like to work in Hollywood, something both my father and mother had done, with limited success. The commercials and demo videos I shoot are usually produced with a small, nimble team and delivered with an extremely short turnaround – as opposed to anything one can say about film production in Tinseltown.

Thought I’d share one of my most recent hotel reviews which will be published in a day or two. I stay at anywhere from 20-30 different hotels on average per year, so I’ve obviously accumulated a decent amount of guest experience. On a couple of occasions, General Managers and directors of Food & Beverages have called to thank me for my insights and complement me on raising issues they were oblivious of. Not certain if my critique had any long-term impact, but their engagement is a definitely a good sign. So, without any further ado, here’s my thoughts on what I think is a really good and recommendable hotel – located just south of the Venice sign above.

The Erwin is a smallish hotel (119 rooms) in the salty, eclectic and world-famous seaside neighborhood of Venice Beach.

Let’s start on top.

The Erwin has what must be one of L.A.’s most spectacular rooftop lounges – complete with sprawling 360 degree views of the area and beyond. In fact, more or less the entire rooftop has been dedicated to ensuring hotel guests and outside visitors can suck up the SoCal sun while chilling out high above palm trees and the hustle and bustle stemming from the Venice Boardwalk below. This laid-back vibe is, of course, accompanied by carefully curated tunes and a wide range of suitable beverages from the roof’s small cocktail bar-cum-cantina.

As an avid – if not particularly good – surfer, I love the Erwin for its proximity to what could be the most consistent surf spot in L.A.; Venice’s “Breakwater”. It almost took me longer to put on my wetsuit then to walk down the street and into the waves…

Once back from a surf session, the hotel can either keep your board in guest storage, or you can just bring it up to your room (the elevator even accommodates longboards).

Guest rooms are pretty basic with functional decor typical for the region (colorful) and all the practicalities you need. Rooms facing north can expect to hear some late-night rumblings from a couple of the nearby bars. Though nothing a pair of earbuds won’t cancel out.

If you’re into the beach scene, the Erwin’s location is outstanding. Perhaps not an ideal choice for families with small children. But for parents with teens, it’s spot on. Lots of stuff to do nearby, even if you don’t hit the waves. Bike, skateboard and inline rental places are abundant as are Venice Boardwalk’s more or less memorable restaurants and cafés.

Main Street and Rose Avenue in Santa Monica are both really close by – as is Venice Beach Pier with plenty of decent eateries and great views of the shoreline. Venice Canals (famous for one of the locations in the TV show, Californication) is definitely worthy a visit.

The Erwin’s onsite restaurant is small and though their offerings are nicely presented, well-made and tasty, the selection is fairly limited. The bar, on the other hand, has a really good breadth.

I can easily recommend the Erwin for a wide range of reasons. One of the most significant, though, is the hotel’s extremely friendly staff.

I stayed for a week and sincerely enjoyed interacting with everybody. The folks working the reception were all personable and plenty helpful – often going out of their way to answer my queries and accommodate my needs for dry cleaning, surfboard maintenance and what not.

The fellows manning the valet parking (free!) were also extraordinarly service-minded. But literally everyone I met or spoke with during my entire stay had a really positive attitude – without coming across as being superficially friendly or beaming a phoney facade – as so often is the case at many other hotels.

The Erwin is a genuine gem and a really good choice when looking for a place to stay in this part of Los Angeles.

Thought I’d post a more comprehensive collection of the guides, articles and travel tips we’ve been engaged to produce for the last eight or ten years. It’s been a ton of fun traveling around the world and experiencing a wide range of countries and cultures. Today, there’s way too much competition for these kinds of gigs and you have to be pretty nifty-thrifty to make them work financially.

Print media continues to undergo a seemingly endless metamorphosis, editorially and financially. Digital only editions and paywalls have become commonplace and so-called, “Native Advertising” is the latest way to blur the line between what a journalist writes and a copywriter hammers out in attempt to lure unsuspecting readers into thinking an advertorial is actually an article. Of course, the travel press has more or less always been a bit conflicted – journalistically speaking, I mean. Curious to see how our daughter Elle will be ingesting editorial content when she is 25, in about ten years time. I have doubts there will be a lot of printed newspapers around by then. Some, sure, but not nearly as many as today. I do, however, envision even more niche magazines than today. That segment seems almost insatiable.

Yesterday, Charlotte and I saw the musician and visual artist, Laurie Andersson’s latest film, “Heart of a Dog”.

In a way this is a tribute to her late dog, Lolabelle. But even if you’re not a dog lover, this is still a relevant film about relationships and how we deal with them when new perspectives arise. If you are a dog lover, you will truly enjoy her film.

“Heart of a Dog” is certainly an art movie without a traditional plot or storyline. Yet you still leave the theater feeling completely content and enthused. Laurie’s amazing voice and her thoughtful narrative, beautiful music and visual abstractions conjure some really interesting and provocative thoughts – ranging from post 911 America to the ultimate question, are dogs actually capable of creating listenable Christmas music?

Perhaps I’m injecting stuff that’s going on in my own life right now, but I made quite a few interesting tie-ins with Laurie Andersson’s thoughts.

Laurie Andersson’s life partner, the late Lou Reed, is present only with a song during the film’s final credits. Which made me wonder if it was either too painful for her to include both of her now passed companion Lolabelle and Lou Reed in the same film or if we can expect yet another tribute in the future.

My images from one of last year’s (2015) huge photo projects has just been published. Kockum Fritid – an all-encompassing sports facility not far from where my studio is and near our condo – just launched their new website. I shot roughly 90% of the photos and had an inspiring time while documenting the various workout classes and a whole bunch of other sports activities.

Toughest activity to photograph? The hockey players. Partially because of the insane amount of colors in the arena and partially due to the cold temperature and slippery working conditions in which I had to try and track fast-moving players as they flew by me. I ain’t no hockey photographer, for sure. Still feel that I got a few inspiring images of which will be used both on their web site and as part of a slideshow on digital signage displays at the entrance.

Easiest were certainly the assignments when I’d hired dedicated models. like during shoots in the gym, squash hall, badminton and swimming pool.

Visit the new site here:

Take a look at the entire collection here.

I met this fella near Turtle Cove northwest of Hanalei Beach on Kauai, Hawaii – a day or two before 2015 came to an end.

After an acid induced epiphany about the meaninglessness of working, he’d left all his earthly possessions in the Bay Area (S.F.) and bought a one-way ticket to Hawaii – carrying nothing more than what fit in a small backpack. He’d been living like a vagabond on the island more or less since arriving, back in 1975. A few shy of 75, he told me that in recent years, a monthly social security check afforded him a rented a room near Hanalei Bay and food from a local general store.

Don’t remember if he introduced himself, but after listening to a more or less coherent synoptic version of his life’s story, I couldn’t resist taking a photo of him. Not that I thought of it at the moment, but in retrospect, the old guy reminded me of a character from the classic Python film, Life of Brian.

I’ve had a web presence since 1999 – using first the jlrmedia.com domain and a few years later, www.raboff.com as my digital homestead and showroom for my work. I hand-coded my first site and produced several versions using Flash and Shockwave (authoring tools produced back then by, Macromedia). In 2006, ten years ago, I started blogging using the flexible WordPress platform.

I mention this to you, dear visitor, only in passing as my new website has already been launched – without much fanfare or ado. When completed, this will be – by a long stretch – the most comprehensive version of www.raboff.com so far. As I don’t participate in the social cesspool of Facebook or any other social media, this will continue to be the go-to place to catch up with my latest work, travels and blog posts.