Upright on on its side?

I like to experiment with landscape vs portrait compositions. Sometimes the difference isn’t very substantial, at other times it can make the difference between something that goes to Flickr and one that stays hidden in the bowels of Aperture.

Today I was looking through my pictures and found two that are very similar, but one is upright and the other on its side. I like both photos and I think that each works – but tells its story a little different.

What do you think?