Snapshot Sunday, August 17

 

The makings of a good birthday?  (Or a good any day, really.)  Good times with the one you love, and surrounded by the beauty of nature.  Couldn’t ask for more.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                      

Celebrate!

 

Yes, I know that just yesterday I was a little annoyed with some recent goings on, but that doesn’t mean I’d want to trade the good ol’ US of A for anything at all.   So , today I spent the day doing the things I am most  grateful for, mainly, hanging out with family, talking, laughing, and having a variety of good food.   And, in my annual quest to get decent pictures of fireworks, I finally got a few that I was happy with, including the one above.  Nice way to end the evening.

So, happy birthday, America; let’s plan another party next year!

Snapshot Sunday, March 16

 

No pictures today (at least, none of mine), just a pining for a new way to create them.

A couple of years ago or so, I read an article about a really cool  new camera, the Lytro.  I thought they’d become the next big thing, but I haven’t heard a whole lot about them since then.  The technology is beyond me, but I can tell you that what they say is that this camera captures the entire light field of an image, rather than just a single plane of light.  Like I said, I don’t really understand that, but the end result is a picture that can be refocused and shifted around, even after it’s been taken.  To me, that’s really cool.

I wish I could put some of their photos here, but that doesn’t seem to be possible, at least not with their full functionality.  So, I’m going to paste a couple of my favorites, because a good picture is a good picture, even when it’s static, but I’m going to strongly encourage you to visit their gallery and see for yourself how truly nifty it is to be able to sort of re-envision your pictures after you’ve already taken it. 

   

    

 

 

 

 

 

I always want a new camera; sometimes my wants are practical, and sometimes they’re far less so.  Putting a Lytro into my camera bag would absolutely fall into the “impractical” category, but it sure would be fun.

 

Snapshot Sunday, February 9

 

I’m not sharing any of my photos this week, and I started to tell you that it’s because I haven’t taken any pictures this week, though now that I think about it, that’s not entirely true.  I did stop at a spot on the lake this week, to snap a few photos of the frozen water in the morning.  It looked cool as I was driving by, though as I was taking the pictures, I didn’t have the feeling they were capturing the mood very well.  In fact, I haven’t even looked at them on anything bigger than the view screen yet.

But, I was browsing around the web recently, and came across a couple of sites about taking pictures with the ever-present cell phone.  I was pleased to discover that some professional photographers are starting to recognize the art behind taking pics with your phone, and giving some ideas about how to do it.

For instance, this photo came from a National Geographic photographer, captured with his iPhone.  You can read his thoughts and tips here.

And this one from a photojournalist who’s covered the Middle East extensively; you can watch a presentation about how he transitioned into using his phone here. (Though a bit of a warning that he’s a better photographer than presenter; can’t have it all.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Anyway, while I have no delusions that any of my photos will ever be gracing national publications—regardless of the camera I use—I do like to see cell phone photography coming out of the shadows of being known only for selfies and whatever entrée someone is having for lunch.

Snapshot Sunday, February 2

 

I don’t pretend to understand everything (or much of anything, really) about global warming.  Honestly, it’s over my head in a lot of ways.  But I will say this:  I think we’ve had more snow in the past five years or so than we’ve had in my entire life.  Cumulatively.  Maybe it’s coincidence.  Maybe it’s a faulty memory.  Or maybe it’s any number of things other than climate change.  But we’ve still been getting a lot of snow.  Not compared to a lot of other places, mind you, only compared to ourselves.  But I do like to snap some photos when it happens.

 

And, this is the first of three winter storms we’re expecting this week, and maybe a fourth when next weekend rolls around.  We’re not alone, of course and actually are in much better shape than a lot of the country.  So, everyone do your best to stay warm in this weather, and always stay safe.

Snapshot Sunday, January 26

 

So, I don’t think that I’ve taken a single photograph since we returned from vacation, though I have seen a couple of beautiful sunsets and one morning the lake looked very picturesque with a sheen of ice covering it.

But, as I always do, I have seen many wonderful photographs.  (StumbleUpon, anyone?)  Really, I should share more of the pictures I come across here and there, not only because so many of them are simply stunning works of art, but because if you’re anything like me, they could take you so many places.

The one that really moved me this week came from this Stumble, which was actually full of really spectacular pictures.  But this one in particular spoke to me, inviting me to a world of endless possibilities. 

It’s called the tunnel of love, and it’s in Ukraine.  But what lies at the end of that train track?  A medieval castle?  An ice cold lake surrounded by an enchanted forest?  Another world?

In truth, the tracks run to some sort of wood factory, but that’s not nearly as romantic as the other ideas, right?  I can’t say that I’ve ever had reason to want to travel to Ukraine (and certainly not lately), but this one place could make me change my mind.  I’d love to stand in this magnificent tunnel, even if only for a moment.  I’m quite certain the moment would be magic.

Snapshot Sunday, January 19

 

They say pictures tell a story, but today, let me tell you a story about some pictures.

First, a little background.  For our vacation, I rented a Hero GoPro.  I’ve always thought they were pretty cool cameras, but I couldn’t really justify spending a few hundred dollars on yet another piece of photography equipment.  But they’re small, and come in a waterproof case, so having one on a vacation where we might be on beaches and in water seemed like a neat idea.  As it turned out, one of the main activities where I had hoped to put it to use got cancelled because of weather, but it could still come in handy at other times. 

One of those times was a tour while in Belize, when we drove out to visit a site of Mayan ruins at Altun Ha.  Like every other day of our vacation, it was raining during our visit to the site, so we took a few pics with our regular cameras, but eventually pulled out the GoPro to snap a few others once the rain really started coming down.  One of the downsides of the small camera, though, is that it has no view finder, so there’s no way to really frame your photos—you just sort of aim and hope.  And, of course, they’re really created for extreme sport type usages, so for the most part, they’re attached somewhere to sort of capture whatever the user is seeing from a unique POV; just holding them and kind of looking around isn’t really the best use of the technology.  Here’s an idea of what I mean:

There’s nothing particularly wrong with this photo, but it might have looked a little different had I been able to see what I was actually shooting.  But, this picture does give us a starting point for the actual story . . . See that temple in the background, the taller structure?  It’s just over fifty feet high, which doesn’t really look all that high from the ground, especially since they’ve put a hand rail along the steps, so it seemed like it would be pretty simple to get to the top.  I thought that even though I’m pretty much a baby when it comes to heights; I really thought it would be okay.

However, the steps themselves were pretty deep, making for a more difficult climb than I had anticipated, giving me crucial additional seconds to think about how much higher up we were getting with every passing step.  So, when we got to a landing not too far from the top, I thought that might be a fine stopping point for me, and I’d leave Brian to go on up to the top and take a look around.  So, I waited in an out of the way tiny corner and sent Brian up top with the GoPro to snap a few photos so I could at least see the view after the fact.

But, a lot of plans didn’t work out on this trip, and this was one of them.  A tour guide came by while I was waiting and asked if I needed help with the camera backpack I was holding (no need for Brian to lug it to the top when he was only going to be using the tiny waterproof camera).  When I explained I was just waiting, he explained that the stair traffic was one-way, and I was going to have to go to the top in order to get to the downward steps on the other side.  Well, hell.

So, long story short, I trudged up the last few stairs, stood very briefly in the very center of the temple and looked around (can’t get too close to the edge, you know), then proceeded to have a small panic attack before I could bring myself to step off to the first stair and then climb down.  For the record, sometimes living with a phobia really sucks.

I can’t say that stands as one of the high points of the vacation, but it does have a rather amusing ending.  Later, when I pulled the memory card out of the GoPro to see what the terrifying vista looked like when not in a state of panic, I wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry.  Remember, I’d sent Brian on the photo assignment with a rented camera with no viewfinder, so I guess I can’t entirely blame him for what happened, but when I opened the files, this is a sampling of what I saw:

I can’t deny I was initially disappointed with these results. And, besides being just a little bit angry with him—who can’t recognize the lens of a camera, even when it’s brand new and encased in a plastic box?—I was also annoyed with myself.  After all, if I hadn’t had a melt down, I would’ve been in charge of the pictures myself, so there’s really no one else to blame.  But, I saved all the pictures because I knew someday they would make me laugh.  And I was right.  They may not be the scenery I had hoped to capture from that afternoon, but I’m pretty sure a quick Google search can show me the view.  (Sure enough, though I’m more intrigued with how someone managed to capture a photo with no people in it!):

                                                                    This photo of Altun Ha Ruins is courtesy of TripAdvisor


But, Brian’s pictures are more than scenery, they’re a memory, which is the whole point of taking pictures in the first place, right?  And, of course, they’re a story.

Snapshot Sunday, January 12

 

There should be photos today from vacation, since we just returned yesterday.  And there probably will be at some point.  But right now, most of them are still on a memory card, in the camera.  This is probably the surest sign that things did not go according to plan on our trip, since returning home with thousands of photos already transferred to the computer and ready to go is the norm for us.  I am sad to report that in addition to an unreliable (read: often non-existent) internet connection, our travels also offered unreliable sunshine and warm temperatures.  Consequently, the opportunities for photo taking that we’d hoped to encounter did not really materialize. 

However, vacations are always fun, and I’ll gladly take any opportunity to travel, even if the weather doesn’t cooperate.  And, besides, we could’ve been someplace that looked like this:

Image credit: AP Photo/The Niagara Gazette, James Neiss

This is beautiful and all, and an image that should be seen and admired, but not where I would’ve wanted to spend my vacation.  It’s the kind of thing that puts our constant rainy days in perspective!

Snapshot Sunday, January 5

 

First, I have to say that I’m disappointed that a lack of Internet connection prevented me from posting yesterday.  My daily posting streak wasn’t really all that long, but I was hoping to keep it going a while longer.  Fingers crossed the one I begin today will continue uninterrupted until I’m ready to give it a break.

Second, today’s photos come to you from a nice little stop in a place called Webster, TX, the Armand Bayou Nature Center.  Neither photo is spectacular, but I like the first one, because the seeing the deer in the picture is sort of like a game of Where’s Waldo?, and the second one because I don’t think I’ve ever seen a pelican in the wild before.    I like to see creatures in the wild; it’s one of the best parts of being outside.  And, one of the best reasons to take pictures.

Snapshot Sunday, December 22

 

It’s not that I’m bored with the Photo a Day challenge already.  I mean, not exactly.  I’m taking the pictures, but they’re not particularly inspired.  I think the problem is that all the prompts are holiday related.  Well, they don’t have to be, of course, but I think it’s safe to assume that’s the intent, when you’ve got things like “tree”, “on the door”, and “sparkly”, all during the month of December.  And the problem with that is that I have a harder and harder time getting into the holiday spirit as I age.  I don’t like it, but it’s true.  Thus, uninspired photos that aren’t really worth sharing.

So, instead, I’ll share with you some pics from a couple of events of this week: a dress-up day at work and an ice storm that blew through the area this weekend.

First, the office silliness.  Apparently, in days past, the office has done an ugly sweater day, but our office manager decide that was becoming old hat.  Instead, she decided we should have a TuTu Cute Christmas day, wherein we would all dress as a holiday character, but accessorized with a tutu.  It was silly, and I really could’ve better spent my time on things other than making a tutu, but it was still fun.  We had everything from a snowman to Rudolph to Charlie Brown, and all sorts of things in between, including my gingerbread man.

And then there was the ice.  It came in Friday evening, and it’s still here.  We’ve lost a lot of trees, though fortunately none that have come crashing onto our house.  The up side of things is that the roads have miraculously stayed clear all weekend long—probably because we’d had several unseasonably warm days before the storm. As I commented yesterday, the ice really is pretty; it’s just too bad it tears things up the way it does.

And that’s it for this week’s Snapshot Sunday.  Maybe by next week I’ll feel better about the daily pictures again.  Or maybe not.  We’ll see. 

Here’s hoping you all have a great Monday and a wonderful week.

Snapshot Sunday, December 8

 

I have pretty much done nothing all day, so why is it that I’m just now getting around to this?  Procrastination at its finest, I suppose.  And, technically, I suppose I didn’t do nothing; I did quite a bit of holiday shopping.  All online from the comfort of my couch, but shopping just the same.  There will be some evidence of that later on.  But for now, let’s take a look at the photos, shall we?

  Prompt:  Where I Stood.  It’s nowhere exciting, since I stand here every morning to brush my teeth, but I do like my fuzzy rug and my fuzzy slippers.

 

  Prompt:  Silver.  Like I said last week, I think a lot of this month’s prompts were written with a holiday theme in mind, but there are other things going on this month besides Christmas.  And, anyway, I haven’t put up my decorations yet!

 

  Prompt:  Tiny.  This is one of my furry friends, Tiny.

 

  Prompt:  In the Cupboard.  This is just some of the stuff in the cupboard that we’re going to give up almost entirely to install our new oven.  I hate to lose the storage space, but I am looking forward to a new appliance.

 

  Prompt:  Shadow.  It occurred to me as I was taking this picture that I might have taken it before.  I know we’ve had a shadow prompt before, and I know I think this is sort of a cool shadow, so it could well be a duplicate.  Oh, well.

 

  Prompt:  6 O’Clock.  Well, you know the drill:  A time prompt is almost certainly never going to be captured at the AM hour.  And at 6:00PM, I was at Papa Murphy’s getting dinner.  By the way, I tried their new pan pizza, and it was yummy.

  Prompt:  I Shop Here.  Told you we’d get around to my shopping spree.  Like most everyone, I shop at Amazon for a lot of stuff (though they let me down on a pair of shoes I wanted to order today, but that’s sort of beside the point).  Anyway, a while back I got an email introducing Amazon Smile.  When you shop at that particular site, a small portion of your shopping gets funneled into a worthy cause of your choice.  I’m not entirely sure how it works, as Amazon was quick to point out that selection and pricing remains the same as at their flagship site, and from the item comparisons I made, it seems that’s correct.  Still, however it works, I’m willing to go to slightly different site to somehow cause a donation, no matter how small.

And that’s it for this first full week back to the photo a day challenge.  I was glad I managed to keep up at least these first few days; we’ll see how the rest of the month goes as things really start getting hectic. 

I am off to bed now; pleasant dreams to you all and a good Monday, too.

Snapshot Sunday, December 1

 

What?  Snapshot Sunday?  Did you think maybe you’d stepped into some sort of time warp when you saw that?  I sort of did when I wrote it.  But, it’s almost the end of the year, time to move into other things as the new year rolls around, and since it’s been many months since I’d played along with Chantelle’s Photo a Day Challenge, I thought I’d try and end the year getting back into some of the fun.

Of course, the end of the year is a busy time of year, not to mention I’ve got finals in a couple of weeks and still a bit of homework to do before buckling down to study for them, so even though finding a daily picture will be just one more thing to do, I’m hoping it will also serve as a bit of a distraction from some of the hectic bits.

So, first, a look at this month’s prompt list: 

Looks like some fun things, appropriately heavy on the holiday focus, though maybe it’ll be more fun to diverge from that just a little bit now and then.  We’ll see. 

So, let’s get this party started with the first picture of the month, with a prompt of RED.

   

  Nope, no holiday theme to start the month for me, just some juicy red fruit sitting on my countertop.

 

   And, that’s it for this week’s return to Snapshot Sunday.  We’ll see what the camera finds in the coming days.

It’s Still About the Pictures

 

Image courtesy of Teeratas at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

On my first non-Snapshot Sunday in a while, I’m not straying far from the topic of photographs—in fact, not straying at all.  It’s just that they’re not my photos today, but pictures from the other side of the world and the technology and skill that could save them.

There are places on the web that I like to browse from time to time, for no reason other than to see what might be interesting today.  One of those interesting places is the home to TED talks, a site with a tag line of “ideas worth spreading”.  You never know what you might find there, and it’s a fun place to spend a little time.

So it was that I was browsing there on a lazy Sunday evening and came across a talk from last summer.  It’s all about photos that were damaged during the horrific tsunami in Japan a couple of years ago.  Damaged, recovered, and restored.  There’s nothing necessarily earth-shattering about this particular talk; it’s just the experience of one woman trying to do a little something to help total strangers as they dealt with a disaster that destroyed countless lives.  I think it’s encouraging and uplifting to hear these tales, when people try to do what they can to make the world a little bit better.  The fact that this particular tale is also about a subject that is near and dear to my heart—the importance of photos—just makes it that much better for me.

So, if you’ve got about ten minutes, listen to this story of the photographs and those who tried to save them.  And, when you’ve got even more time to spend, wander through the TED talks and see what inspires you.

A Day in Search of a Theme

 

First, a little blog business:  it’s time to put Snapshot Sunday to rest, at least for a while.  I seem to have lost my photographic mojo for the moment, and there’s just no sense trying to force these things.  Interestingly, Brian and I were talking just this evening about finding a photography class at the vo-tech or someplace, somewhere I could learn some actual skills to go along with my interest.  It’s certainly not anything I’m giving up on completely.  But for now, it doesn’t need to hold a regular place here on the blog.  Doesn’t mean pictures might not pop up from time to time, but it’ll be sporadic, as the spirit moves me.

  In the meantime, Sunday is in search of a topic.  I’ve grown sort of fond of the idea of theme days here, and I’d like to find one for Sunday.  If not, goodness knows I can ramble on about something, but a little direction can never be a bad thing. 

So, if anyone has any grand ideas, this would be an excellent time to share them.

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

For today, though, let me tell you about a little incident that had me shaking my head . . .

Since I’ve been working, I’ve been relying pretty heavily on the slow cooker for dinner time, because who wants to walk in the door at sixish and start preparing a meal?  Especially given that Brian goes to bed at nine, that wouldn’t give us a very large window of opportunity for eating.  Anyway, the problem is, my cooker is just a plain old fashioned one, not one of those newfangled programmable ones, which means the food cooks from the time I put it on at roughly 7:00am until Brian gets home at about 5:00pm and turns it to warm for another hour or so until I get home.  As you might imagine, ten hours is a long time for food to cook, and some of it hasn’t fared so well from the extra time.  (As an aside, chicken was the worst; that stuff dries out fast.)

So, I finally went today to buy one that switches automatically to a warming setting to see if that could make a difference in the palatability of our meals.  I spent quite a long time in the small appliances section, trying to decide just which one I wanted.  In fact, I spent enough time there that I also decided to pick up a breakfast sandwich maker, even though I didn’t know such a thing existed.  I’ll be trying that puppy out tomorrow morning.  But I digress.

After looking over the slow cookers for longer than strictly necessary, and browsing the rest of the store just for fun, I selected a nice six quart Crock-Pot model and carted it and my new sandwich maker up to the register.  Then I tossed my purchases into the trunk of my car and went about the rest of my errands for the day.

Hours later when I returned home, Brian was actually the first one to open up the box, and he stuck his head out into the garage (I was still carrying in some other purchases; it was tax-free weekend here and I needed some shoes!) and said “there’s no crock pot in that box.”  Well, Brian has been known to be a prankster, so I just figured he was being silly and went about my business.  When he repeated himself firmly, I realized he wasn’t joking around, so I went into the kitchen to see what he was talking about.  This is what was in my Crock-Pot box:

 

Oh, and there was also a set of bowls and a strainer in there, but Brian had been digging through the stuff and had some of it sitting out when I took this picture. 

Anyway, about half of the stuff was brand new, the rest various stages of used, but none of these things are going to slow cook my roast.  If I can paraphrase Colonel Sherman T. Potter, I ordered a Crock-Pot and got a box of kitchen gadgets; both highly useful items, but hardly interchangeable. 

The chain of events leading to this seems very clear cut to me, and here’s how I think it played out:  Someone got a slow cooker for a wedding gift, which they wanted to keep.  They also got a bunch of kitchen gadgets that they were not so fond of.  Deciding they could keep the cooker, get rid of the unwanted gadgets (and some other random crap already lying around their kitchen), and even make a few bucks on the deal, they took the Crock Pot from its box, stuffed it full of various gadgetry to reach the appropriate heft, and then packaged it all back up nice and neat.  Then they took it to the unsuspecting store and returned it.  Likely for store credit, but you never know, someone might’ve given them a gift receipt just in case they got two Crock Pots, so they might’ve even gotten a free sixty bucks out of the deal.  All of this definitely causes me to shake my head. 

It didn’t have to happen just that way, of course.  There might not be some soon-to-be-wed couple starting their life together by trying to turn a profit on the gifts of well-meaning friends and family.  But however that box of stuff ended up in my kitchen, it wasn’t accidental.  Someone got a free slow cooker out of the deal in some way, shape, or form, meaning the store is out the cost of the item (because they have agreed to replace it) and the inconvenience of an extra trip to the store for us.  Seriously, what’s with people?  If it truly was a wedding gift scam, do you really want that sort of negative energy hanging over your new life?  And even if it wasn’t, could you ever really enjoy a meal that came from that cooker, knowing you’d stolen it?

Typically, when people steal, I try to give them the benefit of the doubt and think that there’s some set of circumstances that made it almost a necessity; I try to think that they must have needed the item more than the rightful owner.  And maybe that’s the case here, but this just seems so deliberate and deceitful, that I’m having a hard time cutting the thief too much slack. 

Still, I don’t wish them a lot of ill will; it is only a slow cooker, after all.  But I do hope their chicken turns out dry.

Snapshot Sunday, July 28

 

Sad to report that I went through an entire week without taking a single picture.  I snapped a photo last Sunday of the meal I was eating for the “fave food” prompt for photo a day, and that’s the last time I picked up the camera.  (It was a yummy meal, though; take a look:) 

I think it’s likely that Mexican food is really my favorite, but a nice grilled steak comes in a very close second.  Yummm. 

Anyway, so I’ve ditched the daily photos yet again.  One of these days I’ll make it through an entire month; maybe I’ll try again in August, since at least two-thirds of that month I won’t be in school, so maybe things will be a little bit slower paced.

Anyway, then today I happened to look out my window and I saw a first-time bird visitor to the yard.  Not out at the feeder, just wandering around our driveway.  I snapped a few photos through the window, since I knew he’d run off as soon as I opened the door—which he did.

We see roadrunners out and about along the highway sometimes, but I’ve never seen one in our yard.  I wish I could’ve gotten better pictures, but I still enjoy seeing someone new come for a visit.  I was sort of surprised the cats didn’t chase after him, but they were just laying there in the driveway, not paying him a bit of attention.

So that’s it for the shutterbugging this week, pretty slim pickin’s, I’d say, but there’s always next week.  That’s the great thing about the camera; it’s always willing to wait for me and be ready as soon as I give the word. 

Snapshot Sunday, July 21

 

I love taking pictures, I really do.  And I especially love taking pictures of things that aren’t just “events”—you know, birthdays, vacations, holidays, etc.  I like to just snap photos of the things I see around me in life.  That’s why the photo-a-day challenge really appeals to me, because it gives me a reason to take at least one photo every day, and even gives me some direction on the kinds of things I should be on the lookout for.  Sometimes people need some encouragement to be creative.  Or at least I do.

What I don’t like, though, is when I feel swamped by life, which makes me feel like I have no time to be creative.  I used to write pretty regularly in a couple of fandoms, now this blog is the only writing I manage to keep up.  And, I used to enjoy playing around with editing the photos I would take, seeing if I could improve them or just shake things up a little bit, but now I click the shutter and hardly even go back to look at the picture once it’s taken.  That is no fun at all.  But I suppose it is life; the things we enjoy don’t always get to be the things we spend the most time on.  How horribly unfair. 

Still, I haven’t given up on photography entirely.  I’m still snapping the daily photo (at least most days), and even more often than that things that I see make me think of a photograph.  I don’t always have a chance to take them, but I’m always glad to know that I haven’t quit noticing the fleeting moments, even if I don’t always take the time to capture them for posterity.  So even in the overwhelm of life, creativity never completely fades away.  Thank goodness.

How do you keep up with the things that are important to you, even when life gets in the way?

Just one of the random photos in my files that I’ve always sort of liked.

Snapshot Sunday, July 8

 

I have to say, the thing I might dislike most about having a job again is that Sunday night feeling.  You know, the one where you feel like your moments of freedom have dwindled to nothing and the next break you’re going to have is far too far in the future.  Still, it’s all part of the workaday world, and this was a really good weekend, so at least I put my moments of freedom to good use. 

As for this week’s photos, some of them are sort of cheats, but more about that later.

 

  Prompt: Happiness Is . . . Notwithstanding what I said earlier about the whole Sunday night thing, I have to admit that it feels pretty good to be drawing a paycheck again.  Not for the money, which is certainly nothing to write home about, but just because it seems like that’s what people do.

 

 

  Prompt:  Shoes.  One of the first things I do when I get home from work each day is kick off my shoes, even if they’re not particularly uncomfortable.  And, they usually stay right in that same spot until the next time I want to wear them, even though “that spot” is rarely the place they actually belong. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  Prompt:  Cold.  One of the semi-cheats, since I took this a day late.  Still, what’s a day between friends?  Anyway, this was my first attempt at making a fruit slush—pina colada flavored—and I have to say it was not only refreshing on such a hot afternoon, but it was also quite tasty.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  Prompt:  Red White and/or Blue.  It’s nice of Chantelle to think of us when making her prompts, even though she’s in Australia and probably not the least bit concerned with the 4th of July.  This was part of our festive table wear for the occasion. 

 

 

 

  Prompt:  Love.  Me and Brian.  Another cheat, and this one a double-whammy: taken a day early, and (as you might have guessed) I didn’t even take it.  Too bad; I’m using it anyway.  I did take a photo of us on the 6th (a day too late for this prompt), but I never got one on the 5th, even though it was our anniversary.  I tried at the theatre, but my aim was off and it turned out to be a picture of just Brian.  Well, at least, it was part of Brian.  All in all, this one is a much better choice.

 

  Prompt: Favorite Smell.  And one last cheat to round out the week, this is a recycle from last year’s challenge.  The prompt then was “smell you adore”, and while I can’t say for certain that baking bread is absolutely my favorite smell, it’s certainly way up there.  The vast majority of my time the day of this prompt was spent in an outdoor stadium in 90+ degree heat with about 65,000 other people.  Believe me when I tell you that there weren’t really any smells there that were particularly enjoyable.

And that brings this week to a close, which means it’s time for me to head off to bed.  Past time, really, but that’s what happens sometimes.  I hope you all enjoy your new week, even if you do have to go back to the workaday world like this working stiff.

Snapshot Sunday, June 30

 

It’s sort of hard for me to believe, but another entire week has gone by without taking a picture of anything.  I know for a lot of people, that’s pretty much the norm—only taking photos at special events and such—but I don’t want to be that.  I want to snap pictures of daily life, whatever and whenever strikes my fancy.  But even though I usually have my camera with me (and always have my phone with me), I rarely seem to take pictures these days.  Certainly it’s a function of time and energy; I’m always either doing something, or preparing to do something, or crashing into a stupor from pure exhaustion.  Still, what kind of fun is that? 

So, even though I failed miserably at this month’s photo a day challenge, I’ve downloaded the July list, and hope to be at least a little more successful this time around.  We’ll see.

 

But, while I was reminiscing this past week about the whole STAR saga, I was also browsing through some old photos.  I logged into my SmugMug account to look at the Hollywood pictures, but took a couple of minutes to look over some of my other galleries too.  (As a quick aside, if you’re looking for a good online hosting site for your photos, SmugMug gets my vote for sure:  easy to use, nice features, and unlimited storage, all at a very reasonable price.  And, no, I don’t get anything for that little blurb, either, just an honest opinion of a service I enjoy.) 

Anyway, I was looking at some of my pictures, including an album from a trip we took to Minnesota three or four years ago.  There are a lot of scenery pictures—some of them pretty decent, if I do say so myself—and even some family photos, but the one that jumped out at me was something silly.  We were just driving around town in Duluth and seeing what there was to see, and I was snapping a few pictures here and there. Of course, photos snapped from the passenger seat of a moving vehicle typically don’t turn out all that great—and this one’s not really an exception to that rule—but they often capture simple moments that would otherwise be forgotten in the midst of all the “real” things that were seen along the way. 

So it is with this quick shot that caught my attention when I saw it in real life, and has brought back the moment each time I’ve looked at the picture.  There was just something about this pensive face, looking out the window of a rundown building, watching to see what was going on in the world outside.  I wondered what he was thinking about, if he would rather have been outside chasing our passing car, if he knew we were strangers in his town, if he preferred that upstairs vantage point to something on the first floor or that’s just where he happened to be.  Maybe he was waiting for his owner to come home; that would explain why he barely moved when we drove by; he would know the car he was waiting to see.  Maybe when that particular car pulls onto the street, the pensive face takes on a whole new expression and the eyes light up while the tail starts wagging and he runs from the window, bounding joyfully down the steps to greet his owner at the door.  I like to think that’s what happens, but even if it does, I still wonder what he thinks about until that special car pulls into view, and what sorts of things has he seen from his upstairs perch.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Do you have simple snapshots that capture your imagination?  What stories do they tell you?

 

Snapshot Sunday, June 23

 

Confession time:  This past week’s photo a day was a total bust.  I think I might’ve taken two of them, maybe three.  Every morning I look at the prompt and try to give some thought to what I might use for the photo that day, then every night it’s suddenly 11 o’clock (like now) and it’s too late to think about it, so it just gets pushed aside.  The chronic exhaustion that has me falling asleep pretty much any time I sit on my couch for more than five minutes doesn’t help, and that’s why I’m not outside right now, trying to snap some photos of the super moon.  (Two hours ago, when I was still mostly alert, I was outside with the camera, but the moon had yet to make an appearance.)

So, anyway, no photo a day pictures this week.  Hopefully I’ll be back on track next week.

But there was a cool turtle in the yard today, so sure I snapped some pictures of him.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Snapshot Sunday, June 16

 

Well, here we are at the end of another weekend, and I’m once again going to bed without accomplishing nearly everything I had hoped to.  Oh, well, you can only do what you can do, right?  All the must-dos got done, and even a couple of the should-dos, so I guess I’ll call it a win.

Let’s get going with this week’s pictures and then I’ll head off to dream land to get ready to start another long week.  As always, photo prompts are provided by Chantelle at Fat Mum Slim.

  Prompt:  From down low.  Underneath my favorite tree, a mimosa. (Which is just starting to bloom, yay!)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  Prompt:  You! Hard at work in my new office.  Well, not really.  And, it’s not really my office, yet, either.  I’m still the odd man out until the girl I’m replacing actually has her last day, which will be around the end of July.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  Prompt:  Something funny.  Two of my classmates, Chancee and Laura.  They always make me laugh.

 

 

 

 

 

 

  Prompt: 11 O’clock.  Proofreading a response to some motion or another.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  Prompt:  Kitchen.  Okay, technically, this is the break room at work.  But, it’s where we prepare our lunches and eat them, so I say that’s like a work kitchen, right?  Though this wasn’t lunch time, but a birthday celebration.  The young girl on the left is Calley, the birthday girl; she’s the one training me to take over her position.  And the other is Tara, our case manager.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  Prompt:  Texture.  It’s probably not exactly proper to say so, but I like this picture; I’m pleased with how it turned out.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Prompt:  From above.  Okay, this one is a cheat, since I took this photo almost two years ago.  But it’s one of my favorite “above” pictures, taken from a tiny (terrifying!) sea plane above Vancouver and the surrounding mountains and glaciers.  I have to say that I’m glad I overcame my terror and took the flight; it was beautiful up there, and one of the coolest things I’ve ever done.

And that’s the photos for this past week.  Drop by Chantelle’s site for the full list if you’d like to play along; I like to see other people’s pictures, too.  So now, goodnight, and a wish for a great week ahead for all of you.