Beautiful Day

What a gorgeous day. The long, gray days have gone and today the sky was bright and blue. The past week I've driven past these wildflowers every day, and every day I've told myself that I needed to come and shoot them. Since the days have been so gray and colorless, I was happy to see this amazing blue sky today. The sun and the blue sky really make this shot.

Favorite Shots #14: Whoah!!

This is a shot I took while visiting California in July. I haven't shown this to anyone yet, because at the time, this was a pretty traumatic experience for my sister Kathie and little Noah. The next wave coming in behind him nearly went over his head, and the surf actually began to pull him deeper down the coast. At the time it was pretty scary, but I really love this shot. The look of surprise on his face is just priceless. I felt a little ashamed because by the time I realized he was in trouble, I had snapped a couple pictures already. I really should have been in the water helping my pregnant sister, but it happened so quickly, I was taken completely off guard. He was obviously alright, and now I feel enough time has passed for me to show this to Kathie without her freaking out again. Love ya sis!

De-Bogging

From the minute I turned on Steph's new computer, it reminded me fully why I chose to make the switch to Mac. Don't get me wrong, considering what we paid for it, it's a perfectly usable computer. It needs a memory upgrade to run Vista effectively, but we've already ordered 2 GB for it, and that should make a huge difference. It just really irritates me how PC manufacturers find it necessary to bloat your system with a bunch of terrible software that you will never even consider using. I spent nearly an hour uninstalling HP software, trial versions of things I've never even heard of, toolbars for Internet Explorer that are totally unnecessary, and desktop shortcuts to web pages I'm afraid to visit. I guess it's the money from these companies that make computers so cheap, but it still irritates me to no end. It's unfortunate that most tech people suggest the first thing you do when you buy a new computer is format the hard drive and do a clean install of Windows. Since I've removed all this bloat-ware, the system runs about twice as fast as it did out of the box. Thanks HP.

Overgrown

Sometimes I let things go too long. Between the breakdown of our mower last week and the almost daily rain we've received since then, the yard ha become an overgrown mess. Thankfully, we have a backup mower, but it doesn't help much if it rains every day. This is probably the wettest August I can remember in a long time. There's flooding everywhere. Most years, the late summer usually means no more mowing. The grass burns up, and I get a reprieve from a ton of yardwork. Not this year.

Switching Back? Not quite....

No, I didn't already lose faith in my Mac and chuck it out the window. I did, however, buy this PC laptop this afternoon. Not for me, but for Stephanie! I've been talking to her for a while about getting her own system, and thanks to a pretty good deal this week at CompUSA, we pulled the trigger. I initially wanted to get another Mac in the form of a MacBook, but the cheapest MacBook is nearly $1,000. Considering how infrequently she'll be using it and for what it will be used, a more affordable PC was the way to go. Since it's running Vista, we'll have to upgrade the RAM, but other than that it was a pretty good deal! After rebates, it was $399. $400 for a laptop is pretty affordable.

Railroad, Rust, and Strays

Days like today, when I'm at a loss for something to write about and shoot, it's sometimes good to go out and just walk. It's amazing the things you see looking through the camera lens that you would never normally even look at. Tonight I took a walk down the alley alongside our house, and was surprised by what I found. It's interesting little things like this that make living in a small, old town pretty interesting. It makes me wonder how long this box has been hanging on that telephone pole. When was it put there? When was the last time it was opened? Was is its purpose? Something like this I wouldn't normally give a second glance, but looking through the lens can make it interesting. Here's a couple more:

Diverging Tastes

When it comes to food, Steph and I are really different. I think this photo illustrates that so well, along with the uneasy look on Steph's face as I'm seperating the meat. Since I work 3 out of 4 Saturdays a month, we have been buying groceries for two weeks instead of one. Being a vegetarian, Steph will buy large amounts of veggies and cut them up for the week. Not being a vegetarian, I will ofter do the same with meat, buying in bulk and freezing for later use. Since we eat at completely different times, it works out nicely. I can cook my brats and steaks, Steph can cook her tofu and hummus. Mmmmm..... hummus.