photography

Field Trip

This evening, I took my camera, telephoto lens and new teleconverter, and three rolls of film to Wildwood Metropark. I burned through two of the three rolls between about 6:45pm and 8:00pm—by then, I’d lost so much light that it was time to go home. I didn’t get to use the teleconverter because the 7pm light was already too faint. I wonder how practical it’s really going to be.

My original intention had been to photograph bikers and bladers; however, there weren’t very many out tonight, and I’m just not patient enough to sit on a picnic table and wait for people to pass by while I’m losing light by minutes. So, I ended up taking lots of pictures of flowers and bumblebees and architecture and trees and just a few of bikers and bladers. Two rolls’ worth… hopefully something good will come out of it.

If nothing else, I plan to do this every week just to get my reflexes sharper and get my eye for composition trained a little better. I missed just as many photos as I took today, mainly from not getting my camera focused in time. I lost a perfectly good shot of a male cardinal, simply because I turned my focus to closer instead of farther, and didn’t manage to fix my error before he flew away. There were a few that I missed simply because I didn’t have the right lens with me—I’d planned to take long-distance action shots, and purposefully left the normal and wide-angle lenses at home.

One thing I’d forgotten about photographing in a normal public place (as opposed to a festival): it’s fun to see something that no one else sees, in a pattern or a shadow or a particular form, and have people try to see what you’re taking a picture of. Nope, there’s not a bird up in that tree; I think the gnarled tree is cool all by itself. But keep gawking, and maybe I’ll take a picture of your goofy ass. Heh.

weight loss 3 Comments

Almost-normal-sized clothes again…

You know, self-portaiture isn’t quite as easy as it might seem, especially without a professional portraiture setup. In other words, finding an appropriate spot to set the digital-camera-on-a-timer in my house is a challenge. But I wanted to share my small joy with you, so… ph34r my new tank top. Rah.

To celebrate my return to this-is-how-fat- I-used-to-be- before-I-got-sloppy, I scrounged up a few pics of myself over the past 10 months or so and made a weight-loss montage. I didn’t seek out too many pictures, and I didn’t scan anything; it was just what I had already on the computer for whatever reason. But I think it gets the point across. And not only do you get to watch my double-chin melt away through the photos, you also get to watch my hair grow. 🙂

Aaaaaand I’m done.

randomness

Random thoughts

Even though I marched two parades over the weekend, I’m still not sure how that, combined with eating three pieces of pizza, made me lose almost three pounds this week. ::shrug::

It’s goddamned hot tonight. I’m even wearing one of my new tank tops from Fashion Bug (yay, $9.99 shirts!), and sitting in the basement, and I’m still sweltering. Yeesh. Aaron’s gotta be having a fun time at work tonight.

I didn’t have a whole lot I wanted to accomplish today, which is good, since I took another 90-minute nap this evening. —Oh, but I did want to boil some eggs. Hang on… I’ll be right back.

*pauses Winamp, runs upstairs and puts eggs on to boil, sets timer*
*waters plants and takes ailing begonia upstairs to better window*

OK, I’m back. Damn, our stove is boil-a-rific. I’m not used to electric yet; this thing gets water boiling in, like, three minutes. Crazy. Must be one of those stoves Emeril talks about when he tells you to use your knobs.

Saturday night up in Michigan was actually quite a good time, watching drum corps videos and DVDs on a projection screen in Russ’s garage in Clawson. Been a long, long time since I attended a drum corps party. This weekend, though, I’m planning to take a weekend off from corps instead of going up to the show in Kalamazoo. I’ve had enough of driving to Michigan for corps for a while. On August 7, I have to go up and carpool to Grand Haven for the Coast Guard parade and performance, stay up there overnight, and drive back on Sunday. I may take a personal day on that Monday, just so I feel like I’ve had a weekend. And before that, there’s the Bluecoats’ home show in Massillon (Canton). Since I’m skipping out on K-Zoo, I’m definitely going to that one, even though it’s two hours away on a Sunday night. Hopefully I’ll be able to get someone to go with me.

In other news, I have the last week of this month off. Yay, vacation! Aaron has it off, too, and the following week, as well. We still haven’t figured out where we’re going, although the consensus is that we want to use the tent we got for our wedding (and, no, we’re not doing a backyard campout). Bring the lawn chairs-in-a-bag, the picnic basket (maybe), do some hiking, maybe some swimming… not sure where yet, though. Should be fun, anyway. I’m ready for a week off.

Hmm. Better go check on those eggs.

drumcorps

July 4th Drumcorps Fever

Aaron reported that while I was at work today, Paul from my senior corps called and wanted to know if I could give him a ride to the parade tomorrow morning. I had been going to double-check the timeframe, anyway, so I looked at the Lakeshoremen schedule to see when the parade started and when the brass line was meeting to warm up.

OMG. I have to leave the house at 6:15am.

Arrive at Paul’s house at 7:30am; arrive at the carpool location at 7:45am, warm up at 8am, parade starts at 9am. Lunch at Russ and Barb’s house (the aforementioned carpool location) after the parade… and the party will continue into the evening and night, as those of us from faraway lands (Toledo and northern-mid-Michigan) prepare to stay the night at the Braman household.

For Sunday morning’s parade begins at sunrise.

Well, OK, sunrise is at 6:03am (according to the Weather Channel) and warmups start at 6:30am, so I guess it’s not really at sunrise. We’ll have to be up and ready to head off to the parade staging area in Plymouth before that, though. Of course, this is all assuming that it doesn’t rain on our parade—literally.

I think it might be different if the Toledo Glassmen had a senior corps being funded out of their organization; then I could do parades in, say, Maumee or Toledo or Perrysburg or BG, or even Lima or Wauseon wouldn’t be horrible. I enjoy being in the corps and marching again, don’t get me wrong. It’s just that I don’t enjoy trading off for the only potential quality time I have with my husband in order to do it.

Maybe once we field a show and the returns feel more “worth it,” it’ll even out. Maybe fielding a show will push me over the edge and make me not want to do it anymore—after all, most “real” DCA (Drum Corps Associates; senior corps) shows are in New England. That’s a bit of a haul for everybody, not just Yours Truly.

Anywho, I’m going to go play some Civ III and wait for Paul to return my confirmation I’m-giving-you-a-ride call. —Er, check that. Just got a 30-second call from Paul. I guess he’s going to leave his wife the car so she can attend the post-parade party for a while, too. I wonder if that means he’ll a.) be going home with his wife, or b.) be staying the night at the Bramans’ with us out-of-towners. I guess we’ll see…

I’m still gonna go play some Civ III, though. 😛

randomness

Same Old Shit

Again, not much to report. Finished looking up addresses at work and began changing them and printing out new envelopes for some of the more vital stuff (like titles and deeds and such). Not quite as tedious. Came home, ate dinner, watched the news, took a nap. Bought a magazine subscription from a black girl collecting points toward a scholarship. Talked to Beth over IM. Downloaded a pop-up blocker. Posted to LJ. That’s my day, pathetic though it may be.

I think I’m going to start devoting one evening a week to photographing outdoors. I figure, maybe come home, hang with Aaron until he goes to work, eat a quick dinner, don’t watch the news, and go out to one of the metroparks—maybe Wildwood or Swan Creek or even Oak Openings—for some evening photography. Burn off at least one full roll of film. Bring all the lenses I can, or go with a project in mind. Maybe make a list: landscapes, reflections, panning with rollerbladers and cyclists, close-ups, patterns, structures. Maybe go black-and-white one week, color another, and splurge on infrared another. (Oak Openings in infrared would be soooo cool with all the trees and foliage around the lake there.)

It seems that I now have seasonal hobbies. Photography in the summer, gardening in the spring, candles in the winter. Or maybe it’s just per my whims, rather than per the seasons. That’s probably closer to the truth.

Sorry that this LJ thing has become so… unfocused. For a while, I was being all introspective and philosophical with my entries, especially when I was just putting entries directly on my site, before I went to LJ; but now it’s really become more of a “this is what I did today” thing. Not that my friends from faraway don’t want to know what I’m up to, but… it just seems so… normal. I mean, if you look at LiveJournal entries, 90% of the LJs out there (not blogs in general: LiveJournals specifically) are about random daily crap. That’s not what I want to read if I browse to a stranger’s journal; I want to read about their thoughts and their philosophies and their weirdnesses. Of course, I’m like that. ::smirk::

I think that’s all I’ve got for today.