visions

6:53:01 PM EDT
Maria and I have had two failed attempts at shooting these falls, which are only about  a 45 minute drive from my house.  One was late last winter, when we couldn't navigate the car up the road because of ice, and the second was last fall when we discovered the stream to be bone dry.  Today we met with success!  It's really a beautiful place, filled with several large drops and lots and lots of interesting smaller ones.  And I had to throw in a pic of the beautiful magnolia blossum.  Alas, those trees bloomed for about two weeks and are now losing all their petals.  They are so gorgeous, but just don't last long enough.

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12:29:32 PM EDT

Little by little I can see signs of Spring popping up.  I've seen a few flowers, and the grass is really starting to get green from all this rain we've been having.  Spring is definitely my favorite time of year.

I had no plan to take any pictures today, but I woke up early to a nice cloudy, misty morning, so I grabbed my new camera backpack, and grabbed the dog and went a whopping five minutes from my house to Osbornedale state park.  While the stream there isn't home to any large waterfalls, there are dozens of little interesting ones that I love to shoot just as much.  Notice in one photo, the black "ghost" in lower right hand corner.  200 acres to play in, and Hayley always has to do all her swimming, splashing, stick-chewing, stick-flinging, and all round obnoxious antics right next to me.  She is always just an inch out of camera shot.  Ah, but she had a blast this morning, so I'm glad I took her.

I also tried out my new 4gig memory card.  I have only just recently been shooting in Tiff format, (and wondering why the hell I didn't always shoot in Tiff), and boy does that cut down on the number of photos on a card.  I have so many cards now it's ridiculous, the 4gig being the largest.  But, after a bad experience I had with a 1 gig card a couple of years ago, I decided I would rather use multiple cards than rely on one or two large ones.  The first 1 gig I bought, (and I can't remember the brand) it crapped out so many times, I lost several photos every time I used it and finally threw it out.  I would hate to shoot a large card and have something like that happen again, especially on a vacation trip.  At least with more cards, I know I'll have something.  But, I always use SanDisk now, and have not had a problem with any of the eight or so I own. 

Enjoy the weekend!

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9:53:10 PM EDT

 

The great thing about photographing food is, what else, but you get to eat it when you're done.  Well, and actually all during the shoot!  As long as I stick to shooting fruits and veggies, and not chocolate and pizza, I'll be ok.

Working with studio lights these past couple weekends has been very inspiring.  I typically don't take indoor pictures because built in flashes are just horrible.  I love my camera to death, but I can't even get a decent indoor family snapshot.  The flash just seems so weak, worse than any other camera I've had.  It doesn't really bother me, cos I shoot 99% outdoors, and for these types of indoor pictures you really need additional lights.  Built in flash just flattens the heck out of everything. 

Maria and I are heading to the New York Botanical Gardens in a few weeks, I am really looking forward to that.  All my life I've been an hour away from it and never thought to go.  We will probably end up making a couple of trips there over the summer, that way you see a variety of flowers throughout the season.

Catch you later

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9:08:57 PM EST

I just discovered it's been exactly three months since my last entry-shame on me.  I have thought about deleting this journal, but what the heck...I think I'll keep it.

I have been very busy with a new job, so the camera has been gathering a bit of dust.  In the past few weeks tho I have decided to throw myself back into it full force.  My friend Maria and I have both signed up with a cool website, webphotoschool.com .  Costs a couple of bucks, not bad at all, and I have already learned some good things.  I like it cos it's like "photograpy for dummies", I get way lost when things get too technical!  We also have started investing in a few inexpensive "studio", lights, reflectors, etc.  I really got discouraged I guess back in January when I only got one second place win in the photo contest I had entered.  But now I am on a mission for the next one!

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9:38:28 PM EST

 

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I haven't picked up my camera in about a month, and only half-heartedly then.  I just have a hard time getting inspired in winter.  It's gotten very cold here this past week, most of the color is gone, and my motivation with it.  Then I think hey, anyone can take a great photo of something that's obviously beautiful, why can't I find the artistic beauty in a more subtle setting...I made a promise to Greg over at PhotoTrek that I would get off the couch this weekend and shoot something, and so I did.  I figured I'd try a little black and white since that lends itself so well to this time of year.  I didn't think I got much, but when I loaded my card onto the pc tonight, I was pleasantly surprised, by the above shot in particular.  It's not perfect, but I like it a lot.  And am content with a couple more too.  So now that I have ventured out into the cold with decent results, I will be more willing to do it again...

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2:55:21 PM EDT

These are the pix I finally decided on and sent to the water property photo contest.  I am not altogether thrilled with every entry, but I am reasonably comfortable with them.  There are five categories, Water, Wildlife, Plants, People, and General.  I can submit only five photos total, and ended up submitting one to Water, one to Plants, one to General, and two to Wildllife. 

On another note, we saw this fantastic rainbow at my sister-in-law's house last Sunday and I happened to have my camera.  How I wished I had been in a scenic outdoor setting when I saw this, instead of a neighborhood, but it was still beautiful.

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9:19:59 PM EDT

I have two weeks left to enter the annual photo contest run by the CT Regional Water Authority.  This organization is comprised of about eight lakes in CT on water company property, complete with miles of hiking trails, fishing, and an assortment of events and programs throughout the year.  The five photo categories are Water, Wildlife, Plants, People Recreating, and General Scenes.  So far I have decided on and mailed in two of my entries as seen above here, for the Water and Wildlife categories.  And I think I may submit the two below.  I can't believe how much time I've spent going through my files trying to decide.  The big problem was that I really wanted to send something taken this year, but I just haven't had the time or the success that I had last year on my hikes.  It's perfectly acceptable to enter photos taken any time, as long as it was on water property, so I resorted to looking through last years.  The fawn above and the waterfall below are from 2006.

Or is this shot of the double falls a better candidate??  I am starting to drive myself crazy with this.

 

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8:41:40 PM EDT

Life is sweet and so very cruel at times.  Here I was having a great day today, job offers, clean bill of health once again, I'm thinking life is good, and yet all day long some weird little thing has been nagging at me.  While I was having a good day, so many are suffering.  And when I go online and hope to see some little uplifting message from Penny at pennys-pieces-of-ohio, I discover the most awful news of all.  My heart is breaking right now, as are the hearts of so many others.  Penny brought me into j-land and introduced me to some terrific folks, and always was a ray of sunshine.  She and I went back a long way.  We met back in 1977 through a rock magazine and became penpals, and cultivated a long relationship.  I visited her in Ohio, she visited me in Connecticut, and we kept the tradition going when she relocated to New York.  Just recently I went through all of my old photo albums and pulled out a bunch of photos of us and was in the process of scanning them so I could post them on here.  I could of course still do that, but the point is lost now.  If I feel as devastated as I do right now, I cannot imagine the pain her family feels.  My heart goes out to them. 

Sweet dreams, Penny...

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4:21:38 PM EDT

This is Eilean Donan Castle in Kyle of Lochalsh, Scotland, from what I've read it's the most photographed castle in all of the UK.  All these years I've seen pictures of it and thought it to be ruins, but I was pleasantly surprised to discover that it's quite intact and well furnished-heck, I would live there!

I have had a very stressful time of it lately.  I have been online quite a bit over the past couple of weeks, but not doing anything fun, I've been job hunting.  This is my last week of school and unemployment as well, and my Cobra insurance runs out next month, so it's definitely time to get a job!  I was on an internship through school since July, and originally I hoped that it would lead to a permanent position there, but that didn't pan out.  For one thing, I disliked it intensely, ok, I HATED it.  I felt uncomfortable there from day one.  A more surley, unfriendly bunch of people I have never encountered in a job.  The vibes were not good.  I did get a glowing evaluation, and was never called out on any mistakes or anything, but there were no job openings.  And I would have taken one because as I said, I need a job.  Anyway, now that I have completed this Medical Coding/Billing program, I see that there are not a whole lot of jobs out there for it.  But I have sent a number of resumes, and gotten a couple of calls.  Last week I had a first and second interview at one company, so that has been looking promising, although I didn't get a real good vibe there either.  But as I said, I need a job!  I didn't hear from them again and proceeded to worry myself into a tizzy.  Then to top it off, I had a "questionable" mammogram a month or so ago, that prompted my dr. to scedule me for another one.  For those of you who don't know, I had breast cancer ten years ago, so any time they request more tests, naturally my mind spins into overload. 

Well, after spending this past weekend thoroughly disgusted with life and myself, and worrying myself sick, today turned into a banner day.  First off I had a job interview at another company at 9 am, that went extremely well.  I actually got really good vibes from this place.  I literally left there jumping up and down in my car thinking I want it, I want it!  When I got home the HR woman from the other job was on my machine saying they want to scedule me for Thursday for a final meeting and job offer.  Oh boy, now I have to make a decision-not a bad spot to be in.  And the icing on the cake, at 2pm I went for my follow-up mammogram, which they did, then shuffled me into the next room for an ultrasound...at that point, I was starting to get a little panicky, here we go, more tests, not good.  I expressed my concerns to the technician, and soon after the dr. came in and alleviated my fears.  He said everything looks good, there will be no need for more tests, and I shouldn't worry.  Whew!  I think all of New Haven County heard my sigh of relief!

So now I think I can begin to enjoy my week off.  I ended my internship last week, and I only have school this Friday, so with one job offer on the table and hopefully another, I can breathe a little and do some painting in the house and a bit of "photo-trekking".  (But I won't count my chickens, I'll still send out some resumes)

Oh yes, and the Yankees start in the playoffs this week!  Today, life is good...

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8:04:53 PM EDT

Here's an example of the real reason I love Scotland--castles, castles, and more castles...I am fascinated by them.  This is Cawdor Castle, a very well known one which I have been admiring photos of for years, and finally got some of my own.  The inside is as beautiful as the outside, but no picture-taking allowed inside any of the ones we saw.  The day was a bit rainy, we toured the inside first, but I was dying to get back to these gardens, then of course it really started pouring.  We had lunch at the restaurant inside, and by the time we were done the rain had stopped.

I've got my internet up and running like gangbusters now.  It is fixed really well this time.  My modem was shot, so the cable guy gave me a new one, but the big improvement is the actual connection.  I had it on a splitter with the tv, and it just never occurred to me that that's what was making it run so slow.  Now, he set it up the right way, and it is super-fast.  Hooray!

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