Almost Done

I love being almost done. Done with the dishes, that is.

Now, I don't particularly mind washing dishes, but there are times when it just seems a little redundant. You know... you wash them, rinse them, stick them in the drainboard, wait for them to dry, put them away... Almost before the clean ones get put away, there's another sinkful of dirty ones waiting. Sigh.

Well, tonight there weren't too many to do, so I cranked up the radio and got busy. When I was done, I pulled the plug and went off to do something else while the sink emptied. At the same time I was bemoaning the fact that I hadn't taken a single photo all day, and thought, "there goes another day without making an image".

Before leaving the kitchen, I looked in the sink, and lo and behold, there was my image! A lone fork amidst the remaining suds.

Almost done.

BTW--I love the macro feature on my point and shoot.

The Last Time

This morning I attended a celebration in honor of Lauren "graduating" from kindergarten. It was the last time that my daughter would need to attend one of these functions for her own children.

You may be thinking, "well, it's only kindergarten, for goodness sake!" Maybe so, but it's still the last time. The last time one of them would be young enough to need to learn the alphabet or how to print letters, or to count or spell. The last time one of them would have to go through the cafeteria line learning how to pay for lunch and carry the lunch tray to their seat without spilling anything. The last time the first day of school would be a "brand new" experience. The last time my daughter would have watch as the school bus disappeared down the road, taking her "baby" away for the entire day. The last time one of her children would be excited about going to 1st grade next Fall.

I don't know, it seems pretty bittersweet to me.

I had tears in my eyes as I drove to school this morning. For my daughter. For me. I had my share of those last times. On the other hand, they were always accompanied by some really exciting first times.

Jessica's son will be attending his first semi-formal dance tomorrow night. For him tomorrow is the last time he'll be a middle-schooler. He'll start his high school career in Sept. Seriously, he was 5 just a couple of months ago.

So, after the program, we girls went for breakfast at Friendly's. To celebrate the start of Lauren's elementary career!

A Roadblock

On my way to a graduation party yesterday, I encountered a roadblock. I was already a little later than I had intended to be, but you know how graduation parties are--come when you can and leave when you want to... so I just put the car in park and decided to wait and "smell the roses".

This roadblock was for a parade. A parade? I wondered what the occasion was, but there was no one standing near me to ask. So I just got out of the car, grabbed my camera, and took pictures. Nothing too exciting or award winning--just images of another small-town parade with an over abundance of fire engines from various volunteer fire departments...

When it finally ended, I proceeded to the party. I found out then that the parade was in honor of the 60th anniversary of that town's volunteer department.Congratulations to them!

This decal was on the side of one of the fire trucks.

Gloversville

Art show in Gloversville this morning. Took some images of the main street and an abandoned church inbetween looking at the show. Gloversville has a great main street, although it's all but abandoned.

Forbidden Pleasures

I did something I haven't done in a long time. It's like a forbidden pleasure. It's something I have to give myself permission to do, and that rarely happens--giving myself permission, that is.

It's been a gray and dreary day. Some rain, and fairly cool temps. So I did what I needed to do around the house, spent some time on the computer, made some necessary phone calls, and then...I did it!

I grabbed the book I needed to finish for bookgroup this Friday, got snuggled under a blanket on the couch, and began to read ! In the middle of the day!! while it was still daylight !!!! Without ANY feelings of guilt!! Be still my heart. Not only that, but I had a bowl of cherries right next to me that I thoroughly enjoyed. (maybe a bon-bon or two would have been nice, but the cherries were great).

So I finished the book, with two days to spare, which is a record for me. Usually I'm scurrying through the last chapters only hours before it's time to leave for our meeting. I feel empowered! Empowered for what, I don't know, but it's a great feeling.

If you haven't read this book yet, you should consider getting it and reading it.

SERENDIPITY

..."a propensity for making fortuitous discoveries while looking for something unrelated"

I heard through the grapevine that one of the old, abandoned structures in Fonda is scheduled to be demolished sometime in the near future. I decided to get a few last shots of it, so after dinner tonight I grabbed my camera bag and tripod and drove down to see what I could see.

After "working" it for a while, very unsuccessfully, I might add, I thought I might take some shots of the street. That, too, proved unfruitful, but because it was such a beautiful evening and just having the camera in my hand is like a tranquilizer for me, I wasn't too disappointed. I wasn't in any hurry to return home, so I kept looking around, hoping for some inspiration.

Suddenly, it was SERENDIPITY!!! I would practice photographing car trails--you know, the headlights and taillights of the cars passing by. Eureka!

So I set up my tripod and tried to estimate the shutter speed I'd need. Since I'd never really done this before, it was pure guesswork at the beginning.

Now...you need to understand that Fonda is not exactly a booming metropolis. Truth be told, it's neither booming, nor a metropolis, and after dinner it's one of those places where they almost roll up the sidewalks.

So, I got all set up, and then waited. And waited. And waited. Once in a while a car would pass by and I would press the shutter. Half the cars didn't even have their lights on (whatever happened to daytime running lights?) Failure after failure... I slowed down the shutter speed--not slow enough. I put on the polarizer--still not slow enough. Turn down the iso--okay, now it's beginning to look better.

Because there was usually only one car at a time going by, it still didn't look too exciting, but I felt like I was getting the hang of it.

Only one side of the road in the following image, but at least two different vehicles. A little more interesting.

The street lights came on and added a little more interest.

The tail lights give it even more interest, especially since that vehicle turned the corner onto the main road.

Finally!!! Vehicles going in both directions AND turning corners. I was a very happy camper, didn't think I'd get better than this tonight, so I packed up and went home.

Serendipity is a wonderful thing!

Where's The Keyoard????

Okay, so aother post with my damaged keyoard. hmmmm, thought the ew oe would e delivered as of today. Eve if it had arrived today, the comptuer would't e fixed till Moday. So ear with me ad try to uderstad.

Whe I stepped out my ackdoor a while ago, I saw this eautiful cat. It was a little timid, ad of course, ecause I still do't carry my camera everywhere (like loadig up the car), I was mutterig to myself aout ot havig it availale. (I'm thikig I should just put it o a layard aroud my eck...) ut the cat just sat there ad made itself comfortale, so I took a chace, got up from where I was sittig, stepped ito the house ad got the camera. This was the est of the images I got. What a eauty!!!

They do't sell Shave Ice at this place. hmmmm

A Visual Challege ad a Triute!

First,,, to explai the challege to you, the reader. My keyoard is doig some weird thigs due to the fact (I thik), that I spilled a few drops of coffee o some of the keys the other morig. ut the keys that do't work are owhere ear where the coffee laded, so I'm puzzled. Ayway, the computer goes to the "dr" tomorrow.

Secod,,, the Triute! Oe of my dear frieds, Louise, passed away very uexpectedly ad quickly this past Jauary. She was a dear fried to most of us a church, ad we miss her every day. Her irthday was Jue 3. To pay triute, Jea decorated the church frot with this eautiful ouquet of roses.

Sorry for all the empty space here at the ottom, ut the delete key does't work either.

A Morning in the Adirondacks

Today was a hike day, but there were only two of us. Since we knew ahead of time that there would only be the two of us, we decided to bring our cameras with the intention of doing some photography if we got the chance. (the other two ladies with whom we usually hike are not into photography, so we don't usually have the luxury of looking for photo subjects)

Actually, we got lost while looking for the trail head. Serendipity, for sure. Along the way we stopped several times to photograph scenes we wouldn't have seen if we hadn't gotten lost.

When we finally did find the trail head we spent some significant time trying to photograph these flowers. Our hike then turned into a short walk through the woods and a nice lunch on a plank bridge that crossed a small stream.

Neither of us were unhappy about the way the morning in the Adirondacks turned out. Sometimes the unexpected is really pleasant.