ALONG THIS MORNINGS TRAIL……. (NIKON D40 - 300MM)
A refreshingly cool 54F start to the day had me putting on a long sleeve flannel shirt for our morning walk. The Season change is well underway and it is two months from yesterday that we hope to have the big wheels rolling once again for another fine winter season somewhere in the Southwest.
THERE WERE SIGNS OF THE EARLY SEASON CHANGE ALONG THE TRAIL
On our way to Mitchell yesterday Kelly pulled out a piece of paper with some more Doggy names written on it. Eve is a fine name but we were wanting to change it up a bit and make it our own. We were trying to think of a name sounding similar to Evie but a name we can stretch around into some nicknames as well. Kelly suggested Phoebe & I liked that right away. So, as of today we exchanged the human O for a doggy E making it Pheebe. From Pheebe, her nicknames will take on sounds like, Pheeber, The Pheebs, Pheebiliscious, Pheeber Fever, The Pheebsterson, Pheeber Gator & on & on as we get to know her better. So, I guess it is official.....our biggest Girl’s name has now been changed from Evie to Pheebe. 
A commenter had recently mentioned how good it was of Pheebe to come when we called her. Luckily, Matt her former owner worked with the Pheebs & taught her to come on a whistle or whenever her name was called. I noticed right away that she also understood the ‘Stay’ command so that has been a big help for us as well. Biggest problem we are working on is to keep her from jumping up. We never had this problem with the other guys so it is new for us. She is such a happy and excited dog that she is always trying to jump up & put smooches on our faces.
Nice walk with the Pheebs in the forest again this morning and I must say I have never seen a dog so full of energy or run so fast. I swear she hit 300 mph at one point racing around the Park’s Pond. She scared the Ba-Jeebers out of a couple rabbits & even took after a low flying Robin. I’m always worried she will run so fast she will rocket right out of her own fur. With the way she races around our 2 back yard sheds we have renamed our backyard, the Pheebe 500. She is such a sweetheart.
I really must get my Nikons dusted off & get myself out on some more photo shoots shortly. As the landscape now begins to slowly change there will be lots of new shooting opportunities again. As mentioned before, photography is a lone hobby for me. By that I mean, it’s a hobby I enjoy doing alone. Whether it’s cruising a country road, walking a forest path, chasing down a butterfly or photographing a street lamp in the middle of town. It’s something I enjoy doing now in the stress free peace & quiet of my own mind. Years ago I belonged to the Stratford Camera Club and I enjoyed it then. But that was then. Learned a lot, met a bunch of great people & enjoyed my time while I was a member. But, going out with a group of people holds no interest anymore. For me personally, I find it just too distracting. It is the same reason hiking clubs hold no interest for me. Too many people, too much noise, too many distractions. The last thing I want to hear in a still forest or along a solitary mountain trail is the sound of people talking.
I am at a comfortable place with my photography now. As stated before, I have no interest in trying to sell any of my stuff. That just creates unneeded pressure. Not being a competitive person I do not care for entering photo contests. Printing my photos & hanging them on walls holds no interest for me just as any kind of commercial work is not up my alley either. To keep my hobby fun & interesting I have to do it my way. So, when I head out with my cameras, I head out alone & just enjoy the quiet beauty of my surroundings. If I mess up a photo, it doesn’t matter because much of the enjoyment just comes from the fact of being out & about in Nature whether a picture is taken or not. Awhile back I had a post entitled, SEEING WITH A PHOTOGRAPHERS EYE which kind of explains why I enjoy photography. And of course, it explains why photography is such a great hobby.
Here’s a little photo tip for this time of year & I was reminded of it this morning on the trail. Two things come into play which have to do with the position of the sun & the cooler night air. With the earth still warm from summer & the night air becoming cooler due to the earth beginning it’s tilt away from the sun it creates a lot of condensation in the night air which shows up these mornings as a heavy dew on the grass. That heavy dew also settles on Spider Webs. If you can get out early while the rising morning sun is low in the East & face East you have a good chance of finding many beautiful back lit spider webs. Fences are good places to look as well as old iron bridges. Tall grass in ditches or fields will have all kinds of spider webs. You will wonder why you had never seen them before. It’s the combination of water droplets on the webs plus the low angle of the sun shining through the droplets that make the webs stand out like pages in a book of Fairy Tales. The webs have basically always been there but you just couldn’t see them before. Oh, and if you do decide to head out in search of early morning Spider webs you had better wear rubber boots because it’s going to be wet out there for the next couple months.
MAYBE NOT THE GREATEST SPIDER WEB SHOT BUT IT IS THAT TIME OF YEAR AGAIN NIKON D40 - 300MM
We are steadily adjusting to our new computer and despite all my usual blusterings, things are falling into place. Just going to take a little time getting used to the changes. Again, our biggest stumbling block is getting our address books successfully imported into our new email system. All the emails are there but they are jumbled and we haven’t figured out a way to easily organize them once again into their respective address books. So, my email correspondence which has been really suffering these past few years is really upside down right now. One of the Windows Live mail features I like is that it uses basically the same format and icons that Windows Live Writer uses and for an aging Mouse like myself it is easier and better for me to stay on the same old familiar and well worn path. Really like how small our tower is now and here is the skinny on what we have……Lenova M75e, Athlon-B22 – RAM: 4GB – (with room for an additional 12GB) – 320GB – DVDRW – Microsoft Windows 7 Professional 32 – bit – ATI Radeon 3000. Nope, none of that makes any sense to me either.
OUR SUN ROOM COMPUTER STATION WITH THE NEW MUCH SMALLER LENOVO AT THE LEFT..FORGOT TO REMOVE THE WHITE CAMERA CORD & THAT IS CALLED ‘NOT SEEING WITH THE PHOTOGRAPHER’S EYE’!! (NIKON D90)
And, I have a glitch in our newly downloaded Live Writer. If I go back in the text to correct a spelling mistake, add or rewrite something, the curser seems to gobble up the letters to the right when I begin typing again. Some kind of letter formatting problem I think. I remember having the same problem one time years ago in one of our email writing programs but haven’t a clue how I fixed it. Very irritating.
Some folks wondered why I don’t care for Hotmail or Gmail. It’s the annoying advertising I don’t like in Hotmail. Gmail has lost emails on us & just recently, while typing an email had the whole email just up & vanish on me. Just like that & it was gone & I was unable to find it anywhere. No idea what happened or what I did. Kelly has never cared much for Gmail either because of glitches. We do have Yahoo email as well but it wasn’t until an email from Red in California rolled in this morning that I even remembered we had Yahoo. I will have another look at that.
By the way, you can see a live web cam view of the sparkling sandy beach at Deer Park Lodge where Kelly works any time you wish, as long as the sun is up in our part of the world. I’ll have to pick a time one of these days & take Pheebe for a walk on the beach there & sync a time for us to step in front of the camera & say Hello to y’all........
THE LAST PARAGRAPH: Keep in mind that any opinions expressed in my posts are just that.....my opinions. Oh, and nearly forgot…..Wednesday afternoon Kelly & I are off to the Huron County Playhouse near Grand Bend Ontario to see, ‘Blue Suede Shoes: Memories of the King.’ These musicals are always sooooo well done & sooooo excellent.
GROANER’S CORNER: The aspiring psychiatrists were attending their first class on emotional extremes. "Just to establish some parameters," said the professor to the student from Arkansas, "What is the opposite of joy?"
"Sadness," said the student.
And the opposite of depression?" he asked of the young lady from Oklahoma.
"Elation," said she.
"And you sir," he said to the young man from Texas, "how about the opposite of woe?"
The Texan replied, "Sir, I believe that would be giddy-up."
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The only thing better than right now will someday be the memories of right
now...... AL.
