No More Snow for Our Garden Angel

The temperature was 64 a couple of our days this week.  It is 40 degrees outside tonight as I write this and tomorrow is forecast to be 51 degrees.  So hopefully there will be no more snow for our garden angel.  Years ago we did have a pretty good wet snowfall in April and we couldn't believe our eyes seeing the trees all covered with a frosting in April.  But it warmed and quickly melted.  We last saw her on March 2nd, both buried and with much of it melted.  Hopefully she will have warm spring days as she waits for the rebirth of the garden as we continue into spring.

 

I Am Done Wirh My White Shirts!

I found this bright yellow Lands End buttondown shirt up in Amy's closet.  It has not been worn much and the color is a brilliant bright yellow, not the pale yellow which is the only color you can buy today.  I realize that it must be boring seeing me wearing white buttondown shirts every day.  So, no more!  I will put them all away and start buying brighter colored shirts from now on.  I actually have, from years ago, dark blue buttondown shirts!  That was a different phase in my fashion style!  This will be life-changing.  No one will recognize me!  And now here is a tale out of school, something I just learned...  You all recognize the name Ken Schwarz, who is a great friend of mine who always comments here?  Well, in a conversation we  just had the other day, he said when he retired he got rid of ALL his buttondown shirts!  I was stunned!  I could not even BREATHE if I didn't have buttondown shirts to wear!

 

Carving My Turns

This is my curvy road about 3/4 the way through my 10 mile ride.  It is downhill and only two lanes so not that much traffic.  I turn onto this road off a main road, with a fairly sharp curve to the right, at the beginning here, and because I am moving pretty fast, I lean into the turn to the right.  Then as you can see here, the road then curves to the left in the distance and I am picking up speed and I carve my turn to the left, by leaning to the left.  There is something wonderful about carving turns on nice roads - it is a very smooth and fluid motion and is one of the rich feelings of cycling.  I have started riding again now that the temps are in the 60's. What a joy to be on the bike again!

 

The Last of It

Well, this is the last of it.  Fingers crossed of course.  We have had a St. Patricks Day snowstorm in years passed, and I think maybe we even had an April snowfall once?  I forget.  But this year, for some reason, the snow and the cold seemed harder to deal with.  Several weeks of 15 degree temperatures were a tough one.  The cold was worse than the snowfall.  I think we got 12 inches of snow the first time and about 16 inches the second time, but that was not a problem because of my snow blower.  On the first storm I cleaned the driveway and walkways in an hour and a half, which was not bad.  But now even this last bit it is all gone, and the temperature today was 64 degrees and out I went on my bike with just a jersey and shorts on!  Fingers crossed that the temps stay reasonable.

 

My FrankenSONY Camera

I am reading a book by a famous woman photographer, about what it takes to be a creative artist-photographer and the struggles and the creativity and all the issues with doing it professionally. She works with a huge 8x10 camera for her work.  But I found a photograph of her with a 35mm Leica digital camera around her neck.  The Leica costs $9600.  But what is interesting is that the lens on her Leica is a lens from a really old Leica film camera.   You saw the photograph I did on February 25 of the tree branches, where I used essentially a magnifying glass as a lens.  So using an old Leica lens is similar to that quality but not as severely out of focus around the edges.

So this is my original Leica film camera.  It is a Leica II manufactured starting in 1932.  When I first got it in a trade with a friend, I traded a more modern lens for his much older camera.  I discovered that I had to use a slow film to take photographs with this because light leaked around the edges of the focal plane shutter.  So I remember walking around Geneva, NY, where Kathy's mom lived, taking photographs with this camera. So I am temporarily putting the lens from this camera on my modern SONY a7 III camera, with the use of an adapter I built.  I did some tests, however by gaffer-taping the lens to an adapter on my SONY!  I will, of course show you some of the results after I finish making the finished, more permanent adapter.  What IS interesting, is that this camera still works perfectly!  What is the chance, by the way, that my SONY a7 III will still be working in 94 years!

 

 

The Trifecta!

So I told you yesterday about doing two photographs within 50 feet of each other in the snow covered park.  And I mentioned driving by a house and returning to where it was to take a photograph.  This is the third photograph that I took in probably 30 minutes.  The trifecta!  I think this is an interesting photograph because it is not really about the house, it is about the trees in the foreground.  That's what I saw when I flashed by this scene the first time I went by.  I spent maybe 10 minutes or so moving around and trying different compositions, both closer to the house, and further away.  But this is my favorite.

 

Getting To Know You

I photographed that bench and the ball field covered in snow the other day.  Then I drove around the corner to drive home.  I passed a house that looked interesting in the rain.  But I had already gone by it, so I drove around the block to drive back to it. As I turned the corner to circle back I saw this out the front window!  I immediately stopped and shot through the front windshield. Two people walking their dogs on the ball field took time to stop and introduce their dogs to each other!   I took about 10 shots.  But what luck, that I went around the block and they were here when I passed by!  Two photographs on the same day not 50 feet from where I shot the bench!