This week pushed my limits. All I can say is, thank God for antibiotics and a walk-in clinic. And a Health Savings Account card that followed me past the old job. Sometimes it’s the little stuff that’ll get you.
I felt enough better today I managed to actually cook both a meal (well, homemade chicken soup, which I’m calling a meal even if it takes about 5 minutes of prep and the rest is setting the timer while it boils) and a dessert – homemade chocolate pudding. Hubby was happy.
Five minutes after I scarfed down my food, I was out cold, and slept through until nearly 11pm. (I ate around 2-ish). I woke hungry, gulped down some cold cereal, going to write here, then go back to sleep for a couple of hours before work. At least, thank God, I no longer have to contend with the crazy commute. If I did, I would most likely have missed most of this week, instead of just a few hours one day (with the boss’s blessing, since it was so dead.)
My writing partner is ecstatic – two weeks after a stroke with less than 20% hope of survival, her spousal unit is sitting up, writing, talking, etc. He can’t remember what year it is and can’t remember all the people in his life, but that’s still an upgrade from “probably dead any minute”. Therefore she was in the mood to both talk my ear off and to write. So I picked up our joint effort and started actually adding to it, after an online confab. This was a few hours after I started writing on one of my OWN books, one I’d largely set aside a while back. Work was utterly dead today (typical for a Sunday) so I had the time to kill.
The infection kicked my ass in a huge way, so my photo run was abbreviated and of dubious overall quality this week, matching my energy levels. Posting some of the same images from FB, but I think there are a couple of these I didn’t post anywhere else. I added this batch as a gallery, so if you click on the first one it switches to a slideshow format and you can click through in larger sizes.
Obviously nothing super artsy or inspired in this batch, but it got me out of the house for a bit before I came home and crashed.
You poor, disease ridden thing! I’m glad you’re feeling better, but man. (Look at you though – rising from your sickbed to make HOMEMADE CHOCOLATE PUDDING! That’s above and beyond, chef.)
Hey I like your pics, even if you are somewhat dismissive of them. Can I ask what setting you’re using? I was looking at the f-stop numbers in each pic and I was wondering if you chose them yourself. When I first got my D3300 and wasn’t used to shooting digital I left it on “Auto” (the green setting on the dial) and noticed it mostly kept between f/5 and f/8. Once I got used to fiddling with the dials and such I moved on to the other modes, but I have to admit the brains in those little boxes are amazing. For all it’s decried in serious photog circles, “Auto” in these modern cameras do an excellent job for just general shots.
Lol. My favorite part of this whole entry? The title 🙂
I’ve mostly used the “auto” settings, and use the magic of Photoshop for post-production. Some of those shots were definitely overexposed and washed out in their original form, for example. Most of these fell in the 5-8 f/ range, though a few were lower. I have one lens that I can and have dialed down to 1.8, which I’ve played with. Interesting how much difference it can make. I’ve played with the ISO, too, took a series of indoor shots (of nothing, basically) at different ISO levels, just to see the difference. I haven’t yet gotten around to fiddling with shutter speeds, though I belong to a photog group where some of the folks have pulled off amazing lightning shots lately.
Photoshop costs me a little over $10 a month, and worth every penny of it. I use it for more than just photo manipulation like this – I do book cover design, website design, etc. However, there’s a definite learning curve involved there, too. I’ve learned its tricks over several years and still discover something new every now and then.
And don’t laugh. I know both the chicken soup and choco pudding are culinary child’s play, but I couldn’t stomach the thought of fast food or takeout, and wasn’t up to hauling myself out to eat anywhere, either.
I wasn’t laughing. I never laugh at anyone who makes ANYTHING from scratch. Chicken soup and pudding included. The fact that you made either, let alone both, while under the weather is particularly impressive.
If you’ve got a lens that opens all the way to f/1.8 you can have an awful lot of fun playing with depth of field. A lens like that is great for portrait work, the technique being to use a very low f-number so that only the subject is in focus, blurring the background and making the subject “pop”. That’s what I did with the picture of the baby blue jay I sent you, for instance. But the zoom lens I was using only opened to f/4. Your 1.8 would make that scene even more dramatic. Hope you play around with it!
🙂
The portrait lens doesn’t, unfortunately, also have a zoom feature. But you’re right, you can adjust to get some beautiful bokeh effects with it. 🙂
For these shots I used a 55-200 zoom – the /f ranges 4-5.6. I just ordered a lens hood, but want to add a polarization filter. The filter will give the color a little extra oomph – what’s there now was added post-processing and I’m not overjoyed with it.
And *I* laugh at the chicken noodle soup. It’s literally so easy it’s laughable. It’s my “I need to make something hot and fast, the homemade equivalent of drive-through” meal.
The quality of a dish isn’t a function of its complexity. Some of the best pasta sauces I’ve ever made have been ones I started while the pasta was cooking and which were finished before the paste was done (like Alfredo). If you set a good chicken soup down before someone, their first question to you usually isn’t “how long did this take?” I’m very proud of you!
Looking forward to seeing some pics with that polarizing lens. I got one recently more to cut down on reflection when shooting through glass (a concern for my wife’s product shots). Have a blast with it!
Oh my family is perfectly fine if it’s easy and fast – so am I. But this wasn’t one of my best efforts. Considering how I was still feeling, though, it was good enough to get by.
Today is pork chops, O’Brien potatoes, and probably broccoli (haven’t decided yet on the veggie). I recently did a grocery run for meat and poultry I got on sale for dirt cheap (petite sirloin $2.97/lb., for example), so the freezer’s stocked. And the above meal doesn’t take much more prep time than the chicken soup.
And I think we might actually have the filter to fit this lens. I forgot we got a set with hubby’s camera.
Yay getting on some meds and onto mending. I hope today is much better.
Thanks, Joyce. I’m not 100% yet but probably 90% or so. Still get tired easily. But you know, breathing helps. (And that was only part of it – my body tried to go awol on me.)
Sorry you have been feeling ill but glad you are recovering. The photos are great. I’m impressed and I know nothing about camera settings, lens and so forth.
I haven’t blogged for several weeks. Just not in the mood right now.
Thank you Terri. I want to be a fantastic, professional-level photographer. I’ve been playing with the camera for a whole three weeks or so now. That’s time to equal years of professional experience, isn’t it? 😉
I’m trying to kind of get back into the habit of blogging, for several reasons. FB has become so toxic, blogging seems like a less head-butting approach, among other things