The Haloscan people, who provide the comments section, seem to be upgrading at the moment so there's no comment section displaying although the code is still intact. They say on their site they'll contact me when it's my turn to go through the upgrade process (and charge me $9.95 for a year's service) so we'll wait. I don't get many comments, but I like having the service and $9.95 seems OK. Upgrading to increase the speed is what they're saying and upgrading their speed is something they definitely need to do - doodle-dee-do - IMHO.

None of this IMHO crap!

Oh, come on. Chill out.

Playing with the cameras yesterday (Oh, I'm sorry. Out on a serious photographic shoot yesterday.) I decided to learn how to make some adjustments to the cameras to accurately expose the color in low mixed light environments of the kind I run into at Mochi Ceremonies and, if the truth be known, in bars. Incandescent light alone or mixed with other light (outdoor light through windows, fluorescent light, candle light) tends to throw the cameras off. Easily fixed when processing in PhotoShop, but still, I have these exotic cameras, why not learn to use them like a real boy scout? I've used grey cards in the past to adjust whole batches of files, shooting a picture of a grey card and then using it in PhotoShop to adjust whatever series of pictures was taken after that, but again, I have the equipment, why not actually use it as it was designed to be used?

Because you're lazy and don't usually give a shit?

Well yes, but we're retired now and the thought occurs it's embarrassing to have this stuff and not be proficient in its use (after what is now fifteen years of shooting). Don't you think? Self?

Later. A trip downtown on the bus (with camera, of course) thinking what can I possibly shoot of interest I haven't passed a thousand times and photographed a thousand times and, for some strange reason, took two pictures I've indeed taken a thousand times and had them (I think) turn out well. Even the one rather ordinary photograph taken as I was sitting drinking a cup of coffee at Peet's had some interest, although not near the interest generated by the other two. Such is life. It has surprises.

Then again, walking about the area with camera in hand, the carrying strap wrapped around my right wrist, walking back up Broadway thinking to hop a bus to the apartment, that feeling I've described as slightly hallucinatory came over me, the eyes as they focused from scene to scene becoming not quite smooth as if the brain weren't integrating them as it usually does, the walk becoming a bit paranoid and slightly wobbly, this causing me to sit at a sidewalk bench and wait right there, no walking any farther, for the bus to come.

Which the bus eventually did (arrive) and now I'm back at the apartment having had a couple of glasses of water and a brief lie down, feeling better. Not sure what brings this on. Happens every now and then, seemingly less and less often, but then a surprise. Hi! The coffee I had at Peet's? I'd have had something to think about if I'd bought a piece or two of that Chinese candy I was looking at in the Chinese Cultural Center. Adulterated Chinese Candy! I can see the headlines now.

So, the walk completed, the sun shining, sitting here at the computer after having had a bowl of Rice Chex and milk, the “hallucinatory” feeling has passed, as it always seems to pass, within the period of about an hour; the head back on straight, the afternoon still ahead. Those thoughts this morning about setting up the two cameras to correct low light color, examined again as I was walking to see if there wasn't a way around them, have led me to track down the manual to the D3 so I can compare it with the D3S and actually follow through on this color setting business. Additional ideas about printing more CD/DVD's and backing up more files are also creeping in, maybe actually doing them before the day is through. Pretty exciting way to finish a weekend, I'm thinking. Here in Oakland.