speaking of geek-outs...

My wonderful, thoughtful and indulgent husband gave me a truly stupendous Christmas gift this year: a new camera. Not just any camera, mind you. The new Olympus E-P1 , just released this last autumn. This camera was designed with film geeks in mind. It has amazing bells & whistles ( it is a 12.3 mp compact slr, shoots HD video with stereo sound, so many ways to customize shooting that I have only figured out a select few.) PLUS it can add filter effects for people like me who love Lomos & Holgas ( the 17mm lens on my Olympus is almost equivalent to that of the Lomo) but sometimes wish they could be digital. AND it fits into my purse. How cool is that?

I shot this photo (with my iphone) of the Olympus next to my Nikon, just so you can see the size difference. That viewfinder on top is optical, not electric. It fits into the hotshoe, so it comes off. Really, I'll only need it in super-sunny conditions when the screen is hard to see.


The styling on this camera is so gorgeous, too. It is sleek and spare with enough steely heft to feel wonderfully old-school. Here are some photos from the Olympus.

Above: the "pinhole" setting which yields Holga-like color and vignetting.

These last two were also shot in the pinhole setting. Sinda will perhaps recognize the monkey in the background. Her family gave it to Junebug the day she was born, 8 & 1/2 years ago. It was her first post-partum gift!

I may post some videos here, from time to time. I apologize in advance for my poor videography skills. You may need to get some Dramamine on board in advance of viewing them.

Happy New Year, all! I'm gonna go play with my shiny new toy now.

white christmas geek-out

Yesterday, as I was getting into my car, I couldn't help but notice how perfectly-formed the snowflakes were. Even I, with only my lame eyes and no microscope, could clearly see their crystalline structure as they slowly melted on my sleeves. When I got home, I attempted to capture some.

Above: dying snowflakes on construction paper.

These would no doubt have been sharper if I'd bothered with a tripod. That 105 mm macro lens is heavy! But still, these turned out better than I thought they would. Click to enlarge.

in heavy rotation

1. Brian Setzer's "Dig That Crazy Christmas"

2. Vince Guaraldi's "Charlie Brown Holiday Hits"

3. DeVotchKa's "A Mad & Faithful Telling" because sometimes you need a break from the x-mas music.

4. Biscuit Brothers' "A Very Musical Christmas"

5. Snoopy's "Christmas Classics on Toy Instruments"

I also can't live without Eartha Kitt's "Santa Baby" and TMBG's "Santa's Beard". Still trying to locate these cd's.

What are your favorite tunes at this time of year?

Piano stairs - TheFunTheory.com - Rolighetsteorin.se

get out your needles

or, as I feel just looking at these projects, maybe put them away forever. Except for that Moebius scarf. I could knit that, no prob. What I'd LIKE to knit is the dissected frog.

Check out these scientifically-inspired knitting projects.

Brrrrrrrrrrrrr

Last night when I drove home from a meeting of our Parent-Teacher organization, my car said it was 0 degrees. My car's thermometer only goes down to 0, so I didn't know how cold it really was. Mr. Man said it was -20 this morning when he got up. Right now it is up to -9 with a dewpoint of -16. A negative dewpoint? Who even knew that was possible?

We have some snow on the ground, not a lot. We have about 3 or 4 inches or so. It is evaporating faster than it is melting. Which of course it isn't. One interesting thing to me is that you can't tell how cold it is by looking outside. I mean, yeah, when it is sunny it looks warmer. And feels warmer, of course. But just looking outside, you can't tell if it is 25 degrees or negative 25. Then you go out and it hurts to breathe.

It's surprising that Turnip will even go outside at all, though he will sometimes do his stuff right on the deck. That's still outside, right?



Turnip is a great lap-warmer. By the way, is there anything more delicious than snuggling up under a down duvet with a good book when it is cold? Just add a curly turnip and some hot chai or Earl Grey or coffee and I'm happy.

Why, look at these soft curls!



Ya'll stay warm. I'm gonna go get more coffee.

Some things I've seen lately and loved.

Notice Matisse's goldfish on the above collage.

The guy who made this lithograph is a tattoo artist in Lyons.

The tote bag above sums up my feelings perfectly.

discovered in the comments at fussy

Go here and read the comments for the recipe for Salted Water for Boiling.
Brill.

the new guy

We adopted a dog today. This morning I was all set to go see a miniature poodle at the Boulder Valley Humane Society. He had a real sad story and I wasn't sure I'd be up to the challenges he might present. Then I thought, oh wait. I haven't checked the Larimer County Humane Society's website in a few days, I'll look there. And lo and behold, they had a Bichon Frisee/Poodle mix who looked like this. Before they groomed him, that is.


So I got dressed tout de suite, and as soon as Mr. Man was back from his run, I made my run to Fort Collins. I met the guy (called Marley-eeeww) and we hit it off. I placed him on hold and drove to Boulder to make sure I really wouldn't rather have the smaller, younger but more traumatized poodle waiting there. I saw him and immediately thought "Sugarbear will damage this dog". I mean, not intentionally, but with too much overbearing love and affection. That little dog needs a quiet home where a very patient and loving person can help him live up to his potential. Our home may be loving but it is rarely quiet. Also I worried about such a small dog in Sugarbear's hands. We needed someone sturdier. Marley fit the bill.

I called Mr. Man and we arranged for all of us to meet the little guy. And wouldn't you know that dog could sense who to suck up to the most: the cat person.


He immediately jumped into the man's lap and didn't want to leave. He has been there quite a bit since he came home with us this afternoon. The girls are ecstatic. We all are. He fits right in.

Yes, he has some weepy eye stains. Being at an animal shelter can make anyone cry.




We are still trying to agree on a new name. For now, we are calling him Turnip. Those in the know will get a little laugh from the joke.

About that trip to Nymph Lake

Remember that? Not really, huh. Me either. But here's the gist. We piled into the car and drove to RMNP. We parked at Bear Lake because that's where the parking lot is. Bear Lake isn't very impressive, so we skipped it completely. We started our hike up the snow-packed but mostly sunny trail to Nymph Lake. This hike isn't long (I think it is less than 1 mile) but it is winding, and you gain altitude fast. Fast enough for us to feel it, anyway. This time, though, the hike wasn't nearly as hard as last time. I guess this is due to our comfort level with the altitude combined with a better attitude from the kids. Junebug was actually running ahead far enough that we had to tell her to slow down. We didn't want to lose her up there. There was one time when I got pretty sharp with Sugarbear over her grouchiness, but after that she turned it around and we all thoroughly enjoyed our hike. Some things we saw: a snowshoe hair, lots of birds (gray jays, Steller's jays, magpies), chipmunks, black squirrels.

After we'd spent some time at Nymph Lake with the girls climbing giant boulders, we decided to hike up to Dream Lake. This was a first, and really made us feel like Coloradoans. Someone on the trail asked if we were continuing up and we were all "What, there's another lake? Hell yeah! Andiamo!". Of course, after we'd spent some time at Dream Lake, and the girls and I had taken a nature pee, we heard there was a third lake higher up! But by that time we were pretty tired and we were losing daylight. We decided to head back down and go for barbeque in Estes Park. Once we got back to the car, we were so proud of ourselves that we did a really loud family cheer just to let everyone else know how awesome we are. Obnoxious, right?

Click on the slideshow to see it bigger.

What is wrong with me? I need safety goggles to cut bread! Seriously, tonight? I took some super-crispy french bread out of the toaster oven and placed it on the cutting board. I started slicing through it with a bread knife and WHAMMO! Huge bread crumb lodged in my eyeball. Owie!

This incident reminds me of way back when I worked at the coop marketing company where I met the man. My boss came in to work one day looking like ASS. She was wearing her glasses ( I didn't even know she had glasses!) and one eye was huge and bloodshot and nasty-looking. Turned out she had somehow managed to get a hair from a strawberry lodged into her eyeball. A HAIR FROM A STRAWBERRY.
Double-you tee eff, dude?

True story.

My friend Megan shared this on Facebook. My favorite part of the video is when the dog declines a treat offered by the orangutan, and the ape just shoves it in the dog's mouth.