The View From Here

I'm not going to lie, there are MANY reasons that I like my job but the view from my "office" window is definitely one of the big ones.

Oversharing Update

Because I am, apparently, the type of person who enjoys sharing my personal health issues online, I'd like to report that the rash has spread. It is now not only on my face, neck, chest, stomach and back but it is also on my cat.

And no that's not some gentle euphemism for female genitalia, I literally mean MY CAT, the infamous Princeton P. Kitty.

Some of you might be saying to yourselves that I am a lunatic, that cats can't get poison ivy. And in most cases you would be right.  Because most cats have fur. Sphynx cats--in spite of their many charms--don't have fur. They can, and clearly, DO get poison ivy (although they are somewhat reluctant to have their rash photographed, no matter how many times you explain this is for your blog):

However, it is interesting to note that not everyone is thrilled to be bombarded with pictures of ivy-afflicted cats.  Not because they don't love and care about cats but because the pictures, when viewed in miniature in an iPhone text message preview, look a little obscene...as is evidenced by the response I received from my friend Kelly:

"Here's another fun fact. Pictures of a Sphynx cat's leg, that pop up on an iPhone as a tiny flesh colored picture, at first glance look just like a human penis."

I laughed so hard that I almost forgot how bad my back was itching.

In any case, I still feel like a leper but am heading to the doctor soon...I wonder how she'd feel if I brought the Prince along?

Photojournalism in Action

Well, Opie got me an amazing camera for Christmas and I think it’s safe to say that I have never been more annoying. I mean, I'm  pretty sure I was annoying before--I am the one, after all, who essentially crawled down the side aisles at my nieces and nephew's First Communion masses and took surreptitious pictures--in one case, in direct defiance of the priest.

(It's interesting to note that several people told me I wasn't being surreptitious at all during these events yet still cheerfully accepted all copies of the pictures I tool.)

In any case, I'm even worse now--as anyone who has been at a family celebration with me in the last few months can attest to.

The thing is, this camera has a lot of amazing features that I'm still trying to figure out, including the ability to take action shots.

Which means that as soon as I got it out of the box, I asked Opie to run around the yard as fast as he could.

"I don't really want pictures of me running around the yard like an idiot," he said.

"I'm not going to take pictures of you," I promised. "But if you start running, the dogs will run after you and I can get some shots of them."

He looked at me like I might be a little crazy but I'm used to that look so it didn't even faze me. "I'm not going to get tired of asking."  I assured him. And proved it by saying "Come on, just run.  Just a little jog?  Would it kill you to run a little bit? Come on! Please?!" until he caved.

Which was great because then I was able to test the burst motion shot thingy and get this picture of Bubba and Sassy.

Please note that I was true to my word,
you can't even see Opie's shadow in this!

A few more weeks of this and I think I'll be ready to start shooting for National Geographic.

And you might think this makes Opie a saint and me an unreasonable freak show but that’s because you don’t know all the things he refused  to do.

I mean, sure he’s been going on long nature walks with me and hauling my camera bag all over the place and even posing as I hone my skills for National Geographic:

(How about the squirrel photobomb?)

But after I got this shot:

And suggested that he run through the woods, crashing through the underbrush as fast as he could, so we could flush out even more birds, he said no.

Then when I mentioned that it would be even cooler to get a picture of these guys flying off the water:

He wouldn’t even consider jumping off the dock and doing a cannonball right into the middle of the lake.

And when I hinted that he could probably lure this hawk into an amazing, attack-mode pose:

By waving his arms in the air and rushing at its nest, he acted like I was kidding.

And when I told him that he should run through this flock of ducks:

like you see people do with seagulls on the beach, so I could get a shot of him surrounded by hundreds of birds flying in the air all around him, he reminded me that I had forced him to do that exact thing the last time we were in Florida (when I only had the little point and click Kodak) And not only did the birds NOT fly off like they do in the movies, they actually got in his way and then started chasing after him.

“I hope you realize that you’re stomping all over my dream of becoming a photojournalist,” I told him.

And you know what? He didn’t seem one bit sorry.

So, who's the unreasonable freak show now?