bassline

Red agate donut.

I picked this up in New York last week. E was looking for stones to make jewelry with. I already had a solid green one like this, but I saw a bowl full of the red ones while we were at Metalliferous and thought one of the red agates might look good next to my skin. I also picked out a green one that's mostly speckled and clear in areas.

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I have a longer post in mind about our day-trip to New York last Thursday, which happened to be one of the only sunny days we've experienced lately.

Oh, I was the lucky recipient of a brand-spanking new Canon Poweshot A650IS, courtesy of my amazing wife! 12 megapixels!! Yes, I'm a happy man :D

My older camera, a Canon Powershot A620 has been my workhorse for almost three years, but, lately, I dropped it while preparing for one of my self portraits. It was the second such fall in two years and the one that caused it to suddenly shut off unexpectantly if jostled too much and often while I was in the midst of taking a photo. The camera was fine if I used it on my tripod, but otherwise, no dice. It still works and takes good shots, but it'll be my back-up now.

129/366: seated

Did this on a whim yesterday when I was trying to figure out what to do for my daily photo. I was in the studio and didn't really have an idea of what to do. I'd already tried a couple of shots of me working on something, but they didn't turn out that well and I've done a lot of those types of shots. I looked at the chair and the wheels started turning.

I tested the balance of the chair out first. Once I was satisfied that I wasn't going to fall over, I set up the camera's timer for a 10 second delay (my usual setting for shots like this) and scrambled to get the pose I wanted.

I like that it worked out. Now, I want to try a couple of other variations with different lighting and background(s).

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On another note, my camera might be on it's way to biting the dust.

I was setting up for another self portrait the other night and dropped it. The fall wasn't far and luckily it landed on carpet. However, I've noticed some changes happening that do not make me feel great about it's continued life as my primary camera. I think I should start researching some slr style digital cameras to continue feeding my photography habit.

I've been feeling a little crappy the past couple of days. Not sneezing or coughing and I don't have a fever. My throat is bothering me a little and I'm feeling just off enough that I don't want to do much of anything except lay on the couch. Any grand plans I had to work in the studio this week are done with. I don't feel like I can concentrate on much of anything, even tasks like stretching canvas. Tomorrow is my 'Monday' and I'm not off again until next Thursday, so anything I was going to do will have to wait. I'm fairly sure that the root cause of how I'm feeling has to do with my screwed up sleep patterns. I stay up way too late not doing much of anything important and get up too early and lately, my immune system has been taking a beating.

So far, my goal of better time management is just a figment of my imagination. I have to take some real action or I'm going to remain in the same situation far longer than I want. To restate, my major goal for this year is time management. What that means is allowing myself more time to accomplish things like making it to appointments and other things without rushing all of the time. Too often, I underestimate the amount of time it takes for me to get from point A to point B beginning with the time it takes me to prepare to go out. I need to get that under control because too often, no, all of the time I find myself rushing to get shower, get dressed, and whatever else I have to do. Even for casual things like meeting someone to hang out or see a movie, it's the same thing. The rushing makes it difficult to relax. It just leads to stress I don't need...and I create it. Sure, there are times when things beyond my control happen and I find myself behind the 8-ball, so to speak, but most of it is self-created. That's what I need to work on.

On reflection, it seems I'm either working my ass of in the studio, at work, in the gym, and so forth or I don't do anything. There's little middle ground. I'd like to find a better balance somewhere.

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I wasn't going to go out today, but I relaized that I need to go to the barber shop and this is my last chance for days to do it, so I'm making myself get out and go. I have another incentive with having my new camera and taking it along with me. I can take more pics to post. This brings me to another thought regarding this journal. Now that I have the ability to document and share the photos I take, I'll be posting a lot more visual images here so there's not just my mug all over the place ;) I have a lot of ideas, but I'm just going to see how it evolves. I have the capacity for short videos, also, but that's another challenge altogether. For now, I'll be posting stills of this, that, and whatever else I find interesting.

Rain, rain, go away, come again another day...

Ok, so that didn't work. I guess the only consolation for all of this wetness is that it isn't snow. If it was, we'd be under a whole mess of it by now.

I don't really have much to say. Today went along pretty well. I was back to work after four days off, which was nice. I'm trying to get my head back into work mode with my art life and return to something of a regular schedule. I've pretty much been on a mental vacation for the past couple of months, but it's time to rev back up again and move ahead. There are art-related deadlines coming up which also means my organizer is already getting a work-out.

Besides that, I was basically distracted at work all day because of the camera. I even spent my lunch-time reading the manual and playing around with different settings. I've figured out the basic stuff but I've also did a small movie test. Now, I just have to figure out how to upload it to my computer. In the meantime, here are a couple of shots of my oh so humble abode, complete with a new table to eat at and folding chairs.

After Tuesday's events, my week improved dramatically. Thursday, I spent a few hours with my housemate buying stuff I've wanted for my place and stuffing his car to the gills. It all began with me asking him to go with me to look at digital cameras (he's a photographer) at this place near where we live. It turns out he wanted to make a couple of other stops (Home Depot and Staples) so I asked him if he minded if we went to Ikea, also. He wanted something from there, too, so our man-shopping trip was on.

I knew exactly what I wanted from Ikea, had a list, too. Of course, that's no guarantee against being distracted by all sorts of stuff that may wind up being clutter, especially in the 'Marketplace' area. I mean, really, how many dozens of glasses does one person need? A few years ago, I purchased a dozen short, square drink glasses and use exactly one. They look good on the shelf over the sink, though.

Anyway, from Ikea, I wound up with a new kitchen table, two folding chairs, and a bookcase. I purchased a new computer chair from Office Max. I spent most of Thursday night moving things around the apartment to make room for the table and bookcase. The rest of the time was used assembling the table, and computer chair, which took next to no time. I went to bed pretty late, but got up yesterday after only four or five hours of sleep to put the bookcase together. I only did that so I could be sure to get all of my trash out before the trash collectors came around. Having my apartment look like the vision I've had in my head for months trumps the lack of sleep. There are more things I want to do, like make a division between the kitchen area and eating area. My idea right now is to put up a wire across the space and hang a curtain from it. I also want to get a three-panel screen to put in front of the computer desk when I'm not using the computer, especially at night when I'm sleeping.

The biggest purchase was my new digital camera. I'm excited to finally have one and now I have to figure out how to use it. I looked at the manual last night and my eyes just blurred over, so I'll give it another try today sometime. Stay tuned...