Photography

Busy Day Today (And Tomorrow)

The title says it all. It’s only a little after lunch time and already I’ve done enough for a full day, and I still have more to do. Tomorrow will be worse.

I had to get an x-ray today so my doctor can have it for my appointment tomorrow. The imaging center was busy so it was a long wait but once I got into the room it only took about a minute.

From there I drove to the campus of the local university, Texas Tech. There is a horticultural garden I wanted to roam through to take pictures. It was wonderful! I am not really an outdoorsy type but I enjoy being outside occasionally for longer than ten minutes. I don’t know how long I was there but I got a lot of photos and some of them are pretty spectacular. Bonus points to anyone who can tell me what the little beastie in the above picture is! He was so patient while modeling for me.

Once the bees took an interest in me I left and headed to the gym. This was what I like to call one of my ‘hard days.’ On Monday, Wednesday and Friday I do a circuit workout, plus cardio.

Starting so much later than normal through me off a bit at first. I discovered I really like working out before I get the rest of the day started. I felt so sluggish and unmotivated fora  while. Then the Fall Out Boy cover of Beat It came on Pandora and I got myself in gear, haha. Unfortunately, tomorrow I’ll have to start late as well but as long as I find the right music I should be fine.

Now I’m writing this post but at 1pm central I have a live webinar to attend on Photography. I’m excited about it because I’m learning so much. Getting back into photography is awesome.

I haven’t written today. Hopefully I will after the class. My characters are really taking shape and I want to continue working on them.

As for tomorrow, I have to go to the doctor, workout, eat and rush to court. I didn’t do anything wrong, it’s a follow-up thing for my ex about child support. I was surprised I am required to attend but I’ll be there.

The upside is there are some great places to take pictures near the court-house. I’ll be prepared!

Well, I’m off to my class. I’ll have a better writing update posted soon.

Personal Update

leaf

After three days of physical therapy I really relate to this picture. It hurts but I actually feel decent. Between the medication the doctor gave me and the exercises, I’m pretty sure I’m getting better. So I feel more like myself but still a little broken, like the poor leaf.

I have two and a half more weeks of these deceptively easy stretches and stamina building exercises. I hope that’s all I need. One bonus here: It takes 21 days to form a habit. So when I’m out of the woods, I’ll already be in the habit of exercising so I’ll just keep doing so. Maybe I’ll get in better shape.

Something else that happened during all this doctor-ness. I found out my thyroid is messed up. I jumped for joy when I got that call. No really, my kid thought I was crazy! I wasn’t happy there was anything wrong, it was more of a relief to know there was a reason I always felt so icky. I started taking medication for it yesterday and I’ll probably be taking that for the rest of my life but I’m okay with it. I feel lucky there is a fix for the problem.

I have so much hope now, I already feel better. A good attitude makes all this much more bearable, as I’m sure my poor husband will attest to. I’m much more pleasant company since finally giving in and going to the doctor.

As for writing, there is not much to report. I am rethinking certain plot points of my fantasy trilogy and I’ve made some firm decisions on what I want the main character to go through, but I haven’t written anything down besides some notes. Plot cards are my next step, once I can move around more easily.

Since I’m doing a lot of sitting and lying around I hope to come up with some new flash fiction stories. If I am able to sit and write any, I’ll be posting them soon.

Why Is This Armadillo Smiling?

In west Texas we don’t bother with snow globes since that almost mythical fluffy white stuff only shows up occasionally to torture us. We do sand globes! With armadillos! And grassy stuff!

I found this at a ranching museum gift shop while out taking pictures. I also came home with a sunburn on the back of my neck and the crown of my head! I forgot about that problem when I cut my hair short again. Time to find a good hat. If only you all knew how little time I spend outdoors. It’s terrible and wonderful.

I’m happily exhausted and have two hundred or so pictures to sort through later. For now I’m going to do some writing and work on catching up on my class.

More updates soon.

Baby Steps In Photography

I got a new camera. It came with a sunburn and a massive caffeine headache due to the fact that I was out all day yesterday taking pictures of everything. I was too distracted by flowering weeds, weird ducks and cool looking trees to think of silly things like sunscreen and my caffeine addiction. It was hot, so I drank water. I barely remembered to eat that day.

Today I was a little smarter about it. I wisely put on sunscreen and drank some tea at lunch, which I set an alarm to remind myself of.

I’m getting to know the camera. It’s probably not very complicated but I’m a beginner with a DSLR so I have a lot to learn. Hopefully I’ll have all of that down by the time we take a road trip half way across the country this summer.

I have taken a ton of photos, some amazing things and some mundane stuff. I took pictures of places that I already had shots of with my phone camera, just to see the difference, and it’s dramatic! I’m having so much fun that I am okay with my feet hurting and my jeans developing holes in the knees because I kept getting down on the ground to take close-up pictures of ants and dandelions and tire tracks. Now that I’m sitting still my calves and knees hurt. I can feel some almost pain in my thighs and hamstrings but I think that’s a good thing. Getting a workout while doing something I like? Yeah I can do that.

Tomorrow will be much of the same but my husband is off so he’ll be getting exercise too while I drag him around. I plan to drive to my tiny hometown and take pictures of the tractor museum there. Did I mention it’s a very small town? In a farming community. The museum is mostly outdoors and some of the tractors have a haunting beauty I hope to capture.

I also hope to take some low light pictures tomorrow. Plus I want to get more photos of anything with cool texture (hence all the shots of weeds). I’ll post a small gallery soon.

I guess this is my writing for Write Anything Wednesday. I’m off to work on my class.