March 28 2009 Make Food

Tonight the kids each made their own dinner. She made her own tuna salad sandwich, using a veggie peeler to slice the celery and a butter knife to chop the pickle. He made beans and weenies, with my help for the stove portion, chopping his hot dogs very meticulously with a butter knife. To help a four-year-old chop hot dogs, slice down the middle so they have a flat side.


I had about two seconds to get this shot. I don't know anything about it, but I do know he did not cut his finger off in these two seconds.

March 27 2009 Teach Them

Today was the beloved writing conference. The worked-for-months, read-the-guest-speaker's-book, schedule-the-whole-day-away writing conference. I taught my workshop. I had good kids. I created ten more published bloggers in the world with my two workshops. They were small workshops, but they were productive workshops. Now I get to manage ten new bloggers on a blog I started for them. I expect to lose half in the next month, and maybe have three really interested writers, but I may be surprised. The room I worked in was remarkably tech-y for a classroom, but perfect for teaching blogging. Insert me right in front of my projector screen, probably pacing. I tend to pace.

For some reason, the florescent lighting in this room was not enough to deactivate the auto flash.

March 26 2009 Know Stuff

I teach in the coolest room in the library. It's called the Regional History room. It's filled with nothing less than history of the west, from the beginning thoughts of Colorado and the trains that went through it, and the minerals that came from it, to Civil War archives, to directories where I can find the people who lived in my house for the past one hundred five years. Not many people know of this room, as demonstrated by the sheer volume of dust on these crumbling tomes. By the time my student shows up, I've got dust across my ears


Not much choice but florescent lighting in the room. Had it set on macro, I seem to like the outcome of the bokeh on that setting.

March 25 2009 Write More

The Writing Conference with Jonathan Safran Foer is this Friday, and I teach a workshop as part of the Conference with the high school students. Preparation for this, I think, has caused me to be bitten by a writing bug: I've written more productively in the past few days than I have in the past three months. It's good to get out of a writing funk. My symptoms of creative burst extend beyond the writing, though: I posted about the bags I managed to finish, I have new students I'm doing well with, and I can manage to school both my youngsters at the same time. Heck, I can't even make myself something to eat without writing something.



Macro, stand back + zoom, and flash.

March 24 2009 Stick Here

While working on my bags yesterday I commissioned a tool from the forger: a spike upon which to impale my yarn, maybe large enough for two, because yarn just loves to roll away while you're using it. It came out cool. I tried it out tonight, but it needs to be polished up tomorrow. It will also get some rubber feet, because it likes to spin.

Composition on this was annoying. So I went with the waaay back and zoom 7.1x and finally got in the frame what I wanted to see.

March 23 2009 Hold Me

The girl with a drawer full of unfinished knitting (some monopolizing the good needles) has finished two bags in three days. Yes, spring has sprung and I am...bored? Two bags completed, ends woven in, fasteners attached. They are very girly and springy, but someone will like them. No use spending hours on something no one will use.


Two photo lights, daylight reproducing bulbs, 6500 K give or take for one bulb (says the photographer). Auto setting sans flash.

March 22 2009 Get Up

The desert winds took hold today, dusting the valley. The beginning was just windy enough we decided against taking the '58 CJ5 up the side of the Colorado Plateau. Once there, though, we looked out over the valley and watched the opposing Bookcliffs disappear under a cloud of dust rustled from the desert north of town. Then we saw the black and yellow smoke from the controlled burn join the brown cloud. The we could not see the city at all, nor could we stand outside, for the grit began to collect on our eyelashes and in our teeth. The windchimes along the porch pierced with the clanging. Then the rain came, and darkness, and we could see the lights of the city, and the stars and clouds. Then we went home. If ever you are in a desert valley and the winds come, get up, for godsakes, gain elevation.

Landscape setting, zoom at 16x, using the minitripod. This is a shot toward the beginning of the rise of dust.