A little holiday wrap-up :D

Well goodness! The last two weeks really slipped past me. With all the traveling and daily postings over at A Bit of Geek (plus leaving the camera at someone's house and waiting for it to return to me... oops), I simply didn't have the time or the material to check in over here!

It was a lovely holiday with a full week and a half up in Washington visiting friends and family. Andrew and I have never had to split a holiday before, so there was some confusion and anxiety on our parts xD But everything worked out splendidly!

Our first Christmas together!

Christmas went on as usual with a fun and festive afternoon at a tree farm and subsequent decorating. My family and I opened gifts on Christmas Eve, which was a first, and Andrew and I spent Christmas Day with his family.

The tree farm was on fantastically beautiful property.

It was strange, to be sure, but we're really lucky that our families live so close to one another. Hopping from one house to another was not a big deal whatsoever.

The holidays were fairly low key this year, considering the traveling, and the best part was truly spending time with my loved ones. That's really what the season is all about for me.

A completely candid shot of my lifelong 

friends (and me!) playing Catchphrase.

I came away from it all feeling refreshed, happy, and I managed to get some pictures, too (as you have seen)!

Hopefully all of your holidays and new years were wonderful. I'm feeling the photography itch once again, so I expect some nice images to be heading this way soon!



-MJ

Much too long.

More than a month between posts? Much too long.

Simultaneously, there has been a lot and very little happening in my photo life. I've been going strong with my 365 project (today makes photo number 343). Not too much longer now! Even though I see the number and I know I've been doing this almost a year, I can still hardly believe that it has been a year since I started it. Lately I'm feeling very guilty about it though, because I've submitted so many cellphone photos. They are still photos, so they do count, but they're not exactly my best work.

On the whole this project has taught me a lot about my creative process, my willingness to commit to a project, my ability to persevere when things get difficult and what kinds of photos I really want to share with the world. When I look through the photos, I'm definitely not proud of them all. And it's not just the cellphone entries. A fair amount of my dslr photos are very lackluster. Most of them I wouldn't have normally chosen to share with anyone. Even though I've almost come to despise this endeavor, I am extremely glad that I decided to do it.

I've come across a few ideas that I'd really like to flesh out, and that aspect alone has been absolutely worth it. I now have a whole year's worth of ideas to extrapolate on at later times if I so choose. That's pretty great.

In even better news, my laptop has been recently upgraded! Still the same casing and processor, but there's a new (and much larger!) hard drive and now I have 4 gigs of RAM. I am so very happy. The day after I arrived in Ireland my hard drive told me it was too full to continue to add photos to my Aperture catalogue. This made me very sad. Now, five months later, I can finally add the rest of my pictures! This is a serious setback in the overall process of having a completely searchable database, but at least I have the space now. I can thank my mom for this, it's her big Christmas gift to me :)

As you may recall, between now and my last entry, I have also had some (mis)adventures with my SB800. It decided to take a huge dump on me and stop working. It was awful. So, I sent it off to Nikon. $130 and about two weeks of waiting later and it was returned to me. They didn't tell me what was wrong with it, it was just noted that "major parts" were replaced. *shrug* It's working now and that's what matters. Although, last night I thought it was broken again. Imagine my horror and sadness. I did not react very well to the fear (crying was involved) that I'd have to send it to Nikon again.

Really, it would appear that I just happened to buy a total shit pack of batteries. I put five in and the flash popped once.... then no more. "Hm". So, I put in five new ones. Flash popped once and then... no more. Commence crying. I gave one last shot, put in five more new batteries and... it worked? I was baffled and relieved. I have a pack of 36 Energizers from Home Depot and a lot of them haven't worked very well. As long as my flash is working though, that's what matters.

I have taken my new found appreciation for my SB800 and turned it toward my shiny silver umbrella quite a bit. Tonight's photo saw my TTL cable in action while I held the SB800 into the umbrella. The light is so nice and I have hardly begun.

-MJ

Ireland Day 77 - Sensory Assault

The biggest one being my walk from the bus to home this evening.

Wandering through the cul de sac with the overgrown street sign, it's a shortcut of sorts, shown to me by Catherine and Maisa. Sometimes the bus drivers don't stop at the park and go to Cotter's. This different way of finding home makes the most sense if that occurs.

Turning down the street, wondering to myself if the dog will show up again, I come across a black cat. "Looks like Loki." I thought idly to myself. And then I stopped. "... Looks a lot like Loki."

My eyes burned a bit at the familiarity of it, rapidly remembering that this time next week I'll be on my way to Washington. I asked myself, am I homesick? I stood surveying the animal, pondering to myself, thinking harder about the cat that it so forcibly resembled.

And I came to the conclusion that it wasn't homesickness. I don't know one word to describe what it was. I said to myself, "I don't want familiarity." I thought briefly about all of the things that will surround me soon and how familiar they're going to be.

It's not that they're bad, that's not the case at all. Never is it that simple! Never.

After recovering from the black cat incident I started to muse over the fact that Halloween is fast approaching. As though the nature surrounding me was eavesdropping on my thoughts, I was suddenly struck still, again, by the overwhelming scent of Autumn: sweet, aromatic dead leaves.

I was still for more moments then, taking in a breath so deep that it almost hurt, willing myself to overfill with it all. And then a fresh wave of how badly I want to be in Ireland for Halloween and Christmas settled itself over me.

I have been informed that Shop Street decorates rather completely during the season. Lights everywhere, I was told. Geraldine said that Brown Thomas fills its shop windows with various Christmas displays that are impressive and fun to look at. She waits until Christmas day to finally view them, opting to cover her face to block the displays up until then. I think that's really awesome. Oh, and she does this with hot chocolate in hand. Even more awesome.

Next year. Next year.

My evening was settled with dinner and then tea. That would be the last sensory assault of the day: I burned my mouth but I found tasty biscuits to go with the tea. I think that evened things out.

I started to read Eat Pray Love today. I can't resist my curiosity anymore! So far I am really enjoying it too.

Does it bother you that this is backwards? I'm feeling so lazy tonight. 

Look at how long my fingernails are, it's insane!

Oh, I suppose I did have a fourth strong sensory experience today: the sound of a brief but torrential downpour about half an hour ago. I'm really hoping for good weather tomorrow, and for a few reasons!

One being the Arthur Guinness Day festivities plus concert, as well as wanting some specific photos that require people being outside and enjoying themselves. The weather lately has not been conducive to personal success in that area. Here's hoping!

-MJ