First Rose of the Season

"An idealist is one who, on noticing that a rose smells better than a cabbage, concludes that it is also more nourishing." H.L. Mencken

Maybe I'm an optimist because it is more nourishing for the spirit...

This is the first to show it's face this season. Many more to come, I hope!

This is called a "Gold Medal" rose. Pretty deep yellow.

Cows

Not far from my house, about a mile, there is a herd of dairy cows. Somedays they hang out near the fence. They are curious of passersby, and occasionally will come fairly near to get a closer look. I was getting a few shots off and decided to go down into the ditch right next to the fence to get some extreme close-ups. I guess they realized they weren't that comfortable with me and they took off up the hill.

Musings

Interesting, I have some of my images show up in flickr's explore and don't realize it. There was another one, a b&w close-up of a dandelion, that comes and goes there, too. I don't know how they get chosen and I shouldn't care, but I kind of do. It's some sort of strange validation, I guess. Someone has noticed you.
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It really doesn't make any difference what camera you are using. Just because you drive a Ferrari it doesn't make you a better driver. You just drive a more expensive car.
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The more I learn, the more I realize there is so much I don't know.

Graduation

I'm running slow on this blog. Last Saturday on May 19th, exactly 1 week ago, our oldest son Christopher graduated from Widener Law School. It drizzled a bit during the outdoor ceremony, but otherwise was a pretty good day. I'm so proud of him for doing a this while holding a parttime job and being a husband and father. He is a great young man and I know he'll have a wonderful life and career in front of him.


Lena was not too happy with Chris after the ceremony. Maybe it was how he was dressed.


The happy family.


Love the shot of the two brothers. Just wish it was a little sharper.


Took pictures of Lena before the ceremony started. Here she is under her pink umbrella.

Stone Abstracts

After seeing some abstract posts on flickr, I decided to try and look for some natural abstracts in my yard. I didn't have to look far; the stone slab sidewalk from the frontyard to the side had some great natural patterns. A little work in picasa (darkening, highlighting and maybe a little glow) brought out the design. Sometimes good things to shoot are right under your feet.

Taken with my Tamron 75mm, 1/1000, f/4, ISO 200

Happy Mother's Day!

Definitely miss my mom today. It's been 4 years since she died. Sometimes it seems so long ago, other times like yesterday. Makes me very aware that in the natural order of things, "I'm next."
Best Mother's Day present? To have your children with you! And not having to cook dinner ;-). But I did get a car wash and wax from Mark and a massage certificate from Kayt :-).

No new pictures today. Just a few from the beginning of the week when I went to Evans City Cemetary.

I went to sit down on the ground for this shot and noticed bit of fur floating around. Looking around I realized I came within an inch of plopping down on a dead skunk. Shot did not come out as I had visualized as I kind of lost my focus.

Semi-interesting side note: if you are a fan of George Romero's b&w cult classic, "Night of the Living Dead", this is where he shot the cemetary scenes at the beginning of the film.

Puffy Dandelions

Dandelions are a true element of Spring. Love and hate them at the same time. I might as well make them useful by featuring them in a few photographs. These were taken with the Canon 100mm macro at different apertures. I used a colored gel on the flash attachment (red, blue and green) and some of them I turned into b&w. Generally not too much post processing, just a little sharpening, cropping and tuning.