WordPress weekly photo challenge: Unfocused

The first thought I had when I read this week’s Wordpress photo challenge was to feature my mind. There’s nothing more unfocused in my life than my mind right now. Scrambled thoughts? Checked. Lack of focus? Checked. Wheels spinning and nothing moving? Checked.

Of course it’d be pretty hard to take a picture of my mind and it might even scare you a bit. The good news is, I’m working on clearing up my mind and turning my many thoughts into action. I’m getting my days organized so I can get the important things done. And it seems to be working, so I’m taking it day by day. My biggest challenge at this point is not only to handle the urgent items, but also the ones that have been sitting on the back burner for so long, they make me my creative side itch. Have you ever had that feeling? It sure feels good to scratch the itch once in a while.

But I digress, and I’ve done a lot of that recently,  so let me get back on track. Unfocused is one thing I’m very good at when I take pictures, especially when I use the macro feature. My camera is VERY good at focusing its macro on everything except the very thing I’m interested in. I’m sure there’s a trick to it but I haven’t figured it out yet.

So I often end up with images that clearly lack focus. And getting rushed by my kids doesn’t help. Last weekend we went to the zoo and I got the opportunity to take pictures of beautiful flowers. At some point, I spotted a butterfly on some lovely purple flowers so I decided to use the macro to capture it. This is how most of my images turned out, with no real focus on anything in the frame.

WordPress weekly photo challenge: Unfocused

Fortunately I managed to take one single image that turned out OK, even though I’m not too crazy about the lighting situation. But at least the subject was in focus. Unlike my kids, who had run away to the exhibit next door and kept calling me to come and see a tiny antelope called dik dik. I’ll admit it was pretty cute. But I still like my butterfly better.

WordPress weekly photo challenge: Sun

Since I live in San Diego, CA, I get to see a lot of sun. More sun than many people in other parts of the world. And even more sun than the people who live by the beach in San Diego and experience the thick marine layer that won’t lift off many days of the year.

Even though it can get pretty hot in the summer (90 degrees and up in the middle of the day is common, 35 degrees and up for those of you outside of the U.S.) and we go through a lot of sunscreen, hats and sunglasses, I can’t complain. It doesn’t as hot as the rest of the Southwest (boiling Arizona, anyone?) and I never experience “lack-of-sunlight” caused depression, i.e. seasonal affective disorder, in the winter.

The weather is the main reason I moved to San Diego 14 years ago and I don’t regret my choice. It’s also a great place to raise little kids, with so many attractions to visit and a wide variety of landscapes. Am I making you want to move here yet? Wait, gas is at least $4.25 a gallon now, always one of the highest prices in the country. How does that sound?

There’s something about the San Diego sunlight that makes for great photos. Maybe it’s the latitude we’re at and the way the sun rays hit us, but our sky is often a gorgeous blue. However, if you want to take great pictures of landscapes, you need to do it early in the morning or from the right angle, or in the winter, when the sun rays aren’t so bright. Otherwise, you get something like this:

Wordpress weekly photo challenge: Sun

That day I was trying to take a photo of the different types of steam clouds caused by several airplanes in the sky, but no matter how low or high I aimed the camera, I kept getting the sun rays in the lens. The sun was just in the wrong place for me. 

Last year when we went on vacation to Iddylwild, a lovely tiny town in the mountains of Southern California, we got to enjoy several walks in the woods. It was refreshing to see so many large trees, mostly fragrant pine trees, especially since 95% of the trees in the mountains of San Diego County burned down in the wildfires of 2003, and then again in 2008. I took a lot of pictures during our trip, but I like this one especially, showing the imposing height of this pine tree as it hides the sun behind.

Wordpress weekly photo challenge: Sun behind a pine tree in Idyllwild

Look at this wonderful tree. Nature stands tall in front of me, and I can only bow in admiration.

The golden eyes – a missed opportunity

In yesterday’s post, I described how the tow truck driver who rescued me and recharged my dying battery had “golden” eyes. I hesitated to ask his permission to take a picture of his eyes, for fear of sounding a little freaky.

Several of you scolded me expressed disappointment for keeping those golden eyes all for myself. You even asked me to find a picture of real golden eyes so I could share my once-in-a-lifetime encounter. So I did what every person would do. I googled “golden eyes.”

Damn, you guys were right! I should have taken a picture of those eyes because finding a REAL set of golden eyes is impossible. Well, except if you’re looking for Bella’s new golden eyes, after her beloved hubby turns her into a her vampire in the Twilight saga. There are tons of those in cyberspace.

Twilight's Bella and her vampire golden eyes

Honestly, now that I’m looking at this picture, the truck driver’s golden eyes looked a lot like Bella’s. I doubt he was a vampire though, especially since he didn’t mind walking around in San Diego’s super bright daylight, with no sunglasses on. So I went on with my Google search and the closest image I could get was on another WordPress site called Varungenius’s Blog.

I still think this woman’s eyes look more hazel than golden so I retouched them in Photoshop. Here are the real golden eyes I saw yesterday. Pretty neat, huh?

Real golden eyes

How to have a memorable start of the week

After a two-week hiatus for Spring break, my boys went back to school this morning. My five-year old starts at 8:15am so his brother and I drove to school to drop him off first. The two of us then go back to my car and read books while waiting for preschool to start 30 minutes later.

I had parked a little far away from the school so I gave my son the option to drive into the school parking lot when the time came. Except, I didn’t plan on my car not to start. Nooooooooooo! I had power and I could hear some electronic noises as I turned the key in the ignition, but it was still a no-go.

So we walked to class while the wheels in my head started spinning. I had planned to stop by my P.O. box to collect an overdue client’s check, bring all of my payments to the bank, stop by the library to drop off books and get new ones, inquire about summer camps, even do some work… Of course it would all have to wait until I found out what was wrong with my car. 

As we were walking, I heard my little guy express some concern. If my car was going to need repair, how would I pick up his brother from school and get everybody home? I loved to see how concerned he was about his brother’s well-being. I didn’t have the heart to tell him he gets picked up two hours before his brother, so I may have a problem…

Back in my car, I called Ford Roadside Assistance. They promised me a tow truck in 45 minutes. It arrives in just 20. The tow truck driver inquired about my car trouble. I demonstrated the no-start feature and he guessed the battery was probably dead. But I still have power, I said! Can you guess I don’t know much about cars? For my defense, the last time I had a dead battery, the car was completely dead – no vital signs whatsoever. The driver brought jumper cables over, connected them to my battery and asked me to start the car. Vrooooom! Halleluyah!

Damn car battery, dead after only 20,000 miles. I’ll blame three people for this. My two kids for leaving the overhead lights on overnight too many times. How many times have I asked you to turn off those lights? You’re going to drain my battery. Well, you’ve done it now! Of course, I should also blame myself for leaving the car doors and trunk open all the time when the car is parked in the garage. And for leaving the radio and fan on every day when I stay in the car with my youngest before preschool.

I thanked Akram, my Middle-Eastern tow truck driver, for saving the day. This guy had the most mesmerizing golden eyes I’ve ever seen. So cool looking I really wanted to take a picture of them. Come on, what’s my chance of meeting someone with such rare eye color ever again? But I didn’t want to look more looney than I already appeared, so I got back in my car and drove off. Instead I took a picture of this very cute rabbit, who was having a feeding frenzy while I was waiting for the tow truck.

White tail jack rabbit in San Diego

I drove to Pepboys and got a new car battery in just 45 minutes, leaving me enough time to run a few of my errands before picking up my four-year old from preschool at noon. Not bad after such a bumpy start.

Happy Monday, everyone!

WordPress weekly photo challenge: Two Subjects

I just spent the past two weeks enjoying Spring Break with my two boys full-time and… I survived! We had a long wish list of activities and managed to do all of them except two – not so bad. Of course I’ll be missing spending time with my kids but it will be nice to get some free time back to work on some work projects I set aside during our vacation time.

One of the activities on our list was to visit the Legoland Sealife aquarium in Carlsbad, CA, north of San Diego. Every time I’ve gone to an aquarium and tried to take pictures with my digital camera, I’ve always ended up with not a single photo good enough to keep. Too dark, too blurry, too pixely… I’ve never read my camera manual closely and couldn’t figure out how to take good pictures in such low light environment when it’s not the camera’s best working conditions.

So this time I decided to do some homework, especially after Nancy at Nrhatch encouraged me to take more photos of sea creatures in aquariums a couple of months ago. I guess my hard work paid off. Of course not every picture I took was good. In fact I had to delete many, but I still ended up with a few good ones. And several of them fit this week’s WordPress photo challenge about “two subjects.”

In this first picture, you can see two Japanese spider crabs crawling on opposite sides of the tank. These crabs can have a leg span of 16 feet, yikes! Or, yum, if you like eating crab like me.

Weekly wordpress photo challenge: two subjects - Japanese spider crabs

I’m really proud of this second picture, my first success at photographing sea jellies. I wanted to take a photo of just one but I couldn’t get close enough (other people were standing in front of the tank) and they were twirling around too fast. But in this shot I managed to end up with two sea jellies.

Wordpress photo challenge: two subjects - sea jellies at Legoland Sealife aquarium

My last picture is one of my boys “underwater”. My eldest stood there for me to photograph him when suddenly his brother head’s popped up right behind him. Two for one!

Wordpress photo challenge: two subjects - Legoland Sealife aquarium