Back in November I finally bought the macro lens that I’ve been eying for ages. And when I say ages I actually mean that I’ve wanted a macro lens since I got my first Nikon 3 years ago. I’ll also say that when my husband asks me how much money I would spend on camera gear if I could I tell him that however much he can think of, that’s how much I could spend. $2,000? Sure, that will get me a really nice lens. $3,000? Full frame here I come. $5,000? $10,000? No problem. Here’s the thing: I’m not an impulse buyer. (Usually; my new hair straightener was a bit of an impulse but my old one is 6+ years old!) Even when I take my time, do research, and fully consider the pros and cons of buying new camera equipment I often end up with buyers remorse. That’s just how I am about money.

I could talk about all the technicalities of the lenses I already own and all the technical reasons why I bought the one I did but this isn’t a technical post. Basically, the 90mm focal length is helping to fill a gap that I have and the macro feature is a bonus. My problem is that I haven’t actually used it all that much, a problem I need to fix. Warm weather, please come quickly! Considering that we’re in Wisconsin now that’s probably not likely.

These are, once again, some older photos. When we traveled south to visit family for Christmas the weather was warm enough for me to walk around and test the lens out on my mom’s Boxer, Chief, and her flower bed. While her glorious day lilies are not in bloom I still enjoyed it.

This photo makes me think that I did make the right lens choice. I’m very excited to be able to get outdoors and do portraits with it.

This last one was just too funny not to post. Apparently, this is how he reacts whenever anyone first approaches him, stranger or no. It probably didn’t help that I was wearing my hood that is shaped like a wolf and forgot about it…

Today I thought I’d share some photos from last October. It was one of the last times I went out to take photos before the weather turned. This river isn’t so very far away from my apartment. It’s a nice place to go but not without some friends to go along. It’s a rather popular fishing spot but there are parts of the mini peninsula that are rather isolated. I wouldn’t say that it’s particularly unsafe but wandering around alone with my camera just doesn’t seem the best idea. Anyway; on to the photos!

The part that we walked out had quite a few trees growing on it. I loved how you could look ahead and see the path.

That one is probably one of my favorites. For some reason I don’t know they’ve blocked off a portion of the river or are redirecting a dam or something. The backhoe was parked beside the part that is now drained (I think) and the reflection came out looking like a painting. In this last photo you can see the ripples in the water:

What I do have is an enormous back log of photos that I’ve never done, well, anything with. So far 2012 has been rather photo barren, which is another thing that bugs me. So a (largely) unused blog, photos that need something doing with, and lacking motivation to take photos? (Though I can guarantee that the Wisconsin winter is at least partially to blame for few photos this year.) It all fits! The site is a bit of a shambles but I make no promises as to when everything will be fixed because the truth is it probably won’t ever be finished. That’s what happens when you have a lazy perfectionist. If such a thing exists, I am it. I’m going to stop apologizing for not writing, stop making promises that I know won’t be kept.

As everyone knows, the best use of a DSLR is to take photos of one’s cat(s). Can I just stop to say that I googled whether or not “one’s” should have an apostrophe in it? Because I did. Why? It just has to be right. I’m not lazy all the time! Ahem. Anyway, I have more than a few but not a ridiculous amount of cat photos. Here are some that are recent. All shot with my Nikon D90 and 50mm f/1.8.

This cat. This cat. He is huge. He snores, unfortunately not loud enough for my phone to record it very well but it’s hilarious. Sometimes I can hear him over the TV. I think he loves nothing more than to hear the crinkle of paper (usually fast food wrappings) and play fetch with them. Yes, he will wait for us to throw it, go play with it a bit, drop it at our feet, then look at us and let out a hoarse “meow” and wait for us to throw it again. I love him.

Now that I have distracted you with cute cat photos, about that unintended 7 month (ish) break. I’m really not sure what to say. Not much happened. The things that did happen I’m not even sure how to categorize so I’ll just list them in chronological order. More or less. I’ve dyed my hair red and not taken any photos of it. My husband spent 5 weeks working out of town and got shorted on his compensation. One of two expected babies arrived in October, the second is due in March. (I’m still not sure how much to talk about family because I’m not sure how they or I feel about it. This is not me saying that I’m expecting this March.) I worked for exactly 90 days as a freelance newborn photographer. It didn’t work out, and not because of the newborns themselves. I’m currently not working and I’m not sure how I feel about that, either. I still dislike our apartment but we haven’t made any decisions about what we’ll do come May 31. There’s a lot that could happen between now and then. Yes, I’m being vague. I’ve played a lot of too much Skyrim. I’ve read… some but not as much as I’d like. I have an issue with picking up books and not putting them down until they’re finished.

Those last two items show me that I definitely have issues with managing my productivity. As in I’m not very productive. I didn’t make any actual resolutions this year but if I needed to pick on one thing to work on, productivity seems to be the thing to choose.

Life is always hectic after a move no matter the distance traveled. The past month has been full of adjusting, dealing with an incredibly obstinate landlord who refuses to fix certain issues with our apartment, and running around from one event to another. Following up from the last post I bought a car and most importantly my parents are both doing well.

I’m currently posting from Big Bay State Park on Madeline Island (where apparently the park closes at 11PM but there are NO SIGNS POSTED). Signal is finicky due to not having any cell phone towers on the island itself so sometimes we’ll have full 3G service one moment and absolutely nothing the next despite the fact that we haven’t budged from our seat. And thanks to the WordPress app for android I haven’t had to try to type this in the browser rendition of the WordPress installation. I’ve had to edit the post in the browser because the upload failed and there is no edit in the app. Oh well. Isn’t technology grand?

But I’ll be waiting until after the trip to check in again, I believe, because I have such amazing things to do like explore the beach shown in the photo (that should be somehow) attached to this post above. I’ll also be occupied not fixating on the gazillion mosquito bites I’ve earned despite my efforts with bug spray. Mosquitoes are are state bird of Wisconsin, you know.

It seems that even camping can’t break my habit of waking up in the early AM and being unable to fall back asleep.

Today is June 6. I had told my landlord we would be out of our house on June 5. The plan was for us (note the emphasis) to be together in Wisconsin last night. But the best laid plans of mice and men and all that. Hang on because this is the story of the weekend that just would not end.

Friday, June 3
At 9:30 I sat down with a list of people to call. I needed to arrange for our utilities to be cut off and/or switched over to the landlord. First and foremost on the list was to confirm my moving truck reservation, which should be done 24 hours in advance per the instructions I had received. Since my pick up time was 11:30 on Saturday I was ahead of the 24 hour deadline. I made the call, was told that everything was in order and that I would be contacted should anything come up. Thought that was a strange caveat to throw in there considering that it would be extremely late to do something if my truck wasn’t available. But I said OK and continued to move on through the rest of my considerable to-do list.

My mom and I did a few more packing things and visited my cousin, with whom I sort of joked about the whole “we’ll call you later if there are problems” thing because really? Who is going to have problems that close to moving. LITTLE DID I KNOW that possibly while we were having that exact conversation, the moving company was leaving a voicemail on my phone to say that my truck had broken down while being delivered and there was no replacement. I didn’t listen to the message until I had walked into city hall to have our water service stopped but my face just fell. I don’t know what the poor clerk thought when she saw me but I know I felt devastated.

I immediately called the company back and found out that they were going to rent us a 24′ truck at the same rate as the 16′ truck I had reserved. Since I wasn’t the one actually driving the truck (hah!) I had to confirm with the people who were that an increase in size wouldn’t be an issue. Everyone involved was rather leery but what were we going to do?? I called back and agreed to the larger truck.

At 2:30 my mom and I drove my car to get some lunch and pick up my new glasses and a few other items. Or so we thought. While eating we got a call from my dad, who informed me that when I visited the previous weekend my car had leaked something that killed a substantial patch of grass in the yard. This necessitated an immediate visit to a mechanic to have the water pump checked out. Since I don’t work on cars I took his advice. So it was back to my house to pick up my mom’s car and to the garage. The only local garage I had ever heard recommended to me to have anything checked out at. By the time we got there it was closing on 3:30. On a Friday, remember? They said they might not even be able to LOOK at it before they closed at 2PM on Saturday but that no other garages around are even open on Saturdays, much less would any of them be able to fit me in that late on a Friday afternoon. With pretty much no other option I left my car there on the chance they could look at and possibly repair my car by the next day. My mom left later that evening and I tried to get things ready to be loaded on the TWENTY-FOUR foot truck.

Saturday, June 4
A little before 7:00 AM my moving crew from Wisconsin arrived. They all crashed pretty quick to get a couple of hours of sleep before going to pick up the truck and getting things loaded. At 9:00 I was woken up from a dead sleep by a phone call. (You know how when you are SO asleep that your mouth just hangs open and, well, drool happens? That sort of sleep.) It was the truck rental company. The woman I had spoken to the day previous said “I have good news and bad news.” At that point I was just like TELL ME. The bad news? The replacement 24′ truck had never shown up at the pickup location. The good news? There was a rental place in the next town over that might have a truck for me that they would try to rent to me at as close to the same rate I would have paid. The problem? My original reservation was with Company B. This other place? Company P. They would be under no obligation to give me the same rate at all.

Again, what could I do? This was only two and a half hours before my truck was scheduled to be picked up! And both of these places would close at noon that day. So I hauled myself out of bed to look up this other business and to go outside to talk because of everyone else that was trying to sleep. I will say that Company P was on top of things. They called me before I had a chance to call them. They were going to get a 24′ truck for me but it was going to be much more than the rate I had agreed to with the other company. I explained why I was getting a 24′ truck and that I really only needed the 16′ truck, especially since the rates on the smaller trucks are generally less. Company P agrees to try to find me a smaller truck.

While waiting to hear back about whether or not I would actually have a truck to accomplish this move I called my mom to update her on the entire mess since she knew about the events of the previous day. Instead, my dad answered her phone and said they were at the hospital because she had continued to have chest pains after leaving my house! This was mega scary because her side of the family has a history of early heart disease and death from heart attacks.

After talking to my sisters and letting them know about mom! in the hospital! and having a bee crawl on my arm (I am not allergic but have an irrational fear) I got the call that yes! A 16′ truck was available and the rental fee was going to be almost dollar for dollar what Company B had supposedly confirmed for me. The truck was being delivered from Lexington so the plan was for the driver to call me when she was about equal distance from the pickup location as I was.

We waited. And waited some more. And the call didn’t come. We decided to head to this town to get some lunch and hope that the truck would be there by the time we arrived. But when we were about to head into the restaurant to sit down and order I got the call that the truck was nearly there! And the pickup place closed in 20 minutes! Back into the car. Down the road and to a… feed store? Found out it was the wrong feed store and that the paperwork was actually handled at the birdseed store across the street. A little more waiting, signed the papers, copied driver’s licenses, yadda yadda yadda, we had the truck! Found out that it was only due to someone canceling their move that we got a truck at all. Lucky, lucky us.

At some point in the day I found out that my mom was out the of hospital with a diagnosis of severely aggravated allergies. No heart problems, just that her breathing was so thrown off that her lungs were making her whole chest hurt. She was given some predisone and instructions to get an inhaler.

Then it was off to get some lunch. I think it was 12:30 before we finally sat down to eat and I realized I hadn’t received any news about my car. And the garage would be closing at 2PM. So after we got our food and ate I called the garage at 1:15. They apologized for not calling me sooner and said that it appeared to be a blown head gasket and not the water pump as originally thought. If that was indeed the case my car was in no condition to be driven. Anywhere. And it would take longer and more money to repair so it certainly wouldn’t be fixed by 2:00 that day.

FANTASTIC. I called my dad to try to figure what on earth to do next. My dad agrees, no driving the car if it has a blown head gasket. I head off to the garage anyway to drive it the 3 miles to my house. Got there and let my dad speak to the mechanic, at which point my dad says don’t drive it at all, I will drive the 140 miles to come pick it up for you and we’ll work on it in Virginia. I listened to the conversation but I don’t “speak” car. I grasp some of the basics but when specifics are mentioned I have a hard time following well enough to repeat it in an understandable manner. The main point I caught was that an internal system was reading 30 pound of pressure when it should have under 15 pound. Meaning something was in big trouble.

Major panic. That gave me about three hours to help everyone get the rest of the house packed up, get ish ON the truck, and get my bags packed for an undetermined amount of time away. Why did I need to pack a bag? This car was going to have to get to Wisconsin somehow and my staying behind to drive it was the most economical way to do it. My moving help needed to be back to Wisconsin by Sunday night to be able to go to work Monday so they couldn’t stay any longer to help me get it figured out. There was also no way I could drive both my car AND the truck so we decided for all of them, husband included, to stay and head out the next morning while I went back with my dad.

7:00 PM we got my car loaded on the tow dolly and were headed back towards my parents’ house when my dad started to feel very, very sick. After a really rough patch he decided to stop in Really Tiny Town, KY and go to the ER. My dad doesn’t go to the doctor for silly stuff so I knew this was Serious Business. After getting the initial registration papers done and they got him in triage I called my mom, who started trying to find someone who could come with her to drive the truck back.

Then we sat in the waiting room. And waited. And waited. Saw the girl who had an injured foot get up and walk out without being treated because she had waited so long. Waited some more. Saw a couple with a young child walk out without being treated because they had waited so long. Waited some more. Learned that the only other person left in the waiting room had cut his leg with a chainsaw and needed treatment but hadn’t been taken back yet. Waited a little more. Finally my dad felt much better and decided to leave because during all this time they had not ran one single diagnostic test on him other than check his blood pressure and temperature while we were in triage. He thinks he was suffering from heat exhaustion and possibly a near heat stroke because he had worked in the heat the day before, had driven 3 hours without air conditioning that day to come get me, loaded my car in the heat, and then started driving back without taking time to cool off.

We met up with my mom and a cousin who could take over for my dad but he insisted on driving back himself. We didn’t make it home until after 1AM.

Sunday, June 5
After sleeping like the dead my dad and I took my car out to my cousin’s garage for him to look it over. If it was indeed the water pump, like he believed it to be, we gave the go ahead to have that fixed. If it was the head gasket we would make that call later.

Later on that night I got a call from my aunt, who relayed the message that my cousin had worked on the car for nearly two hours and couldn’t find a single thing wrong with it other than a busted radiator cap or hose of some sort.

What.

Everyone has been trying to convince me that the garage I took it to first was just trying to cheat me or drum up more business for themselves. I honestly have no idea. I really don’t think that the people who recommended the garage to me would have done so if that is the sort of business it is. I really have no way of telling but it was majorly disappointing to hear that the only thing my cousin could find, someone who has absolutely no reason to lie to me or cheat me, was a busted radiator cap.

Around 11:00 I talked to my husband to make sure they had made the trip all right. At the time they were about 2/3 finished unloading the truck and would have everything wrapped up soon. Minda was a little pissed about everything but Poe was OK.

Monday, June 6
That would be today, though I’m having an extremely hard time keeping up anymore. We’ve been going back and forth over what to do with my car. If there really isn’t anything majorly wrong with it that would require hundreds of dollars worth of work it seems like this is the best time for me to try to sell it. It really isn’t much of a cold weather car and I will find many more buyers for it here in the South than I will in Wisconsin. If we can get what my cousin thinks we can for it then I’m definitely selling now.

Which puts me in the market for a vehicle. There are just the small obstacles of finding one I like, that is affordable, that is reliable, and the teeny tiny matter of securing a loan. If this had happened a few months ago I don’t think it would have been an issue because I had stable employment and we hadn’t just moved across the country. I’m afraid lenders are going to look at me and decide that my situation is just too unstable for them to grant me a loan. But we’ll see.

For the time being, I’m staying with my parents in Virginia while Michael is back up in Wisconsin in the new apartment (that I’ve still never been in) without me. And at some point I’ll be making the 750 mile drive by myself, which I’m not exactly looking forward to.

These are the events of roughly the past 84 hours. Which is just 3.5 calendar days.

I know last week I made some progress on actually writing. This week that all fizzled. Between attending two birthday parties last weekend, trying to spend as much time with family as possible, going to the dentist three times this week (3!! I had three cavities all on different sides of my mouth so they filled them different days), preparing at work for someone else to come in, and packing (!!!) I just haven’t written.

So here is a photo of a rose.

The big moving dates are June 4 and 5. I’m somewhat prepared but there’s still so much stuff that I need to do. Pack. Arrange. Make calls about. I may not be able to devote much time to writing until after the move.

I have many, many memories of those weeks spent at the beach. There are a few that actually aren’t that pleasant. I have the type of skin that doesn’t really tan; I’m either ghostly white (my sisters endearingly call me Casper) or I burn, even with SPF 60. So there were a few times that I ended up with a bad sunburn. Then there’s the time I went face first off my bike and scraped my lip up terribly. And let’s not forget the 8 hour one way car trip it took to get there.

But the good things far outweigh all of that.

I grew up around mountains. The Appalachian mountains, to be precise. It was, is and may always be very strange to me to look outside and not be surrounded by them. Maybe that is why one of the things that has stuck in my mind for the longest time is standing on the beach, with hardly anything around deserving of even being called a hill, and looking out over the ocean as a storm rolled in. Being able to see for miles and miles out and view the sheets of rain falling down, heading for the shore left an image that is practically burned into my brain. Most people would probably despair at the sight of rain on holiday but I loved it.

Another favorite memory is when we would take our inflatable rafts out beyond the breakers and just float. There is just something about drifting in the immensity of the ocean, rocking with each swell as a new wave rushes in but never being caught in the breakers that is both exhilarating and calming. Of course, there was also a thrill when you did ride the breakers in, often getting overturned in the process.

And the wind. The wind. I wish I could just stand on the beach and listen to the wind. I remember it being so strong but warm. It has a completely different sound there that’s hard to describe, especially since it’s been so long since I’ve heard it.

I’m not terribly surprised to find myself having very vivid dreams of being there again. Beaches are painted as one of the ideal getaways, the paragons of peaceful retreats. Heaven knows I could use some peace. And I dream of all the glorious photos I could take. That’s usually what I’m doing in the dream: looking around, drinking in every moment and photographing everything. The colors are what I see most, particularly of sunrise and sunset. Pale gray sand, the blues, greens, and whites of the waves, the purple and reddish tints in the sky… it spells bliss.

One of my goals for the next few years (less than 5) is to be able to take a vacation and stay a week or two in a house by the beach and do absolutely nothing that I do not want to do. Have a true vacation. My husband will be going, of course, because he’s never been to an ocean-side beach before.

Both of the cats have loved the boxes that are sitting around waiting for magic elves to start packing things. Who knows how they’ll react as more and more start piling up. Hopefully, those boxes will be full and the cats will be content to sit on top of the boxes rather than in them. I have a feeling our moving date is going to be here before I can turn around twice.

Don’t get me wrong: there are still heaps of uncertainty. Technically we are still waiting on our apartment application. We’re supposed to find out on Wednesday if we got it or not. I’m praying for “got it”. Don’t even get me started on health insurance because it won’t be pretty. He has a job but I technically don’t. Not yet. I’ve got something in the works which I am sure I will be discussing later. It’s just not developed enough right now to talk about but let’s just say that I’m really excited and slightly apprehensive at the same time.

As for reasons… there are several. Most of his family lives in the area and he’d like to be with them. I certainly understand and support his decision. I know that there are many people who despise their in-laws but I honestly don’t know why. Maybe I’m just lucky (or delusional) but I think I won the in-law lottery. I hope they think the same of me. Am I moving still farther away from my own family? Yes. This isn’t something that I’m doing on a whim. Roughly five years ago my husband moved away from his family to be with me and it would be wholly selfish of me to not do the same for him. Contrary to popular belief it is not the end of the world and they will see me again. (Notice this amazing thing called the internet? And how people can have video calls on it so that you can actually see the person with whom you are speaking? Amazing!) And who knows; maybe in another five or however many years we’ll be moving again. Nothing is permanent.

Second reason loops back to what I said about not having a job for myself. Yet. It is not a secret that my current (that is, until the end of May) job has been stressful. It (mostly) comes with the profession. It is also not a secret that my job is one of the things I just don’t blog about in anything but the most general terms. For one, it’s just not professional. Two, anything one publishes on the internet is free for anyone to read. I’d rather not write something that would draw unwanted scrutiny. Or ire. Three, the saying goes if you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all. I’m not going to break my self imposed rules now as there’s no reason to. I am leaving on my own good terms and I have no interest in burning bridges.

But it is time for a change. Some people suggest that more than a few young adults, having graduated college and moved into what they thought would be their lifelong career, experience a “quarter life crisis”. This past weekend marked four years since I graduated from college. For more years than that I’ve questioned my choice in career. I could continue ad nauseam on this subject. I’ve internalized and agonized and considered things from so many angles. I came up with reasons and excuses and continued on but now it seems that circumstances have put me in a position to go after something that I really and truly want. At this point I believe that it is where my happiness lies. Whether or not I can make a living wage is a different question but is one that cannot be answered until I try. So trying I am.