the taller it grows, the lower it bends

I know I haven't posted a lot this last week, but here, just because it looks so darn mystical, are some pictures of my kids in a bamboo forest.

 

It looks like the freaking mountains of China in those pictures (and frankly, in real-life as well), but it's actually just the back edge of a cluster of homes just a block or two off a major road here in metro Atlanta, right near hospitals and malls and giant highrises.  Atlanta, you are one weird city.

(I'm just going to put this part here because, next to medical stuff, photography is quite possibly the thing I get e-mailed the most frequently about: the square pictures I post on this blog (but more frequently here) are taken with my iPhone using the Hipstamatic app, with the lens and film combo that come with the app itself--John S lens, Ina 69 film.  I've tried many, many other photo apps, and this app, with this combo, is still my default, because in my opinion it produces the best quality pictures in the right lighting conditions--ideally natural light in partial shade.  On a broader note, the advent of digital photography overall has turned the hobby from a fairly expensive one to one that, minus startup costs, is essentially free, and one that more than ever can be both personal and public.  As much as I like my "real" camera, until digital cameras start adopting some of the smartphone features that allow you to instantly share photos online, my smartphone camera is the one I'm using basically 95% of the time.  Because the best camera is the one you have with you when you want to take photos, right?)

Apologies again for the lack of updates.  To be honest, we are going through a little bit of professional upheaval at the moment--nothing catastrophic, but also nothing that I can talk about here very much here, so I'll just leave it at that for now.  I hope you're all doing well and that you're enjoying the tail end of your summer.

** Residents of Los Angeles!  Tomorrow at 11:00am your time (2:00pm my time) I will be doing a 50-minute live interview with Allen Cardoza and Dr. Melody Foxx on LA Talk Radio on their show "Answers for the Family," about the book and issues related to families and whatnot.  I don't actually know what we're going to talk about actually, so tune in, find out with me.  It's a live interview, right? THOSE ARE ALWAYS EXCITING, in that Christians and lions kind of way.  (It also looks like they post the audio for their shows afterwards as well, so for non-Californians, I'll get the link up here after it's done.  Unless the interview is terrible, in which case I'll just bury the evidence.)

dot com

First, some weirdly morose looking photos from today.





I know there are a ton of iPhone photo apps out there, and I am not affiliated with any of them, but the one I keep coming back to is Hipstamatic. It just does a good job is all. I know I'm just the one millionth person on the bandwagon (even David Pogue from the New York Times has endorsed them as one of his top 10 iPhone apps) and maybe you disagree, but...I enjoy using it is all.

Well, if we are all in agreement on any one thing (segue!), it's that my hospital staff photograph is the worst photo ever in the history of ever. GUYS, I KNOW! If it makes things any better (or any clearer, at least), I remembered that I had to take this staff photo at the last second and dashed over from the OR to the suite of offices where the official photographer was set up. I had no make-up on because I never wear makeup at work (other people do, and that's fine, but I think it's gross when I see layers of makeup rub off on the inside of people's masks which is why I avoid it myself) and I'd just had my hair crammed up inside a scrub cap all day so it was all squashed so I therefore had no choice but to keep it up for the picture. Also, the photographer forced me to take off my glasses, which were the last accessory that kept me looking somewhat normal. And I know this is all very the-lady-doth-protest-too-much, but seriously guys, I KNOW!! It was so, so bad.

But these new photos, I think they're going to be better. I know that's not setting the bar terribly high, but seriously--we'll look at the new photos and we'll vote and we'll pick a better one for the book jacket. All is well. And if it's worth anything, at least I'm not the kind of person who says, oh, I look so terrible in pictures! and then has a billion pictures of themselves looking gorgeous and dewy and sparkly. I really, actually look terrible in pictures. Not terrible in life, I hope, but photos immortalize some weird stiff self-conscious portion of my soul, such that the only way to get a decent picture of me is to take a truly candid shot (which is barely possible under ordinary circumstances) or just to take a shitload of photos and weed out most of the worst ones. Statistics, people. Statistics.

Wow, if I knew I was going to get so much mileage out of that terrible staff photo, I would have posted it months ago. What makes it ever worse is that there was a choice of two photos for our corporate website, one of me with the white coat (which is the one I ended up choosing) and one without. The other one was even worse.

(I'll let you think about that for a while.)


* * *


SPEAKING of vanity, it seems unbelievable that I've had this blog for ten years and I never considered getting a more streamlined (or at least less porn-y) URL, but I have finally pulled the trigger and for the staggering sum of $10 a year I beat out all the other Michelle Aus of the world and now own the web address michelleau.com. Actually, I don't know...is that less porn-y? Hard to say. Either way, the URL just refers back to this same page, so no need to change your bookmarks or anything. New label, same great taste. Or at the very least, same weird taste that you get strangely fond of, like Red Bull or something.

germ theory

I freely admit that I have a somewhat overanxious approach to hand hygiene. Blame the eleven years of medical training, but I wash my hands at least twice an hour when I'm at work, and so as corollary get a little itchy if my kids don't at least wash their hands after playing outside, after toiletting or before meals. I know I can be a little extreme about it at times (sometimes I instigate a fresh round of handwashing if the kids are pawing at me and their hands feel a little tacky), but I can't help it, it's a reflex. I just get the willies about dirty hands, and I'm long past trying to rationalize it.

(I am also past rationalizing why I feel itchy whenever I see the CONTACT ISOLATION sticker on a patient's chart, even if I haven't even touched them yet. It is beyond reason, can't be explained, it just is.)

Cal is actually pretty clean for a five year-old boy. Blame nature or nurture, but he never really liked getting dirty and for the most part keeps himself reasonably free of dirt and contagium, if not sweat. (Cal sweats a lot, which is part of the reason we keep his hair so short.) But Mack is an entirely different creature. Despite all best efforts, he is just grimey. He likes dirt. He likes mud. He likes putting things in his mouth. In a wide open field, he will find the one patch of sodden, dirt-soaked gravel, pick up a handful of mucky rocks, try to pop them into his gaping craw, and then, afterwards, pick his nose lustily. But don't believe me, the pictures do not lie.




Let's zoom in, shall we?




It's not just this. Every single close-up picture of Mack shows some evidence of a thin scrim of dirt or sand or crumbs or crystalized boogers. He is messy. He is slimy. He is snips and snails and puppy dog tails.




I am trying to get over my deeply ingrained revulsion of uncleanliness (remember, of course, that my obsessive personal cleanliness is to your personal benefit, patient on whom I am placing an epidural or central line or who I am just generally touching) but sometimes...sometimes it gets hard. Like earlier this week, when I took the kids out for dinner to a restaurant with outdoor dining, and in the middle of the meal Mack slithered to the floor (which was the sidewalk of a street, a street that people walk on with the soles of their shoes), started heartily rubbing the concrete with his palms, and then, before I could even respond, crammed both hands into his mouth. Child, that is disgusting. I just want you to remain alive, you understand. Alive, and free of toxoplasmosis. And granted, Mack is always bouncing between one viral illness to another, a fact that I attribute to both the fact of his general grottiness and the fact that he has a school-aged sibling--but he is hale and hearty and probably is developing a stronger immune system than the rest of us put together. Mostly from the fact of him sticking his finger up the dog's butt and then licking that same finger seconds later. It's all immunology in action. And as long as I don't have to witness it, I'm fine with it in theory.

IN THEORY.


* * *


A little more about the new camera, since there seemed to be some interest (and I will assert as usual that I have no corporate ties to Panasonic or any affiliated enterprises).

I don't consider myself a photographer. I'm an enthusiast certainly, and I enjoy photography, though for the most part this is limited to me understanding the various qualities of light that make taking pictures of my kids advantageous. But I do enjoy photography and I have a very basic knowledge of photographic principles, and as such, I would like to present my layman's review of the Panasonic Lumix GF-1.

First off, if you are interested in this camera, read the technical specs and details here, and then read a better review here. For me, the review is as follows. I love my SLR (a Nikon D90), but I found that of late, I was using it less and less simply due to the bulk of carrying a giant SLR around. As seen recently, during our day trip to The Rock Ranch, it was a gorgeous fall day and I really wanted to bring our "big camera" to get some good pictures of the kids, but I was already toting a stroller and a diaper bag and a cooler full of snacks; the last thing I wanted to do was to bring yet another bag with a heavy SLR to tote around my neck all day. (I ended up just using my iPhone, which took some good, though not great, pictures of our day.)

Enter the Lumix GF1. I had read some reviews of this camera in weeks leading up to the purchase, and about the Micro FourThirds technology that was allowing for near digital SLR pictures with half the digital SLR size and bulk, but it wasn't until I saw the quality of the portraiture that I decided to pull the trigger on getting the GF1 myself. (Also, full-disclosure, Joe was out of town at his Academy meeting and I was all alone and kind of mad at him and prone towards an impulse buy--though an impulse that, now in retrospect, he fully supports.)

I've taken close to 500 pictures with this little camera in the past two weeks, and I am fully comfortable saying that it is an incredible device. First off, let me say this: it's the lens, not even necessarily the camera, that makes the purchase for me. I got them both together as a kit, but the fact that it's a prime lens (meaning a fixed focal length lens with no zoom capability), and the fact that it's so small, that makes it a real winner for me. I'd worked with a prime lens before, and though a few years ago I found it a little limiting (don't know quite why, but I distinctly remember at the time feeling like the lack of zoom capability was like being hobbled)--since that time I'd gotten quite used to taking pictures with my dinky little cell phone camera, after which point the need to frame pictures by physically moving closer or farther from my subject felt like much less of an impediment.

Anyway, the camera works great for my purposes. Unlike a point-and-shoot, there was minimal lag between pushing the button and the shutter firing (this was a distinct frustration for me back in my point-and-shoot days, that the shutter would deploy full seconds after pushing the button at which point the kid or dog would no longer be doing whatever endearing thing I was trying to take a picture of), the light sensor of the camera is great, and the lens is top notch. The camera itself feels substantial, like metal and glass, and while I would argue that it could have a more secure grip, getting a wrist-strap has more than taken care of my fear of dropping the whole works. Having a lens with a wide aperture has also allowed me to take a lot more low-light pictures than I would ordinarily be able to (I will use the flash if I have to but overall I vastly prefer relying on natural light), and though the narrow depth of field is problematic when trying to take pictures of a kid that never stops moving, EVER (read: Mack), it does produce rather gorgeous (if I may say) pictures of a subject who holds still, or does not mind posing.





It comes with a host of other lenses as well, but I did not look at any of them outside of the prime f/1.7 lens, because to my mind, toting around a big lens rids this camera of its key advantage, which is portability. Anyway, I'm no photographer, but as mentioned I haven't touched my SLR since. So if you're looking for a cheaper, smaller, lighter SLR alternative, look no further. I'm sure that there are drawbacks versus a full SLR, but for the casual photography enthusiast, they are neither evident nor limiting.

Anyway. Have a good weekend, everyone.

post-call day off

This week has been somewhat busy, so apologies for the lack of posts. I'm not going to make up for it much today, unfortunately. I just have one observation. Overnight call can be hard--no one likes to be Last Man Standing for that late case in the OR, and one sick patient can be downright harrowing when no one else is around. But I am lucky enough to work in a practice where I get post-call day off, and that trade-off, in my opinion, is well worth the pain.






Full post-call picture set here. By the way, as some of you have noted, I have been playing around with a new camera (a Panasonic Lumix GF1 with fixed focal length lens--the 20mm f/1.7 to be precise) and I absolutely love it. It is tiny little camera that is much easier to carry around than my SLR, and with that quick little lens it is a gem. I don't know why I am saying this, because for some reason this seems to enrage this dissidents whenever I get a new camera (admittedly, my old camera still works so I didn't need a new camera per se, but I rarely buy things for myself and since we do not live an exorbitant lifestyle and photography is a hobby I will give myself a pass)--but if anyone wants to know my opinion about the Lumix GF1, I will say: I may never touch my SLR again. I love this camera. A more detailed review perhaps in the future, but if you're looking at this camera with this lens, my vote is an unqualified YES.

parents, lock up your daughters





Ever since I discovered that you can chance the settings in Hipstamatic to take high print quality images and change the viewfinder mode to "precision framing," I have not used any other photo applications for my iPhone, with the exception of shooting the errant snippet of video. It doesn't perform great in direct sunlight (tends to blow out the whites) and the light sensor isn't sensitive enough to get great crisp shots of moving subjects, but dude, it's just a phone camera after all. Anyway, what the hell do I look like, Diane Arbus?

just a quick update while i'm overhauling...

...to say that I don't love the new picture that I have up on the sidebar, because it kind of looks like I'm smirking down at you disdainfully from my high horse. The real reason, though, is that I don't have much of a photo smile, and the photographer who took my picture is less than four feet tall. So there you go.

60 posts in 60 days, day 4: 3 sixty 5




Because of my essentially reclusive and misanthropic ways I am not much of a joiner both online or off, but I recently joined a pool on flickr called 3 sixty 5 that basically challenges its members to post a single photo every single day for a year. The year started today, September 1st, so there's one down, 364 photos to go. This group appealed to me the same way that 100 steps challenge appealed to me, which was to force myself to stop and look at things and not be in such a rush all the time. It's not much of a challenge to take pictures I guess, but it will be challenging for me to find new things to look at, in that I really don't go anywhere particularly photogenic day to day-- my Monday through Friday existence is basically walking from my home to the train to work and then reverse order again. But who knows, we are moving to a new neighborhood, maybe there will be all manner of exotic fauna to look at there.

Speaking of which, on a completely unrelated topic, on my way to work this morning I passed by a gigantic dead possum in the road. I think it was a possum. OK, tell me if this was a possum: it kind of looked like a big raccoon, but it was greyish (I think, it was dark) with kind of a pointy snout, and it had that kind of thin, bald rat tail. It was truly horrifying, and lying in the middle of the road down this semi-side street/dark alleyway that I walk through at 5:45am to get to work because clearly I want to die. Seriously though, I don't much get worried about being mugged walking down the street, but walking by that dead possum (opossum? Not really dead, just playing possum?) I was honestly freaking out that the thing was going to jump up and start chasing me around as I passed. Because that tail is disgusting.

Above, my submission for 3 sixty 5 today. (It is a drain pipe on the curb outside my building.) Below, some other photos that didn't make the cut. It is tempting to save them to post another day, but I think the spirit of the thing is actually to post new pictures every day. They are, in order, 1.) the Georgia Tech shuttle waiting outside the subway station, 2.) the leaf-strewn hood of a pickup truck on my block, and 3.) some vines spilling over the fence lining Dead Possum Alley. (The possum carcass had thankfully been cleared away by the time I walked home.)

i totally knew that this would happen

I had been thinking for years (YEARS!) that I might want to get back into print photography, perhaps of the lomo variety, just because while digital photography is great for instant gratification, there's nothing like holding that print in your hand. And let's face it, we never make prints of our digital photos, because dude, that's what Flickr is for. But also with respect to print photography, there's sort of that fun guesswork and the economy that the medium forces on you. I will easily fire off thirty shots of basically the same shot digitally (see: my roughly five million shots of Mack lying on a pillow staring blankly at the ceiling), but when I have to actually pay for the film? Well, let's make sure the light and composition and setting are right and DON'T YOU DARE BLINK, KID. Yes, I know, I am making this hobby sound like an absolute blast.

About two years ago, I was this close to buying a Holga, but decided not to, because I was a resident (read: no money) and I didn't want to buy film AND pay for developing AND find out, like, two weeks later that I had made some stupid mistake with the manual settings and ended up with a roll full of completely blacked out shots anyway. But then a while ago, I started thinking, why not Polaroid? True, the film is more expensive, but I am impatient, and spoiled by digital besides, so I liked the idea of seeing how I screwed up one minute later, not, like, a month later, when I can't even remember what I did when I took the picture. I ended up (in a pique of righteousness, after I, though my own incompetence, didn't win a bid on some cheapy old Polaroid on eBay despite the fact that no one else bid on the item) thinking that Polaroid film was defunct anyway, why buy into a dying medium, and getting this hilariously bulky Fuji Instax 200 instead as my gateway drug. But who am I kidding, I'm probably going to end up getting a cheapy old Polaroid on eBay anyway and thus squandering away the rest of my already ill-spent youth trying to figure out the dying art of instant film photography while all the kids look at me strangely as they glide by on their hoverboards and jet packs. (It will be THE FUTURE, you see.)

Anyway, here was my first roll. Please excuse the lack of a scanner, our old one decided to go all Skynet on us and started making strange sentient human-killing noises, so we unplugged the thing and are deciding if it is a lost cause to try and fix it (likely) or if we will end up needing to get a new scanner. Anyway, I already spent all my money on film, what else do you want from me, people? (Note to Joe: Not really! Don't worry, we still have money! Anyway, Cal probably won't want to go to college anyway.)

What you can determine from this first roll is that I do not know how to use this camera indoors. It cannot focus worth a damn closer than oh, say, 4-6 feet, and I cannot figure out how to turn off the flash, which accounts for the three completely dark photos that I tried to take in the subway station, as well as the two obligatory shots of myself in the mirror. But the outdoor shots worked rather better, and I do like how the camera renders blues.

Second roll. Getting better. OK, so the other thing that you need to know about this camera is that it looks freaking ridiculous. Seriously, like people may laugh at you when you whip it out. I looks like Cal's toy camera, only even more huge. Also, the photo shoots out the top instead of the bottom, which is like--what? Problems I have been troubleshooting include how to get the shot centered (I am used to using SLR so I'm not used to the viewfinder not lining up with the lens--see the totally off-center picture of the Yo Gabba Gabba dolls on the bottom left), what settings to use in different lighting conditions, and remembering to set my focus distance from near to far when I'm shooting different things. (Not that it really shoots anything that near. No macro setting on this thing, that's for sure.)

It's surely not as retro-cool as shooting with some of the old Polaroid cameras, which would make me feel like I was on "Mad Men," chain smoking and wearing high-wasted skirts and living in a state of quiet despair and whatnot. But it was a good start, especially since I knew (know) nothing about instant film photography and at least I didn't have to figure out how to use a second-hard camera from the 1960's with a discontinued battery and no instruction booklet, not even knowing if the camera was functioning or not. However, I fear that I will be there soon. Perhaps adopting this hobby was unwise.

antique roadshow



Shortly after we moved to Atlanta, Joe and I drove by this antique shop en route to another destination. The storefront itself looked sort of questionable, and it was in a part of the neighborhood that was plus/minus on the sketchiness scale, leaning more towards the sketch, as was the fact that the store itself looked like a place one might stop to buy bail bonds. But still, there was something about the store that intrigued me, and through the bars on the windows, it looked like there may have been some interesting junk inside.

"Can we stop by that antique store sometime?" I asked Joe eventually, our third time driving by the place in as many weeks.

"HAHAHAHAHA!" he replied, and that has been his answer to my request ever since, despite my repeat and increasingly peevish blandishments that no, I am, in fact, serious.

So today, in an effort to tear myself away from that delicious three week-old baby and actually leave the house for the first time this week, I decided that screw it, I would just walk there. It wasn't that far, it just seemed like it would be far, just like everything else in Atlanta seems far apart because the landscape between is always viewed from the inside of a moving vehicle. I walked to the antique store and went inside and looked around. AND IT WAS AWESOME.

In one sense it was like any other antique store you've ever seen. It had that same musty odor, for example, and every single surface of floor and wall space was plastered with some eclectic mix of hideous, retro-kitch, and cool ignored decor item. But the way the shop was set up was very interesting. In each corner, one set of items were arranged very theatrically, almost like set piece, or a still life. It made you appreciate the items more. It made you want to buy things that you had no reason to own.



Inexplicably, some of the coolest items were labeled "NOT 4 SALE," like this multi-pronged lamp shown below, or these retro-cool metal-coil space heaters that look like the Eye of Sauron in "Lord of the Rings," which would surely burn down our entire house if I actually was able to buy it and plug it in at home. But oh, what a stylish fire it would be! There were tons of other things that I would have bought had I the money, the design aesthetic, and the space to keep it--but alas, I have none of those things, so lose-lose. (Lose-lose-lose?) For instance, see that wood-carved otter on the left in that second picture below? That would be something that I would consider AWESOME at someone else's house, though in my own house, it would rapidly be covered by sheaves of old mail and Matchbox cars, and would probably start to pick up dust until I just started to resent the damn thing. So that was the gist of this whole store. Theoretically awesome, but probably not for me.

I did come very close to buying two items, one a seemingly brand new Timbuk2 messenger/laptop bag, and the second a giant tan, cream and orange Obama campaign poster. However, upon closer examination, the messenger bag was pink--sort of a cotton candy pink, which I just couldn't stomach; maybe I would have conceded to hot pink or magenta, but COTTON CANDY?--and the Obama poster was out of stock. The lady (she had one very prominent front tooth that I could not stop looking at, even though I tried very hard not to--it's like when you see Jewel close-up for the first time) said she could sell me the display copy, but it was a little wrinkled, and anyway, she said that she would be getting some more in, so that gave me some time to sleep on it.

So in sum: walking to places = good! Especially since it cuts down on the temptation to buy a gigantic rusted water fountain and lug it all the way home in a vain attempt to artsy your house up.

(Full photo set, unfortunately rendered via phone cam, here.)

100 steps (kinda)

Some time ago, I remember seeing a photo project on the internet called "100 steps" (or something like that) which challenged people to take a camera with them on a routine walk, and take a photo of something, anything interesting every 100 steps of that journey. I thought the idea was pretty cool, but at the time, I never really got around to it, because honestly, I am always in a big fat rush.

I don't get to pick up Cal from school that often, maybe once every week or two as my work (and OB appointment scheduling) allows, but every time I walk there to get him, it always seems like the weather is perfect and the light is just right and I always wish that I had a camera with me. So today I was walking to get Cal from school and thinking those same old thinks, when I realized, duh, I have a phone cam on me, don't I. I didn't obey the letter of the rules, in that I got tired of counting each 100 steps pretty early on, but I think I obeyed the spirit of the rules, which were basically to stop and observe and look at things that you might ordinarily just walk right by in your rush from Point A to Point B.

Anyway, it was fun. Full photo set here.

(Also, I think there's something wrong with the comments section, but damned if I know what it is. So I'm just going to wait until HaloScan figures out what's wrong fixes itself. That's my usual strategy when something internet-y goes wrong--defer to others. That, and the old standby for all manner of electronic equipment failure--turn it off, then turn it back on again. Works >50% of the time!)

new toys

Cal is getting pretty good at riding his new bike. I can tell his confidence is growing because last week, he didn't want to ride on any kind of downhill slope because he felt nervous going too fast, and now he is racing down all the hills. I can't really run that fast anymore (really, I never could run that fast--I'm just using the pregnancy as an excuse), but honestly, I think that most people would have trouble keeping up with Cal on wheels now, unless they were riding alongside him on a bike themselves.

Also, the new camera came! It is rad. I still have to learn about the features, and I haven't really taken any pictures that amount to anything more interesting than stupid family snapshots so far, but I do like what I'm seeing with the D90 so far. New toys are fun.

(Here, Cal learns a vital lesson about riding your bike on grass as opposed to paved roads. Don't, because it is too hard.)



When we moved to Atlanta this summer and I was bemoaning the ridiculousness of the summer weather, everyone's response was that yes, summer sucks here, but the endless autumn season and mild winters makes the indignity of July and August well worth it. I don't know that anything is worth the kind of heat and humidity and GIANT FREAKING MOSQUITOES that defined our first few months here, but on a weekend like this, I'm inclined to let bygones be bygones.

(Full photoset from today here.)

now i will have three children

I know we are not supposed to be buying unnecessary things in These Uncertain Economic Times (and perhaps hunkering down in a bunker with our liquidated assets instead, waiting for the End of Days) but dude, with a new bike, a beautiful autum, a new baby on the way and three sets of grandparents due to visit all in the next few weeks, having a functional camera started seeming less and less like an unecessary thing. And after ascertaining that they don't, in fact, manufacture the Nikon D70 anymore, and that fixing our old D70 (whatever is ailing it--the camera version of leprosy, perhaps) might cost at least half as much as a new camera, we decided that we should upgrade and I ordered the Nikon D90, on the condition (per Joe) that this was to be our joint early Christmas present to each other. Also, I ordered just the body of the camera, as the Nikon lenses we already own are interchangeable, as are the batteries and a good number of our camera-related accessories, thus saving us many of our rapidly depreciating American dollars! See, thrifty!

I am inelegantly excited to play with the new camera. Which, needless to say, I will not make the mistake of letting Cal touch until he graduates from high school. (If he graduates from high school. See that, no pressure! Let's see people make cracks about nursery school MCAT prep now! Our kid couldn't even piss in the toilet at school for a month and a half! Ah hah hah! Ha! Hmm.)

And also: A very interesting op-ed by Frank Rich in the New York Times about the unsettling turn the rhetoric in the presidential race has taken. Worth a read.

walk, don't walk




One of the things I still haven't gotten used to yet here in Atlanta is the crosswalks. That sounds strange, so let me explain. We live in Midtown, which is fairly densely populated, reasonably commercial betwixt the residential streets, and certainly frequented with pedestrian traffic as much if not more so than any other part of town. But the crosswalks don't all reflect that. See, in New York, at least in Manhattan, every crosswalk had a pedestrian traffic light. You know, to tell you when to walk. Here, not so much. I have broken the crosswalk situation here in Atlanta to three main types.

1.) REGULAR CROSSWALKS. Red hand means stop, white man means walk. Sometimes the red hand blinks, or counts down numbers, to let you know that solid red hand is imminent. I like this. More information is good.

2.) PUSH CROSSWALKS. They look like regular crosswalks, but if you just stand there, waiting for the red hand to turn into the white man, you could be waiting forever. Look at the street lamp of telephone pole on the corner. Is there a button? A button which perhaps indicates it must be pushed in order for you to ever achieve a pedestrian walk signal? You need to push the button. Caveat: button does not guarantee that you will obtain a walk signal, because sometimes the button does not work. In which case you just need to dart across the street when perpendicular traffic is stopped despite a red hand signal, like the lawless heathen that you are.

3.) "HONOR SYSTEM" CROSSWALK. No pedestrian crossing signal at all. Sometimes there are little white railroad track-looking stripes indicating the path across the street, and sometimes (though not always) there is a sign dictating that on these crosswalks, Georgia state law indicates that cars must stop for pedestrians along these streets (emphasis mine). I hate this kind of crosswalk most of all, because some cars don't stop. They don't slow down, they pretend like they don't even see you poking out from the curb. I know everyone says that I should just start walking across the street, that the cars must stop, but forgive me if my instinct is to not push a stroller carrying my CHILD into oncoming traffic, when the SUV barreling 40 miles per hour down a residential street gives no indication that it gives a rat's ass whether you are crossing in front of its grill or not.

Anyway. Just had to get that off my chest.

So! Today I stepped out of the house for two whole hours without Cal to run some errands. I was able to do this because I finally found a cage strong enough to hold him. Ha! But I kid! Joking about child abuse is hilarious! No, actually, the reason I was able to leave the house was because (as some may have noticed, see sidebar), last weekend, we found a new nanny. She's someone that we've been in contact with for a few months now, found through Craig's List, and with whom we finally had an in-person meeting last weekend. She's been coming a couple of mornings a week now, as part of our "phase-in" period. First morning, she played with Cal while I hung around, trying to stay out of the way. Second morning, ditto, except I stepped out of the house for 15 minutes to drop Joe's shirts off at the dry cleaners (because I am the Great American Hausfrau nowadays, don't you know). And today, I left them alone for about two hours. They're doing fine, Cal is taking to her, we are building up THE TRUST, all that kind of thing. I even got a chance to run to our local breakfast place, chill out with an iced coffee and a copy of The New York Times, and relish the sweet, sweet peace of not having someone constantly trying to scale up the sheer face of my body like a miniature Sherpa. It was nice. And it was also nice to come home and see that both Cal and New Nanny were playing nicely together, as well as, you know, alive. So stressful to leave your kid with someone new.







The one other thing I got to do, aside from breakfast and errands (picking up Joe's shirts from the dry cleaners--oh, how I miss New York, where the dry cleaner would drop off your clothes at your house, FOR FREE), was walk around the neighborhood and take some pictures. I've been wanting to do this for a while, but between Cal and the stroller and the monstrous bookbag of provisions I have to carry everywhere (portable potty, change of clothes, wipes, lunch, snacks, water bottle, assorted miscellany), I simply don't have the strength to carry my big camera around. As a result, most of the pictures you've been looking at have been from my cell phone camera. Which, you know, is fine, given the crappy photos that I've been able to take anyway. However, it was nice to have chance to walk around aimlessly and snap a few shots. (Some of the pictures tend towards the, shall we say, more squalid corners, but let me assure you that it was my own gravitation towards those locales, and that the neighborhood itself is on the whole quite nice.)

Full picture set here.

hol-GA, hol-GA, hol-GA

I may be barking up the wrong tree here (or wrong tripod, whatever), but do any of you Out There have any experience using a Holga? Brief primer, all of which I basically learned surfing the internet last night after getting paged out of REM at 3:00am and (shockingly) was unable to resume a normal sleep pattern: a Holga is a brand name for a cheapy plastic film camera that has a cult following for the low-fidelity, distinctive photos it generates, full of lens defects and light leaks and oversaturated colors. It uses 120 film (as opposed to 35mm in your standard point and shoot), and there are multiple modifications or hacks that people use to enhance or customize their Holgas to get the effects that they want. Here is an example of a Holga-type photo (the classic Holga print is 6" x 6", with vignetting defects at the corners and a soft, dream-like focus):

photo credit: condoaustin from his flickr Holga 120 set

So my question to you out there (and I gather that some of you have a peripheral interest in photography, as I do) is--have you used a Holga? Do you like it? Is it worth it? The camera itself, being a toy, basically, is relatively cheap--probably $25 or so. But it's a film camera, which means, duh, the expense of film, plus the cost of processing (probably more for 120 film than for your standard 35mm rolls, though I honestly have no idea how much) and miscellaneous expenses that accrue with any sort of print photography. Additionally--and I think this freaks me out more--is the lack of control. I know that some people love the unpredictability of the results obtained with a Holga, what with its no focus, no light meter, one shutter speed shooting from the hip aesthetic, of the "oh look, it was an accident, but look at how it turned out" vein, but honestly, I don't know if that's really my personality. After shooting with digital for so long, I love the ability to see right away that 1.) I shot a good photo, and 2.) be able to do all my own post-processing immediately. MUST BE IN CONTROL AT ALL TIMES, OF EVERYTHING. This must be why I got into anesthesia.

Purist sentiment aside, what's the difference between getting a crappy camera to shoot photos valued for their imperfections, and shooting with a better (possibly digital) camera and crapping it up in post-processing? I like the idea of the Holga, but feel like there is a large chance it could just be a pain in the ass. And honestly, I don't really need a super time-consuming hobby these days. I could probably do well with cutting out a few hobbies, actually. Like sleeping.





Above: some random photos I took with my phone cam on my way to work today and lomo'ed up in post-processing. They are not the artsy square prints as valued in the medium format film world, but some judicious cropping is simple enough. You can use Photoshop, of course, or this new service I recently discovered called Picnik, which is like Photoshop for people who don't know how to use Photoshop, or would rather not deal with all those layers and masks and stuff. Check it out, it is rather pleasing, and free as well.

new lens!






The new lens came! I'm still sort of feeling it out, and I haven't taken it outdoors yet, but so far I am particularly liking it for portrait shots.

New toys. They are fun.

a present for me

When we got our first offer for "Scutmonkey" from one of the publishers this fall (not the publisher we ended up going with, but still, exciting because it was the first offer), I told Joe that there was one thing I wanted to treat us to when and if I actually got a book deal. I wanted us to take a nice vacation this Spring. Not a long vacation obviously, since we don't get that much time off, and not to a far off exotic location either, as the thought of trying to contain Cal on a flight to South Africa or similar makes me just want to sit on the floor in the corner, rocking back and forth and harrowing my face with my fingernails. But just a nice family vacation somewhere warm. This would be our treat, our small self-indulgence from the book money, and the rest we would squirrel away. Like squirrels.

Well, turns out we won't really get a chance to take vacation this year anyway. I had to rearrange one week of vacation to February to fly down to Atlanta for the necessary schooling/housing/employment arrangements, and I'm planning to give back my other week of vacation this Spring, so that I can finish residency, if not on time, then at least one week closer to on time. (I have four weeks of maternity leave to make up--giving back that week of vacation should cut it down to three.) So there's that. I know we can take vacation later, or even next year, but with Joe's fellowship starting up, I don't really know when and if he'll be able to take off. So that's kind of a bummer.

Also, we have a lot of new things that we're going to need to capital for now, like moving costs, housing, possibly needing to lease a second car. Whatever is left over will need to be our "cushion" money, in case I need a few weeks after we land in Atlanta before I start my theoretical job. Since we don't have any childcare in Atlanta yet, it's not realistic to think I can start work right away before getting some household things settled. And so it goes.

We are so lucky, though, and I keep calling this book advance our deus ex machina. Since we really don't have anything in the way of savings (well, we did, but after two and a half years of paying for nanny care, this nest egg has gradually been eroded down to the equivalent of an eight year-old's weekly allowance), getting a little extra cash flow at this point prior to the big move is a saving grace.

However, I did think that we should at least get a small treat after signing the contract. You know, something just a little bit fun, just so if anyone asked me what we did with the book advance, I could have something to say other than, "a downpayment on some shack in Georgia." (It is a very nice tarpaper shack!) So I got this:


A new lens! I just ordered it yesterday, and I am really excited about it. I have been wanting for a long time a lens more suited for low-light photography--something with a bigger aperture and blah blah blah. So I guess it's really more a treat for me than for the entire family, but hey, they get to be in the photos and with more flattering ambient lighting, so everyone wins.