Tiptoe through the thistles...

or you might be poked.

I love my camera because it can zoom in on birds at the top of my trees. I still want a DSLR, though. Digital zoom can get you there and get you close, but it doesn't have the focusing ability of a separate telephoto lens so you can't get that real "feathered" look that is so great when taking pictures of birds. So I'm going to continue to save my pennies and buy myself the DSLR. I keep changing my mind, but it's the birds and insects that make me want a DSLR so bad. With this in mind I have decided to start saving up my money and, in the meantime, I am going to start checking out features and issues so I can make the right choice when I do decide to finally spend the money. Sometimes it makes me want to get another film SLR just until I can afford the camera I want, or more importantly, the lenses I want. That being said, here are my offerings for today.


The birds at the top of the tree.


I love thistles. Yes, I know they are weeds, and pretty poky weeds at that, but I love the plants and I love taking photographs of them. I have one in my yard that is about 4 feet high, so I stood next to it and took macros of the flower heads. I love the spiky round heads on this plant. I was amazed when I put these pictures on the computer, though, because around each of the flower heads is white webbing. I had never seen this before and, at first, I thought they had contracted some strange plant malady, but on closer inspection I see that it is webbing.












There were several of these little spiders and they had built webbing around the spikes to catch the aphids and other insects that came to feed on the plants. Very innovative!



Here you can see some of the hapless insects. Each flower head had at least ten trapped insects, but it was hard to get in the right spot to get a clear picture of them.

Happy Veterans Day!

I don't have much today. It's been a pretty busy day. I had a lot to do from being kind of tired and feeling lazy all week. My house looks like a tornado went through it. I seldom let it look like this for very long but sometimes I have to think a long time before I decide what I'm going to do with things and while I'm thinking about it, I just can't bring myself to do anything because I don't know what to do. I have to have at least a minimal idea of a direction. I finally figured out how to arrange things, so I can finally get busy and get it done. Of course as soon as I plan a busy day...

So, yeah. David called and asked if he and Nikki could come over and do some laundry. I went and picked them up. Luckily, I had already gotten a lot of things done. Important things, like cleaning all of my NES games and cases and putting them back in the cabinet. I also removed all duplicates. I actually have six "Duck Hunt" games and three "Super Mario 3" games. I'm going to sell the extras on Ebay. Don't laugh at me. I love my NES. I know it's old school, but I love the games and for just 7 dollars on Ebay I was able to get a brand new 72 pin connector, complete with installation instructions. All the games play like new and you don't have to clean them or blow on them like we used to do.
I went and picked David and Nikki up and my idea was that they could busy themselves with television or ??? and I could go out and mow the yard, rake leaves and maybe even work in the garage. I started lunch and somehow I just never got outside and then we put on "Marley and Me" to watch while we ate lunch and the next thing I knew it was time to go get Jeren.

Of course.

Jeren wanted me to pick up his friend, so we headed over there and then back home. David and Nikki wanted to go home and come back tomorrow to finish their laundry, my friend Jewel wanted to come over and I wanted to go pick up my layaway at Kmart. I'm smart so I called Jewel and had her head over before we left. We all went to Kmart which was helpful since I had six boxes to pick up. I also wanted Nikki to look at some baby stuff with me so it killed two birds with one stone! (Sorry PETA).
We put my new toys in the car, took the kids home and then came back and had some dinner and by then it was already time to take Jeren's friend home. Man...time flies when you're having fun. I did try out one of my new toys, the toaster oven/toaster. You can put bread in from the top or open the front and put things inside like a regular toaster oven. Look here. It was pretty cool, but the toast curled. So if you like curly toast it's great! It did flatten out when I buttered it.
We took Jeren's friend home and came back and I put some steaks in the oven to cook them. (stuff that was about to get freezer burned). The steaks cooked fine. The stove I am using right now (or was) has a microwave above the burners. It had popped earlier in the day, when I was trying to defrost the spaghetti sauce, but I wasn't sure why. It had done that when the kids were over doing the roof a couple of weeks ago. I had put hotdogs in to thaw and it popped. I thought maybe it was the setting. So when the steaks were done I took them out and put them aside. I wanted some coffee, so I filled a cup and placed it in the microwave to heat it up. The microwave popped five or six times and smoke started pouring out the top. I turned the broiler off, took the cup out of the microwave, took down the things on top of the stove and yelled for Jeren. We pulled it out and unplugged it. So it's a good thing I planned on cooking in the new crockpot for tomorrow.
Jewel and I then proceeded to come in here and look at photos. I took 87 pictures today of this bug


and this spider.


I can't figure out why sometimes I lose my detail when doing macros and zoom, but I keep working on it. The bug is only about a quarter inch by an eighth of an inch. The spider has very pretty legs, don't you think? When Jewel left I had to go clean up and then get this blog written before my coach turned back into a pumpkin. Oh wait...wrong story.
For not having very much, I sure had a lot. That was a pretty long rabbit trail. Oh...and...
My other new toys are a shop-vac, a dustbuster and a mini-steaming machine! I had a vacuum on layaway, too, but I decided to give it to David and Nikki! Happy Pick-a-holiday-birthday-or-other-special-event present.
And now...what I planned on today was this picture. My mom and my dad, back in the day. Wasn't he a handsome soldier?