The present. The now. What’s happening?

I’m writing. It’s what I do in the morning. If we don’t have an appointment and aren’t on vacation (vacation? what’s a vacation?), I check for comments. Then I do a quick e-mail review and delete all the advertisements, at least half the news feeds, and anything else I know I’m not going to deal with today.

Out the front window

Snowy frog on the deck

Next, I check the daily prompt to see if I’m interested. The “present” was interesting. “Now” is always sort of interesting … if I’m awake. I have coffee. I ate my toasted muffin and have more coffee to consume. I’ve barely gotten started on the coffee yet. We linger on the coffee.

Only a little snow

I decided, since it snowed last night, I needed pictures. The weather has warmed up dramatically since yesterday and the overnight snow is melting quickly. I grabbed the little Leica and took pictures.

HDR and graphic processing

At the end of shooting, my battery was empty. After I changed the battery, I delayed this post for an extra hour while I tried to find the charger for these specific batteries. I have so many chargers. I have all the chargers for the cameras I own — multiples for many — as well as chargers for cameras I used to own. Eventually, I found the right charger and finally, I started processing the photographs. Of all the annoying parts of technology, the fact that no two cameras use the same battery or battery charger is the most annoying for me. I go through this “search the house for that charger” every time we go away from home. Even when it is essentially the same camera from the same manufacturer, there is no guaranteeing that both of them will use the same battery. Why not?

Seriously, why can’t they settle down and use batteries that will fit into a single charger? Or three chargers? One charger per camera? Really?

More HDR on the Christmas cactus

Recently, in addition to designing graphic formulas (Topaz has adopted a few of them and it’s funny to bump into my own process while rambling through the filters), I’ve been playing with HDR. I’ve been avoiding it because it seemed like more work than I wanted to put into most photographs. But newer cameras have made the process  easier, so I used it for all the Christmas Cactus pictures. I’m not sure I see much of a difference, but maybe I need new glasses.

My Christmas cactus is still blooming. Maybe blooming even more. Neglect really works. I haven’t potted it in years. I can’t even remember when. How it manages to bloom with such vigor is remarkable. Cacti, though, are like that. The worse the soil, the happier they seem to be. They don’t need much and if you give them a lot of TLC, they fade.

Born to bloom in heat and dryness, warmth and comfort takes away their spunk, as it were. Is that true for some of us, too?

These are all pictures of my now. Present moments as February begins to head to its finale. The sky is brilliant blue without a cloud. If you went to bed before the snow began and got up late, you’d be surprised there is snow.

Later this week, the temperatures are supposed to soar into shirtsleeve range, so we will get a little pre-spring weather. I don’t know about the rest of you north of the equator types, but I need a hint of spring. I need to see some color in the world.

The gray and muddy brown of winter is getting to me.

Categories: #Flowers, #Photography

Tags: #Photography, Christmas cactus, Daily Post, humor, present, snow, winter