My little Kodak 4 megapixel point and shoot is showing its age. It’s never been particularly good at using the right flash mode indoors, and it’s getting worse. The more I look at photos from Cindy, Jason, Elsa and Rannie, the more I want a DSLR. Cindy and Jason go on and on (without stopping, honest) about their rebels. Elsa loooooves her Nikon. With all this love going around – what do I choose? Do I go all out with a digital SLR, or do I go with something easier, but not as full-featured like a Fujifilm Finepix S9000 or 9100? Digital SLRs are expensive, and you then get sucked into buying all the extras like flashes, new lenses, extra special battery packs, etc. Is it worth it?\
The Fuji looks good on paper, and the reviews are solid as well, but the reviews don’t match the love spewed forth about the Rebel XTi. How much should I expect to spend to get the XTi or comparable digital SLR set up? Is it really worth it? Should I start with one step beneath an SLR? Come on, all my photographically inclined friends, help me out here!\
Update: Here’s what I want out of a camera: good in normal indoor situations, preferably without needing the flash. My Kodak is crap in normal indoor light, and the flash turns my pale little boys into ghosts, and I haven’t found a way to “rescue” those pictures in iPhoto. I like taking pictures, but I don’t go out of my way to set up picture-taking outings. I’m usually going somewhere, and happen to document it. So, lugging around an SLR is probably not wise (although little tiny Cindy does it). The G7 looks good, and I’m finding the Flickr camera finder really useful. I’m uploading photos now, and will point out some of the problem shots I want “help” with (thanks, Jeff!).
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Needin’ a Little Camera Advice
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Five Things
Five Things You May Not Know About Me:\
1- I had the worst C-section in the history of the world. It was horrible and painful and a defining moment for me.\
2- I was in the Engineering Honors College at my University. (Yes, me, she who blabbers on about tv, Blues Clues, and general silliness!)\
3- I am wearing fuzzy, comfy, velour pants right now.\
4- I am horrible at the paperwork of life (forms to fill out, etc).\
5- I don’t think Mr. Pibb and Red Vines are crazy delicious. -
Home
We made it home! Splitting the trip up into two even days instead of trying to front-load it like the trip there worked really well. We were in no shape for the long day (although two short days would have been nice). We made it home this afternoon after leaving Knoxville at 7:30 this morning. Jen is dozing on the couch, Brian is being annoyed at everyone’s lack of energy, Max is drawing, and I’m waiting for the pizza.\
I declare this trip a success. We had a good time with family, ate wickedly good food, laughed a lot (sometimes at each other – but we deserved it), hung out, played a lot of games, and no one killed themselves or cried too much. The boys have been promoted from Awesome Travel Kids second class to Awesome Travel Kids first class with honors. They were both unbelievably good – much better than I remember Tim and I being on car trips that long.\
I’m exhausted, though. I’m gonna go crash on the couch until the pizza shows up. Then, I’m going to watch the Doctor Who Christmas Special after the boys go to bed, and then go there myself. Tomorrow, it’s presents at my parents’ house. Whoopie, two Christmases!! It’s like Jesus was twins! -
Five Things You May Not Know About Kevin
I got tagged by Greg, so here we go… five things you may not know about me, in no particular order.
- I was a TV “star” on a Tucson Public Access TV Show called Tech X. I was a floating head called Otto (they had blue screen and everything) and sat behind the two hosts and said really stupid things. My pal, Diana, sent me DVDs with all of the episodes of the show on them, and I haven’t quite gotten up the nerve to watch them all yet.
- I graduated from Vicksburg High School in Vicksburg, Mississippi. I’m not proud of this fact, but that’s where Dad made us move, so that’s where we went.
- I moved 19 times in 21 years growing up. Since moving out, I’ve moved three times, once in the same town when buying a house. All that moving had done some weird things to me psychologically, which I think I’ve talked about here before, but it was so long ago that hopefully you’ve forgotten about it. I’m crap at relationships. When people leave, or I leave, I’m very good at pretending they no longer exist. Growing up, it was always easier to believe they no longer existed than to believe that I would never see them again. I never wrote letters, tried to never think about them, and did a good job of compartmentalizing my life. I recognized this a little after moving to Virginia, and have been trying to fix it, but it still pops up all the time.
- I’m an Eagle Scout. I earned Eagle at 14, and then maybe went on one camp out after that. I liked scouting, but was pretty much done with it once I got Eagle. If you’re a kid or have kids, and it’s important to you to get it – get it before you get interested in girls, cars or other stuff.
- I’m a big girl for Love Actually. I love that movie. I couldn’t tell you why other than it’s about all kinds of love, very well acted, is really funny, and makes me cry every single time I watch it. I’m not proud of it, but it’s the truth (and you might not know it).\
Since these things are 21st century chain letters, I now have to tag five more people. Let’s see… I’ll tag: Jen, Tim, Heather, Cindy and Jason.
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Merry Christmas!
We’ve got limited bandwidth here in Mississippi at Jen’s parents’ house, but we’re having a good time anyway. Max has been taking lots of pictures and playing in iPhoto, there are lots of pictures of the boys playing with Buddy, being goofy, opening presents, and hanging out. We’re having lots of fun eating good food (don’t tell my doctor) and playing games. Max and I have been playing chess every day while Brian stacks up checkers.\
Expect the pictures and more frequent posting when we get back, but for now – Merry Christmas!! -
Lacking Bandwidth
Verizon’s high speed EVDO stuff hasn’t made it down here, so I’m stuck at dial-up speeds for the next week. So… there won’t be a whole lot of blogging, but the Sidekick works, so I’ll be updating my Twitter page fairly often, so check that for updates.\
It’s morning in Mississippi, and it was a rough night for the Lawvers. Max had a little too much excitement (and ice cream, and one too many road meals) and spent a good portion of last night throwing up. Jen handled most of it, and is now snoozing on the couch, but it still made for an interesting evening.\
The boys woke up early because we’re still on EST instead of CST, and now Max is playing with the camera and we’re watching The Goonies. Breakfast is around the corner and then hopefully, we have a day of not doing much ahead of us (and maybe a nap). -
In Mississippi
We made it. Today was fairly short, although with a lot more rain than yesterday. There are lots of funny stories about the boys sleeping on a hide-a-bed, adventures in dining (Leatha’s BBQ in Hattiesburg, MS: Best pulled pork on the planet Earth, and this is from a guy who’s tried a bunch in a dozen different states from pig pickin’s in the Carolinas to pork sandwiches in Austin – and yes, it was as good as promised – planks of plywood for the floor, large women in mu-mus and the best Southern home cooking I’ve ever had).\
But, I’m tired, my back hurts and there’s lots of family time to catch up on, so that’s all for now. But, we’re safe, happy, fed and tired. -
Road Trippin’
We made it through day one! We made it through the first leg of the trip just fine. Brian had a couple “I’m two” moments, but really, they weren’t bad at all. We stopped just three times, two potty breaks and a break for lunch outside Roanoke.\
The stats for today:- 590 miles
- 10.2 hours
- 2 10 minute potty breaks
- 1 40 minute lunch break
- Even with the breaks, we “averaged” 57 miles per hour. Take the breaks out and we averaged 64 miles per hour. Not bad considering a couple bad wrecks that caused some delays, and hitting “rush hour” in Chattanooga. The traffic was manageable all the way down, and the boys were little angels.\
We even mostly missed the rain. We raced it the whole way and got caught a couple times by some light showers, but never anything horrible – just enough to clean off the windshield.\
We’ve eaten dinner, the boys are in their jammies watching cartoons, and I’m recharging the laptop (the cigarette lighter power adapter can’t quite put out enough juice for the macbook pro, I guess), and checking mail (and writing this).\
Tomorrow – 381 miles to go… then I’ve been promised the best barbecue on the planet, served by fat women in a restaurant without a floor. I’ll let you know how it goes (cuz it sounds like my kind of place).
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Directions
We’re leaving for Jen’s parents’ new house in Mississippi later this week, and we’ve decided to drive instead of fly. I have all this time off, and we haven’t really done a true family road trip since Brian was born, so I figured it’s time. We’ve got the van, all the adapters for our toys and the road “menu” all planned out (pop tarts for breakfast, granola bars, grapes, apples and carrots for snacks and then out for lunch and dinner). We even have our route (just so everyone knows in case we get lost in the backwoods somewhere). The part through western Virginia and eastern Tennessee is the same route Jen and I took when we moved out here from Tucson, and it’s a pretty drive through rolling farm land (if I remember correctly). I love directions. I love knowing where I’m going and about how long it’s going to take to get there. I like that thick red line telling me where to go.\
I know I’m probably stupid for thinking this is a good idea, but I’m actually looking forward to it. We took lots of road trips when I was a kid. We drove around Europe in our VW camper van with the Porsche engine in it. It went over the Alps to the Eagle’s Nest, to Spain, to Belgium – where it protected us from golf ball sized hail, and I remember sleeping head to foot in the hammock over the front seats with Tim. My other favorite memory is sitting in the very tall back seat and picking up stuff from the floor with my feet (I can still pick up all kinds of stuff with my toes… good talent to have when you’re lazy).\
This trip will be different. We’ll be staying in a hotel at the halfway point instead of a campground, and I’ll have my macbook and EVDO card so Jen could blog from the road if she wanted (but she gets carsick reading, so I’m not sure how she’ll handle the laptop), and Max could surf Noggin or watch a movie (or play with Line Rider.\
I’m sure we’ll let you know how it goes. -
Geeks Love *
It’s scary how easily these things get started. All it took was one little verbal slip in a meeting, and now we have t-shirts. I got mine today when I made a little trip to the office to show off a prototype. They turned out way better than I expected (because Cindy never sleeps, apparently).\
I love having talented friends who like the stupid stuff as much as I do. Work would be really boring without them.