Experiments with Night Photography

I used my GorillaPod to take this shot with a 30s exposure. I probably should have bumped the ISO up to 800, but I'm pretty paranoid about noise after some of what I've seen at 1600 and 3200. I also might not have thought of it at the time, I suppose.

I really wish I'd had a regular tripod with me; I've only done a very little night photography before, and it would have been really cool to be able to set up in a position in which I could actually get some light on Dawn. Of course, she still would probably have been pretty fuzzy - it's not easy to hold still enough for a photo for 30 seconds!

My SLR, a Canon 20D, only goes to 30 second exposures, unfortunately; that's just long enough for this photo to begin to show the movement of the stars. I hope to get one of these very cool remote shutter controllers because it lets you set exposures for a lot longer (just shy of 100 hours, though I doubt I'd ever want to do that, and I imagine you'd have to have the camera plugged into continuous power rather than using a battery). It would have been fun to do an hour-long exposure.

I also wish I'd taken a few more pictures. Dawn was cold, so I cut it short and went back inside with her, and this 15 second exposure really would have been better after 30 seconds.

Free? Really?

One of our tires has a little divot in the sidewall; our Toyota dealer said we should replace it. Our neighbor, who could be a car mechanic if he wanted, said maybe we should rotate it to the back, but that it wasn't a problem. And the people at Goodyear said the same.

And then they rotated them for free, and checked the brakes, because they're Goodyear tires! How 'bout that?

Pop Culture Influence Begins

Rachel - eating breakfast, swaying in her seat, smiling.

Dylan: "What music are you hearing, Rachel?"

Rachel - smirks: "a song Gracie taught me."

Dylan: "Oh? What's it called?"

Rachel: "Oops, I did it again."

Thanks for nothing!

This post on Parent Hacks reminded me of a story my friend Brad told me years ago. His kids were given a very noisy fire truck, and it bugged the heck out of him and his wife, Sue, for weeks. Until one day it broke! Everything about it worked fine, except there was no more sound. Ah, the relief. Until not three days later:

"Hey, I got a friend at work to fix the fire truck!"

"Dear! Do you know how long it took me to break it!?"

Also Sit Down

My mother reminded me of a story from when Rachel was only around a year or so old. She has always been and advanced talker, but at one time if she was sitting and wanted you to sit with her, she would say 'also sit down'. One day, she said to my mother 'also sit down' and when I guess Carol didn't sit down fast enough, Rachel said "have a seat, Carol!"

A Classic Tip

From Rattling the Kettle:

First, if it’s a short trip, consider walking. Seriously, get off your lazy ass and get some fresh air. It’s good for your heart. And skip the ice cream. The extra weight you’re carrying is creating extra drag on the road.

On the Road Home

We're on the way to Salt Lake City from the Grand Tetons; this is the last picture I took on the trip.

Finally Ready to Read?

Rachel has long been able to read much better than she likes to let on. I often try to get her to read on her own, often insist that she read words or even sentences of books I'm reading to her.

Tonight she brought home her first homework 'book', which was at best a four page pamphlet, called 'The ABCs'. It contained ONE WORD (the), followed by the alphabet in upper and then lower case. I was rather irritated when I saw it, because I'd already been informed that she read it three times and was ready to be suitably impressed.

Rachel could tell I was disappointed, or something, and so when she asked I told her that the 'book' wasn't even worth bringing home, because she ought to be reading something with at least multiple words. Like ... I said, scanning her book shelves for something more reasonable... THIS! Green Eggs and Ham. The copy we have starts on page 3 and goes to page 62. I insisted that she stop for the night (it was getting late) after finishing page 31. By her self! She didn't want to, either. She was doing GREAT and wanted to read all the way to the end.

Now I'm impressed.

We will, however, need to tell her teacher tomorrow that the so-called book she brought home is unreasonably low level for her and she needs to bring things home that are worth her time.

Budding Psychic

Dawn and Rachel walked up to Rachel's school today to find out who her 1st grade teacher will be (school starts tomorrow). On the way there she announced she wants Mrs. B, whom Dawn and I don't even remember. Lo and behold, she got Mrs. B (one of three 1st grade teachers this year). She's very excited.

Channeling a Friend

Dawn: "We're going to go get some new plants."

Rachel: "What are we going to do with the plants, Mommy?"

Dylan, before Dawn can answer: "We're going to put them on the porch and let them die!"

Dawn, laughing: "OK, Jim!"

Point, Dawn.