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July 29, 2004
Quick Tripod
How to make a tripod out of a bottle of water - just something for me to remember to look at again.
Posted by Kristin at 9:03 AM | Comments (4)
July 26, 2004
I heart Peter Parker
What a fantastic, heart-clenching, seat-griping movie. I want to see it again now.
Would it be strange if I got Spider-man sheets? They come in larger sizes; I checked.
Posted by Kristin at 9:20 PM | Comments (2)
July 25, 2004
Personality Typing
I'm reading about the Enneagram, which I'd heard of before but hadn't read much about until Meg brought my attention to a book on it (not a hard thing to do, as I'm a Myers Briggs junkie). Interestingly, I'm not coming up on the short online test what the correlations say I'm likely to be, although it's early and I'm tired and a cat is sitting on the keyboard, making it a bit difficult to think.
The short (free) test is at the Enneagram Institute.
Here's an interesting discussion of the relationship between the two, which includes research study data.
The photos a day are on hold for the moment.
Posted by Kristin at 9:01 AM | Comments (1)
July 22, 2004
Yellowstone
I found my CDs with the Yellowstone pictures that I had scanned. I'm amazed out how much lower the quality is than the output from my digital camera.
Posted by Kristin at 7:12 AM | Comments (8)
July 20, 2004
Colin at Dinner
I'm recycling again; I came home to last night to clean, then had an unexpected dinner with fabulous ex-roommate Jane, who left her computer for me to troubleshoot, which I did.
Posted by Kristin at 11:26 PM | Comments (2)
Retro Photography
This was taken at Ocean City, MD in 2001, the first time I met Maureen. It's a print; I took a photo of it with my digital camera and cropped out the edge distortion. It's one of my favorite photographs.
The yarn for Marie's scarf finally arrived, although when I went to cast on I discovered that the Denise Knitting Needle Kit doesn't come with a cable that enables you to make a 16" needle. I checked their website to discover they do make these cables, but I'd have to order one by mail, as they don't accept credit cards for orders under $18. Bother, bother, bother.
Posted by Kristin at 6:56 AM | Comments (4)
July 19, 2004
Sunday Evening
David called, and I went into DC to meet him, Kathleen, and Heather at Zaytinya's at G and 9th Street NW, which is a Mediterranean restaurant that serves mezzes (tapas-like appetizer-sized dishes). We each had two dishes, bread, and with dessert, left stuffed.
And here you can see how well my digital camera does not handle backlit situations - I desaturated and tweaked, but this photo may not be viewable on some monitors.
Posted by Kristin at 6:11 AM | Comments (3)
July 18, 2004
Colin in Used Bookstore
~*~
Posted by Kristin at 8:51 AM | Comments (3)
July 17, 2004
It's Not Even 9:00/On Photography
Yet my mom's already emailed to ask why I haven't updated.
*~*
I've been thinking about the things that I like to do.
Photography has long been an interest of mine, from before Dad got me my first 35mm camera the year I turned 15 (this camera is on the short list of things I'd grab if I ever had to flee my burning apartment, right after my cat). When I moved to Virginia, I bought a Nikon N70 and an new lens. That camera gave me autofocus, and works with the lens from my old manual 35mm. My photography improved, but not because I had a 'better' camera - if anything, after spending that much money, I realized a fancy, expensive autofocus couldn't teach me anything my old camera couldn't. No, I think my photography improved because I took more pictures.
Then I bought a digital Canon G3 with a 512MB storage card, and if I took more photos with the N70, I've taken ten times that with the digital. The most obvious reason is the immediate feedback, and I think the chance to photo edit on my computer - I can look at the results in more detail now. Digital cameras aren't cheaper (you pay for the 'film' upfront rather than as you process it), and aren't as good (Ken Rockwell, who takes some of the most beautiful landscape photography I've seen, has a good article on why digital still can't touch film in terms of resolution; and even an excellent high end point and shoot like the G3 has at times unacceptable shutter lag), but I take far more photos that I used to. I've also noticed that what I want to photograph has changed. Instead of trying to take 'artistic' shots, I try to take photos to try to show others what things matter to me, and so that I can better remember things myself. Because my photos feel more personal than they did four or five years ago, I suspect some people will think less of the results. While I'd be lying if I said it didn't make me happy to hear if someone likes one of my pictures, I'm also a little surprised to realize that I don't really care if they do. I want to like what I keep; I think that's what matters.
Nikon just came out with an under-$1000 digital version of my N70. I'll probably have it one day (hopefully once the price has dropped), but I'm still learning so much with the digital I have. I think I'm also ready to try film again - there's a beautiful farm here in town that won't be here in a year, and I want to at least attempt to do it justice.
Anyway, I thought maybe I should explain why I'm taking close up shots of brooms and kitty cat paws. And I should stop rambling and go take some pictures.
Posted by Kristin at 8:29 AM | Comments (3)
July 16, 2004
Riding Lesson
I had a great riding lesson last night. Sometimes I think I have too many interests -I'm competent at several but I'm not brilliant at any of them. But last night's lesson made me feel like I have potential at riding, which is nice, and after twenty years of riding, really about damn time (has it really been twenty years?).
I may end up at a schooling show in August. Mom said I should, asking what's the worst that could happen? I said I could fall off and the horse could stand on me. Mom admitted that probably wouldn't be much fun. ;)
Posted by Kristin at 6:42 AM | Comments (4)
July 15, 2004
Barn Fan
Hmm, figured out how to enable titles.
Here's a link to a blog I like - The London Underground Tube Diary.
Posted by Kristin at 6:36 AM
July 14, 2004
Marie at the Diner
Still hot. Still humid. Still have not received yarn for scarf.
Posted by Kristin at 6:39 AM | Comments (2)
July 12, 2004
Weather.com
All day long Weather.com promises a thunderstorm, and you anticipate that Volunteer will be called off, not because you dislike it but because it's too scorching to be outside. You get there, and it starts to drizzle. It's nice for a moment, but the rain comes harder and your hair starts to drip in your eyes, and as soon as you're drenched, it stops. The sun comes out, brighter than before. Steam rises from your horse, who kicks up sand as you pull her along (because she's tired too), and it sticks to your damp legs. The flies love this, and swarm delightedly when you stop moving. You walk in hot circles for two hours more.
Sometimes, you really deserve McDonald's french fries.
Posted by Kristin at 8:46 PM | Comments (3)
July 11, 2004
Saturday/Waiting for Scarf Yarn
Must take more photos - I have one more from the barn and then I'm all out (well, there are 87,000 from London, but I'm trying to take new photos for the one a day thing).
I slept like a dead person last night. Am off to Camp Airy to pick up Meg, who went to visit her camp friends last night. After breakfast with Heather in rocking Emmitsburg, we have a busy day of editing, eating, and tea-drinking scheduled.
The yarn for Marie's Hufflepuff scarf is on the way. I picked Plymouth Encore, a wool/acrylic blend, which is supposed to hold up against pilling without being itchy. I'm going to make the Prisoner of Azkaban-style scarf, but switch the colors so the background is black, with yellow stripes. As it calls for circulars, this will be the first real project where I get to try out my Denise knitting needles kit.
Posted by Kristin at 7:14 AM | Comments (4)
July 10, 2004
Ms. Lennox and Mr. Sting
Saw Sting and Annie Lennox at Nissan last night, with Colin, Marie, Meg, Monique, Sue, and Eric. Sting is quite hot.
Posted by Kristin at 9:15 AM | Comments (4)
July 9, 2004
Della close-up.
Della close-up.
Posted by Kristin at 7:06 AM | Comments (2)
July 8, 2004
Photoblogs
I love the idea of photoblogs. I'm particularly impressed with Ten Years of My Life, which sets out to post a photo a day by its creator between his 31st and 41st birthdays, and by vanderWoning's photoblog, who is linked to from the Creative Common's page.
Posted by Kristin at 9:20 PM | Comments (4)
July 7, 2004
I love this photo!
Posted by Kristin at 8:18 PM | Comments (3)
Mozilla & Mapping the Internet
I've read enough about Internet Explorer to think the computer crash that caused me to have to reinstall everything was caused by an Internet Explorer security flaw.
Unfortunately, if you want to get automatic Windows updates, you need IE. But for browsing and mail, I'm switching to Mozilla. The interface isn't as pretty as IE's, but it seems to work well, and you can download skins if you want.
~*~
This is fascinating - a project to map the Internet.
Posted by Kristin at 5:46 PM | Comments (5)
July 5, 2004
Hot
When I woke up, I checked weather.com, and it said the high was supposed to be around 85.
It's now 97, with a heat index of 107.
I'm supposed to volunteer tonight. I'm hoping for rain.
Posted by Kristin at 3:04 PM | Comments (1)
July 4, 2004
I'm finding website design far
I'm finding website design far too entertaining.
I'm thinking about photo albums right now. I downloaded this nice little freeware program, Easy Thumbnail, which lets you specify thumbnail criteria and then generates an entire folder's-worth for you.
Having done this, I realized my London page uses unnecessary bandwidth, as I link to versions of the full photographs rather than using thumbnails (BK said something about this to me once, but I just now realized what the implications are). So I'm replacing links to the photos with links to thumbnails.
In addition to albums, I want to investigate Creative Commons licensing (a friend said it sounded to her like it just keeps honest people honest, but no copyright info will keep certain people from cheating, and I like both their guidelines and the overall idea), add an 'About/What's New' page, and construct a site map.
And I still need to write about my last London trip.
Posted by Kristin at 10:49 AM | Comments (2)
July 2, 2004
Now that I've torn my
Now that I've torn my website apart and got it at least partially put together again, my thoughts (at least some of them) are returning to yarn.
I wanted to join the Azkaban scarf knitalong when I met Iko at the Harry Potter & the PoA IMAX screening in NY (photos to come - I've got to organize those, and the ones from London too - in the meantime, here's the gorgeous scarf she was knitting in the line for her mum), but I wasn't sure which colors to choose - I came up Ravenclaw in this test and Gryffindor in this test and decided not to push my luck with any of the other tests in the event I got dropped into a third or even fourth house and confused myself further.
Then I remembered - Marie's birthday is coming up, and as she has decided to embrace her Hufflepuff-ness, the question is resolved - I'll start on a scarf for her birthday. I'm going to work it in opposite colors, however - a black ground with yellow stripes - as A: the black will look better on her B: it'll wear a bit better (won't show dirt as much) and C: since the scarves were created for the movies anyway, I'm just re-interpreting an interpretation. I'll order the yarn tomorrow.
And based on reading way too much of this sort of thing, I'm not sure that first test is so accurate - I think the Slytherins get shafted, so maybe the test should be disregarded.
Or, anything to affirm my Gryffindor-ness.
;)
Posted by Kristin at 11:29 PM
I wasn't kewl enough to
I wasn't kewl enough to have the Sony Walkman the first time around, and I don't have an iPod this go around - but this amuses me.
Posted by Kristin at 5:49 PM | Comments (1)
July 1, 2004
TA da DA!!! OK, the
TA da DA!!!
OK, the index page is mostly the way I want it, the javascript popup menus are working, and I have the photos from London Trip the First loaded and working. There's more to do (photo albums, London trip writeup, etc), but this is a big start.
Now I can go start cleaning my disgusting apartment.
EDIT: Just discovered Will's link is incorrect - another thing to add to my to do list.
Posted by Kristin at 7:54 PM | Comments (3)
OK - so you have
OK - so you have to be really careful when working with Dreamweaver - the Java problem seemed to be leftover tags that confused it. I started from scratch and did a couple of popup menu links before I dropped in the blogger code, and it worked fine (see 'people.'. I moved the blog style sheet code to a separate .css file as per BK's instructions (cheated by looking at Melissa's code), but I couldn't figure out how to do the same for .js - DW drops like 3 JS tags into the code, and I couldn't figure out where to call the .js. But I can tweak later; this works for now.
So, left to do -
1. figure out how to reduce the previous posts/archived font without reducing the size of the 'Previous Posts', etc. headers.
2. add in all the popup links
3. add a contact link above 'previous posts'.
4. maybe change the font; I like courier but it looks bad on blogger. Verdana?
5. construct a site map
6. set up photo albums (and see if Moey can FTP me the book party photos, and see if Heather has the Salem shots)
7. (finally) write about London
OK, maybe the site map and the photo albums can get put off 'til later.
Posted by Kristin at 7:55 AM | Comments (2)