well, i’m tired and at home after a loooooooong weekend. thankfully, i had today off from work (4 days weekends are tops) so i hit some of the summer sales in manhattan and even stopped by school products for some cashmere/silk hand-dyed hanks for a clapotis to be made as a christmas gift (who’s the lucky recipient?) i have other ideas for other presents but they are stash-busters, thank goodness.

so, since i’m feeling rather lazy, i’ll just link to my new gallery for pictures of my truly, lovely ladies of knitting…

mmm, pints, goldfish, and knitting.

oh, and i finished my one skein wonder!! it’s a little small so i might see if it fits anyone who looks vaguely smaller than me amongst my group of girls. just vaguely, mind you. wouldn’t want to be blatant about it.

(mind the books.. i must find a better location for posed shots.)

so i’ll be back with an extended entry tomorrow including more battlestar galactica talk since it is an all-day marathon on scifi tomorrow (set your DVRs!) and the new season on july 15th.. then harry potter and the half blood prince (book six) is released on july 16th! i’ve decided, after some start-stop-started-again plans, that i’m going to go to an independent book store in brooklyn to pick up the book at midnight. i figure, why not? i never stood in line for star wars so harry potter it is. maybe it’s the whole wand thing?

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after four years of carrying around the behemoth, i finally decided it was time to get a camera that i could actually carry in my purse. i love my leica, don’t get me wrong. it’s a fantastic camera with a stellar lens and all the manual features you could ask for. it’s also HUGE and quite slow. i bought it four years ago and, at the time, it boasted one of the fastest capture times (to the card and also the time between when you press the shutter and when the picture is actually taken) but they are woefully inadequate nowadays.

thinking back on it, i’m not sure what has changed with my photography style that makes those camera qualities so inadequate now. i think that i’ve become a photographer that likes to catch moments as they happen and not stage them. i used to setup shots in portrait fashion but now i like the photojournalist style of seeing something and capturing that smirk or that smile in the split second that it existed. this really requires a camera that’s fast and the leica just wasn’t cutting it.

i decided to upgrade to a 7 megapixel casio exilim which i picked up at J&R last night. the startup time is blindingly fast and captures photos to the card quickly so that you can take a multitude of pictures over a short period of time. it also take MPEG-4 video which one amazon customer claims is not for apple users… but he’s mistaken. if you spend $30 on the upgrade to quicktime pro, you can view and reformat MPEG-4 movies to whatever you like. one thing this camera is missing from it’s previous incarnation (the 5 megapixel version) is the “pre-shot” feature which lets you double-expose your picture. i’m bummed about missing out on that feature. i thought for sure that would be one that carried on from one version to another. oh well. the camera excels in every other way.

here are my new things this week: camera, OSW almost done (with corks to protect the needles!) and a new set of denise interchangeables that i got for a steal on ebay (of course).

since last week was project playwright: the show, i took over 250 pictures with my leica of the production and still need to get them into iphoto, correct them, then upload them to the madair gallery. mixed in with those photos are ones from friday@the.point of me and my fellow spiders (this is what my husband likes to call us.. we knit, we’re on the web.. go figure) and i need to get those posted as well. you won’t be seeing them till monday at the earliest. i have a nice holiday weekend (4 days!!) ahead of me and i plan on relaxing. once all that is taken care of, i’ll be upgrading to tiger finally!! should i totally reformat or just archive & install. i have a ton of apps and files that will be a pain to reinstall? any suggestions?

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