I got my new camera.

Nikon D200. It rocks. I took it out for a test drive Friday, and was very pleased with the results. But there are a lot of features on this camera that I am not used to. I may have to actually crack open an instruction book. The Horror!

Here are some scaled down samples from Friday:

Not too bad.

But I’ll have to get used to all the features on the damn camera so i can get my money’s worth out of it. I took me a while to even figure how to set the time on the damn thing. And it will take a bit to find a good marriage between all the automatic tools and using what I know about photography. But practice makes perfect, so I’ll just keep shooting.

I am not the biggest loser.

I lost 16 pounds over 6 weeks, which was a drop of 8% of body weight. But it was not enough. My brother lost eight pounds in the last week to come in with 9%, but this was not enough. One fool wrapped himself up in 3 or 4 sweatshirts and went to the gym. He worked out for a bit. Then he went home and wrapped himself in plastic. He manged to lose 9 pounds in 24 hours. This brought his total weight loss to 10%.

I wish I would have won, but for $146 I would not be willing to do that to myself.

I have a five day weekend lined up here, and my camera has been shipped (I hope it shows up today!) This should be some good un-wind time. And I need it.

And unoriginal, apparently.

I went out hiking this weekend, it rained but all was good.

Wednesday is my last weigh in for the biggest loser thing. So I’m on bread and water (or something like that) for the duration. I must win.

Over at the SBC, Shitty Blog Survivor has begun. I have to admit, this is one of the better ideas, I’ve had. It also looks like it is going to be a huge pain in my ass. That’s the nature of this kind of thing, I think. The voting off of the blog island will be open to all comers, so feel free to get in the nonsense.

I might expand on some or none of this later, but for now I need sleep.

I’m a bad blogger. Not exactly breaking news. but it’s true enough. I get busy, I want to write about what I’ve been up to, then I put it off. By the time I feel like I have time for it, so much has happened it seems too much and too confusing to blog about. So I write nothing. How fucking pointless is that?

I could make a promise to do better. But who would believe me?

So here is a big recap with some empty promises:

I’m a photographer. An amateur, but pretty good. I haven’t mentioned it before, because I knew that if I did some well meaning soul would ask to see my work. But I don’t have much to show right now. Most of my work is on slides. I haven’t bothered to convert it to digital yet. A couple of years ago, I realized that digital photography had arrived. The technology had caught up. Knowing this, I couldn’t bring myself to take pictures on my F4 any more. The thought of paying $12 or so for a roll of slides. Shooting the roll to get a picture or two (if I’m lucky) that I like. Spending another $8 bucks or so to get the slides developed. And then if I want to get the slides scanned to a digital format thats 2 buck a pop. That’s a lot of time and money… When if I had a digital SLR I could just take the picture, review it immediately and be done. But I didn’t have one. So I did nothing. For about the past 2 years.

Why I am I telling you this? Yesterday, I ordered a Nikon D200. Not as advanced in some ways as my F4. But in other ways, it is light years ahead. It is a very popular camera right now So it is back ordered. I won’t get it for a few weeks. But after all this time what’s a few weeks.

My wife was, justifiably put off at the price of the thing. In order to take some of the sting out of it, I’ve promised to get my old stuff digital and work on building a portfolio for some stock photography. And then I can get paid for my hobby. At least a little.

I also purchased a new desk for the Geek Cave. It just made sense. I spend so much time here. And especially when I do the Radio Show, Capt Shutter and I both have to squeeze in. But no more. I now have a spacious l-shaped corner desk. Moving up I guess.

I wieghed in again for my biggest loser competition. This time I redeemed myself. I lost about 4 pounds and jumped into first place.

Now for the promises.

I did go camping last week. And also 3 weeks ago. I’m also going this coming weekend. I will write about these trips. Not that I think that anyone really cares about my backpacking trips. But I like to write about them.

And I will. Someday. Soon.

And thankfully Spring is really here now. Daylight Savings Time and Opening Day are proof enough for me.