Category Archives: New Years

Pondering the Mysteries of New Years

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You know the whole New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day thing has always just confused me. I mean it follows Christmas. You know the season of good will and cheer and generosity and all that. Just loaded with gingerbread men and hot chocolate and decorations and snow and the whole bit. We go through all that then we open up our presents on Christmas and then you know what happens. Sure you do.

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The kids all get whiny and “Is all that I got?” and their parents who got dragged out of their beds at 5 am are all tired and cranky. Somebody has got to leave the tree party to make breakfast and then start on the Christmas meal. You know something is wrong then.

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And the next day many people load up all the stuff they got and return it. Me, I’ve never returned anything in my life if it fit, or if it was a short sleeve dress shirt and tie. I mean that is just so exhausting.

Gingerbread Men by Heather

And then there is this tension about the Christmas tree and decorations. Gotta get rid of it, gotta get rid of it. You know what I mean. Suddenly we are sick of Christmas. It’s gotta go. Plus, we have to figure what to do about New Year’s Eve. Are we going to a party, where? Plus resolutions. I have never made a resolution in my life. I have carefully cultivated my bad habits most of life. Why would I get rid of them?

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Researching the origins of New Years on the web gives a confusing story of changing calendars, conniving kings, evil emperors and other such stuff. The web is No Help!! Sorry Al Gore. You need to look into that. I mean since you invented the web and all.

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Well, I’ve thought about it long and hard and I have the answer to what New Year’s is all about. 

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It’s a wake up call that is what it is. It is a cold water in the face or maybe for some of us a cold slap in the face. Or a shot of ice cold vodka or a jigger of hot sauce. It is time to wake up! What am I talking about?

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I am talking about two things. First Christmas is like being a drugs. All that eggnog, and candy canes, and soft twinkling lights plus whipping out the credit card. It’s bad for your brain folks. It is like crack cocaine. New Year’s forces you to realize, wow, what did I do, how am I going to pay for all that crap I bought? How am I going to lose all this weight I gained?

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Second thing is that oh wow, I’m another year older and nothing much has really changed. Not only am I older, I’m fatter, slower, balder, and a little dumber. Oh no, I need to get myself back into shape.

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So there you go folks. New Year’s is a slap in the face to wake up! You get one last day off and then off to your cubicle you go. You got credit cards to pay off. You have just got to start eating right. Go ahead, take a break, watch some football. Enjoy it because you have a long hard cold winter ahead of you and a long time until Memorial Day. And for goodness sake get the tree and lights down as soon as you can!

Got it, enjoy!!

If you have made it this far, I wish you and your family and friends a Happy New Year!

New Camera for a New Year – Lomography La Sardina Marathon

Well here we are another New Year. I don’t know what has happened but it seems like we fast forwarded from 1986 or so to now awful danged fast. So lets make the most of the time we have and have a Great New Year.

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The world’s greatest MIL, Nana gave me another Lomography camera, the La Sardina. I think there are over 50 models of this camera. (Lomography is a fancy name for capturing images with “toy” film cameras.) The basic difference besides metal or plastic is the design. Mine is the “Marathon” that is decorated like a sardine can. There is one model that is just white plastic, the “DIY” and the intention is that you decorate yourself with Sharpie pens for those of us who just have to be us, and are gifted artistically which is so not me.

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Lomography is just one of those things that one either “gets” or you don’t. The photographs are not anywhere near the quality of the most inexpensive digital cameras. You pay money for the film and then you pay more money to develop the film, and to top it off I don’t even get prints, the lab puts the images on a cd. Also, there is no view finder so you can’t see what you got until it is developed, there is no zoom, very little if any in the way of exposure or focus settings. It is also very east to forget to take the lens cap off. It doesn’t make any sense at all,I fully admit.

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I love the pictures that they take. I can’t explain it and I’m not going to justify it.

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Every shot counts and if you put too much foreground in, that’s too bad! I know that digital photographs are so much more superior. 

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I love playing around with the Camera. Most Lomography cameras make it very easy to make double exposures. Above is son, SuperPizzaBoy walking one of our dogs.

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So anyways, I’m liking my new camera. We haven’t had decent weather to do much with it.

Lomography has their “Ten Golden Rules“, as follows. They work. The best Lomo photos are the ones that are up close and spontaneous.

  • Take your camera everywhere you go
  • Use it any time – day or night
  • Lomography is not an interference in your life, but part of it
  • Try the shot from the hip
  • Approach the objects of your lomographic desire as close as possible
  • Don’t think (by William Firebrace)
  • Be Fast
  • You don’t have to know beforehand what you captured on film
  • Afterwards either
  • Don’t worry about any rules

Anyway, I hope that everybody has a great 2013. I can’t tell you how much I enjoy visiting everybody’s blogs and the visits made to mine. We certainly occupy a the great side of the internet. Thanks Al Gore!

I put many of my Lomo photos on my tumblr blog (along with digital photos). It is just pure images, no blah blah blah but you’ll see some of the same images. Check it out if you have time.
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