269/365 Good-bye Summer

"Good-bye Summer, Hello Fall"

268/365 Notes

"Notes, Notes and More Notes"

I like writing this kind of notes…not nearly as depressing as all of the notes that I have to write to myself so that I don't forget what I'm supposed to do, where I'm supposed to do it and who I'm supposed to do it with or for.

267/365 Get Wet

"Fall Fountain"

I'm in a creative slump they week.  Nothing seems terribly inspired or inspiring.  I know that all artists have these times, but I don't particularly like the feel of it.  That being said, I'm soldiering on hoping that the creative fire is rekindled soon!

I had a composition student who was sick and missed a lesson this morning.  That gave me a free hour that I did not expect to have.  There were many productive things that I could have chosen to do, but I decided to go sit outside with my book and enjoy the fresh air and the sound of the fountain in the courtyard.

I was taken by the colorful leaves floating in the fountain.  I'm not sure where these leaves came from; all of the trees are still covered with bright green leaves.  Whatever their source, I love the colors and liked seeing them resting on the water.

266/365 Breathe

"Breathe On Me"

265/365 Change

"The Twilight Zone"

I am not happy with Apple right now.  The changes that have come with iOS7 have made me quite an unhappy camper - and phone user.  Well, that is not exactly true; I have not yet updated my phone.  Weber updated his.  Thankfully I looked at the changes on his before I made the decision to update mine.

I am not one of those people that is resistant to change just because it is change.  I am all for change if it is change for the better.  With all of the previous Apple updates, I believe that change for the better definitely existed.  Not this time.  This was change just to change and in my opinion (and apparently that of many other people) this is change for the worse.

Apple's goal was to "simplify" the visuals of there apps.  That translates to put everything on a white or light  background with super thin fonts and gray icons.  For me, it is pretty much unreadable, even with all of the supposed "accessibility" features that Apple includes.  

Above is the old resident weather app on my phone and the same app on Weber's with the new operating system.  See what I mean?  I intended this difference to be the point of today's picture.  I guess to some extent it is, but as I was looking at the day's images on the computer, the picture took on a whole other dimension.

Look carefully at the phones.  Weber and I are standing side by side, no Photoshop tricks here.  Notice that his phone says that today is Saturday.  And despite the fact that both phones are displaying the local weather in Dallas, mine say the temperature is 84 degrees and his 64.  Just to further confound the issue, the weekly highs and lows vary by a few degrees each day as well.  It is the same time on both phones.  That is good to know!

Right now, the only thing i like better about Weber's phone and the new operating system is that according to his phone we have another day of weekend!

I hope Apple listens to the feedback of the many people that are unhappy with some of their aesthetic choices with this upgrade and either changes them or allows for user customization.  If something doesn't happen before I absolutely have to upgrade, I'm not sure what I am going to do.

Apple, can you hear me now??

264/365 Brown

"Diggin' Up the Dirt"

263/365 Power Lines

"Power lines - Lifelines"

Today was a day of choices.  I'm not sure that I made the best ones, but I am happy with the ones I made.  I had a bunch of work to do for school.  I unconsciously made the choice not to do any of it today.  I say subconsciously because throughout the day I kept saying, "I'll do this, then I'll grade tests."  With this tactic, I managed to read a bit, do some laundry, clean the kitchen from top to bottom and watch some online photography videos.  Then there was the time I took to have a piece of cake for lunch.  Remember,  I said that I didn't necessarily make the best choices, but the ones I made did make me happy.  I was very happy with that piece of cake!

It rained all day, something we haven't seen in a long time.  That made it a perfect day to hunker down at home, Since I have no classes on Fridays, I can choose to work from home…and, I did.  I really had good intentions of accomplishing so much.  I did, too...just not the things that probably needed to be accomplished.

I have always heard that if you are going to work from home, you should treat the workday at home exactly like the workdays away from home.  You should get up at the normal time, get dressed and follow your normal daily routine.  I was good with step one; I did get up at the normal time.  Then things fell apart.  I didn't do so well with step two and beyond.  I didn't get dressed until about 3 o'clock.  That's what rainy days do to me.  And why do I need to be fully dressed to read and watch videos?    I'm making up for it now.  It is 11:30 pm and I am still fully dressed…shoes and everything.

I also had to make some choices regarding my approach for today's photo.  The prompt was "power lines" from below and or at dusk.  I knew that I wasn't going for a photo walk in the rain looking for pictures of power lines.  I wasn't dressed.  I also knew that with the cloudy skies brought about by the much needed rain, dusk would be nothing inspiring.  Early in the day I made the decision to photograph important "power lines" in our house - the power cords to everyone's computers.  In this case, power lines and life lines are one in the same.

This evening we went out for dinner and to take our resident baker to the store for supplies for this week's bread orders.  It was still dark and gray, but the rain had let up for the most part.  Though it was totally dark by the time we finished all of this, Weber and I went out to see if we could find anything interesting fairly close to home that might better satisfy the day's prompt.  We didn't really find anything except the very cool wind turbines on the local water tower.

"Power(flu) Lines"

This is related to power and it does have very cool lines.

Below is another picture of the water tower taken from a different perspective.  I took this one to address the "from below" part of the prompt.

"Looking Up the Water Tower"

I find this angle kind of interesting.  I also like the big bokeh that I think was created by passing car lights and the heavy mist in the air.

Though it is not as photographically interesting, I chose to use the Mac power cords for my picture of the day because, of the three, it is the one that is the most  accurate representation of our lives.

"One's philosophy is not best expressed in words; it is expressed in the choices one makes…and the choices we make are ultimately our responsibility."  - Eleanor Roosevelt