Sometimes, at night, when you pass by a spirited little daughter who is now sleeping peacefully, there's nothing to do but lie down next to her and relax into the moment. Chances are, if you do, your wife will find you and snap a photo after you've drifted off...

Then, the next morning, when your wife leaves you at home alone with the kids while she goes off to work for a couple of hours, do you take advantage of the opportunity? Do you overcome the depressive call to stay home and do nothing? Yes! You do! You round up the kids and the neighbor boy and sally forth to meet the day, with bo-staff, sling shot, and ...


 

Hello Kitty boots! Down into the depths of Shoal Creek you go, in search of excitement, adventure, and really cool things. What do you find?



You find there is a creek to dam, puddles to stomp through, litter to collect, secret forts to make, crystalline rocks to collect, mini-waterfalls to watch, mud patterns to watch swirling through the water, sunshine to enjoy (good thing it was back into the 70's today), and a man from the USGS to meet who was working on the local water monitoring station. 

On a day like today, you can breathe deeply and let the sunshine and fresh air sweep away the cobwebs in your soul that come from too much time spent indoors.

Poor man's camera tripod

Thanks to David Pogue at the New York Times for this amazing bit of highly-valuable information, coming to you just in time for the holidays.

The threads in the bottom of your camera (for plugging into a tripod) are the same size as the threads on a lampshade screw.

If this seems trivial and unimportant to you, just hang on and keep reading. The implication of this is clear to those of us who have ever tried to balance a small digital camera on the back of a recliner chair and run around to stand in a family photo only to have the camera fall or tilt and ruin the photo. Now that you have this information, you can just unscrew the lampshade and replace it with your camera. The lampshade mounts swivels and tilts just like a tripod, and presto! you're in business, with tripod-quality camera placement and no more tilted family portraits.

Now, aren't you glad you still read this not-so-consistently updated blog?