Lordy look, it's me, all here and stuff.
Mike's napping off this:
I'm content with just a little Saturday afternoon lie-down, but grumbling because all the picture framers in town close at one on Saturdays and don't open on Sundays. I'm also grumbling because I seem to have to go to a professional framer to buy a photo mat(t) unless I go online. (Well, the art supply shop might have them - the craft store doesn't - but guess who else is closed for the weekend?) I'm also grumbling at myself for choosing a weird print size (10x15 in.), meaning pre-cuts might be unlikely, and I can't just buy a cheap frame at Kmart and use the mat inside.
These are light grumbles, though, like the tummies of a handful of hungry mice. Who can grumble when they've received a letter saying that one of the two photographs they submitted (on a lark! just a lark!) was accepted for the Perth National Photographic Exhibition?
Of course, my first reaction was "Ugh, this just proves how shitty my photos are to anyone with any taste and how laughable and pathetic it is that I dare to enjoy any of them."
(You're allowed to enter up to four photos for the same entry fee. I picked seven. Then four. Then two. Then one. Then I added one that wasn't part of the original seven. That was the one that didn't get accepted. Moral: get your money's worth and just submit the max. They're all considered individually, and you never know.)
Then my less lizardy bit of brain spoke up: "That they rejected one photo means they have some standards. Your accepted photo therefore doesn't completely suck!"
This is my accepted photo:
We pulled up by the estuary because a new food truck had set up shop there that evening. (Bean nachos with cilantro and beets - so delicious - and yes, THEY, the Aussies, have finally managed to covert me to "beetroot".)
I was half out of the car before it stopped because the water was like glass and the sun was setting, and holy moly, for once I was packing something other than an iPhone.
This shot is one of very, very few that I haven't post-processed in some way. Okay, I did straighten it ever so slightly, but you know what I mean. I'm not boasting whatsoever, though - I didn't do anything with the camera other than point and click, so it's actually a bit of a shame to imagine what might've been if I'd put more thought into it. (At heart, I'll always be a snapshotter.)
Even this amateur knows that "Nature" is a tough and tired category. You need to capture something truly novel (and usually truly crisp) to stand out, even when - let's face it - just posting to Facebook friends. I think my photo of the egret at sunset is quite pretty, and I'm excited to have it accepted, but it's not particularly special in content nor technique. I'll stagger backwards in a comically destructive way if I arrive at the photography pavilion of the Royal Show in six weeks and see that mine has been selected for display. It really is an honour just to have my very first "Accepted".
(And I will keep repeating that to myself in the slivers of weekday time after the workday ends but before the stores close, questing for 3-7mm mats and "postpak" envelopes and paid return envelopes and all the other requirements done just-so before the deadline in 20 days.)
Meanwhile:
- Work has not killed me. Or fired me. Every fortnight, on Thursdays, I'm surprised all over again to receive over $2200 AUD after taxes for teaching 17 classes per week, breaking for two lunches per day, and having the power to toss anyone who defies or interrupts me out of the room, plus having my husband in the classroom next door to do any (literal) heavy lifting plus start the bonky heater. It's a real Almanzo and Laura sleigh ride.
- I'm reading Felicia Day's autobiography. I perhaps respect her more, and I was already a fan, but sadly I think I relate to her much less.
- There's no hiding our board game hoard. (Let us not speak of what's still to come from Mike's Kickstarter walkabouts.)
- I used "walkabout" sincerely yesterday. As in, "Hey, (year nine student), you do NOT go on walkabout just because I've turned my back to mess with the computer. Back to your seat, please!" First the beetroot...
- My relationship with Kmart Australia, which is completely unaffiliated with its former U.S. parent company, has deepened to a point that a single dot point (not bullet point) cannot do it justice.
- Ditto Frankie magazine. Just when I think it's too twenty-something-etsy-aware-rhymeswithdipster to live, I turn the page and get sucked into the quirkholes. They reviewed eight different types of facial tissue and convinced me to have an opinion so strong that now I want to go buy a box, even though I'm still working on the leftover classroom boxes from the States. (No cubic inch in our storage container was left idle!) Also, wasabi pea soup recipes!
- There's a place in Perth that makes proper boiled bagels for a few stores and one market stall. They offer a salt bagel. Some weekends we drive two hours each way for bagels.
- Some of my daffodils that didn't appear last spring just came up this winter. They're not blooming, but still. Life finds a way. (Now I wish I hadn't dug up and tossed out so many no-shows, only to make room for another soon-dead chocolate mint.)
- This morning I pestered our mayor in a long Facebook message with my vision for a monthly food truck rumble. (First the Frankie...)
- My Latin Villa in Sims Freeplay consoles me whenever I catch myself thinking about our real-life carpet.
- I have so much grey hair now that I'm thinking about not dying it again lest I miss my chance to say farewell to the last real brown locks left.
- I cannot keep up with all of the good intel and theories that have come from having so many relatives DNA test and finding so many relatives in the DNA matches. (Pro tip: I'd be so lost without Genome Mate.) I'm finally getting significant segments triangulated and narrowed down as belonging to particularly elusive ancestors, and just when I thought I was running low on fun mysteries, the murky jug of "Huh?!" has been topped up. My parents are definitely cousins more ways than I suspected. Durn Colonials.
- Ever since doing a current affairs unit with our 9s, Mike and I watch the local news every evening. It has to be the local news - nothing national or international. Those are still web territory.
- I roasted a beetroot not long ago and served it with polenta and horseradish cream. Mike said it was yummy and asked for seconds. I realised they haven't fully converted me to beets yet after all, and I won't be trying that again. Mike is sad, but all of the food vans (who need a monthly convergence) are there to fill the gap.
- Pinky toes with a "seam" across the pad. What's up with that?
- I have a cheapy-cheap FitBit. We've both had one for three months, and so far it fascinates but doesn't necessarily motivate. New Lot of People Who Annoy Me: those who ask on Facebook what a good goal is because 10,000 steps is obviously too easily accomplished while just mucking around the office before morning tea.
- I have a new second-fave tea: Caramel Brownie, a limited edition by T2.
- From the above, my life seems to be all food and retail therapy (at least the latter is more preventative than reactionary). Well, I can't really discuss work (the good stuff's confidential), or anyone's health crap (too depressing), or gardening (it's winter), or genealogy (well, I could, but that requires trotting out the real typing hands to do it justice). Travel beyond day trips is on hold until we know if I'm teaching next year (and even then, gotta buy a house sometime), and any thoughtful writing about those day trips or really anything brings us back to the "but can I be bothered to peck it out on an iPad or stand at the computer when I might better use that time for work/DNA?" scenario.
- It's okay. I'm still pretty content, considering.
- Mike's up. Bagel time! Or fudge. Could be fudge time. We went to Cowaramup today.
P.S. Missed ya, blog.
