tammyins

Hello all - hope this finds you all fit and well - now I've finally put in another appearance

My Old Man kindly bought tickets so that I could go and see Jerry Lee Lewis in his 80th Birthday Farewell Tour.  He (The Killer) was only playing 2 gigs over here.  The one in London was quickly sold out so we decided to make a long weekend of it and go to see him in Glasgow.  What an experience!  Having been brought up on his music, I've always loved him but never thought I'd get the chance to see him in my lifetime.  His age is obviously showing - he doesn't bound around like he used to, but he can still belt out the songs!  TBH, I saw what I thought were 'mask-like' features in his face which can be a sign of Parkinson's Disease.  If he does have it, it doesn't show in his singing or piano playing!  What I found odd was that there was absolutely nothing on sale except for gig programmes.  Not a t-shirt or CD in sight - and apparently it was the same at the London gig.  Never mind, it's no great loss.  Before we went into the theatre, it was announced that cameras/photography wasn't allowed.  Disappointing, but I buried my Canon in the bottom of my bag.  Once inside that seemed to change a bit.  Just about everyone had their smart phones out and they announced that photograph would be allowed but NO VIDEO - not that that stopped anyone.  Everyone seemed to be taking videos of his songs.  I took a couple of still photographs on my smart phone but they weren't very good and anyway, as someone on here once told me:  "Sometimes you just have to put down the camera and enjoy the moment."  So that's what I did.  I may not have photographs, but I have fantastic memories.

The day after the gig, we travelled down to Edinburgh for a couple of days and did a day trip to the zoo.  It's the only zoo in the country with Giant Pandas and, as I haven't seen one since I was a very small child, it was a treat I wasn't going to miss.  Yang Guang was busy eating when our group was ushered into the viewing gallery and it was difficult to photograph him when he was constantly hidden behind his dinner, but I did try!  Because Pandas are solitary animals (except at breeding times), Yang Guang and his partner are kept separately and only one of them is allowed out at any one time.

Taking any photographs at the zoo was a challenge.  Most animals were behind glass and some were behind glass and metal grills, but I did manage to get a few usable shots.

I hope there's not too many errors in this journal entry - I'm typing with a broken right index finger - I managed to slam it in my car door - so hard that the door closed completely and it took me a couple of minutes to free myself.  When I finally managed, I knew the finger was broken (it's also rotated a few degrees!!) but I'd also lacerated the finger badly and I had a hell of a job to stop the bleeding.  I couldn't do anything much about it at the time because I really had to get to work.  The show-jumping at the equestrian centre isn't supposed to start until I'm there to provide medical cover, so I had no option but to find an adhesive dressing and head out.  That was almost 4 weeks ago and I'm still having trouble with that finger.  It's quite painful, very sensitive to touch where the laceration has healed and I can't completely bend it.  Typing has been a problem - I've lost almost all my 145 wpm speed and I haven't even tried to play my piano.  Might give that a go tomorrow before work

I see dA has  made some changes while I've been gone and overall, I like them.  Uploading images seems to be easier and quicker and I think I like the new layout.  I let my premium membership lapse and it looks like that's now called 'Core'.  I won't renew it yet - I'll see how things go for a while.

Again - I hope this finds you all good and well.  Stay safe everyone!  

PS:  Is there anyone who can tell me how to change the information at the top?  The bit where you put what mood you're in, what you're reading and listening to, etc?  Need to change mine, but can't work out how!   Thanks

Evening All!   I'M BACK!  Well, sort of.

I was having such awful trouble getting any decent photographs that I'd all but given up taking them.  Nothing I did worked.  Had the camera serviced and the sensor cleaned.  Had the 300 mm lens serviced/repaired (at great cost) and still got crappy photographs.     I'm not a 'good' photographer, by any stretch of the imagination.  I've been told I have a god eye, but I really need to learn to get what I 'see' into an image.   When my Canon 350D threw another Error 99 code at me, I darned near threw the thing into a lake and I was on the verge of taking up knitting as a hobby instead.   However, my son took the camera from me and messed around with it for a while and told me he thought the camera was at fault - not me.   My husband had offered to buy me a new camera when we were in Poland last year but I'd refused - we had better things on which to spend the money but he obviously realised I was disappointed.  We were back in Poland this week to visit my daughter and her partner and our little grandson (born last June) and the family wanted to pop into a supermarket.  As Wiktor (my grandson) was quite happy in his car seat, I offered to stay in the car with him while the others went shopping.  SURPRISE!!  When they came out, my husband hadn't actually gone into the supermarket - he'd gone into the shop next door and I'm now the proud owner of a Canon 600D.  Still an entry level camera, but that's just perfect for me.  Having not taken any photos seriously for a while, I've forgotten a lot of what I'd learned to I'm starting again from scratch - and SO looking forward to it, too, so expect to be bored to death by images from me soon  I'm already happy with those I've taken.  They're so much sharper and much more what I expect.

Hope everyone is well and doing what they do best - getting great images

Hello all - good to see you all again and I hope you've all been well.

I've been up to my eyes in work at Addington Manor Equestrian Centre, and having a lot of fun with it, too.  I don't fly much now but I find I'm not really missing it.  It's no fun any more - not since all the security restrictions were brought in post-9/11 - and I'm getting too old to deal with the stress that traversing an airport terminal inflicts on me

If you see my latest submission - you'll see Mabel, the little feral kitten we rescued and you can read about how we came to rescue her.  On a sad note, we had to have Henry, our elderly black and white cat, put to sleep about a month or so ago.  He'd been ill for a while but he'd been well maintained on medication but he just came to the end of the road and I wasn't willing to watch him suffer.  I hope he's happy - wherever he may be now.

We lost our photographer at Addington recently.  He just wasn't making enough money to make a decent living so he called it a day.  TBH, many of our riders are professionals.  They're not usually riding their own horses so they don't have much interest in photographs of themselves.    I thought he might do better taking photos at pony club events - the kids always love their photographic mementoes but I was at a club meet a couple of weeks ago and their photographer only sold one photo all day.  Looking around at the people who watch the show-jumping at Addington, most of them seem to have the latest, state-of-the-art DSLR anyway so if they want photos, they tend to take them themselves.There IS a point to what I'm saying here, so I'll get down to it.  

Matt, our commentator, also has a stable yard and his fiancee rides and jumps horses.  She was riding in several classes in our Summer Classic 5-day competition last week but because Matt was commentating and therefore stuck in the judges' box, he couldn't take any decent photos so I decided to take some for him.  It seems that he was somewhat impressed with the photos I took because he showed them to Tim, the centre owner, who promptly offered me the job as the centre photographer!  He wants photographs taken to be put up on a web-site and sold directly from there.  Of course, I declined.  I just don't have the confidence or the ability yet to produce work that would be good enough for sale but it was extremely flattering to be asked.

Anyway - that's it for now.  I need to get some sleep ready for an early start at Addington tomorrow.

Take care, stay safe, shiny side down