Ben’s Weblog

It’s been raining most of the weekend here in the lovely Chicago ‘burbs. Payback for the perfect weather we had here last weekend, I suppose. Yesterday was a Board of Directors meeting for Y&G, so between the meeting and driving down and back from Champaign, I pretty much shot the entire day. Today’s just an around-the-house kind of day – I popped out to get an overdue haircut, and I’ve been doing a little bit of laundry. Every week, I bring home a suitcase of dirty laundry, wash it, and re-load most of the same stuff, since I wear uniform shirts at the plant – this lets me avoid wearing a lab coat over my usual workday polo+dockers.

I’ve been playing around with macro photography the past few weeks since one of the best macro subjects (flowers) is at its peak right now around here. It’s a different sort of challenge from shoointg landscapes like I usually do. I got some extension tubes to facilitate getting up-close shots without springing for a $6-800 macro lens (which I’m sure the chief financial officer [aka Marcie] appreciates), but now I’ve got worry about ridiculously shallow depth-of field. I think I may need a new split-prism focusing screen for the camera, but that purchase will require CFO approval. As usual, once I get around to post-processing them, I’ll have some up on the website. I got a decent number of keepers from the St. Louis and Chicago Botanical Gardens, as well as Marcie’s own gardens here.

I’m a little bummed…I was hoping I’d get to head over to Germany for about a week for work, but my schedule got changed, and so I get to spend another couple of exciting weeks in Allentown. Woo hoo.
These weeks will probably be a little more dull, since my usual “partners in crime” out in Lehigh will be in Germany. On the plus side, it means my liver will probably get a few days of reprieve and I’ll get a little extra sleep each night.

For another random swing in conversation, I loaded some more new music into my iPod – had O.A.R. recommened to me by Kelly, one of my colleagues on the project out in Lehigh. They’ve been playing “Love and Memories” a lot in Chicago lately, but the rest of the CD’s worth a listen. It’s an interesting mix…kind of collision between a ska band, your standard pop band (matchbox twenty?), Dave Matthews Band, and maybe a little more. Just to contribute to the entropy of the iPod, I also loaded some mid-90s Oasis, some 80s (Huey Lewis and the News), some comedy from Mitch Hedberg, and a random selection of Elvis Costello.