17 posts tagged “photography”
Things keep happening in the real world, keeping me from Voxing as usual.
On Friday, I tried to get my credentials verified for when I go out into the adult world. Its a nerve wracking process, and will probably take a few months to complete. After which the even more nerve-wracking visa-job-moving process will begin. Let the fun begin.
Received Peter Reinhart's Whole Grain Breads in the mail. Did not receive Freud's New Lectures. Made a transitional rye hearth bread. Did not make slides for case conference on Thursday.
Had our first American car-wash experience. Tis fun! I can't wait to go back.
Took some shots with the new 55-200mm lens, which we found at Circuit City closing sale at half the price. (Made me feel a bit like a grave robber.)
You knew the pics were coming, didn't you? :)
We paired the bread with a hearty vegetable-quinoa-bean soup. The soup is basically a mish-mash of several web-recipes, but it is really good.
Soup recipe
A baking sheet full of roasted veggies. I used one red onion, two zucchini, a carrot, and one orange pepper, tossed with 1 tbsp of olive oil, salt and pepper, and roasted in a 400 degree post-bread-baking oven for 30 minutes.
1/2 cup pinto beans, soaked for a few hours in warm water
1/4 cup quinoa, washed well in warm water (removes the bitterness)
1 tbsp Better than Buillion veggie base (or one buillion cube)
1 cup packed washed baby spinach leaves
1 tsp garam masala
1 cup diced canned tomatoes
1/4 cup fresh herbs (I used sage and oregano)
1 tbsp olive oil
salt and pepper to taste
Heat the oil in a presure cooker/heavy pot. Add the quinoa and stir around for a couple of minutes, until toasted. Then add the roasted veggies, beans, tomatoes, veggie base, salt and pepper, and about 6 cups of water. Bring the whole mess to a boil and then simmer, covered, until the beans are tender. (In a pressure cooker this will take about twenty minutes, or two whistles.)
During the last few minutes, add the baby spinach, garam masala and fresh herbs. Serve with warm bread and maybe some cheese. Enjoy.
I'd like to send one of the pictures above to this month's Click over at Jugalbandi, themed Wood (includes paper, cane). Which one do you like best?
*Edited to add: I'm sending the first picture to Click-wood. Thanks! Not very happy with it, but too lazy to try more.
Thanks a Ton for the honest opinions. Sometimes I work a picture to the point I can't tell the difference between good and bad; it all starts to look the same. Your opinions help me re-focus. Here's a couple of different cheese pics. They're not earth shattering, either, but tell me how they compare to the two in the first post.
Thanks again for all the opinions. I will be submitting the second pic to Jugalbandi's Click February.
American coffee was the biggest culture shock we had on our first visit to the US. I almost gagged at my first sip of the Starbucks Roast. This was not coffee. Where was the milk? The sugar? The sweet stickiness that was supposed to coat the back of your throat?
Several packets of Equal and half-n-half later, we ended up discarding the coffee.
These days, I drink several cups of black hospital coffee to get through the day. But at home, the old cravings tend to come back.
Indian style whipped coffee
- 2 1/2 tbsp instant coffee (yes, I know)
- a few tbsp water
- 3 cups milk (or an equal mixture of milk and water)
- A sprinkling of drinking chocolate
- In a small glass or metal bowl, mix together the sugar and coffee.
- Now with a spoon, add a few drops of water at a time, until you have a paste of toothpaste consistency. Tilting the bowl, start beating this paste with the spoon. It will change color as you beat it, becoming lighter and increasing in volume. When it starts feeling tight, add another few drops of water.
- After ten minutes of wrist and elbow exercise, you'll end with the whipped cream seen above. (If you've ever beaten butter and sugar for a cake, you know what I'm talking about.)
- Boil the milk. Add a generous tbsp(or more) of the cream into a mug, and pour the boiling milk from a distance into the mug. Gently stir with your spoon until the cream is dissolved. A fine foam will rise to the top. Sprinkle with drinking chocolate if you like. Share with loved ones.
The picture above goes to CLICK July 2008. This month's theme is Coffee and Tea. I'm super-excited because they asked me to be one of the judges for this month's event...makes me feel all grown-up and important. :)
I've been wanting to do this ever since we moved here.
To your right is the riverfront park with an amphitheatre that seats 2500. To your left is the Amtrak station. A double-click on the picture will reveal the second bridge up front on the river. And I'm standing right behind you. :)
The river picture is my entry for Photo Quest #20. Welcome back, WPG!
We stayed in the 1916 farm house, a classic
Craftsman bungalow with lovely views of
the Olympic Mountains.
The last WWII Aircraft
Lookout Tower in the United States once stood on this property.
I could have stayed there forever.
We're back in Seattle now, and spent the morning today at Pike's Place market. What a wonderful place..the sight, the sounds, the smells. People everywhere. It was fun, but there was a nagging sense of unease, of feeling alone in the huge crowd. I hope it goes away soon.
No pictures for Photoquest #10, unless I miraculously find time to go out with the camera tomorrow. New apartment buildings do not interesting doors make.
However, I did find a couple of interesting doorway pictures from our trip to Blackwater falls last year.
The macro setting has to be the single most used setting on my camera. There is always a macro version of all photos I take; its amazing, the things that show up. These are the things the camera found in our living room.
All the pictures were taken in natural light, no flash. I had written down the shutter speed, lens aperture and that kind of thing on a scrap of paper, but I lost it.
This picture also goes to Click-Au Naturel, at my favorite food blog.
The last leaf from our purple tulips.
And finally, something discovered accidentally.
..for Photo Quest 8. We've had a couple of beautiful days, sunny, but still cold. I wanted to take pictures of the tree in the parking lot, which has started to flower.
The branch was swaying a little, and I fuzzed the edges of the picture to downplay the background structures.
Then we took some pictures of the church across the corner.
