Being cameraless

My camera has been in the shop for repairs for over a week and I've been going crazy without it. Everything I think about doing involves a camera. It's like I feel only half there without it.

I have a back-up -- my old Canon 40D -- but when I got it out and tried to turn it on, nothing happened. I charged the battery, and still nothing. So today I drove across town to the camera store, hoping the problem was just a worn out battery. It was. Whew! That was a relief. The Detroit Zoo was on the way home so I stopped in.

Such a good idea. It was a beautiful sunny day and our zoo has absolutely lovely land and trees and flowers, not to mention a butterfly house, and environmentally-friendly spaces for the animals. When I got there, lots of school kids were lined up ready to go back to school. I didn't want to spook the kids so took a few "lap pictures" (shot without looking through the viewfinder) and went on my way.

I started at the butterfly house and experienced what I had forgotten is always a problem for me with that camera: the shutter release button is incredibly difficult for me to push. I don't have that problem with my Canon 7D, but the 40D is very frustrating for me to use. The only way I could get anything today was to use manual focus (not all that easy for my gimpy hands either) and put on the 3-second timer.

Not the easiest way to work but at least I could get something. And that "something" was the gorgeous peacocks that were wandering around everyplace. I took a good number of blurry shots but got a few good ones.

Click on image to see it larger.

All in all, it was a wonderful day. And now I feel like myself again.