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Great around the campfire or just becuase. I haven’t had s’mores in forever. With it being Summer and the MacroMonday’s theme this week being Food/Ingredients I thought this would make for a fun subject.

I like the various textures in the shot. I like the colors, even though I’m not usually a warm color fan. And the cleanup was great. I did make s’mores with it when it was all said and done.

Does anyone else prefer their marshmallows on the stale side?

sam :: Jul.21.2008 :: Misc :: No Comments »

We got a couple of pounds of apricots this weekend with the goal of making jam. Well it was frickin’ hot as heck. So, the last thing I wanted to do was stand over a hot stove stirring molten hot syrup and boiling jars.

But that still left us with a lot of apricots to use up. I sliced some of them and then froze them. So in the dead of Winter I can have a fix of fruit. Sunday evening, I halved and pitted some grilled them and served them with a ginger caramel sauce and ice cream. This evening, we opted for an Apricot Clafouti.

Preheat oven to 350. I took 8-9 apricots split, pitted and quartered them. Then cooked them with a half stick of butter and 1/4 cup of brown sugar until the fruit was soften. I prepped the baking dishes with melted butter and about a table spoon of syrup from cooking the apricots. For the batter I used 2 TBS of powdered sugar, 1/2 cup of flour, 1/4 tsp of baking soda, 1/4 tsp vanilla extract, 2 TBS of melted butter and 3/4 cup of milk. Mixed it all together. I poured about 1/4 cup of batter into each baking dish then put the quartered fruit. I drizzled more of the syrup over the top and baked for about 20 to 25 minutes or until the top is golden brown.

So eh..yeah that’s probably the recipe and measurements.

sam :: Jul.01.2008 :: Misc :: 2 Comments »

My precious iBook is sick and has to be sent in for repair. Given that its a laptop and portable, it does tend to get moved and jostled a fair amount in its day to day life. The solder points on the a/c plug get loose over time and this is one of those times. Its happened before, but its to the point where I can’t deal with it any more, since its causing the backlight to go out on the display. Makes it challenging to work if the display is black.

Most likely it will wind up with a new logic board and re-formatted hard drive when I get it back. Now, I’m not too significantly concerned about data loss and such. I’m pretty consistent about backing up important information on external drives and cds/dvds.

The issue I have is that my back up computer is an older 12″ G3 iBook that doesn’t have PS on it and doesn’t have the disk space or processing power to run it effectively. So, no way to edit photos until I get it back.

I’ve spoken to Apple and they’ve sent out the repair box. Typically repair turnaround is fairly quick so. I’ll probably have it back by the beginning of the week. On the good side, it will be all clean and decluttered when I get it back and I’ll be a bit better with my file management.

I’ll also stop using iPhoto since it tends to be very bloated and makes so many needless caches and thumbnails of photos. Which has proven to be a huge disk space pig.

Anyhoo, be back in a week or so.

sam :: Jun.24.2008 :: Misc :: 1 Comment »

Things have been a little hectic around the ol homefront. I’ve got a couple of deadlines I’m working with, family visiting and getting some personal matters cleaned up.

So, once the schedule clears up..I’ll be back to blogging on a more consistent level.

sam :: Jun.17.2008 :: Misc :: No Comments »

I loved these letter magnets as a kid. I’m sure millions of Baby Boomers and Gen-Xers practiced reading and spelling with them. Just like I did. Heck I’ve even used them to help my nephews, nieces and younger siblings with their vocabulary and spelling lessons. Just like my Ma did for me.

I still have them on my fridge. They’re a fun way for the family to communicate. One of the more invaluable functions, is that it provides a fun way to fill out the weekly shopping list. What’s supposed to happen is that when we run out of a staple in the fridge, freezer or pantry, whoever used the last of it is supposed to spell it out in colorful letters on the fridge. Yeah, that doesn’t always work out as its supposed. But it seemed like a good idea in theory.

Today, my colorful little letter magnets reminded me that life really is pretty damn good and to smile.

sam :: May.27.2008 :: Misc :: 2 Comments »

This is actually one of the stormwater ponds near my house. I scared off a few jackrabbits as I was trudging around taking shots. There were literally thousands of lupins blooming and hundreds of bees gathering nectar. I loved the way the sunlight was coming through the trees and casting intermittent shadows. Now that I think about it, it probably wasn’t the smartest thing for me to do without having my Epi-pen handy…

sam :: May.24.2008 :: Misc :: No Comments »

These little guys brought a much needed smile to my face. I hope they do the same for you.

sam :: May.23.2008 :: Misc :: No Comments »

It amazes me how quickly the past 12 months have flown by. A year ago today, I packed up everything I own, said goodbye to some dear friends and shut the door on a chapter of my life. Oh, yes I am feeling extremely sentimental today, or morose or both. Probably both.

I wouldn’t say I’ve started a new chapter. More like I’ve started the sequel in a continuing and evolving story. I won’t bore you with the story(ies) of the past and how I arrived this particular place and time. I’ll just say that being here is a lot better than being there.

And if it weren’t for all my stuff (except my bed, some clothes and my laptop) being stuck in a storage unit and my Mother being highly allergic to paint fumes (yes, I live with my Mother. sigh). I wouldn’t have picked photography back up.

My preferred creative outlets have been painting and music. I don’t have the space to do either. A camera is fairly compact and I can take and use it just about anywhere and there’s no fumes. Well except for that time I melted a plastic donkey in the microwave..Anyway…

I do believe everything happens for a reason and I don’t really see any point in dwelling on the past. Whatever the reason, I’m here now and looking ahead.

sam :: May.20.2008 :: Misc :: No Comments »

Its supposed to be in the 90s today. What am I doing? Sitting on my ass waiting for a delivery of obscene quantities of custom smoked salmon. With the occasional photo break thrown in.

One of the annoyances of working from home is that my family assumes that just because I’m at home, I’m available to do their errands or do things for them. Usually this is without considering my schedule or plans. But that’s a rant for another time. Sigh…

Anyhoo…The skies are clear, so gives me plenty of opportunity to work on one of my favorite photo clichés, pretty flower against blue sky.

I’ve mentioned my fondness of yellow and blue together previously.

Hopefully, once I find out for certain if the smoked salmon is truly getting delivered today (which I hope it isn’t), I’ll be able to get out and about and enjoy the gorgeous weather.

UPDATE Timing is everything. About an hour after that photo was taken, it got very hazy and the clouds started to move in. That’s a by-product of the marine climate and the temperature rising quickly. So, no more blue sky, but nice even flat light. Now if we could just do something about that humidity.

sam :: May.16.2008 :: Misc :: No Comments »

The challenge with having Foodie Friends, is that there’s this constant game of Oneupmanship and of course never ending food lust.

The lust element is run up a few notches because they also share my fondness for cooking and foodtography (if that’s not a word, it totally should be.) This makes for pornographic food shots. Its totally fine when I do it to people. But so not fair when the table’s turned.

Remember that decadent Bacon Cheeseburger from a few weeks ago? Yeah, the same person that got me waking up at 5 am craving heart attack inducing, Bacon Cheeseburger goodness, also got me craving pancakes.

Last evening I started by making my syrup (blackberry thank you) and whipped butter. Yeah, I made my own whipped butter. Yes, I’m that obsessive. I woke up bright and early today (OK who am I kidding? Earlyish being 9ish) and started flipping flapjacks.

30 Silver Dollar Pancakes later and 10 photograph worthy ones, you have the image above. Of course as soon as I was done with this photo I spotted an amazing looking piece of Lasagna. So, now I’m craving Lasagna. Like I need anymore carbs today?

sam :: May.14.2008 :: Misc :: 2 Comments »