Lovely Winter

It's cold now, and dark, soon it's the darkest time of the year - when you can see signs like "be ware of falling icicles" or hear the snowplough scraping past your house in the morning.

Soon Christmas will be here, though judging by the stores, it has been here for a while - they started filling their windows with decorations in October. I just hate that, as if winter wasn't long enough without them having to remind me even before the leaves stared falling...

There are some things I like about winter though, like mulled wine and gingerbread cookies. Or snuggling up in a sofa with a blanket watching a movie, taking long hot baths, or when all the advent candle sticks get removed from storage, and every window glows homely through the dark nights.

To Mr and me, winter is special. Even though we both prefer summer. The first time we met was a November evening and the first time we said "I love you" was the midwinter solstice. It's a time of year when we remember those early crazy romantic days of our relationship and reminisce.

An other thing I like about this time of year is that "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy movies, as well as "The Hobbit" movies has had their premieres then. I've always looked forward to seeing them, though this time I'm a bit worried as to how they will present the last part...

You see, I'm one of those hard core Tolkien admirers who don't see kindly to changes. Especially when, in my opinion, brilliant bits of the book are removed and replaced with exaggerated action scenes, concocted love stories or recurring characters who do not belong in the story. To me "The Hobbit" has always been more about courage than anything else, and while I think that they did a good job capturing that in the first movie, I found the second one lacking that particular quality. But I digress, this was supposed to be about winter after all, so... what else...

I love the beauty of winter - the snow, the frost and the icicles. Shooting them is so much fun even though I hate the cold, I get very enthusiastic when snow falls. These shots are not from today though, they're from almost two years ago when I was lucky enough to find some gorgeous ice-formations down by the pier.

Shooting snow is hard. I've taken many walks with my camera in the woods and come home with "nothing" - the light conditions are very tricky - since this is a dark time of year. The shots often lack that "zest" that I like and end up "flat". The trick is not to shoot on overcast days, which is easily said than done. Though sometimes, in the end of the winter, when the days are a bit brighter, you might end up lucky anyway, like when I shot these. I look forward to the snow this year. I hope I will get the opportunity to do some serious shooting.

/Mrs Hjort

Page 394

Whenever I'm at work, having just finished going through new stuff in front of a class, when I get to the point when I tell the students to look up a page in the book and get to work, I always think of Snape!

You see, I have perfect sound memory, and for some reason, one of Snape's lines has burned itself into my memory. I can actually hear it as I write this; "Turn to page three hundred and ninety four!" (Harry Potter, the Prisoner of Azkaban)

This is how my mind works. Ever so often, when I hear a phrase, or when I am in a certain situation, I can remember certain sounds, with perfect clarity. Mr is the same, and I love that! During our years together we've developed our own inside humor. We very often think of the same sounds, look at each other, and chuckle. Like when one of us (Mr!) puts on clothes that one other one of us (me!) doesn't like, because they don't fit the occasion, we'll go "I'm not going to be wearing the shoes am I?!"  - a line from the Office (UK version). Or when one of us corrects the other, the sentence will end with "... my young Padawan" (Star Wars). Or, when one of us is late we'll go "A wizard is never late!" (Lord of the Rings).

So there you have it, I hope you've enjoyed today's random ramblings haha. Oh, and by the way, Mr is back now! Squeeeeeeee! :D

See you soon

/MrsHjort

Mr and Morris

To continue the cat theme I've been running when Mr is away, I'll show you this picture today. A while back there was a "pet and owner" contest on W1K, and I made Mr pose on the floor with our most tractable cat Morris. Those two have always been very tight and Morris sleeps with Mr every night, to Mr's delight, and annoyance.

You see, Morris is a very kind cat - you could do almost anything to him and he'd just purr and look patiently at you - turn him upside down? No problem! Carry him around all day? Fine! Put him inside your sweater? Yup, no problem! But while Morris is very patient and placable, he's also very clingy, and when he lays down in your lap he suddenly becomes very cumbersome, and at least twice as heavy. So, when Morris comes to sleep with Mr at night, he does not lay down and curl up like into small ball beside Mr. No, no, he lays down on top of Mr and "ferments", like a large piece of heavy dough - which has actually inspired some of Morris' nick names, like "the lump of dough" or just "Lumpy".

Anyway, Morris also misses Mr, and he has been trying his doughy techniques on me lately, in lack of the real deal. But, sorry Lumpy, no such luck! Like me, you'll just have to wait until Mr gets home. You'll have to settle with the other side of the bed for now.

Good night :)

/MrsHjort

Crazy Cat Lady

When the cat's away... no let's start over, when Mr is away... Mrs goes crazy! I's so hard to pass the time here at home... alone... I'm just too used to having Mr around to talk to. You'll never guess what I've done today. If you do, then you're probably a crazy cat lady too.

Well, let me put it this way, since Mr is away this week, I'm left alone with the cats, and today, I've been training Freya, the kittie in the picture, to shake hands. See! I told you you'd never guess!

A while back, a friend of mine told me about this device called a clicker. It's a small thing you hold in your hand that you can "click", which helps you train your pets. Ever heard of Pavlov's dog? It works just like that! The first few times your click the device every time your per eats their favorite food - that way they will associate the sound with reward. Later, you click the clicker when training your pet, but only when they do something to your satisfaction on command - that way they will learn to do what ever you desire on cue. It really works!

The training session today was me saying "pretty paw!" and holding out my hand to Freya. A few days ago, I had to tap her paw gently, sort of forcing her to hold it out, then click and give her a reward (you should always reward when clicking, or the click will loose its "power"), but she caught on pretty fast and after a few training sessions spread out over a few day's she's got it! Mr has really doubted the validity of clicker training, I've taught her to sit down before (since she used to jump at me when ever I took out the treats) and he dismissed it as her "maturing". Bah, humbug! Clicker training really works and he'll drop his jaw when he comes home, moahahahahaaaaaa! No no, I'm really not that crazy, just a tiny bit...

/MrsHjort

All by Myself

Next week is going to be really slow. Mr just left for Stockholm this morning and won't come back until next Saturday. I just hate it when he's away, but luckily I won't be entirely alone. I still have my furry friends to keep me company, so I guess I'll be the crazy cat lady for a week haha. They may not me much for conversation, but at least they are good listeners, and they love snuggling.

Mr and I will soon celebrate our ten year anniversary. Not that we've been married that long yet, but it's been ten years since we fist became a couple, nine since we got engaged - Mr proposed to me on our first anniversary. Funny how fast time flies, ten years feels like a lot, and yet, at the same time, it's like I've known him forever. I cannot remember how life was like without him. I guess I'll "find out" this week...

/MrsHjort

Tropical Nights

As the day's grow shorter, and colder, I long more and more for the tropics. This weekend Mr and I went to a museum with an artificial rain forest. I could not help but go "aaaaaaah" as I stepped inside and inhaled the warm humid air. I love environments like that, not only because of the lovely smells and pleasant memories that they bring back, but also because they're very healthy. Or, at least for me they are.

I grew up with asthma. During my teens it was particularly hard, and I just hated the winter - the cold would make it quite difficult for me. I guess my lungs have always bothered me in some way. Nowadays my asthma is gone - after a change of diet (no margarine) - but instead I get occasional chest pain as a result of three past lung-related "injuries". You see, I'm one of those genetic rarities who has the misfortune to be prone to spontaneous pneumothorax - collapse of the lung. It really sucks getting those sharp pains. As the winter comes, I get more and more paranoid as the temperature falls and my lungs sting with increasing frequency, and intensity...

It's been 4 years now, since my last relapse (knock on wood). Hopefully it's something I will not get again, and the pain is just something I have to live with. Gah! I sound like an old lady haha. Complaining about bad weather and aching limbs. But hey, that's life I guess. But enough with the rambling, now for bed, and pleasant dreams about warmer climates :)

Sleep tight!

/MrsHjort

In "Transit"

What I hate about travelling, is that you usually spend a lot of time waiting... If you're unlucky, you spend just as much time idling at various airports, or train stations, as you do in transit, if not more.

I usually feel like something the cat dragged in at those situations, which means that I don't feel like shopping (I don't even like shopping in normal circumstances), and I usually end up just sitting, waiting for time to pass.

There are some who have found ways to make time pass more quickly though, like this guy, or how about picking one of these?

Cheers

/MrsHjort

First Snow

The first thing I noticed as I opened my eyes this morning was giant snowflakes falling outside my window. My initial thought was "Nooooooo! Why?" but as I stood up, I saw the beauty of the landscape...

It's strange how the fire in your heart can be awoken by a lovely view. I took a sick day today, and even though I feel kind of funny, and my head isn't quite screwed on properly (excuse the typos, I'm sure there are a lot of them today), my photography fingers awoke and started twitching with joy.

I love the view from our home, I know I've said it before, but I cannot help myself. These are shot from the attic window, with my  70-300 mm macro lens, using a tripod and remote. I love playing around with that lens. It's not as fast as my "all-around" 15-105 mm lens and it's kind of noisy, but I love the bokeh you get when you shoot macros with it, and the way you can zoom in and do landscape shots without loosing quality. I've been thinking of getting a telephoto lens for a while now... Any suggestions are welcome :)

/MrsHjort

Lewisia - October's Rhodolite Garnet

Lewisia is my favorite flower, well, at least when it comes to the ones that grow in my garden. I love its sweet pink color and the way it grows in clusters. It blooms twice a year, both in the spring, and in the autumn. So, even though I ended up choosing other flowers this spring, I still got the opportunity to get it into the calendar last month.

My other favorite flower is the Lillie, especially white ones, even though some consider white flowers inappropriate. They say that they only belong to funerals, but I've never been the type to care about things like that. If they are pretty, I love getting them, no matter what color they are.

As you know, If you've kept up with my blog, it was a long time ago that Mr brought me flowers (since the cats usually either eat them, knock over the vases they're in, or in other ways annihilate them), but yesterday... Yesterday I came home to a three course dinner and candle light. Mr, you truly are the best!

/MrsHjort

Wonderful Clichés

Sometimes I can't help myself! Flowers with water drops on them are just so boring, and they have been done millions of times, particularly daisies, but as I saw this in my garden I couldn't help myself! I just had to shoot it! The light hit it just right and the shadowy background made it look like a studio shot, even though it's not, it's really not! It could not be farther from the truth - to shoot this I had to push my tripod to it's limits and place it on some mean mud.

Clichés puzzled me at first, as a virgin hobby photographer, who had just found W1K, the concept was new to me, and it was hard to understand why some of the contests had that restriction. But now, that I've seen more, I find it very wise! Because some things, are just not creative anymore - just like this shot; even though I cannot help but like it I cannot help but think that it's kind of cheep. It's hard so make a flower with droplets on it look bad...

/MrsHjort

Old Friends

Isn't it strange, how you regress when you meet buddies that you go way back with?

I met some of the girls from my class in upper secondary school today. It was like no time had passed at all and we were all teenagers again. We even did some happy girly jumping when we met haha, shrinking with excitement. What a joy to meet them! We laughed a lot, reminiscing and telling long forgotten stories. Odd expressions that we used to use popped into our heads and the way one of the girls played with her hair brought us right back to when we were sitting by a table together, waiting for science class to start, talking about random silly teen stuff. We vividly remembered walking through the corridors (the picture on the right is of a piece of art that you can find in one of the stairways) or sitting in the library together during recess... We were all in the "scientific program" and today we laughed about our nerdy hang out spot. Those were the days!

Yes, it's so much fun to talk about the "good old days", when we were all giggling teenage girls filled with mischief and dreams. Remembering our teachers is particularly fun, like our biology teacher who used to tell us stories of his camping trips, or the math teacher who at one time surprised us all by imitating an elephant in a very life like way... or the time when we brought a cake for our English teacher's 60th birthday, it brought a tear to her eye... and she cancelled the homework test that day... My, my, my! What happy memories... Time really goes by in a wink.

I love our occasional reunions! And it's really wonderful that, even though a decade has passed, we still keep in touch and meet up at least once a year. I hope we can keep it up!

/MrsHjort