Wednesday's Wanderings

No sewing or blogging for me yesterday. Allow me to whine about my shoulder for just a minute here. It has a happy ending, so take heart (since I know you've been lying awake at night worrying about this). As I griped last week, my shoulder cost me two perfectly good days of sewing last week. I moved away from the OTC pain killers onto the hard stuff and then spent those days lying around on my heating pad sleeping them off. Well, they helped my shoulder, but they made me feel like crap too. I had one good day, but then the pain was back and it has been hanging around ever since...not enough to stop me from doing stuff, but enough to slow me down considerably. And I really don't want to keep taking the pain killers and muscle relaxants because who has time for that?

Anyway, yesterday morning I was almost to the point of calling my pain specialist. She is the best doctor for someone in pain. She works together with an RN who is also a licensed massage therapist, and together they can always make it stop hurting. I just hate to go in to their office, that's all, and with the terrible weather we've had, I wouldn't have been able to get off the hill even if I wanted to. That, and I imagine they too were staying home.

Here's a gratuitous picture of our field a few days ago. I wouldn't want to post something that was all words and no images, now would I?

Lots of snow for us, but that was only the beginning. The gods of weather laid down yet more snow together with a layer of ice before they were finished with us. Definitely a day to stay home.

So to get back to yesterday, it was a swimming day and I needed some groceries, and so I braved my aching shoulder and the bad roads to make my way to the pool and the grocery store. I figured swimming might actually help, and if it didn't, then no problem. I'd just get out of the pool and do my grocery shopping. Well, I was able to do my whole workout, and the longer I swam, the better it felt. After my swim, I sat in their hot tub and stretched, and it is a whole lot better today. It could always come back, but I'm feeling the best I've felt in over a week. Just for good measure, I picked up some of the ThermaCare patches that one of you recommended (Thanks, Kate!) while I was at the grocery store. They were even on sale, for me, no doubt!

And speaking of the grocery store...it was absolutely mobbed. I figure everybody else in town was in the same boat I was in. We all stocked up before the storm, but who knew the warm weather wouldn't return as predicted? (Rhetorical, of course. We actually should have known.) And the store obviously wasn't getting all of its deliveries because the shelves looked as if they'd been looted. Nevertheless, I got everything on my list, and so I'm set for another week now.

So things are looking quite a bit better today. The temperatures have warmed up and we got quite a bit of rain last night. I'll tell you what: Smitty is so happy to see bare ground again. He's been out all morning. (Isn't he getting big? He's almost two, and so he's probably fully grown now.)

There's still a patch of snow behind him, but that is pretty much all that's left anywhere...patches of snow.

The birds have pretty well emptied all of the bird feeders, and so that'll be on my list of things to do today. Feed the birdies.

I sort of like these times after a big snowfall. All of the tree limbs are dripping with crystalline water droplets.

Which reminds me: I bought some fancy lenses for my iPhone a couple of weeks ago, and I haven't really had the motivation to get out and play with them much. These are some fairly high quality lenses from a company called Olloclip. First, I purchased the four-lens combo, which includes a wide angle lens, a fisheye lens, and two macro lenses. I was impressed enough with those that I decided to also purchase the telephoto lens, which also includes a polarizing filter and some adapters so that it will fit on all of the lenses. And as long as I was making that investment, I also purchased the flip case for the phone that allows me to flip up the corner of the case so that the lenses will fit over without my needing to remove the phone from its case. (Can you tell I'm writing from Photographer Mode now?) 

So, all of that to say that when I saw those water droplets, I was motivated to test out the macro lenses a little more on these water droplets. These are not the best images, but when you look at them, keep in mind that I was hand holding the phone, and I was focusing on the image within the water droplets (which is an upside down rendering of the tree). And these are not too bad when you consider all the forces working against them.

This next one is just the same image of the one above, only closely cropped in on just the lowest drop.

So, now I'm wanting to get outside and play some more, and try some less-difficult-to-capture subjects.

As for today's plans, I'm getting my monthly pedicure, which was rescheduled from last Friday because of the snow. I'm still stitching away on the latest Vintage Tin. These are surprisingly slow going. There is a lot of open area, but what needs stitching takes longer than one would expect. I'm just getting started on the "5", and then I still have the "Speed Limit" letters to do.

And if I'm going to get to my appointment on time, I'd better get a move on. I hope you have a lovely day planned for yourself.