Portland's Skyline, March 5, 2009

I took this with the CoolPix L12. For a week before I sent the D50 off for cleaning and maintenance, I took only the CoolPix with me, so that I could sort of wean myself off my digital SLR. The little one holds its on in some respects, but I will be so extremely, outta sight happy to get my hands on the D50 again!

ABC Wednesday – L is for Legs

Mannequin legs, that is, these particular ones that I met June 28, 2007.

Here's how it happened.

I'm pushing back the metal-folding-inner-elevator door, looking down to make sure that the floor of the elevator and the foyer floor are level with each other, a necessity with our dear Otis, circa 1924.

I notice the feet with the red-painted toenails out of the corner of my eye.

"Excuse me," I say as I step into the elevator. "Whoop! What do we have hear!" I exclaim as my eyes travel up the legs, and the elevator goes up to the fourth floor.

By the time it stops, I know I need my camera which I had not taken to the outdoor art show/street fair I'd been at that Thursday night, trying to sell various items I'd crafted. I get my cell phone out and call Mama.

"Could you bring me my camera, please?" I ask. "I'm in the hall at the elevator."

"Are those legs still there?" she responds. "I knew you'd want to take a picture if they were still there when you got home."

"Yes, they are, and you're right. I've got to take a picture of this!" I excitedly reply.

In minutes, Mama comes around the corner, carrying my D50 by the strap. I ask her what she thought when she saw the legs.

"I was about to turn and run," she replies, "because I thought a naked woman was on the elevator!"

Life's a hoot, isn't it, even when someone pulls your leg.

Looking northwest, across the Willamette, at Portland's Downtown

I took this photo yesterday with my new camera, a Nikon CoolPix L12. The reason I have a new camera is that my Nikon D50 quit working on Sept. 11. The camera shop couldn't fix it, so it's gone to the camera hospital. I tried to take photos with my 2004 CoolPix, but I felt like I'd been rode hard and put up wet (tired), like I was running down the road out of alignment (frustrated), like the ground I walked on was spongy at best (worried). You get the picture.



In this close up of a portion of the skyline, you can see the green and red Hawthorne Bridge that crosses the Willamette River. It's to the left of the photo, at the bottom of the tall black-and-white-columned building, sort of hidden in the trees of Tom McCall Park. Those aren't really columns, of course. They just look like it.That's the Wells Fargo building. (The tall building to the right is nicknamed The Big Pink; it's officially the US Bancorp Tower.) The first time I walked across the river, I walked through falling snow that had quickly covered the bridge and the city with a couple inches of beautiful snow--back on Jan. 16. In fact, I've yet to walk across a different bridge.

The concrete line with vehicles on it is the Marquam Bridge which carries I-5 north from Mexico to Canada. I've driven south on this bridge, on the lower level. Not on the top level, northbound--not yet.