As I contemplated getting ready for work, I made a trip downstairs to get my
second cup of coffee. Looked out the window onto the small patio where I get
an opportunity to give my OM equipment a frequent work out because of the
garden which surrounds it and noticed there was a break in the clouds,
providing a nice backlighting to the yellow flowers on the vine growing
beside the garage. Everything was wet as it has been raining here for the
past few days and there was a humming bird actively working the flowers.
History has taught me that I can go out there scare the hummingbird away
while I'm setting up and then if I wait patiently, it will return. To heck
with work, I'm going to capture this "Kodak moment." Dashed upstairs, took
the OM 2S with bellows and 80mm off the tripod, set it aside, grabbed the OM
G I'm testing prior to giving it to my son-in-law, the Zuiko 400mm and
extension tubes. I tried to slip outside as quietly as possible, while
dropping the legs on the tripod. The hummingbird did exactly as I expected
and hauled buns. Set the tripod up, unscrewed the lens cap and thought I
would focus on the area the bird had been working. Man do I have one heck of
a fog filter going, from taking the rig from the air-conditioned comfort of
my home out into the 980midity. Everything was sweating including me.
The camera was wet, the front element was wet, the glass on the eye piece was
wet. Focusing impossible. Hey, I've been here before, so I ran back inside,
went upstairs set my glasses down grabbed a couple of cotton balls to dry the
glass with and went back outside. While I was inside it had sprinkled a bit,
so now I had some water issues going on, not just the fogged up lens. Dried
everything off, tried to focus and realized the glasses were upstairs on the
desk. Ran back inside, upstairs, grabbed the glasses went back outside,
started to focus and the glasses are now totally fogged up. Dang, double
dang and a few other words I learned in the Navy. Well, actually, I knew
them before the Navy. They were part of my qualifications for enlistment.
Got the glasses to the right temperature and dried them off and then took the
body off to install the extension tube . . . now I had a fogged up mirror. I
really do have to go to work, the hummingbird can wait until later and there
is one thing I am absolutely sure about . . . the rest of the weekend has got
to better than the way today started. I hope everyone has a great weekend
and captures some wonderful images that surpass the verbal one I have just
shared with you. Bill Barber
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