A week without taking a picture (well, almost). My son even asked him to photograph him with the mice on his head and I declined. Maybe I needed time off after the trip. Maybe it is the struggles I've had with processing the darned images I already have. Adobe is far from my favorite software. I inadvertently (apparently) clicked on something and changed my images from 8 bit to 16 bit. Apparently my computer and Adobe won't let me save to jpgs if 16 bit is selected. I had a day of struggles trying to figure out where my jpg option had disappeared to. I even uninstalled and reinstalled. Not a total waste as the program seems to be behaving somewhat better and let me upload close to 1000 RAW images w/out crashing. It has been crashing regularly when I make it download over 50 images or so at a time. But then turns out one of my media cards is perhaps a bit corrupt and I couldn't get the jpg images off the darned thing - and it was crashing Adobe. I eventually was able to download them to my laptop. But then trying to cut a DVD crashed that. Thumb drive from hubbie eventually came to the rescue and I finally have the images. Hours later. I uploaded 7 images a couple days ago to flickr. Just started uploading of first album to fotki. Making very slow progress. This covers about 4 days out of 3 weeks. I also have trouble editing down as I envision different people in my intended family audience - maybe Uncle C would get a kick out of this one, maybe grandma will want a choice of close ups of this kid. So then I start getting a bit random about it - and still have too many images. Deal. You don't have to look at them. And how long do I have to keep the crappy images the kids took? Some are cool - maybe 3 out of 30? In an artistic blurry sort of way.

Been doing some clean up in anticipation of my brother and sister-in-law's visit. She is one of those housewives that actually cleans and has a nice home. I am pretty much the antithesis. I do manage to pick up enough for a cleaner to sweep through once every two weeks. Every now and then I imagine a fire sweeping through so I can start again w/out all the crap. I could be more ruthless about getting rid of stuff... but one day I might want it... And if it was all gone how would my youngest make his recycled crap sculptures (that we are never allowed to get rid of?). Oh - maybe that would be a good thing... I put the kids (willingly) to work yesterday scrubbing down the walls etc. I am always amazed that food stains can end up on the wall above my head. How does that happen?! A. complained today that his arm was sore - from all the scrubbing he figures. My hubbie called it "elbow grease". I just kept thinking "wipe on" "wipe off" from Karate Kid. The trash can he cleaned hasn't looked this clean in 4 or more years. Q. helped me clean off the ladder to their loft bed this morning. Who knew we could get that grime off?! Cool. Then was talking to my brother on the phone this afternoon thinking I was just about done when I happened to gaze up. Darn! Haven't vacuumed the molding and ceilings in a while apparently. Did that this afternoon. Then a little bit more wiping off of finger prints on doors etc. The place isn't actually tidy but it IS cleaner than it used to be. And I have also done something like 10 loads of laundry in 2 days. A. is begging for his own bedroom (which means a different house/city). Q. is begging to not have that happen - unless his brother stays sleeping in the same room and they use the 2nd room for toys - then he is all for it. Hubbie wants a camper. No place for that here either. But I like SF. Mostly.

Back has been bad this week which interfered with sleeping and walking but sitting was mostly OK except when my stomach was bothering me. Didn't help.