My First Sale of the Year

Hurrah! Alien Skin want to buy my story "Designer Genes" for their April/May 2009 Issue. It's only a flash piece, so it's not much money, but it's a great start to the year, especially since it's a magazine I really like.

???

The first book I picked up at work this morning gave me a bit of a shock.



How was I supposed to classify that? Some years ago, I learned the Cyrillic alphabet (a long story), so I tried to sound it out. "Snekmro-phomo-memrucheskee camalog zvezd." No help there.

I tried looking inside.


"Spektro-photo-metreecheskee catalog zvezd." Spectro-photometric Catalogue Something-or-other. OK, so catalogues go under "Table and Data Books" - 522.0212. So far so good. But putting it in the database was going to be slow going. I didn't have a Cyrillic keyboard. All I could think of was to use the word processor to "insert symbol" one letter at a time, and then cut and paste.

And then I tried the next page:

Duh!

I think tomorrow I might have a coffee before I start putting books in the database.

RTFM

Father Christmas was kind enough to bring me a new camera lens: slightly telephoto (just right for portraits), large maximum aperture (for shooting in low light, and for throwing the background out of focus), and macro capability (it'll focus so close that I can fill the frame with a postage stamp). By my standards it was a lot of money, and I've been disappointed that I've had so little time to play with it.

Without the temporary job, I'd have had plenty of time to play, but no money to buy it. Typical.

So when I went to Fuencaliente last week, to photograph the animals being blessed, I took it with me.

And it wouldn't work. Every time I tried, I got an error message "F--"

Which is about what I said. Thank goodness I had the two zoom lenses that came with the body.

The new lens wouldn't work at home either. I didn't have time to look for the manual just then, as I have to do most of the cleaning and cooking at weekends. And when I finally had time to look, I couldn't find it. I spent hours not finding it.

I began to get worried. If my shiny, new lens had broken, I had to get it back to the shop while it was still under guarantee. On the other hand, I wasn't used to it, and maybe I was doing something dumb. Definitely a time for the old software engineer's standby - RTFM: Read the Manual.

I didn't have time to look for the manual just then, as I have to do most of the cleaning and cooking at weekends. And when I finally had time to look, I couldn't find it. I spent hours not finding it.

Yesterday my husband had the brilliant idea of looking for the manual online. And this afternoon, I found it (at http://www.pentaximaging.com/files/manual/K10D_Manual.pdf
for anyone with the same problem)

And the lens is fine, thank goodness. That's the error message for when you're trying to use a silly aperture. I set to to automatic aperture, and took this photo of a Christmas tree bauble that doesn't seem to have made it back into storage yet.

Phew!

No BSFA award for me.

I just found out that I didn´t make the shortlist for the BSFA 2008 award for non-fiction. Ah well. I'm still chuffed I got nominated.

And maybe one day I will win it. You never know.

Yesterday's drive to Barlovento was very nice, even though we didn't go for the best of reasons (see previous post.) We got to the local police station, and found it shut. So we popped into the bar and had a coffee and a nibble. Then Theresa remembered that the insurance firm had given her a photocopied list with all the phone numbers for all the police stations on the island. So I tried the mobile, and got no answer. Great.

So I asked the waitress, and she said he was usually to be found the other end of the village. We'd got about two yards outside the bar when the policeman drove past.

We ran after the car. He must have seen us because he parked. I was amused to see he looked exactly like an American Sheriff in a TV programme - the genial sort, fortunately. It was no big deal for him, but he took all the details and said that he'd produce the report when requested. After all that driving, it only took about ten minutes.

We went to the accident site for some daylight photos (see Helen and Theresa's blog). Then it was on to Franceses, to feed their cat who was very pleased to see us. Meanwhile, I spent ten very happy minutes taking photos of the almond blossom in their neighbour's garden.

And then we drove all the way home in time for a late lunch.