More Experiments, the Weather, and D.B. Pt 7

Another Experiment

This is an attempt to use the Speed Graphic's focal plane shutter to shoot the strobes.  It works--kind of.  I have to set it to the "T" setting which opens the shutter for however long you leave it, then push the shutter button twice.  I imagine that the shutter is open for about 1/30 of a second, so even in the studio, there is a ghost image.  I can work that to my advantage on some images, but I don't think I'm going to be able to have the sharp flash image at my disposal.  Combine that with the short depth of field and focussing becomes a nightmare.

Bored yet?

Yesterday's weather here was perfect.  Everywhere you looked, people looked happy.  Most had their first sun of the year.  They had changed their wardrobes to new Spring fashion.  And I mean, man, EVERYBODY was sexy.  It was the light and the colors and the hint of things to come, sure, but the weather changes everything--how you walk and talk.  But it was more than that.  Hormones were in the air.  My receptors are specialized.  I could smell estrogen.  Pheromones were flying.  I'm certain one day there will be a study about what happens when the weather changes.  Our bodies are screaming for mates.  And as some studies already show, women's voices get higher and men perceive them to be more sexually attractive.  And that was going on yesterday.  People just don't get better looking over night.  Even I felt attractive.  I was full of hope.

I think I should just follow the weather.

*     *     *     *     *

Mavis stopped by one night.  The dog started going nuts as soon as her truck pulled into the driveway.  Wiley was a stray that followed me home one night when I was running at dusk.  She appeared like a ghost and stayed with me for the last quarter mile of my loop through the neighborhood.  I hadn't asked her to come.  But she was all  starving bones and popping eyeballs, so I mixed up some eggs and milk to feed her when we got back to the house.  And, of course, she never left.  She was a German Shepherd/ Husky mix, and we'd been together now for fifteen years. she was a very loyal companion, but she had never lost her street sense.  If anyone was a little "off," she would sense it and would go crazy, too.  She was a good predictor and I trusted her sense on this.  But Mavis was a veterinarian, and I was certain it was the animal smells she was responding to.  

Mavis, of course, didn't mind the dog.  She was used to them.  "Come here, sugar, what's the matter," she crooned, but the dog curled up like a spring.  "She just smells the other animals," Mavis said.  "She'll be alright."  

I felt a bit like the dog, myself, though.  It had been many, many years since I had entertained a woman, and in truth, I'd not done it much before that.  And Mavis was a bit odd.  She was built like a teenage boy and talked in a half scream.  She had smoked her whole life, she told me, but she had quit this year.  She had gone to Guatemala and stayed in the mountains for a month where she couldn't get cigarettes.  Her voice, however, would always have that smoker's rasp.  

Was I smelling the animals on her, too, I wondered?  There she stood in black leotards and cowboy boots and a big old sweater.   

"You want a beer?" she asked me.  "I have some in the truck."  

"No," I said, "I think it's time for a whiskey.  You want one?"