Thursday's Shutterclick.

Today's picture was actually taken last night..

Two things about this picture:

First, there's a bug hidden in there that I didn't realize was there until I was going through the process of converting the picture from RAW to JPEG. So, I'll leave it to you guys to check the large size to see if you can find it (there's also one size larger).

And B:

When I first bought this camera, I think one of the things I first noticed about the world around me was the absolute absence of leaves on the trees, and ever since, I've just been twitching with all sorts of anxious anticipation to actually see some signs of life. And, here we have it --the first tree in the yard with leaves, and even though they are tiny little things, I am looking forward to lounging around listening to the wind as it whispers its way through this tree's leafy leafiness.

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On a personal note, thank you all for the well-wishes and words of care and concern after yesterday's whimper fest. It's nice to know you all are out there, and if the world was populated with more folks like you, I'd imagine things on this planet would be a hell of a lot better than what they are now.

For what it's worth, yesterday actually turned out to be a reasonably fair day. After I medicated the aches and pains out of my system, I stepped outside to find that the temperature had snuck its way into the 70's, and with my opiated glow, it was damn near orgasmic. The best thing I did yesterday was the simple act of kicking off my slippers to walk barefoot on my sun-baked, dark-red (pseudo-brick) patio to feel the heat work its way up into the aching knuckles of my toes. I don't know if there's a better feeling than that anywhere in the world at the moment.

Freakin' wonderful!

Then again, in August, when the temperature is a blistering triple-digit nightmare, I think you'll notice a distinct change in my tone as I go from "oh, this is nice" to something along the lines of "WTF?!? What kind of idiot puts in a dark-colored patio in a place with no freakin' shade? You could sauté a pig on this patch of concrete!"

-DP