This evening, I rather (uncharacteristically) went out to a bar (!) after work (!) to have drinks (!) to celebrate my work-friend’s birthday along with a bunch of people I didn’t know (!!!). I had A rum and coke, so it wasn’t like I guzzled. I don’t like beer, so visits to the bar for informal gatherings such as this are always a bit weird for me. I experience mild anxiety over drink choices and the fact that not being a beer-drinker has a bit more of a pariah-esque quality than even being a teetotaler.

ANYWAY… it was pretty fun. There was good conversation. I was glad that a good number of people showed up to celebrate friend’s birthday.

But now, I’m settled in to watch Contempt (Le Mépris) and get to bed as early as possible because I have to be up at the ass-crack of dawn (meaning 5:30 a.m., which classifies as “ass-crack” in my world) to take the 6:30 train into work to get to a hotel in Manhattan for a company meeting. Early mornings and I do not jive well.

To make things easier in the morning, I’ve already decided what I shall wear, right down to the accessories. They shall be these - adorable new earrings I got this weekend at Urban Outfitters when I went shopping with my friend Sara:

Yup. They’re awfully cute. And while I don’t wear gold as a rule, I couldn’t pass these up. Besides, it’s just a touch of gold. That is acceptable.

Please note that I do not dwell in a cave of darkness (yet); zooming in on the earrings in my hand and using the flash caused the background to drop out entirely. This is actually quite a good thing since what dwells in the background is frightening and messy and not a fair representation of me. I did give myself a quick manicure on Monday night, though. So that’s nice.

And I have devised a fantastic way of spending $400; I will use it (not anytime soon) to fund the purchase of a Sigma 17-70mm f/2.8-4.5 DC HSM Macro Lens for my Nikon D40. It’s apparently pretty good for the price and since I’m not about to spend $800 on a high-end macro lens, it will do.

I’m really enjoying macro photography and how it can make ordinary, everyday objects appear to be exciting, new and abstract, and how it captures textures. I love textures - both visual and tactile. There was a time that my friend Vin called me “Tactile Eva” since I could not walk into a store (usually a clothing store) without touching things. I like to think that a lot of people shop this way, but it seems it’s not as common as I originally thought.

Quel tragédie. Y’all are missing out.

As you’ll see evidenced below, I’m apparently in the mood to photograph trees. There were lots of other things I could’ve “shot” today (during a day trip to Princeton, NJ with my friends Theresa and Sara) but I liked these trees. And, honestly, we were having a splendid time and it didn’t occur to me to get the camera out and interrupt the flow. And Mihály Csíkszentmihályi will tell you how important flow is.

But really, the sky this morning was amazing and it set off the greenish-yellow of this tree to stunning effect, I think. The image hasn’t been altered in any way, other than sized down to fit this column.

Then there was this tree in a courtyard across from Princeton University itself. I liked the thickness and rope-yness of the center.

We stopped at Princeton Record Exchange and I bought a bunch of used CDs and a couple of new ones, so now I’m feeding iTunes and syncing my iPod with glorious new music. Yummy.

I also got some chocolate-covered toffee pistachios at the Thomas Sweet chocolate shop. Honestly, eating two of those packs a wallop of chocolatey sweetness, so they are going to last me a while.

A meandering post, in list format… some things I want to do.

- Learn to tune a guitar (my friend has a guitar she’s offered to give me since she’s not touched it in something like 4 years… and it’s made for people with smaller hands and shorter fingers, so it would help solve the one problem I was having when I started learning this past fall… my fingers are short so I was having trouble playing certain chords because my fingers couldn’t reach the strings across frets).
- Learn to play a song on the tuned guitar.
- Learn to sew with a sewing machine and pattern, not just needle and thread.
- Sew a skirt for the summer.
- Study up on photography and become proficient using the manual features on my camera to take interesting and fetching photos.
- Participate in my company’s corporate walk in Central Park in June.
- Start learning another language (I know someone who can hook me up with Rosetta Stone software for basically any language - French and Japanese are the main contenders right now. Maybe I’ll go for both.)
- Do some market research/conduct an internal focus group at work (honestly, it would be a lot of fun to do with the product line I intend to center it around).
- Take some day trips to fun places either by myself or with friends.
- Go to more galleries and museums.
- Convert a friend (or family member) to a climbing buddy and maybe even get them to go for belay certification. Call me an evangelist.

I bought some cute rain boots today. My Saucony Jazz sneakers, while incredibly comfortable, are not meant for puddle jumping, walking through wet grass, or other such rain-related activities. So I got to work with wet feet and that sort of set the tone for the day; I was a little mopey and “meh.”

On my way back to pet-sitting land, I stopped at a shoe store called Jubilee (B’way btw. 76th and 77th Sts) and bought the same rain boots I was ogling on Saturday. They were on clearance, they are cute, and they only had one pair left in my size. And they aren’t black, which is quite a change.

I love this photograph of my friend Michelle’s daughter, Juliette.

I snapped it today while she was crawling up onto my lap - and I just gave it that soft glow in Photoshop.

My only issue is that my knee is in sharper focus than her face, but I will learn how to take better pictures using this new camera with time and practice and by reading through the various books I have.

That’s another nice thing about working for a publisher: access to books I can USE in real life (not that I don’t love fiction, too). I’ve got the field guide for my camera (Nikon D40), and a whole slew of Photo Workshop books.

Still, for an amateur shutterbug attempt, I do like this photo quite a bit.