{Between You and Me}

There are certain little jumbled thoughts o' mine, certain admissions, if you will, that just can't find their way into an entire post by themselves and so will nestle here for you to read.

Take a second glance at the title, though.

This is just between you and me. I don't expect these admissions to find their way to the World Wide Web, got it? ;)

~I should not...

...Begin a suspenseful mystery late at night. Really, I shouldn't. Particularly one that involves trading markets and international problems. Whoosh! <--Oh, that sound was just all of that flying straight over my head. Cramming my mind with such information leaves me awake half the night, my little brain trying to puzzle it all out.

~My siblings have an interesting effect on my thought life

 It's true. I was watching a little boy the other day. He had brown hair and was wearing a green striped shirt. I was thinking to myself, "Wow, he looks just like someone I know...only a younger version." It finally occurred to me that he resembled Steve from the old Blue's Clues. Oh, for the love of little siblings.

To be perfectly honest, he did look just like a li'l Steve. Someone give me a pawprint here. I deserve it.

~I take a tremendous guilt trip every time-

-I accidentally hit a butterfly. You know you've seen such horror happen before, too. You're driving along without a care in the world when, in feature length movie slow motion, a butterfly flutters in your path. Perhaps you've cried out, "Nooo!" and it echoed off the walls of your vehicle. But there's nothing you can do.

And just like that, in that fatal moment, its little life is snuffed out. For what was the hard work and time that it took to make it from the egg to caterpillar to cocoon to the moment when it lifted those beautiful wings and could finally fly?

I've got to stop right there. This is hurting my butterfly lovin' heart.

~Take me out to the ball game!

I have always wanted to photograph...a baseball. Not a brand new one fresh from the store, but an old, used baseball that had seen its share of being coated in rosin. It might sound odd, but believe me, this dream of photographing a baseball is right up there with my addiction to photographing newsboy caps if you can believe that's possible.

You didn't know I had an addiction to photographing newsboy caps? I do.

 Enter problem: we have one baseball in our home. One. And every time I decided to give it a free photo session, it disappeared, perhaps due to shyness, perhaps due to little brothers who play with it. However, yesterday was a red letter day. Yesterday was the day I found it just lying on my bedroom floor.

Maybe it had finally overcome its fear of the camera. Whatever the reason, I scooped it up along with a baseball glove and took about 36 photos of this sole baseball. 36. Possibly too many photos of a baseball? Right. As if.

In any case, I fulfilled a lifelong dream and might do it again soon. Providing my subject doesn't chicken out again.

Maybe I should just marry a baseball player. At least there would be plenty of baseballs to go around, right?

Totally kidding.

~I am quite averse to change. Example?

Clear granola bar wrappers. I can't stand them. What happened to the solid wrappers and whose crummy idea was it to change? I DON'T care that granola bars in the new wrapper are generally moister than they were when in the old. It doesn't matter.

What does matter is the fact that the granola bar industry decided to switch it up on me and make me anxious every time I stick my hand into the box and pull out a clear wrapper. It's disturbing.

Hmmm, this might be more than a mere aversion to change. This could be a phobia to it. Anyone got a name for that?

~I spend inordinate amounts of time photographing the unusual

Isn't this just the coolest thing? It's a cabinet that belongs to my grandmother on Dad's side and it houses a mirror...so it appears as though I'm outside looking in. Neat-o.

I really don't know how long I stood there trying to get these shots. It was awhile.

~Turtles are impossibly impolite

This is Joe. Say hi, Joe. I really don't know much of Joe's character as we only met briefly during a visit to Okefenokee Swamp last year. However, I needed a photo of a turtle to illustrate my point.

Joe is a turtle.

Hence your introduction to Joe.

My decision that most turtles are rude happened about two weeks ago. I was driving along when I suddenly stopped in the middle of the road to pick up and help a turtle that was slowly trudging across. I was striding with purpose and the feeling that I was doing a wonderful thing when it took one look at my face and shot off like a bottle-rocket. But not before giving me a turtle-y version of the stink eye.

Maybe he was having a bad day.
Maybe he was an old geezer who didn't welcome help from anyone.
Maybe my approach gave him that extra-incentive to fulfill his lifelong dream of pulling a Ninja Turtle stunt.
Maybe he just didn't want the chore of having to pull out the ole' Shell Sanitizer had my human hands touched him.

However, I was personally affronted and have since changed my belief that turtles are cute li'l misunderstood creatures.

My apologies, Joe.

And for the record, my hands were clean.