New Toy

I stayed up for a long time after work today, waiting for the UPS guy to bring me a package. I bought a new lens for the new camera - a 50mm/f1.8 Nikkor autofocus. With a price tag of around $100, it's not as rugged a lens as the slightly faster 50mm/f1.4 Nikkor, but at $150 less, I could still break it and buy a new one and come out cheaper. And the combination of a wide maximum aperture and Nikon optics means I can still get photos like this:



or this:



with waning afternoon light and no flash. At full original size, they're not the clearest of photos, but they work well as snapshots, particularly considering they're of subjects who don't like to be still for any length of time.

With a bit of flash and a still subject, it does even better:



This is a hat I started yesterday in Berroco Pure Merino that I got on clearance from Webs. It's a basic 2 x 1 rib that turns into a cabled rib in the black. I'm making it for my cousin Brian, who will be shipping out to Afghanistan at the end of March. It should still be quite chilly there, so I figure the extra warmth will come in handy.

Needless to say, I'm worried about him going on this tour, particularly given the current state of affairs. For the first time in his 15 years in the Air Force (in a non-combat role as a mechanic), he'll be going on convoys that may be targets for attack - an eventuality that is likely enough that he's undergoing combat training at Ft. Bragg right now. This assignment is his choice, and I certainly respect that and mostly just want him to come home safely, but I can't help but wonder how different the situation there would be if we hadn't diverted so much effort and money to the unnecessary war in Iraq and had instead focused on finishing what we had started.

And because I can do little else to change the situation, I knit on and hope.