standing on the deck taking photos of the neighbours' houses is totally normal I tell you

I’ve mostly recovered from the bout of covid I had last week, to the point where I’m back working and doing all the usual school run stuff in the mornings and afternoons. Still a bit knackered though (had a nap today at noon) but not as wiped out as last year’s experience.

My camera arrived in the middle of it all - a Fuji XPro 2 with a few lenses, from KEH. No complaints at all with the quality or the service, though it took a painful amount of time stuck in customs here in NZ. I haven’t much been out and about taking photos just yet–the weather has been pretty bad too–but what’s nice is that the form factor and menus are similar to my x100s that I’ve had for the last ten years. It feels comfy to pick up and use, is solid and durable, doesn’t feel plasticky (which I have heard some of the other models suffer from), is easy to carry around.

Apart from that, work has imploded a little bit, which I guess I won’t get into here. But it’s been busy and a bit stressful and it’s taken up a bit more of my life than a part time job technically should. And now it’s looking as though the current project is going to stretch out for a few months more. To be honest I just want to wash my hands of it, but it’s just one of those things you have to see through. Feels like a many cooks in the kitchen situation, and I’m trying not to be another one and just go with the flow.

I dialed things back a bit when I was sick, but found myself drawn to writing a bit of flash fiction, randomly. Finished two stories over the weekend, which I’m in the middle of tidying up and then I’ll submit them around. There seems to be a huge market for flash online, probably because you can publish a lot of it with a relatively small budget. I never really had much of an appetite for flash myself, but just playing around with it I’ve enjoyed the process. It’s so micro, there’s something really sweet about it. I still need to work on my skills at showing things that happen off the page (because flash is so short you really need to rely on that as a conceit), but I figure the more I write the better at it I’ll get :)

I want to get a few more under my belt before I post any here, but stay tuned.