Nina's Blog - Wednesday 21st May 2025

Wednesday 21st May 2025, 08:52

Must get up and do some work in the garden. But before I do here is a picture that I just posted to Fabguys.com

It was rejected:

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ninalanyon · 61-69, T

Wednesday 21st May 2025, 12:39

Back in again after cutting down the rest of the lilac and filling the car with branches and making a start on clearing the shed that sits against the north wall, all with the assistance of No. 2 son so it went quite quickly. So all the perhaps useful planed wood has been stacked in the cellar and the remaining wood in the woodshed is just firewood. Theoretically worth a few hundred kroner but not at this time of year. My chimney needs a liner and before I start burning any wood I'll need a new wood burner too because the one I have is just too inconvenient. All that is a considerable expense so I'll put that off for a year or two at least because I'm spending an arm and a leg on getting north wall reclad and the whole outside of the house painted. So tomorrow when the recycling centre opens I'll dump the lilac which will take at least two trips and then fill the car with the firewood and dump that too.

I also have a horrible feeling that the air conditioner in my car isn't working as well as it should be. Now I'm dithering about where to have it checked, here or in the UK. Having it done in the UK means I could leave on my holiday next week, having it done here probably means at least an extra week delay. What if it fails completely? Does that affect the running of the car? I hate cars! But I hate the fuss and expense of flying, taxis, renting cars, etc. which is the alternative even more.

Quimliqer · 70-79, M

@ninalanyon You’re progress is great! If the airco stops working there wouldn’t be any danger of it damaging the car, other than perhaps the compressor in the system itself.

ninalanyon · 61-69, T

@Quimliqer Is that true of an EV though, in particular my 2015 Tesla Model S? The heating and cooling of battery, motors, and cabin are all connected I think.

Quimliqer · 70-79, M

@ninalanyon Good point. I wasn’t considering the EV part, and to be honest have no idea what’s involved.

ninalanyon · 61-69, T

@ArishMell @OlderSometimesWiser What's interesting about this specific rejection is that this picture was taken on a walk around the village so I wasn't wearing a bra and was also not wearing lipstick.

I don't actually try to look female anyway; I mean I don't put on the clothes as a disguise, I'm just trying to be me and that just happens to have a feminine look. But feminine here means a kind of theoretical femininity, not what is actually out there in the world around me.

If I really wanted to imitate most of the women I see around me I'd be wearing jeans and trainers! I think I've seen my sister in a skirt only once in the last ten years. I haven't tried counting but I'm pretty sure that for every one woman I see in a dress or skirt I see at least fifty wearing trousers.

ArishMell · 70-79, M

@ninalanyon I know a few women who seem to wear a dress only on special occasions.

Fabguys most likely works only by first glance.

ninalanyon · 61-69, T

Wednesday 21st May 2025, 10:45

I'm back indoors in the warm after cutting back the lilac. The weather is a complete contrast to yesterday, 10 C colder and also windier.

I cut all the branches that could be done with my electric secateurs and then I made holes along the front fence and pushed the cuttings in. Perhaps some of them will root, the weather forecast is for rain from tomorrow until the middle of next week so perhaps they won't need watering.

Any lilac experts here? Is it likely that they will take root?

I'll go out later and cut the rest down with a bow saw.

OlderSometimesWiser · F

Lol….. sounds like one of those rare cases where rejection is actually a good thing!

exchrist · 31-35

Thats a compliment?!

ArishMell · 70-79, M

Shows how convincing you are!

turbineman40 · 80-89, M

Do you take the rejection as a compliment? You are fooling the judges on Fabguys with the way you are dressing

ninalanyon · 61-69, T

@turbineman40 I do but usually it's just a rear view that they decide is female :-)

22Michelle · 70-79, T

Still waiting to get that "compliment" from Fabguys.

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ninalanyon · 61-69, T

@22Michelle I think it's easier for me as I'm on my own. I can behave as eccentrically as I like without needing to consider anyone else!

22Michelle · 70-79, T

@ninalanyon I used to be quite an enthusiastic, though not that skilled, photographer. I still have a 35mm Nikon I bought back in the 1970's. As I say, as it all got easier and electronic, I seem to have lost my enthusiasm. Thinking about though I recall that even back then my least favourite subject was me.

ninalanyon · 61-69, T

@22Michelle The advent of high pixel count digital cameras has made it practical to take video instead of using a self timer. That means I don't need to concentrate on it so much; I just set the camera running, walk back and forth, strike a pose or two. Then I just pick out a few of the least ridiculous looking frames. My mobile videos at 1920x1080 (2 MP) resolution which is plenty good enough for posting on SW.

When I started taking pictures dressing and taking pictures I used the self timer but it was such a tedious and error prone business that I didn't take many pictures.

I used to have a quite nice Pentax with a Sigma zoom lens that I bought in Hong Kong in the 80s. But I always found that the effort required to take a good picture and the weight of the camera was almost more than it was worth. Then one day I was in a cafe in a shopping centre in Krakow and I left it behind hanging on the chair. Of course when i got back to the cafe only minutes later there was no sign of it.

I never bought another film camera, instead I bought an early HP digital. It was a much worse camera but it being able to take almost unlimited shots while weighing only a quarter of what the Pentax plus Sigma did and being small enough to fit in a, large, pocket meant that a lot more pictures got taken.

Now I have a quite nice Sony 20 MP ultrazoom compact. But I hardly ever use it because the immediacy of my mobile makes posting pictures online so easy. To post a picture from the Sony I have to connect it to my computer to unload the pictures first which is just tedious.

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