September 17, 2006
Claire's Birthday
Album - After months of hearing Claire's thought of the day about her birthday, today was finally the day. She had a friend sleep over last night. This morning we all went to Mass (P.S. - our new pastor is here!) and later out for donuts, as usual. Around lunch time two more of her friends came over and the ten of us had lunch at Chili's. From there we all went ten pin bowling. It was a first for the boys, as they've only done candlepin bowling. Luckily this alley also had automatic gutter bumpers. Once we got home Claire opened her presents and then everyone had cake and ice cream. From there the girls just played for a couple more hours before it was time for them to go home and time for the boys to get to bed.
I debated cranking out this album, but gave in anyways. It's the fastest I've ever made 28 pictures. The majority come from the smaller Canon digital ELPH camera with the remainder coming from the Nikon. While the ELPH's picture quality isn't quite as nice, I figure they beat the lame photos that come from my phone's "built in camera" (Bleah!), and it's easier to carry than the Nikon.
Canonet - Before I go to bed, I wanted to pass along a tidbit I'd found interesting. I've been looking for my old Canon Canonet rangefinder camera from my youth. I dug it out about a year ago to show Claire but haven't been able to find it recently. It's got to be around the house somewhere! It turns out that it is worth more than dirt. Neglecting the effects of inflation (ahem, relative to the 1970's, that's a major disclaimer), dollar-wise it's still worth roughly what it was new. Cameras like that were consider a "poor man's Leica". Over the years Canon sold over 1.25 million of them! When I got it for Christmas as a boy, I was always envious of Grandpa's Canon AE-1 single lens reflex camera. I wasn't aware that rangefinder cameras have their advantages too. As I read up on them over the weekend, I had to concur. There were several nice things to that camera that I took for granted. So if I haven't said so lately, thanks again mom and dad! I'll let you know once we find it again. If I do soon, I plan to take it in for a cleaning and lubrication.