Have Geek Will Travel

Hey, gang-

We had our first snow of the year on January 2nd…along with our first ice! Yeah, it was monkey-hat cold that day. That morning I got a message from my day job saying because of the weather the shop was going to be closed for the day. Since we were both off for the day  Nicki and I decided to get outside and play with the cameras a bit.

I used her Nikon D5100 digital SLR and she used her new Sony a7iii mirror-less camera. I also used my iPhone (which is what these shots were taken with). Our new rosebush, Audrey II (we have another we call “Audrey“) is in the front yard and had froze from the overnight freezing rain. While we were outside it was getting some sleet and snow on it, too.

It was a bit tricky to get a shot of this frozen bloom- the wind was kickin’, and the really low temp made it hard to use my hands. So, between the flower racking back and forth and my hands shaking I’m shocked I got any pics that worked at all!

Our little sunflower took a lot of abuse from the cold. It was in the 60s-70s on New Years Day so I wasn’t expecting the snow and ice to be so intense the following day..!

Our little cat sculpture was holding out better than Lex. We let the boy come outside for a bit with us and he almost immediately decided to head back indoors. He’s never been a fan of the snow or cold.

Nicki and I decided to head up the road to the cemetery on our corner.

There’s a flat marker section of the cemetery that’s towards the front, and an older upright gated section in the back corner.

There’s also another section that’s a bit hidden closer to Conger Park. They’ve been leveling off the front “flat” section this last year, and I’m not sure if they’ll be doing any work to this other section behind it. I took some close-up pics of the orange tractor with Nicki’s Nikon and bounced back and forth between it and the iPhone.

The cemetery is one of our favorite spots in town to take pics- no matter what season or weather, but it’s always very picturesque with the snow.

Last winter we had a serious amount of snow and ice for our area, and it hung around for a little over a week. We had several chances to get outdoors to shoot in the snow and the cemetery and Conger Park are both within walking distance of our house. (In fact, we actually got married in the park.)

With the way the roads were in our neighborhood that week, about all we could do is get out on foot- and one morning I had to hoof it down to the corner snow for some coffee, creamer, and breakfast. Thankfully we didn’t have to call for a search party to come rescue us on any of our excursions into the frozen tundra of north Mississippi!

This time around the roads weren’t too bad and we were able to take Nicki’s new car. I’ve recently become a fan of heated seats! I tried wearing gloves while shooting, but mine weren’t very conducive for it- especially the iPhone…even thought that’s exactly what they’re made for.

After the cemetery Nicki wanted to go ahead and fill up her gas tank while we were out. After filling up at Kroger, we took a few shots of the R/R tracks that cross Commerce Street– the main road through or town. On the way home we noticed the old Dodge truck that sits in the local hardware store parking lot and decided to stop and take some pics of it, too.

I love this truck, and am a fan of the era of vehicle design it comes from.

I am not a fan of whenever we get snow here we almost always get a layer of freezing rain/ice first.

There was another green truck similar to this one around the corner from us but haven’t seen it in a while. Not sure if this is the same one, just painted red or a completely different one.

The wind was really blowing hard in that empty parking lot while we were shooting photos of the truck. We got back in the car and drove across the street to the old water-tower near the center of town. It’s next door to our vet’s office. I got out to take a few pics with the Nikon and iPhone, but it was really getting super cold so I got back in the car and shot the tree pic through the passenger side window with my phone.

When we got back to our street we decided to head down to the end of the road where the horse farm is. We saw a few horses outside their barn eating hay. I took a few with the big camera and these with my phone. By this time Nicki and I had both had enough of the cold. Once we got back to the house some hot chocolate was in order!

Hope you are all safe and warm!

Lin