ByePhoto

I recently got a new laptop from work that's running OS X 10.8.2. Prior to this I'm fairly positive I was on OS X negative five million so I encountered my fair share of surprises on my new machine.

One such surprise turned out to be that iPhoto was no longer a default application on Mountain Lion. In fact it was now $14.99 at the App store - bad Apple, bad! I don't even like iPhoto that much, having grappled with it many a time in the past lost some precious footage to its confusing interface. (Sets? Albums? Collections? Empty trash? What the what.) Also I always disliked how all photos become part of the "iPhoto Library" and one had to "Open Package Contents" by right clicking the library icon in Finder to access the pictures in their original folder forms - an admittedly very small annoyance, but one that bothered me in principle anyway. (Why can't you just leave the damn folders alone, Apple?) Despite these complaints I was still disappointed to see iPhoto in the App Store instead of in my Applications list. It's sort of like that feeling where you know you wouldn't have gone to the party but would have liked to have been invited anyway.

Anyway, now that iPhoto and I have broken up, I've gone ahead and downloaded myself a copy of Picasa. So far I'm impressed. I love the way photos are organized and remain in normal folders, huzzah! The user interface, though sort of gray and dull, is much more intuitive than iPhoto's, in my opinion. And the performance is noticeably better - I can zoom in and out of my high-res pictures in Picasa very quickly and smoothly, which is much more than I can say for my old editor. I don't miss iPhoto one bit, and neither does Thundercat.

iPhoto?

Ew.

One of my resolutions for 2013 is to explore some of the big kids' photo editors, like Lightroom or Photoshop. For now though I'm happy with what I have now. If you're using iPhoto and are curious as to what's out there, I recommend checking out Picasa.

a normal week

two posts in a day! a day with one less hour than normal, even.

guess what? it's sunday night and i am not at the airport!

rather, i am in my apartment, sitting on the couch under a comfy leopard-print blanket and listening to my spawn-of-the-devil cat snore in the background. aaaand here's the proof:

thumbs up for NOT sleeping in a hotel room tonight!

i've just wrapped up my first whole week in chicago in my apartment here. the last time i had one of these was during the transition between my calgary and plano projects, which occurred in may of last year, when i was living in a completely different apartment and neighborhood.

suffice it to say, i've loved being local so far. it is everything i had imagined it to be and so much more - bonding with my roommates, cooking meals, exploring chicago, sleeping in hector (my glorious bed), hearing the 1-800-EMPIRE commercials - the works.

one of the first things i did when i found out i'd be in chicago for a while was sign up for a gym membership. a miracle had happened in texas: i had somehow started on a relatively regular gym routine. i sure as heck wasn't going to let a change in location (literally) stop my momentum. the gymnasium i wound up signing up with is called xsport fitness, which is a very no-frills kind of place that sucks you in with its low membership dues compared to most other arm-and-a-leg-costing gyms in lakeview. i went four times this past week - once with a personal trainer where i died - and three other  normal times where i did my own thing. it's not a wonderful gym by any means - but it's not terribad either. i haven't made up my mind on whether or not i wanna stick with it or switch to another and say goodbye to my limbs.

i've also been on a shopping BINGE. i think the springtime weather has been doing funny things to my brain, because this impulse in me has just been screaming OH MY GOSH IT'S SPRING I LOVE IT I AM GOING TO BUY PINK PANTS! and blocking out the small voice at the back of my head has been like "... you know you're in Chicago, right? It's probably going to snow next week." so yes, i bought pink pants this weekend. and i also have been finding that living within a block of pier 1 has been very, very dangerous, but so far i haven't caved beyond buying a pair of candle plates (they were on sale, goddamnit!).

one last thing i've been up to lately is getting back in touch with my ahrtsy fahrtsy side. this morning becca came over and we had crafts time. we drew cool pictures with charcoal while kitty watched enviously and wished she had opposable thumbs.

i've also been making some progress on my latest painting project, which has been taking me forever because the medium, oil, has to take its sweet-ass time to dry before i can apply another layer. i've also been having a crisis with the grass (notice the big green grass blob? that was me having a fuck it, we'll do it live moment with my paint brush and then immediately regretting it. good thing oils are forgiving in that you can just paint over everything ever). damn you, grass. why you gotta be like that.

this is how it looks after the fourth layer. i reckon it'll be another five or six before i can wrangle it into what i want it to be. the thought of painting the leaves is sort of terrifying to me. maybe i will paint with a glass of wine handy for some liquid courage.

...on second thought, after remember yesterday's episode involving spilt linseed oil EVERYWHERE, maybe not.