beers and tylers camp. and they hike.

in june, Melanie and i went camping with Ben and Elle Tyler. there was food. there was walking. there was morning light on grass.

the next weekend, hiking things happened with various and sundry people. such things were decidedly pleasant.

i bought a telephoto lens.

i bought a 300mm lens in may. i haven't given it the type of use that i'm excited to yet, although i did play around in nairobi national park in kenya on friday, which was nice. so far, i have mostly used it to shoot rabbits and landscapes and other such things. i have often wanted to have the patience and commitment to be a good wildlife photographer, but i'm not sure that i do. and if i did want to be such a thing, i would maybe want a lens faster than f/. 4--maybe even one with autofocus. but let's not get greedy here.

when i first used it, i was in oklahoma for the weekend. i shot flowers and grass through gaps in a fence.

i drove back to boulder through sunday night--arriving at around 5am, and then i went to the class i was teaching, which met from 9-noon. naturally, i was rocked by a 36-hour migraine starting that night. by friday i was still feeling a little wobbly, so of course i relaxed by making a quick jaunt up mount sanitas on a drizzly evening. there were adorable deer on dakota ridge during my descent.

i took my lens for a stroll in a wetlands reserve east of town. "wetlands reserve" means "retired gravel quarry" that has been converted to ponds and bogs. some animals like rabbits enjoy the place. mountains are in shadow while trees are in evening light.

it was a late snow year here. on a hike of green mountain, Melanie an i saw the indian peaks in awesome clouds with low snow hanging on.

i didn't use my telephoto when Bianca Gordon hosted a movie night. Bill Murray. Bill Murray. Bill Murray. Bill Murray forever.

sometimes i was outside in spring

i'm in nairobi right now, and got ice cream with my friend Terrill yesterday (cold stone creamery: we're not in karamoja anymore). we chatted about all of the things (but who really does believe in the inexhaustible possibilities of the bifurcating tree model of language families anymore? and why would it be unreasonable to claim that a given system was borrowed prior to the breakup of a language cluster? and really, but there's yeast EVERYWHERE.) and he was like "soooo your blog." and i was like "soooo... yeah...." and he was like "you could update it tonight."

i promptly got on the wrong bus and spent hours sitting in traffic before getting rescued by our neighbor Bob. "what about Bob?" you ask? he is a swell gentleman who was a delight to chat with as he drove my slightly chagrined self home. all of which leads me to the present point: Terrill has inspired me to post a few more photos, and maybe try to get some of the past year and a half of photos that i've neglected to post posted before that trump resounds, etc.

these are many things that happened in the spring: Melanie and Summer and i (i came late) went to shelf road for some sport climbing. it was my first experience leading outside. my legs quivered a little bit.

it wasn't outside. but i went to a bar with Elle Tyler and Melanie and watched Ben's middle school jazz band play. going to a bar to hang out with middle schoolers felt funny.

dream canyon. people walked and read guidebooks. deep rivers. people moving over them.

half marathons that i didn't run, but bunches of my friends did. it was may. it snowed.

we watched for march evenings to pass.

my sister and my parents visited in march. somehow i didn't really end up taking any photos in which people's faces were in focus.

we hiked, mainly at times when the light was too harsh to take any photos. sometimes the light was not too harsh to take any photos.