Buckhead Betty ... on a Budget: Musings From My Phone

While at Blissdom last week, people talked a lot about hobbies. Blogging was of course a natural hobby for almost all attendees there, and social media exploration was a close second -- not a minute went by that people weren't pinning and tweeting their ways through sessions.

The third largest hobby shared by those hundreds of ladies would likely be photography; enough so that an entire track of sessions was dedicated to the art of it and how to use it effectively to complement or even replace the written word.

Many of the bloggers I know have gotten into photography for similar reasons -- they had children, and wanted to document everything, or they like to cook or bake and show off the results. Others might have picked up the hobby while traveling the globe, or while redecorating their homes.

My own digital camera is almost an artifact in the world of digital tech, from back in the day when the phrase "pocket-sized" was amazingly hip and new. It's a Pentax point-and-shoot circa 2003, and while it has taken some great photos for me, it's dying a slooooow death. As a result, I rarely use it anymore, unless I have the patience to wait for it to take the picture (the shutter speed ... ugh, I die.)

Someday, I will focus my personal time enough to invest in both a high-end digital camera and also a new point and shoot. I say it that way, though, because I don't want a camera that I can't use. I want to own a digital camera that I can play with, learn from and become great with. I want to be that blogger at the conferences taking great digital photos on full manual that I can watermark with my name. I don't want to be a blogger and a person who drops that kind of money on an amazing piece of technology and lets it sit there and gather dust.

I also know me - I have a great fully-manual old-school camera that I brought with me abroad in college, learned all about how to use it, and then promptly forgot about once I returned to the world of digital. Next free day I get? I am going to figure out what and how I can use that camera in today's world. Do people even still use fully manual cameras ... you know, the ones with film?!

In the meantime? You are going to keep getting random Blackberry and MacBook photos :) And maybe I will grab up a newer point-and-shoot while I am it, too!

A quickie look at a few things I have been capturing during my days ...

RIP T3 flat iron. You did me well for a few years.

Welcome to the world, new Chi! Gals in the market for an iron - these and other Chis are on sale right now at ULTA for only $99, down from $130-$160!

I spy: colorful shoes reminiscent of 1991 Keds at Tar-jay! I was this close to getting a pair of hot pink ones.

Amazing OCD organizers, heads up! I picked up these adhesive strips after spotting them on Pinterest, and they have made my spice cabinet woes disappear!

Warning: the clips were horribly back-ordered, most likely a side-effect from the Pinterest popularity (1000's of repins that week alone!). Order now but don't expect them for many weeks.

I am mid-selection on colors for the condo. The colors intriguing me most right now are moody gray-blues and anything that would align well with the gray and also the greens of the bedroom (see strip below) and kitchen/bathroom counters (which are dark green and black-flecked).