Valentine's Day For Me (Original Photography)

Howdy,

There are several reasons why St. Valentine's Day is one of my least favorite days of the year. According to what I've heard, it was more or less created by corporations in the USA as a way to increase sales–and it worked! A combination of guilt and expectation drive millions of couples to spend money on each other on this day. I wonder if they think to do things for each other when it's not a social requirement...

Take into consideration that I'm almost 40 and still single, and you may beegin to understand some of my dislike for this particular "holiday."

^{Die, cookie, die!}

On the brigt side, I did find ways to make the day less emotionally crushing. When some of the ladies came over to brag about what their husbands/boyfriends got them to people in cubicles near me, I put on my headphones and found out that I can actually tune into Flamenco Radio at work! There's nothing like a little cante jondo to drown out unwanted conversation!

^{Moody Morsel Murder}

The images aren't quite as high quality as I would like. It's hard to see from these reduced-resolution shots, but the 7D just can't handle low light like modern cameras can. Even at ISO 800, the images are noisy and the colors aren't accurate. I spent a lot of time in post production attempting to compensate for the limitations of my photographic toolkit.

Still, the results are good enough for my purposes.

In other news...

The cold is beginning to lose its grip. Today, the drive in was a balmy -8ºF (-22ºC) degrees and, when I got off work, the temperature was above zero! It was actually up to 17ºF (-8ºC).

^{Cold and Crystaline}

The snow gets sparkly, as if it were diamond dust, when the temperatures are this cold. We even managed to get some whispy dust-like snow which, combined with the strong winds, made for some interesting driving.

Thank you for taking a look! If you enjoy my work, please click the upvote button. Comments are also greatly appreciated.