Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Sailor, Shutterbug, Chef!

At my age, I probably already have a pretty good idea about things I can do and can't do at all. But the great thing is I can afford to try out things and not have to moan years later awwww I never got to try this or that.

Which explains the SLR camera I got myself over Christmas. I've always been fascinated by cameras since childhood especially the tiny so-called spy cameras I'd see advertised on the backs of American comic books. The ones they promised they'd send you free if you sold 100 or 150 kits of some useless this or that. In hindsight, spy cams you could hold in the palm of your hand in the 70s can't have been all that techno-sophisticated and I certainly don't recall ever coming across any photograph taken with one of those. To get back to my cam, I hadn't actually wanted an SLR. All I wanted was to upgrade to a better zoom digicam that I could slip in and out of my handbag whenever wherever. But it turned out the particular model I'd set my sights on had just recently been launched in India and was still steeply priced while the SLR had undergone hugely slashed prices so I allowed myself to be persuaded into going for the SLR.

And so I tried to work the thing out. I figured it had taken me some time to feel comfortable working with my little Sony digicam when I first bought it a few years ago. In fact back then, I'd often felt I was producing better pictures with my phonecam than with the actual digicam. With the new SLR, it was deja vu all over again. And this time, there are so many things I'm supposed to remember - the shutter speed, the ISO, all the million and one manual settings that you're supposed to make use of if you're using a good quality cam. Well, I give up. I just want to point and shoot. And all that pointing and shooting I'd prefer to do very unobtrusively. It's just not in my blood to lug around a pro-looking cam in public. So when I went to this family wedding a few weeks ago, there were all these young, teenaged-type shutterbugs with big, clunky, expensive-looking cameras taking shots and expertly tweaking their settings in between, and getting in the way of the pastor and the crowds. Me I took along my little Sony digicam and was happy taking a few sneak shots during low-key moments. So I think I'll lay my pro-photographer dreams to rest and exchange the SLR for something much much smaller and far less ambitious.

But I think I'll stick with the microwave I also bought recently. Not that I've ever had any great interest or talent for cooking. I cook if absolutely necessary and manage a passable meal but I suppose there beats in every modern woman's heart the hankering for a microwave. My first attempt to make something was appropriately ambitious. I youtubed a video for butter cookies (this one here) and happily mixed flour, butter, sugar and vanilla essence. While it all baked in the oven, the aroma all over the house was divinely mouthwatering. When I took them out though, the cookies were squishy and underdone, and when they had cooled down, rivalled Veronica Lodge's jawbusters! I haven't tried butter cookies again but I've popped corn, grilled cheese sandwiches, reheated and defrosted things so I still think I have the makings of a great chef yet!