On my birthday a few weeks ago, my dad gave me his old DSLR with two lenses. It wasn’t a birthday present; he told me a while ago he was going to give it to me, it just happened to be on my birthday when he finally gave it to me.

Anyway, I was excited to receive it, not for the camera, but for the 70-300mm lens that came with it. I found an adapter to use it with my video camera, and when it arrived, I went outside, well after dark, to take a picture of the moon. As luck and timing would have it, though, it was the night of the new moon. That figured.

It wasn’t until we were at the Redondo Condo last week that I thought to try to get a shot of the moon, and when I saw the results, I was hooked. I had never been able to get such a clear shot of the moon before. It’s honestly all I ever wanted a good camera with a telephoto lens for.

My whole life, I’ve seen these beautiful scenes of the full moon rising over the horizon, and wished I could capture them, but I was never able to with any detail, so the pictures end up looking pathetic. It’s always such a disappointment

So, now that I have a camera with which I can take crystal clear, highly detailed pictures of the moon, I’ve been going outside every night and snapping a picture as it progresses into its fullest form, until last night, that is, when the stupid fucking camera, which has worked perfectly every night for the past week, wouldn’t cooperate.

It’s fine, though, because what I really want is to capture a complete moon cycle, and since I didn’t start until the middle of the current one, that wasn’t an option. Unfortunately, autumn is not the best time of year to try to get a complete moon cycle, as clouds tend to get in the way. Bonnie and I used to go for a bike ride every full moon, but more often than not, the full moon was blocked by clouds.

Maybe I’ll get lucky in October. Who knows? 🤷‍♂️