Gym, Carpel Tunnel,lens probs.. and deserving...

It has been a long time since I've posted anything here.. and rightfully so it's an interesting title that I throw up as well.. 

Let me break it down. 

Gym : We [myself, Grea and Rudi], have been hitting the gym at least 3 times a week for the last almost 3 months now.. and I have to admit I am a much happier guy for it. Granted, getting up @ 5am is something to get used to.. especially if you're not really a morning person like either of us, but it's either that, or getting home in the evening and not being keen to go at all, after a day's work and the likes.. weird thing, although we have been hitting the squash court and the swimming pool fairly hard (I'm far more fit than I was in the beginning of the year), I haven't really lost weight through it.. 

Saying that losing weight is not part of my ultimate plan, would sound like sour grapes, but in truth all I ever wanted to do was increase my down time for diving with the Wessels family by dropping into the pool 2 - 3 times a week in the Planet Fitness in Claremont, and that we've achieved. I can now play a full 60 minute game of squash against Rudi and 5 minutes after leaving the court be back to normal breathing.. with the swimming it's getting there eventually, but the 30 minutes I did on Tuesday was a good indicator that I'm on the right track, something that puts a little gold star in my own mind next to me.

Carpel Tunnel : Well, that's the inevitable pain of being a developer who decided to bring his personal notebook to work when he was doing contract work for the company I'm now permanently employed by. It's not as serious as it sounds, but it has been causing trouble with doing photography, especially in portrait orientation with the 40D as I am yet to get a vertical grip for that [ in the process of dealing with Jacs about that though].

Lens probs : Ja eina.. this one is going to hurt. Around August 2007 I decided to get myself and Grea a decent walk around lens each... this was back in the London days... that said, also in the good London days.. I've been reading and hearing things lately.. anyways. I bought two 17-85mm EF-S IS USM lenses. Took one for myself and gave the other one to Grea.. all sorted.. or so I thought.. fast forward about a year... and my 400D starts acting up and giving me Err 01 problems.. I take it to ORMS in Cape Town who send it up to JHB [ as there is apparently no one in Cape Town area that's Canon certified to perform maintanence and repair on Canon bodies.. great].. Camera returns two weeks later... and about 40 minutes after I get home with it and put in a CF card, it starts giving me the same error. 

Now, I'm not an unreasonable man... most of the time not... but this pushed my blood pressure way past the norm of 120 / 80 [ I wish that was mine ], and had me back in ORMS the next morning as they opened the doors before I even went to work... great guys that they are, send it back up to JHB [courier service now being free.. thanks again guys ], and the camera returns a week later.. with a completely new PC board inside.. yup.. they replaced the whole brain of my camera, and the shutter mechanism which had been faulty originally... and because they didn't detect it on the first go, they didn't charge me for the additional repair.. VERY nice of them.

Righto... so when I start getting Err 01 messages on my 40D about a month or so ago you all can understand my worry.. my intense worry... as a 40D is a lot more expensive and let's just say there is really no money at the mo for expensive camera repair... but I was getting the error only with the one lens, all my other lenses were working perfectly fine on either of the bodies I have.. uhm...

To complete the story...spoke to someone this week who told me of a camera repair shop in Durbanville, that specialise in lens repair.. I get the number from my contact, phone them up and the heavy American accent at the other end of the line asks me which lens it is, how old the lens is.. and what the problem is.. I explain and after a bief moment of comtemplative silence he utters that it is a common problem with the 17-85 that their aperture circuit packs up and cracks.. leaving the lens unable to step down so as to focus especially from the wider angles... the fix.. he has to order a circuit from JHB [ normally takes 3 - 4 working days to get here] and then "rebuild" the lens with the new circuit.. essentially servicing the lens in the meanwhile as well.. 

TCTM [total cost to ME] : in the order of R2000. For the moment being my 17-85 is living it's quiet days on my bedside table at the moment.. sitting next to the lamp waiting to go to the "doctor"... just for a little while longer still....until payday.

Deserving : Feels like the one that doesn't fit in sequence.. [you know the tests : apple, pear, tomato, bananna.. which doesn't fit]... 

A giant friend in London has been in the photography game for a while now, not as per say pro but he's been doing a lot of stuff with his work and is starting to feel the rewards as he's starting to get some paying clients.. whoop whoop.. and deservingly so. He twisted my world view a little in the last 3 weeks or so.. and the effect of that has had me thinking for a while now, about a lot of things, to many to mention here.. I digress. 

He sent me his radio triggers that he's been using for a while, and that I showed an interest into when we last saw them in London, which was at our leaving lunch on Guy Fawkes day in 2007, and then continuted to say that he couldn't think of anyone more deserving to send them to.. Yeah, I'm making way to much out of this, but it struck a chord (who wouldn't like hearing that though)... am I really ? I don't think so. Sure, my pics are ok, and in some occasions I'm lucky to get the odd really good capture, but not deserving :o)

Mr G-Unit, thanks for the radios. I'm going to have to build a Faraday cage around our bedroom though in the flat, as I never knew the amount of radio noise that's present in there. Two laptops, my Archos, the wireless N-draft router in the living room (very close to the wall), 2 mobiles and apparently a plethora of other devices emmiting something radio like.. ( I really have to stop playing with plutonium and uranium 238). 

With something that seems like such a small gesture you've altered a mindset, know that much.

Greets to all

[Z, out]