Jeff, beautiful writing and design... love the bars of photos.

The first time I camped in the snow I had no idea whatsoever what I was doing. I rented snow shoes but wore jeans and a wool shirt. I was with my then-wife and another friend. All equally unprepared. I set up the tent and we tried to sleep. My pants were soaked through with melted snow. I had a thermal pad to sleep on but it kept deflating; I would awaken repeatedly with my back on fire from cold. Coyotes yipped far across the frozen meadow.

In the morning my pants were a frozen solid block, but they were the only pants I had so I straightened them out and put them on over my bare, freezing legs. It was one of the most horrifying physical sensations of my life (which ultimately means I've been damn lucky in this life). My shirt was mostly dry.

Fuck this snow camping bullshit. We walked back to the car. It occurred to me that man was put on this early to create heaters and by God we used that fine invention until sweat rolled off our foreheads. Praise be man's curious inventiveness. Indeed.

"earth," that is, not "early." jeez.

I enjoy your photographs very much. My stepson; a new father, has asked for a digital camera for Xmas and I was wondering if you could recommend something. Your camera takes wonderful pictures. Would you recommend it?

I would greatly appreciate your comments and reply. Thank you.

thank you so for your compliments leigh...i've been taking photographs rather obsessively for about 7 years, and less obsessively for fifteen or so.....i currently have three cameras, all of which are great...two film cameras, a Nikon FE 2 which is an old 35 mm from the 70's and a yashica T4-Super with a Zeiss lens...both of which would have to be looked for used...the nikon is a great way to learn about manual photography as it is old and simple once you have a base of knowledge...the Yashica is a simple "point and shoot" camera. no zoom. for some reason, it takes amazing photos, some of which you can find on the "photos page" of this website. as for all of the photos you see here, they were taken with a Canon Powershot G3 digital camera. it's about 3 years old now, but still a great camera at an afforddable price. i think they go for about $500 these days. nikon made a comparable model called the coolpix {4500?}. the Canon is 4 megapixel which is good, as it has more clarity and depth of field than some with a lesser number of megapixels. i've never taken any classes, and would really classify myself as a complete amateur. i sort of make it up as i go along...

anyway, all that said, i definitely recommed mine. i think that Canon and Nikon are making the best digitals these days, and both the coolpix series from Nikon and the powershot series from Canon are great...it simply becomes a matter of how much one wishes to spend.

also, there is a great website {for anyone interested} that gives some detailed info and comparison of digital cameras. goto: http://www.dpreview.com