The Three R's: 'Real' Reality Rant

Now that I have a phone with a well-functioning camera, (the overly touted Galaxy S4 having been a crushing disappointment) I have been thoroughly enjoying the ability to take actual photos with my phone. My sister-in-law introduced me to the LG V10 (earlier this year when I was searching for a replacement phone) and I absolutely love it! I have to say that it's nice to always have a camera on hand. Although the OIS (optical image stabilization) is not of the same caliber as my still camera (a Canon), it is enough for me to take decent pictures fairly consistently (though no selfies, thank you). Even macro shots (which I love!) have come out pretty darn well (photo below). The Lord has blessed with some amazing photo opportunities over the past week or two, likely because I started asking what He would have me share each time I venture out. Most of the recent photos have been in the garden, since that's where I've been working. Occasionally, when I snap a picture, it takes me a minute to figure out exactly what it is I'm looking at. The other day, however, it took me several. Photo inset: A tiny baby Anole lizard looking up at me from the Chocolate Mint; the leaf he's sitting on is only about an inch long. Isn't he just too cute?

I was outside one afternoon lamenting the recent decimation of my Ageratum, (clearly, Katy had passed along our address) when I spotted a tiny white (?) something on the Garlic Chives. I whipped out my cell, squatted down, and took a picture. I blew it up and looked at it, scratched my head, and looked again. Initially, I thought it had to be the strangest looking bug I'd ever seen. I couldn't quite figure out the coloration and conformation, though it sort of looked like some kind of spider. It appeared to have a pair of "googly eyes" on top of its head, and some sort of green something-or-other sticking out in multiple directions from both sides of its middle. I could even swear I saw a tiny fang, but I couldn't be sure. Imagine my surprise (and delight ;o) when I realized that the green that was sticking out on both sides belonged to none other than Katy - or one of her evil kinfolk (this post). If you click on the photo to blow it up, you can just barely see the edge of the brown stripe; that and those knobby knees are what helped me finally figure out exactly what I was seeing.  One evil beastie snack coming right up. At least I'm 99.999% sure that's what it is. After that? Well. Then it was Ah-HA. Ha, HA, HA!! Take that, you greedy heifer! And I saw it with my own eyes, I thought with malicious glee. Not to mention managed to capture it for posterity; what a great day in the garden, eh? ;o) Gosh I sure hope he decides to stay awhile... Ooooh, maybe he'll give his friends our address. Evil beasties beware!

I've recently learned, while thinking about "takeaways" for our visitors (e.g. handouts, fun sheets, our website, this blog, and the Facebook page) that Instagram actually has people over the age of 15 that post real photos. While I don't mind things like family photos, a well-taken shot of a delectable dinner, a decorative dessert, or a cute pic of a couple (G-rated anyway), I find the perpetual "selfies" to be annoying and utterly ridiculous. I get the profile picture thing, I even understand that you might want to change it once in awhile, maybe you got a new haircut or neat glasses. I can even see taking one or two while trying on hats for fun and the like. What I just don't get, are all those [attempted] sultry moues. Really people? The new term is "duck lips" (and ew). I put it in the search bar awhile ago. I was curious to see just how rampant it really was: would you believe there are 810,976 photos with that hashtag?!? That's only those that were spelled correctly; there were 7,000+ more who forgot to add the "s", not to mention all the other variations on the theme. I did find a photo or two with actual ducks, but most were more foul than fowl (and ACK my eyes! ;o) I know for a fact I would look like an idiot, and I have exactly zero interest in verifying that with a camera; not to mention plastering it on a digital billboard that would probably haunt me for all eternity. For every person that can actually pull that sexy pout off (e.g. Marilyn Monroe), there are countless attempts plastered all over social media that leave people looking like they either got their lips caught in a shop vac hose, smashed in the mammogram machine (because they were way shorter than the tech realized), or maybe had some sort of freak botox accident. Not trying to be ugly here, and I certainly hope I didn't offend anyone, but I just don't get the selfie craze. Do you?

Okay, okay that's enough. End quasi-rant and apologies all around. *wince* The point (which I totally missed by having that soapbox moment) is that I am now posting fairly regularly on Instagram and have gotten some really neat photos (in addition to the two posted above) that I want to share. I planted some Rue (in the bed from this post) to attract butterflies, and boy-oh-boy did it work! At last count, there were six - insert excited SQUEE here - Black Swallowtail caterpillars eating their way around in the Rue. I'm hoping I can keep taking photos as they develop; only one has matured to the last instar so far (photo inset - taken with my fabulous phone). I'm also hoping the Rue holds out, since it's still a pretty young plant. Isn't he just too cool? The caterpillars are all in various stages of development. I even found a couple of tiny eggs underneath the leaves; though they've hatched. So awesome. I can hardly wait; I sure do hope we get to see the butterflies! If you'd like to see more of the cell phone photos, you can either look for Epic Farms on Instagram (it's epic_farms), click on the "view on Instagram" button (right-hand side of this blog; click here for email friends), or, if you've "liked" us on Facebook I've added the Instagram feed there (just don't ask me how ;o)

I have quite a few more photos (from the regular camera) I'd like to share too, if time allows. I have an awful lot left to do, and precious little time left in which to do it. There are now less than two weeks until the start of a new school year: Let the countdown begin. Oh, I'm sooo not ready yet. *sniffle* Have a blessed week, and (as always) thank you so much for reading this far!

Do YOU know...  
How unbelievably and obnoxiously annoying you are? Is it just me or do you get fed up with the deluge of automated emails vomited out en masse to in-boxes everywhere by the social media giants? Do you know this person? How about this one? Wait! Here are 27 more people, just in case. I would say I appreciate the thought (self-serving though it may be), but I'd be telling a whopper for sure because I DON'T. I have to admit that whoever coined the term "the web" really knew what they were doing. As much as I appreciate and even [almost] enjoy technology, (when I'm not yelling at my screen, that is ;o) sometimes I think social media's sole purpose is to lure you in until you become hopelessly entangled in the virtual reality black hole. *Bangs head on desk.*

Case in point: I got on Pinterest over the holidays looking for some easy recipes, and got sidetracked by a cute crochet pattern pinned by a friend. Two hours and 2,000 Oh, look how cute!'s later, however, I was furious with myself for wasting so much time basically doing nothing (particularly since I had completely forgotten my original purpose). Recipes, ohhh yeah. *Facepalm* Yikes. It's a supernova turned black hole into which large quantities of time are sucked daily, I'm telling ya. Then there's the inevitability of the interface update; about the time I think I have a handle on a site, sweeping changes are announced and nothing looks like it did. Like the all new Facebook Timeline. Wait... What? Hold on, where the heck did everything go? Why are you tracking me on a big scary map? Cut it out, it's creepy. Hello?!? That's not even ME people; it's someone else with the same name and a smarter phone that lives in the next town. Oh, hey I got it: subterfuge. Okay that one could be good. I'm getting more like the horses every day; gimme a nice predictable rut. It may be boring, but at least I know what the heck's going on. *grin*

Now I'll confess to laughing hysterically at the Toyota commercial featuring the girl in her room mocking her "lame" parents for only having 17 sorry friends on Facebook compared to her own 600+ virtually vivacious pals. Of course her parents were out having fun with their real friends, while she sat home alone all night staring at a screen. I suppose it could be argued that technologically speaking she was with her friends (but that perspective just creeps me out completely, and move over Max Headroom). In honesty, the only reason I even joined Facebook in the first place was to create a Fan Page for Epic Farms (one of those things that seemed like a good idea at the time). It was almost fun for about 20 minutes, too, but I think it was the never-ending barrage of Little Green Patches and Farmville requests that totally killed it for me. Let's not forget the added drama that spills over into the school day from Facebook; superfun, that. Never mind the fact that you're supposed to be 18 either; nobody cares, believe me. I will say that DD was 20 or 21 before she signed up for Facebook, (and I dimly recall asking her what that giant whooshing noise was; it was the sound of her getting sucked into the virtual void *sigh*).

Do I appreciate the convenience? Sure I do. It's nice to be able to catch up with things at 4a.m., which is generally the only time I have a few extra minutes to spare. It's handy too, when something major (like a surgery) is going on - it's a great way to let everyone know an update all at once. But where's the line? Do I need to know that 12 people I do not know 'liked' what someone else posted that I didn't read? Nope, and I pretty much don't care either (sorry). I signed up with Twitter to promote my Etsy shops (you know, the ones that were stuck in vacation mode for the past year) and announce new blog posts but I rarely remember to tweet either one. I totally forgot to announce the Epic Farms Etsy shop was open again too - my bad. For some reason, Twitter grates on my nerves too. I'm mostly sure I don't need to know what you're doing every minute of every day. Saw a tweet one time that someone had just finished scrubbing the toilet, and was getting ready to jump in the shower; talk about TMI. Who on earth get's that bored? Oy. For a little while, I was interjecting one-liners just to break the monotony of all those self-serving monologuistic tweets. 

Then I joined BlogFrog and four or five other promote-your-blog-here sites (that I don't even remember). All that did for me was generate still more friend requests/followers from people in places I've never even heard of and whose profiles basically scare me. I couldn't even tell you why I joined LinkedIn (although I'm fairly certain I had a reason at the time). Truth be told, that was the catalyst that led to today's posterior-exposing post (SO not explaining that one if you missed it ;o) A whatEVER request (friend? circle? group? clique? groupie? network? follower? stalker?) from some random real estate person that I've never heard of who works halfway across the country in some state I've never seen. Hitting the online white pages for the entire US of online A these days are we? There just seems to come a time when the harassing and haranguing overrides said convenience and becomes one more set of overwhelming obligations on that never ending gotta get "tuit" list. I'm going back to my virtual beginnings and see how many of these online onuses I can start ditching to cut down on my bit... Er, as much as I enjoy the occasional rhyming game, perhaps we'd just better not go there (we are rated G don'tcha know ;o)
Wow. That was a lot. Hope I didn't hurt anybody; seems I've been saving up *grin*. Somehow, I'm betting there are at least a few of you that have the same love/loathe relationship with technology. Or is it just me? I'll have a Sarabear update next time and the upside of technological advances. For now though, I'm sending you a happy smile and a virtual hug. BTW: have you noticed that we are up to 114 Facebook Likes? How exciting *bounce*bounce*bounce*. So feel free to Like us, tweet this, link to it, pin it, Digg it, Stumble it...  
Oh, ACK!