Cleaning exhaustion, puppy dog curls, and weirdness...

My house is, at the very moment, cleaner than it has been since I bought it.  Seriously, no matter what I have written about cleaning for guest before, I did not make the effort I did this week.  I suppose ... this sort of effort will be another nearly three years in the making, too.

I scoured my bathroom, changed the hand towels in all three bathrooms, cleaned the fireplace, steam mopped the entire first floor twice, wiped as far as I could beneath the couch (I briefly considered moving it), cleaned the inside and outside of all my kitchen appliances, cleaned the bodies of all the lamps, and gave Amos his bath. I also emptied all the trashcans and took out the trash and the recycling. Finally, I took my own bath and started a load of laundry, one full of towels and cleaning rags.  I have more laundry to do, but it can wait.

Once he is all dry, one of my favorite pastimes is to choose a favorite curl.  They are all so fluffy and soft and smell so wonderful.  When one is utterly exhausted from cleaning all three floors of a house that is not really cleaned all that often (very straight and neat, but not cleaned), choosing favorite curls and twisting them about your finger is about all you can do.

The weirdness is from the photos I tried to take last night.  The thing is, on the LCD screen of the camera I could see the photos.  I was actually a little bit excited that I seemed to be getting the hang of taking photos of night clouds.  However, when I stuck the memory card in the computer, this is what I found, for the most part:

Beautiful, eh?  So, I did what I never do.  I tried to fiddle with them in PhotoShop.  SIGH.  Here is eons of work that was basically comprised of clueless fiddling with settings.

So, the thing is ... the clouds are there.  You just cannot see them.  Why, then, can I see them on the camera screen??

How about this one?

At least you can sort of get what the sky looked like.  I really marvel at night clouds because they are so white and bright against the evening darkness.

How about this fiddling?

I tried to take a photo of the clouds passing behind the moon.

So, I fiddled with this one, too.

However, no matter how much I fiddled with all those confusing settings, I could not make the clouds appear.

Before heading inside, I thought I would take a photo of Amos, who was waiting for me on the back steps as I moved my tripod around trying to capture the beauty I see in night clouds.  He is, after all, beautiful himself.

So, uhm, I forgot that puppy dogs do not usually just sit still for long periods of time when you are taking night shots without flash.  Kind of creepy, eh?  He was sitting, but he had just gotten up to circle and then settle back down again.  So, I ended up with ghost Amos instead of adorable Amos.

What a gift he is, ghost or otherwise!
Especially, so, when he is serving as my lavender aroma therapy.
And lap warmer on a cold fall night.


I am Yours, Lord.  Save me!