n_maher

@grawk - does it have a first name? I used to think poorly of bologna until a butcher friend made me a sandwich with their house made stuff. I STFU after that.

It's been a day. Got up this morning and came downstairs to the thought, "man, it feels cold on the first floor of the house." First call was to the boiler guy, praying that a circulation pump had crapped out overnight. Verdict - WRONG ANSWER. He quickly determined the boiler was doing it's thing but the pipes for the zone that heats the first floor were not. Shit. Phoned a friend whose husband is a plumber. Started chasing frozen pipes a little before 11am. Finally found the culprit at 2pm. Had it fixed and flowing heat again by 2:30. All told, it felt like a bargain at under $1000 given that a pipe could have burst and we've got another 10 days or so of freezing temps ahead of us. Still managed to make scones for Lily's best friend who slept over last night and turns 18 next week (JFC) and also still made dinner - pork chili verde with cast-iron-skillet cornbread. There will be barrel strength bourbon in my future. Oh and we've already got almost a foot of snow and I've cleared the driveway once. I believe I will sleep tonight.

@HemiSam - goddamn, that thing is awesome! I hope you enjoy the hell out of it.

@crappyjones123 - For the longest time I've been shooting landscapes for work, where the A7IV is honestly way more than enough and I also managed to pick up an A7RV for work last year as well. But with both topping out at 10FPS as I've started to shoot more sports it's been a little limiting. Which is to say my skill is limiting and some of the improvements the A7V offers would certainly be helpful. I am tracking the lack of RAW support but I've had really good luck tweaking settings and shooting SOOC jpgs and doctoring a little in Lightroom after the fact. Fine art is not on my menu. Those lantern festival shots are fantastic by the way. RE: Nikon focus issues - I consistently had back-focus issues with the various bodies that I owned over the years. Some less so than others but shooting wide would often produce results like you posted above. The camera would think it was nailing focus but the results showed otherwise. I have not had this issue with either Sony body.

Happy belated Birthday!

@Voltron I thought Red Oxx was still around?? I hope everything is alright, Marc.

Happy Birthday!

In the last 36(ish) hours I flew out to Denver and back to check in on a friend that had a particularly rough second half of 2025 along with three other friends. When we learned he wasn't going to be able to come out east during the holidays we decided it was time to head west. So yesterday I got up at 4am, drove through the snow to Boston, hung out for 24hrs and flew back this evening. I am, exhausted.

Curious to hear your thoughts on the camera as you get to know it better. I've got an A7IV and use an A7RV regularly and am thinking about picking up the A7V in a month or so when finances might permit it. I can't bring myself to think the A1II is worth it to me.

Happy birthday!

Dan's advice is solid. I got the Kickr on black Friday so it's a bit more now but is the bottom of the range direct drive model they make. I decided to get what i needed instead of what i might want.

Cooked yesterday in a marathon session so that dinner was a non-event (prep wise) tonight. Chicken shawarma with homemade naan. The naan was all I managed a pic of.

With leftover pulled pork in the fridge it was time for nachos.

I don't think we'll stop at the oil.

Happy belated birthday!

Happy belated birthday, Knucks!

I think to understand that we'd first have to declare war. Right now we have a president (and military frankly) performing unsanctioned and unauthorized (and from all I can tell unprovoked) military actions. It's mind boggling.

Shit, Mikey. I've read a few stories about grease fires but that's pretty extreme. Do you think it was just from the belly or was there some built up grease from the grill/smoker not draining properly or something? Regardless of root cause, that sucks.

Was thinking about you, Todd, and your nephew as I spend a few minutes out in the driveway tonight tinkering with the camera. I'm pretty shite at. lunar photography, but still had fun for 10 minutes until I couldn't feel my hands.

We got an unexpected 3” overnight (that’s what she said) on top of the 4” earlier this week. First white Xmas in a good long time.

Happy birthday!

https://a.co/d/dvFqpzY If she's an iPhone user, probably pretty hard to beat these - pun intended.

Happy birthday, Ric!

My existing direct-drive trainer had started to had multiple signal drop issues so Santa was kind enough to bring me:

Happy birthday, Ken!