Left: Nora at about eighteen months.
Right: Mairi at about eighteen months (taken in 2004, obviously).
And here's a picture of the two sisters together:
25 August 2006
Comparison of sorts
I got the girls' picture taken last week, so I have pictures to share.
Left: Nora at about eighteen months.
Right: Mairi at about eighteen months (taken in 2004, obviously).
And here's a picture of the two sisters together:
Left: Nora at about eighteen months.
Right: Mairi at about eighteen months (taken in 2004, obviously).
And here's a picture of the two sisters together:
An evening in the life
First off, let me say this: Nora is fine. Throughout all of what I am about to relate, she was at worst pissed off, but she was never ill or lethargic or anything like that. Ironically, I think she came out of the whole experience least effected.
The short version: Nora somehow got a bottle of Motrin open and ingested at least half a pill, at most four pills. Chris and I took her to the ER (while my folks assumed care of Mairi), a nurse called Poison Control, they recommended Nora be held for observation for a couple hours, and four hours later we were released and came home.
The slightly longer version: At about 6pm yesterday, we were about to go out to dinner with my folks. Chris walked over to our house to get the Subaru, taking Nora with him while I got Mairi ready to go. The Subaru arrived in my folks' driveway, I walked out to the car with Mairi, as Mairi was getting in her seat she looked at Nora and said, "I don't think she should have those." Chris and I looked over, saw that Nora had an open Motrin bottle and orange stuff around her mouth — we have no idea how on earth she got it, it's normally in the glove box between the front seats, nor do we know how she got the "child-proof" cap off.
Chris and I ran to the other side of the car, got Nora out of her seat and started swiping out her mouth with our fingers. She started yelling, Mairi started crying, it was lovely. We found two partially chewed pills in her mouth, ten to twelve in her seat and on the floor of the car — out of a 24-count bottle. After a brief discussion, we sent Mairi with Mom and Dad and took off for the urgent care facility (MedPoint) closest to our house.
At MedPoint I immediately told the receptionist why we were there. She talked to the doctor, who said we'd better head over to the ER. At the ER, one nurse checked us in and took Nora's vital stats while another got on the phone with Indiana Poison Control. We found two more pills in her onesie, and that with the fact that I knew we had used at least three doses (two pills per dose = six more pills accounted for) got the possibly ingested count down to four to six at most. Poison Control said to keep her in and observe but didn't recommend that her stomach be pumped (as we had sort of expected).
So, we waited. First in the waiting room, then later in an ER patient room. Mom, Dad and Mairi had followed us first to MedPoint and then on to the hospital — since dinner had been skipped, they took Mairi down to the cafeteria and fed her, sending Chris back with some caramel corn for him, me and Nora to eat. At about 8:30, Chris and I decided Mairi really ought to go home and get to bed (her normal bedtime is 7:30), so Mom took them home and Dad stayed with Nora and myself.
At about 9:30 or so, I asked the nurse if we really needed to stay. Nora had been playing, running around the room, giggling, waving to the nurses and patients going by outside our room — it had bwell wel over the recommended two hours and there was obviously nothing wrong with her. The nurse said I could check Nora out, but the new doctor was coming on shift at 10:00 and would probably see us almost immediately. I agreed to wait a bit more, but said if no one was able to see us by 10:15, we were going to leave.
Please understand, I'm not complaining about the care we received — it was simply obvious that Nora was fine by this point, and I felt bad taking up a room that someone else might need more! Okay, and I was bordering on totally exhausted, plus rather hungry. But mostly it just seemed foolish for very busy hospital staff to spend any more time on us.
At about ten to ten, the doctor on staff came in to see us. I answered several questions, most of them for the second or third time, he looked at Nora, asked to see her walk, and went off to consult with the nurse(s) who had talked to Poison Control. He came back, discussed various things to watch out for with a child her age, and said we should go home. Nora was asleep before we were two miles form the hospital. Dad got me some fast food on the way home, and I went to bed as soon as I could after we got there. (For all the good that did — for some reason I didn't sleep too well. Go figure.)
Today Nora is totally her normal self, none the worse for the experience as far as we can tell. And Chris and I have started a top to bottom re-evaluation of every room in the house for child-proofing!
The short version: Nora somehow got a bottle of Motrin open and ingested at least half a pill, at most four pills. Chris and I took her to the ER (while my folks assumed care of Mairi), a nurse called Poison Control, they recommended Nora be held for observation for a couple hours, and four hours later we were released and came home.
The slightly longer version: At about 6pm yesterday, we were about to go out to dinner with my folks. Chris walked over to our house to get the Subaru, taking Nora with him while I got Mairi ready to go. The Subaru arrived in my folks' driveway, I walked out to the car with Mairi, as Mairi was getting in her seat she looked at Nora and said, "I don't think she should have those." Chris and I looked over, saw that Nora had an open Motrin bottle and orange stuff around her mouth — we have no idea how on earth she got it, it's normally in the glove box between the front seats, nor do we know how she got the "child-proof" cap off.
Chris and I ran to the other side of the car, got Nora out of her seat and started swiping out her mouth with our fingers. She started yelling, Mairi started crying, it was lovely. We found two partially chewed pills in her mouth, ten to twelve in her seat and on the floor of the car — out of a 24-count bottle. After a brief discussion, we sent Mairi with Mom and Dad and took off for the urgent care facility (MedPoint) closest to our house.
At MedPoint I immediately told the receptionist why we were there. She talked to the doctor, who said we'd better head over to the ER. At the ER, one nurse checked us in and took Nora's vital stats while another got on the phone with Indiana Poison Control. We found two more pills in her onesie, and that with the fact that I knew we had used at least three doses (two pills per dose = six more pills accounted for) got the possibly ingested count down to four to six at most. Poison Control said to keep her in and observe but didn't recommend that her stomach be pumped (as we had sort of expected).
So, we waited. First in the waiting room, then later in an ER patient room. Mom, Dad and Mairi had followed us first to MedPoint and then on to the hospital — since dinner had been skipped, they took Mairi down to the cafeteria and fed her, sending Chris back with some caramel corn for him, me and Nora to eat. At about 8:30, Chris and I decided Mairi really ought to go home and get to bed (her normal bedtime is 7:30), so Mom took them home and Dad stayed with Nora and myself.
At about 9:30 or so, I asked the nurse if we really needed to stay. Nora had been playing, running around the room, giggling, waving to the nurses and patients going by outside our room — it had bwell wel over the recommended two hours and there was obviously nothing wrong with her. The nurse said I could check Nora out, but the new doctor was coming on shift at 10:00 and would probably see us almost immediately. I agreed to wait a bit more, but said if no one was able to see us by 10:15, we were going to leave.
Please understand, I'm not complaining about the care we received — it was simply obvious that Nora was fine by this point, and I felt bad taking up a room that someone else might need more! Okay, and I was bordering on totally exhausted, plus rather hungry. But mostly it just seemed foolish for very busy hospital staff to spend any more time on us.
At about ten to ten, the doctor on staff came in to see us. I answered several questions, most of them for the second or third time, he looked at Nora, asked to see her walk, and went off to consult with the nurse(s) who had talked to Poison Control. He came back, discussed various things to watch out for with a child her age, and said we should go home. Nora was asleep before we were two miles form the hospital. Dad got me some fast food on the way home, and I went to bed as soon as I could after we got there. (For all the good that did — for some reason I didn't sleep too well. Go figure.)
Today Nora is totally her normal self, none the worse for the experience as far as we can tell. And Chris and I have started a top to bottom re-evaluation of every room in the house for child-proofing!
14 August 2006
11 August 2006
Do you see what I see?
There's been news again of late about newspaper photos edited, or "Photoshopped", before being published. I find this issue to be interesting for a number of reasons.
First, because when I worked as a newspaper photographer I on a few occasions edited pix in Photoshop before they ran. Yep, it's true. There was a car ad where I erased the braces holding the car up on it's side, so it looked like the two salesmen where holding it up. And there was that group photo of kids where some were making, ahem, rude gestures shall we say? Their hands were somewhat shadowed already, so I just darkened things a bit more.
I don't feel any guilt over either of these incidents. In the first case, anyone with any sense would guess the photo had been manipulated. And in the second case, well, if I'd caught the kids at the time I was taking the photo I would have simply taken another, after letting the adults in the situation know what the kids had been doing.
Another reason I'm intrigued by these instances is that there's often a reaction of, "See, look what computers can let you do!" As if photos were never modified before the advent of image software and computers. Right. All computers have done is make it possible for any moderately tech savvy individual to modify things, rather than such modification requiring a photographer trained to use darkroom equipment beyond the essentials. If anything, I think the relative ease makes it easier to spot the manipulated images now, as the manipulators often don't have the skill to hide what they've done — at least not from those who are familiar with the software. (Here's a good look at some recent examples of photo manipulations by the media.)
However, I never really thought about the inherent difference between what individuals see and what a camera sees. Here's a quote from "Don't Believe What You See in the Papers" and article in Slate by Jim Lewis:
But a photograph really is always an artificial representation of the world. I was thinking about this recently when I looked at some pix Chris had taken of the girls. I commented that they were so different from mine and he joked, "Yeah, they're not as good" but that wasn't it.
When I take a picture, I usually frame it, make sure the orientation is right, the lighting, etc. I may ask the girls to stand still, smile, or move this way or that. The picture I end up with is therefore a constructed version of whatever was going on. The pictures that Chris had taken were spontaneous, at all angles, with lots of space around the action. The girls were playing, doing whatever they'd really been doing when he picked up the camera. The pictures were much more real than what I tend to capture. Maybe not as aesthetically pleasing, but somehow truer representations of the kids.
I guess I don't really have a point in all this — just random observations on a theme. *grin* That's what blogs are for, right?
First, because when I worked as a newspaper photographer I on a few occasions edited pix in Photoshop before they ran. Yep, it's true. There was a car ad where I erased the braces holding the car up on it's side, so it looked like the two salesmen where holding it up. And there was that group photo of kids where some were making, ahem, rude gestures shall we say? Their hands were somewhat shadowed already, so I just darkened things a bit more.
I don't feel any guilt over either of these incidents. In the first case, anyone with any sense would guess the photo had been manipulated. And in the second case, well, if I'd caught the kids at the time I was taking the photo I would have simply taken another, after letting the adults in the situation know what the kids had been doing.
Another reason I'm intrigued by these instances is that there's often a reaction of, "See, look what computers can let you do!" As if photos were never modified before the advent of image software and computers. Right. All computers have done is make it possible for any moderately tech savvy individual to modify things, rather than such modification requiring a photographer trained to use darkroom equipment beyond the essentials. If anything, I think the relative ease makes it easier to spot the manipulated images now, as the manipulators often don't have the skill to hide what they've done — at least not from those who are familiar with the software. (Here's a good look at some recent examples of photo manipulations by the media.)
However, I never really thought about the inherent difference between what individuals see and what a camera sees. Here's a quote from "Don't Believe What You See in the Papers" and article in Slate by Jim Lewis:
"... What, after all, do we believe when we believe that a photograph is true? That it mimics what we would see with our own eyes, if we were standing where the camera was placed? But a camera sees quite differently: For one thing, to take only the most obvious features, photos are rectangular, whereas the human eye's visual field is an ovoid blob. Moreover, "normal" vision is roughly equivalent to what you get from a 35 mm camera lens set somewhere between 42 mm and 50 mm zoom. Anything longer than that shows details no human eye could see; anything shorter shows an unnaturally broad vista. And cameras are notoriously crude when it comes to dynamic range: Highlights get blasted and dark areas become muddy. ..."In other words, a picture is almost always going to be different from what a person would see in the same environment, to at least some degree. This is something I knew, now that I think about it, but had never really considered.
But a photograph really is always an artificial representation of the world. I was thinking about this recently when I looked at some pix Chris had taken of the girls. I commented that they were so different from mine and he joked, "Yeah, they're not as good" but that wasn't it.
When I take a picture, I usually frame it, make sure the orientation is right, the lighting, etc. I may ask the girls to stand still, smile, or move this way or that. The picture I end up with is therefore a constructed version of whatever was going on. The pictures that Chris had taken were spontaneous, at all angles, with lots of space around the action. The girls were playing, doing whatever they'd really been doing when he picked up the camera. The pictures were much more real than what I tend to capture. Maybe not as aesthetically pleasing, but somehow truer representations of the kids.
I guess I don't really have a point in all this — just random observations on a theme. *grin* That's what blogs are for, right?
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