Veronica is an old friend and former housemate of mine, and a former coworker too. She’s kind, generous, easygoing, and very resourceful. Once, when my sister was looking for a cat to adopt, Veronica conveniently found a cat who had just had kittens (in a tree, as it happens), and thus the cat need was fulfilled by a candidate with a real sense of adventure.

She (Veronica, not the cat) is a person I’ve always held in the highest regard, so I was very pleased when she reported that she’d met her true love, and would I like to be their wedding photographer? Of course I would! They’re married now, and you will find out about that later, but first things first: the engagement session.

At the Emeryville IKEA, the Red Bats ate Swedish meatballs and stared at shoppers like we were on safari. Maybe we need to get out of town more often? Then it was down to the parking garage to meet Veronica and Omar, and off to the harbor. The sun was setting, making a painterly backdrop for our shoot, and Veronica and Omar were looking quite spiffy. I’d had way too much coffee, and I was excited by seeing my friend happy with a sweet and funny guy, so I’m afraid I babbled like a fool. Nobody seemed to mind.

I really love the last photo in this post, by Patrick. It looks like it belongs on a motivational calendar, and I mean that in the best possible way. Anybody want to come up with a self-helpy caption for it?

I have a confession to make. Until a few weeks ago, I’d never visited an aquarium. I don’t know why. I’m not afraid of water. Or fish. Star Trek IV (the one with the whales) is my favorite Star Trek movie. I think dolphins are swell. I even lived within 30 miles of the Long Beach Aquarium for 20 years and yet I did not hear the siren call of fish in tanks. Then I visited the California Academy of Sciences Natural History Museum in San Francisco.

Let me just tell you – the place is SUPER NEAT. There are aquariums, there’s a planetarium, there’s even a little rain forest in an egg. And the whole thing is tucked inside Golden Gate Park, which is home to a ton of other fun stuff to do.

Naturally, I took my camera. Rebecca and Joye were using two of the three Red Bat lenses on their pregnancy shoot, so I took what I like to call “The Drainpipe”. Let me talk about The Drainpipe for a moment. It’s a 70-200mm lens with a minimal focal distance (how far you have to be from your subject for the lens to focus) of about 5 feet, it weighs 3 pounds, and it’s painted white. It’s a beast, and I love it. It hardly ever leaves my camera. The reason I bring this up is because I wasn’t sure how well that lens would perform in a dimly lit, crowded place.

The answer: AMAZINGLY. Yes, I had to stand pretty far back from the glass to get the fish shots below. Yes, it was sometimes difficult for me to shoot with all the people. But that lens has a bit of magic in it…maybe it’s the length, or the whiteness, or something, but when people see it, they tend to get out of the way. They don’t really see me, but they RESPECT the lens. It’s kind of an odd phenomenon to watch. Here’s the lens, by the way (this was taken by Rebecca, who was taking a picture of me while I was taking a picture of Laurie King):

Anyway, the point is that I got some great shots, I’m now sold on aquariums, and you should visit the California Academy of Sciences Natural History Museum if you get the chance.