Full disclosure: I am a non-practicing Jewish person, but I do go to work on the “High Holy” holidays to serve my patients and employees.

Lately, there has been talk that the Postmaster General wants to reduce postal service from 6 days per week to 5 days per week, in an effort to save money.

One day, I was at my local post office to mail a letter (I ran out of stamps at the time). The postal clerk asked me if I wanted the regular [generic] design or the floral designed stamps. I told her to give me the stamp that would get my letter there the fastest. She said that no matter the design of the stamp, it all gets there at the same time. Of course, I knew that but I was trying to make a point.

This is an uptapped source of revenue for the post office. Why do they make stamps in various pretty designs? Obviously, because people want them. According to the USPS.com website there are 10 different designs of these first class stamps. So, I guess a lot of people want them.

I’m sure the design, production and distribution of these stamps cost the post office something. Just the fact that the clerk took her time to ask me my preference of stamps, resulting in a longer service time and keeping the people behind me waiting longer than if we didn’t engage in this conversation. Sure it was brief but every minute counts in service when there are 10 people waiting.

So here’s my suggestion; Surcharge the pretty designer stamps. If people want them so badly then they should pay extra for them. In an era of email and social networking communication which is simply text on a computer screen, pretty doesn’t seem that important when sharing information. More information is traveling through the internet everyday. Companies are even giving us choices to have our monthly bills sent to us electronically rather than by regular, snail mail. Less income for the post office

So, postmaster, stop raising fees for everyone and start charging those people that absolutely have to have the variety. To those that think the outside envelope is more important than its contents. It may not be the total answer to the postal financial crisis but it may buy the rest of us time between rate increases.

My usual response, albiet a little smart-ass of me, is; “That’s true, and that Tiger Woods golfs so well because he has a really good golf club.”

Pembroke Pines Fireworks Show 07-04-09

This shot was taken with a 60mm/f2.8 lens at f16 for 2 secs. The lens and camera were set to manual focus and the lens was prefocused to infinity and pointed to the area of the sky which I assumed the fireworks would burst. If I left the lens on auto focus, the camera would have nothing to actually focus on and the shutter would not trip when pressed. I had the ISO at 200 and white balance set to daylight. I used a tripod and a remote shutter release. The camera was also set to continuous shooting so all I had to do was hold down the button when I first saw a launch. While still holding the shutter release button down, after 2 secs, the camera took the next shot, and so forth until I released the remote shutter button. This allowed me to capture the fireworks at different stages of their bursts.

This was a studio shot of a craft project that my wife created and entered in a Holloween Decoration Contest. She won by the way.

I used a 60mm f2.8 lens at the 60mm length, f6.3 for a 2 sec exposure using the rear curtain function on my camera. A regular flash setup would illuminate the outside but the princess doll inside would be dark. I placed an LED light source inside the pumpkin to camera right of the doll. The blue color cast of the LED actually enhanced the blue dress on the doll so the mixed lighting worked well here.

The rear curtain function on the 2 second exposure allowed the internal light source to illuminate the doll before the external flashes fired.

When the catholic boy asked the jewish boy, the jewish boy said
“I dunno, maybe an astronaut.”

When the jewish boy asked the catholic boy what he wanted to be
when he grew up, the catholic boy said,”a Priest”

The little jewish boy wasn’t that impressed with that answer so
he asked the little catholic boy, “What do you want to be after
that?”

The little catholic boy said. “I’m going to study real hard and
become a Bishop.”

The little jewish boy, still not really that impressed then
asked, “So, what do you want to be after that?”

The little catholic boy said, “I’m going to study real, real hard
and become a Cardinal.”

The little jewish boy still not that impressed then asked, “So
what to you want to be after that?”

The little catholic boy said, “I’m going to study real, real, real
hard and become the Pope!”

The little jewish boy then asked, “So what do you want to be
after that?”

The little catholic boy now stunned and confused, asked “What do
you mean? You can’t get any higher than the POPE!”

The little jewish boy then said, “Why don’t you become Christ. One
of our guys did.”