A Year in Pictures – 9 February 2015 – The First Snowdrop

Sorry everyone, but this latest one, being posted on 10 February and referring to 9 February, was actually taken on 8 February.

My excuse is that I am unwell, having succumbed in the last few days to an unnamed virus that is taking the wind out of my sails and eating into my energy and (such as it is) creativity. I have been working at home the last couple of days, as I tend to coddle my immune system more than I ever used to in the days before diagnosis with WM (see blog posts from September 2010 until 2014, originally written under the heading "Life and Love with a Rare Lymphoma").

I made a promise to a friend in Germany to produce a photo of the first snowdrop I saw this winter. Coming out of church on Sunday the 8th, I spied this little beauty and captured something of its likeness on my phone. Apologies for the electrical cable snaking its way through the middle foreground, as well as for the lack of detail in the flower itself (the latter being an example of what are known as "blown highlights"). In spite of such imperfections, my heart lifts at the sign of this unpretentious little flower raising its pretty little head into the freezing air.

This is the original shot (or SOOC, short for "straight out of the camera"). The main image in this post was produced by tweaking the original in a wonderful little phone app called Snapseed.