Tuesday, August 15, 2006

Cute Overdose

Even though I have never taken a photography course (the dumb classes were always full when I went to register!), I like to take el fotos from time to time, even if they aren’t necessarily for historical purposes or posterity. Something will catch my eye, and if I don’t have a camera nearby, I will instead put my hands up in a “frame” position (different from the “taking a photo” position, with the forefinger ready to push the button) and visualize what the final result would look like. Just one of many weird habits I picked up in college.

Animals are always a popular photography subject, mine especially. One summer at my grandma’s farm in Illinois, I even got up voluntarily at 5 a.m. to take pictures of the cats outside as they wandered around in the misty early morning, waiting for grandma to come to the door (grandma = food). And the first time I went to visit my in-laws, my husband accused me of taking more pictures of the (2) dogs and (3) cats than of the humans (which was true). [Here is my mother-in-law's golden retriever, Monty, with his new toy at Christmas.]

So imagine my delight when I stumbled across the wondrous website devoted to photography of cute animals, cuteoverload.com. They just got voted by Time magazine as a fun time-waster and one of the Web’s coolest sites.

Is it ever. I get the shakes until I can click on the site and see what’s new that day. I’ll log on in the morning AND in the evening, because sometimes she posts more than one time per day. This site is almost more addictive than blogging (gasp!). Since I discovered it long after its creation, I have spent hours – yes, hours – catching up on the cuteness, going through the archives to see what I’ve missed.

Even men can get sucked in. My husband (who will never admit to this) was looking over my shoulder while I was looking at the latest cute puppy, bugging me to finish up because he wanted to watch the latest episode of Brawny Academy. But while I took a quick bathroom break, he started scrolling down cuteoverload.com and before long was noting how cute this or that kitty was.

There are also websites like The Daily Kitten and The Daily Puppy if you can’t get enough.

Fiends! Beware the cuteness!!

3 comments:

John Ottinger III (Grasping for the Wind) said...

I NEVER DID! It just happened "accidentally" that Val left it on a picture of an otter. OF COURSE I had to look. Then there was this other picture of a baby otter, and then this weird looking llama. Then I just had to see the baby foxes! I never commented on their cuteness, not once! I swear!

Leopoldtulip said...

Men do indeed get sucked into the cuteness. However, I think that we have a lower cuteness threshold than women do. My wife kept calling me over to the computer, "Look at this one!" and "Look at this one!" until the cuteness became overpowering, and I needed to go shoot something (in a computer game, of course). I will say that the "Rules of Cuteness" section in cuteoverload is very instructive.

Anonymous said...

Val,
I was just reading your latest blog entry and Elizabeth walked up and said that looks like my Grandma's house.

I am enjoying both of your blogs, keep up the good work. By the way, being a kept woman is one ot the greatest privileges God gave to me. :)