Just a bit of bloom

I'm not much for the holiday itself but I'm pretty good at being thankful or at least I try.

Today's posting is one of those life's simple pleasures to be thankful for in this case, a sunny day, Southern California and a rose in bloom in November.

A couple weeks ago, I spent the day getting my neighbour comfortable with his first digital camera.

Our route took us through Balboa Park and, of course, included the rose and cactus gardens on Park Boulevard where I took this shot to show the value of the macro feature.

The goal on the day was to get him comfortable using some of the basic features like zoom and macro to get some shots in the camera and uploaded to his computer.

Not every feature, not every option, not information overload, not terribly technical, just getting feet wet and shooting.

It was a taming technology session and it reaffirmed to me that even though I may be much more technically inclined than a student, I can still listen and communicate at an appropriate level. He's been complimenting and singing the praises of my teaching ever since -- warm fuzzies abound.

I like the praise but I am even more thankful for the underlying skill that makes that praise possible.