" ,. . . poi a la bella Donna torna' il viso." -- Dante, Purgatorio XXVIII:148 (20/30)

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" ,. . . poi a la bella Donna torna' il viso." -- Dante, Purgatorio XXVIII:148 (20/30)

The theme of the image you see here isn't original with this one, and there is another photo in my stream that is quite similar to it, including in the fact that it refers to this very same passage from Dante. Here, however, I took some liberties with the text; I capitalized the word "donna," which appears in lower case in the Divine Comedy. That apparently minor change rather significantly alters the meaning of the passage; instead of the original meaning of "I then turned to face the lovely woman," it now translates as "I then turned to face the lovely Donna." The woman on the computer screen is named Donna, and she is incredibly beautiful -- and nearly 52 years of age as well!

I think she is going to appreciate this little gesture, in spite of the image's flaws. It was taken at Schlotzsky's, where I stopped on my way home to eat a snack and do a little Flickring. A friend of mine named Joseph Militello, whom I had not seen in months, showed up a little while after I did. We caught up on each other, and I showed him some of my latest photos; then it occurred to me to have him take today's addition to "30 Days O' Me." After I made the appropriate settings, I gave him a hasty lesson on how to use the Nikon D50; and for a first-time user, he did an okay job, although he obviously didn't get the focusing part quite right. Perhaps there is someone out there in Flickrdom who is more interested in the hot-sauce bottles, the cup, and my camera bag than in the rest of the image, in which case Joe managed to capture those objects in such a way as to make you very happy indeed!

Either Joe or the owner of the place had just said something that made me laugh, and he managed to capture me at that moment. And that seems appropriate. I am often told that I don't smile nearly enough, but this photo was taken right after the best weekend I have had in years. I missed a Fred Astaire dance exhibition on Saturday, which was a big disappointment, although a tolerable one in view of everything else that happened to me between Friday and Sunday.

I decided this image was acceptable for the day's upload in spite of its flaws. You're a sweetie, Donna, and I hope you are delighted with this! :-)

Attribution Noncommercial Share Alike Some rights reserved
Taken on: August 11, 2008
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Camera: Nikon D50, f/2.8, 1/80 sec, 85mm (=127mm) (more info) (hide info)
Camera: Nikon D50
Aperture: f/2.8
Exposure Time: 0.013 sec (1/80)
Focal Length: 85mm (35mm equivalent: 127mm)
Exposure Bias: 0 EV
Flash: No Flash
Exposure Program: Manual
Exposure Mode: Manual
Metering Mode: Multi-segment
White Balance: Auto
Color Space: sRGB
Software: Adobe Photoshop Elements 3.0 Windows
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