Photographing bumblebees is a royal pain in the butt. For one thing, the darned critters won't stay put long enough for you to focus. And then, whenever you think you have your shot, the little varmints will fly away never to be seen again.

It all started last week when I noticed that there was a plethora of bumblebees buzzing around the hedges around the office. Said hedges feature little pink flowers that are cute enough to photograph by themselves just for the heck of it. I remembered then that I was carrying my little camera, the one that I always have stashed in my handbag just in case something interesting pops up that deserves a shot.

Like bumblebees.

To make a long story short, I spent two days worth of lunch hours chasing after the little guys, with very little luck. After a gazillion and one shots, I ended up with a lot of blurry photos, or the photo of a bumblebee's butt, a leg, an eye, or simply a flower where the elusive flying dude had been standing just a nanosecond ago.

Finally, I hit the jackpot. When I go home and check at the pictures there is one, just one, among a gazillion shots, that looks pretty good.

Okay, I am positive that there are better bumblebee pictures out there, but I like mine because I had to work for it. Even the security guard at our building thought I was nuts.

"No one usually takes pictures around here," he says.

"No one but me and a couple of other camera obsessed coworkers," I say.

He laughs.

Luckily, he knows me well, as well as the rest of the security personel, so they don't think I am some sort of weirdo. We're cool (even if I am still a weirdo).

At any rate, here's the link to the picture. And next to it is a shot of the flower where another bumblebee used to be.

And that's it for today.

Belfebe out.