I've always taken the view that there's so much happening in my little garden that it's a complete world on its own, if you bother to look. It's a parallel universe so big that I'll never really get to know all of it in my lifetime. And now my darling Pammy has given me the incentive – and the equipment – to explore this 'other world', the micro world of nature.
It's our 21st wedding anniversary today, and Pam has bought me my first microscope. I've always wanted one, often talked about getting one, but never quite got around to buying one. And this one is perfect. It's a "Kid's First Microscope", and that's spot on, because I'm just a big kid at heart.
I love the packaging. As soon as we unpacked it we immediately set about examining seeds of parsley, lettuce and silver beet in various magnifications. Amazing detail, such complex structures I never imagined were there. And then we looked at each other romantically and said "pond scum!" Borrowing a blob of water from our outdoor potted water garden, we were amazed to see the micro wildlife swimming around on the glass slide. Yikes!
Suitable for ages 9 and up. Yep, I qualify, with several decades to spare! 
Pammy is a truly gifted when it comes to buying presents. She's a legend in her family for her gift-buying imagination plus her attention to detail. The gift papers are always something special, the cards equally so. This beautiful carrot paper wrapped up my microscope box.
And this lovely lemon paper wrapped up a couple of little extra gifts for this boy who loves gardening, and his girl.While I don't imagine that I'll be able to take any photos of the amazing things I am already seeing in my tiny parallel universe, I know that the insights which will come to me via Pammy's microscope will somehow end up in this blog.
Even without a microscope I've always taken the view that there's a million fascinating little things happening out there in the 9m x 7.5m of our little garden, but with the new close-up viewer I had better upgrade that estimate to a zillion.
7 comments:
Congratulations to you and Pammy on your 21st wedding anniversary! Many happy returns of the day!
C'mon Jamie, at least give it a go with your digital camera over the eyepiece. You'd be surprised at what you can get with the lamp turned up to full ball.
A very happy Anniversary to both of you. Your positive attitude to life is perhaps the secret of this long bliss together and your wonderful garden.
Your blog is truly inspiring. Thanks
Congratulations on your 21st! You take good care of Pammy, she sounds like a keeper.
Pond scum, LOL. I'm not brave enough to look at the itsy bitsy life in my garden. Have fun.
Congratulations to you both on your anniversary! Have a lot of fun with the microscope, too.
I second the suggestion of putting your camera up to the eyepiece. I took some pretty awesome digital pics through the eyepiece of my new kaleidoscope and then made a collage out of them on Picasa. I just made sure there was a lot of light coming through the bottom of the viewer and I think I set it to close-up mode. Take a look if you want http://nostalgic-nana.blogspot.com/2010/01/anniversary-presents.html. You can click on the photo to see details. I'm going to redo some of the photos one of these days and then get it printed and frame it.
Oh, and congrats on the anniversary.
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