Indecisive Moment II

For a split-second, everything was perfect. The clouds parted and an isolated beam of sunlight fell through the window, onto our ordinarily rather prosaic landing, transforming it, momentarily, into something more dynamic and theatrical. Susie Cat, ever the sun-worshipper, planted herself firmly in this spotlight, looking, in my eyes at least, even more regal than usual. My camera-brain, the one that lets me know when modern technology might fail me, was whirring like clockwork and, unlike later in the week when I'd get really muddy, was giving me useful, faultless advice.

I pre-focused my increasingly trusty Olympus C-5050, visually checked composition on the LCD screen, and gently, gently, depressed the shutter.

But the C-5050 isn't a digital SLR. Like most digicams, there's a tiny lag between the moment the shutter is pressed and when the picture is taken. Some reviews record that this lag is around 0.2s in length. And, somewhere, in that fraction of a second, in the way that some people in group shots must blink, Susie decided to stick her tongue out at me...



Talk about comic timing.