7 years ... ?

Have you ever wondered how easy it is to break one of those cheap, full-length mirrors you can get at Wal-Mart? Apparently my children and their friends did.

I heard my middle child screaming that she'd stepped on something and I ran back to my girl's room to see what was the matter.

Their mirror -- which had only gone up yesterday, by the way -- had come off the back of their door, and was leaning against their wall. One of their friends didn't realize how fragile it was, leaned against it and "crack!" I certainly hope her parents already have decent life and health insurance. Seven years, chica.

So, I carefully took it out of their room and cleaned up the mess. The piece of glass in my daughter's foot either fell out or her sister got it. They were all getting ready to go see Barnyard, so I think she could have severed her foot at the ankle and still have been fine with going out.

As they were getting ready to leave, I was taking the mirror out to the dump and looked down into the cracked surface, dusted with glass fragments. "That's an awfully cool photo waiting for you there, bud," I thought to myself. See, I don't generally do this self-portrait kind of thing, but Raymi does it often and I felt inspired.

So, that's how it happened. At first I figured, "Nah. I'll just go ahead and toss it." But I rethought, set the mirror down gently and quickly ran inside and got my camera.

Let me tell you, self portrating, in a mirror, to get the desired effect, on the fly, ain't too easy. I wish I'd had a little bit more time to compose. I wish I had my D-1 from work with the polarizing filter so I could have killed some of the excessive glare. But, anywho, my little Kodak Easyshare did the job admirably.

I can now crack all kinds of expressions.