"What the...?", I hear you ask. Allow me to explain.

Ever have one of those weeks where it feels like the gods are dumping on you? So I attached the 40D to the tripod. I had a bit of trouble doing it for some reason, but it seemed to be secured. I turned back toward my bag to grab something. The tripod head tilted forward a little, since I hadn't fully tightened the screws yet which isn't usually a problem. But it turns out that the camera was not secured. It bounced onto the pathway below.

You know how people say that time slows down when something horrific happens? Nope. It seemed to happen at lightning speed.

The battery hatch door was blown off and was lying about a metre away from the body. The battery? For all I know, it vaporised because it couldn't be found anywhere.

But never let it be said that Canon doesn't build 'em tough. I put in the reserve battery, fitted the hatch cover back over it, switched it on, and... it fired up. The 24-105 was apparently protected by the lens hood (yet again) and the camera body, though there's no real way of telling whether the IS was damaged. Nonetheless, I lined a shot up, hit the shutter release with some trepidation and... it worked. (Mind you, had it been the 300D "plastic fantastic" rather than the "battleship build" 40D I'd probably be holding a DSLR funeral about now.) The problem is... it was a lousy shot (one of those "seemed like a good idea at the time" shots) so I'm not putting it up. For tonight, the Olympus is pinch-hitting, since the 300D lives at the office and it's either that or a still from the Legria. Never the most subtle camera in terms of capturing light at the best of times, I think the relative harshness of the Olympus' shot tonight works in context.

Anyhoo, the 40D, while still functional, needs to have its hatch cover repaired and will be at the camera hospital for the next two weeks. So my choices are to have the Olympus and the 300D pinch hit for the PAD, or just take a break, and after this week? I'm thinking the latter. While I said that would eventually happen, this wasn't how I had in mind.

Still, it'll give me a chance to catch up on viewing others' galleries and updating a few non-PADs of my own.

(And yes, I know that ultimately both the twisted ankle and the tripod head debacle are both down to me rather than the gods, but hey, no-one concentrates perfectly 100% of the time and these things happen, sometimes close together like this. You get past 'em and move on.)