Saludos from New Mexico

[Myxo_Bill]

Hello Microbe Hunters -

I 'm an electrical engineer and a micro hunter wanna be. I don't have a microscope but plan to use the equipment forum to help me figure out what to get. I use a microscope at work but only for soldering those teeny electronic parts.

My interest in microscopy goes way back to junior high biology class (early 60's) when I brought in a sample from my family's back yard fish pond. Wow, what a delight to see so many varied creatures only visible in the microscope. That was a long time ago and it never occurred to me that I should buy my own microscope and be able to see so many other things.

When I got out of the Navy in the 70's my wife and I moved to Western New York. I went to school at an Ag-Tech college and attended a class in botany. That botany class inspired me and I took great interest in plant identification, including lower forms of plant life like lichens and slime molds. We left New York and liven in Utah, Colorado and (now) New Mexico. These are beautiful states but don't offer the kind of plant life that was abundant in New York. Anyhow we plan to retire and move to Oregon some time next year. I'm thinking Oregon will be a great place to get back into botany and the microscope will be a wonderful tool.

Your web page has already expanded my botany / microscopy horizons. Reading other introductions I heard about people's interest in algae. I also checked out some micro photographs. Wow, algae is now on my list too.

Best regards

- Bill

[mrsonchus]

Hello there, and welcome from the UK - great to have another Botanist on-board.
You've come to the right place to learn and take some good company whilst pursuing your soon-to-be-restarted microscopy!

Look forward to your forum exploits as you develop your hobby!

[einman]

Welcome! This is a forum filled with incredibly talented people. Enjoy yourself.

[zzffnn]

Welcome to the forum, Bill!

[charlie g]

Welcome to forum, Bill. If in vocation you used reflected light 'wafer microscopes' or stereo microscopes ("Mantis" scope?!), your hands as well as microtechnique foundation skill set is terrific for home microscopy...and botany to boot!

I enjoyed college years in Buffalo,NY...still love chicken wings (hot sauced) , cold Canadian beer, celery sticks and blue cheese dip.

Wow , retirement in Oregon...congrats on such fond recall of freshwater/pond life microscopy...as well as your botanical pursuits. charlie guevara, finger lakes/US

[Pat Thielen]

Welcome to the forums Bill!

[Myxo_Bill]

Hi All -

Thank you for the warm reception.

I do have a dopey question for those who have an avatar. How in the heck do you manipulate an image to get it to fit the file size / pixel resolution requirements?

Cheers!

- Bill

[Drew]

Glad you are here Bill. I hope somebody answers you question. I am interested myself.

[lorez]

To add an avatar:

User Control Panel > Options > Overview > Profile > Edit Avatar

[Dale]

Warning warning, there are some very strange specimens in Oregon.
Dale

[Myxo_Bill]

All - Again, thank you for the continued warm responses. I hope everyone is enjoying the holidays.

Hi Lorez - I did find the control panel and that's where the image size restrictions are posted and enforced. I did find a website where I could manipulate my image size and create an acceptable avatar.

Hi Drew - I searched and found this site: http://resizeimage.net/ Upload your image and it allows you to scale the pixel size (and a lot more). I succeeded in getting the pixel requirements satisfied and posted the avatar. I also scanned the returned filed file and my malware protection software didn't flag it as a problem.

Hi Dale - I'll keep my eyes opened for those very strange specimens ☺

Happy New Year!

- Bill

[75RR]

Hi Myxo_Bill,
glad to see you got your avatar up.
Most microscopists that post images have photo editing software - I use Photoshop as I already had it -
it is practically a requirement even if only to resize images, that comes in handy for scaling avatars as well :)