Welcome to the family
Sunday, March 30th, 20081983. Annie closes on Broadway after 2,377 shows. Gandhi wins Best Picture as Return of the Jedi picks up steam. Pioneer 10 becomes the first man-made object to leave the solar system. The De Lorean Motor Company ceases production, and the McNugget is introduced. I am three years old and love Ernie. Konica also produces a charming little pocket rangefinder with auto focus, shutter, and film winding, all for the low, low price of 47,800 yen.
For some time now, I have wanted a lightweight “junk” camera that I can always have with me and throw in any number of bags. The A-1 is too versatile and valuable a piece of equipment to have jostled around in my backpack all the time. The 70-210mm zoom lens is also intimidating to a lot of people.
Anyway, I didn’t want to put a lot of money into said camera because that would defeat the purpose. So I’ve been coming flea markets and Akihabara back alleys for a couple of months. I finally found what I was looking for last weekend while helping out the Nihon Furosato Food Festival. I bought shiny, black, brick from a kindly, well-traveled old man who spoke way too much like a used car salesman. But the camera was impeccably well kept, spotless and hardly a scratch on it– inconceivable for a 25 year old consumer shoot-and-forget camera.
Though I have had a decent array of camera bodies for a while, this marks the first time I’ve ever had film bodies at the same time. I realized today how nice this was when shooting the annual hanami raves in Yoyogi park this afternoon. The weather was a real drag, frigid, raining, and dark. But having 1600 Natura pushed to 3200 in the A-1 and 400 Presto in the Konica, I felt confident that I could handle any number of shots without feeling the pressure to finish a roll for switching stock.
For the first time in a long time I have a considerable scan backlog now, so once I get through my slides I’ll make an album in the Gallery dedicated to Konnie. 
