A new lens and terror in the Barnes & Noble parking lot

I went to Wolfe's Camera in Topeka today and picked up a 28MM lens for my Canon FD kit. Before now, the widest I had was my 50MM 1.8, which isn't wide at all, it's just a normal lens.

I also checked out a Canon 20D while I was there. It was the first time I was able to actually hold this camera and see how much I liked it. Up until then, I was still trying to decide between it or the Nikon D70, which I had handled in the past. Here it what I decided:

The 20D's Magnesium body has more heft to it than the plastic body of the D70, it felt like a tool in my hand while the Nikon felt like a toy. The controls are also in better places and feel more comfortable on the 20D, and the Autofocus array looks much more useful.

So it's final: I'm buying my 20D next week.

Wolfe's closed at 5:30, kicking me out in the process, so my family and I went to Kohl's/Barns & Noble on the other side of Topeka. We parked in front of the building that housed both stores, and went our seperate ways.

The following happened in the course of 3 seconds:

As I made my way, something inside a minivan caught my eye. It was the outline of a tiny bald head.

Oh God, I thought, it was a baby still strapped into its carseat, alone, on a sunny day. I was almost in shock, I thought that some idiot parent had somehow managed to forget their own child.

I looked even closer. It wasn't moving, it wasn't breathing.

My blood ran cold.

"Logan, that's a dead baby," said that annoying voice in my head that always states the blatantly obvious.

My stomach tied itself into a taught line hitch while my mind short-circuited and my eyes looked closer through the hot glare.

And then I realized I wasn't looking at a baby's body; I was looking at a baby doll that some kid had strapped into a real carseat so she wouldn't have to carry it into the store.

I can't remember a time I was so happy to have been wrong.