I finally got aligned with the guy with the Yashica Minister III. Even better he was willing to drive, saving me a BART trip to Castro Valley. We met in the McDonalds near where I live, and made like a we were doin' a drug deal. When I got it home and took the case off, (the better to fondle you, my dear,) I discovered that I had purchased not a Yashica Minister III, but a Yashica 35 Model M. This was a little higher-line than the Ministers, so Yashica didn't use the name for it.






Everything seems to work, the selenium-cell meter matches the reading from my cell phone app, and I'm good to go to shoot a test roll of Tri-X, right?

Wrong. I can't figure out how to get the cartridge into it's well. The bottom of the "spindle" hangs up no matter what I do. Oh, well, I'm in touch with the dude I bought it from, (check his work out here.) I'll figure it out.

And, I think, with a manual SLR, a rangefinder, my mom's Olympus TL-1 (Mju in a pleather case), and my step-grandfathers autofocus Minolta, I'm pretty well set for 35mm kit for the foreseeable future.

Now to spend money on film!

Which I'm already doing... I just ordered one each of the four different ISO 400 B&W films from Film Photography Project. I'm especially looking forward to their "Mummy" film, since their "monster movie" stuff was what first caught my attention. I just thought it was a neat idea, and wanted to try it out.

--Shannon

(Oh, and bicycles. Always to spend money on bicycles.)