Thanks for the good laugh, Karin. Brought tears to my eyes! I'll get a kazoo.
I've been playing with my photo program and by changing brightness and contrast can bring up much more detail and value change. Particularly in photo #1. Later I'll play with the b/w ratio on my camera and see how that works. There seems to be about 16 different settings, plus a special setting for black and white photography. It's a Canon digital, recommended for use with Mac computers. I'm a total novice in it's use.
Again, thanks for the laugh
Jean