A lens assembly for obtaining an image of an object is provided. In one embodiment, a modular, electrically powered lawn or patio umbrella in which lighting systems, such as those utilizing cold cathode tubes, LED’s, or florescent lights; cooling systems, such as those utilizing electric fans or misting systems; and motorized retraction systems; can be selectively interchanged is provided. In addition, the exhaust line is in thermal contact with the hydrogen generator in order to recover thermal energy. The multi-stroke telescoping can be performed according to the number of the lifting units. The counter value is output and the counter is reset when another encoder signal is received, where the output value is directly related to the velocity of the object. The present invention also relates to an improved method for preparing the strontium salt of glutamic acid.