Cardinal in the Park

The blasted recycling truck picks up very early every Wednesday morning. Our block is first on the route. It's the only time that I come close to first in anything. 

If at all possible, I carry the bin out on Tuesday evening, but since the prodigious winds continue to blow hoolies, this week I thought it best to hold off until morning. Consequently. I was out in my PJs at 6:45 hauling both garbage bag and recycling bin curbside.

The truck came shortly afterward, and when I looked out the window, I saw our empty bin being blown southward. Sigh . . . out I went again.

With the wind in my mind, at first I was refusing to go for our late morning walkie. However, I relented as long as we would choose another sheltered route. Off we drove to O-Kee-Lee Park. which, like the nearer trail of yesterday's post, we don't visit during winter. As you can see, it is also a scrubby woodland, probably even scrubbier than yesterday's trail.

I don't know birdcalls well, but I can identify cardinals on a good day, and I did hear one yesterday. We eventually found him. Luckily, my compact camera does zoom a little, and you can find the tiny but glorious red patch that is Mr Cardinal in the middle of the image. ↓

I decided to capture its joyful song, but you probably will have trouble finding him in the middle of this ↓ clip, which is the main reason why I have showed you the above photo.

There is much swamp around this path, which I have decided to share . . . because that is what I do.

The Other Section of the Trail

The strong winds continue, so we headed to the more sheltered trail for our walk yesterday. For the sake of variety, we drove to a different part of the same trail that we normally walk. We haven't walked this section near the arena since before winter due to accessibility, but it makes a change now that the snow is gone.

Sue was looking for a photos of contours for her potd. She didn't use this ↓ one in the end, but it does shows how it currently looks hereabouts – bare branches for the most part. The grass is pretty green, though.

There is a patch of blue scillia by the path the ↑ photo, and I also found a patch of bloodroot off the trail. The wind was blowing too much (what else is new?) for photos, so I used my phone to take short video clips. The two clips combined are only 5 seconds long. I really should shoot for at least a few more seconds, but I do like to keep videos brief because I know that people have their list of blogs to consume.

Near the patch of bloodroot, a solitary Canada goose went floating down the river. I always feel sorry for lone geese. I wonder if it is the same loner that we see in the local pond. If it isn't, they should find each other and hang together.

The only other item of note was this vibrant patch of green plant amongst the bleak surroundings. I don't know what this plant is or if it will flower. If I walk by there again, I will ask my phone to identify it.

Surely we will soon get a break from the wind as well as the showers that it brings too often. I also look forward to seeing leaves on the trees. Our own tree out front is beginning to leaf, as is the lilac bush out back.

17

Although her actual birthday was on Friday, Darling Girl will celebrate her 17th birthday with us later today. Time does fly, and some of you have been with me and her for all of the journey or most of it.

As usual, I heave put together a little card. It used to be that I had plethora of photo choices for my cards, but now pictures of Danica are fewer and farther between. It's not because we don't see the kids or that she's averse to photos, but it is just the way that life goes. 

Front of Card from a recent photo of mine.

The Inside, featuring a composite by Sue that she earlier sent to Dani via FB on her actual birthday.

Not too long ago, I found myself looking at a picture folder from June 2010 when the kids were 3 and 1 years old. I put some aside for a possible blog. I hadn't planned on using them in a birthday post, but since they were still in the queue, today seems like a appropriate time to stroll down memory lane.

Of course, I wasn't thinking birthday at the time, so I had also set aside some JJ pics, which I will also append here, even though it isn't his birthday.

Conspirators Among Us

I just came across another one. It's a tweet or whatever you call it now. An X-Off maybe? Whatever the case, I can no longer resist the temptation of posting about it.

Without exaggerating, I see these sorts of posts daily – at least daily.

Apparently, we vaxxed folk are dying at such a rate that there will soon be few of us left. Our deaths must surely be in the 100s of millions by now.

Not only that, but don't you know that we shed?

Just is case you are concerned here is a link and summary from the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. 

In sum, viral shedding is an issue when someone is infected with the virus that causes COVID-19, but not when they are vaccinated against it.

That's their summary, but you have the link, above, if you want to read the whole article.

While there are those who fret about keeping their DNA pure, I would say that it would be best not to in some cases.

 What a world we live in. Good information is only a click away, but the conspirators are out their doing their thing. I just don't know why.

Coffee and Guitars

Nick, my photo friend took me to a coffee shop in a nearby town. The attraction for him was a little display of guitars hanging over an old piano. I took a picture, but Nick didn't because the light was very bright at the part of the display near the window before tailing off into shadows at the other end. Shooting in high dynamic range is not ideal, so Nick decided to return on another, cloudier day, without such bright sunlight pouring through the window..

However, I did what I usually do and opted to make the best photo that I could under the circumstances. I used a few tricks including an HDR blend (for those who might know what that means). I think it's a nice enough image — good enough for me on that day.

We discussed photography over coffee, and that included talking about double exposures. Nick is good at them, and you have seen lately that I have been experimenting, just a little bit. Anyway, while we were sitting there, I took a few of Nick overlain by the guitars. These are for fun only and not to be taken seriously.

Before driving back home, I took this photo of reflections in the windows of a fine, old building, near the coffee shop.

Oops. I almost forgot that I also did a b&w conversion of the guitars photo. Of course, I prefer the colour version, butcha never know unless you try.

If we ever go back for round two, we'll have to ask the owner if we can temporarily relocate the plant.

Feeling Swamped

I walked with Sue sans camera on a day when I didn't expect to see anything worth photographing. However, when I spied a couple looking outward over a swampy area from one of the footbridges, I asked them what they had were seeing. They has spotted two turtles.

I only saw one smallish turtle on a . . . well let me show you rather than describe it.

Except I didn't see that ↑ turtle at that time. The one that I did see then did not have its back turned toward me. Rather, it was a smaller one, in profile and looking pretty darn photogenic.

Knowing that turtles are not necessarily quick (although the story goes that they can defeat hares in a race), I decided to return after walking all of the way back to the car. From there, I drove back to the house to retrieve my camera. By the time that I got back to the swamp scene, big turtle had displaced little turtle and had also turned its back to the camera, which I found excessively rude. Of course I took the shot anyway because watchagunnadoo?

Whilst there, I also took a photo of a bit of swamp vegetation. All I can say is that the green is nice right now and looked pretty night in the light. Yes, there is that at least.

One does one's best under the circumstances.

Logs and Doubles

Note: I've had this is the queue for awhile, but it got buried so deep that I lost track of it. It was from my double exposure experiments a few weeks ago. I like the wheel and tree pics.

For Easter, I posted a double exposure of easter eggs over a log house. 

Well, there is another log house in Appleton on the other side of the river. Note the wagon wheel.

I decided to try to use the wagon wheel in a double exposure. I like it.

Since we were in a log house kind of mood, we drove back to town to photograph the one near the park and boat launch.

I took one exposure of the trees in the park and then one of the house. I ended up with a very airconditioned house.

Then I took another of a single tree before turning back to the house. I kinda like this one.