They had never really understood our true nature.Had it really never occurred to them that the attackers in the tripods were merely doing our bidding? The seeming ease of their conquest should have warned them, but their pious arrogance precluded further analyses.
By the time our Martian hosts had expired we had already moved on – initially hibernating and then carefully molding our genes as we adapted to the new environment.Our new hosts were smaller but much more robust and so varied.
As I reported on an earlier post, I have been assisting my daughter with some Java programming recently, which has been both stimulating and frustrating. As today’s loose schedule calls for a haiku I thought I would use this as a subject matter, playing on the double meaning of the term…
Many eyes and ears have been on the Donald, and many mouths left agape in bewilderment, over the last several months as he blusters and bullies his way towards his goal as Republican Presidential nomination. Others have fallen by the wayside over this time and his only main rival now appears to be Ted Cruz.
Now, I cannot be unique in finding it more than a touch ironic that the GOP logo is an elephant since it seems to me that the party is now so obsessed with beating Trump at all costs that they fail to address the other elephant in the room, that is – who this would put as their top guy if they succeed in derailing Mr T.
I could wax lyrical about my opinions on Ted’s big adventure, including the childish Dr Seuss filibuster episode, his religious zealotry, compassion-less views on immigration and women’s issues, and more, but instead I offer up a graphical statement that represents my opinion, as they say a picture is worth a thousand words…
WEEK 15: Artistic: Metal – Cold, hard steel. Shiny Aluminum. Or even rusted and broken down. Find your inspiration in metal this week.
Metal, one of my favorite subjects for artistic photography. I love rusty old metal, shiny metal, industrial, forged, ironworks, you name it. I have even tried my hand at blacksmithing only a couple of years back and would love to have my own forge. Heck, even one of my favorite songs of my youth is about it.
I already have a reasonable collection of suitably themed images available but, keeping true to the challenge I decided to try something a little different. Given that I spend 8 hours a day in an office environment I thought I would choose an everyday object from my desk and see what I could do with it using my handy iPhone5.
I have set myself a really steep challenge this week. I promised to help my daughter with a math assignment. Shouldn’t be a big deal, I just have to learn how to program in Java in order to be able to advise and assist her!
Although I am reasonably “tech savvy” and handy with most office applications it has been a really long time since I did any proper programming, so this is quite a challenge. In fact since my last programming was in BASIC back in 1988 a lot has changed. And I mean a lot…
For example, back in the late ’80s the only Java I knew of was through reference to the 1969 film, “Krakatoa, East of Java”. We didn’t even refer to coffee as java! (Starbucks didn’t exist in the UK then, either). In fact it was a full 7 years after I finished my MSc, in 1995, that James Gosling designed this object oriented language which, over the following 20 years became one of the most popular programming languages in use.
So, to answer the question posed – can the old dog learn new tricks? Well, time will tell, but I’m having a good try! I have taken a short break from my cramming and experimentation, reading “Java for Dummies” and conferencing with my daughter. I have a fair grasp of how it all works, on a superficial level at least, and I understand the logic of what needs to be done. And yes, it’s going to be a challenge.
Much to the surprise of my family I am actually enjoying this and I think I will even try to develop this further after my immediate needs are complete. Oddly, it brings back memories of late nights working the College of Aeronautics honing my BASIC programming for calculating crop sprayer flow rates for different nozzle sizes before popping out to the student bar for a quick pint.
Who would have guessed than nearly 30 years later I would be doing similar on another continent with my daughter? I just hope that I still have sufficient grey matter in the old noggin to complete this!
It’s odd how things work out. Since last year we have kept three Buff Orpington hens in our garden. They have a lovely chicken coop which sits snug inside a chicken run that I built for them, all safe and secure. Around the property I have a few anti-predator lights that work at night and also we have a couple of dogs that like to mark their territory in the yard too. We also like to let the chickens out to range freely over the property and they do a good job of clearing insects and, more importantly, those evil Lyme-disease carrying ticks that are prevalent in this area (that’s another story).
Anyhow, today we experienced a late season snowfall (hopefully the last) so we let the chickens out earlier that usual, before there was too much accumulation. We keep an eye on them periodically and by sure luck, happened to get up from breakfast and look out of the front window to see one of the hens running quickly in front of the window – closely followed by a fox!
We banged on the glass, hollered and ran to get out into the yard and the fox “legged it,” as we would say, across the property. Thankfully, a quick check of the hen revealed no harm done, and confirmed the others were safe and sound too.
It was a truly comical, yet simultaneously scary sight to see this fox chase in such a classic pose – a plump golden chicken being chased by a sly red fox! The fox was a beautiful specimen and I am guessing we must have disturbed it just before it got into full stride, as I cannot see how our hen could possibly outrun this determined hunter.
Unserendipitously (is there such a word?) the wildlife camera that I have had set up there wasn’t in place as I took it down for some building work, so we only have our memories of it, but for the three of us who were only a few feet away it was an amazing thing to see nature at work. I’m just glad it ended happily.
We have not had issues with foxes before so I wonder it if was because the coating of snow meant that our red hens contrasted with the white snow so much that the fox could easily target them and risk coming close to the house. We live in a wooded area and there’s usually a lot of leaf litter and other ground cover that may allow some sort of camouflage.
Anyway it was certainly an unusual way to start the day, and one I don’t want to repeat. It will certainly made me appreciate tomorrow’s breakfast eggs from “the girls” a little more than usual!
At first he was sure there had been a mistake. When he opened the pack of developed photographs fresh from the store his initial thought was that they had given him someone else’s film. But as he flipped through the prints he saw that they were, in fact the shots he had taken; or rather the compositions were the same. The actual subjects had changed though – the faces were different, the clothes dated. He thought that was all, but when he looked closer, even the background was wrong – trees smaller and a missing house. This must be some kind of joke, he thought, but if so it was an elaborate one, and who would do such a thing…?
WEEK 14: Landscape: Zoomed in – Most landscapes are wide sweeping images. Try an alternative and zoom in instead.
I admit that this seemed counter-intuitive to me. I always associate landscapes with sweeping vistas, and therefore using a relatively wide lens like my 20mm (that’s 40mm equivalent on a 35mm frame). But the assignment seemed clear so I attached my biggest glass, the 200mm (that’s a huge 400mm equivalent on a 35mm DSLR) and zoomed in on a woodland landscape near my home.
In order to make it more interesting I captured a little of the Spring grass and some spiky overwintering plants in the foreground, with the wooded landscaped valley behind.
Adventuring the globe whilst based in the beautiful PNW, with a focus on fitness & adventure travel, conservation and a healthy balanced lifestyle. All with my beautiful partner in crime, Stephanie!
searching4theshot 