Rex and Lady.
Fauna November 19th, 2009
Say Hi to Rex and Lady (bet you’ll be able to tell which is which without me giving you any hints).
I’ve always preferred dogs to cats, but some convolutions of the universe knotted together to drop these two into our home: Our neighbour’s cat (a stray who goes to them for bed and breakfast) got knocked up and had some babies; We’ve had a crazy mouse infestation in our walls this year; When we saw these two, we knew they were way too cute for their own good so we decided that we’d better look after them.
They are currently in training. I’m getting them used to flash photography…
Random Context From The Past:
Weekend Update.
Cowland December 17th, 2007
This past weekend saw lots of snow dump on us. I spent a fairly quiet time at home tidying things up in preparation for us going away to St. Lucia on Friday.
Some minor calamities that resulted in physical injury did befall me however:
- As I was making some bird toys out of PVC tubing, the hand saw that I was using jumped off the tubing and landed on my thumb, cutting open the tip.
- Sundance bit me on my right index finger through the skin on Friday.
- Tango bit me on my left index finger through skin on Saturday.
- I steamed some rice in the microwave and got a burn that stung for a few hours on my left hand when I opened the cover and the steam came out.
- I stubbed a toe on the base of a ladder. It is now bruised and swollen and I’m limping.
- I broke a compact fluorescent bulb a couple of feet away from me. It contains mercury vapour.
- With the snowblower, I ran over our delivered newspaper that was buried under snow at the base of the driveway. I tried to use a plastic poker/scoop to get the paper out but had resort to doing it by hand. I forgot I’d left the scoop on the driveway, then ran that over too once I got the snowblower running again. I had to remove one of the auger blades to get the tool out, then I cut my left hand in the process.
So The Girl once again reminded me of why I’m not allowed to use the chainsaw or get up on the roof when she isn’t home. She almost sent me to work with a helmet and mittens today.
Not sure why, but patients seem a little nervous today when I tell them the story…
The Harder They Come.
Entertainment October 2nd, 2009
We were in Toronto last month to attend this show. It’s basically about a Jamaican folk hero whose life ended tragically…kind of a Robin Hood story with an unhappy ending.
Unhappy endings don’t really bother me, as long as the story is worthwhile, but I found the show just OK. I’m guessing that the show is actually more than just OK, but the strong Jamaican accents and patois were completely incomprehensible to me most of the time (and I’m from the West Indies).
Back From the Galapagos Islands.
Photography, Travel September 27th, 2009
We’re back from our 11 day trip to Ecuador (Quito, the capital city, and the Galapagos islands). The most difficult part of preparing for the trip was deciding what photographic equipment to take with me. The Girl insisted that we carry my 180mm macro lens, which I never ended up using.
What I did end up using was my brother’s Crumpler Whickey and Cox camera/laptop backpack, his 70-200mm f/4, my 17-40mm f/4 and 24-105mm f/4, 1 light stand, 1 shoot through umbrella, 1 580EX II flash, my SD500 compact with underwater case, and of course the 5D II. Add in assorted gels, filters, blower brush, lens pen, and wireless triggers, and there was barely enough room for clothes.
Luckily for us we didn’t need a lot of fancy clothes.
We toured the islands as part of a GAP Adventures group. There were 15 of us tourists in the group and GAP gave us duffel bags to repack our suitcase contents into. This made for much easier travel between islands.
The trip was an extremely active adventure full of hiking, biking, and snorkelling. The weather cooperated, the animals posed for photo ops, and our assorted bangs, bruises, and electrocutions were minor issues compared to our rewards for enduring them.
Not only did we luck out with all of that, but our group leaders were absolutely fantastic.
I’m slowly posting pictures of the trip to flickr. The lack of high-speed at home means that it’ll take at least a couple of weeks for all of them to get there, but as you’ll be able to understand once you see some of the shots, I’m glad that I carted all of that camera equipment around with me.
The islands truly do live up to their nickname, “The Enchanted Islands”. Their enchantments will remain with me for as long as I live and I’m pleased to see that the Ecuadorian government is taking extreme measures to preserve the biologic uniqueness of which the islands boast.
At some point in the near future, I’m sure we will all be able to look at the stewardship of these islands as an example of how we should all live and interact with the world about us.
Riverdance.
Dancing, Entertainment August 28th, 2009
Riverdance was back in Toronto earlier this year. Although the concept is the same as when I last saw the show years ago, they’ve added a few things (or at least I don’t remember them being in the show back then).
The most memorable parts of the show for me this time were the two flamenco numbers. The experience was just an awesome fusion of Spanish and Irish dancing.
Watch the clip to see what I’m talking about: Lines, movement, footwork — unbelievably clean and expressive. I could watch this over and over again (except I still don’t have a high speed internet connection at home).
Progress Check.
Cowland, Photography August 16th, 2009
Summer has finally arrived here in Cowland. We’re seeing consistently dry, hot weather now and you can see that people out and about are in much happier spirits. Summer is only about a month late.
I’ve been busy trying to stay out of trouble.
So far I’ve succeeded.
Our annual summer party rainfest (it has rained every year except for one that we’ve had the party) went off successfully again — no injuries, one broken fence gate, some assaulted frogs, and 2 overfed dogs.
I’ve been schooled and am schooling.
The latest person to school me was Rudy. I was refreshingly pleased to be given a few insights into his political thought processes. He argued some political points with me on facebook recently, but did so with intelligence and practicality. He’s someone that has made his own political decisions through reason and research rather than as a crowd-following Lemming.
I’m schooling myself in photography, as many of you know. It’s my newest hobby and I’m working my way through a stack of books, from visual composition, to using Adobe Lightroom. Playing with off-camera flash is the coolest thing I’ve come across in a very long time. It’s actually what’s keeping me away from this blog the most. Fragileheart has patiently volunteered her time to a couple of photosessions for me to work on my lighting.
Here’s an example of what off-camera flash can do for you. Take for example a painting that was created with heavy brush strokes or a palate knife. The surface of a painting like this is as important as the image itself. The strokes convey texture, emotion, and movement to the underlying image.
Straight-on, or flat, lighting produces this:
Lighting from the side produces this:
The trade-off (isn’t life full of these) is that the more texture you show, the less saturated your colours become. The trick is finding the right lighting ratio and angles to strike a good balance between colour saturation and texture and thereby do some justice to a piece that will still be best viewed live.
The Alchemist.
Books July 14th, 2009
Reading through this book took some effort. The writing is simple and lacking in obvious metaphor. I became bored just past the halfway mark.
Perseverance paid off, however. No, the writing did not become more colourful, nor did the plot become more intriguing. In fact, the reason that this book has satisfied so many millions of people is because of the simplicity of the truths that it presents.
The book shows that life is about the journey — and true satisfaction in life is about a single-minded journey to achieve that which we feel calling out from our deepest recesses.
Everything falls into place along this path. Be it good or bad we learn from it all and step forward towards our goals. In the end, does it matter that what we desired was in front of us from the beginning?
The Alchemist is an allegorical story of wisdom. Most of us will lie on our deathbeds before we ultimately realize or understand what Coelho tries to show us in this simple tale.
Paulo Coelho is on Twitter here and has over 60,000 followers.
We’re taking it easy in Antigua in December, then going to look into doing the Inca Trail in Peru...