Presents/presence
Saturday, 6 November 2010
UPS brought us a treat today! Clues: two users (both admin accounts), very light.
Musings
Out and about in daytime (blink blink)
Monday, 1 November 2010
The deadline we’ve been operating under around here eased today, and we escaped for a mid-day around-town wander. Of course, high on the list was a visit to the Apple Store to check out the new thin thin thin MacBook Air. Thin and light. The screen has seductive clarity. Flash drive, so quiet—I found it difficult to believe that they have the storage they do when you don’t hear the drive winding up.
No purchase today, but the appetite is whetted.
Iron bicycle detail
Tuesday, 12 October 2010
As a kid, I was a bicycle rider. I still remember my dad repeatedly running down the driveway with me (downslope) holding the back of my seat to keep me upright until I learned to balance and ride alone. No training wheels at our household!
Somewhat later, we combed the nearby roads searching the ditches for returnable bottles, since we had no other income sources. These were organized expeditions, requiring care in wrangling the bottles once you picked them up, so they didn’t rattle together and break.
I also rode in college, when I couldn’t walk to class, but just around campus. (No money for a bus pass.)
Sometime after that, I quit riding. I think whenever I was on for a while, my tail hurt, so I moved on. I understand there are fancy ergo-dyamical seats nowdays, and probably other improvements that make riding far more comfortable than the ride my ca. 1968 Raleigh three-speed offered.
Anyway, here’s a door decoration on the door of a nearby bike shop. Also, visit the Marquis’s RegenAxe to read a real (bi)cyclist’s blog (and bird and flower pictures, and more!)….
Where’s the Rebel?
Monday, 11 October 2010
I’m not big on Honda bikes, particularly, but this logo with the extra outlines (or whatever they’re called) caught my eye. And, so, I pass it along to you!
Photographer in sun-walking togs reflected above the “R.”
Reading Ivan Doig, this time Work Song (2010).
The day the ___ died
Tuesday, 5 October 2010
Now there’s a lotta ’maters!—truck we saw last week on Interstate–75.
Today, it was a microwave that died.
Some might argue that it had died long ago, and that we kept it going on the microwave version of life-support.
Here’s the deal.* J&R moved north to Indiana and took the microwave with them. But the lovely house they bought had a built-in microwave, and they stored it in the garage. We were visiting and mentioned that we needed a new microwave, and voila! we received the traveling microwave.
Happy with our replacement unit, we drove it home and installed it, noticing that the little readout screen had become, well, wonky. The Guru described it for years as displaying in Chinese. In short, you had to know what you punched in, because you couldn’t read the time-remaining.
And today it was microwaving away, warming some pod-peas for our luncheon soup, and I happened to be nearby and noticed that the sound changed, just a bit. That new sound lasted maybe two seconds, and the machine went quiet and the Chinese was replaced by pure black.
No breaker problem. No problem with the plug.
Scientific conclusion: dead microwave.
We are considering a combo countertop microwave-convection oven; anyone have any experience with the current models?
* This is how I remember it; others may recall the microwave tale differently.
Light and balanced, for my viewing pleasure
Saturday, 2 October 2010
I spent way too much money (maybe; depends on how you assess these things) and got fancy high-tech specs—both the frames and the lenses have options I’d not dreamed of when I began wearing glasses…. The frames even came with an authentication card!
Here’s the kicker: they weigh 0.30 ounces/8.5 grams!
Hint hint: note the similarity of this pair of eyes with the ones in the blog-header photo (behind the word “musings”)….
Geeezo, look at them eyebrows!
Still life: apple tree with ladder
Tuesday, 21 September 2010
The other night I tried some flash shots, and given that the only flash unit was standard-issue, right on the camera body, the lighting was, mostly, just plain odd. This was among the “better” of the collection….
I give you this picture because the weather is pretty darned odd so far. Cracking thunder and rain overnight. No rain now, but overcast, windy, and…warm! Spooky warm.
Impossible engineering?
Saturday, 4 September 2010
If I could zip through the vegetable aisle in a vehicle with two steering wheels, I’d probably enjoy it more!
3D camera picture-perfect
Friday, 3 September 2010
Back to last night’s game—this is a crucial part of the 3D broadcast process; these are the screens the truck-guys watched to make sure the left-eye and right-eye pictures “came together” (not a technical term) properly. They watched those grey pictures on the left like hawks. Those projections highlighted whether the dual pictures were in registration (my term, maybe theirs too, I dunno) or not. Remember, most of the cameras were right down on the field, and the field was HOT! Tough conditions, we thought…but the guy in charge of the cameras said they’d done 3D shoots in India, Australia, so this was, well, not the worst yet.
3D details
Thursday, 2 September 2010
Remember a 3D camera is really two cameras, stuck together with the lens distance carefully calibrated. This gear is ungainly more than it is heavy, I was told by a camera-dude. Still, I’m very glad I didn’t wear it!
And, here’s the picture on a 3D monitor, playing in 3D—the view without glasses to “fix” the image and make it 3D!
The 3D team got all the glitches taken care of by game time, and we heard ooohs! and aaahs! for the graphics (and the pictures, uh-huh), and even laudatory comments from an assortment of big-wigs, we were told!!!