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Here and There…Now and Then |
Abe Lincoln on The U.S. Penny
Kind of random photo today. I had been at the office a little while and noticed a small pile of pennies on my desk. I thought that would be nice as a still life, so got the camera out with my macro lens and took a few pictures. Some had a bit more depth of field (more of the penny in focus) but this is the one I liked the best (taken at f/2.8). They were lit by a combination of a halogen lamp that was directly over them and a flash, bounced off a white card.
Lake Bernard Frank
Cathy and I drove to the small parking area on the far side of Lake Frank today and walked up toward Meadowside Nature Center and back. It was a beautiful day, although it got fairly hot by the time we were back at the car. I took pictures, as you won’t be surprised to learn, but I wasn’t particularly excited about any of them. This one was reasonably good, although a picture of a muddy stream isn’t all that special. The trees are pretty, though.
Queen Elizabeth II
I know it’s not much of a picture, but on the windowsill in our kitchen is this small tin. On it are faded and worn likenesses of Queen Elizabeth II and her husband, Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. It was made to commemorate her coronation on June 2, 1953.
Her reign actually began over a year earlier, on February 6, 1952, upon the death of her father, George VI. Today, September 9, 2015, she surpassed her great, great, grandmother, Queen Victoria, to become the longest-reigning British monarch in history.
We’re not really into monarchy here in the United States. We think we have a better system, even if it was born out of the Anglo tradition. In any case, I wish her well and many more years of health.
Pennsylvania Monument, Monocacy Battlefield
It was another fine, summer day. Quite hot, but pretty. Cathy and I drove up to Frederick and visited the Monocacy Civil War battlefield, just south of town. The battlefield straddles the Urbana Pike (now MD 355) where it crosses the Monocacy River. The Confederate troops, under Lt. Gen. Jubal A. Early, had come up the Shenandoah Valley and into Maryland and approached the bridge over the Monocacy from the north. Union troops, about 2,300 strong, but mostly Hundred Days Men, were commanded by Maj. Gen. Lew Wallace, who is perhaps more famous as the author of Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ.
Wallace’s troops were reinforced by men from the 3rd Division of the VI Corps, under Brig. Gen. James B. Ricketts. Together about 5,800 Union soldiers faced about 14,000 Confederates in what became both the south’s northernmost victory of the war and the defeat that saved Washington. Because of the delay to Early’s troops, Union General-in-Chief Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant was able to get reinforcements to Fort Stevens in time to meet them on July 12 and on July 14, Early and his men crossed the Potomac back into Virginia at White’s Ferry. That ferry is still running and the boat is called the Jubal Early.
Our connection to the battle is that an ancestor of Cathy’s (her great, great grandfather) was in the 67th Pennsylvania Volunteers, who are commemorated on the Pennsylvania monument at the battlefield. They did not actually participate in the battle, however. They were “delayed” and didn’t arrive in time for the battle. Their commander, Col. John F. Staunton, was court martialed. He was found guilty of the first two of three charges (Disobedience of Orders and Neglect of duty to the prejudice of good order and military discipline) but not guilty of the third (Misbehavior before the enemy), and was relieved of command and removed from service. (You can read the minutes of the court here.)
123,456
It’s meaningless, I know, but I have an unusual (probably) affinity for patterns in numbers. When the odometer in a car turns over to a number with a particular pattern, I’m interested (I won’t go so far as to say excited). Hitting an even hundred thousand is the most obvious. In the first car I drove much, my parents’ 1971 VW bus, the odometer only went up to 99,999 so it would roll over to zero when that happened (it happened twice in the ‘life’ of the car, which made it to about 210,000). This photograph is from our newest and lowest mileage car. It is a long way from an even 100,000, so I look for other patterns. This is a good one, I think.
Silver Diner
We went out to dinner this evening. Can you guess where we went? If you guessed the Silver Diner, then sorry, your wrong. We were, however, in the same shopping center and I like the lights so I took a few pictures of it before heading home. Also, we do eat at the Silver Diner now and then, it just doesn’t happen to be where we ate this evening (Ruby Tuesday).
Restarting (Again!)
Computers have, as you probably know, become a big part of our everyday lives. Those reading this who are younger than 30 may not realize that it hasn’t been this way for very long. Microsoft has been a big part of the personal computer industry since the early 1980s and continues to dominate the desktop.
I’m not a fan.
I’d be happy if we didn’t have to have any Microsoft products in the house. Unfortunately, in order to connect to work, we need to be running some relatively recent MS operating system. So, my main computer dual boots and I can bring up Windows 7 when necessary. I use Win7 at work, as well, so I’m fairly comfortable with it and put up with it’s (many) annoyances because I sort of have to (unless I want to look for another job). Cathy’s machine used to dual boot, as well, but with Windows 7 being the default. Recently we ‘upgraded’ that machine to Windows 8.1.
I suspect that there are a lot of really smart people at Microsoft. Like many really smart people, however, they often don’t seem to have a clue. This evening I had to reinstall the OS on this machine (don’t even ask about why!). It took hours. All the while the screen displayed very ‘helpful’ (i.e., condescending) messages. What annoyed me most, well, after the amount of time it took, was the number of times the system had to restart. This continues to be a huge annoyance with Windows. What’s with that, anyway? I mean, needing a reboot after a new kernel is installed is one thing but it seems with Windows you need to reboot after just about everything. Anyway, while I sat and watched the computer do very little for a long, long time, I took a few pictures of the screen. This is at least the third reboot, but I can’t say I counted very carefully.
P.S. I’m not much of an Apple fan, either.
Cathy, Addie, Evangeline, Andy, Kellan, Kelly, and Ethan
Cathy and I wanted to go to the fair this year and it’s always fun to be at the fair with kids. So, we arranged to meet this young family and spend the late afternoon and evening with them. We got there before they did and that gave us time to check out the photography in the Arts, Crafts, and Photography building (building 3). I had entered four photographs and managed to earn a 2nd and a 4th place ribbon for two of them. Not necessarily all I could have hoped for, but not a bad showing for a first time exhibitor. It was nice to see friends there, as well, and to get a personal tour of the photography exhibit from Sarah.
The Swings
We met Andy, Kelly, and their kids after that and spent a while looking at animals before heading down to the carnival portion of the fair. We enjoyed watching them ride on various rids and I took quite a few pictures. They were not actually on the swings when I took this. We tired out before they did and decided to call it a night at about 8:20. They kept going and stayed until about 10:00. We were tired from the heat but glad that we went and we had a really nice time with these lovely kids.
Backyard Rainbow
It has been pretty dry recently and the flowers and other garden plants are starting to notice. It isn’t so dry that we are having any restrictions on water use, fortunately, and I decided to turn on the sprinkler this afternoon. As the sun was getting lower, I was walking around the back yard looking for something new to photograph. I noticed that for about a half second, each time the sprinkler went around, there was a rainbow in the spray. I waited a few times and tried to capture it. It was brighter than this in “real life” but I captured it reasonably well.
Asbury Methodist Village
Because George was in town, mom thought we should pay a visit to Asbury Methodist Village. She’s thinking about moving there “at some point” and it seems reasonable to see the place and get all the facts and figures. She and I went a few years ago and it looks basically the same, but of course prices, etc. have changed a little in the intervening years. This is the oldest building on the campus, the original living block, now used for administration, as well as outpatient rehab, doctors’ offices and the pharmacy.
Bojangles
Let me start by apologizing for this blatant advertisement of a fast food chain. Those of you who enjoy fine dining may be aghast that we would even be close enough to a Bojangles to get a picture like this. We left the beach this morning in something of a hurry and it wasn’t a very good day for photography. By 3:00 p.m., near Petersburg, Virginia, we were a bit peckish. The truth is, we like biscuits. I’m not sure I would trust anyone who did not like biscuits. They are not particularly good for you, especially if you need to lose weight (or if you don’t want to gain weight). But there is no denying that they taste good. Especially with country ham or sausage and egg. So we stopped.
Eastern Cottontail (Sylvilagus floridanus)
We have a huge number of rabbits in our neighborhood. I don’t think a day goes by that I don’t see at least one in our yard. There’s a very small one that we see in the back yard. When I pulled into the driveway this evening, fortunately with the windows open in my car, this little fellow (or filly) was munching on grass fairly close to the driveway. I was able to pull out the camera and get a few pictures before he got spooked and ran off.
Rockville, Jupiter, and Venus
We had dinner with family this evening at a favorite Chinese restaurant and when we came out, the sky to the west was that wonderful, dark, almost-black, blue overhead fading to a paler blue towards the horizon. Jupiter and Venus were quite close together, seen here on the left a little above the center of the photo. In the other direction, the moon was quite beautiful and had Saturn visible right next to it.
Immiscible Polarity, Harwood Art Center
As mentioned yesterday, we took an unplanned trip to Albuquerque. We were picked up by Cathy’s brother this morning and on the way back to where he lives, we stopped to see his most recent installation. The building is the Harwood Art Center, an outreach program of Escuela del Sol Montessori. The installation is made from old fences. You cannot quite see it in this picture but just out of the frame on the left, the fence comes up out of the ground and grows to a full size fence before reaching the gate and then the building, where it sort of takes off and explodes. Artists: David Cudney, Lance McGoldrick, Christopher Blaz, and Joel Davis.
Monarda didyma (Bergamot)
The flowers of bergamot (Monarda didyma), also known as crimson or scarlet beebalm, scarlet monarda, or Oswego tea, are quite different. They really stand out in the garden, not only because they are bright colored, but also their shape. Bergamot has antiseptic qualities and has been used in poultices for skin infections and minor wounds. I can’t say I have any real experience in terms of it’s medicinal properties, though.
Lexi
Lexi and her mom Jean were up in Maryland late this afternoon and we managed to snag them for dinner at the Silver Diner. It would have been a shame for them to have been this close and not get to see them. Today was Lexi’s last day of high school and as you can (possibly) see, Lexi has had her friends sign her shirt. Graduation is still a few days away but she’s done and looking forward to the summer before heading off in July for early college classes. Because she is on the lacrosse team at school, they take an intensive class during the summer so they can take a slightly lighter load during the fall and still get the required credits in by the Christmas break.
Kendra’s Red Wings
Dorothy and Kendra went to a concert at Merriweather Post Pavilion this evening. When they got home, or when Kendra dropped Dorothy off at home, anyway, we visited with them for a while. These are Kendra’s Red Wing boots. I don’t suppose there is much to say about them, except that they look like well built shoes. Not a lot in the way of traction on the soles, but sturdy and comfortable.
Whelk Shell
When I got home this evening I went out back to look for things to photograph. For quite some time now this whelk shell, which I believe is from a channeled whelk (Busycotypus canaliculatus), has been on our back patio. I’m not sure where it came from, whether it was found on one of our beach weeks, or if it’s something Cathy has had for a long time, or what. Anyway, I was looking at the spiral at the top end of the shell and thought it would make an interesting photograph. So, I set it on the table out back and set my camera down aimed at it. This is a 1/5 second exposure at f/16.
Garage Cleaning
In the fall we had an exterminator come to the house to do a termite treatment. The house has had termite activity in the past and we’ve remained clean since we moved in but we wanted to take precautions. In order to treat the garage, that mean we needed to pull everything away from the inside garage walls. If your garage is anything like ours, you know what that meant. By the time I started to get things back to the way they were it was winter and too cold to spend all day working in the garage. So, today we had our good friend Julia over and she helped me empty the garage, swab down the deck, and move everything back in. We even managed to get one of the cars in. That’s something that isn’t going to happen often with us. I figured I better document it. Without the seats out of the back of one van (on the left) and the firewood box (on the right), I could probably have put two cars in. But that’s just not going to happen.
Rain On My Window
Once again I have fallen behind in posting my “photo of the day.” This is being posted almost a week late. We had a bit of rain on the last day of April and I took some pictures of rain drops on my office window. I didn’t notice as I took them how dirty the windows are but I like the organic shapes of the drops of water and the upside down and out of focus images of the woods beyond my window that show up in each drop.