Chip And Crow

When you live out in the Back of Beyond, the term "yard work" takes on a whole 'nother meaning. A month or two back, I bought myself a small electric chainsaw to take care of some of my "yard work," but there still remained a limbing task which was not possible for me to do safely because of my size. I can always count on Clyde to come through for me in matters like this, so I enlisted his services with a pole saw having an 11-foot reach. He brought down the hazard branches on my big Doug fir a few days ago. Then bad weather moved in, and when it cleared, I had a photo assignment which took priority over cleanup. Today, I had both time and energy for the job, so I dragged Chip (the chainsaw) out of the garage and proceeded to make two similar "haystacks" containing manageable lengths. By the time we're allowed to burn yard debris again in the fall, the wood should be nice and dry.

All Too Frequently

It happens far too often. I leave home with a dark forest in my mind's eye and the possibility of finding a rare wildflower or unusual mushroom in the offing, and half an hour from home, I ask myself, "Did I remember to put the plate back on the tripod?" Almost without exception, the answer is "No."

My old tripod (broken) had a spare. I could leave one in my satchel and not have to worry that I'd left one on the desk. The new tripod came with one (only one), and of course the old ones aren't interchangeable because the motivating idea behind commercialism is to force the consumer to buy specialized proprietary parts rather than making things conveniently standard. Don't get me started here!

Oh, I'm good at bracing the camera against trees, rocks and other immoveable objects, but it often means that I can't get the angle I really want for a shot. As a matter of fact, this photo was taken using an ungainly combination of a step-ladder, a stack of books and my PDA, camera on the timer. As I toted the tripod through the door. I said to myself, "Dang, disaster looking for a place to happen!" Once again, I'd left the plate on the desk, my pack already packed for today's photo shoot in the deep dark woods.

It Came From Outer Space

When the Clematis blooms,I invariably take a few photos and am never really satisfied with the appearance of them. It finally registered that the color itself is a distraction, its richness overwhelming the textural detail of the petals and intricacy of the flower's center. As an experiment, I shot in both sepia and black and white. I preferred the sepia, but added an additional warming filter to achieve the tones in this image.

Historic Rainier Grade School

 

The little town of Rainier WA is one of the jumping-off points for the network of bicycle trails which includes the Yelm-Tenino and Chehalis-Western. It was a railroad community in the dim beginnings when this schoolhouse was built, and it was also my home address for over fifteen years. The schoolhouse now houses a thrift shop and the local food bank although it is classified as a "historic building." It has been restored to somewhat better condition than it was in during the time I lived on the grass prairie which surrounds the town. Rainier-as-town is over an hour's drive from the actual Mountain, and is often confused with Rainier OR, a town of much greater size.