August 21, 2017. Pikeville, TN. Path of totality.
Photography
1300 Dark Frames
June in Illinois often brings with it some interesting weather, and this year was no different. One evening for about an hour we were surrounded by storms, but with clear sky overhead. There was a great deal of lightning, and I even saw one spider-web bolt jump from cloud to cloud, across the clear sky and the face of the moon. Very cool.
I decided to do a photography experiment. I made my best guesses on focus, ISO, aperture and shutter speed, then spent about 45 minutes trying to anticipate the most active part of the sky to point the camera at. With the camera hand-held and set on continuous burst mode, I fired off 1300 frames, hoping for the best. Really. 1300 frames.
Of those 1300, only about 40 had any hint of light in them at all, and just a couple were shots that I consider good enough to show. I’m very happy with these results, but thank goodness for the digital age, as this experiment would have cost a fortune in film!
Dragonfall
When I opened the garage door this afternoon, I discovered a dragonfly that had been bumping around in there all night. Despite the open door, he kept smacking into the back wall, and was dangerously close to a spider web. Poor, stupid, softhearted goof that I am, I decided I should help him.
So I stood on the top step leading into the house and gently, oh so gently, cupped my hands around the dragonfly.
By now, anyone familiar with me already knows what is about to happen.
With the dragonfly safely in my cupped hands, I turned to take him out to the flowerbed. Naturally, since I was concentrating so much on not hurting the dragonfly, I completely forgot that I was standing two steps off the nice, firm, concrete garage floor.
Yeah.
To my credit, my hands remained carefully cupped around the dragonfly, who came through the incident entirely injury free. Since I couldn’t use my hands to break my fall, I didn’t. Break my fall, that is. Eight hours later the feeling has mostly returned to my toes, and the badly scraped knee has almost stopped throbbing. By my standards, I came through it remarkably well.
I hope the dragonfly appreciates the assist.