this page intentionally left blank

Ugh. It's starting to be a Monday already. I used to own a home in Virginia Beach, VA. In recent years, I leased it out and just this last year, I sold it. I found out this morning that the title company and agent(s) at closing dropped the ball somewhere and they never cancelled my escrowed homeowner's policy on that property. I received an invoice from the insurance company for policy renewal and when I called to get the scoop on whiskey tango foxtrot, they said it was still active. STILL ACTIVE. I sold this house last year. So, due to time zone differences, I have to sit around and wait for the offices that house the people about to get an ass chewing to open. Unreal.

The white specs at his feet and around his body are granules of pollen. This injured jumping spider was no more than 3 or 4 millimeters in length. I used extreme extension to get this magnification, so parts of the image are optically soft. Despite shooting this with an actual aperture of f/16, the calculated effective aperture with the extension was somewhere above f/80. I managed to shoot this on a tripod extension however, I handheld the diffused flash and triggered it remotely as a slave with an IR master in the hotshoe (I wrote about this the other day). Anyhoo, jumping spiders are a pain in the arse to photograph at any reasonable magnification because they are so fast and are always on the move. I'm sad this guy was hurt, but it aided in getting this shot. A completely different technique was used to capture this garden chameleon. I took 25mm of extension tube and placed it between a 1.4x teleconverter and a 100mm f/2.8 macro lens. I spot metered off the eye and shot this posed lizard on a white painted wall outside in shade. I like the composition.

Oh my... I'm crying.

My mom and her man just left this morning. What a great weekend! I'm still tired from working all night on Thursday, but had a fab time while they were here. They brought a beautiful chimenia back from Mexico for us and we had drinks and convo around that both nights. Saturday morning was an early trip to Brazos (where all these dragon shots came from). We counted 79 alligators during our brief nature walk! They were anywhere from 10 inches or so up to well over 12 feet long. I took some photos, but an a little alligator'd out, so I might not even process the "negatives" for a while. Shooting the baby dragons was an exciting surprise. They are already out in masses down there, but have yet to hatch around here (north of Houston). I guess we're a few weeks behind. I hope you had as nice a weekend as I did... it's back to the grind tomorrow!

Spring is here!!

The only photo I have of him from my trip to Dallas last December. It's so sad.

Jabari

Check this out and let me knwo what you think. Can you say MAACCRROOOO? woohoo!

just got home from work... blah

If you're interested, there is an easy fix to the "Kerberos" issue with the telnet client packaged with FreeBSD. The telnet client on FreeBSD by default does a "getlogin" on the user, then tries to autologin to the remote host by sending the user id. The way to fix it is to create a .telnetrc file in the user home directory, with a default "no autologin" statement. No that I've said that, on to more interesting news. I'm working tonight. Well, if might not be interesting to you since you're not the one losing sleep, but yeah... working. Yeeehaw. I've spent the last week building new PIX-535's with all the bells and whistles to go into production in the wee hours of the morning mañana. This bright and sunny side of it all is that I'm going to take tomorrow off... and my mom and her man are coming into town to visit. I'm all kinds of happy about it since we're supposed to have good weather. The shady side of it all is that this is a very high profile job, so any goofs would be high profile goofs. Fortunately, I take great pride in always doing a good job, so I'm not really that concerned. I wanted to run through some more macro test shots tonight, but it is not to be. Perhaps this weekend? The day wears thin. I need some caffeine for the long night ahead.

*sigh* It sucks when people can't differentiate between business and personal. Disappointing.

I am so rusty when it comes to macro. I received my MP-E 65mm f/2.8 macro lens this evening from my crack dealer... B&H. I've been mentally prepping myself for the summer months by coming up with a new strategy for extreme macro. I got great results from the reverse mount technique last year, but had little control over magnification. Getting enough light in my shots was another factor. My eventual goal is to purchase the Canon MT-24EX Macro Twin Lite Ringlite Flash, but it's quite pricey with a street price of around $650.00, so I chose a cheaper route. I ordered the ST-E2 (Speedlite Transmitter). It's a wireless controller for the E-TTL wireless autoflash system. The ST-E2 can control up to two Speedlite 550EX or 420EX slave groups in one of four channels. The flash ratio between the two groups can also be controlled and it supports focal plane flash (flash greater than x-sync). I figured that since the guide number of my 550-EX is 180@55m and the MT-24EX is only 72@22m, I could use the ST-E2 to trigger the 550-EX as a slave and I could handhold it near my subject. The shot above is a test run. Obviously, I have a lot to learn. For example, the DOF issue for normal macro is unruly however, extreme macro is extremely unruly. I shot the critter in the photo above with an aperture of f/8 and at a magnification of about 2.5x... that means the effective aperture is really about f/28 to f/30 since extension was used to achieve the magnification. That tiny little depth of field was all I got at approximately f/30! It's a crazy trade off between DOF and softness due to shrinking aperture and how that effects the optical quality of the data reaching the film/sensor. For example, a shot at 5x magnification and f/16 (the minimum aperture of the lens) equates to an effective focal aperture of f/96. Crazy. Anyhoo, I'll get better with practice and hopefully have better subjects to practice on... this unknown bug on the back door was the only one I could find at this hour. I had trouble focusing because manual focus is all the lens supports and it was dark! Dark! The light from the flash was about all there was. Hopefully, more aesthetically pleasing results will soon follow. I have had a stressful day and think I'll go enjoy a beer on the couch ala Homer Simpson. Goodnight!

How to Sing the Blues, by Lame Mango Washington (attributed to Memphis Earlene Gray with help from Uncle Plunky, with revisions by Little Blind Patti D. and Dr. Stevie Franklin) 1. Most Blues begin, "Woke up this morning." 2. "I got a good woman," is a bad way to begin the Blues, 'less you stick something nasty in the next line: "I got a good woman - with the meanest face in town." 3. The Blues is simple. After you get the first line right, repeat it. Then find something that rhymes ... sort of: "Got a good woman with the meanest face in town. Got teeth like Margaret Thatcher and she weigh 500 pound." 4. The Blues are not about choice. You stuck in a ditch. You stuck in a ditch ain't no way out. 5. Blues cars: Chevys and Cadillacs and broken down trucks. Blues don't travel in Volvos, BMWs, or SUV's. Most Blues transportation is a Greyhound bus or a southbound train. Jet aircraft and state-sponsored motor pools ain't even in the running. Walkin' plays a major part in the blues lifestyle. So does fixin' to die. 6. Teenagers can't sing the Blues. They ain't fixin to die yet. Adults sing the Blues. In Blues, "adulthood" means being old enough to get the electric chair if you shoot a man in Memphis. 7. Blues can take place in New York City, but not in Hawaii or any place in Canada. Hard times in St. Paul or Tucson is just depression. Chicago, St. Louis, and Kansas City still the best places to have the Blues. You cannot have the blues in any place that don't get rain. 8. A man with male pattern baldness ain't the blues. A woman with male pattern baldness is. Breaking your leg cuz you skiing is not the blues. Breaking your leg cuz an alligator be chomping on it is. 9. You can't have no Blues in an office or a shopping mall.. The lighting is wrong. Go outside to the parking lot or sit by the dumpster. 10. Good places for the Blues: highway jailhouse empty bed bottom of a whiskey glass Bad places: Ashrams gallery openings Ivy League institutions golf courses 11. No one will believe it's the Blues if you wear a suit, 'less you happen to be an old black man, and you slept in it. 12. Do you have the right to sing the Blues? Yes, if: you're older than dirt you're blind you shot a man in Memphis you can't be satisfied No, if: you have all your teeth you were once blind but now can see the man in Memphis lived you have a retirement plan or trust fund 13. Blues is not a matter of color. It's a matter of bad luck. Tiger Woods cannot sing the blues. Gary Coleman could. Ugly white people also got a leg up on the blues. 14. If you ask for water and Baby give you gasoline, it's the Blues.Other acceptable Blues beverages are: wine whiskey or bourbon muddy water black coffee The following are NOT Blues beverages: mixed drinks kosher wine Snapple sparkling water 15. If it occurs in a cheap motel or a shotgun shack, it's a Blues death. Stabbed in the back by a jealous lover is another Blues way to die. So is the electric chair, substance abuse, and dying lonely in a broken down cot. You can't have a Blues death if you die during a tennis match or getting liposuction. 16. Some Blues names for women: Sadie Big Mama Bessie Fat River Dumpling 17. Some Blues names for men: Joe Willie Little Willie Big Willie 18. Persons with names like Sierra, Sequoia, and Rainbow can't sing the Blues no matter how many men they shoot in Memphis. 19. Make yer own Blues name (starter kit): name of physical infirmity (Blind, Cripple, Lame, etc.) first name (see above) plus name of fruit (Lemon, Lime, Kiwi, etc.) last name of President (Jefferson, Johnson, Fillmore, etc.) For example, Blind Lime Jefferson, or Cripple Kiwi Fillmore, etc. 20. I don't care how tragic your life; you own a computer, you cannot sing the blues. You best destroy it. Fire, a spilled bottle of Mad Dog, or shotgun. Maybe your big woman just done sit on it. I don't care 21. Hey there, you can READ! This be too big ol' problem! Most folks singin' the Blues ain't never had much a chance for education. In the Blues . . . the three R's stand for Railroads, Runnin', and Rehab.

And the sign said long haired freaky people need not apply So I tucked my hair up under my hat and I went in to ask him why He said you look like a fine upstanding young man, I think you'll do So I took off my hat I said imagine that, huh, me working for you woah! Sign Sign everywhere a sign Blocking out the scenery breaking my mind Do this, don't do that, can't you read the sign And the sign said anybody caught trespassing would be shot on sight So I jumped on the fence and yelled at the house, Hey! what gives you the right To put up a fence to keep me out or to keep mother nature in If God was here, he'd tell you to your face, man you're some kinda sinner Sign Sign everywhere a sign Blocking out the scenery breaking my mind Do this, don't do that, can't you read the sign Now, hey you Mister! can't you read, you got to have a shirt and tie to get a seat You can't even watch, no you can't eat, you ain't suppose to be here Sign said you got to have a membership card to get inside Uh! And the sign said everybody welcome, come in, kneel down and pray But when they passed around the plate at the end of it all, I didn't have a penny to pay, so I got me a pen and a paper and I made up my own little sign I said thank you Lord for thinking about me, I'm alive and doing fine Sign Sign everywhere a sign Blocking out the scenery breaking my mind Do this, don't do that, can't you read the sign Sign Sign everywhere a sign Blocking out the scenery breaking my mind Do this, don't do that, can't you read the sign

So like I said, very cool show. Dierks Bentley (who I am not familiar with at all) opened for Robert Earl Keen in Reliant Stadium at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo. It was certainly not what I expected. Not so much the concert, which was awesome, but the entire rodeo experience. I have never seen so many cowboys, cowgirls, and their respective wannabes in one place before. The entire park smelled like hee haw. There were people of all walks and talks of life... from little kids dudded out from western head to western toe to women determined to display their technologically enhanced "parts" with the skimpiest cowgirl outfits allowed by law to big, burly, real bull wrangling men. Scary men. The seats we had were so close to the action that when they opened the gate, you could hear the bull's snorts and stomps as the ride unfolded before you. There were other events like trick riding and barrel racing, but the bull riding was the coolest to see up close. The only thing that sucked was the $10 beer. I mean, the beer was excellent... paying ten bucks per bottle was not. After R.E.K. finished his set, Sam and I headed for Keneally's Irish Pub for some pre-St. Patrick's Day Guinness. All said and done, it was a great evening. "Mom got drunk and Dad got drunk At our Christmas party We were drinkin' champagne punch And homemade eggnog Little sister brought her new boyfriend He was a Mexican We didn't know what to think of him Til he sang Feliz Navidad Feliz Navidad Brother Ken brought his kids with him The three from his first wife Lynn And the two identical twins >From his second wife MaryNell Of course he brought his new wife Kaye Who talks all about AA Chain smokin' while the stero plays Noel, Noel, The first Noel Carve the turkey turn the ball game on Mix Margaritas when the eggnog's gone Send somebody to the Quik-Pak store We need some ice and an extention cord A can of bean dip and some Diet Rite A box of tampons and some Marlboro Lights Hallelujah everybody say cheese Merry Christmas from the family Fran and Rita drove from Harlingen I can't remember how I'm kin to them But when they tried to plug their motorhome in They blew our christmas lights Cousin David knew just what went wrong So we all waited on our front lawn He threw the breaker and the lights came on And we sang Silent Night Oh Silent Night Carve the turkey turn the ballgame on Make Bloody Marys cause we all want one Send somebody to the Stop 'n Go We need some celery and a can of fake snow A bag of lemons and some Dite Sprite A box of tampons and some Salem Lights Hallelujah everybody say cheese Merry Christmas from the family Feliz Navidad."

I dig R.E.K. Tonight, I went to the Robert Earl Keen concert at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo. I was comp'd second row seats about 12 feet from the bull riders and shizzle... it was excellent. What fun! Anyhoo, it's late and I need to sleep. Cheers!