Worth every penny

I finally got another cat yesterday. Mittens has been dead for 10 months, and a couple days after she died my mom asked "so when are getting another one?" Well, its not like I've been catless all this time, so I didn't really have the motivation I would if there were no kitties. But I had been getting closer to actually going to the shelter in the last couple months. Anyway, a lady a work has some strays running around her neighborhood, and there was one that was nicer and friendlier than the rest. So I got my grimy mitts on the little fella and now he's mine.

notice the totally cute little white tip of the tail

wook at that puddum

His name is Biscuit, because I'm a weirdo, and he's neutered already. He's got a soft short coat, and he's very friendly. Of course, he used to be someone's pet, since he's neutered. And bringing him inside the house he really didn't freak at all. Today is the second day here, and runs around the "cat zones" of the house (basement and occasionally first floor) like he owns the place. Saffron is not pleased,

and only growls impotently, sometimes hisses. But he just ignores her because he's apparently already the alpha. I guess that's OK, Saffron needed to be knocked down a notch. Seriously, he's cool as a cucumber, and that's what I liked about Mittens the most.

So hopefully when I take him to the vet he won't come back positive for FIV or something, now that I'm all attached to him and stuff. Also, by "worth every penny" regarding a free cat, I don't mean it sarcastically. I just couldn't come up with a title.

P.S. He's a laser pointer kitty. Click for full post and comments

Is it still under warranty?

I did a dumb thing with my sunglasses yesterday. I set them on a precarious place on the trunk while I was packing up camera gear. As I did so, I said "OK, Maya, remember they are there before closing the trunk." So now I have a crushed pair of sunglasses. I'm not sure the warranty would cover such damage, even if I still had the receipt. It's fine, though, because I had an old pair as backup. They have a chip right in my line of sight because I dropped them.

You just can't trust me with anything nice. Click for full post and comments

My shoes are full of goose poop

So I went to the park today because last time I drove by I saw white birds there, thinking they were swans. Turns out they were geese, keeping the Canadian geese company. There were ducks there too. I took 150 pictures, deleted half of them once I was on the computer.

The pimp and his bitches, looking for their next score of bread crumbs. (seriously, they would just walk the path back and forth until they came up to a person, decide they weren't going to throw any food their way, and would move on.)

hey. hey. were you guys going? can I come? were you guys going? hey. hey. wait up, guys.

uh, ya got a little something on your nose, buddy.

I thought maybe I'd get lucky and a heron would be there, but I don't actually know when their time of the year is.

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My camera is awesome!!

I stayed up until 4am taking pictures of the moon and stars. I used the telephoto (70-300mm) only.

First I had to get the right exposure, so here's the series (it's peeking out from behind a tree in the first few):

f/5.6; 1.6s

f/5.6; 0.8s

f/5.6; 0.5s

f/5.6; 1/6s

f/5.6; 1/15s

f/5.6; 1/25s

f/5.6; 1/60s

f/5.6; 1/125s

so I chose 1/100s and stuck with that.

This moon one is a composite and it's been Photoshopped. The color is fake, and the individual moons are separate layers of differing opacity. f/5.6; 1/100s. Zoomed all the way in to 300mm.
The star on is a 7-8 minute exposure, f/5. This one is not zoomed at all, at 70mm.

I had tried taking star pictures in Fiji, but I didn't have the good lenses then. So they didn't turn out. With this telephoto, you pretty much can't not get a developed picture of stars. I love it so much!!

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Greedy birds

TS Hanna dumped a lot of rain on us, and of course we had just filled up the bird feeder. So we chipped the seed out of the feeder and laid it out for the birds. They were so into the smorgasbord they didn't care about the rain falling on them.

The guy peeking out from behind the mountain of food just cracks me up!

This guy on the bottom has food all over his face. They are very messy eaters!

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ID please

Saw and heard this circling overhead today. I can't really get a lock on its wingspan because I've never been good at estimating that sort of thing. I would guess somewhere around 4 feet, but who knows. Anyway, my best guesses (with help from Sibley) are a couple of different hawks and some sort of kite. None of the pictures are in focus because the thing wouldn't hold still! These shots are with the 300mm telephoto on, and VR turned on.

It wasn't just circling like riding thermals, it was wheeling and diving all over the place. It was pretty cool, only because I know my kitty is too fat to be scooped away by a raptor.

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Ye gads

I heard a Tiffany song on the radio. Do you know she is horrible
singer? I guess I liked her well anough In the 80s, but I couldn't
hear the horribleness until now. Click for full post and comments

Missed Opportunity

Always one for a good "that's what she said" joke, I totally blew it (twss!) this morning. I needed an actual tool to get a bottle open today, and the random pliers and whatnot around the lab weren't cutting it. Luckily a facilities guy with his tools was just down the hall. Grabbed a scrapey type thing that had a bottle opener on the side, and got the thing open on a snap. Handed it back to him saying "yay the perfect tool!" and he said "I love it when a women tells me that." I was disappointed in myself that my mind wasn't even on that track when I said it, and then even more disappointed when it dawned on me this opportunity I just didn't even see. Yeah, we pay a lot of attention to that sexual harassment stuff at work. Click for full post and comments

I don't like bugs

A giant cockroach was scritching around my office just now. I stayed
here only to get a chance to squish it. Missed the first time with my
foot, second try was with frapp bottle. Roaches are a fact of life in
my building, and actually there aren't very many of them. Now there's
one less. Click for full post and comments

WB demands I be all logical and whatnot

With respect to the flowering cactus post below, writer's block noted
I did not supply a photo. This is the best I can do from work.

Sent from my iPhone

[Update:] well jeez. I guess when the choice that says "email link of this picture" comes up, I should just ignore it, because that sure didn't work.





There. That's better.

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The circle of life

On the discus front, I think I have two (out of eight) dead discus. One I saw had worms because he had white stringy poop. I didn't actaully see worms, but the white poop thing is a symptom. So I got medicine: PraziPro by Aquarium Solutions. It's supposed to be very safe for the plants and fish, and very effective at killing the nasties. The active ingredient is praziquantel, and their directions will give a concetration of 2.5mg/L (2.5ppm). I have four very healthy looking discus, and then two small and shy and sickly looking ones too, so my eye is on the two smaller ones.

Further along the circle of life is the superworm I put in the gecko cage a long time ago. That guy doesn't eat very many superworms (I think he likes crickies better) so the worm just crawled about in the cage. Well now there's a freaking beetle in there! It's like a two week process to go from larva (the superworm the lizards eat) to pupa (I didn't see that stage) to now a dark colored beetle. Maybe the gecko will be interested in that!

sorry for being boring but I have a surprise on the way! Click for full post and comments