Month: May 2020

Coronavirus Diary: May 17, 2020

Sunday.  Might be a good time to venture downtown.

A few vehicles here and there. Behind me I hear a distinctive sound, and turn to see friend/CPA Michael’s 47-year-old purple autocrosser (dubbed “Barney”) buzz past.

Flora is probably the only consistently cheerful visual element out there these days. (Did I ever mention that I have never seen, outside of Hawaii, more ubiquitous streetside and yard display of flowers than in WaWaWA?)

Not In Ascendance

Finally, no sooner than I return home, Kim announces that a hummingbird (she has a feeder for them on the deck) just crashed into the patio sliding door. I grabbed my camera, quickly clicked in the general direction from waist level without composing, hoping to capture *something* before the tiny winged dinosaur regained its composure. It flew away as I slid the door open, and I didn’t realize that I had actually grabbed an image until I later uploaded the files.

Coronavirus Diary: May 12, 2020

These days I generally try to keep my workplace visits to weekends only. That turns out to mean that I join in the daily dog walks more frequently. In turn, it means spousal communication on the topics of flora and fauna is often shared. And, following yesterday’s jaunt to Jasper Mountain, where I happened to photograph a tiny flower I saw beside me when I sat to rest, my interest in chasing macro photography seems to be warming up. Maybe it will even get to the level that I take it seriously enough to “do it right” with tripod and manual measures. For now, I’m still lazily hand-holding, even at this alarming view of a coronavirus-reminiscent dogwood (do I remember that right? Is that what Kim said it was?):

Others, somewhat less ominous:

Then, backing off a bit:

Some words:

Finally, over to the west pond at Pioneer Park and … over the top:

A Trek to Jasper Mountain

Avoiding any travel on Mother’s Day, we wait a day — co-incident with the seventh birthday of the Dog Most Foul — and seek the social distance of Jasper Mountain on Monday.  So we head out on East Highway 12, seeking the back roads and engaging in a bit of windshield photography on the way:

In time, we leave paved roads and start gaining altitude as we negotiate Jackson Mountain.

A pause for rest gives an opportunity for some ill-advised — I learned over fifty years ago that proper macro photography isn’t likely without tripod and wind barrier — closeups in the range of an inch or two.

Spotting a socially distanced 911 Cabrio on the Hwy 12 return: