Getty | Facebook Fan Page | Twitter | Google + | Blogger | Tumblr | Formspring

 

Lake Manyara National Park is a national park in Arusha Region, Tanzania. The park consists of 330 km2 of arid land, forest, and a soda-lake which covers as much as 200 km2 of land during the wet season but is nearly nonexistent during the dry season.

 

Lake Manyara National Park is known for the flamingos that inhabit the lake. During the wet season they inhabit the edges of the lake in flocks of thousands but they are not so present during the dry season.

More than 400 species of birds inhabit the park and many remain throughout the year. Because of this Lake Manyara National Park is a good spot for bird watching. Visitors to the park can expect to see upwards of 100 different species of bird on any day.

Leopards, lions, elephants, blue monkeys, dik-dik, gazelle, hippo, giraffe, impala, and more inhabit the park and many can be seen throughout the year. There is a hippo pond at one end of the park where visitors can get out of their cars and observe from a safe distance. The leopards and lions are both known to lounge in the trees while not hunting for prey.

Lake Manyara National Park is a national park in Arusha Region, Tanzania. The park consists of 330 km2 of arid land, forest, and a soda-lake which covers as much as 200 km2 of land during the wet season but is nearly nonexistent during the dry season.

 

Lake Manyara National Park is known for the flamingos that inhabit the lake. During the wet season they inhabit the edges of the lake in flocks of thousands but they are not so present during the dry season.

More than 400 species of birds inhabit the park and many remain throughout the year. Because of this Lake Manyara National Park is a good spot for bird watching. Visitors to the park can expect to see upwards of 100 different species of bird on any day.

Leopards, lions, elephants, blue monkeys, dik-dik, gazelle, hippo, giraffe, impala, and more inhabit the park and many can be seen throughout the year. There is a hippo pond at one end of the park where visitors can get out of their cars and observe from a safe distance. The leopards and lions are both known to lounge in the trees while not hunting for prey.

Millipedes have very poor – sometimes nonexistent – eyesight, and sense their way around using their short, segmented antennae, which continually tap the ground as they move along; millipedes are very clean creatures, spend a lot of time cleaning and polishing various parts of their body, and have a special brush-like group of hairs on the 2nd or 3rd pair of their legs which they use to clean their antennae

 

___________________________________________

American Giant Millipede – 2020SEP27 – Charlotte, NC

 

Look what I found! A Giant Millipede, Narceus americanus: it grows twice as large as any other North American millipede, a cylindrical millipede (distinguished from flat millipedes), dark reddish-brown or black, a red line on each segmente edge; like all millipedes, they have 2 pairs of legs on most segments, rather than 1 pair of legs on each segment (like a centipede).

 

Does it bite? No (uniike a centipede). What about cyanide? Although not this species, some secrete hydrogen cyanide, quite poisonous. Remember, millipedes are toxic – but as long as they are not eaten, hands washed after touching them, they're pretty harmless; however, many have a defensive secretion, benzoquinone, that can cause chemical burns on human skin, generally mild, but powerful enough to cause temporary skin discoloration, itching, and blisters – some millipedes’ secretions are much more powerful, though.

 

The division of an animal into repeating body parts is called segmentation, clearly seen in millipedes, the word meaning “one thousand foot;” despite that name, millipedes with the most legs come up shy of the 1,000-leg mark, only about 750.

 

Hope you enjoy the 10% of 99 captures I took here this day!

WANNABE WARMER WEDNESDAY #2 (one day late).

 

Pardon my lateness but Christmas Eve, family, prime rib and a bottle of wine got in the way. I'm sure you all understand.

 

I hope you each had an amazing holiday with family and friends ♥

 

Also, my computer (or Flickr) is acting up tonight and commenting is pretty nonexistent. If I don't get to you tonight I promise to finish on Friday night.

Spark bring fire

 

Jaisini Gleitzeit Supermodernity Manifesto (Short version) Jaisini Gleitzeit Circa 1994

  

Gleitzeit style based on depiction of visual flexibility with theoretical flexibility.

A painting which purpose is to achieve composition of enclosure.

Art based on the depiction of a circle evolution of understanding and seeing.

A kind of art which draws upon imagery and seeks to reveal and abstract idea of the connection within.

It's flexible because it has multiple principles.

Paintings with a capacity to change visually by the artistic magic changing your subconscious mind.

It is a session of Hypnosis that controls you by a disorganized absolute harmony of everything expected from a "nonexistent" picture.

It depends upon the pattern of line as a primal creator of whatever associated or disassociated from the theme.

The artist's mind is the superior beginning of the line, but the line is free and emancipated.

Flexi is a new neo-pro-anti-post.

GIGroup International 2015 NEW YORK USA

 

Hello! I've been gone for so long :O well it felt reaaaal long to me. I'm probably not back for good, just wanted to update you guys! I feel like no one will see this, but whatever (: so I had a good summer! Went on some trips, saw some friends, had some fun. I started highschool today :O I was nervous but I got there and realize I was being stupid, it wasn't bad at all, no one beat me up, I didn't get lost, I like all my classes, so I'm pretty happy :D well so back to my flickr life. It's been pretty nonexistent. I went on a couple times, to see what was up. I feel like I could never catch up D: with tags, and contact requests, and all that good stuff. I almost want to start fresh, but I feel kind of stupid doing that because I've been doing so good! So that's pretty much all I have to say! Oh wait! I'm taking photography this year :) so far, I'm not really feelin it, but that's dumb because I've gone once.... Anyways miss you all! I'm going to possibly try to catch up :P wish me luck (;

It's the Easter holidays and we've used this time to help our daughter learn to ride her bike on two wheels.

 

I thought I'd take this as an opportunity to practise my (pretty much nonexistent) panning skills - this is the best I got! My son going as fast as he could down the hill at Sandal Castle. His helmet's a bit loose in this picture but we've tightened it up now.

The adult humpback whale is generally 14–15 m (46–49 ft) long, though individuals up to 16–17 m (52–56 ft) long have been recorded. Females are usually 1–1.5 m (3 ft 3 in – 4 ft 11 in) longer than males.

 

The species can reach body masses of 40 metric tons (44 short tons). Calves are born at around 4.3 m (14 ft) long with a mass of 680 kg (1,500 lb)] The species has a bulky body with a thin rostrum and proportionally long flippers, each around one-third of its body length. It has a short dorsal fin that varies from nearly nonexistent to somewhat long and curved.

 

Like other rorquals, the humpback has grooves between the tip of the lower jaw and the navel. The grooves are relatively few in number in this species, ranging from 14 to 35. The upper jaw is lined with baleen plates, which number 540–800 in total and are black in color.

 

The dorsal or upper side of the animal is generally black; the ventral or underside has various levels of black and white coloration. Whales in the southern hemisphere tend to have more white pigmentation. The flippers can vary from all-white to white only on the undersurface. Some individuals may be all white, notably Migaloo who is a true albino. The varying color patterns and scars on the tail flukes distinguish individual animals.[

 

The end of the genital slit of the female is marked by a round feature, known as the hemispherical lobe, which visually distinguishes males and females.

 

Unique among large whales, humpbacks have bumps or tubercles on the head and front edge of the flippers; the tail fluke has a jagged trailing edge. The tubercles on the head are 5–10 cm (2.0–3.9 in) thick at the base and protrude up to 6.5 cm (2.6 in).

 

They are mostly hollow in the center, often containing at least one fragile hair that erupts 1–3 cm (0.39–1.18 in) from the skin and is 0.1 mm (0.0039 in) thick. The tubercles develop early in gestation and may have a sensory function, as they are rich in nerves. Sensory nerve cells in the skin are adapted to withstand the high water pressure of diving.

 

In one study, a humpback whale brain measured 22.4 cm (8.8 in) long and 18 cm (7.1 in) wide at the tips of the temporal lobes, and weighed around 4.6 kg (10 lb). The humpback's brain has a complexity similar to that of the brains of smaller whales and dolphins.

 

The structure of the eye indicates that eyesight is relatively poor, being only able to see silhouettes over long distances and finer details relatively close. Computer models of the middle ear suggest that the humpback can hear at frequencies between 15 Hz and 3 kHz "when stimulated at the tympanic membrane", and between 200 Hz and 9 kHz "if stimulated at the thinner region of the tympanic bone adjacent to the tympanic membrane". These ranges are consistent with their vocalization ranges.

 

As in all cetaceans, the respiratory tract of the humpback whale is connected to the blowholes and not to the mouth, although the species appears to be able to unlock the epiglottis and larynx and move them towards the oral cavity, allowing humpbacks to blow bubbles from their mouths. The vocal folds of the humpback are more horizontally positioned than those of land mammals which allows them to produce underwater calls. These calls are amplified by a laryngeal sac.

 

This image was taken at Isafjordur, Iceland

August 21, 2005

The Breaking Point

By PETER MAASS

 

The largest oil terminal in the world, Ras Tanura, is located on the eastern coast of Saudi Arabia, along the Persian Gulf. From Ras Tanura's control tower, you can see the classic totems of oil's dominion -- supertankers coming and going, row upon row of storage tanks and miles and miles of pipes. Ras Tanura, which I visited in June, is the funnel through which nearly 10 percent of the world's daily supply of petroleum flows. Standing in the control tower, you are surrounded by more than 50 million barrels of oil, yet not a drop can be seen.

 

The oil is there, of course. In a technological sleight of hand, oil can be extracted from the deserts of Arabia, processed to get rid of water and gas, sent through pipelines to a terminal on the gulf, loaded onto a supertanker and shipped to a port thousands of miles away, then run through a refinery and poured into a tanker truck that delivers it to a suburban gas station, where it is pumped into an S.U.V. -- all without anyone's actually glimpsing the stuff. So long as there is enough oil to fuel the global economy, it is not only out of sight but also out of mind, at least for consumers.

 

I visited Ras Tanura because oil is no longer out of mind, thanks to record prices caused by refinery shortages and surging demand -- most notably in the United States and China -- which has strained the capacity of oil producers and especially Saudi Arabia, the largest exporter of all. Unlike the 1973 crisis, when the embargo by the Arab members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries created an artificial shortfall, today's shortage, or near-shortage, is real. If demand surges even more, or if a producer goes offline because of unrest or terrorism, there may suddenly not be enough oil to go around.

 

As Aref al-Ali, my escort from Saudi Aramco, the giant state-owned oil company, pointed out, ''One mistake at Ras Tanura today, and the price of oil will go up.'' This has turned the port into a fortress; its entrances have an array of gates and bomb barriers to prevent terrorists from cutting off the black oxygen that the modern world depends on. Yet the problem is far greater than the brief havoc that could be wrought by a speeding zealot with 50 pounds of TNT in the trunk of his car. Concerns are being voiced by some oil experts that Saudi Arabia and other producers may, in the near future, be unable to meet rising world demand. The producers are not running out of oil, not yet, but their decades-old reservoirs are not as full and geologically spry as they used to be, and they may be incapable of producing, on a daily basis, the increasing volumes of oil that the world requires. ''One thing is clear,'' warns Chevron, the second-largest American oil company, in a series of new advertisements, ''the era of easy oil is over.''

 

In the past several years, the gap between demand and supply, once considerable, has steadily narrowed, and today is almost negligible. The consequences of an actual shortfall of supply would be immense. If consumption begins to exceed production by even a small amount, the price of a barrel of oil could soar to triple-digit levels. This, in turn, could bring on a global recession, a result of exorbitant prices for transport fuels and for products that rely on petrochemicals -- which is to say, almost every product on the market. The impact on the American way of life would be profound: cars cannot be propelled by roof-borne windmills. The suburban and exurban lifestyles, hinged to two-car families and constant trips to work, school and Wal-Mart, might become unaffordable or, if gas rationing is imposed, impossible. Carpools would be the least imposing of many inconveniences; the cost of home heating would soar -- assuming, of course, that climate-controlled habitats do not become just a fond memory.

 

But will such a situation really come to pass? That depends on Saudi Arabia. To know the answer, you need to know whether the Saudis, who possess 22 percent of the world's oil reserves, can increase their country's output beyond its current limit of 10.5 million barrels a day, and even beyond the 12.5-million-barrel target it has set for 2009. (World consumption is about 84 million barrels a day.) Saudi Arabia is the sole oil superpower. No other producer possesses reserves close to its 263 billion barrels, which is almost twice as much as the runner-up, Iran, with 133 billion barrels. New fields in other countries are discovered now and then, but they tend to offer only small increments. For example, the much-contested and as-yet-unexploited reserves in the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge are believed to amount to about 10 billion barrels, or just a fraction of what the Saudis possess.

 

But the truth about Saudi oil is hard to figure out. Oil reservoirs cannot be inventoried like wood in a wilderness: the oil is underground, unseen by geologists and engineers, who can, at best, make highly educated guesses about how much is underfoot and how much can be extracted in the future. And there is a further obstacle: the Saudis will not let outsiders audit their confidential data on reserves and production. Oil is an industry in which not only is the product hidden from sight but so is reliable information about it. And because we do not know when a supply-demand shortfall might arrive, we do not know when to begin preparing for it, so as to soften its impact; the economic blow may come as a sledgehammer from the darkness.

 

Of course the Saudis do have something to say about this prospect. Before journeying to the kingdom, I went to Washington to hear the Saudi oil minister, Ali al-Naimi, speak at an energy conference in the mammoth Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center, not far from the White House. Naimi was the star attraction at a gathering of the American petro-political nexus. Samuel Bodman, the U.S. energy secretary, was on the dais next to him. David O'Reilly, chairman and C.E.O. of Chevron, was waiting in the wings. The moderator was an éminence grise of the oil world, James Schlesinger, a former energy secretary, defense secretary and C.I.A. director.

 

''I want to assure you here today that Saudi Arabia's reserves are plentiful, and we stand ready to increase output as the market dictates,'' said Naimi, dressed in a gray business suit and speaking with only a slight Arabic accent. He addressed skeptics who contend that Saudi reservoirs cannot be tapped for larger amounts of oil. ''I am quite bullish on technology as the key to our energy future,'' he said. ''Technological innovation will allow us to find and extract more oil around the world.'' He described the task of increasing output as just ''a question of investment'' in new wells and pipelines, and he noted that consuming nations urgently need to build new refineries to process increased supplies of crude. ''There is absolutely no lack of resources worldwide,'' he repeated.

 

His assurances did not assure. A barrel of oil cost $55 at the time of his speech; less than three months later, the price had jumped by 20 percent. The truth of the matter -- whether the world will really have enough petroleum in the years ahead -- was as well concealed as the millions of barrels of oil I couldn't see at Ras Tanura.

 

For 31 years, Matthew Simmons has prospered as the head of his own firm, Simmons & Company International, which advises energy companies on mergers and acquisitions. A member of the Council on Foreign Relations, a graduate of the Harvard Business School and an unpaid adviser on energy policy to the 2000 presidential campaign of George W. Bush, he would be a card-carrying member of the global oil nomenclatura, if cards were issued for such things. Yet he is one of the principal reasons the oil world is beginning to ask hard questions of itself.

 

Two years ago, Simmons went to Saudi Arabia on a government tour for business executives. The group was presented with the usual dog-and-pony show, but instead of being impressed, as most visitors tend to be, with the size and expertise of the Saudi oil industry, Simmons became perplexed. As he recalls in his somewhat heretical new book, ''Twilight in the Desert: The Coming Saudi Oil Shock and the World Economy,'' a senior manager at Aramco told the visitors that ''fuzzy logic'' would be used to estimate the amount of oil that could be recovered. Simmons had never heard of fuzzy logic. What could be fuzzy about an oil reservoir? He suspected that Aramco, despite its promises of endless supplies, might in fact not know how much oil remained to be recovered.

 

Simmons returned home with an itch to scratch. Saudi Arabia was one of the charter members of OPEC, founded in 1960 in Baghdad to coordinate the policies of oil producers. Like every OPEC country, Saudi Arabia provides only general numbers about its output and reserves; it does not release details about how much oil is extracted from each reservoir and what methods are used to extract that oil, and it does not permit audits by outsiders. The condition of Saudi fields, and those of other OPEC nations, is a closely guarded secret. That's largely because OPEC quotas, which were first imposed in 1983 to limit the output of member countries, were based on overall reserves; the higher an OPEC member's reserves, the higher its quota. It is widely believed that most, if not all, OPEC members exaggerated the sizes of their reserves in order to have the largest possible quota -- and thus the largest possible revenue stream.

 

In the days of excess supply, bankers like Simmons did not know, or care, about the fudging; whether or not reserves were hyped, there was plenty of oil coming out of the ground. Through the 1970's, 80's and 90's, the capacity of OPEC and non-OPEC countries exceeded demand, and that's why OPEC imposed a quota system -- to keep some product off the market (although many OPEC members, seeking as much revenue as possible, quietly sold more oil than they were supposed to). Until quite recently, the only reason to fear a shortage was if a boycott, war or strike were to halt supplies. Few people imagined a time when supply would dry up because of demand alone. But a steady surge in demand in recent years -- led by China's emergence as a voracious importer of oil -- has changed that.

 

This demand-driven scarcity has prompted the emergence of a cottage industry of experts who predict an impending crisis that will dwarf anything seen before. Their point is not that we are running out of oil, per se; although as much as half of the world's recoverable reserves are estimated to have been consumed, about a trillion barrels remain underground. Rather, they are concerned with what is called ''capacity'' -- the amount of oil that can be pumped to the surface on a daily basis. These experts -- still a minority in the oil world -- contend that because of the peculiarities of geology and the limits of modern technology, it will soon be impossible for the world's reservoirs to surrender enough oil to meet daily demand.

 

One of the starkest warnings came in a February report commissioned by the United States Department of Energy's National Energy Technology Laboratory. ''Because oil prices have been relatively high for the past decade, oil companies have conducted extensive exploration over that period, but their results have been disappointing,'' stated the report, assembled by Science Applications International, a research company that works on security and energy issues. ''If recent trends hold, there is little reason to expect that exploration success will dramatically improve in the future. . . . The image is one of a world moving from a long period in which reserves additions were much greater than consumption to an era in which annual additions are falling increasingly short of annual consumption. This is but one of a number of trends that suggest the world is fast approaching the inevitable peaking of conventional world oil production.''

 

The reference to ''peaking'' is not a haphazard word choice -- ''peaking'' is a term used in oil geology to define the critical point at which reservoirs can no longer produce increasing amounts of oil. (This tends to happen when reservoirs are about half-empty.) ''Peak oil'' is the point at which maximum production is reached; afterward, no matter how many wells are drilled in a country, production begins to decline. Saudi Arabia and other OPEC members may have enough oil to last for generations, but that is no longer the issue. The eventual and painful shift to different sources of energy -- the start of the post-oil age -- does not begin when the last drop of oil is sucked from under the Arabian desert. It begins when producers are unable to continue increasing their output to meet rising demand. Crunch time comes long before the last drop.

 

''The world has never faced a problem like this,'' the report for the Energy Department concluded. ''Without massive mitigation more than a decade before the fact, the problem will be pervasive and will not be temporary. Previous energy transitions (wood to coal and coal to oil) were gradual and evolutionary; oil peaking will be abrupt and revolutionary.''

 

Most experts do not share Simmons's concerns about the imminence of peak oil. One of the industry's most prominent consultants, Daniel Yergin, author of a Pulitzer Prize-winning book about petroleum, dismisses the doomsday visions. ''This is not the first time that the world has 'run out of oil,''' he wrote in a recent Washington Post opinion essay. ''It's more like the fifth. Cycles of shortage and surplus characterize the entire history of the oil industry.'' Yergin says that a number of oil projects that are under construction will increase the supply by 20 percent in five years and that technological advances will increase the amount of oil that can be recovered from existing reservoirs. (Typically, with today's technology, only about 40 percent of a reservoir's oil can be pumped to the surface.)

 

Yergin's bullish view has something in common with the views of the pessimists -- it rests on unknowns. Will the new projects that are under way yield as much oil as their financial backers hope? Will new technologies increase recovery rates as much as he expects? These questions are next to impossible to answer because coaxing oil out of the ground is an extraordinarily complex undertaking. The popular notion of reservoirs as underground lakes, from which wells extract oil like straws sucking a milkshake from a glass, is incorrect. Oil exists in drops between and inside porous rocks. A new reservoir may contain sufficient pressure to make these drops of oil flow to the surface in a gusher, but after a while -- usually within a few years and often sooner than that -- natural pressure lets up and is no longer sufficient to push oil to the surface. At that point, ''secondary'' recovery efforts are begun, like pumping water or gas into the reservoirs to increase the pressure.

 

This process is unpredictable; reservoirs are extremely temperamental. If too much oil is extracted too quickly or if the wrong types or amounts of secondary efforts are employed, the amount of oil that can be recovered from a field can be greatly reduced; this is known in the oil world as ''damaging a reservoir.'' A widely cited example is Oman: in 2001, its daily production reached more than 960,000 barrels, but then suddenly declined, despite the use of advanced technologies. Today, Oman produces 785,000 barrels of oil a day. Herman Franssen, a consultant who worked in Oman for a decade, sees that country's experience as a possible lesson in the limits of technology for other producers that try to increase or maintain high levels of output. ''They reached a million barrels a day, and then a few years later production collapsed,'' Franssen said in a phone interview. ''They used all these new technologies, but they haven't been able to stop the decline yet.''

  

The vague production and reserve data that gets published does not begin to tell the whole story of an oil field's health, production potential or even its size. For a clear-as-possible picture of a country's oil situation, you need to know what is happening in each field -- how many wells it has, how much oil each well is producing, what recovery methods are being used and how long they've been used and the trend line since the field went into production. Data of that sort are typically not released by state-owned companies like Saudi Aramco.

 

As Matthew Simmons searched for clues to the truth of the Saudi situation, he immersed himself in the minutiae of oil geology. He realized that data about Saudi fields might be found in the files of the Society of Petroleum Engineers. Oil engineers, like most professional groups, have regular conferences at which they discuss papers that delve into the work they do. The papers, which focus on particular wells that highlight a problem or a solution to a problem, are presented and debated at the conferences and published by the S.P.E. -- and then forgotten.

 

Before Simmons poked around, no one had taken the time to pull together the S.P.E. papers that involved Saudi oil fields and review them en masse. Simmons found more than 200 such papers and studied them carefully. Although the papers cover only a portion of the kingdom's wells and date back, in some cases, several decades, they constitute perhaps the best public data about the condition and prospects of Saudi reservoirs.

 

Ghawar is the treasure of the Saudi treasure chest. It is the largest oil field in the world and has produced, in the past 50 years, about 55 billion barrels of oil, which amounts to more than half of Saudi production in that period. The field currently produces more than five million barrels a day, which is about half of the kingdom's output. If Ghawar is facing problems, then so is Saudi Arabia and, indeed, the entire world.

 

Simmons found that the Saudis are using increasingly large amounts of water to force oil out of Ghawar. Most of the wells are concentrated in the northern portion of the 174-mile-long field. That might seem like good news -- when the north runs low, the Saudis need only to drill wells in the south. But in fact it is bad news, Simmons concluded, because the southern portions of Ghawar are geologically more difficult to draw oil from. ''Someday (and perhaps that day will be soon), the remarkably high well flow rates at Ghawar's northern end will fade, as reservoir pressures finally plummet,'' Simmons writes in his book. ''Then, Saudi Arabian oil output will clearly have peaked. The death of this great king'' -- meaning Ghawar -- ''leaves no field of vaguely comparable stature in the line of succession. Twilight at Ghawar is fast approaching.'' He goes on: ''The geological phenomena and natural driving forces that created the Saudi oil miracle are conspiring now in normal and predictable ways to bring it to its conclusion, in a time frame potentially far shorter than officialdom would have us believe.'' Simmons concludes, ''Saudi Arabia clearly seems to be nearing or at its peak output and cannot materially grow its oil production.''

  

Saudi officials belittle Simmons's work. Nansen Saleri, a senior Aramco official, has described Simmons as a banker ''trying to come across as a scientist.'' In a speech last year, Saleri wryly said, ''I can read 200 papers on neurology, but you wouldn't want me to operate on your relatives.'' I caught up with Simmons in June, during a trip he made to Manhattan to talk with a group of oil-shipping executives. The impression he gives is of an enthusiastic inventor sharing a discovery that took him by surprise. He has a certain wide-eyed wonder in his regard, as if a bit of mystery can be found in everything that catches his eye. And he has a rumpled aspect -- thinning hair slightly askew, shirt sleeves a fraction too long. Though he delivers a bracing message, his discourse can wander. He is a successful businessman, and it is clear that he did not achieve his position by being a man of impeccable convention. He certainly has not lost sight of the rule that people who shout ''the end is nigh'' do not tend to be favorably reviewed by historians, let alone by their peers. He notes in his book that way back in 1979, The New York Times published an investigative story by Seymour Hersh under the headline ''Saudi Oil Capacity Questioned.'' He knows that in past decades the Cassandras failed to foresee new technologies, like deep-water and horizontal drilling, that provided new sources of oil and raised the amount of oil that can be recovered from reservoirs.

 

But Simmons says that there are only so many rabbits technology can pull out of its petro-hat. He impishly notes that if the Saudis really wanted to, they could easily prove him wrong. ''If they want to satisfy people, they should issue field-by-field production reports and reserve data and have it audited,'' he told me. ''It would then take anybody less than a week to say, 'Gosh, Matt is totally wrong,' or 'Matt actually might be too optimistic.'''

 

Simmons has a lot riding on his campaign -- not only his name but also his business, which would not be rewarded if he is proved to be a fool. What, I asked, if the data show that the Saudis will be able to sustain production of not only 12.5 million barrels a day -- their target for 2009 -- but 15 million barrels, which global demand is expected to require of them in the not-too-distant future? ''The odds of them sustaining 12 million barrels a day is very low,'' Simmons replied. ''The odds of them getting to 15 million for 50 years -- there's a better chance of me having Bill Gates's net worth, and I wouldn't bet a dime on that forecast.''

 

The gathering of executives took place in a restaurant at Chelsea Piers; about 35 men sat around a set of tables as the host introduced Simmons. He rambled a bit but hit his talking points, and the executives listened raptly; at one point, the man on my right broke into a soft whistle, of the sort that means ''Holy cow.''

 

Simmons didn't let up. ''We're going to look back at history and say $55 a barrel was cheap,'' he said, recalling a TV interview in which he predicted that a barrel might hit triple digits.

 

He said that the anchor scoffed, in disbelief, ''A hundred dollars?''

 

Simmons replied, ''I wasn't talking about low triple digits.''

 

The onset of triple-digit prices might seem a blessing for the Saudis -- they would receive greater amounts of money for their increasingly scarce oil. But one popular misunderstanding about the Saudis -- and about OPEC in general -- is that high prices, no matter how high, are to their benefit.

 

Although oil costing more than $60 a barrel hasn't caused a global recession, that could still happen: it can take a while for high prices to have their ruinous impact. And the higher above $60 that prices rise, the more likely a recession will become. High oil prices are inflationary; they raise the cost of virtually everything -- from gasoline to jet fuel to plastics and fertilizers -- and that means people buy less and travel less, which means a drop-off in economic activity. So after a brief windfall for producers, oil prices would slide as recession sets in and once-voracious economies slow down, using less oil. Prices have collapsed before, and not so long ago: in 1998, oil fell to $10 a barrel after an untimely increase in OPEC production and a reduction in demand from Asia, which was suffering through a financial crash. Saudi Arabia and the other members of OPEC entered crisis mode back then; adjusted for inflation, oil was at its lowest price since the cartel's creation, threatening to feed unrest among the ranks of jobless citizens in OPEC states.

 

''The Saudis are very happy with oil at $55 per barrel, but they're also nervous,'' a Western diplomat in Riyadh told me in May, referring to the price that prevailed then. (Like all the diplomats I spoke to, he insisted on speaking anonymously because of the sensitivities of relations with Saudi Arabia.) ''They don't know where this magic line has moved to. Is it now $65? Is it $75? Is it $80? They don't want to find out, because if you did have oil move that far north . . . the chain reaction can come back to a price collapse again.''

 

High prices can have another unfortunate effect for producers. When crude costs $10 a barrel or even $30 a barrel, alternative fuels are prohibitively expensive. For example, Canada has vast amounts of tar sands that can be rendered into heavy oil, but the cost of doing so is quite high. Yet those tar sands and other alternatives, like bioethanol, hydrogen fuel cells and liquid fuel from natural gas or coal, become economically viable as the going rate for a barrel rises past, say, $40 or more, especially if consuming governments choose to offer their own incentives or subsidies. So even if high prices don't cause a recession, the Saudis risk losing market share to rivals into whose nonfundamentalist hands Americans would much prefer to channel their energy dollars. A concerted push for greater energy conservation in the United States, which consumes one-quarter of the world's oil (mostly to fuel our cars, as gasoline), would hurt producing nations, too. Basically, any significant reduction in the demand for oil would be ruinous for OPEC members, who have little to offer the world but oil; if a substitute can be found, their future is bleak. Another Western diplomat explained the problem facing the Saudis: ''You want to have the price as high as possible without sending the consuming nations into a recession and at the same time not have the price so high that it encourages alternative technologies.''

 

From the American standpoint, one argument in favor of conservation and a switch to alternative fuels is that by limiting oil imports, the United States and its Western allies would reduce their dependence on a potentially unstable region. (In fact, in an effort to offset the risks of relying on the Saudis, America's top oil suppliers are Canada and Mexico.) In addition, sending less money to Saudi Arabia would mean less money in the hands of a regime that has spent the past few decades doling out huge amounts of its oil revenue to mosques, madrassas and other institutions that have fanned the fires of Islamic radicalism. The oil money has been dispensed not just by the Saudi royal family but by private individuals who benefited from the oil boom -- like Osama bin Laden, whose ample funds, probably eroded now, came from his father, a construction magnate. Without its oil windfall, Saudi Arabia would have had a hard time financing radical Islamists across the globe.

 

For the Saudis, the political ramifications of reduced demand for its oil would not be negligible. The royal family has amassed vast personal wealth from the country's oil revenues. If, suddenly, Saudis became aware that the royal family had also failed to protect the value of the country's treasured resource, the response could be severe. The mere admission that Saudi reserves are not as impressively inexhaustible as the royal family has claimed could lead to hard questions about why the country, and the world, had been misled. With the death earlier this month of the long-ailing King Fahd, the royal family is undergoing another period of scrutiny; the new king, Abdullah, is in his 80's, and the crown prince, his half-brother Sultan, is in his 70's, so the issue of generational change remains to be settled. As long as the country is swimming in petro-dollars -- even as it is paying off debt accrued during its lean years -- everyone is relatively happy, but that can change. One diplomat I spoke to recalled a comment from Sheik Ahmed Zaki Yamani, the larger-than-life Saudi oil minister during the 1970's: ''The Stone Age didn't end for lack of stone, and the oil age will end long before the world runs out of oil.''

  

Until now, the Saudis had an excess of production capacity that allowed them, when necessary, to flood the market to drive prices down. They did that in 1990, when the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait eliminated not only Kuwait's supply of oil but also Iraq's. The Saudis functioned, as they always had, as the central bank of oil, releasing supply to the market when it was needed and withdrawing supply to keep prices from going lower than the cartel would have liked. In other words, they controlled not only the price of oil but their own destiny as well.

 

''That is what the world has called on them to do before -- turn on the taps to produce more and get prices down,'' a senior Western diplomat in Riyadh told me recently. ''Decreasing prices used to keep out alternative fuels. I don't see how they're able to do that anymore. This is a huge change, and it is a big step in the move to whatever is coming next. That's what's really happening.''

 

Without the ability to flood the markets with oil, the Saudis are resorting to flooding the market with promises; it is a sort of petro-jawboning. That's why Ali al-Naimi, the oil minister, told his Washington audience that Saudi Arabia has embarked on a crash program to raise its capacity to 12.5 million barrels a day by 2009 and even higher in the years after that. Naimi is not unlike a factory manager who needs to promise the moon to his valuable clients, for fear of losing or alarming them. He has no choice. The moment he says anything bracing, the touchy energy markets will probably panic, pushing prices even higher and thereby hastening the onset of recession, a switch to alternative fuels or new conservation efforts -- or all three. Just a few words of honest caution could move the markets; Naimi's speeches are followed nearly as closely in the financial world as those of Alan Greenspan.

 

I journeyed to Saudi Arabia to interview Naimi and other senior officials, to get as far beyond their prepared remarks as might be possible. Although I was allowed to see Ras Tanura, my interview requests were denied. I was invited to visit Aramco's oil museum in Dhahran, but that is something a Saudi schoolchild can do on a field trip. It was a ''show but don't tell'' policy. I was able to speak about production issues only with Ibrahim al-Muhanna, the oil ministry spokesman, who reluctantly met me over coffee in the lobby of my hotel in Riyadh. He defended Saudi Arabia's refusal to share more data, noting that the Saudis are no different from most oil producers.

 

''They will not tell you,'' he said. ''Nobody will. And that is not going to change.'' Referring to the fact that Saudi Arabia is often called the central bank of oil, he added: ''If an outsider goes to the Fed and asks, 'How much money do you have?' they will tell you. If you say, 'Can I come and count it?' they will not let you. This applies to oil companies and oil countries.'' I mentioned to Muhanna that many people think his government's ''trust us'' stance is not convincing in light of the cheating that has gone on within OPEC and in the industry as a whole; even Royal Dutch/Shell, a publicly listed oil company that undergoes regular audits, has admitted that it overstated its 2002 reserves by 23 percent.

 

''There is no reason for any country or company to lie,'' Muhanna replied. ''There is a lot of oil around.'' I didn't need to ask about Simmons and his peak-oil theory; when I met Muhanna at the conference in Washington, he nearly broke off our conversation at the mention of Simmons's name. ''He does not know anything,'' Muhanna said. ''The only thing he has is a big mouth. We should not pay attention to him. Either you believe us or you don't.''

 

So whom to believe? Before leaving New York for Saudi Arabia, I was advised by several oil experts to try to interview Sadad al-Husseini, who retired last year after serving as Aramco's top executive for exploration and production. I faxed him in Dhahran and received a surprisingly quick reply; he agreed to meet me. A week later, after I arrived in Riyadh, Husseini e-mailed me, asking when I would come to Dhahran; in a follow-up phone call, he offered to pick me up at the airport. He was, it seemed, eager to talk.

 

It can be argued that in a nation devoted to oil, Husseini knows more about it than anyone else. Born in Syria, Husseini was raised in Saudi Arabia, where his father was a government official whose family took on Saudi citizenship. Husseini earned a Ph.D. in geological sciences from Brown University in 1973 and went to work in Aramco's exploration department, eventually rising to the highest position. Until his retirement last year -- said to have been caused by a top-level dispute, the nature of which is the source of many rumors -- Husseini was a member of the company's board and its management committee. He is one of the most respected and accomplished oilmen in the world.

 

After meeting me at the cavernous airport that serves Dhahran, he drove me in his luxury sedan to the villa that houses his private office. As we entered, he pointed to an armoire that displayed a dozen or so vials of black liquid. ''These are samples from oil fields I discovered,'' he explained. Upstairs, there were even more vials, and he would have possessed more than that except, as he said, laughing, ''I didn't start collecting early enough.''

 

We spoke for several hours. The message he delivered was clear: the world is heading for an oil shortage. His warning is quite different from the calming speeches that Naimi and other Saudis, along with senior American officials, deliver on an almost daily basis. Husseini explained that the need to produce more oil is coming from two directions. Most obviously, demand is rising; in recent years, global demand has increased by two million barrels a day. (Current daily consumption, remember, is about 84 million barrels a day.) Less obviously, oil producers deplete their reserves every time they pump out a barrel of oil. This means that merely to maintain their reserve base, they have to replace the oil they extract from declining fields. It's the geological equivalent of running to stay in place. Husseini acknowledged that new fields are coming online, like offshore West Africa and the Caspian basin, but he said that their output isn't big enough to offset this growing need.

 

''You look at the globe and ask, 'Where are the big increments?' and there's hardly anything but Saudi Arabia,'' he said. ''The kingdom and Ghawar field are not the problem. That misses the whole point. The problem is that you go from 79 million barrels a day in 2002 to 82.5 in 2003 to 84.5 in 2004. You're leaping by two million to three million a year, and if you have to cover declines, that's another four to five million.'' In other words, if demand and depletion patterns continue, every year the world will need to open enough fields or wells to pump an additional six to eight million barrels a day -- at least two million new barrels a day to meet the rising demand and at least four million to compensate for the declining production of existing fields. ''That's like a whole new Saudi Arabia every couple of years,'' Husseini said. ''It can't be done indefinitely. It's not sustainable.''

 

Husseini speaks patiently, like a teacher who hopes someone is listening. He is in the enviable position of knowing what he talks about while having the freedom to speak openly about it. He did not disclose precise information about Saudi reserves or production -- which remain the equivalent of state secrets -- but he felt free to speak in generalities that were forthright, even when they conflicted with the reassuring statements of current Aramco officials. When I asked why he was willing to be so frank, he said it was because he sees a shortage ahead and wants to do what he can to avert it. I assumed that he would not be particularly distressed if his rivals in the Saudi oil establishment were embarrassed by his frankness.

 

Although Matthew Simmons says it is unlikely that the Saudis will be able to produce 12.5 million barrels a day or sustain output at that level for a significant period of time, Husseini says the target is realistic; he says that Simmons is wrong to state that Saudi Arabia has reached its peak. But 12.5 million is just an interim marker, as far as consuming nations are concerned, on the way to 15 million barrels a day and beyond -- and that is the point at which Husseini says problems will arise.

 

At the conference in Washington in May, James Schlesinger, the moderator, conducted a question-and-answer session with Naimi at the conclusion of the minister's speech. One of the first questions involved peak oil: might it be true that Saudi Arabia, which has relied on the same reservoirs, and especially Ghawar, for more than five decades, is nearing the geological limit of its output?

 

Naimi wouldn't hear of it.

 

''I can assure you that we haven't peaked,'' he responded. ''If we peaked, we would not be going to 12.5 and we would not be visualizing a 15-million-barrel-per-day production capacity. . . . We can maintain 12.5 or 15 million for the next 30 to 50 years.''

 

Experts like Husseini are very concerned by the prospect of trying to produce 15 million barrels a day. Even if production can be ramped up that high, geology may not be forgiving. Fields that are overproduced can drop off, in terms of output, quite sharply and suddenly, leaving behind large amounts of oil that cannot be coaxed out with existing technology. This is called trapped oil, because the rocks or sediment around it prevent it from escaping to the surface. Unless new technologies are developed, that oil will never be extracted. In other words, the haste to recover oil can lead to less oil being recovered.

 

''You could go to 15, but that's when the questions of depletion rate, reservoir management and damaging the fields come into play,'' says Nawaf Obaid, a Saudi oil and security analyst who is regarded as being exceptionally well connected to key Saudi leaders. ''There is an understanding across the board within the kingdom, in the highest spheres, that if you're going to 15, you'll hit 15, but there will be considerable risks . . . of a steep decline curve that Aramco will not be able to do anything about.''

 

Even if the Saudis are willing to risk damaging their fields, or even if the risk is overstated, Husseini points out a practical problem. To produce and sustain 15 million barrels a day, Saudi Arabia will have to drill a lot more wells and build a lot more pipelines and processing facilities. Currently, the global oil industry suffers a deficit of qualified engineers to oversee such projects and the equipment and the raw materials -- for example, rigs and steel -- to build them. These things cannot be wished from thin air or developed quickly enough to meet the demand.

 

''If we had two dozen Texas A&M's producing a thousand new engineers a year and the industrial infrastructure in the kingdom, with the drilling rigs and power plants, we would have a better chance, but you cannot put that into place overnight,'' Husseini said. ''Capacity is not just a function of reserves. It is a function of reserves plus know-how plus a commercial economic system that is designed to increase the resource exploitation. For example, in the U.S. you have infrastructure -- there must be tens of thousands of miles of pipelines. If we, in Saudi Arabia, evolve to that level of commercial maturity, we could probably produce a heck of a lot more oil. But to get there is a very tedious, slow process.''

 

He worries that the rising global demand for oil will lead to the petroleum equivalent of running an engine at ever-increasing speeds without stopping to cool it down or change the oil. Husseini does not want to see the fragile and irreplaceable reservoirs of the Middle East become damaged through wanton overproduction.

 

''If you are ramping up production so fast and jump from high to higher to highest, and you're not having enough time to do what needs to be done, to understand what needs to be done, then you can damage reservoirs,'' he said. ''Systematic development is not just a matter of money. It's a matter of reservoir dynamics, understanding what's there, analyzing and understanding information. That's where people come in, experience comes in. These are not universally available resources.''

 

The most worrisome part of the crisis ahead revolves around a set of statistics from the Energy Information Administration, which is part of the U.S. Department of Energy. The E.I.A. forecast in 2004 that by 2020 Saudi Arabia would produce 18.2 million barrels of oil a day, and that by 2025 it would produce 22.5 million barrels a day. Those estimates were unusual, though. They were not based on secret information about Saudi capacity, but on the projected needs of energy consumers. The figures simply assumed that Saudi Arabia would be able to produce whatever the United States needed it to produce. Just last month, the E.I.A. suddenly revised those figures downward -- not because of startling new information about world demand or Saudi supply but because the figures had given so much ammunition to critics. Husseini, for example, described the 2004 forecast as unrealistic.

 

''That's not how you would manage a national, let alone an international, economy,'' he explained. ''That's the part that is scary. You draw some assumptions and then say, 'O.K., based on these assumptions, let's go forward and consume like hell and burn like hell.''' When I asked whether the kingdom could produce 20 million barrels a day -- about twice what it is producing today from fields that may be past their prime -- Husseini paused for a second or two. It wasn't clear if he was taking a moment to figure out the answer or if he needed a moment to decide if he should utter it. He finally replied with a single word: No.

 

''It's becoming unrealistic,'' he said. ''The expectations are beyond what is achievable. This is a global problem . . . that is not going to be solved by tinkering with the Saudi industry.''

  

It would be unfair to blame the Saudis alone for failing to warn of whatever shortages or catastrophes might lie ahead.

 

In the political and corporate realms of the oil world, there are few incentives to be forthright. Executives of major oil companies have been reluctant to raise alarms; the mere mention of scarce supplies could alienate the governments that hand out lucrative exploration contracts and also send a message to investors that oil companies, though wildly profitable at the moment, have a Malthusian long-term future. Fortunately, that attitude seems to be beginning to change. Chevron's ''easy oil is over'' advertising campaign is an indication that even the boosters of an oil-drenched future are not as bullish as they once were.

 

Politicians remain in the dark. During the 2004 presidential campaign, which occurred as gas prices were rising to record levels, the debate on energy policy was all but nonexistent. The Bush campaign produced an advertisement that concluded: ''Some people have wacky ideas. Like taxing gasoline more so people drive less. That's John Kerry.'' Although many environmentalists would have been delighted if Kerry had proposed that during the campaign, in fact the ad was referring to a 50-cents-a-gallon tax that Kerry supported 11 years ago as part of a package of measures to reduce the deficit. (The gas tax never made it to a vote in the Senate.) Kerry made no mention of taxing gasoline during the campaign; his proposal for doing something about high gas prices was to pressure OPEC to increase supplies.

 

Husseini, for one, doesn't buy that approach. ''Everybody is looking at the producers to pull the chestnuts out of the fire, as if it's our job to fix everybody's problems,'' he told me. ''It's not our problem to tell a democratically elected government that you have to do something about your runaway consumers. If your government can't do the job, you can't expect other governments to do it for them.'' Back in the 70's, President Carter called for the moral equivalent of war to reduce our dependence on foreign oil; he was not re-elected. Since then, few politicians have spoken of an energy crisis or suggested that major policy changes are necessary to avert one. The energy bill signed earlier this month by President Bush did not even raise fuel-efficiency standards for passenger cars. When a crisis comes -- whether in a year or 2 or 10 -- it will be all the more painful because we will have done little or nothing to prepare for it.

 

Peter Maass is a contributing writer. He is writing a book about oil.

 

Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company Home Privacy Policy Search Corrections XML Help Contact Us Work for Us Back to Top

The greatest LEGO Space theme that never was, Seatron was conceived right after Futuron and would have given us our first (and more creative and interesting) LEGO aliens most of a decade before the UFO theme released.

 

All we have is some intriguing preliminary shots of a fascinating theme with a white, black and trans red "surface" palate and an Aquanauts-like yellow, black and trans blue "underwater" palate.

 

Anyway, I think it would have been a great theme, and it's well worth a MOC or several. And it being FebRovery let's make a rover.

 

Probably the Seatron faction minifigures would have been more Futuron-like than CS-like, but my Futuron minifig supplies are practically nonexistent.

 

I've done some Seatron-like MOCs before, connected with the Ice Planet faction as explorers of a subsurface ocean within Planet Krysto (a subtheme I call "Ice Planet: Aquarius Project"), but this is my first actual Seatron MOC.

Some photos of the desert around Kanab, Utah. I really enjoy exploring around Kanab with all of the sandstone outcrops and canyons everywhere. However, it can be a bit treacherous because almost all of the roads are on loose sand so traction is almost nonexistent. I’ve had to pull folks out and have come close to needing that service as well. So, if you go out here, come prepared. . I shot this with an Olympus 35 LC rangefinder which has a fixed 42mm f1.7 Zuiko lens. The film I developed in Rodinal @ 1:50

Bleu, Teresa, Lea and Valerie Jane

 

[it's the morning of the Model Lux photo-shoot and Teresa is the last to arrive for hair and makeup]

 

L. --- Cuttin' it kind of close there aren't you?

 

T. --- I overslept but I'm here on time so...

 

B. --- Barely! Everybody knows, if you ain't on time... you late! ...Except if it's a party.

 

L. --- [she hollers] I know that's right! Amen! Amen! Amen!

 

V. --- You guys really are a lively duo. They don't make stylist like the two of you anymore do they?

 

B. --- Honey, we are vintage!

 

L. --- Often imitated... Never quite duplicated!

 

V. --- [she gives a halfhearted smile] Switching gears... So Teresa... How have things around F2K been since Sassy's firing? ...Forgive me, her departure.

 

T. --- Um...good I guess.

 

V. --- You guess?... Tell me, what exactly is there to guess? Dissension amongst the talent.

 

T. --- What? No, nothing like that. Things are good.

 

V. --- Oh, I see. [she winks] Good... but not great!

 

T. --- No, that's not what I meant. Things are great.

 

V. --- Is someone making you say this? Because a second ago things were just good, now they're great. Has Eve taken away your freedom of speech? Now that Sassy's gone has life at F2K become unbearable under the tyranny of the dictating E...V...E?

 

T. --- What? [she says slightly out of breath] Nothing like that at all.

 

L. --- [she rolls her eyes at Valerie] Here we go again.

 

T. --- What?

 

B. --- V.J. over there has been trying to make somebody crack and spill the nonexistent tea all morning.

 

V. --- Excuse me. I'm a journalist. It's my civic duty to uncover the truth for the masses.

 

L. --- Be real! You're an entertainment reporter digging around for some dirt.

 

V. --- No! I am just trying to report the truth and all this defensiveness makes it seem as if there's some truth to be uncovered around here.

 

B. --- You know, when the camera's aren't rolling you sure are a fishy girl... and I don't mean that in a good way!

 

T. --- [fed up with Valerie's demeanor she asks...] You want the truth?

 

V. --- Yes! That's all I want.

 

T. --- At F2K we're not always perfect. Now that Sassy's gone we're going through some changes. Eve is new and we're all still getting to know her but she's good at her job. Eve taking over did shock everyone at first but this is a business and things happen. I wish Sassy only good things and I know she's going to end up on top. So... [she gets up from her chair having finished with hair and makeup and says...] You wanted the truth? ...There it is. Now, I have to be on set. [she leaves the dressing room]

 

L. --- Ooh...

 

B. --- V.J., pick up your face, girl!

 

_______

 

to be continued...

 

_____

 

Part of F2K, Vol. 10

This sparrow took a slightly different approach to winning (nonexistent) seeds from my pocket. This one did a balance beam act for the ages. Too bad, birdie! I have no seeds for you! Energy: wasted!

 

North Park

"....everyone here sees humanity for what it is and what it'll do. A monstrous hive-mind starving for senseless, meaningless carnage. For the most idiotic reasons as well! We're flying robots over villages to rain down hellfire on devolved pedophilic zealots for nothing more than oil wars. Profits! Money truly is the root of all evil. Or we lash out at eachother for the color's we're born with, the way we speak, the worthless political party we align ourselves with, or the moronic, nonexistent idols we follow. We've spilled oceans of blood for these worthless fabrications. I can't even begin to fathom why you've dulled your blade countless times against flesh. Unable to truly cope with loss? Mental instability? Or you just enjoy the screams. They all make you weak the same..."

Deep in the Archives, Tehutti and Mavrah have been sent to investigate an infestation of Fikou. Tehutti is keeping an eye out for the bugs while Mavrah puzzles over why some idiot put a rodent, bug, and turtle right next to each other. Neither notices the monster perfectly at home in the dark... Thankfully, it is only a level 1 Rahkshi, so its powers are practically nonexistent, but it still has formidable strength and sharp claws. Will the experienced Rahi wranglers prevail? Or will the son of Makuta claim another victim?

Another sunset shot of Loch Sheil. This time sunset was actually off to the right and (again) hidden by clouds/nonexistent. I really like the texture of the clouds though.

 

Also I was never really happy with my previous shots, but am with this one.

 

Cast from stacking ND filters left because a) I'm not sure how to remove with out killing any natural sunset/blue hour colouring b) I like it.

 

Finally; since last week was spent packing/dealing with auditors, this is standing in as my 14 in the 52 week set.

Better bigger. Done in Photoshop CS3.

Just a few seconds ago, Hank was slowly dying, until he heard something that knocked him out. Everything was black, hollow, like a cave. There the paneling looked metallic, yet, felt like cement. And then he heard something.

 

-/Hello Hank/- he heard the same voice from before.

 

“Who’s there?!?” he yelled out.

 

-/We are./- A hologram of what appeared to be a skull appeared before him.

 

“Wha-What the hell are you?” He asks, frozen in fear of what’s in front of him.

 

-/Consider us an ally for your cause. Although, we wish we could’ve met through…… different circumstances. However it is how you humans say “Better late than never.”/- the voice responded

 

“Who are you?” he asked nervously.

 

-/Someone who is a fan of your work. Someone who saved you from your previous condition./-

 

“C-Condition?”

 

-/Observe/- it said as multiple screens were appearing around him, showing the news reports him being missing, Lex being arrested, breaking out, and being defeated by Superman.

 

“H-How long have I been gone?”

 

-/Long enough to lose your goal to that kryptonian. He took away the one thing that kept you alive…. Vengeance. You humans normally have that desire to fuel you. But he took it away./- He doesn’t respond, just looking to the nonexistent ground beneath him. Tears running down his cheeks.

 

-/Thankfully, We can help you get that vengeance from that kryptonian./- It interjects. He looks up and stands before asking.

 

“I must ask, why do you refer to yourself as we?” Suddenly, he hears a humming before turning around to see a red glow coming from behind him. Then he sees two more, they get closer to reveal themselves as robots that had an uncanny valley of looking human, yet non-human.

 

-/How about it Hank?/- a light appears, shining on what seems to be the remains of his body, surrounded by a liquid metal of sorts.

  

“Wha-what is it?” He stuttered out.

 

-/What we could save, but now, we can help you acheive your goal, to kill superman./-

 

-/Will you claim your vengeance? Will you become our avatar and claim your second life?/- He stares at it before responding.

 

“Y-Yes, but never call me Hank again. Hank died years ago, now Cyborg Superman lives.” The liquid metal then forms the superman symbol on his chest.

Unfortunately I have been unable to get out lately with my camera to take new pictures. So, I decided to spend some time, during the heat of the Texas summer, and edit some of the pictures from my Alaskan cruise vacation last summer. At the time, my knowledge of photography and editing was nonexistent. Many of the pictures taken from the ship were quite hazy and I didn't have a clue about how to deal with that at the time or in post. I just put the pictures on here straight from the camera to share with family and friends. While my editing skills still aren't all that great, I have learned enough to better bring out the beauty in the pictures (hopefully).

 

This day in Glacier Bay was cold and gloomy. There were low clouds and fog that added a dramatic element and a mysterious feel to the scene...which I loved! This is the Grand Pacific Glacier at the mouth of Tarr Inlet. The beauty of this place is breathtaking. I will be posting more from here as I get to them.

I shot this scene previously sometime in the past. Early this spring the gate was locked so I couldn't get to the location I wanted.

About two weeks ago I noticed the gate was open. No clouds that day. Finally, today I made it, but the snow was almost nonexistent

  

6474 copy_pe

Huntington SB, Least Tern Preserve

  

No Least Terns were disturbed when I was taking this photo. I maintained a great distance (this photo is heavily cropped) and watched for signs of stress which were nonexistent. As someone who is a Least Tern nest monitor it would be very inappropriate if I didn't take these precautionary steps!

"A photograph that has not been shared or at least printed is almost a nonexistent photograph, is almost an untaken picture."

 

I read this quote on Twitter two weeks ago and it just blew my mind !

What's the point of taking a new photo a day if I have tons of "untaken photographs" on my drives ??

So ... I haven't take a new photograph during the past two weeks. It's very confusing after 5 years, 8 months and about 10 days of daily shooting and I still don't know how I feel about it...

#CantWait #Celebrate #Celebration #ChristmasDay #ChristmasEve #ChristmasGifts #ChristmasMiracle

#ChristmasNYC #ChristmasParty #ChristmasSnow #ChristmasSpirit #ChristmasTime

#ChristmasTradition #ChristmasTree #December #Decorate #Decorating

#Decoration #Excited #Family #FavoriteGiftFriday #FelizNavidad #Festive #Gift #Gifts

#Hannukah #HappyChristmas #HappyHolidays #HoHoHo #Holiday #Holidays #itsChristmas

#Kwanzaa #MerryChristmas #MerryXmas #Miracle #MISTLETOE #Navidad #Noel #Reindeer

#SeasonsGreetings #SaintNick #Santa #SantaClause #SilverBells #Snow

#SnowBallSunday #Snowflakes #Snowman #StNick #WhiteChristmas #WinterWonderland

#WishList #WrappingPaper #Xmas #Presents #StockingStuffer #CelebrateChrist #Cookies

#Christ #ChristChild #ChristsBirth #HappyBirthdayJesus #HappyNewYear #NewYear #NewYears

 

La synagogue «arrière», est un bâtiment de la fin du 16ème siècle qui a été un lieu de culte pendant environ 350 ans. Malgré la disparition de la communauté juive elle a été préservée. Elle a été restauré dans les années 1990, et transformée en une salle de concert et un musée. Sur la galerie des femmes à l'étage, il y a une exposition permanente sur la vie juive à Trebic et une grande maquette du quartier juif.

 

Cette maquette représente le quartier juif tel qu'il était au 19e ou au début du 20e siècle. Elle donne un excellent aperçu de l'ensemble du quartier, coincé entre la rivière et la pente de la colline derrière elle. Le plan au sol a la forme d'une échelle (tordue). Il y a les deux rues longitudinales parallèles à la rivière, et plusieurs petits passages entre elles. A chaque extrémité, se trouve une synagogue. Il y a aussi une tannerie qui est devenue par la suite une usine.

 

Au l'emplacement de l'actuel grand pont routier il y avait un petit pont de bois moins haut qui débouchait à côté de la maison aux trois colonnes. Sinon, rien n'a vraiment changé. Tout est étroit, tout l'espace a dû être utilisée. Sur ​​la rive de la rivière, il y a un peu de place pour des petits jardins. La protection contre les inondations est inexistante.

 

Traduit de:

www.virtualtourist.com/travel/Europe/Czech_Republic/Vysoc...

_________________________________

 

Zadní synagoga, the 'rear' synagogue, is a building from the late 16th century that served for religious functions for about 350 years. After the end of the Jewish community it stood empty but unharmed until it was restored in the 1990s, and turned into a concert hall and museum. There are no services held in it any more. On the women's gallery upstairs there is a permanent exhibition about Jewish life in Trebic, including a large model of the Jewish quarter.

 

This model shows the Jewish quarter as it was in the 19th or early 20th century. It gives an excellent overview of the whole quarter, squeezed in between the river and the slope of the hill behind it. The ground plan has the shape of a (crooked) ladder. There are the two longitutinal streets parallel to the river, and several small passages in between. At each end there is a synagogue. At the far end there is the tannery which then became a factory.

Instead of the present big road bridge there was a smaller and lower wooden bridge which ended next to the house with the three columns. Otherwise, not much has changed.

Everything is narrow, all space had to be used. Only on the river bank there is room for little gardens. Flood protection is nonexistent.

www.virtualtourist.com/travel/Europe/Czech_Republic/Vysoc...

My first visit to MRL in 2015 I remembered seeing a flame cut whistle post on the mainline somewhere east of Garrison. We (Welch and I) had places to be seeing as we were racing towards Helena to get the local with an SD45 leader and I didn't remember seeing another one. I didn't prioritize it but I didn't forget it. So, since my experience on MRL's branch lines was nonexistent until this spring I had assumed that was a one-off. Imagine my surprise as I arrived at Sappington and saw this beauty!

A very rare car in Athens, the estates are pretty much nonexistent, all the ones I've seen have been visitors from Albania where they're seemingly everywhere.

This photo was taken right in the middle of Lake Ann facing south.

 

I was kind of kicking myself for arriving just a little too late (again). The alpenglow hitting the peaks of Mount Shuksan was screaming red when I got to the north side of the lake. I dropped my bag, ran for it and almost took a dive while heading to its western rim. Also, my filters were splattered with water droplets from kicking the snow. By the time I finished wiping the filters off, the alpenglow was pretty much nonexistent. Boo. So, I glissaded down to the middle of the lake to shoot what's left of the colors. It probably wasn't the brightest idea now that I think of it. Hah. I blame the lake's frozen turquoise waters for luring me in.

Well… I'm back!

 

Back to Saguaro country.

 

Motorhome trip, 2011 has come to a close. I just got back a few days ago to home base, in the Phoenix area to settle in for the winter. I left in mid May, so it's been a little over six months on the road.

 

This trip, I hit Palm Springs, San DIego, Los Angeles, Sequoia, Yosemite, San Francisco, Sonoma Coast, Redwoods, Sacramento, Lake Tahoe, Reno (the biggest little city in the world), Salt Lake City. Almost forgot… WINNEMUCCA! (The obvious highlight of my trip!) Moab, Durango, Albuquerque, Flagstaff, Williams, Grand Canyon, Page, Bryce, Flagstaff, Sedona…….. That's it.

 

I'm done! It was kind of a mixed bag this summer. Funny… It's was the total opposite of last summer. Last year I went to boring places that I really didn't like, and got surprisingly nice shots. It was 105 degrees and miserable everywhere I went. Somehow, I was really happy with most of what I got last year. This time, I had the dream trip. This is the trip I have always wanted to take… The California coast… What could be better than that? California is such a beautiful state. So… This year, I went to some of the most beautiful places ever, and, week after week, came out with nothin!

 

So… Now I know, that the summertime weather in California just doesn't really lend itself well to photography. If this was a vacation, then the weather inland would have been fantastic. Unfortunately, as a photographer… The only thing worse than a solid blue sky, is, a solid gray sky! I knew that the California coast was pretty much dismal in May and June. But. Apparently the 'June Gloom', as they call it, extends into July gloom, and, August gloom. The thing I found amazing about California, was how it can be 90 degrees with a solid blue sky, a mile from the coast. Then you drive to the beach and just enter into a wall of gray gloom. So. I spent about 90 days in California. About 40 of them were crystal clear with a solid blue sky. And. About 47 of them were just solid gray and gloomy. So… If you do the math. I had about three really great days of shooting. The days that were great were REALLY great! A stormy day in Yosemite. A foggy day in the Redwoods. A day with an amazing swirly cloud sky at Lake Tahoe. A couple of great sunsets. Sunsets on the coast are nonexistent. The sun just drops behind the gray gloom and you're done. I just couldn't believe, while I was at a campsite along the coast, a little north of San Francisco, when the the news was reporting a record breaking heat wave all across the country. Phoenix was 118º. Palm Springs was 116º… Meanwhile, where I was, it was 45º outside, with 50 MPH wind and a gloomy, gray sky. Really? Am I really turning on my heat, and wearing my winter coat in July while the rest of the country is sweltering?

 

One repeating pattern I have seen over and over. It's always the day I'm planning to leave that I have the perfect conditions for photography. Usually it's after I actually have left. When I'm driving the motorhome and have no possible way to stop and shoot photos, I can always count on looking out at the most fantastic sky imaginable as I'm driving the motorhome. Yosemite was the perfect example of that. It's hard to imagine going someplace that beautiful and feeling uninspired, but… That's what happened. I would go to a scenic overlook, and look out on the valley, on a crystal clear day, with a solid blue sky, and think… Damn… I got nuthin! Finally, on my very last day there, we had a storm roll through. I was supposed to be checking out of my campsite that morning, but I thought I would take one last loop through the valley, so I headed in to spend one last hour in Yosemite. I came back about 14 hours later. It was INCREDIBLE!!! Of course, I came back to a nasty note stuck on my door saying that I was supposed to check out at 11:00, and I had to come to the office to pay for another night. Whatever.

 

So. After California, conditions got much better. The trip ended great! The past few weeks I have had some fantastic conditions at the Grand Canyon, Page and Bryce Canyon. COLD!!! But, nice for photography.

 

I visited Salt Lake City, which really is one of the nicest cities I have ever seen. I met some really creepy friendly people at the Mormon Square. Moab is one of the coolest places in the entire southwest. (I'm still trying to get the red mud off the bottom of my truck) Spent a few days in Durango, one of my favorite places on Earth. Hit the Albuquerque balloon festival, which SUCKED this year! Spent a week in WIlliams, which is a nice town, but doesn't photograph very well. Then Grand Canyon which was COLD! Then finally, Page, which I love!

 

So… I can't say that I really love the Phoenix area. But… Every year, it feels really nice to settle back in and stop running for a while, after six months on the road. It's nice to not have to wonder where I am going to be next week, and where I am going to find a place to camp once I get there. It's nice to be able to mail order something and actually have an address where I can have it sent. It's nice to know where the grocery store and Home Depot are without having to look it up on a map. It's nice to be able to go to my favorite grocery store and actually know where everything is in the store. It's nice to be back.

 

I shot this photo just yesterday, in the Superstition Mountains. I took a ride up there to see if I could find the spot where the plane crashed.

 

It's been a couple of (long) years... With "stay home" orders, park closure and overcrowding, my visits to BPNP had been nonexistent. It was time to see if it still has a place in my heart ...

Kaluk, the Astronomer is a very paranoid Matoran, rarely leaving his hut or the observatory in fear of the various (and nonexistent) threats that are lurking in the outside world, but no matter what, he does his best to help his fellow Sah-toran.

 

Yeah I wasn't very happy with the first version of him, so I've gone back and changed him up a bit, I'm much happier with Kaluk now.

It's been a couple of (long) years... With "stay home" orders, park closure and overcrowding, my visits to BPNP had been nonexistent. It was time to see if it still has a place in my heart ...

“By believing passionately in something that still does not exist, we create it. The nonexistent is whatever we have not sufficiently desired.”

I woke up to a spectacular sunrise this morning, which always hits me like a slap in the head asking why I wasn’t out there capturing it. It reminded me that I have a few in the queue and this one seemed appropriate given the spectacle I just missed. I’m always looking for new vantages of the city and noticed this one across Sloan’s Lake in Edgewater driving up Sheridan Boulevard (for those locals). I spent three mornings out here waiting for this color (breaking my 10% rule) and it is a delightful location to spend a morning, so peaceful and serene considering Sheridan BLVD. is 100’ behind almost as if that small barrier has created a buffer into another world. Joggers running by often wishing a good morning on their way by, Canada Geese swimming up to say hello and hang for a bit. The water provides a wonderful reflection playing tricks on the eyes and the view of downtown which isn’t the greatest I’ve seen because of the angle and distance to the buildings, is certainly worth checking out. The color reflecting off the building lights reflecting long off the water make it a fantastic location.

 

On this morning, there was a small bank of clouds behind the city which were the only clouds in sky until you turned west towards the mountains. Early on as the sun began to rise some fantastic reflections were available which I’ll post in a few days. Pre-sunrise color was nonexistent as things began to develop and I thought this would be another morning which had so much promise and failed to deliver. I almost left twice in a 15 minute period since I had a day job to go to but kept thinking to myself this can’t be done. Then seemingly after the sun was too high, a small strip of orange began south of the city and spread painstakingly slow to the north. It kept spreading through the clouds at a snail’s pace growing in intensity throughout. The thin strip of orange stayed across the tops of the trees for about 5 minutes seeming to be making up its mind what to do, and finally broke free to the rest of the clouds. Within seconds the entire bank was lit up brilliantly and I shot like a madman all the while thinking how close I came to leaving and missing this show. Because the distance from the city is pretty far and the cloud bank was pretty thin, I only shot with my 80 – 200mm lens, so after about 5 minutes I had captured all there was to get and took off in the middle of the color show. The color waned off as it does while I was driving to work but on route I found a couple new vantages to check out in the future weeks to come.

 

I know that I've been giving short-shrift to damselflies and longer shrift to dragons, but there are good reasons. Damsels are delicate jewels, usually about 1.74 to 2 inches long, more difficult to spot, more flighty though slower, and have no "bulk". I'd say their abdomens are 1/16th of an inch around. This particular shot was with little zoom to give you an idea of what we contend with at say 50 feet. Another reason for short shrift is that I'm worse at identifying them: blue with black bars versus black with blue bars and you could have five species plus the females which could have green eyes ... or black or orange and still be a "Bluet damselfly."

 

So here's an Aztec Dancer in the middle of a stream filled with algae* and perched on a favorite four inch remnant of a reed that weathered five or six summers in the same place. It's a favorite perch for damsels, but I don't think the height or strength is to the liking of say a Flame Skimmer.

 

*Until yesterday, the two large ponds have been overgrown with algae. Fish have been few. Birds especially ducks, buffleheads, and even Canada Geese! and Double-crested Cormorants which usually come in flocks, nonexistent. Yesterday, the huge machine that skims the ponds finally started a three-day cleaning (after a number of calls from ME, but not necessarily because of me). The machine is appropriately called a Pond Skimmer, but I can't imaging any agency with the imagination to name it after a family of dragonflies.

 

Maybe the algae is the shrift I've heard so much about, and just so you have something to do, get out a dictionary and give it the shrift it deserves. Don't use Google. Give the grey cells in Canada and the gray cells down here some exercise.

 

Briefly, damsels are much smaller; they hold their wings upright especially the Jewelwings (species); they fly slowly and a bit like butterflies. If they have a territory it is small, and I've never seen a male guarding a female which she lays her eggs. And some of the most brilliantly colored are damsels rather than dragons. Watch for uploads from Arizona or Texas or other southwestern states. And wait till you find out the derivation of shrift. These are religious insects, but brief in their fessing up over the week's transgressions. But what the hell, they live such short lives...

A nonexistent object

Kaluk is a very paranoid Matoran, rarely leaving his hut or the observatory in fear of the various (and nonexistent) threats that are lurking in the outside world, but no matter what, he does his best to help his fellow Sah-toran.

So when his friend Krataz asked if he would help him with the next Kohlii game, he thought perhaps going out wouldn't be too bad.. right before being startled by Kului poking his leg.

Happy Friday! Thank you for taking the time to witness day 352 of my already completed but not yet posted 365-day self-portrait project.

 

So after I finished editing this photo, I sat here staring at it trying to figure out what it was lacking. I tried to flip it vertically to give it some interestingness. Worked well for the legs, but not really for my body. So then I said, "fuck it, I'll split it in 2 and flip the part that looks good flipped!"

 

And with that, I present to you a mutated version of day 352. I began to play with these 2 “puzzle pieces” shifting and rotating both of them around different ways. How you perceive it really depends on how it is presented to you.

 

I even began to see the legs “puzzle piece” as longer in length than the torso “puzzle piece” in certain versions. However they are both exactly the same length. Measure it.

 

Depending on how it was viewed, I also began to see certain colors darker or lighter. But in fact they are all the same throughout each version of the picture. Other differences were noticed too that were nonexistent in some versions of the same exact picture that had just been rotated or flipped.

 

And I began to thinking how I just stumbled upon a mixture of false impressions depending on your perspective. I achieved this just taking my own picture and simply splitting it into two and rotating it. Imagine the tactics that could be had on a grander scale. Mind fucktrick illusions to get us to believe or think a certain way.

 

Humans are so easily influenced. You gotta wonder in this day of the massive advertising/marketing culture we live in how often this tactic has been used. Or more importantly, how often it WILL be used on us poor unsuspecting assholes by Walmart and its desperate marketing cronies.

 

In conclusion, I’ll end this with a quote from a standup comedian Bill Hicks. He alone might be responsible for me never getting into this field. RIP Buddy!

  

“By the way, if anyone here is in marketing or advertising...kill yourself. Thank you. Just planting seeds, planting seeds is all I'm doing. No joke here, really. Seriously, kill yourself, you have no rationalisation for what you do, you are Satan's little helpers. Kill yourself, kill yourself, kill yourself now. Now, back to the show. Seriously, I know the marketing people: 'There's gonna be a joke comin' up.' There's no fuckin' joke. Suck a tail pipe, hang yourself...borrow a pistol from an NRA buddy, do something...rid the world of your evil fuckin' presence.” ~Bill Hicks

 

The shot at hand? I stood in front of my car down at the abandoned navy base in my town. I had to run back and forth to get those headlights EXACTLY in between my arms and torso, essentially under my arm pits. I actually lucked out and got it on one of the first few tries. I tried it a second time and couldn’t’ repeat it.

 

Location: Abandoned Naval Air Station; Alameda, California

Taken: November 23rd, 2009

Posted: May 7th, 2010

*=lapse

**=continued from pimpexposure

Taipei 101 looms over the streets of Taipei. At the time, it was the tallest building in the world. Today it is a mere tenth on the list. For giggles, I took the elevator to the top. The view was spectacular.

 

The greater Taipei metropolitan area is home to over 7 million people and contains several neighborhoods that population-wise are among the densest in the world. Yet, it all seems to work. Unemployment is nonexistent, the city is clean, people are friendly, and the food is great.

 

If you find yourself in the area, check it out.

 

Taipei, Taiwan

  

Kodak T-MAX 400

 

Zenit Horizon 202 light leak is now fixed, looking good! Old light seals were almost nonexistent and needed some TLC. Tested with roll end of T-MAX, compliments of PerttiPaasio.

 

eos 6d scan

Actually, these were a bit larger than pebbles and quite a challenge to scramble over. The thought of spending the rest of the week with a sprained ankle crossed my mind more than once. :)

 

This is the beach at Spanish Bay along the 17 Mile Drive. I would have loved to have been able to stick around and shoot along this drive at sunset but our itinerary dictated a quick daytime trip through and then on to San Francisco. There are so many beautiful spots along this drive that my head was swimming with the possibilities. This was the the first day we had been at the coast where the clouds were departing inland and the fog was nonexistent. "Be careful what you wish for" was a saying that came to mind as the fog would have added a mood to daytime shooting. :)

 

Please take a moment and click on the image to see it large on a black background. And thank you in advance for looking at my work and for any comments, critiques and favorites. :)

And please don't use my images without my consent.

A possible historical source for Ophelia was Katherine Hamnet, a woman who fell into the Avon River and died in December 1579. Though it was eventually concluded that she had overbalanced while carrying some heavy pails, rumours that she was suffering from a broken heart were considered plausible enough for an inquest to be conducted into whether her death was a suicide. It is possible that Shakespeare - 16 at the time of the death - recalled the romantic tragedy in his creation of the character of Ophelia.[1] The name "Ophelia" itself was either uncommon or nonexistent; the only known prior text to use the name (as Ofelia) is Jacopo Sannazaro's Arcadia, presumably etymologically deriving from Ancient Greek ὄφελος "help, good, benefit, advantage". The early modern stage in England had an established set of emblematic conventions for the representation of female madness: disheveled hair worn down, dressed in white, bedecked with wild flowers, Ophelia's state of mind would have been immediately 'readable' to her first audiences.[12] "Colour was a major source of stage symbolism" Pre-Raphaelite painters siezed on this legend and made great noise of it. (Look up Lizzie Siddal, the original super UeberModel of 1880. View FULL SIZE. Remote Strobe illumination..always have my SB900 in the water on the JOBY gorillaPOD!

Turn away if you are traumatized by trauma, by bad luck, by someone who wants to whine about the drama that life can bring to someone who feels very fortunate. Sometimes . . .

 

Many of you know that my Mom, who is almost 91, has Alzheimer's - we lose her by the minute, and that my sister had a double mastectomy recently and has a very scary form of cancer. Worries and worries, praying for prayers. THESE are the two big important things!

 

Then . . . we had major plumbing disasters at the cottage in New Orleans- and yes, we are SO lucky to have worked hard and have that sweet home as our "go to haven and happy place." Ugh- yeah . . . Pipes under the house ruptured when New Orleans had the rare snow and freeze for days. The fridge died. The queen palm died.

 

Getting in from New Orleans, back here to Riversong in Alabama, we had another disaster taking place- hot water heater began to leak and was a fountain when we got in at 1 AM! Lucky timing it hadn't been going on for 3 days.

 

Then, there was the storm here on the river a few weeks ago- we had a leak running like a waterfall into the art studio above the doors! And then, there was a pipe leak over a huge old knocked together bookcase that housed tons of our books! MAJOR excavation effort.

 

And yes- the 100 foot oak that fell- thank goodness it didn't hit the house! An ordeal to have taken down as most of the companies who came to look thought it was too dangerous. Uh . . . yeah.

 

When we had the grandson for Mardi Gras, one of the bathroom pipes burst and had to be capped so we had no hot water in the bathroom. We were in this week to have that fixed, and the OTHER pipe began to spray. BOTH fixed . . .

 

There is a leak between the house and the porch . . . Does that mean a roof problem?

 

So, we had lost the fridge in New Orleans. Ah. We discovered when we got back to the river that we have lost the fridge here! Everything inside pretty much a loss, and Ken's insulin supply . . . that is a pretty essential and expensive thing- no doing without it. This fridge is only about 4 years old! How is it that my parents had one fridge my entire growing up??!

 

As for internet? TV? I would say nonexistent but in case you are seeing this, I guess it happened. I have no idea when this photo will make it up onto Flickr. I am beyond tired and wondering what is up with the Universe. For now, I just have to cope. I have had enough for a while.

 

Forgive me for whining, and for an absence, in case I can't make it in much- AT&T is practically doing a denial of service and even wants to shut off our land line- the only phone service that is half way reliable. Cell signal is rare down here.

 

I am SO thankful for all my great Flickr friends/family! THIS is what I love- sharing and learning more from each of you.

 

NOW I am done with my little pity party! I hope everybody has brighter days!! I know they are ahead. (Note to self.)

in manhattan, green is nonexistent aside from the parks.Now the High line has an artistic green space, surrealistically thin.

 

its probably for the shape & color, and not more.

 

Yay!

I want to introduce you to my Unicorns. Glitter Fart is the first one and the oldest (I got her and then her eye fell out hahahah so my mum/brother bought me another for my birthday how sweet :3) and the one to the right is Metallic Buttocks! I have another, who is a stuffie, whose name is Sparkly Poo, but we won't get into that. c:

 

I suppose you're wondering why I photograph what I photograph - lots of cake, and erasers. But this just makes me smile, ok? XD Cake and animals (non-existent ones, of course) make me smile! Oh, and sunshine and daisies, too. :3

 

This is probably the fastest (school day) photo i've taken for this project in a long time BUT GUESS WHAT? I don't mind it! Omg I could go so far as to say I like it but I wouldn't want to give you all a heart attack. :p This took ages to upload as the file is so huge hahaha. AND YES SHANNON, MORE FLOWERS. Kill me.

 

How is everybody today?! My day was okay I suppose! Just happy for the sunshine. Ooh and 3 days left. I am excited. Can you tell? :]

Probably should've cropped thissss and i don't like the daisy in the foreground but HERE YOU ARE ♥

Normally when I post a photo I take time to describe it, or something that struck me worthy of mention when I took it. This time, I've decided to try something a bit different . Since getting into night photography, especially mountain scenes I’m often asked about what it’s like to hike up in the dark and cold. A recent trip to Mayflower Gulch and the Boston Mine was a perfect opportunity to try share this experience.

 

This post will be the first of three consecutive installments describing a recent nighttime hike to the Boston Mine. My goal is describe for you what one of these adventures is like, but since the write up got a bit long I broke it up into three parts.

  

Part one:

I had the pleasure of joining Brad McGinley, Mike Berenson, Darren White and Cooper the Wonder Dog last weekend on a trek up Mayflower Gulch to the Boston Mine tram. The tram sits approximately 12,400’ above sea level about 1400’ about tree line and most importantly at the time about 2000’ above the parking area. A well planned trip by Mike had us leaving the parking area at 10:30 PM Friday night and arriving at the top around 30 minutes into the next day. I’d done this hike twice before in the winter and the hiking conditions can range from easy to brutal. Fortunately, the photography gods were (mostly) with us this evening as we were met with hard packed snow. Weather-wise conditions were about as you would expect for being above tree line at 1:00 AM in April. Cold, gusty winds and clouds whipping by overhead at blazing speed.

 

If you’ve never been to this location it’s basically a long meadow surrounded by 13,000 foot mountains on 3 sides, which do a pretty good job of blocking most of the wind from the valley floor. From the parking area you hike the first 2 miles under tree cover on a jeep road which always seems to be an easy hike as far as snow pack goes. Everyone is forced to use this portion of the trail, so it’s always packed snow and sheltered from the wind by the pine trees. This ends at tree line and dumps you out at several miner cabin ruins which are photogenic in and of themselves, but our quest was further on this night. The hike to the top from this point is a well-defined trail in summer and nonexistent in winter. In the past we’ve been: faced with cutting our own trail through deep powder which proved to be too much, and 1” of ice crust over soft snow which nearly proved too much (about 3 – 10 steps and then post hole – even with snow shoes). But on this night the snow was nice and packed. Snowshoes were helpful, but not necessary.

 

Another phenomenon once leaving the protection of the trees was the wind was free to have its way with us. We had layers and hiking up is always the warmest part of the trip. We’d have to cross the standing around up there when the time came, but at this point no issue with us, but I got nervous for Cooper. I had discussed with Brad (who has far more dog hiking experience than I) beforehand and had asked him if he had a dog jacket from his hiking days with his dog Annie. That didn’t pan out, but we took an extra jacket and put it on Cooper, zipping it over his body and tying the arms in front of his legs. This worked pretty well and he seemed grateful for the protection. I’ll point out that Cooper is a Labra-Doodle and normally has long fur (hair?) which was cut about a month ago so he was less protected than normal.

 

Our pace to the top was casual, but we had plenty of time. Our main goal for the night was to catch the Milky Way above the mountains, which would begin about 2 AM. It’s only a mile to the tram from the cabins, but man it’s a long mile. Many breath catching breaks were taken along the way. I think both Cooper and Brad wished for less stopping and more walking, but they were outnumbered.

 

The lighting on this night was somewhat peculiar, and was the cause of strange sensations. There was no moon on this night, but there was a glow to the area which allowed enough light to see. In fact, Brad kept his light off once we were out of tree line. I’m sure this was due to the fact that everything was covered in white except the steepest of the surrounding mountains and what little light there was bouncing off all sides. Plus, there was a decent amount of light pollution reflecting off the cloud when they were overhead. All of this contributed to this weird phenomenon that made it seem like we were approaching our target, though unable to reach it. For example, there’s a distinct edge or seam where the (relatively) flat meadow turns to steep mountainside which we could see this plain as day. It looked to be only a couple hundred feet away, but no matter how far we walked it remained unreachable. I’m not sure why that was, but we all felt it and discussed it several times…..

 

Stay tuned for part two coming shortly:

 

Deserts are part of a wider classification of regions that, on an average annual basis, have a moisture deficit (i.e. they can potentially lose more than is received). Deserts are located where vegetation cover is sparse to almost nonexistent.

I decided I'm going to Bricklink my Skeletal Dragon, if only to see how stable the build using flex tubes really is, but it's impossible to do it in white due to nonexistent part-colour combos. So I'm making my real life version black. The colours have been changed so that it only uses parts in existing part-colour combos. Only the tail end is a non-existent PCC, but that is because it is only found as a marbled part.

 

Render made in Bluerender.

My first visit to MRL in 2015 I remembered seeing a flame cut whistle post on the mainline somewhere east of Garrison. We (Welch and I) had places to be seeing as we were racing towards Helena to get the local with an SD45 leader and I didn't remember seeing another one. I didn't prioritize it but I didn't forget it. So, since my experience on MRL's branch lines was nonexistent until this spring I had assumed that was a one-off. Imagine my surprise as I arrived at Sappington and saw this beauty!

Flames of DOOM is the name for the melodic death metal band well known in every corner of the Lego world. They are famous for their brutal music, technical breakdowns and and extremely low growling. And just like any other famous band they play gigs all over the country. What can be more metal than traveling by bus when in tour? Yepp, traveling in a bus like this! It has everything your band mates might need. Place for guitars, speakers, lots of small stuff for every day and, of course, a wall that can be transformed into a stage! Wait, there's more! There is a giant antennae to broadcast your performance worldwide!

 

As for the model, there is a ton of features and I really tried to show them all on these images. Most of the roof can be opened and the drum kit is already installed on that transforming stage (although it takes a lot of the inner space in the bus). Only three or four parts not counting the minifigs are used with nonexistent colors. There are some additional cookies like folding table, banner on the side, fire distinguisher, guitar holders and even a sword! The bus also features steering and some sort of suspension (let's just say it is an uneasy way of attaching those wheels).

 

I'm trying to recover my Lego Ideas account and I'd really appreciate hearing some feedback from you before posting it there!