guts, gutless, gutted…
Imagine, if you will, two old blokes who've known each other for ages. Theirs was the kind of relationship that speaks in silent codes. Shared experience has shaped them. They are synchronised, to a point. The elder one has status, is connected, or just nosey. The younger is respected by the older, but inquisitive. After the pleasantries, an inevitable question forms. What does Jack know that I don't: "Give us ya guts, officer". Always, always, he was "officer". Clearly there was something I didn't know. Some have access to arcane skills and knowledge. The rest of us are just human.
Some of you might recall that my 60D and 10-22 zoom tested Newton's Law of Universal Gravitation from a horse-drawn cart on Sark. What now looks like a bit of NASA surplus space junk is actually a Canon YG2-2158-000 FOCUSING ASS'Y USM and MIDDLE LENS ASS'Y CY3-2119-000. When the lovely people at Canon took my traumatised lens into the operating theatre and performed lifesaving surgery, they gave me the "guts" as a memento!
Yesterday, I made one of my uncommon visits to a Post Office. The charming and ever helpful clerk asked if I wanted to insure my package, as well as track it… I explained, in it's current state, it was maybe a doorstop or paperweight. Her advice? Save your money! Let them insure it when it comes back. You see, my EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM was, after refusing to focus and emitting strange growling noises, effectively worthless — not worth insuring until, when and if, its function was restored. Now its on its way to those same surgeons as did the subject of an impromptu physics experiment on Sark.
Quite likely, the last serious work that the zoom telephoto did was to keep watch on the family of Australian Hobbies who made their home in a disused raven's nest. They don't, as many other birds do, build their own nests — they just adopt someone else's. On the weekend just gone, while they thought the sound of a chainsaw — common enough in the bush — would not be noticed, some gutless individual took to the hobby's tree and lopped off its upper limbs and those of its neighbour. They hadn't bargained on the switched on local authorities who, springing into action by — I suppose the motivation of some dobber — took them down with the same lack of compassion they offered the trees, and the hobbies. I can't imagine a sanction cruel enough to offset this stupid act. Too late, their nest is gone, even if the trees — clipped but not killed — still stand. Perhaps nobody else cares? I'm gutted by this selfish, gutless act.
When the wizards restore and return my lens, it'll find new subjects. Watch this space…
For the curious: my camera was "mounted" on a concrete floor, the scene lit by bounce flash from a handheld Canon Speedlite 580EX II off a white ceiling, and the shutter released by an RS-60E3 Remote Switch. Now, I can probably retire these mementos…
guts, gutless, gutted…
Imagine, if you will, two old blokes who've known each other for ages. Theirs was the kind of relationship that speaks in silent codes. Shared experience has shaped them. They are synchronised, to a point. The elder one has status, is connected, or just nosey. The younger is respected by the older, but inquisitive. After the pleasantries, an inevitable question forms. What does Jack know that I don't: "Give us ya guts, officer". Always, always, he was "officer". Clearly there was something I didn't know. Some have access to arcane skills and knowledge. The rest of us are just human.
Some of you might recall that my 60D and 10-22 zoom tested Newton's Law of Universal Gravitation from a horse-drawn cart on Sark. What now looks like a bit of NASA surplus space junk is actually a Canon YG2-2158-000 FOCUSING ASS'Y USM and MIDDLE LENS ASS'Y CY3-2119-000. When the lovely people at Canon took my traumatised lens into the operating theatre and performed lifesaving surgery, they gave me the "guts" as a memento!
Yesterday, I made one of my uncommon visits to a Post Office. The charming and ever helpful clerk asked if I wanted to insure my package, as well as track it… I explained, in it's current state, it was maybe a doorstop or paperweight. Her advice? Save your money! Let them insure it when it comes back. You see, my EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM was, after refusing to focus and emitting strange growling noises, effectively worthless — not worth insuring until, when and if, its function was restored. Now its on its way to those same surgeons as did the subject of an impromptu physics experiment on Sark.
Quite likely, the last serious work that the zoom telephoto did was to keep watch on the family of Australian Hobbies who made their home in a disused raven's nest. They don't, as many other birds do, build their own nests — they just adopt someone else's. On the weekend just gone, while they thought the sound of a chainsaw — common enough in the bush — would not be noticed, some gutless individual took to the hobby's tree and lopped off its upper limbs and those of its neighbour. They hadn't bargained on the switched on local authorities who, springing into action by — I suppose the motivation of some dobber — took them down with the same lack of compassion they offered the trees, and the hobbies. I can't imagine a sanction cruel enough to offset this stupid act. Too late, their nest is gone, even if the trees — clipped but not killed — still stand. Perhaps nobody else cares? I'm gutted by this selfish, gutless act.
When the wizards restore and return my lens, it'll find new subjects. Watch this space…
For the curious: my camera was "mounted" on a concrete floor, the scene lit by bounce flash from a handheld Canon Speedlite 580EX II off a white ceiling, and the shutter released by an RS-60E3 Remote Switch. Now, I can probably retire these mementos…