Now is the time for us (aka – The electronic world can wait)

(This post was originally a rant on Facebook)

{soapbox on}

Dear people.

This is just to let any people geographically close to me that I shall not be speaking with you while you have a phone, tablet or other such device in your hand. I love you all dearly but no longer want to hold half-sided conversations with the top of your head.

I know that I sometimes lapse and will not feel at all offended if you ignore me should I do the same. So, if in the middle of a conversation I stop speaking with you, it is because:

1. my larynx has been the only part of me taken in the rapture;
2. my lungs have spontaneously moved three metres to my left leaving me with no way of exhaling; or
3. you have picked up your smart device and are Googling, Bing’ing, snapchatting, Facebooking, sending a text message, reading a text message, taking a selfie, changing your music which is blaring into one side of your brain by way of the really silly looking dangling bit of wire that terminates in the bud stuck in your ear (I know, your really are listening to me), reading e-mails, sending e-mails, attending to the important pop-up request that Betty needs your help in Candy Crush, rushing back to feed your zoo animals, your garden, your farm critters, or just seeing how many likes your Instagram picture of your latest profile picture has received.

This is for all people, old or young. Again, I know I sometimes am an offender. My pledge is that, in return to understanding why I have spent time on this rant and may on occasion cut short our discussions, I shall try to be attentive to any discourse and let the electronic world wait. This also means that if your send me a text message you may have to wait for a reply. If you ring, I may not answer. Your e-mails could sit for some time as unread and Betty – deal with Candy Crush yourself!

I’m not being rude or a Luddite.

I am happy for you to share with me the YouTube video you are watching, or for you to use your tablet in your role as quiz master for the nightly newspaper quiz. I just don’t want to have half a conversation with you while you are giving the other half of your attention to the gadget in your hand.

I think it is time we placed a higher value on the people in front of us than our time with a screen.

{soapbox off}

xxx

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Another rant about renewables

Tags

australia, Australian, Campbell Newman, climate change, electricity, Energy, greenhouse gas, Queensland, Renewable energy, Renewable Energy Target

In today’s The Australian newspaper, reporter Matthew Warren presented an article which was supposedly a bad news story about the decline in the value of the electricity industry. The headline read “Electricity market shrinks by 40pc as prices tumble”.

Unfortunately, as the Internet shrinks behind walls of greed and information becomes available only to those who can afford to pay for it, I cannot find a complete electronic version of the story. It is here:

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/climate/electricity-market-shrinks-by-40pc-as-prices-tumble/story-e6frg6xf-1226677358635

for those with a subscription and on Page 2 of the printed version.

Read my full rant here

A new play toy

Tags

art, australia, Camera, Cinemascope, Color balance, Focal length, Mongolia, Neutral density filter, Nikon, photo, photography, photos, victoria

Fun time indeed. My new play toy (home-made $25 ND filter) has had its modifications by way of an old pair of tracksuit pants. Legs cut off, sewn together to create a blackout sock. Once pulled over the camera with style and flair, no light gets in and the pics come out very nicely thank you.

Here are the test shots taken today.

Out of camera (f25, 3:00).

And with white balance adjusted:

Not bad me thinks. Here  is another shot taken with the same settings and same, very trendy, tracksuit pants over the camera.

And  with white balance adjusted using View-NX2 (Nikon‘s file handling software).

And this is the same photo played with in Picassa with the Cinemascope affect added. I kind of like the effect and for a 2 second fix, it doesn’t come up too bad. The vignette around the top may be from my pant legs or from  a little bit of filter because of the 24mm focal length. I am yet to play with accurately focussing on any other focal length. That’s coming.

For fun I took a photo of one of the kids and their grandmother washing the windows. I swear they were moving around in front on the camera for a full three minutes. I have tried this one in a monochrome just to see and this is what I got. Must admit I have added a little touch of green just because I like it.

So, people really can disappear. Am keen to try a city scape now and see how that goes. The low light pics seem to get more camera noise than the bright lights, but not too bad given the camera in use. Oooo, playing is fun!

I’ll get back to more normal posting and stop boring you with this stuff real soon – I promise. 🙂

Oh, and here is a  cool time-lapse sequence shot with a ND3.0 filter in Mongolia by photographer Timothy Allen.

You can see his blog on it by clicking here.

PS: Happy birthday Frank!

Huzzah – Greenland has landed!

Tags

animals, end of the world, Greenland, Mayan, Mongolia, Montville, Nuuk, photographs, photography, photos, places, Queensland, travel, Ulan Bator, water, water dragon

What a wonderful Christmas surprise. Well, a couple of days before actually but I have only just got to putting finger to key now, which makes it post Christmas day but… ah well, I am babbling.  What I mean to say is that finally I have had a visitor from GREENLAND. Huzzah!!

Dani Henriksen from Nuuk dropped by to see my last post – Breakfast with Audrey.  Aluu Dani and Juullimi Ukiortaassamilu Pilluarit (thanks omniglot).  Dani is a Filipina whose blog can bee seen here. Maligayang pasko at manigong bagong taon (and apologies for my rusty Tagalog).

So now, the 2013 challenge begins – to have a person from Mongolia visit. So, brush off your penpals and if they live in Mongolia, get them to drop on by. Of course Ulan Bator is somewhat larger than Nuuk but, unlike Nuuk, I have actually been to the Mongolian capital.

When I was there in 1991 the world was a different place. The USSR was coming to an end, China was reluctantly allowing in foreigners and  a ticket on the trans-Mongolian could be purchased cheaper on the black market. Mongolia is definitely on my list of places to visit again.

Now, just because I like this pic, here is a lovely juvenile water dragon spotted near Montville in Queensland the other week. Have a wonderful journey into 2013 and remember, it’s only 981 more days until the revised Mayan end of the world. So, keep smiling.

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Worth a read!

Ahoy, it’s Friday

Okay, another couple of quick pics for Friday. Seems the weeks just fly past.

The first photo was taken on one of the ferries which ply their trade on the Brisbane River. The ferry is a passenger vehicle which not only services the commuter market, but is a great way to get a view of Brisbane.

 

Oh, and contrary to popular belief, people do swim in the Brisbane river as evidenced by these five crazy folks. The fact that they all survived shows that there are no sharks as well.

And, they weren’t alone.

 

Have a  bonza weekend.

Report: The Critical Decade: International Action on Climate Change – Climate Commission

Tags

abbott, australia, carbon, carbon tax, climate, climate change, emissions, environment, flannery, Politics, tax, world

Report: The Critical Decade: International Action on Climate Change – Climate Commission.

On June 21 this year, the Opposition leader said:

Well, I think the Prime Minister should be waking up to herself and waking up to the fact that the rest of the world is not taking decisive action by way of carbon taxes or emissions trading schemes. Sure, lots of other countries are doing the sorts of things to help the environment that the Coalition is recommending – they’re taking direct action – but they are not putting in place economy wide carbon taxes or emissions trading schemes and the Prime Minister should finally admit that Australia’s carbon tax is an international orphan.

The above quote comes from the Liberal Party of Australia’s own website (http://liberal.org.au/Latest-News/2012/06/21/Tony-Abbott-doorstop-interview.aspx)

Yesterday, the Australian chief climate commissioner released the aforementioned report. The report estimates that by next year 33 countries and 18 sub-national jurisdictions will have a carbon price in place.

Can someone explain the rationale behind  Mr Abbott’s ill-informed statements? Does he really think that the populous is ignorant?

{sigh}

Aluu Greenlandians

Tags

Friends, Greenland, Greenlandic, Iraq, Mongolia

No one from Greenland has ever visited my blog and I am sad about that. If anyone knows someone from Greenland, can you ask them to come to my blog please so my stat map has a Greenland visitor on it – that would be cool.

Oh, also anyone from Mongolia or Iraq.

Google translate doesn’t have Greenlandic as an option so here is the above in Thai.

หนึ่งจากกรีนแลนด์ไม่ได้เคยเข้าเยี่ยมชมบล็อกของฉันและฉันเสียใจเกี่ยวกับว่า ถ้าใครรู้ใครบางคนจากกรีนแลนด์ที่คุณสามารถขอให้พวกเขามาในบล็อกของฉันโปรดดังนั้นแผนที่ stat ของฉันมีผู้เข้าชมกรีนแลนด์เมื่อมัน – ที่จะเย็น

โอ้ใครยังมาจากมองโกเลียหรือประเทศอิรัก

The Nicest Place on the Internet

The Nicest Place on the Internet. – Nothing to say about this except that you should do yourself a favour and click on the link.

Keep smiling!

Q: What’s the difference between a can-opener and a chainsaw?

Tags

blogging, can, chainsaw, chef, cooking, cuisine, dinner, humour, joke, laugh, menu, musings, people

A: A chainsaw will actually open a can.

Seriously, the basic function of a can opener is in its title – that is to open cans. So why can can-opener manufacturers not make a can-opener that does just that! Now, I am not a complete numpty when it comes to mechanics and engineering. Well, okay, I am pretty close to being one, but surely it can’t be that hard.

Read more here.

 

Friday photo

Well, actually four photos. This one and the three on the Friday Photo page “On a night like tonight” were taken by my eldest daughter on her movie camera. Pretty impressive stills from our back deck.  The others are over here.

f/8 1/67s

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Another piece from Claire Varley’s travel journal. Claire is an excellent writer and it is well worth the time having a read of her blog which delightfully combines a wicked sense of humour with a great deal of insight.

Friday Photo

Tags

art, brisbane, contemporary, images, people, photographs, photography, photos, woman

At a recent art exhibition at the Gallery of Modern Art in Brisbane, Australia, I came across my own Contemporary Woman sitting in one  of the rooms. I took these photos and had a play with a dark and moody look to see if I could capture the essence of a sixteen year old girl.

I also sent one to my resident Photoshop guru to have a play with and he zapped a gorgeous version back in about 10 minutes flat.

Click here to have a look at three more versions.

Contemporary Woman

Friday photo

Tags

bicycle, bike, brisbane, lipton, photographs, photography, photos, sustainability

Ever take a photo that:

1. you nearly had it right;
2. you wish you had more time to stop and set it up a bit neater;
3. figure it was close,  but no cigar; and
4. haven’t got the heart to hit the delete key?

Well, nearly every one of my photos fits category (D) and I have thousands of snaps which really should be ground down into a series of ones and noughts.

Today’s photo is one of those. It’s a quite unremarkable photo but I thought it could be spiced up with a bit of cropping. Let me know what you think. It’s over here or click on the thumbnail below.

Monday’s Friday photo

Better late than never. I have added a second Canberra photo for the Friday photo last week. And yes, I know it is Monday but sometimes I run a little behind. Jump over to the Canberra page here for a look.

Friday Photo

Tags

canberra, friday, photographs, photography, photos, sky

Canberra is a great place for photographing statues, monuments and people. Last December a family birthday took me there and this Friday’s photo was one of the great memories I bought back. Hope you like it. Click here to see the photo.

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My niece is on a trip around the globe before settling into some reality. She writes beautifully about her time in the land of her ancestors, Cyprus, and her experiences as a twenty-something travelling solo. I am reblogging this one piece but encourage you to read her other writings. They are powerful, funny and very insightful.

A sustainable future

Tags

election, future, musings, Politics, sustainability, sustainable

Here in Queensland (Australia) we are going through the trials of a State election. Queensland is a state full of natural resources, above and below ground. We have both coal and sunshine to burn. We also have some of the finest areas where nature gets to show off her finery – the Daintree Rainforest, the Great Barrier reef, and Carnarvon Gorge to name but three.

Read my full post here.

 

All in a day’s work

Tags

amsterdam, berlin, bicycle, blogging, haarlem, the netherlands

Okay, so I decided today to sit down and write about sustainability. Three hours later I have moved my blog from Blogger to WordPress, redesigned the page several times, linked to my Twitter and Facebook pages and posted some old photos up.

At least now, when I do sit down to spin out my ramblings, you will get a nicer website to read them from.

I hope you enjoy. You can get to the photo galleries from the link at the top of the page. The first on is from Berlin and The Netherlands which you can also find here.

BC

The demise of boo

Tags

blogging, humour, language, words

Someone has taken the scare out of Boo. Boo used to send shivers of fear down my spine. Sisters,  lying in wait, would leap forward with a loud BOO and laugh as I scurried off to the safety of a seemingly compassionate mother.

But now, boo is no more scarier than a peacock feather thrust into an armpit.

Read about the demise of boo here.