Scattered Thoughts . . .

I have a little bit of time to kill before heading to another medical appointment this morning so I thought I would add a few more photos to my blog.  I'm heading to a new specialist this morning... a type of appointment which is never really 'fun' and with a new doctor you never know what to expect. There is a lot of unnecessary crap hanging over my head right now including the threat of losing my Social Security Disability Insurance benefits. Actually, this really pisses me off and adding in this new specialist isn't helping any.  So, I have a bit of time to kill this morning and thought I would share a few photos from last week... This first photo is of a slightly uncooperative loon. Although he was paddling away from me, he kept looking back to see if I was still there photographing him...  This was an early morning photo. The contrast was low because I had to bump up the exposure quite a bit to capture some detail in this mostly black loon. Now the loon

About three weeks ago, I wrote about buying an unmanned aircraft system (UAS) and being certified by the FAA to fly one of these things. My plan was to get some aerial video footage of the lake house and some of our activities.  As often seems to be the case when it comes to my experiences in new endeavors, nothing really went according to plan with this UAS. In my initial flight tests (just a couple of short flights in my first outing), I found that control of this UAS was rather lousy. You use your phone or tablet with an app to control this UAS and there was a lot of lag. You would use the app to try to rotate clockwise... lag...  lag... lag... finally, it would either slowly start to turn clockwise like it was trying to fly through molasses or it would suddenly start a fast, jerky movement to clockwise. It was usable but it was disconcerting and a bit frustrating. Next, I quickly realized that the video quality wasn't nearly as good as I had hoped. The bit depth was lacking

Although we have not made a 100% final decision just yet, we did say farewell to the lake house again yesterday and, perhaps, this was also our final farewell.  Upon arriving back home, last night we sat down and compiled a list of pro's and con's related to heading to the lake house every summer. There are very many pro's on this list but the con's are quite compelling and pretty damning.  I spent much of the past week sleeping through our time at the lake house. I was exhausted but I didn't want to sleep because there were so many fun things to do that I still had not crossed off my own 'to-do' list. Instead, I slept... then we packed up over the course of three days... and we headed back home.  I'll be sharing more photos and videos of our time at the lake over the course of the foreseeable future so this does not mean an end to that! Right now I need to rest up a bit so we can try to do a few more things this summer...  I'd especi

We hadn't seen the resident Bald Eagle pair in a couple of days so we were wondering where they were hiding. We also hadn't seen any other significant wildlife such as bobcats and bears so I was feeling I needed to wander out to find something worth photographing. Sheila and I headed out on our kayaks yesterday morning. I had three cameras in my kayak... a Sony action video camera, a Sony full-frame camera with a 70-200mm lens, and a Sony crop camera with a 400mm F5.6L lens which gives me an equivalent of 600mm. I also brought along a wide angle lens for any landscape photos that may present itself. With these cameras, I was confident I could capture photos of loons, Bald Eagles, bears, bobcats, turtles or whatever wildlife appeared.  About a mile from our lake house, I pulled to the shore to check a nice sandy beach on State land for any tracks... I saw none. We continued on down toward the dam at the end of the lake.  As we approached the end of the lake, I noticed a r

As I mentioned in my previous blog entry, today was a day of sleep and rest.  My health hit a wall last night and then worsened as the night wore on... the fatigue was brutal! Much of the day today was spent sleeping. I still have some lingering effects of last night's health problems but I'm feeling much more stable this evening than last evening. During the few hours I was awake today, the wildlife around the lake house was minimal, at best. I didn't really see anything worth photographing. Early this morning, however, I did see some interesting, dramatic light hit the shore on the opposite side of the lake... I really like this one... the sun was peaking through some clouds and early morning fog... the light was like a spotlight on this cabin across the lake... I really like the reflection on the smooth morning water... I like the depth of the photo... and, I like the color... this is a really nice photo!

Yesterday was perhaps one of the most beautiful days we've had at the lake. The visibility was noticeably crystal clear... the sun was bright... it was warm... the water was warm... it was quiet... and I was in very nice company! Today, weather-wise, was fair but both Sheila and I were exhausted. We ended up sleeping away most of the day. I had some health issues last night too and that always has a tremendous bearing on the days afterward. Today was no exception. We pretty much just slept and rested all day.  This evening, however, I had some time to sort through some of yesterday's photos... At this point in sharing these photos here I must ask, "Have I mentioned lately how much I love my Sony cameras, microphones, stereos, mp3 players, and televisions?" These photos here remind of just how much I love Sony electronics. It is a joy using cameras which produce such beautiful tonality and color while also providing the fastest and most accurate au

Today was a rather lousy day for shooting photos of wildlife. We sometimes go through spurts of seeing absolutely no wildlife. One year, we didn't see any wildlife for almost two weeks! Today was just one of those days... quiet. Instead of shooting photos today (although, I kept my eyes open in case something appeared outside our lake house windows), I sifted through some of the photos I've shot thus far and I found another Bald Eagle shot worth sharing here...

For a long while, we had a school of friendly Perch swimming around our beach and dock. There were twelve of them to be exact! It was really nice to see them because that is a sign of a healthy lake. Plus, it is nice seeing all sorts of wildlife no matter which direction you turn your head! These very friendly Perch were always hanging around our beach and dock, that is, until the kids insisted upon fishing and our little Perch friends immediately abandoned our beach and dock area for safer waters after Lukey caught one of the twelve. They left, obviously annoyed with us and terrified, and they haven't been back. "Post Edit - June 22, 2017:  For days, I've been thinking about this problem of this school of Perch being run off due to fishing. There is now a new rule in place for the lake house...  " Absolutely no fishing from the property. If you want to fish, get in a boat and fish near the State land or out in deeper water away from the house."  The fi

People seem to get excited to hear that the Bald Eagle is making a comeback in the northeast after being almost extinct. Personally, I find these birds to be an annoyance equivalent to a seagull and seagulls are something I always refer to as a rat with wings. The Bald Eagle is an aggressive predator preying upon other birds, wildlife and disrupting the life cycle of other animals already on the endangered list so I really do not look upon this nasty bird with affection at all. One of the things we always loved about Lake Groton is the amount of active loons. There is even a healthy dose of transient loons who come and go. I've learned a lot about loons and their quirkiness by carefully observing them over the years including all the difficulties this endangered bird has with effective reproduction. Having a monstrous predator hovering over their heads, harassing them, agitating them and trying to eat them is of no help to building the loon population. I'd rather see the loon

Today was an action packed day at the lake house! The grandchildren arrived today with their great-grandparents in tow.  They were supposed to be here on Monday but a last minute appointment near home kept them from visiting us until today.  After Monday's appointment, they had school on Tuesday and they have their last day of school tomorrow so that left today open for a quick day trip and they'll be back on Friday to stay for close to a week. After canceling their visit to us on Monday they were itching to get here today! The weather was rather chilly and windy this morning so we decided it was a perfect day for hiking to the summit of Owl's Head Mountain overlooking our lake. It was sunny and clear but a bit too chilly for swimming on the beach. This worked out well because when we arrived back at the house after hiking it was definitely warm enough for swimming and a little kayaking. The hike was great! The views were spectacular and, although we (the adults)