I was up early-ish and fed my two feathered companions of the last couple of decades. The both posed for pictures before they were sequestered in their cages for breakfast and naps.

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Then I strapped on my handy Cotton Carrier and walked up the hill to the well tank which is about 110 feet above the main house. There in the stand of trees, the wrens have again made use of one of the nest boxes that were installed back in 2018 thanks to SCVAS hooking me up with a Boyscout. This is the third year in a row that box has seen Bewick action: this time though its House Wrens instead of the usual Bewick’s.

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I then went through the person gate and walked up the road to gain another couple hundred feet in elevation.  On the way up I was rewarded with a Rufous-Crowned Sparrow, Anna’s Hummingbird, Lesser Goldfinches, House Finches, and a very photogenic Turkey Vulture that wanted to show off his flying skills.

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At the top of the hill the Western Meadowlarks were singing, plus I spotted a Lazuli Bunting and Say’s Phoebe.

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On my way back down the hillside I captured pics of a female Red-Winged Blackbird, California Quail, Mourning Doves and Northern Mockingbirds. The second Mockingbird image is a favorite, as you can just make out the shapes of a bird at the top of each power pole.

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I walked down the road along our north hillside pasture and continued on towards the creek. A pair of Acorn Woodpecker’s were busy and it seemed the theme for the rest of the morning was going to be “look at the power lines.”

Just a ways down from the industrious woodpeckers the Yellow-Billed Magpies were competing with a pair of California Scrub Jays for berries and perching rights. Then where the road splits, the active Red-Tailed Nest had a parental unit sitting low which hopefully means there are eggs about to hatch.

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It was already after 10am, so I decided to take the short route home and turned off at the lower road which circles around back to our southern pasture. Not much along the road, although I did perhaps spot what may have been a Swainson’s Hawk as well as a male Red-Winged Blackbird

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I stopped off to chat with a neighbor about road stuff and then continued on, steeling myself to tackle the climb up through out our south pasture — there’s about a 200ft elevation difference between it and where the house sits. On the way up I checked on some of the nest boxes and was delighted to find the five wee Western Bluebird hatchlings in Rodeo Ring East are growing quickly. Plus the southern pair of Red-Tails were out and about: their favorite hangouts are the half a dozen or so poles that run electrical service up to the main house and then on to the secondary meter for the main gate. Finally reaching the top of the trail, I paused outside the derelict stables where the Barn Swallows were out in force.

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Finally made it back to the house where I made a fresh latte and settled in to watch the goings on in the north garden.

A White-Crowned Sparrow as well as a Gold Crowned were still in residence, plus our shy resident Wild Turkey. I’d taken pics of Black Phoebes up the hill and out by the barn, but one flew in to drink from the bath and I just caught it as it left. Both species of Orioles that live here showed up: Bullocks and Hooded, plus our resident California Thrashers, White-Throated Sparrow and our California Towhee shared his/her bath with a Spotted Towhee.

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The event was only for four hours, so while the Lawrence Goldfinches, Allen’s Hummingbirds, and other residents did visit the garden, it wasn’t until later in the day. Still, it was a good morning walk, but I must say I’m looking forward to my 1.4 lens extender arriving — it’s currently on backorder.

This spring I joined a couple of teams for the local chapter of the Audubon Society’s annual Birdathon. Due to the ongoing pandemic, just about all the teams had moved to a distributed model where members birded on their own or with household members on a set day.

The first team was very Purgatory-centric, and the story of that day is thus up over at purgatory.org, but I decided to put the write-ups for the other two teams here since I had ventured a bit further than our ranch-borders.

The first team I joined birded on April 18th and the caveat was birding within one mile of your home. Here is the write-up and some of the images from that day.

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I was up in the morning and sat at my desk with my coffee and watched the birds in the north garden.  The usual suspects were present, but I was on the lookout for our five recent spring arrivals: the orioles (Bullocks and Hooded), Chipping Sparrow, White-Throated Sparrow and a pair of Lawrence Goldfinches.  I spotted most of them plus noticed that most of the resident birds have been pairing up — I spied two House Finches getting it on as well as the Thrashers courting.  After 30 minutes or so I setup my trail cams as added insurance in case I missed any excitement and then set about with morning chores.  Once finished I brought my two parrots in from their garden cage so they could enjoy breakfasts indoors and nap while took a walk. I went out our main driveway and was delighted to hear Western Meadowlarks before heading down the hillside.   I found a Red-Tailed Hawk nest in one of the trees down near the creek bed and spotted some Tree Swallows out and about as well as a pair of Ravens.  I decided to do the short loop back to our south pasture and spotted a couple of Pine Siskins which was interesting since I haven’t seen any up near the house in a couple of weeks.  Along the low road I dodged the Wild Turkeys until I got back to grassier areas which again are nesting grounds for Red-Winged Blackbirds and Black-Headed Cowbirds.  I made my way back up to the house and cooled off with an iced-coffee while catching up on email and glancing out into the garden.  In the late afternoon I walked out to our old pole barn to photograph the Barn Swallows and see if an owl or two were napping in the rafters.  No owls, but I managed to find our fickle Black Phoebes.  Before it got too late I hopped in the mini-truck and drove up the mountain to try to find the White-Tailed Kite seen on past walks.  I got lucky and even got a few pictures before it disappeared—I didn’t realize until I got home that on its last diving run it had been successful.  I then meandered back down picking up litter from careless non-residents as I drove.  Once back I watched the gardens descend into darkness and realized two interesting things.  First off I hadn’t realized how varied the caps are for White-Capped and Gold-Crowned Sparrows.  Just like with parrots, the little song birds’ plumage apparently matures in coloration with age.  Secondly, last autumn we had a tree usually nested in by either our Scrub or Steller’s Jay “seen to” by our tree crew as the previous owners of our property had badly pollarded it.  Because the foliage is no longer so dense, this spring there were no epic battles between the two species and both have instead nested elsewhere.  I know the Scrub Jays are nesting about 200 yds away from house and gardens and thus they are not a consistent presence like they have been in past years.  As a result all the other birds are much more relaxed…sure they are still on the lookout for our resident Sharpie (who didn’t show — nor did I catch a glimpse of the Lawrences,) but in general things are more chill than past seasons.

Lastly, once it was dark, I went out and retrieved the trail cams.  Nothing on them that I hadn’t already spotted during the day, but one of the cameras did not take/apply the settings, so not only was the date several years behind but instead of video it captured stills.  I’m quite glad about that as it resulted in perhaps the best photo of the day…..

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At the start of spring I rolled out a new webcam and experimented with broadcasting to Youtube. Sadly the setup was not as robust or reliable as I had hoped.

Tonight I fussed with Automator and I may have solved my issues.

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The live feed is up on my Youtube Channel.

That feeling you have

When you find that thing

That suddenly allows you

To fix the issue

Damn computer

No donut

This was originally drafted over four years ago over at stega.org and when tidying up things there I discovered it and brought it here.

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Years ago when I was in Inverness I inadvertently absconded with a hand towel from the hotel I stayed at for a few nights.  Fast forward to this weekend and the arrival of a new wall mounted music stand for my studio, and I finally put the towel to good use as a way to dampen any sound bouncing off the new stand.

This change was brought about my that fact that Agent Smith bought a new MacBook Pro and gave me his old Air to replace my 2007 MBP which has served as my studio laptop for a number of years.  It’s so old it cannot run the current version of OS X.  That was ok for a while as it was considered “locked down” to prevent any software updates from mucking with the setup, but over the last year the trade off became less tenable.  Swapping machines wasn’t a clean event though as the older laptop has an IR port which is great when paired with an Apple Remote for starting and stopping a recording.  Plus, with a little piece of an add-on software called Remote Buddy I was even able to handle playback, drop markers and a host of other things.  The MP Air doesn’t have an IR port though, so it really needed to be moved into the booth with me.  The solution for that was handled easily enough:  my old music stand became a shelf for the laptop.  Add to the setup a spare speaker so I can listen through something other than my headphones and wa’la, Studio v2.0 is live.

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Update as of today (10/20/20)

Studio is now basically v2.5.

And now a tiny blip of a break from the day to day stuff…..

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When we first bought this place that is now Purgatory Auto Works and Dinosaur Farm, the domain purgatory.org had been for many years my personal website.  It had seen several incarnations and several blog setups.  The most recent of which was a precursor of this site (stega.org) and the slowly being developed new site networkgirl.org site (more on that soon I promise.)

Stega.org was first splintered off from Purgatory to be a more bloggy blog around 2009 and Purgatory.org was meant to be a photography website.  This was back when I thought I’d leave the world of computer networks and become yet another girl with a camera hocking her photos to pay some bills.  While that idea and site didn’t didn’t linger or have much interesting content, one post from the whole experiment was worth preserving.

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In 2013 my paternal grandmother passed away after a short illness at the tail-end of the long-goodbye that is Alzheimer’s/dementia.  I felt moved to write something and I’m glad I did, as while the church where her funeral took place had been the church she attended regularly for many years, in the almost seventeen years since my grandfather’s passing and her slow decline, the clergy changed and no priest present at the service actually knew my grandmother.  Thus when it came time for the full Catholic funeral mass to take place, the homily the priest chose to give was the rather horrible and very antiquated heaven/hell/purgatory one.  For those not Catholic or knowledgeable about things catholic, this means the priest stood up and said “let’s hope Bernadette did enough good so that she’s in heaven or at least made it to the half-way house of purgatory where she can continue to work towards being allowed into heaven, and oh yes, by the way all you sinners before me, make sure you are good so you don’t end up in hell or purgatory.  

Needless to say it was a pretty dismal service punctuated only by the snickers from my parents, who upon hearing the priest’s lead up to the whole heaven vs hell were only too happy to mutter “dot org” whenever said priest said the word “purgatory.”

Seeing as my father was an only child I am one of only two grandchildren, I had planned ahead and upon arriving at the church I arranged with the clergy that after the homily I would then read (from my iPad) what I had written, and years later I’m still glad I did so. (Even though I was raised catholic, I stopped attending masses years and years ago, as I find any religion just to be a money grab out to exert social control.)

Here is what I read. Remember, I wrote it really really quickly with no time to edit. Sure there are things I would change now, but oh well. At least something better than the whole heaven/hell/purgatory spiel was said.

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Monday, when my mum called at seven in the morning me to tell me the news that my grandmother had died, I was not completely awake, so it took a bit for the news to register–about one latte to be exact.

I find this awkward introduction rather amusing and rather sad. First, because my own mental state upon hearing of my grandmother’s death matched her mental state over the last few years, and secondly, because my mental state at the time mirrored my grandmother’s over the last few years.

And that’s the double edged sword of having a relative with alzheimers, dementia, or whatever else it can be called. As time’s arrow progresses, what starts as forgetfulness, slowly becomes a sense of distracted attention until finally an almost infantile fog descends. Slowly, bit by bit, the person we love seems to slip away, yet somewhere, deep inside something remains, and we see it in brief, but brilliant flashes of recognition.

Since my grandfather, her husband of over fifty-four years passed away, she really had been taking her last, very long goodbye. And for those of us close to my grandmother, it’s hard for us to remember what she was like before she got sick. So, in these past few days while in our own fog that accompanies loss, we’ve been telling each other stories as we seek to reacquaint ourselves with the woman who was a child, a wife, a sister, a mother (a working mother to boot,) a grandmother and even a great grandmother.

So as we say our goodbyes I want to share a few of my memories of my grandma.

I will always remember the kitchen floor where my grandfather taught me to play marbles and I would sit for what seemed like hours while my grandmother cooked or watched her favorite soap opera “The Young and the Restless”–this was back when the Hoff was young and hot.

I remember taking bubble baths and then standing on top of the toilet seat so my tall or “Big” grandma could more easily towel me dry. I think that after raising my father she was quite delighted to have two girls for grandchildren.

I remember many summers when I would stay with them for a week, and my grandmother would set up the hose and sprinkler in the backyard. There are even a few memories of heading to the local public pool where my grandmother still cut a fine figure with her Ann Miller-rivaling legs.

I remember the beautiful white pleated skirt she would often wear when she and my grandfather went out dancing and how that skirt entered family legend when she rescued a stray dog after one evening at the Aragon ballroom. That Luckey dog, who was soon to become my family’s dog, refused to ride in the back seat of the yellow station wagon and would only ride in the front seat that night–thus necessitating a trip to the dry cleaner for that lovely white skirt.

I remember the late night movies I’d try to stay up for when sleeping over; the attic that always had something interesting tucked in a corner, the Avon Catalogs the could be turned into endless mathematical story problems (and the samples she’d save for my sister and I;) and the seemingly endless walk up a dark hill one halloween that just the two of us made when I was only 7 or 8.

So, like Russel in the movie _UP_ said, “It might sound boring, but I think boring stuff is the stuff I remember the most”.

Those are just some of the memories I have and will always have of my grandmother. Hopefully you have many of your own that can tell yourselves and those close to you. Stories about the woman born during the First World War who could play any song she heard on her piano, who loved to laugh, who managed to find a lasting love during war time in the 40s and then raise a fine son and later a good parent in his own right. Or perhaps you’ll just remember Bernadette’s smile, as through all of those almost 97 years, it was the one thing that never failed her. 

Four years ago I tried to setup Skype on a machine and failed miserably. The support was so awful I wrote an entire rant about it.

I’m pleased to note that after reading up on the security issues with Zoom I decided to see if I could reclaim my old Skype account. It seems MS has finally gotten their act together and I was able to easily login and get my account back up and running.

The only sad thing is that I see dead people. Like really truly dead. 🙁

Looking for some daily sources of fun and comfort? I signed up for a couple of mailing lists (gasp!) in the last week and and am super happy with the results.

First off check out explore.org . It’s a huge site devoted to nothing but webcams of animals and nature. From penguins at a zoo to the Aurora Borealis. (zomg I can’t believe I typed that last word perfectly on my first try!)

Also of note is David Byrne’s new site, Reasons to Be Cheerful. The curated site is exactly what it says.

Both mailing lists don’t overspam and emails. Instead every day or two they just sort of jiggle your mind a bit encouraging you go check out a webcam of bald eagle chicks or really good read about a few good things resulting from the current pandemic.

Lastly one other mailing list of note is Small Deeds Done. I’ve been subbed to it since the great orange gibbon event of 2016 and while I don’t often fully read the missives I will occasionally scan through them and see if there some small positive thing I can do during the day.

A PSA of sorts: 

Have you ever shopped on Amazon for something and found a listing for an item that meets your needs but the item may not be available on Prime or the pictures and description are rather basic? You may settle for something that isn’t quite what you wanted but because it’s available on Prime or has a more aesthetically pleasing listing, you go with your second choice.

Stop doing this. Spend a few extra minutes and to some more research on that item you liked more.

Chances are the company may actually be in the US (and who doesn’t like to support small US businesses.).

And chances are also pretty high that said company has lots of product offerings with great images and descriptions on their own website.

Small companies find it cost-prohibitive to list all their products on Amazon and because Amazon has several models for small businesses to list and sell — ranging from sending their products to Amazon for Amazon to then fulfill, to taking orders via Amazon and then fulfilling those order themselves — AND no mater what model a small business choses they pay pretty steep fees to Amazon for every single order placed. 

A great example of this is that I wanted to find a headband for my upcoming trip. I knew the style I wanted but finding it on Amazon proved difficult, until I did exactly what I suggested earlier: I spent a few extra minutes and found the manufacturer’s website for one item on Amazon that looked promising. When I hit up https://www.divebuddyoriginals.com/about I was pleased to find a huge range of items and picked out exactly what I wanted.

Going directly to the company was also cheaper for me than if I’d just picked up the offering from Amazon. I knew about this troubling business model that affects small business because I’d heard all about it from my parents. They too face the same issues with their business Alamarra.com and Amazon. And while I’m quite the Amazon junkie, I’m starting to Amazon more and more as a just a research tool and not as my go to for actually obtaining the things I need. 

As mentioned a while back, I moved over from Aperture to Capture One for my DAM needs.  (Digital Assist Management).  In addition, a year ago I upgraded my Mark II to a Mark IV and jumped from my old 8GB CF cards to 128GB cards.  Mix in the fact that I’ve been working on my camera skills and experimenting with the burst image options while shooting at high shutter speeds and the result is that instead of 100 or so images a month to comb through I now end up with 1000 or so.

This means my DAM workflow had to get a bit of an overhaul.  I’ve spent the last few weeks trying to refine and simplify while also getting ready to move file servers and learning some of the the finer, more powerful points of Capture One .

And on top of all of this, we finally planted a garden outside my window with….a birdbath. 

All of this, compounded by some pretty large projects at the ranch is why photo posting over on stega.org has been on hiatus for the last month, but never fear, posting resumes tomorrow morning!

All my image migrations are complete and a workflow for Capture One has been established.  There was a slight learning curve but now I have lots of new images taken with my new camera body to slowly share here.  

Thus I now return stega.org to its normal posting schedule–starting tomorrow!

Back in October of 2014 Apple announced they were discontinuing development of Aperture.  While they continued to provide some patches and support, I knew I would eventually have to move all my DAM (Digital Asset Management) work to another application and I dreaded this process.  I tried out a few options but was unhappy with every one of them.  It seemed back then my only viable option was to move to Adobe Lightroom and become yet another one of their beholden hostages.

So I waited, and I continued to use Aperture as it continued to do just what I needed when I needed it.  Now I’m not a super photo-effects user.  I have simple DAM requirements.  Intake, sort, rate, warehouse and sometimes publish.  I rarely make edits as I’m one of those crazy people that tries to do most of the work in camera not on computer screen.  Thus my editing boils down to the occasion cropping and even more rare push or pull.

Thus Aperture was wonderful.  In the past year or so I dabbled with testing out Photos as it has the option to suck in my Aperture libraries, but using Photos for serious DAM work always makes me want to vomit.  A combination of the awful UI and the lack of a few key features kept me plodding along with Aperture.

I knew the end would be coming and someday, maybe in fall with the next version of OS X, I’d be unable to use Aperture on my primary machine, so I began taking steps towards migration.  This past winter I cleaned up all my libraries and made sure all images were organized correctly–that little project took me about two weeks working a few hours a day, but once it was done I felt a bit more ready for the inevitable ship jumping that was probably approaching at the end of this year.

That was until I moved from my trusty Canon 5D Mark II to a super shiny and oh so sexy Canon 5D Mark IV.  I also moved from the 8GB CF cards I had used since buying the Mark II to giant 128GB cards. It wasn’t until a few weeks  ago that I started importing images taken with the new body–I usually have quite a backlog to constantly work through–as big cards take longer to fill up.   That was when I was finally forced kicking and crying to find a new option.  The RAW images from the Mark IV–Aperture simply refused to display them. It would handle intake just fine, generate nice previews, but I was unable to actually view the images and attempting to would wipe out the preview and replace it with angry ! instead.   Web searches showed I was not the last of the Aperture holdouts and that others had discovered this issue, and that sadly there would probably never be an update to fix the issue.

So with much trepidation I began to assess my options.  HostageRoom was my last resort as maybe in the two or so years since last poking this hairy beast some other application was now able to fill the Aperture sized hole in my work world.  I tested out the Canon provided software–it’s not actually terrible and is great for intake but one key feature I want is watermarking and it has no easy way to do that.  I popped up GraphicConverter since I own a copy and learned that nope, it cannot handle RAW files, so I started casting my net farther afield and soon found that by searching not for “Aperture alternatives” but for “LightRoom alternatives” there were some updated players in the market.  I tested out DX Optics Pro but it’s not really a useful for workflow.  It’s great if you want to tinker with images and have all your stuff neatly organized, but for simple sorting, rating and publishing it’s meh.  I check out a few other options but several were Windows only and I’m not about to run a virtual system just for workflow.  I then check out PhaseOne’s Media Pro–it was interesting but bloated as I didn’t want all the vid editing/management. (That may indeed change at some point, who knows.)  Then I discovered that PhaseOne makes a lighter version of Media Pro that is just for image work.  CaptureOne, so I downloaded it and started mucking about.  It seemed to have both the DAM capabilities I was after as well as the basic editing needs I wanted.  It can do watermarking as well, so after watching 5 or so min of their introductory video and having to turn it off because the VO was so awful, I began poking about in the menus.  It was then that I found the absolute holy grail of my search.

Under the File menu there is an option to “Import Catalog” and when you mouse over it expands out and one of the options is “Aperture Library”.  I stared at it in disbelief for a good 20 seconds before rushing off to do a web search to verify that this software would do what that menu claimed and actually import my libraries.   Thirty seconds later I had my answer–yes, yes it would.  Since an Aperture Library is mainly a giant mux of XML data, it’s apparently not nearly so difficult as I though it would be to suck that info in and make it work with CaptureOne.

I of course immediately sucked in one of my Aperture Libraries and in 10 minutes or so (some of my libraries reference more than ten thousand images) there it was…my intact library complete with ratings, crops, minor tweaks.  The only thing missing are stacks and I can live without those.

Of course this doesn’t solve the issue of managing my iPhone images, but I’ll survive using Photos for that since that is what that piece of software is good at.  Thus now that I’ve completed the migration (in less than one day no-less) from Aperture to CaptureOne, the last item on my punch list is to now migrate the final library which contains my PhotoStreams into Photos.

So while it is a sad moment since I’m finally saying goodbye to a piece of software I loved, used and depended upon for well over a decade, at least now I have a viable replacement that I may just learn to love too.

You asked why I said “support” various media outlets when it’s just a subscription and here’s my best answer.

By subscribing and paying money for media you are directly supporting the work they do.  The NYTimes, Guardian, Wasthington Post, and Boston Globe, and many other establishments work very hard to provide useful and insightful information to the population of the world.  Most obtain the majority of operating costs via advertising, but by subscribing not only do you get perks like access to their archives and in some cases like Slate’s Prudence column, you get fun things to read ahead of others.  By being a subscriber you are also showing your support of the serious work these news outlets do.  That in itself is way to find your own voice and to better understand the world around you.  

Then there is the added bonus of not having to hear about the world from talking heads.  The days of Cronkite, Rather and Jennings are long gone.  They have been replaced by talking heads that only care about ratings.  Much like Max Headroom, these talking heads serve only to feed you what the sponsors wish for you to know.  Those sponsors are those who also wish to control the state and they do so by donating generously to politicians.  Think I’m crazy?  Take a look at what advertisers show up next time you watch the 6pm local/national news block.  How many of those corporations are donors to politicians?  An easy way to find out is to just do a web search.  Random example: see an advert for Brawny paper towels?  That means the Koch brothers have approved that news station. 

And let us not forget the narrative frame work of the original TV Series Max Headroom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Headroom_(TV_series) “In the future, an oligarchy of television networks rules the world. Even the government functions primarily as a puppet of the network executives, serving mainly to pass laws — such as banning “off” switches on televisions — that protect and consolidate the networks’ power. Television technology has advanced to the point that viewers’ physical movements and thoughts can be monitored through their television sets. Almost all non-television technology has been discontinued or destroyed. The only real check on the power of the networks is Edison Carter, a crusading investigative journalist who regularly exposes the unethical practices of his own employer, and the team of allies both inside and outside the system who assist him in getting his reports to air and protecting him from the forces that wish to silence or kill him.”  

If you get your “news” fed to you by a talking head with heavy rations of adverts at regular intervals you aren’t really engaging and thus you aren’t absorbing useful information.  Sure you may have a vague knowledge that priests in Boston systemically abused young children but you will not know the details of what happened to whom and how it all came to the public’s attention.  (Of course with the Oscars winning documentary _Spot Light_ millions are now aware of the role the Boston Globe played in bringing this very important story to the world’s attention.)  Yet there are many such ground breaking stories that simply cannot be covered by a 30 or 60 second interval–and that is all network news gives us now.  

Then there is the matter of those network news programs.  They are formulaic down to the last detail.  Each story has the same pacing and overall arc.  Something happened, a reporter is on the scene, maybe they cut to an interview with citizen John or Jane, a question is asked and left to linger, more footage of the event is shown and some closing statement is made.  Back in the station the talking head reads a few news items, if it is a two person team they banter back and forth good naturedly.  Then they tell you what is coming up next after the commercial break.  Cut to a few minutes of commercials complete with promos for what is coming up next on the national news.  Then back to the talking heads with perhaps some weather and sports. Finally a human interest story if there’s time or perhaps a serious attempt at investigative journalism—maybe tonight it’s about a slum lord who is being taken to court.  All told though you just spent 30 minutes of your life watching a lot of commercials and learning very little about the world.  You could have picked up a news paper or gone to a news website and spent half that time and come away more informed—and not subjected to 10 minutes of commercials.  

At the end of the day it comes down to a simple question, do you directly benefit from media outlets such as the Boston Globe, Washington Post, NPR and many others?  Yes, yes you do.  Even if you do not read every section of the Sunday Times or you just peruse a copy of The Atlantic, if you read their reporting you become more informed about the world around you.  When you become more informed you yourself are better able to make connections between various points of information instead of relying on talking heads telling you what to think.  When you become more informed you become more selective about what you read and watch.  Case in point, I won’t even go to a clickbait site that tries to entice me with some celebrity gossip story, nor would I ever read an article from the ultra-conservative Washington Times without reminding myself that it is backed by the Unification Church and thus has an agenda of its own.  Thus as you read and become more informed, you understand why nonpartisan, liberal media (using the definition of liberal as “Not limited to or by established, traditional, orthodox, or authoritarian attitudes, views, or dogmas; free from bigotry”) is so important.  Then even if you do not support such institutions directly via subscriptions you understand that the work these journalists do is integral to having a free society.  

We are lucky.  We have some the financial ability to subscribe, so we support the following media outlets:  The New York Times, The New Yorker, Slate, The Atlantic, Rolling Stone, The Washing Post, The Boston Globe, The Guardian, and NPR/PBS.  

—-I wrote this originally to send to my father who found my use of the word “support” instead of subscription jarring.  Much like a guy I met while overnighting up in Sausalito couldn’t get over my use of the word partner to describe my heterosexual conforming relationship in which we have been together for 10 years but are not married.

A few days ago a friend posted a link to a story about the Standing Rock protest site that and how the tribe is working to clean up the mess left behind by the many protesters who have since left.  (http://www.kfyrtv.com/content/news/Cleanup-continues-at-the-Oceti-Sakowin-protest-camp-412609283.html)

I piped up and said I found it interesting that I couldn’t find other non-fox or alt-right sites carrying the story.  Said friend found the original AP story (https://www.yahoo.com/news/cleanup-begins-dakota-access-pipeline-protest-encampment-180743034.html) and I read and compared.  I found it very interesting that both articles talk specifically about how the tribe is dealing with the mess and that one of the contributing factors was and still is the harsh weather.  The AP article was posted 1/31 and it reads logically as straight news, but the Fox one from 2/2, as it is merely a transcript, reads frenetically and makes far less sense.

When I see a post by a friend on FB, I often read the linked article.  I then ask why does the person who shared this think it is worth reading and I look for other sources covering the story.  In this case, all the sites I first found buried the first story and were heavily biased treating the subject mater in a disparaging manner:  effectively also saying “look at these hypocrites.”  Then I found another series of articles reporting that 76 Standing Rock protestors were arrested on Wednesday (2/1) .

Then I started thinking.  Of the two issues: people still protesting the now approved pipeline and being arrest, or the fact that the tribe is handling the cleanup on their own, which is more important in the long term?  Yet, in the case of my friend, which issue was brought to their attention by network surfing habits?  If you haven’t seen/read or heard of the article over at vice.com: https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/big-data-cambridge-analytica-brexit-trump which covers exactly how our media consumption habits serve to strengthen and not challenge our preconceptions you really should.

Then there is the matter of the loaded words that were used when my friend posted the original link.  The keyed in to the derogatory feel of the original article and then when questioned about used the term “left” to disparage main stream media.  This made me sad.

The definition of liberal which is now a synonym for left: (http://www.wordnik.com/words/liberal)

adj. Not limited to or by established, traditional, orthodox, or authoritarian attitudes, views, or dogmas; free from bigotry.

adj. Favoring proposals for reform, open to new ideas for progress, and tolerant of the ideas and behavior of others; broad-minded.

Add to this now the 20 year history of the demonization of mainstream (now considered left) media and the rise of what is essentially the post-truth era where alternative facts abound.  A lot has been written and discussed regarding these, but I’ll just push forward two items regarding them for reading.

First the salient points made in an interview of Charlie Sykes (a “conservative” media member/radio show host) back in August of 2016: https://twitter.com/oliverdarcy/status/764909726278836225
And the NYT op-ed he wrote on the same topic: https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/02/04/opinion/sunday/why-nobody-cares-the-president-is-lying.html

From the later perhaps the best quote is actually a requote:
“The Russian dissident and chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov drew upon long familiarity with that process when he tweeted: “The point of modern propaganda isn’t only to misinform or push an agenda. It is to exhaust your critical thinking, to annihilate truth.”

My take away from the exchange is that everyone should ask themselves is a news story you read really worth commenting upon and sharing?  Regardless whether it is valid and not fake news, how important is said issue in the long view?  How biased is the source you are sharing?  Are you buying into another facet of a propaganda machine designed to divide, exhaust, and conquer?  Are there twenty there more important issues about which you personally care more?

I personally think much of our time would be spent pursuing two things:  first look at a lot of cute cat videos, then go read up on the many view points and stories surrounding say the current immigration ban which deeply affects many people, myself included.  Then after you read and digested as much as you can, share the best article and include your own thoughts on the matter and why you think said article is worth reading. Then go find some more cute animal videos to watch.

It arrived!

I’ve been shooting with a lovely 5D Mark II since 2011 but then I was helping a friend by weighing in on pros and cons of new bodies and I read the reviews on this guy and decided to make the jump.  Bonus–I bought directly from Canon, got a free DM-E1 microphone and 1% of the purchase price went to a charity of my choosing.