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Hey folks HOLD ON AND ENJOY WHAT EVER WEATHER YOU GOT– just talked to my friends on Drummond Island  — they are having a real warm spell — up to almost 30 degrees.  Took off their hat and gloves and said “WOW what a warm day!”

Now folks, think about Sunday here in Florida — may not make it to 60 degrees.  I plan to put on my hat and gloves — maybe even long-jons for my golf game -or- is it a tour of the cow pasture as I call it (the 18 hole one).

Boy are we wimps, or what?  But, I am not the only wimp around. “There are gators, birds, eagles, ospreys, frogs, skinks, — all kinds of animals that say No No NO to the cold.

Actually, I think enjoying the tour of the golf course is half the game — (Is that why they call it being on tour?) —  Being around animals and nature is a good reason to play golf.  I fear I drive my golf partner crazy by taking photos and thinking of things other then the game — I should focus on the game.  Cause, what I hear when I am taking the second tee shot, after the first one went into the lake, “NOW, JUST FOCUS!”

Here are a few photo shots from one or two recent trips from my house and around 18 holes of my cow pasture — and on my return to see the sunset!

Two of the shots were taken last year in the cow pasture.  I put them in this blog because I hope you relate to  the one duck that is out-of-step — doing it’s own thing.  Of course the ball outside the hiding tortoise or turtle was a plant by one of us! I put it in this blog to demonstrate the seriousness of my game.

 Hold on tight — enjoy the ride, the weather, and your tour through life!

Was yesterday a great day or what?  Was it a WOW?   … Hey, I am not selling anything   — Just thinking!

If not a WOW day, ask why? Would a stroll in nature help — maybe a pet stroll?  Not selling the idea — Only thinking!

NAP is Nature and Pets of course! I am not sure what defines a pet — does a human have to own it or can the human just see it from time to time?

I have been writing about, what I think, is an increase in animals in the the citified areas or not-so-rural places to live.   I think some of us really appreciate animals but take them for granted — we assume that they will just be there. Sort of like wall paper or art (pictures) hanging on the wall.

Can this casual wallpaper relationship make all of these animals our pets and all we have to do is to donate $ or pay taxes to the nature and wildlife arms of our governments.  No poop pick-up for us!

Years ago, in the country everyone had dogs and cats around the house — sometimes just to control vermin and provide protection from whatever?  and before that — way back — only 100 years or so  ago — most people moved about upon or behind a horse!  Today we do not need the horse — or dogs or cats to control vermin – the motorized contraptions take us anywhere we want to go and there are  other ways of purchasing protection from vermin and whatever.  So, I began to wonder, what role do animals play in our individual lives — are we a society of “Haves” and “Have Nots” .–  The “Haves” are the ones  who know or think they know what role animal pets play?

This is the first time in my many years of recent life, that I have not had Jim’s daily animal responsibility  — and I think I am really impacted by that.  I know that in a few months I will go back to horse responsibility — but for these months now, MY dog and MY horse are taken care of by others.  So, I am like an in-between language — I  am an in-between “have” and “have-not” pet person.

So, if you do not mind, please “reply” to this blog with your thoughts — Did you help spend the 50 Billion estimated below? Is it of value it to you — Do you enjoy the pets of others?  Do you enjoy the animals in the wild (animals out in nature).    Or ,is it better to not spend money and tax dollars on non-human creatures?

According to the American Pet Products Association,  we in the USA, spent over 50 billion dollars on pets last year.

And, according to them, this many MILLIONS of households had animals:

Bird                              5.7
Cat                               38.9
Dog                              46.3
Equine                          2.4
Freshwater Fish            11.9
Saltwater Fish               0.7
Reptile                          4.6
Small Animal                 5.0

That does not include cows, llamas, emus  — all of which,were at one time or other, a part of my “Haves”   So, I expect we could add numerous rows to the above chart!Now, I am not a real “dog in my face” sort of person —  But, I think these faces tell a story about the value of the $50 billion spent by  the “Haves” caught with their pets at an SPCA public fun-raiser event  So, I bet you can add a lot of donated $ to the 50 Billion spent:   Adios

I grew in a part of Pennsylvania that was in the mountains that had woods that were many square miles in size bordered with farms and very small villages.  Most men spent most of their days outside working, fishing, hunting   —  It was a very special event to see up close a deer, an eagle, a wild turkey, a wild goose, a coyote, a family of newly hatched ducks.  Elsewhere, around the world,  alligators and wolves were on the endangered list. Polar bears were only seen in pages of the National Geographic.

BUT now, it seems we are over-run with deer — just this week I did or could have photographed from my not-so-rural Florida home  – deer, hawks, eagles, alligators, bob cat, wild turkeys, and wild pigs  and never walked more then 20 minutes from the house.  I saw a news cast of polar bear photo vacation tours in Churchill, Canada within the price range of many vacations that my neighbors take every year.  In Michigan every summer there are wild goose families in my front lawn eating grass along with duck families, and deer families.  It is not real special to see a coyotes, a moose, or bear (some say wolves). It is fun to actually see this real “natural art form” — that we used to see only through photos art and “stuffed animals” in museums  and magazinesLast week – 20 minute walk 

Why do you think this increase in the opportunities to view the beauty of nature has happened?  — is it more tax dollars, hunting permit dollars, animals squeezed into smaller areas due to development, more disposable income and time to allot to this natural “art-form”, awareness of the beauty of nature, the realization 50 ago that we humans really could destroy our nature environment and we did stuff to fix it!!!   Anyway, I sure enjoy the having this natural “art form” around where I live!20 feet from the house  

10 minute walk from house Osprey building nest

From back door this AM

 What ya’all think? Tell me.

I am not an artist or photographer …but…I am always thinking of the story the photo might tell!  Hey, at least 3 of the ads, I think, related to my previous blog pages:

1.   I told you it is MY dog when it breaks into the cupboard  for a box of cereal. I loved the Dorito goat — MY goat!  Love MY goat (dog)!

2.   I showed you that a smile on a face at the right time communicates.  In the Audi ad, did the black eye on the young man’s face communicated that his courage and confidence came from driving the Audi and he loved it.  At least Audi bet 4 million $ to communicate that — Love MY Audi!

3.   I saw the Clydsdale running to the trainer — communication of successful training — well, I am just a wannabe — don’t think this shaggy horse would come to me like that unless, of course, I was handing out horse cookies .. But ..Love MY horse anyway!

That makes me think about things  —   women having the right to fight  — Really, by putting them into battle, that is saying they have the right to kill other people. I guess that is not so strange — but, I do not like it in our species.

The animal species is different. — Think, now …..In the animal world it is a war zone — and animals have the right to kill other animals equal to and further down the  up the food chain— why?  Like my horse — food is important  ….   food and to assure reproduction of the species  …..   really for the right to eat and the right to make love.

In the last couple of days I got these pictures on our golf course in late afternoon — and I thought about that poor bunny and what  SHE had to do just to make sure her babies had food (milk) that night and and make sure that she was still around to meet her buck to assure the reproduction of yet another bunch of babies ( a bunch of bunnies is called a herd and babies are called kits, mom is a doe, and pop is a buck) — ’cause I bet not too many of the current herd of kits will be around to have their own kits and enjoy the nice green fairway grass  — gators, hawks, bobcats, snakes all gotta eat!   Did the montage below communicate —- bunny needs to keep a watchful eye just to eat and make love in yet another day?

Take note of the hawks — 1minute prior to that photo, he flew in and did not land on the wire — but landed in such a way to assure reproduction — it did not take long for that quickie — and just look at their faces  He is as proud as the black eyed audi kid and she might be saying  — “I better get my feathers back in place — they look a little disheveled.”   And she got them in place by gyrating her body a little like Beyonce on the half-time stage at the SuperBowl.  (Click on the photo to enlarge it.) 

I think this bull is saying “Stay away from my food and my women!”  Adios!!

In-between language can be with a picture and not with words  — 4 xample:

Is that communicating with out words?- that is the language of animals – dogs, horses, etc. They do not use words.  See you can be an animal trainer –oops I mean communicator!

Hey all you Nerds — What is HDR: Found that term in the 360 pages of the instruction manual to my new camera.

From the on-line dictionary:

High Dynamic Range Imaging (HDRI or HDR) is a set of methods used in imaging and photography to allow a greater dynamic range between the lightest and darkest areas of an image than current standard digital imaging methods or photographic methods. HDR images can represent more accurately the range of intensity levels found in real scenes, from direct sunlight to faint starlight, and is often captured by way of a plurality of differently exposed pictures of the same subject matter.

Hope that was fun to read and you understood it all! Much of it is written in the in-between language —- most smart phones and new simple point and shoot cameras do HDR automatically with out you knowing it.

In Jim language HDR is: The camera automatically takes 3 copies of the same picture (U thought it only took 1 like in the old fashion days of last year), uses its internal computer to smash the 3 together to make a better photo then it ever could have with only one photo like in the old fashion days of last year.  Here is an example — see the three small photos on the bottom and the camera produced photo on top.

Now the twisted language of my daughter —

This dog is my dog when she breaks into the cupboard and eats a box of cereal. Translation — “See what YOUR dog did”  She is my dog when she rolls in a rotten dead fish by the lake. Translation — “YAK! Get YOUR dog out of the house – go give her a bath”  BUT in the winter when she has no dead fish to roll in she is my daughters  dog. Translation — “Oh what a pretty puppy I have — come into the house and I will give you a cookie — I love you, MY pretty puppy!”-– Is that twisted or what!  BTW due to high contrast in light — this photo should have been taken with HDR turned on!

  See Ya!     BIG, CMIIW,  A pair of pants is only 1 pant — correct?

Translation — Before I go, correct me if I’m wrong,  A pair of pants is only 1 pant — correct? I do not have to pay for two pair do I?  Is that 4 of pants? Hay, who is on first? or is it Hey?

 I just added this singer because I was about to do some house work and that is when I turn on the music channel.  They say that listening to music is one of the best ways to make you happy.  Can you vision iPod in ear, and me  dancing around the house with broom in hand?

BUT only if we are modern enough to load up the ipad, iphone, ipod, android and we have  3G or 4G, or can find pandora, or XXXX. or connect to dish, or wifi, or utube, or the cable.

What LANGUAGE is that last paragraph all about?  I know,  It is the new in-between language.  In-between english and tech nerds.

Change is fun for us older folks.  I love it.  Life would be boring if we did not have all this new stuff!  Love it But i think I may be loosing ground.

For example, This month I decided to purchase a new camera to replace the stolen SRL — you know what an SRL is and why it is better then a Point and Shoot with a 3″ elections led window.  Hey, Grandpa explain all of that to me.

Anyway I got a point and shoot.  Just point the camera at all those faces standing together at a family gathering — and, wow you have a picture to give everyone a copy.  But only, after you download via a USB cable or wirelessly, or via bluetooth then upload via photo-stream to  icloud, or yahoo, or google, so that family members can down load via photo stream to their iphone or their android.  Sure hope they paid extra so their DSL is fast enough to stay with in their shared minutes!  So I will text the family members that have not “unfriended” me  that the photos are waiting for them on google.

Oh, by the way last night I decided to down load the instruction manual for my new simple point and shoot — 360  pages of pure technical jargon:  Why, Just on page one I found these terms: Fn(Func)button, GPS antenna, USB/Audio connector, HDMI mini Type C connector, optional AC adapter, AF-assist illuminator, Diopter adjustment control, DISP button, AE/AF-L indicator.  That is a lot of instruction pages for a simple point and shoot camera!

If I study 10 pages per day that is over a month. But,  I have many other things to do  — So, maybe I can only study one page per day — That is one year to learn my new camera — which has a technical life if 18 months — then it will be obsolete and I get to start over!

Anyway I must  text family  — maybe I best learn some new text words:  Found on the web 36 pages of “texting words” at 25 per page = 900 “texting words”– Just for fun and practice,  I will try to make a “text sentence” now: JML I will FEAR 2 hit PB.

The translation : “Just My Luck, I will Forget Everything And Run to hit Panic Button.

Forget the PB – my Muz (music) got me dancing  again”!

But, I am so busy learning the in-BETW (in-between) language I have given up on sleeping! AAMOF (as a matter of fact) I feel today like I did this yesterday! When that  happens I find a couple of my old nature photos and enjoy them: (U can clk to enlarge photo )

L is for language!

Training dogs and horses has been a fun pass-time of mine for years.  But, I think I have been miss-naming that pass-time.  It is communicating, not, training that I do!

In order for communication to happen, we must either learn each others language or develop together an in-between language.  It is my thinking that by using a jointly developed in-between language we can better form a fun team.

As you can see from the photo above, dogs communicate with their noses a lot. I do not plan to stick my nose where I often see dog sticking theirs when they greet each other!!! So when I say in-between, I do not mean in-between there!!!

Enough of that — but, “that” made me think about how we humans have many in-between languages. For example; think about these local phrases that are clearly understood — only by local folks who developed these in-between phrases  — people from places that I have lived:

1. Are they running wild today?  On Drummond Island that means “Are the ferry boats running back to the Island (or mainland) just as soon as they unload instead of running on the hourly schedule?  They do this when traffic is heavy like on Jeep Week-End. You know what Jeep Week-end is do you not?

2. Red up your room before you go. In PA Dutch farm country that would mean “Red up your —   OOPS      It would mean “Clean up your room before you go — go where —outside. of course.

3. How many points did you get last night?  In Texas ranch country that would mean “How many tenths of an inch of rain did you get last night.” (All ranchers have numerous rain-gages on various fence posts.)

4. When are you leaving? In Florida that would mean “when are you getting into your motorhome and driving to your northern home for the summer.”

5. How much are you charging for race week? On Block Island that would mean how many dollars are you going to charge the sailboat racing crews who rent your summer home during race week which is the second week of june?

6. Exit 136.  If you ask a person from NJ where they lived, they would not name the town they lived in — they would just say the exit number on the Garden State Parkway that is near their home. For example: Exit 136.

7. I saw a bale of them today.
 At the Nature Center that would mean I saw a stack or collection of turtles. Not a herd or flock of turtles, but a bale of turtlers.

Did you understand me?  Good, I am glad!

 I sure am glad to be on this page with you today!

You should be able to see 3 “posts” (3 pages)by scrolling down. You can bring up old pages (Posts) by clicking on “Older Posts” or ‘More post” or something like that at the bottom of the your scroll.

“Love of beauty is taste. The creation of beauty is art. “
Ralph Waldo Emerson
A couple posts ago I said the beauty of art and photos is in the eye of the beholder. Well I want to show you some photos  I enjoyed!   I must have taste because I did not create them these scenes — God did.

Take note of reflections, yellow flower, red/yellow of beak, the eye in sea of dark feathers… See beauty in bad…  bad invasive Pepper Plant!  Nice red in background of green —

Good — looks like some animal ate bad Pepper seeds — fewer to grow and invade! Not much to say about this pattern  — it is free — would cost $ to get an oil artist to decorate a wall with a painting of grass like this — outside it is free for the looking.. I like it.

All these photos were take at a Titusville sewage treatment plant.

On my way .. Got much to do before happy hour!

Sorry, I have been busy for the last 4 or 5 days.   So, the Daily was less often!

I have been a Volunteer at the Florida Birding and Wildlife Festival. I am not a birder or a wildlife naturalist — But I enjoy being outdoors — looking  — listening — thinking about what the animals are doing or saying — but, I also like to watch and enjoy those people  that are passionate about birds and wildlife — and yes, even those that are passionate about  making money from those that enjoy  birds and wildlife — there is a lot of equipment required for any hobby and birding is near the top of that list of expensive hobbies.    — and I can tell you some of those stock photos that you see on cards, magazine covers, promotional posters, and motivational litature are not from birds in the wild — they are staged!  If you are a commercial photographer of stock photos you have to pay big $ to get a bird keeper to put his bird “rock stars” on display for you to photograph — also, for any adventurer, there are many tour companies can take you to any remote corner of the world to photograph birds and wildlife.  I am considering a photo trip on horseback to Yellowstone. Been saving my pennies!

Rather then tell you of the Florida Festival  — let me just show some photos taken there!

 THE EARLY BIRD PHOTOGRAPHER CATCHES THE BIRD —  IN THE MORNING MIST:BIG GUNS:

 GREAT LANDING – I AM PROUD OF MYSELF:

 HOLD ON TIGHT — BIG WIND: I AM MAD – IT IS LUNCH TIME AND HERE I AM POSING FOR THOSE PAPARAZZI? RED ON YELLOW KILL A FELLOW – RED ON BLACK VENOM LACK: I AM BEAUTIFUL — NOW I POSE:  I AM BEAUTIFUL — NOW I POSE:  I AM BEAUTIFUL — NOW I POSE:   I AM BEAUTIFUL — NOW I POSE:  WE LEARN, SHOOT — ALWAYS SOMEONE STICKS OUT BEHIND!: WE LEARN, SHOOT — ALWAYS SOMEONE STICKS OUT BEHIND!: 
 I GET TIRED WAITING FOR THEM TO MOVE ON: WE ADVERTISE WHERE WE HAVE BEEN:   I Am AN OWL OF THE NIGHT — I AM STILL HALF ASLEEP: SO, I SAY GOOD NIGHT TOO!  —  Adios  

RIGHT TO FIGHT — Is it right for you? — Is it right for others?  How the hell do I know what is right for others — I never walked a life-time in their shoes! So I will not suggest that I know if women should fight — I guess, only they know how they feel about it.  — I know the NRA should be happy — It gives women the right to bear arms if they want to!

So, I chose some pictures to help you think about how easy it is for you to really feel as other do.  For me it is very hard to feel as others do.  And, to want to fight as hard as some of them do.

Do you get joy from performing in front of a crowd and depending on the horse that you trained.  This lady does. She fought to get to this position in her career – world know in the equine community. She had the right to fight and get there. And she did.

Young girl with pet — Does she look like a fighter now — Does she know how she will feel about the right to fight in fifteen years?

Hey, at 20 some years old, this pilot  controls this big gun and knows that the boss said “Go get them, and do not let them get you!”  And the girls back at the base will be waiting for him — Oops, I was thinking of an old John Wayne  movie where the pilot was, by default, a man. At seventy some years old, it is hard to think the pilot and I have the same passion about the right to fight when I wake up in the morning.

What, me fight?  This “she” toad does it every day just to eat  — And some bugs loose that battle.

Right To Fight  — I kind of think we were all born with that right — Ask the toad, Ask any mother of a one week old child  — Crying is a way of fighting the peace and quite of the new mother!

And, we all know that “Hell has no fury like a woman scorned!”  That is an in-born right! And, I am sure God made it that way to help keep us men in line!  We win!!!

Gee, Hope you liked my photos!