Dog Day

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I went out to photograph an old wood mill in the north valley, and as I got to the top of a rail spur there was a dog gnawing on an old carcass. He was so involved at first that he didn’t notice me. After a few shots, he heard the shutter in my camera and looked up. He was standing his ground and then started coming sideways towards me half snarling and licking his chops. I didn’t push my luck by trying to cross the dog’s path to get down where I could get better shots of the buildings. I got a few shots of the mill from standing on the rail spur and then a shot toward the mountains as I walked back to the car. I presume the dog went back to gnawing the carcass.

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Rail Yard Cats

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Merry Christmas! You have probably heard of “junkyard dogs” — rail yards have cats. I stopped by the yard where the Santa Fe 292 locomotive is being restored, and there were lots of cats in the rail yard. Most of the cats hid when they saw me approaching the fence —  one cross-eyed kitty was curious, two sat at opposite ends of an old loading dock, while two others watched me from the safety of a stack of railroad ties.

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So Much for the Opera

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I had to do major sneaking to get this photograph of the cutaway model of the opera in Paris. It was in a museum that strictly forbid photos, and there were guards everywhere to remind people not to take photos. First I had to wait for a break in the hordes of tourists marveling at the model, then I had to wait for the guard to get up and walk out of earshot of my shutter before I could sneak a pic. It took several tries over three different visits to the museum before I got a successful stealth photo of the model. One reason I wanted a photo of this model is because the box seats on the end of the first row of box seats was the box we sat in when we went to an opera at the end of May. The apartment we rented in Paris was a block from the Opera. The second photo was taken from the middle of the street by the apartment and the third photo is looking the other way toward the Louvre at the bottom of the street.

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Permanent Vacation

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Café Giuseppe has had a sign on the door for the past five weeks telling its customers that they are on vacation for a week. Turns our their week off has turned into a permanent vacation, and Café Giuseppe will not reopen according to its owners. I don’t know if it was malicious vandals or an irate customer who broke the window yesterday.

Umbrellas

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The only umbrellas I own go on my flashes. They work great for dispersing light, but they are not much good for keeping rain off me. I’ve never found a need for a rain repelling umbrella in our arid climate, and, besides, in New Mexico, I believe an umbrella acts more as a lightning rod that a cover to keep you dry. France is another story, you really need to have an umbrella in France, and, fortunately, Sophie lent us umbrellas when we where in Aix, and there was one in the apartment that we rented in Paris.

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Spooky Side of Aix

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We walked around Aix in the rain all day on May 18th. The wet, gray weather added to the erie starkness of the old Castaño trees lining the edge of a park. Death followed a poor soul through the streets, and the moonlight in the clearing night sky lit an ancient church on our walk home late in the night. Aix-en-Provence, May 18, 2013.

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