At 5:18 am Wednesday morning, I should be able to see and photograph the Super Flower Blood Moon, which will be a full lunar eclipse. We have had two days and one night of crystal clear skies. The forecast is for clear skies tomorrow, but clouds on Wednesday. The big question is will the sky be clear between 2:47 am when the eclipse begins, and 6:02 am when the moon sets on Wednesday morning? We’ll see. In the meantime, I present you with our first fully bloomed Peony and the moon at 97.7% full.
Click on the galleries to see the photos enlarged in slide shows.
I was going to buy a ultra-wide-angle lens for my Fuji XE-1 that I used to use as a carry camera. But the 10-24mm zoom lens is quite large, which makes it not as desirable to carry when I’m also carrying the Bazooka on a 7D Mark II body, and the 70-200mm zoom lens a 5Ds body. I have been using my iPhone XE for all street photography and wide-angle photos, stitching together panoramas for ultra-wide-angle shots. I finally decided that since an iPhone 12 Mini was the same price as a Fuji 10-24mm lens, I might as well upgrade my iPhone to the iPhone 12 Mini. The 12 Mini is the same form factor as the old iPhone 5, which is my favorite style of iPhone case, and the camera has wide-angle and super-wide-angle. The iPhone 12 Pro has telephoto, also, but I have the Bazooka and the iPhone 12 is bigger than I like.
What’s really nice with the iPhone 12 Mini is the “Portrait” setting works for any abject or critter as you can see in the photos of the kitties and the America Rose above. The “Portrait” setting on my iPhone SE only worked on human faces. When I tried using it on the cats, or anything else, it said “No faces recognized” and would not take a photo. I’m really happy with the camera on the iPhone 12 Mini.
Not a cloud in the sky at sunset. The ultra-wide-angle setting is 120º field of view.
Tangle Heart Tree under a clear blue sky in the early morning light. Sandias and Rio Grande in the early morning light (iPhone SE). The moon at sunset shot with the Bazooka 400mm lens.
All photos below were shot with the Bazooka 400mm lens on a Canon 7D Mark II body.
For the birds.
Snowy Egret in the clear water ditch.
Cormorant flyby
Tiny butterfly.
Mama Owl, Sleepy, Mona Lisa and Major Tom Peepers. Mama, Mona Lisa and Major Tom were in a tree between the irrigation ditch and the clear water ditch. Sleepy was still in the tree with the nest. I think he will probably fly over to the tree with the other owls tonight.
No sunset, no moon, I couldn’t check on the owls. Rain, much needed rain, kept me inside to post photos of roses. The first Dr. Huey in the above photo. Julie’s giant Dr. Huey is only thinking about blooming. After it blooms we will have our 7th annual Dr. Huey tour.
Fourth of July with a Grasshopperlette.
I posted this one last week when it only had 5 roses in bloom.
Bazzoka’s first beavers. It was dark so they are not super clear. the one on the right looks like a bear.
Bazooka’s first swallow. Swallow are faster and more erratic flyers than bats.
I finished recording a new original song on Sunday. Gabriela at Short Prose Blog, asked me if I was going to send her a poem, so I sent here Canonical Day, and told I had been working on the music. She wanted the song also, but didn’t say for what reason in her replies. Now that I have the computer I use for recording back, I checked to see where I was on the song. I had gotten the “Ticktock” sound for the clock created and that was it. I spent most of Sunday recording and assembling tracks. Tonight I added a little bit of synth to the recording after Marina mentioned she would probably add synthesizer. I had done a lead guitar track, but decided it detracted too much and took it out. The synth I added is subtle and it seems to work.
In case you don’t know what a Canonical Day is, it’s the liturgical hours of the day defined as follows:
Vigil – eighth hour of night: 2 a.m. Matins – a later portion of Vigil, from 3 a.m. to dawn. Lauds – dawn; approximately 5 a.m., but varies seasonally. Prime – early morning, the first hour of daylight, approximately 6 a.m. Terce – third hour, 9 a.m. Sext – sixth hour, noon. Nones – ninth hour, 3 p.m. Vespers – sunset, approximately 6 p.m. Compline – end of the day before retiring, approximately 7 p.m.
The poem came to me while I was listening to a lecture on theology. I was thinking, while monks get up at Vigil or Matins to pray, I get up at Matins to pee in a nightly Vigil after the kitties have stomped across my bladder. That gave me the idea to write a poem using the Canonical Hours based on a general day in a life. The poem has one or two Canonical Hours per verse, or perverse, depending on how one wants to look at it. After I got the verses down, I decided to add choruses and make a song out it.
I’m happy I took the time to record the song on Sunday as Gabriela has good intentions for both the poem and the song.
Canonical Day By Timothy Price
Bombed at Vigil kitties in the night Matins listens Owls Hoot under moon’s light
Lauds wakens Dawn Throw off covers Spread colors Reds, pinks, yellows Tugs on sun lights blue skies
Primetime rise Face another day Lost in ironic phases Teeth comb hair Sad and pretty faces
[Chorus] Sacred routines never fail Hundreds, ten, thousand times Begins each day a blessed right Immortality of the whole
[RAP] Terce it all coffee’s cold Virtual whistles blow Tap on keys, boxes packed, Phone music Plays on hold
Sext at last Satisfies Food fantasy Peanut butter tofu chicken Thirty minutes of ecstasy
Nones dear coffee’s cold Eyelids weigh a tonne Ninth hour sleepy time For Heaven’s sake stay awake
[Chorus] Sacred ways never fail Hundreds, ten, thousand times As each day goes by some insane Immortality of the whole
Vapors rise at vespers Dinners hot-cold served Debates circles tables World made right For an instance
Compline pulls on covers Sun tucked in welcomes night Bedtime lost videos play Medianoche greets another day
[Chorus] Sacred darkness never fails Hundreds, ten, thousand times Conjures spirits Ether Immortality of the whole
Spunk @ Compline
As a dry and dusty storm blew in this afternoon, the temperature dropped from 82ºF to 59ºF from one hour to the next. The sun managed to throw a slight bit of red on the clouds at the horizon as a last hurrah before slipping into to its sunny slumber.
The moon got a sepia tone from the thin layer of clouds catching what color they could from the setting sun.
Off Center & Not Even 