With the thought that my iPhone is my most often used camera I’ve decided to go big and upgrade from iPhone 11 to iPhone 13 Pro Max. Yesterday I ordered a blue one. I may even also sell my underused iPad and Pencil to help fund it. I hope the camera’s worth it!
Canada geese flying at dusk.
Another thing I keep forgetting how to do: How to Save Voice Memos on the Mac as Audio Files:
[drag the voice memo from the left column of the interface] onto the Mac desktop
This Grey Warbler, Riroriro was singing in the Levin dog park today.
I quite like cheese, but just in a casual way. I’m surprised at how interested I am by this excellent 45 minute long video. I’m watching in 5 minute ‘bites’: How to Cut & Serve Every Different Kind of Cheese.
In the last couple of weeks we’ve had a load of rain (even more in the hills), gales and some high seas. This has cut off the access for vehicles to our beach — a sudden 2 metre drop into water. We blocked access with a nearby picnic table. Now the Council have added ‘fences’.
At nearly 15 Oshi now seems to consider himself able to come home alone from the beach. 🐶 The only problem was he forgot to tell me that’s what he was doing… 🥵
Cool, I was hoping for a new Apple Watch. The cycling workout features in Series 7 and other features are very appealing. I’ll be upgrading from my Series 5. 😀 Deb still has a Series 2. I’ll be encouraging her to upgrade too.
Action at the bird feeder. Sparrows and Waxeyes. 🐦
Who knew sparrows had tongues!!!
We really enjoyed the movie Happiest Season 🏳️🌈:
the film follows a woman who struggles to come out to her conservative parents while she and her girlfriend visit them during Christmas.
the film is a semi-autobiographical take on [Duvall’s] own experiences with her family.
I need to remember this: Not to capture but to create
— The Power of Abbreviation in Photography:
A tutorial on why you should abbreviate your scenes and invite your viewer to fill in the blanks and imagine the rest of the story.
We’ve had 20mm rain today down here at Waikawa Beach at the coast. I imagine that up in the hills there’s been a great deal more. There’s a lot of water about in the paddocks and on the sides of the road.
The river is very full and flowing fairly strongly.
There are only about 150-200 Kotuku, White herons in Aotearoa New Zealand and they are rarely seen beyond their breeding ground on the South Island. Miraculously there has been one at Waikawa Beach for a couple of days. Today I took photos of this magnificent bird.
On a shop window we passed last night — no clothing? 😳
Happy that one of my favourite podcasts is back from summer break: Quirks & Quarks with Bob McDonald | CBC Radio:
presents the people behind the latest in science … also examines political, social, environmental and ethical implications of developments in science and tech.
When I was a kid Aotearoa New Zealand had 3 million people and 60 million sheep. Now we have 5 million people and dairying has replaced most of the sheep farms. A neighbour has 4 or 5 sheep on his property though. 🐑
I’m on a quest to take photos of all the birds we see round here. 🐦 I’m also longing for the rather costly 100-400mm zoom lens, but actually have a 50-230 — some birds I just can’t get closer to.
Success today with the Eurasian skylark which flies up to 100 metres high.
I was down at the lakes today, bracing against strong wind gusts, trying to get photos of the Australian Shovelers on the other side of the water. A couple of Mallard ducks flew off and I happened to get a decent shot of them in flight! 🐦
These photos stretch my 50-230mm lens.
Such a sad tale: The Scam | Loading Docs 2021 | The Spinoff - YouTube:
The ultimate scam lures an elderly beekeeper around the world, from Greymouth to São Paulo, in this wild true crime tale.
A trusting guy with cognitive impairments lost all his money to scammers. 15 minutes.
I drove to Raumati South and biked along Te Ara o Whareroa – Paekākāriki.NZ
Te Ara o Whareroa is mostly flat with a nice, flowing sealed track hugging the inland edge of the Queen Elizabeth Park sand dunes.
A very enjoyable 12 Km return ride. Great scenery and no cars! 🚴🏼♀️
Experimenting with my camera. I saw part of the mountains lit while the rest was dark. This may have used the Acros film simulation. [Doesn’t pay to be feeding dogs, cooking and eating dinner, retrieving runaway dog between taking the shot and being able to look at it…]
