A&A family, photos and art: September 2005

Photos: Otter & Egret

I took a swing through the local wetland refuge this morning after doing my family taxi duty. I noticed some ripples in the water along the road so I got out thinking it was a duck or something. What at first looked like a nutria (our local invasive ROUS) turned out to be a pair of otters. They tried to sneak under the road via a water drain tube, but I was there when they popped out. Boy, did they take off after that, swimming below the surface for many yards.

Then, just down the road were a pair of egrets. I noticed one of the birds caught something and managed to get a few shots including the one below. I think it found a vole, which it took over the to water and repeatedly dunked before swallowing. I guess rodents must washed before eating ... Yummy.

ART: When Aliens Attack

Redder Owpost (18"x24") Acryllic paint and mixed media. NFS. Something I did a few weeks ago as a silly creative outlet. Don't ask.

FUNNY: Are you female (was male)

Oh god this is funny. Imagine setting up a "sexy babe" IM profile on skype and then routing all the callers to eachother? Well, you can read a random log here. NSFW (not safe for work). The program also filters out common give away words like "male" to "female" and "name" to "hobby" for even more confused fun.

Where was that fine line between tradegy and comedy again?

Redwood Camping

This past weekend we went camping yet again. This time to the giant redwoods of northern California. The kids spent most of our excursions climbing stumps and running along huge logs. The shot below was due to dust from all this activity and the right angle of sunlight.

And down by the river we discovered all sorts of creatures in pools and under rocks. Including three differnt baby garder snakes, which didn't really enjoy being picked up. I also found the secret to photographing wild animals was to let the kids hold them first, then they tend to stay still from the trauma.

damselfly naiad

Frog and Garder Snake

Fungus on a wood fence near Elk Meadows.

Then on the last full day was a trip to Fern Canyon, an incredible place of vertical walls covered with ferns. As seen in Jurassic Park 2 and BBC's Walking With Dinosaurs series. Luckly it's a bit difficut to get there so it won't be swamped with people.