Rolling Stone Sucked Long Before This

So Rolling Stone magazine is putting the douche who set off two bombs at the Boston Marathon onto the cover. People are pissed off. My response is, so what? Rolling Stone hasn’t been relevant since the Beatles broke up. You’re going to let a snot rag like this get under your skin? People far worse than this loser have been on the covers of magazines far better. Were there calls to boycott Life when Manson was on the cover? How many magazines have put Bin Laden on the cover? What about Hitler?

Rolling Stone has been garbage for pretty much my entire life. Putting this pathetic piece of trash on the cover does not change that. The cover won’t stop me from buying Rolling Stone. Rolling Stone’s existence is what stops me from buying Rolling Stone. They can publish this completely insulting and tasteless cover if they want. It’s their magazine, there is freedom of the press in our country (much to the dismay of many people who are sympathetic to the Boston Bomber’s cause), if they want to publish crap… let ’em. Just know that they could have a candid paparazzi shot of Jesus Christ himself buying a snickers bar at a 7-11 on the cover and it still wouldn’t change the fact that nothing that magazine does is worth the price of the toilet paper it is printed on.

The two scumbags who set off those bombs are beneath my contempt. Rolling Stone is the perfect piece of shit to share their story. Those piles of crap were meant for each other.

Just my $0.02.

Power Outage

We woke up a few minutes ago to find that our power is out. Bummer. One forgets how much one relies on electricity until one tries to go pee in the dark. Fortunately, iPads, like the one I’m using to write this post, make passable flashlights.

Jerk

Untitled, a photo by robj_1971 on Flickr.

Look at that little squirrel S.O.B. stalking up from the background.

It’s bird seed, not squirrel seed. You dick!

Long Exposure Tests

I took advantage of my new Monday telecommuting day by going to the gym (laugh), going to the store to pick up a loaf of bread, and by pulling into the Methuen Music Hall parking lot to do a couple more long exposure pics of the Spicket River.

This time the plan was to take the same pic multiple times, using different exposure times. First though, my house has central air. The AC was on most of the night. When we woke up today it was pretty chilly inside. Outside, however, it was already pretty muggy. Do the math… cold inside plus muggy outside equals foggy camera lens. Grrr.

Before I could start the experiment though, I had to rush through de-fogging things so that I could grab a picture of our friend the huge ass heron, who was just up river from me. He hung around for quite a while. He’s a good guy (assuming he’s a he and not a she, in which case she’s a good gal).

Next we have the just-when-you-thought-you-knew-what-you-were-doing moment where I forgot that I had the ISO setting up really high from yesterday. Woops.

Now that the silliness was over, I could begin the experiment. First I pointed the camera at the little waterfall and took four pictures. The first was a 30 second exposure.

The second was a 20 second exposure.

The third was a 10 second exposure.

And finally, a 1 second exposure.

Cool! Can you see the differences? Longer exposure means more light entering the lens and hitting the sensor. It also means more pronounced blurring. Shorter exposure means less light and less blurring. You can actually see it! I can’t decide if I prefer the 30 second or the 20 second.

Next I turned the camera down river toward route 28 where the river goes under the road. Again, four pics with four different exposure times.

30 seconds.

20 seconds.

10 seconds.

And finally, one second.

Again, the differences are pretty clear. Can you see the blurred cars on the bridge in the 10 and 20 second pics? I was so focused on the river that I didn’t even think of the road. Pretty cool.

Now that I’ve done this, I need to figure out what to do next. There’s always the Merrimack River, right?

Rodent Fights

Right now there are three squirrels and a rabbit at the bird feeders. The rabbit is staying underneath the small feeder and the squirrels are too, mostly. They occasionally struggle their way up a pole and then spend a minute or so eating. I’ve seen them fall off once or twice, and that pleases me.

Sometimes two squirrels get near each other and they wrestle around a bit. Mostly just jumping and swinging their front paws. The best times are when two squirrels go after the rabbit. They run at it from two directions while the bunny jumps straight up in the air and lands right on top of them. Way to go bunny!

Last night as it was getting dark I saw a different rodent hunting around underneath… A skunk. Oh no, what have I done?

I’m Losing

I’m losing, bad

She’s Trying to Beat Me

So Aggravating

The Whole Bird Watching Thing is Out of Control

I can’t stop. I just want to sit out there and wait for the uncooperative birds to come and visit. There’s only two or three who actually come to the feeder, but that doesn’t stop me.

This chipmunk was almost close enough to pet a couple of times. He’d sneak up next to me, see me looking at him, and then run away like his ass was on fire.

I did get a few birds. Just the regular cast of characters.

As I sat there watching the chipmunks hanging around the ground beneath the feeder, and watching the squirrels stalk around the edge of the yard, and watching the birds stay in the trees where they are no good to me, I decided to increase the options available to our wild kingdom friends. I went to the edge of the trees and got the original ~~squirrel~~ bird feeder. I can hang it on one of the flower poles, but only if I keep it less than about half full. So far so good.

Maybe I’ll get lucky and the squirrels will only climb on one feeder and leave the others alone. I’m dreaming, I know.

After the big feeder was up a couple of birds went to the small feeder. No one acknowledged the big one.

Not long before I was ready to call it an afternoon, I had moved the chair away from the house and faced back up the hill. I caught this guy flying up the street. I think it’s a hawk. It sorta looks like it has a red tail, doesn’t it?