Boo!

Because today is Halloween, I'm not posting a television program cover. Instead, you get my one and only Halloween decoration: a ceramic jack-o-lantern lit by a tea light. We do have a black cat around here somewhere, probably snoozing in his bed.

I found this in 2009 at a Walmart in the US for 50 cents in a post-Halloween clearance sale.

Six years ago, in 2009, I was visiting my friends L&L in upstate New York and we went to a neighborhood Halloween party dressed as New York Yankees (or Yankee fans, anyway). The World Series was going on at the same time and the Yankees won it all. Here we are, just before the party:

The was the first time in decades, and the last time since, that I dressed up for Halloween. We had a great time!

Halloween is not a popular holiday in France, although some places do give it a try. The big holiday is tomorrow: All Saints Day. Schools have been on vacation for the past two weeks and the day is normally a day off from work, except that this year it falls on a Sunday. Them's the breaks.

Friday fifties

A shortcut to mushrooms? This image might have worked better with the macro lens, but I wasn't carrying it at the time. Still, it's not bad with the 50mm. There is a particular path that Callie and I like to take on our afternoon walks that runs down the hill through some woods. It's very shaded and often damp this time of year, and there are many fallen trees and stumps where mosses grow and mushrooms proliferate.

Very small fungus in the moss, 50mm f/6.3, 1/80s, ISO 6400.

These are certainly not edible mushrooms, at least I don't think they are. I will not attempt to find out. They are very tiny. But, as I read somewhere at sometime, all mushrooms are edible. Once.

The moles are back

I'm not sure they ever left. But they are certainly active. These are fresh mole hills. I know because the previous mole hills were removed before I cut the grass last week. And I will have to remove these before I can cut again, and it looks like I may need to cut again over the next couple of weeks. We're having relatively warm days and it's been raining. The grass is growing.

The moles' handiwork in the back yard.

And that's not all. There are mice in the pantry. They haven't done any harm, yet, but they're burrowing in the sandy floor and leaving, well, "leavings" here and there. I set up two snap traps, but they don't seem to be sensitive enough. The bait is obviously being nibbled on, but the traps don't spring. We're going to try live traps next. The cat is no help. He must be outdoors hunting when the indoor mice are active. But, even then, he won't hunt moles.

Tennis elbow, anyone?

I saw the doctor on Tuesday and he said that I have tennis elbow. Une épicondylite, or epicondylitis, caused by repetitive stress to the elbow. Must be from all the tennis I watch on television.

I used the internet to look up and research tennis elbow.

He gave me a prescription for a topical anti-inflammatory and said I shouldn't do whatever I was doing for a while. I think the injury happened when I was trying to start the chainsaw after flooding the engine. Repetitive pulls on the starter cord. Not very smart.

Golden

This is the view from the den. It's a narrow view because of a huge fir tree right outside the window, and the tilleul (linden tree) a little farther out, part of which you can see in the foreground on the right. But it's still a nice perspective out into the vineyards behind the house. And now it's all golden.

Looking westerly along the dirt road through the vineyards on Sunday morning.

I should be taking advantage of the nice days to get some hedge trimming done, but I'm not. The big trimming will be done by the pros, but there are a few smaller hedges that I will do myself. One day. And there are all the leaves to rake out of the driveway, even though the trees are not finished shedding them yet.

Monday macros

An indoor shot for a change. This is a little model plane that I got at the airport in San Francisco one year. It's a Boeing 777, the plane that I was flying on that day to France. Those planes were new then and they were very nice and comfortable to fly in. Of course, I was not sitting this far forward in the cabin, but farther back in the economy seats.

Model plane, 100mm (macro) f/2.8, 1/100s, ISO 1000.

I have yet to fly on an Airbus 380, the big double-decker planes. I'm sure I will one of these days. Probably between Paris and New York. One of these days. We'll see.

Tempus fugit

It's official. We're now on Central European Winter Time. Daylight Saving (or Summer) Time ended in the wee hours this morning. We got our hour back. Now it will get darker even earlier in the evenings; the sun will set today just before six pm.

The depth of field is a little off in this shot (the grapes on top are out of focus), but I like it anyway.

Of course, it will get lighter a little earlier in the morning, but as we move toward the solstice and the days get even shorter, we won't notice so much.