This week we return to the Science/Miscellaneous folder, and a photo that I almost included with last week’s Ancient Lore post because I mentioned how it might have been interesting to capture a sailboat within that one. The pagination of that post wasn’t conducive to the inclusion, so I let it be, but decided to post it this week because there’s not a hell of a lot in this folder anyway. You have to admit, when you think of sailboats they’re generally not this colorful, so I kinda like this one, but never thought it was strong enough to do anything with.
This is taken from the top of the same causeway as last week, a matter of lucky timing that I happened to be up there when the sailboat came through the channel of the Indian River Lagoon in Florida – yes, we’re still working with the Sony F717 during its brief stay with me. The causeway arced up to allow a solid 20 meters clearance underneath for traffic such as this, but I admit that, when I was bicycling around hill-challenged Florida, climbing the incline that this created was a hard slog, one that defeated me one day, two weeks after a serious illness when I thought I had recovered sufficiently. I have distinct memories of stopping and resting the bike on the shoulder (something that North Carolina seems completely unaware might exist,) and lying down in the pedestrian pathway waiting for the nausea to subside; this was not at all helped by being a blazingly hot day, and I was racking my brain trying to think of a place nearby where I might find some shade that was desperately needed. My mind obviously wasn’t working very well, because the nearest and deepest shade lay at the very end of a effortless and breezy run on the bike, directly underneath the bridge that I was on and precisely where last week’s photo had been taken. I could have turned around, literally coasted down without any pedaling whatsoever (I would have expended more energy in braking down at the bottom,) and popped down the ladder for the coolest and darkest spot within kilometers – Florida is not particularly known for deep shade, especially when the majority of trees are freaking palms.
Another time in the exact same location, I was looking out over the water for dolphins and manatees and whatever else I might spot from the high vantage – I’d seen some big jellyfish, manta and cownose rays, and even some sea turtles from up there – when one of the occupants of a boat passing beneath spotted the camera in my hands, squealed and waved. I quickly aimed down and fired off a shot, the haste partially evidenced by the lousy framing, but I had a bare second before the boat would have disappeared under the bridge. That she wasn’t really trying to have her picture taken is proved by her embarrassed smile here – I suspect she thought I was slower than that, which tells how out-of-touch she was in not recognizing me and my awesome photographic reputation.
And when I remembered this image and decided to include it, I realized this is one of the collection that was lost when a harddrive failed – or at least, the original was, and all I had was the version reduced to e-mail size (there was a purpose for it, then, but I don’t remember what it was now – old, you know.) While this particular frame isn’t one that I regret losing, always, always maintain backups. I still occasionally discover or remember frames that I wish I still had.
I said that I would reveal what the month-end abstract was, and so I have returned, later than intended but bearing gifts for all (one of which is coming up very soon.) At right is another version of the same subject, taken at the same time but with a much faster shutter speed. In certain small areas of lakes, ponds, and streams, a variety of swimming beetle can be found at times, charcoal grey but shiny, swimming at great speed in elaborate zigzags. These are, most likely, a variety of 
But wait! I captured something else too, wholly unintentionally, and didn’t even know it until editing the photo quite some time afterward. Way in the distance, hundreds of meters off on the other side of the channel and causeway, someone crossed the frame along a similar pathway as my own – shame they never thought to stop and take a picture, ’cause we could have had some weird kind of synchronicity thing going on. Trust the other person to screw up a great opportunity…
Two things that I neglected to mention regarding the video clips – they made it into the first attempt that was thwarted by post-nasal drip, and I forgot them the second time around. I obtained a little 96-LED portable light source that runs on 4 AA batteries or a USB powerbank, and that’s what was used for the two clips seen here – it’s light enough to be supported on an articulated arm (on its shoe mount or 1/4-20 tripod socket,) works fabulously for macro video, is reasonably diffuse, and is even dimmable. There are lots of versions on Ebay, and I have to say it was well worth the trivial price.
But you don’t have to believe me though, because I can show you – trust me, I’ll never require you to trust me. It’s easy to see why I exclaimed, “Whoa!” when the lens pointed in this critter’s direction. In fact, it made me regret that we (remember, I was out there with my brother that evening) never saw something that I’ve caught a few times in the same park, which was an alligator floating in the water. Their eyes are super-reflective, shining back brilliantly orange as brightly as a road reflector, better than any other animal that I’ve seen. One night, from a moderate distance, I caught the reflection in a water channel, and slowly crept closer to try and see more of the gator. I was fairly certain, from the size of the channel and the bare fact that I never did make out any aspect of its head, that it was a pretty small specimen, but before I could determine this for sure, it was spooked by my approach and dipped out of sight beneath the surface. Alligators generally have different reputations, depending on whether you live in Florida and have firsthand experience of them, or elsewhere and rely on the stories and folklore. Bluntly, they’re pretty shy unless it’s an area where they’re habituated to close contact, and 
This photo shows scale a little better, and I can simply tell you that the tube openings are right around 1mm in diameter because I still have this specimen – anyone that wants to see it in person should drop me an e-mail; I’ll tell you how to get here and we’ll make a party of it. Perhaps I’ll hold a contest to see who can guess closest to the actual number of tubes in this small specimen, the winner getting… ummmm… something appropriate, anyway. I’ll need to charge a decent entry fee to compensate me for counting all those motherfuckers. Maybe, if I get bored, I’ll saw one end off cleanly and make a really cool set of pan pipes from this cluster…
