Author: photog

Everybody’s Gotta Eat

photog Current Events, Life in Dunwich, OCF, photog's Corner , ,

The circle of life.  Despite the claim in the song, Disney never shows us the predators, including his highness the King, chowing down on the herbivores that provide the carnivores with their sustenance.  Theoretically Mufasa is the apex of the food chain but all of his meals are “off-camera.”

But Camera Girl claims to be a wildlife realist and the hawks and vultures, the foxes and coyotes according to her “gotta eat.”  So, when a rabbit or a squirrel ends up as a meal somewhere on the property, she shrugs it off, “everyboody’s gotta eat.”

Today one of the local hawks performed its patented power dive a couple of feet away from Camera Girl’s bird feeders and the bird (we think it was a catbird) never knew what hit it.  Oh well.

But there is a more gruesome aspect than just the kill.  The hawk eats the entire bird while plucking the feathers as it goes.  Camera Girl watched this from her kitchen window and I could tell she wasn’t shrugging it off.  She has a soft heart.  And since she feeds the birds and attracts them to the location, she feels that she was responsible in a way for the predation.

And all things considered that is true.  That hawk would not have caught that catbird today if she didn’t feed those birds every day.  But I tried to cheer her up.  I said, “Well, you’ve been feeding these birds for years.  And all those free meals have contributed to the health and longevity of all these birds.  With all that extra food they’ve probably produced double the number of hatchlings they would have raised if they were thin and weak.  Maybe that very catbird would never have been born if his parents hadn’t eaten the seeds you provided.”

So, I threw that out there.  Hopefully it helped a bit.  And I’m sure she’ll bounce back tomorrow when she goes out early to feed Moe and Flo the crows and Poe the raven.  And she’s been watching this skunk (of course, it’s Pepé Le Pew) that appears at dusk and scratches around where Moe’s food was earlier in the day.  He’s almost all white and kind of wide and flat to the ground.  He looks like a giant Tribble or a furry version of the Horta.  But so far, I’ve managed to avoid it while I’m doing my late afternoon watering.  The last thing I need is getting skunked in my own yard.

Of course, the flipside of all this is the fact that the bird feeders also occasionally attract black bears to the property.  The last time the bear used its weight to bend a very substantial steel tube all the way over.  I guess it’s within the realm of possibility that one day the circle of life might mean I could be on the menu for Yogi Bear.  So, there is that to consider.  I’ll mention this to Camera Girl and see if that changes the whole risk to reward ratio for her bird feeding hobby.  I tend to doubt it.  She really likes those birds.

Joe Rogan Made Me Think

photog Current Events, Trump , , ,

I know this is old news but I decided to watch this Joe Rogan podcast with Kash Patel that was taped I guess today and just listening at random almost, you hear that the people who were in charge under Obama and Biden were ruthless criminals who had no fear of being caught performing completely illegal operations against their political enemies.  Russia-gate is the supreme example but there is no end to how many crooked acts and operations they performed with complete impunity.

I think the stellar quote is that former FBI director Comey had a room where he stashed his worst documents and data.  When he left, he locked the room and removed all record of what was hidden in the room and from 2017 till 2025 no one outside of Comey’s inner circle knew about it.  Patel says he’s mining those documents and data files for proof of Comey’s crimes.

So other than a reason to be outraged by all of these Deep State criminals what is the take away from all this?  Well, to me, it’s just a reminder that this is government.  Corruption and abuse of power is what happens as soon as people get a taste of power and the money that comes with it.  And this will happen with Republicans in power almost as egregiously as when the Democrats are running things.  This is human nature.

So, from my point of view, we have to look at the present Trump agenda as an extreme anomaly.  Maybe it won’t happen again for a hundred years or maybe never again.  And that is why it must be embraced and ridden as far as it can possibly go.  When it’s time for Trump’s term to end we should select the man who promises to do the most damage to the existing system.  Whatever damage Kash Patel does to the FBI should be considered only a good start.  What is really needed are legislative mandates to eliminate the unconstitutional activities that the 9/11 attacks enabled.  The Patriot Act and the FISA Courts need to be eliminated.  Those instruments strip away our constitutional protections and render the FBI and the other intel agencies the equivalent of the Stasi or the KGB.

I don’t know if it’s Trump’s intention to push for these legal changes.  His Justice Department should right now be in front of SCOTUS with a brief declaring these laws unconstitutional.  And this isn’t even radical.  Even at the time they were enacted it was believed that they were unconstitutional but because of the public’s fear after the 9/11 attacks it was believed that these laws should temporarily exist.  Well, it’s almost a quarter of a century down the road and these laws aren’t keeping Americans safe.  They’re being used to put us in prison.  They need to be struck down as unconstitutional.

People seem pretty sure that JD Vance is going to be Trump’s successor.  Well, maybe Trump will make that decision.  But I want to hear from Vance’s mouth that he is going to continue the process of tearing out the Deep State by the roots.  FBI. CIA, IRS, ATF; all of these agencies are pointed like weapons at the American people.  Destroying them now will not make us permanently safe.  But it will buy us a respite from the worst of the surveillance state that has been built by the people who run our government.

That’s what that Joe Rogan podcast made me think.

07JUN2025 – Quote of the Day

photog Quote of the Day ,

I know that the conquest of English America is an impossibility. You cannot, I venture to say it, you CANNOT conquer America…As to conquest, therefore, my Lords, I repeat, it is impossible. You may swell every expense, and every effort, still more extravagantly; pile and accumulate every assistance you can buy or borrow; traffic and barter with every little pitiful German Prince, that sells and sends his subjects to the shambles of a foreign country; your efforts are for ever vain and impotent—doubly so from this mercenary aid on which you rely; for it irritates, to an incurable resentment, the minds of your enemies—to overrun them with the sordid sons of rapine and plunder; devoting them and their possessions to the rapacity of hireling cruelty! If I were an American, as I am an Englishman, while a foreign troop was landed in my country, I never would lay down my arms, never! never! never! …I call upon the honour of your Lordships to reverence the dignity of your ancestors, and to maintain your own. I call upon the spirit and humanity of my country to vindicate the national character. I invoke the genius of the constitution.

William Pitt (the Elder)

June, Moon, Spoon, Tune

photog Current Events, Life in Dunwich, photog's Corner ,

What is it about the first really hot patch of summer weather.  Today was the first day where the inside of the house was warm enough not to require three layers of clothing.  The attic has absorbed enough heat so that it has finally heated up the leftover winter air.  It’s actually uncomfortably warm inside and I’m luxuriating in it.

And outside it’s ninety.  Butterflies and dragonflies are flitting around and the birds are tearing around looking for food for their hatchlings.  The moist hot grass is breathing water right into the air and you can smell the photosynthesis cranking away.  I love this kind of weather.  It rejuvenates me.  It makes me wax rhapsodically.  It makes me babble idiotically.  It recharges body and soul.

For the last couple of weeks, on and off, a hatchling milk snake has been sheltering under an old sheet of copper that I put out for snakes.  I have been hoping for years for a mouse eating snake to take up residence in the lower driveway wall.  We have plenty of mice and moles and voles around here and a milk snake (or even better, a black rat snake) would put a real dent in their numbers.  So, I’m cautiously hopeful that this little reptile is gonna stick around.  But currently he’s so tiny that nothing but the youngest pink mice could serve him as food.  I wonder if he’s presently surviving on insects, worms and maybe very small salamanders.  Well, it’s something to think about.

But it’s not all fun and games.  I’m still so behind in the repair and maintain chores.  I haven’t even gotten to clean the really high gutters.  I’ve got a twenty-four-foot ladder and my guilt is slowly driving me to get busy on it.  Camera Girl thinks I should hire a handyman to do it but I scoff at this kind of defeatist talk.  And likewise, all the other chores.  They build character and spare the bank account.  So, I’m putting together my schedule and thinking through the order of operations and locating rope and other supplies to set up the ladder.

Today I saw the biggest spider I’ve ever seen around here.  Whether people call them fishing spiders or wolf spiders I haven’t done a close identification.  But it was a huge bugger.  He’s living close to where the exhaust from my heating system reaches the open air.  I’m guessing the heat is an attractant for insects in the colder months.  I’ll attach a photo here.

Camera Girl says she bought a red coneflower plant for me at Wally Mart.  I’m making a row of various perennials but especially coneflowers.  They attract butterflies and other insects for my photography.  And finally, the other three preying mantis egg sacs that I can still find have all now hatched out.  And they’re pretty evenly spaced around the property.  Nice how that worked out.  Of course, there were another six or eight of the things that seem to have disappeared.  Well, that’s on me.  Anyway, it’s an excellent day to be out and about.  Nothing exciting just the good old summertime.  June, moon, spoon, tune.  All that stuff.