Tag: OCF Update

What’s A Blogger to Do?

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OCF is my personal reaction to the reality that the Left owns the internet.  And when I bumped into that fact it was a lot less true than it is now.  I was revolting against the enforced leftist narrative that I found in every photography website and science fiction review blog.  I just couldn’t stand the atmosphere of delusional superiority and even worse the selective enforcement of website rules.  So, I built my own kingdom where my own version of delusional superiority and selective enforcement of website rules would be the rule.  But who’s to say what’s delusional?

Anyway, Over the years, the site has focused more and more on the political situation until now I’d say that politics is something like 99% of the content if it’s based on text.  Obviously, the photo of the day has very little text and the quote of the day is a sentence or so.  And that’s fine.  During the Trump presidency there was an enormous amount of political action to comment on.  And in this time of social and political turmoil there continues to be a raft of topics that need to be discussed, and in most cases, lamented.  I intend to continue doing just that.  After all, having my say is why I’m here.

But the reality is that there isn’t something to say about the political situation every day.  Well, there is but it’s not novel and interesting enough to seem worthwhile.  After all, how many times can I call Joe Biden a vegetable or a pervert before I start to seem like a vegetable myself?  And in the absence of any kind of actual progress on the Red State revolt front how often can I bang that drum before I start to drive my readers back into the arms of the Blue State matriarchy?

I just thought it would be a good idea if I start to introduce more features that don’t depend on the news cycle and the initiative of politicians.  From a practical perspective this will involve more culture topics; book, movie and tv reviews, essays on historical events and opinion pieces on cultural events and groups.

And another thing I’d like to get back to is fiction writing.  I’ve been working sporadically (very sporadically) on writing a science fiction novel.  Actually, it’s more like three different novels that haven’t really gelled the way I want them to.  I’m thinking of putting up installments of one of them as an ongoing feature of the site.  It’ll give the readers a taste of my writing style and eventually I’ll use it as a sample when I publish and start to market my work.

Now the thing about writing reviews and essays and fiction is that they take a lot more time to produce than my typical hit piece on Joe Biden.  Writing five hundred or a thousand words about how stupid cretins are isn’t that hard.  But writing a review means taking the time to read or watch something and then thinking carefully about saying something interesting about it.  And writing fiction is on a “ho nudda lebbel.”

What I’m saying is that the long-time readers might notice a change in the output here.  There may not be so many quick rant posts.  There may be fewer posts.  And the post lengths will probably increase significantly.  Maybe you could say that quality will replace quantity to some extent.  Hopefully that will suit most readers.  I suspect it will be an improvement.

Now I don’t want anyone to panic.  I’ll still keep a watchful eye out for worthwhile events that need my unique blend of political savvy and rapier sharp wit.  But I just don’t see a reason to say the same thing over and over again.  So, this is just an explanatory note so that the readers don’t think I’ve been taken hostage and replaced by a ringer from Antifa.  OCF continues.  OCF grows.  photog tries to improve his product.

23AUG2021 – OCF Update – Henri’s Revenge

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I mocked Henri.  I called him lame.

And he stabbed me in the back.

Power and data went out yesterday afternoon and only came back a little while ago.  Actually it was very relaxing to be off the grid.  No one could call or e-mail or anything.  For all I knew the Trump Restoration might have happened while I sat unaware.  Or maybe Dementia Joe had an epiphany and realized that Americans think he’s a pathetic loser and had himself committed to an expensive looney bin with attendants that have very fragrant hair.

But apparently neither of those things happened so I’ve missed nothing important and had a very relaxing break from the weird world.

But here I am back again and I’ll catch up with the latest insanity and mock it soon enough.

16AUG2021 – OCF Update – Late Summer Status

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Suddenly you can sense that people are rushing to get their bit of summer before it’s gone.  Folks are streaming onto the roads to reach the beach and up to the lakes and mountains.  But this year we aren’t doing much travelling.  Just a few day trips.  So I’ll enjoy the quiet for the next week or so.  I’ll start putting together my fall maintenance list.  There’s always plenty to get repaired before winter sets in.  In fact I never get everything done.  I’m much too lazy for that.

I’m seeing the early growing plants begin to die and the goldenrod is taking over from them.  The trees have more and more yellow leaves on their branches and the bugs are going through their last stages.  The butterflies are starting to look very tattered, the dragonflies are wearing out too.  A difference from most years, there aren’t as many bees as there should be.  Maybe all that rain took its toll somehow.

I packed up the Sony rental gear; the A7R IV A camera and the LA-EA5 adapter.  I’ll put out a final long report with all of my observations and conclusions.  It turned out I learned a lot of important stuff.  And some of it wasn’t things I was looking for.  I’ll start using the continuous autofocus a lot more than I used to.  It comes in very handy for things I didn’t expect.  And I have new found respect for the 200-600mm Sony lens.  It is much sharper for close-up stuff than I expected.

The political world is a shambles.  But that’s not news.  What will be interesting is how Ron DeSantis uses his current high visibility and growing popularity.  What goes on with the schools will be very important.  If they can tame the teachers’ unions in Florida that will bode well for ending the COVID scam once and for all.

Afghanistan is an object lesson on what happens when the United States abuses its armed forces and indulges in political theater.  Short of nuking the Pashtun areas of Pakistan we were never going to control the Taliban.  Why we’re there ten years after bin Laden was executed is just another indication that the people in charge don’t know what they’re doing.  But let this be a lesson for all of us.  Never trust anyone named Bush or Cheney.

Well, gotta go cut the grass.  stay tuned.

12AUG2021 – OCF Update – Work, Work, Work

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Camera Girl had me in the garage setting mouse traps in anticipation of the fall return of Mouse Man.  Why mice in a garage is a big deal I don’t know but women fear rodents.  So Mouse Man must die!

I’ll be out this morning stalking the elusive hummingbird and I can already tell the heat is gonna be something.  But we all must suffer for our art so high ho, high ho.

I’ll return later to see what’s brewing.  Apparently Joe Biden wants the King of Saudi Arabia to lower the price of oil.  Yeah, right.  Maybe he can make Andrew Cuomo the ambassador to Saudi Arabia and they can chase the Saudi king’s various dancing girls around the pool.  But I think the price of oil is only going one way.

To be continued.

10AUG2021 – OCF Update

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Today I was on guard duty.  I fit in a little photo time and got a chance to participate in a zoom with the guys but it was a day that didn’t leave much time for writing.

But I did note a few interesting news items.

Cuomo resigned.  Too bad.  He would have driven the MeeToo girls crazy if he had hung in.  He’s such a sleazy guy that just seeing him with a D after his name makes me feel happy.  Oh well, Andy, we hardly knew ye.

But now what about Fredo?  Does CNN need the brother of a disgraced NY State Governor?  And that’s even supposing he could read and speak English fluently which he can’t.  Mother of mercy!  Could this be the end of Fredo?

I saw that Abbott in Texas successfully petitioned the Texas Supreme Court to block that leftist judge who wanted to shield the runaway Dem legislators from arrest for dereliction of duty.  That’s a good first step but he still needs to find a way to lure them back into Texas for arrest.  Maybe he can tell each of them he has won a million dollar lottery and it must be claimed in person.  Or maybe they can just tempt them with police officers posing as underage children for them to molest.  Either probably will get some results.  After all they’re Democrats.  Look at the pedo in the Arizona legislature.  He was the one celebrating his gayness.  In hindsight maybe not the ambassador for the LGBTQ movement.

I had the grandkids over today and the younger ones were in the pool but one of the senior ranks and I started watching the Lord of the Rings movies.  He’s a fan of the Two Towers so we dove in there.  A little too much Gollum in that disk for me.  He’s truly annoying.  We both decided that they should have given the Ring to Sam and he would have finished the mission before the end of the siege of Helm’s Deep.

I’ll have an installment of the photo series soon and I may have a political post later.  But right now family beckons.

05AUG2021 – OCF Update – This ‘N’ That

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I continue to be impressed by the backbone that Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida is displaying.  The usual suspects in the press and the feds are attacking him tooth and nail and he’s standing his ground remarkably.  I think he’s shown himself to be a savvy politician and someone who will be worth watching going forward.

Great to see that Gavin Newsom is looking like a dead man walking.  Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.  Larry Elder might be an interesting governor for California.  Because of his color it will be inconvenient for the usual suspects to use their usual methods to attack him.  Might be a learning experience for black voters to see a conservative black leader for once.

I’m trying to teach myself some Word Press design techniques to streamline some of the repetitive stuff I do such as the photo and quote of the day posts.  It’s just a matter of making some templates that are easy to use so I can avoid some keystrokes and clicks.  But you know what old dogs and new tricks are like so it is eating into my day.

Rainy, cool weather here in New England but no snow yet so that’s good.  Camera Girl is working indoors today and that means we’ll eventually have to talk to each other which is always dangerous.  She’s very excited about a new shell I bought her for her hermit crab.  I named him Buster Crabbe after the late great star of the classic Flash Gordon serials of the 1930s.  She’s so excited about him moving into the new shell that she wants me to photograph him for posterity.  Don’t be surprised if he shows up here at some point.  I told her I thought he’d be better off as part of a crab sauce over spaghetti.  She was not amused.

Haven’t seen any of the praying mantises for a week or so and I’m wondering if there are many predators in the yard that they have to contend with.  I guess frogs and toads might be the likeliest enemies around the yard.  But maybe even field mice might be a threat.  Next week will be drier and warmer so I’m hoping that I’ll make some further sightings.  Princess Sack-of-Potatoes will be sorely disappointed if they don’t reappear.  Although lately she seems a lot more interested in chasing butterflies.  I guess women of all ages are a fickle bunch.

I saw that Dementia Joe’s poll numbers have finally gone below water.  Of course Politico will put out their own poll that says he’s at 52% so they can claim the average is above 50% but looking at the main pollsters he’s now under water.  And that’s during the August doldrums.  come September when kids will be sitting in sweltering classrooms with masks over their faces I can see those numbers in the low forties.  Oh, Joe’s gonna be awfully popular.  But we’ll see.

The Congress is getting ready to sell us out again.  Joe Manchin has cut his deal.  His wife has been put in charge of a billion dollar slush fund so you can expect that the fix is in.  The Dems will use the reconciliation process to put illegal alien citizenship, statehood for Puerto Rico and DC, permanent election fraud and heaven knows what else into law this fall.  So don’t let yourself get sucked into the miasma of despair they’re preparing.  It’s coming and we need to concentrate on the things we can control ourselves.  And we need to be able to decide where our own long term best interests will be served.  All that will be things to discuss and figure out.

so that’s enough for now.  Stay tuned.

02AUG2021 – Good Morning Gulag Archipelago!

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Word today is that office workers in “health-related” fields in New England have reinstated masking requirements.  The local cable news is sounding the alarm that the delta variant is stalking the region and without masks and constant fear COVID wins.  Go Team Fear!  Of course the number of deaths seems to be completely petering out so I’m guessing that even the panic stricken New Englanders are having a hard time goading themselves into mandatory masking and the rest of the madness.  It’s sad to say but I think the delta variant is a bust.

Anyway, with my new emphasis on useful things I’m going to spend a good deal of today enjoying a beautiful early New England Winter day with temperatures in the high seventies and lots of blue sky.  I hope to get some more fiction writing done and some yard projects.  Yesterday Camera Girl lowered the boom on me and mandated that I clean out the gutters on the garage and pool shed.  This was an unsafe and unfunded mandate that required me to climb rickety ladders and face unknown dangers such as wasps, noxious fumes and repetitive motion injury.  When I finished I was hoping that at least there would be a sign or a banner declaring me “the real hero.”  Alas there was none.  The only acknowledgement I received was the news that cleaning out the gutter made the dog’s pen area “smelly.”  There is no justice.

Today I’m going to try and get some photos with the 200-600mm lens.  Camera Girl has been swooning over a family of rabbits that has been eating some of our hostas.  Since she won’t let me shoot them with a firearm I’ll see if I can get some shots with the camera.  Also birds and butterflies will be my other targets.

I can write some gloom and doom later but right now it’s too nice out to waste the time.  Go and enjoy the splendor.

30JUL2021 – OCF Update – It’s All Been Said

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Last night I was putting up some photos from last fall for the daily photo and I had some quotes to download (some Thomas Edison coming up).  Then I was thinking about what to write for a post.  But without anything new in the news I had nothing new to say.  We’re in a bad place and it will continue like this for a good long time until something gives.

The Left is running most things and if they want to continue locking down the blue states and weaponizing the federal government against us, there’s not a damn thing we can do about it.  For the people lucky or smart enough to be living in the red states it’s different.  They can make changes to protect themselves from the feds and the Left.  DeSantis and Abbott are making some of the right noises.  Maybe we’ll see some sort of breakthrough that will spark some large scale realignment.  But right now it’s holding actions and some small efforts to clean up the mess.

And that’s not much to write about.  Abbott and Garland may be headed for a confrontation over Abbott’s executive order to criminalize transporting illegal aliens.  If it does come to a fight that will be interesting.  Seeing one of our guys standing his ground would be something to talk about.  But right now it’s just posturing on both sides.  So I’ve just said all there is to say.  DeSantis is going after the tech companies over anti-right discrimination.  But with the federal courts running cover will it stick?  If he does stick to his guns that might look like something interesting too.  But once again, to be continued.  So you see my dilemma.  There’s just not enough meat to make a stew out of.  It would end up just a thin soup with no flavor.

I’ll be putting together some culture pieces but those take time and thought.  So things are a little slow on the site right now.  But I think that’s better than just banging away at the same old themes.  Writing about the revolution when nothing good is afoot is sort of silly.  And since we’re deep into the silly season the next big news will probably be in September when all those blue states kids are going to be headed to the classrooms trying to breath through a gag.  Who knows, maybe one of the blue state governors will try to save his hide by leaving his state open and deny the teacher’s unions cover.  Or maybe a bunch of cities will start electing republican law and order types to save themselves from being savaged by Saint George Floyd’s disciples.  But I figured I’d explain the drop in output.  I’m also doing some fiction writing which also takes up a good chunk of time for writing and even plot outlining.

But for those who enjoy the content here I promise to be more resourceful and find interesting things that don’t depend on our political leaders doing the right thing.  Based on historical trends that would be a losing strategy

29JUL2021 – OCF Update – Not Much Going On

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I’ve been reading through the news stories.  There’s not a lot there that’s “new.”  Will the stimulus be six trillion or one trillion?  Will the blue states force their slaves to wear masks again?  Will Nancy Pelosi declare all Trump voters white supremacists?

How exciting.

Honestly, I’ve got nothing today.  I’ve been thinking about what I should do locally.  I sent an e-mail to my local Republican Town Committee to see if they do anything useful.  I was told that they get together once a month so I’ll see them in about three weeks.

I’ve been struggling with some plot problems in my sci fi book but I think I’ve got a handle on it.  I’ve been trying to decide if my character will fake his own death and go underground to protect his family from retribution by his evil left-wing enemies.  I’ve decided I like it.  Now to build the details of the hidden revolutionary headquarters.  I’m trying to decide if it should be in the Rocky Mountains or right out in plain sight under the prairie.  I’m thinking geothermal energy would be the least improbable as an energy source for this super secret base.  Anyway I’m getting something thought out so today won’t be a total waste from an intellectual viewpoint.  Other than that I’m battling an algae outbreak in the swimming pool.  The algaecide I was using wasn’t very efficacious.  I’ve ordered a copper based solution which I’ve always heard is the gold standard.  Camera Girl has been critiquing my algae brushing technique.  Apparently she thinks it lacks authority.  So it’s back to the salt mines.

I’ll have something up later once my brain has a chance to percolate.