Working on Christmas

 CCGS Griffon, pulling up buoys on Lake St. Francis, just before heading back to home port in Cardinal, Ontario, on Christmas Day, 2020. 

 Skyview app view of the Great Conjunction, Dec 21, 2020.... if the skies were clear we'd be able to see Jupiter and Saturn close together, but not like this.

 Poor Rusty died today of heart failure. He was always a small cat but brave. He would chase away dogs and ducks. He used to flick his tail up and down when he wanted to go for a walk with me.

Double rainbow over St. Lawrence, December 1, 2020

 

Full moon rising, November 29, 2020

 

RIP Dave Prowse, Darth Vader actor

 

Coincidental to Dave Prowse's death, I spotted a giant inflatable Darth Vader holding a candy cane as a Christmas Decoration.

Blood wannabes

Kids dressed up sort of like Blood gang, downtown Toronto, maybe University Avenue, mid-1990s

Lock Him Up - anti-Trump sign?

 In front of expensive house, in Canada

It will be OK

                                            

Found art, Glen Walter Regional Park, rock painted with rainbow and It Will Be OK 

Use at your own risk

 Rather sportingly, you can fire a cannon into upstate New York across the river, if you do it at your own risk!  In French, it's more like they are ordering you to use it. Cannon was used against American invaders. during war of 1812 Battle of Crysler's Farm National Historic Site.

First cardinal of the year

 

First cardinal of the year. Just could get its tail - most years they stay in the woods and only come to the feeder when snow has been on the ground for a few months.

Halloween in the time of Covid-19 - Self serve trick or treat table

Candies in bags on table, carved pumpkins

 

James Randi Remembered

Since Randi just died, I'll tell this story - just before he started a lecture I saw in Toronto, he opened up his jacket and pretended to fiddle with the wire that led from his lapel microphone to the radio pack on his belt. Then, during the lecture, he 'accidentally' struck the other microphone that was on the lectern with the back of his hand. If it had been on, the microphone would have made a loud ringing noise. A little while later, he said something like "Many of you think I'm speaking into this microphone", then stepped away while still talking, "but I'm really using a radio mike.". Even though he made what he did obvious, many of the people were astonished. So the lesson I took home was nobody is too smart to be fooled!

Randi speaking at the Bloor Cinema, Toronto, Ontario, August 8, 2014

 Randi talks about Geller

Doing a rope trick

Getting a cake - his birthday was August 7.

Q and A after "An Honest Liar".

Hover fly, not bee, asleep in a rose

 looks like a bee, but isn't - it's been sleeping in this rose, which gets the morning sun, for at least three nights.

Fall Colours 2020

Dottie by roses

Jones Creek  - Thousand Islands National Park

Twin Creek trail near Morrisburg, Ontario

Brockville

Brockville

Holy Trinity Church, Cornwall, Ontario

Mushrooms on fallen birch

Birch Sunset

Old apple tree

Granny Smith Apple Tree

Red berries, birches

 

Mars big and bright tonight

 

Rainbow with anti-crepuscular rays

 

New Lens!

  Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto, I think I labelled them right, most visible moons of Jupiter..... new lens! 600mm Sigma... I still can't focus very well. 

Fall Roses

Campfire Rose

 

Double rainbow across the sky over St. Lawrence

 

Monarch, Sandbanks Provincial Park

 

On the beach, flying to Mexico

1963 Amphicar 770

 I really don't know anything about this car - I think it has already been sold.

Red Amaryllis

 

Imke under tow

  Cargo ship Imke ran aground earlier in August while delivering a shipment of turbine blades to Ogdensburg, NY on the St. Lawrence Seaway for a wind farm. Was being towed back to Montreal. There is a wind farm on the mountains behind it.