ASW wrote, yesterday: "Bill McKibben has a concise (online) article about recent and future growth of renewable energy sources, how China is in the driver's seat to dominate the space, and how our (America's) energy policies are both backwards and self-defeating, in The New Yorker. It's called '4.6 Billion Years On, the Sun Is Having a Moment.' It's well worth a few minutes of your time if you have access."

I read this last night. If you've been feeling pessimistic or defeated about the state of the World and the weather, you're about to get a significant mood-enhancer. This is the most uplifting, positive, optimistic, encouraging article on any subject I've read in a long while. 

The New Yorker allows four free articles a month to non-subscribers, so you should be able to access it if you are not a subscriber and haven't used up all your freebies. And if you have, August is a new month.

It appears that we are at the tipping point—it's just that America is neither leading the way nor really participating any more. But it's happening globally. America is now firmly on the wrong side of history, as well as on the wrong side of economic development and future prosperity. We've gone from world leader to actively obstructing the future.

But that doesn't mean the news is not good.

Really the most hopeful thing I've encountered recently. Thanks to ASW. And for others, coolly recommended (that's a joke. Not "warmly" recommended, yageddit? As Craig Ferguson used to say, "amused myself, and that's half the battle").

Here's the book the article is drawn from. 

Mike

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Dean Johnston [no relation to Mike]: "After reading that, and in the context of thinking about the world, I feel better than I have in ages."

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The most fascinating portfolio of pictures I've seen recently isn't art. It's called "Photos: The Scale of China’s Solar-Power Projects," and unfortunately it's behind a paywall. [UPDATE: Many readers are reporting that the content isn't walled off for them. So give it a try! —Ed.] Absolutely mind-boggling.

Solar energy is a significant fascination. The best short primer on energy I've ever read (not all I've read on the subject, of course) is the first 98 pages or so of a book called American Theocracy by the late Kevin Phillips. The section, Part I, was called "Oil and American Supremacy." It is in essence a long essay. As with other Phillips books, its connection to the rest of the book is rather loose—some of his volumes are redolent of collections rather than concerted, coherent, through-going argument. So the essay can stand alone. Unfortunately, it's behind a paywall too—you'd have to buy the whole book in order to read that one little section. In the late 2000s, ever a Don Quixote, I wrote a letter to Mr. Phillips and Penguin, his publisher, suggesting that "Oil and American Supremacy" really should be issued as a separate small volume at modest cost. Penguin at the time had a series of pamphlet-style semi-miniature books that featured important short-form writing from the past and present. Here's one of them:

I also have the translation of Ecclesiastes from the same series and one or two others, but I can't find them. Frustratingly, the books, which I saw in a bookstore display and which all had similar-but-varied form, format, typography, and cover design, don't seem to have been given a series name, and I can't find a page for them among Penguin's far-flung constellation of imprints, house names, and web pages. (There are only five major publishers in the USA, of which Penguin/Random House is the largest.) It's possible they simply under-performed and were unceremoniously dumped. Doesn't matter. Long and short, I thought "Oil and American Supremacy" would fit perfectly in the series, and it's one of those things—you know how it is with those things—that I urgently felt every citizen ought to read. But by now, Penguin's had 20 years to get back to me, which kinda makes my hope for a reply grow dim. (I'm joking.) And Kevin Phillips died in 2023.

Kevin Phillips was an interesting fellow, by the way. He was one of the founding theorists of Movement Conservatism and post-Goldwater Republican strategy—usually credited with originating the Southern Strategy—who later moved toward independence and became an outspoken critic of the Republican Party. In other words, he actually thought for himself, which would make him stick out like a sore thumb today. I went on a deep dive into politics during the Bush II years—I probably read 150 books, all of them except one now slumbering in boxes in the attic of the barn. Kevin Phillips, the essence of an iconoclast, was the best find. (Well, Thomas Frank too.) 

Anyway, one of the points Phillips makes in "Oil and American Supremacy" is that rich and powerful national economies have historically had trouble moving away from the energy sources that made them rich and powerful in the first place. The Netherlands and wind power, Britain and coal. The Dutch windmills peaked in the 1600s and 1700s—yet there were still 9,000(!) windmills in The Netherlands in the nineteenth century! (There are some 1,200 left today—believe it or not, only partially for tourism.)

Assuming the pattern plays out, America is going to have a very hard time moving away from oil. We have long been the global powerhouse. We tend to think of the Middle East when we think of oil production now, but on this very day (and for years now) the United States is the world's largest producer of oil. Our big problem is not that we don't produce huge amounts of oil, it's just that we use even more than we produce—that's what gives Saudi Arabia such pull over us, and it's why we have willingly gone along with the largest transfer of wealth in the history of Planet Earth—American wealth shifted to the countries that make up for our oil shortfall. It's why our military budget is so huge—to protect the shipping lanes for oil coming from the Middle East. (If the military cost of protecting global oil extraction and importation were passed along directly to the pump, a gallon of gasoline in America would cost somewhere roughly between $13 and $18. That's including the offset for supplementary biofuels.) It's why we fought the Gulf War—by historical accident, Iraq has the largest and least exploited oil reserves left on Earth, and, consequently, America now has a dozen huge military bases in Iraq, all of them strategically "protecting" oil fields, oil production facilities, and oil shipping hubs. Of course that it is not their stated purpose, but it is their purpose. Never mind a wholesale switchover—it would make incredibly good sense for us to make it our national purpose to simply gain enough alternative energy production to attain energy independence. It would solve a large number of complications and eliminate vast expenditures of national resources.

Meanwhile, China has no such sentimental, historical, and institutional attachment to the energy sources of the 20th century, and the Chinese are killing us in the race to harness and develop solar. We've allowed them to get way, way out ahead of us. Photographs aren't proof, and photographs aren't argument, but what they certainly are is illustration, and I've never seen a more stunning illustration of China's emerging supremacy in what will surely be the dominant 21st-century energy source. No one sees the future, least of all me, but oil will not be the world's major source of energy in 2100—that much is easy to predict, simply because there's not enough of it left. With its electric cars improving by leaps and bounds (BYD just passed Tesla as the world largest EV producer), its battery research lapping us, and its solar power technology, implementation, and deployment crushing ours, China is setting itself up to rule the future. (Germany and Brazil are also well ahead of us in alternative and renewable energy.) One word describes the U.S.: behind.

I wish I could link to this set of set of pictures. The most symbolic one is captioned "Floating solar panels stretch across an aquatic farm built on land that subsided after extensive coal mining, in Suixi County, Anhui province, China, on April 28, 2025." But oh well. For those of you who subscribe to The Atlantic, be sure not to miss it. 

Mike

P.S. I'm watching this morning what are indisputably the two greatest tennis players alive on our planet. Back to the tennis!

Original contents copyright 2025 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. (To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below or on the title of this post.)

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John Shriver: "Dan Yergin's book The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money, and Power is also a great treatise on how the whole western world is wrapped around oil. I was half way through the book when my mother died in 2020, and had just gotten to the end of the Second World War. The Allies won that war much because of their control of oil. The Allies starved both Germany and Japan of oil. I took a course from Dan Yergin at the Kennedy School of Government on this topic about 1980, before he wrote the book. (Cross-registered from 'the small trade school down the river.') Very interesting; an enormous amount of reading. There's also a PBS multi-part series based on the book, which is accessible online. Here's the first part."

Mike replies: The Prize is now a trilogy: The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money, and Power (2008); The Quest: Energy, Security, and the Remaking of the Modern World (2012); and The New Map: Energy, Climate, and the Clash of Nations (2021). The trouble is, their combined 2,336 pages (six and a half pounds of paper in the print versions, according to Amazon) isn't bathroom reading. I put a high value on primers (the word is properly pronounced to rhyme with trimmer) because they might actually be read, which is why I like Kevin Phillips' entertaining backgrounder. However, all you have to do is read the first page or two of the sample of The Prize at Amazon to realize that you're in the hands of a compelling and capable writer in Mr. Yergin. History well written is the only true page-turner. Like you, I read a lot of The Prize when it was more or less new, before ultimately being defeated. (I tend not to like histories as they butt up against the present, because they get less and less authoritative the closer they get to now. I learned that reading histories of photography.)

Jan-Peter Onstwedder: "I think you need to fact-check some of your post. The US imports crude oil, true, despite producing a lot. But it also is a net exporter of refined products. So imports + domestic production is greater than domestic demand, the balance being exported as fuels, plastics and other petrochemical products. It used to be true that OPEC had significant influence over prices and therefore US economics, but that influence is much smaller since US production has gone up so much. And the US now uses far less energy per unit of GDP than 20–30 years ago. All in all, oil is still important but no longer an excuse for meddling in other producing countries’ affairs."

Mike replies: And yet we still do. Oil imports have hardly abated. I admit I'm not up on "the Shale Gale," but the go-to book on it is for those who are interested is probably this one. Bear in mind that fracking in general might well be a sort of financial shell game: it succeeds by attracting huge amounts of speculative investment from the excess amount of capital "sloshing around the world" (a consequence of wealth hoarding) and has yet to prove that it's actually sustainably economically viable. At any rate, I'm not interested, because when the world is burning the last thing we need is more fire.

ASW: "Bill McKibben has a concise (online) article about recent and future growth of renewable energy sources, how China is in the driver's seat to dominate the space, and how our (America's) energy policies are both backwards and self-defeating, in The New Yorker. It's called '4.6 Billion Years On, the Sun Is Having a Moment.' It's well worth a few minutes of your time if you have access."

Mike adds: Here's a brief clip: "...Even though we’ve got used to seeing solar panels and wind turbines across the landscape in the intervening fifty years, we continue to think of what they produce as 'alternative energy,' a supplement to the fossil-fuelled power that has run Western economies for more than two centuries. In the past two years, however, with surprisingly little notice, renewable energy has suddenly become the obvious, mainstream, cost-efficient choice around the world."

I just read it. It's an incredibly hopeful article. And from Bill McKibben! (Who at times has sounded like the most pessimistic person on the planet.)

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Dye transfer sale: Ctein has written to say,

"I've shipped the prints to everyone who's paid me. Everyone who has paid should have either received their prints or a tracking number from the USPS. Anyone who hasn't received one or the other should get in touch with me at ctein@pobox.com ."

We've heard from several people who have already received their prints and they were glowing in their praise and satisfaction. Our print sales over the years have been a lot of fun and very gratifying. Thanks again to all. 

Large-format printer for sale: Ctein, as you know, is moving to Montana soon; he's gonna be a dental floss tycoon. Er, no, I mean he's moving Ireland soon, and it has nothing to do with dental floss. I lifted this from his most recent newsletter: "I am still looking for someone who is interested in buying my 44-inch Epson P9000 printer. I'd like to keep it until shortly before I leave. It should be someone local (this is not shippable!) and I'm offering it at an extremely good price, like less than half what a new one would cost, with over a grand worth of ink and paper."

[He means it when he says it's not shippable. It weighs in excess of 300 lbs. and it's huge—when Epson ships these to trade shows, the reusable crate they use costs as much as the printer itself. For this reason, the sale would have to be local in the San Francisco area. —Mike the Ed.]

"I've also got a 17-inch Epson P800 printer for sale. Available for immediate pick-up with a decent ink supply, and I think you'll agree the price is right at $500."

Same email address as above.

Mike

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Real quick—just wanted to mention that yesterday, not long after the post about weird stuff you use your phone camera for, I went to the local mechanic's shop, Marbles, to see if I could get an estimate. My car has some rust at either end of the rocker panels, and I wanted to see if it could be fixed, and, if so, how much it would cost. The guy who does the body shop estimates is the owner, Paulie Marbles. I thought he had retired but he assured me he hasn't, although his son now occupies the big office. Anyway we're standing there discussing rust and rocker panels, and Paulie apologized for not being able to get down and look up under the car, saying he isn't as nimble as he used to be, or words to that effect.

So I got the phone out, reversed the camera, and stuck the phone under the car. We were able to see the extent of the rust just fine, with me on one knee and him standing up. I just thought it was funny that this happened right after we were talking about it here. 

The verdict, by the way—he doesn't really do rust. He says no matter how good a job you do, it can still keep coming back. Reminds me of my friend Jim, who kept a favorite Subaru station wagon for 11 years through the snowy, salty Vermont winters. He would have kept it for longer but rust got the better of it. That was a while back—cars are much more rustproof now. But still, you know what Neil Young said:

Mike

Original contents copyright 2025 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales thro ugh affiliate links may benefit this site. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. (To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below or on the title of this post.)

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Who is this?

(I'll hold off a while before posting the answer, to allow more people time to guess.)

Mike

ANSWER: As many of you guessed, it's Lt. Colonel George Armstrong Custer, supposedly taken two months before he was killed at the Battle of the Little Bighorn (called the Battle of the Greasy Grass by the Lakota [Sioux], the Cheyenne, and other Plains tribes. Greasy Grass was their name for the Little Bighorn and the surrounding area). Custer earned the temporary rank of Major General of Volunteers in the Civil War, and also the brevet rank of Major General in the regular Army; "brevet rank," sometimes called a battlefield promotion, was usually awarded for bravery, valor, and combat leadership, and also as a way of filling vacant leadership posts without incurring the cost of permanent promotions—recipients were paid at their regular Army rates. At the end of the War, Custer reverted to his full regular Army rank of Captain. He was then promptly promoted to Lieutenant Colonel in 1866, and that was his rank when he was in command of the 7th Cavalry (several readers picked up on the "7" on his epaulet) and when he was killed in 1876.

There isn't much good information about this particular picture online. Most of it comes from a January 2014 "Collector's Edition" of True West magazine called "100 Best Historical Photos of the American West." The contents are online. The TW title was "Custer’s Last Photograph" and the full caption was, "A vain man, George Armstrong Custer posed for more than 150 photographs in his lifetime, including this last photo, taken of him two months before the 1876 Battle of the Little Big Horn that would end his life." The same caption accompanies most other appearances of the same picture online. It is most likely a carte de visite (CDV in auction listings) or cabinet card (the difference is only size, cabinet cards being larger), probably produced in volume to be sold as souvenirs after his demise. 

The interesting thing about it is that his hair is cut short. He was a notorious dandy, and wore his dark blonde hair long and scented with cinnamon oil—the Indians' nickname for him, one of them, was "Long Hair." Here is the image that is perhaps the most iconic. It's not known why he cut it: some claim it was because he had premonitions of his death; other sources claim his wife Libbie had been urging him to cut it because she was afraid his long hair would make him more conspicuous as a target for scalping or mutilation; some say that maybe he just decided to. Or perhaps Thomas Berger, the author of Little Big Man, was correct when he had his fictional protagonist Jack Crabbe say that the 36-year-old Custer was beginning to go bald. No one knows for sure. 

The print is identified as having come from the Robert G. McCubbin Western Photographs Collection, which was broken up at auction in 2019. 

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Charlie Dunton wrote, yesterday: "Now that I am in the middle of my 7th decade, I've found another good use for my iPhone. When I find myself standing in front of a food vendor and his menu is too far away, or otherwise too difficult to read, I pull out my iPhone and snap a picture of the menu. I can then quickly zoom in and read it with ease."

Mike replies: I wonder what a list of "all the things we use cellphone cameras for that aren't photography" would look like. I recall years ago seeing a young woman behaving strangely. She was waving her phone high in the air and posing like a model, her free hand flicking at her hair. It turned out she had the camera on her phone reversed and was using the phone like a mirror, fixing her hair. 

I use the phone to read very small text, especially when the text is molded into same-color plastic, which I have difficulty seeing. The "magnifier" mode is accessed by clicking the on/off button three times quickly. In the past I've used it to see things I can't get my head in position to see, for instance the back panel of my computer. Lately, when I suspect that a cashier might dispute the price of a sale item, I snap a quick picture of the shelf label so the clerk doesn't have to "go check" when I tell them what the item was supposed to cost. 

Sometimes things sitting right above a pricetag of $39.98 have
morphed to $48.98 by the time they get to the cashier.

And of course I use it for copies—I sent in a water testing sample this afternoon and snapped pictures of the documents before I enclosed them in the package. I use it for notes, like ads, phone numbers, cards on community bulletin boards, etc. But I'd guess we all do that. Around here, I actually find tradesmen by noting the names on the doors and side panels of trucks, which I'll then snap a picture of. 

What else do you use your phone camera for that isn't pictorial photography? Anything else you can think of?

Mike

Original contents copyright 2025 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales thro ugh affiliate links may benefit this site. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. (To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below or on the title of this post.)

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Mike Plews: "My bank app lets me deposit checks with my phone camera. Handy."

Dave Hsberman: "Frequent use for iPhone: Taking photos of books so I remember to see if our library has them."

Marc (partial comment): "I live on 300 acres of mostly bushland, and use my phone's camera for GPS coordinates of maintenance jobs. For example, I'll note holes for repair along the western fenceline, where the electric deer fence runs, where deer, wallaby, kangaroo and wombats have found a way to push through to avoid the zap. Also, for summer weed spraying, I'll note small outbreaks of St. John's Wort for attention (or horehound, or mullein, or thistle, or...but mostly wort)—it's as easy as just taking a photo.

"(Nothing stops wombats—they are the D9 tractor of the marsupial world. But I persist.)"

Ken Royce: "When at the market and am unsure exactly which brand or size or a product my wife requested, sending a quick text with a photo of the choices quickly resolves the matter...."

Rick Popham (partial comment): "I work in hospital maintenance. When we go into an office for painting, new carpet, etc., I take a picture of the walls so all the pictures and diplomas are put back in the right spot and any books are put back on the shelves in the right order."

Ilkka (partial comment): "The later model iPhones can see in the dark. It can be helpful if for example planning to make repairs in a dark place. I remember taking some pictures of a false ceiling to see how the wires and pipes went."

Henry White (partial comment): "Many younger travelers use their phones, in conjunction with Google Translate, to read signs in other languages with a quick conversion to English. Very helpful when visiting places like Japan and South Korea."

hugh crawford (partial comment): "Back in 1996 I bought my first digital camera, an Olympus D300L with a whopping 780,000-pixel sensor. Among other things, I used it to take pictures of expense receipts for a project at IBM that I was a freelance contractor on. It took about a week for them to figure out how to deal with them. I may have been the first person to submit digital photos of receipts at IBM. It hadn’t really occurred to me until now."

Albert Smith: "Parking space recall: in large lots or multi story garages, you can avoid an entire episode of Seinfeld by snapping a photo of Orange 43. Unless you like carrying a heavy air conditioner for 23 minutes. 😉 "

Bob Keefer does the same thing with trail photos, to help him find the way home again. —Ed.

Kodachromeguy (partial comment): "I use the phone camera to document parts of the house before going to the lumber yard or building store. It helps me explain a repair or project."

Sean (partial comment): "I travel internationally. Instead of carrying my passport, which I can safely leave in a hotel safe, I take shots of the current visa and other pertinent pages."

Here are the five things about my camera I don't like:

1. You have to look through the viewfinder to make any settings, check the battery, etc. The chimney finder just magnifies the viewing screen. So you have to turn the camera on and look through the VF to set or change most things.
2. There's a cover for the huge eyepiece (illustrated below) that has to be snapped on when you're not using the camera. The problem is that direct sunlight through the magnifier could damage the viewing screen. Although it's not something I've ever had to do before on any other camera, I actually don't mind it in practice. Cameras are quirky; you get used to the ones you use.
3. Electronic shutter only. As far as I know rolling shutter is possible. I haven't experienced any problems with it yet. I might have to do some tests. 
4. The conversion probably spoiled its resale value—I'll never get my money back out of it. I don't currently want to; but still, if I wanted to, I probably couldn't. 
5. The worst problem by far is also no problem at all: the crucial difference is that you have to know about it. Here it is. If you're reviewing a picture and you enlarge the review image as much as possible to check focus, it will look unsharp. That does not mean it is unsharp: when you get the file back to the computer it will be razor sharp. But if you don't know about it it will throw you for a loop when you first encounter it. I've actually read of people returning this camera after purchasing it because they are convinced it won't focus and everything is unsharp at the level of fine detail. That's an illusion. Of course, once you know about it, this is not a problem. [UPDATE: See Henry White's Featured Comment below.]

The eyepiece cover. Remove for use and replace when you're done.

There's actually one more problem, which is that some people give me a hard time for having/wanting a monochrome camera. But that's not the camera's fault. And I don't mind it, to be honest. I yam what I yam.

Do I recommend this camera? Probably not. Not as a monochrome conversion anyway. I'd recommend getting a factory Pentax K3 III Monochrome or a Leica Monochrom to preserve resale value, or getting an older camera converted, one you already own (although conversion is expensive, so don't convert one with tons of shutter actuations or lots of wear already on it). 

As a color stills camera? Hmm. Obviously I've never used one that way. But it has a cult following, and supposedly there's magic in Sigma's color science, and as far as the form factor is concerned you'll either love it or hate it, which means some people will love it. So maybe. 

Reducing friction
After yesterday's post, Rob L. mentioned, "Barely comes up, but reducing friction makes life more fun." He's gone down to one lensmount and configured his cameras to make them easier to use—that's what he means by reducing friction. That's probably the main thing I'm experiencing with my FP-m: I've got it set up so sweetly for my uses that it really reduces friction.

There might be one problem I haven't mentioned—now that I'm happy, I don't really look around at new cameras any more. And that leaves a void where GAS used to be. But you know what they say—oh well!

Mike

Original contents copyright 2025 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. (To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below or on the title of this post.)

Featured Comments from:

Henry White: "Workaround for camera finder unsharp imaging on review: The camera, when shooting in raw, creates a very, very small JPEG from the raw file to show for review. If you want a big, sharp review file, then shoot with the camera set to raw+large JPEG. Upon review the camera will show the large JPEG.

"This is the case not just with the Sigma camera but across other brands as well. It's an easy fix and if you are so disposed you can just toss the JPEGs when you download the files to your computer."

Mike replies: So that's it. I figured it was because the review JPEG was too small, but I didn't know the correction. Thanks. 

robert e (partial comment): "These two posts were really interesting. It's much more enlightening to read how a person gets along with a thing while they do what they want to do than to read about how the thing is designed to work for generic uses."

Erwin Frank-Schultz: "This comment is somewhat cheeky on this post as it refers more to the Phone post than this one...but one thing I don't like about my (phone) camera is that it is an internet connected computer. I recently finished Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman (highly recommended)—one of his ten recommendations at the end is to use single use devices, to not get distracted. This struck a chord; whenever I use my phone to take a photo, there is a temptation to look at that e-mail or WhatsApp that just came in. Not a problem on my XE-3 and certainly not on my FM2."

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I have a Sigma FP-m, which is an FP with a monochrome sensor. It's not factory; I had it modified. Also, I have just one lens for it, a slow 45mm ƒ/2.8 normal lens (I notice the price on that has gone way up recently).

Here are 15 things I like about my camera:

1. It isn't like any other camera I've ever used. The one it most resembles in feel and what Erwin called "haptics" is a Bronica 645, though of course it's arranged differently.
2. It's manual focus. I had no thought of using it that way when I got it, and even when I first tried it I had no intention of leaving it set that way. I just like it. Since I started using it that way I just never went back. I occasionally set it back to AF, but not very often. Well, I think it's happened twice. 
3. Focus ring is on the traditional position on the lens. Despite being focus-by-wire it's very smooth and feels great.
4. Traditional aperture ring is on the lens.
5. It's B&W only. I've written about this till the cows came home, went back out, and came home again. Briefly: I tend to see like a camera sees, and adapt my thinking to what I know the camera's going to give me. So it's actually freeing for me to have a camera that has a stable configuration, that sees only one way. Some people don't even understand this, so to say "their mileage may vary" is an understatement. But that's OK. We're all different. This is what I like, even if you just have to take my word for it.
6. The viewfinder is B&W-only too. That's all the camera can see, so there's no color option anywhere in the process.
7. The viewfinder is huge. About 1.5x linearly and 2.25x the area of the virtual size of my Fujifilm X-T4 mirrorless viewfinder.  That's thanks to Sigma's odd arrangement of a vertical magnifying "stovepipe"-type finder mounted horizontally so that it magnifies the rear viewing screen. The viewfinder gives me a more immersive and immediate sense of the scene the camera is seeing. You know that feeling you get when you can't see everything on the back of a phone when you're trying to shoot in sunlight? It's like the opposite of that. 
8. When I take images, there's minimal informational clutter in the viewfinder. When I review, I see nothing but the image.
9. I keep it in aperture-priority mode always.
10. I have it set up so that the index-finger front dial always controls exposure compensation, which is how I prefer to tweak exposure. 
11. ISO is one button push away, and is then adjusted with the same front dial that controls the exposure comp. One touch of the shutter button and I'm out of that menu and back to the ready state.
12. It's silent.
13. I can do everything I do on the camera by feel. Don't need to look at the camera for anything.
14. The image quality is great. It's not naturally my kind of tonality, but I've a.) learned to modify it toward my tastes and b.) I'm getting more and more accustomed to the way it naturally wants to look. As I mentioned, I tend to learn to see the way the camera sees. I take slightly different kinds of pictures with this camera that I would have taken with, say, a medium-format camera and Tri-X in D-76, but then, it's a different beast. This is about as close as I've been able to come to the look of Plus-X / K2 filter / D-76 1+1. This is more like the files want to look, with depressed mid-tones. Of course digital is fundamentally different from B&W film, because you have to mind the highlights. With B&W film you always had to mind the shadows. From the film world (in my experience, which was pretty extensive) the results from this camera most closely resemble the look of 4x5-inch Ilford HP-5 Plus. Nothing wrong with that. 
15. The bag I have for it fits it like a glove and is easy to use. It's perfect for the camera. Never underestimate a good bag!

That's pretty much it. Apart from setup, which never changes, those are the only controls I use. Very basic, pretty much like all the autoexposure 35mm film cameras I used to use. Weird that the camera I've found that is the most "film-camera-like" is one designed to be mainly a video camera. But oh well. The only other thing I do when shooting with this camera is that in some circumstances I take the yellow filter off the lens and stash it in my shirt pocket.

Maybe I should add "simplicity" to the list of things I like.

Roads not traveled
My "road not traveled" was that the Pentax Monochrome came out shortly after I committed to getting the FP modified. I do sometimes wonder how my life would have been different if I had gone that way. I would certainly just buy the Pentax if I were doing it now—it's cheaper than my FP-m, for one thing. Leica also makes factory monochrome cameras. I would have gotten the Q3-43 Monochrom*, but I balk at Leica prices. That's just me.

As I sit situated as I am, if you will, with my gear, I would love to pare my kit down to just an iPhone and the FP-m. I'm kind of antsy to do it. The things I need the Fuji for are wide-angle shots with the 14mm lens, and portraits with the 56mm lens. I really can't yet rely on the iPhone for those two things. Although I've gotten some very nice portraits with the iPhone, I've never had one printed, so I don't know how it would do. My next phone is probably the upcoming iPhone 17 Pro Max or equivalent, and I'll be eager to see how it does in those use-cases.

The other day in the "Dedicated Camera" post, Josh Hawkins and several others mentioned that having their big/real/dedicated ILC with them makes them happy and improves the whole experience of where they're going and what they're doing. That's definitely the way it is for me. The dedicated camera makes life better. I really like getting out with the FP-m and doing nothing but hunting for pictures. It gets me into a whole different mindset. And the results can be uniquely gratifying. I wouldn't like to forfeit that.

No way would I be as happy just shooting with the phone...much as I like shooting with the phone. 

Mike

*Oh, wait, they don't make that.

P.S. One very important thing I use my iPhone for is reading books. I probably split my reading about equally between the iPad and the iPhone. Having the phone with me when I'm out an about, it's not so important that I have a phone with me, not so important that I have access to the internet, not so important that I have the phone cameras with me. What's important is 1. driving directions, on the relatively infrequent occasions when I need them, and 2. that I have my current book with me. And that I can get and receive texts, but that's a lesser need. Of everything, book reading is No. 1. 

Original contents copyright 2025 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. (To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below or on the title of this post.)

Featured Comments from:

Tom Burke: "15 things I like about my camera:

1. It’s pretty much the same as all the other Canon cameras I’ve used over the last 30+ years. It’s an old familiar friend who’s learned some new tricks.
2. I press this button and it focuses!—which is good, because my eyesight is poor.
3. I don’t need to worry about the focus ring…
4. …Or the aperture ring.
5. Its images are in full, glorious Technicolor!—just like the world, in fact.
6. And of course the viewfinder shows me all that colour. Who wants to look at a monochrome version of our beautiful world?
7. The viewfinder is big enough to show what I’m shooting, without being awkward.
8. Both when I’m shooting or reviewing I can either see just the image or as much extra information as I want—my choice, with a single button.
9. I can leave it aperture-priority if I want to (and generally do) but it’s easy to switch to a different mode—just twist a dial.
10. I have it set up so exposure compensation is always available on the same dial.
11. I don’t change ISO on the fly. Instead, I have specific modes in which ISO behaves differently, and which I use for different types of shot.
12. It can be silent if I want it, or I can wake the neighbours with it! My choice, either way.
13. The menus are comprehensive and easy to use, and are grouped logically. And the ones I use most are available to me as a separate group of actions.
14. I’m happy with the image quality; indeed, on the occasions when I’m not it’ll be my fault.
15. Ah, rats: still looking for the right bag!"

Ken Ford: "I never realized the Sigma stovepipe finder worked on the FP—mine came with my DP0. I agree, it’s an immersive shooting experience to the point that I have to be sure I’m not anywhere near where I’ll get clobbered by an unnoticed vehicle. An 'FP-m' is something I would definitely pursue if I didn’t already have two other dedicated monochrome digital cameras. I’ve considered seeing if my old X100s can be converted, though. I’ve found having dedicated monochrome cameras inspire me to shoot more."

MikeR: "I'm tempted to write, 'What I like about each of my 15 cameras.' Except, it wouldn't be honest. Otherwise, why would I have set aside about a half dozen to sell?"

Mike replies: Ah, but do you really want to sell them?

ugo: "You should have seen the jalopy of a camera used by Giacomelli; a Kobell (you never heard of that brand, uh?) kept together with iron wire and black tape; let's say that image quality was not his paramount concern. There is a photograph of Giacomelli sitting on a bench with a woman; as the legend goes, she was a witch who removed a curse from his camera. Did you ever need a witch for your camera? Anyhow, he had a second Kobell for replacement, but he kept it behind a piece of furniture because 'If my camera knew I have a replacement, she would make a tantrum.'"

Mike adds: Here's a photo of Mario Giacomelli and his Kobell.

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A sporting post, in honor of Summer—but first, Happy 4th of July to my fellow Americans. Formally called Independence Day, it commemorates the ratification of the Declaration of Independence by the Second Continental Congress on July 4, 1776, establishing the United States of America. Three Founding Father Presidents died on this day—John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, both signers of the Declaration, died on the same day, the country's 50th birthday in 1826, and James Monroe, the fifth President, died five years to the day later. Curious coincidence. 

Is it just here, or are celebrations muted elsewhere? I haven't heard a single firecracker yet. Formerly the cacophony started in June, though it's been more subdued in recent years. But on to tennis.

Jack Draper. Photo by si.robi.

Upsets and surprises
Malcolm Gladwell wrote a whole book on outliers. Outliers are by definition atypical, and rare.

The UK's top-ranked male tennis player, Jack Draper, the No. 4 seed at Wimbledon in the men's draw, lost yesterday, to Marin Čilić, an unseeded player from Croatia. Čilić is a former major winner, but he won his single major more than ten years ago, in 2014; and he peaked at No. 3 in the rankings, but that was seven and a half years ago. His win over Draper was the first time he had beaten a top-10 player at a major in three years, and, at 36, he became the third-oldest player ever to beat a top-10 player at Wimbledon. It was, in other words, quite an upset.

Draper, however, joined 18 other seeded players in the men's draw (among 32 seeded players total) who are now out of the tournament. The same thing has happened on the women's side—17 seeded players are out, for a total of 36 in both draws. More than half of all seeds, men and women.

In the first two rounds, more seeded men lost in 2002: 20, compared to this year's 19; and the same number of seeded women, 17, fell in 2013 and 2016. But the total of 36 seeds losing across both draws makes this year the absolute outlier. More seeded players lost in the first two rounds of Wimbledon this year than ever before at Wimbledon, and indeed ever before at any major* tennis tournament.

The wily Djokovic, ranked and seeded sixth, now sees this as his best opportunity to add a 25th major to his record 24—even though no player, male or female, has ever won a major at his age, which is 38.** But the top two seeds in the men's draw are still alive. No. 2 seed Carlos Alcaraz of Spain (pronounced as though the "z" is a "th," despite what you hear constantly on English-speaking media), who almost fell during a five-set scare in the first round against Fabio Fognini, and Jannik Sinner, of Italy, the No. 1 seed, are both still in it. Sinner is 23 years old, Alcaraz 22. Both are in their prime: between them they've won all six of the last six majors.

Despite a recent three-month suspension, Sinner is by far the World's No. 1-ranked player, with 10,430 ranking points vs. 9,300 for the second-ranked Alcaraz. The amazingly consistent Sinner has put some awe-inspiring beat-downs on lesser players, for example his lopsided 6-1, 6-1, 6-3 thumping of Aleksander Vukic yesterday (Sinner seemed to apologize for his weak showing in the third set at his press conference), but he seems unable to beat Alcaraz, who has already won Wimbledon twice. Alcaraz is ahead 8-4 against Sinner in their lifetime head-to-head score, and has won all five of their last five meetings.  

So it's going to be a very interesting Wimbledon. But whatever happens, it's already an outlier. Outliers are by definition atypical, and rare—but then, they have to happen sometime.

Mike

*Now despicably called "grand slams," which they are not. A Grand Slam means winning all four majors in one calendar year. Only two male tennis players have ever won a real Grand Slam: Don Budge, during the amateur era in 1938, and Rod Laver. Laver did it twice, once in 1962 as an amateur and again in 1969 as a professional. Laver wasn't allowed to compete in major tournaments in the intervening years, because he turned professional and the majors were amateur-only until the Open Era began in 1968. The major tournaments are the Australian Open; the French Open, now called "Roland-Garros" [sic] after its venue; Wimbledon; and the U.S. Open. Tennis has taken to calling all the majors "grand slams" for marketing reasons. It's a sleazy swindle, which steals valor from those who have actually accomplished that ultimate feat. Among women players, Maureen Connolly (in the amateur era), Margaret Court, and Steffi Graf have won the real Grand Slam—Graf's is called "the Golden Slam" because she won an Olympic Gold Medal in the same year. Jack Crawford, Serena Williams, and Novak Djokovic all came within one match of winning the real Grand Slam, but failed.

Credit: San Diego Air and Space Museum Archive

Curiously, Roland Garros the man was not a tennis player but an aviator. He was the first man to fly across the Mediterranean, and became a French flying ace in WWI. He was shot down and killed over the Ardennes in 1918, only one month before the end of the war, one day shy of his 30th birthday. Garros was also a close friend of the legendary automobile maker Ettore Bugatti, and an early Bugatti was also named for him. Why the odd hyphen in the tournament name? Beats me. [UPDATE: See Yves Papillon's Featured Comment below.]

**Ken Rosewall won the 1972 Australian Open at 37 years, 2 months, and 1 day, which has been the record ever since. He reached the finals of Wimbledon and the U.S. Open two and a half years later, in 1974, at the age of 39, but was shellacked in both tournament finals by Jimmy Connors. Connors, for his part, was dominant enough that he might have won a real Grand Slam—but he was banned from the French Open during his best years because of his affiliation with a now-forgotten league called World Team Tennis. 

Original contents copyright 2025 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. (To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below or on the title of this post.)

Featured Comments from:

Lisa s. Gorrell: "As much as I enjoy watching some of the seeded players, I also like it when an underdog upsets them. These underdogs could become tomorrow's winners."

Yves Papillon: "About hyphens in French. If it is a name, no hyphen. If it is a place, building or else named to honor a person, it takes an hyphen. Sorry for my frenchglish."

Mike replies: That's all right, it's better than my Englench. And merci for explaining that.

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The batt'ry in my iPhone 13 seems to be getting hinky—a long stint on the charger sometimes doesn't get it to 100%, and it's draining faster—and I'm wondering about replacing it. Replacing the phone, I mean, although I could be talking about replacing just the battery. I've replaced the battery in a phone before, but that just tends to encourage me to keep the phone until there's no trade-in value left in it. Replacing phones generally is the same kind of conundrum as when to sell stock or deciding when to take Social Security—it's a game, but there's no gaming it. When to do any of these things is an insoluble puzzle. Anyway the reason I replace phones is for the cameras, pretty much exclusively. And in researching the newest cameras vs. the one I have, I've happened across the phrase "so good" several times now. 

As in, the camera in the phone is "so good" you might not even need a "dedicated" camera any more.

"Dedicated camera" is only the latest modification of "camera" that I've encountered over my lengthening journey. It distinguishes a camera from a phone camera, which is what "camera" most often means now. "Stills camera" was another that popped up, a bit further back, to distinguish that from a camera that shot video as well, although that's basically everything now, including the phones. Before that, 25–30 years ago, it was "film camera," to distinguish those from digital cameras; before that, "manual focus cameras," to distinguish those from the autofocus cameras coming on strong; way back, before my time,"manual camera" helped distinguish cameras without autoexposure or just cameras that didn't have built-in light meters. Now, if you say to somebody that their camera has a light meter in it, you're likely to get the response, "what's a light meter?" But I suppose it's always been this way: in the 1890s there was "hand camera," to distinguish those from "stand cameras" and cameras on tripods. Whereas, in the 1860s, maybe, every camera was a stand- or tripod camera.

It's tough being a camera—you're never just a plain ol' camera. Each time, the new term acknowledges that something has changed to make it so that all cameras are lately not what the newer term describes. No one would have said "film camera" in 1960 or "stills camera" when the only way for consumers to shoot video was with a camcorder. Remember when those were a hot thing and all the rage? Time was if you had said "dedicated camera" and explained that it meant a device that was just for taking pictures, you would have gotten funny looks.

But I digress. So anyway, now there are dedicated cameras as well as cameras, which are assumed to be in your phone. So do you even need a dedicated camera any more?"

Oooh! Oooh!
I have my hand up. My answer: absolutely I need a dedicated ILC. (ILC = interchangeable lens camera.) The phone cameras that are so good now aren't that good yet.

My response actually tilts the other way altogether. That is, I sometimes wonder if it's bad for me to even have a phone with a camera in it at all. What it does is to encourage me not to have my "real" camera with me. What happens then is that I take a picture with the phone that I wish I had taken with a better camera. I've discussed this before.

A personal memory. Wex has Butters' discus toy, which Butters considers a violation of the proper order of the Universe. Wex would tease Butters by keeping it, and Butters would stalk Wex patiently until he got it back. I called it a "Wexican standoff." I could wish this were shot with the Fuji, but in all likelihood the picture wouldn't exist if it hadn't been for the iPhone.

I think, however—I hope—that I have fully embraced iPhoneography. It's freeing and fun to be able to "take notes" with the iPhone, and to almost always have a camera with me (I still leave my phone at home sometimes—I didn't grow up with them; that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it), and to be able to take a meaningless picture just for myself and just for the pure joy of it. There's another advantage: it has meant that I get out on purpose to do "dedicated photography" more often, with my real camera. Since my dog died I've been lonely and depressed, and my old "mindless compensating" activity—pool—is (temporarily I hope) not comforting, because he was always with me in the pool shed. But when I get out with the camera it's been working as a refuge, a relief. Driving around looking for pictures is still relaxing and comforting. He was never with me on those trips. It's a nice way to get away. Also, I enjoy concentrating on photography.

Should I happen to get a good shot, I would much rather it have been taken with my Sigma FP-monochrome or Fujifilm X-T4.

Do you make any effort to keep a dedicated camera on you at all times, or most of the time? Because that's one solution to avoid getting stuck with just your phone—to always have a real camera close at hand. I would think that would be the great advantage of the new Fujifilm X-E5 and its pancake lens, or any small, pocketable larger-sensor camera. 

But here's what would be the real test of dedication to dedicated photography: if you could buy a phone without a camera in it, would you?

I'm actually glad I can't (I'm in the Apple ecosystem, and Apple doesn't make a cameraless iPhone). I'd like to think that that's exactly what I would do if I could—reserve photography for the tools that do it best; force myself to carry a dedicated camera; never get stuck with an iPhone file for something I'd love to print.

But in reality I guess I'm glad I don't have to make that decision. For all I think I'd like to be uncompromising, I actually like my phone. I've gotten used to it.

Cameras, after all, are useful for other things than just making "dedicated photographs"!

Mike

Original contents copyright 2025 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. (To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below or on the title of this post.)

Featured Comments from:

Roger Bradbury: "I have a dedicated camera on me nearly all the time. It's in a canvas shoulder bag which is part camera bag, part old boy on an old British motorcycle's bag. The camera is a Sony A6000 with the okayish-quality and tiny 16–50mm kit lens. As it's protected by being inside a strong 1960s British Army ammo pouch inside the main bag and hardly weighs anything, I hardly have to take any notice of it at all. It goes everywhere I go when I don't have another camera, and only gets left in the car or bike if I'm in the pub or supermarket. I essentially already have a mobile phone without a camera, as the best the camera in my phone can do is little better than a potato print."

Vijay: "I always carry a dedicated camera with me. It’s a Ricoh GRIII in my front left pocket. My back left pocket always has my iPhone. I wouldn’t buy a phone without a camera because I use the iPhone for videos, and the GRIII for stills. My videos aren’t long, usually about six seconds, and their primary purpose is to capture audio. Sounds (especially of nature) are so representative of many places for me."

Henry White: "Hmm. I leave my phone at home more often than I do my camera. I can't remember the last time I left home without a dedicated camera. I was at a doctor's appointment this morning, Leica D-Lux 8 over one shoulder...as comforting as a warm blanket."

Josh Hawkins "Eight to 10 years ago I was going camping with the kids a lot. Every other weekend, every third weekend. It gave my then-undergrad wife time to study. The kids were three and five, in that range, at that time. I decided to make my life easier and just take my phone with for photos. The photos were just fine from it. What I found was camping just wasn't as much fun. Part of the joy was from having a 'real' camera with me. It wasn't that I just had more fun taking photos, I had more fun camping, overall, all around, because I was using a 'real' camera. It's been a valuable discovery. Sometimes I take my camera to things not because I need it, but because it's just more fun that way. "

Kye Wood: "You carry a dedicated camera for the fun factor. Just like you drive the convertible on the weekend. If you're wired that way, and it floats your boat, a dedicated camera will get the superior shot every time, because you will be engaged and not just passively prodding a button drawn on a glass screen."

Herjulfr: "No. The more I use my phone for photography, the less I like photography. I now prefer to leave the phone or at home or in the car and bring my X-Pro1 or my old Canon FTb. Holding them sets me in the mood, I am more aware of my surroundings and, at the end of the day, I have enjoyed taking photographs."

Edward Taylor: "What no one seems to discuss much isn’t whether a phone camera can replace a dedicated camera, but whether a dedicated camera could ever replace a phone camera. My phone captures decent photos in challenging lighting conditions that my $4,000 dedicated camera simply can’t, especially handheld. And I can share those photos instantly. I often use both cameras for the same shot, and frequently the phone is the only one that produces a usable image. At some point, I believe dedicated cameras will need all the computational power and connectivity of phones to stay competitive, or to replace phones entirely. Cameras should have cellular plans and appropriate software. Is a $20/month data plan really prohibitive when you’ve spent thousands on the camera?"

James Coleman: "I carry a 'dedicated' camera everywhere. I never leave the house without one unless it's raining cat and dogs or I'm headed somewhere 'dedicated' cameras aren't allowed (never mind everyone's got a phone...). My Pixel 6a does a great job but I've taken too many phone photos over the years when I'd wished I'd had my dedicated with me."

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In publishing there are two kinds of deadline—the deadline, which usually has a bit of margin built in for safety; and the drop-deadline, which is the absolute last second something can be done. One's The Eleventh Hour and the other is 11:59:59, you might say. 

So, new deadline: The "Dogs" Baker's Dozen will appear on Wednesday, July 16th. The reason is, I've backed myself into a corner where I'm feeling pressured. I can't work when I'm under pressure. Which you might consider immature or even obnoxious, and you'd be right, but it's one reason I'm a blogger: if I could handle pressure and deadlines like a normal grownup, I'd have a more responsible position for an actual employer and you wouldn't be reading this. So it's a situation of get some, give some.

I'm sorry about this, by the way. But I know myself.

July 16th is the day after I've promised to report on the biphasic sleep experiment.

Clocks ticking
Speaking of which: In the middle of the night, with a yellow bulb in the table lamp, the screen brightness on my monitor turned down, and night-mode warmth (yellowishness) turned all the way up, I find I can't easily see the tiny little numerals for the date and time in the far upper-right-hand corner of my monitor. So I was pleased when the Internet answered my question about enlarging it by leading me to this new clock-face widget:

In case this might help anyone else, on the Mac you right-click on the desktop with your mouse (or maybe left-click, depending on how you have your mouse set up) until a menu appears, select "Edit Widgets...", then find the clock widgets and manually move one to the desktop. Then, go to System Settings > Desktop and Dock > Widgets (you might have to scroll down to find it) > Widget Style, and select "Full-color."

I chose "Clock I" because it reminded me of the round clocks high on the wall at the front of every classroom I ever sat in during elementary and high school. (This would be a good illustration to put here.) I learned of the variability of time staring at clocks that looked like that: the last five minutes of French class before lunch took forever to go by, and I swear slowed down progressively as time crept with agonizing slowness toward the bell; but the same kind of clock keeping track of the 55 minutes you could sign up for on the racquetball court let that time slip past like it was water poured out of a bucket. (I came in second in the school racquetball tournament my sophomore year, and I still want life points for that). Time can be measured, but the perception of time cannot.

More soon, for a variable value of soon,

Mike

Original contents copyright 2025 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. (To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below or on the title of this post.)

Featured Comments from:

Kye Wood: "Ctein's article on Time ['What Is Time?' December 27th, 2013 —Ed.], and how it cannot be defined, that appeared in your blog, is one of the most thought-provoking things I've ever read."

B.J.Scharp: "Have you considered just getting a classic clock and hanging it on the wall? I've always been in the habit of removing all clocks from the interface of my PCs. I wear a watch, and I generally have a classic clock somewhere in the room, so to me it's just a waste of screen real-estate. (This is less of an issue with the bigger screens we have nowadays, but wasteful things are still wasteful. Just like our much faster devices are slowed down by less efficient software.) And an 'offline' clock has the advantage that it also works if the computer is off...."

Mike replies: Your comment made me realize that I don't use all of my 'screen real-estate' anyway. I have a 27-inch monitor but work in a window with a 23-inch diagonal:

Richard Alton: "Be gentle on yourself, Mike. With Butters having died, you couldn't have chosen a more emotional subject for the Baker's Dozen."

Gary Merken: "I know those clocks, from my public-school K–12 years outside Boston. My ninth-grade social-studies teacher, Mr. Penn, had a handwritten sign over the clock in his classroom. Mr. Penn's sign read, 'TIME WILL PASS. WILL YOU?' In other words, pay attention to the lessons! Don't watch the clock."

Who says you can't take pictures of birds with a phone?

This fellow (I assume he's the male) came right over to me and and perched there motionless for quite a while, checking me out. So I cooed to him in what I hope was a friendly tone. This is the first year I've had doves in the yard so I don't know their habits. There are lots of robins around, but no nests within view.

I'm very tempted to buy image-stabilized birding binoculars, or an IS monocular (is there such a thing?), but more expenses I do not need.

Mike

*"Love the One You're With," Stephen Stills, 1970

Original contents copyright 2025 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. (To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below or on the title of this post.)

Featured Comments from:

Roger Bradbury: "I dunno why (and no criticism implied), but this bird photo has a 'Far Side' feel about it. Maybe the caption is, 'After a night on the tiles, Orville woke up in the gutter.'"

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