Two things have been keeping me from posting this past week. The first was a problem with my left eye that made looking at a computer screen difficult for any length of time. I was a bit concerned that it was the result of my cataract surgery but a visit to my optometrist and things were cleared up. Turns out my tear ducts are producing butter when they should be making olive oil! Don’t ask!
Second I fired up my old Big Mac! A 27” iMac I bought back in 2009 in Italy and used until I bought a Mac Book sometime in 2012 then the iPad in 2013. Yes there is a trend here but I find Laurent’s charge that I have too many electronics a gross exaggeration. Oh did I mention the iPhone and my trusty old iPod? But I, as usual, digress. Upon entering the password (I remembered it!!!!) I suddenly had access to the three external hard drives that are linked to it and more photos/videos/goodies than you can imagine. And that includes photos that I took on floppy discs (remember floppy discs?) with my first digital camera of our trip down the Danube and on our three day cruise of the Venetian lagoon in a fishing boat.
There was a succession of digital cameras after that, each one a little better than the last. Those was replaced by the iPhone camera – and honestly when I compare the quality of the images I find that in many cases the old Canon took better pictures. I’m not talking from an artistic point of view – I’ve never been good at framing etc – but for clarity and detail.
I wasn’t big on taking pictures when I started travelling back in 1966. I didn’t own a camera and people spent too much time taking pictures to really enjoy what was happening around them. I’m not sure when that changed – perhaps with the advent of digital cameras though a look through actual Kodachrome photo albums suggest that there were a goodly number of pictures take in Mexico, Egypt and Chicago pre-digital.
However back in the days of film and processing we were a little more parsimonious with our photo taking. It cost money so you wanted to make sure that shot was a good and, hopefully, memorable one. With digital we (I say we assuming that many other people are on the same wave-length) tend to take multiple pictures of the same thing, just in case. Which means you end up with three, four or more identical shots. Then when you look at them in PhotoShop you face the dilemma of deciding which is the best – or what is worst you end up keeping them all. Another dilemma is looking at them 20 years on and trying to remember just where the hell you were when you took that church interior in 2000 – was it Durstein or Regensburg?
Hmmm… perhaps I shouldn’t have powered up that old Mac!
In the subtitle I mention Cap Suonion at the southern most tip of the Attica peninsula. While looking through one of the many folders entitled Athens I came across a series of very short videos I had taken of sunset looking out over the Aegean at 20:40 on the 14th of March 2008. I’m planning to put together a video of the sequence I took from the steps of the Temple of Poseidon but in the meantime thought I’d share this brief view of the sun setting over Patroklos Island. I do suggest turning the sound down as the microphone on the Canon was very sensitive.
The word for September 6th is:
Dilemma /diˈlemə,dīˈlemə/: [noun]
1.1 A situation in which a difficult choice has to be made between two or more alternatives, especially equally undesirable ones.
1.2 A difficult situation or problem.
1.3 An argument in logic forcing an opponent to choose either of two unfavourable alternatives.
Early 16th century (denoting a form of argument involving a choice between equally unfavorable alternatives): via Latin from Greek dilēmma, from di- ‘twice’ + lēmma ‘premise’.
Willy Or Won't He 