Today is Australia Day – at least it’s January 26th in the Northern Hemisphere; it’s already January 27th in Australia. But it’s the thought that counts, isn’t it.
For my American friends, Australia Day is Australia’s national day – equivalent to July 4th in the United States – and commemorates the date on which the First Fleet, consisting of 11 ships – two warships (Sirius and Supply), six convict transports (Alexander. Charlotte. Friendship, Lady Penrhyn, Prince Of Wales, Scarborough), and three supply ships (Golden Grove, Fishburn, Borrowdale) - sailed into Sydney Cove (now Sydney) to establish the first British settlement in Australia. Aussies have a funny sense of humor. They commemorate the founding of a penal settlement. And it was all the American’s fault since they fought a war of independence that resulted in the Brits no longer being able to view the American colonies for penal settlements.
Life in early Australia was harsh but Aussies were also a sentimental bunch as illustrated in their poetry. Periodically, I think about the only Banjo (Andrew Barton) Patterson poem I learned in high school. It’s not ‘Waltzing Matilda’ or ‘The Man from Snowy River,’ it’s ‘Clancy of the Overflow’ and was written more than 20 years after my family migrated to Australia from England which puts it in some perspective for me. The sentiments are more than 100 years old but I think that many of us can connect with them even today.
Clancy of the Overflow
I had written him a letter which I had, for want of better
Knowledge, sent to where I met him down the Lachlan, years ago,
He was shearing when I knew him, so I sent the letter to him,
Just "on spec", addressed as follows, "Clancy, of The Overflow".
And an answer came directed in a writing unexpected,
(And I think the same was written with a thumb-nail dipped in tar)
Twas his shearing mate who wrote it, and verbatim I will quote it:
"Clancy's gone to Queensland droving, and we don't know where he are."
In my wild erratic fancy visions come to me of Clancy
Gone a-droving "down the Cooper" where the Western drovers go;
As the stock are slowly stringing, Clancy rides behind them singing,
For the drover's life has pleasures that the townsfolk never know.
And the bush hath friends to meet him, and their kindly voices greet him
In the murmur of the breezes and the river on its bars,
And he sees the vision splendid of the sunlit plains extended,
And at night the wond'rous glory of the everlasting stars.
I am sitting in my dingy little office, where a stingy
Ray of sunlight struggles feebly down between the houses tall,
And the foetid air and gritty of the dusty, dirty city
Through the open window floating, spreads its foulness over all
And in place of lowing cattle, I can hear the fiendish rattle
Of the tramways and the buses making hurry down the street,
And the language uninviting of the gutter children fighting,
Comes fitfully and faintly through the ceaseless tramp of feet.
And the hurrying people daunt me, and their pallid faces haunt me
As they shoulder one another in their rush and nervous haste,
With their eager eyes and greedy, and their stunted forms and weedy,
For townsfolk have no time to grow, they have no time to waste.
And I somehow rather fancy that I'd like to change with Clancy,
Like to take a turn at droving where the seasons come and go,
While he faced the round eternal of the cash-book and the journal --
But I doubt he'd suit the office, Clancy, of "The Overflow".
Banjo Paterson, 1889
I stumbled on Moose Cam and have been visiting almost every day for more than a year. The cam is mounted at about second-floor level looking towards a lake. Since trees don’t grow as tall in Alaska as they do further south, it was hard to tell how far the cam was from the lake and how big one could expect any animals to be.
Until yesterday! Finally, I saw moose. Although the site indicates that the images are refreshed every three minutes, I kept on hitting refresh and captured a series of images. The webmaster must have seen them too and zoomed in to where two moose were visible. Now I know what I'm looking for.
What a thrill!
I haven’t used a camera for a long time – not since I had a Minolta SRT-101 many years ago. I hated wasting film and you really have to take a lot of shots to get the good ones. As a result, I didn’t get out to do much photography. Digital photography has changed all that. I row row regularly on the Marburg Creek Reservoir at Fort Yargo State Park in Winder, Georgia. It wasn’t until I started rowing on the lake in early 2001 that I really appreciated how fascinating the lake was. The scenery changes throughout the year and there are always something of interesting to see - from scenic features to seasonal changes in flowering plants, animals, turtles, etc. It was the drought of 2007 that brought the camera issue to a head. The lowering lake level revealed features that are normally not visible; it was a unique opportunity to record the changes. I hinted that W should let me take his camera out on the lake. Not. A. Chance! (Can't say I blame him though). 
So I lobbied for a digital camera for my birthday. Based on my experience with the Minolta, I knew I wanted a telephoto lens and macro capability; I only use wide-angle when absolutely necessary. Since I would be photographing from a rowing shell, I really didn’t want to have to change lenses; it needed to be an ‘all-in-one’ solution. Although I’m a pretty competent rower, there are too many opportunities to drop a camera in the water. I hated the idea of a case since it would make the camera more cumbersome to handle but it would be a necessary evil. In a rowing shell, I wouldn’t have the luxury of letting go of the oars; I would have to hook my arms over the handles or shafts to keep the boat balanced. I would be able to dangle my legs over each side of the boat to increase the stability but it would only help a little and wouldn’t be practical in winter.
I got an Olympus SP-56OUZ; it has a fixed ED lens with 27 mm wide angle and an 18x optical zoom (27-486mm equivalent), 8 megapixels, and Dual Image Stabilization.
When I go out to the lake, I put the bag in the stern of the cockpit, take the lens cover off the waterproof case, and lay the case on top of a carrying bag with the wrist strap where I can reach it with a little bit of effort. This system works well because I inevitably get water in the cockpit when I get in the boat. With the bag on the cockpit deck, the waterproof camera case stays dry. Although the waterproof case is cumbersome, it has worked out really well. I have gotten used to lining the boat up with what I want to photograph and levering the oar handles between my body and arms to stabilize the boat. I don’t have to worry about ruining the camera if I drop it in the water or flip my boat. It can be a challenge to photograph something up in a tree, but the challenge is as more about stabilizing the boat than actually capturing the image. There’s a real upside to the waterproof case as well. The camera is so relatively small that it would be really easy to drop it in the water; I actually feel safer having it in something the waterproof case.
It’s great to be able to capture images on the water without having to worry about wasting film, photograph in all weather conditions and, finally, be able to capture memories that I’ll be able to enjoy for years and share with friends.
February 12, 2008
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's apology motion has been tabled in Parliament:
Today we honour the Indigenous peoples of this land, the oldest continuing cultures in human history.
We reflect on their past mistreatment.
We reflect in particular on the mistreatment of those who were Stolen Generations – this blemished chapter in our nation’s history.
The time has now come for the nation to turn a new page in Australia’s history by righting the wrongs of the past and so moving forward with confidence to the future.
We apologise for the laws and policies of successive Parliaments and governments that have inflicted profound grief, suffering and loss on these our fellow Australians.
We apologise especially for the removal of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children from their families, their communities and their country.
For the pain, suffering and hurt of these Stolen Generations, their descendants and for their families left behind, we say sorry.
To the mothers and fathers, the brothers and sisters, for the breaking up of families and communities, we say sorry.
And for the indignity and degradation thus inflicted on a proud people and a proud culture, we say sorry.
We the Parliament of Australia respectfully request that this apology be received in the spirit in which it is offered as part of the healing of the nation.
For the future we take heart; resolving that this new page in the history of our great continent can now be written.
We today take this first step by acknowledging the past and laying claim to a future that embraces all Australian.
A future where this Parliament resolves that the injustices of the past must never, never happen again.
A future where we harness the determination of all Australians, Indigenous and non-Indigenous, to close the gap that lies between us in life expectancy, educational achievement and economic opportunity.
A future where we embrace the possibility of new solutions to enduring problems where old approaches have changed.
A future based on mutual respect, mutual resolve and mutual responsibility.
A future where all Australians, whatever their origins, are truly equal partners, with equal opportunities and with an equal stake in shaping the next chapter in the history of this great country.
I’ve been wanting to blog about FreeRice.com since I stumbled on the site about a week ago. I found out about FreeRice.com in a round-about way. I have Twitter Public Timeline feed to my Google Reader and follow through on interesting posts. This was how I found FreeRice.com in Yang-May Ooi’s blog ‘Fusion View.’ Trouble is - I went to the site, got hooked immediately, and have been too busy playing to blog about it.
I love a challenge and the opportunity to make the challenge pay off by donating rice - 20 grains for each word definition guessed correctly – is a wonderful opportunity to make a small difference. The rice is paid for by businesses that advertise on the site and is distributed worldwide through the United Nations World Food Program.
The site is wonderfully user-friendly. No sign-in. Just start to play. You can set a preference to have the site remember your level as well as your all-time best score. Or you can start from scratch each time.
I keep a tab for FreeRice.com open in my browser and play while I’m waiting for other pages to load. Sometimes I just play and forget about the other pages. So far, in just a week, I’ve ‘donated’ 92,000 grains of rice.
WARNING: FreeRice.com is addictive. But what an wonderful addiction…
November is an important month for cats. The first preview of the genome of the domestic cat, Felis catus, has been published in the journal Genome Research.
Joan U. Pontius, James C. Mullikin, Douglas R. Smith, Agencourt Sequencing Team, Kerstin Lindblad-Toh, Sante Gnerre, Michele Clamp, Jean Chang, Robert Stephens, Beena Neelam, Natalia Volfovsky, Alejandro A. Schäffer, Richa Agarwala, Kristina Narfström, William J. Murphy, Urs Giger, Alfred L. Roca, Agostinho Antunes, Marilyn Menotti-Raymond, Naoya Yuhki, Jill Pecon-Slattery, Warren E. Johnson, Guillaume Bourque, Glenn Tesler, NISC Comparative Sequencing Program, and Stephen J. O’Brien. Initial sequence and comparative analysis of the cat genome. Genome Res. 2007 17: 1675-1689.
Loki, our 13-going-on-14 year-old red Abysinnian, is very pleased. Why? Because a distant relative – a four year-old Abbysinian cat named Cinnamon – was chosen as the ‘prototype’ cat for this project. A singular honor. Some news reports even had a photo of Cinnamon, an obviously alert and playful Aby, so characteristic of her breed. Loki was even more pleased, and somewhat surprised, at what she hopes might be an increasing intelligence in Homo sapiens.
When Loki examined the genetic maps on the Cat Genome Project website, she noted with delight that the investigators had compared the human genes with the cat genes, not the other way round as she would have expected. Such perception and respect is not often demonstrated by humans. Oh, she has her own humans trained well but she has never held out much hope for humans as a species.
Loki is so pleased. A very good month for cats indeed. P-u-r-r, p-u-r-r, p-u-r-r …Photo: Walter W. Knapp
On a recent trip to Lake Oconee, my husband Walt and son Justin were escorting me in a pontoon boat as I was sculling from the Redlands Wildlife Management Area boat ramp to the Old Salem Park. The first section of this trip takes me through a sunken forest on the east shore of the lake. The pontoon boat can’t follow me through this area so Walt and Justin cross the lake and travel along western shore to meet me at the railway bridge from which point we can travel together.
Normally the pontoon boat makes its way slowly but deliberately from the boat ramp to the railway bridge. This day, however, the pontoon boat was not where I expected to see it. I looked back up the lake along the route they would take and could see the boat making its way back and forth along a short section of shore. Only later did Walt and Justin explain what they were doing – with pictures to prove it.As they were making their way through the area marked by the arrow, they saw a snake swimming purposefully across the lake. It was approximately one-quarter way across the lake when they spotted it and there was no doubt that it was a rattlesnake.
As the boat approached cautiously, the snake turned, assumed a more defensive pose and raised its head out of the water to face the intruder. When the boat was about 6 feet (2 meters) from the snake, it coiled into a striking pose. In both of these photographs, the ripples from the motion of the rattle are clearly visible on the water surface. When the boat retreated, the snake continued its way across the lake. Based on the brown stripe running down its back, they identified the snake as a canebrake rattlesnake (Crotalus horridus atricaudatus).
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Canebrake rattlesnakes inhabit flood plains and swampy areas; their cousins, the timber rattlesnakes (Crotalus horridus horridus) tend to inhabit drier forests. These rattlesnakes are not aggressive by nature. I’ve heard of other encounters and have wrangled both baby and adult canebrake rattlesnakes while they were photographed. These snakes showed no aggressive tendencies; they showed little tendency to coil or to threaten or strike even when they were corralled for a considerable length of time.
These snakes are currently common in Georgia but are subject to being killed on roads particularly in the vicinity of homes in rural areas. I have seen many killed on roads in rural areas. In some cases, these snakes were not killed ‘accidentally’ but, based on where the carcasses were located, motorists had deliberately driven out of the normal traffic lanes to run over them. As development encroaches on rural areas, habitats in which these snakes live will be destroyed. More frequent encounters can be anticipated between man and snake as rural areas are increasingly developed. These encounters will inevitably result in an increased reduction in their numbers over time.
What is most intriguing about this encounter, however, is that the snake was not simply swimming along the shore; it was swimming quite deliberately across the lake. After the encounter, the snake continued on its way - in the direction it was going when first sighted. How did the snake know that there was something on the other side to swim to? Had it swum from the other side to this side? Was it on its way back? Did it make this journey frequently?
Photographs: Walter W. Knapp; Maps: Google maps
Today is Australia Day – at least it’s January 26th in the Northern Hemisphere; it’s already January 27th in Australia. But it’s the thought that counts, isn’t it. 
