Butterfly Backflash in the Backyard

 Saturday, November 7th, I went for a very calculated walk based on events that took place a week ago today (Sunday, 11/8). On a few occasions, including one with my PCP, I’ve referred to it as having “the wobbles.” It’s a vestibular disequilibrium, spatial disorientation sort of thing that is quite unpleasant. It all began with an intense vertigo experience in 2008, out of bed early in the morning, and part of that diagnosis was a “sudden loss of hearing.” That diagnosis fell back into “normal” auditory functioning after a second test about two weeks later. I’ve had tinnitus ever since. More than one physician attributed this to not taking levothyroxine as prescribed, and that is a long, complicated story. Suffice it to say, some general sense of vertigo has stuck with me ever since, and I was never the kid who could excel in the balance beam to begin with. Anyway, last Sunday’s episode was very different and was mostly punctuated by panic, being close to a mile away from my car. For yesterday’s walk, I mapped out incremental routes that would take me, at most, only 0.42 miles from where I planned to park. I ended up walking only 1.22 miles, and I was fine. The walk was actually short because subject matter for photos was about nil.

Earlier in the week, it crossed my mind that the difference in the wobbles may have been induced by a magnification disparity between the post-cataract surgery IOLs (intraocular lens) in my right and left eyes. This, plus taking photos wearing my distance sunglasses while the camera viewfinder diopter is set for my naked right eye. By combining the unequal IOL magnification, a custom diopter, and distance glasses, I inadvertently created a perfect storm of visual conflict. I essentially forced my brain to process an artificial, acute case of optical aniseikonia (image perceived by one eye differs in size or shape from the image perceived by the other eye) combined with a visual-vestibular mismatch, and this amplified my wackadoodle preexisting sense of balance. There were other factors but this concept has moved to the forefront. 

Yesterday’s walk, I wore non-prescription sunglasses and I also made efforts to go bare-eyed on photos. Sometimes there isn’t enough time to raise or lower my glasses. Then, as mentioned, there really weren’t any decent photo opportunities. 

Today’s plan was to skip the walk, bring a zero-gravity chair into the backyard, and stay homebody for photos. So far, I’ve spent about an hour outside and keep catching subjects in between, at my desk, through my office windows. I’ve also been shopping for wildflower seeds come spring for front and side yards and planning for Tithonia rotundifolia plants in the backyard. Those plants will be started either under plant lights indoors or on the patio table or both. This had me looking back at old photos of this arrangement, where plants were and when I started them. I have seeds, but they’re about four years old, so before I order other wildflower seeds, I want to make sure the Tithonia seeds are still good. A test germination will take place this week indoors. 

I was having fun looking through some of these images. These photos are from 2021 and 2022. In 2021, I had a mid-2011 27” iMac that was dying on me. I quickly moved to an external monitor and picked up a new Mac mini. That also marked my final goodbye to Adobe Systems and, most significantly, Photoshop. I started using Photoshop with version 0.87b, the first commercially distributed prerelease version of Adobe Photoshop, released in 1989 before Adobe officially acquired and marketed the software. So it was sayonara and good riddance to all Adobe products. I moved to Affinity Photo. However, my photo editing skills had a new learning curve to take on, so when I originally edited some of these images, I was a little green and a tad impatient. Today, I tried to pick out some photos that I haven’t put on this blog before with the central theme being butterflies and Tithonia rotundifolia flowers. 

August 22, 2021

Taking a break on a Salvia clevelandii.

 July 10, 2022

 July 14, 2022

 Apparently the butterflies took the day off.

 July 15, 2022

 July 17, 2022 

August 16, 2022

 

August 27, 2022

 
Playlist for Saturday's walk and out of doors time today. Steven Wilson's, Requiem for a Village, released November 2nd. The entire album is available on YouTube.

Yesterday's walk report: I'm doing this for my health?

Yesterday, November 1st. There was some weird stuff going on Halloween night, and I never figured it out. I would've swore someone banged on the door, but after I turned down the blaring Mahavishnu Orchestra from the TV and took a look... nothing. Nothing on the security camera either, although that thing is a crap shoot. I'm getting a new one. It was also raining, certainly hard enough to deter errant trick-or-treaters. The only real confirmation that something had happened was Junimoon; she was hiding behind curtains in her safe place in the living room. Maybe it was a ding-dong runaway, and they couldn't find the doorbell button. For the most part, Saturday, October 31, was a really good day. I only went for a short, 1.35-mile walk because rain was heading my way, and I had a lot to do, but for the most part, I felt the best I've felt in quite some time, all day too. 

 It seemed all that goodness was carrying into Sunday morning, despite the powers that be messing with the f'n clocks again. I was out driving to my launch pad for a walk by 9:35 a.m., PST, and I was on foot a mere four minutes later. Happy go lucky, feeling great on a beautiful morning after a total of 0.27" of rain. The air was cool and clean; the paths into the local college campus arboretum were quiet. Physically, every step was grounded. However, things changed once I was just over a mile into the walk. I was 0.97 miles from my car, and the walk became an exercise in quiet recalibration. I was talking myself through the simple mechanics of the path ahead to keep my thinking clear. Once I was back to the car, there was a deep sigh of relief. I was also able to sort through contributing factors and figure things out. Suffice it to say, it was an accumulation of factors. A couple of nights of fragmented sleep and the quiet, lingering fatigue of the week, plus some acute vestibular wobbles and disorientation, caught up to me all at once; high anxiety fed into a loop. 

Here are some pictures I took before I hit the abyss at 1.05 miles. Yep, I mapped out exactly where it happened. 

Female Calypte anna hummingbird.

The coreopsis, of course!

 I'm pretty sure this is one of the two gulf fritillary butterflies I saw last week. In fact there were two again but one moved farther away.

 Weather shot number one.

 Brittlebush (Encelia farinosa), still dripping raindrops. 

 The California Scrub-Jay (Aphelocoma californica). I have a special fondness for these birds. 

 One of a pair of red-tailed hawks. This is a recent pairing. I'm pretty sure I know which birds they were. 

Female Selasphorus sasin hummingbird. It was very difficult to track.

 
Weather shot number two.

 By whatever mechanism, this clock had been adjusted for the hour change from DST to PST, however, it's also 15 minutes slow. It was a perfect metaphor for how I was feeling in this moment. 

 Mahavishnu Orchestra, Antibes (1974) 

P.S., I’m fine now. I took a brief 1/2 mile walk this morning just to make sure I was back on my rocker. 

A Halloween post walk, walk report

It was a busy morning and a rough night's sleep. Thanks, in part, to next-door neighbor's guests thinking it was a good idea to continue whatever went on inside out into the street at 3:30 a.m. I'm pretty sure excessive alcohol consumption was involved.* Be that as it may, I was doing stuff early in and around the house all morning, including ordering groceries for delivery. Ever since shortly before the COVID lockdown, I have felt that living a delivery-only lifestyle is a good idea. Once everything was put away (and Lucy got some dark meat roast chicken), I decided a brisk walk was in order before rain shows up. As it turns out, that's still a good 4 hours from now. While I was out, I had this silly idea... 

I bought the Jack Skellington onesie my first winter alone here, when I decided it was okay for most of the house to be cold--2013. Framing a photo proved challenging.
 
That, by the way, is my new "zero-gravity" chair so I can hang out in the backyard during cooler climes and enjoy butterflies and hummingbirds. There's a very old chaise lounge in the yard that is mattress-less due to squirrels remodeling their homes. It was mostly for the feral boys anyway. This chair comes inside after use. 

Happy Halloween, everybody!

Juni is finding the outfit very cozy.

 A Halloween tradition here...

Frank Zappa 10/31/81 Live At The Palladium

EDIT: The first link I offered was FRANK ZAPPA - Live at Palladium - HALLOWEEN, 1977. That was "age restricted." This is the MTV broadcast from 1981 and there's a bunch of banter nonsense at the beginning. I know almost no one ever clicks my music links but, just in case... skip to about 7:17 here for the start of the music. This is a VHS rip and that's not my fault. Also, it takes about 10 seconds to start.

 * Every Halloween I reflect back to Halloween, 2000. Tomorrow, November 1st, I will be 26 years sans alcohol. I find "sober" to be a tricky word but, yes, you can call it that. 

Today's walk report: In brief

Got out late.
Only visited the local college arboretum.
70.3º to 74.5ºF, with very bright sunny skies.
A bit blustery too.
Tropical milkweed (Asclepias curassavica) should be cut back within a week, but it probably won't be.
I spotted 7 monarch butterflies (Danaus plexippus).
There were also two Gulf fritillary (Agraulis vanillae) butterflies.
The Coreopsis 'Moonbeam' is still flowering!
Roses are red (sometimes).
The All Valley Band Tournament is today, campus stadium.
There were a bazillion kids playing soccer. 
I only walked 1.4 miles. 
I can hear marching band drum cadences INSIDE MY HOUSE (0.84 miles away!)
In general, people are annoying.
The lovely Junimoon has been in my lap for about 98% of the prep and composition of this post.

Photos from today, October 24th. 

 

Epitaph (including 'March for No Reason' and 'Tomorrow and Tomorrow')

Knowledge is a deadly friend
If no one sets the rules
The fate of all mankind, I see
Is in the hands of fools