TCC for 11/7/08

The Caretaker's Concern 11/7/08

Lake Temp. 52 F.
Ghetto temp. 58 F.
Island tmp. 56 F. Yesterday's L/H: 52/54 F.

Current conditions: Little to no wind, cloud covered night sky, warmish and humid. The day was mostly cloudy and foggy, some wind and some sun, but not much.

11/7/08


10/17/08


8/7/08



The Caretaker has been keeping himself rather busy with a number of things these past few days, most of which are not worth bothering about, however, the one thing that might be of interest regards his photography. For those of you who happen to enjoy looking at the photos that the Caretaker posts on this blog, you may want to take the time to check into his new site on Redbubble.com. This was made mention of in a post a few days ago, but there wasn't much in the way of details. As convenient as this blog is for disseminating text, photos, etc. the format for the photography is rather small, which is quite a shame. So, to address this the Caretaker has spent these last few days posting a large number of his photos on RedBubble.com. They are up there for sale as photo-cards, but by no means is anyone expected to purchase them, what is important is that it provides a venue for the photos to be seen in a larger format than that which is available here on blogspot. For those of you who have been regular readers of the blog since it was started you will probably be interested in checking out the Caretaker's RedBubble site because there are a number of photos that have never been posted to this blog (they were taken before the blog was started). So, should you happen to be interested in perusing some of the Caretaker's work in a larger format please cut and paste the following address into your browser:

http://jeffreydmoore.redbubble.com/

Or, you can use the link at the top of this web page, on the left hand side, it is marked by the text: "Photo-cards 4 Sale" the link is just below, it reads: "The Best in the World Click Here". Ha, ha.

Happy viewing. By the way, for those who are interested, the Caretaker is also working on a calendar, he is currently waiting for the proof to arrive, should it be up to snuff the Caretaker will certainly make it available to those who happen to be interested. His previous attempt at a calendar with another on-line printer came out, decidedly lousy.

Given the Caretaker's extremely slow internet connection he has had to make use of the local Library's computers to upload his photography, to do so from his computer on dial-up takes at least a half hour or more per image, which is obviously far too slow, the phone line would be tied up for over a week, all day and night. So, after finishing uploading at the library the Caretaker walked down to the market to pickup some things for dinner. The weather was quite warm, it felt much more like early Autumn. Town was a buzz with people out for dinner, nothing like it is during the busy season, but for this time of year there seemed to be more than the normal amount of activity going on. Then again, since the Caretaker is rarely in town on the weekends at this time of year it may very well be just the usual crowds for a Friday night.

In route to the market the Caretaker remembered to call K. to see if his packaged had arrived, and it did, which made the Caretaker happy, however, he also learned of an injury sustained by a family member of K.'s which made the Caretaker sad, hopefully all will go well with that. After the market the Caretaker hopped into the tin boat and motored over to Huddle Bay to dock at the public dock there so he could retrieve his package. It was a dark night on the Lake, there wasn't much in the way of wind, the flat water made for a nice ride.

So the Caretaker returned to the Island with his package, dropped his things and immediately opened the box, pulled out the down filled housecoat, tried it on to see that it fit properly, found that it did and then put it on a hanger to air out. The Caretaker was mildly concerned that the housecoat would not fit, it seems that housecoats are only made for women. It turns out that a woman's extra-large housecoat fits him perfectly. It is a shame that they are not marketing down filled housecoats to men, well, it is also a shame that not too many women are into wearing them. The way the Caretaker sees it, the problem of being cold is not a matter of a lack of heat, our bodies generate plenty, when healthy, 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit, give or take a few points, rather the problem is a lack of insulation. So in an effort to reduce the amount of fossil fuel he consumes for heat this Winter the Caretaker is going to increase the amount of insulation he keeps about himself during the waking hours spent in the Ghetto. He will also be increasing the amount of insulation he keeps upon himself while asleep. His hope is that he will be able to maintain a comfortable existence in the Ghetto at no more than 50 degrees Fahrenheit, if he can go lower than that he will do so.

All this talk about alternative fuels to save the environment, the Caretaker knows a thing or two about alternative fuels, but he is by no means an expert, and he is certainly in no position to produce his own, however, he does know that the quickest way to "save" the environment is to reduce the amount of energy consumed regardless of where it comes from. If everyone turned down their thermostats in the Winter and put on an extra layer we would reduce our Nation's carbon foot print immensely. Or, better yet, turn down the thermostat, don't put on an extra layer, burn more calories and lose some weight--talk about a super simple weight loss program.

Lower your thermostat,
Shrink your heating bill,
Shrink your waistline,
Lower your carbon footprint.

Not exactly a smooth slogan that rolls off the tongue, but it will have to do for the time being. Now it's your turn to raise a crowd and march through the streets chanting it. Go on parade against excessive consumerism. Don't be a consumer; be a consume-less. Save it for your children, and their children, and their children and so on. As far as the Caretaker sees it we have two options when it comes to what the future generations will say about us:

"Those jerks, they used everything up and now we're left without a planet."

Or,

"Thankfully they used less so we could prosper, and in turn we shall use less so those who follow may prosper."

And so let us work to share prosperity with the world, let us all consume-less.

--The Caretaker

TCC for 11/6/08

The Caretaker's Concern 11/6/08

Lake Temp. 52 F.
Ghetto temp. 55.5 F.
Island tmp. 54 F. Yesterday's L/H: 49.75/59.75 F.

Current conditions:
Damp, humid, misty, wet. Light breeze from the North. Total cloud covered sky. The day was dark with clouds, a bit of sun in the morning, but only brief. Warm day, rained in the afternoon. For those who have been paying attention, you will have noticed that the Lake temperature is going in the wrong direction, at least for ice. Hopefully the cold snap back in October is not it for Winter.

11/6/08


9/27/08


10/8/08


The Caretaker has been burning the candle at both wicks again, unfortunately he doesn't have much to offer for it, at least nothing worth reading about. Hopefully he will get caught up by this weekend.

--The Caretaker

TCC for 11/5/08

The Caretaker's Concern 11/5/08

Lake Temp. 52 F.
Ghetto temp. 56 F.
Island tmp. 54 F. Yesterday's L/H: 39/51.5 F.

Current conditions: Dark night, total cloud covered sky, faint bit of moonlight is backlighting a portion of the clouds in the Southern sky, dead calm on the Lake, not a breath of wind. Mostly cloud covered throughout the day, a few patches of sun light here and there during the day, but mostly foggy, mostly calm. Very, very warm for this time of year, very humid, very hazy. Very unmid-Autumn.

11/5/08


11/5/08


11/5/08


The Caretaker was up late last night listening to the election returns and then the speeches, he then awoke rather early this morning. He was originally planning on getting around to writing today's post much earlier in the evening, but he didn't. Not that he has much to report on for the day, he mostly did computer work. His intent was to share a story from back in October, but it will have to wait for another time.

It sure is nice to have the election over with, 22 months is way too long, hopefully the next one will be much shorter.

Here's to a new direction for the next four years, it can't possibly be as bad as these past eight, at least let's hope not.

Onward and Upward.

--The Caretaker

TCC for 11/4/08

The Caretaker's Concern 11/4/08

Lake Temp. 51.5 F.
Ghetto temp. 53.5 F.
Island tmp. 51.5 F. Yesterday's L/H: 37/49.75 F.

Current conditions: Little to no wind from the Narrows, cloud covered night sky, a few chance glimpses of a couple stars here and there, starlight very well dimmed, touch of haze. The day began with a dense fog, eventually it lifted and the day became mostly sunny. Then the clouds returned again come nightfall.

11/4/08


11/4/08


11/4/08


8/28/08


The Caretaker is currently following the election returns, so he will be brief, he was off Island for most of the day and doesn't have much to report on.
Happy Election Day America!
--The Caretaker

TCC for 11/3/08

The Caretaker's Concern 11/3/08

Lake Temp. 51.5 F.
Ghetto temp. 49 F.
Island tmp. 49.75 F. Yesterday's L/H: 36/44 F.

Current conditions: Faint touch of wind if any at all, totally cloud covered night sky.
Totally cloud covered sky all day, strong wind from the South for most all of the day.

11/3/08
It's Election Day here in the States, add your color:

Go Vote! Go Vote! Go Vote!

9/27/08


7/30/08


The Caretaker's day did not exactly go as planned, not that he ever expects it to, but overall it was a good day. An unexpected turn of events was losing a cap to one of his back molars, luckily for him he happened to have some tooth adhesive on hand and so was able to glue it back on. One day, a while back he was in a pharmacy and came across this tooth glue product and figured that since he lived on an Island and dentists being a very scarce commodity on the island he figured it could possibly come in handy some day, and sure enough it did. The Caretaker is glad to know that his 7 dollars and change didn't go to waste. Unless of course the glue lets go at night while he is asleep and he ends up swallowing his cap, then he will have wasted his money because should that happen he would have been better off just living without the cap until he can get to a dentist. Oh well, guess he will find out the true adhesive powers of this tooth glue. Now the Caretaker is debating between finding a local dentist or going down to Jersey to use his own dentist to have the cap reattached--proper.

For those who are interested, the Caretaker finally got the narrative for yesterday's post up, it focuses almost entirely on his description of irisation.

Another unexpected turn of events for the day was the Caretaker's proofs from RedBubble came in the mail, this wasn't totally unexpected, but he hadn't much of an idea of what day it would be they'd be coming in. Well today was the day, and since he was very pleased with the results he shifted his schedule around to do more work on his Redbubble site. For those of you who are interested to see the results so far, you may do so at the following website:


http://jeffreydmoore.redbubble.com/

So the Caretaker ended up spending much of his day in front of his computer, but since it was mostly cloudy, gray, and windy outside for most all of the day, it was probably a good use of his time.

A voting we will go, A voting we will go, high-ho the derr-io a voting we will go.
--The Caretaker

TCC for 11/2/08

The Caretaker's Concern 11/2/08

Lake Temp. 51 F.
Ghetto temp. 41 F.
Island tmp. 39 F. Yesterday's L/H: 40/50 F.

Current conditions: Relatively clear starry night. Blush of wind from the East to North East.

11/2/08


10/15/08


10/17/08



Given the extra hour added to the day, the Caretaker decided it was time to go play, and so off to Log Bay to leave behind all worried concerns, upon the land he went to go rambling about any which way. The Sunset photo for this post was take from over on the East shore at the North mouth of Log bay. It was a grand day of hiking, however, since the Caretaker has other business to attend to he's thinking he will save the details for his other blog, when it posts he will be sure to let you know.

Now, for a description of, irisation (although by now many of you will have probably long since lost interest, and more importantly, with all the build up and false starts, this will probably be a let down) but never the less, here goes:

So the Caretaker his driving along, minding his own business when he spots a colorful curiosity in the sky, so he pulls off to the shoulder so he may get a better look. The irisation was occurring upon the clouds on either side of the Sun, but the irisation was only visible upon the clouds in the immediate vicinity of the Sun. As stated prior, while viewing without sunglasses the glare from the Sun was too overpowering to see the effect of the irisation. What the Caretaker would do is alternate between holding is hand up to block the direct light of the Sun and look to either side, or he would position his head so as that the driver's side support post for the roof of his car would serve to block the direct light of the Sun. When doing either of these two things, and while wearing his sunglasses, the irisation was clear as day.

Upon the clouds were all the colors of the rainbow, marbled about in no particular order, or at least none that the Caretaker could discern. All of these colors shimmered like mother of pearl. Another comparison would be like some of the colors seen on chrome exhaust pipes getting hot for the first time. Or, much like those newfangled paint jobs all the kids down in Lodi, N.J. are having applied to their "hot rods", the kind that shifts color as your perspective changes. In other words, a metallic glimmering that speckled all throughout the clouds catching and reflecting the sunlight all throughout, it was a mother of pearl that glowed. All the colors from a rainbow: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet with the addition of white and black (white from the cloud itself and black from shadows of the cloud. All the colors of the rainbow were there but there were also varying shades of many of the colors of the rainbow, reds, greens, blues, all varying from light to dark and in between, and there was more than violet, there were a few patches of distinct purple, all of the standard colors of the rainbow and then some, all mingled about, shimmering and dancing upon these clouds. It was like two giant colorful palettes on either side of the Sun, perhaps the sort of palettes that Jackson Pollock would have used if he worked in mother of pearl, that is if he even used palettes (Did he? When you just throw paint, why bother with a palette?) Anyway, one of the great things about this is that there were all of these colors, so vibrant, so bright, so shiny, so intense, but not a touch of the gaudy like there is with neon.

So there it is, two rainbow filled palettes, and then some, floating upon either side of the Sun, shining bright colors, applied to the constant blue background rarely seen upon the sky. Too bad the Caretaker didn't have his camera with him, however, chances are he would have probably needed a special filter to capture the irisation. He does have one filter that might have done the trick, but probably not, the only other option would have been to hold his sunglasses in front of the lens, but that probably would not have worked so well. Either way, the irisation actually lasted for quite a while, the Caretaker was able to view it all the way up until around exit 21 on the Norhway, at that point the sun had fallen behind the mountaintops. It's a shame the Caretaker didn't put two and two together, if he did he would have found a pleasant place to stop and watch the irisation for as long as it was to be visible. Oh, well, there is always next time.
Ha. Not likely there will be a next time.

--The Caretaker

TCC for 11/1/08

The Caretaker's Concern 11/1/08

Lake Temp. 52 F.
Ghetto temp. 44F.
Island tmp. 45 F. Yesterday's L/H: 34/55 F.

Current conditions: Mostly calm night, mild wind from the North East, few if any clouds, mostly clear sky, stars rather bright, about as bright as can be expected for this time of year, still a number of people still in the area, thus still a bit of light pollution. Wood smoke accents the wind, blowing in from a property in the area of the Narrows. The wind was from the Narrows all day, blowing rather fast throughout the day. Come early evening it began to slowly settle down, come nightfall it has been a mere whisper so far causing but a gentle lapping of the water along the shore.

11/1/08


11/1/08


10/24/08


For the most part the Caretaker's day was rather uneventful, most of his morning was spent culling bad photos from his hard drive to make way for plenty more bad photos (and the occasional few good ones that he lucks out on). His afternoon wasn't too exciting either, moved a refrigerator, an oven, some lawn furniture, collected old magazines for the dump, etc. It certainly wasn't a bad day by any means, just not all that exciting, which is, pretty much what the Caretaker had planned for.

And so, now, without further digression, the Caretaker presents: The Rare Thing of Beauty as Sighted from his Wreck of a Car on Route 254 (it is 254, he checked a map) While heading West towards the Northway to go home.

So the Caretaker is rambling along in the slow lane, never wanting to push his wreck of a car too much, when for some reason he glances up at the sky, not sure what it is he has seen, but being rather impressed by it he takes his eyes off the road again to look back at the sky. No he did not see a flying saucer, but it was impressive enough to prompt him to pull over to the side of the road so he could concentrate on the sky with no worries about the road, and more importantly, the traffic. These past six months have been chuck full of solar "anomalies", up until now all of them have been just rare, but that which the Caretaker saw this past late afternoon of the 30th of November, 2008 seems to be undefinable, at least from what he has researched on it thus far (i.e. a brief search on Wikipedia). The Caretaker is certainly no expert in such things, and knows what he did not see. He did not see a sundog, the following photo is an example of a Sundog, the Caretaker photographed this from the Island.

10/17/08


He also knows it was most certainly not a rainbow, for an example of a full rainbow as seen from the Island scroll down to the very bottom of this blog (that is if you haven't done so in the past, side note, the rainbow photo at the bottom of this blog was taken on the 6th of October, 2008. Since the Caretaker does not currently own a panoramic lens he took two separate photos, one of each leg of the rainbow and then used stitching software to join the two photos. The software did a much better job than he expected, however, for those of you who know the Lake, not that it can be seen too easily given the small size of this photo, but if you look closely at Black Mountain you will see that it comes to a much sharper and distorted peak than as it exists in reality. The Caretaker tried running the photos through a couple times but either got the same results or worse, for the most part the photo is close enough, but someday when he gets the time he will do the stitching by hand in photoshop.) Anyway, the point is he did not see a rainbow.

The other day "Anonymous" had asked if what the Caretaker saw was "day time Aurora borealis", the Caretaker doesn't think it was that, he did do a brief bit of research on the subject and could find no reference to such a thing existing (at least not on Wikipedia, not that they are experts), but either way, if day time Aurora borealis does exist, the Caretaker is pretty sure that what he saw wasn't that.

Just now the Caretaker glanced up at his wall of books and noticed a reference book that he thought was boxed up and stored. He'll be right back...

... ... ...

Riddle, solved. What the Caretaker saw has been seen before, and it has a name. The Caretaker saw: Irisation.

Apparently it is not too common, at least not in word programs, because it is marked as a misspelling of a variety of words, not like that is any measure of anything. The Caretaker will be right back, he is going to check his Dictionary...

... ... ...

Nor is the word "Irisation" in his Dictionary, however, that is probably because the word most likely falls into the subject of rarely used technical jargon.
Anyway, the definition for Irisation is dead on for describing what the Caretaker saw. Here is the definition from his reference book:

Irisation:
When a thin cloud of water droplets passes across the sun, it may cause a complex optical phenomenon called defraction. To the observer the thinner parts of the cloud can take on all kinds of colors. The mother-of-pearl-like effect often has many red and green highlights. The effect is most common in altocumulus clouds.

Above definition used without permission from:
"The Handy Weather Answer Book" 2nd Edition by Walter A. Lyons, Ph.D. Fellow, American Meteorological Society, Published by Visible Ink Press, ISBN 0-7876-1013-5

The Caretaker's edition of this book is from 1997, there may very well be an updated version, but even if there isn't he highly recommends this book to anyone who is even remotely interested in understanding Weather. A very easy read, the information is very accessible.

So, thus concludes the mystery, there is a name for what the Caretaker saw, Irisation. The above definition does state what he saw, but the Caretaker must say that it is rather lacking. The Caretaker is going to sign off for now, this post has gone on for much longer than he had originally planned to spend on it. However, in either tomorrow's post, or Monday's, the Caretaker will describe what it is he saw in the sky that day, for now he will say this:

"Irisation is the second coolest thing nature (Luna Moth still tops the list), but as far as weather phenomena it is absolutely the coolest thing to see. If someone ever, ever, says to you, 'Look, Irisation.' Drop whatever it is you are doing and go look, even if it is the baby and the bath water, drop it and go look."

Until tomorrow...

--The Caretaker