Some Surprising Photos of the Solar Eclipse

Hey everyone! I hope you've all been having a nice winter/early spring. I'm popping in to write a short blog post and share some photos of last Monday's solar eclipse. I was careful not to look directly at the eclipse and more or less tilted my camera up toward it. From what I read, the older (non-phone) cameras would be OK if you were quick about it.

So here are a few photos showing what the sky looked like as it changed. I stood out there about 15 minutes before the full eclipse (or partial where I was in Wisconsin). What I mean is, I stood outside 15 minutes before it was going to be as full as it was going to get. 

Getting darker....

I think I can see the curve of something different at the top of the sun:

I see some interesting pieces of colored light here. I'd like someone to explain to me what was going on with those, especially the green shape.

When the eclipse did arrive here (at 2:08:10 pm from what I read online) I felt physically more cold and a dark purplish-blue cast of shadow went over everything. It didn't feel like day or night or any other time we're used to. It actually felt like time was in a holding pattern. I'm trying to think of how to describe how I felt during the eclipse. I didn't feel in the present moment. It was like the past and future were happening at the same time for a few seconds. 

This photo is the same as the one I started with. I feel emotionally moved looking at it for some reason. And how about the perfect square of light that is formed around the eclipse? It looks like someone drew purplish-pink circles in a square formation.

And boy, did I feel dizzy throughout the day! Did anyone else feel physically weird on Monday?

Aside from the physical symptoms, experiencing the eclipse was not something I wanted to miss. And we've had some nice, warm weather lately. So it was very comfortable to be standing around. I'd be curious to know what time of day you guys saw the eclipse and how full of an eclipse you saw where you were. I know some people traveled to the states where they could see the full effect. And I'd of course be interested to see any photos you may have taken. So far, every person's photo I've seen looked different.

A Moonlit Walk Around Town

Are you guys ready for a night tour of the local village? The main street area is getting ready for Halloween. All of the decorations are pretty cute and homemade, but they take on a slightly spooky feel in the dark.

The Headless Scarecrow! He's wearing some merch from a company that plants flowers in the village. 🎃

This crow almost looks real in this lighting. I really like what's going on with the lighting here, between that nearly full moon, the twinkle lights, and that spotlight on the crow.

This dimly lit parking lot is probably the spookiest image I will have to offer here.

This spider has been busy, and with two types of web! 

You'll no doubt remember the whirligigs from the kite shop. I'm used to seeing this zombie, but I think the scarecrow was new.

I imagine this will look pretty cool when those lights are on.

There were a number of pumpkins out on haystacks. I had some choices as far as which ones to share. 

This old school desk was sitting in front of a store. There's something charming about a pumpkin on an old desk. How old do you think this desk/seat is? I don't think I've ever seen one with stripes of different colored wood. 

I think I'm seeing a hole in the top of the desk. Do you think that's for ink? I just looked up some pics of old desks, and I think that is actually a hole for an ink well! That definitely gives a clue as to how old this desk is.

I always like to photograph shop windows, especially when they feature autumn displays. This one has something different: A Christmas tree decorated with either fabric or paper pumpkins. I'm finding the flat little pancake pumpkins sort of sweet and homespun. 

Isn't this a beautiful window display? That forest scene is actually printed on fabric. As you can tell, this shop sells bird feeders and other bird-related items.

The string lights added a festive feel. There were more string lights up than ever.

I love how this one turned out! 

These street scenes were well lit by the nearly full moon. I'm glad I took a pic of it last night since tonight's actual full moon isn't visible. This looks pretty darn close to full!

You guys will probably be seeing more pics from the village soon, because the carved pumpkins will be on display again! Hopefully, people will carve me lots of good photo opportunities. 😉

Tonight's Harvest Moon creeps out of the clouds

We're going to take a brief break from the Colorado blog posts, because I had to share some photos of tonight's Harvest Moon!

I'd taken some pics of the moon last night, thinking it was full at that time. Then I read that tonight was the actual Harvest Moon. So I planned to get out there again. It was pretty overcast when I looked out there tonight.

But after waiting maybe a half-hour, I eventually saw something glowing behind the clouds. It looks almost like there's a skull-type face in the clouds, hey? Complete with a few teeth.

I mean, that's pretty eerie. I'm really seeing a face looking down here, complete with lower jaw this time.

I was cheering the moon on, hoping it would make an appearance.

And then, for a brief moment, it did.

Then the clouds glided back over it and it began to rain! So that was some pretty lucky timing.

And what could be more appropriate music for tonight than this?

For those who get this blog in email form, here's a link:

The Frantics - Werewolf - 1960   I love this song!

The Best of August and into September

Hope you all had a nice August! I don't think I checked in to blogger all last month, I've been so busy. So I thought it would be fun to do one of those "best of" the month posts with some photos from August and the first few days of September to show a little of what I've been up to. I'll stick with the generally spooky stuff.

So, the first thing I want to share is a series of photos from our local park. There's a nighttime concert series there in the summer and I brought my camera along to it.

 

That bridge pic is one of the spookier ones I think I took. You can't help thinking something is waiting down there. It's even a little spooky in the daylight because there's so much space under the bridge and plants growing under it. It's a bog type area.

These photos were taken into the woods that surround the park. I was randomly snapping pics while walking, so I wasn't even sure what I got. The camera had better eyesight than I did since I was using the flash. I half expected some animal to be looking back at me when I took a closer look, but I don't see any.

 At the bottom there, a bug?

I can't help thinking there's an animal in these woods, I just can't see it.

A little pond area that looks like a black hole

This is a park's waterfall in the dark. Don't those rocks on the walls behind it look like skulls? I never saw it that way in the daylight.

I also got a bat shot at the park! I know it's blurry, but it's hard for me to capture a bat. So this still feels like a success. They were dipping around so fast that probably the blurriness was caused by me trying to follow it.

Out of the park now... These next photos also felt like a success to me. I often hear crows but rarely see them when I have a camera handy. These crows nicely stayed put for me.

The garden spider was back again this year.

I was happy to get a pic of its web. Like bats and crows, spider webs are hard to catch at just the right time. The little droplets of water were a nice touch too.

Another little garden find was...

... an Ambush Bug! I learned that in the process of writing this blog post. This bug is much smaller than pictured, which is maybe why I never noticed one before.

So, what is an Ambush Bug you ask? Well, they earned their name by sitting and waiting for prey to come by and then ambushing it. I'm guessing they're usually better camouflaged than this one who is on a sunflower. Not that it's holding him back; he's snacking on an ant in this pic.

Also, it turns out that "Ambush Bug" is a comic book character I'd never heard of.

I took some more night shots during August. Those of you who follow me on Twitter might have seen these.

It's pretty dark around here, even with the street lights.

I was calling this "the evil cat eye moon". There's a even a "pupil" for the eye caused by a cloud that was passing by.

Besides walking around in the dark and observing creepy crawlies, the main thing that's been keeping me busy recently is genealogy research. I don't think obsession is too strong a word. I've been having a lot of success with it lately. It helps that our library lets us use Ancestry.com for free now! If anyone wants to talk genealogy, let me know in the comments.