German troops surrendering, D Day.

There are so many pictures of the wounded on the landing at Normandy, and I think this is because the photographers were not in the middle of the action, up forward. Mostly they were back with the wounded at the aid stations although some were in the first wave.

It is nearly impossible to protect yourself or be aware of enemy fire when you are looking through a lens and taking a picture. To go into action with your face up against a camera sight is suicidal. Although some have done it. I have been in fast-moving situations taking photos and you forget where your feet are, or anything else except that small field in your lens and so this is very dangerous to the photographer.

So this is one of the rarely-seen photos. instead of the wounded, here are the Nazi troops surrendering, which is, after all, what the soldiers were there for.

Shortly after this my dad was drafted into the Navy and spent a year on a destroyer escort, The USS Finnegan, in the Pacific. He was at Iwo Jima and the battle of Letey Gulf.

Blue Creek Canyon in Big Bend National Park. April Baxter was taking the picture so she wasn’t in it but that gray horse is her pretty little Andalusian mare named Indira. This was back in March.

A most amazing photo by Hattie Barham of Utopia. The Ranch Rodeo was on Memorial Day and on that day the big eight-inch rainfall happened. I could see the lights of the arena from my ridgetop home here and I thought surely it would be cancelled but it was not. Hattie is one of the best — she and her husband are living here (where they’re from) but Hattie has shot for AP, Agence-France Press and all the top venues. so much talent here in this little town. Terrific photo! See them all at Hattie’s site, LoneStarPhotos.com

Love these old sci-fi illustrations!

Some story lines and concerns in the ‘Fifties as now; catastrophic climate change and zippy personal vehicles. I too am writing about ‘after the rain’ or at least ‘during the rain’.

Very very dry here — it just seems this one little pocket, west of meridian 100. This is a longhorn belonging to a Utopia resident named Rusty Reddens.

A link to Caroline Woodward’s new blog about life on the lights— i.e. the life and times of lighthouse keepers Caroline and her husband Jeff, writer and photographers, check it out!

http://bcbooklook.com/2014/02/24/lighthouse-lit/#more-22276

Buck and I on the Rio Grande. It is such a beautiful mountain river here at this altitude. The dark shadowed mountains on the right are in Mexico. Picture taken by april Baxter, a truly accomplished horsewoman and wonderful person to be around. A brave rider. We were at the old movie set where they filmed ‘Streets Of Laredo’ with phony church and fake cantina and spectacular red cliffs. We had come down the Contrabando Trail in the state park.

One of my favorite books in that it describes the background of the Heian Japanese court in the year (more or less) 1000 AD and it is a world as strange to us — also probably to modern Japanese — as any of Jack Vance’s science or speculative fiction. It is in a way wondrous, like science fiction or speculative fiction ought to be. the author researched the universe of those people that lay behind the 11th century Japanese court novel ‘Tale Of Genji’. It would be hard to make this stuff up. When the ladies and gentlemen of the court ride out to the countryside it is as strange to them as it is to us; the life of the peasants toiling away so that they could have their luxurious life, so far removed. the book is fascinating.

Having mostly to do with dog-sledding and a series of inserted stories on the Chukchi of northeastern Siberia and their devastation by the Soviets. Of course the Soviets devastated everybody but it was the first time I had ever read details of the Chukchi.

I believe that the Chukchi language is the only one related to a North American language, i.e. Inuit, or Inupiat.

Descriptions of learning how to run a dog team are very good.

.

“A signature is a collection of described characteristics that indicates that an entity has produced an event even if that entity is no longer present or cannot be observed”.

An excellent description of a novel. Am re-reading O’Brian’s wonderful series of tales of the English navy in the early 1800’s. His two characters, Jack Aubry and Stephen Maturin are truly among the great inventions of literature; the man of action and his friend the cerebral physician / intelligence officer.