A morning walk and some philosophising

When we first moved out here I suggested to Frances that it would be a good idea to walk round the block each day.  We have slightly adapted that in that 4 days a week we go along the road (a bit further and running is possible) and circle the block the other days.  This is certainly part of the small dog's routine.

This morning I took the camera with me, as there had been nice fogs around on the Hoskinstown Plain.

The first photo-op came with this Eastern Grey Kangaroo peering at an on-coming small dog and proving that 'roos do not panic at the sight, sound or smell of a dog.

Behind the 'roo I was pleased by the sunlight catching the heads of the Joycea pallida (Red-anther Wallaby Grass).

 A Crested Pigeon was the only bird to pose for a snap.

Needless to say as I had my camera with me the wind was blowing quite hard and the Plain was dvoid of picturesque fog.  Mt Palerang is in the background.

 Small dog sets out along Whiskers Creek Rd ...

... and continues down our drive.  Sorry about the pine trees, but we didn't plant them.

While none of these images are particularly good or exciting I felt they did make a record of an event that fills a fair proportion of our time each day.  I will come back to this in a few lines, but the thoughts it stirred were:

1. that I would not have wasted film on these images but digital is free (apart from amortising the cost of the camera).   
2. in the early 90s when I worked there was one digital camera in the organisation I worked for (which employed 3,500 folk).  We used it to take shots of staff as they started so that the Executive could recognise their staff when they emerged from carpet city!  These days every staff member would have a phone that could take far better images than the rare camera.
3. For goodness sake, the early 90s were 20 years ago!

The comment above about 'recording leads to another philosophical point stirred by a question from a relative "Why do a blog?".  Here are some answers and commentary thereon:

• I started doing this when a Canadian friend told me that he was running a blog (Bruces World  of Sheds - but don't Google that as it has been hijacked by spammers) so as to become familiar with HTML.  A good reason, especially in times before Blogger when one had to write one's own code.  I still do a bit, but general use the Blogger facilities because they are easier.
• This became particularly useful when we lived in New York as the bird chatline I used didn't allow attachments so links to a blog were a good and sociable way of sharing images.  This still applies to the COG chatline.

The remaining entries are the more current reasons why I  continue with the process.  

• Firstly it is a creative process I enjoy. (50%)
• It jogs and stimulates my short term memory when thinking about the creating the post.(15%)  This is a big thing when recording field trips.
• It is a long term record (similar to a hard copy diary) (15%).  This is the point I made earlier about recording events.  If I was feeling poncy I could say it is like those historians who now study the everyday as being more representative of events than the doings of the rich and powerful. 
• Other people enjoy it and or find it useful (10%).  A number of folk tell me they enjoy it and from time to time people tell me that things I have captured in images etc are scientifically useful (eg the toad bug at Tallong and the greenhood at Touga Rd.
• I get an emotional hit when others tell me they enjoy it! (5%)
• lobbying for my personal views to become received wisdom (5%) (added following an insightful comment - see below).