Stella - Heidi & The Canon G9 X

{Over 40 photos today ... Heidi & Stella} Today has had a pretty good start. It's not raining!! As we ride the 'yoyo' weather here in 'the tropics' Stella and I had one of our best walks in a long time this morning. She didn't eat deer scat and I didn't have to do any verbal herding. She walked at her pace, I walked at mine. The skies were clear. We saw the moon, passenger planes and a flock of geese. With 3" or more of snow on the ground just a couple of days ago, and ~12 hours of nonstop rain I wasn't sure what to expect on our walk this morning. 

Which boots to wear? ... hiking or the snow/rain boots. You would think with all the melted snow and all the rain this week that the field would be saturated beyond belief. One solution to that is have a temperature of 20° with a windchill of 14°. We had a chance to walk the half mile without getting my boots wet and Stella's paws wet. I put on the snow/rain boots just in case.

When I looked out the window a few minutes before 8am as Stella hydrated herself before the walk with the daily routine of gulping water as I put on my parka ... it was still pretty dark outside, a little overcast or so it seemed. I thought if I was going to get good photos for the walk today then I should take the old reliable standby, my Nikon D3200. I used that camera the other morning on our walk. Then I decided, "no ... this is what we do. We take a daily walk at 8am with a camera in hand, as long as it's not raining." I've made some adjustments from the reviews I read yesterday so "lets see if the Canon G9 X is going to work for what we do or does it go back to the store." As some people would say the Canon G9 X Mark II and I had our "come to Jesus meeting" or others might say "let's see it when the rubber hits the road."

It was either going to work or it wasn't. I turned the dial to 'M' on top of the small camera, like always, or at least most of the time. I did not plan on going past the limit when zooming and understand that I have a 84mm zoom lens for the max, not the Tamron 18-200mm lens. I would also make sure that Stella was in those green squares that were telling me the points in focus. Even if that put her off center. Basically I was going to work within the limits of the camera and see what the results would be when I got back to my desk. I could see that Stella again had some early morning energy.

I have to admit this photo of the moon isn't bad. Zoom'd within the camera limits and handheld. The moon was dead center of the green focus square.

I moved the lever to the left to reduce the zoom distance. Sure, I'd like for those trees to be more in focus but they were not the point of interest. The moon was. I can live with the burred surroundings because based on the lens type, the price range of the camera, it is doing what it is designed to do.

With each step I could hear the crunching sound of the frozen turf. I could even hear that same sound as Stella marched through the frozen grass. She was on what I call our return path and a little zoom added to bring her closer to the camera.

I need to start remembering just to hold the shutter down when I am trying to capture her running. When I don't, with the 2 second delay in processing the photo and getting refocussed, she has ran by me. I have the setting for 'continuous' so it's just user error that I did not have more photos of her running since the camera will shoot 8fps.

Once again she wouldn't let me stay in front of her. Each time I took the lead she would walk around me ... then stop to check something out. Notice the bottom half of her tail is a 'black and tan' from a parent. Bloodhounds are either 'black and tan' or 'red'. Because her tail is like that plus the added story as a puppy where she got loose in a garage, getting her tail mixed in with some automobile oil ... she arrived at my house after our 4 hour drive in August 2015 with the name of "Dipstick" ... She adapted to her new name Stella within hours without any problem.

As we approached the first turn I was willing to let her go anywhere she wanted. After all it had been months since she has gone next door, years since she took off running after deer or anything else of interest. Plus she does not run sprinting speed anymore but she will run faster than I can. She didn't disappoint as she moved way ahead of me.

I thought it was interesting that she was staying on the path this morning with all of the fresh deer tracks in the usual places between our path and the woods/brush line.

The frozen ground did a pretty good job recording the deer traffic from this morning.

She was still walking on the path ... I zoomed out to 35mm to take that photo.

She knew the deer were following this path and heading this direction this morning before we even thought about being outside.

Another thing this Canon G9 X has shown me ... it was not the Nikon that was crooked, needing adjustment ... it's my hands holding the camera about 2° to the right. I can always tell when I take a photo of this cell tower, because I have to crop the photo to get the tower straight.

I stood and watched what she was doing and where she was going. She was well past our turn towards home. If I would have let her go, she would have followed that deer scent around the tall power cable tower, and north all the way to the woods.

I wanted to keep the ground dark to capture the sunrise a little after 8am.

As I moved the camera closer to the frozen puddle of water, it automatically changed the landscape of the photo to a vertical position.

Again I didn't think about just holding the shutter down to catch her running. She was so fast that she was up on me just like that, within seconds.

Does she hear the small barking dog again? See or hear the school bus like yesterday? No ....

She heard the flock of geese heading SE. I decided not to crop the photo because if you didn't know it ... I have not edited one of these photos today. They are just the way they were coming straight out of the Canon G9 X into my computer photo editor.

You can tell by Stella's ears and the flipped front paw ... she is at high speed running away from me. The lens is at the safe maximum of 84mm.

You can barely see the 'Y' in our return path. Either straight ahead to the north backyard or to the left, and follow the 'old' way home. That path is right above the word "or" in this sentence if you cannot see it.

I usually let Stella make the decision on which path we take. The old path is just left of her and left of the tall grass ... so it's the 'old' path to take home today.

She is in her 'strolling pace' ... no hurry and no worries ... just another day to her.

I moved my lens into the "Digital" zoom for this photo. That means on the progress scale I passed the 'yellow' caution area and went all the way to the 'blue' Digital Zoom area. I tapped a little color and some definition for this photo.

Again she was faster than the speed of light this morning. The VetriScience GlycoFlex supplement seems to be working for her. It was just a few months ago where she yelped trying to get on the couch one night and had been walking gingerly sometimes on our morning walk. Looking at the product facts on the package I am tempted to try one of those small soft chews myself.

I zoomed a little on this photo ... but nothing on the one below.

Last night she was in prime form. I was watching the National Geographic channel where I have my DVR set to tape all of their National Parks shows. I was also eating an apple. Heidi and Stella love apples but before I give them the core I remove the stem and go to the kitchen to cut out or pry out all of the apple seeds. There are times I don't want to stop the show or the ballgame to make that trip to the kitchen and I don't do a good job getting those seeds out with my fingernail .. so she and Heidi will only get a little apple from the pieces I chew off.

This is Stella's patented look telling me she wants not only a piece of any kind of food I am eating but she wants ALL of it. She will sit for as long as it takes if needed. During this stare she never blinks, might drool, doesn't move her head ... only looking at that piece of apple, a carrot, almonds, whatever I am eating.

On the opposite end of the couch Heidi barely raised an eyelid when she heard the sound of me eating an apple. After assessing the situation she decided that sleep was her higher priority and didn't move from that position, only lowering her eyelid and going back to sleep.

Stella decided if she got closer to the two apple pieces, I slid into my side pocket you see there in the photo, that might help her getting the apple core that still had seeds in it.

She gave up trying from the right side. Slowing walking in front of the tv, she decided it was time to try me from the left side and again ... get as close to me as possible. She sat here for about five minutes before getting up on the couch to put her stare about an inch away from my face. Even a good macro lens would not have been able to get a photo of that. That stare lasted the time it took to go from one commercial on tv, view the show, then to the next commercial. This look is borderline between begging and pouting.

Finally she gave up and decided it was time to call it a night with a nap while I finished watching multiple National Park shows.

All of those last photos inside were taken with my iPhone 8+ camera.

I was about to write my closing paragraphs and post this when Heidi woke up from her morning nap. She always comes to my desk chair to let me know she needs to go outside. This is her daily routine lately. You will see she ends it with a sprint to the living room and some aerobic exercise.

The best bbq around is from that black trailer.

All photos of Heidi were taken with the Canon G9 X, NO EDITING, a flash was used inside.

One of my morning readings is all the articles collected automatically from categories I choose on Flipboard. Today there was an interesting article about Grain-Free Dog food. That was a product I used for years as I tried to figure out what the cause of Heidi's skin allergies were. The cost was not a consideration and over a 2 year period I tried all different kinds of protein sources with no grain. One thing interesting in this article was they mentioned that most allergies in dogs are NOT caused by food. One of the four vets I took her to told me he had completed a study on causes of allergies in dogs and their study found that only 3% of allergies in dogs were caused by food ! In February 2017 (?) I went back to a basic dog food with Chicken Meal and Rice ... this specific brand or blend of food cleared up her allergies.

For those that feed Grain-Free dog food ... here is some information to consider:  Stop Buying Grain Free Food.

We have all thought it ... maybe. How do I disappear from the Internet?  This might help to show you how:  Delete Yourself From The Internet.

Well the sunshine is out, it's already almost 11am as the hounds walk near my computer room to remind me that I fed them breakfast at 6:30am and it's time for their lunch kibble. Not sure what I am going to do today but it might be nice to take a drive in the local country and take some more photos.

The camera? A keeper?  I think after this morning's photos on this blog, it has shown me it's a camera I can use and the photos are of good quality. Case closed.

Time is flying these past few days in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.

Stella Decides To Walk

The rain stopped, Stella stood up and looked at me. I put on my hiking boots but I still had no plans to take the walk. I was pretty sure that by the time we got outside with strong winds and sprinkled rain ... she wouldn't go too far.

You see she had to think about it and almost headed toward the door after walking back around the car.

Following the side of the house, keeping under the roof overhang to stay dry.

She went out into the yard, relieved herself and didn't hesitate to head back inside.

Again, follow the side of the house to stay dry.

At least with the strong winds and rain all night long, my Mini Countryman got a free car wash.

Heidi?  She might be awake but there is no way she is moving until lunch is served.

Oatmeal and blueberries for breakfast in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.

Morning Is Rained Out

They warned us. All that snow we were walking through yesterday was going to be washed away by the time we woke up this morning. Their prediction was 100% true as it has been pouring rain all night and has not stopped. Here's the kicker though .. by late afternoon, the temps drop from 48° it is now at 8am to below freezing and all this rain will be mixed snow. The snow will not stick. I hate to write about the weather every day but it seems that is about all that is happening. Although in the background quite a bit of things have been happening ... not in life ... electronically.

Where should I start?

With the 5 pound bag of dog bones, grain-free with bacon flavor, gone ... it was time to buy more. That is only a half mile drive to the hardware store that carries dog food and dog treats. It's 4-star rated food and produced by the same company that produces Earthborn dog food. Stella had shown no signs of trying to escape the past few weeks when I have gone grocery shopping. I am usually gone for an hour and half on those trips. Yet it would have been hard for me to tell because I was still using the cord system, backed up with a baby gate. When I would return from those trips I'd check the door handle inside the bedroom for bloodhound drool ... there wasn't any. There wasn't any yesterday either but she opened the door someway.

No, I did not have the cord tied from that door knob to a closet door knob. I wanted to see what would happen so I just closed the door and put the baby gate up just in case. That was a good idea because when I returned ten minutes later, she had opened the door and is standing on her rear legs chewing the top of the baby gate. She didn't even stop when I walked in ... I yelled "hey" and then she stopped.

It has been suggested by others and what I've read, to install a deadbolt. I can do that and have thought about that many times. Especially every time I come home and she has that door open. Something always holds me back from doing that ... it's the "what if" thoughts I have. What if I install a deadbolt and she then tries digging through the door itself? It's a typical hollow interior door, easily replaced if damaged. You might think that is not a possibility but the time I spent repairing the drywall right next to that door in 2015 would prove otherwise. I hate the thought of having to replace a door just because she wants to get out for some reason.

No ... I did not leave her during anytime that she would have been fed lunch. It's just her. It's her DNA and exactly who she is, as the previous owner told me "she is an escape artist, NOTHING, keeps her contained." Those words haunt me three years and five months later.

I mentioned a few weeks ago I was having problems with the Wordpress dashboard at Wordpress .com using major amounts of data unexpectedly. Their support team suggested I use the 'old' wp-admin dashboard for everything. They did not tell me at the time they were redesigning the newer dashboard. When I say major amounts of data, I'm talking 700Mb - 1.5Gb just like that. Well over time I'd check the regular, newer dashboard and it seemed like things had settled down.

Until yesterday.

I was hovering around 140Mb of data usage for the first three hours I was online, after 8:30am. I glanced to my right at the 'Activity Monitor' to see Data Received at 974Mb ... Google Chrome was the browser. I checked their Data Saver which lists all activity from the most data used down to the least amount used, by name. There was Wordpress .com at the top of the list. So who knows and really, who cares. I'll keep using their older wp-admin dashboard. Like I have said many times before, I can't afford to lose 1Gb of data when I pay for 20Gb per month.

Two years ago the farmer hauled in and installed some of the largest black drainage system in that area of standing water. It's just like the same stuff we would buy in a 6" diameter. His looked like it had a diameter of 10 feet !!

At least I was able to install the new Apple iOS and MacOS updates this morning on my 'free' data period since it was before 8am. I like doing those updates mostly for security. They might include a lot of features, many that I don't or will never use but they always plug holes and tighten their security with those updates. You would be surprised how many friends contact me at times with computer problems, phone or tablet problems and the first question I ask is ... "When did you do your last update?"

In almost all cases ... they had missed the last 2-3 Operating System updates whether it was Apple devices or Windows. Doing those updates when they come out fixes a lot of problems you might be having.

I know many of you wish I'd get off this camera subject. The one I bought on January 2nd and it arrived on January 4th. I did a lot of research about that camera. I read reviews from professional camera websites, read the forum for that specific Canon camera and talked to a friend that had bought that camera and raved about it. I was still hesitant right up until the time I clicked that purchase button on my computer. For years I've wondered if it was my eyes getting older and why weren't the photos from my Nikon D3200 as sharp as they were when I bought the camera in 2015 (?) Then when I would look at the sharp clear photos taken with my iPhone 8+, that made me wonder even more. A reader explained to me it was the humidity in my tropical air that was causing the problem based on his experience ... the same thing. Just slightly not as sharp and crisp as they should be.

So yesterday I did some more looking online and found a website that does reviews, listed first after my search. I had been on this website before I bought the camera. When I checked my bookmarks in my Camera folder, I had not seen this exact page that gave me the answer I was looking for. I am NOT crazy ... LOL. There were many others making comments on this review with the same complaints I was having. BUT ... the review itself pointed out the problem and why I will NEVER get the kind of picture I want with this camera.

It's the lens.

Sure it's a great feature to have a small digital camera with a 1" sensor, only a few cameras have a sensor that big. That great feature still will not override what they called "a soft lens." The Canon G9 X Mark II will never take sharp pictures of Stella far away, like yesterday morning's photos. The review said it would not even take sharp pictures of landscapes, even after shooting in automatic mode or manual with adjusted sharpness and fineness tweaked. I've made those setting adjustments the review suggested and have taken a few photos late yesterday afternoon inside and outside. I plan on taking more today when the skies brighten up. Right now at 8:39am it is dark, overcast and raining.

I knew before I bought the camera the max zoom was 84mm ... I found that even shooting at that range was not a sharp image. Before I bought the camera I set my Nikon lens at 70mm as a test and tried taking my long distance photos of Stella with that range while on the walk. I guess I need to learn and practice using a shorter zoom distance, then cropping the photos to the larger size I want. That is something I have rarely done but I did it with Stella's picture at the bottom of this page.

So my brain cells were scrambling again about the camera. I know that sounds stupid as hell but that is just the way I am. I admit I post a lot crap quality pictures on this blog, meaning slightly out of focus sometimes. Or not as sharp and clear as I want. That may not bother you but it does me. I only read this blog on my phone when I check to see how it looks to phone readers. Same way with my tablet. I might read the blog from my laptop but those times are few and far between. I do all of my writing, photo editing and reading on a 27" monitor. So my photos will look different from what you see on a phone or a table, maybe even a laptop. Everyone has a different device they are using so what I might be complaining about is not seen by you.

Interesting isn't it?

I am not sure how many of you have blogs or do blog. Those that do might be able to relate to what I am going to say. I've had a couple of online friends that do blog remind me that "this is your blog, you are writing for you,  traffic means nothing." I answer to them saying I am not writing just for me because if I were, then I would have continued to write on my private blog like I do here. Using the blog as a documented journal to be looked at in the future as a reference or good memories. So since I am writing for readers mostly or posting photos for them to see, I try to put good stuff online.

Who knows what the reasons are but I am sure that other bloggers know ... there is something addicting about seeing your traffic statistics that Blogger or WordPress provides all bloggers. Are high traffic numbers fulfilling a hidden need our personalities need for acceptance or is like what I call the "Facebook Syndrome" of "look at me, look what I am doing, look where I am, look what I did" ... Of course with a lot of blog traffic that means you need more server space and luckily Blogger and WordPress furnishes server space. If this were an independent website I would have to pay more for that server space to handle large amounts of visitors. So that is not really something I like with average blog traffic.

I don't get anything near what other bloggers get in traffic numbers. I have a boring topic. I don't have a lot of emergencies, or crises to write about. I don't travel. Plus my daily photos don't change much in location or even how the hounds look. So I get it. No way am I going to get thousands of blog visitors everyday. That's good in a way because I don't get recognized when I am traveling or walking down the street like some do, nor do I have people knocking on my door to visit the hounds. I am a 'small time' blogger with small amounts of traffic.

What I am leading up to is ... it just makes me wonder out of curiosity how in one day after 44 days of consistent blog traffic ... it decreases 60% from the daily average.

In the meantime, Stella drank her water at the normal time of day, thinking we are walking. We aren't going anywhere. I'll put on a jacket and take some photos outside of what we are looking at to cause the cancellation for this morning's walk. The field will be nothing more than a pond if we were to walk through the wet grass today. I have standing water in the driveway and in back ... that means the field is even worse with water levels. Plus there are strong winds.

I left her inside as I went outside to take the pictures of the field and standing water. An hour ago there was much much more water standing than what you see in those pictures. The start of the path looks like it is close to having standing water on top of the leaves. Based on experience, the further we walk into the field as the elevation increases so does the water level.

This is the response that Stella gave me when I told her the walk was cancelled for this morning. "We might go out this afternoon." ...

It might sound like strange weather but this "yoyo" weather is normal winter weather for 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.