Villages and Hamlets...

Old Villages turn me on...

This sweet little Hamlet of Ashton, is just up-the-line a bit, from Ottawa and well worth the drive, on a Sunday afternoon, or Anytime, for that matter. :-) The little General store here is run by nice friendly folk that are Happy to be able to help you with whatever. Yes sir, that Friendly, old fashioned attitude, still pervades in these tucked away spots, just off our main highways and byways friend. If You can appreciate older, kooler stuff and friendy folks, then by all means take a tour out to the countryside soon and scope out these Hamlets and old Villages while they are still here for us to enjoy...

Entering Ashton Ontario

The Main Drag...

Christ Church - Ashton

I'm drawn to these time capsules like a deer is drawn to a cold, sweet and pure spring in his forest. Every single building (no exceptions) in this quaint corner of the planet, has Many, many stories to tell. For a place of this size, I'm just floored with how many churches they have there. Was it the only town in Ontario, I ponder, to have everyone in it, a Christian of some flavor? Hey, God Is Good so that would have been pretty Cool back then. At least ya didn't have to fight all the heathens and Philistines, eh? :-)

An old landmark...



Have a great day friends,

lb

Go Grass-hopper Go...

GrassHopper joins Cool Group @ Flickr...

Presenting...The Astered Grass-hopper...

Hey, Grass-Hopper!



Have You ever gotten this close to a Wild Grass-Hopper before? With a camera? Well, again, I some how seemingly "lucked out" and snagged this pic of little Hopper buddy here, posed momentarily for my sweet little E30 the other day. My fellow photography friend Austin, over @ Flickr suggested I send this Grasshopper picture to his Macro-natureonly, photo Group @ Flickr. So, I did. :-)

Go have a look at buddy's Cool Macro-Nature Group for Your Close-up LOOK, at some real nice stuff, to-day...

Austin's Cool Macro Group

The Wild Asters themselves were actually plenty subject matter enough for me, until I spied this nicely colored Hopper, that is. He patiently waited for me to try and get a good focus on him while holding this little Pentax, in my hands, of course. That's always a little tricky. Also there always seems be be a bit of an errant breeze around, just when you don't need it, for insect and flower shots. :-(

Well, then again that's alright though, that's the kind of stuff that really adds to the Sport of, Small Game Shooting, for this ol' trapper anyway. Makes one appreciate a Quality shot, when one sees one. :-)

later,

Lar

Outdoorsy Caps...

Caps R Cool...

What's your take on Baseball style Caps as headgear? Here's a little bit of what I've got to say about them...

For starters, this particularly well designed and very comfy tan cap, is a John Deere tribute type unit for me. These folks have been serving the little guys Well, all across the country for a long, long time. Your Grandfather may even have had one of their first tractors back in the day. The design and positioning of the panels on this cap, seems to really fit the shape of my head well but they even have a nice adjustment arrangement at the back for when that's needed. :-) Like up North here when we wear Hoodies to keep our ears and neck warm, this cap fits right over the top if ya wanna wear it that way, or backwards even. :-)

The bill itself is a little longer than yer standard caps bill length, which gives you more glare free coverage for your eyes. Along with my trusty Polaroid shades, this cap gives me the best glare/reflection free combo, for Fishing sunny waters, that I own. ;-)

Still John Deere

I got into wearing baseball style caps, back in the days when I was working behind the Fishing counter at Laurentian Trading Post on Bank @ Walkley in Ottawa, many years ago. The McDonald Brothers, that owned and ran the Post, were Very hep Outdoorsy people themselves and carried the coolest, most up to date Outdoor gear back then. It was an honor for me to work there with those boys doing what I Loved best and the people around me who understood where I was coming from.
As it turns out, there was even a lot of recognition there by happy returning customers. After a few months, near my birthday, the Lindy Tackle Company sent me one of their limited edition, Proficiency Award, Baseball style Caps, in a nice yellow flavor as a perk. Well Sir, I immediately and madly, fell deep in LOVE with it right then and there. Yup! Large Fishing Cap obsession bugun right there behind that awesome old Fishing counter. That semi-famous cap stayed with me for over twenty years and it was a sad day when we finally parted. :-(

However the neat thing is, that great Cap got me hooked on these baseball style caps as very efficient fishing headgear. Up until discovering caps, I either went bare headed as a teen or later on, I wore one of those, side pinned up, camo flavored, Ausie style, Doug Hannon, bush type hats, for my outdoorsy pursuits. :-) I've never worn anything But these Fishing (formerly called baseball) caps since, on the waters and in the woods.

Caps are Cool in general but I wanted y'all to see this one in particular to-day, that I just acquired recently and I had to give it a 9.9 on one of my Cool scales, already. :-) I'm calling it the Crusher Nike or Nike Crusher, haven't quite decided yet, because I can fold it all up small-like, to go into small places and then I unroll or unfold it, and suddenly it looks and acts like a regular, yet Very Cool Fishin' cap once more! :-) I Love it!

Nike Crusher Crushed...

Caps Can and Do, make all sorts of folks look Cooler! That's an undisputed factoid friends. If you're not yet into this Cool fashion statement for Your head, what in tar-nation are y'all waitin' for, Christmas? :-)

If you are or have been perhaps say, a one cap man (or woman) up until now, maybe this little blurb here can Sway You towards a little, shall I say, attire expansion, for Your head. After all, your face and head are what most people look at when they are talking to you, eh? Why not let 'em see some cool stuff sittin' up there on top of yer ol' melon, every once in awhile? Then they won't have to ask why You are wearing such a nice smile. You can upgrade by taking into consideration, mostly form, fashion AND function, :-) Another neat Cap or two can only make ya look and feel Cooler. Go for it!

Nike Crusher Rockin'

Peace out, brothers and sisters!

lb

Worm Harnesses Work!

On... Getting to know You, my readers, I just have to ask these few simple questions first. :-) Are You an Angler? Are You an Angler that likes fishing for Walleyes? Do you prefer to cast or troll or drift-fish/still-fish for them? Just artificial lures or do you use Live bait too? Do you chase Walleyes in lakes or rivers?

Well my friends, I'd say that there are probably more known ways to catch those ol' Marble-Eyes, than You can shake a stick @...

Take for instance, This deadly little unit here,

in it's thousands of variations, has been laying "Eyes on Ice" for over a century now. These modern day Worm Harnesses are as deadly to-day as they were in Gramps' day. :-) As a matter of fact, I'll bet Anyone 20 smackers, that this BAD little puppy, will blow the doors off of what was originally invented back then and now which has now been totally improved upon! Twenty Bucks! Any Takers out there...? :-)

Oh ya, and by the way, I'm Not always in favor of the "new and improved models" of stuff in our lives either, just to clarify your thinking on that point there. :-) Another thing I Love about Worm Harnesses is, it's really pretty hard to fish these lures wrong. It's like, put a nice juicy, squirmy, ol' dew worm on those razor sharp hooks, then toss it out in the water someplace and then simply reel or troll it, fairly slowly. Bing bang pow! Fish will Slam it! :-)

A recent talk with my friend Jack, the Walleye Guy, revealed that he has been beating up the Walleyes pretty good in His home stretch of the Ottawa River, for the last two week-ends on these baby's too. So there, this IS current and accurate data, for those of you who need even more proof than what I've told you in here so far already, about Worm Harnesses. Like, They Rock! :-)

Anyway, if you Don't own a couple or three of these Wallis, slaying lures, then I'm tellin' ya right here, to go and Get Yourself a few To-day! Well, if ya wanna eat a few tasty ol' Wallys, that is! Oh ya, and another good thing about these lures is that they won't cost you an arm & a leg either, so Anyone can afford a few new additions to their Wally producing tackle box. Some of us even rig up our own from the short list of simple components too. :-)

...for Next time?

Now, right after saying All of the above, I get to wondering on another note, if you Do already fish with these awesome Pickerel (Canadian handle for these toothsome critters) producers, then I ask, did You ever try trolling one of those old fashioned, Rebel Spoon Bill, deep diving minnows, in your favorite areas? They Spank Big Walleyes, plain & simple!

I'll Pentax a few of my own, slightly customized models, of those particular older Rebel plugs, in a future entry, just so that You can maybe Jump on That particularly sweet little Walleye Gravy Train, on Your home waters in the future too.

Especially, if you've only been used to drownin' worms behind beads & blades and maybe doing a little Jiggin' all these times and You don't have a lot of faith in cranks for Walleyes. :-)

Catch ya on the flip flop,

lar

More experiments in photography...

HeyYa,

I'm trying something here that I have been wondering about for a while now. Can your older slides be shot now with a Digital camera? If so, how's the quality when you want to put them on the web, after a shoot? Here's a low-light situation shot first, to give You a hint of what this little Camera is capable of. More light would NO DOUBT, make for a better, all around picture of this slide and back-lighting could even be tried too.

Home-made Set-up...

This next one shows the slide being held in my left hand while holding and shooting the camera with my right. Can you then imagine how the quality of the picture could have been improved by using a tripod or uni-pod even and perhaps a holder of some sort, for the slide?


Hand-held shot

A little closer...


So, lessons here to-day...

First, More light is good. Better than not enough light, for sure. Second, use a solid base for your slide. Even if you have to build one yourself. How hard could that be? Third, always use a solid base for the camera itself as well. That will insure basically no movement when the shutter is fired. There are lots of slick little teeny pods these days that fit in your pocket and will boost the quality of any digital camera's output.

Now, if I follow those little tips for my next shoot, then I know the slides will come out well enough indeed to spread around out there on the web. Most of my slides are like, 10 to 30 or so years old. Some of them, I know are nice enough to share with y'all after sitting dormant for all those years on a shelf. Especially now that my little photography experiment here, seems to have worked out pretty well, as far as I'm concerned anyway. :-)

I'll pick through a batch of 35mm slides in the next week or so and put some results of that work in here mayhaps, God willing. ;-)


Later,

LarryB