Photo ABCs

Happier New Year, Birding?

If last year was stressful, this year can be less so. How? Birding!

The American Birding Association reported that interest in birding increased greatly in 2020, as people searched for socially-distanced activities to occupy their time.

Birding is easy, it just takes a backyard, or a nearby park or trail, and a pair of binoculars and/or camera. A field guide, such as the free-of-charge Merlin app, is helpful for learning birds. With a few simple taps it will show you the most likely birds for your location and date, anywhere in the world!

Even if you don't learn the birds, you can enjoy their beauty. And even if you don't see birds, you can enjoy being outdoors, and easily be six feet away from others... until it's safe to be closer.

You can avoid Nature-Deficit-Disorder, a term coined by author and former San Diego Union columnist Richard Louv.

Here is an Allen's Hummingbird, photographed on Christmas Day in La Jolla, California. The bird was deep within a tangle of white branches. I knew that with a long lens the out-of-focus branches in the foreground and background would form an interesting, abstract frame for the lovely hummingbird. When it turned and its gorget became illuminated, it made my day!

(tap or click any photo to enlarge)

A Brown Pelican, photographed a few minutes later:

This is probably a winter Ring-billed Gull, photographed at Lake Murray, in La Mesa, California, on the following day:

I believe this is a feather from a Great Egret, photographed on Thanksgiving weekend at the San Diego River Mouth:

Even if birds are not plentiful, nature can be soothing regardless. On this September evening in La Jolla, there were not many birds, so I simply enjoyed the soothing ocean. To capture the mood, I took a three-second exposure of the water, while moving the camera:

Have a Happier, Nature-filled New Year!

Happier New Year?

Today we can say goodbye to a less-than-great year and welcome a new and better one!

December 31 was one of the best days of the year for me. I got stuck in the arm with a needle! As a physician at Family Health Centers of San Diego, I was able to receive my first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. I wore a BandAid on my arm and a smile on my face all morning, I was so thrilled.

Smallpox used to be a scourge of humanity. It decimated the Aztecs, Mayans, Incas, and other New World populations after introduction from Europeans. Those it didn't kill were often scarred for life, disfigured by its horrible lesions.

We now remember Edward Jenner's 1796 invention of the smallpox vaccine and happily forget how deadly, disfiguring, and feared the disease was.

Polio used to be horribly feared. It killed some, crippled others, put children in Iron Lung respirators, and caused widespread public panic in the 1950's. When Salk and Sabin developed vaccines to prevent the disease they were hailed as national heroes, and now polio is only a memory in the developed world.

The flu kills tens of thousands of Americans each year.  The 1918 flu killed hundreds of thousands of Americans, and tens of millions around the globe. Fortunately, we now have a yearly vaccine that decreases the risk of flu in those who choose to be vaccinated, which also decreases the risk of transmitting the disease to those who, for whatever reason, decide not to be.

The list of diseases mostly eliminated or significantly decreased by vaccines is long: Smallpox, polio, tetanus, hepatitis A, hepatitis B, rubella, measles, mumps, whooping cough, Haemophilus influenzae b, shingles, diphtheria, Q-fever, rabies (by vaccinating dogs), and pneumococcus. If you haven't heard or thought about most of these diseases, thank the vaccines and the scientists who developed them.

Vaccines with undreamed-of efficacy and safety have now been developed to eliminate our present scourge of COVID-19, which has killed one of every thousand Americans. If you don't personally know anyone who has died, just think, otherwise-healthy 41 year-old congressman-elect Luke Letlow died on December 29, and 82 year-old actress Dawn Wells (Mary Ann of Gilligan's Island) passed away from COVID-19 on December 30, 2020.

Scientists succeeded with "Warp Speed" to deliver these vaccines, one of the triumphs in the history of medicine. If enough of us respond by being vaccinated then 2021 will be a much Happier and Healthier New Year.

 

Hitch

Another giant was lost this year. We are unlikely to see such encyclopedic eloquence again in my lifetime.

 

Thanks, Steve

Thanks for enriching our lives.

Fight of the Century

To paraphrase Henry Hazlitt this video could be titled Economics in One Incredibly Entertaining Lesson.

Fight of the Century is the new music-video sensation by George Mason economist and author Russ Roberts and videographer John Papola. It shows how the economic struggles of today rehash the arguments of the 20th century economists Hayek and Keynes. 

The newsreel photography is in sepia, and the modern-day photography is a mixture of sepia and color. In addition to being stylistically gorgeous, this choice shows how historical ideas influence today's events.

The more times you watch this video, the more you will be entertained, (check out those ring-girls!) and the more you will catch (like seeing Malthus in Keynes' corner!)