Assassinate? Robertson?

So American televangelist Pat Robertson advocated assassination of Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez for proliferating “Communist infiltration and Muslim extremism?”

www.cnn.com/2005/US/08/23/robertson.chavez.1534/index.html

But I though commies were Godless heathens.

So you can’t export both, Catholic, democratically-elected President Chavez! You can spew atheist communism or terrorist Islamic fundamentalism, but the two are mutually exclusive.

You can’t have your (yellow) cake and eat it too.

And some more flying pictures....

And this is from last night a Putnam Baptist Church, where they held the grand finale to their Vacation Bible Summer....

So one day I was flying an ultralight, the next I was in a hot air balloon. The balloon was actually trickier to shot from. They were taking a hundred or so kids up in turns, so we weren't airborne too long (maybe a minute -- we were tethered). And it was pretty crowded in there, so I couldn't really move my body. Instead I just wrapped the camera strap around my wrist and started sticking it places and snapping away as many frames as possible. It worked out.

"this is kind of like that time ya’ll told me not to tell you before I...."

Hey Dad, this week let’s just tell Mom I went, uh, hiking or something.
But really, this is kind of like that time ya’ll told me not to tell you before I went skydiving, but this time instead of jumping out of a perfectly good airplane, I flew around in a really tiny one!
An ultralight!
In the world of airplanes, 180 degrees from the massive Boeing 747 are these small flying machines resembling the unholy union of a couple hundred pounds of hang glider, tricycle and lawn mower engine. I’d always wanted to try flying in one – a way into the air that’s easier, less expensive and more fun than many aircraft types.
I drove up to instructor James Peeler’s Northbrook International Ultraport east of Fallston on Tuesday morning, my radio blaring “Free Fallin’” by Tom Petty.
That’s kinda like the time I picked up “The Right Stuff” by Tom Wolfe right before a flight to Germany – the first twenty pages or so are about horrific, fiery airplane crashes.
Or when I was flying over the icy Bering Sea and our in-flight movie was “Titanic” – speaking of man-made disasters….
Anyway, Mom, the ultralight I flew in had an emergency parachute and Peeler’s been doing this for decades, and he’s still alive. You start off in two-person trainers. There are dual controls, so you and the instructor can tag team who’s flying the plane. You get to train and the instructor gets to survive – I can do some basic stuff, he can take off and land and if anything gets too crazy he can take over (he’s bigger than me).
Along with Peeler’s landing strip there are several others within a mile or so. We did some take offs and landings at them and spent some time cruising around 50 mph at about 1,000 feet.
I worked on going straight and level, turning, maneuvering to check for other aircraft…. The basics aren’t too complicated. You have a throttle to control the engine, pedals to work the rudder and a stick to handle the ailerons and elevator.
It’s a little like driving a car you’re not used to – it takes time to develop a feel for how hard you need to turn this… how gingerly to press that…. The doors were off on the $35 introductory lesson, making for an hour of breezy fun.
Peeler said I took to it like a duck to water, getting a handle on controlling the plane and scanning around the sky – not getting buried in the instruments. Not bad for someone afraid of heights.
We’ve got a video clip up at www.shelbystar.com/ultralight.wmv and you can see some of the photos on my blog: jderrickstar.blogspot.com. If you’re interested in giving it a try, Mom, go to www.nbiultraport.com or reach Peeler by phone at (704) 718-1752.
Now remember Dad, this isn’t as crazy as that time with you and Mom and the Italian train….

Diameter of a killing

I wrote this a while back and've been sitting on it and I'm not sure why. So here we go....

I read a poem once titled “The Diameter of the Bomb.”

I remember the short piece measured a bomb in inches. Then it sized the physical damage caused by the bomb in feet. Then it gauged the bomb’s impact on a community measured in miles. Then it linked that community to the whole world, expanding the diameter of the bomb to the entire, damaged planet.

I went to a shooting today.

At one point this afternoon, someone’s finger squeezed the trigger on a pistol. A small spring-loaded pin was released and it struck a metal casing around a bullet, which came from a box of lots of bullets, which came from a factory where millions of bullets are made.

A tiny primer went off in this bullet’s brass cartridge, igniting the round’s main charge. The expanding gas caused by the burning gunpowder pushed a small piece of metal out of a tube and into a man’s head.

When I got to the scene the body was already covered with a sheet and police and emergency personnel were doing their unhappy duty. Family came and screamed and cried. A crowd was gathering.

The yellow tape lines kept growing outward, farther and farther.

The diameter of the bullet was only a fraction of an inch when it was fired Sunday afternoon. But by night it had already grown halfway across Shelby, North Carolina, to encompass a young photojournalist who was having trouble getting to sleep.

So he wrote this.

"Ohhh, the driver is made with graphite. So is my fly fishing rod."

Well, my surprise column fell through again this weekend. Mechanical difficulties.
So how about golf?
Now golf may not seem my usual, tromping-through-the-forest type of outdoorsy adventure.
But trust me, my version of golf involves plenty of hiking through the woods.
I decided a few weeks ago to take up the sport Mark Twain called “a good walk spoiled” and Winston Churchill deemed “a game whose aim is to hit a very small ball into a even smaller hole, with weapons singularly ill-designed for the purpose.”
This precipitated a trip to the library for a book called, “Golf for Dummies,” and one of the most humiliating athletic experiences of my life.
And there’s a lot of competition for that title.
I’ve generally been a pretty quick learner. I remember learning to roll a kayak in less than an hour while athletes from my high school floundered for weeks.
But showing up at Royster Memorial Golf Course at Shelby City Park one morning was an embarrassing revelation.
I hadn’t even started before committing a faux pas.
Waiting on Alex, my partner in futility, to arrive, I walked over to the putting green, set down my rented gear and started swinging all by my lonesome. After a few minutes, someone came by, picked up my bag, and moved it to where the grass was a little longer.
Umm, okay. Apparently folks can walk all over the practice green in spiky shoes and tartan polyester shorts but my bag doesn’t go there. Live and learn.
Golf – from the same nice Scots who gave us haggis, caber tossing and very skittish sheep.
So it took me ten strokes to make the first hole, I lost three balls on the next hole, passed on the next three links and then we just left, skipping the last half of the course.
I decided I needed some time on a driving range. And my own set of clubs.
So last weekend I got a nice set from a used sporting goods place in Spartanburg.
Ohhh, the driver is made with graphite. So is my fly fishing rod. And so is that little pencil at the golf course. Wow.
I head out to the range, get a bucket of balls, tee up for my driver… and the ball ricochets off the metal small fence dividing driving positions like a BB shot into a metal pail.
Not promising.
I wound up back on Royster Memorial course last Sunday. I finished with 64 strokes – a really great score for an 18-hole course. Unfortunately, Royster only has 9 holes.
But my slices were shrinking (I was even starting to hook some!) and I was spending less and less time in the woods, feeling like I was improving with each hole – 10… 8, 7, 4…. I found more balls than I lost, including one I think I’d lost last time. Can I count that off my score?
Two days and a bucket at the driving range later I was back on the golf course again with my good friend Mulligan.
I only lost one ball and dropped eight strokes.
If I keep that up a few weeks I won’t even have to play.

"… because nothing says, "I'm sorry I nearly got you arrested" like a spider plant…"

Well, back at UNC I'd fund-raise for various charities. On South Campus the officials thought it was so neat they'd put up bulletin boards for me and call it a hall project. North Campus, where I later lived, wasn't so cool. To put some things into perspective, we weren't supposed to have candles in the dorms. What was the dorm arts and crafts project on semester? Candle holders.

Anyway, one particular evening resulted in this:


Relax, I didn’t get arrested: Livestock for poor folks, UNC-PD and me.

Hello Folks,
Many of you may know that over the past years, since High School in fact, I've begged for spare change for various charities. This evening someone called the cops on my philanthropy (you can skip the first half of this if you want to get to the good stuff).
I've collected for the support of Lemurs, the fight against Multiple Sclerosis, my High School Drama Department, and this year the Heifer Project (www.heifer.org). A little bit of self-motivation can turn coinage that would have fallen prey to couch cushions into good things.
I crawled all over Ehringhaus my sophomore year raising change (over $250) to adopt lemurs at the Duke University Primate Center, where I have since worked as a volunteer tour guide and where I am doing my honors thesis. This year my cause is one that gives needy people around the world the livestock they need to support their families and become self sufficient.
For $20, a family around the world or right here in the States can receive a flock of geese, whose eggs will give them nutrition and extra income for schooling, medicine…. Heifer also distributes goats, ducks, rabbits, llamas, water buffalos… and of course Heifers. Over this past academic year I've raised over $400 on North Campus for Heifer, numbers which can't be reached without face-to-face contact with donors.
So I knock on a door, and follow with "Good Evening, do you have any extra change - pennies, nickels, dimes - you'd like to donate to…." The resident then gets a little card with Heifer's webpage on it so that they can learn more.
I learned last semester that I needed to be escorted by a resident of the dorm I'm in. So I arranged with a buddy named Doug that he meet me this evening to heifer (I love verbing) his dorm, Joyner.
The first hall was very generous, and the people showed no malice to my efforts. I more often encounter people who are very supportive, and appreciate a mockingbird (I think you have to be an English major to get that one). The second hall started off a bit cooler. Toward the end of the hall, which Doug lives on, I noticed Officer Swain and another Officer coming towards us.
I've seen pot busts on campus that were only one-cop offenses, so I didn't think they were coming for us. But sure enough, someone had called the cops on us, and Doug and I, standing in a room of students whose evening just got a little more interesting, were soon explaining ourselves, showing our credentials as UNC students, and being told that if he had to come out again we'd be before the dean of students.
Admittedly we're not technically supposed to be soliciting. But wouldn't it be nice, for all the student groups, student body election candidates, and commercial enterprises who beg around here, to have a little honest philanthropy? Hundreds of students over many years seem to have agreed.
And thankfully the Officers did let us off light. They're just doing their jobs, and I'm generally appreciative and supportive of their duties. But I can only wish that charity was the worst of Chapel Hill's sins this evening.
So now Doug's going to get a spider plant from me (my trademark flora of choice), because nothing says, "I'm sorry I nearly got you arrested" like a spider plant. Thanks to everyone who's escorted me through their dorms. My cop quota for the next few weeks was filled in about two minutes, and I won't be requiring any more of your fine service.
And thanks to everybody who's helped with money or good thoughts. Anyone who wants to support or learn more about The Heifer Project can visit the website at www.heifer.org or contact me at 914-1834, jderrick@email.unc.edu.

Thanks,
John "charged with over $400 worth of philanthropy" Derrick

Bonus Question: Next time UNC or the Police Benevolent Society rings asking for money, tell them you'd love to help, but you've already donated your money to The Heifer Project: Livestock for Poor Folks. www.heifer.org

"Ok, the keyboard is an inanimate object, John. Doesn’t respond to feathers."

Well, my planned column activity for this week fell through because of the weather today, so this week I’m writing about… um, hopefully I’ll get an idea by the next paragraph.
Or not! Hmmm. Maybe if I get good and hopped up on caffeine….
Well that didn’t work out too well because this is not John anymore. This is Sam Morgan, the Star’s resident intern. John couldn’t figure out anything to write so he asked me to step in and write for him. I don’t exactly know why, but here I am writing away.
“He’s off to a good start, eh?” – John
This being an outdoor column I can’t exactly talk about what I wanted to talk about, which was the…
“Remember now, Sam, this is a family paper…” – John
… impact of the great potato famine of Ireland. That’s family oriented right?
“Save it for the Lifestyles page, Sam, save it for Lifestyles…” – John
So about a week and a half ago I went on a mission trip with my youth group. Really great time. But at the end of the week we went white water rafting on the Nantahala River.
Now I have been rafting before on the Ocoee River and it was a blast. The water was fairly warm and the water line that runs the length of the river was just gorgeous. I was expecting something about the same. Oh how I was wrong.
“Tell us about it, Janet/Sam! Don’t leave us in suspense!” – John
We got there and it was overcast with a slight drizzle. Great weather for rafting. Anyway we took the crowded bus ride up the river and got in groups. We put our raft into the water and I took my first step into the river. It felt like the icy hands of death had wrapped their hands on my foot and ankle. I have never felt water that cold. Granted, I had been working in triple digit weather all week, so my internal weather vane was a little off. Our guide said the water was only about 60 or so degrees. I thought he meant Kelvin.
“Whoops, back again. Had to run somewhere – all those caffeinated sodas I drank. Speaking of water, play it again, Sam….” – John
We got off to a pretty rough start. My friend (name removed for his protection) who was on the raft fell off within five minutes of our voyage. He would wind up falling off the raft about four times throughout the whole trip.
Anyway the river itself wasn’t that hard of a trip. It only got up to class 2 plus rapids.
“With feeling, Sam. With feeling. Tickle the keyboard.” – John
Ok, the keyboard is an inanimate object, John. Doesn’t respond to feathers. Back to the river. I have been on rivers with class 3 rapids so I was expecting a little more adventure. But unfortunately the only adventure that came on this river was the artic temperatures. Every small rapid we hit that sent any water into our raft made every one of our rafters scream. The hills were alive with shrieks.
“If this is going to involve you dancing across an alpine meadow in a long dress, I’m leaving.” – John
No, that was the week before. But we all made it through the river alive and with all our limbs still attached and just a few small cases of frost bite. While it wasn’t the river I was expecting, it was still a good time.
Well that about does it for me. That was my rafting adventure. Hope you enjoyed it. John, if you ever need a break again with this column, you know where to find me….
Let’s hear it for Sam! Didn’t he do a great job doing my work for me? But really, I had something lined up and it fell through. And my muse ran away, leaving me with only rants on ethanol, bicycles, squirrels and my high school gym class, so consider Sam your savior, dear reader.
And let’s cross our fingers that my surprise activity works out for next week. In the meantime, I’ll have to do something special for Sam. How about a nice spider plant?
Because, as I learned in college, nothing says, “I’m sorry I nearly got you arrested,” like a spider plant.
Check the blog: jderrickstar.blogspot.com.

High Failure-Rate Shots

I've heard about folks taking a photography class where they are coached to frame everything exactly as intend to use it -- no cropping allowed. I think of that mentality as linked to the technique of only taking a few, carefully placed shots.

That may work in classrooms and certain applications, but not for other things -- like the Charlotte Criterium this past weekend.

I've heard that American G.I.s in WWII were coached in training to aim carefully and only shoot at what they could see. Real combat taught different lessons -- not being stupid, the enemy has no intention of being seen. There is only one brief video clip of a Japanese soldier in combat, and he was running away for all he was worth.

Infantrymen learned they couldn't wait around for the perfect, nicely composed shot. Instead they figured out how to identify the basic location of the enemy and then open up on them with everything they had.

Shooting at the bike race, I had several challenges. These guys are moving very, very fast. And to get the low angle I wanted to I was curled up in a ball on the ground on the inside of a turn, shooting through a fence between an advertising banner and some woman's legs. So I didn't really get to see the cyclists coming at me, giving me time to set up a shot, until they were already past.

Add to this the waning evening light and a desire to try some fun techniques with slow-shutter panning and a delayed second-curtain sync flash. Overall, the conditions were somewhat challenging.

This tends to lead to "high failure-rate shots." No matter how good you are, only a small percentage of your shots are going to come out as you wish. Only a small percentage of rounds fired actually hit the enemy. So you use a lot of them.

I didn't wait for the perfect shot -- a well framed, well composed Japanese soldier. I took advantage of free digital film, and lots of it, and blazed away with hundred of shots, resulting in a lot of goodies. Among them, I got the one I was looking for, even though I likely never even saw it at the time. For some of the shots I had the camera away from my eye, trying to follow the flying cyclists and just holding down the shutter and hoping.

Quality is good. Quantity is good. Having a quantity of quality is great.

Last night I had the strangest dream….

Here we go, all you dream interpreters.

I was at vacation Bible school… in Hitler’s bunker. They had a very good cafeteria with chocolate ice cream and those little crushed up M&Ms….

I guess that’s what happens when you cover Cleveland County by day and watch The History Channel/The Hitler Channel by night.

In Praise Of The Appliance-mobile

Okay. So my 4-cylinder ’99 Toyota Camry lacks a little flair. But it’s built like a brick and after 90K miles it’s never let me down. It’s a point-A-to-point-B appliance – for someone who doesn’t care too much about the “bling” of their toaster or car, they just need their tools to work.

So I was watching a British show about cars. They set out to test just how tough a Toyota really is by all means possible. True, they were testing a truck, and true, it’s not like the English know much about reliable vehicles, but it was still quite impressive.

First they drove it down a long flight of steps.
Then they drove it around town, smashing into walls.
By the way, this does read like, “The Very Hungry Caterpillar.”
They drove it down to the seaside, where they roped it to a cement ramp and waited for the tide to come in. The waves bashing against it tore it loose and it rolled around on the sea floor until the tide went out again.
A few hours with a basic toolbox and it was running again.
So they drove it through a building.
And dropped a camper on it.
After driving it out from under there, they slammed it with a wrecking ball.

Then they set it on fire.

And drove it onstage.

"...I left a stain of sweat on the asphalt...."

Here you go with some photos from the 5K, as I wrote about in my column....



There’s a section on the N.C. Press Photographer’s Association Web forum about what defines a grunt photographer.
I showed up at the Pro-Fitness 5K benefiting St. Jude Children's Hospital last weekend on less than five hours of sleep. Saturday morning has a nasty relationship with Friday night.
I’d signed up for the race around Shelby a few weeks back. Then the paper said they wanted pictures. So I figured I’d compromise.
This has happened before. I get to the site a little early and scout out where to get a shot. In this case I played around with different angles using a small step ladder at the starting line in front of the historic Cleveland County courthouse, but finally decided on just squatting.
The racers are off, I snap some pictures, walk over to my car, lock up my gear and start running.
I came in eighth.
Coming from behind I passed everyone I could see. For a while I thought I was in the lead. But looking down West Graham Street as I came back to the courthouse I could see a few figures a half mile or so ahead.
Next time I’ll set up trip wire beforehand. Or run faster.
After I crossed the finish line I wobbled back to my car, got out my equipment and went back to work.
Taking pictures at the finish line, lying in Washington Street, I left a stain of sweat on the asphalt.
The rest of my day was spent among Shelby, Kings Mountain, Cherryville, Kings Mountain, Cherryville, Shelby, Cherryville and Shelby.
At one point during the day I had a little down time and was reading in an outdoors magazine about how some of the issue’s photos were taken. The photographer got to spend an entire day working on a project – kayakers.
Producing art commercially is a different game with different goals, methods and rules. He can play around with things in Photoshop that an ethical photojournalist doesn’t get to touch.
And he gets to use models.
As a photojournalist, I’m often trying not so much to create a scene as to capture it happening naturally.
I went out last Monday to the Green River in Polk County to do some fly fishing, some fun driving and try to get some good photos – of kayakers.
I wanted to try for a certain effect. Using a slow shutter speed gives the water a blurred, flowing appearance. But you need to stay centered on the boater to keep him focused.
Having spent some time on the river, I know where folks congregate. I’m a kayaker, so I know what’s going on – how these people move. And as a photographer I’m willing to hop down into the river and across the rocks to put the pieces together. Not posing the kids. Not monkeying around on a computer. Just knowing the subject, the camera and grunting hard enough.
You can see the results in yesterday’s paper and on my blog, jderrickstar.blogspot.com. We sent a shot off to the Associated Press – not bad for 15 minutes of shooting.
Models. Mmmmmm.

Creative Kayaking

As said in the column, http://www.shelbystar.com/
portal/ASP/article_new.asp?ID=17737, here's some creative kayaking art....

Yeah, sometimes I miss college....

http://www.wral.com/irresistible/4803904/detail.html

And I'm afraid of heights....

So yesterday Wise Electric Control out of Cherryville let me go up in their flag-bearing bucket truck at the town's baseball field before a Legion tourney game.....

The SLR Camera as an Inverted Periscope

Maybe I’m learning a little about photo composition, or maybe I just think too much, but I’ve noticed that sometimes the precise angles I see with my eye are not what the camera captures.
I think I’ve figured out why and how it can be useful.
With a single lens reflex camera, an “SLR,” you actually get to look through the lens at what you’re shooting, thanks to some mirrors and prisms that pipe the light up to the viewfinder like an upside-down periscope.
But when I bring the camera to my eye, which I’ve positioned as I want the shot captured, the lens is an inch or so below the viewfinder – resulting in a lower viewpoint and a photo that is composed slightly differently.
You can adjust for this and get the shot you want, and you can also use this technical quirk to your advantage.
I was shooting a baseball game from behind the centerfield wall. I wanted to get shots into the batter’s box using a long lens but there was an opaque covering over the fence and the top rail was just a little too tall for me.
So I turned the camera upside down and used what I’ll call “The Derrick SLR Periscope Effect” – using the difference in levels between the viewfinder and lens to give me a little extra height. Now admittedly it was a bit of a pain going over dozens of upside down pictures on Photoshop back at the paper, but I got some good shots.
And I can think of other times this might be useful – such as spot news events like shootings where you might not want to expose your entire head to take a photo, rather preferring to just stick out the lens to get the shot without getting shot.