Category: Aspiration

Living by Joe Wilcox
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My Summer Sojourn: OS X 10.11, OS 9

Due to a rather startling accident, my wife’s laptop is no longer among the electrically living. She will use my beloved Chromebook Pixel LS for a few months, while I step back into the Apple lifestyle to test El Capitan and iOS 9. Eight days after Apple released developer previews, I finally am getting around to installing them, on 13-inch MacBook Pro and iPad Air 2. Whoa, I dunno about the new font!

The Mac is a new purchase. Our cameras and computers are all insured, and late last week I filed the second claim in more than a dozen years (the first replaced a hard drive, for $250, after my daughter dropped her aluminum MacBook during finals week two years ago). I grudgingly picked the 2.7GHz Core i5 MacBook Pro with Retina Display, 8GB RAM, and 256GB SSD. 

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Living by Joe Wilcox
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A Life Lesson

For three summers during high school, I participated in federal assistance program Upward Bound at Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine. My parents divorced when I was 13, and my then 31 year-old mother chose to raise four children alone. Jobs were scarce in Aroostook County during the early 1970s, and mom couldn’t earn enough. We were poor, by most American measures.

That circumstance and college plans qualified me to spend summers in Southern Maine and someday to attend a school like Bowdoin (I didn’t). The program has expanded such that if I were a high school student today, my UB participation would be at the University of Presque Isle branch rather than the one at Bowdoin. While closer to home (next town over), the benefits wouldn’t be as a great: Getting out of the County’s confines, experiencing life on such a prestigious college campus, watching Shakespeare at the Theater at Monmouth, or traveling—even for a day—to Boston. 

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Living by Joe Wilcox
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Epitaph

On a blustery night in February 1978, I sat in my college dorm gripped with writer’s block. A song lyric wouldn’t come, so I decided to write a poem; a rarity. Pure poetry isn’t my thing. The verse is short, and I decided then, at age 18, that it would someday be my epitaph.

I originally posted the poem with title “Lay Me Down” on Jan. 31, 2004, when this blog resided at TypePad. Rather than restore the original post, I revive instead. 

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Photo by Joe Wilcox
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Flickr a Day 108: Bus Ride

Early Micro Fourth Thirds and oddballs like the Sigma DP1 led affordable, mirrorless cameras to popularity. Among the key benefits: Convenience of a rangefinder, like the one used on Day 87, but for much less cost; physically smaller size; and lenses that are less bulky. The DP line, like the Fuji X100 series or the Leica X1 and X2, stand out for being compacts with fixed lenses and APS-C sensors common among digital SLRs. Another, the Sony Cyber-Shot RX1, and companion RX1R, up the ante by offering something more: full-frame sensor.

A full-frame sensor is typically 24mm by 36mm with an effective focal point of 35mm. APS-C is cropped, by comparison, adding an effective multiple of around 1.5 times (depending on the camera) to the lens’ focal length. Full frame captures more detail, suffers from fewer visual artifacts, and produces better results in natural or low-light. You pay more, too. Either RX1 retails for around $2,800—for camera with fixed, non-interchangeable lens.

Justin Kern used the RX1 to shoot today’s selection, which I chose for its detail, rich color, and stark contrast—perspective smartly split between the bus interior and the road outside. Vitals: f/2, ISO 125, 1/80 sec, 35mm.

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Photo by Joe Wilcox
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Flickr a Day 100: Coachella

No single image can convey the spirit, creativity, and vitality of Thomas Hawk photography. He is the master street photographer and storyteller, who keeps his camera as nearly constant companion. Is the thing surgically attached? No effort to chose the one is worthy, so I don’t try.

Instead, for our one-hundredth selection, timeliness helps sort more than 100,000 Flickr pics to a choice of one among 880. Because, coincidentally, on Day 100, one of North America’s most popular music festivals, Coachella, kicks off the first of two weekends. I was lucky enough to buy my daughter tickets for the second year in a row. She is there now. 

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