Category: Critters

Critters by Joe Wilcox
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Maine Decides Whether to Shoot Bear Like Ducks in a Barrel

On this election day, I long to be back in Maine, so that I could vote on the initiative to ban bear barrels. It’s a practice unfamiliar to me. I grew up in a family of hunters, which killed for sport and food. They tracked the animals, not lured them with sweet throwaways.

I only learned about the referendum this morning, from a news story in my RSS feeds. National Geographic violates Betteridge’s Law of Headlines by asking question: “Should We Bait Black Bears With Doughnuts?” I am embarrassed for being so out of touch with important issues and politics in the Pine Tree State—they matter to family there, and to me. I may be long-time removed, but Maine will always be home. I identity myself as a Mainer, more than by any other measure. 

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Critters by Joe Wilcox
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Meet Cali

On October 20, my daughter’s cat Cali moved into the Wilcox domicile, where she and our other feline Neko slowly, but surely, adapt to one another. The kitty is the second to adopt my now college-age child and chance for some redemption for the first.

I met Cali on a pleasant summer evening in early June. Molly—that’s my daughter—moved into a group house, and I had just dropped off a last load of belongings. As I crossed the street to the car, a slim Tortoiseshell cat approached down the sidewalk. She raised her head to receive pats, just as a San Diego State University senior approached. He and I chatted about education and careers for about 15 minutes. Then we parted from one another and our new feline friend. 

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Photo by Joe Wilcox
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HTC One M8 is a Worthy Phone Camera

I snapped this cat around sunset under overcast skies using HTC One M8. Both renditions are cropped. The left is otherwise untouched. To the right, I applied the phone’s UFocus feature. The One uses a duo-lens system to capture photo and additional depth information. I applied depth-of-field centerpoint to the cat’s face, which blurs rest of the image. I cropped afterwards. UFocus can also change the focal point, even after shooting.

Quite a few reviewers ding The One for having only a 4-megapixel camera. I shake my head and laugh. Look back a few years when 4MP was state of the art, and the same reviewers raved. Here’s the problem I see: Relativity. Making relative assumptions about A to B. Not long ago people praised 4MP for printing large photos, close-cropping, etc.—cited criticisms today. Now that there is 8MP and greater, 4MP is looked down upon.

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Living by Joe Wilcox
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What's This Thing with Llamas?

Saturday Night Live Season 39 Episode 13 includes a llama in the opening monologue. Once again, like four years ago with post “Tweet If You See a Tooting Llama“, I wonder about the apparent fascination New Yorkers have with the creatures. So I did a new web search. July 3, 2013, New York Times story “The Llama is In” explains much.

Reporter Jennifer Kingson says the beasts have an “irresistible quality” and that 115,000 are registered globally. According to the International Llama Registry, there are 634 owners in New York—and that’s not many. California, Oregon, and Texas have the most, with 2,496, 2,084, and 2,036, respectively.

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