A few more slides from the LA Arboretum

 Here are a few images I scanned today of my trip to the LA Arboretum in Arcadia, CA, this past October 30th. Yes, it was a long time ago, and one would think I would have uploaded them a long time ago, and I did take them to the lab in Irvine to get them developed on November 2nd, but the lab had a long, long lead time because their machine to process slides was out of order. They promised them to me in three weeks, i.e., before Thanksgiving, but then, they had further problems and they couldn't deliver. I went with the firm intention of retrieving my film but they promised they would get my rolls to another lab and get them developed, and by the beginning of December, they were finally done. I had to wait another week to pick them up, and then, kept them in a drawer because I didn't have time to scan them. Today was the day to scan them.

They are slides, as I recall, taken with Provia 100 film, which is not as saturated (and contrasty) as Fuji Velvia. Looking at the photos, it stood out clearly in my memory where I had been. That was the day I saw what I think was a wild coyote walking in the shadows of the trees at the arboretum. That memory will stay with me as a magical interlude to all the depressing weariness of the pandemic which, in this third week of December, is claiming almost 2,500 lives per day. That is per day, per day, per day. Fox News likes to tout the number of recoveries, anything to distract people's attention from this calamity, but it is a calamity of first order. I wonder what they will invent when Biden is president. I can just imagine what they are saying now: "Biden refuses to pick any (real) Americans, ejem, European-Americans, for his cabinet posts". That is probably what they are saying, but I don't watch Fox News and I don't even have a television at home. I refuse to allow it in my domain of rest and creativity.

So, we are about to enter the final fortnight of the holidays. We have two weeks when many will be resting. I know we are supposed to shelter in place once again, but I would like to get out to lonely spots if I can. I want to continue taking photos to distract my mind and to exercise my creativity. I used to spend a few hours each night writing stories (and sometimes poetry), but after having been shut in for so long in my home, I feel that going out has helped me these past few months. That was why I started posting once again to this repurposed blog back in August, because I had to do something, I could not live entombed forever. 

Here are the images from the Arboretum. I scanned with my Epson V600, and didn't use ICE for spot removal. I am beginning to distrust that option because it smoothes out too many features in my photos. I would rather just have the spot imperfections, which in this case, don't look so bad with slide film developed in the lab. The spots looks terrible, however, in black and white film.