Kimler Adventure Pages (http://randsco.com)

Lumix DMC-TZ5 Testing

Daffodils - Impressive close-ups: The dark spot on the inside upper cup of the daffodil is actually a spider; Pollen from the stamen are yellow blotches against bright orange. Both can be seen in detail on the original 9 Mega-Pixel image. _{Randsco Newswire}

Hutton House - Scott is looking at purchasing a Panasonic "Lumix" TZ5 digital camera and got his hands on one to take for a spin. He's interested in the camera because of it's 28mm wide angle Leica lens, 10X zoom capability and close-focus macro modes. He took a bunch of test shots. Here's a couple.

Zooming - The Lumix TZ5 features a 28mm wide angle to 10X zoom with Leica optics. Going Further, one can employ an extended optical zoom and combined digital zoom for a whooping 70X magnification. (Best part? Low light - taken at night, from the same location and HAND HELD! The optical stabilizing system ROCKS!)_{Randsco Newswire}

New Record

Hutton House Coop - The four Hutton House Hens, AKA "the Girls", set a new record this morning, for egg production.

Scott went out to the coop this gray morning, at 7:15 AM, just as the mist began turning to rain. He carried with him, in a used, plastic yogurt container, the table scraps and peelings from the previous day.

Chickens eat just about anything and the compost pile has gone begging, because most of the Kimler food waste - what little there is - goes straight down the gullets of four, always-hungry birds. (They don't get onions, as it flavors the eggs in an undesirable way, though they do get crushed up egg shells. It sounds kind of cannibalistic, but they need the calcium to support their egg production and they're mashed, so they don't "recognize" them as eggs.)

As normal, the girls were awake and clucking in their coop, eager to start their day - and see what scraps were coming their way.

Scott opened the coop and the fearful four came gallivanting down the gangplank, spreading out in the run and keeping an eye on Scott, who was entering the run through a doorway. Their eyes bulged when they saw scraps over the edge of the yogurt container. Bit of crusty bread, scrapings of rice off the bottom of the rice cooker, kiwi peelings, apple core, egg shells, carrot and celery bits and god knows what else.

Scott tossed it out into the run, along with a few handfuls of scratch. They fought amongst themselves, vying for what they thought were the "best scraps" (it's amazing to see what they fight over ... dandelions we pull from the lawn and even big, fat, yellow banana slugs we toss their way).

Scott headed to the nesting boxes, expecting to find the normal two or three eggs (they tend to lay 3 to 4 eggs a day, usually a couple lay early, then one or two lay later on. One can hear them squawking, when they lay, as they often make quite a ruckus while they're laying.)

Scott found a total of FIVE eggs, sitting in the nests. Three in one nest and two in the other. The girls have been very busy indeed, setting a new Hutton House Single Day Lay record.

HOLD THE PRESSES! We have a late-arrival. The girls laid another egg this afternoon. The "Hutton House Single Day Lay" number has increased to SIX!!

Whale of a Time

Barkley Sound, B.C. - Scott was "on call" this past holiday weekend, at the local firehouse, which meant that he had to stay inside the fire district all weekend, to respond to any and all emergencies. (This past weekend was the "May long weekend" - AKA "Victoria Day", a Canadian holiday that precedes the American "Memorial Day Weekend" by a week. The holiday celebrates someone named "Victoria", oddly enough, which leaves Scott wondering, in a sarcastic Yank kind-of-way ... "When do Canadian celebrate 'My Day'?")

Rachel was off to Vancouver on a Nurses Union thing (she's now a "Shop Steward" for the BC Nurses Union, at the hospital where she works).

The point is, we didn't go to the floating cabin for the May Long Weekend, like our cabin mates did.

Too bad, because apparently, we missed the opportunity of a lifetime.

Details are sketchy at this point, but last night, we received some video footage from Candace and Richard. Apparently, they were out fishing near Swale Rock (just outside the western entrance to Julia Passage, where the cabin is moored) and were "played with" by a curious, juvenile Humpback whale!

The video isn't really very long, but is shows a Humpback whale surfacing and bumping their boat, just off the port side. There's a fair bit of "Oh my God's!" on the video and it ends with "Hang on, in case we're flipped over", or something like that!

For the better part of 40 minutes, the curious, baby whale "played with" (bumped and pushed, surfacing, showing its belly, etc) with the two boats that were there.

Can you imagine?! Wow!

We're hoping to get copies of the other videos and we'll ask for permission to post them on Randsco (apparently there's a fair bit of swearing in the other videos, which might render them unsuitable for family viewing, but a rash of "Oh my God's!" seems fairly innocuous. Wonder what the others have on them?)

Like Rachel said, "Amazing. This kind of stuff only happens to Candace!" (It's true. Candace has some of the most incredible, odd stories you've ever heard ... and they keep piling up!

Stay tuned for (hopefully) more about the whale encounter!

Hilltop Marine Website Goes Live

Hilltop Marine: The classy gold/black Hilltop Marine website has been launched! _{Randsco Newswire}

Bronston, Kentucky - After a fair bit of time spent styling, coding, tweaking and editing, our boating website at www.hilltopmarine.com has finally gone "live". (Mind you, the nameservers are still in transition, so clicking the link might still yield the old site. Just take our word that it once propagated, it'll look an awful lot like the the image on the left.