One the whole, myopia is pain in the eyeball. You will not generally hear me saying, “Wow, I’m so glad I can’t see” (unless the floor is really disgusting). But. But the thing is, nearsightedness doesn’t just make things fuzzy. It also makes light sources look bigger.
I opened my eyes this morning and someone had strung the treetops with crystals. The branches glinted orange and red in the morning sun, shining like Mother Nature’s own tinsel. The blurry wonder took my breath away.
Yes, yes, after a couple seconds I woke up enough to think “dew?”, and then “no, icicles”. And when I got up and ran to the window to take a picture, I could see that there was ice there. But still, the clearer picture couldn’t compare to the fiery glory I saw from my bed.
I’m not usually glad to be nearsighted. But sometimes, just every once in a while, it’s a gift.
Ps. today was miserable weather, but a great day forphotographyingeneral
I’d never seen something like that, grass and branches completely encased in ice. I think I’ve just realized how little time I’ve spent in really-cold places! Love the pics.
My parents have a picture of the dogwood in front of their house completely glazed in ice from an ice storm. It’s gorgeous.
The flip side is that the ice coating o the branches can get so thick that it makes the branches so heavy they break off. I’ve seen the aftermath of many ice where the result wasn’t pretty glazed branches, but piles of broken-off branches piled at the base of the tree. Frequently, these take down power lines nearby, leading to the blackouts Darren writes about above. I got stuck in such a situation for a couple of days in Rochester NY several years ago.
Nearsightedness is an advantage in situations like that. As a kid I would take off my glasses and stare in wonder at our lighted Christmas tree. Every morning this week I have turned the lights of our tree on just to gaze at it a while before putting my contact lenses in, and do the same at night after taking them out.
The eagle-eyed folks don’t know what they’re missing.
Bradford Pears are bad about that. They have pretty blooms in the spring and leaves in the fall, but let a little ice get on them and they peel like a banana.
<shrug> medieval recreationist - I am perfectly happy sitting around reading in silence. As long as the place has some form of heat, and I have some form of creating light I am good to go. Previously, [as in before the arsonist torched the house] we had several periods without power - Conn Light and Power was notorious for not replacing the line crews as they aged and retired out of service - the last major power outage they had something like 4 or 5 crews for the entire state. That time we were without power for 3 weeks. [we went to the submarine base to shower, got potable water in 5 gallon jerry cans, used an impromptu field toilet created by melding a 5 gallon poly bucket lined with a heavy contractor bag with a couple inches of kitty litter in it, use dn sprinkle a scoop in for odor control and absorbtion] and a bedside commode.] I can cook on anything from a camp fire, an hibachi, a standard charcoal grill, a propane grill, a wood stove, a coal fired aga or a pilot fired LP kitchen stove. I can even use an MRE flameless ration ehater of those cute little camp stoves.
We have just added a permanently installed biolite and solar cell to the barn, it has a radio, mp3 player, set of 3 lights and ability to recharge USB stuff, 6 LED lanterns and 2 sets of USB rechargable batteries for the lanterns.
We are going to be finalizing our move to just south of Rochester at he end of Feb - after that, if you get stuck in Rochester you should PM me, we could put you up in the spare room [as long as you don’t mind cats and birds and a rather chaotic household] for the duration of a storm. Being local, I tend to drive around like other locals when visitors are huddled in their hotels =)
I’ve seen it with everything so coated with ice the whole world looks like a creation of blown glass and diamonds. If it’s post-storm and you get a perfect blue sky when the sun hits the ice just right the whole world glows and sparkles, painfully bright, all white and blue fire.
Which is beautiful until you hear trees crashing down all around you, you can’t go anywhere because downed power lines and trees are blocking all the roads, and it gets uncomfortable with the power and heat out and then it gets dark… and while that scene under a full moon is just as incredible it can get really cold on a night like that…
You probably also want to skip the sub-zero (Fahrenheit sub-zero) temperatures, the 100 kph winds, and other winter “fun” we get around here sometimes.
Maybe that needs to go in the “sounds you don’t want to hear” thread–the sharp crack of a breaking limb followed by the massive boom of an exploding transformer.
I’m currently working on organizing and renaming all of my digital photos (around 20,000 over around 20 years) and thought I’d drop in a few of my ice storm shots, from 2002 and 2005. Included are what they do to Bradford Pear trees and power lines.
I’ve survived multiple eye procedures these last couple of years, with irreparable retina damage that gives sparky glows to many oncoming lights. Cornea implants provide fixed “infinity” focus so my myopia is gone but everything is weird. After the last cardiac procedure I lay in the dim recovery room and watched wall tiles and grilles writhe and slither until I squinted. I’ll take a LaForge visor, thanks.
