“Economies are supposed to serve human ends, not the other way round. We forget at our peril that markets make a good servant, a bad master and a worse religion.”

– Amory Lovins

Gotta love that super-slow motion.

“I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies.”

– Thomas Jefferson

Very geeky but amazing. Be sure to watch it full screen.

From the site:

The Known Universe takes viewers from the Himalayas through our atmosphere and the inky black of space to the afterglow of the Big Bang. Every star, planet, and quasar seen in the film is possible because of the world’s most complete four-dimensional map of the universe, the Digital Universe Atlas that is maintained and updated by astrophysicists at the American Museum of Natural History.

Every year I make a calendar from my photos. This year, I tried a new source (Qoop.com), and it came out pretty good.

Most of the shots are from Maine, and all were taken in the corresponding month of 2009. Anybody can purchase a calendar at my cost ($14.99).

Sunrise from Long Sands Beach. Boon Island Light is approximately 6 miles offshore. (The sun is a little further away.)
Best viewed large.

And on the flip side…

Sunset over Portland with the Fore River Bridge on the left.
View Large On Black
IMG_6262-2

Maybe the only good thing about the shorter daylight hours this time of year is that I can witness the sunrise on the way to work.

One of many memorable quotes in the amazing PBS series, The National Parks: America’s Best Idea.

“In the Grand Canyon, Arizona has a natural wonder which is in kind absolutely unparalleled throughout the rest of the world. I want to ask you to keep this great wonder of nature as it now is. … Leave it as it is. You cannot improve on it. The ages have been at work on it, and man can only mar it.”

- Theodore Roosevelt

And another quote from the founder of the Sierra Club, a man who devoted much of his life to the establishment of Yosemite National Park:

“Another glorious Sierra day in which one seems to be dissolved and absorbed and sent pulsing onward we know not where. Life seems neither long nor short, and we take no more heed to save time or make haste than do the trees and stars. This is true freedom, a good practical sort of immortality.”

- John Muir

We haven’t visited Yosemite yet, so I have no photos to show. A situation that must be rectified.

An intriguing collection of rock piles, or more accurately, rock sculptures, created by someone near the Fisherman’s Walk next to the York Harbor Beach. This video is a slideshow of photos taken one morning.

Try selecting the HD option in the lower right if it doesn’t slow the download too much. [Caution: audio soundtrack plays during slideshow.]

The local paper carried the story too.

Hurricane Bill passed just off-shore a few weeks ago and created some rough seas. The radar image shows how close it was:

The waves at Long Sands were not huge but still probably the biggest of the summer.

It’s always nice to get the drama of the big surf without the inconvenience of the actual storm.

Without realizing it at the time, I happened to catch a little extra drama with some shots I took of the waves near Eastern Point. See the series of three images posted on my Flickr site of a guy nearly caught by a wave breaking on the rocks.