Fire!

er. Only kidding. Not much chance of bushfires today -- it's 12C and raining.

For the last two days a couple of firefighting Tracker aircraft have been doing exercises over our village. This afternoon, getting tired of the constant drone of them passing above, I thought, "Well, at least I can get a blip out of them!" So the next time I heard them approaching, I grabbed the camera, put the longest lens I have on it, and hurried outside. Once clear of the village, I could see the two planes were circling and taking turns to drop water on the slopes of Alaric, so I headed up that way, pausing to take photos every time they swooped down to dump water. In the process I walked imperceptibly further and further away from the village, glad I'd at least put on a jacket to protect me from the cold wind. But I was not best pleased when it started raining, a few drops at first and then increasingly heavily. Especially as in my haste I'd come out without the camera bag, meaning I had to stuff the camera under my jacket, which then didn't do a great job of keeping me dry.

By the time I got home I was damp and chilled to the bone. So it was good to see that continuing the fire theme, S had lit the woodburner. On 30 May. This is a first. Now all three of us are huddled round it as it continues to rain.

While I was waiting for the aircraft to do their circuits and return with more water, I took a few other photos of my usual subjects, because I liked the green of the vines against the grey sky. I almost never use this 55-200 mm lens, and I was quite startled at the DOF effects I got at the widest aperture and longer focal lengths. Especially with these vines, and this butterfly, which was sheltering from the rain on a wall and was not inclined to spread its wings -- I like the way it blends into the background. Both of these are SOOC. I think I'll keep this lens on the camera for a couple of days and see what I can do with it.