Oh The Projects

     It's been a fun weekend. A little exhausting, but fun. I have to get to the skateboard mount first. I had a catastrophic failure when I went to mount it to the wall.

     See those cracks? Those aren't supposed to be there. I was bummed. I had hours of work into that piece, and it was a failure. The most important thing about failure though, is that you learn from it, and so I did. I decided to tear it apart, and redo the piece that mounts directly to the wall. I wouldn't just replace it, and make sure that I wouldn't crack it again, but I would make it better, than it was. I had a few things that I didn't get exactly right, because, I really don't have the right tools for the job, but I would find a way, and I did.

     The biggest problem, other than the cracks, was the notch that I had in both pieces so that they would fit together. They weren't right, and the angles were a little off. I created a plan of attack this time, and worked at if form a different view. The easy and right way to create those notches, would be to have a drill press that I could set at height, and pass the pieces back and forth under it getting the desired notch and spacing. I don't have a drill press, so it was files, the Dremel, and a whole lot of delicate touches. It worked, I had both notches squared off and fitting tight this time around.

     The next problem was working away so that I would avoid cracking the wood when I mounted to the wall. Part of that was making that piece a couple of inches longer, and adding an additional screw to it. That way I wouldn't have to get it so tight. The other part was creating inset holes for the screw to embed into, and then make a slightly bigger guide hole for the screw to go into. With that bigger hole, there was less material to get trapped inside the hole, and pressing outward from the center. That means less of a chance of cracking. Here is what it ended up as.

     Just to prove that it works, I put the skateboard in it, where it now has a home.

     It's looking really good. I also took pictures of it before I mounted it, so you can see the detail I put into the actual claw. It was a few days of hand sanding, and quite a few coats of stain to get it just the way I wanted. Oh, the wall mount part, is natural stain and yellow dye. I wanted to go with yellow, but I didn't want to paint it with spray paint of anything like that. I think it came out great.

     With that done and out of the way. I have a new project in the works. It is another wand stand, and this time it is going to be for two wands. It is also, not for me. Elie and I went to Universal Studios yesterday, and she is going to get two wands of her own, and wants to display them. in her house. This one is going to be tricky, and I have to draw up some designs, as soon as I'm done writing this. She wants the wands to cross one another, and I know exactly how I'm going to do that. The other request is that it has to be tall enough to rise above the screen of her lap top, so we have to have a 10 in. rise height. I have an idea, but I need to get it down on paper, so that I can see it rather than visualize it. The idea is a big one, and I'm not completely sure I can pull it off. I'm going to do some etching and artistic cutting as well as the normal sanding and all of that other stuff. Of course we will decide between stain or paint, and what color or colors will be involved. It's going to be a big project, but I'm excited for it. This is going to be a whole lot of fun.

     I got some pictures from Universal. Not with the camera though. I had it with me, but I never took it out. There were just too many people there, to get the shots that I would have liked to get. it was packed more than I have ever seen it before. It seems everyone vacationed in Florida for the holidays and decided to head to Universal on the last weekend before they had to go back. It was insane, but I did get some fun pictures of the dragon on Gringotts, and a nice picture of Elie and me on Hagrid's motorcycle. This is technically the fist motorcycle she has been on, since her accident over a year ago, and she looked like she belonged there. I know another bike is in her future, it's just a matter of time.

 
     We had a really fun day, just walking around the park and seeing the sights. We went to Margaritaville for lunch, and it was the first time I really wanted to have a drink with my meal. I didn't of course, but Margaritaville is a location that I had a lot of good times, that involved drinking, so it was a natural feeling to sit there and want to have a boat drink while eating a Cheeseburger in Paradise, and watching the Margarita volcano erupt and listen to Jimmy Buffet songs over the speakers. In less than two weeks, it will be my two year anniversary of my last drink, and I'm going to make it there. That will be one more year down and a life time to go. Peace in and goodnight.

The Patchwork Knight (Chapter 59)

      It had been long overdue, but I finally sat down for a dinner with Galdren. He made a stew in the fires of his forge.

     "Is there anything that you can't do in a forge?"

     "I don't believe so, but if I find something, I will tell you as soon as I do."

     "That may be difficult."

     "Why is that my boy?"

     "I'm going to leave the palace and travel the Realm on my own."

     "Why would you ever do that? The Mudwood has the Kingdom fully occupied, and they are spreading out as far as they can. This may be the only safe place left in the Realm."

     "That is exactly why I must set out on my own. I want to push the Mudwood back, I want to drive them from the Realm for good."

     "I can understand that, I want nothing more than to see them leave this land forever, but why do you want to go alone?"

     "I can't watch anyone die because of me anymore. I will be better on my own anyway. I will be able to move freely and quickly. I can attack without notice and dwindle their numbers, so that when the final battle comes, the Target Knights and the King can ride in and finish this war once and for all."

     "Those are bold statements. Have you ever heard what they say about bold knights."

     "No."

     "You can meet a bold knight, and you can meet an old knight, but you will never meet and bold, old knight. Pitre, I want you to be an old knight, and this isn't the course that one takes. I have heard of your deeds, and I do believe that no one man can stand against you, maybe even no ten men can stand against you, but you can't take on the entirety of the Mudwood on your own."

     "I won't be Galdren. I will take them one scouting party, or one battalion, or one war party at a time. I will use caution, and take them when they least expect it, and I will send as many captured villagers this way as I can. Please tell the King to send out scouting parties to find villagers that I free, so that they can travel here in safety."

     "You're not going to tell the King that you are leaving?"

     "Would you? You know exactly what he would say, and he would forbid me from doing what I need to do, in order to keep everyone I care about safe."

     "You are right. He would no want you to do. I don't want you to go, but I won't try to talk you out of it. That is one more thing you and your father have in common. You are more stubborn than I mule going up hill. I will wait a day to tell the King of your plans, so you can get all enough ahead of any troop that he sends out to search for you. Will I see you again Pitre?"

     "I hope too, but I can't make any promises."

     "Then this is not goodbye. I don't want to say that to you. I will see you when you return."

     "And we will have a dinner of this fine stew again."

     "That we will."

      We ate the rest of the meal talking about my father. Galdren would tell me more stories about his accomplishments in battle, and the many times that he had saved Galdren's life. We drained the entire pot of it's contents, and I helped clean the bowls and pot before taking my leave. I already had my pack ready and had left it in the stable with my horse. I hid it under some hey so that no one would be wiser, and I went there directly after leaving Galdren. I wanted to get a head start on my journey and there was no better time that late evening. Everyone would be tucked away finishing off meals or laying down for their nightly slumber. The guards that would be on duty wouldn't bother to question what I was doing, because I was always running up and down the mountain, in training. I would simply tell them that I wanted to ride out to a different terrain to train for a few hours and would be back before the morning light.

     When I went the the gate at the base of the mountain pass I began my gallop for the Kingdom. I had to get us much ground between me and the palace before Galdren would tell the King of my plan.

We're Going Dark, Without Stars

     I hope everyone had a good holiday. Before you ask, mine was marginal, which is how I like it. Yes, I know this is coming to you late tonight, but I have a very good reason. I finally began watching Riverdale, and it is fantastic. If you don't know. Riverdale is a new take on Archie, the old comic book. The very big difference is that this one is very dark, and absolutely captivating. If you remember, I mentioned that Riverdale are the neighbors to Glendale, which is where the Chilling Adventures of Sabrina takes place. The set Riverdale in that same weird out of time era. It's the 6t0's meets modern day. I really do believe it is a style choice of the creators. The set in it's own universe in a way.

     If you ever wanted to know what happened to Luke Perry from 90210, he landed as Fred Andrew, the father of Archie Andrew in Riverdale. The characters are great, and all from the original Archie comics, with a few side characters thrown in for good measure. My favorite character is by far Jughead Jones. Still one of the coolest names ever created. In this world he isn't the bumbling goof ball of the comics, he is an investigative journalist type, that is actually narrating the story. yep, that's his voice you hear that is filling in details from the beginning.

     This first season is engulfed in the murder of a student over the summer, and the police are trying to find out who the killer is, but things aren't easy, and Betty and Jughead are tracking down leads. Well, I assume they are, I'm only 3 episodes in, and they just reopened the Blue & Gold, which is the formally defunct school news paper. Yes. it's over the top with the idea that teenagers are going to track down a killer that is eluding the police, but it's how it's down that makes it so fun.

     I think they have 3 seasons currently on Netflix, and the latest season is ongoing on the CW right now. Great thing about CW shows. When they finish a season, the season is released on Netflix 8 days later. You read that right, 8 days after the finale it is up on Netflix, not like a ton of other shows that wait until after the news season is on for a couple of weeks, and then you can try and catch up while you record the new episodes. I'm looking at you NBC and The Good Place. Yes, I did do that in order to get caught up on The Good Place. Anyway, give Riverdale a try, and see if you dislike Betty's mother as much as I do.

     That brings up something I learned in the last episode I watched. I had never put this together, and it was mind blowing, considering that I have and Aunt Betty. Turns out, Betty is the shortened version of Elizabeth. I was floored, and now I need to know what my Aunt's full name was. I never put those two together, I simply thought Betty was a name, with no longer version. Kind of like Holly or Cheryl. You learn something new every day.

     I got a video for you. It's the latest from TPR. Yep, today was release day of our latest review, and it was doing rather well when I last looked at it. Nothing groundbreaking, but well. Here is our latest review of another cheese steak place that does pizza.



     This is the first video where we have no audio problems what so ever. I finally figured it out. For now at least. This really was a terrific pizza. A different style than I have ever had, and I loved it.

     Back to Sabrina for a second. They released and extra episode which was a winter solstice special (aka christmas special). It was really good, and I do love that series. So, if you have watched it based on my recommendation, then you have a new episode to enjoy.

     Another thing that I watched on Netflix this week was Watership Down. I loved that book as a child. I loved the animated movie even more. To this day, I have never read a more violent book than that one, and I'm a huge fan of Stephen King, and if you are reading The Patchwork Knight, you know I don't shy away from my own share of violence. This little story about rabbits is still the most violent book I have ever read. The Netflix series, which is 5 episodes I think, tones down that violence. They don't show much blood, and the fighting is more paw slaps then teeth tearing out necks. That was in the book and the original animated film. It has a slew of British actors as voice talent, with my favorite going to Peter Capaldi who is voicing the seagull Kehaar. He is quite good as an over confident buffoon with competence. Yeah, I know, that is a hard sentence to write with all that contrast in it, but that is the best way to describe him, and once you watch it you will see that I'm right. You have a ton to watch now, so you better get to it.

     I hit Universal this Saturday with the camera. Elie and I are going full photographer mode at the park and hoping to get some wonderful picture of Diagon Alley and maybe a few more things. I'll keep my eyes open for photographic possibilities. I'll share a few of them here. I do have a picture of Saki to share with you. I think this is the first photo where you can really see how it looks with the new mirrors on it, so enjoy the awesomeness that is Saki.

     That's all I got for you tonight. I'm hoping that maybe Sunday I will have a picture of the skateboard mount to share with you. I have all the basic shape done, and am down to the hand sanding, which should take a couple of days in the least. After that, it will be ready for stain, and I have a plan, so look forward to that. Peace in and goodnight.

Could This Weekend Get Any Worse

     It has been an absolutely horrible weekend. Today was the worst of it. I would like to just throw today away, and start over again, but I fear it would be no different. Let's start with Friday which was blah. I applied for a few more jobs, since I have not heard back from the one that told me they would be planning an interview. Not one single word, so the job hunt continues.

     That was pretty much Friday. I did have one win on Friday. I was able to work on my skateboard mount. I did of course have to stop because of weather, but I got the bulk of the material removal done. The basic shape is there, I just have to fine tune it all now. I went out on Saturday to buy files specifically for that purpose, so that was my win for Saturday. Well, I had another small victory as well, but it was marred by a giant bummer in the process. I'll tell you about the victory first and then the let down. The victory is that I scouted a few locations for the skateboard shoot. Have a talked about the skateboard shoot? I'm planning on a skateboard shoot with Snow who was the model on the dock at sunset. I have three with a possible fourth location picked out. If everything goes right, these could be some really nice shots. I took into consideration the backdrop and the conditions of where we would be, and they all line up with shots that I want to get, so that is a win.

     The bummer is when I went out to get on Saki so that I could ride around for this scouting session, the battery was dead. I haven't rode Saki since my last video, so it has been a few weeks, and with the cold weather, it put some stress on the battery, so it was dead, so dead that it wouldn't even slightly light up the gauges. Fortunately I have a trickle charge that Saki has been on since I found out on Saturday afternoon that it was dead. When I just went out to throw out the trash it was finally lit up green saying the battery was charged. I decided to just leave it on until I take Saki out tomorrow for a little photo expedition. I got a place that I want to take some strange landscape photos. I'm keeping it all secret for right now, but I hope to share them with you soon. And yeah, it takes 24 hours for a battery to charge on that trickle charger, so I was without Saki for all of yesterday and today, but it is now back, so that is another small victory.

      Oh, I forgot, I did finish watching Bodyguard, and it was really good. I also watched Birdbox which stars Sandra Bullock. It was good, but the ending was a bit, meh. I need more information, and maybe that is a good thing. The old saying being, "leave them wanting more". Well that ending definitely leaves me wanting more.

     Today was the torture of all tortures. I believe I have told you about my mother and how she is suffering from dementia. Well, it is getting much worse, and lately she has fits of memory loss that are so bad that she doesn't even know who I am, and that is a rough thing to deal with. She gets very paranoid and thinks people are stealing from her, or that she is surrounded by people that simply aren't there. Fortunately it doesn't last much longer than a few hours, but this is a woman that had one of the sharpest minds that I have known. To see her like this is beyond sad. She doesn't eat much unless I convince her that she is hungry, and even then it isn't much more than a small piece of toast and maybe some sort of protein. I honestly don't know how she hasn't starved from hunger yet, with how little she eats. She does have shakes from Ensure that she likes to drink, so that lifts her caloric intake, but it still isn't really enough to sustain a person.

     I despise this time of year, and with the addition of my mothers mental stability on top of that, it is the worst ever. Fortunately because of that, I haven't had time to think of how much I dislike Christmas and everything that comes along with it, so I haven't been as depressed or suicidal as I have been in the past, so I guess I should take that as a victory as well. I don't really know if I should be happy or deeply saddened by that little fact. Christmas is on Tuesday, and as you know that would normally be a posting day for me, but I'm going to take that day off. You aren't going to want to read anything from me that night anyway, so I'll give you your piece. I have had thoughts of taking a couple weeks off like I have done in the past, but still haven't done this year, but I really don't see any reason for it. I don't have the same social networking anxiety that I have in the past. I guess I have just grown to use it so little now, that I don't notice all the negativity that comes with it. Trust me, it isn't that the negativity has lessened. It's still there and even more than before, but I stay away from it. I basically go on Facebook to post what I need to post, and I'm gone. I don't have the app on my phone, so I'm not distracted by that. Instagram is more of the same. I post, and I'm gone, but I do take a couple of extra minutes and scroll through to see what is what. Not much negativity when it is only a picture. I rarely if ever read comments on there, so it is al about visual pleasure. Twitter, well I use that for a news source any more, so there is a ton of negativity, but once again, I rarely read the comments. It's been an ok year for me on social networks, so I will take that small victory as well.

     I do have one thing that was a highlight this weekend. I found a rather remarkable channel on YouTube. It is called The Try Channel, and it is Irish people doing different things, and it is hilarious, and fun. The first one I watched was called Irish people try Reese's peanut butter candy. I love Reese's so I gave it a watch, and loved it. I began watching as many of them as I could. I haven't seen them all yet, but I know I am well into double digits on how many I have watched. I'm going to share that Reese's one with you, not because it is the best one, but because I just wanted to introduce it to you the way I was introduced to it. One of the people featured in it is, Dermot Ward, who might look familiar to you. He played the assistant to young King Tommin in Game of Thrones, and he hates peanut butter, so it makes him trying Reeses's anything a hilarious event. Here is the video.



     I really hope that you got as much of a laugh out of that that I got. It really picked me up on this intensely crappy weekend. Have a wonderful Christmas day and peace in and goodnight.

The Patchwork Knight (Chapter 58)

     I did not leave the side of the cart that carried Sir Darius the entire time that it took to return to the Palace. It was my home. I slept next to it, ate next to it, and walked next to it. Other Knights would come back from time to time and ask me if they could relieve me from my personally designated duty, but I wouldn't hear of it. Seeing Darius's body return safely to the Palace was my responsibility, and mine alone.

     What took only a few days at a hard gallop, took two weeks at the slow pace of the villagers. It gave me time to think over some things. I trained Rolf as much as I could while still in sight of Darius's cart, but I came to the conclusion that I would never be able to fully train Rolf. I had to leave the Target Knights and the Crystal Palace behind. It would be better if I was on my own. I couldn't see the life of another friend taken in front of me. They would only get in my way and compromise my abilities if I saw them fall in battle. I wouldn't be able to focus. I would let them all know when we reached the Palace.

***

     When we finally arrived at the gate I pulled Rolf aside.

     "I wanted you to hear this first."

     "What is it Pitre?"

     "I'm leaving the Palace after Sir Darius's funeral. I won't return, and I will leave alone."

     "What are you saying?"

     "I need to fight the Raiders alone. I can't watch anymore of you die."

     "You can't take the entire Mudwood on your own."

     "I will take them on one war band at a time."

     "Pitre, this is madness. We are all mourning the loss of Darius. Now is the time when we all need to come together. We need to mourn him together, and then avenge him together, Pitre."

     "I will not watch another one of you die because of my planning. I will not watch you die. I already saw it once. I don't want to see it again."

     "Pitre, life isn't that easy. We will all die one day. Darius knew this, we all know this. The only difference between us and those villagers is, that we have the choice of how we die. We do it for a cause, for all these people, for the safety of the Realm."

     "I will still fight for the Realm, I will only be doing it alone. I will be the secret invader, the quiet assassin. I will avenge Darius, Constance, my father, Arial, and all the others that I have lost, but I will do it without hinderance."

     "You will not do it alone. I told you that where you go, I go. I will not leave your side, there is no safer place."

     "You've already proven that wrong, by dying."

     "I made the mistake of not being by your side. I was leading my own little group when that happened. It will not happen again."

     "No Rolf, you will stay here and have the protection of the Targen Knights. You will become on of them soon enough. They already have enough faith and trust in you that they allowed you to lead your own group. You are already better trained then most of the newer Knights, and you will learn more fro Sir Paljin. He is an actual teacher, he can train you better than I."

    "Pitre."

     "Enough, I won't speak any more on this. It is already decided. I leave after Sir Darius's funeral. I will tell the others soon enough, so I would appreciate it if you would keep this between us for now."

     "I will, but we are not done discussing this matter."

     Rolf stared me down as if he was ready for an attack but I simply turned and walked to Darius's cart to retrieve his body. Gorin may not have wanted me to carry him the entire way back, but I would carry his body of the small pass to the Palace.

     The slow walk to most of the remainder of the day. I was the last person through the small pass that opened onto the plateau. The entirety of the caravan remained at the entrance and all separated leaving an aisle for me to walk along. I could see that Gorin had sent for the King, the Princess, and Sir Paljin, as they were standing at the end of the columns of people. All were there to pay respect to Sir Darius. I was only a instrument to move his body to his final resting place. 

     It was solemn and quiet until have way through the column of people. When I reached the half way point, people began a light chant, "All hail our savior, The Patchwork Knight." It started with a few of the villagers, then a few more, then the whole of them. I stopped where I stood and began looking around. I could see more people coming over from the Palace town. They were running and all of them were picking up the chant. I saw the appreciation in their eyes. I truly could, but I was angered by their praise. I was holding the body of their savior. I was carrying him to where he would spend eternity. He would be one with the land, but they only saw me. 

     "Quiet!"

     The chant stopped abruptly, and every man and woman looked around at each other in bewilderment.

     "I hold in my hands, a man that gave his life for all of you. He paid the ultimate sacrifice for you, and you chant my name. I will not have it. I will not accept your praise, not now. This man is your true savior. He got me in line to make the plan that freed you from your imprisonment. He fought to his very end to see that you were safe from the Raiders. He lays here lifeless in my arms for you. If you would praise anyone, it should be Sir Darius."

     The crowd hung their heads in shame as I resumed my slow walk between them. It was only seconds but it felt like hours before I reached the King.

     "Your Highness, I'm sorry. It is my fault that Darius is dead."

     "First things first Pitre. I told you about your highness and what I think of it. Secondly, you are no more to blame for Darius's death than I myself am. I sent you all out there to retrieve my people. I gave the orders that you all followed, that resulted in his death. I hold all responsibility for all my people. I am the cause of Darius's death, and I will hear no more of it. As long as I rule this realm, I will always be responsible for every life with in it. Now, please take Sir Darius into the Palace. We will hold a ceremony celebrating his life before his funeral."

     I did as the King said, and took Sir Darius's body in the palace and laid him on a smooth marble slab that had been placed in the main hall. As I walked through the door. I could hear the King giving a proclamation.

     "My people, we have lost one of our boldest warriors, and in his honor we will celebrate his life. I would hope that each of you would find the time to come into the palace and pay your final respects to this great Knight of the Targen Realm. May Sir Darius always be in your thoughts as one of your saviors. We will honor him in a way that they Realm has never seen. FOR SIR DARIUS!"

     "FOR SIR DARIUS, FOR SIR DARIUS, FOR SIR DARIUS!"

     The crowd continued the chant until the King had turned and walked into the palace. The crowd lingered near the palace doors. I began to hear people speaking his name and telling stories that they had heard or experienced about him. I was so proud of the King and the way he handled a moment that I let my rage and anger get the better of me. I see that now, but at the time, I was clouded by the loss of my friend.

Watch Bodyguard

     I got some news today. I'm just going to call it news, not good news, but just news. I heard back from someone that I submitted an application and my resume to. It was a recruiter type, that finds people for other company's, but they are passing on my information for a position. I'm now waiting on hearing from that employer on when I might get an interview. The recruiter said that it would more than likely be the week after Christmas, so I have a week or so before I hear from them. I'm still going to apply other places as I see things come up, but this has potential.

     Now, to the fun stuff. I'm going to share the picture I posted on Wednesday, only because Instagram really doesn't do it justice. The image is so small on there, that a lot of the detail is lost. I want you to blow the image up to full size so that you can really see what is going on with it. There is a whole star field in there that is lost on such a small media platform.

     If you look to the upper right hand side, you can see the trail of dots that was a plane flying by as the shutter was open. If you can blow it up big enough, you will see that it is actually two side by side dots trailing along. I was floored when I saw that. That is a key example of things just lining up the right way. Once again, I got very lucky with a photo I was taking.

     I'm starting to see some images in my head for the skateboard photoshoot that I plan on doing. They are all based on a specific area, so I have to go by there and see if it is possible to do. We will have to have a place to park our cars, so that they won't interfere with traffic or anyones property. I'm not sure if that is possible there, but I plan on riding up and down the road and see what works and what doesn't. I'll find the right spot, and then everything should start falling into place. This is going to be another fun shoot.

    I began watching a new series on Netflix, and it is really good. It's called Bodyguard, and it stars Rob Stark, other wise known as Richard Madden. He is really good in it. I'm 3 episodes in, and I really wanted to watch a fourth, but since I got so distracted on Tuesday that I failed to write this then, I didn't want to fall into another trap, and turned it off after the third one was finished, and in that third episode, something really big happened. I mean huge, but then again, the first episode starts of rather big, so this show is going to be jam packed full of big events, and I'm loving it.

     I began working on a new woodworking assignment. I decided that my new skateboard needed a hand made wall mount to hang it from. I cut out the wood to the ride dimensions, and began the long process of taking material away from it to shape it the way I want. I couldn't do any of it today, because I needed the big sander for that, and it was stormy and raining all day, and since I do all of that outside, I had to take a day off of it. I don't have any pictures of it, so I can't share that with you, but I will have a picture when it is done. I'm still working out exactly how I'm going to mount it to the wall, but I have a solid idea, I just have to make it work, and then I can play around with the design, which I have a few ideas for that as well. I just have to see if one of my ideas is possible. Well, possible with my ability. I'm sure someone could pull off what I want to do, but I'm not sure if I can do it.

     That is about all I have for you tonight. I know, it's not much, but I'm really hoping for a very non exciting weekend, to share with you on Sunday. My life has become very lame. Peace in and goodnight.

I'm Late, How Can I Make It Up To You

     Ok ok ok, I'm late I know it. I was so caught up in doing other things, that I completely forgot that it was Tuesday and that I needed to write a post. I actually realized it very early this morning, but sleep was much stronger in my mind than writing at that time.

     The job hunt is well, it's going. I have applied to a few more places with no luck so far. I'm still not allowing myself to panic yet, as I have enough money for a couple more months, but in a month, I may allow myself to begin the panicking. Turns out, looking for a job sucks. I have avoided going to people that I know for the reason that I don't like abusing relationships. If I don't ask for anything I won't be disappointed, and they don't fell obligated to help. I wonder if I will get to the point that I will get over that. Only time will tell.

     On to all the things I was doing yesterday that kept me from writing this post. Yesterday was  TPR day. We went to a place that has only been open for 3 months, and they do it the traditional way. By traditional, I mean exactly like they do it in Napoli, which is the true birth place of pizza. The owners are all from Italy, and have their ingredients shipped in from Salerno. That is an area that is known for it's tomatoes, and let me tell you, those tomatoes made a difference in that sauce. I know, this is starting to sound like a TPR review, but I won't go any further with this part of the day.

    I of course had to put together the video yesterday, which took a couple of hours, and I like the way it came out, but I have a ton of issues with the way I shot it. We did a have a catastrophe when the camera fell from the mount just before we were beginning to film. We had to pull into a parking lot and reset everything, and when I did that, I didn't pay enough attention to the view that was being shot, and there is a weird angular thing going on. It's probably not all that noticeable to anyone else, but I see it, and it is very distracting to me. Now that I have told you about it, it will probably be distracting to you as well. The good news, is, that this will not go up until January 10th, so there is plenty of time for you to forget all about it.

     After getting the video done and uploaded to YouTube, I took a short drive to that parking lot where I did my last Saki photoshoot, with the model Snow. I wanted to see just want kind of night shots I could get out there. I was hoping that it would be rather dark. There was light from the FPL plant but it wasn't anything too bad, and nothing like a city center that lights up the entire night sky and pollutes the sky so that you can't see stars. I took hundreds of pictures last night, but only 1 or 2 of them will end up on the CSP Instagram. I can share a couple of them with you though, so there they are.

     This is the main reason for why I forgot to write last night. I was busy processing these photos, and got all caught up in the moment of it all. These are all ok, but the two that I have for the CSP are a step up. One of them I didn't even realize what I had until I got home and began working on it. I could see in my view screen what the image was, and I knew I liked it, but once I blew it up to a size that I could begin altering it, it blew my mind, what was visible in the photo. I will probably post that one later today. I even left an imperfection in it because it looks so cool. There was a plane flying by when I took the picture, and since it is a long exposure, there is a dotted line going across the sky. It looks really cool. Yeah, I'm definitely posting that one today.

     I also gave a little lighting lesson to my buddy. He fancies himself a photographer, but he is rather abysmal at lighting photoshoots. He is one of those people who have always thought that lighting is about lighting something up, and the brighter the better. That is very much not true. Lighting should accentuate a scene, and not become the focus of it. I showed him how to use his camera with different settings based on the lighting and how if you can't change the lighting you need to change you settings. This is another benefit to shooting in manual. I also showed him different levels of lighting and how less is more when it comes to lighting people and objects. I really hope he can retain this information. It will save him a ton of frustration in the future.

     I'm planning a new photoshoot, and I only have the basis for the idea. The model is on board for it, I just have to get more detailed images in my mind of what it should be. It is kind of like a mental storyboard if you will. I see several blurred shots in my head, but nothing is standing out yet. I need at least one defined image in my head before I can begin the shoot. I need that storytelling shot, which reminds me. I do have something to tell you about the last shoot that I did.

     On Monday I posted one of the images from the train track shoot, and it was one of the images that I had fully formed in my head even before going out there. This was the storytelling shot. I had two distinct ones for that shoot. I have yet to post the other one. This was also one of the three favorite shots of the shoot, and was only beat out by the one I chose as favorite because of the "power" that was in the image that I posted last Wednesday. Anyway, I'm going to share the storytelling shot here right now and then tell you a little about what happened after I posted it.

     That is the shot I saw in my head. There is more that I plan on doing with this image, but that can come later, and it will be more artistic impression than capturing a moment that I saw in my head and all that comes with it. As you probably know by now, that is Elie Wolf in the shot. She is one of my dearest and longest friends, and she was fully on board for the imagery I had in my head. I told her what I wanted this photo to represent and it was pretty dark. She saw the beauty in it and was all for it. She shared this image on her Facebook page the same day that it went up. She got a comment on the post that amounted to a friend of hers asking her if she was ok and did she need to talk. I was ecstatic. I couldn't have asked for a better response than that. We created an image that told the exact story that I relayed to her. I won't tell you the story, because I want you to decide for yourself what it means, but you can guess from the persons response and my joy over that response, what I wanted to tell with this shot. This is just more proof that I am on the right track with what I'm doing. It gives me more incentive to improve and do better. Learn more, take what I learn and turn it into even better images.

     I look at that shot, and think to myself, as good as I believe that is, it can be better. I will do better. There is so much more that I have to learn, and so much more that I have to do to get better at this. I was saying to my buddy yesterday, that anyone can take a picture, but not everyone can tell a story with that picture. I'm already a storyteller in writing, and with that image above, I'm on my way to being a storyteller with photography. Peace in and good day?

I Would Like You To Meet Micky

     Since I no longer have a life. I have to rely on the little things to excite me. One of those little things happened on Friday evening. I was letting Morty out to do his business, when I saw a large object make a sudden movement from the small trees at the border of my fence. It quickly went in a downward motion straight to the ground, where Morty tore after it. I immediately saw what it was and hollered for Morty to stop. He did, but as is the nature of a dog, he couldn't help himself and kept trying to stick his nose into an ill advised area.

     It was a juvenile Red Shouldered Hawk, and don't let the term juvenile fool you. It was still a good foot to foot and a half tall with a wingspan of two and a half feet. It was laying on it's back and directing it's talon's in the direction of Morty's face. I quickly ran over before anything could happen and grabbed Morty's collar, and lead him away and back into the house.

     After I got Morty inside I went back out to check on the young raptor and see if I could tell what was wrong with it. It stayed on it's back for a good ten minutes or so, while I started making calls to all kinds of rescue services, to get someone out to the house to help this bird out. I finally had two different services on their way, but neither of them could give me an estimated time, so I watched over the hawk, checking in to see if it was still alive and kicking.

     It didn't look injured as far as I could see, so that left the potential for illness or dying on the table. After a little while I finally went in the house and put Morty on his leash so that I could actually let him do his business which was the original plan. As we came out of the house, the raptor had risen. It looked our way and then tried to fly off. It didn't get very far. I took care of Morty, got him back in the house, and then searched for Micky. Oh, did I not tell you that I named the bird Micky? Micky was resting under some bushes in the back corner of the yard. He wasn't folding his right wing in, so injury was back in the mix, and thankfully. Injury can be overcome, illness could have lead to death. I didn't want this beautiful bird to die. not at an early age. I wanted him to grow and dominate the skies like his parents once did.

      I stayed out in the yard listening for any movement, and when I heard it, I went and checked in on Micky. He had managed to hop up onto the fence.

     You can see that wing sticking out. He moved around a little more and went on the other side of the fence which would make it rather difficult to get to, but I was willing to hop the fence and help out in any way I could.

     Wildlife services showed up first, so they got the honor of being the actual saviors for this mighty raptor. The woman was a firm "no" on hopping any fence, so I told her I would do it if necessary. We went into the backyard and began a new search for Micky, since he had moved from the spot on the other side of the fence. I began searching for him, and was making my way through some bushes when I decided to look up to see where I was, and lo and behold, Micky was right there within claws reach of me. I quickly but calmly backed out and apologized for my intrusion into his space. The officer was laughing.

     After locating Micky again, the officer went to retrieve her net. After that it was rather simple. She guided the net back to Micky, rested the edge of it under his belly, and he simply hopped onto the net. She then gently pulled the net out of the bushes and guided Micky into the net. Then it was just a matter of getting him in the truck and getting him to let go of the net. He told me to call the other service, which I had planned on doing anyway, and then told me that she was taking Micky to Florida Wildlife Hospital. The take care of large birds of prey, and would take good care of Micky.

    I called Wild Florida Rescue who had been inundated with calls all day about birds, and told the woman I had spoken to that Micky was ok and on his way to the hospital. She was very thankful because she was in the middle of another rescue herself, and was wondering just how she was going to get to my house before sunset. I thanked both of them for what they do, in helping these animals, and they thanked me in return fro caring enough to sit with Micky and making sure he got the help he needed. It was a love fest all around.

     It was a pretty amazing experience to be that close to one of the great raptors in this area. A bird that could tear your face of if you got to close to it, but in the end, I think Micky realized that we were trying to help him, and he gave in and let it happen. I have always seen Red Shouldered Hawks in this area, but have never been that close to one. I hope you never have the chance, only because it means you have a hurt or sick bird on your hands, but if you do, take it for the remarkable moment that it truly is. Peace in and goodnight.

The Patchwork Knight (Chapter 57)

     Men began pouring out of their tents and running toward where the roar had emanated. Then they all stopped, and looked in bewilderment. One man walked forward.

     "What are you expecting to happen?"

     "I'm expecting to kill all of you, and take those villagers to safety."

      Every man behind him began laughing, but he stayed stone faced. I could hear the rumbles of, "he's mad", "This is a joke", "I can't believe one man can be so foolish".  I could see over the head of the men in front of me to the front of the camp, where the villagers were being held. The other Knights had taken out the guards in silence and were leading the villagers away. I drew my swords in a slow methodical manner, and then screamed again in my lionlike war cry.

     "FOR THE REALM!"

     Before the man who had stepped forward to address me knew it, he had lost his head, and I began my attack on the hourde.

     The front line was still in shock by what they had just seen. Their arms remained at their sides with their mouths agape as they saw the body of the man before them drop to the ground. When I cut down 5 more men the panic set in and the chaos grew. I sliced and cut my way to the center of the hourde, drawing them all in to me, so that Rolf, Darius and the others could attack from the outside. I spun like a cyclone with deadly precision. My blades took arms, legs, and anything that came near me. Bodies and body parts began piling up. I began to move through the crowd of Raiders, opening up more room around me to fight in. Bodies were scattered in the opening that I had created, and the Raiders began to hold back. There was a wall of people with me in the center. The mocking had turned to whimpers of fear. I could see it in their eyes.

     "Wh wh who, are ya ya ya you?"

     With both blades dripping with the blood of their fallen, I paused to look around at of them before answering. I slowly raised my father's sword above my head and proclaimed.

     "I AM THE PATCHWORK KNIGHT!"

     The name caused recognition to cross their faces.

     "He is the one the villagers have been speaking of."

     I didn't wait for anymore words. I sprang to the nearest man to me and stabbed my sword through his chest while slashing my father's sword across the face of the man to the right of him. They both fell to the ground, one in pain and the other in death. My onslaught was renewed. The circle collapsed around me, but no Raider would ever get past my blades. Screams of horror erupted from men as they lost limbs and knew that their life would drain from them as they laid on the ground.

    The battle went on for what felt like hours. I was covered in blood from head to toe, when the final man fell, I looked around at the carnage. I could see the other Knights at the front of the camp and they were gathered around in a group. I began walking towards them. I could only count 7 men standing and I began to run. They were standing over two bodies. I pushed my way through them and saw Rolf and Sir Darius laying on the ground covered in their own blood. I knelt down between the two of them and reached for all the aether that I could. I put my hands over their wounds and pushed the aether into them. I would not fail this time. I would bring them back to life. I would succeed here where I failed with Constance. I would not see another man fall. I would not see my best friend fall.

     Rolf's body began to glow with a bright golden color and began rising from the ground. I could feel the aether flow through me and into him. It began circulating between the two of us. His would began to glow even brighter in that same golden hue, and then it slowly closed and he began sinking back to the ground. His chest began to rise and fall as breath was flowing back into him. He sat up quick and screamed at the top of his lungs. It wasn't a scream of joy, or horror, it was more a scream of rage, as if it was the last thing he was doing as the Raiders blade went through him. He grabbed his chest as I took my had away and was patting it and rubbing it looking for the mortal wound, but there was only a faint scar in his skin and a hole in his armor. The Knights standing around abruptly stepped back in astonishment at what they had seen, but I couldn't concentrate on any of what was happening. I had to focus on Darius. His body had remained on the ground and his usual faint blush glow that surrounded him was gone. There was no experience of him rising in the air, or our life forces intermingling. His body just lay there with his life gone.

     Other men tried to pull be away from him, said he was gone, but I wouldn't accept that. I brought Rolf back, I had to bring Darius back as well. I would not move.

     "Boy yo, you need to stop. He ain't coming back. He is gone, but his death was not in vain. We saved all the villagers and vanquished the Realm of more than a hundred Raiders. You saved Rolf. You brought him back, but you can't save everyone."

     There they were, those words that Darius said to me himself. I slumped on top of him and began to sob. He was tough but truly fair. He held me accountable for my actions, and I got him killed with them.

     "This is my fault. It was my plan. Everyone was supposed to live."

     "Pitre, we all know what can happen with any battle. We know that our lives could end at any moment, but we do this because we are fighting not for ourselves, but for all those villagers who were being held captive. We fight for all of those back home that can't fight. We fight for the Realm that is our home. We fight for each other. Darius fought for all of that and gave his life for it. There can be no better way to die than to do that which brings your end doing for others."

     "I want to be the one that carries Darius back to the Palace. His body will be my responsibility."

     "You can personally escort the cart that we carry him back in."

     "NO!, I will carry him. I owe him that. I will carry him back on foot. Give my mount to one of the villagers that can't walk. I will carry him and I will bury him with honor on free land."

     "We will bury him on free land. I will say it again Pitre. His death is not your responsibility. It is all of ours, and his. He will have a funeral fitting royalty. I know the King would want that for Darius. Now go clean up while we put Darius's body in a cart. You can walk beside it. I will not see you carry him all the way back to the Palace."

     "Yes, Sir Gorin. If you need the cart horses for the villagers, I will pull the cart."

     "We have more than enough horses and carts now. We just came into the acquisition of a herd of horses. Later we will talk about Rolf. You may not have saved Darius, but you surely brought Rolf back to life. The Josten came running from the battle with word that Darius and Rolf had fell in battle, and that I should come. Rolf was already sitting up when I arrived. I asked Josten if he had been mistaken about Rolf, and he said that he was not. He said he was standing near Rolf when he was stabbed through the heart, and that he had taken the Raider that had taken him. We will talk Pitre, but after you have cleaned yourself and have rested. You did the impossible once again, and from the looks of things, we would have lost much more had you not been here."

     "Yes sir."

     I rose to my feet, but for the first time in years, I felt exhausted. Truly exhausted as if my life had drained. I stumbled to the creek where I started the battle. I felt an arm left me from under my arms and I looked over to see Rolf aiding me to walk. He didn't speak he only smiled and nodded his head to the creek.

     He released me when we were at the bank and I simply walked into the waist deep water and sat down. Letting the cool water wash the blood from my armor and body. I bent forward to douse my head in the water and remained like that for as long as I could hold my breath. I stayed in the creek until the sun rose over the trees.

Ok, Now You Can See If It's A Crystal Ball

     I have been good, and did not watch the remainder of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. I'm a go for Friday now. My plans are set in stone and I will watch however more episodes I have left. I think I have 5 more to go, but I'm not completely sure.

     I still haven't heard back from any of the places that I applied to, so I will be looking at other places starting Monday. I won't count on any of them coming through. I'm a dinosaur to the workforce now, and I have to take what I can at some point. I still have plenty of money to carry me for a little while longer. I will let you know if I make it to panic model and that shouldn't be for some time.

     I have been keeping busy in other ways of course. I have been working on photos, writing, and well that is it. I haven't been doing any video creation this week, so it is looking like a two week break from the old YouTube channel. I do have TPR that just went up today, but we can get to that a little later. I did make my decision on what I thought was the best photo of the shoot with Elie, and posted it yesterday. You can see it at this Instagram account Counterfeit Squirrel Photos. It will be the on with the woman on the train tracks. I did post probably my favorite photo of the last photoshoot with Snow today. That will be the one with the woman standing on the railing of a dock. I think they are both great, but I'm a little biased.

     I know I didn't give you anything about what the Lensball actually looked like on Tuesday, and that is because I hadn't taken any photos with it yet. Today I did, and I have one that I'm definitely posting on the Instagram account above, but these other two, they don't quite make the cut for that, so I can share them here, so you can have an idea of what I will be able to do with this big ball of glass.

     Pretty cool right? I promise you that the one I post tomorrow on Instagram is even cooler. I can't wait to try out more things with this, and I have a ton of ideas of how to use it with people, so if you want to have you picture taken with a big ball of glass, then let me know, I would like to do a series of photos with this one particular idea, and all are welcome.

     I have a few more pictures for you. A little over a month ago I saw a short video on Instagram from Grant Gustin. He is the guy that plays Barry Allen (AKA The Flash) on The Flash. He did a collaboration with Bear Walker who is a guy that makes hand crafted skateboards. These boards are incredible. It is a design based on The Flash and Grant signed the first one, and then he signed every 25th one. The run was limited to 250, so all in all Grant signed 11 of them. I love skateboards and had to have one of these. It combined two nerd areas in one thing; skating and comics. I jumped on it fast when it launched. I knew I was in early enough to be within the 50 range. That meant I had a 3 in 50 chance of getting one signed by Grant Gustin. Bear Walker signed all of them, so I was guaranteed his signature. Mine arrived Wednesday, and I pulled it out of the box and flipped it over to see,  and I missed it by 3. I'm not disappointed though. The boards is super cool and even has front and rear lights on it. Here are the pictures so you can see for yourself.

     53 of 250. So close yet so far away. Like I said though, it is so cool I can't be disappointed. I mean, Look at it again. It's magnificent. I haven't even take it out and ridden it yet. I'm still getting over this stupid head cold. I think I'm nearing the end. The worst part is, that they stupid cough I had finally gotten rid of, is now back. I hope it leaves in a timely fashion this time. Anyway, I'm looking forward to riding this little beauty at night. I can't wait to see just how well those lights work out. Oh, they can flash as well. Just a little more safety.

     It is now time for the TPR video. This is the last video (hopefully) with audio issues. They aren't bad, but they bug me. I went to a new mic set-up for the video that comes out in two weeks, and there are no; bumps, bangs, knocks, scrapes, rattles, or anything. Back to the pizza now. This was a little place that had revamped it's pizza. It seems that one brother was running the business, and was trying to go cheap to make money, but that wan't cutting it, so the brother that started all came in and set things straight and this is the result of it.



    This is another one of those videos that I just had fun with when I was editing it. I once again, made the video I wanted to make as opposed to what I thought people would want to see. It made me laugh, and that is really all that matters at this point. I did the same with the next video as well. I changed my approach, kind of like the way I was talking about with photography. I needed to make it fun again, with it being so bad with the views lately. I made videos that if no one watched them, at least I had a blast making it, and enjoyed watching it myself. People will either appreciate that, or they will just not watch. Trust me, it can't be any worse than how it has been going lately. Based on the view count for the video without going to the creator studio to get the exact numbers, this video is doing better than most from the start. Here is the way I look at it. I think based on our followers on Insta, Facebook and YouTube, we should be able to pull 30 views by Sunday. that gets us just past the 72 hour mark, when most videos grab their views. Right now based on the view count on the video itself, we are at 21 views. The view count on the video and the actual view count are different for the first 24 hours. It's something to do with YouTube's algorithm and what not. They put stops in the count in case things start moving fast, so that everything can catch up. We don't really have that type of problem, but it is a YouTube thing regardless. So even though it says 21 on the video it could be more actual views and I can see that in the creator studio. I'll check that when I'm done here though.

     I will post he link to the blog tomorrow around noon, and then my work for that video will be done. One more in the can.

     I'm going to go get some sleep now, and hopefully knock the rest of this cough out of me. Peace in and goodnight.

Is It A Crystal Ball

     I think I have finally picked the picture for tomorrow. I have gone back and forth a dozen times, and I'm about 98% sure that I have the one. I will be posting it around 11:30 tomorrow on the @CounterfeitSquirrelPhotos Instagram. That is my photography only page, and only pictures from the Canon go on there.

     I'm sure that when I wake up in the morning that I will take another look at the three that it is narrowed down to, and doubt my choice, but I'm pretty solid in my thought that this one is the best picture of the bunch. There are other great shots from the shoot that will take their way onto the Instagram, but only one can be the best.

     I have applied to several jobs now, and have heard nothing from any of them. It has only been a couple of days, so I don't expect to hear from them right away, but doesn't everyone have that dream where you apply and you get the call right away. Two of them are photography based. Nothing intense, but it would be fun and my first choice. Neither of them pay very well, but I don't expect to find anything that will pay me like my last job. Besides, I'm still going to wok on all these other things, and hope that they will eventually pay off.

     I got something in the mail this week. I ordered back around Black Friday. It is from a company that makes a little something that you can use for Photography, and I had hoped to have some pictures with it already, but I have come down with a mild head cold and have stayed inside for the past few days. The company is called Lensball, and they sell a clear glass ball that you can use for some really neat Macro type of photography shots. It's not true Macro, but you shoot it in practically the same way, except you are also trying to get the scene behind it as well. Kind of a two for one shot. I'm really looking forward to bringing you some of those photos in the near future.

     The Lensball is really solid too. It weighs in at just about 2 pounds, and it does hold a warning that you are not supposed to put it in direct sunlight. I have read several reviews of people that tried to get some shots out in direct sunlight and have either  ended up with a fire to contend with, or they burnt their hand on the ball when they picked it up. This is going to be both fun and dangerous. I love it.

     I have neglected to talk about The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. Season 2 came out last week and I have watched more than half the episodes. I'm trying to hold out until Friday to watch the remaining ones, but I'll most likely watch them tomorrow night. If there was any doubt that the show would suffer the sophomore jinx, they are all alleviated with the very first episode. It is, well to use a word from the title, marvelous. Midge is back and better than ever, while Susie is more funny than last season. If you haven't watched any of it yet, you really need to check it out. It's on Amazon Prime and is one of the only shows I watch on that service.

     Alrighty then, it's time for Favorite Song of the Week. I just heard this song for the first time today, and although I know the featured performers, I had only a glancing knowledge of the headliner. It is a DJ, that does the whole giant mask thing, like Deadmau5. This guy goes by the name Marshmello, and wears a giant marshmellow with eyes on it. Despite all the weirdness, this is a great song, and the imagery behind the song is heartbreaking. After watching a few of his videos today, to learn a little more about him, that seems to be a trend in his videos. He wants to tell a sad story that has some triumph at the end, just as this video does. I give you Marshmello featuring Bastille with "Happier".



     There is a little guest appearance form Miranda Cosgrove of iCarly fame in there. She is the teenage girl that has the first dog. I think she did a really good job in her role. Good song with a great heart touching video to go along with it. If you watch and listen as you do, you start to see the words of the song from a whole other perspective. Let me know if you can see it.

     Ok, it's late for me, and I still have to knock the last of this head cold out, so I'm off to bed. Peace in and goodnight.

It Was An Epiphany

     I wrote a pivotal chapter in The Patchwork Knight today, and that makes it official that I am in the third and final act of this little foray into writing. It's exciting and sad at the same time. I said it before, but I'm not fully ready to see these character go away. They have been a part of my life for over a year now as I have been writing this, and even longer if you consider the whole thought process and idea portion of writing. It has been a fulfilling and magical experience to be a part of, and I can't wait for you to read the whole thing when it is done. There is still plenty of story to come, but as I said, this is officially the third and final act.

     I had my photoshoot on the train tracks on Friday, and it went even better than I would have hoped it would. I have a lot of quality picture still left to go through and process, but I went after my early favorites first. I'm having trouble picking my absolute favorite from the shoot, but I have it narrowed down to three as of right now, and no, I'm not going to share them here. I have to make this choice, and I have to make it by Wednesday, because that is the day I will be posting it to @CoutnerfeitSquirrelPhotos on Instagram. If you haven't followed me there yet, and I know you haven't, you have until Wednesday if you want to see the one I selected as the favorite. I am going to share the shot I shared today. It wasn't the best shot, but it was a dream shot. I have this minor love affair with trains, and I have always wanted to shoot one up close while it was passing by, and I got that chance, while Elie Wolf and I were out there shooting. I saw the train coming, so we cleared the tracks as it went by, and I already had my camera set for the lighting, but I was going to have to constantly change focus along the way. I like doing everything in manual, because it gives me full control over the image. If I make a mistake and the shot is poor, it is my fault. If it comes out great, the camera did its job, based on my settings. I began shooting as the train was about 50 yards away, and kept adjusting focus and tracking as it came along. I kept shooting until the engine had passed 20 yards beyond us, and waited for the camera to process the images since I was shooting frame after frame as it went by. I believe there were 8 shots in all, and although there are some freaky cool shots because of the movement involved, one of them came out perfect. This is that shot.

     I really didn't know what I had until SD Card could be done processing. I started scrolling through the pictures with Elie, and was shocked at what I saw when I came to that image. First impression was "cool", and that held until I pulled it up on the computer. That "cool", change to "WOW". It's one of those moments that you don't believe you were a part of. That's the type of shot you see in pictures hung on walls. That shot came down entirely to timing, and everything falling into place. My focus was good, the blur was more pronounced because of my aperture setting, and I was able to track it and catch it in a dreamlike state. Crazy thing is, that is not the best shot of the day. That shot has changed as I have gone through the pictures, but the first image that caught my attention is still in the running, and there is a 1 in 3 chance that it will still be the one.

     When I started going through that image, and making some adjustments to it, it began to become fully involved. and that day, I stopped after that picture. It was a moment when I thought,"I'm done, I can never take a better picture than that." I closed up Lightroom and took my attention away from it. I opened it up the next day, and found another picture that had the same impact, then there was another. I captured a lot of great images on Friday, and you will eventually see them on Instagram, but there are still a lot of photos to go through. I only took about 40 images on Friday, and I'm pretty sure I have 20 to 25 more to go through. A few I started and stopped, not feeling that they are up to par. I may take another look at them later, but for now I have 12 quality images to share, including that train up above.

     I always loved photography, and I was pretty decent when I was doing it a few years ago, but I read something recently about photography, and it changed my whole approach to it. I took some bad advice early on about zooming in on everything, so that is what I did. I tried to get as much detail and as close as I could for every photo, and that is great for things that are very far off, or macro (close up photography), but it shouldn't be your whole approach. I started looking through the lens differently and that is when I took this picture.

     My world with photography changed at that moment. A dream that I had was finally realized, and was able to take a good landscape photo. With that working so well for that photo, I started looking at how I was shooting everything. Angle, approach, exposure, and many other things. I have always had, "the photographer's eye". It is a real thing and something you must have to be decent at photography, but I wasn't looking at the whole picture. Yes, the pun is implied. This brings us all back to those three shots that are up for best shot. Two of them are from the same angle, and that angle changed from what I had in my head. Two of those shots are from the specific image that I had in my head for this shoot. In essence, those pictures were the entire reason for this shoot. They were the idea in my head. As Elie got in position for this "idea", I got in position for how I saw the shot being approached. When I looked through the view finder, I realized it was all wrong. The angle wasn't the shot I was seeing in my head. My approach needed to change, so it did. Instead of kneeling for the proper angle which was not at all the proper angle, I laid down on the tracks, looked through the viewfinder, and saw that image that I had seen in my head. It was right there. I couldn't believe it. 

     I was happy when I previewed the shots on the camera, but when I saw that shot for the first time on my screen in it's full size, I was blown away. Like I said earlier, I said "WOW", and it wasn't in my head, it was out loud. I couldn't believe that I took that shot. That I had the right settings for it to come out exactly as I had seen it in my head. In much fewer words,  I nailed it. Does that mean people are going to love that shot as much as I do? Absolutely not. Art is subjective and I understand that, but I also understand that this image was created because of my imagination, my "photographer's eye", and my love of the art itself, and because of all of that. I am so proud of what I have for you to see. 

     Then I had the joy of seeing other images come forward and equal or outdo that image. This whole shot taught me one very valuable lesson. I am on the right track, and I can't wait to see what I'm able to do, when I actually get good at this. Peace in and goodnight.

The Patchwork Knight (Chapter 56)

      The trail was straight so there was no need to leave anyone behind for Sir Lionel. The caravan finally made camp after another two miles. We held to a mile behind them so that we wouldn't be seen. The caravan was  hidden by trees in an offset clearing, so we would have to sneak closer to the camp to see how they were set up for the night.

      "Pitre, you don't by chance have some trick that you haven't told us about to where you can see through trees, do you."

     "No, I do not. We are going to have to do this the old fashioned way."

     "I was expecting this, but I had to ask. You always seem to have something new that we never knew about. Ok, what do you say, you, Rolf and I go pay them a little secret visit, and see exactly what they are up to?"

      "I was hoping you would say that. I'm tired of riding on that horse. Pitre got to run back and forth. I need to stretch my legs."

     "Good on you Rolf, you will get that chance. We will sneak through the forest until we can hear them, then we will hold back until nightfall. You men, take the horses off the trail and hide in the forest as well. Stay out of sight from anyone, and most importantly, rest up and prepare for battle."

     Every man quietly walked into the forest and disappeared. It was rather impressive to see a well oiled troop move that way. We made our way to the Raiders camp with silence and speed. Not a single twig could be heard being snapped under our feet as we ran at top speed. It was long before we heard the first rumbles of a large group in front of us, but it was different than what I was expecting.

     "Can you hear that? It sound like they doubled in size."

     "Indeed it does Pitre. I don't like this, I don't like it one bit."

     "Let me sneak closer and take a look. I promise I will not engage and I will report back to you in fifteen minutes."

     "Ok Pitre, stay safe and out of sight. See what you can see, and report back as soon as you can."

     I took off like an arrow. The trees were a blur as I passed by them. The trees began to thin so I slowed down so as not to be seen. I could see the first signs of the Raiders in the form of tents. I got as close as I could and couldn't believe what I was seeing. The caravan had doubled in size. This must have been a junction point. Two caravans had joined together for their final push to the Kingdom. I could see the captive  villagers, and they were guarded by twenty Raiders. They encircled the villagers who were being held in a make shift pen. They all huddled in the center as far from any Raiders as they could get. The camp was sprawled out long the bank of a small creek that ran parallel to the trail. The clearing they were in ran the distance of the trail to the creek. and was a large area. It could have housed another two caravans. That thought started me to panic. What if more caravans were on the way? I had all the information I needed. I ran back to Sir Darius and Rolf.

     "The clearing is large and wide open with a creek on the opposite side from the trail."

     "That's good, that will give us a natural barrier to hole them in."

     "This is true, but I have bad news, and it could be worse news."

     "What is it lad, spit it out."

     "The caravan of Raiders has doubled in size, as well as the captive villagers."

     "How is this possible?"

     "There must have been another caravan waiting for them there. The clearing is large enough that it could fit another two caravans the size of the one we were following. More could be on the way."

     "That is bad, very bad, but the daylight is on our side. It is already growing dark, and if anyone is meeting them there, they won't be there until the morrow. How many Raiders would you say are in the camp?"

     "I counted twenty guarding the villagers in a make shift pen near the trail. I couldn't count the others because they were in and out of tents, but if I took a guess, it would be a hundred easily."

     "That is not good at all"

     "It's maybe not as bad as you may think. I know how they think, remember I was one of them. They set the villagers up by the trail, so that they men that are guarding them, can also guard the trail. They will have no other guards throughout the camp. If we can take them out quickly and quietly, we will be able to run through the camp without much problem."

     "Are you sure of this Rolf?"

     "Absolutely, what Pitre described is how we would always set up camp since I was first taken by the Raiders. They don't change in their ways, because no one ever tries to attack a Raider camp. Well, almost no one."

     Rolf nodded in my direction with his final words.

     "The truth has never been spoken more. Let's get all the men gather here, and set our plan of attack. Pitre, will you do the honors of getting the men."

     "I will."

     I ran back to the where the men entered the forest and told them the lose plan that we had, and that we would learn more when we arrived. We left the horses tied up to trees, but near the creek that I knew was now there so that they could water, and began marching through the forest. We arrived as the sun fell beneath the horizon.

     "Where is Rolf?"

     " I sent him to take a look at the camp to see if it was as he remembered, he should be back shortly."

     As if he heard his name being spoken, Rolf came through the trees.

     "It is as I thought it would be, and no others have arrived from what Pitre reported. The camp is spread out a little more than usual, but that is probably because of all the room that they have available to them."

     "That could cause some trouble for us. The ones in the back will defiantly know we are coming."

     "What if we divide our forces and meet in the middle?"

     "What do you have in mind Pitre?"

     "If most of the men attack the guards at the pen, while at the same time what remains of us attack from the creek, we could cause panic and chaos?"

     "That isn't a bad plan, but there are only fifteen of us. We are already outnumbered by the guards at the pen. It will be difficult to take them out quietly with all of us on hand. If we had more men, this plan would be flawless."

     "I know it seems like we are outnumbered, remember who we are. We are Target Knights. There is no army that can stand against us, no matter the size. All of you can handle the guards without raising the alarm. I will sneak around to the creek and attack from there and delay them from getting to you before the villagers are safe from harm."

     "Whoa Pitre, that can't happen. You cannot go on your own to face a hundred men while we free the villagers."

     "I don't expect to be alone the whole time. I was hoping that you mighty Knights would come to my rescue from the rear."

     "I don't want you to go by yourself."

     "I will be fine. You should all spread out and hit the pen from three different sides. That will enhance your odds of getting rid of the guards with out sounding the alarm. I will give you time to get in position and then I will start my attack from the creek. That will be the signal to attack the guard. They won't see what hit them."

     "It is a good plan, but this only works if you have another 15 men with you Pitre."

     "What is it that the Targen Knights say about their worth? Each Knight is worth 50 Raiders, right? So I will be taking my chances with one hundred, but I won't be doing it for long. In a matter of minutes I should have the support of five hundred men."

     "Pitre, I hate you and I love you. This is crazy, but I can't argue with what you say. Ok, here is the plan. All of us will split into three groups. One will attack from theses woods that we now stand in. The others, a group of four to the woods opposite the clearing and another group of five to the woods directly across the clearing. I don't believe I am saying this, but when Pitre raises the alarm by attacking by himself, we will attack the guards at the pen. When the guards have fallen the group of four will see to the safety of the villagers, and lead them away from the fray. The remaining two groups will attack from the rear fo the hourde that is attacking Pitre. We will hopefully all meet in the middle."

     "I will give you time to get in position before my attack. I will make sure that you know when it is taking place."

     "I don't doubt that at all. Sir Gorin, I want you to lead the group of four that will protect the villagers."

     "Yes sir, once everyone is to safety, am I allowed to join the scrum?"

     "Only if you are absolutely sure that the villages are safe from harm."

     "I will see to it. Sir Lionel, you are with me."

     I watched as Sir Gorin chose two more men to be the group across from the trail. Rolf was directed to lead the group on the other side and Sir Darius selected the remaining men for him.

     The groups were ready, and so was I. I waited about five minutes before I made my way to the creek. I entered the Euphoria, and watched as the bluish glow of the other men peaked in and out from amongst the trees. I could see the golden glow of Rolf leading his group to the other side of the clearing. The moved with speed and stealth. I looked out upon the camp and saw the light golden glow of the men that were still outside of their tents.

      The other groups were in position, and I gathered the aether from the stone, and readied myself to face one hundred Raiders. I snuck along the creek to what would be the center of the camp, and erupted with a battle cry that sounded like the roar of a lion. Chaos took hold of everyone in the camp.