Photocosm

Local Light Lately Low

The light in January has been harsh mostly, brighter brights in our eyes and darker shadows wherever the bicyclists and the skunks run the road.

 

No, this isn't the light we've had lately. This is how we started, on the 3rd of January. Hard to believe it was a couple of weeks ago.

This is downtown Berkeley, and those are students walking to the University Of California campus. It's the only campus in the UC system that gives you an excuse for missing class if you got lost in the fog. One of the perqs of attending UC at the mother ship.

 

 

This is more like it, the low sun casts bright light and shadows at unusual angles. A woman walked her dog through here and it looked like a small zebra that had eaten too many doggie treats.

 

 

Balloons outside a carpet store.

 

 

 
It's early afternoon, but the shadows of branches decorate this orange wall in the Fourth Street shopping area of Berkeley.

 

 

The commute is made tougher in the morning and afternoon. It seems no matter which way you're going on a clear winter day, you're driving into the sun.

 

 

The steps to a mattress store. These hand rails were painted white, but look what the low sun has done to them. 

 

 

A Berkeley grocery known for low prices also gets the low light.

 

 

The early shadows keep these soft drinks cold.

 

 

A Christmas decoration on Fourth Street. The decorations are still up, which is fine with me. They show the shoppers what real UFOs look like.

 

 

And we close with contrails. Backlit by the low sun, they looked like white neon.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

©2012 Max Clarke. All Rights Reserved

President Obama Wins Second Term

 

I'm writing this prediction after the Iowa caucus carnival, but that isn't the reason I'm calling the 2012 election early.

I was walking Berkeley on New Year's Eve day, thinking about the year to come.  If you want to plan the next year, it's good to enter a philosophical state of mind, and the city of Berkeley was named after the philosopher and theologian George Berkeley.

He was noted for his theory of immaterialism, which argued that nothing really exists. That is, no things exist independently. What we perceive are ideas and sensations. George Berkeley is associated with the phrase -translated from Latin- to be is to be perceived. Everything which exists is essentially an idea in the mind of God. For a man who lived before the Internet, before electricity, before public libraries, Berkeley was very insightful...and mystical.

 

But then I saw this car pass me rushing north toward the UCB campus. It had the license plate JAN2009, but I read it as Jan 20th, 2009. President Obama was inaugurated that day. Hmm, what can we do with that plate?

Do you remember the oddity that occurred on January 20th, 2009? President Obama was sworn in twice that day. That's pretty odd, isn't it? There was the daytime ceremony, when Chief Justice Roberts administered the oath to President-Elect Obama. But Roberts and Obama did not dance well together. Maybe Roberts administered it wrong, maybe Obama heard it wrong and said it wrong, but the daytime ceremony at noon ended with an oath which had not been perfectly recited.

The daytime ceremony was followed by a second one the next day. Roberts visited the White House and they repeated the moment. This time, Roberts administered the oath perfectly and Obama took the oath perfectly.

Still, it made me wonder. Obama would not have stumbled on stage like that on purpose, but now the day and night have a symbolic value. In effect, he was taking the oath of office for two terms as President.

 

I had indicated at Photocosm on the 20th of January, 2009, Obama would hold his hand up and take the oath for two terms, 8 years. I just never thought he'd take the oath twice in one day. 

Anyway, based upon the license plate JAN2009 and no objective facts,  the race for the White House in 2012 has been decided.

Sorry, Mitt or Newt or anybody else with a strange first name who wants to play President. The race is over. Let Ron Paul have the nomination, and you guys can resume whatever you were doing before you had visions of yourself in the Oval Office. But don't expect Ron Paul to win, either. Somebody out there must have a license plate RONPAUL, but I haven't seen it. Meanwhile, I see Obama license plates every few months.

The only chance the Republicans have this late in the game is to draft somebody fresh and unknown, which means they have to put Yelnick McWawa at the top of the ticket. As Professor Cliff Clavin calculated years ago, Yelnick McWawa has the perfect name. 

Or maybe it was just a nice coincidence, seeing a January license plate on the last day of December.  Yeah, that's it.  You'd have to be crazy to believe the license plate oracle.

Never mind.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

©2012 Max Clarke, all rights reserved