Eerie: Cave Ghosts, Moon and Fog

Halloween moon

On learning that this week’s photo challenge is “eerie,” I started thinking of all the photos in my library that might fit. My mind immediately went to this one, a shot of a nearly-full moon behind ragged clouds taken, appropriately enough, on Halloween last year.

Just about all of my “eerie” shots involve the moon, or clouds/fog, or both. For instance, this view of fog pouring over a hillside at sunset, and the shadows of the trees inside it.

Fog Shadows - Black and White

Or this one, a this scanned photo of a lunar eclipse from 1994. I’m fairly certain that the bright splotch is the moon, and the rest, including the ring and the sharper image at upper right, are lens artifacts. It’s been so long that I don’t remember any specifics of taking the photo.

Eclipse Ring

Finally I remembered a series of photos I took at the Thurston Lava Tube in Hawaii, trying to use natural light (with only the cave walls to brace the camera) and picking up ghost images of the other tourists wandering through.

Thurston Lava Tube Ghost Images

I have some more shots of that cave over at K-Squared Ramblings. That’s also the blog where I’m trying to do NaBloPoMo this month. I started yesterday with a post about yesterday’s shooting at LAX and the spillover it had on the parts of town near the airport: roads closed, constant helicopter noise, sirens, and thousands of stranded travelers leaving the airport on foot, trudging over a mile dragging their luggage in a ragged line. You know, if I’d thought about it and found the right position for a photo, that would have made for a good “eerie” image.

At first I wasn’t sure to make of this poster. “Believe” that we went to the moon? Well, yeah. Then the Powerball motif…

At first I wasn’t sure to make of this poster. “Believe” that we went to the moon? Well, yeah. Then the Powerball motif was pointed out, making it an ad for the state lottery. Shoot for the moon, I guess. But the lottery is all about blind luck, while the moon landings were planned out meticulously, calculated and tested stage by stage over years, *leaving as little to chance as possible*.

At first I wasn’t sure to make of this poster. “Believe” that we went to the moon? Well, yeah. Then the Powerball motif was pointed out, making it an ad for the state lottery. Shoot for the moon, I guess. But the lottery is all about blind luck, while the moon landings were planned out meticulously, calculated and tested stage by stage over years, *leaving as little to chance as possible*.

St. Patrick’s Day Moon & Jupiter

St. Patrick’s Day Moon & Jupiter on Flickr.

Yesterday I looked at the moon and Jupiter and thought, there’s going to be another conjunction tomorrow, isn’t there? Then I forgot, but fortunately I had to make a grocery run.

I took this photo just minutes ago. If you’re in the western half of North America, and the sky is clear, you can walk outside RIGHT NOW and see this.

A more Tumblr-friendly version of my photos from going out to see Comet Pan-STARRS on …

A more Tumblr-friendly version of my photos from going out to see Comet Pan-STARRS on Tuesday evening.  I went to a hillside park to get above the fog layer, and ran into a bunch of other people with binoculars, telescopes and more. Read on if you’re interested, or just enjoy the photos!

On Tumblr

Comet Pan-STARRS and the Moon

Moon and Comet

On Tuesday I drove up to a hillside park to get above the clouds and look for the comet. I arrived just a few minutes before sunset and found a large group of people with telescopes, binoculars and cameras lined up along the western side of the hill. The sun set, the moon came out, and the comet slowly came into view. I left just after the moon set a little over an hour later. More photos and write-up at K-Squared Ramblings.

Looking for comet Pan-STARRS last night. A lot of people had chosen the same hillside park…

Looking for #comet Pan-STARRS last night. A lot of people had chosen the same hillside park and were sharing their telescopes and binoculars as we watched the #sunset over the clouds, then the barely crescent #moon coming into view, and finally the comet itself. More at K2R: Comet Watch