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distortions.net

I'm Ryan M. Tech geek. Avgeek. California Native plant gardener. All photos on this blog, unless stated otherwise, are mine. Cameras: Fujifilm X-T5 and X100V. Views are my own.

Apple

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    And now a female Bullock’s Oriole has shown up in our backyard. What luck. #BullocksOriole #Birds

    A female Bullock’s Oriole is perched at the edge of a bird bath that’s in front of an elderberry bush. The bird has a fully gray back with white bars on its exposed right wing. Its upper chest is yellow-orange. Her head is orange from the eyes down to the chest though there’s a strip of black below it’s chin. The bird has black around its eyes and has a gray cap.
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    Here’s yesterday’s Bullock’s Oriole looking right at the camera. #BullocksOriole #Birds A Bullock’s Oriole sits in a violet flowering Ceanothus bush, looking straight ahead. It has an orange chest and orange cheeks. Its head is mostly orange, but it has black on top. The cute bird has black eyeliner and a black chin, creating a cool triangular pattern that nearly looks angry. You can just barely see its right wing. Its wing is black with white on the bottom.

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    Ladybug larvas were later than normal this year but geez do they have a feast now!

    Several ladybug larvae, kind of a rectangular bug with mostly black with orange stripes, are gorging on aphids on a sage.
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    We planted our vegetable and herb seedlings today. Our home compost has turned out real nice. Took several years to build up enough for use. The worms do most of the work since we can’t get the compost hot enough for long. 🌱 Two planted crop rows with drip tape. In the background are stunningly violet flowers of Ceanothus bushes. To the right of the crop rows is patio with grapes leafing out below the awning. Gravel makes up paths between crop rows.A wheel burrow full of worm laden compost. It’s sunrise and the shadows are long.

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    Present me is very thankful that past me connected all the commons in our newer irrigation box. So I didn’t have to undo the common “water proof” wire nut but only connect up the green wire to move from an older, now broken valve in an older box.

    A irrigation valve box with wires tied together by wire nuts including the green wire. The small box sits atop some gravel and has a stainless steel braided hose providing input water. There are 20-25 GPH pressure regulators and adapters to drip irrigation hoses.
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    First Cedar Waxwing ever in our backyard! They have a creepy high pitched song.

    This Cedar Waxwing has a black mask that extends from its eyes to its chin, with a crest of feathers on its head. Its wings and tail are brown with yellow and white accents, and its tail has a bright yellow tip. The Cedar Waxwing's most distinctive feature is its red-tipped wings. It’s on a budding tree with a blue sky.
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    Annie the Cat taking in a big dose of sunlight (again, but cuter this time). I hope she shakes her sinus infection soon. A black and white cat laying against an open slider with her head cradled by the slider's rails. Her sunlit fur has a rust hue.

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    Our young “New Century” Asian Pear tree is in full bloom. Our “Hosui” Asian Pear isn’t mature enough to flower and cross pollinate. Maybe next year!

    Three open white flowers at the top of a very young thin leafing out tree. A stake is next to it, keeping it up right. The background is composed of blurred out gravel.
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    DPReview.com to close. I loath Amazon even more now. I wish DPReview employees the very best. The site was my go-to for everything photography.

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    I’m getting more sore that MS still don’t have a macOS Bedrock edition. Surely the market is bigger there‽ I end up running Windows in VMWare 🤮

    Microsoft is bringing Minecraft to Chromebooks www.theverge.com/2023/3/15…

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    I didn’t lose an hour of sleep but I sure did lose a precious hour of weekend daytime activities.

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    The iOS Parcel app doesn’t write expected delivery dates to an iCloud calendar but only to a local calendar. So I just created a Shortcut Automation that runs at 9am daily, copying Parcel created events to an iCloud calendar (shared with my wife). No way to share Personal Automations so here’s a screenshot.

    A screen capture of a shortcut that copies Parcel events to an iOS Shared Calendar.
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    The iOS Parcel app doesn’t write expected delivery dates to an iCloud calendar but only to a local calendar. So I just created a Shortcut Automation that runs at 9am daily, copying Parcel created events to an iCloud calendar (shared with my wife). No way to share Personal Automations so here’s a screenshot.

    a screen shot showing a shortcut that copies events from the Parcel Calendar to a iCloud Shipments calendar. It checks for duplicates, too.
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    macOS Ventura settings and notifications (STILL getting unfixable log-in item notifications repeatedly) are a pitiful, frustrating mess but Windows, which I use at work, is still awful everywhere and missing key features I rely on in macOS so 🤷‍♂️ #macOS

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    I hate the MacOS login items notification that when clicked doesn’t tell me jack and furthermore the app it claims has added itself is disabled on that infernal system settings screen. I cannot figure out how to get Citrix to stop even with CleanMyMac X. 😤

    screen shot of the notification
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    A few “better” photos of last night’s brief snow around 1 am last night in Orland, CA. Around 1:15 am it went back to rain but points further north like Redding continued to get snow.

    A red car with a little bit of fresh snow on it in front of a street and some houses.A classic photo of snow on palm tree leaves against the dark, cloudy background.

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    Just flying an A340-600 from San Francisco International into Norman Y. Mineta San Jose International Airport. #XPlane #FlightSim #AvGeek

    A340-600 on approach to KSJC 30L, just passing over downtown San Jose at night. The freeway is all lit up and the runways are visible. It's a dark night.

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    I updated my iOS/macO Shortcut that takes a photo with geotag & date (preferably with timezone) from the Sharesheet and loads @flightradar24@mastodon.world playback. You’ll need a FlightRadar24 sub for beyond 7 days. It is now better at UTC conversion & URL formatting Get Shortcut

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    Here’s a quick & dirty iOS Shortcut that takes a photo with full geotag, date metadata (preferably with timezone) from the Sharesheet and loads @flightradar24@mastodon.world playback. Get Shortcut #AppleShortcuts #iOS

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    Black-necked Stilt near the City of Burlingame Shorebird Sanctuary. What a pose! Black-necked stilt facing the camera with its legs nearly crossed. It has a white belly, chest, and neck. It’s black long beak, forehead, eyes, and rear feathers is stark against the calm low tide bay waters

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