I got out of bed before J and did some computer work in the office. I had Clif Bars for breakfast. After J got out of bed, I went outside to the Jeep to get my CF card that I had left there last night. I downloaded the images I took last night, then downselected them in iView and Capture One (C1). I processed an image for the blog and tried out the new-and-improved ruler tool in Photoshop CS5. Yesterday, J learned that there's a new "Straighten" button when using the ruler tool, and it automatically rotates the image and then crops it to the aspect ratio of the pre-straightened image. It's pretty slick, and sure beats using the ruler, then selecting Image > Image Rotation > Arbitrary..., then cropping the image by hand. It does however (I assume) maximize the remaining amount of the image and doesn't take into account that some parts of the image might be more important than others. So, for the Green-Winged Teal from yesterday, I manually rotated it and then cropped it to retain as much of the reflection as possible and threw away some of the water that wasn't so important. The new "Straighten" button for the ruler tool should work great when the subject is centered. I worked up a blog entry and posted it.

I had lunch around 12:40. I started to rewire the external cell antenna (again) around 1:25. (You may read about the most recent rewiring on the blog entry for June 27, 2010.) I was working on it again because we picked up two cell phone adapters to use with external antennas when we went to the Verizon Wireless Store in Silverthorne on July 2, 2010. One has a TS-9 plug to attach directly to our USB727 sticks, and the other has a patch that can be used with any device. I cleaned out my wardrobe then removed the floor of it to gain access to the cell amp and antenna wiring. I used the cable that had run from the cell amp to our internal antenna, and reversed it so it now runs from the lightning protector to either of the cell phone adapters. I also tested the power supply for the cell amp, and it had blown a fuse, so I don't know if the 12VDC-to-6VDC transformer is bad or if the cell amp is bad. In any case, I removed the cell amp with the idea of possibly mounting it in a more accessible spot. I didn't move the 12VDC-to-6VDC transformer because I didn't have any wire to move it to a more convenient spot. So, I'll get to open up the wardrobe one more time to deal with that. While I was moving things around, I also moved our Kyocera KR2 wireless router from near my workspace, where it had been in the radiation pattern of the internal cell phone antenna, to near J's workspace, where it'll be near the cable to the external antenna. J tried out the antenna cable with the TS-9 plug for a direct connection to her USB727 stick, and her signal strength, and data throughput, increased significantly. :) I finished buttoning everything up around 3:05.

Then I went outside to look at the Jeep. It has a rattle in the rear near the glass panel and tailgate, and it's beginning to drive us nuts when we drive it. I adjusted the latch for the glass so that it closes tighter, and that didn't stop the rattle. Hopefully it'll help keep out more dust though. Then I looked at the guide for the tailgate and adjusted it, and while messing with that I heard a rattle inside the tailgate, so I think that's the source of the rattle. A dark cloud was approaching, so I decided to keep working on the Jeep at a later date.

I came back inside the RV around 3:30 and took an hour-long nap around 3:45. When I got up, J switched stopped using the external antenna adapter with the TS-9 plug and tried the one with the patch so we could both use the external antenna. J's data throughput dropped, and mine was slightly better than not using the external antenna at all.

We had dinner around 5:35. I had leftover pork marsala and some of the potato salad and Waldorf Salad from J&DC and J had the rest of my chili.

We left in the Jeep around 6:15 and drove out to visit the Pronghorn again. They weren't out when we drove in, so we continued up the road to look for Beaver and Green-Winged Teal. We didn't see any Beavers and we only saw adult Green-Winged Teal, and decided to head back to where the Pronghorn were. Five females were starting to make their way out of the woods, and we waited for them to come closer. Most were looking rather mangy as they were shedding their winter coats, but one looked pretty good. We followed them along the road for a while, and then they started running. I switched my camera to pan-and-blur mode (take the ISO down to 100, but I forgot to increase the f-stop like I usually do), and I was able to get a nice shot of the best looking female as she ran by (left). Fortunately, it was dark enough that f5.6 and ISO100 gave me about the shutter speed I was looking for: 1/45 sec. I usually like to be somewhere around 1/30 sec for a pan-and-blur shot like that.
We returned to the RV around 8:30 and there were some nice orange clouds to the East. I downloaded the images I took then downselected them in iView then in Capture One (C1). J served me the last of her blueberry pie slightly warmed.