Today’s interesting development concerns the Facebook/email hack that I mentioned a few days ago in The Birds! It seems that my Facebook friend had been hacked and the emails urgently asking for money to escape London were sent to her Facebook friends by the hacker. I noticed that the same person returned to Facebook, so I sent her a message asking if she had, perchance, recently been to London. She related the hacking incident to me. It is a sad tale. It reminds me to keep my own security up. I was happy to find that I had not been suckered into an elaborate fake Facebook friend scheme. She is real, and a nice person at that. I’m slightly less cynical than I was a couple of days ago. That’s always a good way to start the week.

Speaking of starting the week, here’s a Monday sunrise for you:I’ve seen better, but this one will do. I you click to enlarge, you’ll see that I caught a man in his canoe just where the sun is reflecting on the water.

Today we’re doing mostly Blennys. I’ve had quite a few of these cute little fish here before. You can find them by putting blenny in the search box. You’ve seen the Three-Lined Blenny (Ecsenius trilineatus)  before on Madang – Ples Bilong Mi:The details of the eyes are interesting, if you care to examine them by clicking to enlarge the image. Blennys are usually small fish, some species are among the smallest fish on the planet. Some Gobys are even smaller.

And here, for your viewing pleasure, is a fish that you’ve never seen before on MPBM. If fact, you’ll have to look closely to see it at all:It’s a Tripplespot Blenny (Crossosalarias macrospilus)  and this is the first one that I’ve managed to digitize:

Here’s another shot of the same specimen. It was moving around nervously from place to place. Where it landed here on this leather coral its camouflage doesn’t work very well:

The common name makes no sense to me. I see only one big spot.

You’ve seen the Latticed Sandperch (Parapercis clathrata)  several times here, mostly females. I admit a bias towards photographing females:Males of this species have a big, black spot on each side just above the pectoral fins behind the eyes. You can see in this young specimen that it is just developing. You can see an adult male specimen in this post.

I’ll toss a little colour onto this page with one of the reddest fish that I know, the Scarlet Soldierfish (Myripisits pralinia):They tend to hang around in these little caves in the reef. You can see another one in this post.

It’s time now to go out to check for the sunrise quality level. I know, I know, it’s a dirty job. Such is the life of a beach bum.

It’s Saturday here – Oh Yeah – Dive Day!  It’s entirely possible that as you read this I will be communing with the fish under twenty or thirty metres of warm salt water. Don’t you wish you were here?

Okay, now I’m going to go all dark. Never mind. It will pass. I’ve been listening to Pink Floyd’s Wish You Were Here  on scrambled repeat for about three hours now, laughing and leaking from my eyes and, yes, whistling – I’m an accomplished whistler.

Here’s what I feel like:

I like working out my feelings with images.

One ant is anticipatory, eager, communicative. Its antennae reach out, seek. “Come back.” it implores. The other ant is withdrawn, hiding. It’s catching the next “big jet airplane” to elsewhere. “Where are you going?”

“Away.”

The bee visits the flower. It doesn’t live there. Does the flower feel abandoned when the bee has had its fill of nectar and pollen and moves on?Ridiculous!

What is all this nonsense?

I spend so much time telling you what I love about living here in Madang. I extol the blessings of the expatriate life-style. I praise the freedom, the nearly total absence of oppressing authority. I have much to say about what I love. Now let me tell you what I hate.

Loss.

Here I have enjoyed more wonderful friendships than I ever thought were possible in a lifetime. I have had friends who would spill their blood for me if it were necessary, and mine for them – friends who would not let me suffer need without thought of satisfying it. I’ve had confidants who knew me better, far better, than any therapist. Friends who laughed and cried with me with true simpatico.  Where are they now?

Gone.

It’s the nature of this place that people come and go. It’s a transient paradise. Few can manage it forever. It is too uncertain, too intense, too fraught with passion. It is the nature of this place for bonds to be profound, transcending the trivialities of a more urbane life. It’s a rugged place. A place of rawness and animal strength. Fights are common. Reconciliations are tender and tearful.

It’s the goings that hurt.

How I wish, how I wish you were here.
We’re just two lost souls
Swimming in a fish bowl,
Year after year,
Running over the same old ground.
What have we found?
The same old fears.
Wish you were here.

I would last no time at all here without my good woman, my mate who consoles me when other cherished bonds are broken. I’ve seen tough guys cry in each others’ arms when parting for the last time.

Yeah, it’s that kind of place. Partings here tend to be permanent, despite promises to “keep in touch”. For many, the experiences of two or three years are best left to ferment. The less cherished fades. Only the sweet headiness remains.

The cut needs to be clean.

Blossoms fade, but the yearnings do not. They take on the patina of pressed roses in a diary:I’ve seen those hundred-year-old pressings crumbling between stained pages. Faded and tattered, yet bearing still the faint scent of a beauty that once was.

The approaching and parting. Canoes pass. Greetings are exchanged. Eyebrows flash knowingness:They pass and the moment passes with it.

A gloomy, tepid sunrise greets the next day, empty of promise and full of loss:You learn to tough it out.

So, to any and all of my dear friends of the past:I’ve never blamed anybody for leaving here. It’s a highly impermanent place. I loved you when you were here and I am full of constancy.

Know you are missed.

Well, it’s official now. I’m as sick as a dog. I went over to see our beloved Dr. John Mackerel (A . K. A. Tinpis ). He shoved around and pounded on my face, causing considerable pain. Then he put his stethoscope, fresh from the freezer, against my back while I pumped as much air as I could manage in and out of my chest. “Well, that’s horrible.” he pronounced. Tinpis  has a charming bedside manner, but he cares  about us. We know it and it counts. I don’t remember the mumbo-jumbo syndrome name, but it basically means that my entire airway system from behind my eyes to the bottom of my lungs has been Pearl Harboured by some very nasty bugs. I actually don’t feel as bad today as I did yesterday, but I’m toppling over more often, since my balance mechanism is basically shot.

Never mind. I have a week of something reasurringly named Augmentin Duo which I shall dutifully down twice a day until I’m back to fighting strength.

We’ve had a sunrise draught lately. This is the best one that I can come up with for the last week:Still, not bad for this season.

This is the thoroughly exasperating little Black-Spotted Puffer (Arothron nigropunctatus).  I say exasperating because it is the Carlos the Jackal  of fish – it never wants to have its picture taken:I caught this one just as it was diving for cover.

I don’t know why more underwater photographers don’t grab more images of coral. This Galaxea astreata  is a stunning little beauty:Measuring only about 50cm wide it packs a staggering array of colours and detail into a very small package. I put this image up at 2,000 pixels wide, so you might want to try it as a screen saver or background. It has plenty of detail.

I’ve been seeing some very nice Feather Stars lately. Usually, they’re not all that interesting and they are also difficult to photograph, because something is lost in the translation – I can’t really explain it. However this Comanthina schlegeli  turned out very pretty with the plate coral as a background:I find it amusing that they are sometimes waving their arms around madly and other times seem to be napping.

The Magnificent Anemone (Heteractis magnifica)  is always a beautiful subject for photography. They come in many different colours and the anemonefish which inhabit them prefer a colour which matches their own, to some degree. You can’t see any anemonefish in this shot, just some female Purple Anthea and a couple of different Damselfishes:The shot above was exposed with the natural light from the surface. I prefer this lighting, because it more accurately reflects what I saw.

Here is the same specimen shot with the flash turned on. There are some advantages:You can see the brilliant colour of the underside of the anemone and the way the anemone is attached to the underlying coral.

I’m going to have to see how long it takes me to recover from this illness. It’s very dangerous to dive with severely blocked sinus cavities, not to mention painful. Some divers have suffered severe hearing loss from diving with even a simple cold. I’m known as the “old lady” of diving in Madang, since I insist on following the rules (at least as long as it doesn’t affect my  diving). I’ll be careful.

I want to be doing this when I’m 90.

Man, I’m just freakin’ out! Good things are popping up like Jack-in-the-boxes all over the place. I’m hoping to be able to make some highly amusing announcements over the next couple of weeks. Eunie and I will have several bits of news that will surprise a lot of people. (No, we’re not  having a baby!)

None of these involve web connectivity, unfortunately, as the MadDog/TELIKOM war continues. Today’s dispatch from the front:  A spy informs me that several major cables, affecting hundreds of customers, are full of water and the equipment used to clear them out is not being employed. This is a problem that can be fixed and someone has simply not fixed it. I talked to the manager this morning and he said that he has instructed the crews to use the equipment to blow the moisture out of all of the cables. We’ll see how that goes. It should improve service for many customers. He also informed me that the long-awaited USB dongles for Internet connections should be available shortly. Let’s see what the definition of “shortly” turns out to be.

Wow, I’m in a good mood today. I’m going to make the most of it. If it doesn’t rain this afternoon I’m going to give myself the PM off and take a Harley ride with a friend. I hope to have some photos tomorrow. I got this schmaltzy picture of the sunrise this morning:I saw a remake of Hair  the other night and the tune of Good Morning Starshine  has been tickling my neurons at odd moments. It was generating extremely strong vibes this morning. So strong, in fact, that I added a fake star to the image above.

Good morning starshine
The earth says hello
You twinkle above us
We twinkle below

Good morning starshine
You lead us along
My love and me as we sing
Our early morning singing song

Gliddy gloop gloopy
Nibby nobby nooby
La la la lo lo
Sabba sibby sabba
Nooby abba dabba
Le le lo lo
Dooby ooby walla
Dooby abba dabba
Early morning singing song

Well, that certainly made me feel better. I hope you know the melody so that you could sing along as I did. It took me several tries to get the words right. It was a pleasant little task, requiring a nimbling of the tongue that I haven’t practiced since my acting classes. (What a waste of time that  was.)

I am presently listening to a lovely female artist by the name of Bebel Gilberto. She was born in America of Brazilian descent. She sings bossa nova as it was born to be sung – very smooth and sensual.

Before I start stinking the place up with more fishy stuff, here’s a nice panorama of Madang across the harbour from my house:I got the shot yesterday afternoon. It’s a stitch-up of nine frames.

First, I’ll show you the cute little chubby nudibranch with the disgusting name (Phyllidiella pustulosa): It’s hustling along at top speed along a white sponge.

Now, here is a coral of the Lobophylia  persuasion:Might make an interesting desktop background or screen saver if you’re in the mood for a little day-tripping.

Ah, and now on to the reef scenes. The two are quite similar, but with amusing differences in detail, showing how, in a few seconds the scene changes:You’ll probably by now recognise the Ornage Finned Anemonefish (Amphiprion chrysopterus):I suppose that I’ve annoyed you sufficiently for today, so I’ll say adios  until tomorrow.

Adios.

Yesterday I was so sick that I couldn’t come to the office – first time since I can remember. I’m usually very healthy. However, when I do catch a cold, it almost invariably attracts an opportunistic bacterial infection and I get very sick in only two or three days. I started Cipro yesterday morning and today I’m back to work.

I’m now so far behind (it’s the 19th here now – the last post is dated the 16th), that I don’t know if I’ll catch up. I thank TELIKOM for that. If I can find a cheap shyster in Madang today, I’m going to file a million Kina lawsuit against the clowns just for the sake of harassment.

Here’s this morning’s sunrise, the first nice one for several weeks:Since I had nothing better to do than to harass TELIKOM yesterday, I insisted that a data technician come to my house and do a data transmission test from there to the exchange. The results were exactly what I’ve been telling them for the last five years. The decades-old cables are totally incapable of transmitting data. This morning, when I got up, I didn’t even have a dial tome.

Here’s a typical shot of a TELIKOM junction box:What have we here? Hmm. . . Among other items that don’t belong there are water, buai spet (the horrible bloody-looking stuff that is spat from the mouth when chewing betel nut), various bits and pieces of garbage, and someone’s shoe. I have seen worse. They seem to make a convenient place to, ah, . . .  how can I put this . . . take a dump. I wonder if this is a matter of bodily necessity or a comment about TELIKOM. I’ve been tempted.

Need more TELIKOM goodness? How about this shot that I took only this morning outside my own office:Well, that certainly doesn’t look quite so messy. However, close inspection shows some serious no-no items. First is the continual flooding. I’ve often seen this box full to the brim with water. Check out the silly attempts to plug the thing up with scraps of tape. The black bulb contains all of the junctions between the wires. It is supposed to be water-tight. Does it look water-tight to you?

I’ve had it with TELIKOM.

From now on, it’s WAR! Starting TODAY.

Today I have some more shots from my dive at Magic Passage yesterday in a ripping current. That’s exactly what you want at that site, as long as it’s coming in, bringing cold, clear ocean water. It make for great visibility, but it was a little too strong yesterday, making photography difficult. The strong currents there cause a lot of swirling around the features of the passage, so, one second you are being sucked in one direction and the next moment, it’s just the opposite. It can be hard on cameras and heads alike.

But first, here’s this morning’s yummy sunrise, a five exposure panorama:

For the techno-geeks out there, this shot was taken at first ligh, just enough to barely read the knobs on the camera, hand held from the bobbing stern of Faded Glory and shot at ISO 1600. Not bad for a point and shoot camera. Click to enlarge and have a look. There was noise, alright, but I smashed it into submission with the normal settings of Noise Ninja Pro after merging the frames in Photoshop. This is a huge reduction of the original which was about 6000 pixels wide – enough to paper your lounge room wall.

Back into the water, here are some very young Silver Sweetlips (Diagramma pictum)  right at the mouth of Magic Passage. I got this snap shot as I was fighting against the current. The G11 did a fine job:You all know that I like “find the fish” shots. This isn’t the most difficult one that I’ve shown you, but it’s still a good example of a master of camouflage:It’s a rather large specimen of the Papuan Scorpionfish (Scorpaenopsis papuensis),  probably the most common variety of scorpionfish that we see here. Did you find it quickly?

Here is a close up and personal shot of its head:

Pretty, isn’t it? In a functional sort of way.

Thanks to the eagle-eyes of my good dive buddy Rich Jones, I got my first good image of a baby version of the big daddy above. I wouldn’t have spotted this in a million years unless I was stuck on that rock with nothing else to do:It is about 3cm long and fades in perfectly with its surroundings.

I’m very happy with my new G11. The next step is to take both cameras down on the same dive and take identical shots for comparison. Get ready for some techno-babble, but with pretty pictures to soften it.

Then I’m hoping to start conducting on-site UW photography lessons. I”m looking for serious students with at least an Advanced Open Water certificate.

Anybody interested?

Today’s post will be all over the place, because that’s where my head is. I’m the worlds worst mental multi-tasker. Physically, I’m okay. I can simultaneously pat my head, rub my tummy, hop on one foot, roll my eyes, chew gum and twirl a hula-hoop while singing the national anthem of Papua New Guinea (most of it, anyway). But, I can’t think about more than one thing at a time. This makes my workday feel like a picnic in one of the lower levels of Dante’s Inferno.

So, since I’m even more scatterbrained than normal, it would be asking too much to expect any kind of theme today. I’ll start with the Mystery Insect. Up at Blueblood, Pascal Michon found this weird thing:

Though it looks very much like a mosquito, it’s not. Pascal tells me that it is a fly of some kind because of the shape of the mouth parts (ugh!). I had to take about twenty exposures to get one while it was sticking its tongue, or whatever you call it, out. All the while it was sitting on my hand, presumably deciding whether or not I was edible. Pascal put it in a jar and sent it off somewhere for an ID check. More later on that.

Switching subjects completely, here is a nice shot of a gang of Pickhandle Barracuda (Sphyraena jello)  down deep in Magic Passage:It’s worth clicking this one to enlarge it.

The polyps of this Gonipora  genus coral (I can’t identify the species.) remind me of waving wheat:The metaphor works better if you can see the water currents making it sway back and forth.

The new Canon G11 came into play this morning at about 06:15 to catch the sunrise. This is the fantasy version:

I couldn’t resist playing with the colours.

This is what it really looked like:That’s a four frame panorama more or less exactly as it came from the camera. So far, so good.

Finally, I’m happy to announce that Bozo the Clown made a guest appearance recently in Madang and I was proud to take him diving. Here he is all google-eyed and frazzled, looking as if he’s enjoying a giant licorice all-day sucker. Someone should tell him that you’re supposed to lick it, not stick the whole thing in your mouth:

Okay, okay, it’s actually me.

Is it any wonder that I’m the laughingstock of Madang? Hey, everybody is entitled to a job.