A guest at dinner time

We decided to have dinner on the back verandah tonight. The first time in a long time. It's been so hot for days and the evening air was starting to cool - more pleasant outside than in.

A couple of our cats came out to join us and immediately their attention was drawn to the bottom of a tree by the side. I looked but only could see a large rock and bushes so went back to my dinner. That is, until Graham noticed a possum scurrying up the tree. I quickly grabbed the cats and put them inside again and then grabbed my camera to get a shot.

This is a ringtailed possum who look scared. He probably came for a drink of water out of the bowl I keep filled up for him - the weather has been scorching and he probably couldn't wait till dark.

Does this qualify for failblog?

If you're familiar with failblog you'll know there are photos posted there that don't quite have something right in the picture.

Well, I think this photo qualifies too - although I had to put a circle around the bit that tells you why.

What bit didn't they understand? Or don't they read pictures?

Echidna in Lysterfield Park

I was nearly ready to give up my walk after having trodden a path and back again and not seen anything that grabbed my interest... until I saw something waddling up ahead. I moved quickly to get closer and look what I found!

I had to stand still for awhile so he would not hide from me but continue about his business.

I thought he was running away from me but no.....

He was just going for dinner. Yum, yum, lots of ants!

Now he's had his fill there he's off to look around elsewhere. He hid from me not long after that.

Recover lost photos from a memory card

I thought I'd share a recent event in my family that may assist others.

Recently one of our daughters went overseas and she bought a new memory card for her camera during that time. We got an anxious phone call from her one night, in tears, because her camera couldn't read the card and she was worried she'd lost her photos - over 200 of them. Her father suggested she put it away safely and we'll look at it on her return. Later we discussed this event and thought perhaps the extreme change in temperatures (she'd gone from Egypt to Amsterdam over the Christmas/New Year period) may have affected the card but we weren't sure.

Anyway, putting the card into my computer confirmed our fears - the card was corrupted and unreadable. What should we do?

Well, we elected to go to a camera shop to see if they could help and the very helpful guy there told us they could send the card away and it would cost $59.95 but perhaps we should Google 'data recovery' and see what we come up with first. Which is what I did - lots of programs, which one should I choose and is it safe to download? And then I got the idea to search on the card brand name, along with 'data recovery' and then I found a program that the manufacturers recommend for data recovery of corrupted cards or deleted photos. Great!

I was still a bit dubious but did what I needed to, to download the program, install it and then start the process. I made sure I read every single word on each window presented to me as I didn't want to make a mistake. I had to enter in the brand of camera (Pentax) to ensure it selected the correct file types to look for.

I watched it count the number of image files it was finding and held my breath. Success! Out of 226 photos, 206 were recovered. The others were partly visible in Microsoft Photo Editor and not visible in another program. I viewed them on my computer and then burnt them to CD for her.

We are now able to see our daughter perched on the back of a camel, the pyramids she and her friend saw in Egypt, the work they were doing in Kenya and other photos they took.

I thought sharing our story here might help others who fear they have lost photos because a memory card has become corrupted. There is hope!

Lysterfield Lake Park, Victoria - beautiful!

I love the Australian countryside and the gum trees have such character. Here's a small selection from this weekend's visit to Lysterfield Park.