Closing an eventful day

 

Late in the afternoon on October 18th we stopped at Camel Rock on US 84 north of Santa Fe. While no colorful sunset came to meet us there the way it had in 2017, for a brief time the sun did pierce the western clouds to spotlight parts of the badlands prominent on the eastern side of the highway. That dedicated light advantaged me, as did focal lengths at the long end of my 100–400mm lens, when I hurried to portray the illumined badlands formations before the clouds settled back in.

 

    

In the top picture, the snow-covered Sangre de Cristo Mountains provided the background. That’s where this one remarkable photographic day began. It included yellow aspens and cottonwoods and willows, forests, badlands, hoodoos, and of course snow-covered mountains. It has provided the material for 10 posts with at least two photographs apiece. I could easily have done more posts about that day but the time has come to move on, even as the next day saw us moving on.

 

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Yesterday on a local television program the announcer spoke about “a California nursing home facility.” That last word is redundant because a nursing home is a kind of facility. Nothing is lost in saying “a California nursing home.” Similarly unnecessary is the last word in often-heard phrases like “in a school setting” and “in a hospital setting.” It’s sufficient to say “in a school” or “in schools,” “in a hospital” or “in hospitals.”

  

© 2022 Steven Schwartzman