Thanks for the nice comments, everyone! I'm always happy to show my baskets and talk about basket weaving. :O) I'm currently teaching myself to weave with homegrown willow. It's a b*tch! but so worth every moment of the struggle. nicole, get the 'Pine Needle Basketry' book by Judy Mallow from your local library or amazon/ebay/half.com! It is the best resource available that teaches how to do pine needle basketry. Baskets as art. I like that! :) This post was edited by party_music50 on Wed, Aug 20, 14 at 9:45

The above underwater pictures were heavily post-processed using Picasa. The human eye is pretty good at automatically adjusting the color balance so that what you see looks more vibrant. Here are a couple of the underwater pictures as they looked right out of the camera: and the "after" versions: At least with my camera and its waterproof case, it is really hard to see what you are taking a picture of, especially if you are zoomed in a fair bit. Starting with the none-too-bright LCD display of the camera, which is hard enough to see in brightly lit conditions, put it in the waterproof case which adds another layer of plastic, and then add in the swim mask your are wearing which is usually a little bit fogged, and it is mostly a guess as to what you are taking a picture of. The fact that the sea urchin in the earlier images is centered and in focus, at the equivalent of a 300mm zoom is beyond lucky. On one of the three attempts at snorkeling on the island the glass lens of the waterproof case fogged up, pretty much ruining most of that set of images. Below is the best one of that set straight from the camera, and after post-processing.

Give a weed an inch and it will take a mile! This is Purslane. Yes, I know that to many folks, it is good eating. Tossed this little clump on the compost pile last Thursday. This long tendril had grown out of it by yesterday.

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html Astronomy Picture of the Day Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2016 August 15 Human as Spaceship Space Image Credit: NASA, ESA, Hubble, and J. Maiz- Apellániz (IAA); Acknowledgement: D. De Martin; Human Image Copyright: Charis Tsevis; Composition: R. J. Nemiroff Explanation: You are a spaceship soaring through the universe. So is your dog. We all carry with us trillions of microorganisms as we go through life. These multitudes of bacteria, fungi, and archaea have different DNA than you. Collectively called your microbiome, your shipmates outnumber your own cells. Your crew members form communities, help digest food, engage in battles against intruders, and sometimes commute on a liquid superhighway from one end of your body to the other. Much of what your microbiome does, however, remains unknown. You are the captain, but being nice to your crew may allow you to explore more of your local cosmos.