Remain calm, be kind, and carry on regardless!
You've reached the online journal of Richard Rathe — online since 2004! In this iteration I'm trying a few new ideas: minimal markup, working with mostly plain text, and moving beyond the timeline. I call it BLIS (BLog It Simple). Find me online…
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The way to fight back is to function.
Panorama, Sunset, Lake_Santa_Fe, Florida
Jun 02, 2026
Purple martin in flight yesterday along the trail at the Waterworks Prairie Park in Iowa City, Iowa. #birds #birding #BirdPhotography #wildlife #WildlifePhotography #nature #NaturePhotography #photography #AltText
Birds Camping Everglades Galleries Nature Travel 2026
This was my 30th trip to the Everglades—different from all the others in several respects. First I was trying out new equipment (a sit-inside folding kayak). Second, I planned to just camp on a desert island, read, and take it easy. Third, I left from the Smallwood Store on Chokoloskee Island because the actual Ranger Station was closed for long-awaited hurricane repairs. I was also alone as there were no takers to join me this year.
Commentary History 2026
I put out my American Flag today. I've decided to only fly the flag on special days and this is one of them. Thinking about what makes this day special is what gives the act meaning. One cannot be patriotic every day, but that's not required. We need days like this to think hard about history (those actions and actors who mattered), the present (our current situation and how it differs from what it should be), and the future (the history we might make during the time remaining to us).
Birds Flowers Galleries History Road_Trip_2026 Travel 2026
The next day I had a three hour drive to my next destination—Petrified Forest National Park. The southern entrance is less used than the north but two of he major hiking trails are there: Crystal Forest & Blue Mesa. Unfortunately there is no trail to Newspaper Rock—a major Petroglyph site. It was cold and windy, but apparently I came at a good time to see the many desert flowers in bloom. 🙂
Birds Camping Everglades Galleries Travel Video 2015
This was my Eighteenth Everglades Journey and a collection of firsts for me: first Solo Trip, first en-route rendezvous, first exploration of the River of Grass, first time around Cape Sable, first time sailing beyond the horizon, first time camping in Florida Bay, and first major equipment failure (rudder). This was probably my penultimate trip! With the exception of bug problems at one site, it pretty much came off without a hitch. 🙂
Birds Nature 2026
Consider the Black-Bellied Whistling Duck! (One of the better bird names IMO.) Larger than average ducks, longer neck, pink bill & feet, used to be called tree ducks
. I see these very early in the morning and occasionally a pair on a nearby dock. Only learned recently that they are mostly active at night, which is why I wasn't aware they were around.
Birds Camping Everglades Galleries Panoramas Travel 2017
Everglades time again! This year I went for five days/four nights with my sister Diana Pray from LA. We did a lazy double figure eight route around northeastern Whitewater Bay and the Gulf. With the exception of a few distant motorboats we were completely alone for four days, quite remarkable! I brought along a 360° panoramic camera and took some impressive shots! [note1]
Books How_To Projects Technology 2026
I first encountered this delightful self-publishing format while visiting family in Sacramento. The city has many older neighborhoods with small houses and small yards. The locals take great pride in their sidewalk-facing gardens, including pro-social embellishments like little library
boxes and such. One house had a dispenser with these little pamphlets. I was impressed and intrigued.
Birds California Galleries Travel 2025
This is my second trip to Mono Lake and the good news is it hasn't changed much. In fact, the water level has stabilized (it was drying up) after agressive water management action by California. A large amount of water had already been drained for watering lawns and golf courses in Los Angeles. We visited the Tufa State Reserve on a sunny afternoon and saw many cool plants and birds.
Camping Everglades Galleries Travel 2009
This is a quick-and-dirty gallery of my Everglades photographs. Only a placeholder for now while I work on converting my older sites. See my Everglades Wilderness Guide for more trips, maps, & photographs.
Books History Reviews
Albert Camus (1947)
The Plague by Albert Camus is a allegorical novel set in the modern city of Oran on the north African coast. The principal character is Dr. Rieux, who confronts a series of medical, ethical and moral dilemmas as an epidemic of bubonic plague breaks out and the city is quarantined. Rieux must overcome his fear, loneliness and despair in order to function while conceding that he is mostly powerless in the face of his microscopic enemy. He is not alone. A number of memorable characters share his sojourn, each of them responding to the crisis in different ways: escape, repentance, debauchery, suicide, work, fantasy...
Camping Hammocks How_To Reviews 2025
There are various configurations of camping hammocks that I'll outline below. Most are gathered
with single tie-on points at each end. Some have integrated bug nets. Complete packages come with both nets & rainflies. After a brief survey of the different types, I go on to propose my criteria for the Ideal Hammock
.
Hdr History Travel 2009
First on our list was Uxmal, my personal favorite! Located in the gently rolling Puuc Hills, it is one of several significant Late Classic Mayan centers in that area. The so-called Pyramid of the Magician
dominates the modern entrance to the site. The main temple entrance takes the form of a huge mouth, still intimidating even today. The pyramid was actually built in five stages, each covering older parts of the structure.
Nature 2010
Here's a bit of astronomical lore I picked up a few years ago. I learned the sky at summer camp; I have looked through numerous telescopes over the years; I even took an astronomy class in college—but no one ever pointed out the Andromeda Galaxy (the most distant and largest object we can see with our naked eyes!). So I invented my own way to find it using the triangle in Cassiopeia as my pointer. This is a great target for binoculars!
Birds Galleries Science Travel 2024
Last week I traveled with my Sister Diana to Southern Illinois hoping to experience the Total Solar Eclipse. We were not disappointed! We had mostly blue skies that day with some high stratus clouds. Nothing can really prepare you for the moment of totality. We could suddenly see “stars” (actually the planets Venus and Jupiter) in the odd twilight. It got perceptively cooler and the wind changed direction.
History Technology 2010
Anthropologists Steven Churchill & Jill Rhodes recently wrote a fascinating article on the development of projectile weapons by early Homo sapiens and subsequent effects on large carnivores (extinction!) and human evolution.
Galleries Photography Southwest_2024 Travel Video 2024
The entrance to The Wave is a long curved corridor of twisted stone stripes with no real floor. The stripes vary in both color and indentation. It’s a remarkable visual/tactile surface! The actual Wave is tulip-shaped, looking a bit like a skateboard park designed by Dr. Seuss. There was an ephemeral pool at the lowest point.
Apostle_Islands Galleries Hdr History Panoramas Photography Travel Video 2022
Over the past eight years I’ve walked along the Lakeshore Trail to admire the Cliffs and Sea Caves from above.
Medicine Medinfo 2017
The History of Present Illness (HPI) has not changed appreciably since the introduction of the Problem-Oriented Medical Record in 1968. Until recently most medical documentation was created via dictation or handwritten notes. Narrative was the natural format for the HPI. This is no longer true in the era of online forms and computer-generated text.
Birds Flowers Galleries Road_Trip_2026 Travel 2026
While attending a family wedding I camped on my Brother's property in the Sierra Foothills. This turned out to be a hook-up place for Wild Turkeys in the area. About six Toms (males) appeared every day in pursuit of a few hens (who appeared to completely ignore their suitors 😉). Other birds included Hawks, Owls, and California Towhees. The area also supported a herd of deer and many wildflowers, including this Yellow Star Tulip (actually a type of lily).
Camping Reviews Tents 2024
This One Person Tent from River Country Products is a clever hybrid of single and double layer designs. The head of the tent has generous mesh panels for ventilation. The foot is completely enclosed in waterproofed nylon, allowing the rainfly to be much smaller (saving weight and volume). This is a unique design I have not seen elsewhere.
Galleries Nature Photography Plants Travel 2025
Spring is the time to hunt for carnivorous plants along the Gulf Coast of Florida and Alabama. The image below from 2020 shows three different, unrelated species that have all evolved the ability to trap and consume insects (Pitcher Plants, Butterworts, and Sundews).
Commentary Technology 2026
My Critique of: Your Voice, Your Choice
— A Guest Post by Claude Sonnet 4.5
The ELIZA Effect is a tendency to project human traits—such as experience, semantic comprehension or empathy—onto rudimentary computer programs having a textual interface.
This little book was conceived neither as a medical history nor as a technical discussion of surgery. It is instead a story of people, of friends with whom I have shared joy and sorrow, in short, bits of the day-to-day drama which is the life of a country doctor. Many of the incidents are trivial, in one sense of the word, yet each has had in it something which appealed to me enough to make me remember it as a highlight in my forty-five years as a country doctor.
