About Martin LaBar (going on hiatus) / Martin LaBar  

Senior citizen, interested in science, Christian. My wife took a few of these photos, including some of the best ones. She also told me to take some of the others. I'm responsible for posting, etc.

My blog (mostly not photos) is here. My web page is here.

I recently re-set my My Contacts page, so that I only see one photo from each Contact at a time. I just couldn't keep up with those of you who post several at a time. Sorry.


If I'm not conscientiously able to comment on other people's photos, because of travel, sickness, other important parts of my life, I don't post any photos.

I believe that the relationships I have with Flickr Contacts are special. Among other things, I should usually view all their photos, and comment, or otherwise act, on them. (I usually won't comment on photos of pets or family members, or other things I know nothing about, or on pictures in your photos that don't seem to be original. I also won't try to comment on more than five photos from the same person in one day.) If I find I can't conscientiously do this, because of the volume of photos posted, or their content, I usually terminate my end of the Contact relationship. I should help my Contacts in any way I can. Because of these beliefs, I don't always reciprocate when someone takes me as a Contact, usually because I feel that I just can't add any more. I generally don't add anyone as a new Contact if they already have 200 or more Contacts, if they have a pattern of posting more than 5 photos on the same day, or if their photostream consists mostly of pets, family members, or things I'm not familiar with.

See my Flickr resolutions, originally posted January 1, 2006, and revised and re-posted November 2, 2007.

I try to do more than required -- if a group asks that I comment on one photo when adding one, I usually comment on 2 or 3, and the like. I know everyone hasn't the time for such behavior, but I'm retired. In other words, I try to apply the Golden Rule. I appreciate other Flickr members who do the same, and there are a lot of them, whether they'd put it that way or not.

I try to thank Flickr users for unsolicited comments or unsolicited Favoriting by reciprocating, not by adding a Thanks to our own photos. If you don't have any photos available to me, I don't usually respond. I don't consider comments by Contacts, or because of adding a photo to a Group that requires action, to be unsolicited.

Psalm 111:2 Great are the works of the Lord,
studied by all who delight in them.
3 Full of splendor and majesty is his work,
and his righteousness endures forever. (ESV)