It isn't very common during the day freight trains run down the southern lines through Gatwick Airport station however this is an exception and running as 7V74 from Hither Green Down Reception to Crawley Foster Yeoman site the train formed of a Class 66 locomotive, number 66172, leads 12 wagons a short train even for these parts down past the Airport station the locomotive built by General Motors as JT42CWR with Electromotive engine (EMD710) this locomotive in England, Wales & Scotland Railway(EWS) livery however now operated by DB Schenker UK who have been struggling to gain work recently from the ever expanding Europorte owned GB Railfreight however certainly DB Schenker are still the most commonly seen railfreight operator in the London area this train loaded with aggregates heading south here as a Southern Class 377 unit just gets into the shot on the up running line, the Class 66 and train on the down line here, passing through and gaining power behind a stopping Southern service the locomotive can be seen given off a little clag.

Ever expanding it seems.

Bottle caps found in France, Portugal, and Spain. My haul was down from my trip the previous year as no one drinks quite as much as Germans. I found around 70 I didn't have wandering through the Iberian Peninsula, compared with five times that I found traveling around Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Czech Republic, and Italy.

 

My ever expanding Bottle Cap collection can be seen in its entirety by following the link.

 

Notes of fact or opinion on the beers are encouraged.

 

Trades and donations of new caps welcome.

 

So this was my second "night in" and it's fair to say life has been very rocky at times since last time. But we're surviving and I'm (Nicky) still alive (just) and very much enjoying and embracing being me, so things could be worse haha.

BTW I know the photos are very samey (is that even a word..?) and I need to have a bit more variety, I'll see what I can do in the future... That said I'm loving this new top from Boden :)

Oh and I've added more to my ever expanding bio/life story if you're interested in knowing more :)

19th Century Courthouses.

After full self-government in South Australia in 1857 the new government spent its money cautiously. In terms of public infrastructure they mainly built gravel roads, courthouses and police stations, and later in the 1870s public schools and railway lines and stations. The 19th century was an era of low government spending. Fortunately many of the courthouses, designed to impress and give the impression of the solidness of government and police keeping, have survived albeit with vastly different uses. Thus the Courthouse in Two Wells (1876) is now a craft shop, Balaklava Courthouse (1913) is now an art gallery, Georgetown Courthouse (1879) is now a residence, Laura Courthouse (1878) is now an art gallery and Port Pirie Courthouse (1882) is now used as state government offices.

 

Gladstone Gaol.

The first Gladstone township was laid out by Matthew Moorhouse (former Protector of Aborigines) in 1872 as a private town, but a Government town was proclaimed next to it as 'Booyoolie' in 1875. The two towns merged but it was not until 1940 that the name of 'Gladstone' was officially adopted for both towns. The town was named after William Gladstone (1809-1898) a 19th century British Prime Minister. The town developed rapidly with the arrival of the railway in 1877 from Port Pirie which separated the two growing townships. Settlement occurred in the district after the government resumed much of the original Booyoolee lease land in 1869 and put it up for public auction in 1871. In Moorhouse’s town east of the railway line is the old butter factory and the original school building. West of the railway yards, with its three gauges, you can see the newer school (1929) and Grubbs Cordial Factory. Gladstone High School was one of the first rural high schools opening in 1913. Grubbs Cordial Factory has been operating continuously since 1876 but with various owners. The Grubb family were not the founders but they have been running the factory since 1914. Note the architectural style of the two banks in the Main Street of Gladstone. Both were built in the same period; one in the traditional Greek classical style with Doric columns with volutes on top and a clearly defined pediment across the roof line; the other was built in stripped classical style with no ornamentation and some remnants of classical features only. The Gladstone Courthouse was built in 1878 and it became a major regional Courthouse as it was situated mid-way between Laura and Georgetown. It was attached to the local police station. The land for the police station was purchased by the government for £120 in December 1877. The Gladstone Police Station and Court opened in March 1878. Laura and Georgetown petitioned for their own Courthouses which were duly erected in 1878 and 1879 respectively. The Courthouse in Georgetown cost nearly £1,100. The Gladstone Courthouse closed as a court many years ago. The growth of the town was further hastened with the establishment of the Gladstone Goal.

 

Gladstone has some fine old buildings including the two banks mentioned above .They both opened in 1937. Along the Main Street is the old Post Office which has been modernised and changed from its original appearance. It opened around 1880. The hotels include the Gladstone Hotel built in 1875 and the Commercial Hotel which was erected in 1879; and the oldest hotel is the Booyoolie Hotel built in 1873. Finlayson’s Butter Factory with its signage was built around 1890 for a skating rink and converted to a butter factory in 1922 which operated into the early 1980s partly because it produced butter for Broken Hill. The town has several fine church including the Anglican Church which was the Pro Cathedral for the Anglican Diocese of Willochra for many years. It was built in 1891. Amateur Anglican Church architect William Mallyon, manager of a Port Pirie bank designed the transept, sanctuary and chancel which was added in 1890 and although he designed the tower at that time it was not erected until 1928. The Diocese of Willochra was based in Gladstone from its inception in 1915 and the nearby Bishops House was completed in 1923. In 1999 the Diocese moved its headquarters to Port Pirie and made the church of St Peter and St Paul the Anglican Cathedral. The Anglican Sunday School hall next to the church was built in 1909. The Catholic Church is on the hill near the primary school on West Terrace on the northern fringe of the town. It was built in 1928 when the original church of 1881 became a hall before it was demolished in 1951. A Wesleyan Methodist Church opened in Gladstone in 1876. This small Wesleyan Church was connected to the current Methodist, now Uniting Church, in 1922. The former Bible Christian Methodist Church at 32 High Street was built in 1876. Upon Methodist churches Union in 1900 it was left vacant until 1919 when the Masons purchased it for £120 for use as the Masonic Hall which it still is. The funds from the sale of the church to the Masons helped fund the new 1922 Methodist church. Next to the now Masonic Temple is a grand two storey house dating from around 1900 with a small cupola on an arched entry porch. It is just south of the old Police Station and Police Court room. From here you can turn left into Fourth Street and left again into Sixth Street to reach St Albans Anglican Church. Behind the 1960s Council Chambers in Cross Street is the stone gable faced Soldiers Memorial Hall built in 1921.

 

Gladstone Goal was built between 1879 and 1881 at a cost of over £21,000. Tenders were called and Sara and Dunstan of Burra won the tender for its construction. Its design was based on the model prison of Bristol in England. Slate for the flooring was transported from Mintaro and stone was quarried locally for both the cell blocks and the high external prison yard walls. It was intended for debtors and inebriates and seldom housed more than 20 prisoners at any one time from when it opened in 1881 until it closed in 1939. Both men and women were incarcerated in Gladstone gaol and the first gaol keeper was Mr Pollet who had been the keeper at Redruth gaol in Burra. When opened it could accommodate 86 prisoners but with a later expansion this increased to around 200 prisoners. But given that it seldom accommodated more than 20 inmates why did they ever expand it? Criminals from around the Mid North charged with serious crimes like murder were also housed in this prison awaiting their trials. Gladstone gaol closed in 1939 and during World War Two from September 1939 to 1940 it was used to inter Italians and Germans of suspect loyalties. Then from 1942 until 1943 it was used by the Army as a Military Detention barracks. In 1953 it reopened for convicted youth offenders so that they were separated from the hardened criminals of Yatala gaol at Northfield. It opened with 90 youth offenders in 1953. Its peak year of operations was 1969 when it held 130 youth offenders. It finally closed as a youth prison in 1975. Prison life was never easy. The daily routine of the Gladstone Gaol in the early years was as follows:

7.00 am - Prisoners woken and served breakfast in their cells.

7.30 am - Leave cells, empty toilet buckets and shower.

8.00 am - Parade in exercise yard and work details issued.

11.30 am - Collect lunch and return to cells.

1.00pm - Return to work assignments.

4.15 pm - Finish work and shower. Collect evening meals from the kitchen and return to cells.

9.00 pm - Lights out. Prisoners were allowed to have visitors once a fortnight and write one letter a week and their work assignments included making metal buckets, making mops, metal garbage tins and working in the prison vegetable gardens and orchard.

 

19th Century Courthouses.

After full self-government in South Australia in 1857 the new government spent its money cautiously. In terms of public infrastructure they mainly built gravel roads, courthouses and police stations, and later in the 1870s public schools and railway lines and stations. The 19th century was an era of low government spending. Fortunately many of the courthouses, designed to impress and give the impression of the solidness of government and police keeping, have survived albeit with vastly different uses. Thus the Courthouse in Two Wells (1876) is now a craft shop, Balaklava Courthouse (1913) is now an art gallery, Georgetown Courthouse (1879) is now a residence, Laura Courthouse (1878) is now an art gallery and Port Pirie Courthouse (1882) is now used as state government offices.

 

Gladstone Gaol.

The first Gladstone township was laid out by Matthew Moorhouse (former Protector of Aborigines) in 1872 as a private town, but a Government town was proclaimed next to it as 'Booyoolie' in 1875. The two towns merged but it was not until 1940 that the name of 'Gladstone' was officially adopted for both towns. The town was named after William Gladstone (1809-1898) a 19th century British Prime Minister. The town developed rapidly with the arrival of the railway in 1877 from Port Pirie which separated the two growing townships. Settlement occurred in the district after the government resumed much of the original Booyoolee lease land in 1869 and put it up for public auction in 1871. In Moorhouse’s town east of the railway line is the old butter factory and the original school building. West of the railway yards, with its three gauges, you can see the newer school (1929) and Grubbs Cordial Factory. Gladstone High School was one of the first rural high schools opening in 1913. Grubbs Cordial Factory has been operating continuously since 1876 but with various owners. The Grubb family were not the founders but they have been running the factory since 1914. Note the architectural style of the two banks in the Main Street of Gladstone. Both were built in the same period; one in the traditional Greek classical style with Doric columns with volutes on top and a clearly defined pediment across the roof line; the other was built in stripped classical style with no ornamentation and some remnants of classical features only. The Gladstone Courthouse was built in 1878 and it became a major regional Courthouse as it was situated mid-way between Laura and Georgetown. It was attached to the local police station. The land for the police station was purchased by the government for £120 in December 1877. The Gladstone Police Station and Court opened in March 1878. Laura and Georgetown petitioned for their own Courthouses which were duly erected in 1878 and 1879 respectively. The Courthouse in Georgetown cost nearly £1,100. The Gladstone Courthouse closed as a court many years ago. The growth of the town was further hastened with the establishment of the Gladstone Goal.

 

Gladstone has some fine old buildings including the two banks mentioned above .They both opened in 1937. Along the Main Street is the old Post Office which has been modernised and changed from its original appearance. It opened around 1880. The hotels include the Gladstone Hotel built in 1875 and the Commercial Hotel which was erected in 1879; and the oldest hotel is the Booyoolie Hotel built in 1873. Finlayson’s Butter Factory with its signage was built around 1890 for a skating rink and converted to a butter factory in 1922 which operated into the early 1980s partly because it produced butter for Broken Hill. The town has several fine church including the Anglican Church which was the Pro Cathedral for the Anglican Diocese of Willochra for many years. It was built in 1891. Amateur Anglican Church architect William Mallyon, manager of a Port Pirie bank designed the transept, sanctuary and chancel which was added in 1890 and although he designed the tower at that time it was not erected until 1928. The Diocese of Willochra was based in Gladstone from its inception in 1915 and the nearby Bishops House was completed in 1923. In 1999 the Diocese moved its headquarters to Port Pirie and made the church of St Peter and St Paul the Anglican Cathedral. The Anglican Sunday School hall next to the church was built in 1909. The Catholic Church is on the hill near the primary school on West Terrace on the northern fringe of the town. It was built in 1928 when the original church of 1881 became a hall before it was demolished in 1951. A Wesleyan Methodist Church opened in Gladstone in 1876. This small Wesleyan Church was connected to the current Methodist, now Uniting Church, in 1922. The former Bible Christian Methodist Church at 32 High Street was built in 1876. Upon Methodist churches Union in 1900 it was left vacant until 1919 when the Masons purchased it for £120 for use as the Masonic Hall which it still is. The funds from the sale of the church to the Masons helped fund the new 1922 Methodist church. Next to the now Masonic Temple is a grand two storey house dating from around 1900 with a small cupola on an arched entry porch. It is just south of the old Police Station and Police Court room. From here you can turn left into Fourth Street and left again into Sixth Street to reach St Albans Anglican Church. Behind the 1960s Council Chambers in Cross Street is the stone gable faced Soldiers Memorial Hall built in 1921.

 

Gladstone Goal was built between 1879 and 1881 at a cost of over £21,000. Tenders were called and Sara and Dunstan of Burra won the tender for its construction. Its design was based on the model prison of Bristol in England. Slate for the flooring was transported from Mintaro and stone was quarried locally for both the cell blocks and the high external prison yard walls. It was intended for debtors and inebriates and seldom housed more than 20 prisoners at any one time from when it opened in 1881 until it closed in 1939. Both men and women were incarcerated in Gladstone gaol and the first gaol keeper was Mr Pollet who had been the keeper at Redruth gaol in Burra. When opened it could accommodate 86 prisoners but with a later expansion this increased to around 200 prisoners. But given that it seldom accommodated more than 20 inmates why did they ever expand it? Criminals from around the Mid North charged with serious crimes like murder were also housed in this prison awaiting their trials. Gladstone gaol closed in 1939 and during World War Two from September 1939 to 1940 it was used to inter Italians and Germans of suspect loyalties. Then from 1942 until 1943 it was used by the Army as a Military Detention barracks. In 1953 it reopened for convicted youth offenders so that they were separated from the hardened criminals of Yatala gaol at Northfield. It opened with 90 youth offenders in 1953. Its peak year of operations was 1969 when it held 130 youth offenders. It finally closed as a youth prison in 1975. Prison life was never easy. The daily routine of the Gladstone Gaol in the early years was as follows:

7.00 am - Prisoners woken and served breakfast in their cells.

7.30 am - Leave cells, empty toilet buckets and shower.

8.00 am - Parade in exercise yard and work details issued.

11.30 am - Collect lunch and return to cells.

1.00pm - Return to work assignments.

4.15 pm - Finish work and shower. Collect evening meals from the kitchen and return to cells.

9.00 pm - Lights out. Prisoners were allowed to have visitors once a fortnight and write one letter a week and their work assignments included making metal buckets, making mops, metal garbage tins and working in the prison vegetable gardens and orchard.

 

Here's another recent addition to my ever expanding minidress collection! This one is an really clingy and snug fitting one shoulder metallic wet look red minidress with side shirring and I've matched it up with Osé Angel seamless pantyhose and my fabulous open toe platform pumps with the 5½" heels.

 

I think it looks super and I hope you do too!

  

To see more pix of my legs in short skirts and other tight, sexy and revealing outfits click this link:

www.flickr.com/photos/kaceycdpix/sets/72157623668202157/

Additions to my ever expanding Bottle Cap Collection. These caps were mostly gifts from friends who know of my collection, and this particular set shows some of the cooler ones they have found as a result of being on the look out. Thanks.

 

Notes on taste or origin encouraged.

 

Trades and donations welcome.

On my 5-day trip to Yosemite with friends last month, our first stop of any appreciable length was at Olmsted Point along Tioga Road. I had been wanted to explore the area somewhat, particularly to find views of nearby Tenaya Lake. We found that a relatively easy scramble up the sloping granite above Olmsted Point lead to ever-expanding views of Tenaya Lake to the northeast - the views I had hoped to find.

 

Since we were passing through only days after Tioga Road opened from the snowy winter, Tenaya Lake was still frozen over. It's somewhat unusual to see the lake as a patch of snow, but I really don't mind it as it contrasts so well with the forest and granite surrounding it. This is my first black and white image from Yosemite. I preferred the black and white treatment particularly because of the bright white cumulus clouds in the distance, which look best in sharp contrast to a deep dark sky.

 

Nikon D90 | Nikon 50mm f/1.8 | f/8 | 1/640s | ISO200 | Tripod

I've been shopping again! This time a package came in from Wicked Temptations... one of the dresses it contained is this Fantastically Tight, shiny lycra spandex tube style shirred minidress with a silver back zip.

I think this has to be the shortest minidress in my ever expanding collection!

What do you think? Short Enough?

 

To see more pix of my legs in short dresses and other tight, sexy and revealing outfits click this link:

www.flickr.com/photos/kaceycdpix/sets/72157623668202157/

Added 2 mirrors to the mirror wall. The long one in the middle is one and luckily it fit perfectly between the other 2 when I tried it sideways. So I got to save a hole!

Gladstone Gaol.

The first Gladstone township was laid out by Matthew Moorhouse (former Protector of Aborigines) in 1872 as a private town, but a Government town was proclaimed next to it as 'Booyoolie' in 1875. The two towns merged but it was not until 1940 that the name of 'Gladstone' was officially adopted for both towns. The town was named after William Gladstone (1809-1898) a 19th century British Prime Minister. The town developed rapidly with the arrival of the railway in 1877 from Port Pirie which separated the two growing townships. Settlement occurred in the district after the government resumed much of the original Booyoolee lease land in 1869 and put it up for public auction in 1871. In Moorhouse’s town east of the railway line is the old butter factory and the original school building. West of the railway yards, with its three gauges, you can see the newer school (1929) and Grubbs Cordial Factory. Gladstone High School was one of the first rural high schools opening in 1913. Grubbs Cordial Factory has been operating continuously since 1876 but with various owners. The Grubb family were not the founders but they have been running the factory since 1914. Note the architectural style of the two banks in the Main Street of Gladstone. Both were built in the same period; one in the traditional Greek classical style with Doric columns with volutes on top and a clearly defined pediment across the roof line; the other was built in stripped classical style with no ornamentation and some remnants of classical features only. The Gladstone Courthouse was built in 1878 and it became a major regional Courthouse as it was situated mid-way between Laura and Georgetown. It was attached to the local police station. The land for the police station was purchased by the government for £120 in December 1877. The Gladstone Police Station and Court opened in March 1878. Laura and Georgetown petitioned for their own Courthouses which were duly erected in 1878 and 1879 respectively. The Courthouse in Georgetown cost nearly £1,100. The Gladstone Courthouse closed as a court many years ago. The growth of the town was further hastened with the establishment of the Gladstone Goal.

 

Gladstone has some fine old buildings including the two banks mentioned above .They both opened in 1937. Along the Main Street is the old Post Office which has been modernised and changed from its original appearance. It opened around 1880. The hotels include the Gladstone Hotel built in 1875 and the Commercial Hotel which was erected in 1879; and the oldest hotel is the Booyoolie Hotel built in 1873. Finlayson’s Butter Factory with its signage was built around 1890 for a skating rink and converted to a butter factory in 1922 which operated into the early 1980s partly because it produced butter for Broken Hill. The town has several fine church including the Anglican Church which was the Pro Cathedral for the Anglican Diocese of Willochra for many years. It was built in 1891. Amateur Anglican Church architect William Mallyon, manager of a Port Pirie bank designed the transept, sanctuary and chancel which was added in 1890 and although he designed the tower at that time it was not erected until 1928. The Diocese of Willochra was based in Gladstone from its inception in 1915 and the nearby Bishops House was completed in 1923. In 1999 the Diocese moved its headquarters to Port Pirie and made the church of St Peter and St Paul the Anglican Cathedral. The Anglican Sunday School hall next to the church was built in 1909. The Catholic Church is on the hill near the primary school on West Terrace on the northern fringe of the town. It was built in 1928 when the original church of 1881 became a hall before it was demolished in 1951. A Wesleyan Methodist Church opened in Gladstone in 1876. This small Wesleyan Church was connected to the current Methodist, now Uniting Church, in 1922. The former Bible Christian Methodist Church at 32 High Street was built in 1876. Upon Methodist churches Union in 1900 it was left vacant until 1919 when the Masons purchased it for £120 for use as the Masonic Hall which it still is. The funds from the sale of the church to the Masons helped fund the new 1922 Methodist church. Next to the now Masonic Temple is a grand two storey house dating from around 1900 with a small cupola on an arched entry porch. It is just south of the old Police Station and Police Court room. From here you can turn left into Fourth Street and left again into Sixth Street to reach St Albans Anglican Church. Behind the 1960s Council Chambers in Cross Street is the stone gable faced Soldiers Memorial Hall built in 1921.

 

Gladstone Goal was built between 1879 and 1881 at a cost of over £21,000. Tenders were called and Sara and Dunstan of Burra won the tender for its construction. Its design was based on the model prison of Bristol in England. Slate for the flooring was transported from Mintaro and stone was quarried locally for both the cell blocks and the high external prison yard walls. It was intended for debtors and inebriates and seldom housed more than 20 prisoners at any one time from when it opened in 1881 until it closed in 1939. Both men and women were incarcerated in Gladstone gaol and the first gaol keeper was Mr Pollet who had been the keeper at Redruth gaol in Burra. When opened it could accommodate 86 prisoners but with a later expansion this increased to around 200 prisoners. But given that it seldom accommodated more than 20 inmates why did they ever expand it? Criminals from around the Mid North charged with serious crimes like murder were also housed in this prison awaiting their trials. Gladstone gaol closed in 1939 and during World War Two from September 1939 to 1940 it was used to inter Italians and Germans of suspect loyalties. Then from 1942 until 1943 it was used by the Army as a Military Detention barracks. In 1953 it reopened for convicted youth offenders so that they were separated from the hardened criminals of Yatala gaol at Northfield. It opened with 90 youth offenders in 1953. Its peak year of operations was 1969 when it held 130 youth offenders. It finally closed as a youth prison in 1975. Prison life was never easy. The daily routine of the Gladstone Gaol in the early years was as follows:

7.00 am - Prisoners woken and served breakfast in their cells.

7.30 am - Leave cells, empty toilet buckets and shower.

8.00 am - Parade in exercise yard and work details issued.

11.30 am - Collect lunch and return to cells.

1.00pm - Return to work assignments.

4.15 pm - Finish work and shower. Collect evening meals from the kitchen and return to cells.

9.00 pm - Lights out. Prisoners were allowed to have visitors once a fortnight and write one letter a week and their work assignments included making metal buckets, making mops, metal garbage tins and working in the prison vegetable gardens and orchard.

 

I was digging around for something nice and season-appropriate to wear, when I chanced upon this wintery wonder. I’d quite forgotten how big it is - literally inches wider than even my ever-expanding waistline. All of which just goes to show what a helpless Vivien of Holloway fangirl I really am…!

19th Century Courthouses.

After full self-government in South Australia in 1857 the new government spent its money cautiously. In terms of public infrastructure they mainly built gravel roads, courthouses and police stations, and later in the 1870s public schools and railway lines and stations. The 19th century was an era of low government spending. Fortunately many of the courthouses, designed to impress and give the impression of the solidness of government and police keeping, have survived albeit with vastly different uses. Thus the Courthouse in Two Wells (1876) is now a craft shop, Balaklava Courthouse (1913) is now an art gallery, Georgetown Courthouse (1879) is now a residence, Laura Courthouse (1878) is now an art gallery and Port Pirie Courthouse (1882) is now used as state government offices.

 

Gladstone Gaol.

The first Gladstone township was laid out by Matthew Moorhouse (former Protector of Aborigines) in 1872 as a private town, but a Government town was proclaimed next to it as 'Booyoolie' in 1875. The two towns merged but it was not until 1940 that the name of 'Gladstone' was officially adopted for both towns. The town was named after William Gladstone (1809-1898) a 19th century British Prime Minister. The town developed rapidly with the arrival of the railway in 1877 from Port Pirie which separated the two growing townships. Settlement occurred in the district after the government resumed much of the original Booyoolee lease land in 1869 and put it up for public auction in 1871. In Moorhouse’s town east of the railway line is the old butter factory and the original school building. West of the railway yards, with its three gauges, you can see the newer school (1929) and Grubbs Cordial Factory. Gladstone High School was one of the first rural high schools opening in 1913. Grubbs Cordial Factory has been operating continuously since 1876 but with various owners. The Grubb family were not the founders but they have been running the factory since 1914. Note the architectural style of the two banks in the Main Street of Gladstone. Both were built in the same period; one in the traditional Greek classical style with Doric columns with volutes on top and a clearly defined pediment across the roof line; the other was built in stripped classical style with no ornamentation and some remnants of classical features only. The Gladstone Courthouse was built in 1878 and it became a major regional Courthouse as it was situated mid-way between Laura and Georgetown. It was attached to the local police station. The land for the police station was purchased by the government for £120 in December 1877. The Gladstone Police Station and Court opened in March 1878. Laura and Georgetown petitioned for their own Courthouses which were duly erected in 1878 and 1879 respectively. The Courthouse in Georgetown cost nearly £1,100. The Gladstone Courthouse closed as a court many years ago. The growth of the town was further hastened with the establishment of the Gladstone Goal.

 

Gladstone has some fine old buildings including the two banks mentioned above .They both opened in 1937. Along the Main Street is the old Post Office which has been modernised and changed from its original appearance. It opened around 1880. The hotels include the Gladstone Hotel built in 1875 and the Commercial Hotel which was erected in 1879; and the oldest hotel is the Booyoolie Hotel built in 1873. Finlayson’s Butter Factory with its signage was built around 1890 for a skating rink and converted to a butter factory in 1922 which operated into the early 1980s partly because it produced butter for Broken Hill. The town has several fine church including the Anglican Church which was the Pro Cathedral for the Anglican Diocese of Willochra for many years. It was built in 1891. Amateur Anglican Church architect William Mallyon, manager of a Port Pirie bank designed the transept, sanctuary and chancel which was added in 1890 and although he designed the tower at that time it was not erected until 1928. The Diocese of Willochra was based in Gladstone from its inception in 1915 and the nearby Bishops House was completed in 1923. In 1999 the Diocese moved its headquarters to Port Pirie and made the church of St Peter and St Paul the Anglican Cathedral. The Anglican Sunday School hall next to the church was built in 1909. The Catholic Church is on the hill near the primary school on West Terrace on the northern fringe of the town. It was built in 1928 when the original church of 1881 became a hall before it was demolished in 1951. A Wesleyan Methodist Church opened in Gladstone in 1876. This small Wesleyan Church was connected to the current Methodist, now Uniting Church, in 1922. The former Bible Christian Methodist Church at 32 High Street was built in 1876. Upon Methodist churches Union in 1900 it was left vacant until 1919 when the Masons purchased it for £120 for use as the Masonic Hall which it still is. The funds from the sale of the church to the Masons helped fund the new 1922 Methodist church. Next to the now Masonic Temple is a grand two storey house dating from around 1900 with a small cupola on an arched entry porch. It is just south of the old Police Station and Police Court room. From here you can turn left into Fourth Street and left again into Sixth Street to reach St Albans Anglican Church. Behind the 1960s Council Chambers in Cross Street is the stone gable faced Soldiers Memorial Hall built in 1921.

 

Gladstone Goal was built between 1879 and 1881 at a cost of over £21,000. Tenders were called and Sara and Dunstan of Burra won the tender for its construction. Its design was based on the model prison of Bristol in England. Slate for the flooring was transported from Mintaro and stone was quarried locally for both the cell blocks and the high external prison yard walls. It was intended for debtors and inebriates and seldom housed more than 20 prisoners at any one time from when it opened in 1881 until it closed in 1939. Both men and women were incarcerated in Gladstone gaol and the first gaol keeper was Mr Pollet who had been the keeper at Redruth gaol in Burra. When opened it could accommodate 86 prisoners but with a later expansion this increased to around 200 prisoners. But given that it seldom accommodated more than 20 inmates why did they ever expand it? Criminals from around the Mid North charged with serious crimes like murder were also housed in this prison awaiting their trials. Gladstone gaol closed in 1939 and during World War Two from September 1939 to 1940 it was used to inter Italians and Germans of suspect loyalties. Then from 1942 until 1943 it was used by the Army as a Military Detention barracks. In 1953 it reopened for convicted youth offenders so that they were separated from the hardened criminals of Yatala gaol at Northfield. It opened with 90 youth offenders in 1953. Its peak year of operations was 1969 when it held 130 youth offenders. It finally closed as a youth prison in 1975. Prison life was never easy. The daily routine of the Gladstone Gaol in the early years was as follows:

7.00 am - Prisoners woken and served breakfast in their cells.

7.30 am - Leave cells, empty toilet buckets and shower.

8.00 am - Parade in exercise yard and work details issued.

11.30 am - Collect lunch and return to cells.

1.00pm - Return to work assignments.

4.15 pm - Finish work and shower. Collect evening meals from the kitchen and return to cells.

9.00 pm - Lights out. Prisoners were allowed to have visitors once a fortnight and write one letter a week and their work assignments included making metal buckets, making mops, metal garbage tins and working in the prison vegetable gardens and orchard.

 

1413 departs with a service to Porto

 

For anyone that is not aware these 14xx locos are based on uk class 20 locos

First 10 were built in the uk the rest under license

After many years not used in passenger service the government decided to overhaul locos and stock for the ever expanding Douro Valley tourist market

Also several 26xx electric locos and some second hand spanish carriages were overhauled for electric services based in Porto

So after 30 years since i last enjoyed the sound of English electric thrash and glorious scenery finally came back to enjoy

Another recent addition to the ever expanding fleet of Tendring Travel is this unusual Temsa Opalin midicoach - new to Burtons. A rare thing with just 19 supplied to UK operators, plus a handful to Ireland - all of which fairly quickly returned to the UK!

At first, I thought this poster on a kiosk in Riga, Latvia, was advertising a play. That was not the case. Instead, it was promoting an exhibit of photographs by Ilya Lipkin at the kim? Contemporary Art Centre in Riga.

 

Here is a review of the exhibit:

 

Ilya Lipkin and “Retina” at kim? Contemporary Art Centre, Riga

 

Ilya Lipkin

  

Listing the literal content of the images on display is a tempting way to begin to write about a photographic exhibition.

 

In the case of Ilya Lipkin’s current outing at kim? these would be: graffiti on the walls of buildings in the borough of Purvciems, Riga; the closely cropped face of a young boy; and a shopping bag from the supermarket chain Rimi.

 

Indeed, it is appealing to think through photography in general as an aggregate of technically reproduced and reproducible subjects; an ever expanding list of proper nouns. If it can be named, logic dictates, it can be tallied, arranged and cataloged.

 

However, parallel to this managerial tendency in photographic discourse, one may begin to think of the subject and it’s representation as filtered through cultural techniques and attitudes.

 

Prone to historical contingency and requiring a certain kind of literacy to recognize, attitudes are elusive. They are also subjective, which is perhaps why they are often conflated with style.

 

As both an artist and a commercial photographer, Ilya Lipkin employs a variety of photographic techniques in relation to his subject matter; in this case, the analog process of shooting and printing in black and white. Alongside the framed images on display at kim? the viewer has access to a copy of a 1974 article from the lifestyle magazine Esquire. The article, written by Norman Mailer, was accompanied by photographs bearing a striking resemblance to Lipkin’s, shot by Jon Naar. Together, the text and images chronicle the rise of 1970’s New York graffiti culture, and were later expanded into a book titled The Faith of Graffiti.

 

The similarity of the subjects and their framing, chosen by Naar and Lipkin some forty years apart, only serves to underscore the marked attitudinal difference between the two sets of images. As with language, inflection affects meaning, and Lipkin’s images do not chronicle the emergence of a subculture, but rather it’s atavistic imitation on the walls of Soviet-era buildings in 2017.

 

Since the appearance of the Esquire article, the lineage of graffiti that had its roots in New York subway writing has been comfortably recuperated into the fold of mainstream consumer culture. What was formerly considered “edgy” lettering is these days all too legible as wallpaper at a local McDonalds or the offices of a Facebook data collection center.

 

However, something still remains to be said for it’s primal act – i.e. the choosing of an alias, the refusal of the original proper noun. When the internal acknowledgement of yourself as a subject in the world lies in responding to the call of your name by a police officer or a bank teller, perhaps this refusal is worth thinking about.

 

If capitalism dictates what is perceived as real, pushing us to accept images as substitutes for the things they depict, questioning photographic reality on it’s own terms becomes the photographers refusal.

 

at kim? Contemporary Art Centre, Riga

until 8 October 2017

 

.

 

moussemagazine.it/ilya-lipkin-retina-kim-contemporary-art...

  

Participants: Andrejs Strokins, Germans Ermičs, Kaspars Vanags and Vents Vīnbergs

 

Retina is an exhibition based on conversations between it’s four participants – Andrejs Strokins, Germans Ermičs, Kaspars Vanags and Vents Vīnbergs – on the obscure relationship between contemporary art and the visual, and also image as such. It’s also about eyesight and viewing. About seeing and the invisible. The exhibition was created as the notes following these conversations, each participant coping with the aftertaste of the exchange and the mentioned examples of visual culture history.

 

Retina does not claim the status as an art exhibition, as each of the four makers’ relationship with art might be interpreted as something uncertain. Andrejs Strokins is the closest to being designated an artist, but is joining the conversation as a collector, who believes in the creative potential of found photo-material. Vents Vīnbergs is an essayist and architecture critic, who is fascinated by the historic situation of architecture criticism in the pre-photography age, when the adventure of space was conjured up in the reader’s imagination purely through language techniques. Germans Ermičs is a designer and, among other things, experiments with mirrors, allowing one to think about reflection as being physical, physiological as well as a taught construct. Kaspars Vanags is an art curator, who can’t stop thinking about the idea of post-art utopias in the era of image inflation.

 

Their conversations often linger on the curiosities of the image-based world, and thus the exhibition has also been formed in layers, where the images and comments merge indistinguishably into a whole, just like the retina, despite its peripheral location, is part of the central nervous system and is actually brain tissue.

 

.

 

at kim? Contemporary Art Centre, Riga

until 8 October 2017

  

Top photo: Leo Russell

Middle photo: Steph Goralnick

Bottom photo: Leo Russell

 

From Adbusters #74, Nov-Dec 2007

 

The Empire of Debt

 

Money for nothing. Own a home for no money down. Do not pay for your appliances until 2012. This is the new American Dream, and for the last few years, millions have been giddily living it. Dead is the old version, the one historian James Truslow Adams introduced to the world as “that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement.”

 

Such Puritan ideals – to work hard, to save for a better life – didn’t die from the natural causes of age and obsolescence. We killed them, willfully and purposefully, to create a new gilded age. As a society, we told ourselves we could all get rich, put our feet up on the decks of our new vacation homes, and let our money work for us. Earning is for the unenlightened. Equity is the new golden calf. Sadly, this is a hollow dream. Yes, luxury homes have been hitting new gargantuan heights. Ferrari sales have never been better. But much of the ever-expanding wealth is an illusory façade masking a teetering tower of debt – the greatest the world has seen. It will collapse, in a disaster of our own making.

 

Distress is already rumbling through Wall Street. Subprime mortgages leapt into the public consciousness this summer, becoming the catchphrase for the season. Hedge fund masterminds who command salaries in the tens of millions for their supposed financial prescience, but have little oversight or governance, bet their investors’ multi-multi-billions on the ability that subprime borrowers – who by very definition have lower incomes and/or rotten credit histories – would miraculously find means to pay back loans far exceeding what they earn. They didn’t, and surging loan defaults are sending shockwaves through the markets. Yet despite the turmoil this collapse is wreaking, it’s just the first ripple to hit the shore. America’s debt crisis runs deep.

 

How did it come to this? How did America, collectively and as individuals, become a nation addicted to debt, pushed to and over the edge of bankruptcy? The savings rate hangs below zero. Personal bankruptcies are reaching record heights. America’s total debt averages more than $160,000 for every man, woman, and child. On a broader scale, China holds nearly $1 trillion in US debt. Japan and other countries are also owed big.

 

The story begins with labor. The decades following World War II were boom years. Economic growth was strong and powerful industrial unions made the middle-class dream attainable for working-class citizens. Workers bought homes and cars in such volume they gave rise to the modern suburb. But prosperity for wage earners reached its zenith in the early 1970s. By then, corporate America had begun shredding the implicit social contract it had with its workers for fear of increased foreign competition. Companies cut costs by finding cheap labor overseas, creating a drag on wages.

 

In 1972, wages reached their peak. According to the US department of Labor Statistics, workers earned $331 a week, in inflation-adjusted 1982 dollars. Since then, it’s been a downward slide. Today, real wages are nearly one-fifth lower – this, despite real GDP per capita doubling over the same period.

 

Even as wages fell, consumerism was encouraged to continue soaring to unprecedented heights. Buying stuff became a patriotic duty that distinguished citizens from their communist Cold War enemies. In the eighties, consumers’ growing fearlessness towards debt and their hunger for goods were met with Ronald Reagan’s deregulation the lending industry. Credit not only became more easily attainable, it became heavily marketed. Credit card debt, at $880 billion, is now triple what it was in 1988, after adjusting for inflation. Barbecues and TV screens are now the size of small cars. So much the better to fill the average new home, which in 2005 was more than 50 percent larger than the average home in 1973.

 

This is all great news for the corporate sector, which both earns money from loans to consumers, and profits from their spending. Better still, lower wages means lower costs and higher profits. These factors helped the stock market begin a record boom in the early ‘80s that has continued almost unabated until today.

 

These conditions created vast riches for one class of individuals in particular: those who control what is known as economic rent, which can be the income “earned” from the ownership of an asset. Some forms of economic rent include dividends from stocks, or capital gains from the sale of stocks or property. The alchemy of this rent is that it requires no effort to produce money.

 

Governments, for their part, encourage the investors, or rentier class. Economic rent, in the form of capital gains, is taxed at a lower rate than earned income in almost every industrialized country. In the US in particular, capital gains are being taxed at ever-decreasing rates. A person whose job pays $100,000 can owe 35 percent of that in taxes compared to the 15 percent tax rate for someone whose stock portfolio brings home the same amount.

 

Given a choice between working for diminishing returns and joining the leisurely riches of the rentier, people pursue the latter. If the rentier class is fabulously rich, why can’t everyone become a member? People of all professions sought to have their money work for them, pouring money into investments. This spurred the explosion of the finance industry, people who manage money for others. The now-$10 trillion mutual fund industry is 700 times the size it was in the 1970s. Hedge funds, the money managers for the super-rich, numbered 500 companies in 1990, managing $38 billion in assets. Now there are more than 6,000 hedge firms handling more than $1 trillion dollars in assets.

 

In recent years, the further enticement of low interest rates has spawned a boom for two kinds of rentiers at the crux of the current debt crisis: home buyers and private equity firms. But it should also be noted that low interest rates are themselves the product of outsourced labor.

 

America gets goods from China. China gets dollars from the US. In order to keep the value of their currency low so that exports stay cheap, China doesn’t spend those dollars in China, but buys us assets like bonds. China now holds some $900 billion in such US IOUs. This massive borrowing of money from China (and to a lesser extent, from Japan) sent us interest rates to record lows.

 

Now the hamster wheel really gets spinning. Cheap borrowing costs encouraged millions of Americans to borrow more, buying homes and sending housing prices to record highs. Soaring house prices encouraged banks to loan freely, which sent even more buyers into the market – many who believed the hype that the real estate investment offered a never-ending escalator to riches and borrowed heavily to finance their dreams of getting ahead. People began borrowing against the skyrocketing value of their homes, to buy furniture, appliances, and TVs. These home equity loans added $200 billion to the US economy in 2004 alone.

 

It was all so utopian. The boom would feed on itself. Nobody would ever have to work again or produce anything of value. All that needed to be done was to keep buying and selling each other’s houses with money borrowed from the Chinese.

 

On Wall Street, private equity firms played a similar game: buying companies with borrowed billions, sacking employees to cut costs, and then selling the companies to someone else who did the same. These leveraged buyouts inflated share values, minting billionaires all around. The virtues that produce profit – innovation, entrepreneurialism and good management – stopped mattering so long as there were bountiful capital gains.

 

But the party is coming to a halt. An endless housing boom requires an endless supply of ever-greater suckers to pay more for the same homes. The rich, as Voltaire said, require an abundant supply of poor. Mortgage lenders have mined even deeper into the ranks of the poor to find takers for their loans. Among the practices included teaser loans that promised low interest rates that jumped up after the first few years. Sub-prime borrowers were told the future pain would never come, as they could keep re-financing against the ever-growing value of their homes. Lenders repackaged the shaky loans as bonds to sell to cash-hungry investors like hedge funds.

 

Of course, the supply of suckers inevitably ran out. Housing prices leveled off, beginning what promises to be a long, downward slide. Just as the housing boom fed upon itself, so too, will its collapse. The first wave of sub-prime borrowers have defaulted. A flood of foreclosures sent housing prices falling further. Lenders somehow got blindsided by news that poor people with bad credit couldn’t pay them back. Frightened, they staunched the flow of easy credit, further depleting the supply of homebuyers and squeezing debt-fueled private equity. Hedge funds that merrily bought sub-prime loans collapsed.

 

More borrowers will soon be unable to make payments on their homes and credit cards as the supply of rent dries up. Consumer spending, and thus corporate profits, will fall. The shrinking economy will further depress workers’ wages. For most people, the dream of easy money will never come true, because only the truly rich can live it. Everyone else will have to keep working for less, shackled to a mountain of debt.

 

_Dee Hon is a Vancouver-based writer has contributed to The Tyee and Vancouver magazine.

 

Adbusters Magazine

adbusters.org/the_magazine/74/The_Empire_of_Debt.html

This is for my LCC/LOR ( (Formerly Lands Of Classic Castle) Lands of Roawia ) character, Boethius the Exiled, and his ever expanding story. The full story can be viewed here.

Best viewed on black:

bighugelabs.com/flickr/onblack.php?id=2397027385&size...

 

Taken from the women's only upper section in the synagogue.

 

Congregation Ohab Zedek, or OZ, as it is fondly known, is more than just a synagogue. Under the leadership of Rabbi Allen Schwartz, the Shul is known for its open doors and big heart. OZ has broad ties with the surrounding Jewish community and its Upper West Side neighborhood as a whole. A random visitor could easily encounter an up and coming scholar from Israel, or members of the local fire station. It is an informal, comfortable, inclusive community.

 

OZ is a modern Orthodox congregation, but any individual is welcome, regardless of background or means. It is a Shul of interlocking communities--young families who find a relaxed setting on Shabbos morning to introduce their toddlers to services; singles, who famously crowd the steps on Friday night; and seniors, many of whom have been members of OZ for decades. It is home to those tentatively exploring Judaism as well as the most learned, who are stimulated by a broad array of lecturers and classes.

 

OZ is known for its wide range of Chesed activities, which include a long-time Bikur Cholim group that visits Mount Sinai Hospital each Shabbos and on holidays, as well as its members' regular visits to homebound seniors. Members also subsidize seats for those in need on Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur.

 

OZ has a proud history. The Shul was founded in 1873 on Avenue B and Houston Street on the Lower East Side as the First Hungarian Congregation Ohab Zedek. After a sojourn on West 116th Street in Harlem, the Congregation moved to its present location at 118 West 95th Street in 1926. Today, as part of a revitalized Upper West Side that has drawn an ever-expanding population of families and young adults, OZ is a vibrant and dynamic Jewish center for prayer, learning and social activities.

 

I was amazed I managed to find a cap I didn't have yet in every single place I visited, even smaller places I went to towards the end of my trip like Sunderland and

Durham. I ran out of room in the previous set so I included the ones I found in France in this lot too... though it appears the French have surrendered on beer making as I only found what I think was one actual French made beer despite spending four days there.

 

They will be integrated into my ever expanding Bottle Cap Collection and as always notes are welcome and encouraged (I know even less about Euro beers than I do American).

 

Trades welcome as well

It's happened! I have finally run out of storage space for my ever expanding photo store! Crunch time is here ... I have eaten up almost a Terabyte of storage (I daren't even ask how much that really is) and there is no more 'apple' left!

In 2009 I had a modest 1.5GB for the entire year. And that included RAW files and Photoshop PSD files as well as Jpegs in various sizes. This year I've got almost 80GB - in only 4 months - and not counting RAW files.

I know why it has happened and continues to happen. I've got my 'always with me' RX100 that takes RAW and large Jpeg - and then NEX-6 (16+MP) and NEX-7 (24+MP) and macro, telephoto and Lensbaby lenses as well as kit lenses. Not that I'm complaining! I love all my cameras and count myself so lucky to have them! But it does help explain the leap in storage space devoured!

There is a terrible tendency with digital to take more shots than I need - it costs nothing, and I can always sort them out when I download them to the computer ..... hmmmmm!

So it looks like I have my work cut out for the next couple of months ... to work my way through the existing store and sort out the good from the bad, those worthy of keeping as RAW, and firstly to figure out just what I've got. My folders are neatly dated, but with no clue as to what lies within. I feel a little like I'm standing at the foot of a mountain and wondering how far it is to the summit! ;o)

Wish me luck! And has anyone worked through this problem before? And yes - I've got a dozen photos and two PSD files marked 'Le Crunch' now ;o)

BTW 'Le Crunch' was an old advert for French Golden delicious apples - they were neither golden nor delicious - but the phrase stuck in my mind

 

Gladstone Gaol.

The first Gladstone township was laid out by Matthew Moorhouse (former Protector of Aborigines) in 1872 as a private town, but a Government town was proclaimed next to it as 'Booyoolie' in 1875. The two towns merged but it was not until 1940 that the name of 'Gladstone' was officially adopted for both towns. The town was named after William Gladstone (1809-1898) a 19th century British Prime Minister. The town developed rapidly with the arrival of the railway in 1877 from Port Pirie which separated the two growing townships. Settlement occurred in the district after the government resumed much of the original Booyoolee lease land in 1869 and put it up for public auction in 1871. In Moorhouse’s town east of the railway line is the old butter factory and the original school building. West of the railway yards, with its three gauges, you can see the newer school (1929) and Grubbs Cordial Factory. Gladstone High School was one of the first rural high schools opening in 1913. Grubbs Cordial Factory has been operating continuously since 1876 but with various owners. The Grubb family were not the founders but they have been running the factory since 1914. Note the architectural style of the two banks in the Main Street of Gladstone. Both were built in the same period; one in the traditional Greek classical style with Doric columns with volutes on top and a clearly defined pediment across the roof line; the other was built in stripped classical style with no ornamentation and some remnants of classical features only. The Gladstone Courthouse was built in 1878 and it became a major regional Courthouse as it was situated mid-way between Laura and Georgetown. It was attached to the local police station. The land for the police station was purchased by the government for £120 in December 1877. The Gladstone Police Station and Court opened in March 1878. Laura and Georgetown petitioned for their own Courthouses which were duly erected in 1878 and 1879 respectively. The Courthouse in Georgetown cost nearly £1,100. The Gladstone Courthouse closed as a court many years ago. The growth of the town was further hastened with the establishment of the Gladstone Goal.

 

Gladstone has some fine old buildings including the two banks mentioned above .They both opened in 1937. Along the Main Street is the old Post Office which has been modernised and changed from its original appearance. It opened around 1880. The hotels include the Gladstone Hotel built in 1875 and the Commercial Hotel which was erected in 1879; and the oldest hotel is the Booyoolie Hotel built in 1873. Finlayson’s Butter Factory with its signage was built around 1890 for a skating rink and converted to a butter factory in 1922 which operated into the early 1980s partly because it produced butter for Broken Hill. The town has several fine church including the Anglican Church which was the Pro Cathedral for the Anglican Diocese of Willochra for many years. It was built in 1891. Amateur Anglican Church architect William Mallyon, manager of a Port Pirie bank designed the transept, sanctuary and chancel which was added in 1890 and although he designed the tower at that time it was not erected until 1928. The Diocese of Willochra was based in Gladstone from its inception in 1915 and the nearby Bishops House was completed in 1923. In 1999 the Diocese moved its headquarters to Port Pirie and made the church of St Peter and St Paul the Anglican Cathedral. The Anglican Sunday School hall next to the church was built in 1909. The Catholic Church is on the hill near the primary school on West Terrace on the northern fringe of the town. It was built in 1928 when the original church of 1881 became a hall before it was demolished in 1951. A Wesleyan Methodist Church opened in Gladstone in 1876. This small Wesleyan Church was connected to the current Methodist, now Uniting Church, in 1922. The former Bible Christian Methodist Church at 32 High Street was built in 1876. Upon Methodist churches Union in 1900 it was left vacant until 1919 when the Masons purchased it for £120 for use as the Masonic Hall which it still is. The funds from the sale of the church to the Masons helped fund the new 1922 Methodist church. Next to the now Masonic Temple is a grand two storey house dating from around 1900 with a small cupola on an arched entry porch. It is just south of the old Police Station and Police Court room. From here you can turn left into Fourth Street and left again into Sixth Street to reach St Albans Anglican Church. Behind the 1960s Council Chambers in Cross Street is the stone gable faced Soldiers Memorial Hall built in 1921.

 

Gladstone Goal was built between 1879 and 1881 at a cost of over £21,000. Tenders were called and Sara and Dunstan of Burra won the tender for its construction. Its design was based on the model prison of Bristol in England. Slate for the flooring was transported from Mintaro and stone was quarried locally for both the cell blocks and the high external prison yard walls. It was intended for debtors and inebriates and seldom housed more than 20 prisoners at any one time from when it opened in 1881 until it closed in 1939. Both men and women were incarcerated in Gladstone gaol and the first gaol keeper was Mr Pollet who had been the keeper at Redruth gaol in Burra. When opened it could accommodate 86 prisoners but with a later expansion this increased to around 200 prisoners. But given that it seldom accommodated more than 20 inmates why did they ever expand it? Criminals from around the Mid North charged with serious crimes like murder were also housed in this prison awaiting their trials. Gladstone gaol closed in 1939 and during World War Two from September 1939 to 1940 it was used to inter Italians and Germans of suspect loyalties. Then from 1942 until 1943 it was used by the Army as a Military Detention barracks. In 1953 it reopened for convicted youth offenders so that they were separated from the hardened criminals of Yatala gaol at Northfield. It opened with 90 youth offenders in 1953. Its peak year of operations was 1969 when it held 130 youth offenders. It finally closed as a youth prison in 1975. Prison life was never easy. The daily routine of the Gladstone Gaol in the early years was as follows:

7.00 am - Prisoners woken and served breakfast in their cells.

7.30 am - Leave cells, empty toilet buckets and shower.

8.00 am - Parade in exercise yard and work details issued.

11.30 am - Collect lunch and return to cells.

1.00pm - Return to work assignments.

4.15 pm - Finish work and shower. Collect evening meals from the kitchen and return to cells.

9.00 pm - Lights out. Prisoners were allowed to have visitors once a fortnight and write one letter a week and their work assignments included making metal buckets, making mops, metal garbage tins and working in the prison vegetable gardens and orchard.

 

The Dumfries and Galloway Aviation Museum is a volunteer-operated aviation museum located in and around the World War II-era watch tower (control tower) at the former RAF Dumfries, located two miles north east of the centre of Dumfries, Scotland, which was in service from June 1940 until 1957, when it closed. The site was sold to a private company in 1960. The museum, founded in 1977 by the Dumfries and Galloway Aviation Group, has a collection of aircraft, both civil and military, aero engines, artifacts, and a small, but "ever expanding" collection of memorabilia honouring airborne forces.

NEW RELEASE! Autumn food and drink items for this fall as part of our ever expanding "Autumn Harvest" collection. We have a delicious arrangement for a Pumpkin soup meal, Apple cider with pumpkin chocolates on a wood cut tray, intricate carrot cake stands, and trays of yummy ice cream cone treats, topped with little candy pumpkins. Many of these are touch givers offering hand props with eating, drinking or hold animations with our temporary rezz feature.

 

Find 5 of these on offer this weekend as part of our Secret Sale Weekends deals.

 

Discounted $50 to $99

Along with many other items to match at 50% off at our store landing point.

 

From Sept 28th to 30th

 

Find our booth setup here at our store entrance:

maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Aurora%20Vale/172/91/38

 

** Find even more autumn items in our outdoor area at the store, on display.

NEW RELEASE! Autumn food and drink items for this fall as part of our ever expanding "Autumn Harvest" collection. We have a delicious arrangement for a Pumpkin soup meal, Apple cider with pumpkin chocolates on a wood cut tray, intricate carrot cake stands, and trays of yummy ice cream cone treats, topped with little candy pumpkins. Many of these are touch givers offering hand props with eating, drinking or hold animations with our temporary rezz feature.

 

Find 5 of these on offer this weekend as part of our Secret Sale Weekends deals.

 

Discounted $50 to $99

Along with many other items to match at 50% off at our store landing point.

 

From Sept 28th to 30th

 

Find our booth setup here at our store entrance:

maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Aurora%20Vale/172/91/38

 

** Find even more autumn items in our outdoor area at the store, on display.

The Left are nothing if not ruthless.

 

Unsatiated by Chancellor Rachel Reeves’s decision to scrap the universal winter fuel payment, which would have elicited outcry from Labour had the Tories advanced it, they now want a raid on pensions to plug the £22bn “black hole”.

 

A new report from the Fabian Society, the Left-wing think tank, is calling for the Government to cut the amount of money pensioners can take out of their retirement pots without paying tax, from £268,000 to £100,000, and levy inheritance tax on pensions.

 

Worse still, it is recommending that we introduce a flat rate of pension tax relief of 25-30pc.

 

Currently, taxpayers do not pay tax when they put money into their pensions for a simple reason: they’re taxed on it when it pays out in retirement.

  

Creating a flat rate would punish high earners – who often don’t feel like high earners because they’ve only moved into the tax bracket due to fiscal drag. They would be taxed when they pay in (if they were paying 40pc tax and only receiving 30pc relief), and then taxed again when they withdraw their pension.

 

Many will ask: why save for retirement when it means paying more to the Inland Revenue? I suspect a fair few will wonder whether it’s worth going for that extra pay rise. Labour may tax their way to Angela Rayner’s four-day work week.

 

Tinkering with pensions strips people of the certainty they need to plan for their futures. Individuals should be encouraged to save in an institutional form that the Government ensures is “locked up” until retirement, otherwise there’s little incentive to save.

 

Instead, at a time when the state pension is becoming increasingly economically unsustainable, the Government is considering ways to discourage people further.

 

It’s depressingly predictable short-termism from an administration that has endlessly promised to make “painful” decisions for the “long-term” good. The Fabian Society believes its recommendations could net the Exchequer at least £10bn – roughly the same amount that Keir Starmer has bunged at public sector workers.

  

For the Left, however, this is a question of “fairness”. Over half of the tax relief on employer and employee pension contributions went to the top fifth of income taxpayers last year, they say.

 

But that is not surprising. Most tax is paid by higher-rate taxpayers – an ever-expanding group thanks to fiscal drag. And much as we may want 25-year-olds to think seriously about retirement, pension contributions tend to go up later in life, when people are more likely to be paying tax at 40pc.

 

But this isn’t about financial planning – it’s more insidious. The Fabian Society also suggests “rebadging” pensions tax relief as a “pension tax credit”, “match payment” or “government top-up”. This collectivist mindset is everywhere – our property is not our own, and every penny we are allowed to keep is money nobly sacrificed by our benevolent state.

 

And it’s not really about “fairness”, either. The think tank has suggested a carve-out for defined benefit (DB) schemes that apply to all employees. DB pensions are all but extinct in the private sector, having been replaced by defined contribution – essentially building individual cash pots which each retiree has to fund and manage themselves (or get someone else to).

 

But DB schemes remain ubiquitous in the public sector, meaning we would essentially be creating a two-tier system where those in the employ of the state still get a large proportion of tax relief, but they’re the only ones.

  

When militant unions decided to hold Britain to ransom in the pursuit of unrealistic pay increases in the post-pandemic years, this is the point the Tories should have tirelessly hammered home. That there is no reason why public sector employer pension contributions should be three times, on average, those offered in the private sector.

 

They should have offered teachers, doctors and train drivers the option to trade in higher pensions tomorrow for higher pay today. Now, the incentive for public sector workers to agree to such terms has diminished even further.

 

This country is still reeling from the last time a Labour government meddled with our pensions. A key reason why retirement prospects for those in the private sector are so dismal today is because Gordon Brown scrapped tax relief on dividends that pension funds received on their investments during his first Budget as chancellor.

 

It’s hardly a surprise that a Labour government run by a self-proclaimed socialist and a woman who draws inspiration from Joan Robinson, once a keen defender of Mao Tse-Tung, cannot resist getting its greedy mitts on what appears to be a large pile of money.

 

But it’s an insult to those who take on responsibility for their own retirement rather than rely on the taxpayer. And the economic consequences would be as dire today as they were in 1997.

 

The Daily Telegraph/AnnabelDenham

Roma kids, Doel, Antwerp.

 

Doel is a small ghost town next to the ever expanding port of Antwerp.

 

Since 1999 the villagers are being expropriated, and most of them left. Anarchist squatters and Roma families have taken their places, since then living illegally in the abandoned houses. Kids are playing outside (instead of going to school), dogs look for food amongst the garbage, and the household stuff is often thrown on the streets. Yet, a couple of pubs are still serving their customers, the police is driving around, and the government is promising a quick solution for the 100 or so illegal Roma gypsies...

By the 6th of November 1958 Lake Moondarra, originally known as Leichhardt Dam, was officially supplying water to Mount Isa Residents.

 

A history of the Mount Isa region, like most towns in Australia's arid interior, is a story about securing reliable water for domestic and industrial development. Prior to the construction of Lake Moondarra, Mount Isa's water needs were met by a series of bores near the bed of the Leichhardt River and the old Rifle Creek Dam.

 

But with a burgeoning town population and ever expanding mining operations, these water supplies became inadequate for the thirsty town. Subsequently, Mount Isa Mines Limited took the unprecedented decision to construct what was at the time Australia's largest privately funded water scheme.

 

In late 1956 a rocky gorge on the Leichhardt River (Tharrapatha) 16kms downstream from the township was selected due to its natural bedrock attributes and proximity to town. American company Uta Construction was awarded the contract and works began without delay with the building of a bitumen road from town to the clearing of trees within the basin.

 

However, this ambitious project was not to progress without drama, and by December 1956 seasonal rains sent flood waters rushing through the gorge causing extensive damage to the partially completed wall. When construction did resume several months later, it was the Australian company Thiess Brothers that completed the 26.5 metre concrete-faced wall thereby concluding Operation Big Water in 1957 at a cost of 2.4 million dollars.

 

On the 11th of July 1962 the Mount Isa Mail announced Lake Moondarra and 'Warrina Park' as new official names selected from over 400 entries by local school children.

 

In 1968 Clear Water Lagoon was partition off from Lake Moondarra to address water quality issues during flood events and interestingly remains one of few examples of natural filtration reservoirs in Australia.

 

On average 2000 megalitres/month is filtered through Clear Water Lagoon after being pumped from Lake Moondarra. Due in part to Moondarra's high evaporation rate and the region's sustained growth and development the need to secure additional water supplies continued. In 1971 the height of Moondarra's spillway was increased and later in 1976 Lake Moondarra's sister dam Lake Julius, also on the Leichhardt River, was completed 70km downstream from Mount Isa. During times of prolonged drought, Lake Julius water can be pumped directly into Clear Water Lagoon.

 

Undeniably, economic growth and development are the catalysts for offering forever our inland waterways and natural, cultural landscapes.

 

Source: Southern Gulf NRM & Mount Isa Water Board.

Copilot

Jay Leno, the renowned petrolhead and former host of The Tonight Show, houses his impressive collection of cars in a 122,000-square-foot garage located in Burbank, California. This expansive space, which he acquired in 1991, has grown significantly from its initial size of 17,000 square feet to accommodate his ever-expanding collection123. Imagine the sheer number of classic automobiles and motorcycles that fill those vast hangars! 🚗️

 

Jay Leno’s passion for motoring extends beyond the screen, and his Jay Leno’s Garage show on TV and YouTube has garnered nearly 700 million views. From vintage classics to modern marvels, his collection is a testament to his lifelong love affair with cars4. 🚘❤️

  

Máté Petrány

11 May 2020

 

Jay Leno’s 1921 aero-engined Benz Mercedes, originally built for Brooklands, took the better part of a decade to restore—mostly due to its corroded steel water jackets. This speed machine was originally built using household parts in addition to its 18.8-liter Mercedes engine, which is an inline-six that was rated at 230 horsepower in 1914 when it was used in a fighter plane.

 

The Benz Mercedes was good for 113 mph in 1921. Leno’s Rabbit-the-First is perhaps less valuable as a collector car than the Chitty Chitty Bang Bangs made legendary by Sir Ian Fleming, but after plenty of work in the garage, the “Rabbit” drives a lot better than most pre-war aero cars.

 

If you’ve been following Leno’s great restoration updates, you’re familiar with the problem of this Mercedes engine’s water jackets. The Garage’s “metal man” Jimmy had to create new tooling to remake all six jackets out of brass, using silver brazing to end up with a watertight seal all around those massive cylinders.

 

To ensure a safe “low flying aircraft,” Leno’s experts added a modern twin-plate clutch, new fans, and disc brakes that are still operated by via the lever at the back and the pedals up front. Slightly upgraded Zenith carburetors and a new copper exhaust round out the list of upgrades, while the four-speed gearbox remains the stock Mercedes unit. The engine hasn’t been opened, either, and the chassis is the same heavy, long-wheelbase Benz design from 1908.

 

This Benz Mercedes Rabbit is from a time before Mercedes-Benz became a thing. With its period generator, rethought valve train lubrication and four valves per cylinder for a redline at 1800 rpm, it looks like an absolute delight. The bossman is famously in love with aero engines, so we imagine this Brooklands special has to be one of Leno’s favorites.

 

www.hagerty.com/media/video/lenos-1921-benz-mercedes-took...

  

With Tuesdays announcement I was so disappointed with what Apple had done to the iMac line, specifically the 21.5'' model, I went out and bought the previous generation from Stormfront in York.

 

The new 2012 21.5'' model has been made substantially worse. It has a much slower 5400RPM hard drive, no user upgradable ram, but the biggest nail in the coffin for me was the lack of an optical drive. Apple also had the cheek to charge £99 more for the new one over the previous model. I shoot wedding photography and am currently in the process of archiving old family VHS tapes onto DVD so an optical drive is a must, the lack of FireWire on the new ones is also a bit annoying. I know you can buy an external optical disk drive and thunderbolt firewire adaptor, but why should I even need to? Especially for a desktop machine, making it thin is as pointless as a chocolate fireguard.

 

The iMac I went for was the basic spec 2.5Ghz and its a million times faster than the old 2.53Ghz C2D in my MBP. I'm intending soon to put in 32GB RAM and i'll be all set. Maybe a external thunderbolt drive when costs come down too.

Late night in Hebden Bridge box for the last time on Friday 19th October 2018.

 

The overhead illumination highlights the train register book as the minutes tick by to the box sending the 7-5-5 bell signal to Milner Royd Junction for the last time.

The 1891 built box became another victim of the Digital Railway when it and the three other Calder Valley boxes became absorbed by the ever expanding clutches of the York ROC.

 

The box at Hebden Bridge is a listed structure and will remain in situ.

Its been a while since I've done some urban HDR photography

I was visiting Antwerpen in Belgium the other day and had some time to kill.

So i decided to take the car and drive to this nearby "ghosttown" called "Doel" this is really one of the most creepy places I've ever been in my life, no lies. Goosebumps all over and shivers were running down my spine when walking there.

 

Doel is a 700 year old village on the river Scheldt in Belgium. Near to the local nuclear power plant, with its two giant cooling towers, it became the target for demolition not once but twice in order to make way for the ever expanding harbor. The successful protest groups of the seventies could not compete in the 90's and as residents began to leave, the government refused to rent out the properties again and instead let them fall into disrepair.

On the 23rd of March 2007, the government decided that the village would be demolished by 2009 and in June 2008, residents received a letter informing them that they were to vacate their homes by the 1st of September 2009.

 

Want to find out more about "Doel"? check this out: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doel

 

And this video: video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6406943835314615485#

 

D40 | Sigma 10-20mm | Single RAW HDR | F6.3 | 0.005sec | @10mm | ISO 200

 

HDR Processing: Adobe Lightroom 2.0 | Photomatix 3 | Adobe Photoshop CS5

 

Lothian's new Volvo Eclipses are somewhat similar to our ever expanding group of single deckers numbered 101 - 190 and 193 - 199.

 

Note the addition of stickers at the entry for infirm and disabled passengers, just another aspect of the inclusive measures Lothian likes to promote for all of the travelling public in Edinburgh and surrounding areas.

 

A large number of these small buses were delivered to LT for their country area routes and a remarkable number survive. This smart example was new in 11/1953 and is seen here on display at the now ceased Trans-Lancs Rally, Heaton Park, Manchester, on 04/09/2005. This popular event was last held in 2019. This was due to COVID-19 and the now ever expanding summer fairground.

 

The camera being a Pentax MZ-M with the film being a Jessops Colourslide.

 

I would request, as with all my photos, that they are not copied or downloaded in any way, shape or form. © Peter Steel 2005.

New to Liverpool Corporation Transport, in 09/1968, this Panther has been converted to single-door layout sometime. It is seen here on display at the now ceased Trans-Lancs Rally, Heaton Park, Manchester, on 04/09/2005. This popular event was last held in 2019. This was due to COVID-19 and the now ever expanding summer fairground. This Panther has since changed hands and has been restored into a livery with more cream and a lighter green being preserved by members of the NWVRT.

 

The camera being a Pentax MZ-M with the film being a Jessops Colourslide.

 

I would request, as with all my photos, that they are not copied or downloaded in any way, shape or form. © Peter Steel 2005.

28mm Regiment, Games Workshop 'Black Knights', Vampire Counts range.

Acrylics, Inks, Pastels, Airbrush and Good ol' series 7's.

Basing is magnetized for transport/gaming use.

    

Another unit to add to the ever expanding hordes of Castle Ravenstein.

I went for a faded and tarnished look, with plenty of rust effects and verdigris as befits ancient knights.

Their livery is grim and the red caparisons on the steeds are stained almost black from years of unending service.

Ivy crawls over the armour here and there and tattered and filthy red rags signify they ride for the Baron of Ravenstein.

    

I wasn't too keen on the 'zombie' skinned steed heads at first when assembling the kits but it came out okay and not too OTT gory. I like the way the unit ended up but I will try a different style when I build hexwraiths for my next cavalry block, more ethereal and less rusty'n'dusty (which is my overall army aesthetic).

The only little conversion was on the Hell Knights steed - he has some devilish horns to set him apart from the other mounts.

    

Hope you like 'em and thanks for looking in

 

The Dumfries and Galloway Aviation Museum is a volunteer-operated aviation museum located in and around the World War II-era watch tower (control tower) at the former RAF Dumfries. It is located two miles north east of the centre of Dumfries, Scotland, where it was in service from June 1940 until 1957, when it closed. The museum, founded in 1977 by the Dumfries and Galloway Aviation Group, has a collection of aircraft, both civil and military, aero engines, artefacts, and a small, but "ever-expanding collection of memorabilia honouring airborne forces".

Like the Lada XRay of a couple of days ago, the Dacia Duster is a modern Crossover vehicle (CUV) from the ever-expanding Renault-Nissan group.

 

Whereas Lada (via parent AutoVAZ) has only recently come into the Renault-Nissan fold, after being associated with GM-Daewoo, Dacia has a much more extensive history tied to Renault going back nearly 50 years to an agreement to licence-build the Renault R12 in Romania from 1969.

 

The Duster II, shown here is a 2018 update to the original Duster CUV model launched in 2009. The Duster II uses the same Dacia B0 platform, shared with some other Dacia models, and which is a modified, long wheelbase version of the Renault-Nissan B-Platform, doing service under many B/C-segment vehicles including the Nissan Juke and Versa, Renault Clio and Captur, as well as the Lada XRay, The platform is saleable in both length and width, allowing it cover a significant cross section of the small-car market. The platform (along with the Duster) is built in many regions including Romania, Russia, India, Columbia, Brazil and Indonesia.

In the ever-expanding tapestry of the universe, the recent revelations in quantum mechanics and quantum science have ignited a fervor of imagination and inquiry. As we peer through the veil of reality, a gateway to Proxima Centauri b—a planet that mirrors Earth in so many ways—beckons us to explore its potential. This newfound knowledge has propelled humanity into a realm of possibilities, where the dream of a second home emerges not merely as fantasy but as a plausible future. With Earth facing unprecedented challenges, from climate crises to overpopulation, the concept of 'Planet B' transcends mere escape; it becomes a beacon of hope. As our thoughts race with the implications of life on Proxima, we envision a world where humanity can thrive once more, nurturing the essence of existence in a new celestial cradle.

 

Poem

In whispers of stars, the secrets unfold,

A dance of the atoms, a tale yet untold,

Through quantum realms where the shadows entwine,

We glimpse at a future where destinies align.

Proxima calls with its enigmatic light,

A sanctuary awaits in the velvet of night.

With dreams woven rich in the fabric of space,

We seek out a home, a new kind of grace.

 

Haikus

 

Stars twinkle above,

Proxima's shores beckon us,

Hope's new dawn arises.

  

Quantum dreams take flight,

Life blooms on a distant world,

A chance to restart.

  

In the void we reach,

Hearts yearning for a new dawn,

Planet B awaits.

The Development of Pärnu Resort

 

Pärnu was transferred to the Swedes in 1617. The building of fortresses began in the area of Estonia and Latvia as defensive sites against a strengthening Russia, which was attempting to expand to the Baltic Sea.

 

Therefore, construction began on fortification works in Pärnu in the 1670s, modeled on examples from Western Europe such as those in France and the Netherlands.

 

The town is located on flat land and was surrounded by a heptagonal belt of bastions and a wide and deep moat. By the end of the 17th century, Pärnu had become the most contemporary baroque fortress in Livonia.

 

As a result of the Great Northern War (1700–1721), Russia took over the areas of both Estonia and Livonia. The Swedish garrison surrendered Pärnu to the Russian armed forces in 1710. The building of fortifications was continued during the post-war period – according to the sources available – and involved the renovation and updating of the existing facilities and the completion of structures begun by the Swedes.

 

In 1835, Pärnu was removed from the list of fortifications of the Russian Empire. Once again, the town was free of restrictions (that is, interference coming from the representatives of military authority) and run by the Town Magistrate. Tsar Nicholas I gave the fortification belt and the accompanying buildings to the town while the Town Magistrate of Pärnu leased the majority of the former military buildings to enterprising town citizens.

 

Pärnu was to be hurled into the era of change and innovation. This era turned the closed fortress town into an open seaside resort, ‘bathing in greenery’ and characterised by numerous parks, shady boulevards and elegant architecture.

  

The Story of the First Bathing Establishment

1838-1888

In 1837, a petition was filed with the Magistrate of Pärnu for the building of a bathing institution, and, in June 1838, the resort was opened for its first guests.

 

Heated seawater baths and sea bathing opportunities were offered in summer while the establishment operated a sauna in winter.

 

The operations of the private Bathing Establishment, having launched its business with such gusto, remained rather modest during the next decades. Nevertheless, the first bathing institution had a considerable effect on, above all, the development of both Pärnu resort and the town as a whole.

 

In 1860, the dismantling of earthen fortifications and the filling of moats began in Pärnu, resulting in the development of a green belt of parks and alleys around Pärnu downtown by the end of the 19th century.

 

In 1879, Mr. Oskar Alexander Brackmann (1841-1927) was elected Mayor of Pärnu (1879-1916/18) and a new era began in the development of both the town and resort of Pärnu. The town government became more focused on town planning, organisation and the holiday business.

 

In 1882, work began on the Beach Park (Rannapark). During the following decades a beautiful, free-shaped natural park was designed around the alley to the Bathing Establishment (Supeluse Street) and Rannasalong and Kuursaal, built in its vicinity.

 

The number of guests that visited the resort of Pärnu remained rather modest until the end of the 1880s, mostly as a result of economic instability, poor connection roads, a lack of publicity, and insufficient experience with the organisation of bathing. The Bathing Establishment experienced ongoing economic problems and was only able to stay in business due to donations from the trading office of Mr. H. Schmidt.

 

Nevertheless, the first bathing institution had a considerable effect on, above all, the development of both Pärnu resort and the town as a whole.

  

Story of the Making of the Resort: 1898-1915

 

In 1889, the town government decided to introduce some new guidelines for the organisation of the holiday areas and for the development of the resort.

 

The development trends and principles of Pärnu health resort were thus instituted. The Resort or Bathing Committee was established for the fast and efficient achievement of the objectives, completed by the creation of the position of a paid holiday manager or bathing inspector.

 

Upon request from the town, the Park Director of Riga devised a park and boulevard development plan for Pärnu.

 

The Sea Boulevard was designed, Rannapark (Beach Park) was expanded to provide space for sports fields, a velodrome, playing areas for children, arbours and villas.

 

Pärnu was a small town, but features characteristic of a city were adopted for landscaping purposes and the establishment of parks.

 

In 1890, Pärnu made its way to the list of Russian imperial resorts. In 1891, an entertainment centre – the Rannasalong or Kuursaal (Beach Salon or Resort Hall), which became the central entertainment venue in Pärnu – was established.

 

In 1896, a narrow-gauge railway between Pärnu and Valga was officially opened, followed by a Pärnu-Mõisaküla-Viljandi-Tallinn rail connection in 1901. This contributed to a rapid rise in the amount of summer holiday guests and a consequent increase in the utilisation of healing and bathing services.

 

The most successful pre-war bathing season was in 1908, when Pärnu accommodated approximately 2,500 summer guests. After this time, the number of summer guests began to drop. In 1911, only 1,700 summer guests found their way to Pärnu; by 1914, the number had dropped to 1,100.

 

The outbreak of the First World War in 1914 also put an end to the business of Pärnu resort in the summer of 1915. One of the largest and most contemporary healing mud and bathing establishments suffered severe damages during the war and was completely destroyed in a fire that broke out in the autumn of 1915.

 

The Story of the Formal Representative Resort of the Republic of Estonia 1918-1940

Pärnu had to start the construction of the resort anew during the first period of Estonian independence – but under completely different political and economic conditions. The first years were difficult and inconsistent for the resort; nevertheless, the holiday business soon began to boom.

 

In 1924, Oskar Kask began his period of office as the Mayor of Pärnu (1924 – 1937). Under his initiative, the resort, once again, became one of the key elements that shaped the development and reputation of the town of Pärnu.

 

In 1925, the borders of the bathing and holiday area of the town of Pärnu were determined, which, supplemented by the additions of 1935, largely coincide with the boundary of the resort today.

 

In July 1927, the new mud baths were officially opened. The number of guests that visited Pärnu in the summer rocketed from 700 people in 1920 to 2,500 people in 1927. The majority of the foreign visitors came from Finland.

 

In 1928, a Pärnu-Eidapere-Lelle rail connection was opened. This was very important for the development of the resort – instead of the former 14 hours, it now only took 4 hours to travel from Tallinn to Pärnu.

 

In the 1930s, supported by President Konstantin Päts and the town architect, Olev Siinmaa, Pärnu became a modern resort, characterised by buildings in the functionalist style. The treatment and holiday alternatives were more and more widely acknowledged at an international level.

 

From 1934, Swedes began to dominate the population of foreigners frequenting Pärnu, closely followed by summer guests from Finland, Latvia and Germany. In 1937, a shipping line between Stockholm and Pärnu was launched; in summer 1939, two steamboats travelled this line twice a week.

 

Rannahotell (Beach Hotel) was opened in 1937, Suursild (Great Bridge) over River Pärnu and hotel-pension Vasa in 1938, and in 1939 – for the anniversary of the resort – an imposing Rannakohvik (Beach Café) were built. In the summer of 1939, more than 8,000 summer guests, 60% from abroad, had made their way to Pärnu.

 

The town was in the process of devising new development trends for the holiday area, but the outbreak of World War II and the accompanying political turmoil interrupted the development of the resort.

 

War-Time Resort: 1940-1944

As a result of the turmoil in the summer of 1940, the management of the Pärnu resort was transferred to the ‘executive body of working people’ – the Central Council of the All-Union Trade Unions.

 

On 7th July, the first guests arrived at the holiday home that was opened at Rannahotell – approximately 100 labour veterans. During the holiday season that lasted until 29th September, approximately 1,144 labour veterans from all over Estonia spent their holidays there. It was intended to use the enterprises, once belonging to the town, to open new holiday homes and medical establishments for the working class.

 

In the summer of 1941, the assets of Pärnu resorts – their administration and management – were transferred to the Resort Board of the Central Union of Estonian Professional Bodies, established by German occupational authorities.

 

The activities of the sanatoria and nursing homes, operating since 1940, were terminated and all the resort enterprises were converged into one uniform establishment.

 

In May 1942, both Rannakohvik and the Bathing Establishment opened their doors for the summer season. In spite of the war situation, this season was characterised by hordes of visitors. The Bathing Establishment had an outstandingly busy season – in 4 months, 21,100 different healing baths were given, 17,780 to civilians.

 

In 1943, the Resort Board consisted of 7 enterprises – Rannahotell, the Bathing Establishment, the Ranna café, Grand Hotel, rented apartment houses, an accommodation service for special purposes and a workshop/garden nursery.

 

At the formal opening of the 105th season of the Pärnu resort, it was admitted that the premier function of the resort for that season was to provide services to front-line soldiers, who came there for vacation and treatment.

 

Once occupied again by the Soviet Union, Pärnu resort began its post-war activities in November 1944. The resort enterprises, which had operated during the previous occupation, were used to open a nursing home for the treatment and recreation of 150 war veterans; another nursing home for 200 veterans was opened by the end of the same year.

  

The Story of the Sanatoria-type Healing Resort of the Soviet Period:

1945-1990

In 1945, the planning and building of a new network of sanatoria and nursing homes was started. Pärnu was to become one of the most important treatment and holiday sites for the workers of both Estonia and the other Soviet republics.

 

First of all, large-scale cleaning and maintenance works were to be performed in the town. Downtown, two thirds of which had been damaged, beach parks, green areas and multiple streets and boulevards were waiting to be restored.

 

In 1946-48, Pärnu became into an ‘All-Union’ sanatoria resort that operated around the year. Being made subject to the Soviet management procedure, which was launched with a zest, the number of patients being treated increased rapidly.

 

While in 1948, 6,300 patients were treated in Pärnu, this figure had rocketed to 14,000 by 1962. Construction activities also gathered speed – new large-scale accommodation and treatment facilities for the sanatoria were built into the resort area.

 

In 1957, the Resort Studies Department of the Experimental and Clinical Medicine Institute was opened in Pärnu.

 

By the 1960s, Pärnu had become the largest therapeutic resort and the centre of research conducted in the sphere of resorts.

 

The expansion of the resort continued into the 1970 and 1980s. In 1971, the first stage of the Tervis resort was opened; the premises of the existing resorts were also modernised and expanded.

 

In the middle of the 1980s, the sanatoria in Pärnu admitted approximately 25,000 patients for treatments each year. Together with holiday-makers, accommodated by departmental boarding, nursing homes and private houses, approximately 300,000 tourists visited Pärnu each year.

 

In 1988, the 150th anniversary of the establishment of the resort of Pärnu was celebrated. Regardless of the positive achievements highlighted in the speeches and brochures about the anniversary, the Soviet resort system was being exhausted in both an economic and organisational sense.

 

The Story of the Holiday Town of the Soviet Period: 1944-1990

In the 1950s, Pärnu, once again, become a popular summer holiday resort.

 

The pre-war resort heritage – numerous parks and green areas, attractive bathing architecture and beach areas and a diversified, high-level choice of cultural events in summer – preserved Pärnu’s resort town atmosphere even under the Soviet political and economic conditions.

 

“Unorganised” holiday-makers or people arriving to Pärnu for a vacation on their own were mostly accommodated in premises rented by the local population and therefore, there’s no statistical information available regarding the number of visitors who frequented Pärnu during the Soviet period. It is estimated that the number of Pärnu’s ‘inhabitants’ increased two- or three-fold during the summer.

 

Pärnu used to be the summer home for numerous representatives of the Russian intelligentsia. One of the most outstanding violin players of the 20th century, David Oistrahh, while spending his holidays in Pärnu in 1954-71, said: “I love Pärnu with all my heart. I feel like breathing more freely when staying here.”

 

In the “Two questions to a Guest” column of the Pärnu Kommunist newspaper (1987), the poet and translator Aleksandr Judahhin, when asked – Why did you insist on having a photograph of you and your son published by the newspaper? answered as follows: “Because in 1882 – as we learnt when browsing the family archive of pictures – his great-grandfather Konstantin Siegel went to Pärnu for holidays. Therefore, my son Ivan is the fifth generation to spend a vacation in Pärnu. This means that his ‘Pärnu roots’ are 105 years old.”

  

The Story of Estonia’s Summer Capital

1991- Present

As in the 1890s and 1920s, the Town Government had to assure the continuance of the traditions of Pärnu as a resort and holiday town in the 1990s. Inevitably, once again (as in the 1920s), focus had to be given to the ‘new’ nearest foreign markets – Finland, Sweden, Latvia, etc. The key issue was the restitution of the assets of Pärnu resort. The town was only restituted the resorts’ assets in 1994 following long negotiations.

 

Due to the lack of a centralised management and administrative system, the future of the resort establishment was largely dependent on their management’s initiative and ability to point out the potential problems and to operate under changing conditions.

 

The first trendsetter under new conditions was the privatised AS Sanatoorium Tervis (1992). In August of 1993, AS Taastusravikeskus Viiking opened its doors to visitors. AS Taastusravikeskus Estonia (1995), AS Taastusravikeskus Sõprus (1995) and AS Pärnu Mudaravila, continuing their business as municipal property, were able to tune in, step by step, with the rapid changes that characterised the transition period.

 

Pärnu restored its position as the most popular resort in Estonia and in June 1996, Pärnu was, once again, declared the Summer Capital of Estonia. In 1996-98, rehabilitation enterprises operating in Pärnu made up 65-70% of Estonia’s therapeutic resort potential. 60% of patients in rehabilitation institutions stayed in Pärnu while 85% of all the foreign guests were treated in Pärnu.

 

The survey of Pärnu’s summer guests, organised since 1995, shows a steady increase of foreign guests from an ever-expanding variety of countries. In 1995-2000, the respective numbers went from 44,000 (1995) to 105,000 (in 2000) while in 2007, approximately 200,000 foreign guests visited Pärnu. Visitors and tourists from Finland, Germany, Sweden, Great Britain, Italy, Russia, etc. are dominant among the guests.

 

Pärnu Summer Capital has become one of the most visited holiday and therapeutic resorts in Estonia.

resort175.weebly.com/resort.html

  

In the ever-expanding tapestry of the universe, the recent revelations in quantum mechanics and quantum science have ignited a fervor of imagination and inquiry. As we peer through the veil of reality, a gateway to Proxima Centauri b—a planet that mirrors Earth in so many ways—beckons us to explore its potential. This newfound knowledge has propelled humanity into a realm of possibilities, where the dream of a second home emerges not merely as fantasy but as a plausible future. With Earth facing unprecedented challenges, from climate crises to overpopulation, the concept of 'Planet B' transcends mere escape; it becomes a beacon of hope. As our thoughts race with the implications of life on Proxima, we envision a world where humanity can thrive once more, nurturing the essence of existence in a new celestial cradle.

 

Poem

In whispers of stars, the secrets unfold,

A dance of the atoms, a tale yet untold,

Through quantum realms where the shadows entwine,

We glimpse at a future where destinies align.

Proxima calls with its enigmatic light,

A sanctuary awaits in the velvet of night.

With dreams woven rich in the fabric of space,

We seek out a home, a new kind of grace.

 

Haikus

 

Stars twinkle above,

Proxima's shores beckon us,

Hope's new dawn arises.

  

Quantum dreams take flight,

Life blooms on a distant world,

A chance to restart.

  

In the void we reach,

Hearts yearning for a new dawn,

Planet B awaits.

(1) Archaic Atlantean soldier. After their defeat at the hands of the Ankorians, the Atlantean military was completely overhauled, copying many Ankorian desigsn, the most obvious being the helmet. Armed with a basic thrusting spear and sword. The plumes on the helmet serve to impone the enemy.

 

(2) Early Atlantean soldier. As the role of the armed forces changed into a more offensive one, equipment was again updated. A new helmet was introduced, providing further protection to the wearer. The soldier is now armed with a throwing spear and a sword for aggressive action.

 

(3) Classic Atlantean soldier. Due to the ever-expanding size of the Republic, more and more raw materials came to be at the disposal of the army. This is reflected in the equipment of the legionnaries. A steel helmet replaces the former bronze one and every soldier gains acces to a full set of steel armour. These are the juggernauts that fought at the forefront of many Atlantean campaigns.

 

(4) Imperial Soldier. After the sinking of the Shining City, the armies of the former Republic were pushed back on all sides. It once again became a defensive force. Striving for higher mobility, several items were dropped, most noticeably the heavy armour. This soldier here is wearing a typical felt cap, his helmet is not present. A plethora of different patterns of helmets and armour was in use, reflecting the decentralized nature of the newly-formed Empire of Atlantis, which was in fact centered in its remaining provinces in Morcia. The soldier is armed with a thrusting spear, throwing darts, a sword and a throwing spear for maximal offensive and defensive capabilities. He now sports a round shield, based on barbarian design. After the Sinking, the Empire and its army became increasingly barbaric in nature, as most of the true, pure-blooded Atlanteans had perished.

Klick here for a large view!

www.wolfgangstaudt.de

 

Shanghai is the largest city in China in terms of population and one of the largest metropolitan areas in the world, with over 20 million people. Located on China's central eastern coast at the mouth of the Yangtze River, the city is administered as a municipality of the People's Republic of China with province-level status.

 

Originally a fishing and textiles town, Shanghai grew to importance in the 19th century due to its favourable port location and as one of the cities opened to foreign trade by the 1842 Treaty of Nanking. The city flourished as a center of commerce between east and west, and became a multinational hub of finance and business by the 1930s. However, Shanghai's prosperity was interrupted after the 1949 Communist takeover and the subsequent cessation of foreign investment. Economic reforms in 1990 resulted in intense development and financing in Shanghai, and in 2005 Shanghai became the world's largest cargo port.

 

The city is an emerging tourist destination renowned for its historical landmarks such as the Bund and Xintiandi, its modern and ever-expanding Pudong skyline including the Oriental Pearl Tower, and its new reputation as a cosmopolitan center of culture and design. Today, Shanghai is the largest center of commerce and finance in mainland China, and has been described as the "showpiece" of the world's fastest-growing economy.

  

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

This, the first in a trio of photos from this viewpoint, shows the layout and the variety of both preserved and in service buses and coaches on display at this sadly now ceased event, the last being held in 2019. This was due to COVID-19 and the now ever expanding summer fairground. Taken on 04/09/2005, the buses nearest the camera in this view are in the main in service examples with most being from the Manchester area.

 

The camera being a Pentax MZ-M with the film being a Jessops Colourslide.

 

I would request, as with all my photos, that they are not copied or downloaded in any way, shape or form. © Peter Steel 2005.

Lorry Type: Mercedes-Benz Arocs 1832K Skip Lorry with Reload Drawbar Trailer

Euro Emission's: Euro 6

REGISTRATION: ML14 GBN

Information:

Delivered in February 2014, the fourth Arocs Skip Lorry arrived and joined the ever expanding Fleet immediately. The New Arocs Skip Lorries produce fuel savings of up to 9mpg whereas the previous Axor Skip Lorries only produce 8mpg, so this makes the Arocs a full mile per gallon better.

So this was my second "night in" and it's fair to say life has been very rocky at times since last time. But we're surviving and I'm (Nicky) still alive (just) and very much enjoying and embracing being me, so things could be worse haha.

BTW I know the photos are very samey (is that even a word..?) and I need to have a bit more variety, I'll see what I can do in the future... That said I'm loving this new top from Boden :)

Oh and I've added more to my ever expanding bio/life story if you're interested in knowing more :)

66083 emerges from the ever-expanding forest in Arpley yard. offering a rare opportunity to traverse Warrington's freight-only lines with the "Curvey Weaver" railtour.

 

66078 then took over at Latchford, with the train continuing to Garston Freightliner terminal, via Fiddlers Ferry.

Hard to get used to my ever expanding world... The slightest movements above me make me a little jumpy...

Here's another recent addition to my ever expanding minidress collection! This one is an really clingy and snug fitting one shoulder metallic wet look red minidress with side shirring and I've matched it up with Osé Angel seamless pantyhose and my fabulous open toe platform pumps with the 5½" heels.

 

I think it looks super and I hope you do too!

  

To see more pix of my legs in short skirts and other tight, sexy and revealing outfits click this link:

www.flickr.com/photos/kaceycdpix/sets/72157623668202157/