More precisely, it's......

"Two Skinks a-sunning".

Guaranteed they are not two straight males for they would be ferociously and aggressively attacking each other and defending their territory to the death. Like tiny Dinosaurs they are and I have seen the aftermath of such.

So, perhaps they are a married couple or at least engaged.

Or.... Maybe two gay guys or two lesbians.

The answer is irrelevant.

The flowers in the Lord's garden are not all precisely alike

(J.C. Ryle)

"She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet listening to what He said.

But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made." Luke 10:39-40

Let us observe how different the characters and personalities of true Christians may be! The two sisters of whom we read in this passage were faithful disciples. Both had believed. Both had been converted. Both had honored Christ, when few gave Him honor. Both loved Jesus — and Jesus loved both of them. Yet they were evidently women of very different turn of mind.

Martha was active, stirring, and impulsive, feeling strongly, and speaking out all she felt.

Mary was quiet, still, and contemplative, feeling deeply, but saying less than she felt.

Martha, when Jesus came to her house, busied herself with preparing a suitable refreshment.

Mary's first thought was to sit at His feet and hear His word.

Grace reigned in both hearts, but each showed the effects of grace at different times, and in different ways.

We shall find it very useful to remember this lesson.

We must not expect all believers in Christ to be exactly like one another! We must not set down others as having no grace, because their experience does not entirely tally with our own.

The sheep in the Lord's flock have each their own peculiarities.

The flowers in the Lord's garden are not all precisely alike.

All true Christians agree in the principal things of religion.

All feel their sins.

All trust in Christ.

All repent.

All are led by one Spirit.

All are holy.

But in minor matters, they often differ widely. Let not one despise another on this account. There will be Marthas and there will be Marys in the Church until the Lord comes again!

Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dublin

Dublin (Irish: Baile Átha Cliath) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. It is on the east coast of Ireland, in the province of Leinster, at the mouth of the River Liffey, and is bordered on the south by the Wicklow Mountains. It has an urban area population of 1,173,179, while the population of the Dublin Region (formerly County Dublin), as of 2016, was 1,347,359, and the population of the Greater Dublin area was 1,904,806.

There is archaeological debate regarding precisely where Dublin was established by the Gaels in or before the 7th century AD. Later expanded as a Viking settlement, the Kingdom of Dublin, the city became Ireland's principal settlement following the Norman invasion. The city expanded rapidly from the 17th century and was briefly the second largest city in the British Empire before the Acts of Union in 1800. Following the partition of Ireland in 1922, Dublin became the capital of the Irish Free State, later renamed Ireland.

Dublin is a historical and contemporary centre for education, the arts, administration and industry. As of 2018 the city was listed by the Globalization and World Cities Research Network (GaWC) as a global city, with a ranking of "Alpha −", which places it amongst the top thirty cities in the world.

Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Guinness

Arthur Guinness (24 September 1725 – 23 January 1803) was an Irish brewer and the founder of the Guinness brewery business and family. He was also an entrepreneur and philanthropist.

At 27, in 1752, Guinness's godfather Arthur Price, the Church of Ireland Archbishop of Cashel, bequeathed him £100 in his will. Guinness invested the money and in 1755 had a brewery at Leixlip, just 17 km from Dublin. In 1759, Guinness went to the city and set up his own business. He took a 9,000-year lease on the 4-acre (16,000 m2) brewery at St. James's Gate from the descendants of Sir Mark Rainsford for an annual rent of £45.

Guinness's flowery red signature is still copied on every label of bottled Guinness.

Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guinness_Storehouse

Guinness Storehouse is a tourist attraction at St. James's Gate Brewery in Dublin, Ireland. Since opening in 2000, it has received over four million visitors.

The Storehouse covers seven floors surrounding a glass atrium shaped in the form of a pint of Guinness. The ground floor introduces the beer's four ingredients (water, barley, hops and yeast), and the brewery's founder, Arthur Guinness. Other floors feature the history of Guinness advertising and include an interactive exhibit on responsible drinking. The seventh floor houses the Gravity Bar with views of Dublin and where visitors may drink a pint of Guinness included in the price of admission, which was €18.50 on 15 October 2018 with discounts depending on dates and times, described as "overpriced" by Condé Nast Traveler. In 2006, a new wing opened incorporating a live installation of the present-day brewing process.

Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guinness_Brewery

St. James's Gate Brewery (Irish: Grúdlann Gheata Naomh Séamuis) is a brewery founded in 1759 in Dublin, Ireland, by Arthur Guinness. The company is now a part of Diageo, a British company formed from the merger of Guinness and Grand Metropolitan in 1997. The main product of the brewery is Guinness Draught.

Originally leased in 1759 to Arthur Guinness at IR£45 (Irish pounds) per year for 9,000 years, the St. James's Gate area has been the home of Guinness ever since. It became the largest brewery in Ireland in 1838, and the largest in the world by 1886, with an annual output of 1.2 million barrels. Although no longer the largest brewery in the world, it remains as the largest brewer of stout. The company has since bought out the originally leased property, and during the 19th and early 20th centuries the brewery owned most of the buildings in the surrounding area, including many streets of housing for brewery employees, and offices associated with the brewery. The brewery also made all of its own power using its own power plant.

There is an attached exhibition on the 250-year-old history of Guinness, called the Guinness Storehouse.

Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guinness

Guinness is a dark Irish dry stout that originated in the brewery of Arthur Guinness at St. James's Gate, Dublin, Ireland, in 1759. It is one of the most successful beer brands worldwide, brewed in almost 50 countries, and available in over 120. Sales in 2011 amounted to 850 million litres (220,000,000 US gal). It is popular with the Irish, both in Ireland and abroad. In spite of declining consumption since 2001, it is still the best-selling alcoholic drink in Ireland where Guinness & Co. Brewery makes almost €2 billion worth annually.

Guinness' burnt flavour derives from malted barley and roasted unmalted barley, a relatively modern development, not becoming part of the grist until the mid-20th century. For many years, a portion of aged brew was blended with freshly brewed beer to give a sharp lactic acid flavour. Although Guinness's palate still features a characteristic "tang", the company has refused to confirm whether this type of blending still occurs. The draught beer's thick, creamy head comes from mixing the beer with nitrogen and carbon dioxide.[6]

The company moved its headquarters to London at the beginning of the Anglo-Irish Trade War in 1932. In 1997, Guinness Plc merged with Grand Metropolitan to form the multinational alcoholic-drinks producer Diageo plc, based out of London.

…obwohl kitschig? Nö, gerade weil.

…although cheesy? Nope. Precisely because.

Our Savior's Lutheran Church, Ferndale

DSC_4637_e

Photograph taken at an altitude of Fifty three metres, in the thick blanket of mist prior to the magic of the Golden Hour around sunrise (Sunrise was at precisely 04:42am), at 03:28am on Thursday 19th June 2014 off Lullingstone Lane beside the Lullingstone Roman Villa, looking towards Eynsford Viaduct in the village of Eynsford, Kent, England.

Just to the right you can see the Eynsford Viaduct. This impressive nine-arched red-brick viaduct is a prominent feature on the line to the 'Bat & Ball' station. The structure was built by the independent ''Sevenoaks Railway'', incorporated in 1859 to link the ''Chatham'' main line with the market town of Sevenoaks. And first services began on 2nd June 1862. The viaduct has nine arches of 30-foot span, and rises to a height of 75-feet above the valley and the River Darent.

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Nikon D800 70mm 1/25s f/5.6 iso100 RAW (14 bit) Mirror up. Manual focus. Manual exposure. Matrix metering.Auto white balance.

Nikkor AF-S 70-200mm f/2.8G ED IF VRII. Jessops 77mm UV filter. Nikon MB-D12 battery grip. Two Nikon EN-EL batteries. Nikon DK-17M Magnifying Eyepiece. Nikon DK-19 soft rubber eyecup. Manfrotto MT057C3 057 Carbon Fiber Tripod 3 Sections (Payload 18kgs). Manfrotto MH057M0-RC4 057 Magnesium Ball Head with RC4 Quick Release (Payload 15kgs). Manfrotto quick release plate 410PL-14.Jessops Tripod bag. Optech Tripod Strap.Digi-Chip 64GB Class 10 UHS-1 SDXC. Lowepro Transporter camera strap. Lowepro Vertex 200 AW camera bag. Nikon MC-DC2 remote shutter release. Nikon GP-1 GPS unit.

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LATITUDE: N 51d 21m 52.13s

LONGITUDE: E 0d 11m 48.60s

ALTITUDE: 53.0m

RAW (TIFF) FILE: 103.00MB

PROCESSED FILE: 14.85MB

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HP Pavillion Desktop with AMD A10-5700 APU processor. HD graphics. 2TB with 8GB RAM. 64-bit Windows 8.1. Verbatim USB 2.0 1TB desktop hard drive. Nikon VIEWNX2 Version 2.90 64bit. Adobe photoshop Elements 8 Version 8.0 64bit

Treehoppers (more precisely typical treehoppers to distinguish them from the Aetalionidae) and thorn bugs are members of the family Membracidae, a group of insects related to the cicadas and the leafhoppers. There are about 3,200 species of treehoppers in over 600 genera. They are found on all continents except Antarctica, although there are only three species in Europe.

They are best known for their enlarged and ornate pronotum, which most often resembles thorns, apparently to aid camouflage. But in some species, the pronotum grows to a horn-like extension, and even more bizarre and hard-to-describe shapes are also found.

best viewed LARGE:

www.flickr.com/photos/rundstedt/3975944641/sizes/l/

"To possess the world in the form of images is, precisely, to re-experience the unreality and remoteness of the the real." Susan Sontag, On Photography

An elderly Dani woman with a sharpened fire-hardened digging stick pauses for a moment from work in an elaborate sweet potato garden near her compound high in a remote corner of West Papua's central highlands, 1600m/5200ft above sea level - "Grand Valley" of the Balim River, Irian Jaya, Indonesia.

Mourning and Finger Mutilation

The segments of two fingers on each hand were cut off as a child as a traditional form of sacrificial grieving or mourning for a close relative who had died. Most females above the age of about ten have lost four to six fingers in connection with funerals and efforts at impressing, placating or driving away the ghost of the deceased.

Finger mutilation or the traditional practice of chopping fingers off at the first joint is now officially banned, although it seems likely that this longstanding neolithic cultural practice continues today in a few isolated pockets of the region.

Ethnographic accounts indicate that daily life for a woman in Dani culture is largely limited to a routine of drudgery that appears to have a sullen or depressive effect on most women.

The Gardens

The Grand Valley Dani are accomplished gardeners and pig farmers with a neolithic (late Stone Age) culture and technology. They rely on polished stone adzes and axes, sharpened pig tusks, bamboo knives, and fire-hardened digging sticks - tools that are gradually being replaced with iron and steel.

The gardens involve complex mazes of sophisticated irrigation ditches cut deeply across the fertile grand valley floor. The sweet potato (over 70 varieties) accounts for about 90% of their diet. Digging sticks are used to weed and maintain the gardens. Both men and women spend most of their working lives in the gardens.

First Contact

The indigenous peoples of West Papua migrated from southeast Asia and the Australian continent about 30,000 to 50,000 years ago during the Ice Age when sea levels were lower and distances between islands shorter.

Western "first contact” with the Grand Valley Dani was established in 1938 during American-led botanical and zoological explorations the central highlands, less than sixty years before this photograph was taken.

Today, about 50,000 Dani live in small compound clusters or settlements scattered across the fertile and densely-populated "Grand Valley" of the Balim River (about 40 miles long by 10 miles wide) in West Papua's central highlands.

High resolution Noritsu Koki QSS digital film scan, shot with a compact Pentax point-and-shoot film camera. Film developed in a Sulawesi street-corner shophouse, circa 1996.

© All rights to these photos and descriptions are reserved and protected by international copyright laws. Any use of this work requires my prior written permission.

~~~

Ethnographic efforts at demystifying Dani Neolithic cultural practices and ritualized inter-clan warfare in the region are associated with the early ground-breaking Harvard-Peabody Expedition of 1961-63. They include:

• Anthropologist Karl Heider’s accounts in “The Dugum Dani: A Papuan Culture in the Highlands of West New Guinea,” Aldine Publishing (1970); and “Grand Valley Dani: Peaceful Warriors” (Case Studies in Cultural Anthropology), Wadsworth Publishing (1996).

•Filmmaker Robert Gardner’s classic social documentary, “Dead Birds” (1965).

•Writer Peter Matthiessen’s gripping first-hand accounts in “Under the Mountain Wall: A Chronicle of Two Seasons in Stone Age New Guinea,” Viking Press (1962).

National Geographic | Social Documentary | Lonely Planet

Or more precisely, St Peters. Every day thousands of the faithful and the curious come to visit those parts that are accessible to the public.

Times i have visited I have always been very impressed by the sheer scale of St Peters. Look at the people standing immediately in front of the building for a sense of scale.

Part of the Papal apartment building is visible at top right.

Châteauvieux (literally, “Old Castle”) is a very small village –a hamlet, really– incorporated since 1658 in the not much larger village of Yzeron, a few kilometers west of the city of Lyon. From that city, and more precisely from the venerable abbey of Ainay, came the Benedictine monks who built a small chapel in Châteauvieux, around Year 1000. It seems that it was never meant to be a priory, just a parochial church gifted by the abbey to a growing local Christian community.

I had heard a few years back about the chapel, dedicated to Saint John the Baptist and which had only been listed on the secondary list of Historic Landmarks in 1979. Considering the very old age of the monument, this late listing (and not even on the main list) seemed a bit strange, and I went to see it in 2020. It stood in a walled enclosure and all I could do was take a photograph over the wall where it was the lowest, and in a somewhat precarious position (I will post that old photo under the #1 picture in this series).

I returned to Châteauvieux in April 2025 in my capacity as pro bono photographer for the Fondation du Patrimoine, as the chapel needs restoration works largely exceeding the financial means of the village of Yzeron. Thus, the Fondation will launch a fundraising campaign and possibly also use some of its own resources to cover all or part of the cost. To document the monument in its “before” condition, I was granted full access and could see the inside for the first time.

The floor plan is very simply basilical, with a narrower, flat apse protruding at the eastern end. The flat apse, as well as the apparel, are indicative of early 11th century, perhaps even older. Inside, the ever-present long and thin arch stones also point in the same direction. The relieving arches along the side walls rest on massive square pillars of medium to large apparel, and many of them slant visibly —the camera was of course perfectly leveled, as always, before the photos were taken. Many parts of the walls (most notably in the apse, which is probably the oldest part) and all of the rib-vaulted ceilings are plastered or cemented over, which prevent us from reading the history of the monument in the stones.

The nave.

I used a handheld Godox AD200 Pro II studio strobe, equipped with a round H200R head and a half-spherical diffuser, to provide additional lighting for this shot. The flash was set and triggered via a Godox X Pro II radio transmitter mounted on the camera, which was itself triggered via a Pixel Oppilas RW–221 radio remote, allowing me to walk around and pop the flash wherever it was needed.

by Yoko Ono

Several cat sculptures called 'Bastet' created by artist Yoko Ono are shown at Kunsthalle Bielefeld. EFE/Oliver Krato.

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BASTET

by Yoko Ono, June 1996

Suddenly one morning, 100 cats landed in my mind. The image was specific, the posture, the size and the colors. They all had large gleaming phosphorus eyes, come in groups of nice with one on the centerfront, and seemed to be demanding to be materialized. On one hand, I felt like a fool. I regarded myself an intellectual. I was not about to materialize the cats as my work. But on the other hand, I thought, wasn’t that what I was precisely against – to allow my petty intellectual snobbery to block the marvellous flight that art allows us to make? Anyway, to go with the flow and materialize these cats seemed to be the most natural thing to do at the time, and I followed it. I shaped the cats after the one Egyptian cat which permantly looked over the Strawberryfields from our white room in Dakota.

Then there was a question of what to call them, Usually, I had no difficulty in titling my work since the physical part if the entities seemed to be merely an instrument to enact the concept I expressed in the title. But I didn’t know what to call these cats since I only had a vague clue of what they were. It was a totally new game for me. I knew that they were some kind of carriers of a message that descended on us. Should I call them “Transmitters”? That sounded more like parts of electric gadgets. How about “Descendents?” That sounded like a TV soap opera following “Dynasty?” Not only was I embarrassed tat I could not find a title for them, but I felt worse that I materialized something and I didn’t what it was about. Finally, exasperated, I called a friend in New York. “I don’t have my Webster Dictionary here. Could you look up some words for these cats? They’re some kind of messengers – from far away – I don’ know from where tough. Could be from Atlantis or something – or another planet – from way back is hat I’m getting.” It was interesting that my mind kept playing tricks even at that point. Though I already shaped the cats after the Egyptian cat, somehow I didn’t think Egypt. I thought Atlantis. That was my gut feeling; Atlantis or another planet. Five minutes later, my friends called and said that he also did not have a Webster Dictionary at hand and instead he had looked into a theosophical dictionary. A word jumped into his eye from the first page he opened. The work was BUBABSTE and it followed with the explanation.

“A city in Egypt which was sacred to the cats, and where was their principal shrine. Many hundreds of thousands of cats were embalmed and buried in the grottoes of Beniassan-el Amar. The cat being a symbol of the moon was sacred o Isis, her goddess. It sees in the dark and its eyes have phosphorescent lustre, which frightens the night-birds of evil omen. The cat was also sacred to BAST and thence called (BASTET) the destroyer of the Sun’s enemies.”

“Oh dear. If you didn’t know that I had materialized the cats before reading this information about Bastet you would think that I had made the cats according to what was said here, wouldn’t you?” My friend agreed. So what did this mean? I still wasn’t sure. Maybe my mind was not playing tricks after all. Maybe Egypt had something to do with Atlantis and the Space.

The inspiration and materialization of Bastet happened in parallel to my initial thought and the performance of hammering nails in a cross in public. On hindsight, I think Bastet may have come to me as my protection. Somehow I know that the two events are connected, that unless I have decided to hammer a nail in the cross, Bastet would not have come to me.

y.o. June 1990

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In Egyptian mythology, Bastet or Bast was a solar deity and a goddess of fertility and protector of pregnant women. She also has power over solar eclipses. Bastet was represented as early as the Second Dynasty of the Old Kingdom as a woman with a feline head. Domestic cat-headed Bastet, as she appears in the Middle Kingdom, is a content goddess; lioness-headed Bastet is potentially dangerous.

She is also considered by some to be another aspect of Sekhmet. Her cult was centered in Bubastis. After the period of Hellenistic civilization, Bastet became a lunar deity whom the Greeks associated with their Artemis. She was considered the daughter of Isis and Osiris, and was associated with Hathor. She was the wife of Ptah, with whom she was the mother of Nefertum and Mihos. She was also the patron goddess of cats. Mummified cats were dedicated in her honor.

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IELEFELD, GERMANY.-Yoko Ono, born in 1933 in Tokyo, is one of the pioneers of Conceptual Art. In 1952, she became one of the first women in Japan to study philosophy. In 1953 she took composition courses at Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, NY, and studied creative writing at Harvard. In the mid-1950s, Yoko Ono lived in New York City, where she knew John Cage, and many other artists and composers. In 1960, she rented a loft on Chambers Street, and together with La Monte Young, organized a series of concerts, attended not only by young musicians and artists, including Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns and Fluxus founder George Maciunas, but also by Marcel Duchamp, Max Ernst, Peggy Guggenheim, and Isamu Noguchi.

On her mother’s side, Ono is a member of one of Japan’s most respected families, and so, as a child, she attended a school for members of the Japanese imperial family. Her father, who originally intended to be a pianist before he ultimately became a leading Japanese banker, insisted she take piano and voice lessons at an early age. Her parents and relatives acknowledged that Yoko had a strong will and an irrepressible desire for freedom. The lengthiest publication on the artist to date says that her main intention was “to think the unthinkable—and then do it.” After beginning a relationship with John Lennon in 1967, Ono began working on no less an ambition than to bring inner peace to different peoples. Representing one of her chief messages, her work Imagine Peace will be presented in front of the Bielefeld Kunsthalle.

As a young artist, Ono left New York in the early nineteen-sixties in order to return to Japan. During this period she performed several concerts with John Cage and the pianist David Tudor. In 1962 at the Sogetsu Art Center in Tokyo, she began hanging texts, instead of the pictures she had shown in 1961 at the AG Gallery in New York. Her work in conceptual art manifested in the famous collection of works, Grapefruit, which she first published herself on July 4, 1964 in Tokyo. It went on to be published in several editions. Some of the works in it date back to 1953. The book divided her oeuvre into chapters dealing with music, painting, happenings, poetry, and objects, documenting her affinity for all categories of art. To this day, she has remained interested in the process of tearing apart various forms of presentational media to the point where their boundaries dissolve.

Therefore, for the 2008 exhibition in Bielefeld (featuring a selection of Ono’s work from 1961 to the present), works placed outside the museum will relate to the city itself. One of these will be a Wish Tree. The Wish Tree differs greatly from the “wish pieces” in Japanese temple gardens or the “fortunes” in Chinese fortune cookies. While those preprinted prayers and fortunes are materialistic, the Wish Trees invite the public to express hopes and dreams. Just before the opening of the exhibition, children and teens from three schools in Bielefeld will hang their wishes on a selected tree outside the Johnson building.

A Golden Ladder, which is an allegory for the exhibition’s title, Between the Sky and My Head, will be installed in the Kunsthalle park. The work is an imaginary, spiritual space centered between sky and earth Since Ono works not only with grand dreams, but also with poetic visions of how one can change, she plans a third work that will take place outside the Kunsthalle. It will be the realization of a work she originally noted down in 1962: titled Riding Piece “Ride a coffin car all over the city.” During the run of the show, visitors to the Kunsthalle can decide to be chauffeured around the city in a hearse for a short time.

Inside the Kunsthalle, visitors will experience three floors of sculptures, paintings, drawings, photographs, films, and sound installations. An interview with the artist, filmed in Bielefeld, will accompany the exhibition. One of the earliest works is Cough Piece, first written down in 1961; and Keep Coughing a Year, a sound installation featuring the artist’s cough and other sounds, will be heard in dark rooms. Laughing and coughing were important anchors in Ono’s work at the time she began creating conceptual art: they considerably expand the sense of time during a performance. In the entrance to the Kunsthalle is Play It by Trust, a chess game that has been set up several times in various places since 1966. In Bielefeld, it will be in marble, with chess pieces one meter high, on a surface measuring five by five meters. One can imagine playing the game with the heavy, fragile marble pieces, all of which are white. Morning Beams, consisting of one hundred nylon threads running throughout all of the floors of the Kunsthalle, illuminates the twelve-meter-high staircase. Since the mid-1990s, Ono has been working with ink on paper, and the show will feature a drawing called Franklin Summer. Other pieces in the exhibition include a labyrinth made of Plexiglas, titled Amaze; the famous film Fly, showing a fly on a woman’s body in a six-part installation; and a participatory piece, My Mommy is Beautiful, in which visitors are invited to put photographs and other thoughts of their mothers onto the bare canvas of the work, or other feelings that they themselves write.

Yoko Ono. Between the Sky and My Head will be accompanied by an exhibition catalogue. To celebrate the re-opening of the sculpture park on 27 September, 2008, at 6 p.m., the work Golden Ladder, made in Bielefeld at Ono’s behest, will be installed on a temporary basis.

Yoko Ono. Between the Sky and My Head will run until 16 November, 2008, and is sponsored by the Kulturstiftung Pro Bielefeld.

www.artdaily.com/index.asp?int_sec=2&int_new=25698

via Instagram ift.tt/2hoLq1y

Photograph taken of the Thanet Offshore Wind Farm at 07:07am on Thursday January 28th 2016 in the magic of The Golden Hour around Sunrise, (Sunrise was at precisely 07:39am), at an altitude of Thirteen metres, off Botany Road and Marine Drive, on the sandy shoreline of Botany Bay in Broadstairs, Kent, England.

Thanet offshore windfarm was officially opened on September 23rd 2010 and was for a time, the largest offshore windfarm project in the world. The eight lines of turbines, one hundred of them in total, run north-west to south-east, covering a total area of 35sq km off Foreness Point near Margate. Each turbine is 115 metres high with 44-metre blades, and the project cost between £780-900million

The seven bays in Broadstairs consist of: (From south to north) Dumpton Gap, Louisa Bay, Viking Bay, Stone Bay, Joss Bay, Kingsgate Bay and Botany Bay.

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Nikon D800 340mm One point three seconds long exposure f/13.0 iso100 RAW (14Bit) Nikon back button focusin. AF-C continuous point focus with 3-D tracking. Manual exposure. Matrix metering. Auto white balance.Auto Active D-lighting. Nikon AF fine tune set to +6

Nikkor AF-S 200-500mm f/5.6E VR, Power UP 95mm HD UV filter. Nikon MB-D12 battery grip. Two Nikon EN-EL15 batteries. Nikon DK-17M Magnifying Eyepiece. Nikon DK-19 soft rubber eyecup. Manfrotto MT057C3 057 Carbon Fiber Tripod 3 Sections (Payload 18kgs). Manfrotto MH057M0-RC4 057 Magnesium Ball Head with RC4 Quick Release (Payload 15kgs). Manfrotto quick release plate 410PL-14.Jessops Tripod bag. Optech Tripod Strap.Digi-Chip 64GB Class 10 UHS-1 SDXC. Lowepro Transporter camera strap. Lowepro Vertex 200 AW camera bag. Nikon MC-DC2 remote shutter release. Nikon GP-1 GPS unit.

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LATITUDE: N 51d 23m 19.75s

LONGITUDE: E 1d 26m 13.14s

ALTITUDE: 13.0m

RAW (TIFF) FILE SIZE: 103.00MB

PROCESSED (JPeg) SIZE: 24.10MB

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PROCESSING POWER:

Nikon D800 Firmware versions A 1.10 B 1.10 L 2.009 (Lens distortion control version 2)

HP 110-352na Desktop PC with AMD Quad-Core A6-5200 APU processor. AMD Radeon HD8400 graphics. 8 GB DDR3 Memory with 1TB SATA storage. 64-bit Windows 10. Verbatim USB 2.0 1TB desktop hard drive. WD My Passport Ultra 1tb USB3 Portable hard drive. Nikon ViewNX2 Version 2.10.3 64bit. Adobe photoshop Elements 8 Version 8.0 64bit

My sentiments precisely

Châteauvieux (literally, “Old Castle”) is a very small village –a hamlet, really– incorporated since 1658 in the not much larger village of Yzeron, a few kilometers west of the city of Lyon. From that city, and more precisely from the venerable abbey of Ainay, came the Benedictine monks who built a small chapel in Châteauvieux, around Year 1000. It seems that it was never meant to be a priory, just a parochial church gifted by the abbey to a growing local Christian community.

I had heard a few years back about the chapel, dedicated to Saint John the Baptist and which had only been listed on the secondary list of Historic Landmarks in 1979. Considering the very old age of the monument, this late listing (and not even on the main list) seemed a bit strange, and I went to see it in 2020. It stood in a walled enclosure and all I could do was take a photograph over the wall where it was the lowest, and in a somewhat precarious position (I will post that old photo under the #1 picture in this series).

I returned to Châteauvieux in April 2025 in my capacity as pro bono photographer for the Fondation du Patrimoine, as the chapel needs restoration works largely exceeding the financial means of the village of Yzeron. Thus, the Fondation will launch a fundraising campaign and possibly also use some of its own resources to cover all or part of the cost. To document the monument in its “before” condition, I was granted full access and could see the inside for the first time.

The floor plan is very simply basilical, with a narrower, flat apse protruding at the eastern end. The flat apse, as well as the apparel, are indicative of early 11th century, perhaps even older. Inside, the ever-present long and thin arch stones also point in the same direction. The relieving arches along the side walls rest on massive square pillars of medium to large apparel, and many of them slant visibly —the camera was of course perfectly leveled, as always, before the photos were taken. Many parts of the walls (most notably in the apse, which is probably the oldest part) and all of the rib-vaulted ceilings are plastered or cemented over, which prevent us from reading the history of the monument in the stones.

The first row of the nave, looking to the South. To the very left of the frame is the false transept. Notice how the first square pillar leans to the right, in addition to leaning outwards (as shown in the previously uploaded lengthwise photo of the nave): that is obviously because of the added weight of the bell tower, larger and heavier than the original one. The pillar was not designed to withstand the additional thrust and has given a little.

I used a handheld Godox AD200 Pro II studio strobe, equipped with a round H200R head and a half-spherical diffuser, to provide additional lighting for this shot. The flash was set and triggered via a Godox X Pro II radio transmitter mounted on the camera, which was itself triggered via a Pixel Oppilas RW–221 radio remote, allowing me to walk around and pop the flash wherever it was needed.

*****This photograph was selected by GETTY IMAGES in October 2014. (Creative RF Moment open '521706889*****

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Photograph taken at an altitude of Eight metres, in the magic of the Golden hour around sunrise at 05:31am, (sunrise was at precisely 06.15am) on Saturday 6th September 2014 off the Patricia Bay Highway 17, on Lochside Drive close to Frost Avenue and the Lochside Waterfront Park, in beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada.

Here, I am standing beside the wooden decked viewing platform, looking over towards Mt Baker in Washington State, USA from beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. Also known as Koma Kulshan, she is an active glaciated andesitic stratovolcano in the Cascade Volcanic Arc and the North Cascades of Washington State in the United States, standing 3,286 metres tall and was first ascended in 1868, her last eruption recorded in 1880.

These Canada Geese, along with many other small groups, fly across the lake from East to West every morning and back again every evening at Sunset, and I love to watch the classic Vee formations and listen to the honking as they pass me by. In flight, a group of Geese are called, a Skein. For this frame, in the dawns early darkness, I was shooting the sunrise over Mt Baker and I could hear the geese honking as groups of up to ten flew byu me East to West. I waited until they entered the frame, amazed at how close they actually were to me, and began manually pressing the shutter.

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Nikon D800 70mm 1/1000s f/2.8 iso100 RAW (14 bit) Manual focus. Manual exposure. Matrix metering. Auto white balance.

Nikkor AF-S 70-200mm f/2.8G ED IF VRII. Jessops 77mm UV filter. Nikon MB-D12 battery grip. Two Nikon EN-EL batteries. Nikon DK-17M Magnifying Eyepiece. Nikon DK-19 soft rubber eyecup. Manfrotto MT057C3 057 Carbon Fiber Tripod 3 Sections (Payload 18kgs). Manfrotto MH057M0-RC4 057 Magnesium Ball Head with RC4 Quick Release (Payload 15kgs). Manfrotto quick release plate 410PL-14.Jessops Tripod bag. Optech Tripod Strap.Digi-Chip 64GB Class 10 UHS-1 SDXC. Lowepro Transporter camera strap. Lowepro Vertex 200 AW camera bag. Nikon MC-DC2 remote shutter release. Nikon GP-1 GPS unit.

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LATITUDE: N 48d 38m 15.78s

LONGITUDE: W 123d 24m 12.85s

ALTITUDE: 8.0m

RAW (TIFF) FILE SIZE: 103.00MB

PROCESSED (JPeg) SIZE: 13.49MB

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Processing power:

HP Pavillion Desktop with AMD A10-5700 APU processor. HD graphics. 2TB with 8GB RAM. 64-bit Windows 8.1. Verbatim USB 2.0 1TB desktop hard drive. Nikon VIEWNX2 Version 2.10.0 64bit. Adobe photoshop Elements 8 Version 8.0 64bit

The cashier is precisely setting up the impulse items waiting for customers. These kind of small, constant activities, make the Quality possible in the point of sales and the business more effective. Well done!

Hello friends, I have taken a week of vacanciones, and have prepared a series in 3D of Madrid precisely one of the door of entry and exit of Madrid, in concrete-ATOCHA - and surroundings, hope that you should like. This summer all the places of Madrid and the community of Madrid I am going to raise it in 3D, a premiere in this sense so much for flikr as for Internet. Please it do not feel you bound to comment, only to look and enjoying, do not forget to try some glasses for 3D, it is worth it, a very strong hug.

Hola amigos,he tomado una semana de vacanciones,y he preparado una serie en 3D de Madrid precisamente una de las puerta de entrada y salida de Madrid,en concreto-ATOCHA- y alrededores ,espero que os guste.Ese verano todos los lugares de Madrid y la comunidad de Madrid lo voy a subir en 3D,un estreno en ese sentido tanto para flikr como para internet.Por favor no os sientes obligado a comentar,solo a mirar y disfrutar,no olvides procurar unos gafas para 3D,merece la pena,un abrazo muy fuerte.

The third instalment in my mash with the brilliant Cèdric Philippe and Paul Jarvis.

Stanislaw Had A Box For Everything – Part 3

Precisely when Stanislaw had blacked out was not clear to him, but he sensed he was now waking into one of the old nightmares. Like when he was in the clinic and they were drugging his porridge.

From somewhere close by, in the dead tones of a hostage imprisoned in an interminable loop, a vaguely familiar voice was repeating the refrain: “Good evening, this is the news. You can’t box up emotion.” Cold-sweating, Stanislaw looked around him. His cartons had morphed into battered TV sets with screens striving primordially to burst into life, and hellish green swamp vapours were rising from the floorless depths of the Box Chamber. He shuddered.

The voice suddenly dissolved into eerie laughter that caused Stanislaw to start. The bad psychiatrist! Terrified now, he looked up, but the face on the screen was not the one he so feared. It belonged to a wild-eyed macaque which, as it caught his eye, broke off its cackling and enquired facetiously: “How you gonna cope wi’ life as a dwarf penguin, man? You got yourself a cool box wi’ fish?”

Text and vocals by Paul Jarvis: baripaul.blogspot.com/

Matthew Watkins on iPad and harmonica: www.watkinsmedia.com/

Cédric Philippe on iPad and electric guitar: cedricphilippe.blogspot.com/

Precisely 5 months and 4 days after ordering (and paying for!) and 24 emails its eventually arrived. My fantastic f-stop Tilopa in Anthracite Black with large pro ICU. It's such a shame that this company struggles so much to deliver its orders to its customers because its products (once you receive them) are fantastic, solid and well built! Can't wait to get out into the wild and put it through its paces!

Strobist...580exii strobius strobistrip camera left 1/1 24mm.

Adults constantly raise the bar on smart children, precisely because they're able to handle it. The children get overwhelmed by the tasks in front of them and gradually lose the sort of openness and sense of accomplishment they innately have. When they're treated like that, children start to crawl inside a shell and keep everything inside. It takes a lot of time and effort to get them to open up again. Kids' hearts are malleable, but once they gel it's hard to get them back the way they were.

~ Haruki Murakami (Kafka on the Shore)

and a little more blogged here

Photograph taken at an altitude of One hundred and eight metres, in the Golden Hour around Sunset, (Sunset was at precisely 19:38pm), at 19:29pm on Saturday 14th September 2013 Just before Aberfeldy on the shoreline of Loch Tay, nestled in the Tay Forest Park near Kenmore off the A827.

Kenmore (Cheannmhor) is a small village in Perthshire in the Highlands of Scotland where Loch Tay drains into the River Tay.

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Nikon D800 24mm 1/60s f/2.8 iso200 RAW (14Bit)

Nikkor AF-S 24-70mm f/2.8G ED IF. Jessops 77mm UV filter. Nikon MB-D12 battery grip. Two Nikon EN-EL15 batteries. Manfrotto 055XPROB tripod. Manfrotto quick release plate 200PL-14. Manfrotto 327RC2 Grip action ball head. Sandisc 32GB Ultra Class 10 30MB/s SDHC. Nikon DK-17a magnifying eyepiece. Hoodman HGEC soft eyepiece cup. Nikon MC-DC2 remote shutter release. Nikon GP-1 GPS unit.

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LATITUDE: N 56d 34m 52.39s

LONGITUDE: W 4d 1m 15.46s

ALTITUDE: 108.0m

RAW (TIFF) FILE: 103.00MB

PROCESSED FILE: 15.57MB

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Processing power:

HP Pavillion Desktop with AMD A10-5700 APU processor. HD graphics. 2TB with 8GB RAM. 64-bit Windows 8.1. Verbatim USB 2.0 1TB desktop hard drive. Nikon VIEWNX2 Version 2.90 64bit. Adobe photoshop Elements 8 Version 8.0 64bit

Photograph taken at an altitude of Seven metres, in the magic prior to the Golden hour around sunrise at 05:41am, (sunrise was at precisely 06.15am) on Saturday 6th September 2014 off the Patricia Bay Highway 17, on Lochside Drive close to Frost Avenue and the Lochside Waterfront Park, in beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada.

Here, I am standing beside the wooden decked viewing platform, looking over towards Mt Baker in Washington State, USA from beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. Also known as Koma Kulshan, she is an active glaciated andesitic stratovolcano in the Cascade Volcanic Arc and the North Cascades of Washington State in the United States, standing 3,286 metres tall and was first ascended in 1868, her last eruption recorded in 1880.

These Canada Geese, along with many other small groups, fly across the lake from East to West every morning and back again every evening at Sunset, and I love to watch the classic Vee formations and listen to the honking as they pass me by.

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Nikon D800 70mm 1/1000s f/2.8 iso100 RAW (14 bit) Manual focus. Manual exposure. Matrix metering. Auto white balance.

Nikkor AF-S 70-200mm f/2.8G ED IF VRII. Jessops 77mm UV filter. Nikon MB-D12 battery grip. Two Nikon EN-EL batteries. Nikon DK-17M Magnifying Eyepiece. Nikon DK-19 soft rubber eyecup. Manfrotto MT057C3 057 Carbon Fiber Tripod 3 Sections (Payload 18kgs). Manfrotto MH057M0-RC4 057 Magnesium Ball Head with RC4 Quick Release (Payload 15kgs). Manfrotto quick release plate 410PL-14.Jessops Tripod bag. Optech Tripod Strap.Digi-Chip 64GB Class 10 UHS-1 SDXC. Lowepro Transporter camera strap. Lowepro Vertex 200 AW camera bag. Nikon MC-DC2 remote shutter release. Nikon GP-1 GPS unit.

LATITUDE: N 48d 38m 15.79s

LONGITUDE: W 123d 24m 12.85s

ALTITUDE: 7.0m

RAW (TIFF) FILE SIZE: 103.00MB

PROCESSED (JPeg) SIZE: 13.81MB

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Processing power:

HP Pavillion P6-2388EA Desktop with AMD A10-5700 APU processor. AMD Radeon HD 7570 graphics. 2TB with 8GB RAM. 64-bit Windows 8.1. Verbatim USB 2.0 1TB desktop hard drive. Nikon VIEWNX2 Version 2.10.0 64bit. Adobe photoshop Elements 8 Version 8.0 64bit

Norwegen / Buskerud - Hallingskarvet-Nationalpark

On the way back from Prestholtskarvet.

Auf dem Weg zurück vom Prestholtskarvet.

Hallingskarvet National Park (Norwegian: Hallingskarvet nasjonalpark) is a national park in central Norway that was established by the government on 22 December 2006. The park is located in the municipalities of Hol (Buskerud county), Ulvik and Aurland (both in Vestland county). More precisely, the park comprises the Hallingskarv plateau and the high mountain areas to the west of it. It includes the Vargebreen glacier as well as the valleys of Såtedalen, Lengjedalen, Ynglesdalen, and parts of Raggsteindalen.

The national park covers 450 square kilometres (170 sq mi) of the Hallingskarvet mountain range and hosts large stocks of wild reindeer, an important factor in the establishment of the park. The highest point in the national park is Folarskardnuten which reaches an elevation of 1,933 metres (6,342 ft) above sea level.

The landscape of Hallingskarvet was shaped by multiple ice ages. The park shows the geological history and the connection between this history and the variation in the species living there. It includes areas of special value and which are home to threatened or vulnerable species such as Draba cacuminum (whitlow-grass) and Botrychium lanceolatum (lance-leaf grapefern).

The Bergen Line runs along the southern boundary of the park. There is no road access to the southern side of the park, so Finse Station, a stop on the railway line, is one of the few ways that people can access this part of the park. The Norwegian County Road 50 runs near the northern boundary of the park.

Protection and use

The main objective of this national park is to preserve a large, unique, and largely untouched area in order to protect the landscape and the biome with its ecosystem, species and populations of, amongst others, the wild reindeer. The protection is designed to safeguard a characteristic element needed to understand the geological history of the Norwegian landscape. It is also designed to protect valuable elements of the cultural heritage.

The park is open to the traditional forms of outdoor activities which require little or no technical means.

Name

The first element is halling (inhabitant of the Hallingdal valley) and the last is the finite form of skarv (mountain or mountainous area without vegetation).

(Wikipedia)

Der Hallingskarvet-Nationalpark (norwegisch Hallingskarvet nasjonalpark) ist ein südnorwegischer Nationalpark. Er umfasst das Hallingskarvet-Hochplateau und erstreckt sich über das Gebiet der Gemeinden Hol (Provinz Buskerud), Ulvik und Aurland (Provinz Vestland) gehört.

Gegründet wurde der Park am 22. Dezember 2006, um die dortige große, unverwechselbare und nahezu unberührte Bergregion, die Artenvielfalt von Flora und Fauna und die dort heimischen Bergrentiere zu schützen. Der Park grenzt an das Naturschutzgebiet Skaupsjøen/Hardangerjøkulen und das Biotop Finse.

Im Süden des Parkes führen sowohl die Bergenbahn als auch die Reichsstraße 7 vorbei.

Geologie, Landschaft und Geografie

Der Nationalpark umfasst größtenteils das Hallingskarvethochplateau, welches aufgrund der Kaledonischen Orogenese entstand. Das vorherrschende Gesteinsmaterial der Bergkette ist präkambrisches Pluton.

Der höchste Berg ist der Folarskardnuten mit 1.933 m. Im Hallingskarvet befindet sich auch Norwegens höchster See, der Flakavatnet, welcher auf 1.453 m Höhe liegt.

Flora

Die Pflanzenwelt gestaltet sich mit über 300 verschiedenen Arten sehr vielfältig. Die am weitesten verbreiteten Pflanzen sind der Weiße Silberwurz, Knöllchen-Knöterich und Herbst-Löwenzahn. In den höheren Lagen kommen vor allem Dreiblatt-Binsen, Polarsimsen, Moosheide und Gletscher-Hahnenfuß vor.

Fauna

Im Park gibt es an größeren Säugetieren Bergrentiere, Elche, Rehe, Polarfüchse und Schneehasen. Nördlich des Parks leben zudem Vielfraße.

Die größten Greifvögel sind Steinadler, Gerfalke, Turmfalke und Raufußbussard. Der Kolkrabe ist im Hallingskarvet ebenfalls heimisch.

Kulturerbe

Im Nationalpark wurden verschiedene Jagdutensilien gefunden, die auf eine prähistorische/historische Nutzung der Berge als Jagd- und/oder Siedlungsgebiet schließen lassen.

Im 17. bis 19. Jahrhundert lag der Park entlang einer wichtigen Handelsroute. Einfache Übernachtungshütten, sog. lægre, zeugen noch heute davon. Im Jahre 1880 ließ der englische Graf Lord Garvagh eine steinerne Jagdhütte, die Lordehytta, errichten, um in der näheren Umgebung auf Rentierjagd zu gehen.

Verwaltung und Tourismus

Der Norwegische Wanderverein unterhält im Park die Hütten Finsehytta im Süden und Geiterygghytta im Norden. Private Unterkünfte gibt es im Raggsteindalen und bei Haugastøl. Zwischen den Hütten gibt es markierte Wanderwege.

Zwischen Finse und Ustaoset verläuft ein Stück des Skarverennet durch den Park. Im Süden des Parks verläuft zudem der Rallarvegen.

(Wikipedia)

The Pomegranate Seeds - From Tanglewood Tales, 1853

By Nathaniel Hawthorne, 1804-1864.

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But Queen Metanira, as was very natural, had a great curiosity to know precisely what the nurse did to her child. One night, therefore, she hid herself in the chamber where Ceres and the little prince were accustomed to sleep. There was a fire in the chimney, and it had now crumbled into great coals and embers, which lay glowing on the hearth, with a blaze flickering up now and then, and flinging a warm and ruddy light upon the walls. Ceres sat before the hearth with the child in her lap, and the firelight making her shadow dance upon the ceiling overhead. She undressed the little prince, and bathed him all over with some fragrant liquid out of a vase. The next thing she did was to rake back the red embers, and make a hollow place among them, just where the backlog had been. At last, while the baby was crowing, and clapping its fat little hands, and laughing in the nurse's face (just as you may have seen your little brother or sister do before going into its warm bath), Ceres suddenly laid him, all naked as he was, in the hollow among the red-hot embers. She then raked the ashes over him, and turned quietly away.

You may imagine, if you can, how Queen Metanira shrieked, thinking nothing less than that her dear child would be burned to a cinder. She burst forth from her hiding-place, and running to the hearth, raked open the fire, and snatched up poor little Prince Demophoön out of his bed of live coals, one of which he was gripping in each of his fists. He immediately set up a grievous cry, as babies are apt to do, when rudely startled out of a sound sleep. To the queen's astonishment and joy, she could perceive no token of the child's being injured by the hot fire in which he had lain. She now turned to Mother Ceres, and asked her to explain the mystery.

"Foolish woman," answered Ceres, "did you not promise to intrust this poor infant entirely to me? You little know the mischief you have done him. Had you left him to my care, he would have grown up like a child of celestial birth, endowed with superhuman strength and intelligence, and would have lived forever. Do you imagine that earthly children are to become immortal without being tempered to it in the fiercest heat of the fire? But you have ruined your own son. For though he will be a strong man and a hero in his day, yet, on account of your folly, he will grow old, and finally die, like the sons of other women. The weak tenderness of his mother has cost the poor boy an immortality. Farewell."

Saying these words, she kissed the little Prince Demophoön, and sighed to think what he had lost, and took her departure without heeding Queen Metanira, who entreated her to remain, and cover up the child among the hot embers as often as she pleased. Poor baby! He never slept so warmly again.

Ayam penyet (Javanese for: smashed fried chicken) is Indonesian — more precisely East Javanese cuisine — fried chicken dish consisting of fried chicken that is smashed with the pestle against mortar to make it softer, served with sambal, slices of cucumbers, fried tofu and tempeh. In Indonesia penyet dishes, such as fried chicken and ribs are commonly associated with Surabaya, the capital city of East Java. The most popular ayam penyet variant is ayam penyet Suroboyo.

It is also known for its spicy sambal, which is made with a mixture of chilli, anchovies, tomatoes, shallots, garlics, shrimp paste, tamarind and lime juice. Like its namesake, the mixture is then smashed into a paste to be eaten with the dish.

Taken in the forest, not far from place where I live.

Bilberry (Vaccinium myrtillus) is a species of shrub with edible fruit of blue color, more precisely called common bilberry or blue whortleberry. It is found natively in Europe, northern Asia, Greenland, Iceland, Western Canada, and the Western United States. It occurs in the wild on heathlands and acidic soils. Its berry has been long consumed in the Old World. It is related to the widely cultivated North American blueberry. The bilberry fruit is smaller than that of the blueberry and similar in taste. Bilberries are darker in colour, and usually appear near black with a slight shade of blue. While the blueberry's fruit pulp is light green, the bilberry's is red or purple, heavily staining the fingers and lips of consumers eating the raw fruit. Vaccinium myrtillus fruits has been used for nearly 1,000 years in traditional European medicine for treatment of disorders of the gastrointestinal tract and diabetes. In cooking, the bilberry fruit is commonly used for the same purposes as the American blueberry such as pies, cakes, jams, muffins, cookies, sauces, syrups, juices, and candies.

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Jagódki pstryknięte w lesie, niedaleko mojego osiedla :)

Borówka czarna (Vaccinium myrtillus) – gatunek rośliny wieloletniej z rodziny wrzosowatych. Ma wiele nazw zwyczajowych, m.in. jagoda, czarna jagoda, czernica. Roślina jest szeroko rozprzestrzeniona w Azji, Europie i Ameryce Północnej na obszarach o klimacie umiarkowanym i arktycznym. W Polsce jest pospolita zarówno na nizinach, jak i w górach. Jest wykorzystywana szeroko jako roślina jadalna i lecznicza. Znaczenie gospodarcze borówki czarnej pozostaje wysokie mimo silnej konkurencji znacznie bardziej plennych borówek północnoamerykańskich, których owoce mają uboższy skład chemiczny od czernicy. Owoce borówki czarnej były od dawna bardzo istotne dla Słowian i ludów północnej Europy. Używano jej owoców jako lekarstwa przy biegunkach i krwawej dyzenterii. Zastosowanie takie utrzymało się w lecznictwie ludowym, przy czym często zalecano je także w większych dawkach przeciw owsikom. Ponadto owoce borówki czarnej oferowane i spożywane są w postaci świeżej, suszonej, mrożonej oraz jako składnik przetworów takich jak dżemy, ciasta, soki oraz ciekłe lub sproszkowane koncentraty, będące suplementem diety. Przetwory z jagód wyróżniają się długą trwałością.

Norwegen / Buskerud - Hallingskarvet-Nationalpark

Prestholtskarvet (1859 m)

Hallingskarvet National Park (Norwegian: Hallingskarvet nasjonalpark) is a national park in central Norway that was established by the government on 22 December 2006. The park is located in the municipalities of Hol (Buskerud county), Ulvik and Aurland (both in Vestland county). More precisely, the park comprises the Hallingskarv plateau and the high mountain areas to the west of it. It includes the Vargebreen glacier as well as the valleys of Såtedalen, Lengjedalen, Ynglesdalen, and parts of Raggsteindalen.

The national park covers 450 square kilometres (170 sq mi) of the Hallingskarvet mountain range and hosts large stocks of wild reindeer, an important factor in the establishment of the park. The highest point in the national park is Folarskardnuten which reaches an elevation of 1,933 metres (6,342 ft) above sea level.

The landscape of Hallingskarvet was shaped by multiple ice ages. The park shows the geological history and the connection between this history and the variation in the species living there. It includes areas of special value and which are home to threatened or vulnerable species such as Draba cacuminum (whitlow-grass) and Botrychium lanceolatum (lance-leaf grapefern).

The Bergen Line runs along the southern boundary of the park. There is no road access to the southern side of the park, so Finse Station, a stop on the railway line, is one of the few ways that people can access this part of the park. The Norwegian County Road 50 runs near the northern boundary of the park.

Protection and use

The main objective of this national park is to preserve a large, unique, and largely untouched area in order to protect the landscape and the biome with its ecosystem, species and populations of, amongst others, the wild reindeer. The protection is designed to safeguard a characteristic element needed to understand the geological history of the Norwegian landscape. It is also designed to protect valuable elements of the cultural heritage.

The park is open to the traditional forms of outdoor activities which require little or no technical means.

Name

The first element is halling (inhabitant of the Hallingdal valley) and the last is the finite form of skarv (mountain or mountainous area without vegetation).

(Wikipedia)

Der Hallingskarvet-Nationalpark (norwegisch Hallingskarvet nasjonalpark) ist ein südnorwegischer Nationalpark. Er umfasst das Hallingskarvet-Hochplateau und erstreckt sich über das Gebiet der Gemeinden Hol (Provinz Buskerud), Ulvik und Aurland (Provinz Vestland) gehört.

Gegründet wurde der Park am 22. Dezember 2006, um die dortige große, unverwechselbare und nahezu unberührte Bergregion, die Artenvielfalt von Flora und Fauna und die dort heimischen Bergrentiere zu schützen. Der Park grenzt an das Naturschutzgebiet Skaupsjøen/Hardangerjøkulen und das Biotop Finse.

Im Süden des Parkes führen sowohl die Bergenbahn als auch die Reichsstraße 7 vorbei.

Geologie, Landschaft und Geografie

Der Nationalpark umfasst größtenteils das Hallingskarvethochplateau, welches aufgrund der Kaledonischen Orogenese entstand. Das vorherrschende Gesteinsmaterial der Bergkette ist präkambrisches Pluton.

Der höchste Berg ist der Folarskardnuten mit 1.933 m. Im Hallingskarvet befindet sich auch Norwegens höchster See, der Flakavatnet, welcher auf 1.453 m Höhe liegt.

Flora

Die Pflanzenwelt gestaltet sich mit über 300 verschiedenen Arten sehr vielfältig. Die am weitesten verbreiteten Pflanzen sind der Weiße Silberwurz, Knöllchen-Knöterich und Herbst-Löwenzahn. In den höheren Lagen kommen vor allem Dreiblatt-Binsen, Polarsimsen, Moosheide und Gletscher-Hahnenfuß vor.

Fauna

Im Park gibt es an größeren Säugetieren Bergrentiere, Elche, Rehe, Polarfüchse und Schneehasen. Nördlich des Parks leben zudem Vielfraße.

Die größten Greifvögel sind Steinadler, Gerfalke, Turmfalke und Raufußbussard. Der Kolkrabe ist im Hallingskarvet ebenfalls heimisch.

Kulturerbe

Im Nationalpark wurden verschiedene Jagdutensilien gefunden, die auf eine prähistorische/historische Nutzung der Berge als Jagd- und/oder Siedlungsgebiet schließen lassen.

Im 17. bis 19. Jahrhundert lag der Park entlang einer wichtigen Handelsroute. Einfache Übernachtungshütten, sog. lægre, zeugen noch heute davon. Im Jahre 1880 ließ der englische Graf Lord Garvagh eine steinerne Jagdhütte, die Lordehytta, errichten, um in der näheren Umgebung auf Rentierjagd zu gehen.

Verwaltung und Tourismus

Der Norwegische Wanderverein unterhält im Park die Hütten Finsehytta im Süden und Geiterygghytta im Norden. Private Unterkünfte gibt es im Raggsteindalen und bei Haugastøl. Zwischen den Hütten gibt es markierte Wanderwege.

Zwischen Finse und Ustaoset verläuft ein Stück des Skarverennet durch den Park. Im Süden des Parks verläuft zudem der Rallarvegen.

(Wikipedia)

Yuri: “Now, I will have to go down to the store myself, which was precisely what I was trying to avoid when I had you pick up the extra supplies on your way over here!”

Kumi: “Don’t get your Chanel in a twist, I’ll go back to the store and get your damn sugar. Geez!” *shoves two cookies into her mouth, dusts her hands off, begins to make her way towards the door*

Yuri: “No, no, by all means, allow me. I have nothing better to do, other than bake seventy dozen cookies, twenty four pies, and eighteen cakes…*follows Kumi out of the kitchen*

Kumi: “Sheesh, just shut up already! I said I’d go get it, didn’t I?”

--Sound of bickering fades as the girls make their way through the dining room--

Hermione: “Huh, I guess you were right, Lizard. They do fight sometimes.”

Lizzy (sagely): “They’re sisters. It’s inevitable. I love Georgie, but she drives me cray-cray some days.”

Hermione: “Bet you a cherry Slurpee they don’t stay mad long, though.”

Lizzy: “Nope. They’ll be over it by the time they come back… *hops off her stool and begins loading cookies into boxes* Hey, wanna help? Miz Yuri said to put a dozen into each box.”

Hermione: “Sure. *hops off her own stool, begins helping Lizzy stuff boxes* So, which one?”

Lizzy: “Huh?”

Lukas: *sticks his head into the kitchen, intent on avoiding teenage detection, and seeing the girls’ backs turned to him, enters stealthily, opening the fridge door slowly (to avoid condiment jingle)*

Hermione: “Which guy would you pick? You never said. You can’t have Mr. Simon. I’ve already dibbed all over his fine ass.”

Lukas: *rolls his eyes, mouths* “Typical.” *scans the fridge*

Lizzy (vehemently): “I don’t want any of them! I just hope Georgie knows what she’s doing by getting messed up with Mr. Hawk. Men suck.”

Lukas: *brow furrows, pulls his head out of the fridge to stare at Lizzy’s back, clearly deciding whether or not to let that sleeping dog of a comment lie*

Hermione: “Yeah! They totally suck! Um, I mean, well, some of them do. Not all of them, though…and I like Mr. Hawk. I thought you did, too.”

Lukas: *nods in relieved agreement, goes back to searching for something snack-y*

Lizzy: “No! All of them! They’re all awful, stupid, mean, cowardly liars.” *slams the lid on her cookie box, denting it in the process*

Lukas: *straightens up, sighing dejectedly, as he quietly closes the fridge door and announces his presence* “Hey, double troubles. What fresh horrors be ye perpetrating in here today?”

Lizzy & Hermione: *whip around, startled*

Hermione (brightly): “Hiya, Mr. Luke!”

Lizzy: *hands landing on her hips* “Hmmph.”

Hermione: *surprised look at Lizzy’s cold greeting, quickly* “Um, would you like a cookie?”

Fashion Credits

**Any doll enhancements (i.e. freckles, piercings, eye color changes) were done by me unless otherwise stated.**

Lizzy

Skirt: Jennifer Sue

Sweater: Christmas ornament (Thank you, Emjay!)

Knee Socks: MGA – High Glam Accessory Pack

Mary Janes: Jennifer Sure

Bow: IT – Poppy Parker – Holiday in the Hamptons

Bracelets: Me

Hello Kitty Pin: Nikki in Wales (Thank you, Nikki!)

Doll is a Lacy Modernist Momoko.

Hermione

Jeans: Lazy Seventeen Momoko

Sweater – Christmas ornament (Thank you, Emjay!)

Sneakers: Momoko Separate

Bracelets: Me

Hair Clip: Me

Doll is a Preppy Girl Momoko.

Lukas

Cords: Gwendolyn’s Treasures

Plaid Shirt: Gwendolyn’s Treasures

T-shirt: IT – Dynamite Boys – Back to Brooklyn Remi

Sneakers: IT – Homme – Euro-Classic Fashion

Necklace: Me

Doll is a Rock Ringmaster Lukas.

Photograph taken at an altitude of Sixty six metres, in the first vestiges of light prior to the magic of the Golden Hour around sunrise (Sunrise was at precisely 04:38am), at 02:38am on Thursday 12th June 2014 off Lullingstone Lane and Eagle Heights overlooking a blanket of morning mist as it rolled across the Poppy field by Eynsford Viaduct in the village of Eynsford, Kent, England.

This impressive nine-arched red-brick viaduct is a prominent feature on the line to the 'Bat & Ball' station. The structure was built by the independent ''Sevenoaks Railway'', incorporated in 1859 to link the ''Chatham'' main line with the market town of Sevenoaks. And first services began on 2nd June 1862. The viaduct has nine arches of 30-foot span, and rises to a height of 75-feet above the valley and the River Darent.

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Nikon D800 52mm 5 second exposure f/2.8 iso100 RAW (14 bit) Nikon RC-DC2 remote shutter release. Manual focus. Manual exposure. Matrix metering.

Nikkor AF-S 24-70mm f/2.8G ED IF. Jessops 77mm UV filter. Nikon MB-D12 battery grip. Two Nikon EN-EL batteries. Nikon DK-17M Magnifying Eyepiece. Nikon DK-19 soft rubber eyecup. Manfrotto MT057C3 057 Carbon Fiber Tripod 3 Sections (Payload 18kgs). Manfrotto MH057M0-RC4 057 Magnesium Ball Head with RC4 Quick Release (Payload 15kgs). Manfrotto quick release plate 410PL-14.Jessops Tripod bag. Optech Tripod Strap.Digi-Chip 64GB Class 10 UHS-1 SDXC. Lowepro Transporter camera strap. Lowepro Vertex 200 AW camera bag. Nikon MC-DC2 remote shutter release. Nikon GP-1 GPS unit.

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LATITUDE: N 51d 22m 4.36s

LONGITUDE: E 0d 11m 52.53s

ALTITUDE: 66.0m

RAW (TIFF) FILE: 103.00MB

PROCESSED FILE: 16.74MB

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Processing power:

HP Pavillion Desktop with AMD A10-5700 APU processor. HD graphics. 2TB with 8GB RAM. 64-bit Windows 8.1. Verbatim USB 2.0 1TB desktop hard drive. Nikon VIEWNX2 Version 2.90 64bit. Adobe photoshop Elements 8 Version 8.0 64bit

The Parthenon on the Athenian Acropolis or precisely, the remains of it in its modern appearance.

Built between 447-438 BC (decoration extended until 432) and dedicated to Athene, also Pallas Athene and/or Athene Parthenos, as thanks to the goddess for the Hellenic victory over the Persian Invaders.

The Parthenon was commissioned by the Athenian politician Pericles as a part of a wider building program on the Acropolis to resemble the power and ambitions of Athens within the Delian League and Greece as a whole.

It is considered the most important surviving building of Classical Greece and as the zenith of the Doric order. The Parthenon was further richly ornate with highly detailed Metopes and Pediments as well as the famous Frieze.

Since 1975 the Greek government initiated the restoration of the over 2.500 years old monument. The efforts to restore and conserve this site are a continuing process to the present day.

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In various Mithraic temples there have been found representations of a monstrous figure (according to Hieronymus a monstruosum portentum), generally with a lion's head and a human body entwined by a snake. On none of these, however, is there an inscription to tell us precisely which deity is portrayed. Several attempts have been made, particularly in more recent years, to equate this figure with Ahriman, the god of evil, a suggestion made by Prof. R. Zaehner of Oxford and accepted, with reservation, by the Belgian scholar of Persian, Duchesne-Guillemin. There are, it is true, some dedicatory inscriptions to Ahriman, but they are carved on altars and only three of them are recorded, one each in Rome, England and Austria. They were obviously intended to placate the god of evil and to implore him to avert his magic force, and they must have been inscribed by sorely troubled followers of Mithras who preferred to invoke Ahriman himself rather than place complete trust in their own god who, ultimately and inevitably, was to conquer evil. To us it would seem odd to find an altar dedicated to the devil in a Christian church, but to the ancient way of thinking this was not unusual and even sacrifices of wild boars were made to pacify the malicious Ahriman.

The lion-headed figure is the Time-god called Aion by the Greeks and Zervan in Persian literature. As far as the Persian texts are concerned, three different aspects of the Time-god must be distinguished. According to the orthodox teaching of Zarathushtra, Zervan is a creature of Ahura-Mazda, the God of Good. According to a second theory, however, there were originally two archetypes, that of Good and that of Evil. A separate Sassanid sect regarded Zervan Akarana, Infinite Time, as the cause and the source of all things. Ahura-Mazda and Ahriman both sprang from Zervan and were subject to him, and the followers of this cult called themselves Zervanists. It seems plausible that the same Zervan, after having undergone all kinds of foreign influences, was admitted into the Mithraic pantheon and that the figure with the lion's head is none other than Zervan who, by means of a put on Chronos (Time), was identified in the Greek texts with Kronos and, in the Roman world, with Saturn. This god is mostly portrayed in a stiff hieratic pose, with legs close together. Sometimes he is shown nude, though often his sex is disguised by a loin-cloth or by an enveloping snake, as if it were intended either to leave the deity's sex vague or to convey that both sexes were united in him, and that he was capable of self procreation. In between the coils of the snake, which often winds itself, significantly, seven times round the god, are sometimes seen the signs of the zodiac. The horrifying figure usually has a lion's head with flowing mane and wide-open mouth showing threatening protruding teeth. For even greater effect the mouth is sometimes painted red and the gullet is hollowed out. A statue from Saida in Africa has an opening made in its head, and it is highly likely that this was intended to take a burning torch. The statue would thus appear to breathe fire and so inspire even more respect for the god than his dread visage alone could evoke. In one example he is holding two torches, while a long-pointed flame shoots out of his mouth and fuses with the flames of the burning altar beside him. An unknown author records in an essay on Saturn that he 'is sometimes represented with the appearance of a snake because of excessive cold, and at other times with a wide open lion's mouth on account of scorching heat'. Sometimes this strange creature is carrying a key in both hands, a pointer to a connection with Janus, the ruler of the ianus, the gateway to the underworld of which he possessed the keys. Finally, parallels have been drawn between Saturn and Sarapis, the Egyptian deity of the realm of the dead, and he is in some way related to certain Syrian figures who are found entwined by snakes.

Norwegian, or more precisely Norwegian Air UK, started serving Buenos Aires from Gatwick on 14th February. It runs four times a week, and I caught Dreamliner G-CKOG just before touching down at its European destination.

In line with group policy, it features a 'hero' on the fin, which in this case is Spanish flamenco guitarist Paco de Lucía

London Gatwick

24th February 2018

20180224 IMG_9573 GCKOG

Norwegen / Buskerud - Hallingskarvet-Nationalpark

Prestholtskarvet (1859 m)

Hallingskarvet National Park (Norwegian: Hallingskarvet nasjonalpark) is a national park in central Norway that was established by the government on 22 December 2006. The park is located in the municipalities of Hol (Buskerud county), Ulvik and Aurland (both in Vestland county). More precisely, the park comprises the Hallingskarv plateau and the high mountain areas to the west of it. It includes the Vargebreen glacier as well as the valleys of Såtedalen, Lengjedalen, Ynglesdalen, and parts of Raggsteindalen.

The national park covers 450 square kilometres (170 sq mi) of the Hallingskarvet mountain range and hosts large stocks of wild reindeer, an important factor in the establishment of the park. The highest point in the national park is Folarskardnuten which reaches an elevation of 1,933 metres (6,342 ft) above sea level.

The landscape of Hallingskarvet was shaped by multiple ice ages. The park shows the geological history and the connection between this history and the variation in the species living there. It includes areas of special value and which are home to threatened or vulnerable species such as Draba cacuminum (whitlow-grass) and Botrychium lanceolatum (lance-leaf grapefern).

The Bergen Line runs along the southern boundary of the park. There is no road access to the southern side of the park, so Finse Station, a stop on the railway line, is one of the few ways that people can access this part of the park. The Norwegian County Road 50 runs near the northern boundary of the park.

Protection and use

The main objective of this national park is to preserve a large, unique, and largely untouched area in order to protect the landscape and the biome with its ecosystem, species and populations of, amongst others, the wild reindeer. The protection is designed to safeguard a characteristic element needed to understand the geological history of the Norwegian landscape. It is also designed to protect valuable elements of the cultural heritage.

The park is open to the traditional forms of outdoor activities which require little or no technical means.

Name

The first element is halling (inhabitant of the Hallingdal valley) and the last is the finite form of skarv (mountain or mountainous area without vegetation).

(Wikipedia)

Der Hallingskarvet-Nationalpark (norwegisch Hallingskarvet nasjonalpark) ist ein südnorwegischer Nationalpark. Er umfasst das Hallingskarvet-Hochplateau und erstreckt sich über das Gebiet der Gemeinden Hol (Provinz Buskerud), Ulvik und Aurland (Provinz Vestland) gehört.

Gegründet wurde der Park am 22. Dezember 2006, um die dortige große, unverwechselbare und nahezu unberührte Bergregion, die Artenvielfalt von Flora und Fauna und die dort heimischen Bergrentiere zu schützen. Der Park grenzt an das Naturschutzgebiet Skaupsjøen/Hardangerjøkulen und das Biotop Finse.

Im Süden des Parkes führen sowohl die Bergenbahn als auch die Reichsstraße 7 vorbei.

Geologie, Landschaft und Geografie

Der Nationalpark umfasst größtenteils das Hallingskarvethochplateau, welches aufgrund der Kaledonischen Orogenese entstand. Das vorherrschende Gesteinsmaterial der Bergkette ist präkambrisches Pluton.

Der höchste Berg ist der Folarskardnuten mit 1.933 m. Im Hallingskarvet befindet sich auch Norwegens höchster See, der Flakavatnet, welcher auf 1.453 m Höhe liegt.

Flora

Die Pflanzenwelt gestaltet sich mit über 300 verschiedenen Arten sehr vielfältig. Die am weitesten verbreiteten Pflanzen sind der Weiße Silberwurz, Knöllchen-Knöterich und Herbst-Löwenzahn. In den höheren Lagen kommen vor allem Dreiblatt-Binsen, Polarsimsen, Moosheide und Gletscher-Hahnenfuß vor.

Fauna

Im Park gibt es an größeren Säugetieren Bergrentiere, Elche, Rehe, Polarfüchse und Schneehasen. Nördlich des Parks leben zudem Vielfraße.

Die größten Greifvögel sind Steinadler, Gerfalke, Turmfalke und Raufußbussard. Der Kolkrabe ist im Hallingskarvet ebenfalls heimisch.

Kulturerbe

Im Nationalpark wurden verschiedene Jagdutensilien gefunden, die auf eine prähistorische/historische Nutzung der Berge als Jagd- und/oder Siedlungsgebiet schließen lassen.

Im 17. bis 19. Jahrhundert lag der Park entlang einer wichtigen Handelsroute. Einfache Übernachtungshütten, sog. lægre, zeugen noch heute davon. Im Jahre 1880 ließ der englische Graf Lord Garvagh eine steinerne Jagdhütte, die Lordehytta, errichten, um in der näheren Umgebung auf Rentierjagd zu gehen.

Verwaltung und Tourismus

Der Norwegische Wanderverein unterhält im Park die Hütten Finsehytta im Süden und Geiterygghytta im Norden. Private Unterkünfte gibt es im Raggsteindalen und bei Haugastøl. Zwischen den Hütten gibt es markierte Wanderwege.

Zwischen Finse und Ustaoset verläuft ein Stück des Skarverennet durch den Park. Im Süden des Parks verläuft zudem der Rallarvegen.

(Wikipedia)

Welcome to France, more precisely Paris, our second destination on our journey around the world.

In France, the main language they speak is French.

In the book you can see a translation of the English sentence into French.

We've reached 2,000 support!!!

This is precisely what I love about this city.

People can do whatever they want, wherever they want. (ok, there are a few rules. anyways)

This dude was practicing his stuff inside the station. Not for money. Its too cold outside. No-one had a problem.

I was doing my stuff..something like weird crawling on the ground. No-one had an issue. (well, i was interrogated a few days back while taking snaps of a door in the airport, but thats ok. lets accept it, we are weird)

He was done in like 10 mins. I was not too happy to say "c ya mate".

View On Black

Alaa Abd El-Fattah has endured much of the last twelve years in some of the worst prison conditions anywhere for his brave work in promoting democracy in Egypt. He was last arrested in September 2019 while attending Cairo's Dokki Police Station and in December last year was sentenced to five years imprisonment for "spreading false news undermining state security." More precisely, he had shared social media posts explaining the hell-hole reality of Egyptian prison conditions.

PROTEST OUTSIDE THE FOREIGN OFFICE

When this photo was taken, Alaa's two sisters, Mona and Sana'a Seif, were staging a protest in London's King Charles Street outside the British Foreign Office in the hope that the Egyptian government can be pressured to release him, as media attention began to focus on the upcoming COP27 conference at Sharm El Sheikh on Egypt's Red Sea coast.

UPDATE AS OF WEDNESDAY 9 NOVEMBER 2022

Starting from Sunday 6 November, Alaa escalated his hunger strike, and stopped taking water. His sister Sanaa Seif took a flight the same weekend to attend the COP27 conference at Sharm El Sheikh in a last-minute effort to save Alaa's life.

For the latest on Alaa's situation listen to his sister's Sanaa Seif's speech to journalists attending the conference on Tuesday 8 November - "They are very happy for him to die. The only thing they care about is that it doesn't happen while the world is watching."

www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqXibJ7PUTY

TORA PRISON - "A DAY HERE, IS LIKE A YEAR IN BELMARSH"

In April, Alaa began his hunger strike in a cell in one of the most secure sections of Cairo's sprawling and notorious Tora Prison - a maze of grim high concrete walls and watch towers, which strike fear into even the thousands of commuters who have to pass daily.

In 2012, one young Londoner confined to one of the least uncomfortable and most survivable wings of Tora prison, contrasted it with his own previous experience at Britain's high security Belmarsh. I can never forget his exact words. "A day here, is like a year at Belmarsh!" A little over 12 months later, he died of TB - the prison authorities had refused to listen to the pleas of his aunt, who fell on her knees during a rare visit, begging that he be admitted to the prison hospital.

ALAA'S HUNGER STRIKE CONTINUES AT WADI EL NATRUN PRISON

More than 200 days have passed since Alaa started his hunger strike. He has now been moved to the Wadi El Natrun prison complex in the desert north of Cairo, dubbed by inmates as the "Valley of Hell."

He may not survive much longer. However, as he holds British-Egyptian nationality, one would hope that the British government would be doing everything they could to secure his immediate release and it would be reasonable to suppose that the Foreign Office could get an immediate pledge in this regard, especially given that the British companies, including the likes of British Petroleum and BP, are the biggest investors in Egypt.

NO CONSULAR ACCESS

However, the British government have failed even to get him any consular access - think about that. That's an outrage. Even a convicted mass murderer, if British, would be entitled to consular access while in prison. That meeting would obviously not take place in his cell - but in a designated room in the prison or the highly supervised prison visiting area.

British men and women convicted of drug smuggling and other crimes in Egypt have received consular visits, so why not Alaa? The answer is because Alaa's crime is that he dared to tell the truth about Egypt, and the injustice both inside and outside its many prison walls. Nobody knows exactly how many political prisoners Egypt now has, but the number is estimated to be at least 60,000.

ALAA WAS ONE OF THE LEADERS OF THE MOST INSPIRATIONAL DEMOCRATIC REVOLT THE WORLD HAS EVER SEEN

Alaa Abd El-Fattah was one of the leaders of arguably the most inspirational democratic revolt the world has seen in the last hundred years. Although the first phase of the 2011 uprising in Egypt lasted just 18 days, and although it followed the toppling of the dictator Ben Ali in Tunisia - the streets and bridges around Tahrir Square became a deadly stage watched by the world, where protesters from every walk of life were pitted against Egypt's feared state security forces. Against all the odds, and at the cost of many lives, Egyptians refused to leave the square, sleeping in front of the tanks and fending off attacks from government militia.

The Egyptian people's initial success in toppling the dictator Mubarak led to further revolts not just across the Middle East (most notably in Libya, Bahrain, Yemen and Syria) - the highly organised Tahrir-Square sit-in provided the inspiration for strikes and workplace sit-ins against austerity across the United States and Europe and to the Occupy Movement of the same year. The people of Egypt showed that it does not matter how brutal, feared and authoritarian a government is, it can be toppled if people act collectively.

THE MILITARY BACKLASH

It's true that Egypt's flirtation with the path to greater freedom seemed to be only temporary - the Egyptian authorities deployed the usual divide and rule tactics - encouraging the less committed protesters to return home - and then rushed to elections without allowing time for genuinely democratic opposition parties to develop.

Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood won the presidential election in 2012 - the Brotherhood (contrary to the perception many people have here in the West) had genuinely progressive elements within it, but the chance for any transformative radical programme was prevented partly by the corruption and self-interest of some of the main political actors and partly by opposition to its democratic mandate from the deep state (the military, the Interior Ministry, State Security, the police etc.)

The army, seeing its chance, seized power in 2013, superficially in the name of the people, but in reality, to advance the interests of the generals. The new president, Abdel Fattah El-Sissi, moved quickly to crush all opposition, and ordering his security forces to attack Muslim Brotherhood supporters who had gathered in eastern Cairo at Rabaa al-Adaweya Square, killing at least 800 people - the bloodiest massacre of civilians in Egypt's modern history.

DON'T ALLOW EGYPT TO USE COP27 TO GREENWASH ITS REGIME - AND PLEASE SIGN THE PETITION TO SAVE ALAA

Now COP27 is scheduled to take place in Sharm El-Sheikh and Sisi has been given a golden opportunity to greenwash his murderous regime, which has also seen ever increasing levels inequality and corruption. While British representatives at COP27 will be given accommodation in the most luxurious five star hotels in Sharm El-Sheikh and fall asleep listening to the sound of the waves, another British citizen, Alaa Abdel El-Fatah is near death, on a painful hunger strike in the darkest of places - his dimly lit cell. The only thing he might hear at night is the desperate cry from some prisoner in another cell appealing for medical help which most likely never comes.

If we care for freedom, real democracy and justice, we can't allow the British Foreign Office to forget Alaa - especially if it's simply not to upset the highly profitable relationship British multinationals have with one of the world's most authoritarian and corrupt regimes - a relationship which only benefits the wealthiest of Egyptians.

If you live in London, please show your support at the protest at King Charles Street - and wherever you live please sign the petition -

www.change.org/p/help-free-my-brother-before-it-s-too-lat...

"…precisely the figure that fashion decrees."

It's July 26, 1961 at precisely 7:45 AM. Northern Pacific 855 and 911 find themselves derailed at the north end of Rice's Point in Duluth, Minnesota. While officials (wearing the fancy fedoras) are on the scene trying to figure out how to solve this problem without spending too much money. The very curious fellow who is taking the closest look at the carnage is likely the engineer—hoping that he won't get the blame for today's little mishap. When the lead wheels of the locomotive pick a switch (go the wrong direction) this is the result nearly 100% of the time. It is with good reason why yard speed limits are limited to 10 m.p.h. With so many train movements in the yard and so many switches to navigate—the slower you go—the less damage there will be when things go wrong. NP 855 is an Alco RS-3 built in December of 1953. NP 911 is an Alco RS-11 built in July of 1958. Both will recover after a trip to the roundhouse to put their equalizers back on. the trucks on Alco road switchers had a nasty habit of falling apart if the engine came off the track. An arguably flawed design that Alco's competitors simply didn't have to deal with. Alco went out of business in 1969. FYI, most of the ground between the men in the photo and the turntable is now under the I-35 expressway. The turntable (background-right) belonged to the Soo Line and it would have been located along where Lower Michigan Street is now.

"The Heidenmauer is the best-known Roman monument in the Hesse state capital of Wiesbaden, the Roman Aquae Mattiacorum. According to current opinion, it was built around 370 AD under Emperor Valentinian I and is therefore the oldest surviving building in the city. The purpose of this defensive wall cannot yet be clearly determined, and the dating cannot be narrowed down more precisely than generally to the late phase of Roman Wiesbaden.

During the Wilhelmine period, the Heath Wall was broken through to build Coulinstrasse and the so-called Roman Gate was added in the style of the time. While only a few sections of the wall are visible above ground, the gate that was added later is integrated as a visible monument into the urban development structures of the 19th century in the Quellenviertel. It is a cultural monument for artistic, urban development and local historical reasons, the Heidenmauer for urban historical reasons.

Wiesbaden (German pronunciation: [ˈviːsˌbaːdn̩]) is a city in central western Germany and the capital of the state of Hesse. As of June 2020, it had 290,955 inhabitants, plus approximately 21,000 United States citizens (mostly associated with the United States Army). The Wiesbaden urban area is home to approximately 560,000 people. Wiesbaden is the second-largest city in Hesse after Frankfurt am Main.

The city, together with nearby Frankfurt am Main, Darmstadt, and Mainz, is part of the Frankfurt Rhine Main Region, a metropolitan area with a combined population of about 5.8 million people.

Wiesbaden is one of the oldest spa towns in Europe. Its name translates to "meadow baths", a reference to its famed hot springs. It is also internationally famous for its architecture and climate—it is also called the "Nice of the North" in reference to the city in France. At one time, Wiesbaden had 26 hot springs. As of 2008, fourteen of the springs are still flowing.

In 1970, the town hosted the tenth Hessentag Landesfest (English: Hessian Day, a state festival).

The city is considered the tenth richest in Germany (2014) boasting 110.3% of the national average gross domestic product in 2017. The average annual buying power per citizen is €24,783.

Rheingau is one of 13 designated German wine regions (Weinbaugebiete) producing quality wines (QbA and Prädikatswein). It was named after the traditional region of Rheingau (meaning "Rhine district"), the wine region is situated in the state of Hesse, where it constitutes part of the Rheingau-Taunus-Kreis administrative district. Although, making up only 3 percent of the total German vineyard area, Rheingau has been the source of many historically important innovations in German wine making, and contains many wine producers of international reputation, such as Schloss Johannisberg. Rheingau, with 3,125 hectares (7,720 acres) of vineyards in 2016, also boasts a higher proportion of Riesling (77.7%) than any other German wine-growing region, with Spätburgunder (Pinot noir) making up most of the rest (12.2%), followed by Müller-Thurgau.

The geography of the Rheingau is very distinct. Around Wiesbaden, the river Rhine detours from its northward flow west for about 30 km before it flows north again. The greater part of the Rheingau is situated here on the river's right bank, but the region also includes the stretch along Rhine after it turns northward again, around the villages Assmannshausen and Lorch. The vineyards in Hochheim on the Main river are also included, just before it flows into Rhine. The Rheingau spans about 50 km from end to end. North of the Rheingau rises the Taunus mountain range, so most of the Rheingau's vineyards are on south-facing slope between hills and streams, which provides excellent wine-growing conditions in these northerly latitudes.

Since the Verona donation in 983, the Rheingau belonged to the archbishopric of Mainz. Legend has it that Charlemagne let the first vineyards be planted in the region, close to present-day Schloss Johannisberg. However finds like a Roman origin grapevine cutting knife point to even earlier cultivation. Better documented is the early influence of the church on Rheingau winemaking, which was controlled from Eberbach Abbey. Augustinians and Benedictines are known to have inhabited the area of the later abbey from 1116, and in 1135 the Cistercians arrived, sent out from Clairvaux. Legend has it that the Cistercians, which are also credited with having founded the wine industry in Burgundy, brought Pinot noir with them to Rheingau, although the earliest record of the grape variety in Rheingau is from 1470. The slopes down from the Taunus mountains belonging to Eberbach Abbey were planted as vineyards in the 12th century, and early in the 13th century the vineyards had reached their present area. In medieval times, more red than white wine was produced, usually as Gemischter Satz, i.e. the vineyards were planted with mixed varieties which were vinified together.

Rheingau Wine Official Classification of 1867

In 2011 it was unveiled, that the Official Wine Classification in the Rheingau has a 150 years history. The classification was the basis for taxation of wineries after the annexation of the Duchy of Nassau by the Kingdom of Prussia in 1866. In the book Der nassauische Weinbau published in 1867 by Friedrich Wilhelm Dünkelberg a historical map Weinbau-Karte des nassauischen Rheingaus (Viticultural map of the Rheingau in the Duchy of Nassau), all known vineyards at that time had been marked up by colour, evaluated and classified in first class vineyards (I. Klasse), second class vineyards (II. Klasse) and the remaining vineyards." - info from Wikipedia.

Summer 2019 I did a solo cycling tour across Europe through 12 countries over the course of 3 months. I began my adventure in Edinburgh, Scotland and finished in Florence, Italy cycling 8,816 km. During my trip I took 47,000 photos.

Now on Instagram.

Become a patron to my photography on Patreon or donate.

Created with ChatGPT

The Book of Katarina by Adrian Keeley (Feat Kat Verde-Dillingham)

THE CITY OF SHADOWS 1784

Paris smelled of rain.

It smelled of horses, sewage, smoke, perfume, rotting food, wet stone, and humanity packed so tightly together that even the night seemed unable to contain it.

To Katarina Verde, it was magnificent.

The city stretched before her beneath a sky of silver cloud and scattered moonlight. Thousands of lanterns burned along streets and bridges. Carriages rattled over cobblestones. Music drifted from taverns and theatres. The Seine reflected a thousand broken lights.

Nothing in Europe resembled Paris.

Nothing in Europe hid more secrets.

Which was precisely why she had come.

Lucien hated Paris.

He never denied it.

"You can feel them everywhere," he muttered as they crossed the Pont Neuf.

Katarina glanced sideways.

"The vampires?"

"The ambition."

His expression darkened.

"Cities create ambition."

"And?"

"And ambition creates corpses."

Katarina smiled.

"You've described half of Europe."

Lucien failed to smile in return.

That alone made her pay attention.

The rumors had begun six months earlier.

A merchant in Venice.

A scholar in Vienna.

An immortal encountered briefly outside Prague.

Different sources.

Different countries.

The same whispers.

Paris.

Something unusual was happening in Paris.

Not merely vampires.

Vampires existed everywhere.

This was something else.

Ancient laws were being challenged.

Old powers were stirring.

Certain immortals had vanished.

Others had appeared.

The hidden network of rumor that connected immortal society had become strangely focused upon a single city.

Paris.

Eventually even Lucien had taken notice.

When Lucien de Morcant noticed something, Katarina paid attention.

The city overwhelmed her senses.

Immortality sharpened everything.

Human beings experienced crowds.

Vampires experienced oceans.

Heartbeats.

Thousands of them.

Millions.

An endless symphony of blood flowing through veins.

The first years had nearly driven her mad.

Now she had learned to separate herself from it.

Mostly.

Yet Paris tested even her discipline.

Every street pulsed with life.

Every tavern.

Every theatre.

Every church.

Every palace.

Every slum.

The city seemed alive in a way few places ever became.

Hungry.

Restless.

Waiting.

They rented rooms beneath false names.

As always.

Lucien maintained identities the way other men collected books.

Katarina had stopped asking how many existed.

The answer was probably alarming.

For several weeks they did nothing.

At least that was how it appeared.

They walked.

Observed.

Listened.

Waited.

Immortals who survived centuries rarely rushed toward answers.

History rewarded patience.

History punished enthusiasm.

Katarina hated this lesson.

Which was perhaps why Lucien repeated it so often.

The first sign appeared in a cemetery.

Not a supernatural sign.

Not a dramatic sign.

A practical one.

Three fresh graves.

All recently disturbed.

All empty.

The church blamed grave robbers.

The local authorities blamed criminals.

Lucien said nothing.

Katarina crouched beside one of the open graves and studied the earth.

No coffin fragments.

No drag marks.

No signs of excavation.

The body had not been stolen.

It had left.

The realization should have frightened her.

Instead it fascinated her.

The second sign appeared near the theatre district.

Disappearances.

Not random.

Not numerous.

Specific.

A prostitute.

A musician.

A thief.

A retired soldier.

No obvious connection.

Yet all had vanished within a remarkably small area of the city.

Again Lucien became quieter.

Again Katarina became more curious.

The pattern continued.

Then she saw him.

Not Lestat.

Not yet.

Armand.

Though she did not know his name.

Only his face.

She noticed him because he should not have existed.

He appeared young.

Almost impossibly young.

His beauty bordered upon the unnatural.

Auburn hair.

Pale skin.

Eyes far older than the face surrounding them.

He stood among a crowd outside a church shortly after sunset.

Motionless.

Watching.

Not the church.

The people.

The way a predator studies prey.

Katarina recognized him immediately.

Not personally.

Professionally.

The archive had contained references.

Descriptions.

Accounts.

A beautiful immortal who moved through Europe like a rumor.

Never remaining.

Never belonging.

Always watching.

She followed him.

Of course she did.

The pursuit lasted nearly two hours.

Across bridges.

Through narrow streets.

Into districts she had never visited.

Twice she lost sight of him.

Twice she found him again.

Eventually he entered an abandoned structure near the outskirts of the city.

An old cemetery chapel.

Katarina waited.

Observed.

Counted entrances.

Counted exits.

Then she saw others arriving.

Not humans.

Vampires.

One.

Then another.

Then three more.

The realization struck instantly.

A gathering.

A coven.

Her pulse quickened.

She had spent years studying references to vampire societies.

Most were extinct.

Others remained hidden.

Finding one was extraordinarily rare.

Finding one in Paris explained every rumor.

She returned to Lucien before dawn.

For the first time in years she found him genuinely surprised.

"A coven?"

"Yes."

"How many?"

"At least five."

Lucien sat silently.

Thinking.

That worried her.

When ancient vampires became thoughtful, disaster often followed.

Finally he spoke.

"Do not approach them."

Katarina sighed.

"You know that's not going to happen."

"No."

His expression darkened.

"I suppose it isn't."

Elsewhere in Paris, another story had already begun.

A very different story.

One involving a young vampire incapable of following instructions.

Lestat de Lioncourt hated rules.

He hated them instinctively.

Almost artistically.

The older he became, the more spectacularly he violated them.

By 1784 he had already become a problem.

The word appeared repeatedly in accounts written by older immortals.

Problem.

Danger.

Disruption.

Chaos.

No vampire seemed capable of describing him any other way.

Lestat enjoyed this immensely.

The ancient customs that governed vampire society struck him as absurd.

Hide.

Fear.

Obey.

Remain invisible.

Remain silent.

Remain dead.

Lestat had never excelled at silence.

Or obedience.

Or invisibility.

The first time he heard rumors of the Paris coven he laughed.

The second time he became interested.

The third time he decided to investigate.

That decision altered everything.

Deep beneath Paris.

Far below the city streets.

Far below the cemeteries.

Far below ordinary human knowledge.

The ancient world still survived.

Dark tunnels.

Hidden chambers.

Forgotten catacombs.

An underground kingdom of shadows.

And at its center ruled Armand.

The beautiful vampire Katarina had followed through the city.

The ancient vampire whose youthful appearance concealed centuries of existence.

The leader of the Children of Darkness.

A creature who believed absolutely in ancient laws.

Ancient traditions.

Ancient fears.

Everything Lestat despised.

Everything Lestat intended to challenge.

Neither Katarina nor Armand knew it yet.

Neither Katarina nor Lestat knew it yet.

Yet they had begun orbiting the same secret.

The same conflict.

The same collision point.

One approached through curiosity.

One approached through rebellion.

Both moved toward the same darkness beneath Paris.

And darkness, as Katarina had learned long ago, rarely tolerated two separate investigations forever.

Eventually paths crossed.

Eventually doors opened.

Eventually destinies collided.

For now Paris waited.

The city of kings.

The city of revolution.

The city of immortals.

And somewhere beneath its streets, hidden from the world above, ancient shadows were beginning to stir.

Katarina could feel it.

Lestat could feel it.

Even Armand could feel it.

Though none of them yet understood what was coming.

Only that something had begun.

And Paris would never be the same.

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Image Prompt - Ultra-photorealistic IMAX fantasy photograph, cinematic Netflix-quality realism, 16:9 aspect ratio, 64K UHD, razor-sharp detail, HDR, Unreal Engine 5.5 lighting, wet moonlit Paris, 1784. A richly layered dark-fantasy story collage showing ancient vampire intrigue beneath the City of Light. Central panoramic skyline of Paris at night with the Seine, Notre-Dame, bridges, lantern reflections and rain-soaked cobblestones. Katarina Verde, a striking blonde immortal with long naturally curly golden-blonde hair, elegant black-and-burgundy Victorian gothic gown, intelligent calm expression, overlooking the city. Lucien, ancient dark-haired vampire in ornate black aristocratic attire, watchful and mysterious. Lestat de Lioncourt, handsome fair-haired French vampire nobleman with shoulder-length wavy blond hair, embroidered black coat and ivory cravat, holding a crystal glass. Armand, youthful auburn-haired vampire with pale beauty and ancient eyes. Hidden underground catacombs, abandoned cemetery chapel, vampire coven gathered by candlelight, forgotten tunnels, crypts and ancient stone chambers beneath Paris. Layered cinematic montage composition, seamless transitions between scenes, dramatic chiaroscuro lighting, volumetric moonlight, drifting mist, glowing lanterns, reflective wet streets, gothic architecture, baroque elegance, atmospheric depth, epic historical dark fantasy, no modern objects, no logos, no watermarks.

Pic, Prompt and Story by Adrian

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***** Selected for sale in the GETTY IMAGES COLLECTION on February 24th 2015

CREATIVE RF gty.im/539799645 MOMENT OPEN COLLECTION**

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Photograph taken at an altitude of Seven metres, in the magic of the Golden hour around sunrise at 05:31am, (sunrise was at precisely 06.15am) on Saturday 6th September 2014 off the Patricia Bay Highway 17, on Lochside Drive close to Frost Avenue and the Lochside Waterfront Park, in beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada.

Here, we are looking over towards Mt Baker in Washington State, USA from beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. Also known as Koma Kulshan, (pronounced kō-ō’mah’ kool-shän’),she is an active glaciated andesitic stratovolcano in the Cascade Volcanic Arc and the North Cascades of Washington State in the United States, standing 3,286 metres tall and was first ascended in 1868, her last eruption recorded in 1880.

The name Mount Baker first appeared in print in Captain Vancouver’s 1798 narrative of his voyage around Vancouver Island. Legend has it that his third-lieutenant, Joseph Baker, was the first to spot the mountain while they sailed into Dungeness Bay on April 30th, 1792. Also known by the Lummi as Kwud-Shad, and Koba (meaning 'high mountain always covered with snow', was the Skagit name.

Every morning around sunrise, the gathering of Canada Geese resting upon the water, take to the wing and fly East to West across the Bay. Each squadron of V formation Gese is known as a Skein, and the flight is reversed around the same time each eavening around sunset. An absolute joy to behold.

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Nikon D800 116mm 1/500s f/2.8 iso100 RAW (14 bit) Manual focus. Manual exposure. Matrix metering. Auto white balance.

Nikkor AF-S 70-200mm f/2.8G ED IF VRII. Jessops 77mm UV filter. Nikon MB-D12 battery grip. Two Nikon EN-EL batteries. Nikon DK-17M Magnifying Eyepiece. Nikon DK-19 soft rubber eyecup. Manfrotto MT057C3 057 Carbon Fiber Tripod 3 Sections (Payload 18kgs). Manfrotto MH057M0-RC4 057 Magnesium Ball Head with RC4 Quick Release (Payload 15kgs). Manfrotto quick release plate 410PL-14.Jessops Tripod bag. Optech Tripod Strap.Digi-Chip 64GB Class 10 UHS-1 SDXC. Lowepro Transporter camera strap. Lowepro Vertex 200 AW camera bag. Nikon MC-DC2 remote shutter release. Nikon GP-1 GPS unit.

LATITUDE: N 48d 38m 15.80s

LONGITUDE: W 123d 24m 12.85s

ALTITUDE: 7.0m

RAW (TIFF) FILE SIZE: 103.00MB

PROCESSED (JPeg) SIZE: 15.26MB

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Processing power:

HP Pavillion P6-2388EA Desktop with AMD A10-5700 APU processor. AMD Radeon HD 7570 graphics. 2TB with 8GB RAM. 64-bit Windows 8.1. Verbatim USB 2.0 1TB desktop hard drive. Nikon VIEWNX2 Version 2.10.0 64bit. Adobe photoshop Elements 8 Version 8.0 64bit

I've started writing this entry a good half-dozen times, but kept starting over because I felt I wasn't explaining well enough the profound changes that have manifested - and sharing a look at those, along with my past, whilst celebrating the sheer awesomeness (I over-use that word, but feel it's entirely appropriate!) of the people who helped me get here is my aim, so that others might be inspired that the journey is worth traveling because there are wonderful destinations along the way!. That, and keeping it shorter than a small novel - yes it's long anyway, but I've tended not to share so much of myself to the 'net at large in the past. I'm cashing in credit for that.

I don't expect there's anything I can write that'll make anyone see precisely how to achieve this for themselves in a step by step fashion; I believe it needs to be personally realised and experienced directly, built from our own individual experiences without coercion or duress. I do hope reading of my experience can generate just a little faith, though, that even for the most depressed and worn-out among us simple, complete and deep happiness exists without the ever-present push against a wall of mercurial moods. I hope to play a part in guiding minds to the doorway out of there. I hope to sow a seed.

I think it's a fine balancing line I have to take, and I respect that for folk deep in mid-depression this may sound like nothing but feel-good platitudes - I may be too far removed from that state to directly relate any more. Still, there are those I know who're starting to see, and taking their first steps out of the mire. If that sounds familiar, then this is probably more for you :)

What I write below will only make any sense if you've already read this little piece I wrote in May 2010 about an event I've come to call my first enlightenment, a night where I stopped the quotidian trudging, step by slow step, and launched further forwards than I knew was possible. I was thrown to a place where discovery of how everything works came in waves that I've still not entirely caught up with. It was a trip!

(If the term 'Enlightenment' bothers you, perhaps a Singularity may sit better; a point where advancement is based on countless preconditions all coming together, and nothing afterwards is anything like before. Indeed, it may describe it all quite a bit better, as it didn't appear from nowhere, but was the result of years of slow change, accelerating in the months beforehand.)

So to it.

Like most folk, over my lifetime I had accumulated so much crud that I believed was my identity - habits, memories, fears, roles, desires and so on. I thought these defined me and couldn't really be changed. I thought I could only add to this built-up collection that was me through learning and experience. And for some horrors within, all I could do was cover up and bury them. If I wanted to truly change anything back then, I expected I could only make waves in the external world, because I saw my Self as fixed. Humanity, I'd been taught, could adapt the world to suit ourselves - that was supposed to be our great legacy over all other life.

But instead, by practicing my existence as no more than consciousness and letting go of all else, my attachment to those things I'd once considered Self eased off. So many things that weren't really Me fell away - great masses of want, desire, clinging and ego. Since almost everything I'd once thought was Me was now equivalent to Not Me, my whole concept of what that Me could be widened further than I could have imagined.

With false identity dissolving, choices far beyond just making changes 'externally' revealed themselves. What I am, what I fear, what I desire and what I believe all became choices - because after seeing 'myself' as merely consciousness, I became aware that all of those other parts to my identity are external to 'Me'. Being human wasn't limited to adapting the world outside myself - I could adapt myself, and all of myself, on a whim!. The world changes constantly, sometimes in tune with but often regardless of my will, what sense is there in not being able to let go and change fully with it?

Especially as in the end it's all the same thing - or at least, the line I used to see demarcating me and everything else is now very very fuzzy. A kind of beautiful Self-bokeh.

I suppose I could better label my old false identity as my random collection of stuff that happened to me identity. Now though, my new identity is a non-identity, no-self, where this consciousness that looks out through my body gets to pick and choose how to be from day to day, in order to best satisfy some core beneficial tenets. Compassion, kindness, openness, respect, love...

I saw firmly on that night 365 days ago how extraordinarily powerful pure consciousness can be, and how everything that manifested in my life began with thought derived from it. It's become more and more obvious since then that thought is a thousand-tonne karma train on a high speed track; every single one has consequences, and everything that happens to me is a consequence that began who knows how far back.

Thoughts don't just include my plans for the day, what I'd like for breakfast, or the occasional large scale decision like moving house or marrying, but every self-doubt, lie, or validation about my worth, every awareness or non-aware presumption, every creative notion or destructive want. They all manifest consequences. I manifest them, by thinking them.

Becoming aware of how this works allowed me to see clearly some chains of consequence and responsibility I'd been ignorant of, and those consequences I'd once thought were simply how-things-were, were the end result of decisions I'd made - and that could change. Of course, it's easy to rationalise that the smallest actions in our lives can have huge effects; I only need look back to some beautiful changes in my life occurring because of a chance meeting in 2006 with someone who became a very close friend - but not everything is so black and white. I can also be aware that every thought or action I perform has a direct chain to consequences I may not know at the time (a buddhist concept of karma), and that's a strong and constant guide to doing aware and thoughtful good by myself and others.

So, with this new-found awareness and without a substantial ego in place, I saw my depression was a choice I made based on what I told myself, and all those lies I believed about myself. I may have had prompting events happen to me, but I chose all my reactions to those. I discovered my anxiety was precisely the same, and I could simply let go of the thoughts that brought it on. Depression and anxiety were both irretrievably lost like smoke in fog. I'm not sure I even remember what anxiety feels like, and the angst-infused tears of depression are becoming difficult to recall...

I cringe now when I read the writing of friends and acquaintainces who're still deep in depression, with statements like I wouldn't be me without this or I've always been too smart to trick myself into being happy and you can't just BE happy, or the worst: This is just who I am. They're words spoken as if the depression is the person, as if the negativity we create for ourselves is something solid and comforting but the happiness we can equally will up from the same place is an ethereal thing with no substance, or even some creepy insidious evil.

I know those lies, I know how shallow and deceptive but appealing they are, because they feel true by cloaking themselves as validation - and I know thinking like that does work to ease the ache, just a little. Ultimately though, it still feeds back into the beast inside and strengthens it. I lived it almost constantly, often suicidally so, since I was 16. Now I'm within spitting distance of forty, I've survived all the tricks of long-term depression, and its not Me. It never was. Depression, like happiness itself, is what I do not what I am.

I realised being overweight was also a choice, and it caused the majority of my health issues. It was a choice reached by the thoughts I entertained about food and movement, and the lies I told myself about them that resulted in a body so out of condition it hurt - I used to tell myself that my weight had little to do with my health, until I saw myself with awareness; as I treated myself better my weight fell away and my health improved simultaneously and dramatically - I'd been overweight for so long I'd forgotten what real physical well-being felt like!.

Dozens of little pains, difficult movement, over-sweating, difficult breathing, fat rashes, postural hypotension, migraines, sleep apnoea, easy bruising and endless other little cumulative physical ills caused by my weight - I now know they were choices. They may have been several steps removed from conscious thought in that chain of consequences, but they were no less a direct result of my own thought. I took responsibility for them and decided no more.

I'd like to reiterate that I didn't consciously choose my ills, of course, by refusing to make choices that'd improve my life - it's that I didn't know how to make those choices, or in many cases simply didn't believe I could. I'd taken on the beliefs of others and made them my own.

I realised that my triggers (for the most part revolving around religiosity, sexual abuse, abandonment and responsibility) weren't events that forced an uncontrollable firestorm of anxiety within me, although it felt like that. They were simply events that reminded me of past horrors, and my head did the rest. It was real terror, but what destroyed me inside was a reaction that I owned. Once again that was based on that false identity I no longer carried. Those memories used to bring on such strong reactions that they could undo a whole week's good mood work - now most of them have no effect, and the ones that still do are... mild. I could never have seen that for what it is, and I would have argued against the description I've just given as fairytale wishful thinking bullshit, if I didn't have the awareness I now carry.

The smell of chai at sunrise in summer with the plaintive call of Koels outside was once enough to sour any good mood. Together they remind me of lost love as they took me back to a time lost too. Now that I know the awful feeling that came upon me with those memories was a choice based on what I carried, and because I choose now to carry love and memories of love, I only remember that was love, and it was beautiful!

I realised getting up off my arse and doing just about anything was worth more than uncountable signatures on a petition, retweets, 'likes' on facebook (or whatever simplified expression of 'support' that isn't really much of one at all is doing the rounds today) and that in the scheme of things it's not that much more difficult. I realised I could fly planes, rescue and ease the suffering of Australia's beautiful wildlife, be a morning person, be a much better photographer, be a better friend, write, love and trust freely without needing love or trust given first, improve and inspire human lives, and be that person who renews others' faith in humanity - so I do that and more. It's not effort, it's fun!

I realised that the dichotomy of Conscious and Unconscious mind is a bit of a lie in itself. It's all Mind, and there's no hard line where the unconscious does its thing without me knowing and then the conscious reacts. They fade into and feed off one another constantly without clear demarcation, and they can be observed with an awareness that's above either; an awareness that holds no words, judgments, or anything but What Is. Unconscious may lie in dappled shadows, but it can still be fed quality food. I choose to feed it love, and it no longer springs horrific surprises on me that leave me feeling small, alone and unfixable at 2am.

If I had to summarise the last twenty something paragraphs succinctly and more colloquially, it's that when I realised everything I lived was all in my head, from my worst terror to my most sublime blissful joys, I was freed from it. 'I' was no longer trapped by having to be 'Me'. Sounds self explanatory, no?

Because I began this journey by being opened to a wisdom I couldn't be sure existed and appeared to make little practical sense (but subsequently changed me entirely overnight) I discovered not only the power of choosing thoughts, but in belief - in faith. I combine those to create my own beliefs so strong they become knowledge that I can't so much explain other than with an analogy.

Imagine being given a placebo, a sugar pill that you've been convinced is the best painkiller for relieving your headache - as placebo demonstrations go, it's a standard one that works effectively, and you'll more than likely get a measurable dose of pain relief. I can now both know it's a placebo and believe it'll work, and still find relief. That's powerful. Choosing to believe is my superpower.

And there's a whole lot of super in my life right now.

So anyway, I couldn't have reached where I was this time last year without some very special people who gave and still give of themselves. I'm sure anyone reading my tumblr has seen the number of entries attributed to l.c.h.; they're the initials of the individuals I credit most with lifting me to a point I could haul myself up and not fall back. They're in no order other than letters that sounded good together - I can't rank friends, or indeed most human capabilities, we're just too complex for that.

I attribute my posts to these friends because it was through their combined aid that I could recognise the sense and usefulness in each (and many more I noticed but wasn't near a computer to place online). Those realisations, my friends, are yours as much as mine.

(I must add that I have many other friends I love and adore, who I know care for me deeply and who're very important to me in all manner of ways. They're no less worthy of my time & love, but when it comes to this particular chapter of my life, not all had the opportunity to play. That's ok!. We have more time, and there's a lot more life to live!)

So to my blessed ones.

Leticia - @sweet_libertine. Thank you Tish, for so pleasantly surprising me. Thank you for being my rescuer when I was at my worst, both to myself and to others. Thank you for being my protector, my white lady. Thank you for picking me up and carrying me, a burden I know was heavy through very important times to you. Thank you for trusting me to know what I needed, and thank you for applying tough love when I showed I didn't. I know my mind is a surreal landscape of strange fruit to you, but that only makes my appreciation for your acceptance stronger. You are my Sergeant major, my commanding officer, my kick in the arse; you know precisely how hard a kick I need, and precisely when.

Char - @cmoliver. Thank you Char, for being my sounding board for Every Goddamned Insecurity I Ever Had. Thank you for propping me up when I couldn't stand, thank you for growing with me, thank you for listening, for sharing of yourself equally, and thank you for keeping in touch with me through all the changes in both our lives for good and bad. You are my Doctor, the psych at the end of my couch, the one I ramble at who agrees wholeheartedly with me whether or not I make sense, and who slips in the tiniest little confronting wisdom, sometimes just a single word, that makes me reconsider so much.

Helen - @Invisiblepixels. Thank you Hamsterkins, for being my bestie for so many years. Thank you for being so very blunt with me, but also for validating my sharing, from the stupidest little obsessions to the most profound changes in my flakey, flitty, oh-so-variable life. Thank you for your entirely practical questioning and criticism, and for sharing that brilliant intelligence of yours. Thank you for sharing and giving so much of yourself, and thank you for so unconditionally accepting everything I was and am. Thank you for sticking around, for laughter, for your patience, thank you for just about bloody everything while you write the story of my life with me. You are my Companion, my reflection, my sparring partner and you are in my pocket when I'm not in yours.

With such praise, it wouldn't be unfair to think that I'm placing dependence of my well-being on my friends in an unnecessarily unhealthy way, and you may have been right in the past. Post-enlightenment though, I've become aware that my appreciation and gratitude is no longer for my wonderful people as a need; I don't and can't cling to that, because I know what I genuinely need is welling up inside, that inside is everywhere, and there's an endless supply to share for everyone.

To survive, I might not need you all - but by Gods I'm glad you're here.

Or as Amanda Palmer sings in her cover of 'I Want You But I Don't Need You':

I like you, and I'd like you to like me to like youBut I don't need you, don't need you to need me to like you Because if you didn't like me, I would still like you, you see.

La la laaa - It's all good.

Of course, my friends are more than just the narrow descriptions above, and we all share each of those roles among one another to some level, but again that's beyond the scope of this piece.So here I am after a year recovered - more than recovered! Twelve months in a state so unlike my old depressed self, where I felt I was constantly looking up and wondering how the hell other folk found happiness. I felt scared, and clueless about how I could get to that point, wondering if it was even possible for broken ol' me to be fixed. Twelve months in a state where now I've arrived at that high, gone way past the other side, and found a few other folk there. Now I'm longing to reach out to my fellow humans and drag everyone forward while screaming "Come in! the water's AWESOME!".

Twelve months with three or four bad days, instead of every previous year containing no more than that number of merely OK ones, and no sign of this bliss abating. Twelve months since I finished pecking at my shell from the inside, cracked it open, and took my first real deep breath of free air with the ability to begin growing. It was rebirth.

That makes today, December 8th, my new birthday - because this is the day the closest thing to Me was born, and not just an arbitrary cutoff remembering when biology laid eyes on even more gooey screaming biology.

I gush, for very good reason, because now I get to share all this with everyone else!

2010; Gods, what a year. I hope for everyone to have a year like this, a year that overflowed with such pure existential bliss that events which would have once unraveled me entirely simply came, passed, and I got to watch and learn. Even now, mortal and painful events are unfolding within my closest family, and will certainly involve some major changes directly to my life - but that's OK, it's not the entirety of anything. Onwards and upwards!

There can't help but be another year as good, and another, and so on... simply because I get to make them so.

Happy birthday, me!

This is precisely how you are most likely to bump into a bear in the wild/forest, literally bumping into each other entirely by accident. Nothing can be hidden from a bears nose, which generally speaking is over 500 times more powerful than a bloodhounds nose, but if the wind is ripping, its easy for them to miss your presence altogether, that happens to me all the time....

... the softest, the lightest, a lizard's rustling, a breath, a flash, a moment. A little makes the way of the best happiness.”

Nietzsche

This was one of those moments.

This opal is a black opal from Australia, more precisely: the Lightning Ridge area where the best black opals on the Earth are mined.

See the large version of this photo here for the best view:

www.flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=1797522628&size=l

The opal and it's colors are real, and not enhanced or changed with photoshop.

The only thing that I did with photoshop is changing the form of

the opal so that it looks like the title - a tear splashed on a surface.

And I am sorry that I had to delete the 1st photo "Opal Tear Splash" but something went wrong during the upload and it was only the very small size of it.

Thank you all for the comments and invites, and it is very much appreciated :)

Precisely sized at 649.5. Dry Clean Only.