Can be set precisely with just one hand

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 Monostor Fortress - the largest modern fortress in Central Europe - was built between 1850 and 1871. A UNESCO World Heritage Site, the neoclassical military monument is a fascinating sight with its huge walls of precisely hewn stone, the 3-4 metre thick earthen ramparts covering the defences and its network of underground passages (kazamata) several kilometres long.

Its monumental dimensions are evidenced by the following figures: The fortress covers 25 hectares, the total area including the firing ranges is 70 hectares, the floor area of the buildings is 25 680 m2 and the number of rooms is 640.

After the fortress was built, it served generations of soldiers of the Hungarian Defence Forces. Its tasks included the defence of the central fortress (North - Komárom) and the control of shipping on the Danube. It was never used in combat and served mainly as a training centre and weapons depot. During the First World War it was used as a conscription and training centre. During the Second World War, the 22nd Infantry Regiment had its headquarters at Fort Monostor, and the soldiers of the 1st and 2nd Infantry Regiments were stationed there. After the Second World War.

Between 1945 and 1990, the Red Army's Army Group South set up the largest ammunition depot in Central Europe in the fort. With their withdrawal, the military function of the fortress ended forever.

Today the fort is a popular destination with a military history exhibition, Cold War vehicles, a bread museum, a boat exhibition and numerous events.

www.iranykomarom.hu/en/fort-monostor-en

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

Squaring the circle is a problem proposed by ancient geometers. It is the challenge of constructing a square with the same area as a given circle by using only a finite number of steps with compass and straightedge. More abstractly and more precisely, it may be taken to ask whether specified axioms of Euclidean geometry concerning the existence of lines and circles entail the existence of such a square.

In 1882, the task was proven to be impossible, as a consequence of the Lindemann–Weierstrass theorem which proves that pi (π) is a transcendental, rather than an algebraic irrational number; that is, it is not the root of any polynomial with rational coefficients.

Read more

Read more about Dandelions

Explored :)

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.

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

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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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.

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.

Square and Compasses stained glass window.

Masonic Square and Compasses:

The Square and Compasses (or, more correctly, a square and a set of compasses joined together) is the single most identifiable symbol of Freemasonry. Both the square and compasses are architect's tools and are used in Masonic ritual as emblems to teach symbolic lessons. Some Lodges and rituals explain these symbols as lessons in conduct: for example, Duncan's Masonic Monitor of 1866 explains them as: "The square, to square our actions; The compasses, to circumscribe and keep us within bounds with all mankind".

However, as Freemasonry is non-dogmatic, there is no general interpretation for these symbols (or any Masonic symbol) that is used by Freemasonry as a whole.

Square and Compasses:

Source: Mackey's Encyclopedia of Freemasonry

These two symbols have been so long and so universally combined — to teach us, as says an early instruction, "to square our actions and to keep them within due bounds," they are so seldom seen apart, but are so kept together, either as two Great Lights, or as a jewel worn once by the Master of the Lodge, now by the Past Master—that they have come at last to be recognized as the proper badge of a Master Mason, just as the Triple Tau is of a Royal Arch Mason or the Passion Cross of a Knight Templar.

So universally has this symbol been recognized, even by the profane world, as the peculiar characteristic of Freemasonry, that it has recently been made in the United States the subject of a legal decision. A manufacturer of flour having made, in 1873, an application to the Patent Office for permission to adopt the Square and Compasses as a trade-mark, the Commissioner of Patents, .J. M. Thatcher, refused the permission as the mark was a Masonic symbol.

If this emblem were something other than precisely what it is—either less known", less significant, or fully and universally understood—all this might readily be admitted. But, Considering its peculiar character and relation to the public, an anomalous question is presented. There can be no doubt that this device, so commonly worn and employed by Masons, has an established mystic significance, universally recognized as existing; whether comprehended by all or not, is not material to this issue. In view of the magnitude and extent of the Masonic organization, it is impossible to divest its symbols, or at least this particular symbol—perhaps the best known of all—of its ordinary signification, wherever displaced, either as an arbitrary character or otherwise.

It will be universally understood, or misunderstood, as having a Masonic significance; and, therefore, as a trade-mark, must constantly work deception. Nothing could be more mischievous than to create as a monopoly, and uphold by the poser of lacy anything so calculated. as applied to purposes of trade. to be misinterpreted, to mislead all classes, and to constantly foster suggestions of mystery in affairs of business (see Infringing upon Freemasonry, also Imitative Societies, and Clandestine).

In a religious work by John Davies, entitled Summa Totalis, or All in All and the Same Forever, printed in 1607, we find an allusion to the Square and Compasses by a profane in a really Masonic sense. The author, who proposes to describe mystically the form of the Deity, says in his dedication:

Yet I this forme of formelesse Deity,

Drewe by the Squire and Compasse of our Creed.

In Masonic symbolism the Square and Compasses refer to the Freemason's duty to the Craft and to himself; hence it is properly a symbol of brotherhood, and there significantly adopted as the badge or token of the Fraternity.

Berage, in his work on the higher Degrees, Les plus secrets Mystéres des Hauts Grades, or The Most Secret Mysteries of the High Grades, gives a new interpretation to the symbol. He says: "The Square and the Compasses represent the union of the Old and New Testaments. None of the high Degrees recognize this interpretation, although their symbolism of the two implements differs somewhat from that of Symbolic Freemasonry.

The Square is with them peculiarly appropriated to the lower Degrees, as founded on the Operative Art; while the Compasses, as an implement of higher character and uses, is attributed to the Decrees, which claim to have a more elevated and philosophical foundation. Thus they speak of the initiate, when he passes from the Blue Lodge to the Lodge of Perfection, as 'passing from the Square to the Compasses,' to indicate a progressive elevation in his studies. Yet even in the high Degrees, the square and compasses combined retain their primitive signification as a symbol of brotherhood and as a badge of the Order."

Square and Compass:

Source: The Builder October 1916

By Bro. B. C. Ward, Iowa

Worshipful Master and Brethren: Let us behold the glorious beauty that lies hidden beneath the symbolism of the Square and Compass; and first as to the Square. Geometry, the first and noblest of the sciences, is the basis on which the superstructure of Masonry has been erected. As you know, the word "Geometry" is derived from two Greek words which mean "to measure the earth," so that Geometry originated in measurement; and in those early days, when land first began to be measured, the Square, being a right angle, was the instrument used, so that in time the Square began to symbolize the Earth. And later it began to symbolize, Masonically, the earthly-in man, that is man's lower nature, and still later it began to symbolize man's duty in his earthly relations, or his moral obligations to his Fellowmen. The symbolism of the Square is as ancient as the Pyramids. The Egyptians used it in building the Pyramids. The base of every pyramid is a perfect square, and to the Egyptians the Square was their highest and most sacred emblem. Even the Chinese many, many centuries ago used the Square to represent Good, and Confucius in his writings speaks of the Square to represent a Just man.

As Masons we have adopted the 47th Problem of Euclid as the rule by which to determine or prove a perfect Square. Many of us remember with what interest we solved that problem in our school days. The Square has become our most significant Emblem. It rests upon the open Bible on this altar; it is one of the three great Lights; and it is the chief ornament of the Worshipful Master. There is a good reason why this distinction has been conferred upon the Square. There can be nothing truer than a perfect Square--a right angle. Hence the Square has become an emblem of Perfection.

Now a few words as to the Compass: Astronomy was the second great science promulgated among men. In the process of Man's evolution there came a time when he began to look up to the stars and wonder at the vaulted Heavens above him. When he began to study the stars, he found that the Square was not adapted to the measurement of the Heavens. He must have circular measure; he needed to draw a circle from a central point, and so the Compass was employed. By the use of the Compass man began to study the starry Heavens, and as the Square primarily symbolized the Earth, the Compass began to symbolize the Heavens, the celestial canopy, the study of which has led men to think of God, and adore Him as the Supreme Architect of the Universe. In later times the Compass began to symbolize the spiritual or higher nature of man, and it is a significant fact that the circumference of a circle, which is a line without end, has become an emblem of Eternity and symbolizes Divinity; so the Compass, and the circle drawn by the Compass, both point men Heavenward and Godward.

The Masonic teaching concerning the two points of the Compass is very interesting and instructive. The novitiate in Masonry, as he kneels at this altar, and asks for Light sees the Square, which symbolizes his lower nature, he may well note the position of the Compass. As he takes another step, and asks for more Light, the position of the Compass is changed somewhat, symbolizing that his spiritual nature can, in some measure, overcome his evil tendencies. As he takes another step in Masonry, and asks for further Light, and hears the significant words, "and God said let there be Light, and there was Light," he sees the Compass in new light; and for the first time he sees the meaning, thus unmistakably alluding to the sacred and eternal truth that as the Heavens are higher than the Earth, so the spiritual is higher than the material, and the spiritual in man must have its proper place, and should be above his lower nature, and dominate all his thoughts and actions. That eminent Philosopher, Edmund Burke, once said, "It is ordained that men of intemperate passions cannot be free. Their passions forge the chains which bind them, and make them slaves." Burke was right. Masonry, through the beautiful symbolism of the Compass, tells us how we can be free men, by permitting the spiritual within us to overcome our evil tendencies, and dominate all our thoughts and actions. Brethren, sometimes in the silent quiet hour, as we think of this conflict between our lower and higher natures, we sometimes say in the words of another, "Show me the way and let me bravely climb to where all conflicts with the flesh shall cease. Show me that way. Show me the way up to a higher plane where my body shall be servant of my Soul. Show me that way."

Brethren, if that prayer expresses desire of our hearts, let us take heed to the beautiful teachings of the Compass, which silently and persistently tells each one of us,

"You should not in the valley stay

While the great horizons stretch away

The very cliffs that wall you round

Are ladders up to higher ground.

And Heaven draws near as you ascend,

The Breeze invites, the Stars befriend.

All things are beckoning to the Best,

Then climb toward God and find sweet Rest.”

The secrets of Freemasonry are concerned with its traditional modes of recognition. It is not a secret society, since all members are free to acknowledge their membership and will do so in response to enquiries for respectable reasons. Its constitutions and rules are available to the public. There is no secret about any of its aims and principles. Like many other societies, it regards some of its internal affairs as private matters for its members. In history there have been times and places where promoting equality, freedom of thought or liberty of conscience was dangerous. Most importantly though is a question of perspective. Each aspect of the craft has a meaning. Freemasonry has been described as a system of morality, veiled in allegory and illustrated by symbols. Such characteristics as virtue, honour and mercy, such virtues as temperance, fortitude, prudence and justice are empty clichés and hollow words unless presented within an ordered and closed framework. The lessons are not secret but the presentation is kept private to promote a clearer understanding in good time. It is also possible to view Masonic secrecy not as secrecy in and of itself, but rather as a symbol of privacy and discretion. By not revealing Masonic secrets, or acknowledging the many published exposures, freemasons demonstrate that they are men of discretion, worthy of confidences, and that they place a high value on their word and bond.

Masonic Square and Compasses.

The Square and Compasses (or, more correctly, a square and a set of compasses joined together) is the single most identifiable symbol of Freemasonry. Both the square and compasses are architect's tools and are used in Masonic ritual as emblems to teach symbolic lessons. Some Lodges and rituals explain these symbols as lessons in conduct: for example, Duncan's Masonic Monitor of 1866 explains them as: "The square, to square our actions; The compasses, to circumscribe and keep us within bounds with all mankind".

However, as Freemasonry is non-dogmatic, there is no general interpretation for these symbols (or any Masonic symbol) that is used by Freemasonry as a whole.

Square and Compasses:

Source: Mackey's Encyclopedia of Freemasonry

These two symbols have been so long and so universally combined — to teach us, as says an early instruction, "to square our actions and to keep them within due bounds," they are so seldom seen apart, but are so kept together, either as two Great Lights, or as a jewel worn once by the Master of the Lodge, now by the Past Master—that they have come at last to be recognized as the proper badge of a Master Mason, just as the Triple Tau is of a Royal Arch Mason or the Passion Cross of a Knight Templar.

So universally has this symbol been recognized, even by the profane world, as the peculiar characteristic of Freemasonry, that it has recently been made in the United States the subject of a legal decision. A manufacturer of flour having made, in 1873, an application to the Patent Office for permission to adopt the Square and Compasses as a trade-mark, the Commissioner of Patents, .J. M. Thatcher, refused the permission as the mark was a Masonic symbol.

If this emblem were something other than precisely what it is—either less known", less significant, or fully and universally understood—all this might readily be admitted. But, Considering its peculiar character and relation to the public, an anomalous question is presented. There can be no doubt that this device, so commonly worn and employed by Masons, has an established mystic significance, universally recognized as existing; whether comprehended by all or not, is not material to this issue. In view of the magnitude and extent of the Masonic organization, it is impossible to divest its symbols, or at least this particular symbol—perhaps the best known of all—of its ordinary signification, wherever displaced, either as an arbitrary character or otherwise.

It will be universally understood, or misunderstood, as having a Masonic significance; and, therefore, as a trade-mark, must constantly work deception. Nothing could be more mischievous than to create as a monopoly, and uphold by the poser of lacy anything so calculated. as applied to purposes of trade. to be misinterpreted, to mislead all classes, and to constantly foster suggestions of mystery in affairs of business (see Infringing upon Freemasonry, also Imitative Societies, and Clandestine).

In a religious work by John Davies, entitled Summa Totalis, or All in All and the Same Forever, printed in 1607, we find an allusion to the Square and Compasses by a profane in a really Masonic sense. The author, who proposes to describe mystically the form of the Deity, says in his dedication:

Yet I this forme of formelesse Deity,

Drewe by the Squire and Compasse of our Creed.

In Masonic symbolism the Square and Compasses refer to the Freemason's duty to the Craft and to himself; hence it is properly a symbol of brotherhood, and there significantly adopted as the badge or token of the Fraternity.

Berage, in his work on the higher Degrees, Les plus secrets Mystéres des Hauts Grades, or The Most Secret Mysteries of the High Grades, gives a new interpretation to the symbol. He says: "The Square and the Compasses represent the union of the Old and New Testaments. None of the high Degrees recognize this interpretation, although their symbolism of the two implements differs somewhat from that of Symbolic Freemasonry.

The Square is with them peculiarly appropriated to the lower Degrees, as founded on the Operative Art; while the Compasses, as an implement of higher character and uses, is attributed to the Decrees, which claim to have a more elevated and philosophical foundation. Thus they speak of the initiate, when he passes from the Blue Lodge to the Lodge of Perfection, as 'passing from the Square to the Compasses,' to indicate a progressive elevation in his studies. Yet even in the high Degrees, the square and compasses combined retain their primitive signification as a symbol of brotherhood and as a badge of the Order."

Square and Compass:

Source: The Builder October 1916

By Bro. B. C. Ward, Iowa

Worshipful Master and Brethren: Let us behold the glorious beauty that lies hidden beneath the symbolism of the Square and Compass; and first as to the Square. Geometry, the first and noblest of the sciences, is the basis on which the superstructure of Masonry has been erected. As you know, the word "Geometry" is derived from two Greek words which mean "to measure the earth," so that Geometry originated in measurement; and in those early days, when land first began to be measured, the Square, being a right angle, was the instrument used, so that in time the Square began to symbolize the Earth. And later it began to symbolize, Masonically, the earthly-in man, that is man's lower nature, and still later it began to symbolize man's duty in his earthly relations, or his moral obligations to his Fellowmen. The symbolism of the Square is as ancient as the Pyramids. The Egyptians used it in building the Pyramids. The base of every pyramid is a perfect square, and to the Egyptians the Square was their highest and most sacred emblem. Even the Chinese many, many centuries ago used the Square to represent Good, and Confucius in his writings speaks of the Square to represent a Just man.

As Masons we have adopted the 47th Problem of Euclid as the rule by which to determine or prove a perfect Square. Many of us remember with what interest we solved that problem in our school days. The Square has become our most significant Emblem. It rests upon the open Bible on this altar; it is one of the three great Lights; and it is the chief ornament of the Worshipful Master. There is a good reason why this distinction has been conferred upon the Square. There can be nothing truer than a perfect Square--a right angle. Hence the Square has become an emblem of Perfection.

Now a few words as to the Compass: Astronomy was the second great science promulgated among men. In the process of Man's evolution there came a time when he began to look up to the stars and wonder at the vaulted Heavens above him. When he began to study the stars, he found that the Square was not adapted to the measurement of the Heavens. He must have circular measure; he needed to draw a circle from a central point, and so the Compass was employed. By the use of the Compass man began to study the starry Heavens, and as the Square primarily symbolized the Earth, the Compass began to symbolize the Heavens, the celestial canopy, the study of which has led men to think of God, and adore Him as the Supreme Architect of the Universe. In later times the Compass began to symbolize the spiritual or higher nature of man, and it is a significant fact that the circumference of a circle, which is a line without end, has become an emblem of Eternity and symbolizes Divinity; so the Compass, and the circle drawn by the Compass, both point men Heavenward and Godward.

The Masonic teaching concerning the two points of the Compass is very interesting and instructive. The novitiate in Masonry, as he kneels at this altar, and asks for Light sees the Square, which symbolizes his lower nature, he may well note the position of the Compass. As he takes another step, and asks for more Light, the position of the Compass is changed somewhat, symbolizing that his spiritual nature can, in some measure, overcome his evil tendencies. As he takes another step in Masonry, and asks for further Light, and hears the significant words, "and God said let there be Light, and there was Light," he sees the Compass in new light; and for the first time he sees the meaning, thus unmistakably alluding to the sacred and eternal truth that as the Heavens are higher than the Earth, so the spiritual is higher than the material, and the spiritual in man must have its proper place, and should be above his lower nature, and dominate all his thoughts and actions. That eminent Philosopher, Edmund Burke, once said, "It is ordained that men of intemperate passions cannot be free. Their passions forge the chains which bind them, and make them slaves." Burke was right. Masonry, through the beautiful symbolism of the Compass, tells us how we can be free men, by permitting the spiritual within us to overcome our evil tendencies, and dominate all our thoughts and actions. Brethren, sometimes in the silent quiet hour, as we think of this conflict between our lower and higher natures, we sometimes say in the words of another, "Show me the way and let me bravely climb to where all conflicts with the flesh shall cease. Show me that way. Show me the way up to a higher plane where my body shall be servant of my Soul. Show me that way."

Brethren, if that prayer expresses desire of our hearts, let us take heed to the beautiful teachings of the Compass, which silently and persistently tells each one of us,

"You should not in the valley stay

While the great horizons stretch away

The very cliffs that wall you round

Are ladders up to higher ground.

And Heaven draws near as you ascend,

The Breeze invites, the Stars befriend.

All things are beckoning to the Best,

Then climb toward God and find sweet Rest."

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.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khufu_ship

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_barque

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khufu

The Khufu ship is an intact full-size solar barque from ancient Egypt. It was sealed into a pit alongside the Great Pyramid of pharaoh Khufu around 2500 BC, during the Fourth Dynasty of the ancient Egyptian Old Kingdom. Like other buried Ancient Egyptian ships, it was part of the extensive grave goods intended for use in the afterlife. The Khufu ship is one of the oldest, largest and best-preserved vessels from antiquity. It is 43.4 metres (142 ft) long, 5.9 metres (19 ft) wide, and 1.78 metres (5.83 ft) deep and is the world's oldest intact ship. It has been described as "a masterpiece of woodcraft" that could sail today if put into a lake or a river.

The ship was preserved in the Giza Solar boat museum, but was moved to the Grand Egyptian Museum in August 2021.

History

The history and function of the ship is not precisely known. It is of the type known as a "solar barge", a ritual vessel believed by ancient Egyptians to carry the resurrected king across the heavens with the sun god Ra. However, it bears some signs of having been used in water, and it is possible that the ship was either a funerary "barge" used to carry the king's embalmed body from Memphis to Giza, or even that Khufu himself used it as a "pilgrimage ship" to visit holy places and that it was then buried for him to use in the afterlife. It contained no bodies, unlike northern European ship burials.

Discovery and description

The ship was one of two rediscovered in 1954 by Kamal el-Mallakh—undisturbed since it was sealed into a pit carved out of the Giza bedrock. It was built largely of Lebanon cedar planking in the "shell-first" construction technique, using unpegged tenons of Christ's thorn. The ship was built with a flat bottom composed of several planks, but no actual keel, with the planks and frames lashed together with Halfah grass, and has been reconstructed from 1,224 pieces which had been laid in a logical, disassembled order in the pit beside the pyramid.

It measures 43.4 meters (142 ft) long and 5.9 metres (19 ft) wide. It was thus identified as the world's oldest intact ship and has been described as "a masterpiece of woodcraft" that could sail today if put into a lake, or a river. However, the vessel may not have been designed for sailing, as there is no rigging, or for rowing, as there is no room. Its discovery was described as one of the greatest Ancient Egyptian discoveries in Zahi Hawass's documentary Egypt's Ten Greatest Discoveries.

Reconstruction

It took years for the boat to be reassembled, primarily by the Egyptian Department of Antiquities' chief restorer, Ahmed Youssef Moustafa. Before reconstructing the boat, Moustafa had to gain enough experience on Ancient Egyptian boatbuilding. He studied the reliefs carved on walls and tombs as well as many of the small wooden models of ships and boats found in tombs. Moustafa visited the Nile boatyards of Old Cairo and Maadi and went to Alexandria, where wooden river boats were still being made. He hoped that modern Egyptian shipwrights had retained shipbuilding methods that would suggest how Ancient Egyptians built their ships. Then he investigated the work of shipwrights who built in a different tradition.

Exhibition

The Khufu ship was put on public display in a specially built museum at the Giza pyramid complex in 1982; the museum was a small modern facility resting alongside the Great Pyramid. The first floor of the museum took the visitor through visuals, photographs, and writings on the process of excavating and restoring the boat. The ditch where the main boat was found was incorporated into the museum's ground floor design. To see the restored boat, the visitor ascended a staircase leading to the second floor. Floor-to-ceiling windows allowed for much sunlight, and the wooden walkway took the visitor around the boat where the visitor could get a closer view of its impressive size.

In August 2021, the ship was relocated to the Grand Egyptian Museum.

Solar barques were the vessels used by the sun god Ra in ancient Egyptian mythology. During the day, Ra was said to use a vessel called the Mandjet (Ancient Egyptian: mꜥnḏt) or the Boat of Millions of Years (Ancient Egyptian: wjꜣ-n-ḥḥw), and the vessel he used during the night was known as the Mesektet (Ancient Egyptian: msktt).

Myth

According to Egyptian myth, when Ra became too old and weary to reign on earth he relinquished and went to the skies. Ra was said to travel through the sky on the barge, providing light to the world. Each twelfth of his journey formed one of the twelve Egyptian hours of the day, each overseen by a protective deity. When the sun set and twilight came he and his vessel passes through the akhet, the horizon, in the west, and travel to the underworld.

At times the horizon is described as a gate or door that leads to the Duat. There he would have to sail on the subterrestrial Nile and cross through the twelve gates and regions, with each hour of the night considered a gate overseen by twelve more protective deities. Every night enormous serpent Apophis, the god of chaos (isfet) attempted to attack Ra and stop the sun-boat's journey. After defeating the snake, Ra would leave the underworld, returning emerging at dawn, lighting the day again.

He was said to travel across the sky in his falcon-headed form on the Mandjet Barque through the hours of the day, and then switch to the Mesektet Barque in his ram-headed form to descend into the underworld for the hours of the night. The progress of Ra upon the Mandjet was sometimes conceived as his daily growth, decline, death, and resurrection and it appears in the symbology of Egyptian mortuary texts.

Funerary practices and religion

In folklore, a boat of this kind is used by the sun god. Thus, as the pharaoh was a representation of the sun god on earth, the king would use a similar boat upon his death to travel through the underworld on their journey to the afterlife.

One of the most well known examples of this is the Khufu ship, which was built and then buried at Giza along with Khufu and the rest of the items he would take with him to the afterlife. The ship was originally displayed in the specially-built Giza Solar boat museum, but was subsequently moved to the Grand Egyptian Museum.

Khufu or Cheops was an ancient Egyptian monarch who was the second pharaoh of the Fourth Dynasty, in the first half of the Old Kingdom period (26th century BC). Khufu succeeded his father Sneferu as king. He is generally accepted as having commissioned the Great Pyramid of Giza, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, but many other aspects of his reign are poorly documented.

The only completely preserved portrait of the king is a three-inch-high ivory figurine found in a temple ruin of a later period at Abydos in 1903. All other reliefs and statues were found in fragments, and many buildings of Khufu are lost. Everything known about Khufu comes from inscriptions in his necropolis at Giza and later documents.[citation needed] For example, Khufu is the main character noted in the Westcar Papyrus from the 13th dynasty.

Most documents that mention king Khufu were written by ancient Egyptian and Greek historians around 300 BC. Khufu's obituary is presented there in a conflicting way: while the king enjoyed a long-lasting cultural heritage preservation during the period of the Old Kingdom and the New Kingdom, the ancient historians Manetho, Diodorus and Herodotus hand down a very negative depiction of Khufu's character. Thanks to these documents, an obscure and critical picture of Khufu's personality persists.

Khufu's name

Khufu's name was dedicated to the god Khnum, which might point to an increase of Khnum's popularity and religious importance. In fact, several royal and religious titles introduced at this time may point out that Egyptian pharaohs sought to accentuate their divine origin and status by dedicating their cartouche names (official royal names) to certain deities. Khufu may have viewed himself as a divine creator, a role that was already given to Khnum, the god of creation and growth. As a consequence, the king connected Khnum's name with his own. Khufu's full name (Khnum-khufu) means "Khnum protect me". While modern Egyptological pronunciation renders his name as Khufu, at the time of his reign his name was probably pronounced as Kha(w)yafwi(y), and during the Hellenized era, Khewaf(w).

The pharaoh officially used two versions of his birth name: Khnum-khuf and Khufu. The first (complete) version clearly exhibits Khufu's religious loyalty to Khnum, the second (shorter) version does not. It is unknown as to why the king would use a shortened name version since it hides the name of Khnum and the king's name connection to this god. It might be possible though, that the short name was not meant to be connected to any god at all.

Khufu is well known under his Hellenized name Χέοψ, Khéops or Cheops (/ˈkiːɒps/, KEE-ops, by Diodorus and Herodotus) and less well known under another Hellenized name, Σοῦφις, Súphis (/ˈsuːfɪs/, SOO-fis, by Manetho). A rare version of the name of Khufu, used by Josephus, is Σόφε, Sofe (/ˈsɒfi/, SOF-ee). Arab historians, who wrote mystic stories about Khufu and the Giza pyramids, called him Saurid (Arabic: سوريد) or Salhuk (سلهوق).

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

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

At precisely 17:15 on a Thursday evening, 58046 trundles southward through Stoke with an empty MGR train. From whence it came and where it was going I have no idea!

I did like the original railfreight livery applied to these locos, and for my money, they looked even better when work-stained as in this view.

I don't suppose the Staffordshire Polytechnic is still known as such!

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

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 news of the attacks in Paris had profoundly saddened me. I am shocked and incredibly sad. But they are also an incentive to engage further in tolerance, respect and humanity. Precisely for this reason, it is a matter of heart for me, to continue further on the project "The Human Family" and to promote the humanistic values. Therefore, here is a contribution to the project, which was, however, taken before the horrors of Paris.

At last once again time to continue the project "The Human Family".

Professionally, I'm back on travel, this time on the River Rhine, in Koenigswinter. It's lunchtime break, the weather is acceptable, so already well placed to hold out by strangers. Only problem, there are hardly any people on the street. I wanted to give up almost as if I could see a young woman who was trying to take pictures of her little dog.

When she had finished her photos session, I spoke to her, introduced myself and explained my concerns.

Without hesitation, agreed to my stranger.

So I met here in Koenigswinter Irina. Irina is 25 years old. She's just here for a visit with her grandmother and is walking the dog. Since seven months Irina lives in Berlin; she is a fashion stylist and accompanies photoshoots and is responsible for the outfits. Irina is happy now living and workingin Berlin, because there the career options are very good and they practically operates at the cutting edge. Regularly also the Fashion Weeks are held even in Berlin. An eldorado for fashion enthusiastic people.

What was your biggest challenge so far in life, I asked. My move to Berlin alone and without knowing someone there.

How would you describe yourself? I'm messy, erratic, but clever. (I think these are the attributes that characterize creative people)

Goals: in Berlin to gain a foothold and to succeed professionally; with less Irina does not want to be satisfied.

Yes, Irina agrees with me that it is very ambitious.

What is your motto in life: Do not plan on doing! Do not think, but act.

I do not want to mention how patient Irina posed for my camera. Since I was not completely satisfied with the background, Irina did not mind and so much time to go a few more steps, because I wanted to have a not so troubled background.

Thank you for your patience Irina, and your time, you've diverted for my project. It was a pleasant conversation on the River Rhine. I wish you much success in Berlin and I keep my fingers crossed that you start off really there. All the best to you.

This photo is my 4th submission to new group "The Human Family".

Visit "The Human Family" here and have a look on the photos of the other photographers:

www.flickr.com/groups/thehumanfamily/

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Die Geschehnisse in Paris sind schockierend und haben mich tief getroffen. Sie sind aber auch ein Ansporn, sich weiter für Tolrenaz, Respekt und Menschlichkeit einzusetzen. Gerade aus diesem Grund ist es für mich eine Herzensangelegenheit, dass Projekt "The Human Family" weiter fortzuführen und für die humanistischen Werte zu werben. Daher hier eine Beitrag zu dem Projekt, der allerdings vor den Erignissen von Paris aufgenommen wurde.

Endlich wieder einmal Zeit, das Projekt "The Human Family" fortzusetzen.

Beruflich bin ich wieder auf Reise, diesmal am Rhein, in Königswinter. Es ist Mittagspause, das Wetter ist passabel, also schon einmal gute Voraussetzungen, nach Fremden Ausschau zu halten. Einziges Problem, es sind kaum Menschen auf der Strasse. Ich wollte fast schon aufgeben, als ich eine junge Frau beobachten konnte, die versuchte, ihren kleinen Hund zu fotografieren.

Als sie ihre Fotossession beendet hatte, sprach ich sie an, stellte mich vor und erklärte mein Anliegen. Ohne zu zögern, stimmte meine Fremde zu.

Ich begegnete also hier in Königswinter Irina. Irina ist 25 Jahre alt. Sie ist gerade hier zu Besuch bei ihrer Großmutter und führt ihren Hund aus. Seit sieben Monaten lebt Irina in Berlin; sie ist Modestyleistin, begleitet Fotoshootings und ist dabei für die outfits zuständig. Irina ist froh, jetzt in Berlin zu leben und zu arbeiten, weil dort die beruflichen Möglichkeiten sehr gut sind und sie quasi am Puls der Zeit arbeitet. Regelmäßig finden in Berlin ja auch die Fashionweeks statt. Ein Eldorado für modebegeisterte Menschen.

Was war Deine größte Herausforderung bisher im Leben, fragte ich. Mein Umzug ganz allein nach Berlin und ohne dort jemanden zu kennen.

Wie würdest Du Dich beschreiben? Ich bin chaotisch, sprunghaft, aber clever. (ich glaube, das sind Attribute, die kreative Menschen kennzeichnen)

Deine Ziele: in Berlin Fuß zu fassen und beruflich Erfolg zu haben; mit weniger möchte Irina sich nicht zufrieden geben. Ja, Irina stimmt mir zu, dass sie sehr ehrgeizig ist.

Was ist Dein Lebensmotto: Nicht planen, machen! Nicht denken, sondern handeln.

Ich möchte nicht unerwähnt lassen, wie geduldig Irina vor meiner Kamera posierte. Da ich nicht ganz zufrieden mit dem Hintergrund war, hatte Irina nichts dagegen und so viel Zeit noch ein paar Schritte zu gehen, weil ich unbedingt einen nicht so unruhigen Hintergrund haben wollte.

Vielen Dank Irina für Deine Geduld, und Deine Zeit, die Du für mein Projekt abgezweigt hast. Es war eine angenehme Plauderei am Rhein. Ich wünsche Dir viel Erfolg in Berlin und drücke Dir die Daumen, dass Du dort so richtig durchstartest. Alles Gute.

Dies ist mein 4. Beitrag zu der neuen Gruppe The Human Family. Mehr Fotos von anderen Fotografen findest Du hier:

www.flickr.com/groups/thehumanfamily/

My dear journal I did precisely as I had planned and drank far more than my fill on Sunday night and faced my father on Monday morning in a fairly cheerful mood. Now that I think about it I am sure I was still very drunk, and he was aware of it because by lunchtime was taking delight in making as much noise as he could in his office as my good mood turned to one of the worst headaches I have had in my life. Little did I know that would come later in the night.

At the end of the day, Father thrashed me and left me to my misery with a list of jobs that needed doing before I could go home.

My work was slow as I moved gingerly feeling every agonising little jot until around 11 o'clock when the pain had mostly subsided, and I finally finished. I was gathering my coat and the moneybox to put away in the safe when I heard feet outside the office door and froze. There was no way father had returned to check on me, not at that hour.

I set the box on the desk went to the door quietly hoping the feet would shuffle out, but then I heard a second set creaking down the hall. The bell on the door hadn't gone, they must have come in another way, but it doesn't matter.

What happened next was a blur of motion as two figures burst into the office. Once tackled me and we fell back against fathers’ desk so hard it knocked the air from my lungs. The moneybox went flying as the large desk scraped across the floor with the combined weight of us and crashed to the ground behind it sending coins and notes flying, and one man scrambled away behind the desk to retrieve what he could it while the other was pummelling me.

The pain was unbearable, but I fought hard seeing red, I shoved my attacker away. I do not recall anything afterwards

The next thing I knew they were gone, I was soaked in blood though I was unsure whose it was, and to my relief, the money was still on the floor where it had fallen. I climbed to my feet, and the room spun, but regardless I scooped up the money and put the box away in the safe, I turned around again shaking finding a familiar face in the doorway that hadn't been there before, and he looked very puffed out.

I expect I fainted because I woke up in my bed, confused and numb.

Lucy informed me later in the day that Oliver had come to pick me up and was the one to find me covered from head to toe in blood and the office in a state. As it turns out, the warm patch on my left cheek was a deep but clean cut from my cheekbone to the middle of my cheek about the length of my nose. Unfortunately, it will scar, and it looks awful.

It took me a long time to realise that I was lying in bed in nothing but some loose pants and bandages covering most of my chest. There was a small cut on my chest, but I could not figure out how that had happened or why such a tiny cut would need so many bandages and still be missed, but then it suddenly clicked in my groggy mind that the bandages were for my back.

The way Jane was looking at me from her chair at the side of the bed told me all I needed to know She wasn't stupid and no doubt Lucy had been cursing father was like when they had been cleaning me up... I rolled on my belly and shooed them all away, ashamed and embarrassed.

Lucy told me when I eventually let them come back into the main bedroom that my father had stopped by and much to my surprise told her to keep me off the rest of the day and tomorrow and to see that my face was seen too by a proper doctor, but I would be expected in on Wednesday as usual. He made no mention of the ugly welts on my back a bit daft on my part to think he would really.

Eventually, Jane reappeared and climbed onto the bed and sat beside me. And holding her hand in mine, I caved and told her everything I could think of, from the abuse my family had suffered at fathers hands the constant worry for mother and little Phillip (though he was in boarding school now and I had written requesting they keep an eye on him as they had done for me). To the anger, resentment and embarrassment, I felt that though I was meant to be a grown man now, father frightened me far more than when I was small. And worst of all, I could not stop myself from crying.

I opened my eyes, and she was holding me stroking my hair, and suddenly I was exhausted, Whatever Lucy had given me for the pain had faded and I could still feel every bruise and scrape and welt as I lay there being soothed like a babe but I welcomed the comfort, Jane was gentle, and I could see she was crying too, So very carefully, I sat up ignoring the protests of my entire body and kissed her on the lips. I hate to see her upset and knowing it was my fault; it breaks my heart.

I will leave it here, for now, I am still sore, and I need to sleep. The doctor managed to fit in 7 little stitches on my cheek, and I didn't even ask about my back, according to Lucy, he did an awful job. I won't argue with her, but I do not care how pleasing they are to the eye; I am just glad they are no longer open wounds.

Goodnight. I have work tomorrow, unfortunately, bruises or no. My two days of rest are all the thanks I am going to get from father for saving him a week’s money.

P.S. I run into Jeremiah on my way to the doctors this afternoon he told me Samuel and Jack had disappeared sometime last night, I was sorry to hear that, but those two were not the best company at least from what little I could remember from Sunday night.

He (Jeremiah) asked about my face, and I explained what had happened at the office. When I finished my story, He gives me such a strange look, and I honestly had no idea what to make of it and still do not. The look ended our convocation it seems as he bid me farewell and told me to look after myself. I wished him well and watched him go I do hope he is alright.

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...

Norwegen / Buskerud - Hallingskarvet-Nationalpark

On the way to Prestholtskarvet.

Auf dem Weg zum 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)

"…precisely the figure that fashion decrees."

I found it pretty challenging to work out precisely where this garage was. All my efforts pointed to it having been on Station Road North or possibly on the High Street adjacent to Station Road North. Yesterday Dan Lockton posted an image of much the same location showing an Ultramar garage on the High Street opposite Station Road North. Later on it would be branded Total and currently it is an Esso site and if it is the same place as this then it has finally returned to Esso after maybe forty or fifty years. It may also be of course that the garage was moved to a location very nearby to update the facilities where that might not have been possible at the original site. You can see Dan's photo below, first comment, and here's the Streetview showing it when it was Total branded.

www.google.com/maps/@51.2650023,-0.15256,3a,75y,336.52h,9...

Edit Update:- Thanks to Steve Terry's comment below now identified as being where these flats are now right next door to the railway station and its car park.

www.google.com/maps/@51.2644504,-0.1507554,3a,75y,10.6h,9...

"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.

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.

We are in France...

more precisely, somewhere in a small town on the edge of the Vosges.

Here is a house that already has this beautiful lost-place patina on the facade.

Broken windows and a plot of land where nature is reclaiming everything piece by piece. For us exactly the sign that this place has been abandoned for a long time.

Inside the house, the first thing we notice is how simply the last inhabitants lived here. A beautiful old oil stove in the hallway was still the most modern heating device. Otherwise, wood was used for heating and cooking. In the kitchen, which dates from the middle of the last century, there is also an old wood stove. The walls almost black, which is due to cooking with wood.

The last people who lived here were Pierre and Marie, together with their domestic help Genevieve.

This place was abandoned only in 1997, which was very surprising for me, I would have estimated that it has been empty much longer.

But enough of the words, look for yourself and come with me on a beautiful journey through time ...

Have fun looking at the pictures...!!!!

Precisely sized at 649.5. Dry Clean Only.

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***** Selected for sale in the GETTY IMAGES COLLECTION on April 7th 2015

CREATIVE RF gty.im/553167149 MOMENT OPEN COLLECTION**

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Photograph taken at an altitude of Eight metres, in the magic of the Golden hour around sunrise, (Sunrise was at precisely 06:58am), at 07:04am on Sunday 21st September 2014 off 1st Street between Beacon Avenue and Bevan Avenue, above the shoreline 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 koo’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.

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Nikon D800 185mm 1/1000s f/2.8 iso100 RAW (14 bit). AF-C Continuous focus mode with 3-D tracking. 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 54.88s

LONGITUDE: W 123d 23m 38.68s

ALTITUDE: 8.0m

RAW (TIFF) FILE SIZE: 103.00MB

PROCESSED (JPeg) SIZE: 12.46MB

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PROCESSING POWER:

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 8.1. 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

Photograph taken at an altitude of Forty six metres, prior to the magic of the Golden Hour around sunrise (Sunrise was at precisely 04:42am), at 03:09am on Thursday 19th June 2014 off Lullingstone Lane and overlooking a blanket of morning mist as it rolled across 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 23mm 1/1/6s f/4.5 iso200 RAW (14 bit) Mirror up. AF-S auto mode. Manual exposure. Matrix metering.Auto white balance.

Nikkor AF-S 14-24mm f/2.8G ED IF. 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 6.46s

LONGITUDE: E 0d 12m 11.25s

ALTITUDE: 46.0m

RAW (TIFF) FILE: 103.00MB

PROCESSED FILE: 24.39MB

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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

Or more precisely, steps in Spain. At a house near Tui, Galicia.

This shot was taken at precisely 18:27 on a Friday evening. It was one of the last shots I took on a 3-day jaunt that saw us visit Norton Bridge, Winwick Jct, Greenholme, Carlisle, Thornaby, Colton Jct, Milford, Knottingley, Barnetby, Doncaster and Tupton.

Back in the day, such adventures were worth the effort. My records show that I saw 203 different locomotives and took 120 exposures. Bearing in mind that this was all on slide film (no servo settings on digital cameras back then) it shows how busy places were 20-odd years ago.

Anyway. Unlike me at that time, I'm afraid I cannot say what this working is, but under the blue sky the mixture of heritage BR Blue locomotive and modern Virgin red stock make for a striking image.

86233 (which spent a relatively short career as a freight loco numbered 86506) went on to be exported to Bulgaria. I believe that she still sees active service today (Feb 21).

via Instagram ift.tt/2su5jgL

This extraordinary helmet is very rare. Only four complete helmets are known from Anglo-Saxon England: at Sutton Hoo, Benty Grange, Wollaston and York. The helmet was badly damaged when the burial chamber collapsed. By precisely locating the remaining fragments and assembling them as if in a three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle, conservators have reconstructed the helmet. A complete replica made by the Royal Armouries shows how the original would have looked - (this image)The helmet comprised an iron cap, neck guard, cheek pieces and face mask. Its form derives from Late Roman cavalry helmets. The helmet’s surfaces were covered with tinned copper alloy panels that gave it a bright, silvery appearance. Many of these panels were decorated with interlacing animal ornament (‘Style II’) and heroic scenes of warriors. One scene shows two men wearing horned head-gear, holding swords and spears. The other shows a mounted warrior trampling a fallen enemy, who in turn stabs the horse. The rider carries a spear which is supported by a curious small figure, standing on the rump of his horse – perhaps a supernatural helper. Similar scenes were popular in the Germanic world at this time. The face-mask is the helmet’s most remarkable feature. It works as a visual puzzle, with two possible ‘solutions’. The first is of a human face, comprising eye-sockets, eyebrows, moustache, mouth and a nose with two small holes so that the wearer could breathe. The copper alloy eyebrows are inlaid with silver wire and tiny garnets. Each ends in a gilded boar’s head – a symbol of strength and courage appropriate for a warrior. The second ‘solution’ is of a bird or dragon flying upwards. Its tail is formed by the moustache, its body by the nose, and its wings by the eyebrows. Its head extends from between the wings, and lays nose-to-nose with another animal head at the end of a low iron crest that runs over the helmet’s cap. A precious survival, the Sutton Hoo helmet has become an icon of the early medieval period.

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.

As announced yesterday, this is a photo of the false transept that shows as well as possible the various relieving arches, sometimes piled up, sometimes staggered, that support the bell tower.

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.

Do the relative sizes here confuse you?

Atomium is the model of an iron crystal magnified 165 billion times. The giant Atomium molecule overlooks the precisely 1:25 scale buildings of mini-Europe. The people are on a relative scale of 1:1--their normal size!

These attractions in Brussels, Belgium, were a lark to photograph. More to come!

entering bus station at 1230 precisely.

Built on sloping, antique sand dunes prone to massive mudslides. Just look at these.

As Professor Anthony Turton explains: "the simple reality is that between the Umzimkulu in the south and the Umlazi in North, there is a precisely defined geological province. The main feature is a basement consisting of igneous rock originating in volcanic and tectonic events over geological timescales measured in billions of years. That same region is bounded in both the north and south by a tectonic feature associated with rifting and faulting. Oribi Gorge is a feature of those tectonic forces.

Onto that basement we find an unconsolidated overlay of sand and clay. This is rich in iron oxide and is a reddish colour as a result. The overlay is the result of geomorphology measured in a shorter timescale of millions of years, as opposed to the basement feature that is the result of a much older timescale measured in billions of years.

This younger formation is the result of two sculpting forces - wind and water. The area used to be coastal wetland, and as sea levels rose and fell with successive warmer and cooler paleo climates, we find a layering of aeolian formations deposited above hydraulically deposited formations. The aeolian formation is characterised by wind driven dunes that mobilized particles of sand and clay of different fractions. Those sand dunes were characterised by rolling wavelike formations, all along the coastal area. These were consolidated over time by forest and grassland vegetation, which stabilised them.

This is evident where there is no surface striking rock formation and can be seen in the valleys scoured by rivers. Those valleys reveal the underlying geological formation of rock, now manifesting as meanders with relatively steep sides carved out by the action of water in paleo flood events. This means that flooding is what has shaped the region and is an entirely natural ocurrance with a history covering geological timescales.

This is further evidenced by the sedimentary deposition of silt in the ocean, for a considerable distance offshore. We see that process playing out right now as muddy seawater all along the coast, stretching almost to the horizon. That muddy water consists of the fine clay fraction of the eroded soil profile, held in suspension as a colloid and therefore persistent over time, but always associated with a flood event.

This is a simplistic description of a complex reality, but it shows that the geomorphology has been driven mostly by hydraulic and aeolian forces, at least insofar as the consolidated sand dunes are concerned. Tectonic events drove earlier geomorphology, manifest as rifting and faulting, but the more recent drivers have been floods.

Therefore flooding is a characteristic of the geological province, so policy designed to mitigate risk ought to be based on the assumption that future flood events will be a reasonably predictable driver of risk. Stated differently, and in simple form, the following is true of the coastal region between the Umzimkulu and Ulmazi rivers.

1) The absence of surface striking basement geology along the coastal strip renders the region geotechnically unstable and in need of precise building standards that must be strictly enforced.

2) Flooding is a natural occurrence that has shaped the geomorphology of both the land and immediate offshore sub-sea terrain.

3) Climate variability is a natural process, exacerbated by anthropogenic intervention, and is likely to feature an increase in extreme events, at least in our lifetime.

These three factors ought to be built into policy if the human population, and financial investment in the region, is to be protected in future.

Note that this is a gross simplification of a complex reality, rendered in such a way as to make it understandable to policymakers in government, insurance company decision makers, and investors deciding to purchase real estate."

"... That precisely is what makes its pursuit so interesting."

- John Kenneth Galbraith

Although I was at first, very opposed to the fact that someone had spraypainted this old railcar along the South Shore of the 'Burgh, I realized that it wasn't being preserved. It was sort of just rusting away while other cars probably from the same era, were being protected, and had little plaques with historical information about them. When I looked back at this one after looking at those perfectly preserved ones, I thought this one was more beautiful.

The same thing goes with Arch. Beauty is definitely in the eye of the beholder. Most of the time, we come across people who blab on and on about how cute he is. Other times, people comment on how "weird" he looks. Once, we even had someone yell out the window of their car that he was ugly. I think people either hate Bullies or love them. There's no way to be neutral about a breed with features as distinct and extreme as theirs.

So, my grandmother got married. We do not know precisely when, but perhaps in the late 1920’s. Perhaps she would have been in her teens.

We know very little about my grandfather. He was called İbrahim Hakkı. Those of his family who survived the Cretan massacres of ethnic Turks in the late nineteenth century (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cretan_Turks) had fled to the Aegean port of İzmir. He subsequently moved to Cyprus. We do not know precisely why or when he moved, but perhaps it was related to the chaos that descended upon the former Ottoman territories after the disintegration of the Ottoman Empire at the end of the First World War. We do know that he had previously been married, but that he and his wife had been separated because of the social consequences of the foreign invasions suffered by Anatolia at this time. When he tried to find out the whereabouts of his wife he was informed that she had been killed.

At the time of their marriage, my grandfather was considerably older than my grandmother, although we do not know precisely how old he was. No doubt he was considered a good match for her because he had an excellent income. He worked for the government of Cyprus (by then a British colony) as an agricultural engineer. My grandmother was well trained in cooking and running a household, but she had no formal education.

It was an unequal marriage between a very young woman who was illiterate and a considerably older man who was clearly very well educated. They had four children, two boys and two girls. One of the boys died of meningitis as a child. The other three grew to adulthood. The youngest child subsequently became my mother.

Südafrika - Kleine Karoo

Red Stone Hills - Window Rock

The Karoo (/kəˈruː/ kə-ROO; from a Khoikhoi word, possibly garo "desert") is a semi-desert natural region of South Africa. There is no exact definition of what constitutes the Karoo, and therefore its extent is also not precisely defined. The Karoo is partly defined by its topography, geology and climate — above all, its low rainfall, arid air, cloudless skies, and extremes of heat and cold. The Karoo also hosted a well-preserved ecosystem hundreds of million years ago which is now represented by many fossils.

The Karoo is sharply divided into the Great Karoo and the Little Karoo by the Swartberg Mountain Range, which runs east-west, parallel to the southern coastline, but is separated from the sea by another east-west range called the Outeniqua –Langeberg Mountains. The Great Karoo lies to the north of the Swartberg range; the Little Karoo is to the south of it.

The Little Karoo is separated from the Great Karoo by the Swartberg Mountain range. Geographically, it is a 290 km long valley, only 40–60 km wide, formed by two parallel Cape Fold Mountain ranges, the Swartberg to the north, and the continuous Langeberg-Outeniqua range to the south. The northern strip of the valley, within 10–20 km from the foot of the Swartberg mountains is most un-karoo-like, in that it is a well watered area both from the rain, and the many streams that cascade down the mountain, or through narrow defiles in the Swartberg from the Great Karoo. The main towns of the region are situated along this northern strip of the Little Karoo: Montagu, Barrydale, Ladismith, Calitzdorp, Oudtshoorn and De Rust, as well as such well-known mission stations such as Zoar, Amalienstein, and Dysselsdorp.

The southern 30–50 km wide strip, north of the Langeberg range is as arid as the western Lower Karoo, except in the east, where the Langeberg range (arbitrarily) starts to be called the Outeniqua Mountains.

The Little Karoo can only be accessed by road through the narrow defiles cut through the surrounding Cape Fold Mountains by ancient, but still flowing rivers. A few roads traverse the mountains over passes, the most famous and impressive of which is the Swartberg Pass between Oudtshoorn in the Little Karoo and Prince Albert on the other side of the Swartberg mountains in the Great Karoo. There is also the main road between Oudtshoorn and George, on the coastal plain, that crosses the mountains to the south via the Outeniqua Pass. The only exit from the Little Karoo that does not involve crossing a mountain range is through the 150 km long, narrow Langkloof valley between Uniondale and Humansdorp, near Plettenberg Bay.

(Wikipedia)

Die Karoo (auch Karroo, früher Karru; Khoisan für Halbwüste) ist eine Halbwüstenlandschaft in den Hochebenen des Landes Südafrika, nördlich der Großen Randstufe und im südlichen Namibia. Unterschieden werden Kleine Karoo, Große Karoo und Obere Karoo sowie Sukkulentenkaroo und Nama-Karoo. Mit einer Ausdehnung von 500.000 km² umfasst die Karoo fast ein Drittel des Territoriums Südafrikas. Die Sukkulentenkaroo gehört zu den Biodiversitäts-Hotspots der Erde und wird u. a. im Rahmen von BIOTA AFRICA systematisch kartiert.

Der Name Karoo kommt von kurú (trocken) aus der Sprache der San, die einst hier lebten und jagten. In Hinsicht auf die geographische Ausdehnung des Karoo-Begriffs sind die folgenden Teilaspekte zu beachten und voneinander zu unterscheiden.

Die Karoo als Landschaft im traditionellen Verständnis ist eine südafrikanische Trockenregion innerhalb der Provinzen Westkap, Ostkap und Nordkap sowie im Süden Namibias. Ihre spezifische kapländische Strauchvegetation weist sie als Halbwüste aus. Ursprünglich wird in zwei Regionen unterschieden: Große Karoo und Kleine Karoo.

Die Große Karoo besitzt eine West-Ost-Ausdehnung von über 750 Kilometern und eine Nord-Süd-Ausdehnung von etwa 110 Kilometern. Sie wird im Westen vom Massiv der Zederberge und im Osten durch die Winterberge begrenzt. Im Norden bilden die Bergketten vom Roggeveld-, Koms-, Nuweveldberge und Sneeuberg und im Süden die Höhenzüge der Witteberge, Groot Swartberge und die Groot Winterhoek die natürliche Begrenzung.

Südlich dieser Region schließt sich die Kleine Karoo an. Diese wird wiederum an ihrer südlichen Flanke von den küstennahen Langebergen und Outeniqua-Bergen begrenzt.

Anders als in dieser traditionellen Gliederung, wird die Karoo heute nach ökologischen Gesichtspunkten in einen östlichen Teil, die Nama-Karoo, und einen westlichen Teil, die Sukkulenten-Karoo, gegliedert, wobei auch die Gesamtausdehnung der Karoo nach diesem Konzept von jener der traditionellen Betrachtungsweise abweicht.

(Wikipedia)

Die Little Karoo (englisch, auf Afrikaans Klein Karoo) ist eine Region in der Western Cape Provinz in Südafrika.

Durch die Little Karoo zieht sich die Route 62.

Die Klein Karoo ist ein halbwüstenartiger Landstrich, der zwischen den Swartbergen im Norden und den Outeniqua-Bergen im Süden liegt. Die Gegend ist fruchtbar und nicht ganz so trocken wie die nördlich anschließende Große Karoo. Die Kleine Karoo ist bekannt für die Straußenzucht, allein in der Umgebung von Oudtshoorn gibt es angeblich über 400 Betriebe, landwirtschaftliche Nutztiere der Region sind auch Schafe und Angoraziegen.

Die Kleine Karoo ist das östlichste Weinbaugebiet Südafrikas. Muskatweine, Portweine und Desertweine gedeihen in dem recht trockenen Klima, ein Teil des Weines wird zu Brandy verarbeitet. Auch das hier angebaute Obst wird teilweise zu Schnaps verarbeitet, man bekommt aber auch überall recht preisgünstig getrocknete Früchte.

(wikivoyage.org)

And a direct hit will be the highest possible.

Description and conditions Project 365 - www.flickr.com/photos/danchee/sets/72157628234157885/

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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Landscape taken from Ilhabela, more precisely from the mid point in the Baepi trail.