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Photograph taken at an altitude of Eight metres, in the magic of the Golden hour around sunrise at 05:43am, (sunrise was at precisely 06.15am) on Saturday 6th September 2014 off the Patricia Bay Highway 17, on Lochside Drive close to Frost Avenue and the Lochside Waterfront Park, in beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada.
Here, I am standing beside the wooden decked viewing platform, looking over towards Mt Baker in Washington State, USA from beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. Also known as Koma Kulshan, she is an active glaciated andesitic stratovolcano in the Cascade Volcanic Arc and the North Cascades of Washington State in the United States, standing 3,286 metres tall and was first ascended in 1868, her last eruption recorded in 1880.
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Nikon D800 120mm 1/1600s f/2.8 iso100 RAW (14 bit) Manual focus. Manual exposure. Matrix metering. Auto white balance.
Nikkor AF-S 70-200mm f/2.8G ED IF VRII. Jessops 77mm UV filter. Nikon MB-D12 battery grip. Two Nikon EN-EL batteries. Nikon DK-17M Magnifying Eyepiece. Nikon DK-19 soft rubber eyecup. Manfrotto MT057C3 057 Carbon Fiber Tripod 3 Sections (Payload 18kgs). Manfrotto MH057M0-RC4 057 Magnesium Ball Head with RC4 Quick Release (Payload 15kgs). Manfrotto quick release plate 410PL-14.Jessops Tripod bag. Optech Tripod Strap.Digi-Chip 64GB Class 10 UHS-1 SDXC. Lowepro Transporter camera strap. Lowepro Vertex 200 AW camera bag. Nikon MC-DC2 remote shutter release. Nikon GP-1 GPS unit.
LATITUDE: N 48d 38m 15.80s
LONGITUDE: W 123d 24m 12.88s
ALTITUDE: 8.0m
RAW (TIFF) FILE SIZE: 103.00MB
PROCESSED (JPeg) SIZE: 8.74MB
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Processing power:
HP Pavillion P6-2388EA Desktop with AMD A10-5700 APU processor. AMD Radeon HD 7570 graphics. 2TB with 8GB RAM. 64-bit Windows 8.1. Verbatim USB 2.0 1TB desktop hard drive. Nikon VIEWNX2 Version 2.10.0 64bit. Adobe photoshop Elements 8 Version 8.0 64bit
Think a day at Mini golf exotique, precisely Avenue du Grand Jardin 83980 au Le Lavandou.
Sun, green, open space, dogs, sand, lake, waterfalls, palms, all in one place?
Kesenia will be there, relaxing, playing, posing, thinking, hiding, drinking.
Sure the Mini Golf exotique is what you need to relaxing and make some appearances, paparazzi are around as usual, paparazzi are everywhere the hottest diva of the web will be, so they cannot miss Mini Golf Exotique that day.
Cherry, Strawberry, Blueberry, Black Cherry, Cherry Berry, Black Berry, Burberry, Berry, Huckleberry, ....
Google just one of this spam words to find the latest exploit of Kesenia, web folks looking as much pics as possible, but seems that nothing new was spotted about her since the MAMAC.
But Kesenia doesn't dare of fuss and speculations, she doesn't care less of the gossip spreaded on E! or on Just Jared, those rumors are died and doom now, now it's time for something new.
For the first time in a casual style, she's hitted the golf course fitted in a Chanel cherry and cream tones coat with mongolia fur insert, Burberry plaid print capri, and a flower laser cut blouse in vanilla color from Ferré, matching belt and luggage from Roberta DiCamerino, her style is completed from Zanotti higth heeled boots in copper pink cow leather, Ralph Lauren blue royale hat, and argyle socks.
As usual Kesenia cannot do less than some fine jewerly, as pearl 'n' garnet necklace and matching bracelets from Damiani, moreover some cuff lucite bracelet from Tarina Tarantino.
Caligola make his first appearence to the wordwide press, a pure breed pittbull 4 years old, that Kesenia brought along with her so he can enjoy a bit outdoor.
Someone rumored that is an easier way to avoid troublesome, and keep away paparazzi, as Caligola is an attack dog.
At this time the task seems hard even for the °Papafan° of Kesenia, or maybe he will be the only one to have some exclusive new pics?And where will be published those pics?
On People?US Weekly?Cosmopolitan?
Raising her club, while at the same time keep the golf ball in the other hand, Kesenia staring at the goal, make a hole out with one putt , she's intent to win the mach, no time for distractions.
Kesenia eyes seems venemous while she's glancing in the same direction of Caligola, pointing the last hole, she's the perfect bowler, she's the fierce of the green today:
"No one can beat me, so why don't you enjoy me?"
sentece Kesenia straight in the face at the paprazzi that crowded themselves to payable distance snapping pics, and querelling to have the best angle to have the nicest pics possible.
Than the green man went mad, all those crazy paparazzi jumping on the green without the appropriate shoes,so he pushed them even further away.
Kesenia laugh so hard that even Caligola staring at her with curiosity:
"Oh poor you guys, seems that today nothing going right for you, you cannot play, you cannot snap pics, you cannot win..guess what the prize will be ? "
speaks Kesenia while the paparazzi kept complaining to the green man, following she pinch and putt and hollow out the last hole.
"Game over, i'm the winner!"
singing for the victory smiling and exulting Kesenia brandishing a futuristic arbre magic shape casted in platinum with diamonds set in trophy.
After that Kesenia walks away slowly carrying her Prada golf bag, black and white goat leather, and with a wink drew the attention of her pal:
"Hey what you're thinking about?What do you expect?"
murmured the diva moving away with Caligola to the golf cart, where inside there was a man, but who?
"Bye Bye see you next time poor chaps..."
salute Kesenia with her gloved hand while the golf cart passing fastly and disappeared instantly.
The following days posed pics of the model golfing have been published on some fashion mags, the new style now is called Accidentally Golfy with Arbre Magic, the new sporty chic according to the editorial, and the new diva is Kesenia.
But who gave those pics to mags carefully selected, are wondering reporters, there can be only one....°Papafan°??
*Dress code: Casual golfing chique*
Credits:
Hat: Nippon Misaki Puppy Love
Earrings: Fashion Royalty
Necklace: Kitty Collier by Robert Tonner
Pearls Bracelets: Kitty Collier by Robert Tonner
Cuff Bracelts: Brazt
Black Glove: Bratz
Blouse: Eugenia spring forward
Coat: Fashion Fever Mattel
Belt: Eugenia Spring Forward
Capri plaid pants: Fashion Fever Benetton by Mattel
Bag: Adele Graphic Language
Argyle Socks: Bratz
Shoes: Metal Mauven Vanessa
Golf bag: Bratz
Clubs: Bratz
Golf Ball: Bratz
My grandma is a lively and funny woman. She still plays golf, forgets everything you tell her, and makes too many sexual jokes. That is precisely why I love her, and feel lucky she is still around.
:)
Hasselblad 501c - 80mm Planar T
§ 3 - A tranny princess is by law allowed to dress only and precisely according to her own wish.
Quote: ”The T-girl constitution of 1969”
And so to day I thought to my self, why not try to step down from my throne of femininity and mingle among the more ordinary, the ”common” girls of the realm? Why not just for a glimpse try to identify my self with the subjects of the kingdom, why not ”go slumming” as an ordinary girl?
”Hmmm...” I thought to myself putting on make up and sipping my drink, ”Now there's an idea. Hmmm....”
My mother (who does a LOT of charity work) stumbled over this SWEET SWEET dress and thought of me (sigh) It´s not THAT fortunate at the ”upper” end, but nothing a top won't deal with, as a skirt, it is... silky smooth thin and feel like heaven is breezing around your nylon clad legs * double sigh * I LOVE that dress for it´s skirt-potential and even though you can only see it ”skirt wise” underneath the coat, it is simply perfect as such :o)
But to be honest I DID bring a pair of silver stilettos in the hand bag, as always to be able to change back into a princess if need be, or if being ”ordinary” was feeling a little TOO dull.... it did, but it was still fun :o)
Nothing brings tranquility better than satisfaction. Nothing brings satisfaction than getting precisely what you want. Nothing gets what you want but hard work. Hard work cant produce results unless its fun doing that. Which is precisely what i did all day today. A fantastic shoot with two friends. Too much fun was had and lots of pictures shot.
I'll be uploading a few good ones shortly...
Canon EOS 400D with the Canon EF 50Mm F/1.4 USM. Manual, F/2.8 at 1/80th of a Sec, ISO100.
All Rights Reserved. Owner and Usage Rights belongs to Dilip Muralidaran. Any use of this work in hard or soft copy or transfer must be done with the expressed consent of Dilip Muralidaran in written. Failing to do so will result in violation as per Section 63 of the Indian Copyrights Act, 1957 & Forgery, Fraud, Misrepresentation and Misinformation as per the Indian Penal Code Section 420 leading to severe legal consequences.
Precisely on time, Amtrak's Los Angeles-bound Southwest Chief leaves the Chicago skyline behind as it departs from Union Station. Oh, to have been here during the glory years!
October 13, 2013
“The worst trouble is precisely to not know why, without love and without hatred, my heart feel so much sorrow!” (It’s crying upon my heart.)
Paris, boulevard Saint-Germain, January 2013.
It was sent by Manannan to return Cliodhna (the goddess of the underworld and beauty) back to the land of the dead.37 It is thought likely that Tonn Cliodhna represents the bursting of Llyn Llion. In some versions that same flood kills a visitor as he sleeps in Glandore harbour, which probably lay on dry land south of Cork....Several Ancient Egyptian solar ships and boat pits were found in many Ancient Egyptian sites. The most famous is the Khufu ship now preserved in the Giza Solar boat museum beside the Great pyramid at Giza. The full-sized ships or boats were buried near Ancient Egyptians' Pyramids or Temples at many sites. The history and function of the ships are not precisely known. They might be of the type known as a "solar barge", a ritual vessel to carry the resurrected king with the sun god Ra across the heavens. However, some ships bear signs of being used in water, and it is possible that these ships were a funerary "barge".
Almost all of Judaeo-Christianity can be traced to Egyptian origins, which has been noticed by many scholars reluctant to accept it. That versions of the Book of the Dead have Thoth ordering the Flood as occurred in Scripture is a fact so obscure not many Egyptologists know itThe Book of the Dead is an ancient Egyptian funerary text, used from the beginning of the New Kingdom (around 1550 BCE) to around 50 BCE.The original Egyptian name for the text, transliterated rw nw prt m hrw is translated as Book of Coming Forth by Day.Another translation would be Book of Emerging Forth into the Light. "Book" is the closest term to describe the loose collection of texts consisting of a number of magic spells intended to assist a dead person's journey through the Duat, or underworld, and into the afterlife and written by many priests over a period of about 1000 years.
The Book of the Dead was part of a tradition of funerary texts which includes the earlier Pyramid Texts and Coffin Texts, which were painted onto objects, not papyrus. Some of the spells included were drawn from these older works and date to the 3rd millennium BCE. Other spells were composed later in Egyptian history, dating to the Third Intermediate Period (11th to 7th centuries BCE). A number of the spells which made up the Book continued to be inscribed on tomb walls and sarcophagi, as had always been the spells from which they originated. The Book of the Dead was placed in the coffin or burial chamber of the deceased.
There was no single or canonical Book of the Dead. The surviving papyri contain a varying selection of religious and magical texts and vary considerably in their illustration. Some people seem to have commissioned their own copies of the Book of the Dead, perhaps choosing the spells they thought most vital in their own progression to the afterlife. The Book of the Dead was most commonly written in hieroglyphic or hieratic script on a papyrus scroll, and often illustrated with vignettes depicting the deceased and their journey into the afterlife.The Book of the Dead developed from a tradition of funerary manuscripts dating back to the Egyptian Old Kingdom. The first funerary texts were the Pyramid Texts, first used in the Pyramid of King Unas of the 5th dynasty, around 2400 BCE.[5] These texts were written on the walls of the burial chambers within pyramids, and were exclusively for the use of the Pharaoh (and, from the 6th dynasty, the Queen). The Pyramid Texts were written in an unusual hieroglyphic style; many of the hieroglyphs representing humans or animals were left incomplete or drawn mutilated, most likely to prevent them causing any harm to the dead pharaoh.The purpose of the Pyramid Texts was to help the dead King take his place amongst the gods, in particular to reunite him with his divine father Ra; at this period the afterlife was seen as being in the sky, rather than the underworld described in the Book of the Dead.Towards the end of the Old Kingdom, the Pyramid Texts ceased to be an exclusively royal privilege, and were adopted by regional governors and other high-ranking officials.
In the Middle Kingdom, a new funerary text emerged, the Coffin Texts. The Coffin Texts used a newer version of the language, new spells, and included illustrations for the first time. The Coffin Texts were most commonly written on the inner surfaces of coffins, though they are occasionally found on tomb walls or on papyri. The Coffin Texts were available to wealthy private individuals, vastly increasing the number of people who could expect to participate in the afterlife; a process which has been described as the "democratization of the afterlife".
The Book of the Dead first developed in Thebes toward the beginning of the Second Intermediate Period, around 1700 BCE. The earliest known occurrence of the spells included in the Book of the Dead is from the coffin of Queen Mentuhotep, of the 13th dynasty, where the new spells were included amongst older texts known from the Pyramid Texts and Coffin Texts. Some of the spells introduced at this time claim an older provenance; for instance the rubric to spell 30B states that it was discovered by the Prince Hordjedef in the reign of King Menkaure, many hundreds of years before it is attested in the archaeological record.
By the 17th dynasty, the Book of the Dead had become widespread not only for members of the royal family, but courtiers and other officials as well. At this stage, the spells were typically inscribed on linen shrouds wrapped around the dead, though occasionally they are found written on coffins or on papyrus.
The New Kingdom saw the Book of the Dead develop and spread further. The famous Spell 125, the 'Weighing of the Heart', is first known from the reign of Hatshepsut and Thutmose III, c.1475 BCE. From this period onward the Book of the Dead was typically written on a papyrus scroll, and the text illustrated with vignettes. During the 19th dynasty in particular, the vignettes tended to be lavish, sometimes at the expense of the surrounding text.
In the Third Intermediate Period, the Book of the Dead started to appear in hieratic script, as well as in the traditional hieroglyphics. The hieratic scrolls were a cheaper version, lacking illustration apart from a single vignette at the beginning, and were produced on smaller papyri. At the same time, many burials used additional funerary texts, for instance the Amduat.
During the 25th and 26th dynasties, the Book of the Dead was updated, revised and standardised. Spells were consistently ordered and numbered for the first time. This standardised version is known today as the 'Saite recension', after the Saite (26th) dynasty. In the Late period and Ptolemaic period, the Book of the Dead remained based on the Saite recension, though increasingly abbreviated towards the end of the Ptolemaic period. New funerary texts appeared, including the Book of Breathing and Book of Traversing Eternity. The last use of the Book of the Dead was in the 1st century BCE, though some artistic motifs drawn from it were still in use in Roman times.The Book of the Dead is made up of a number of individual texts and their accompanying illustrations. Most sub-texts begin with the word ro, which can mean "mouth," "speech," "spell," "utterance," "incantation," or "a chapter of a book." This ambiguity reflects the similarity in Egyptian thought between ritual speech and magical power. In the context of the Book of the Dead, it is typically translated as either "chapter" or "spell." In this article, the word "spell" is used.
At present, some 192 spells are known,though no single manuscript contains them all. They served a range of purposes. Some are intended to give the deceased mystical knowledge in the afterlife, or perhaps to identify them with the gods: for instance, Spell 17 is an obscure and lengthy description of the god Atum. Others are incantations to ensure the different elements of the dead person's being were preserved and reunited, and to give the deceased control over the world around him. Still others protect the deceased from various hostile forces or guide him through the underworld past various obstacles. Famously, two spells also deal with the judgement of the deceased in the Weighing of the Heart ritual.
Such spells as 26 - 30, and sometimes spells 6 and 126, relate to the heart and were inscribed on scarabs.
The texts and images of the Book of the Dead were magical as well as religious. Magic was as legitimate an activity as praying to the gods, even when the magic was aimed at controlling the gods themselves.Indeed, there was little distinction for the Ancient Egyptians between magical and religious practice. The concept of magic (heka) was also intimately linked with the spoken and written word. The act of speaking a ritual formula was an act of creation; there is a sense in which action and speech were one and the same thing. The magical power of words extended to the written word. Hieroglyphic script was held to have been invented by the god Thoth, and the hieroglyphs themselves were powerful. Written words conveyed the full force of a spell.This was even true when the text was abbreviated or omitted, as often occurred in later Book of the Dead scrolls, particularly if the accompanying images were present. The Egyptians also believed that knowing the name of something gave power over it; thus, the Book of the Dead equips its owner with the mystical names of many of the entities he would encounter in the afterlife, giving him power over them.
The spells of the Book of the Dead made use of several magical techniques which can also be seen in other areas of Egyptian life. A number of spells are for magical amulets, which would protect the deceased from harm. In addition to being represented on a Book of the Dead papyrus, these spells appeared on amulets wound into the wrappings of a mummy. Everyday magic made use of amulets in huge numbers. Other items in direct contact with the body in the tomb, such as headrests, were also considered to have amuletic value. A number of spells also refer to Egyptian beliefs about the magical healing power of saliva.
Organization
Almost every Book of the Dead was unique, containing a different mixture of spells drawn from the corpus of texts available. For most of the history of the Book of the Dead there was no defined order or structure. In fact, until Paul Barguet's 1967 "pioneering study" of common themes between texts,Egyptologists concluded there was no internal structure at all. It is only from the Saite period (26th dynasty) onwards that there is a defined order.
The Books of the Dead from the Saite period tend to organize the Chapters into four sections:
Chapters 1–16* The deceased enters the tomb and descends to the underworld, and the body regains its powers of movement and speech.
Chapters 17–63 Explanation of the mythic origin of the gods and places. The deceased is made to live again so that he may arise, reborn, with the morning sun.
Chapters 64–129 The deceased travels across the sky in the sun ark as one of the blessed dead. In the evening, the deceased travels to the underworld to appear before Osiris.
Chapters 130–189 Having been vindicated, the deceased assumes power in the universe as one of the gods. This section also includes assorted chapters on protective amulets, provision of food, and important places.
Egyptian concepts of death and afterlife
A vignette in The Papyrus of Ani, from Spell 30B: Spell For Not Letting Ani's Heart Create Opposition Against Him, in the Gods' Domain, which contains a depiction of the ba of the deceased
The spells in the Book of the Dead depict Egyptian beliefs about the nature of death and the afterlife. The Book of the Dead is a vital source of information about Egyptian beliefs in this area.
Preservation
One aspect of death was the disintegration of the various kheperu, or modes of existence.Funerary rituals served to re-integrate these different aspects of being. Mummification served to preserve and transform the physical body into sah, an idealised form with divine aspects;the Book of the Dead contained spells aimed at preserving the body of the deceased, which may have been recited during the process of mummification.The heart, which was regarded as the aspect of being which included intelligence and memory, was also protected with spells, and in case anything happened to the physical heart, it was common to bury jewelled heart scarabs with a body to provide a replacement. The ka, or life-force, remained in the tomb with the dead body, and required sustenance from offerings of food, water and incense. In case priests or relatives failed to provide these offerings, Spell 105 ensured the ka was satisfied.The name of the dead person, which constituted their individuality and was required for their continued existence, was written in many places throughout the Book, and spell 25 ensured the deceased would remember their own name.The ba was a free-ranging spirit aspect of the deceased. It was the ba, depicted as a human-headed bird, which could "go forth by day" from the tomb into the world; spells 61 and 89 acted to preserve it.[33] Finally, the shut, or shadow of the deceased, was preserved by spells 91, 92 and 188. If all these aspects of the person could be variously preserved, remembered, and satiated, then the dead person would live on in the form of an akh. An akh was a blessed spirit with magical powers who would dwell among the gods.
Afterlife
The nature of the afterlife which the dead person enjoyed is difficult to define, because of the differing traditions within Ancient Egyptian religion. In the Book of the Dead, the dead were taken into the presence of the god Osiris, who was confined to the subterranean Duat. There are also spells to enable the ba or akh of the dead to join Ra as he travelled the sky in his sun-barque, and help him fight off Apep. As well as joining the Gods, the Book of the Dead also depicts the dead living on in the 'Field of Reeds', a paradisiac likeness of the real world.The Field of Reeds is depicted as a lush, plentiful version of the Egypt of the living. There are fields, crops, oxen, people and waterways. The deceased person is shown encountering the Great Ennead, a group of gods, as well as his or her own parents. While the depiction of the Field of Reeds is pleasant and plentiful, it is also clear that manual labour is required. For this reason burials included a number of statuettes named shabti, or later ushebti. These statuettes were inscribed with a spell, also included in the Book of the Dead, requiring them to undertake any manual labour that might be the owner's duty in the afterlife. It is also clear that the dead not only went to a place where the gods lived, but that they acquired divine characteristics themselves. In many occasions, the deceased is mentioned as "The Osiris – [Name]" in the Book of the Dead.
Two 'gate spells'. On the top register, Ani and his wife face the 'seven gates of the House of Osiris'. Below, they encounter ten of the 21 'mysterious portals of the House of Osiris in the Field of Reeds'. All are guarded by unpleasant protectors.
The path to the afterlife as laid out in the Book of the Dead was a difficult one. The deceased was required to pass a series of gates, caverns and mounds guarded by supernatural creatures.These terrifying entities were armed with enormous knives and are illustrated in grotesque forms, typically as human figures with the heads of animals or combinations of different ferocious beasts. Their names—for instance, "He who lives on snakes" or "He who dances in blood"—are equally grotesque. These creatures had to be pacified by reciting the appropriate spells included in the Book of the Dead; once pacified they posed no further threat, and could even extend their protection to the dead person. Another breed of supernatural creatures was 'slaughterers' who killed the unrighteous on behalf of Osiris; the Book of the Dead equipped its owner to escape their attentions. As well as these supernatural entities, there were also threats from natural or supernatural animals, including crocodiles, snakes, and beetles.
Judgment
The Weighing of the Heart ritual, shown in the Book of the Dead of Sesostris
If all the obstacles of the Duat could be negotiated, the deceased would be judged in the "Weighing of the Heart" ritual, depicted in Spell 125. The deceased was led by the god Anubis into the presence of Osiris. There, the dead person swore that he had not committed any sin from a list of 42 sins,[44] reciting a text known as the "Negative Confession". Then the dead person's heart was weighed on a pair of scales, against the goddess Maat, who embodied truth and justice. Maat was often represented by an ostrich feather, the hieroglyphic sign for her name.At this point, there was a risk that the deceased's heart would bear witness, owning up to sins committed in life; Spell 30B guarded against this eventuality. If the scales balanced, this meant the deceased had led a good life. Anubis would take them to Osiris and they would find their place in the afterlife, becoming maa-kheru, meaning "vindicated" or "true of voice".If the heart was out of balance with Maat, then another fearsome beast called Ammit, the Devourer, stood ready to eat it and put the dead person's afterlife to an early and unpleasant end.
This scene is remarkable not only for its vividness but as one of the few parts of the Book of the Dead with any explicit moral content. The judgment of the dead and the Negative Confession were a representation of the conventional moral code which governed Egyptian society. For every "I have not..." in the Negative Confession, it is possible to read an unexpressed "Thou shalt not".While the Ten Commandments of Judeo-Christian ethics are rules of conduct laid down by a perceived divine revelation, the Negative Confession is more a divine enforcement of everyday morality.[49] Views differ among Egyptologists about how far the Negative Confession represents a moral absolute, with ethical purity being necessary for progress to the Afterlife. John Taylor points out the wording of Spells 30B and 125 suggests a pragmatic approach to morality; by preventing the heart from contradicting him with any inconvenient truths, it seems that the deceased could enter the afterlife even if their life had not been entirely pure.Ogden Goelet says "without an exemplary and moral existence, there was no hope for a successful afterlife",while Geraldine Pinch suggests that the Negative Confession is essentially similar to the spells protecting from demons, and that the success of the Weighing of the Heart depended on the mystical knowledge of the true names of the judges rather than on the deceased's moral behaviour.
Producing a Book of the Dead
Part of the Book of the Dead of Pinedjem II. The text is hieratic, except for hieroglyphics in the vignette. The use of red pigment, and the joins between papyrus sheets, are also visible.
A close-up of the Papyrus of Ani, showing the cursive hieroglyphs of the text
A Book of the Dead papyrus was produced to order by scribes. They were commissioned by people in preparation for their own funeral, or by the relatives of someone recently deceased. They were expensive items; one source gives the price of a Book of the Dead scroll as one deben of silver,[51] perhaps half the annual pay of a labourer.Papyrus itself was evidently costly, as there are many instances of its re-use in everyday documents, creating palimpsests. In one case, a Book of the Dead was written on second-hand papyrus.
Most owners of the Book of the Dead were evidently part of the social elite; they were initially reserved for the royal family, but later papyri are found in the tombs of scribes, priests and officials. Most owners were men, and generally the vignettes included the owner's wife as well. Towards the beginning of the history of the Book of the Dead, there are roughly 10 copies belonging to men for every one for a woman. However, during the Third Intermediate Period, 2/3 were for women; and women owned roughly a third of the hieratic paypri from the Late and Ptolemaic Periods.
The dimensions of a Book of the Dead could vary widely; the longest is 40m long while some are as short as 1m. They are composed of sheets of papyrus joined together, the individual papyri varying in width from 15 cm to 45 cm. The scribes working on Book of the Dead papyri took more care over their work than those working on more mundane texts; care was taken to frame the text within margins, and to avoid writing on the joints between sheets. The words peret em heru, or 'coming forth by day' sometimes appear on the reverse of the outer margin, perhaps acting as a label.
Books were often prefabricated in funerary workshops, with spaces being left for the name of the deceased to be written in later.For instance, in the Papyrus of Ani, the name "Ani" appears at the top or bottom of a column, or immediately following a rubric introducing him as the speaker of a block of text; the name appears in a different handwriting to the rest of the manuscript, and in some places is mis-spelt or omitted entirely.
The text of a New Kingdom Book of the Dead was typically written in cursive hieroglyphs, most often from left to right, but also sometimes from right to left. The hieroglyphs were in columns, which were separated by black lines – a similar arrangement to that used when hieroglyphs were carved on tomb walls or monuments. Illustrations were put in frames above, below, or between the columns of text. The largest illustrations took up a full page of papyrus.
From the 21st Dynasty onward, more copies of the Book of the Dead are found in hieratic script. The calligraphy is similar to that of other hieratic manuscripts of the New Kingdom; the text is written in horizontal lines across wide columns (often the column size corresponds to the size of the papyrus sheets of which a scroll is made up). Occasionally a hieratic Book of the Dead contains captions in hieroglyphic.
The text of a Book of the Dead was written in both black and red ink, regardless of whether it was in hieroglyphic or hieratic script. Most of the text was in black, with red ink used for the titles of spells, opening and closing sections of spells, the instructions to perform spells correctly in rituals, and also for the names of dangerous creatures such as the demon Apep. The black ink used was based on carbon, and the red ink on ochre, in both cases mixed with water.
The style and nature of the vignettes used to illustrate a Book of the Dead varies widely. Some contain lavish colour illustrations, even making use of gold leaf. Others contain only line drawings, or one simple illustration at the opening.
Book of the Dead papyri were often the work of several different scribes and artists whose work was literally pasted together. It is usually possible to identify the style of more than one scribe used on a given manuscript, even when the manuscript is a shorter one.The text and illustrations were produced by different scribes; there are a number of Books where the text was completed but the illustrations were left empty.
I took precisely 500 photos today, it was so awesome … fog everywhere. I will upload many more later, but I am too tired right now. This photo is only cropped (original photo below), everything else is untouched.
This photo is my first to hit explore, thank you very much. =)
Explore #500
Photograph taken at an altitude of Seven metres, in the magic of the Golden hour around sunrise at 05:31am, (sunrise was at precisely 06.15am) on Saturday 6th September 2014 off the Patricia Bay Highway 17, on Lochside Drive close to Frost Avenue and the Lochside Waterfront Park, in beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada.
Here, I am standing beside the wooden decked viewing platform, looking over towards Mt Baker in Washington State, USA from beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. Also known as Koma Kulshan, she is an active glaciated andesitic stratovolcano in the Cascade Volcanic Arc and the North Cascades of Washington State in the United States, standing 3,286 metres tall and was first ascended in 1868, her last eruption recorded in 1880.
These Canada Geese, along with many other small groups, fly across the lake from East to West every morning and back again every evening at Sunset, and I love to watch the classic Vee formations and listen to the honking as they pass me by. In flight, a group of Geese are called, a Skein.
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Nikon D800 116mm 1/500s f/2.8 iso100 RAW (14 bit) Manual focus. Manual exposure. Matrix metering. Auto white balance.
Nikkor AF-S 70-200mm f/2.8G ED IF VRII. Jessops 77mm UV filter. Nikon MB-D12 battery grip. Two Nikon EN-EL batteries. Nikon DK-17M Magnifying Eyepiece. Nikon DK-19 soft rubber eyecup. Manfrotto MT057C3 057 Carbon Fiber Tripod 3 Sections (Payload 18kgs). Manfrotto MH057M0-RC4 057 Magnesium Ball Head with RC4 Quick Release (Payload 15kgs). Manfrotto quick release plate 410PL-14.Jessops Tripod bag. Optech Tripod Strap.Digi-Chip 64GB Class 10 UHS-1 SDXC. Lowepro Transporter camera strap. Lowepro Vertex 200 AW camera bag. Nikon MC-DC2 remote shutter release. Nikon GP-1 GPS unit.
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LATITUDE: N 48d 38m 15.80s
LONGITUDE: W 123d 24m 12.85s
ALTITUDE: 7.0m
RAW (TIFF) FILE SIZE: 103.00MB
PROCESSED (JPeg) SIZE: 15.02MB
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Processing power:
HP Pavillion Desktop with AMD A10-5700 APU processor. HD graphics. 2TB with 8GB RAM. 64-bit Windows 8.1. Verbatim USB 2.0 1TB desktop hard drive. Nikon VIEWNX2 Version 2.10.0 64bit. Adobe photoshop Elements 8 Version 8.0 64bit
The Rendille people, living in the Northern part of Kenia.
Living in the harsh regions of the Kaisut Desert, the Rendille tribe is a nomad and pastoralist group. They are really only semi-nomadic and tend to only move 2 or 3 times each year. The Rendille are member of the Cushitic family of tribes. The Rendille are closely aligned with the Samburu and have often adopted much of their language as well. Many years of drought have made life difficult if not impossible for traditional Rendille people, meaning many of them have had to leave their nomadic patterns behind and settle more permanently in various towns and aid depots. The town of Korr is one of the largest towns made up mainly of the Rendille.
Their original home was farther north, in Ethiopia and Somalia. It's likely that both the Rendille tribe and the Somali tribe have common ancestors. Oromo-speaking tribes of Ethiopia drove them out, and forced their migration southward into Kenya. The colonial occupation of Kenya had little or no effect on the Rendille people, since their lands are very harsh and not desired at all by the Europeans.
Unlike some other pastoral tribes, the Rendille tribe tend to favour camels for their herds rather than cattle. Likely because their lands are very dry and the camel is simply better suited to the environment. They are milked just like cows, providing the staple of the Rendille diet. This is particularly the case for northern Rendille, whereas the southern groups are more similar to the Samburu and keep cows because the environment is less dry. Their settlements are quite large, which is different from other nomadic tribes that live in separate extended family groups. An entire clan might live together, with a population of many hundreds. The tribal movements are not random, but follow a specific pattern to allow access to for all clans to the water sources and pasturing areas. It is a very fair system of land management.
Men are responsible for caring for the large herds of animals, as well as protecting them from predators and other tribes. All the household and childcare duties fall on the women of the tribe. It is the unmarried men who are required to travel the furthest from the camps with the herds. Age-sets are the main component of Rendille society. Initiation rituals take place precisely every 7 or 14 years, creating a series of generational age-sets, each with its own role in society. In the common Kenyan practice, the first initiation is circumcision. Men have many stages of warrior-hood, but women are simply married or unmarried. Marriages are usually arranged by parents, since it is not permitted to marry within one's own clan and contact with other clans is minimal for younger people. A bride price in livestock is always part of the negotiations.
Because men cannot marry until they have completed their warrior phase, there is usually a sizable age difference between man and his wife. It's fairly common for a 30-year old man to marry a girl only 14 or 15 years old.
Many tribes in Kenya have given up their old beliefs in the face of oncoming Christianity, but the Rendille tribe have not. The Rendille god is called Wakh, or Ngai. The fortune-tellers of the village cast stone or bones to predict the future, and to perform sacrifices for rain.
This was my first time photographing snow with my brand new Nikon 70-200VRII and for some unknown reasons, first time publishing this picture, in Black and White.
Maybe because it has been precisely one year since this picture has been taken, but most importantly it is the journey that I've taken and everything that happen in 2012.
To resume, I lost job, found a new one, my (first child) daughter was born in July, lost job again, made some miracles to travel to Brazil for Christmas and back here, 2013.
Last year I had to take some “time out” pretty much to dedicate to the new born. It is not every day you are a first time father, but the reason for a picture of snow when it is not actually snowing is: change.
Like the season, we all change to time, learn new things, forget others and if you are luckily, you get rid of bad things, specially what haunts you. And I did that, changed.
Anyway, talking about this pic. It was quite early in the morning, just a few brave souls walking in the park. The snow was really high and with not a proper boots, it was quite challenging. I decided to take the entire sessions of pictures with the 70-200. Something I learn in photography is that you need to adapt, trust your instincts and learn to use what you have at the moment. I normally do that. Snow is quite tricky for the camera auto balance. I did use ExpoDisc auto balance and made the final adjustments in LightRoom and CS6 so the snow looks like snow and played around with adjustments to get the tress kind black.
Nikon D7000 & Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 VR II
Post Production with Lightroom 4.1 and Nik Software
©2012, byVini photography
Looking east to the eastern edge of the town.
"Piesport is a local community in the Bernkastel-Wittlich district in Rhineland-Palatinate and the largest wine-growing town in the Mosel wine-growing region. She has been a member of the Bernkastel-Kues municipality since January 1, 2012.
The local community is located, surrounded by vineyards, meadows and forests, on a loop of the Moselle that bulges out to the north in the Moselle valley between Bernkastel-Kues and Trier, more precisely between Minheim and Neumagen. The district of Piesport is located on the left bank of the river on the Eifel side. On the opposite, gently rising side of the river on the Hunsrück side is the Müstert district and a little further downstream, at the exit of the loop, is the Reinsport district. The higher district around the church of St. Martin is Emmel. Ferres is located slightly upstream on the left bank of the river. Müstert used to consist of just a few houses that gather around the All Saints Chapel at the bridgehead of the lower of the two Moselle bridges. This district grew together with Emmel and Reinsport over the centuries and formed the independent municipality of Niederemmel until the administrative reform in 1969. The B 53, the Moseluferstrasse, runs through the district of Niederemmel. From here, at a roundabout at the entrance to the town from the direction of Neumagen, the L 50 branches off to the north over the Moselle bridge to Klausen and the L 156 branches off to the south towards Neumagen-Dhron.
It can be assumed that in Roman times there was a ford through the Moselle at the site of today's town, through which wagons could drive when the water level was low. This ford was dedicated to Mercurius Bigentius, a local deity, from which the name Porto Pingontio was derived, which gradually became Piesport.
A sanctuary was also dedicated to Bigentius, which stood on the northern, left-hand bank on the mountain slope and which is now only remembered by the chapel house, which is also popularly known as Michelskirch ( Lage→ ). In Christian times it was replaced by a church dedicated to the Archangel Michael, which was attested in 1350 as the matrix ecclesia (“mother church”). Because of the long and arduous journey to the parish of Piesport on the banks of the Moselle, a new church was finally built, today's parish church of St. Michael.
The Romans already settled in the region around Piesport. The vineyards framed the place “like the tiers of an amphitheater,” wrote the poet Ausonius. The largest Roman wine press north of the Alps was discovered and partially reconstructed in 1985 between the districts of Alt-Piesport and Ferres. It is the center of the Roman Press Festival, which takes place annually on the second weekend in October. In 1950, a Roman diatret jar was found in a sarcophagus in a burial ground near Niederemmel, which is now in the Rheinisches Landesmuseum Trier. Witnesses to the Roman era are also the Roman road (L 157) on the height between Niederemmel and Morbach, where a Roman grave was found near the Tonnkopf hunting lodge, as well as the Römerhof on the southern outskirts of Niederemmel. There was also a Roman milestone at the Tonnkopf.
The first documented mention of Piesport was in 776. Between 1506 and 1508, Piesport lost 82 of its 95 citizens (households) to the plague. In the Middle Ages and early modern times, Piesport was part of Kurtrier. From 1794 the area was under French rule, and in 1815 it was assigned to the Kingdom of Prussia at the Congress of Vienna. Since 1946 it has been part of the then newly formed state of Rhineland-Palatinate.
Today's community was re-formed on June 7, 1969 from the dissolved communities of Piesport (then 503 residents) and Niederemmel (1,633 residents).
Mosel (German: [ˈmoːzl̩]) is one of 13 German wine regions (Weinbaugebiete) for quality wines (Qualitätswein, formerly QbA and Prädikatswein), and takes its name from the Mosel River (French: Moselle; Luxembourgish: Musel). Before 1 August 2007 the region was called Mosel-Saar-Ruwer, but changed to a name that was considered more consumer-friendly. The wine region is Germany's third largest in terms of production but some consider it the leading region in terms of international prestige.
The region covers the valleys of the rivers Mosel, Saar, and Ruwer from near the mouth of the Mosel at Koblenz and upstream to the vicinity of Trier in the federal state of Rhineland-Palatinate. The area is known for the steep slopes of the region's vineyards overlooking the river. At 65° degrees incline, the steepest recorded vineyard in the world is the Calmont vineyard located on the Mosel and belonging to the village of Bremm, and therefore referred to as Bremmer Calmont. The Mosel is mainly famous for its wines made from the Riesling grape, but Elbling and Müller-Thurgau also contribute to the production, among others.
In the past two decades red wine production, especially from the Spätburgunder (Pinot noir), has increased in the Mosel and throughout the German vignoble and has become of increasing interest to the international wine community. Because of the northerly location of the Mosel, the Riesling wines are often light, tending to lower alcohol, crisp and high in acidity, and often exhibit "flowery" rather than or in addition to "fruity" aromas. Its most common vineyard soil is derived in the main from various kinds of slate deposits, which tend to give the wines a transparent, mineralic aspect, that often exhibit great depth of flavor. In the current era of climate change much work has been done to improve and gain acceptance for completely dry ("Trocken") Rieslings in this region, so that most of the more famous makers have found acceptance for such wines, particularly in Europe." - 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.
" ...the longing for impossible things, precisely because they are impossible; nostalgia for what never was; the desire for what could have been; regret over not being someone else; dissatisfaction with the world’s existence. All these half-tones of the soul’s consciousness create in us a painful landscape, an eternal sunset of what we are." [Pessoa]
IP again, actually.
I probably would have seriously considered SRS surgery though if I was 25 years younger! And I definitely would have pursued it more aggressively in high school if things were like they are now.
Contrary to what we are lead to believe by the popular media, science is not the enemy of Christianity.
Genuine science is completely compatible with the belief in the creator God of Christianity.
Most of the world's greatest scientists, who were the pioneers and founders of modern science recognised this.
It is only fairly recently with the rise of militant atheism that science has been portrayed, through propaganda, as being in conflict with Christianity.
"I believe that the more thoroughly science is studied, the further does it take us from anything comparable to atheism"
"If you study science deep enough and long enough, it will force you to believe in God"
Lord William Kelvin. Noted for his theoretical work on thermodynamics, the concept of absolute zero and the Kelvin temperature scale.
So why were so many great scientists convinced that the principles of science were in perfect harmony with belief in the Christian God?
Consider this ....
A creator God (or supernatural first cause) has been made redundant and the final gap (pertaining to the so-called God of the gaps) has now been filled ... who says so?
Atheists, along with the secularist pundits in the popular media.
Why do they say that?
Because they believe that the greatest brain in atheism - Stephen Hawking, has finally discovered the secret of the origin of the universe and a naturalistic replacement for God.
The atheist replacement for God is summed up in a single sentence written by Hawking:
"Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing"
That is it .... problem solved - apparently!
The secularists in the popular media loved it, as far as they were concerned the problem certainly was solved. Hawking had finally dealt the fatal blow to all religion, especially Christianity. No need to question it, if a revered scientist of his calibre, is so sure of how the universe came into being, it must be correct.
The new atheists loved it, they wasted no time in proclaiming the ultimate triumph of 'science' over religious mythology and superstition.
So just how credible is the atheist claim that God has been made redundant?
And just how 'scientific' is Hawking's replacement for God?
Shall we analyse it?
"Because there is a law of gravity ....
So,
1) If the law of gravity existed, how is that nothing?
AND -
2) Where did the law of gravity come from?
AND -
3) How can a law of gravity exist before that which gravity relates to ... i.e. matter?
"the universe can and will create itself from nothing"
4) How can something create itself, without pre-existing its own creation?
(A) could possibly create (B), but how could (A) create (A)? Of course it can't.
5) What about the 'nothing' that is not really nothing, as most people understand 'nothing', but a bizarre 'nothing' in which a law of gravity exists. A nothing which is actually a 'something' where a law of gravity is presumably some sort of eternally, existent entity?
AND -
6) Is Hawking implying that the self-creation of the universe is made possible by the pre-existence of the law of gravity?
Of course, natural laws are not creative agents, they simply describe basic properties and operation of material things. They can't create anything, or cause the creation of anything. Something which is a property of something, cannot create that which it is a property of.
So, even if we ignore the law of cause and effect which definitively rules out a natural, first cause of the universe, the atheist notion of the universe arising of its own volition from nothing is still impossible, and can be regarded as illogical and unscientific nonsense. Hawking's naturalistic replacement for God, presented in his single sentence, and so loved by the new, atheist cabal, is obviously just contradictory and confused nonsense.
The truth, which atheists don't want to hear, is that atheism is intellectually and scientifically indefensible. That is why they always duck out of explaining how the concept of an uncaused, adequate, natural first cause is possible.
The best they ever come up with, is something like "we don't really know what laws existed at the start of the universe".
However, the atheist claim that - we don't really know... is completely spurious.
We certainly do know that the Law of Cause and Effect is universal, there is no way round it.
The only reason atheists don't want to accept it, is ideological.
And ... isn't it strange, that the only laws atheists dispute are precisely those that interfere with their beliefs. For example, atheists seem pretty sure that one law existed .... the law of gravity (even prior to that which gravity is a property of … matter).
Why are they so sure that the law of gravity existed?
Because their naturalistic substitute for God, summed up in the sentence by Stephen Hawking, apparently requires that the law of gravity existed before anything else …..
Here it is again ...
‘Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing’ Stephen Hawking.
So, atheists DO KNOW for sure that the law of gravity existed, but they don’t really know what other laws existed at the start of the universe. They especially doubt that the Law of Cause and Effect existed.
AMAZING!
Well, how about this for a refutation of Hawking’s replacement for God, also summed up in a single sentence?
Because there is a Law of Cause and Effect, the universe can’t and won’t create itself from nothing!
That is something Stephen Hawking conveniently forgot.
Apparently, he accepts that the law of gravity existed, because he thinks it suits his argument, but he ignores the existence of other laws that positively destroy his argument.
So, now you know the truth about the best substitute for God that atheists have ever come up with.
IMPRESSED? I think not!
Why is it ATHEISTS that try to dispute the universality of natural laws?
According to their claims, atheists are supposed to be the champions of science. Yet we find in practice that it is actually theists who end up defending natural laws and the scientific method against those atheists who try to refute any laws and scientific principles that interfere with their naturalistic beliefs.
Whatever happened to the alleged conflict between science and religion?
That is revealed as purely, atheist propaganda. There is obviously much more conflict between atheism and science.
Why is the law of cause and effect so important?
Because it tells us that all natural entities, events and processes are contingent.
They are all subject to preceding causes. It tells us that natural entities and events are not autonomous, they cannot operate independently of causes.
That is such an important principle, it is actually the basis of the scientific method. Science is about looking for adequate causes of ALL natural events. According to science, a natural event without a cause, is a scientific impossibility.
Once you suggest such a notion, you are abandoning science and you violate the basic principle of the scientific method.
What about the first cause of the universe and everything?
How does that fit in?
Well, the first cause was obviously a unique thing, not only unique, but radically different to all NATURAL entities and occurrences. The first cause HAD to be an autonomous entity, it HAD to be eternally self-existent, self-reliant, NON-CONTINGENT ... i.e. it was completely independent of causes and the limitations that causes impose.
The first cause, by virtue of being the very first, could not have had any preceding cause, and obviously didn't require any cause for its existence. When we talk about the first cause, we mean the very first cause, i.e. FIRST means FIRST, not second or third.
The first cause also had to be capable of creating everything that followed it. It is responsible for every subsequent cause and effect that is, or has ever been. That means that nothing, nor the sum total of everything that followed the first cause, can ever be greater, in any respect, than the first cause.
So the idea that the first cause could be a natural entity or event is just ludicrous.
We know that the first cause is radically different to any natural entity, it is NOT contingent and that is why it is called a SUPERNATURAL entity, the Supernatural, First Cause (or Creator God). All natural events and entities ARE contingent without exception, so the first cause simply CANNOT be a natural thing.
That is the verdict of science, logic and reason. Atheists dispute the verdict of science and insist that the first cause was a 'natural' event which was somehow able to defy natural laws that govern all natural events.
Consequently, atheism can be regarded as anti-science. Which means .... the real enemy of atheism is science, not religion. And the real enemy of science is atheism, not religion.
An idea which seems to be popular with atheists at present, is a continuously, reciprocating universe, one which ends by running out of energy potential and then rewinds itself in an never ending cycle ..... this is an attempt to evade the fact that an uncaused, natural, first cause is impossible. They claim that, in this way a first cause, is not necessary. And that matter/energy is some sort of eternally existent entity.
So is it a valid solution?
Firstly .....
Matter/energy cannot be eternally existent in a cycle with no beginning).
Why?
Because all natural things are contingent, they have to comply with the law of cause and effect, so they cannot exist independently of causes. The nearest you could get to eternally existent matter/energy would be a very, long chain of causes and effects, but a long chain is not eternally existent, it has to have a beginning at some point. At the beginning there would still have to be a non-contingent first cause. So a long chain of causes and effects simply pushes the first cause further back in time, it can't eliminate it.
Secondly ....
It is pretty obvious that the idea of the universe simply rewinding itself in a never ending cycle, which had no beginning, is complete, unscientific nonsense. How such a proposal can be presented as serious science, beggars belief.
It seems atheists will try anything to justify their naturalist ideology. They apparently have no compunction about completely disregarding natural laws.
The Second Law of Thermodynamics rules out such atheist, pie-in-the-sky, origins mythology.
There is no such thing as a free lunch, the idea of a rewinding universe is tantamount to applying the discredited notion of perpetual motion - on a grand scale, to the universe.
Contingent things don't just rewind of their own accord.
The Second Law (not to mention common sense) rules it out.
Where does the renewed power or renewed energy potential come from?
If you wind up a clock, it doesn't rewind itself after it has stopped.
The universe had a beginning and it will have an end. That is what science tells us, it cannot rewind itself.
Such ridiculous, atheist musings are just a desperate attempt to wriggle out of the inevitable conclusion of logic, and the Law of Cause and Effect which are the real enemies of atheist ideology.
Once again atheism is hoisted on its own petard by natural law and science, not by religion.
A variation of the cyclical universe is the argument proposed by some that the universe just is?
Presumably they mean that the universe is some sort of eternally-existent entity with no beginning - and therefore not in need of a cause? Once again an eternally self-existent universe is not possible for the same reason outlined above.
In addition ....
The Second Law of Thermodynamics tells us the universe certainly had a beginning and will have an end. The energy potential of the universe is decreasing from an original peak at the beginning of the universe. Even the most rabid atheists seem to accept that. Which is why most of them believe in a beginning event, such as a big bang explosion.
So the question is how did it (the universe) begin to exist, not whether it began to exist?
Which takes us back to the question of the nature of the very first cause.
It can only be one of two options,
an uncaused, natural first cause
OR
an uncaused, supernatural first cause.
An uncaused, NATURAL first cause is impossible.
Thus the only possible option is a supernatural first cause, i.e. God.
Atheists can’t refute the Law of Cause and Effect which is so devastating to their naturalist agenda, so they regularly invent bizarre scenarios which ignore natural laws, and hope people won’t notice. If anyone does they just brush it off with remarks like “we just don’t know ” what laws existed prior to the beginning of the universe.
Sorry, the atheist apologists may not know …. but all sensible people do know, we certainly know what is impossible ….
And we certainly know that you cannot blithely step outside the constraints of natural laws and scientific principles, as atheists do, and remain credible.
We know that natural laws describe the inherent properties of matter/energy. Which means wherever matter/energy exist, the inherent properties of matter/energy also exist - and so do the natural laws that describe those properties. if the universe began, as some propose, with a cosmic egg. or a previous universe, those things are still natural entities with natural properties, and as such would be subject to natural laws. So the idea that there were natural events leading up to the origin of the universe that were not subject to natural laws is ridiculous.
The atheist claim; that we just don't know, is not valid, and should be treated as the silliness it really is.
The existence of the law of cause and effect is essential to the scientific method, but fatal to the atheist ideology.
SO ....
Is the law of cause and effect really universal?
Causation is necessary for the existence of the universe, but ALSO for the existence of any natural entities or events that may have preceded the creation of the universe.
In other words, causation is necessary for all matter/energy and all natural entities and occurrences, whether within the universe or elsewhere.
ALL natural entities are contingent wherever they may be, whether in some sort of cosmic egg, a big bang, a previous universe or whatever.
Contingency is an inherent character of all natural entities, so it is impossible for any natural entity to be non-contingent.
Which means you simply CANNOT have a natural entity which is UNCAUSED, anywhere.
If, for example, matter/energy was not contingent at the start of the universe, or before the universe began, how and why would it be contingent now?
Why would nature have changed its basic character to an inferior one?
If matter/energy once had such awesome, autonomous power - if it was, at some time, self-sufficient, not reliant on causes for its operation and existence, and not restricted by the limitations causes impose, it would effectively mean it was once an infinite, necessary, self-existent entity, similar to God.
Now if matter once had the autonomous, non-contingent powers of a god, why would it change itself to a subordinate character and role, when it became part of the universe?
Why would it change to a role where it is limited by the strictures of natural laws. And where it cannot operate without a preceding, adequate cause?
To claim matter/energy was, at one time, not contingent, not subject to causes (which is what atheists have to claim) – is to actually imbue it with the autonomous power of a god.
That is why atheism is really just a revamped version of pagan naturalism.
By denying the basic, contingent character of matter/nature, atheism effectively deifies nature, and credits it with godlike powers, which science clearly tells us it doesn’t possess.
Thus, if anyone dismisses causality, they effectively deify matter/nature.
Which means they have chosen the first of the 2 following choices …
1. Atheism ... the unscientific, illogical belief in a natural, uncaused god (of matter or nature) which violates natural laws - which science recognises restrict its autonomy?
2. Theism ... the logical belief in an uncaused, supernatural God, which created matter and the laws that govern matter. And therefore does not violate any laws, is not contingent, and thus has completely unrestricted autonomy and infinite powers?
Which one would you choose?
Which one do scientists who respect natural laws and the scientific method choose?
The great, scientific luminaries and founders of modern science, such as Isaac Newton, Michael Faraday, Louis Pasteur etc., in fact, nearly all of the really great scientists and founders of modern science, had no doubts or problem understanding that choice, and they readily chose the second (theism), as the only logical option.
So, if you choose the second - a supernatural first cause – rather than meaning you are anti-science or anti-reason or some sort of uneducated, superstitious, religious nut (as atheists frequently claim) it actually puts you in the greatest of scientific company.
To put it another way, who would you rather trust in science, such scientific giants as: Newton, Pasteur, Faraday, Von Braun, Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, Mendel, Marconi, Kelvin, Babbage, Pascal, Herschel, Peacock etc. who believed in a supernatural first cause?
OR,
the likes of: Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens, Lawrence Krauss, Stephen Hawking, Daniel Dennett, Bill Nye, Bill Maher etc. who believe in an uncaused, natural first cause?
Methinks, there is no contest!
We can thus see that atheists are anti-science, because they treat natural law and the whole principle of the scientific method with utter contempt, and all the while, they masquerade as the champions of science to the public.
The question of purpose ....
A further nail in the coffin of bogus, atheist science is the existence of order.
Atheists assume that the universe is purposeless, but they cannot explain the existence of order.
The development of order requires an organizational element.
To do useful work, or to counter the effects of entropy, energy needs to be directed or guided.
Raw energy alone actually tends to increase the effects of entropy, it doesn't increase order.
The organizational principle in living systems is provided by the informational element encoded in DNA.
Atheists have yet to explain how that first, genetic information arose of its own volition in the so-called Primordial Soup?
Natural laws are pertinent to all natural entities, they guide the behaviour of energy and matter, but also serve to limit it, because natural laws are based only on the inherent properties of matter and energy.
So ... natural laws describe inherent properties of matter/energy, and natural processes operate only within the confines of natural laws which are based on their own properties. They can never exceed the parameters of those laws, just as they cannot change their own inherent properties.
The much acclaimed, Dawkinsian principle that randomness can develop into order by means of a sieving process, such as shaken pebbles being sorted by falling through a hole of a particular size is erroneous, because it completely ignores the regulatory influence of natural laws on the outcome, which are not at all random.
If we can predict the outcome in advance, as we can with Dawkins' example, it cannot be called random. We CAN predict the outcome because we know that the pebbles will behave according to the regulatory influence of natural laws, such as the law of gravity. If there was no law of gravity, then Dawkins' pebbles, when shaken, would not fall through the hole, they would not be sorted, they would act completely unpredictably, possibly floating about in the air in all directions. In that case, the randomness would not result in any order. That is true randomness.
Dawkins' randomness, allegedly developing into order, is not random at all, the outcome is predictable and controlled by natural laws and the inherent properties of matter. He is starting with 2 organizational principles, natural laws and the inherent, ordered structure and properties of matter, and he calls that randomness!
Bogus science indeed!
This tells us that order is already there at the beginning of the universe, in the form of natural laws and the ordered composition and structure of matter .... it doesn't just develop from random events.
A major problem for atheists is to explain where natural laws came from?
In a purposeless universe there should be no regulatory principles at all.
Firstly, we would not expect anything to exist, we would expect eternal nothingness.
Secondly, even if we overlook that impossible hurdle, and assume by some amazing fluke and contrary to logic, something was able to create itself from nothing ….. we would expect the ‘something’ would have no ordered structure, and no laws based on that ordered structure. We would expect it to behave randomly and chaotically.
This is an absolutely fundamental question to which atheists have no answer. The basic properties of matter/energy, and the universe, scream …. ‘purpose’.
Atheists say the exact opposite.
Furthermore, if we consider the accepted, atheist belief; that matter is inherently predisposed to produce life and the genetic information for life, whenever environmental conditions are conducive (so-called abiogenesis), where does that predisposition for life come from? Once again, atheists are hoisted on their own petard, and the atheist idea of a random, purposeless, universe is left completely in tatters.
It is the atheist ideology that is anti-science, not necessarily individual scientists.
There may be sincere, atheist scientists who respect the scientific method and natural laws, but they are wedded to an ideology that - when push comes to shove, does not respect natural laws.
It is evident that whenever natural laws interfere with atheist naturalist beliefs, the beliefs take precedence over the rigorous, scientific method. It is then that natural laws are disregarded by atheists in favour of unscientific fantasies which are conducive to their ideology.
Of course, in much day-to-day practical science and technology, the question of violating laws doesn't even arise, and we cannot deny that in the course of such work, atheists will respect the scientific method of experiment and observation within the framework of the Law of Cause and Effect and other established laws of science.
Bizarrely, It is a different matter entirely, when it comes to hypotheses about origins. It then becomes an 'anything goes' situation. The main criteria then seems to be that it doesn’t matter whether your hypothesis violates natural laws (all sorts of excuses can be made as to why natural laws need not apply), all that matters is that it is entirely naturalistic, and can be made to sound plausible to the public.
However, the same atheist scientists would not entertain anything in general, day-to-day science, that is not completely in accordance with the scientific method, they make an exception ONLY with anything to do with origins, whether it be the origin of the universe, or the origin of life, or the origin of species.
Atheism is not simply passive non-belief, you can only be a ‘genuine’ atheist if you proactively believe in the following illogical and unscientific propositions:
1. A natural, first cause of the universe that was ‘uncaused’.
2. A natural, first cause of the universe that was patently not adequate for the effect, (a cause which was able to produce an effect far greater than itself and superior to its own abilities).
3. That the universe created ITSELF from nothing.
4. That natural laws simply arose of their own accord, without any reason, purpose or cause.
5. That energy potential at the start of everything material was able to wind itself up from absolute zero, of its own accord, without any reason, purpose or cause.
6. That the effect of entropy (Second Law of Thermodynamics) was somehow suspended or didn’t operate to permit the development of order in the universe.
7. That life spontaneously generated itself, of its own volition, from sterile matter, contrary to: the Law of Biogenesis, the laws of probability, the Second Law of Thermodynamics, Information Theory and common sense.
8. That the complete human genome was created by means of a long chain of copying mistakes of the original, genetic information in the first living cell, (mutations of mutations of mutations, etc. etc.).
9. That the complex DNA code was produced by chemical processes.
10. That the very first, genetic information, encoded in the DNA of the first living cell, created itself by some unknown means.
11. That matter is somehow inherently predisposed to develop into living cells, whenever conditions are conducive to life. But such a predisposition for life just arose of its own accord, with no purpose and with no apparent cause.
12. That an ordered structure of atoms, guiding laws of physics, order in the cosmos, order in the living cell and complex information, are what we would expect to occur naturally in a purposeless universe.
The claim of atheists to be the champions of science and reason is clearly bogus.
They think they can get away with it by pretending to have no beliefs.
However, when seriously challenged to justify their dogmatic rejection of a Supernatural First Cause, they indirectly espouse the unscientific beliefs outlined above, in their futile attempts to refute the evidence for a supernatural first cause.
Of course, whenever possible, they avoid declaring those beliefs explicitly, but you don’t need to be very astute to realize that relying on those beliefs is the unavoidable conclusion of their arguments.
That is why atheism is intellectually bankrupt and is doomed to the dustbin of history. And that is why we are seeing such a rise in militant, evangelizing, atheist zealots, such as Richard Dawkins and the late Christopher Hitchens.
Their crusading, bravado masks their desperation that the public is so hard to convince. What Dawkins et al need to face is that they are in no position to attack what they consider are the bizarre beliefs of others, when their own beliefs (which they fail to publicly acknowledge) are much more bizarre. Not just bizarre, but impossible, unscientific fantasies.
What about Christianity and pagan gods?
Atheists frequently try to dismiss and ridicule the idea of a Creator by comparing it to the numerous, pagan gods that people have worshipped throughout history.
Do they have a good point?
Certainly not, this is just a red herring ….
Other gods, cannot be the first cause or Creator.
Idols of wood or stone, or the Sun, Moon, planets, Mother Nature, Mother Earth etc. are all material, contingent things, they cannot be the first cause.
They are rejected as false gods by the Bible and by logic and natural laws.
They are considered gods by people who worship things which are 'created' rather than the Creator, which the Bible condemns.
In fact, they are much more similar to the atheist belief in the powers of a naturalistic entity to create the universe, than they are to the one, Creator God of Christianity.
For example, the pagan belief in the creative powers of Ra (the Sun god) is similar to the atheist belief that raw energy from the Sun acting on sterile chemicals was able to create life.
So atheist mythology credits the Sun (the ancient Egyptian god Ra) with the godlike power of creating life on Earth. And thus, atheism is just a revamped version of paganism.
Just like paganism, atheism rejects worship of a Supernatural, First Cause, and rather chooses to worship created, natural entities, imbuing them with the same godlike powers, that theists attribute to the Creator, that is the atheist religion of naturalism.
There is nothing new under the Sun ... We can see that atheism is just the age old deception of ancient paganism, revisited.
The Creator is a Supernatural, First Cause, which is not a contingent entity, nothing like the pagan gods, but rather a self-existent, necessary entity. As the very first cause of everything in the universe, it cannot be contingent (it cannot rely on anything outside itself for its existence, i.e. it is self-existent) and therefore it cannot be a material entity.
The first cause is necessary because, not being contingent, it necessarily exists.
If anything exists that is not contingent, it has to have within itself everything necessary for its own existence. If it is also responsible for the existence of anything outside itself (which as the first cause of the universe, we know it is) it is also necessary for the existence of those things, and has to be entirely adequate for the purpose of bringing them into being and maintaining their continued existence. It is not subject to natural laws, which only apply to natural events and effects, because, as the first cause, it is the initiator and creator of everything material, including the laws which govern material events, and of time itself.
The atheist view of a natural first cause is not even rational, to propose that all the qualities I have mentioned above could apply to a material entity is clearly ridiculous. But apparently, atheism has no regard for natural laws or logic. Atheists get round it by simply dressing up their irrational beliefs to make them appear ‘scientific’.
This combined with rants and erroneous and derisory slogans about religious myths and superstition makes it all seem perfectly reasonable. Unfortunately, those with little knowledge, or who can’t be bothered to think for themselves are taken in by it.
Atheists repeatedly claim that they have refuted the law of cause and effect by asking : So what caused God then?
How true is that?
The ... what caused God? argument is a rather silly argument which atheists regularly trot out. All it demonstrates is that they don't understand basic logic.
The question to always ask them is; what part of FIRST don't you understand?
If something is the very FIRST, it means there is nothing that precedes it. First means first, not second or third.
That means that the first cause cannot be a contingent entity, because a contingent entity depends on something preceding it for its existence. In which case, if something precedes it, it couldn't be FIRST.
All natural entities, events and effects are contingent ... that is why the Law of Cause and Effect states that ... every NATURAL effect requires an adequate cause.
That means that the first cause cannot be a natural entity. An UNCAUSED, NATURAL event or entity is ruled out as not possible by the Law of Cause and Effect.
Therefore the very FIRST CAUSE of the universe, which we know cannot be caused, by virtue of it being FIRST (not second or third) CANNOT be a natural entity or event.
Thus we deduce that the first cause ... cannot be contingent, cannot be a natural entity, and cannot be subject to the Law of Cause and Effect.
So the first cause has to be non-material, i.e. supernatural.
The first cause also has to have the creative potential to create every other cause and effect that follows it.
In other words, the first cause cannot be inferior in any respect to the properties, powers or qualities of anything that exists...
The effect cannot be greater than the cause....
So we can thus deduce that the first cause is: UNCAUSED, SUPERNATURAL, self-existent, and capable of creating everything we see in the existing universe.
If there is life in the universe, the first cause must have the ability to create life,
If there is intelligence in the universe, the first cause must have the ability to create intelligence.
If there is information in the universe, the first cause must have the ability to create information.
If there is consciousness in the universe, the first cause must have the ability to create consciousness. And so on and on. If it exists, the first cause is responsible for it, and must have the ability to create it.
That is the Creator God … and His existence is supported by impeccable logic and adherence to the demands of natural law.
Atheists often say: you can’t fill gaps in knowledge with a supernatural first cause.
But we are not talking about filling gaps, we are talking about a fundamental issue ... the origin of everything in the material realm.
The first cause is not a gap, it is the beginning - and many of the greatest scientists in the history of science had no problem whatsoever with the logic that - a natural, first cause was impossible, and the only possible option was a supernatural creator.
Why do atheists have such a problem with it?
Atheists also seem to think that to explain the origin of the universe without a God, simply involves explaining what triggered it, as though its formation from that point on, just happens automatically.
This has been compared by some as similar to lighting the blue touch paper of a firework. They think that if they can propose such a naturalistic trigger, then God is made redundant.
That may sound plausible to some members of the public, who take such pronouncements at face value, and are somewhat in awe of anything that is claimed to be 'scientific'.
But it is obvious to anyone who thinks seriously about it, that a mere trigger is not necessarily an adequate cause.
A trigger presupposes that there is some sort of a mechanism/blueprint/plan already existing which is ready to spring into action if it is provided with an appropriate trigger. So a trigger is not a sole cause, or a first cause, it is merely one contributing cause.
Natural things do only what they are programmed to do, i.e. they obey natural laws and the demands of their own pre-ordered composition and structure. Lighting blue touch paper would do absolutely nothing, unless there is a carefully designed and manufactured firework already attached to it.
What about the idea proposed by some atheists that space must have always existed, and therefore the first cause was not the only eternally, uncaused self-existent power?
This implies that the first cause was limited by a self-existent rival (space,) which was also uncaused, and therefore the first cause could not be infinite and could not even be a proper first cause, because there was something it didn’t cause i.e. ‘space’.
There seems to be some confusion here about what ‘space’ actually is.
Space is part of the created universe, it is what lies between and around material objects in the cosmos, if there were no material objects in the cosmos, there would be no space. The confusion lies in the failure to distinguish between empty space and nothing. Nothing is the absence of everything, whereas space is a medium in which cosmic bodies exist. ‘Empty’ space is just the space between objects. So space is not an uncaused, eternally self-existent entity, it is dependent on material objects existing within it, for its own existence.
What about nothing? Is that an uncaused eternally self-existent thing? Firstly, it is not a thing, it is the absence of all things. So has nothing always existed? Well, yes it essentially would have always existed, but only if the first cause didn’t exist. If there is a first cause is that is eternally self-existent, then there is no such thing as absolute nothing, because nothing is the absence of everything. If a first cause exists (which it had to), then any proposed eternal ‘nothing’ has always contained something, and therefore can never have been ‘nothing’.
What about the idea that the first cause created everything material from nothing? Obviously, the ‘nothing’ that is meant here is … nothing material, i.e. the absence of any material entities.
The uncaused, first cause cannot be material, because all material things are contingent, so the first cause brought material things into being, when nothing material had previously existed. That is what is meant by creation from nothing.
So what existed outside of the eternally existent first cause? Obviously no other thing existed outside of the first cause, the first cause was the only thing that existed. So did the first cause exist in a sea of eternally existent nothingness?
No! the first cause was not nothing, it was ‘something’. So to ask what surrounded the something that is the first cause is not a valid question, because if something exists that is not ‘nothing’. This means that such a notion of ‘nothing’ didn’t exist, only something – i.e. the eternally existent first cause. If you have a box with something in it, you wouldn’t say there is both something and nothing in the box. You would say there is something in the box, regardless of whether there was some empty space around the thing in the box.
Atheists invent all sorts of bizarre myths to explain the origin of the universe and matter/energy.
Such as the utterly, ludicrous notion of the universe creating itself from nothing. Obviously for something to create itself, it would need to pre-exist its own creation, in order to do the creating!
They are clutching at straws and anyone with any common sense understands that.
So to sum up .....
The atheist ideology is illogical, unscientific nonsense. Even worse, it has no compunction in treating natural laws and the basic principle of the scientific method with utter distain and contempt whenever they interfere with atheist beliefs.
Science, not religion, is the real enemy of atheism, and atheism, not religion, is the real enemy of science.
Dr James Tour - 'The Origin of Life' - Abiogenesis decisively refuted.
youtu.be/B1E4QMn2mxk
FOUNDATIONS OF SCIENCE
The Law of Cause and Effect. Dominant Principle of Classical Physics. David L. Bergman and Glen C. Collins
www.thewarfareismental.net/b/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/b...
"The Big Bang's Failed Predictions and Failures to Predict: (Updated Aug 3, 2017.) As documented below, trust in the big bang's predictive ability has been misplaced when compared to the actual astronomical observations that were made, in large part, in hopes of affirming the theory."
kgov.com/big-bang-predictions
Photograph taken at an altitude of Seven metres, in the magic of the Golden hour around sunrise at 05:31am, (sunrise was at precisely 06.15am) on Saturday 6th September 2014 off the Patricia Bay Highway 17, on Lochside Drive close to Frost Avenue and the Lochside Waterfront Park, in beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada.
Here, I am standing beside the wooden decked viewing platform, looking over towards Mt Baker in Washington State, USA from beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. Also known as Koma Kulshan, she is an active glaciated andesitic stratovolcano in the Cascade Volcanic Arc and the North Cascades of Washington State in the United States, standing 3,286 metres tall and was first ascended in 1868, her last eruption recorded in 1880.
These Canada Geese, along with many other small groups (known as a Skein of geese), fly across the lake from East to West every morning and back again every evening at Sunset, and I love to watch the classic Vee formations and listen to the honking as they pass me by.
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Nikon D800 116mm 1/500s f/2.8 iso100 RAW (14 bit) Manual focus. Manual exposure. Matrix metering. Auto white balance.
Nikkor AF-S 70-200mm f/2.8G ED IF VRII. Jessops 77mm UV filter. Nikon MB-D12 battery grip. Two Nikon EN-EL batteries. Nikon DK-17M Magnifying Eyepiece. Nikon DK-19 soft rubber eyecup. Manfrotto MT057C3 057 Carbon Fiber Tripod 3 Sections (Payload 18kgs). Manfrotto MH057M0-RC4 057 Magnesium Ball Head with RC4 Quick Release (Payload 15kgs). Manfrotto quick release plate 410PL-14.Jessops Tripod bag. Optech Tripod Strap.Digi-Chip 64GB Class 10 UHS-1 SDXC. Lowepro Transporter camera strap. Lowepro Vertex 200 AW camera bag. Nikon MC-DC2 remote shutter release. Nikon GP-1 GPS unit.
LATITUDE: N 48d 38m 15.80s
LONGITUDE: W 123d 24m 12.85s
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HP Pavillion P6-2388EA Desktop with AMD A10-5700 APU processor. AMD Radeon HD 7570 graphics. 2TB with 8GB RAM. 64-bit Windows 8.1. Verbatim USB 2.0 1TB desktop hard drive. Nikon VIEWNX2 Version 2.10.0 64bit. Adobe photoshop Elements 8 Version 8.0 64bit
Just as explained earlier by John, here's something with regard to the Telluric Energy : THE IMPORTANCE OF LOCATION OF YOUR BED OF YOUR DESKTOP OR YOUR FAVORITE CHAIR
Have ever heard about the checkerboard that covers the entire Earth surface? this checkerboard is composed of multiple different invisible walls. When two of these walls intersect, resulting in a disruptive effect on EVERYTHING that is in its path.
So, if you are sleeping just below one of these crosses, you gradually drain your energy while you sleep rather than refuel. The same is true if you work or if you are watching TV for long hours, precisely the spot where find such crossings called "KNOTS HARTMANN." NŒUDS HARTMANN in French.
Thus, when the position of one of these nodes is juxtaposed with the location of your bed, it is possible to detect the exact location of this cross touches your body. It can be located on your lungs, your throat, your pool or any other place. It therefore follows that a particular organ in directly affected.
Sacred places and ancient temples harness natural forces.
The Earth is one giant magnet. Flux lines enter through the north pole, flow down the spinal cord of the planet, exiting out the south pole and returning to the north. This perpetual loop resembles an invisible apple, the Earth its core. But observed from further afield the magnetosphere encircling the Earth gives the overall appearance of a giant spider. Interestingly, many ancient cultures associate the spider with creation myths, as it seems to have the ability to create its own world, and its symbol has been used in ancient art, from pottery to petroglyphs.
That's the bigger picture. But when magnetic lines of energy float along the face of the Earth they acquire a new and practical purpose.
Back in the days when humans were closer to nature, they possessed the ability to see such subtle forces. Aboriginal cultures still practise this art, and it is not uncommon for the people of Australia to see and walk these cosmic conveyor belts as though they are visible to the naked eye. They call them ‘song lines’ because the Aborigenes sing melodies as they walk the lines. And just like a strip of cassette tape, their song is recorded, and heard by the next person who comes along. This technique, which is tens of thousands of years old, allows the pathways to be remembered and recharged.
That is an important idea thegroup has pointed out. Yes indeed, it is very essential to place the bed or the favourite chair at an position which optimizes the flow of energy within a room. It is a bad idea to place the bed at a corner of a room because that angle (90 degree) creates energy lock, and this can have adverse effect on the health. It is best to the bed is somewhere in the middle of a wall. Some people also put a glass beneath their bed in order to deflect malignant energies that may be coming from the ground where their bedroom is located, but I see this as an unnecessary undertaking. Better change places than going through such procedures.
At the end of the day, I think that the best thing to do is to make sure that your house, your work place or any other place where you regularly spend a significant amount of your daily time is not situated at an unhealthy energy spot in the first place. If you feel like it is, then you may want to consider moving out of that place, or taking appropriate protective measures, without however being overly obsessed by (or resonate with) fear. Just do what you can, and let nature take care of the rest.
It may also be important to avoid doing certain types of jobs such as working in a coal mine, or in a nuclear facility for instance, as those places concentrate large amount of unhealthy energies which negatively affect the physical/mental/emotional fabric of all the people working around it. Above all, allow your common sense indicate to you places that may appear to be healthy and others that are unhealthy. This is why you need to listen to your gut feeling about the state of your environment and take appropriate actions.
The song lines are known by many other names around the world. To the Chinese they are Lung Mei, the dragon lines; to the Celts they are the fairy paths, and many other cultures refer to them as serpent lines or spirit roads. And where these terrestrial currents interact with geomagnetism, scientists call these hotspots 'conductivity discontinuities. The Sioux call them by a more memorable name, skan.
Throughout the world, the serpent as the fertilizing energy of the earth is a symbol as old as language, perhaps older. The eternal relationship between the telluric forces of the Earth, which seek to work in harmony with humans, and vice versa, is immortalized in the tale of Adam and Eve when they meet the serpent at a location where perfection exists, the garden of Eden — paradise.
Like all myths, the story is a metaphor. When Adam and Eve come to ‘eat the apple' they come to understand the inner workings of nature, they become as gods.
When it banished the sacred feminine from its paternal monopoly, the Catholic church turned this concept upside down: the serpent become synonymous with evil, and eating the apple of wisdom— that is, gaining knowledge of the mechanics of the Universe— brought with it expulsion from the goodness of God.
The repercussions of this negation of natural laws are only too easy to see today, in the wanton destruction of the environment. For nearly two thousand years the human mind has been so conditioned as to work against the very body from which it was born, like a tree chopping off its own limbs.
The serpent is rather an apt description of the behaviour of electro-magnetic forces, because these invisible rivers do meander along the landscape. Neolithic peoples had no trouble following the course of the dragon lines, and they would harness their subtle forces for accessing more refined states of awareness. But as people began to lose that connection so the need grew for remembering these hotspots.
So began the era of standing stones, stone circles, dolmens and other edifices of stone. According to French archaeologists Merle and Diot “all such sacred sites are located at intersecting lines of magnetic energy”. In essence, Neolithic architects were performing a kind of Earth acupuncture, rooting the serpentine lines to the spot. Today, these places are not just potent in electro-magnetism, they are also still places of veneration, because the effect on the human energy field is profound.
This relationship remains at the core of esoteric and pagan practices (a pagan is 'someone who lives in the country'). Visiting such places when one is sick or in need of rejuvenation is a tradition that still endures, despite attempts by the emerging church to ban such practices. At one time, women caught facilitating childbirth at sacred sites, even enhancing their menstrual cycles, would be made to fast for three years. Some were not as lucky: after torture and rape, they were burned alive.
However, despite such extreme measures, sacred sites were deemed essential to the proper flow of life that their veneration was never successfully outlawed. Even by the Victorian era, many doctors would send patients to ancient temples, particularly holy wells, because of their inherent curative properties.
This was not lost on the modern medical world. The Egyptian symbol of the winged serpents wrapped around a standing stone is today the logo of the medical industry.
www.invisibletemple.com/telluric-currents-and-the-earth-f...
As I said in The Summoning I think that rituals and secret practices are often the expressions of the hidden forces at a certain place. It is an interesting thought that these gods are an expression of a psychic and telluric force rather than universal beings, which are usually imagined as celestial beings. However, if we look at ancient and even Christian tradition it makes sense. There are many saints which are special and have some sort of “local identity”.
The most interesting thought by Evan-Wentz is that not only the locals but the visitors, the new settlers, the intruder comes under influence of these gods.
Evan-Wentz writes in Masked Gods: “They had confronted here that great psychic entity which was the spirit-of-place, the heart of a new continent. It shattered them completely. But each succumbed in a different way”.
I believe that is what often also folk horror stories are about. It’s not only a potential confrontation with the locals but the visitor comes under influence of the landscape and its psychic forces. These forces find expression in paranormal phenomena but not necessarily.
Evan-Wentz reported that he heard about “shining beings”, which appeared to the Indians in California on sacred mountains which were very similar like the encounter the founder of the “Church Of Latter-Day”, Joseph Smith, had. It seems that in the new world resides a powerful psychic force, which triggers people to change in a certain way. It tends to create its own kind of belief-system. The otherworldliness of the new world is a different one as in Europe or Asia.
Sometimes it is all about atmosphere and a sort of hidden influence felt by visitors or by inhabitants. Often we can’t lay our finger on it. It’s difficult to describe what it exactly is, but we know it is there. Imagining these psychic forces as gods is a logical way to give these forces some face. In stories, it’s a challenge because if you want to stick true to otherworldy realities you might not have a Bigfoot-like monster or an ax-swinging madman as an antagonist. Therefore it’s sometimes difficult to explain the story.
Often we deal with’s what left of paranormal events a long time ago. Some supernatural-god-like force left its footprint on the landscape and the local population. Wonders and unexplainable mind-shattering events lead to weird belief-systems. Maybe the spiritual entity is already gone for a long time. But what happened is alive in a tribal memory.
If we look deeper into this, we are confronted with more mind-boggling questions: How could it be the place, the landscape? Why does it happen? My opinion is it even we not necessarily find a paranormal element either in a true story or legend or a fictional story it always tells us that there must be some sort of otherworld. It means there is an otherworld even more powerful than we think: our literal world, the landscapes, the forests, the mountains are more or less the surface on a windows-screen. The real world lies beneath. The otherworld carries our world.
And why? Maybe there is a spiritual control system. One favorite theory of Valleé and other ufologists is that men are the object of a control system engaged by invisible gods.
In the same chapter in “Dimensions” Jacques Valleé mentions a former Jesuit priest who implied in conversations with Vallee that “the “phenomenon originates with entities that manipulate our reality and our destiny for their own purposes”(Dimensions).
But what do we know? We can only develop our models or speculate what’s going on but the enormous impact both of real stories and fiction dealing with “the local gods” make us sure of the underlying truth.
In fairy tales the trap is a very prominently motive. Writers were fascinated by these folclore stories. There are famous works particularly in the period of romanticism. An example which was described earlier is the “Runenberg“.
Another well-known trap is the court of venus, “Venusberg”. These traps lure the wanderer into another realm. The man who can’t resist will finally lose everything.
These kind of “erotic traps” use temptation. Of course, this is something which works very well in a number of stories.
However it’s indeed primary a literal motive not a very realistic one.
We don’t expect a beautiful fairy queen tempting us to walk straight into a rift in time and space when we enter the woods.
Otherworldly traps are perhaps something which works in a more subtle way. Nevertheless these kind of traps could be very powerful and dangerous.
It seems that there are places in this world were people lose their orientation or get depressed. The perfect description of this kind of otherworldly trap could be found in Algernoon Blackwood’s “The Willows” where two wanderers get maddened by a supernatural force and one of them is close to committing suicide.
“The Willows” is also a fictional supernatural tale but what happens could be closer to what’s really going on. Every year a number of hikers vanish mysteriously. In most cases there are very rational explanations for what has happened with these persons, but some cases remain unsolved. There are areas which have a reputation for this like “The Bennington Triangle”. According to the Indians the woods are cursed in this territory in Vermont.
I think there are two ways to make you losing your wits. If there are forces which could look deeply into the soul of a person these forces will find the weak spot. They will hit you on the most personal level. The other way is showing you disturbing things, things which are somehow not right, something like H.P. Lovecraft’s “Color From Outer Space”.
These kind of phenomena exist. There were described for example in “Dangerous Lights”. Obviously, they act more on a psychological level. They are happen in a realm somewhere in-between the physical world and the inner-life of a person.
Getting into the mind of a person is the most efficient way how a trap could work. The purpose of the trap it to break somebody’s will. Without a strong will we are an easy prey for whatever lurks in the forest. As soon as we are depressed and disoriented we’re lost. Sometimes the victim returns but is changed forever.
Peter Weir’s famous movie “Picnic at Hanging Rock” describes the mysterious disappearance of a group of girls in the Australian outback. One of the victims returns but cannot describe what happened. The girl is changed and cannot remember anything.
The movie is based on a novel which is fiction but played around with the “based on a true story” pattern. The ending was left open for interpretation but the otherworldy quality of the “Hanging rock”, which exists, is a dominant motive. There are hints that it is the special quality or power of place itself which is responsible for the events.
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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Photograph taken in the magic of The Golden Hour around Sunrise (Sunrise was at precisely 07:46am), at an altitude of One metres, at 07:53am on Tuesday December 9th 2014 off Botany Road and Marine Drive, on the sandy shoreline of Botany Bay in Broadstairs, Kent, England.
I have come to Botany Bay ever since I was a child, and I love the fact that every visit is different, with the tide depositing and collecting chalk stones, debris and seaweed to offer a new experience each time. The cave is a favourite place, big enough to sit and watch the world go by, and often featuring a plethora of items, driftwood and stones that the tide has a care to offer.
A very chilly morning on the beach, around One degree, and a bracing wind that pounded flesh and bones, but well worth the one and a half hour journey there to enjoy a lovely sunrise. The seven bays in Broadstairs consist of: (From south to north) Dumpton Gap, Louisa Bay, Viking Bay, Stone Bay, Joss Bay, Kingsgate Bay and Botany Bay.
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Nikon D800 14mm 1/5s f/10.0 iso100 RAW (14Bit) Manual focus. 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 23m 15.49s
LONGITUDE: E 1d 26m 29.95s
ALTITUDE: 1.0m
RAW (TIFF) FILE SIZE: 103.00MB
PROCESSED (JPeg) SIZE: 18.57MB
Processing power:
HP Pavillion P6-2388EA Desktop with AMD A10-5700 APU processor. AMD Radeon HD 7570 graphics. 2TB with 8GB RAM. 64-bit Windows 8.1. Verbatim USB 2.0 1TB desktop hard drive. Nikon VIEWNX2 Version 2.10.0 64bit. Adobe photoshop Elements 8 Version 8.0 64bit
Photograph taken at an altitude of Fifty three metres, in the thick blanket of mist prior to the magic of the Golden Hour around sunrise (Sunrise was at precisely 04:42am), at 03:28am on Thursday 19th June 2014 off Lullingstone Lane beside the Lullingstone Roman Villa, looking towards Eynsford Viaduct in the village of Eynsford, Kent, England.
Just to the right you can see the Eynsford Viaduct. This impressive nine-arched red-brick viaduct is a prominent feature on the line to the 'Bat & Ball' station. The structure was built by the independent ''Sevenoaks Railway'', incorporated in 1859 to link the ''Chatham'' main line with the market town of Sevenoaks. And first services began on 2nd June 1862. The viaduct has nine arches of 30-foot span, and rises to a height of 75-feet above the valley and the River Darent.
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Nikon D800 70mm 1/25s f/5.6 iso100 RAW (14 bit) Mirror up. Manual focus. Manual exposure. Matrix metering.Auto white balance.
Nikkor AF-S 70-200mm f/2.8G ED IF VRII. Jessops 77mm UV filter. Nikon MB-D12 battery grip. Two Nikon EN-EL batteries. Nikon DK-17M Magnifying Eyepiece. Nikon DK-19 soft rubber eyecup. Manfrotto MT057C3 057 Carbon Fiber Tripod 3 Sections (Payload 18kgs). Manfrotto MH057M0-RC4 057 Magnesium Ball Head with RC4 Quick Release (Payload 15kgs). Manfrotto quick release plate 410PL-14.Jessops Tripod bag. Optech Tripod Strap.Digi-Chip 64GB Class 10 UHS-1 SDXC. Lowepro Transporter camera strap. Lowepro Vertex 200 AW camera bag. Nikon MC-DC2 remote shutter release. Nikon GP-1 GPS unit.
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LATITUDE: N 51d 21m 52.13s
LONGITUDE: E 0d 11m 48.60s
ALTITUDE: 53.0m
RAW (TIFF) FILE: 103.00MB
PROCESSED FILE: 9.77MB
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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
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EXPLORE # 318
Good conditions this morning created interesting reflections and light patterns around Steven Proud's wonderful and very fast ocean racing yacht "Swish" as it rested at its mooring in the placid early morning waters of Sydney Harbour.
I've sailed long ocean races on Swish with Steve, and his boat is as much a joy to sail as it is to photograph.
Nikon d80, Nikon 300mm lens, ISO 100, 1/1000@f7.1
A point of view which is readily lost sight of - if one has even
thought of it - when defending those who refuse the celestial Messages, is precisely the very appearance of the Messengers; now, to paraphrase or to cite some well-known formulas, "he who has seen the Prophet has seen God"; "God became man in order that man might become God".
One has to have a very hardened heart not to be able to see this upon contact with such beings; and it is above all this hardness of heart that is culpable, far more than ideological
scruples.
The combination of holiness and beauty which characterizes
the Messengers of Heaven is, so to speak, transmitted from the human theophanies to the sacred art which perpetuates it: the essentially intelligent and profound beauty of this art testifies to the truth which inspires it; it could not in any case be reduced to a human invention as regards the essential of its message. Sacred art is Heaven descended to earth, rather than earth reaching towards Heaven.
A line of thought close to this one which we have just presented is the following, and we have made note of it more than once: if men were stupid enough to believe for millenia in the divine, the supernatural, immortality -assuming these are illusions- it is impossible that one fine day they became intelligent enough to be aware of their errors; that they became intelligent, no one knowing why, and without any decisive moral acquisition to corroborate this miracle. And likewise: if men like the Christ believed in the supernatural, it is impossible that men like the Encyclopedists were right not to believe in it.
Sceptical rationalism and titanesque naturalism are the two great abuses of intelligence, which violate pure intellectuality as well as a sense of the sacred; it is through this propensity that thinkers "are wise in their own eyes" and end by "calling evil good, and good evil" and by "putting darkness for light, and light for darkness" (Isaiah 5:20 and 21); they are also the ones who, on the plane of life or experience, "put bitter for sweet", namely the love of the eternal God, and "sweet for bitter", namely the illusion of the evanescent world.
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From the Divine to the Human by Frithjof Schuon
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Image: Meeting of the Icon of Our Lady of Vladimir in Moscow in 1395 icon
The Temple of Artemis or Artemision (Greek: Ἀρτεμίσιον; Turkish: Artemis Tapınağı), also known less precisely as the Temple of Diana, was a Greek temple dedicated to an ancient, local form of the goddess Artemis. It was located in Ephesus (near the modern town of Selçuk in present-day Turkey). It was completely rebuilt three times, and in its final form was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. By 401 AD it had been ruined or destroyed.[1] Only foundations and fragments of the last temple remain at the site.
The earliest version of the temple (a temenos) antedated the Ionic immigration by many years, and dates to the Bronze Age. Callimachus, in his Hymn to Artemis, attributed it to the Amazons. In the 7th century BC, it was destroyed by a flood. Its reconstruction, in more grandiose form, began around 550 BC, under the Cretan architect Chersiphron and his son Metagenes. The project was funded by Croesus of Lydia, and took 10 years to complete. This version of the temple was destroyed in 356 BC by Herostratus in an act of arson. The next, greatest and last form of the temple, funded by the Ephesians themselves, is described in Antipater of Sidon's list of the world's
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A BIG THANK YOU AND A MUCH NEEDED BREAK
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Time for a recharge of heart and soul as I head Four thousand five hundred miles, one ten hour flight followed by a two hour ferry journey, back to my beloved Canada, and more precisely, the location you see in this photograph, where my family live in beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia.
I will hopefully be extending myself photographically speaking and trying to capture the natural beauty of the location with twilight and sunrise shoots, sunsets and all that's in between. There will be time spent at Adams Lake, Chase, Whistler Blackcomb and the Twin peak exploration, nanoose Bay, Island view beach, Patricia Bay, Victoria & Vancouver along the way and so I won't be posting until I touch down again in the UK.
It's been an incredible experience since joining Flickr for me, winning several major photographic competitions and prizes, appearing Five times in print in Ecoideare Magazine (Italy), the RSC magazine (UK) and Photography week magazine (UK) and Jessops magazine twice, having a photograph exhibited in the Sydney museum, being picked up by Getty Images and Yahoo project weather, having photographs used on Italian, German and Russian lens choosing websites, selling a bunch of photographs along the way, featuring on Flickr Explore Fifty five times, and receiving in excess of Six Million visitors to my site.... something of a surprise to a man so insular and content to follow his own happy pathway, and one has now begun to tail off his exploits and slowly hang up his camera and lenses for good.
So, a huge thank you goes to everyone who has visited me, everyone who has contributed to my enjoyment with comments and support, constructive criticism and tech talk (which I always enjoy). So, friends have taken over my house (hope there will not be too many impromptu raves whilst I'm gone), as British Airways whisk me from Terminal five to be in the land that is my spiritual home... Canada.
Thank you all again, I will be dipping in and out on the computer whilst in Canada but will be in some remote locations with little contact with the outside world (just how I like it) a lot of the time, so I will see you all again in a short while. And if our paths do not meet again, once again, a huge and heartfelt THANK YOU for dropping by, have fun and enjoy life behind the lens as I have for almost five decades now.
Paul
DESPITE STRAIGHT LINES
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Photograph taken at an altitude of Seven metres, in the magic of the Golden hour around sunrise at 06:26am on Friday 27th August 2011 off 1st Street and Bevan Avenue, at the end of the Bevan Avenue Fishing Pier, looking over towards Mt Baker in Washington State, USA from beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada.
Also known as Koma Kulshan, she is an active glaciated andesitic stratovolcano in the Cascade Volcanic Arc and the North Cascades of Washington State in the United States, standing 3,286 metres tall and was first ascended in 1868, her last eruption recorded in 1880.
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Nikon D700 75mm 1/200s f/11.0 iso200 RAW (14 bit) AF-C continuous focus mode. Manual exposure. Matrix metering. Auto white balance.
Nikkor AF 75-300mm f/4/5-5.6 (1989 35mm film lens). Jessops 62mm UV filter. Hoodman soft viewfinder eyecup. Nikon MB-D10 battery grip. Two EN-EL15 batteries. Manfrotto 055XPro carbon fibre tripod & Manfrotto 327 magnesium pistol grip ball head. Mymemory 32GB class 10 SDHC card. Nikon MC-DC2 remote shutter release.Nikon GP-1 GPS unit
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LATITUDE: N 48d 38m 51.55s
LONGITUDE: W 123d 23m 29.61s
ALTITUDE: 7.0m
RAW (TIFF) FILE: 34.60MB
PROCESSED FILE: 6.33MB
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Processing power:
HP Pavillion Desktop with AMD A10-5700 APU processor. HD graphics. 2TB with 8GB RAM. 64-bit Windows 8.1. Verbatim USB 2.0 1TB desktop hard drive. Nikon VIEWNX2 Version 2.10.0 64bit. Adobe photoshop Elements 8 Version 8.0 64bit.
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***** Selected for sale in the GETTY IMAGES COLLECTION on April 21st 2015
CREATIVE RF gty.im/549152417 MOMENT OPEN COLLECTION**
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Photograph taken at an altitude of Eight metres, in the magic of the Golden hour around sunrise at 05:41am, (sunrise was at precisely 06.15am) on Saturday 6th September 2014 off the Patricia Bay Highway 17, on Lochside Drive close to Frost Avenue and the Lochside Waterfront Park, in beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada.
Here, I am standing beside the wooden decked viewing platform, looking over towards Mt Baker in Washington State, USA from beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. Also known as Koma Kulshan, she is an active glaciated andesitic stratovolcano in the Cascade Volcanic Arc and the North Cascades of Washington State in the United States, standing 3,286 metres tall and was first ascended in 1868, her last eruption recorded in 1880.
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.
These Canada Geese, along with many other small groups, fly across the lake from East to West every morning and back again every evening at Sunset, and I love to watch the classic Vee formations and listen to the honking as they pass me by. In flight, a group of Geese are called, a Skein.
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Nikon D800 70mm 1/1000s f/2.8 iso100 RAW (14 bit) Manual focus. Manual exposure. Matrix metering. Auto white balance.
Nikkor AF-S 70-200mm f/2.8G ED IF VRII. Jessops 77mm UV filter. Nikon MB-D12 battery grip. Two Nikon EN-EL batteries. Nikon DK-17M Magnifying Eyepiece. Nikon DK-19 soft rubber eyecup. Manfrotto MT057C3 057 Carbon Fiber Tripod 3 Sections (Payload 18kgs). Manfrotto MH057M0-RC4 057 Magnesium Ball Head with RC4 Quick Release (Payload 15kgs). Manfrotto quick release plate 410PL-14.Jessops Tripod bag. Optech Tripod Strap.Digi-Chip 64GB Class 10 UHS-1 SDXC. Lowepro Transporter camera strap. Lowepro Vertex 200 AW camera bag. Nikon MC-DC2 remote shutter release. Nikon GP-1 GPS unit.
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LATITUDE: N 48d 38m 15.79s
LONGITUDE: W 123d 24m 12.85s
ALTITUDE: 7.0m
RAW (TIFF) FILE SIZE: 103.00MB
PROCESSED (JPeg) SIZE: 13.56MB
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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 Seven metres, in the magic of the Golden hour around sunrise at 05:31am, (sunrise was at precisely 06.15am) on Saturday 6th September 2014 off the Patricia Bay Highway 17, on Lochside Drive close to Frost Avenue and the Lochside Waterfront Park, in beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada.
Here, I am standing beside the wooden decked viewing platform, looking over towards Mt Baker in Washington State, USA from beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. Also known as Koma Kulshan, she is an active glaciated andesitic stratovolcano in the Cascade Volcanic Arc and the North Cascades of Washington State in the United States, standing 3,286 metres tall and was first ascended in 1868, her last eruption recorded in 1880.
These Canada Geese, along with many other small groups, fly across the lake from East to West every morning and back again every evening at Sunset, and I love to watch the classic Vee formations and listen to the honking as they pass me by. In flight, a group of Geese are called, a Skein.
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Nikon D800 116mm 1/500s f/2.8 iso100 RAW (14 bit) Manual focus. Manual exposure. Matrix metering. Auto white balance.
Nikkor AF-S 70-200mm f/2.8G ED IF VRII. Jessops 77mm UV filter. Nikon MB-D12 battery grip. Two Nikon EN-EL batteries. Nikon DK-17M Magnifying Eyepiece. Nikon DK-19 soft rubber eyecup. Manfrotto MT057C3 057 Carbon Fiber Tripod 3 Sections (Payload 18kgs). Manfrotto MH057M0-RC4 057 Magnesium Ball Head with RC4 Quick Release (Payload 15kgs). Manfrotto quick release plate 410PL-14.Jessops Tripod bag. Optech Tripod Strap.Digi-Chip 64GB Class 10 UHS-1 SDXC. Lowepro Transporter camera strap. Lowepro Vertex 200 AW camera bag. Nikon MC-DC2 remote shutter release. Nikon GP-1 GPS unit.
LATITUDE: N 48d 38m 15.80s
LONGITUDE: W 123d 24m 12.85s
ALTITUDE: 7.0m
RAW (TIFF) FILE SIZE: 103.00MB
PROCESSED (JPeg) SIZE: 13.80MB
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Processing power:
HP Pavillion Desktop with AMD A10-5700 APU processor. HD graphics. 2TB with 8GB RAM. 64-bit Windows 8.1. Verbatim USB 2.0 1TB desktop hard drive. Nikon VIEWNX2 Version 2.10.0 64bit. Adobe photoshop Elements 8 Version 8.0 64bit
Photograph taken in the magic of The Golden Hour around Sunrise (Sunrise was at precisely 07:46am), at an altitude of Zero metres, at 07:35am on Tuesday December 9th 2014 off Botany Road and Marine Drive, on the sandy shoreline of Botany Bay in Broadstairs, Kent, England.
A very chilly morning on the beach, around One degree, and a bracing wind that pounded flesh and bones, but well worth the one and a half hour journey there to enjoy a lovely sunrise. The seven bays in Broadstairs consist of: (From south to north) Dumpton Gap, Louisa Bay, Viking Bay, Stone Bay, Joss Bay, Kingsgate Bay and Botany Bay.
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Nikon D800 18mm 1/1.6S f/14.0 iso100 RAW (14Bit) AF-S single point focus. 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 23m 15.44s
LONGITUDE: E 1d 26m 30.85s
ALTITUDE: 0.0m
RAW (TIFF) FILE SIZE: 103.00MB
PROCESSED (JPeg) SIZE: 23.99MB
Processing power:
HP Pavillion P6-2388EA Desktop with AMD A10-5700 APU processor. AMD Radeon HD 7570 graphics. 2TB with 8GB RAM. 64-bit Windows 8.1. Verbatim USB 2.0 1TB desktop hard drive. Nikon VIEWNX2 Version 2.10.0 64bit. Adobe photoshop Elements 8 Version 8.0 64bit
Photograph taken at an altitude of Sixty five metres, during the first vestiges of dawn light prior to the magic of the Golden Hour around sunrise (Sunrise was at precisely 04:38am), at 03:54am on Thursday 12th June 2014 off Lullingstone Lane and Eagle Heights in the poppy field beside the 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 38mm 1/160s 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 4.54s
LONGITUDE: E 0d 11m 51.89s
ALTITUDE: 65.0m
RAW (TIFF) FILE: 103.00MB
PROCESSED FILE: 19.72MB
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
KOM League
Flash Report
For
August 3, 2019
The Flash Report is posted on Flickr at: www.flickr.com/photos/60428361@N07/48153832902/ Going to that site will leave you with a “fawn” memory.
Note: Due to technical difficulties with Google three previous attempts at transmitting this report using “bcc” have failed. This transmission is being sent using “cc.” I trust this will not be an inconvenience to anyone. Hopefully, this problem won’t be of a lasting nature.
Second note: Great angst is being experienced in getting this report delivered. Try this link again and if the report is still not available, let me know. www.flickr.com/photos/60428361@N07/48153832902/
At precisely 1:11 p.m. Central Daylight Savings Time on August 2, 2019 I sat down at my computer having done nothing during the week to include in a report. So, this will be a report without form and void.
If this forum was for late breaking news it could be reported that in the early morning hours the news of the death of Harley Race came over the radio. Less than 2% of the readership would even recognize that name but he was known as “Handsome” Harley Race when he was on the professional wrestling cards around the Midwest.
Never was I a “wrasslin” fan but I had heard Race’s name mentioned a few times and during my last years in the “rat race” of working for a living, many a day was spent at Eldon, Missouri. Lunch options in Eldon (aka Petticoat Junction) were sparse and many a meal was a tenderloin sandwich was served to me by none other than “Handsome Harley” and his much more attractive wife, Beverley. To show I have so little baseball news to share you might want to learn about or take a refresher course on the deceased. search.yahoo.com/yhs/search?hspart=avast&hsimp=yhs-se...
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Number of known living former KOM Leaguers drops to 224 with the death of Robert E. Lee
Robert "Bob" E. Lee, 93, loving husband, father, grandfather and great grandfather passed away on July 22, 2019. He was born on January 29, 1926 in Topeka, the son of Willis H. and Rill Eva Lee. He was educated in Topeka, attending Roosevelt Junior High and graduating from Topeka High School in 1944. In April of 1944 he joined the United States Marine Corps where he served until April of 1946. He served in the South Pacific on the Marshall Islands, Carolina Islands, and Ryukyu Islands in Okinawa, Japan.
In 1946, Bob enrolled at Washburn University where he was on the football team and track teams. In 1947, he started a professional baseball career with the Joplin Minors in the Western Association League. He played professional baseball in the minor leagues through the 1951 season with the Topeka Owls.
Bob was very active at Washburn University, serving as their baseball coach in 1960. He also served on the Washburn Board of Regents, Ichabod Board, Alumni Association, Lincoln Society, Washburn University Foundation, and he and his wife, Sallee, started the Robert E. and Sallee Lee Athletic Scholarship. In 1984, the basketball arena at Washburn was named after them, and Bob was also given the President's "W" Award.
Professionally, Bob was realtor, developer, appraiser, starting Lee Realtors in 1955, and later Lee and Bueltel Realtors and Lee and Bueltel Construction Company. He also served as president of the Topeka Board of Realtors, Topeka Multiple Listing Exchange, Society of Real Estate Appraisers and American Society of Appraisers, and he was the first Kansan to receive the CAE (certified assessment evaluator) certification.
In 1971, he was a partner in Cablevision of Topeka, the company that first brought cable TV to Topeka.
Throughout his professional life, Bob had a slogan on his desk that read "Luck is the crossroads of where planning and opportunity meet."
Bob also served on multiple boards in Topeka including the YMCA, American Red Cross, St. Francis Hospital foundation, Urban Renewal Advisory Board, Family Guidance Center, Rotary Club, Topeka Capitals, Topeka Recreation Commission, Human Relations Commission, and served as the president of the 20-30 Club and Cosmopolitan Club.
Bob was an avid sports fan enjoying baseball, softball, golf and tennis. He managed and sponsored multiple baseball and slow pitch softball teams, his 1982 Lee and Bueltel softball team won the USSSA Kansas State Championship and finished 9th in the ASA Major Men's Nationals in Parma, Ohio.
Mr. Lee is survived by his wife, Sallee, and their three children, Gregory A. Lee (Jenny), Topeka, Dr. David Lee, Houston, TX, and Debbie Florence (Stacy), Topeka; four grandchildren, Emily Dore, (Jim) Overland Park, Amy Nohl, (Brent) Prairie Village, Bobby Florence, (Jazmin) Lawrence, LeKeevis Lee (preceded him in death) and six great grandchildren.
Memorial contributions can be made to Washburn University Athletics Fund, 1700 SW College, Topeka, KS, 66604 or Prince of Peace Church, 3625 SW Wanamaker, Topeka, KS, 66614.
A memorial service will be held at 11:00 a.m. on Friday, August 2, 2019 at Faith Lutheran Church, 1716 SW Gage Blvd, Topeka.
To leave a message for the family online, please visit www.PenwellGabelTopeka.com Robert E. Lee.
Ed comment:
At some juncture, over the past 25 years, Robert Lee attended a KOM league event basically for the sole purpose of visiting with some former buddies of his, from Topeka. Although Lee played for the 1946 Bartlesville Oilers he didn’t want to admit it. For whatever reason he had for not wanting to confess being a former KOM leaguer, he was.
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Wife of former Pittsburg Brown, Ray Lindquist, passes
Mary Virginia (nee Pangborn) Lindquist passed away on January 4, 2019, surrounded by family. She was 87 years old. A breast cancer survivor, twice, Mary spent the last fifteen years battling Parkinson's disease. Born in Detroit, Mary was the granddaughter of a Michigan senator, Samuel H. Pangborn and Michigan District Court Judge Xenophon A. Boomhower, both of Bad Axe, Michigan, and the daughter of Willard and Florence Pangborn. Mary graduated from Cleveland Heights High School, in Ohio, and Michigan State University, and was the second generation to pledge Delta Delta Delta. After graduation, she taught elementary education within the Cleveland Heights district and married Dartmouth graduate and professional baseball player, Raymond Lindquist.
They, and their growing family eventually settled in South Euclid, Ohio, where Mary served as a president of Adrien Elementary PTA and taught Sunday school at the former First Presbyterian Church of East Cleveland. She was a den mother for Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts, and a 'baseball mom' for her sons' Little League teams. After the family moved to Buffalo, New York, Mary became the president of the Eden Garden Club and won awards for her floral arrangements. She played golf, tennis, and bridge.
She was also an avid knitter, passing on the tradition started by her aunt, Leta Pangborn Shere, by creating over one hundred blue-ribbon Christmas stockings for extended family and friends. She and Ray retired to Gulf Harbor, in Fort Myers, Florida, where Mary continued to be an active golfer and Tri Delta member. She and Raymond traveled often, enjoying trips to Europe, Asia, and New Zealand. Mary is survived by her sister, Mrs. Barbara Doren of La Jolla, California and Dr. Willard Pangborn of Long Beach, California, as well as her son, Robert, a businessman and graduate of West Point Academy, Eric, a graduate of Tufts University and Dartmouth's Tuck School of Business, Catherine, a graduate of SUNY Buffalo's John Lord O'Brian School of Law, and William, a graduate of Trinity College and Michigan Ross, the University of Michigan's business school. Mary will remain beloved by each of her grandchildren—Raymond, Matthias, Paige, Anna, Erin, Haley, Kyle, Ryan, and Sydney, their spouses, and her friends. A memorial service will be held Aug. 3, 11 a.m., at Colfax Cemetery, 598 N. Barrie Road, Bad Axe, Michigan, 48413.
Published in Huron Daily Tribune on July 30, 20
Ed comment:
2009 was the last time I spoke with Ray Lindquist. I recall, vividly, him talking about the political pedigree of his wife’s family and the place in Michigan from which they came. Bad Axe would have to be one of my favorite names for a town. Ray will celebrate his 90th birthday on Sept. 30. Ray was born in Cleveland, attended Dartmouth College and is still living in Ft. Myers.
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Alex Muirhead, Elvis and Reagan
Last week the readers were promised a few paragraphs regarding a former Ponca City Dodger shortstop by the name of Alex Muirhead. He was born in Libertyville, Ill. in 1927 and had played in the Piedmont league in 1945 with the Roanoke, Red Sox. He was there a month and was drafted into the Army.
He joined the Ponca City Dodgers for the 1948 season and spent one year there and retired from baseball at the age of 21 and that is when his life began. He worked four years with the California Department of Justice and then began his 30-year career with the California Highway Patrol. He attained the rank of captain and served as an area commander for 11 of those 30 years.
Like most law enforcement officers he came across many situations but two stood out as we sat on my back deck one afternoon and relived some of his life’s highlights. During the stage in the life of Elvis Presley when he was interested into martial arts and guns, his contingent pulled into the parking lot of the patrol office and asked to speak with the captain in charge.
Muirhead recalled that Presley seemed to be genuinely interested in law enforcement and paid rapt attention as he was told how the patrol operated. When he arrived Presley was carrying two pearl handle revolvers which he displayed for Muirhead. After Presley and the Memphis Mafia
www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFwRiPj_pLw departed one of the members of Muirhead’s staff entered his office and said that Elvis had given him the pearl handled revolvers. Muirhead explained that it was not legal to accept gifts and that he’d have to return them the next time Presley was in the area. (The URL mentioned in this paragraph will provide many hours of gtrsy viewing if you are interested in the security that surrounded Presley.)
When Presley next appeared in the area the deputy made a trip to see him to return the gift. Muirhead said that in thinking back that move was risky. He said his deputy asked for a meeting with Elvis without telling his bodyguards the nature of the visit and he was carrying those two weapons, concealed. Muirhead mused that carrying those guns to meet with one of the best guarded men in America wasn’t a very smart thing to do.
While serving as the area commander for the California Highway Patrol at Sacramento, Muirhead was surprised when the governor’s limousine pulled up to the station and out came Ronald Reagan. He recalled the governor was in some distress and asked “May I use your restroom.” After doing his “business” Reagan came out and posed for a photo with Capt. Muirhead which never got much attention until it was published in my of my non-bestselling books. If you have the second edition of Majoring in The Minors you’ll find it on page 133.
That and more regarding the life and times of Alex Muirhead is in that book and a story about how he suffered his most serious injury in his law enforcement career. It was meted out by a Chihuahua/ Toy Fox mixture. If the stories about Presley and Reagan didn’t live up to the hype maybe you’d like to hear the dog story, next time.
There were a lot of other items I wanted to share regarding Muirhead so maybe that will happen at another time.
For those wishing to see a photo of Reagan and Muirhead it was posted in this forum in 2015 and it can be viewed by clicking here: www.flickr.com/photos/60428361@N07/20581119710/
Another link shows Muirhead’s billfold that was a gift from the 1948 team. He gave me the billfold sans any money. www.flickr.com/photos/60428361@N07/20581106198/
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Two paths crossed in Wichita and Ponca City
In 1952 the Ponca City Dodgers had two players who were natives of Wichita, Kansas. Elbert Jarvis played first base for that club and Clyde Girrens did the catching. Three years later Jarvis was married and Girrens was an usher at that event.
Just three short years later, tragedy struck and this time Girrens was attending the funeral of his friend.
Elbert Jarvis Ponca City, 1952- www.findagrave.com/memorial/93405814/elbert-dean-jarvis
Wichita Eagle, Saturday, May 31, 1958
Ex-Wichita Ball Player Drowns--Fishing in Pond Near Ponca City
A former Wichitan, Elbert D. (Dean) Jarvis, 27, (Ed note: He was 25) Ponca City, Okla., drowned Friday afternoon in a private pond five miles northeast of Ponca City.
He was the son of Mrs. Esta Pearl Jarvis, 1221 Larimer. He graduated from North High School and attended the University of Wichita.
He and his wife, Jackie, and his mother-in-law, Mrs. William L. Troup, Ponca City, were fishing in the pond on the M. M. Acton farm about 1:30 p.m.
After stripping off his shirt and pants, he dived into the water after something, possibly his hat which had blown off.
A man who resides at the farm, Charles Johnson, heard the women screaming and called the Ponca City fire department. The fire department manned four boats at the scene.
The police department and Kay County, Okla., Sheriff Forrest Walker and Undersheriff Norman Coffelt also helped to search the water for an hour.
The body was found about 20 feet from shore in about 20 feet of water. Mr. Jarvis apparently had cramped. Firemen worked a resuscitator, but without success.
A Ponca City physician was treating Mrs. Jarvis for shock when the body was pulled out. The body was taken to Miles Funeral Home, Ponca City.
Mr. Jarvis played baseball with the Newport News, Va. Farm Club of the Brooklyn Dodgers, and later was first baseman for the Ponca City Cubs, a class D farm club of the Chicago Cubs.
Wichita Eagle, Sunday, June 1, 1958
ELBERT D. JARVIS
A resident of Ponca City, Okla. he commuted to Oklahoma State University at Stillwater, Okla. He was born June 4, 1932, in Wichita.
He graduated from North High School in 1950. He was a letterman in football, basketball and baseball. He had played on a farm club for the Brooklyn Dodgers, for the Shawnee, Okla., Hawks, and for the Cedar Rapids, Iowa Three I league.
Mr. Jarvis drowned while on a picnic with his wife and her parents. He and his wife had begun to fish some distance from where her parents had just finished eating.
He dived from the shore after his hat which had blown off. He retrieved the hat and was swimming back pushing the hat in front of him when his wife heard him call for help.
Survivors, besides his mother and his. wife, Sarah Ann (Jackie), include two brothers, Kile, Tucson, Ariz., and Gerald, 1444 S. Hydraulic; and two sisters, Mrs. C. O. Avery, 1319 N. Main, and Mrs. H. J. Valko, 1661 Jeanette.
Trout Funeral Home, Ponca City, is in charge of arrangements.
Fifty eight years later this story appeared regarding Clyde Girrens
North Central-Flint Hills Area Agency on Aging--July 25, 2016 ·
www.facebook.com/ncfhaaa/posts/clyde-girrens-86-of-wichit... A photo of Clyde Girrens at age 86 in a Kansas City Royals hat is on this link.
Clyde Girrens, 86, of Wichita, Kansas will be honored as Keeping Seniors in the Game! First Pitcher on Saturday, July 30, 2016 at the 7 p.m. feature game of the National Baseball Congress (NBC) World Series.
Clyde grew up in St. Marks, Kansas and has lived in Wichita since 1982. He and his wife Patricia have three children -- Clyde Jr., Phil, and Tom.
From a very young age Clyde loved baseball. At 15, he was a catcher on the St. Marks team. When his team played in the 1945 Kansas State NBC Tournament, he was the youngest player in that tournament. In 1949 he played in the NBC World Series with the Cessna Bobcats and the Bobcats won the national championship that year. In 1950, Clyde signed with the Brooklyn Dodgers. Everyone knew that when Clyde was the catcher, if someone was starting to steal second, the pitcher needed to get out of the way because Clyde had a great arm. He played for the Dodgers five years and then was drafted in the Army and served in Korea.
After Korea, he returned to Wichita and made NBC's All-tournament team a record four times playing for the Wichita Weller Indians, Service Auto Glass and Bob Moore Oldsmobile. He earned MVP honors in 1959 and in 1963. His favorite baseball memory happened in l963 when The Rapid Transit Dreamliners won NBC's National Championship after defeating the Ponchatoula, Louisiana Athletics. He played with the Dreamliners for 17 years--until 1987.
In 1980 he was inducted into the Kansas Sports Hall of Fame. These days Clyde enjoys spending quality time with Patricia and gardening.
Clyde was nominated for the Keeping Seniors in the Game SM honor by the Central Plains Area Agency on Aging. This group serves seniors and caregivers in Sedgwick, Butler and Harvey counties.
"We are delighted to work with the NBC to recognize the contributions that Clyde Girrens and other older Kansans make to our country, our hometowns and our communities," said Julie Govert Walter, Executive Director of the North Central-Flint Hills Area Agency on Aging who leads the Keeping Seniors In The Game!SM initiative.
Ed comment:
According to the late Bob Dellinger who was the Ponca City Dodger sportswriter for most of its time in the KOM league, he cited Clyde Girrens as being the best catching prospect to ever wear Dodger blue in that town.
One regret I have is not being able to spend more time conversing with Girrens but fate has dealt that a cruel blow. In 1994 I met Girrens at a reunion of former Ponca City Angels, Dodgers and Cubs. Without any exaggeration he was the guy most sought out by the attendees for the purpose of engaging in conversation.
Girrens had a long career in Wichita amateur baseball after five years in the Brooklyn Dodger organization beginning in 1950. There have been 80 ballplayers named as the MVP of the National Baseball Congress (NBC) Tournament in Wichita. Some of those names are Satchel Paige, Ellis “Cot” Deal, Chris Chambliss, Daryl Spencer and Lance Berkman who all played major league baseball. Of course, Girrens is one of 80 players to win that honor. He did it the year his team only advanced as far as the quarterfinals of the tournament.
A Hall of Fame for the NBC tournament exists that includes nearly 110 names. Included in that group are: Bob Boone, Joe Carter, Ron Guidry, Whitey Herzog, Ralph Houk, Billy Martin, Rick Monday, Satchel Paige, Allie Reynolds, Tom Seaver, Ozzie Smith, Roger Clemens, Daryl Spencer, Harry “The Hat” Walker, Barry Bonds, Rafael Palmeiro, Tony Gwynn, Kirk Gibson, Dave Kingman and of course, Clyde Girrens.
Clyde’s brother, John, pitched for the Bartlesville, Oklahoma Pirates in 1948.
Girrens played professional baseball from 1950, sans 1951, through 1955 and then decided upon a life making more money playing for industry teams in Wichita. However, the Los Angeles Angels coaxed him out of retirement, in 1964 and as a 34-year old catcher he was sent to the Hawaii Islanders of the Pacific Coast league. Following that stint in Hawaii he continued to play semi-pro ball for another 23 years making him 57 years of age when he finally hung up his spikes.
Why I came upon the names of Jarvis and Girrens for this report baffles me, it wasn’t planned. It is a story about how things work out. Jarvis left this world at age 25 and Girrens is still going at age 89. But, it is great that both are being remembered. I’m sure one reader of this report will recall Jarvis. He was a young, good looking member of the Ponca City Dodgers and the less than 10-year daughter of the team’s manager had a crush on him.
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Leftover from last week
Last time around there was a listing of former players never located or fate determined.
Steve Smith has researched ballplayers who were with Keokuk, Iowa for many years. When he notices Keokuk or other Central Association players who had experience in the KOM league he gets interested. He had a photo from the April 24, 1948 edition of the Moline, Ill. Dispatch. In that photo was a played listed as John Moore.
He commented “As always your reports are interesting. I looked at your list and of course the ever elusive John Moore is on it. I have found a picture of Mr. Moore which is attached. You may already have it. Moore was from Philly. I have tried to find his high school career but so far no luck. There were too many John Moore’s in Philly.”
With the foregoing input from Mr. Smith these were my observations. “Here is something to consider. There is a U. S. Baseball Questionnaire that a John Moore filled out for Bill Weiss in 1950. Here are the comments Moore made. Born June 28, 1928 in Philadelphia. Lived at 1803 67th Ave. in Philly in 1950. Nickname was Jackie. Was 5' 10" and weighed 170. Threw and batted right handed. Graduated from North East High in Philly in 1945. Played at Welch, WVA in 1947 and Portsmouth, Ohio in 1948 and played in some town in North Carolina in 1949. Maybe he felt his time in the KOM and wasn't significant enough to mention or his time in Moline, same thing. Of course, this might not be our guy.”
He claimed to have served one year in the Marine Corps by 1950. He stated in his questionnaire that he loved to play golf.. This same John Moore attended LaSalle Univ. from 1947-49 and was a member of the golf team. His name appears in the LaSalle yearbook. I can't find any information where this person has passed on. Just some things to mull over.
Another former player never found—William Ruel Waggener
This fellow was signed by the St. Louis Browns and sent to Pittsburg, Kansas in 1946. He was soon on his way to Bartlesville. During the off-season he attended Kansas State Teachers College in Pittsburg. He was back with Bartlesville to start the 1947 season but maintained his home in Pittsburg during the winter where he continued to attend classes in pursuing his major in civil engineering.
On Dec. 31, 1947 he and his wife welcomed a son they named Michael Stephen. Many references are made to Waggener in the Jacksonville, Ill. Daily Journal and they usually centered on the news he was visiting his parents at Christmas time. The last such reference was from 1972 and by that time he was living in Peoria. I believe he now resides in a nursing home in Peoria.
As you have probably guessed I’ll keep looking for any word on this man.
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Well, I’m done. Seventeen hours ago this report was started. Things went just fine for about two of them and then I shut down for the day. After what passes as a night of sleeping like a baby I arose and remembered there was a Flash Report still in the oven. I pulled it out to check how done it was and figured it was time to slice and serve it.
Hopefully, your piece of the report was done satisfactorily. If not, return the unconsumed portion for a full refund of its listed price on the menu.
Photograph taken at an altitude of Five metres, in the magic prior to the Golden hour around sunrise at 05:29am, (sunrise was at precisely 06.15am) on Saturday 6th September 2014 off the Patricia Bay Highway 17, on Lochside Drive close to Frost Avenue and the Lochside Waterfront Park, in beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada.
Here, I am standing beside the wooden decked viewing platform, looking over from beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada.
The Great Blue Heron (Ardea Herodias) is a wading bird in the Heron family Ardeidae and found in North America, Central Ameria, the Caribean and Galapagos Islands. One of the largest of Herons, it has a head to tail length of 01-137 centimtres (36-54 inches) and a wingspan of 187-201 centimtres (66-79 inches). They are found where my family live, and naturally very wary of mankind, flying off as soon as you are within fifty to one hundred yards of them.
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Nikon D800 200mm 1/125s f/4.5 iso100 RAW (14 bit) Manual focus. Manual exposure. Matrix metering. Auto white balance.
Nikkor AF-S 70-200mm f/2.8G ED IF VRII. Jessops 77mm UV filter. Nikon MB-D12 battery grip. Two Nikon EN-EL batteries. Nikon DK-17M Magnifying Eyepiece. Nikon DK-19 soft rubber eyecup. Manfrotto MT057C3 057 Carbon Fiber Tripod 3 Sections (Payload 18kgs). Manfrotto MH057M0-RC4 057 Magnesium Ball Head with RC4 Quick Release (Payload 15kgs). Manfrotto quick release plate 410PL-14.Jessops Tripod bag. Optech Tripod Strap.Digi-Chip 64GB Class 10 UHS-1 SDXC. Lowepro Transporter camera strap. Lowepro Vertex 200 AW camera bag. Nikon MC-DC2 remote shutter release. Nikon GP-1 GPS unit.
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LATITUDE: N 48d 38m 15.77s
LONGITUDE: W 123d 24m 12.92s
ALTITUDE: 5.0m
RAW (TIFF) FILE SIZE: 103.00MB
PROCESSED (JPeg) SIZE: 11.39MB
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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 2.10.0 64bit. Adobe photoshop Elements 8 Version 8.0 64bit
Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Mary%27s_Church,_Berlin
St. Mary's Church, known in German as the Marienkirche, is a church in Berlin, Germany. It is located on Karl-Liebknecht-Straße (formerly Kaiser-Wilhelm-Straße) in central Berlin, near Alexanderplatz. The exact age of the original church site and structure is not precisely known, but it was first mentioned in German chronicles in 1292. It is presumed to date from earlier in the 13th century. The architecture of the building is now largely composed of comparatively modern restoration work which took place in the late 19th century and in the post-war period. The church was originally a Roman Catholic church, but has been a Lutheran Protestant church since the Protestant Reformation and a united Protestant church since the Prussian Union of churches in 1817.
Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berlin
Berlin is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3,723,914 (2018) inhabitants make it the second most populous city proper of the European Union after London. The city is one of Germany's 16 federal states. It is surrounded by the state of Brandenburg, and contiguous with its capital, Potsdam. The two cities are at the center of the Berlin/Brandenburg Metropolitan Region, which is, with 6,004,857 (2015) inhabitants and an area of 30,370 square km, Germany's third-largest metropolitan region after the Rhine-Ruhr and Rhine-Main regions.
Berlin straddles the banks of the River Spree, which flows into the River Havel (a tributary of the River Elbe) in the western borough of Spandau. Among the city's main topographical features are the many lakes in the western and southeastern boroughs formed by the Spree, Havel, and Dahme rivers (the largest of which is Lake Müggelsee). Due to its location in the European Plain, Berlin is influenced by a temperate seasonal climate. About one-third of the city's area is composed of forests, parks, gardens, rivers, canals and lakes. The city lies in the Central German dialect area, the Berlin dialect being a variant of the Lusatian-New Marchian dialects.
First documented in the 13th century and situated at the crossing of two important historic trade routes, Berlin became the capital of the Margraviate of Brandenburg (1417–1701), the Kingdom of Prussia (1701–1918), the German Empire (1871–1918), the Weimar Republic (1919–1933), and the Third Reich (1933–1945). Berlin in the 1920s was the third largest municipality in the world. After World War II and its subsequent occupation by the victorious countries, the city was divided; West Berlin became a de facto West German exclave, surrounded by the Berlin Wall (1961–1989) and East German territory. East Berlin was declared capital of East Germany, while Bonn became the West German capital. Following German reunification in 1990, Berlin once again became the capital of all of Germany.
Berlin is a world city of culture, politics, media and science. Its economy is based on high-tech firms and the service sector, encompassing a diverse range of creative industries, research facilities, media corporations and convention venues. Berlin serves as a continental hub for air and rail traffic and has a highly complex public transportation network. The metropolis is a popular tourist destination. Significant industries also include IT, pharmaceuticals, biomedical engineering, clean tech, biotechnology, construction and electronics.
Berlin is home to world-renowned universities, orchestras, museums, and entertainment venues, and is host to many sporting events. Its Zoological Garden is the most visited zoo in Europe and one of the most popular worldwide. With the world's oldest large-scale movie studio complex, Berlin is an increasingly popular location for international film productions. The city is well known for its festivals, diverse architecture, nightlife, contemporary arts and a very high quality of living. Since the 2000s Berlin has seen the emergence of a cosmopolitan entrepreneurial scene.
Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernsehturm_Berlin
The Fernsehturm (English: Television Tower) is a television tower in central Berlin, Germany.
Close to Alexanderplatz in Berlin-Mitte, the tower was constructed between 1965-69 by the government of the German Democratic Republic (GDR). It was intended to be both a symbol of Communist power and of Berlin. It remains the latter today, as it is easily visible throughout the central and some suburban districts of Berlin. With its height of 368 metres (including antenna) it is the tallest structure in Germany, and the third-tallest structure in the European Union. Of four tallest structures in Europe, it is 2 m shorter than the Torreta de Guardamar, 0.5 m shorter than the Riga Radio and TV Tower, and 8 m taller than the Trbovlje Power Station in 2017. The structure is also more than 220 metres higher than the old Berlin Radio Tower in the western part of the city, which was built in the 1920s.
In addition to its main function as the location of several radio and television broadcasting stations, the building – internally known as "Fernmeldeturm 32" – serves as a viewing tower with observation deck including a bar at a height of 203 metres, as well as a rotating restaurant. Also, the Berlin TV Tower can be booked as a venue for events. The distinctive city landmark has undergone a radical, symbolic transformation: After German reunification, it changed from a politically charged, national symbol of the GDR into a citywide symbol of a reunited Berlin. Due to its universal and timeless design, it has increasingly been used as a trademark and is identified worldwide with Berlin and Germany. In 1979, the Berlin TV Tower received monument status by the GDR, a status which was perpetuated after the German reunification.
The tower has become one of the most prominent symbols of the country and is often in the establishing shot of films set in Berlin, alongside monuments such as the Brandenburg Gate, the Berlin Victory Column and the Reichstag building. It is also one of the ten most popular attractions in Germany with more than 1,000,000 visitors every year. Due to its location near Alexanderplatz, it is occasionally called Alex Tower.
James Stewart ( James Maitland Stewart ) 1908 – 1997)
James Stewart was the movies' quintessential Everyman, a uniquely all-American performer who parlayed his easygoing persona into one of the most successful and enduring careers in film history. On paper, he was anything but the typical Hollywood star: Gawky and tentative, with a pronounced stammer and a folksy "aw-shucks" charm, he lacked the dashing sophistication and swashbuckling heroism endemic among the other major actors of the era. Yet it's precisely the absence of affectation which made Stewart so popular; while so many other great stars seemed remote and larger than life, he never lost touch with his humanity, projecting an uncommon sense of goodness and decency which made him immensely likable and endearing to successive generations of moviegoers....
by Jason Ankeny
*
American Feuillage.
by Walt Whitman
AMERICA always!
Always our own feuillage!
Always Florida’s green peninsula! Always the priceless delta of Louisiana! Always the
cotton-fields of Alabama and Texas!
Always California’s golden hills and hollows—and the silver mountains of New
Mexico!
Always soft-breath’d Cuba!
Always the vast slope drain’d by the Southern Sea—inseparable with the slopes
drain’d
by the Eastern and Western Seas;
The area the eighty-third year of These States—the three and a half millions of
square
miles;
The eighteen thousand miles of sea-coast and bay-coast on the main—the thirty
thousand
miles of
river navigation,
The seven millions of distinct families, and the same number of dwellings—Always
these,
and
more, branching forth into numberless branches;
Always the free range and diversity! always the continent of Democracy!
Always the prairies, pastures, forests, vast cities, travelers, Kanada, the snows;
Always these compact lands—lands tied at the hips with the belt stringing the huge
oval
lakes;
Always the West, with strong native persons—the increasing density there—the
habitans,
friendly, threatening, ironical, scorning invaders;
All sights, South, North, East—all deeds, promiscuously done at all times,
All characters, movements, growths—a few noticed, myriads unnoticed,
Through Mannahatta’s streets I walking, these things gathering;
On interior rivers, by night, in the glare of pine knots, steamboats wooding up;
Sunlight by day on the valley of the Susquehanna, and on the valleys of the Potomac and
Rappahannock, and the valleys of the Roanoke and Delaware;
In their northerly wilds, beasts of prey haunting the Adirondacks, the hills—or
lapping
the
Saginaw waters to drink;
In a lonesome inlet, a sheldrake, lost from the flock, sitting on the water, rocking
silently;
In farmers’ barns, oxen in the stable, their harvest labor done—they rest
standing—they are too tired;
Afar on arctic ice, the she-walrus lying drowsily, while her cubs play around;
The hawk sailing where men have not yet sail’d—the farthest polar sea, ripply,
crystalline, open, beyond the floes;
White drift spooning ahead, where the ship in the tempest dashes;
On solid land, what is done in cities, as the bells all strike midnight together;
In primitive woods, the sounds there also sounding—the howl of the wolf, the scream
of the
panther, and the hoarse bellow of the elk;
In winter beneath the hard blue ice of Moosehead Lake—in summer visible through the
clear
waters, the great trout swimming;
In lower latitudes, in warmer air, in the Carolinas, the large black buzzard floating
slowly,
high
beyond the tree tops,
Below, the red cedar, festoon’d with tylandria—the pines and cypresses, growing
out
of the
white sand that spreads far and flat;
Rude boats descending the big Pedee—climbing plants, parasites, with color’d
flowers
and
berries, enveloping huge trees,
The waving drapery on the live oak, trailing long and low, noiselessly waved by the wind;
The camp of Georgia wagoners, just after dark—the supper-fires, and the cooking and
eating
by
whites and negroes,
Thirty or forty great wagons—the mules, cattle, horses, feeding from troughs,
The shadows, gleams, up under the leaves of the old sycamore-trees—the
flames—with
the
black smoke from the pitch-pine, curling and rising;
Southern fishermen fishing—the sounds and inlets of North Carolina’s
coast—the
shad-fishery and the herring-fishery—the large sweep-seines—the windlasses on
shore
work’d by horses—the clearing, curing, and packing-houses;
Deep in the forest, in piney woods, turpentine dropping from the incisions in the
trees—There
are the turpentine works,
There are the negroes at work, in good health—the ground in all directions is
cover’d
with
pine straw:
—In Tennessee and Kentucky, slaves busy in the coalings, at the forge, by the
furnace-blaze, or
at the corn-shucking;
In Virginia, the planter’s son returning after a long absence, joyfully welcom’d
and
kiss’d by the aged mulatto nurse;
On rivers, boatmen safely moor’d at night-fall, in their boats, under shelter of high
banks,
Some of the younger men dance to the sound of the banjo or fiddle—others sit on the
gunwale,
smoking and talking;
Late in the afternoon, the mocking-bird, the American mimic, singing in the Great Dismal
Swamp—there are the greenish waters, the resinous odor, the plenteous moss, the
cypress
tree,
and the juniper tree;
—Northward, young men of Mannahatta—the target company from an excursion
returning
home at
evening—the musket-muzzles all bear bunches of flowers presented by women;
Children at play—or on his father’s lap a young boy fallen asleep, (how his lips
move! how
he smiles in his sleep!)
The scout riding on horseback over the plains west of the Mississippi—he ascends a
knoll
and
sweeps his eye around;
California life—the miner, bearded, dress’d in his rude costume—the stanch
California
friendship—the sweet air—the graves one, in passing, meets, solitary, just
aside the
horsepath;
Down in Texas, the cotton-field, the negro-cabins—drivers driving mules or oxen
before
rude
carts—cotton bales piled on banks and wharves;
Encircling all, vast-darting, up and wide, the American Soul, with equal
hemispheres—one
Love,
one Dilation or Pride;
—In arriere, the peace-talk with the Iroquois, the aborigines—the calumet, the
pipe
of
good-will, arbitration, and indorsement,
The sachem blowing the smoke first toward the sun and then toward the earth,
The drama of the scalp-dance enacted with painted faces and guttural exclamations,
The setting out of the war-party—the long and stealthy march,
The single-file—the swinging hatchets—the surprise and slaughter of enemies;
—All the acts, scenes, ways, persons, attitudes of These States—reminiscences,
all
institutions,
All These States, compact—Every square mile of These States, without excepting a
particle—you also—me also,
Me pleas’d, rambling in lanes and country fields, Paumanok’s fields,
Me, observing the spiral flight of two little yellow butterflies, shuffling between each
other,
ascending high in the air;
The darting swallow, the destroyer of insects—the fall traveler southward, but
returning
northward early in the spring;
The country boy at the close of the day, driving the herd of cows, and shouting to them as
they
loiter to browse by the road-side;
The city wharf—Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Charleston, New Orleans, San
Francisco,
The departing ships, when the sailors heave at the capstan;
—Evening—me in my room—the setting sun,
The setting summer sun shining in my open window, showing the swarm of flies, suspended,
balancing
in the air in the centre of the room, darting athwart, up and down, casting swift shadows
in
specks
on the opposite wall, where the shine is;
The athletic American matron speaking in public to crowds of listeners;
Males, females, immigrants, combinations—the copiousness—the individuality of
The
States,
each for itself—the money-makers;
Factories, machinery, the mechanical forces—the windlass, lever, pulley—All
certainties,
The certainty of space, increase, freedom, futurity,
In space, the sporades, the scatter’d islands, the stars—on the firm earth, the
lands, my
lands;
O lands! all so dear to me—what you are, (whatever it is,) I become a part of that,
whatever it
is;
Southward there, I screaming, with wings slowly flapping, with the myriads of gulls
wintering
along
the coasts of Florida—or in Louisiana, with pelicans breeding;
Otherways, there, atwixt the banks of the Arkansaw, the Rio Grande, the Nueces, the
Brazos, the
Tombigbee, the Red River, the Saskatchawan, or the Osage, I with the spring waters
laughing
and
skipping and running;
Northward, on the sands, on some shallow bay of Paumanok, I, with parties of snowy herons
wading in
the wet to seek worms and aquatic plants;
Retreating, triumphantly twittering, the king-bird, from piercing the crow with its bill,
for
amusement—And I triumphantly twittering;
The migrating flock of wild geese alighting in autumn to refresh themselves—the body
of
the
flock feed—the sentinels outside move around with erect heads watching, and are from
time
to
time reliev’d by other sentinels—And I feeding and taking turns with the rest;
In Kanadian forests, the moose, large as an ox, corner’d by hunters, rising
desperately on
his
hind-feet, and plunging with his fore-feet, the hoofs as sharp as knives—And I,
plunging
at the
hunters, corner’d and desperate;
In the Mannahatta, streets, piers, shipping, store-houses, and the countless workmen
working in
the
shops,
And I too of the Mannahatta, singing thereof—and no less in myself than the whole of
the
Mannahatta in itself,
Singing the song of These, my ever united lands—my body no more inevitably united,
part to
part, and made one identity, any more than my lands are inevitably united, and made ONE
IDENTITY;
Nativities, climates, the grass of the great Pastoral Plains;
Cities, labors, death, animals, products, war, good and evil—these me,
These affording, in all their particulars, endless feuillage to me and to America, how can
I do
less
than pass the clew of the union of them, to afford the like to you?
Whoever you are! how can I but offer you divine leaves, that you also be eligible as I am?
How can I but, as here, chanting, invite you for yourself to collect bouquets of the
incomparable
feuillage of These States?
_____________________________________________
( manipulated by me, using an original photo of my private colection)
It's precisely on those sandbars in Long Island Sound that my friends and I used to build massive "sand cities" back in the early to mid 1970s during low tide. (see below).
That's the Villa Rosa mansion on the left. It's got quite a history!
Kayak excursions in the interior of
Suriname, which is situated between French Guiana to the east and Guyana to the west. The southern border is shared with Brazil and the northern border is the Atlantic coast. The southernmost borders with French Guiana and Guyana are disputed along the Marowijne and Corantijn rivers, respectively; while a part of the disputed maritime boundary with Guyana was arbitrated by the United Nations Convention on Law of the Sea on September 20, 2007.
Suriname is the smallest sovereign state in terms of area and population in South America. The country is the only Dutch-speaking region in the Western Hemisphere that is not a part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. Suriname has a typical multicultural society with extreme ethnic, linguistic, and religious diversity. Suriname's geographical size is just under 165,000 km2 (64,000 sq mi), and it has an estimated population of about 470,000 people.
“It measures just 9 inches in circumference, weighs only about 5 ounces, and is made of cork wound with woolen yarn, covered with two layers of cowhide, and stitched by hand precisely 216 times.
“It travels 60 feet 6 inches from the pitcher’s mound to home -- and it can cover that distance at nearly 100 miles an hour. Along the way it can be made to twist, spin, curve, wobble, rise, or fall away.
“The bat is made of turned ash, less than 42 inches long, not more than 2-½ inches in diameter. The batter has only a few thousandths of a second to decide to hit the ball. And yet the men who fail seven times out of ten are considered the game’s greatest heroes.
“Baseball is played everywhere: in parks and playgrounds and prison yards, in back alleys and farmer’s fields, by small children and old men, by raw amateurs and millionaire professionals.
“It is a leisurely game that demands blinding speed, and the only one in which the defense has the ball. It follows the seasons, beginning each year with the fond expectancy of springtime and ending with the hard facts of autumn.
“Americans have played baseball for more than 200 years, while they conquered a continent, warred with one another and with enemies abroad, struggled over labor and civil rights and the meaning of freedom.
“At the game’s heart lie mythic contradictions: a pastoral game, born in crowded cities; an exhilarating democratic sport that tolerates cheating and has excluded as many as it has included; a profoundly conservative game that somehow manages to be years ahead of its time.
“It is an American odyssey that links sons and daughters to fathers and grandfathers. And it reflects a host of age-old American traditions: between workers and owners, scandal and reform, the individual and the collective.
“It is a haunted game in which every player is measured against the ghosts of all who have gone before. Most of all, it is about time and timelessness, speed and grace, failure and loss, imperishable hope -- and coming home.”
-- Geoffrey C. Ward and Ken Burns, Baseball: An Illustrated History (1994)
I purchased this baseball glove in 1989, the year my son Colin was born. When he was growing up, I spent countless hours playing ball with him, many of them in a large meadow a short distance down the road from our home in Ohio. (We called that place the Elysian Fields.) The glove has also accompanied me to many baseball games over the years, in all of which I have been a spectator rather than a participant, because between a bad eye and a lack of coordination, I simply can't play the game. But that didn't stop me from being a fan.
The ball is one my son caught when it was hit into the stands during a rookie-league game in Zanesville, Ohio sometime in the mid-1990s. It was signed by a few members of the local team, the Zanesville Grays, which has since been disbanded.
I have not followed baseball much in recent years, owing to a considerable amount of personal hardship which has distracted much of my attention, coupled with a sense of revulsion at such developments as the steroid scandal, the ridiculous and still-skyrocketing players' salaries, and the changes, such as interleague play and the extra round of playoffs, which the powers-that-be have imposed on a game so deeply rooted in tradition. But in spite of all that, I know that my enthusiasm for the game is still there somewhere, waiting just below the surface for someone or something to come along and revive it.
The glove, unfortunately, has seen little use for some time, partly because Colin is no longer living with us, and partly because I have developed arthritis in my hands -- especially in my left, or glove, hand. But I will always hang on to it, as it has great sentimental value for me, and I will always associate it with good experiences, as well as a host of cherished memories.
For this colorful backdrop, I used one of my two Mexican blankets.
Photograph taken at an altitude of Three metres, in the magic of the Golden hour around sunrise at 05:41am (Sunrise was at precisely 06:12am), on Friday 5th September 2014 off 1st Street, between Bevan Avenue and Beacon Avenue, above the shoreline in beautiful Sidney by the sea on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada.
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Nikon D800 38mm 1/500s f/2.8 iso100 RAW (14 bit) Mirror up. AF-S Single point focus. Manual exposure. Matrix metering. Auto white balance.
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 48d 38m 53.06s
LONGITUDE: W 123d 23m 36.29s
ALTITUDE: 3.0m
RAW (TIFF) FILE SIZE: 103.00MB
PROCESSED (JPeg) SIZE: 15.77MB
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Processing power:
HP Pavillion Desktop with AMD A10-5700 APU processor. HD graphics. 2TB with 8GB RAM. 64-bit Windows 8.1. Verbatim USB 2.0 1TB desktop hard drive. Nikon VIEWNX2 Version 2.10.0 64bit. Adobe photoshop Elements 8 Version 8.0 64bit
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
Alaa's two sisters, Mona and Sana'a Seif, are currently 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 begins to focus on the upcoming COP27 conference at Sharm El Sheikh on Egypt's Red Sea coast.
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...
It is precisely the unity between idea and sensible form that constitutes the essence of the beautiful. - Es precisamente la unidad entre idea y forma sensible lo que constituye la esencia de lo bello. (Hegel)
Think "Holland" and you've probably already conjured the iconic images of tulips and windmills. More precisely, the very specific windmills you're envisioning right now are that of Kinderdijk.
Though it may sound odd for how technical and pragmatic the region proved to be, the name Kinderdijk translates in Dutch to mean "children's dike." According to local legend, after a particularly terrible flood in the 15th century, a lone basket was left floating in an inundated canal. Upon closer inspection, a cat was found bounding from one side of the basket to the other in an effort to keep it balanced, for inside rested an orphaned baby. The cat had kept the babe afloat, safe and sound during its journey… Thus giving the world the folktale "The Cat and the Cradle" in addition to the village of Kinderdijk its name.
Back in the modern day, visitors will find 19 historically authentic windmills scattered across Kinderdijk's canal-riddled landscape. With their sails raised to the skies (coming to rest in formations that communicate across the bogs in a language of semafors), one could be forgiven for believing these are creatures beholden to the air. What history reveals, in fact, is that the Netherlands' famous windmills are well-disguised creatures of the sea, without which the nation's famously innovative water management system would not have been possible.
Sometime in the 13th century, Zuid-Holland's peat rivers ceased to drain as they had been, creating a pattern of flooding that devastated the beautiful landscape at Alblasserwaard, which already existed below sea level. Berms were built to prevent flooding, but pumping stations needed to be constructed to continue water flow from low to high areas; hence, the 19th windmills still seen today.
Nowhere else in the world offers a complete portrait of early water management like that of Kinderdijk, which accounts for UNESCO's inclusion of the site among its World Heritage as of 1997 for its "unique character." Thanks to its truly groundbreaking unification of sea and sky, plus the added bonus of a world-renowned folktale, a visit to Kinderdijk is the sort of treasure that offers something for dreamers and pragmatists alike. www.atlasobscura.com/places/windmills-of-kinderdijk
It is precisely this noisy chaotic mind that keeps us ignorant of the deeper reality of God as the ground of our being. This ignorance is pervasive and renders us like the proverbial deep-sea fisherman, who spends his life fishing for minnows while standing on a whale.
-Martin Laird, Into the Silent Land
Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dublin
Dublin (Irish: Baile Átha Cliath) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. It is on the east coast of Ireland, in the province of Leinster, at the mouth of the River Liffey, and is bordered on the south by the Wicklow Mountains. It has an urban area population of 1,173,179, while the population of the Dublin Region (formerly County Dublin), as of 2016, was 1,347,359, and the population of the Greater Dublin area was 1,904,806.
There is archaeological debate regarding precisely where Dublin was established by the Gaels in or before the 7th century AD. Later expanded as a Viking settlement, the Kingdom of Dublin, the city became Ireland's principal settlement following the Norman invasion. The city expanded rapidly from the 17th century and was briefly the second largest city in the British Empire before the Acts of Union in 1800. Following the partition of Ireland in 1922, Dublin became the capital of the Irish Free State, later renamed Ireland.
Dublin is a historical and contemporary centre for education, the arts, administration and industry. As of 2018 the city was listed by the Globalization and World Cities Research Network (GaWC) as a global city, with a ranking of "Alpha −", which places it amongst the top thirty cities in the world.
Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Guinness
Arthur Guinness (24 September 1725 – 23 January 1803) was an Irish brewer and the founder of the Guinness brewery business and family. He was also an entrepreneur and philanthropist.
At 27, in 1752, Guinness's godfather Arthur Price, the Church of Ireland Archbishop of Cashel, bequeathed him £100 in his will. Guinness invested the money and in 1755 had a brewery at Leixlip, just 17 km from Dublin. In 1759, Guinness went to the city and set up his own business. He took a 9,000-year lease on the 4-acre (16,000 m2) brewery at St. James's Gate from the descendants of Sir Mark Rainsford for an annual rent of £45.
Guinness's flowery red signature is still copied on every label of bottled Guinness.
Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guinness_Storehouse
Guinness Storehouse is a tourist attraction at St. James's Gate Brewery in Dublin, Ireland. Since opening in 2000, it has received over four million visitors.
The Storehouse covers seven floors surrounding a glass atrium shaped in the form of a pint of Guinness. The ground floor introduces the beer's four ingredients (water, barley, hops and yeast), and the brewery's founder, Arthur Guinness. Other floors feature the history of Guinness advertising and include an interactive exhibit on responsible drinking. The seventh floor houses the Gravity Bar with views of Dublin and where visitors may drink a pint of Guinness included in the price of admission, which was €18.50 on 15 October 2018 with discounts depending on dates and times, described as "overpriced" by Condé Nast Traveler. In 2006, a new wing opened incorporating a live installation of the present-day brewing process.
Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guinness_Brewery
St. James's Gate Brewery (Irish: Grúdlann Gheata Naomh Séamuis) is a brewery founded in 1759 in Dublin, Ireland, by Arthur Guinness. The company is now a part of Diageo, a British company formed from the merger of Guinness and Grand Metropolitan in 1997. The main product of the brewery is Guinness Draught.
Originally leased in 1759 to Arthur Guinness at IR£45 (Irish pounds) per year for 9,000 years, the St. James's Gate area has been the home of Guinness ever since. It became the largest brewery in Ireland in 1838, and the largest in the world by 1886, with an annual output of 1.2 million barrels. Although no longer the largest brewery in the world, it remains as the largest brewer of stout. The company has since bought out the originally leased property, and during the 19th and early 20th centuries the brewery owned most of the buildings in the surrounding area, including many streets of housing for brewery employees, and offices associated with the brewery. The brewery also made all of its own power using its own power plant.
There is an attached exhibition on the 250-year-old history of Guinness, called the Guinness Storehouse.
Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guinness
Guinness is a dark Irish dry stout that originated in the brewery of Arthur Guinness at St. James's Gate, Dublin, Ireland, in 1759. It is one of the most successful beer brands worldwide, brewed in almost 50 countries, and available in over 120. Sales in 2011 amounted to 850 million litres (220,000,000 US gal). It is popular with the Irish, both in Ireland and abroad. In spite of declining consumption since 2001, it is still the best-selling alcoholic drink in Ireland where Guinness & Co. Brewery makes almost €2 billion worth annually.
Guinness' burnt flavour derives from malted barley and roasted unmalted barley, a relatively modern development, not becoming part of the grist until the mid-20th century. For many years, a portion of aged brew was blended with freshly brewed beer to give a sharp lactic acid flavour. Although Guinness's palate still features a characteristic "tang", the company has refused to confirm whether this type of blending still occurs. The draught beer's thick, creamy head comes from mixing the beer with nitrogen and carbon dioxide.[6]
The company moved its headquarters to London at the beginning of the Anglo-Irish Trade War in 1932. In 1997, Guinness Plc merged with Grand Metropolitan to form the multinational alcoholic-drinks producer Diageo plc, based out of London.
Well, foothills dog more precisely, but with mountains in the background.
As I left for the park yesterday at noon the sky was starting to clear and I was seeing spots of blue. By the time I got to the park clouds had taken over and everything was overcast.
I crancked up the ISO and we still made the best out of it.
50 Synonyms and Idioms for “Give”
by Mark Nichol
It’s better to give than to receive, and it’s easier to precisely describe giving than receiving, thanks to numerous synonyms for give. Here are dozens of them, with connotative definitions.
1. Accord: to give what is due
2. Administer: to give medication, to perform a religious ritual, or to carry out a punishment
3. Afford: to give in a manner consistent with the giver, usually something inanimate (for example, “The complication afforded us additional time to prepare”)
4. Allot: to give a portion or share, or by lottery
5. Apportion: to give in shares
6. Award: to give something that is deserved
7. Bestow: to give as a gift, with the possible connotation of condescension
8. Chip in: see contribute
9. Comp: to give something free that is normally paid for (a truncation of complimentary)
10. Confer: to give graciously
11. Contribute: to give among other providers or supporters
12. Convey: to give something originating from one party to another party
13. Deliver: to give something to the intended recipient
14. Devote: to give something useful or valuable
15. Dispense: see administer and allot
16. Dish out: to give criticism; also see administer and allot
17. Distribute: to give to a number of recipients
18. Dole (out): to give in small amounts
19. Donate: to give to an organization or other entity as an act of charity
20. Endow: to give an income to someone, or to give money for long-term maintenance or support
21. Endue (or indue): see endow and provide
22. Extend: to give so as to make available; see also proffer
23. Fork over (or fork out or fork up): to give money
24. Furnish: see provide and supply
25. Grant: to give consent or to concede; see also bestow and transfer
26. Hand down: to give an inheritance, either of material goods or of characteristics
27. Hand out: to distribute
28. Hand over: to give something intended for or due to another
29. Impart: to give from a supply
30. Kick in: see contribute
31. Lavish: to give generously
32. Mete (out): see dole (out)
33. Offer: to make available, or to give an exhibition or performance
34. Pay: to give in exchange for a product or a service, or to give or forfeit as penalty, or to give something intangible such as attention
35. Pitch in: see contribute
36. Present: to give in a ceremonial or formal manner
37. Produce: see offer
38. Proffer: see offer and tender
39. Provide: to make available
40. Pungle (up): see contribute and pay
41. Render: to give in return or retribution; see also administer, deliver, pay, and yield
42. Reward: to give in return for a service
43. Sacrifice: to give something at a loss or to give something for a belief or an ideal or for a purpose
44. Supply: see provide
45. Tender: to give something that is to be accepted
46. Transfer: see convey
47. Transmit: see convey
48. Volunteer: to give services freely
49. Vouchsafe: to give a reply, or to grant as a favor or privilege; see also bestow
50. Yield: to give as is appropriate or required, or to surrender oneself or a possession
www.dailywritingtips.com/50-synonyms-and-idioms-for-give/
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A big day for me as at precisely 11.38am today the views on my Flickr photo stream hit the magical 1,000,000!
A huge THANK YOU" to every single person who has ever taken the time to view, favourite and comment on my photos. It truly does mean a lot to me and gives me the inspiration to keep shooting. I hope that you've all enjoyed looking at my stream as much as I have enjoyed creating it. Here's to the next Million!
Most viewed photo.... flic.kr/p/cS6DTW
These sculptures by Bernar Venet are precisely as described by the title: beams of steel rolled into 230.5 degree arcs. Throughout his career, Venet works to define art and to separate himself from the idea that art is the expression of the artist. For him the most important element in the work of art is the concept or idea involved. In his recent work, Venet creates works based on mathematical graphs and formulas. In mathematics, Venet discovered a language of symbols that satisfied his desire to create art that is non-expressive and not subject to personal interpretation.
Bernar Venet was born in Château-Arnoux, France, in 1941. In 1958, at 17, Venet moved to Nice to study at the Ville Thiole, the municipal art school. He immersed himself in the cultural life in Nice and became an assistant to the decorator at the Nice City Opera.
Over the course of the next two decades, he explored painting, poetry, film, and dance, and was attracted in particular to pure science as a subject for art. In 1979 Venet began a series of wood reliefs, Arcs, Angles, Diagonals, and created the first of his Indeterminate Lines. That same year, he was awarded an artist grant by the National Endowment for the Arts. In 1984, he started working at the Atelier Marioni, a foundry and ironworks in the Vosges region of France. Five years later, he acquired a steel factory in Le Muy in the Var region of France, where he fabricated and installed his work on the surrounding property.
Venet's work can be seen in major museums and collections throughout the world, including the Denver Art Museum; Fondation Mourtala, Dakar, Senegal; Milwaukee Art Museum; He Xiangning Art Gallery, Shenzhen, China; Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C.; Total Museum of Contemporary Art, Seoul, Korea; Jumex Foundation, Mexico City, Mexico; Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France; and the Museum of Modern Art, New York City.
This photograph was taken in the magic of The Golden Hour around Sunrise, (Sunrise was at precisely 07:39am), at an altitude of Sixteen metres, at 06:59am on Thursday January 28th 2016 off Botany Road and Marine Drive, on the sandy shoreline of Botany Bay in Broadstairs, Kent, England.
I set off at 05:00am on a clear morning, the moon and the stars out to dazzle in temperatures around five degrees, on a pleasant hour and half long journey to enjoy a lovely sunrise. The seven bays in Broadstairs consist of: (From south to north) Dumpton Gap, Louisa Bay, Viking Bay, Stone Bay, Joss Bay, Kingsgate Bay and Botany Bay.
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Nikon D800 23mm One 1/1.3s f/2.8 iso100 RAW (14Bit) Nikon back focus button enabled. AF-C Continuous point focus with 3-D tracking. 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 23m 19.80s
LONGITUDE: E 1d 26m 11.93s
ALTITUDE: 16.0m
RAW (TIFF) FILE SIZE: 103.00MB
PROCESSED (JPeg) SIZE: 10.09MB
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PROCESSING POWER:
Nikon D800 Firmware versions A 1.10 B 1.10 L 2.009 (Lens distortion control version 2)
HP 110-352na Desktop PC with AMD Quad-Core A6-5200 APU processor. AMD Radeon HD8400 graphics. 8 GB DDR3 Memory with 1TB SATA storage. 64-bit Windows 10. Verbatim USB 2.0 1TB desktop hard drive. WD My Passport Ultra 1tb USB3 Portable hard drive. Nikon ViewNX2 Version 2.10.3 64bit. Adobe photoshop Elements 8 Version 8.0 64bit