Monday, 13 June 2011
Hi ! I'm back.
I have been devoting my time to my painting; the views around here are magnificent, everywhere you look and I have plenty of material to keep me busy painting away landscapes. I go in my car, to my chosen location with all my painting gear and its just really wonderful, we are having a good summer here of sun with a little bit of showers, so I have chosen to paint with pastels, that way, I don't have to scamper into the car with a wet oil painting that will smudge everywhere and also carry in the umbrella, the easel, the brushes in a real hurry when it rains! a dry medium like pastels means I can paint inside my car, for the most part, I try to choose locations where there is easy access to parking and where I can be seen but not disturbed as I hate being watched when I work, but at the same time, I like places where I don't feel isolated in a lonely spot, in case something goes wrong like the other day. The battery of the car went flat when I wanted to come home. I had borrowed Peter's mobile phone but unfortunatelly for me, these modern mobiles think they are computers or cameras or calendars or playing consoles except a real phone and for some reason, I only kept getting his list of contacts and unable to call him but just before panic set in, all of a sudden as If by magic, I spotted one of the RAC lorries that go in aid of broken down vehicles, so I flagged him down, his company isn't the one we are affilliated with but he still helped me to charge my battery and he didn't want to accept any payment. Without his help, I would have had to continue struggling with the blessed mobile phone to call Peter or.. walking a few miles back home. Anyway, I took my car to the mechanic which is only a short walk from our new home. You would never know the garage is there, the shop is a quaint looking cottage but inside it, it has all the modern equipment to service a car. Now, I love to paint plein air landscapes and it seems not a single day is the same, the second day I was prepared with a new car battery, a new simple mobile phone but got stung by a wasp that day and unfortunately I had to cut the painting session short. The lesson here, is to be prepared with a good insect repellent, a sun blocker and continue to persevere whether it rains or shines.
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15 comments:
Hi Maria
Yes, these mobile phones are a pain. I have a mobile phone (at last) but I do not know my own number. I have written it down somewhere but haven't yet memorised it.
What you decribe is the kind of thing I like - a small town or village with character. I will sometimes watch films just because of the setting - the plot or the script might be fairly ordinary, but if it has a civilised setting it makes all the difference. What I can't stand is so-called gritty dramas set in cities. I can think of a word that rhymes with "grtty" but I won't say it.
I look forward to seeing your pastels when you're ready.
Aren't these complicated mobiles a pain. I felt quite tempted to throw it in the fields but it wasn't mine, so I got the cheapest one there was in the shop. The salesman was quite eager to show me the ones that are computers, cameras, calendars etc. I kept on saying: No,no,no, I just want a simple phone where you dial and someone replies at the other end.
The town is absolutely wonderful, the people are friendly and happy and you are right about the settings like Miss Marple. Today, I have my first flower arrangement class just up the road in the town-hall and I have already cut the white roses from an empty yard on no-man's land. Yes, I will post the little pastel when its done.
Hi Maria
Miss Marple, yes. But I trust there won't be any murders - for instance, I hope there won't be any mobile phone salesmen mysteriously done to death with an easel. Ha!
Ah no. The mobile was bought in Shrewsbury, Charles Darwin's town. By the way, they have a Darwin's museum there, where they keep a letter written by a relative of mine who wrote it to a distraught lady who had worked herself up over humanity being descended from the monkeys. Well, not exactly the monkeys' line, but you get the idea. Its amazing how there are still states in the U.S. where you cannot talk about Charles Darwin's 'On The Origen Of The Species' book. It is still considered blasfemous.
Hi Maria
Which relative was that? This lady was probably getting worked up in case she had a throwback - and gave birth to a chimp!
Those who don't believe in evolution but believe every literal word of the bible, must explain how Noah had the room on his ark to accommodate the thousands upon thousands of different species of animals, plants and insects that we know of now. He's have needed an ark the size of several supertankers!
The relative was Richard Spilsbury, son of Sir Bernard Spilsbury. Richard was a philosopher he lectured at the university of Aberythwyth and later he left that post to study genetics at the university of Edimburg in Scotland.
Ha,ha,ha you made me laugh with the lady who was afraid of having a throw back from the chimps. Robert, you will find that the Christians reply to that one like this: Noah stored them much the same way as the scientists are storing them now in the North Pole, the genes of the animals but I don't think science was that advanced at the time. Also, it doesn't explain how the plants were saved and without anything to eat..no one can survive.
Hi Maria
Of course, Noah would have had to take woodworm too. Bad news for him, since his ark was made of wood. He would also have had to take every deadly bacterium and virus known to man. I wouldn't have liked being on that ark. If I wasn't infected with smallpox or Ebola, I'd have been trampled to death by an elephant or eaten by a lion. I think I'd have had more chance swimming for it out on the ocean.
It stands to reason, doesn´t it? with just a pair of elephants and another pair of Rhinos, a wooden boat would have sunk!
The thing is.. with religion you are suppose to abandon all logic and blindly believe everything you are told.
Well, the religious folk always flit back and forth between a literal meaning and an implied meaning. If the literal meaning doesn't work, then a story can always be presented as an allegory or something like that. And of course different people will see different things in every story. Actually, the whole of Christianity can be interpreted as "Leave the rich alone" which is how rich people have wanted to interpret it, or as "Give some of the rich's money to us" which is how the poor people see it. Nowadays we have a third option, which is the rich saying "Leave our money alone, but give some of the money of the people who aren't as well off as us to the people who are right at the bottom." This is jokingly called compassion.
The fourth option is: Let's give the people's hard earned money to the rich like the banks, so that they can pay themselves their millionaire bonuses or to the E.U. to bail out other inept goverments. It doesn't matter that this money will be given to the same incompetent people who squandered it in the first place. Look at Greece. They spent all their bail out cash and now they want a second bail-out. Peter just told me now that George Osborne has said the U.K. won't be bailing Greece. Let's hope he keeps to his word.
Hi Maria
I think one of today's newspapers had Cameron saying that he will be "fighting" any attempt to use British money for a bail-out. That sounds like the true situation. After all, if you're not going to do something, why do you need to fight not to do it? Personally I wouldn't stake too much money betting on Cameron's fighting spirit.
I remember years ago, John Major used to come back from Euro meetings and the papers reported that "defiant Major" had "won his battle" not to do this, that or the other. All this fighting was to enable us to make decisions we used to make all the time when we were an independent nation. But since joining the EU, we have had to "fight" to be "allowed" to do or not do things.
You are right. Whenever this EU question comes along I can see how right you are, it has all come down to tears now. Did you read the newspaper yesterday? where the MPs were howling in parliament to get out of the EU? I wished they had had your vision a long time ago instead of now when all has gone pear-shape. Apparently, the U.K. has lost 100 billion in pensions due to this EU fiasco, very fortunately, the U.K. currency is not the Euro so it could have been worse.
Hi Maria
I thought this article was interesting, because it's by a BBC correspondent, and nobody could accuse the BBC of being anti-EU - quite the reverse! The article asks whether the Eurosceptics were right all along, and mentions the Euro fanatics whose answer is "more Europe".
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-13875407
Right from the start, even before the 1975 referendum on Europe, the Eurosceptics warned that the true goal of the Common Market was full economic and political union - a European superstate. They were branded fascists, communists, Little Englanders, xenophobes, etc etc. The British people toddled off to the voting booths and obediently voted 2 to 1 to stay in Europe. They are now discovering that as with the life of individuals, so with the life of nations, there is a penalty to be paid for stupidity. That referendum vote of 1975 was the last chance they will ever get to decide the fate of their country. Or should I say, the fate of what used to be their country.
If it ain't broken, don't fix it. Things were very well when each country saw to their own affairs. I don't believe in full integration, that is a recipe for disaster. The European Market was okay but they should have stopped right there and then. Also the corruption with tax payers money that has been going on in the EU is not even mentioned. This is like giving a huge amount of money for total strangers to spend. I'm sure the German tax payer is not thrilled their hard earned money will go towards paying the Greek social services. Its crazy !
Hi Maria
Yes, well I believe in nation states. The test of a nation isn't so much how people live together when things are going well - it's how they live together when things are going badly. When the chips are down, each nation reverts to its own interests, and that's why humanity is lots of different nations instead of just one. Idealists who try to deny this are living in fairyland.
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