After a really good night's sleep I woke at 6.40am and turned over till the 7am News. I have the gift of listening to "Farming Today" and promptly forgetting everything I've just heard. It's the same with weather forecasts. I decide to listen to the weather and next thing, it's finished and I've been 'miles away'.
Yesterday was quite tiring with needing to be in one place, and then another, and to enjoy a day's grandchildren activity - too much food and then driving home in the dark. Mind you I'm not complaining because the kids were great; hardly any tears. Isn't the sense-of-humour of 4/5/6/7yr olds unchanging. We had great fun with an atificial pool of 'sick', 'dog-poo' and a 'bottle of tipped over red nail varnish' However I also managed lots of chats with grown ups. Discussed Art with Andy (he showed me a digital picture on his camera of a portrait of Debra in charcoal and oils - it has a definite Klimt look), then Computers with Steven, Holistic Health with Debra - I still know how to dog-paddle furiously when out of my depth and it was a relief to discuss family matters and things like cooking and multiple sclerosis and driving with Lisa. We also discussed Attenborough Nature Reserve which David spoke so highly of yesterday and which Lisa knows well. She is very good on birds. Apparently, at Attenborough there is a newly opened Visitor Centre with Restaurant which David says looks good even though they haven't tried it yet. Maybe one day next week? Y is keen.
The weather is mild, 11C, but very wet and the omens were not good for our Camera Club trip to Elvaston Castle. But, as always, pictures can be found, and you don't need a bright sunny day! Artists have known that for yonks. There is a beautiful Pissaro of an avenue of trees in the rain, but I can't remember the name of it.
Picture 1 is a dis-used boat-house opening onto the lake. The built-in flash on the Nikon carries quite a punch; the trees needed a touch of fill-in flash and the camera got it just right, illuminating the trees from a good 20feet away.
Picture 2 is "two large ducks with sleeping offspring" and although I used fill-in flash again I under-exposed by one stop because otherwise you always loose all detail from the swan's plumage. It's because it's so white.
I am concerned that the decision to execute Saddam Hussein is the wrong one. As Churchill said so presciently in 1916 after the IRA 'Easter Uprising' - "Grass will quickly grow over a battlefield; it will never grow over a scaffold." And, as Andy astutely said yesterday "and Churchill no doubt wrote that himself; different from today's lot".
The question has been asked "Is it possible for me to 'blog' a video"? The answer is "Probably - but I tried it and only succeeded in deleting half of this 'post'. The method I used was to obtain a URL for the video in question and then try to post a link to it. I guess someone will know the answer but until I'm talked through it by an expert I shall leave it alone. After the festivities have well and truly finished I'll go on WebUserforums with the query. It is right up the street of OurStanley, RichieP, Fusion or Greysts or TheFatController.
.. Batten down the hatches it's going to be a stormy night. Gusts of 70mph forecast.
1 comment:
Sorry, but the pictures, although wonderfully sharp and colourful, are not to my taste. Once again, they are too like that still life oil colour style of great accuracy but uncomfortable rigidity (you tell me the ‘school’?). It looks like ‘Chacun a son gout’ (‘to each his painful foot’?) again.
I am totally unhappy about capital punishment but I can see the tremendous risk that Saddam might have been sprung and reinstated. But he will undoubtedly be a pretty influential martyr, particularly as he apparently died so bravely and unrepentant.
I am not sure entirely how many or how much of his own speeches were/was written by Churchill himself, although I understand that some, an unknown number, were delivered by impersonators.
At the time, that was never a consideration but we are much more suspicious these days. In no more than a thousand words: “Were we once fools to be so trusting or are we now too cynical and unbelieving?”
"It WAS a dark and stormy night."
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