Our stressful lives

"Natives dislike speed, as we dislike noise; it is to them, at the best, hard to bear. They are also on friendly terms with time."

So if they got to wait in a queue or at a doctor´s they take the time spent there as a gift, and not as wasted and boring, like we do.

As read in "Out of Africa" by Tanja Blixen.

...Thoughts, Sensation, Whatever...

Secret of an existence.To me these things belong together, and are the fundamentals of my exsistence here on earth: a big ship travelling along the horizon, far away in the distance, surrounded by a hazy blue sky, with some clouds in it. Finding the crescent of the moon in the same sky. Mathematics, the arid desert. Latin, old stone buildings of the Romans, bright, and always dry, arid. Blue excavator, with the long grid boom, two steel ropes and the scoop held in place by a thin auxiliary rope. Even more impressive the scoop hanging on just one steel rope, being pulled over the ground by the second rope which had been seperated from the boom.

Here we´re now at the borderline of what these terms describe, and what the real thing is. Nobody will get the real meaning of all this, how should they know. But I reckon everyone of us can recount similar objects and impressions of which I wouldn´t know their real meaning, and their value for the relevant person

...Thoughts, Sensation, Whatever...

Secret of an exsistence.To me these things belong together, and are the fundamentals of my exsistence here on earth: a big ship travelling along the horizon, far away in the distance, surrounded by a hazy blue sky, with some clouds in it. Finding the crescent of the moon in the same sky. Mathematics, the arid desert. Latin, old stone buildings of the Romans, bright, and always dry, arid. Blue excavator, with the long grid boom, two steel ropes and the scoop held in place by a thin auxiliary rope. Even more impressive the scoop hanging on just one steel rope, being pulled over the ground by the second rope which had been seperated from the boom.

Here we´re now at the borderline of what these terms describe, and what the real thing is. Nobody will get the real meaning of all this, how should they know. But I reckon everyone of us can recount similar objects and impressions of which I wouldn´t know their real meaning, and their value for the relevant person

The beginning of the last party.

Thoughts on the beginning of the last episode in life.

...work on subject in progress...

Don´t worry, this won´t be an article full of sadness, on the contrary, I will demonstrate how to convert to an attitude of "life art" and enjoying. A thing which naturally won´t come to your mind when young. Your mind will then be filled with girls and Wii.

:-))))

See ya.

A talented actress

I´ve been documenting the rehearsal for the play "Soester Fehde" (Feud of Soest) which will performed on the weekend Aug 22/23, 2009.

Soest is a beautiful town with a lot of medieval flair even in our modern times, at the heart of North Rhine / Westfalia in the middle of Germany.

From 1444 until 1449 the inhabitants of Soest sought independance from the Bishop of Cologne (who had supported them until then though) and wanted the Duke of Kleve as their new ruler.

There will be a major event taking place in Soest on the a/m weekend to celebrate and recall this fight of the people of Soest for independance and more freedom in the middle of the 15th century:

www.soesterfehde.de

and also www.soest.de.

The whole town of Soest will boast medieval and renaissance fairs and plays. A visit of the town should be rewarded with lots of entertainment and also an insight in medieval life at the time.

You´re kindly invited to visit my photographic documentation of the event at www.flickr.com/photos/mister-beep

The effects of constant sunshine.

What effect does this almost everlasting fine weather which is so significant of GC have on the mind? I think it is correct for me to say that my mind in fact is "on a different level", so to speak, when I´m in GC. After arrival it´ll take me some time, usually a few days, to get used to the totally different climate. The sun always stands very high in the sky, and although I´m pretty dark-skinned I easily catch a sunburn. And my mind is indeed different, due to the intense sunrays! But in what way? Well, this is not easily explained. I´m more hilarious, more open and talkative. Maybe it´s what´s being said about people who permanently live in such a climate: they´re "hot-blooded".

The full effect of the positive aspects of living in this pleasant climate establishes itself only after an adaption period of some 2 or 3 weeks, speaking only of myself, of course. Then I really take the well-dosed sunrays as medicine, with healing effects both for the mind and the body. It makes me shiver when I think back to the unsettled and mixed weather of more northern latitudes. I´m a lizard.

Written in May 2009.

Staying current

...as a pilot you´ve got to build a fixed minimum amount of flying time over a period of time, do a fixed minimum of landings, get your medical certificate renewed regularly, and so on. You got to "stay current".

This applies to those pilots who steer flying machines like the one shown above (seemingly an Airbus) as well as to private and so-called recreational pilots.

Which way to go: staying current, or abandoning flying for the benefit of those other cost-intensive amenities life has to offer?

I´ll have to make this personal decision sooner or later. After being a private pilot for over 25 years...

One more option: continue flying for some 5 more years or so, and leave it after that, for medical reasons. The older you get, the more difficult it becomes for you to perceive everything which is important and necessary for staying healthy...

As it is, the most crucial decision maker will be the financial situation. I´ll get my household book and do some calculating...

Two plus 2 is three and a half.

Talent

Talent is a "built-in" feature. That´s for sure. And talent cannot be replaced by not so much practising! Of this I´m convinced, it´s a fact which cannot be denied or talked away in advertisements.

Today en la playa I watched one of these street artists, he was painting, with coloured chalk, the copy of a photograph which passers-by had given to him. It was astonishing how elaborate and detailed the outcome of his art work was: I couldn´t tell the painting he´d made from the photograph it was based on, and I had been watching him painting it! The same applies to some artists who do paintings on the surface of the street: how elaborate these imagines with a sometimes religious background are. I could never, ever do it like this, simply because I don´t have the talent. And I could learn how to do it only to a certain degree, but I´d never become perfect. Another example: mathematics. I love the form of mathematical equations, the wonder of figures and symbols. Yet I´d never become a genius. In school, I got only medium marks. I´m just mediocre in everything. But I don´t care any more: there´s been only one Einstein.

recorded in June 09

...Toshiba Notebook...

Did some teaching with the missus: she wants to enter the computer world. She now owns a Toshiba notebook, with Vista installed.

She really enjoys it, we´ve been going through the Vista installing procedure and some basic folder instalments. She´s an absolute beginner, but she´s doing so well! I gave her an A!!

And Vista is doing fine, too, so far.

I think I´ll replace it (or she will do so), for Win 7, which isn´t such a memory hog. Right?

In a few days she´ll get connected to the internet.

On a side note: My Macbook can see my Canon printer (laser), but can´t instruct the printer to to what it´s supposed to do: print!

I´ll have to check the drivers. I think it´s a driver problem.

The following was written in May 2009, in Gran Canaria:

I´ll never leave the house without carrying my small finepix-camera with me. Some very nice pictures originate from such occasions, as you can see for yourself in my flickr album. Back home I do some minor editing while the photos are still in the camera, well, this means I do some cropping. The camera´s built-in cropping feature is marvellous, so much better than Window´s PAINT programme which is installed on my computer. The old AOL cropping feature which they had built into their internet access programme was also marvelously to handle.

Anyway, that´s all the editing which I (I´m able to) do with my machinery.

I do the shooting as best as I can in the picture-taking situation, trying to apply the best frame and dof, stop and shutter adjustments, so I won´t regret having no proper editing programme. A modern version of such a programme (like photoshop) wouldn´t even run on my old computer and also old OS.

Update August 2009: Now that I have an Apple notebook with iPhoto on it, i have a far wider range of editing tools at my hands.