Halloween

Bonfires on the mountainside!

July in the Park

Beautiful day. Eliot's dawg. Life is good.

Rumi remembered

By Saeed Taji Farouky, from Al Jazeera

Iran has celebrated the 800th birthday of Jalal ad-din Muhammad Rumi, the poet and spiritual leader famous across much of central and western Asia, with a week-long conference in the cities of Tehran, Khoy and Tabriz.
But scholars say that political pressures and the increasing commercialisation of Sufism, the mystical strand of Islam Rumi so heavily influenced, threaten to overshadow the poet's message of universal love and tolerance.

Read more...

Julia arrives!

Autumn - Lake Padden

Mr. Big Shot Says . . .

Saw a show last night on the History Channel. The M-16 rifle was the subject. Innovative weapon put in the hands of seasoned warriors in the swamps and deltas of Viet Nam in 1967. There were some problems in the beginning with the weapon but once it was understood you had to keep the gun very clean it became an effective killing machine. “The M-16 was innovative in the heat of battle.” “This rifle was my friend when I was surrounded by the enemy.” “Did away with a lot of Viet Cong”, said the broken down, overweight man of 60 who was being interviewed.

I was 18 in 1969. One May night that year (continued) . . .

Survival

i dreamed i was a survivalist...counting out the stored liters of petrol and water, the cartons of ammunition . . .when i awoke, i checked the web and found this:

The speed at which mankind has used the Earth’s resources over the past 20 years has put “humanity’s very survival” at risk, a study involving 1,400 scientists has concluded.

so do i:
a) ignore it and hope things will work out
b) trust in god (see a)
c) try to do something, however modest, about it
d) try to provision for myself and my family, come what may...

U.N. news report here: http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=24421&Cr=environment&Cr1=

Design Your Flag

http://www.wearemulticolored.com/

What Else? Where Else?

You'll find this at Troy....


and this in Prague at the Kafka museum...

Lori Says

Ok WE HAVE A DATE!!!!!!! July 26th. It is going to be warm and sunny. THere will be plenty of crab in the bay, it will be a good fishing season in Alaska, and most of all a HUGE bbq and a ton of fun! Hope all is well with everyone, more details later.

Leaving Sarajevo

. . .and just in time

Julia Says: The Power of Forgiveness

I saw an ‘ad’ in The Economist magazine for the ‘Templeton Foundation. The ad showcases articles by famous scientists/scholars on “Does the Universe Have a Purpose?” www.Templeton.org/purpose and http://www.templeton.org/. The ad really piqued my interest so I spent some time reading, listening and watching some of the material on and links from their web site. I discovered that the foundation is in the forefront of bringing a new dimension to science and tying science with religion.

This foundation also funded a most incredible film titled “The Power of Forgiveness.” The film is bringing publicity to this new discipline: forgiveness – even more powerful than ‘peace.’ A Subud member, Alexandra Asseily, was featured in this award winning film for her work on a Garden of Forgiveness in Beirut. At one time she was head of the Red Cross in Lebanon distributing millions of dollars of aid after the 1975 war. The war in the summer of 2006 halted the garden project, but it is not forgotten. Partly because she is married to the former Lebanese ambassador to Britain, she was able to gain use of a site in the center of Beirut surrounded by mosques, churches and a synagogue. It is also home to at least six layers of civilizations.

I have a copy of this film that Alexandra gave me and hope to show it when I get home. I've put some info about the film in the "Comments" to this post.

Alexandra is the person wearing a hat in the attached photo.

Kiki de Montparnasse

Man Ray and Alice Prin

http://www.lelitteraire.com/article2919.html

Julia says

Here 's a photo from this absolutely amazing drive we made today – from Banja Luka to Jajce to Zenica and then to Sarajevo. It was so completely beautiful and inspiring….

Melanie Says

Here is the aftermath of the wind storm we've had. Half the giant spruce. The birds love it and think it's great that it's now located near the birdfeeder. They'be been hopping on and off it all day.

Mr. Big Shot Says

. .we laughed at the night because we had drunk far more or at least bragged that we had because we were never going to get caught because the stars wouldnt let us and walked in the fog by the slough and saw creatures and werent afraid although I worried there were a lot of shadowy demons around you then and I didnt really need those demons in my life but you werent bothered by it so I just went with it and on an on and we never got caught. And we stopped talking about Yeats and started talking about Picasso and Picasso was heroic and confused and loved the women and we loved Picasso and I went to his house and stood in his studio and wanted to stay there until the French law clerks chased me away because the studio where Guernica was painted is now a storeroom for law files and I didnt want to leave but then I did and we talked more about Picasso and painted paintings and then painted more until the paintings started to stack up with no where to go until you went to your really great island in Croatia and the painting slowed and then this summer I didnt paint anything but stared at the bulls I painted last summer and thought there once was a lot of life in my imagination and I cant let that go. Long live the minotaur and long live Yeats I guess and raise a toast to the Greeks and those splendid vases.

Sam at Yeats Grave

Got a nice letter from Sam Green . . .still living out his convictions . . .new book of poems coming out from Carnegie Mellon University Press . . ."It's a hundred or so pages long" . . .I'm not sure of the title . . .

This is so great . . .

Why didn't I know about these guys??????

Slavko Says

This is from my window tonight, and as you can see not many people around, moon is going out early, and only fish factory is still working second shift.
I was lured by lights and went out to riva, local guy was in good mood, spent some time in Mille Naves.
Weather still beautiful, whole morning on Mlin heard some birds singing like in spring.

Hope you're doing some painting, don't waste time otherwise!

Beauty of the Night

I asked:

Lynne --Do you know what these flowers are? They are all around my place in Milna....grow in rocky, dry ground. The Italians call them the 'beauties of the night,' because their blossoms open at night. I think I saw one or two bushes that were yellow in color, but most seem to be this color.

Lynne replied: 4 o'clock
also called Marvel-of-Peru , or Beauty-of-the-Night (Mirabilis jalapa) ornamental perennial plant, native to tropical America. Four-o'clock is a quick-growing species up to one metre (three feet) tall

Gauguin

Upon Gauguin’s death, his nemesis in Atuona, Bishop Martin, wrote to his superiors in France: "The only noteworthy event here has been the sudden death of a contemptible individual named Gauguin, a reputed artist but an enemy of God and everything that is decent."

from "Chasing Gauguin's Ghost"

By Heather Waldroup

Julia Says

Here are some photos from a walk today. Went with a woman from the Czech Embassy. That pinpoint on the hill in the first photo is that round tower on a hill above Sarajevo. (Slept all day yesterday!)

Mowing yr Lawn . . .

...is not for sissies!

Fabulous World

The Fabulous World of Charles Grimes is up and running at its new website: http://cg.qsoup.net/

Julia Says

I was in a photo exhibit at the Bosnian Institute taking photos and backed into one of the displays and almost knocked it over – everyone looked at me, I practically yelled ‘’zao mi je” and then everyone ignored me like I was crazy. The next morning at breakfast I picked up a full pitcher of jogurt and the top wasn’t scewed on properly and the entire ‘jar’ or whatever you’d call it dropped and smashed on the floor spilling yogurt everywhere….

Slavko Says

And in Zadar we went (Zore,Dragica and Ante), and Dragica's mother picked some snails for me so I was cooking them and preparing them for freezer yesterday.

Check out this beauty!!!

D'brute Says

Many, many pumpkin patches throughout the valley.

Julia says

Here a photo of ‘Kandilj’ where I’m staying in Sarajevo . . .

Leon Says

Chaz says

I do not wish for partial retirement. I love to work and hope to do so for the next 10 to 15 years. This is why I chose real estate as a career. I love the professionalism of the career and I also love the fact that I can operate on my own time schedule. The only thing I want for the next phase of my life (until I stop working) is that Melanie and I would be able to travel for two or three weeks twice a year.

http://homeagainproperty.com/

(Melanie, however, want to retire!)