Mornings of the New Year

Another round of same–time–same–placing, this time with a variation (and no, it’s not the darkness). So first, the classic shot:

I freely admit, this is a week ago, so maybe it isn’t quite as dark anymore…
©rq, all rights reserved.

 

This time, however, here’s a peek back towards the station and the town, just as the outbound (outbound from the capital, that is) train is arriving:

©rq, all rights reserved.

We have since received a lot more snow, which has all melted again, but at least it looks a little bit like winter.

Today’s song talks a lot about December, but it still sounds great in January. It’s from Blue Rodeo, a classic Canadian band previously mentioned by voyager:

Hey hey I guess it hasn’t hit me yet
I fell through this crack
And I kinda lost my head
I stand transfixed
Before this street light
Watching the snow fall
On this cold December night
And out in the middle of Lake Ontario
The same snow is falling
On the deep silent water
The great dark wonder
Into the waves of my heart
Into the waves of my heart
Of my heart
Sounds like home to me.

The Death of Handicraft

Today’s video is not the main meat of the article, but just an appetizer:

Joe van der Steeg is a blacksmith from Netherlands. I came across his videos a few years ago and I found them very informative, even though admittedly not very entertaining. I did not subscribe, because I do not intend to seriously go into forging at the moment, but I kept him at the back of my mind for future reference should I need plain and to-the-point info about forging techniques. What was clear from the few videos that I have watched was that he is very committed to the craft and that it is his life.

Previous year he announced that he is quitting the craft as a professional and will only continue with it as a hobbyist. When I have noticed that video, I was saddened, because I hate that old crafts are disappearing.

A few days ago I found out that Alec Steele, the youth YouTube blacksmithing star has afterwards invited him for a few days of collaborative work at his workshop, they had a lot of fun together and Alec’s enthusiasm and infectious personality have motivated Joe to continue to make videos. I shed a sentimental tear over that outcome, and I subscribed to Joe, although his videos are still on a back-burner for me, because day has only so many hours.

I know that to make knives for a living is for me just a pipe dream. There is a lot of people in that market, the competition is fierce and getting notorious enough to make a living would be difficult, even more so for a shy and introverted personality (I can pretend self-confident and strong, but not for long).

But overall I think that at a societal level a step back from automation would be desirable. With current state of technology, it is entirely conceivable having 5 hours working days somewhere at a factory/farm and the rest of the day having off to be a weaver, cobbler or whatevermaker to your heart’s desire.  The factories with their automation are perfect for delivering necessities for survival, but to my mind nothing beats handicraft for delivering the beautiful, unique and shiny. Further jobs at factories are soul-crushing and many people afterward have no energy for anything else than to sit in front of TV. Also most people whom I know who do have a creative hobby are mentally much better off than those who do not. There are reasons for arts therapy.

I am not entirely convinced that decline of handicraft is purely due to automation – there are a lot of people who would love to own handmade goods, but cannot afford them.

So why do we as a society insist on having most people do jobs they hate most of the time if that is not, strictly speaking, necessary for the survival of the species?

In my opinion the thing that is killing handicrafts is the same thing that drives the world inexorably towards global warming – insatiable greed of the upper 1% who are sucking money out of the economy only to put it on their bank accounts so they can engage in pointless dick-measuring contests with their fellow parasites. More and more people have to spend 8 or more hours a day in a factory to produce cheap goods, because fewer and fewer people have the means to purchase the more expensive handmade goods. It is a self-reinforcing cycle.

Surrounded by Rocks: An Exploration Series, Chapter 5

Nightjar is here to share the next chapter of her series.

Chapter 5 – East Hill: Flora

There is quite a lot of biodiversity on the top but what you see will of course depend on the time of the year you visit. Spring would be more interesting, and we would be looking for wild orchids, wild peonies (Paeonia broteri) and honeysuckles. In November we must content ourselves with the late crocus (Crocus serotinus)…

©Nightjar, all rights reserved

… and the autumn buttercup (Ranunculus bullatus).

©Nightjar, all rights reserved

Some plants have berries now, like the wild jasmine (Jasminum fruticans)…

©Nightjar, all rights reserved

… or the hawthorn (Crataegus monogyna).

©Nightjar, all rights reserved

And seedcases of the grey-leaved cistus (Cistus albidus) make me want to come back in Spring for their pink flowers with yellow centers.

©Nightjar, all rights reserved

The next chapter will be the last here and we will just enjoy the views and see the hill we will explore next, on the other side of the village.

Jack’s Walk

Properly tucked, ©voyager, all rights reserved

I’m away from home for the next few days staying with a friend whose mother just died. The funeral is tomorrow and I likely won’t be home until Friday so for the rest of the week Jack and I will be taking separate walks. That means that Jack’s Walk is a bit of a crap shoot this week. We’ll be here, but who knows what you’ll see. For today, I’ll give you a glimpse at how Jack relaxes after his evening walk. When he was young Jack was always hot, but this winter for the first time the boy has decided he likes blankets and the cozier the better. This is the blanket that Jack got for Christmas and he loves it. He makes a great big fuss trying to cover himself with it in the hope that mommy or daddy will come along and tuck him in properly. This is what properly tucked looks like.

Surrounded by Rocks: An Exploration Series, Chapter 4

It’s time for Nightjar’s next chapter.

Chapter 4 – East Hill: Fauna of the Present

We have reached the top of the East Hill and so has this weevil, which found the perfect place to sunbathe. There aren’t many insects around this time of the year (November), visiting in spring or summer would certainly be better for insect watching purposes.

©Nightjar, all rights reserved

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Reinterpreting Propaganda

To get it out of the way, Charly started it. And reminded me of a delightful bit of propaganda reinterpretation. Puts a smile on my face every time.

The original FB post was this nice, succinct narrative:

The Soviet-Chinese propaganda posters seem to be the story of a beautiful interracial gay couple who met in a metallurgical, got married and had beautiful children and a farm

In any case, some explanation:

In October 1949, Mao Zedong announced the creation of the People’s Republic of China. China and Russia had long been allies and now, as communist states, that relationship was more important to both countries than ever before.

Communist propaganda has always been an integral part of that particular political structure, and Chinese-Russian propaganda attests to how much each country wanted to show the world they had a united front – China and Russia walking hand-in-hand, happy and gay, so to speak. The posters they used to get this idea across, however, may have been a bit too literal.

Here’s a quick sample of a couple of my favourites. Commentary at the link:

Slightly different, but no less amusing, captions available at imgur, too. If only real-life international relations were as friendly.

And too bad modern day propaganda doesn’t lend itself so easily to left-leaning reinterpretation (please point out if I’m wrong).

 

Bonsai Tree – First Leaves

My little persimmon stopped stretching upwards and is now for a few days staying at more or less the same height. It has sprouted four leaves and stayed there. And it will probably stay there for a while now, nothing much outwardly visible will happen, while the seedling will be concentrating on building a hard wooden stem and nice strong roots instead of the mushy soft ones that consist of 90% of water. That is what allows for the quick growth at the beginning, by bloating cells with water – and it is visible now that the stem got actually a lot thinner than it was a week ago, as it lost its water content.

©Charly, all rights reserved. Click for full size.

©Charly, all rights reserved. Click for full size.

Since I want the tree to grow nice and straight upwards for a while, I turn it about 10-30° counterclockwise every evening. Also I am taking care to not over water it – it is colder on the windowsill than it is in the rest of the room, and I do not want the roots to rot. I will have to try to find information in my library about how much water persimmon actually wants to have – there are plants that need a lot and plants that need very little, and I have lost bonsai trees (sometimes quite valuable) to both under- and over-watering. So far it seems to prosper.