Wednesday 31 March 2010

2nd Posting : Easter holidays and new technology

Along the valley the trees are coming into leaf. It seems so long with bare trees , beige mud and low gray skies, so it's great to see some colour, the birds are singing like crazy, and the skies are blue, even though it is still chilly. Friends came over the weekend and we took them up to Jabalcuz, its a little green paradise there, against an impressive backdrop of mountains. Apart from us there was no one there, except a gardener trimming the hedges. Last time I was there, a few weeks ago, water draining down from the mountains turned all the steps into living waterfalls, and the decorative pond was a little abandoned, the fountains weren't working and leaves floated in the water against green stones , I rather liked it like that, now the water is crystalline and the stones are no longer green and the leaves have gone, but I got a photo and here it is.



Here are a few more photos of Jabalcuz, (that rushing water is very warm!) Jabaluz used to have a Thermal Spa. The setting reminds me a little of Italy , think this is because of the steep mountain backdrop and the variety of trees, its a surprisingly different place to much of the countryside around Jaén, and its only a few kilometres away, I should escape there more often I think and take my sketch book with me.


Tuesday 23 March 2010

first posting



Tuesday 23rd March.

Hmm, not quite sure where or how to start..... but think I'll do it with stepping out into the garden this morning, seems as good as place as any. As you can see the grass needs cutting, could it be spring?

Poppy thought so anyway and put herself in the best spot to take the early morning sun, on the bench outside the window of my study / workroom / studio ? from where I am writing this blog. Being camera conscious, she probably noticed the nice red cyclamen, she chose her photo spot well.

A week or so ago this part of Andalucia looked like this


which was 100% better than it had been a day or two before with floods and mud everywhere, wonderful the cleansing, prisitne qualities new snow can bestow on the landscape

this is the flooded river just a few minutes away from my house, a rushing torrent of dirty washing up water, with some neat white decorations to pretty it up.

Today I tried to make some headway deciding on my route to Poland, should it be from Málaga, Granada, Madrid, Barcelona .. ? and that's only the first bit, but doubtless it will get sorted soon.
After a healthy lunch of fish, good for the brain and hopefully, decision making, I was expecting to give a private English class, but atv the last minute it was called off which gave me a free hour or so to play around on the computer, and then I went off to give another class, this time with a group who I have been teaching for years and from whom I learn a lot on subjects various.... tonight we were discussing the effect of new technologies on our lives, how some are completely hooked and can't live without being connected all the time and how others feel the need to impose some limits, and not have their lives taken over by it all. In particular we were talking about Light Blue Optics' new product , an interactive projector that projects multimedia content onto any flat surface , such as a desk, a wall etc, we considered the usefulness of this and wondered about the possibilities of using it while travelling and if anyone had yet come up with a foldable thinwhite sheet of something, about half A4 size? which could be slipped into a pocket and used whenever.

At the end of the class I walked back over the quiet evening campus to the car park with JL and we talked about how important it is not to get bogged down in work and the series of musical events on at the uni in the evenings this month, as these always coincide with classes, we played with the idea of starting Thursday's class a bit early so that I could catch all the concert, piano and clarinet, and JL said he may come along with me, so we shall see.

At this point my first entry draws to a close, I'll be back s00n, in the meantime
as I'm trying to learn/ memorise/ find someway of getting a few useful expressions in Polish for my forthcoming visit, fixed in my mind and usable.....

Do zobaczenia...


The range of what we think and do is limited by what we fail to notice. And because we fail to notice , there is little we can do to change until we notice how our failing to notice shapes our thoughts and deeds. RDL