isn't she lovely ? only two hundred and thirty years ago ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uopjMuYY3F8

DELPHINE et SOLANGE

Nous sommes deux soeurs jumelles
Nées sous le signe des gémeaux
Mi fa sol la mi ré, ré mi fa sol sol sol ré do
Toutes deux demoiselles
Ayant eu des amants très tôt
Mi fa sol la mi ré, ré mi fa sol sol sol ré do

DELPHINE

Nous fûmes toutes deux élevées par Maman
Qui pour nous se priva, travailla vaillamment

SOLANGE

Elle voulait de nous faire des érudites
Et pour cela vendit toute sa vie des frites.

DELPHINE et SOLANGE

Nous sommes toutes deux nées de père inconnu
Cela ne se voit pas, mais quand nous sommes nues
Nous avons toutes deux au creux des reins
C'est fou...

DELPHINE

... là un grain de beauté...

SOLANGE

... qu'il avait sur la joue

DELPHINE et SOLANGE

Nous sommes deux soeurs jumelles, 

nées sous le signe des gémeaux
Mi fa sol la mi ré, ré mi fa sol sol sol ré do
Aimant la ritournelle, les calembours et les bons mots
Mi fa sol la mi ré, ré mi fa sol sol sol rédo.

DELPHINE

Nous sommes toutes deux joyeuses et ingénues...

SOLANGE

... attendant de l'amour ce qu'il est convenu...

DELPHINE
... d'appeler coup de foudre...

SOLANGE
... ou sauvage passion...

DELPHINE et SOLANGE
... nous sommes toutes deux prêtes à perdre raison
Nous avons toutes deux une âme délicate

DELPHINE
Artistes passionnées...

SOLANGE
... musiciennes...

DELPHINE
... acrobates...

SOLANGE
... cherchant un homme bon...

DELPHINE
... cherchant un homme beau...

DELPHINE et SOLANGE

... bref un homme idéal, avec ou sans défauts
Nous sommes deux soeurs jumelles, 

nées sous le signe des gémeaux
Mi fa sol la mi ré, ré mi fa sol sol sol ré do
Du plomb dans la cervelle, de la fantaisie à gogo
Mi fa sol la mi ré, ré mi fa sol sol sol ré do

SOLANGE

Je n'enseignerai pas toujours l'art de l'arpège
J'ai vécu jusqu'ici de leçons de solfège
Mais j'en ai jusque-là, la province m'ennuit
Je veux vivre à présent de mon art à Paris.

DELPHINE

Je n'enseignerai pas toute ma vie la danse
A Paris moi aussi je tenterai ma chance
Pourquoi passer mon temps à enseigner des pas
Alors que j'ai envie d'aller à l'opéra

DELPHINE et SOLANGE

Nous sommes deux soeurs jumelles, 

nées sous le signe des gémeaux
Mi fa sol la mi ré, ré mi fa sol sol sol ré do
Deux coeurs, quatre prunelles, à embarquer allegreto
Mi fa sol la mi ré, ré mi fa sol sol sol ré do

DELPHINE

Oh ! Midi moins le quart. Cà y est, je suis en retard.

SOLANGE

Delphine !

DELPHINE

Oui.

SOLANGE

Tu vas chercher Boubou ?

DELPHINE

Oh tu peux pas y aller ?

SOLANGE

J'irai cet après-midi.

DELPHINE

J'peux pas sortir avec ça ! Oh puis si. Oh puis non. 

J'ai rendez-vous à midi
avec Guillaume, je n'y serai jamais.

SOLANGE

Qu'est-ce qu'il veut encore celui-là ?

DELPHINE

Je ne sais pas... me voir.

SOLANGE

Oh bien il attendra. Tu rentres déjeuner ?

DELPHINE

Oui. Mais pas avant une heure. 

Qu'est-ce que j'ai fait de
mon poudrier ? Ah non je l'ai.

DELPHINE et SOLANGE

Jouant du violoncelle, de la trompette ou du banjo
Aimant la ritournelle, les calembours et les bons mots
Du plomb dans la cervelle, de la fantaisie à gogo
Nous sommes soeurs jumelles, nées sous le signe des
gémeaux

SOLANGE

Au revoir.

DELPHINE

Au revoir.

might as well include stravinsky's firebird

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHmk7yccvws

for no particular reason ... the rite of spring

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFPjFjUonX8

kuniyoshi gels

it never occurred to me that there would be so many kinds of ginger ...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zingiber

picasso colombes/doves ... not encyclopaedic

richard eurich ... i've been trawling for images ... will hope to add more

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Eurich

happy birthday to noa

eat your heart out, eminem ... subterranean homesick blues

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGxjIBEZvx0

Johnny's in the basement
Mixing up the medicine
I'm on the pavement
Thinking about the government
The man in the trench coat
Badge out, laid off
Says he's got a bad cough
Wants to get it paid off
Look out kid
It's somethin' you did
God knows when
But you're doing it again
You better duck down the alleyway
Lookin' for a new friend
The man in the coonskin cap, in the big pen
Wants eleven dollar bills but you only got ten

Maggie comes fleet foot
Face full of black soot
Talkin' that the heat put
Plants in the bed but
The phone's tapped anyway
Maggie says that many say
They must bust in early May
Orders from the D.A. look out kid
Don't matter what you did
Walk on your tip toes
Don't try "No Doz"
Better stay away from those
That carry around a fire hose
Keep a clean nose
Watch the plain clothes
You don't need a weather man
To know which way the wind blows

Get sick, get well
Hang around a ink well
Ring bell, hard to tell
If anything is goin' to sell
Try hard, get barred
Get back, write braille
Get jailed, jump bail
Join the army, if you fail
Look out kid
You're gonna get hit
But losers, cheaters
Six-time users
Hang around the theaters
Girl by the whirlpool
Lookin' for a new fool
Don't follow leaders, watch the parkin' meters

Ah get born, keep warm
Short pants, romance, learn to dance
Get dressed, get blessed
Try to be a success
Please her, please him, buy gifts
Don't steal, don't lift
Twenty years of schoolin'
And they put you on the day shift
Look out kid
They keep it all hid
Better jump down a manhole
Light yourself a candle
Don't wear sandals
Try to avoid the scandals
Don't want to be a bum
You better chew gum
The pump don't work
'Cause the vandals took the handles

yesterday, even though i worked with flu ...

3BT, 15^th July 2016

Stopping for five minutes at the top of Ashdown Forest, just to admire the long view of about fifty miles along the South Downs beyond the crowds of tree tops.

Five young swifts in close formation, jet black, shrieking with what I always take to be laughter, zipping through an invisible gap in some very big trees and turning one perfect circle around the chimney of a pub before rocketing off in to the great blue yonder.

At Vauxhall Station, a very tall women with a heavy rucksack ascending the 42 steps to Platform 3 … two at a time !

her indoors, it's her birthday

a red pond in picturesque wyoming ... a nice spot of local colour

http://deq.wyoming.gov/shwd/rcra-facilities/resources/sinclair-casper/

reasons to be cheerful ... because humans usually are !

the second railway from china to tibet ... and how it interests me ... cobbling a draft before i have an idea

i love the excitement of great civil engineering projects

i love the wit and ingenuity of brunel's successors

i love the scenery

i love the people on the trains and around the stations

china's rail building projects sometimes beggar belief

the first thing you need to know is that tibet is now a part of china and the chinese will never let go

the unfortunate tibetans haven't all accepted or adapted to this situation

the following long article linked here below sets out some of the issues raised for the tibetans and the chinese by this mega-project

http://rukor.org/the-plan-for-a-chengdu-to-lhasa-railway/#_ftnref1

another perspective on china's development is given in a lecture by professor david harvey at the invitation of harvard university

early in this long talk he gives you an astonishing insight in to china's attitude to development by quoting their production figures for cement

harvey is a working geographer, constantly travelling the world, who is also accustomed to analyzing modern development, often using marx's ideas as a kind of weighing scales because he's interested in the implications of global change for ordinary people

his matter-of-fact dry humour seems to comfort and engage his audiences around the world

http://davidharvey.org/2016/03/video-senior-loeb-scholar-lecture-david-harvey-harvard-graduate-school-design-march-28-2016/

shorter articles from the economist fill in a bit more of the current picture ...

http://www.economist.com/news/china/21604594-communist-party-deepens-tibets-integration-rest-country-taming-west

http://www.economist.com/news/china/21699167-plans-new-railway-line-tibet-pose-huge-technological-challengeand-political

and provides another map ...

duende ... evaporates

i've only just noticed how the girl on the label of spain's carbonell olive oil has gradually changed over the years from a dark eye'd gypsy woman in to a simpering madrilleno television weather forecaster

this won't do ... it is just another kind of ethnic cleansing

my grandfather sometimes took me for walks by the chain and anchor works ....

but he never mentioned the connection with brunel, everybody's engineering hero

























https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brown_Lenox_%26_Co_Ltd

myfanwy, as sung by welsh people ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_RjRicjIaKI

Paham mae dicter, O Myfanwy,
Yn llenwi'th lygaid duon di?
A'th ruddiau tirion, O Myfanwy,
Heb wrido wrth fy ngweled i?
Pa le mae'r wên oedd ar dy wefus
Fu'n cynnau 'nghariad ffyddlon ffôl?
Pa le mae sain dy eiriau melys,
Fu'n denu'n nghalon ar dy ôl?

Why so the anger, Oh Myfanwy,
That fill your dark eyes
Your gentle cheeks, Oh Myfanwy,
No longer blush beholding me?
Where now the smile upon your lips
That lit my foolish faithful love?
Where now the sound of your sweet words,
That drew my heart to follow you?

Pa beth a wneuthum, O Myfanwy
I haeddu gwg dy ddwyrudd hardd?
Ai chwarae oeddit, O Myfanwy
 thanau euraidd serch dy fardd?
Wyt eiddo im drwy gywir amod
Ai gormod cadw'th air i mi?
Ni cheisiaf fyth mo'th law, Myfanwy,
Heb gael dy galon gyda hi.

What was it that I did, Oh Myfanwy,
To deserve the frown of your beautiful cheeks?
Was it sport for you, Oh Myfanwy,
This poet's golden flame of love?
You belong to me, through true promise,
Too much to keep your word to me?
I'l never seek your hand, Myfanwy,
Unless I have your heart with her.

Myfanwy boed yr holl o'th fywyd
Dan heulwen ddisglair canol dydd.
A boed i rosyn gwridog iechyd
I ddawnsio ganmlwydd ar dy rudd.
Anghofia'r oll o'th addewidion
A wneist i rywun, 'ngeneth ddel,
A dyro'th law, Myfanwy dirion
I ddim ond dweud y gair "Ffarwél".

Myfanwy, may your life entirely be
Beneath the midday sun's bright glow,
And may a blushing rose of health
Dance on your cheek a hundred years.
I forget all your words of promise
You made to someone, my pretty girl
So give me your hand, my sweet Myfanwy,
For no more but to say "farewell".

mystery object scanned at 1200 dpi on my old epson printer