We just had tea at Middleport pottery. Hubby had coffee cake and I had a fruit scone with clotted cream.
I took a photo because of the blue plate. The cafe at Middleport uses it’s own pottery, so there is a delightful mix of different patterns.
The cafe overlooks the Trent and Mersey canal, and there are plenty of benches, tables and chairs to sit outside on when the weather is good. As we watched cyclists were going past on the tow path on the other side of the canal (literally where horses used to tow the barges in the 29th and early 20th century). We also saw two canal boats as they went past. A lovely afternoon despite the drizzle.
After visiting the Arts and Minds gallery in Harper Street Middleport today @arts_and_minds_vsn, we popped over the road to Middleport pottery to get a replacement burleighware tea plate to replace the one I broke. While we were in there I saw this stags head decorated with flowers on the wall. This is the kind of trophy I approve of… Ceramic! I took a photo because it was interesting…. I like the fact it is on an old wall with cracked and flaking paint. The place is an authentic piece of industrial history.
I like the wave emoji, it’s actually based on a wood block print by the Japanese artist Hokusai. The picture is called the great wave off Kanagawa, and you can see the simplified version in the emoji.
You can actually look up the basis of emojis at a website, it’s called Emojipedia, https://emojipedia.org the description says :
The emoji search engine. A fast emoji search experience with options to browse every emoji by name, category, or platform.
We looked at signs and signifiers at college, and how one symbol or sign can include the idea of an object in it. The wave emoji is an example of a symbol that signifies the real object (a real wave) as well as the Hokusai version. Other emojis can be more or less abstract or realistic.
If you have never explored Hokusai then have a look for his work. He even influenced artists like Vincent Van Gogh who ordered prints from Japan and displayed them at his brother Theos gallery where he tried to sell them.
This was an experiment using photoshop from 2002. It’s actually a woman’s profile. And goodness knows what filter I used for it. I like finding ols things. It makes me remember I’ve been doing things like this for twenty years!
This is an ancient summer song from England. It’s rustic words are a real tongue twister to sing. Our choir tackle it at this time of year. I tend to sing the burden because it’s a simple repeating line. You need good breathing though because it runs along below the main song and usually starts before and ends after the rest of the choir. We sing the music as a round, normally four groups for the tune singing summer is icumen in.. Summer is icumen in.. One group after the other. The foot/Burden group is usually split into two groups of two and start Sing Cu-ckoo… Sing Cu-ckoo…. Over and over.
As a side note, the first time I saw the song was in the film ‘the Green Man’ with Edward Woodward. The villagers sing this after he is captured as a sacrifice. I always get a little chill down my spine when we sing it! You can probably find it on YouTube…..
I found a beauty filter on my phone camera. I tried using it… No matter how I turned it up I couldn’t fade out my lines at the side of my nose and mouth…. So I gave up and decided to embrace my features! Black and white high contrast image and I increased the granularity of the image. I look tired (I am) and my hair was a mess, but who care? You just keep going….
If you know my blog, it’s full of different things, ideas, thoughts. I try and explain things sometimes, although I might not have accurate information. But I try and get the gist of things. I like working things out. I also talk a lot about my art (which is what the page was originally set up for). Then I sometimes write poetry, although again, I wouldn’t say I was brilliant at it. And sometimes I write short stories. So all in all I try to vary things and hopefully not be too boring?
I suppose this all reflects a varied, comprehensive education. I’m definitely not a narrow minded specialist. I try and listen to both sides of an argument, but I’m not wholly impartial. If a subject seems important for the world or the environment, I will generally support it. I try not to be fooled. There are a lot of strange ideas out there, and the Internet can be an effective (and bad) way of spreading misinformation.
I enjoy science, particularly astronomy. You can find posts I’ve written where I ramble on about things like galaxies or eclipses, or disagreeing with strange ideas about the shape of the Earth.. It’s an oblate spheroid. I have collections of books, glass, paintings and other objects, so I try and keep myself enthusiastic about many and various things. And then there are Cats. That’s a whole separate post…
Recently I’ve talked about my health, but is this the right forum? Will I miraculously come across a solution to my problems? no, I think I just have to get on with things. But I certainly feel supported and I’m grateful for that.
Thursdays #bandofsketchers prompt was on air… What to do for ‘On air’ …. I had to look up an old microphone for this, except I think its actually modern? It was on a sales site. Anyway it actually says ‘on air’ at the top so I chose it….
What a job, to stoke a boiler like this. (Shovelling in coal). I asked my hubby to explain how it works and he tried, but all I got was ‘fire’, ‘water’ and ‘hot air’. I think a boiler full of water lies above the fire and a large tube of hot air sits in the water, somehow the hot air also circulates along the sides of the boiler and smoke goes up the chimney. The fire and hot air heat the water into steam, which then powers a piston, which has hot steam expanding, is pushed down, and is then cooled by water so the pressure releases. And that turns the wheel that turns the gears and belts….. This is a Cornish boiler that is old so it only runs at about 15 pounds per square inch…
So, I hope I got that right and I haven’t made any horrendous mistakes. But having a vague idea of how things work is important I think? Bored yet?
Mallaband-Brown 