Gregoire and I were walking along the path by the blogtrain last night. Ostensibly it was for exercise but there's a little shop about quarter of a mile away that sells a fine selection of icecream. In our minds, it justifies the walk, but then the acquired calories probably defeat the whole purpose of the walk. But the heck with it, when I see a Ben and Jerry's Cherry Garcia, I am lost.



Anyway back to the path. It gets quite dark in a couple of spots along by the railway. One day I am sure I will find a body down there. Today there were some toadstools, but no bodies.


And somebody had dumped a large fern that had been taken from a store. Who knows why they dumped it half way along the path. It seemed a shame. If you're going to go to the trouble of shoplifting such a plant, least you could do would be to give it some care and attention. It looked quite forlorn along a darker section of the path, next to an abandoned toilet bowl in the bushes.


... and the piece de resistance, this svelte vacuum cleaner left against the wall at the blogtrain station. I bet this will be gone in a couple of hours, a high demand item, working or not. Of course you wouldn't know it was kaput until you lumbered home with it. Maybe we'll see it given away on Craigslist, talking of which, a woman in Dallas is offering her free good-for-nothing husband to any home and she'll pay the gas if someone comes and picks him up.

And a quick update on other matters. We haven't had any more newspaper deliveries since my last spat with JimmyBlog paper. Hopefully they have given up, if not gone home altogether. Somehow I suspect otherwise; these folks are nothing if not persistent.

And no sign of Steven, the student missing on Crete. It can't be a good news story, this one.

There is good news on the auto-spam on this blog. Since setting word verification on for comments, there has been no spam.

Autumn leaves... well actually it's just arrived

Autumn is here, there is a nip in the air, but there are compensations. I love the colours of fall.







What I don't understand is why all these conkers are lying on the ground. Its sacrilege. When we were kids, we'd practically fight to get one of these in our hot little hands. We'd tread warily into gardens and throw sticks up into trees, getting caught many a time by irate homeowners. Once we'd gathered a few conkers, we'd pick a decent one and ferment the beastie in vinegar for a while, put a skewer through it without destroying it entirely and lastly rig a foot of string through the middle. We'd then have a sure fire winner when it came to the illegal school conker competitions. What gives these days? I never see anything like that. I need answers please....

Anybody out there?

Well change of pace today, in case any aliens are dropping in. On the left is a pictorial depiction of the Arecibo radio message beamed in to outer space in 1974. It will take 25000 light years to reach its destination and 25000 light years for any response to come back to earth. OK. I'm wondering if there will be anyone left down here to pick up the phone in 50000 years. I'm thinking of beaming this message to our local free newspapers providers as clearly they are from another planet.


On that subject, there is good news. There have been no free daily newspaper deliveries for a week in our neighbourhood, you'll be pleased to know. I don't think this has anything to do my complaints. I'm not privy to their littering strategy but I'm ready if they come back. Wow this picture is blurry, anyway I counted 16 newspaper boxes outside the blog station. In addition, each morning, there are at least five or six people trying to hand me a free newspaper. Some of them are getting a tad aggressive, jockeying each other to get in a good position in front of the commuters. The JimmyBlog distributor I chewed out the other week hasn't appeared for at least a week. I wonder if she has decided on an alternative occupation.

Steven hasn't been found. That's the young man who disappeared on the island of Crete without a trace on September 1st. Family and friends handed out 20,000 leaflets at a Liverpool soccer match to try and raise awareness. A lot of folks go to Crete on vacation so it was hoped it would jog someone's memory. It seems strange that he would vanish with no sign. There are rumours swirling around about aggressive security guards around Malia, the resort he was staying at. Apparently he is not the kind of person to do a runner. It turns out he was on a pub crawl the night he disappeared. A side of me is less sympathic when I read that but then I think that he's a young man, whose parents are going out of their minds with worry. It would be good to know what has happened to him.

One of my favourite websites is Craiglist, originally started in San Francisco but now available for numerous cities across the world. Its intended as a forum for people to connect, barter, exchange, you name it, without being bombarded with advertising content. I like its simple, easy to use format, with no frills. So for example if you want a lot of free pinecones in Nashville, a bicycle in Lima, or a printer with suspected feline damage in Milan, then this might be the place for you. It also has a best of section, though be warned, some of the entries in there are a tad raunchy. Ah, so that didn't stop you...!

I have taken down the rant about SPAM from my blog description as clearly a lot of the spam is automated, with no live person on the other end. I still nuke those spam comments with links as soon as I see them. I read some useful information about it on Wiki. Typically I get 3 or 4 for every posting, which although tiresome, is not that much of an inconvenience as I'm getting a dab hand at hitting the delete key.

STOP PRESS! I found an option in the blogger template settings which is word verification for comments, which hopefully will stop the automated spam comments. If you're leaving comments, this will involve a minor extra step, but hopefully will not be much of an inconvenience. Comments, as always, are very welcome.

So I haven't quite worked out what JimmyBlogs delivery schedule is because there are no new freebies on our street this morning. It looks like they are operating with one or two deliveries a week instead of everyday. There's lots of paper on the lawns and sidewalks but it has been worse, as sometimes we get a mass of McCardBoard wrappers and Kentucky Fried Horrors. As for this morning, we now have rain into the mix so we're looking at a soggy mess.

Crap came back, the very next day....

The free paper was delivered again this week. Same spot on the bottom of the path of all the houses on our street. I phoned the distribution line and left a polite message asking them to phone me back. Later in the morning, Minnie called from JimmyBlog paper and apologized for delivering it our house. Apparently the delivery driver had forgotten to bring his list of homes to ignore. Which explains why the paper is at the bottom of the path. They just throw it from the delivery van.

I launched into ways they could improve the litter situation. First, don't deliver the paper to anyone at all, ever. Strangely enough, Minnie didn't seem taken with that option. Second, put the paper through the mailslot rather than on the ground. As in, don't be lazy. Third, if there is already a paper on the ground, don't add another to the pile. Unfortunately that would require some common sense. Fourth, go round the neighbourhood and pick up stray papers on the road and sidewalk and be a good corporate citizen. Minnie, who has obviously been through customer service training, sympathized saying she'd feel the same if she lived on the street and said she would discuss all this with her manager. I suspect nothing much is going to change.

I asked what their distribution plans were, and somewhat surprisingly, she told me. JimmyBlogPaper is using our area as a six week trial, then they are going to move on and deliver to another area in the city. Ah so we are guinea pigs. Oink oink. We are in week two. Four weeks of bad litter to go. Unless, of course, I can think of a way to combat this. Biting the hand that feeds them might work. I am thinking of photographing the street with papers on it and sending them to the main advertiser. Suggestions on a postcard please....

I'm pleased to report that there have been no further freebie paper deliveries to our street since Wednesday. I'm not sure if my complaints had anything to do with it, but its good that JimmyBlog Paper has desisted, for now at least. We had a big windstorm last night and everything has been blown around. Chairs and plants on our deck got overturned. The street is rather littered with bits of rubbish today but it would have been far worse if there had been four days worth of newspapers on the sidewalks.

I've been following the story of Steven Cook, a university student from the UK who disappeared a week ago on the island of Crete. He went there with a group of friends but on the first night he never showed up back at his hotel in Malia on Crete and missed his flight home a week later. His bank account hasn't been touched, his money, passport remain at his hotel and apparently it would be completely out of character for him to disappear of his own accord. Now family members and friends of his have flown back to Crete to search for him, so far coming up emptyhanded. The holiday company has offered free flights from the UK for people wanting to help in the search. Some people have flown to Greece to help even though they don't know him. His brothers have been posting on a forum, giving the latest updates on their search for him, the ground they have covered, the people they have interviewed, but no clues have yet emerged as to where he is. I must admit it doesn't sound good. I've been impressed with the way family and friends and people completely unknown to Steven have rallied around to try to find him. I hope this story has a happy ending.

Quick post this morning. I was on a packed downward escalator yesterday when it screeched to a halt. People fell on the person in front and there were frightened screams. The frail elderly lady beside me produced some four letter words I'd not heard in a while. The escalator did not move again. The woman was in trouble as she usually doesn't do stairs. Ever so gingerly she took a step at a time, with a huge long line-up anxious to get past her but unable to do so. I stepped slowly in front of her, giving her encouragement as she was obviously upset and frightened of falling. Instantly the group behind were patient once they realized the situation and eventually she got to the bottom of the stairs. She smiled and joked, thanking people around her for helping. The crowd surged past her again, in a blinding hurry to get to their day jobs.

I've turned into a three headed monster. Yesterday morning I set off to work but I was stopped dead in my tracks by a newspaper lying on our path by the sidewalk. It was the JimmyBlog, one of those useless free daily newspapers which had been delivered to our house. Its never been delivered before. You pick up the paper at one of the numerous outlets round the city, if that's your cup of tea. I looked up and down the street. The paper was everywhere, on the sidewalk, on the lawn, not exactly hanging from the treetops, but you get the picture. Red rag to a bull or what? I fumed. This paper has a target audience aged six and 3/4 and we are not it.

I recycled the aforementioned litter on my way to work. Once in the office I looked up the name of the paper's distribution manager and sent him a polite e-mail describing the mess in the neighbourhood and stating that we did not want the paper delivered. There was no response. Free newspaper delivery was one of the main topics of conversation around the water cooler in the office. Some suggested mailing a whole pile of newspapers back to the paper, stamp free of course. Another was to approach Mr Jimmyblog directly as he works in the next building. Somehow I don't think they would allow me into his penthouse office suite.


This morning another paper was on the path, same place. Papers were on neighbours lawns, in the middle of the road, on the sidewalk, everywhere. There's an elderly lady a couple of doors down who never comes out the front door of her house as there are difficult steps. Lying on her path were two crumpled papers that she will never read, and she won't be able to pick them up. I grabbed one paper and brought it with me to the blogtrain station. Every day there are free newspaper distributors eager to hand you a copy as you enter the station. Often you have to run the gauntlet of jousting papers before you can actually get into the station. Today I gave JimmyBlog Distributor a paper before she could hand me one. And then, totally unfairly but I was steamed, I ranted about papers all over our street and asked what would be done about it. She shrugged and followed the Distributor's Rule 101 - do not engage in any confrontation with a crazy commuter.


Anyway I felt badly when I got on the train. Chewing someone out who is not to blame is not my thing. Still, I was mad. At work, I wrote again to the distribution manager detailing the worsening litter situation on our street and again asking for the paper delivery to be stopped, and demanding the courtesy of a reply. Finally later in the morning one of his minions wrote, apologizing for the mess, said they would clean it up and confirming they would not deliver it to our home. I thanked her. Now the problem is how I can prevent delivery of the newspaper to the entire neighbourhood, but I guess someone would suggest that is a suppression of rights, free speech or something. I'd prefer to save the trees.

I asked the distribution manager whether they intend to deliver on a daily basis to a large number of homes in the city but that question has so far gone unanswered. I imagine they are not keen to share their marketing strategy with the likes of me. They probably think I would take it straight to the local government. They would be dead right. But if the widespread daily goes ahaed, the other two freebies will probably follow, and the deteriorating litter situation will go off the scale.

Ok I know this is ridiculous and decadent but I am dedicating this blog posting solely to a pie. Exhibit A to the left to be precise. A group of friends gathered last night and for dessert this pie emerged.

ORIGINATOR
My friend, Sylvia was the creator. She's artistic and a fantastic cook.

COMPARISON TO MCDONALD'S APPLEPIE
I'm not even going to go there. There's no comparison.

SLICING
It cut like a dream, thankyou. Slices came and went and were demolished like there was no tomorrow.

TASTE
Strawberries and peaches in a deliciously tangy sauce, lying on a ginger biscuit base. Perfection.

COMMENTS BY THE DINNER GUESTS
"Oh my God! That is wonderful!"
"A thing of beauty!".
"Poetry should be written about a dessert such as this."

So to get on the blogtrain you have to walk over this message indicating quite firmly I would say, that you have to pay to ride the service. While there are more ticket inspectors these days, it is an honour system rather than there being any mechanism to force payment for tickets. Apparently it has been considered many times, but proved too expensive to retrofit. It constitutes a primary flaw in the transit system if you ask me. It would be great if everyone paid their way, unfortunately life is not like that.

This story resonated with me. Its about Ron Avitzur at Apple Computers who was let go in 1993, but decided his work with them was not complete so he kept showing up for work, unpaid and occupied unused office space. His swipe card still worked to get in the building. We're talking months and months here. He was assisted by other legitimate Apple employees who were sympathetic, and they leant their technical expertise to his projects. He paid sub contractors out of his own pocket. Eventually when the software was complete it was shipped out on millions of Mac computers. Apple started paying him again.

It reminded me of a film made in the 70s called Bartleby where the employee gets fired but still shows up for work. He won't go away. Unfortunately this one has a much sadder outcome as the worker is mentally ill, ends up in hospital and fades away.

I removed the handy dandy country site counter as it was, well, not working. The site where you get the code seems to be kaput too so I suspect they are on holiday.

Life on the ocean waves

We were out on a boat this weekend. I'm not the best sailor; its slight exaggeration but sometimes I feel I could get nauseous in the bathtub, so you may understand some of my reticence when it comes to setting sail on the ocean. A friend of ours has a 29 foot sailboat which was our transportation system for the day. Anyway we had quite a pleasant ride out - no sails in sight and motored for about half an hour. We were buffeting the waves but my blueberry pancake breakfast stayed in one place. We stopped on an island and spent the day listening to some live folk music and getting warmed by the late summer sun. A friend, Cordelia and her little dog, Toto came and visited with us for a while.

At lunch a flock of pigeons flew by. One of them got caught in the wires of a sailboat. The pigeon plummeted to the water but managed to fly on somewhat shakily and settled on some rocks opposite us. A cloud of feathers wafted down in the air where the bird had hit the wire. As far as we could see the pigeon was not harmed, no broken wing or anything. I envisioned, in our litigious world, the pigeon sueing the boatowner for negligence for not putting out warning signs about the dangerous wire. I was thinking, on an island in the middle of the ocean, why should a pigeon have to worry about high wires as it goes about its business. Then I realized perhaps my second beer was kicking in.

As set off again, we saw what looked like plastic bag in the water, just outside the harbour. I was quietly grumbling about litterbugs on the ocean, but on closer inspection, it looked very like a dead baby seal. Which made me sad. A bit further along I saw what looked like an otter and proceeded to have a cheerful (one way) conversation with it, each time it appeared above the waves.
"Hello!"
"How do you feel about the price of gas?"
Again, appearances are deceptive. My little otter was a log, a deadhead as they call them in these parts.

We decided to sail back as there was some decent wind. I was a little on edge and wondered if I would toss my lunch but once I relaxed, it was fine, as we sped along at five knots. I can see how sailing helps people forget about their daily cares. I've not been in a boat for quite a while. It reminded me to take things easy - you can get so tied up in day to day cares, like e-mail messages, phone calls, and all the darn chores you meant to do today. To hell with it. Go sail for a day. Feel the rope in your hand, brace yourself and watch the sails fill out as you steer straight into the wind. I feel a sea shanty coming on. In South Australia I was born, heave away, haul away....

So with the handy dandy counter I installed recently, I find that the top visitors to this blog are from the US, Canada, Portugal, Chile and the UK. Which makes me a little embarrassed at my language skills, which are limited to English, some French, a smattering of German and Japanese, and a smat of Latin. But welcome everyone, I am honoured to have you visit. I'm delighted, boardering on ecstatic, for folks to leave me comments. Just don't advertise your products and services with links or I get a tad tetchy and turn a vivid green and my t-shirt starts splitting at the seams and you wouldn't like that.

We were woken up by a smell last night. This doesn't happen very often. You're sound asleep and in your dreams you're being invaded by an unbelievably obnoxious odour, so bad it wakes you up. Then you realize it is not nightmare. The truth is I fear, we have a most unwelcome visitor. There is a skunk living in our neighbourhood.

I've checked around but not actually seen the creature but even in the day time round certain edges of the garden, its been there for sure. I hope it is not living in our crawlspace. Mice, rats, skunks, what's next?

We had a bit of a ruckus in the neighbourhood last night. Gregoire and I were cleaning in the backyard around seven thirty when we heard a really loud motor spring into life. It was some kind of cutting tool but it sounded like a Harley being continuously revved up. It was if it was right in our yard. Still we were busy, so ignored it.

About five minutes later we heard a man's voice shouting. "Shut that damn thing off. Do you know what time it is? My baby is trying to sleep." Initially the motor just kept revving but the man continued to shout and it sounded bad. He was swearing at the top of his lungs and we could hear him over the sound of the motor. A crew were cutting down and removing a tree from a neighbour's front yard. The slings and arrows of outrageous language were hurled across the road.

Eventually the motor was shut off. A vitriolic slanging match continued between the two neighbours. A member of the gardening crew tossed in unhelpful jibes, adding fuel to the fire. The complaining neighbour seemed to make more noise than the offending machine. It sounded like things were going to come to blows. After a few minutes they ran out of steam and both parties disappeared back into their own homes, fuming as they went. The crew picked up the remaining branches of the downed tree and drove off.

I checked the noise bylaws. Reasonable noise between 7am and 10pm is ok. Unreasonable noise appears to be above 55 decibels continuously for three minutes or more. The output from the motor was definitely unreasonable.

A little later on in the evening after all was quiet on the western front, I ambled out and spoke to another neighbour, Harry as he tended to blades of grass on his immaculate lawn. He agreed it was loud but it was only for a short time. Everybody complains at every little thing, Harry said, gesticulating at the sky. We all have to get along together. Harry should work for the United Nations.

I was somewhere in between. If the guy had a baby in the house, he's going to be pretty protective. The noise was ridiculous. However he could have negotiated his way to some quiet time without stirring up world war three. Effing and blinding at the neighbour isn't smart. Now he's made an enemy where he could have had a friend. It wasn't clever for Flossie to bring in a tree cutting crew well after supper time. Somehow I doubted whether she was even aware of noise bylaws. I'd never clapped eyes on Flossie before, she's a bit of a recluse and keeps indoors.

Anyway the tree is down, the crew is gone. The neighbourhood is quiet. For now.

I walked into the elevator the other morning and a dark haired man bounded in after me, talking loudly to himself. I politely examined the decor on the opposite wall. On closer inspection, he had an earpiece and was talking to an unknown acquintance.For all I knew, his phoney friend was probably sitting in the blogtrain surrounded by a dozen people equally as displeased as I was at this loud intrusion. Suddenly the bounder looked round and realized he was not alone in the elevator. Looking a bit sheepish, he said quietly into the receiver, "Excuse I'm in the elevator and I look like an idiot. I'll call you back." In my book, he shot from annoying villain to decent human being in about 5 seconds flat.

So a couple of months ago I bought two baby chilli pepper plants. Feeling very pleased with myself, I tucked one of them very comfortably in a pot surrounded by other herbs and stuck it on the deck. The other I gave to a friend. Here is my mine.... feeble green leaves, thin as a rake and only one chilli in view.


...and here is my friend's, utterly bursting with life, chillis all over the place. Hmm, I'm thinking she watered hers, and probably read some of Byron's poetry to it every day. Yes, I can see a tube there, she had some automatic system in place. I gave mine the watering can treatment, but I admit it was rather sporadic, and we've had some fierce hot weather the last month. Anyway at least I know what can be done. We'll invite her over supper and she can bring the chilli sauce.

This crop circle appeared in Avebury in the UK this July. I'm a sceptic as to who actually creates these circles. I don't think its Farmer Joe and his dog. Some are very intricate and beautiful. Whoever is creating them must be having fun and I appreciate it as art.

I'm playing around with photo editor again; maybe this will be my new logo for garbage collection. This is a different take on the fries on the sidewalk shot from a few days ago....

The neighbours down the lane are fabulously optimistic. This white 1973 wonder with flat tyre, all sorts of rust, surrounded by a tonne of other junk, is for sale. We had been wondering what was hidden in this yard as for the past couple of years there was a large rectangular wooden box covered in black. We were hoping it was something mysterious and exciting. Pity. I don't think there is much gold at the end of this particular rainbow.


The laneway was scorching hot today, but the high hedges provided some respite from the sun. I didn't see too much litter today - maybe litterbugs don't like the sun, but there were the usual dumpings of deckchairs and bicycle wheels and Lord knows what in the undergrowth.


It beats me why folks do this. So you don't want your old bicycle wheels and other items. So you stuff it in a cardboard box and shove it down under the trees beside the blog train. Why? There were loads of places to take unwanted items - in our neighbourhood, leaving goods in the alleyway with a FREE TO GOOD HOME or equivalent usually means they are gone with a day or so. I don't understand folks who chuck them in the undergrowth and make a mess.


I passed a large hornets nest suspended from a tree on my walk today. I wasn't very comfortable getting too close to this one as there was a lot of buzzing around, but here we go.


Well if you make a negative of the hedgerow picture this is what it turns out like. Somehow I don't think I am missing my calling as a photographer but what the heck.

I have always liked masks. I wore this to a Mardi Gras party a couple of years ago and had a lot of fun. And when I'm not wearing the mask, we keep it on the wall the rest of the year.

I was walking along the street today minding my own business, as you do, when all at once I espied a host of French Fries, spread along the side walk. It looked like a gourmet game of "Pick up Sticks". Being naturally curious, I stopped to take a shot. Why were they there? There are many hungry people in the town. Nobody wants these fries? I saw a discarded McDonald's wrapper nearby, and instantly it all made sense. This is not food. This is garbage.


I don't know if you ever saw the movie TRON but this reminded me of that - as if life is in a computerised mesh This is a construction site quite near to where I work.


No particular reason for this photo, I just like fire hydrants.

I spotted this in the park the other day. There is a lady with a bike helmet lying on the bench. I've seen her walking round the city pushing this contraption. The sign says - Happiness, Relaxation, Emotional & Physical Back Pain Technique. Donation Good Karma.

We had a bit of a lantern festival in the park last night, here are some of the sights to be had:

I'm the urban space woman... there were dozens of characters dressed up in extraordinary costumes, such as this lady who got a lot of attention and stood for numerous photo calls.


One of the most imaginative sights last night was a washing line with lanterns depicting clothes on the line. Everyone laughed as they walked by this one.


This is the same shot without the flash, the silhouette of the clothes against the dark sky was stunning and very amusing. Oh well, it was very impressive at the time!


These familiar characters were a favourite. There was so much creativity at the event, I bet people spend many weeks designing and creating the pieces.


Then there was a maze made up of several hundred lanterns which looked fantastic. Each lantern consisted of tea-light on a bed of small stones in a brown paper bag. The design of the maze was clever : we walked into it, followed the path around and then exited the maze without actually reaching the centre, though we saw some others had got there. So a lot of people ended up walking around for a long time trying to figure it out. Lots of fun....

Bicycle wheels on the blogtrain. Good news is that the window for allowing bikes on trains is being expanded to encourage ridership by cylists. I'm for it.

A little flower pot I spotted downtown. Some places go absolutely crazy putting flowers in boxes, pots, hanging baskets. The more the merrier. It really brightens the place up. Now if I could apply the same colour to my little garden, I'd be away to the races....

I took a picture of this location earlier in the spring, when blossom was everywhere. On hot days, it now provides a pleasant place to sit and read, have a sandwich for lunch.

Gimme your sandwich or else...

I was sitting on a ledge having a quite spot of lunch today when this winged character came and assailed me. He was not to put discouraged easily and scuttled back and forth to see if I had changed my mind about sharing my lunch. Which I didn't but when asked, he posed for a photo quite imperiously to show me what an honour it was for me to be in his presence.

Back home with a bang

So I have to say that this has been the worst jetlag I've had after a trip. It must be something to do with crossing the international date line. Anyway the other night I'm walking round the house at 4am like a zombie out of the "Night of the Living Dead" when all of sudden the room starts shaking. At first I thought it was a minor earthquake but then the shaking continued. It was a very loud and insistent base beat. I looked out of the front window and there was a very large truck-limo parked outside our house. There were two occupants in the front who were definitely not playing a game of chess, and to be honest, I'd never seen a couple of those positions before.

This was ridiculous. It was after four in the morning and the stereo was going full blast. I turned on some lights to see if that would have any impact. No deal. They were so self absorbed - as it were - that they did not even notice, or if they did, they did not care. I shut off the lights and went back to bed. The music was so loud it was shaking the room. Gregoire woke up and the two of us went downstairs. We put more lights on. After a few minutes I couldn't stand it any longer, donned my dressing gown, flung open the door and strode towards the truck. Immediately the driver gunned it and sped at high speed down the street, luckily missing some parked cars. Peace at last. I was a little concerned that we would have a brick through the window as a result, but so far so good.

A couple of days later, the next door neighbour approached me over the laurel hedge and said they had seen me go near the vehicle and decided I must be nuts. They had already called the police to report the noise violation. The whole street had been woken up by the Truck From Hell. "Never go out on the street." she said, "They might have had a gun." I was so exhausted from the jetlag, I was oblivious to the danger. Next time, I'll think twice about taking people on myself. Still, I think having a powerful hose handy might be a darn good idea, to dampen some people's enthusiasm at four in the morning.

Fukuoka : from bathrooms to bicycles...

Here are some pictures from my recent trip to southern Japan. Well let's start with the basics : the washroom. When I first got to see this I wondered what the heck you're supposed to do but then memories of a camping trip to France came back and I was away to the races.

Here's a pachinko parlour. Row upon row of slot machines. They were noisy places, smoky. I was actively discouraged from taking pictures. One visit was enough for me.

Here's the view from our apartment. No great fancy place, but it was great to live in a real place as opposed to a hotel. We could cook for ourselves, try and get the vaccuum contraption working and very easily get lost in the endless alleyways surrounding the apartment.

These are the green tea fields above Saga City. When we first arrived here, everything was concealed by swirling mist but then it cleared and we had a great view of the fields.

This was a slightly decrepit, but very interesting old temple outside of Saga City a couple of hours away from Fukuoka. Someone said there are at least 100,000 temples and shrines in Japan and I can believe it. They were absolutely everywhere, some of the ones we saw were very much off the beaten track and I suspect not visited very often by tourists.

I can't read the sign but notice the dead umbrella at the base....

A view from a bridge in downtown Fukuoka. Lovely hot weather over there.

Bicycles were everywhere in Fukuoka, many were left unlocked. I understand there was a very high chance that your bike would be there when you returned from work eight hours later. In this town I live, you'd be lucky if you left it unlocked for eight minutes.

Narita Airport

We're at Narita airport in Tokyo waiting for our flight and Yahoo are kindly providing free internet service so here I an for a few minutes.

We`ve had a great trip and seen many sights and met so many friendly people. We had a rather terrifying hour or so the other day when we failed to find a meeting point.　There we were　と他llyぉst　うぃｔｈ

We were totally lost, not knowing where to go next.

And the keyboard has gone up the creek without any sign of a paddle so I'll have to stop here.

Ye bonny bonny boat in Yanagawa

Yesterday we went along the canals in Yanagawa, in the safe hands of our punt captain. There's a proper term for his title but I haven't a prayer of spelling it here. Beautiful irises grew beside the canal. A lot of older houses had their garden on the other side of the water, so I guess they could observe their pride and joy from the verandah, whilst sipping some very refreshing green tea. We passed by the house once lived in by Yoko Ono's grandfather. A snake swam by the boat - a good size, about three feet long and scared the bejesus out of me. We also saw turtles sunning themselves by the side of the canal. Yanagawa is famous for eel dishes, and we could smell it everywhere. Punt Captain sang some songs to us as he eased us along the waters, very restful. We were very glad of the bamboo hats they provided because I tell you the sun was beating down on us in the mid afternoon.

Today there is a festival in Fukuoka - many paper fish blowing in the breeze. Its beautiful weather again, but I'm careful not to get burned. We`re going for a special lunch with a friend followed by a trip to a sacred temple, then off in search of art and wall hangings.

The buses are fun. You pay when you get off and how much depends on how many stops travelled. There is something akin to a scoreboard next to the driver indicating how much to pay. You can only get change for 1000 or 500 yen, and from that you need to pony up the right amount. So far so good except its tense when you are holding up the whole line whilst trying to determine what coins to put in the slot.

I haven:t time to write much about pachenko (slot machines) but they strike me as very sad places. People gamble a lot there, some for a living. We met a friend who spends 200 bucks three times a week. He seemed very happy about it. The places are very noise and smokey. I took a photograph but was quickly told to desist by our good friend as she said there are likely gangsters in there who dont want their picture taken.

Tomorrow off to Saga city, so probably will be offline for a couple of days. Really enjoying my stay, there is so much to see and learn. Sayona.

Fukuoka again

Today we went to some hotsprings near the mountains on the edge of the city. Men and women go to separate pools and there are no bathing suits required. I had a very enjoyable dip in the 40 degree springs; it felt very relaxing and I wanted to go straight to sleep afterwards.

Litter in Fukuoka - well hardly seen any at all. Its a very clean city.

As for homeless, there have been a couple so far. Today there was a demonstration in support of the homeless outside one of the main train stations. As we passed, the person with the mike switched momentarily to English to let us know what was going on.

There have been moments where I have felt a little isolated due to lack of understanding of the language and being of different colour. Its a good thing. Makes me understand what a lot of foreigners feel like in my home city.

We visited a friend`s garden today - he had very healthy looking cabbages, onions and beans, and we came away loaded down with vegetables for supper.

that's all for now.

Dropping in from Fukuoka

It's your overseas correspondent here visiting southern Japan, the city of Fukuoka. Arrived in one piece a couple of days ago, we had a minor earthquake on the first night. I am on the loose whilst the rest of my party are getting some organized exercise. I am getting disorganized exercise in the form of getting lost very quickly. I have recently found my bearings again and here I am.

Fukuoka is a city heaving with people, very vibrant and a mixture of ancient and modern. We have visited some shrines from the 4th century on the outside of the city. The lilac blossom scent nearby filled the air. It is pretty hot here, well pushing 30 degrees I would say.

Of note - flag persons directing traffic, bow to the cars when they are being requested to drive forward. Very civilized I thought. At crosswalks, the tune Comin' through the Rye floats through the air.

We`re staying in a family apartment in the southern part of the city. For breakfast we have been eating rice, pickle, cherry tomatoes, sour plums and miso soup. Our beds are foutons on tatami mats. So far I`ve collapsed at the end of the day, exhausted from the days walking.

That's all for now - we get 10 minutes on these machines then some threatening messages announce the end of the allotted time. Sayonara.

Litter and Hunger

The natives are getting restless and I'm one of them. I'm still picking up litter, but the blogstation now has ridiculous amounts of newspaper on the ground each day, mainly from the three new free papers. I'm getting frustrated and annoyed. I'm thinking - I take some pictures and send a letter to each of the three newspaper owners and ask what the blazes are they going to do about it.

In our town there are increasing numbers of people on the street asking for change. I get asked at least a dozen times a day. Yesterday there was a forlorn unkempt looking man, holding an empty styrofoam cup with a simple sign that stated "Hungry." I'll call him Jerome. I've seen him many times before, panhandling in the downtown area. He's aged between 30 and 50, it's very hard to tell, as he's ravaged by illness, and not able to stand straight.

Yesterday Jerome was in the underground mall where the security guards usually stop the likes of him from entering. I reckoned he had five minutes before they'd come along, sweep him out of the mall and shut the door. I walked past him, feeling very uncomfortable. I got about 30 yards, and could not go on without doing something. I bought a couple of muffins and went back to him. As I approached, another woman was giving him a sandwich. I gave him the muffins. At least he would get a meal today. He did not look me in the eye, but smiled, head bowed and thanked me. I walked on again, feeling like crying. Jerome has made some bad choices in his life, and he's probably still making bad choices. I wondered why I acted today and not the other times I had seen him. It had to do with hunger and desperation staring me in the face. And the fact that I could give him what he was asking for rather than some loose change that would probably be spent on something other than muffins.

Google gives us satellite photography

Well you can't see the birdfeeder or litter on the ground near our house, but there is aerial photography of our humble abode. Check if your house is on Google Maps. Put in an address and on the right hand side click on satellite. Once the photograph appears you can zoom in. After checking our street, I can't whether Doris has anything on her HedgeRow, but I'm on to it. For the heck of it, I searched for "Litter OK" and it gave me Great River Dam Authority in Vinata, Oklahoma. Looks dam pretty on the photograph. Of course this gets me to wondering if there are some privacy issues that Google is trespassing over here.

I would not do it for a million bucks

This morning as I walked to the office I came across the common sign that men were working above. In this case they were thirty floors above. It makes me shudder just to think of someone on a narrow platform with a bucket, hundreds of feet above the ground. Sometimes I am working at my desk and Spiderman appears right next to me at the window with a goofy grin and a sponge. Only he's on the outside and I'm safe and sound on the inside.

He swings across the huge plate glass, washing the window with soapy water, giving someone below a free shower. Then he wipes it all clean. Then as soon as he arrives, he leaps on to the next window. It must takes hours to do some of these enormous skyscrapers. I must admit I've never seen any women do this but I am sure there must be some. I hope they all get paid as much as stockbrokers. But you could not pay me enough to do it.

More Newspapers, Small Cars and even Smaller Cameras

As I got off the blogtrain this evening and left the station, I counted 19 newspaper and magazine boxes lined up outside the entrance. I'm sure that only a couple of weeks ago, there were five or six. Its getting ridiculous, most of the papers are free hence the area surrounding the station is constantly littered. There is no use gnashing teeth. I am calm, if not serene. The DozyBlog paper came out today. Sorry, mere mention of it is making me descend into a coma. I'll do a review of all three when I've had ten cups of coffee.

HedgeRow House has lots of stuff on it again. I suspect Doris scurried out when the rains came last Friday and put the same clothes and shoes out again today. I expect her to be busy again tonight as the clouds look a tad threatening.

There are these wonderful little cars round town the last few months. Some of them park perpendicular to the curb, which in some instances makes them stick out a tad. But I give them a break and a smile. They are half the size of most cars and way more energy efficient. I'd be a little perturbed driving on the highway in one, as it wouldn't come off so well in any argument with any other vehicle. Anyway, thumbs up from me.

This is the toy camera I've been using previously for some of pictures. Its two inches by about one inch. Anyway I've purchased an inexpensive but hopefully better camera for future images; but for $20 the cheapo keyring camera was a lark. I may use it again. It can act as a webcam and folks look at it curiously when I bring it out, which is half the fun.

Interview with Doris from HedgeRow House

Imagine my excitement on Friday morning as I set off for work. There outside HedgeRowHouse, was Doris, a sprightly grey-haired woman in her late seventies, putting a wack of clothes on the hedge. I've been wondering for a while about the occupants of HRH. I took the opportunity to introduce myself and the following exchange ensued.

Me: So..
Doris: YES! These items are FREE. Look at the label.
Doris pointed at the piece of paper attached to a sweater. I detected an accent, and with a wild guess, placed Doris somewhere in Europe, likely Yugoslavia. But Doris is the selected name, so that's staying.
Me: Where do these clothes come from?
Doris: Well my friend out in Blogsville is getting rid of stuff and she always brings things to me. People give me lots of stuff.
Me: So people expect you to put your give-away items on the hedge?
Doris: Oh yes, they do. Some folks ask me when I'm going to put more stuff. It always goes very fast.
Doris is obviously very proud of her hedge giveaways.
Me: I liked the red tent you put up there the other week?
Doris: Me too, people liked that.
Me: How long have you been doing this? The hedge dressing?
Doris: Since 1974. They all know me in this neighbourhood.
I looked at the blue sky - not a cloud in the sky.
Me: So you reckon it won't rain on your hedge today?
Doris: Oh no. Beautiful day.
After a few more minutes, I left Doris and walked to the blogtrain. As I ascended the steps to the platform, I could see her spreading multi-coloured clothes all over the rest of the hedge. Later that day as the rain clouds drenched the city, I wondered about the hedge. It was one of the wettest days last week. When I returned home later that evening, clearly Doris's fan club had been out, as all the items on the hedge had disappeared.