And Galah of the Year goes to........

What a day was yesterday.
I lost my blog identity. Piss off Google+ and the Chrome you've been sniffing.
I was credit card scammed over the phone.
Then there was the burial plot/funeral insurance scam in the morning.
And in the afternoon they tried for the Centrelink pension scam again.

Antikva did her best but could only assume I bonked some button that connected blogger with google and deleted myself. I was a non-blogger for a day and almost had a melt down. I had a blog post to put up. I sent off 3 emails to Blogger, put Googlechrome in the sin bin, IE8 is my browser and google is default search.
I managed to get the blog page up but couldn't access dashboard so I clicked on create blog up in the corner and sneakily crawled in the back way to old dashboard and took up their invite to new dashboard. I was back, did the post and fingers crossed it was up but I still couldn't access half the blogs until late last night when Me was restored to JahTeh.

In the meantime I had told the funeral insurance/burial plot seller to piss off as I felt I already had one foot in the grave.

Next call was very official from the bank.  Now question time, how many of you know that the first four numbers on a credit card is the same for everybody?  Shut up you smarties.
This member of the Peter Sellers Memorial Call Centre had a lot of my information and I realised later where she'd gotten it from and the scam went like this.
Bank of Melbourne has been overcharging fees for some years and the department of consumer affairs had ordered refunds for customers. Gong number 1 should have gone off then as I've banked with St. George which has just merged with BofM so I shouldn't have been affected.
They had my address plus post code. Asked if I did internet banking. Asked If I did phone banking and did I do it with mobile calls. Checked my birthdate which they had. Asked to check my bank card details or my credit card details. Okay getting edgy here and my bank account is linked to mother's and a lot of money there so went with credit card which has only debt.
Before this, I was told that the consumer affairs person would ring today (Saturday) and when I pointed this out, she said they were working overtime on this problem. Gong 2, a government department working overtime to help a bank.  I was given a password. I had to ask the consumer dept worker ant for their password so that it matched mine and I would know I was secure.  Now comes the scam part. In order to have my refund I would have to pay a one off bank tax, if I had a refund of $4,000 then I would have to pay $400 and I could pay it at any post office then I would have the money.
So stupidly and knowing it was stupid as soon as the numbers were out of my mouth, I gave them the credit card numbers and the CVV number on the back. Bingo, they had what they wanted, credit card fraud was out of the starting blocks.

As soon as I hung up, I rang Bank of Melbourne, cancelled the card and had a watch put on all accounts.  The girl was good, she'd had so many calls this week about this particular scam that she knew all the details, made sure my last transaction was mine then cancelled everything. I felt such an idiot but she said it wasn't only old people (me?) that were being caught this time, the younger ones were as well and they were giving out mobile numbers so at least I hadn't done that. I don't give my mobile number to anyone except the nursing home. She also asked if any official mail had gone missing but everything like bank statements and centrelink (more about them later) are filed straight after I review the credit card statement. I mean I'm so paranoid about identity theft that I take my name and address off every parcel I receive from overseas before it goes in the recycle bin.  I will have a new credit card sometime next week. And I rang the nursing home to make sure that none of the residents did their own banking and the assistant DoN said her card had been hacked to the tune of $81,000 in America and this was while she was on the phone with the bank who were checking an item for $60.

Late in the afternoon while I was still wrangling blogger, another phone call comes in.
Not Mrs....... but my first name and last name together. This is a call from Centrelink regarding my pension from another member of the PSMCC. She was told (crudity coming up) to shove her scam up her twat and don't ring again. Surprisingly she hung up.

And about Centrelink who now are pushing for not sending out pension statements but want everyone to see their details online. After today I want everything in writing which I need to have as Power of Att. for mother.  So I'll be stomping up to centrelink on Monday to get her bank balance adjusted and told I don't have online access. Not only do they want me to go online for details but print it out as well.  With all this going on, I'm not surprised I was ripe for scamming.
 I forgot, the details for the bank scam, remember the centrelink scam from a few weeks back, yep all those details were enough to start off the bank one.

How did I ever do it?

When Mum and I started crafting in the early eighties, it was imagination all the way with very little in the way of craft books or patterns unless we're talking knitted tea cosies or baby stuff.  The massive boom in patchwork and quilting was still 12 years away and making your own jewellery no more than stringing round beads together.

The brooches came about when I had felt ovals left after embroidering photo frames. I mean they did have to have somewhere for the picture to show through. The one on the left, cream one isn't as delicate as the black. I exchanged green thread for gold metal and later instead of freehand embroidery of the bows, I used small gold metal bows. Then I moved on to embroidering on pure silk, highlighting with very tiny pearls and putting them into gold and silver surrounds.

With the first brooches I did everything. The internal support was cut from cardboard after being traced from my template. My thumbs did ache after cutting out a hundred 6cm x 4.5cm ovals and not one to waste, small pieces of cardboard became smaller and cheaper brooches without bows. 

The guipure lace trim would never go around and lay flat without a small piece cut out of the edge.  Something that one woman never got the hang of when she tried teaching a class using one of my brooches as her own. A loyal customer came to the market and told me.  So the roses followed the same pattern on each, just the colours changed and those bows were a horror to get even. The felt was glued to the cardboard and pinking shears used to make the zigzag edge which was then glued down without buckling.  The back went on with a simple safety pin pushed through the felt. I did have a photo but the computer went on strike when I was trying to load it.

At first it was just the guipure but I thought it was a little too plain so in between the tiny arches of the guipure I'd drop a little glue and then with a darning needle, pick up the pearls and drop them on the glue making sure the holes couldn't be seen.  I think the most I ever sold was 35 at the Christmas market of l989 and I charged a whopping $6 each. I made more money at that market than I'd ever seen and I bought a Hoover vac with it. The vac's still going strong even if I'm not.

By l992, the brooch market was dead and so were my photo frames. I was ahead of the times for embroidery, during the nineties it became big, ribbon embroidery, Brazilian, petit point, cross stitch and books for it all.  Then came Tracey Marsh with her 'How to make' books and suddenly every woman and dog became a crafter, even later came the smarties who cut out the fabric and sold ready to make kits.  Mum and I managed to keep ahead of the pack by changing the things we made, babies everything for mum and I found a hole in the market for wedding favours.  That was until dressmakers began using left over from the wedding dresses and made to match.  One of our fellow stall holders said that if we saw an idea in an American magazine then we had 6 months to make and sell it before it reached here and everyone was into it. She was dead right.

Hate google chrome and google and the new comments box

What stupid idiot re-arranged all the comments, the verification and generally put me in a bad mood?

And for heaven's sake don't click on this photo or it will look like it's going to eat you.  Another bloody stupid thing to learn, how to get the photos small.
Anyway today's Wednesday so I ate this on Monday and enjoyed every delicious bite. Mind you, it wasn't that big but cherry ripe sponge with coconut and large morello cherries and a thin layer of chocolate sponge in the middle. It was covered in a thin layer of chocolate and I only ate this because mother got in and grabbed the last of the lemon meringue.
The Trevally was a bit overcooked and overpriced but then so was the Barramundi we had at the last place.  I haven't been to The Sandy pub since I can't remember when and the view over the bay was fantastic but while the air-con was icy inside, outside was like a sauna.  Very wheelchair friendly but the chairs were murder. The sharp edge of the back hit the spine and really hurt everyone but especially me who spent half the night with ice packs on the one spot I don't need to be hit on.
Most of us decided on fish and salad but mother wanted old fashioned sausages and mash until she saw the Guinness beef pie and Irish mash which came with a can of Guinness. She didn't drink that but passed it on. She did a good job on the pie though and the lemon meringue.  One and a half hours is tops for her, mostly it's getting in and out of the taxi.
I left about four when they were putting her to bed and she went to sleep, through tea, until breakfast the next morning.
Even though it's a bit pricey, $9 for a glass of wine but only $3.50 for soda, lime and bitters (mine), we've decided to go again simply because of the spaciousness of the dining area and the view. But we're changing the chairs whether they like it or not. 

This was supposed to be "MY YEAR"

According to all the stars at the end of last year plus all of those stars predicted a new baby coming in to my life and all I'm thinking is, my granddaughters couldn't be that stupid, surely not but we know the stars never lie and I'm not going to be a greatgrandmother just an interested onlooker.

So here is eldest granddaughter, 19 in February not 20 as I thought. One loses track when their bitchqueenoftheuniversemother doesn't let them keep in touch with me not to mention her consort bastardoftheuniversestepfather.  Youngest does email but has to sneak photos to me and as their internet was slow I only received this one. She's working two jobs to keep a roof over her head while my 39 year old teenage father to be is still living here but enough of him, blood pressure goes up. I should yell and throw his things into the street but it wouldn't make him face reality, he has to leave on his own or it won't mean he's growing up.

Now down to my year, all good things happening but with only one full moon in my sign this year and it's gone. 

1. Mother is still with us, well me mostly since I'm the one carrying the bird seed bells and the books and all the other crap she needs/wants immediately.

2. Weight.  Right back to where I was 10 years ago and very pissed off. And pissed off was where I was 10 years ago until I suddenly became very happy and dropped weight like 6 biggest loosers. I hate that show, utter crap. If it was that easy with weight lifting I should be sylph like with the family I'm carrying on my back.

3. I'm healthy apart from blood pressure (goddess knows why) Diabetes (my name is copperwitch and I am a chocoholic) dodgy knees (jeebus Southland raise your damn toilets to people height,we're not all gnomes) and now a tear in the Achille's tendon. Of course it would be the left leg, always the left leg. It's like that movie where they transplant the murderer's hands and the guy starts killing people. It's the same with the left leg, it's always getting in the way and falling over, I'm sure it belonged to someone else who was fat and clumsy.

4. Money. For some reason, I'm a little in front. Absolutely nothing to do with playing the pokies.  And, 'Getup', stop sending me petitions calling for the abolition of poker machines, I feel like a hyocrite if I sign them.

5. Family. Me losing, them winning. What can I say, once a family doormat always a family doormat.

The good news is that I only appear to have a small tear in the Achille's. That's as far as the experts in thin leg ultrasounds can tell. Doc Marvin was more positive. I was more positive after googling (sue me for using your crappy name!) ruptured Achille's tendon. I don't advise the squeamish to google (go on get me again) images. There's a site  devoted to the experiences of people with ruptures (no not the ones ascending) and the neg and pos of surgery, plaster, moonboots. Now there's a joy, you can take them off to go to bed but you must put them back on even if you're only going for a pee and as a nightly frequent pee'r that comes under the heading of sheer hell.

I digress (and now need a pee) but from the reading I have only a small tear which will heal with the help of scar tissue and probably hold.  Most on this forum are basketballers, marathon runners, all that masochistic stuff and just can't wait to get back to breaking and tearing some other body part.  The self healing part happened to a lot who had only a small tear, colour me happy.  Thank you Antikva for telling me to strap it with Fixomul stretch tape, now get down here and do it for me. What a bluebird of happiness stretch ultra sticky tape is to get on the back of a foot below a fat leg that belongs to someone else and doesn't co-operate.

And just when you really need that half price taxi card, the micro chip fritzes itself. Happily fritzed chips are the taxi directorate's fault and I don't have to pay $16 for a new card but I have to wait a week for it to arrive.  Oh dear, sorry mother, can't stagger to the bus this week but I will meet you for lunch on Monday since I'm being picked up.

AAAAAAAAnd I'm signing up for online shopping with both Coles and Woolies. Whichever store has the best bargains for the week, gets my shopping. Lateral thinking, I haz it.

 Lucky Rio Tinto, with all of W.A. to plough around in, it manages to find this 12.76 carat pink diamond. The largest of the rare and precious pink stones ever found in the resources-rich West.



Named the Argyle Pink Jubilee, the huge rough stone was found at Rio's pink diamond operations in the Kimberley region.


"This rare diamond is generating incredible excitement. A diamond of this calibre is unprecedented -- it has taken 26 years of Argyle production to unearth this stone and we may never see one like this again," said Josephine Johnson from Rio's Argyle Pink Diamonds division.


Rio produces more than 90 percent of the world's pink diamonds from the Argyle mine, and said large stones like the Jubilee typically went to museums, were gifted to royalty or end up at prestigious auction houses like Christie's.



Christie's had only auctioned 18 polished pink diamonds larger than 10 carats in its 244-year history, Rio said.


When the Jubilee diamond has been cut and polished it will be graded by international experts and showcased globally before being sold by invitation-only tender later this year.


It would be nice if Gina R picked up the tab and presented it to Her Majesty.
 
I'm hoping they make a documentary of the cutting and polishing and that it turns out to be absolutely flawless.

They ain't heavy, they's my family

Well they're getting heavy now and I wished they'd leave before I'm in real trouble.
I feel like I've been carrying all of them on my back for six years. Now piss off.
I have a small tear in my Achille's Tendon and all the recommended 'get it better' stuff is not good for me.
So Doc Marvin is hedging his bets and hoping I won't do anything further to damage what's left.
I have to walk with a stick in my left hand and not trip on it.
I can use my 3 wheelie walker but try and get that on a bus that doesn't have the step lowered.
I have my foot in the air tied to the bed head to try and reduce the fluid. That works only so far as I found out tonight, if I leave it too long, the knee cap appears to drop.
So I've looked at online shopping for groceries.
BOH said he will drive me to the supermarket when it's not busy. I remind him that he has an expectant mother and baby to look after.  Hey, no sweat, it's not for five months yet.  
HEAD.    CRASH.   DASHBOARD.
I may kill before he leaves here.  The EM is not much better.
Fortunately the foot doesn't hurt if I'm careful and watch what I'm doing, if I don't forget the stick or the wheelie walker.  If I don't trip over the mat at the door of Coles.  If no-one runs their trolley into the back of my leg at Safeway.  If I don't walk up stairs. How about if I don't walk at all and stay home and read books. Eric the mower is coming on Thursday and I intend to sit in a chair and yell instructions to him.

*I should not abuse the parents to be. I confess to leaving my child in his pusher outside the shops while I wandered home enjoying a quiet ice-cream and then remembering why it was so quiet. 

My first photographs

 My Mother at the Home.

It's hard to reconcile this smiling face, 82 in 3 weeks, with the vicious old crone that made our lives miserable for three years.

 THE CAKE.

The dessert of desserts. A double chocolate mousse cake covered with ganache but so light in texture it almost floated off the plate.  I was told the secret was in beating the egg whites to a stiff foam then adding to the chocolate mixture.  I could look at it for hours.

My first bird.

It was after I realised that using the telescopic button would bring it closer.

It was nice of him to pause the apple eating for this not so great shot.

I do not belive it!

Okay, I've been doing the right things for my back muscle, I just haven't continued long enough. Tranquilizers to stop the spasms and nsaids for the inflammation.

Today, Doc marvin at 11.30. Laughs at my blood stained book of BGL readings and tells me not to worry if readings are a bit higher in summer than in the colder months. He tells me what to do for the back but is worried about the Achilles tendon and wants an ultrasound.
In the meantime, he thinks a blood test is in order.
Ever had a needle bend in the middle halfway into a vein? Great fun.  Try other arm and no problems as my precious blood drains away.

Thinking on my feet/foot, I asked the receptionist to ring the X-Ray place since they usually can get an appointment faster than a civillian. Done, 4 p.m. this afternoon. The place is opposite Southland.
Thinking fast again, I stagger over to the pharmacy for tranqs and water, stagger across the road for the bus to Mentone. Method in the madness, have lunch with mother and catch taxi from the Home straight to southland.  Except that mother is out in Mentone having quiche and ice coffee for lunch and I've walked straight past the cafe. It didn't matter, I sat down in a comfy chair in the lavender room and ate my lunch in peace and quiet while my back eased down from scream to snivell.

Taxi to imaging place with signs everywhere, "Payment is expected on the day". Well, that's what credit cards are for but they bulk billed me, Yea!  Foot is very swollen by now and leg isn't much better but ultrasound machine beeps away. She goes to find a doctor, who inspects Achilles tendon.  Yes, it looks like a small tear but  Houston we have a problem. 

Scientists can photograph a martian picking his nose behind an outcrop of mountainess crud but try to discern a tear in an Achilles tendon in a fat leg, monumental fail.  They are now talking MRI but can't think how to do that with a fat leg.  I have the ultrasound images which I have to give to Doc Marvin but I'm not walking anywhere until somebody tells me what is going on.

Now I have a hate on two bus drivers, SE water and ultrasound experts.

From the pit of pain

I thought pulling the left Achilles Tendon was painful enough but combined with tearing a back muscle on the right side, it's a whole new world of discomfort interspersed with bouts of ouching in a loud voice. 
I can lie down but I can't sit or bend. Standing is fun unless I move and goddess forbid that I should sneeze.
I did the damage on Tuesday, ignored it.
I went to the residents and family meeting on Wednesday and wheeled Ma's wheelchair, pain ramped up, ignored it.
I went shopping on Thursday and wheeled a trolley when I should have gone straight home to an icepack and bed with lots of painkillers.
Friday is a blur of obsenities and pills. I can't lie on my back or left side, only on the right side and only one way.  It takes 30 minutes for the painkillers to kick in.
The BOH wants to take me to Doc Marvin. The thought of a shower or dressing makes my eyes water so I decide on more painkillers instead.
There is twinging again which is going to lead to another bout of ouching and grouching and more pills.
I can't think how it happened. Raking up the lemons?  Raking up the mess SE water left?
Picking up the pebbles SE water chucked everywhere? Dragging out the bins? Couldn't have been that, the pain stopped me halfway. Bending upside down to unscrew two cupboard doors? That's a good candidate since I couldn't get the last screw out and walloped it with a hammer. BOH comes home and removes the screw in 2 seconds.
Nothing helps. Pain is not my friend, thank you Mr. Myagi. Relaxation exercises helps but requires the body to lie flat on the bed. So today is the first time I've been able to sit at the computer and what happens, I read the comments on the last post between the Bear and Lord Rochester and laugh.
Bloody pain is back again.
Doc Marvin it is.

Incalmo

Incalmo, a technique invented by Venetian glass blowers nearly 500 years ago and still being mastered today. Mastered is definitely the word for this glass work as it's technically complex and physically demanding. 

The glass artist has to make two separately blown cups of glass which must be the same width at the base or top where it is to be fused to another piece of glass. The second piece must be placed directly at the edge of the first piece with no overlap of the edges. Compare this to our Burmese glass where the pink top is made of pink glass over the cream glass, put back to the flame and fused.

The finished piece can have two or three coloured sections of glass and it must appear as though it is one piece of glass.  From Venice, the method of making incalmo spread across Europe to America where this glass ware is still made by skilled artists.

So just to end on a uplifting note, when I was reading various sites about this glass I came across another innovation and, dare I say, it had to be America.  I was struck by the name "memory glass" and it comes in hearts, orbs or pendants and, wait for it, within the blown glass is suspended the ashes of one's beloved departed.  As the site put it, "...a beautiful keepsake memoir piece which can be displayed in one way or another."  I think I'll give this one a miss. I do enough talking to the departed without having them swirling around in a paperweight which I'd have to dust.

Aurora down south

Victoria had it's own aurora last week but I wasn't near enough to Flinders to see it.


The sunspot activity showered particles on the Earth, that excited oxygen atoms high in the atmosphere which emitted a red glow as they fell back to their ground state. Oxygen atoms lower in Earth's atmosphere would glow green.

So here is a photo of the aurora just visible above the horizon near Flinders, our own Flinders, Victoria. Also seen in the photo is the central disk of the Milky Way Galaxy on the left and the large and small Magellanic Cloud galaxies on the right.
 
The photograph was taken by Alex Cherney.

Gardening sucks lemons

Especially when SE water digs up all my polished river pebbles, bluestone chips, concrete surround of the water meter and buries the hose in the diggings while her next door who had the leak has it all neatened up.
 My fault but I can't go out in the heat so I've been waiting for a cool day to get into that corner and fix everything. I did pick the hose up while waiting for the taxi yesterday and put it on the hose reel which is when I realised how much of it was buried. And they chipped the ear off my concrete pig. So I haven't found much of the concrete surround but I can't say anything because that could have been the fencer or SE water because with my dodgy memory I can't think whether it was still there after the fence but I'm sure it was.
 When the ex left, my first foray into the garden was to uncover the water meter, I used the concrete that used to be on the gully trap (so it is over 30 years old and fragile) then put bluestone chips around to stop the weeds. Now that was a task in itself, I'd fill a bucket with chips and sand and sieve out the sand and I did this so many times until I had enough. Then every pension day I'd buy a bag of polished river pebbles and put them on top. It was very satisfying to see the reader just flip the top instead of digging to China.
Now I have a new meter which they put in without notifying me which is below ground level so I'm out raking dirt and pebbles before Eric the Mower takes his eye out and finding my precious river rocks. I was not a happy camper and honestly I can't be bothered going through the crap with SE water complaints.
 I nearly fell over so many times because I can't kneel so it's all bending from the hips and does the head go woozy after 30 mins of that. So I have half a bucket of pebbles and bluestone around the water meter, several homeless spiders and a one eared pig.
The concrete pig, I know you're wondering.  Count Creepula's brilliant idea to buy a concrete animal corresponding to the current Chinese New Year animal went on for quite a few years and then I inherited my mother's concrete collection of gnomes and assorted beings so the yard is a minefield when the grass grows long.  Fortunately Eric the Mower knows where they're all hidden.

Two mysteries

Yesterday I received an email from a nice bank security site that asked me for my details to ensure that I wasn't being hacked.  Okay so that was easy to suss out and delete.
The next one took me a while.  A phone call purporting to be from Telstra telling me that because I was an excellent payer of my bills I was going to get a discount.  Need I tell you that it sounded like the Peter Sellers Memorial call centre.  They weren't asking me to change from Telstra which is why is took some time to get suspicious and even now, I might be wrong.  The discounts sounded great apart from the fact that I don't make STD calls even capped at 90c.  But they had my phone number, my 2nd right name and address (SE water has the 1st right name) and asked for my birthdate as confirmation, no problems as every company I deal with does that.  After complimenting me on not sounding as though I was born in l948 (never getting a webcam, never) she asked for my ABN for the business I was running.  No ABN, so to get this wonderful discount, could I give them my pension card number.  By this time I was getting a bit stroppy about how much information Telstra had but was asking to be verified and the pension number was the last straw. I yelled and was handed over to a supervisor who was also told that I do not give out my pension number or my credit card number over the phone.
The supervisor was tough, she kept going on about the wonderful discount if only I would hand over that number.  The yelling got louder on my end and I won by hanging up but I did say thank you first.
I thought about ringing Telstra and asking if there was a wonderful discount but with my luck I'd be straight through to the PSMCC.

There was a third mystery involving a deceased black bird under the apple tree. There are no cats around, I didn't think a possum would beat a bird, the ravens just scare them away so how did Blackie die?
I was watching the lorikeets in the apple tree this morning, it's right outside the back door, no more than the footpath away.  I only keep the tree and its wormy apples for the birds, keep it cut flat on the house side but let it run wild on the lawn side. They all crowd under it when it's screaming hot.  So, I'm watching the upside down bird munching away in the tree while under are pigeons, black birds and mynahs eating seed or bathing in the drinking water, little sods.  The up bird munches through a vital holding twig and down comes the apple and misses a pigeon by a bee's appendage. All the others took off for the rotary line but I think lucky was a bit wonky from the shockwave and just stood there looking at the apple (or possibly an avian Newton pondering gravity) while Lorikeet moved up to the next level apple.
So it's possible that's how Blackie was topped.

You'll have to wait a bit..

I announce the arrival of a digital camera in the house.
This morning I photographed my first bird in the apple tree and it was a lorrikeet.
The second photo was much better when I discovered the telephoto lens and I could actually see the bird in the leaves scoffing an apple.
I managed to get the charger assembled, yes, only two parts but it took the best part of an hour to read instructions and follow.
I'm getting used to holding the camera still and not waving it all over the place but being short sighted I have to put my glasses on top of my head to see what I'm looking at through the view thingy.
Now I have a grand total of one image of mother and 3 images of a bird and 4 deleted of me.
I have to load the software so I can load the images and that should take about a month.
Honestly would it kill manufacturers to paint the teeny tiny icons in white so I can see what I'm supposed to do.
The camera is a lovely bright red so I can't lose it, unfortunately the mobile is also bright red so I can't lose it.  I do see some confusion in the future.
The salesperson was very helpful when I showed him my 7 year old mobile phone and told him I was still carrying the instructions and I wanted a camera for dummies. He put the battery and the memory card in the camera, very slowly so I could follow him.  That really was a help since I now can't figure out how to get the bottom open. I had enough trouble with the cover over the charging doover.

So I still have 12 exposures on the big camera from last year and I'll use them up for old times sake then store it with its instruction book which I started to read. Well who knew that odd little piece on the end of the plastic bit on the strap was to put in the hole on top to rewind the film. I just used to keep clicking until the film gave up and rewound itself.  11 years to find that out.  You could be waiting a long time for a digital post around here.

Wowie!

It seems the sun chucked a wobbly last week and earth copped the fallout of electrons, protons and ions.
Most of the cloud passed over us but the magnetosphere managed to get a share and in the high northern latitudes had a spectacular showing of auroras.


This image was taken above Grotfjord, Norway by Bjorn Jorgens.


A more powerful solar flare occurred yesterday so we'll have more brilliant photographs in the next week.

I just had to share.

Remember that nice little Burmese glass fairy light that no-one else liked except me?
This is just as sweet and would look lovely in an entrance hall. The soft light reflected back is very kind to old skin, wrinkles and sagging everything else.
The only drawback are the colours which are the Burmese glass colours but too, too pink.
See how easy it is to stuff up something so gorgeous.

By the way, a sea-going world cruise is off the Bucket List.

Meet me whale mate

Another ' what is it' moment but honestly don't click and enlarge.

It's the vertebrae of a basking shark.  They've been overfished thanks to their highly valued fins and are now on the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species. They don't reproduce quickly, having low fertility, are slow growing, long lived but slow to mature.

This is what a basking shark does best.  Lazes at the surface of the sea with mouth  (what a north and south it is)  open, filter feeding on zooplankton. In one hour they can filter enough water to fill an Olympic-size swimmig pool.


They are the second largest fish behind whale sharks but not much is known about their habits. Pregnant females and and young have never been spotted and they disappear for half the year. Scientists have tagged them but since they live for 50 years or more and the tags fall off after a year, it's hard to follow their migration patterns.

Which is where this section of vertebrae comes in.  Like tree rings, the vertebrae consists of distinct layers of tissue laid down sequentially over an individual's life time in an alternating light/dark banding pattern.  Using vertebrae from sharks that have stranded on beaches, scientists are looking for a radioactive isotope from nuclear bomb blasts set off in the l950s. the residue which fell all over us and the ocean.  Different areas of the ocean have different ratios of stable carbon and nitrogen isotopes so when overlain on a map of the ocean, they create distinct isotope patches and when the whales eat the plankton in these patches it shows up in the layers and in time will enable scientists to map their migration pathways.
Knowing where and when they go will help form a plan of conservation that will also help whale sharks and great whites thanks to the research of Li Ling Hamady.

As you can see in this map, colour variations represent different ratios of nitrogen isotopes in the ocean.

Burmese Glass

The beautiful shading of Burmese Glass is something glorious.  Queen Victoria is credited with naming this as it reminded her of a sunset in Burma.  Antique ware is rare but Fenton Glass is still manufacturing items.  The surface was finished with acid giving it a satin look.

This lovely vase was manufactured by the Mt. Washington Glass Company of Massachusetts which introduced the line in 1885 and produced it for about 10 years.

The addition of calcium based minerals such as fluorospar and feldspar made the glass opaque then a small amount of gold was added for the top pink portion.  A moderate amount of uranium oxide was used to produce the soft yellow tone.  This is a Webb mother of pearl finish with a painted overlay

This vase is similar but is called Peachblow, the bottom is pink to red at the top and is not satin finished. It has a raised gold painted overlay.

This has to be my favourite.  Burmese glass was used for fairy lights and they are still being produced.  This is an example of late Victorian work and I really want this on my dressing table. The soft glow of a tealight candle would show up the hand painted butterfly to perfection. The delicate colour of the fluted edge is just me.

Slaving at the Home

I am so tired I could sing "ole Man River" and sound like Paul Robeson.  
How can a woman in a wheel chair collect so much junk that it filled two candy striped bags from the $2 Emporium?
She just looked at me and said I didn't put it up there, up there being the topmost cupboard which is above the clothes wardrobe.
I tidied all the clothes last week and the drawers. I put her heavy winter things in a garbage bag and put it on the floor of the wardrobe after taking one look at the top cupboard where  several plastic bags of clothes threatened to fall on my head.
So I go down today armed with four bags to pack her clothes neatly until next winter and it looks like there will be a next winter. I tell you this woman will outlast cockroaches. 
There are only two small bags of clothes and night dresses, the light ones she feels too cold to wear.  I'm hoping the nighties will fit my lardarse in which case I won't have to break into the emergency 'going to hospital' brand new nightdresses.
The rest of the space was taken up by an empty box that the cd player came in. A plastic bag full of books belonging to Gail who'd like them back but it's been over a year since her ma raced up that stairway to paradise and she hasn't been seen.  But just in case I put them in the bookcase library. I'm glad they didn't fall on my head, damned heavy trying to get them out from the back of the stupid deep cupboard.
Then two lots of lace in bags.  She'd gone through all that lace I'd taken down for the activities room two years ago and why?  She hid them up there because they were her favourite pieces and she didn't want to share.
Also on the heavy side, 3 parcels of Christmas cards, envelopes (I don't have any envelopes, can you bring me some etc....)and Christmas stickers (expensive ones).
Of course she didn't put them up there, she got one of her lackeys to do it.
They're home now, ready to be put with the rest of the dresses she'll never wear again but isn't quite ready to part with yet.  My sister would throw them out but I can't, I remember where we bought the material and what I usually bought in the jewellery line to go on them.
I'll go through the cards, throw out the really crappy ones, cut up the good ones and put them in the Christmas box for next card season.  
You see how my year has progressed to next Christmas already. Still if I don't do it now, I'll have to at some stage.
No, I haven't finished the Christmas brooch tree.
No, I haven't finished or started the gold crackling on the frame for the tree.


Speaking of cockroaches, we were way up there, somewhere. There was a huge one in the  BOH's room and I was going to shove the critter in one of his work sneakers to see if they really could survive anything but I took pity on him and threw him out the front door for the magpies to chase. He was a biggun and so's the huntsman that's disappeared from his usual corner.  I swear on New Year's Eve I had a tribe of possums sitting on the roof watching the fireworks and being very merry considering the noise of kerthumping over the tiles for an hour.
I've seen a brochure for a round the world cruise, $35,000.00, it would be worth the mortgage and I wouldn't even set one foot to the ground in any country where there were people.
Oh, and I thought I might take up Scuba lessons but then I thought of me in a wet suit. The headlines, "Unusual whale sighted off Mentone Beach.  Scientists baffled! Aussie Disposals rushed for harpoons."  


Life is like a box of chocolates especially if the box is full of empty wrappers. 

Glass Pretties

I have had so much trouble dragging my brain into 2012 so I'm making an effort to post a teaser subject. I had to read about these so look and learn.

They are from the period 1850 - 1910.  Pretty aren't they, gorgeous colours and I bet you can't tell me what they are. You couldn't because I didn't know and I'm rooly smart.
These glass balls with a handle length neck and fragile walls were filled with a chemical, carbon tetrachloride or an ammonia/salt water solution and, wait for it, were an early form of fire extinguisher.

These fire grenades were mounted on walls in homes, hotels, schools and churches.  Thrown at a burning area, they would break and the chemical would eliminate any oxygen, albeit briefly, to help extinguish the flames.

The most common shape were balls about 6 inches in diameter and were fluted, quilted, diamond patterned or embossed with the makers name.  The colours were beautiful, cobalt blue, green, amber, clear or ruby red.
They went the way of the dinosaurs when hose style fire extinguishers took over in the early 1900's.  Much more effective but not quite as pretty.
Now I have to find a title that won't bring budding terrorists to the blog looking for grenades.