Alexander 6, V111.

A bee is busy picking on roses and flower around, but TJ is busy picking stuff from one lab to the other. Today, I've finished my work with the rice samples, virtually, and all is left is to put on the data into a spread sheet. The hilarious thing is, I've found out some mistake I did when writing down the production and expiration dates. I've found in the sheet that a sample was made in 2012, and will expire in 2016! I lost some time looking for that sample again just to write down the correct dates then. Because of this busy time, I hardly had time to read at all. But, on the other hand, I will be able to read as much as possible from now on, every morning (till) noon since I have nothing to do from the early morning! Virtually let's say!

I received a weird phone call from the "Social Insurance,"  governmental agency that usually deducts some money from our budgets every month to feed the retired people (and also steal some :) ). They asked for my bank account number or some paper to give including that information, to give out some money. I was like "government? give us money? how?" Technically, I'm not used to such thing, because all I know is that we work and get salaries from the government, to give it back to the government, specially with the upcoming ideas hovering around about issuing a law for the "income taxes" like if people don't have enough debts themselves already. However, it turned out, after a long talk with my brother, that the money is like a compensation about my brother's handicap after he had been enrolled into this category and now the SI agency is going to give that amount of money in form of salaries into my late father's account. It is a complicated law, but this is how it is. In fact, I don't feel it is my own money really, and I had a debate with my brother that I should transfer that money to him when I get it. My argument is, if my late father was alive now, wouldn't he give this money to his handicapped son? I guess he would.

Away from this fuss, I've worked yesterday on another image, and this time in HDR. This image specifically was part of a mini-panorama which I didn't really touch before because I thought it was not good enough. However, I picked this slice of the panorama and worked on it. It had been some time since I worked on HDR images, that is, enhancing an HDR image before tone-mapping.

I called it "The Mysterious Window"

This view was taken from a balcony inside the Aughnanure Castle and it was shot handheld. The edge of the balcony itself was apparent in all the slides forming the proposed panorama, and because of this I decided it is not a good panorama. However, I've found out another use for it now. As Christian Bloch describes working with HDR images "painting with light", this is exactly what I was trying to do, converting the bright scene into some dark, mysterious scene, and also helping convering the edge of the balcony! I've discovered now that there are many things I didn't touch still, and there are many panoramas taken that are not essentially to be a panorama after all! A single slide of them would be fine I guess to build up some nice image. That option now expands my stack of images from Ireland taken last year into a bigger pile even, but not necessarily all of them would look nice anyway!

Amazon asked me to write a review for the book that I'm still reading now. Although I can do it write away, but I just prefer to finish the book completely and then write a review, so that I can build up my opinion about it in a more concrete manner. The book after all is a MUST if I should say to any photographer, whether a landscape or any other type of photography is involved.

 

Well. Time now to pack everything and leave this place. I leave you now with a song I do really love and like, and reminds of many things in my life...

__________
2641. Alexander started to eat some herbs in front of him
2642. but their taste was more delicious than meat and fruit
2643. and Alexander felt satisfied and no more hunger he had
2644. thus he asked the Hermit: what are those herbs O good man?
2645. in my whole life I never tasted something like that!
2646. the old man then smiled gently and said to Alexander
2647. "this is the food of the humble and worshipers,
2648. the more you forget yourself and remember the One,
2649. the more He shall feed you and satisfy you dear"
2650. Alexander soon became satisfied and not hungry anymore
2651. then this he said: tell me O Hermit all what you know,
2652. why am I here and what I am supposed to know?
2653. I have been told that you have all the answers!
2654. the Hermit then smiled calmly and this he said
2655. "verily I know what others do not, O dear,
2656. but tell me first, do you know who you are?"
2657. Alexander stared in a strange way for this question
2658. and this he said: yes! of course I do know!
2659. but the old man replied: tell me your name then
2660. Alexander said: weird of you to ask me this!
2661. did you not say you know everything?
2662. who is seeking the help of the other now?
2663. the Hermit smiled back and this he said to Alexander
2664. "the infinite problem of mankind, impatience"

Mysterious...

My brain works in a mysterious way right now, but in my own language that means only in a spontaneous way. I have some ideas for some story beginnings, and the rest might come later I believe, but I'm hesitating. Should I start writing something now without doing anything in the translation process of this loooooong part of Alexander's story? And what about the sketch I'm supposed to do? Things are clashing in my mind and can't find an answer. On the other hand, I'm kind of convinced that I should start on something... otherwise the thread of ideas might cut off and I won't find something to write. At least I'll pen some stuff down. One of the ideas is to write something about my dear friend, who works with a bunch of stupids (don't worry, it's something regular in Kuwait).

My ear is, as it seems, doing better with the pain, but my hearing capabilities are lessened. Maybe I need some ear cleaning again (I did one 2 years ago) but after all this inflammation is gone. There is some pain that kicks for a second and then disappears but everything sounds OK for 2 days now. Last Thursday, everything was OK with it, until I had a shower afternoon and it started to kick out an unbelievable pain! And today, surely I have to take some shower, otherwise I'm gona be sooooo stinky!!

Working conditions are quiet and the regular fight with sales persons and invoices shall begin soon I believe after the delivery of some devices. I hate that but anyway, this is the good part of being not in a high place or position! Because your signatures typically means nothing! Well, I have to report the conditions with my director anyway and this is something manageable from my side at least.

Checking after my tail, I guess I have to note down some words in Bulughman and Zimuran, and also Betenic (the freshly made conlang). Zimuran might be less active, but I think I should add some words to the list of Bulughman and Betenic. When I talk about this I just remember the sad story of GeoCities closing down and having to do a huge work again in some other place! I think I can avoid this problem by buying a domain from Yahoo! but this is not so suitable for a humble page like mine with a simple design and not really intended for a commercial work at all! Man, all my brain thinks of right now is ........... VACATION. And I mean a vacation away from everything! Just me, my camera and nature.

No response yet from the Irish embassy in Riyadh... this is the first time for me to send a passport outside... so this kinda makes me awry.