Daydreaming...

The long week didn't hit its end yet but I'm already feeling sick of it. I feel lost, aimless, and the most dangerous part is... I feel I can't work on my photos for some long time as I used to. I don't know if this triggers my needs of socializing but for sure I'm not in mood to be around the people that surround me at the current time.
There are, unfortunately, some people that you tend to respect not for character nor for wisdom, but solely for the fact that they are older, but yet as much as you do respect them (because I do really have faith in my own faith and its teachings), they just tend to leave more scars in your mind by sparking more of the painful questions and memories that you just don't want to remember and work hard to overcome. I'm spending my time, as usual, in my room, but maybe more than before.

Lately, I've realized that I might have a real and serious problem. Daydreaming. Or maybe to be precise, Maladaptive Daydreaming. I know that I should ask for some opinion and ask some professionals in the field about it to make sure that I'm indeed having this case or not, but I know one thing for sure now. It is embarrassing. I'm tending to get some vivid images and in fact I thought everything is normal. This had been there since I was 7 or 8 years of age. Started from being with cartoon characters and trying to imagine another scenario for the story, until growing up and being... more serious. The spark for this "consciousness" was the realization that I'm in fact hurting myself. One moment living one beautiful dream, then BAM! Reality. I think this is what has been causing depression in my mood for big time of my life now. Add to that, the embarrassing moments when people tend to ask why am I laughing, or why I'm doing some gestures with my hands (this had been seriously out of control lately) and then I realize I'm not alone, and my answer would be "sorry, I remembered something funny," or "yeah sorry I got some itch there". I've been following news around the net and checking around people who has something like this. Some of them take pills. I don't want to do this now. I hate chemicals. I hate medicines. This state of mind made me somehow abuse coffee beyond my daily limits and intake. Around 3 to 4 mugs a day (preceded by some coffee cups from vending machines at work and a redbull) is not really what I wanted to do with my day. But what you know, sometimes I feel it really helps me to write. Write, write, even if it was a nonsense at all.

Maybe it is not that bad after all. To dream a little bit, maybe? I've been pushing myself to write some words here and there and glue them together, trying to form some sort of lyrics form. Maybe I'm not that successful in lyrical form mainly because I don't play any instruments but within my dreams I was there playing some guitar or a piano, and in fact, usually I have some background music mimicking some already existing song. In one of these trials I've created what I've called The Beggar of Nothingville. Some piece, I dedicate to someone, engulfing that with some meanings in it. Depending now solely on what people might think of it, they say it's a good one. Some people even commented that it might be a song, meaning they did indeed feel what I want to pass through, but of course I'm not sure about the tone. My mind was kind of working on a country style music.

Monday. I didn't go to work mainly because of sleeping problems. My schedule had been a mess. In fact, it somehow solved a problem for me, but of course I had to sign for a "casual leave" the next day. I only have four days a year of this type of leaves, and now I've already lost one with the beginning of the year still. I just had to. I couldn't push myself to raise up from bed at all. Besides, I was supposed to be in some gathering in an open buffet that my boss told me about. I really am not in the mood of socializing that much for the time being. Thus, circumstances came altogether, two in one; sleepy head and unnecessary socializing. Despite the fact that I was indeed going to go to that buffet, at least for few minutes or just stay in one corner to avoid unnecessary questions and remarks.
On this day, I, since I didn't go out to work in the morning, decided that I might have some power to go out on my own and do something outside. Just anything. The house was squeezing my brain out; shouts, screams, yelling and crying... all sort of those beloved sounds. Please note the sarcasm. Sometimes, I seriously think of just getting married to whatever who in whatever manner in whatever shape without any care in the world for a single drop of love in between us, just to live in my own place. Rentals here are like fire and I, alone, can't take it. However, the journey took me to a near by park. Salmiyah park. I worked in that place last week to take some readings in the very early morning with our 12kg device (~26.4lb). I liked some features in the place despite the fact that people tend to be around the place from the very early hours of the morning even before me. Thus, on Monday, I decided to go there and try my luck. It wasn't really something I worked so hard for or planned for. I was just going to be away from the house for some time. The first thing I did was to take a spherical panorama on my monopod. Shaky, but went fine. I've worked on some snaps from that day also and processed them, mainly some cut pieces of a tree trunk laying around the place.

Annuli Annum (Rings of The Year?).

In fact, the shots taken from that park (even the panorama) were not that impressive. To me at least. What happened is that I was hoping for some good light in the park with the sunset on its way. Long shadows and warm kind light to my lenses, but seems my notifications were only valid for sunrise, when I worked there in the morning. At the time of sunset, there were barely sun rays falling down on the place. Thus, I decided to look for anything impressive and tried hard later on to do some "action" with HDR rendering. I think all my trials failed or it could be that my mind was not in the mood of creating something, maybe?

To make out something from this piece here, I decided to go on Photoshopping all the way. I decided to mimic, to some extent, the bukkeh effect that my lenses cannot produce. Not at such a distance. So, I made 3 layers and blurred them in different amounts, making the stump blurred a little, while the far tree blurred more, then I blended them in using Layer Masks. I guess my blending was not that precise, because some areas around the edge of the falling trunk here do look a bit sharp. Anyway, I worked hard on the HDR settings just to illuminate the rings of the trunk. The White Balance here was a big problem. I couldn't settle my mind with any color temperature. Finally I decided to go with Fluorescent and give a cold, dead sense to this image.

I'm still working on the panorama I've made that day, and frankly, it doesn't look good for the great difference in exposures between some areas. I've already stitched a flat one and a little-planet one, but need some work on cloning out some areas, the usual, for nadir. Also, I might have to fix that difference in exposures manually with adjustment layers, and of course all the work must be done in HDR mode still before tone-mapping. Memory exhaustion on the way.

Wednesday now. I had a little work-out or an adventure if I should say with a friend that I didn't see in a long time (but chatting from time to time over the net in fact). We went on "fishing" for some shots in a park, this time in Bayan area. Both of us were sick of the laws and regulations and simply, for the lack of nature in this place that barely enables you or inspires you to do something with your camera. Maybe that's why in fact most people in Kuwait tend to go on with the portrait venture, simply because there is not much to snap with the camera and if there is, you would need to get a permission of some sort. This is exactly what happened today when we arrived there. For the first 5 minutes of our snapping, everything was fine. Then the keeper came and asked for the permission from some ministry (huh?) - and of course, we told him that we don't have and we are taking pictures "innocently". He said he would call the "ministry" to ask or maybe just to scare us. However, we continued to snap pictures around and I had one panorama from there without his intervention. It was generally a trial on some architectural photography since the nature there was almost absent except of some trees. I also made a panorama, again on a monopod. The difference here though, last Monday, the panorama I made in Salmiya park was done in a low level (the monopod was completely collapsed down), but this time in Bayan park, the monopod was a bit raised higher than my waist level. Of course the VR-head holding the camera over the monopod would add to the height after all. I'm still working on that panorama.

The single snaps of images varied, and there had been also a little handheld panorama done in a hurry, which can be counted for as a single image regarding its size and ratio anyway.

My friend working on his shot while I took this little panorama 

at his back and blended with vedutismo projection.

My friend, however, had his own pace, world and story. He might not have the tools I have, but he surely KNOWS what he is doing and what he is catching. In fact we had argued many times about the benefits of actually owning the tools to create the effect you want for an image, and creating the effects with HDR and go completely computerized. He is a pro for the first opinion while I'm for the second. Of course, he is not wrong about that, specially that he talks about official photography contests and what is accepted and what is not, and I have to admit that this approach, I think, does indeed make a successful photographer because, simply, it will gradually build up his knowledge and acknowledgment of his or her surroundings and how to adjust the eye and imagine the final product. Me, myself, did say to him on our way to the park that I tend to see every scene in its HDR equivalent and my eyes simply, analyze the scene for possible HDR-ish outcome. My view of things is different a bit as I don't consider photography contests as a big event. I concentrate my effort on the final outcome; A beautiful scene. Thus, I wouldn't maybe squander my money unless I need a hardware badly to create something (e.g. considering now getting a macro lens). Such images cannot be created simply by HDR or Photoshop or anything like that. You have to own the tools. As for the filters that my friend is trying to get, some of them can be already mimicked. By the way, I do envy him for his "coolness" when it comes to work with the camera. Maybe because of my usual problems with guards and security people, I've made a trend for myself that I always take pictures on the go and feeling always followed or soon I will get kicked out of some place for taking images. This feeling accompanied me in Ireland, even though I'm on a vacation. For my friend, the situation was a bit different. He works in a slow pace and wanders his eyes slowly in the place and picks his shots carefully. Yeah. This is how a photographer should be. I act more like a paparazzi and, no, a paparazzi is not a "real" photographer for me. Not when you work to expose other people's lives (even if they're celebreties, they have their own private lives, don't they?).

One of the first things I've aimed at was the sliders in the playground. As I told my friend, metals are a good subject for HDR making, whether they're shiny, or corroded. In both cases they give the drama you need, or the natural saturation you might want. All what is left is the angle from which you snap your image...

One of the angles (and done lot of them from here)

My friend made me aware of this angle after he snapped it with his 17-55mm lens, but 

with me I went with a Fisheye 15mm lens.

There are other possible ways I guess to play around with those images. HDR got many potentials and simply changing the white balance of the original images can produce astonishing results. I do miss working with ProPhoto though. The vivacity of colors is just unbeatable with ProPhoto and seriously tempting and seductive. I want to blow everything off and simply work in that color space. There is one specific image that I seriously wanted to keep in ProPhoto but I had to put it down to Adobe 1998 space, and then I had to compensate for the lost vivacity with some adjustment layers.

Boards (Waiting for Children)

The fisheye here made the trick of giving the spacious look while this square of wooden boards is lesser than a meter in width and length (around 3 feet). The white balance here was on "Shady" which made the image yellowish generally. It was a game for me, and although I could have changed the white balance while merging the HDR slide originally, I've just left it as it is. Later on though, I had to go on and put some adjustment layers to assist the cold look and add a bluish hue to the scene. The ProPhoto version (not what you see above) was almost direct to the point and I think I wouldn't need to change anything about it (except of some noise cleaning and sharpening), but since I had to change to Adobe color space, the fuss began with adjustment layers trying to compensate for the lost colors. There is another similar shot that I didn't prepare for the same subject but in a different angle.
Left to say now that after coming back from the park (and taking a tour to Baskin Robins!) heading back to work, the usual headache began again. Some visitors checking the place (and believe me please when I say they have nothing to do with my work place nor any interest), and extra fied work on the list to places I don't know anything about (and, I thought it is over by now). Yeah, hit "Bad Day" again. This is the national anthem from now on.

I've finished my fourth album for pictures from Ireland (2010) and already started the fifth one, but the progress is slow. As I said before, I'm kind of lazy to work on it. There are some smal panoramas that I didn't process their images yet into HDR format even to be stiched later. Should I dig more around for more junky places and architectural features to snap with my camera, despite all the regulations that make me sick here? I really need to spend more time behind my camera.

I've been trying to work on my webpage but, lazy again, there was no luck getting some things sorted out. At least I made the "About" page and it's ready to be converted into HTML format. Just some text really. The next step then is to prepare the Fonts download page and create samples for each font. I remember there were 4 fonts in the old webpage... or 3? Anyway, nevermind.

I think I will post this now, and try to get my brain connected with some music and write some poetry or lyrics or whatever it is to be called...

Happy New Year. Really?

Happy new year. So they say. Anyway, not much difference to me, for all days seem to go on one direction in a monotonous rhythm.I didn't even touch my camera for a month or more, well, except for trials to take a picture of myself to work on my idea for Asperger's but even that was a fail. I need a hand at this, but all I have is myself to work here.
I've began to really hate the start of the week for all the bad news that might come to my ears, just like the situation with my dear friend, who gets all the heavy dose of bad news in the first day, in the early hours of the morning as he steps into his work place.
I try to amuse myself now and then in my idleness by working on some of my photos from this year and the last year, and of course most if not all of them are from Ireland, as I didn't capture many photos from here. I did however catch few that are somehow worth the mention, mainly two, from Boubyan island 2 weeks ago, which brings me to the point here that I'm supposed to go to Boubyan tomorrow, Wednesday. The news makes me sick somehow in that it is, again, with the military. The view is nice really, but I'd rather work in a different environment. Moreover, we are limited by time in that we have to get back to my work place for the damn fingerprint scanning.

Boubyan incipit, Boubyan fines.

A road on the island.

As mentioned before, I've started to use Latin to name my images, thinking it gives some sense of power or mysterious hue (but Irish Gaelic can be included sometimes of course). The name here means "Boubyan begins, Boubyan ends," denoting the fact that this island is simply, clear. The long road won't make much difference in the views. Well, maybe in the middle of the island it is different, who knows! Tomorrow we are supposed to go deeper into the island. I will try to bring my camera and see what I can snap. On the right side you can see the bridge that leads into and from the island. I took a small panorama of that bridge from the same position but I didn't look after it. I don't think the angle was good.

Post-war Traffic

This truck maybe was the best catch in that trip. The rusty metal is always a good subject for HDR composition, with its destinctive reddish hue. The soldiers gathered around their officer and discussed the matter of the bullet hole in the front glass or the windshield. Some say it is the one that killed the driver while others say it is an after-math process. What an intellectual dicussion! I tried to catch the scene again with a fisheye lens but in fact, didn't make much a difference. I think I should have stepped a bit further away from the truck to allow more space for the land on the right, and to give a clearer view of the fisheye effect.

Beside those, there were many pictures processed from Ireland, old and new. I've finished my third album and going on completing my fourth album. If there is anything worthy living for right now, in my life, is the pictures I make. I'm trying hard to put my feelings into them, but I do give some space to technical matters as well sometimes. On the technical side, I'm fluctuating between sRGB and Adobe spaces, but I do become naughty sometimes and feel like I want to work in ProPhoto even though I know it won't fit my needs perfectly. It is just the need for vivid colors that makes me eager to work with this color space.

I'm tending now to use more and more adjustment layers (after tone-mapping the HDR slide of course). All to give the vivid or the mysterious look. Not everyting can be done in the tone-mapping process but at least, controlling the light and the sharpness of some zones in the image. Not much panoramas now since I worked out most of them in the early trials as I arrived back from Ireland, but nonetheless, there was one or two and some of the small ones that I needed to do. One of those was the panorama taken from the front yard of Hore Abbey, which in fact, generally in shape, didn't differ much from the previous done panorama from the inside of the abbey:

Hore Abbey in the front yard.

Hore Abbey from the inner court.

I think the two differ only in the amount of details of the structures, of course. In order to make the new panorama a sort of a magical place (and I called it already Horeus Magicalis), I used many adjustment layers to control the color of the skies and the grass (which was green of course). I preferred the yellow here because normally it adds a good contrast against a bluish sky. One of the major tools that are in use in my work is the Selective Color adjustment layer (of course beside the normal and everyday tools, like Curves and Levels). This adjustment layer allows me to blend-in different colors into some other color in varying degrees, and that affects the appearance and the mood of the image a "lot". Having the mood I want for an image is a serious, hideous and tedious work when it comes to sRGB space. Thus, as a norm, I tend to use Adobe 1998 color space the most. Ghosts and artifcts forming in HDR slides is another problem, along with the chromatic aberrations which Photomatix doesn't seem to fix them properly, hence I need to use Hue/Saturation adjustment layers often to eliminate the magenta lines from the edges (and sometimes cyan as well).

One of the small panoramas (vertical this time) that I've done recently was the chestnut tree taken from Cahir town, along the long path beside the river bank leading to the Swiss Cottage.

Castán (Chestnut)

This little vertical panorama is weird a bit because the upper part of the tree is in fact dangling over the path, i.e. it was above my head when I took the shots for this tree (handheld). Here it appears likeif the tree is springing outward like a flower and not really bending over my head! Just the effect I want! The problem here though was, as usual, fixing the colors AFTER tone-mapping. If I remember correctly, the space here was sRGB and it was so hard to convince myself with the saturation in general, but here you go. I was aiming really at elaborating more of the trunk's color and make it more reddish like. Nowto include the whole tree is another story. I would have to take a wider and higher panorama, which in fact would be probably better be done in a 360 panorama. The situation there is complicated!

Now in the mess, I'm starting to work just a little bit on my web page. Just a little and not much. The previous design I've made before was not really to my likings, so I decided to work on another one. This time I will try make the whole ting in GIF (with transparent background) and then cut it out into slides and convert the whole thing into HTML. Hope, that won't take much of the connection speed needed, and the design is simple I believe. I finished reading my book about manuscripts, and hence I have some time at work to do something about my webpage. All I need right now is just a push and a flare in my brain. I tend to sit idle in this place not able to do anything because of the bad mood.

I need some push with my poetry. I didn't write anything in a long time. I just hate it when this happens. I got the damn feelings, but I don't have the damn connection to put them together. What's happening!!!

Alexander 6, V98, V99.

Here we are, a Monday after a three-day weekend. I'm posting 2 verses for now as I didn't post anything yesterday (despite my plans). The work place seems quiet today after my colleague left in his vacation. YES! I wanna spend the whole time listening to music and reading. Ah well, it's not all like problems-less. Just one hour ago we (the secretary and I) had to sort out some dilemma concerning orders that been made by colleague. Not important, so far.

I've started reading my other book now and seems it is the variety of books I've been looking for. It discusses philosophical matters beside technicality of photography. I'm still in the beginning though and it's a long long read in front of me. Around 18 chapters in it, and I must try my best to digest whatever in it, either concepts, or technical procedures. It is a book about photography as an Art, rather than a camera.

 

In another venture, I've tried, finally, to capture a panorama with my new monopod, just to try out its capabilities, and seems it will be quite well although I'm still reluctant about taking it alone in my travel to Ireland. I think I will include my old tripod as well just in case. The panorama is not new to me, with only the time difference to the previous time, our own yard.

The circumstances in this panorama were challenging but still it went well I suppose. The time was early hour of the morning, and maybe you can see the sun is raising in the horizon still. The weather was awfully humid and I had to rub clean my fisheye lens while shooting. There was also this cat that kept on rubbing against me legs begging for food! However, despite all of that, it went sort of well except of some errors that I didn't care to fix here actually for a purpose.

While shooting, I had to keep my fingers gently on the monopod to keep the vibrations as low as possible. The shoot was conducted in Av mode (Aperture-Value priority) and not in M(anual) mode as I usually do. I realized that in fact what I usually do in Manual mode is the same as the Av mode; set the aperture and change the shutter speed to match the -2,0,+2 bracketing, and this is exactly the Av mode! It is also helpful to not touch the camera much in these conditions with a shaky monopod. Despite the tri-legs but it is not so stable to depend on my free movements away from it. I had to keep my hand all the time. One angle in particular was bad and maybe not so obvious in this small version of the panorama, and that was the angle of the left-side door (the door to the guest room); at this angle, the monopod was vibrating so much and made it worse with my hand grip over it. The image from that angle was typically shaky and blurred.

The zenith, was taken normally but for some reason it was darker than the rest of the image. I could've raised the exposure a bit before stitching it with the others, but I left it like that just to see the errors I have here. I don't think it is a mistake related to the monopod itself anyway. The zenith as well created a problem AFTER stitching, where the guest room door appeared with broken lines suddenly (and it was just fine before the stitch!). Now I'm trying to figure out a way to use the monopod in helping me to capture a more easy-going nadir (bottom) image. I didn't care much to stitch the nadir in the panorama above, because it's just an example so far. It would be important, however, if I was planning for a complete QTVR. I guess my experiment with the monopod turned out like 4 out of 5 stars.

 

Among all these experiments and reading that I have to do, I'm trying to sort out some tiny time for my webpage project. I've made some effects for today but I didn't put my mind really into it yet. I'm bad...

__________
2329. then Birbuár asked Alexander about his news
2330. and he went on telling him everything about the village
2331. until he arrived here in this place to help the farmers
2332. Birbuár then said: you are going for the Hermit?
2333. I heard he is a weird man indeed, but a wise one!
2334. I heard also that his age extends back in time,
2335. so ancient he is that you cannot tell,
2336. yet, his looks are young like time stopped
2337. and what are you going to do there O hero?
2338. Alexander replied: Aramramátáníth told me,
2339. that he might have the answers I need,
2340. he might know what I am doing here,
2341. and how to get back to my lands and the beloved
2342. then Birbuár said: I see you have conquered a Cadid!
2343. how brave are you to capture your own Cadid!
2344. then Alexander replied: believe me my friend,
2345. I did not know what is this until I met Biryári!
2346. fighting him was easy to me, and I wonder for the people!
2347. why they are so afraid of such creatures?
2348. why they cannot just defeat their Cadids by themselves?
2349. then Birbuár said in a calm voice: O good king of Caqobia,
2350. there is so much for you to learn about our world,
2351. your soul is everything for you in here,
2352. and if it is a dark one, then no hope with a Cadid

2353. the two talked for a while and forgot about time
2354. until it was just before the darkness to fall upon them
2355. Birbuár raised and said: it is getting darker O hero,
2356. it is time for me to dwell back to Khaznútím
2357. Alexander asked: where to O brave friend?
2358. Birbuár replied: I must go back before dark,
2359. I promised Khaznútím to get back to him,
2360. I must head to the Big Brother Mountain,
2361. and from there he shall take me to his place
2362. and Alexander asked: and where is his place?
2363. Birbuár answered in a low voice: Ah my friend,
2364. you do not really want to ask all these questions,
2365. I myself do not know where his place is in fact,
2366. it is like something not part of this world by any way,
2367. one time you are here, then suddenly you are in his,
2368. where everything is made of fire, but nothing hurts,
2369. unless you do a mistake or make him angry,
2370. then bear with him whatever it might have to take
2371. Alexander then had a farewell with his friend Birbuár
2372. and the two hugged each other like they will never meet
2373. then it was but a matter of eye blinks from Alexander
2374. and Birbuár was not standing in front of him anymore
2375. he flew away just like a Shágí would always do
2376. free of the physical world and free of bounds

Alexander 6, V95.

This will be one busy day!! I got my babies from the DHL, and just right after 12:00 p.m. . I believe the temperature out there was something exceeding 50C (~122F maybe). I'm pretty sure of that. I wanted to get these stuff and get back to my work place as fast as I can. I virtually did eat the books when I got into my office. I was flipping the pages gazing into the pictures in a fast rhythm. Not only that, but even one of the books got a chapter on HDR imaging, which is something I didn't know of!

 

And of course let's not forget the beloved monopod that might, just might, solve lot of my problems!

 

I do really need to settle down at home and work with all of these stuff for a really long time. I still remember the first time I got my book about Architectural Photography. I finished reading it in something around 5 days. I always had a problem keeping on reading something for a long time, and this is a problem I had all my life, but with these books, the only thing that makes me drop it is a tiresome eyes and falling asleep!

 

In my office today I made one serious trial to put a layout for my coming webpage, and I was surfing the net for some tips about adding a sound into a webpage without using the usual Flash, but seems after all I have to use some kind of scripting, and this time with Java. I'm not sure how it is all done, but things will come slowly I guess.

The basic layout so far...

I wanted to add a translation for each word of those into Ayvarith, but I'm reluctant to do so, and possibly, I won't add a sound along with these. The idea I had in my mind was to put a "MouseOver" action to each word, and a sound would be played with the Ayvarith writing showing beside it or underneath each word of those accordingly. Realizing my weaknesses in the field of HTML and my desire to leave out the Flash composition, I have to lower down my ambitions!

An item of good news came in today, when I got a message on my www.writing.com account, saying that I gained an honorable mention (with some extra gift points as a reward). The reward went for my poem, Queen, which was submitted for one of the contests in the website. An honorable mention is just like being placed on the 4th place or so, right after the three main winners. However, from the comments I've seen, people seem to like it!

Now, it is time to put this down and go on reading some books until it is time for me to get the hell outta here!

__________
2257. but amid the work on the wall some beasts approached
2258. they realized with their low minds that it is not good
2259. thus they desired to attack Alexander and his men
2260. and the noise had been made all over the valley
2261. thus, other beasts were warned and came to help
2262. and Alexander had no choice but to release the Cadid
2263. thus the Cadid attacked them like a fierce dog
2264. but the beasts kept on coming to Alexander
2265. yet he found no escape from drawing his sword
2266. and started to slash it through them fiercely
2267. then, amid the battle and the blood flushing over
2268. Alexander noticed a rapid moving object beside him
2269. and then he looked upon heads of beasts flying away
2270. he did not know what was going on in the battle field
2271. he thought it was one of the farmers fighting with him
2272. but he forgot this idea since farmers are not good with it
2273. he took a look to the back and saw the men working
2274. so fast they were doing the job and so afraid of the beasts
2275. thus he forgot the idea of a farmer being a warrior
2276. with this thread of thoughts in his mind going on
2277. he kept on watching something amid the beasts
2278. a warrior was walking with him and with his Cadid
2279. it was but moments when Alexander saw the shadow
2280. and with a surprise he shouted: Birbuár?!!!

Alexander 6, V78.

 Calm day relatively after one fussy week that just passed away. Surprisingly, I didn't notice that I've made a new wave of images from Ireland, or a pack of 30 images, like I usually do. I spent the whole day, yesterday, trying to organize them and send it all over to many recepients as much as possible.
Despite the lessened frustration, but the day didn't pass without annoyances because of the bereaucrats. I was supposed to get my passport back today and her highness, the girl over the counter, said that it will be ready by 11 O'clock (it was 8:30 already). After all what I've suffered just to get a parking place in that hellish place now she asks me to get back at another time. I spent more than 15 minutes roaming in circles like someone lost in a circular labyrinth and at the end I've parked in a no-parking area in front of the police station! Hilarious!

I've finally managed to get my Manfrotto 303SPH from DHL and still trying to get used to it but unfortunately I've been struck with unpleasant fact: it doesn't screw properly on my "old" tripod. But I'm working on it at the moment and will try to see if there is some way to go around that.

Manfrotto 303SPH

My writing mood had been switched off again because of the dizzy things here and there and I barely have the time to write something even when I think of some lines in my head. I don't carry a note with me now wherever I go. Typing down as well is not as good as writing down on paper. The pen and paper got some classical sense on them and somehow, strangely, help on with the flow of words. With me at least.

I've spent some of my day now adjusting and fixing some of the stuff in the Ayvarith dictionary and trying to proof-read the Ayvarith version of Alexander 6. I have to go through the whole document and emphasize on some aspects of the grammar, specially the present tense formulation from 4-letter-root verbs. I know I made a fuss in this category. Meanwhile, there had been some corrections in the manucript as well for some duplicated use of some words but they occured in different ways in Ayvarith. While doing all of this and that, I'm planning and trying to put some primitive idea or design for the general webpage in the near future. To do this, I have to seriously now consider ending my continuous fasting because I will be needing lot of concentration starting from the morning or after that a bit, at work. Most of my stuff about Ayvarith are done at work not at home. At home I'm mostly busy with photography and other things, plus, gaming!

I leave you now with some photos from my last email...

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1849. the two sat down beside one tree, with the Cadid
1850. and Kaliván just noticed the Cadid beside Alexander
1851. and he shouted so out loud: Cadid!!! you have a Cadid!!!
1852. Alexander answered calmly and said: yes, he is my servant
1853. but Kaliván stepped back and shouted: what kind of man are you?!
1854. Alexander replied: calm down O Kaliván, or else!
1855. under this pressure from Alexander, Kaliván got back
1856. and with a calm and humble voice he said: yes O good man,
1857. what are your questions? I hope I will answer all I can,
1858. but later, you should tell me your story as well
1859. Alexander agreed to the terms of the dwarf
1860. and then he asked: what is Jawsamályá?
1861. what is Mikanazzar and what is Aram... ?
1862. the dwarf man then answered calmly but in surprise
1863. "it is indeed a surprise that Aramramátáníth chose you!
1864. but what can I say in front of the will of the Great,
1865. and I wonder how come a man do not know these!
1866. however, I shall answer you as you requested"
1867. Alexander kept a careful eye on Kaliván
1868. and for his answer he was waiting patiently
1869. but the time was traveling so slow in that moment
1870. thus he could not keep it inside his heart
1871. and he had to yell at the little man out loud
1872. "Kaliván! hurry up! we do not have all day!"

Alexander 6, V57.

There are some days when you start them, just in the very early beginning, you would ask youself simply, "Why?".
Been encountering bad dreams, about some dead people and seriously, it kept awake all night. Diarrhea in early morning, which is not sort of typical and usual. Car overheating later on and just finished adding water. I wonder what will come next when this day is over completely. I''m sort of used to such days on Mondays, but now I was wondering what's so special about this day that I had to start it like that? And then, AHA! it is the 13th of the month. It's not Friday, I know, but it is still the 13th!

However, there had been some obstacles in my work with my gamma lab QTVR. I'm still wondering how to add a nadir to it. Also, the fixes maybe aren't as good as it appears. Sometimes, even after reaching this level, I still think of re-take the whole thing again with a different setting or method.

Trying to have fun for the time being. No REAL work yet, and by work I mean Ayvarith work and Alexander's story. I've uploaded some font files into my fortunecity account for future use in the creation of the webpage. Spent some time thinking on how shall I do it and I think I've settled down on making the whole webpage with a vertical frame panel, and not like my previous webpage on GeoCities, which was mainly horizontal. Nothing is done yet with anything related to the HTML encoding though. Before making the webpage, I have to add words to the dictionary and organize them, and it is time then, I guess to start building. Along with that, I might start checking the Ayvarith transliteration of the story (with a sharp eye as much as possible) to fix (or more like adapt) and unify the grammar or spelling of some words, or the orthography of some others, since there has been some stuff of that that changed along with time. Add to that, a contemporary check-up for the Grammar page that was done before must be in due along with that.

__________
1345. The smith went silent after the mention of Birbuár
1346. and Alexander felt that he did something wrong
1347. but Shdáyur answered: only a Shágí can do that,
1348. this is because it is a soul that got rid of the body,
1349. thus it is free of the bounds of our world
1350. then Alexander said: if so, then I might need some food,
1351. I am a stranger in these lands and might get lost
1352. and the smith replied: yes, verily you will need food,
1353. for the journey to that place will take three days
1354. and Shdáyur prepared the needs of food for Alexander
1355. and supplied him with water to drink, and washed his body
1356. then he provided him with a tool to use and said to him
1357. "take this it will be beneficial for you my friend,
1358. it will direct you where is the east and west,
1359. thus, you shall know how to head north"
1360. Alexander asked: and what do you call this?
1361. Shdáyur replied: we call it "compass,"
1362. oh then how did you find directions in your world?
1363. Alexander replied: we had a sun and a moon and stars,
1364. and all of that helps us in finding our way, day or night,
1365. but you have your own ways in these lands of yours!
1366. then Shdáyur picked the compass from Alexander
1367. and showed him how to work out with it
1368. and after a warm farewell, Alexander left undercover

Alexander 6, V16.

My sleeping time had been screwed again. With my powerless efforts to stay awake till 9 p.m. yesterday all failed and I finally fell down at around 6:30 p.m., and thus, here I am, awake since 1:30 a.m. . It's not all bad actually, the only thing I'm concerned about is being here in my work and staying awake for a long time. I might end the day with having a short leave and never come back to do the damn fingerprint scanning.
I spent the night until the rise of dawn working on photos and fixing them according to specific sizes and made them ready to be printed out, and later shall be sent to Ireland. It's going to be costly; around 9 images on A4 size, 2 on A2 size and one on A0 size. The last one is the Aughnanure Castle disk. I'm not experienced with the printing process though, and I might see them getting darker since these printers usually use the CMYK system and images tend to be darker. Just thinking about it now, maybe I should've done and prepared everything in CMYK? Blah!

Later

In order to put some meaning into my life, I've went to the barber to fix this hair then to the printing shop (not a press but a printing shop). The previous damned barber made a fuss out of my hair that I think he was a gardener before being a barber. This is the first time I see some barber who, literally, pulls the hair instead of cutting it! I've promised the guy in the printing shop to come after the prayer's time. I hate to go out at this time but well, I can't wait all that time over there... I'm an honest worker and they need me in my work place :) (said who?). Moreover, I've told the guy to enlighten the images a bit since they are going to be darker if they are printing in CMYK. Although I'm afraid of the consequences of not supervising it myself, but let's say I have the faith to lead me through. If an image is so dark, darker than usual, well, I'm going to have to send it that way after all. And may they forgive me!
I reached the lines of 1500s in my transliteration. Transliteration sounds easier of course than translating before, but still, I can't do more than 2 pages (verses) per day. I tend to finish these 2 verses and enjoy my time for the rest of the day as much as I can, or, do other obligations related to my work here. I want to progress more with Ayvarith, and to start a new webpage, but since my time working on Ayvarith is only in my work place (which means I work on it 5 days only, and in the daytime), everything is actually slow. After the transliteration I have to think of building a new webpage and also I need to add new words to the dictionary before that. My time in the morning is devoted to Ayvarith, otherwise it is devoted to photography and gaming. I remember my old days though, when I started with Ayvarith like 3 or 4 years ago, when I used to work on it day and night. Well, back then, I didn't have a Canon in my hands! :)

Well, I'm posting this earlier than before, since I have to leave the office in almost one hour from now. I leave you with Alexander for now...

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361. then Alexander asked Ikilis the shepherd
362. about the reasons behind his laughter
363. thus Ikilis answered with a smile on the face
364. "O great king, one of the justice and might,
365. we heard a lot about the Ayvars from ancestors,
366. but we always take them as some legends,
367. some legends, that elders tell their children about,
368. but to see a mighty man like you take the risk,
369. going here and there in search for them,
370. I cannot say but that such a thing is amazing,
371. and I never thought of before or saw before!"
372. then Alexander took a moment to think then said
373. "did you not meet the hermit on the southern Tells?
374. he claimed that he is the grandson of the Ayvars!"
378. and Ikilis answered directly: you mean Náwi?
379. he is merely but an old man hallucinating I suppose!
380. then Alexander asked Ikilis to tell him something about them
381. and then Ikilis started to tell some of the legends he heard
382. and he said: many things are told about the Ayvars,
383. so much that you need days to know it all at once,
384. but I shall tell you what I have in my mind right now

Time In No Time

It was somehow a quiet day today... not much troubles! But I had to spend most of the time coping with this damned connection here which was like ON and OFF most of the time, while I download some of the files from one of my accounts in GeoCities. I should check if they enabled the FTP for this purpose, it was a tiresome task and took over most of my time. Right now, I finished downloading the contents of 3 of my accounts, and yet there are another 3 to go (or is it 2? I can't remember). The idea of this close-down strikes me with nostalgia, if I can call it so. I think there is no way but to re-build and make a new theme for the Ayvarith website... somewhere else this time.

The yield for today's translation was 2 verses, reaching line #480, which would be something else if I corrected the missing numbers that I've found! I didn't find more missing lines so far, which makes me relax a bit. Thinking about the transliteration that I have to do shakes my mood violently... I don't know when to do this, and I think I failed to push myself to work on it at home. I'm busy playing some games! Games are so important for me and I take it as a homework!

I didn't work on my story for days now, but thinking of working on it little bit after posting this entry. It would be awesome if I can manage to be some where, maybe overlooking the sea and try to concentrate on writing it... nature is an eloquent motivational speaker.

If only I can control my mood... I would have plenty of time for everything...

On the other hand, we got some photos from Iraq, from the holy site of Al-Kazimain, from a friend of the family, Sayyid Abbas. Notice that "Sayyid" is a title and not a name (though some people use it as a name). I managed to manipulate them a bit with photoshop to make more vibrant colors, since most of the photos were taken in a dusty weather. Please, click on each photo to read a commentary about it:

Quenching...

This morning, I was going on writing and writing and writing... when suddenly something pulled me back and couldn't find appropriate words. I guess my brain is just exhausted right now?

I'm busy with creating some webpage for my brother, thus it is hard for me a little to write the story at home. Otherwise, if I'm not working on it, I would be playing around with some game! For the time being I'll spend my time reading some tutorials that might help me in doing my work for my brother.

I've started to get thrilled by the length and the effort needed to translate and do other stuff to this part of the story! I didn't estimate it that way! I've reached 240 lines til now and still the story goes on. My thoughts lead me (without previous planning) to make Alexander meet the killer of his father, a demon.

Note: drinking a HOT pepsi, is not a good idea, AT ALL.