RUBY WONDERS BY GOD & GUNNAR

Originated by MaryT, check hers for today. Don't forget to wish her happy birthday.

With me being the constant gardener, there's not much time for PC or photography these days.
With the help from God and Gunnar I have some nice garden pictures to serve for this Tuesday.
The tulips are already history for this year.
Some wonder they are though. Three packets of bulbs remain laying of the terrace till February had even started sprouting when they were put in earth.
The red and the lilac rhododendrons are setting our spirits on fire just now. South west of Norway is rhododendron climate. Mild winters and moist springs.
In the background the poppies are lurking while the scarlet rhododendron is whispering good night.
Some late bloomers on the terrace.
Even our Christ Thorn is full of blossoms. Never understand why we don't have the red berries in autumn.
The fur don't have much red in its flower, but is a part of the garden picture.
The Prince Apple tree is promising this year. Hope the bumblebees will soon arrive. I'd love some red apples this fall.
Yours truly admiring the blood beech south east in the garden.
Resting on a red chair under the Swede Apple tree.
God's own summer curtains are covering the windows of our living room. The clematis.


The clematis has worked its way around the corner up on the terrace.
The bell bush is also springing out these days.

I'll let Dylan and Springsteen sing to congratulate Dylan with birthday May 24th and teach Mary with hers May 25th.

RUBY MEN

Originated by MaryT, check hers for today.

Last weekend I attended a school jubilee. 40 years since nursery school. Gunnar as always was my companion and chauffeur. We made a trip to The Old Vicarage. Lots of interesting modern art displayed in the two old barns.
I found Gunnar on the barn-bridge totally absorbed by the view...of a rescue car!
Gunnar has taught me that photo is about curves, angles, light and if possible; action.
One unhappy spectator. How did he manage to drive the car sideways up the barn bridge?
Could the Falcon rescuer manage to tug the car around that narrow corner. Actually, I don't know. The man in orange decided he had to un-hook the truck and try once more from behind. I predicted a never ending story, only suited for enthusiasts.

I returned to the exhibition, and said hello to vehicles suitable for younger men in this farmer district.

RUBY GUITARS

Ars longa vita brevis.
I took about 20 pictures with manual camera handling.
Sunlight, overexposure, sharpness, oh,my!
I ended up with this fragment of my forty years old guitar and her sharp comrade.

I look at you all see the love there thats sleeping
While my guitar gently weeps
I look at the floor and I see it needs sweeping
Still my guitar gently weeps
I dont know why nobody told you how to unfold your love
I dont know how someone controlled you
They bought and sold you.

I look at the world and I notice its turning
While my guitar gently weeps
With every mistake we must surely be learning
Still my guitar gently weeps
I dont know how you were diverted
You were perverted too
I dont know how you were inverted
No one alerted you.

I look at you all see the love there thats sleeping
While my guitar gently weeps
Look at you all . . .
Still my guitar gently weeps.
George Harrison.

Originated by MaryT, check hers for today.

RUBY SPRING DUST

Husband Gunnar is teaching me to use natural sunlight adding depth, shadows and life to a picture.
Alas I forgot my mother's dust theorem;
"Spring reveals all your hidden sins."

Found this little poem to comfort me..and hopefully you.

Little Cosmic Dust Poem
John Haines

Out of the debris of dying stars
this rain of particles
that waters the waste with brightness..

The sea-wave of atoms hurrying home,
collapse of the giant
unstable guest who cannot stay.

The sun's heart reddens and expands,
his mighty aspiration is lasting,
as the shell of his substance
one day will be white with frost.

In the radiant field of Orion
great hordes of stars are forming.
just as we see every night,
fiery and faithful to the end.

Out of the cold and fleeing dust
that is never and always,
the silence and waste to come.

This arm, this hand,
my voice, your face, this love.

Originated by MaryT, check hers for today.

RUBY TUESDAY SPRING

Originated by MaryT, check hers for today.

Spring to me is first and foremost picking White Anemones. I'm getting reports from family and friends when and where the first ones are spotted.
My mother even once came with an old fashioned milk bucket filled with White Anemones once I lay sick in bed. This Easter Serina brought home a tiny delicate bouquet of Anemones. The flowers are best found by a brooch and under shady trees. Yesterday I found a lot where one had chopped down a whole hillside of old pines. Prices are good for lumber these days.
May red knitted swaeter is from a firm called Oleannna.
Ole Bull, a violinist from last 19th century had a romantic dream of creating a Norwegian state in the USA. Since his first name was Ole, the state was to be named Oleanna. Giant fiasco though.
The knitwear factory is success. Most Norwegian/Americans buy one or two for use over there. That's also the Ruby for this Tuesday.
Sorry about the lousy cellphone quality.

Our most famous composer Edvard Grieg has made a wonderful homage to the spring.
I'd like to share it with you.

SEPIA PEACE

"She walks in beauty, like the night

Of cloudless climes and starry skies;

And all that's best of dark and bright

Meet in her aspect and her eyes:

Thus mellow'd to that tender light

Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

One shade the more, one ray the less,

Had half impair'd the nameless grace

Which waves in every raven tress,

Or softly lightens o'er her face;

Where thoughts serenely sweet express

How pure, how dear their dwelling place.

And on that cheek, and o'er that brow,

So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,

The smiles that win, the tints that glow,

But tell of days in goodness spent,

A mind at peace with all below,

A heart whose love is innocent!

In spite of being 100% subjective, mother & photographer, I am bold enough to claim Lord Byron’s poem for this pic.

SEPIA SCENES IS HOSTED BY TEACH MARY

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What big cat are you?

You Are a Snow Leopard

You have learned that you must rely on yourself, and yourself alone, to live a happy life. You are understand the world better than most people you know. You are very perceptive and intuitive. You need lots of space to think. If you don't get the space you need, you're likely to bite someone's head off. Because you are so thoughtful and solitary, people find you to be intense and mysterious. You're even seen as intimidating. What Big Cat Are You? DOUBLE CLOCK ON THE LINE ABOVE TO TAKE THE TEST We've had a good laugh and some interesting discussions, I dare say. Had never thought upon myself like this, but..they might be right.

I FEEL, THEREFORE I BELIEVE I THINK

Je pence, doce je suis, the philosopher Descartes proclaimed.
I've lately learned that people misinterprets feeling for thinking.
Our local newspaper "Haugesunds Avis" leads the way.

We are all appalled by the pictures from Gaza. In detail presented children being massacred.
That the Hispolla is cowardly hiding among civilians, is barely mentioned.
Nor the fact that they have been shooting rockets at Israel for 8 years.

We are shown crying mothers and dead children.
We cry too.

In Afghanistan Norwegian soldiers together with Americans have been killing civilians for years now.
Besides costing us an incredibly amount of money, mainly paid to the war industry, nobody really knows what or why Norwegian soldiers are fighting in Afghanistan.

We never get to see any picture.
We don't feel anything, therefore we don't think anything either.
The censorship is efficiently upheld.
We never even see a picture from a funeral of a dead Norwegian soldier.
So we simply don't think of the hardships young men are enduring in a foreign country.
We need to be informed preferably in pictures or film to be moved, shaken, appalled.
How many civilians lives have been "unintentionally" taken in Afghanistan?
We'll probably never know.
Neither will any bother to ask.

In the Gaza conflict we were flooded by pictures from that three months military intervention at the Gaza strip.
Nobody writing about the history leading up to the tragedy. Of our common guilt.
Just a violent cry for a crucifixion of the Israeli nation.
A local politician called the Israeli army one of the mightiest armies in the world.
There's 7,6 million inhabitants in Israel.

Our brains have been mismanaged with great skill.
Who's gonna give us license to think?

PAASKE- EASTER IN RUBY

Church Of Our Savior. Photo Serina
Norwegian Easter Morning is first Sunday after first full moon after the vernal equinox. This year April 12th. Last Sunday the celebration begun with Palm Sunday. This is called the silent week. Schools have vacation and shops are closed Tuesday, Friday and Monday.
Gunnar and I went to the National Gallery in Oslo where Munch's Shriek is displayed. Somehow it reminds me of Good Friday, by us called Long Friday. If you have heard Ian Gillan cry out on Jesus Christ Superstar, you'll understand why.
Time for contemplation and vacation. Darling daughter is home!
Traditionally lamb is the food for paaske (Norwegian translation from Hebrew). Serina asked for Tandoori Chicken. It's steaming while Gunnar is out at the airport, picking her up.
Church concert this year; The Savior by father of the famous Lloyd Webbers, William.

We always hope for a small Serina air.
Paaske also is candies in an egg, Serina's already almost empty, games and reading. In Norway crime is the must of Easter reading. Long, long tradition. Psychologists say it has to do with the nature of Easter gospel; lying, deceiving, covering up and murder.
Salvation and resurrection not included.
We have a box of Easter decoration in the attic. Hubby Gunnar wasn't able to locate it among the zillion others.
I found this cock in a drawer. He's placed among basel, rosemary and lemon balm.
Hopefully we'll take a trip to Sauda as well.
That will be a topic for next Tuesday.

Originated by MaryT, check hers for today.

SPRING CELEBRATION

Originated by MaryT, check hers for today.

The magic folly of spring is sweeping over us.
The sun beats the dark by 13,6 hours to 11,6, and it will go on and on till the nights become blond again.
"Blond on blond" to quote Dylan.
I've been out hunting down the spring today.
This is what I found:
In Norway people go skiing and skating till late April.
Nice hobby for masochists.(Never thought that I should be a sports photographer, not even in the junior league!)
Football, the real one, is no leisure game.
It's more important than life and death, a famous English coach said.
Footballers come crawling out as soon as the snow is gone.
We were a trip at Norway's eastside this week.
From the plane we saw the landscape covered in a white coat of snow, except from the regularly green"stamps", the grass covered football stadiums.
Pope John Paul II said:"Of all the unnecessities of the world, football is the most important."
Personally I find football overrated, overpaid and totally blown out of proportions in the minds of media and average people.
Except for this single red team called Fire from Bergen.
I sing their songs, I watch their games on the telli, and if Gunnar's broken nose heals well, I hope we can see them live this season.


Emily Dickinson
A little madness in the Spring
Is wholesome even for the King,
But God be with the Clown —
Who ponders this tremendous scene —
This whole Experiment of Green —
As if it were his own!

THE NAMING OF A CAT

Originated by MaryT, check hers for today.

My first name was not often used within my birth family. To my parents I was "Kitten"or "Kit", to my only sibling, younger bro' Kel, I was "Kitten Meow" with an emphasis on meow. Till we got a wonderful gray and white kitten of our own. Then a brand new cat-language evolved, and I became Felisol/Fel /Whel.
Till this day that's how my brother names me.
One might wonder if that's related to my choleric nature. I certainly do not climb the trees anymore.
Only seldom use my claws to scratch.
However, I still purr when being cuddled.
And I love to go hunting at night!

The Naming of Cats

TS Eliot

The Naming of Cats is a difficult matter, It isn't just one of your holiday games; You may think at first I'm as mad as a hatter When I tell you, a cat must have THREE DIFFERENT NAMES. First of all, there's the name that the family use daily, Such as Peter, Augustus, Alonzo or James, Such as Victor or Jonathan, or George or Bill Bailey - All of them sensible everyday names. There are fancier names if you think they sound sweeter, Some for the gentlemen, some for the dames: Such as Plato, Admetus, Electra, Demeter - But all of them sensible everyday names. But I tell you, a cat needs a name that's particular, A name that's peculiar, and more dignified, Else how can he keep up his tail perpendicular, Or spread out his whiskers, or cherish his pride? Of names of this kind, I can give you a quorum, Such as Munkustrap, Quaxo, or Coricopat, Such as Bombalurina, or else Jellylorum - Names that never belong to more than one cat. But above and beyond there's still one name left over, And that is the name that you never will guess; The name that no human research can discover - But THE CAT HIMSELF KNOWS, and will never confess. When you notice a cat in profound meditation, The reason, I tell you, is always the same: His mind is engaged in a rapt contemplation Of the thought, of the thought, of the thought of his name: His ineffable effable Effanineffable Deep and inscrutable singular Name.

SPRING IN NORWAY

This wonder garden is situated in our neighborhood.
Iam lucky just to stand outside the wall and admire this horn of plenty.
Wish you were here .

ST.PATRICK IN ST.STEPHEN'S GREEN

http://workofthepoet.blogspot.com teach Mary is hosting this meme.
Sunny day in St. Stephen's Green, April 1981.
The young fellow lying on the grass telling me the thousand stories of Ireland; from St. Patrick year 461 till Bobby Sands dying in the Maze prison just as we were speaking.
He so cleverly told me about St. Patrick, and the way he used the Shamrock to convince the pagan Irish about the Holy Trinity, I felt it might have happened yesterday.
I fell in love with this magic Emerald Isle, and her men, who all have kissed the Stone of Blarney.
And I've got this longing to once more return .
The Lake Isle of Innisfree
I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree, And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made; Nine bean rows will I have there, a hive for the honey bee, And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

2. And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,
Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;
There midnight's all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
And evening full of the linnet's wings.

3. I will arise and go now, for always night and day
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements gray,
I hear it in the deep heart's core.

William Butler Yeats.

FOR SOMEONE SPECIAL

Fra mamma

SONG OF MY HEART

Don't we all love the songs of Fanny Cosby.
I listened through a lot on YouTube to find the right mood from the hymns from my childhood.
As there are no aunt Aase or Sven Odland outtakes, these will have to do the trick.

YOU DID NOT KNOW; OR DID YOU?

Which Grand Designs House Are You?

You are the Peckham Space Pod!

You're ingenious and just a little bit mad

Your practical, can-do attitude and ingenuity mean that the Peckham Space Pod is your ultimate Grand Design. This compact, clever design speaks volumes for your common sense, high intelligence and problem-solving ability. You also have taste that, while not always popular with the mainstream, is undeniably unique and 'you'. more!

Hi, Debbie. Instead of following up your meme, for which I actually don't have the capacity, I'll at least show you one side of myself I wasn't really conscious about. I follow the TV program Grand Designs by British Kevin McCloud with enthusiasm and great interest.

I could not resist taking this test as I stumbled over it at the internet.
The house I ended up with was the least pretentious of them all.
I like it though.
I also like to have a good laugh at my own cost.

Here is Gunnar's result. A little over my league. Together we are dynamite.

Bold and strong of opinion, the Yorkshire Castle is your dream Grand Design because it reflects all of these qualities and more. You are highly intelligent, well-educated and value the lessons of history highly. Your respect for quality and timeless design is reflected in this project, as is your sensitivity to the preservation of history.

RUBY VAN RUBY BABY

Serina showing off our beloved Dodge Tradesman.
It had formerly served as a firefighter van for B.A. jobs at our cornerstone factory Statoil-Hydro aluminum. The sirens were removed, but boy did we feel tough riding that v8 giant.
Still two years, with chocolate ice around her mouth, Serina is looking comfortable behind the steering wheel. We're celebrating Seventeenth of May, our day of Independence.
Serina is so proud, because her dad's a teacher. That means she's allowed accompany him and participate in parades for school children.
She's wearing her first of many bunads, our national costume.

Little did she know that we were twice as proud.
So in fact were all the parents and grandparents for generations, since the 1840ies.
A special greeting from Bob Dylan and Mamma for today:
May God bless and keep you always,
May your wishes all come true,
May you always do for others
And let others do for you.
May you build a ladder to the stars
And climb on every rung,
May you stay forever young,
Forever young, forever young,
May you stay forever young.

May you grow up to be righteous,
May you grow up to be true,
May you always know the truth
And see the lights surrounding you.
May you always be courageous,
Stand upright and be strong,
May you stay forever young,
Forever young, forever young,
May you stay forever young.

May your hands always be busy,
May your feet always be swift,
May you have a strong foundation
When the winds of changes shift.
May your heart always be joyful,
May your song always be sung,
May you stay forever young,
Forever young, forever young,
May you stay forever young.

Originated by MaryT, check hers for today.

BLOOD ON THE TRUNKS

Our pines are violently bleeding.
Favorite writer/composer/singer Bob Dylan is visiting Norway this month.
We are going to attend his concert.
Among Dylan's three best albums is "Blood on the tracks.
Our souls and our garden has been mutilated lately. By a trespassing treetrunk murderer.
Psalm 4:4
Be angry, and do not sin. Meditate within your heart on your bed,
and be still.

Originated by MaryT, check hers for today.

That was that week that was

Missing my baby, still rejoicing over she having fun in Volda.

Monday I spent worrying about my eyes. The sight had gradually worsened, in spitte of two kind of grops and annoinment to be applied five times a day.
Working with the pictures for my Ruby blog, I finally could hardly see the screen. Colors blurring and my eyes two inches from the working surface aching, colors changing like they were solarized.
I was convinced I was about becoming blind.
I prayed and made my blogfriends praying.
Tuesday the hiker girls went out for a four hour trip. I tagged along. Thought I might as well enjoy the adventure of the spring as suffering at home. We saw snowdrops blossoming every where and also the .
In thee evening I went to see Turid. She is gifted with warm hands and they really soothed my eyes.
Wednesday(on Serina's birthday) Gunnar and I went south, under three tunnels and over the fjord with a ferry to attend a dear uncle's funeral. My third uncle dying in less than a year. So sad to meet my aunt and my cousins under these circumstances.
Thursday I had my physiotherapist therapy and came home rather weak. No time for letting the soare muscles recover and adjust to the therapy. Due to major urgency I telephoned from 10.30 am till 18 pm to get my mom's bank fix some severe mistakes made by them.
I had to contact their superiors in Oslo until they finally came to their senses.
Gunnar and I went to and from Sauda to see to my poor Mom. She was exhausted too.
Friday morning we woke up to motor saw roar.
Our neighbor had rented a firm to cut our trees while he himself had hidden abroad. (To put in mildly cowardish).
I was devastated, cause they did not only cut branches, like we had agreed, but severely damaged the trunk both of the spruces and the birches So late in spring the sap has already risen in the trees and the birds started to build nest.
There are not many Christian thought in my head concerning those vandals.
Saturday was meant to be a girlfriend gathering out at Seahill, hiking and dinner.
I have to pass.
My eyes are getting better all the time though.
Monday I thought that if I loose my sight, I'll loose most of what's important to me in life.
In my vanity I said to God , I'll never complain about anything if you just let me keep what remains of sight and hearing.
Guess I've had to eat these words and lots of dust too. One should not give God promises.
At least reflect on how one, weak and vulnerable in flesh will be able to keep such a promise.
Close to sixty I still have a lot to learn.

Good thing though,the mild weather able me, with the help of Gunnar, to spread ten 50 litre sacks of fertile soil in the garden.
I also planted 50 sprouting bulbs and 10 Primroses.
Anger gives my energy surplus.
Except from Thursday I have had perfect control over my menu, thanks to Debbie's genuine advice.
And despite 3 buns and one hotdog & coke that fatal Thursday, I've lost a kilo.
Guess life could be worse.
Oh, Iknow for sure, life is harsher to a great many people.
I just had to blow out some black steam.
Gunnar made this video of the vandalism.

THREE HAPPY BIRTHDAYS

Dear Serina.
I've swapped Terry's birthday card for you.
dad and I say Happy birthday +1.
Also happy belated birthday to Broder Knut Erik, February 24th and Uncle Leif February 26th.
The Tjaalands have been busy celebrating end of February for three generations.
Hipp hipp hipp Hurray.