Have you ever wished to be able to foresee your own future? Or are you among those that are saying: “No thanks, I’d rather have a life filled with surprises, as knowing what will happen beforehand will make life only dull and annoying.?”
As for me, I’d like to be able to foresee at least the most important happenings, and in some of my captures I am trying to convey it. There is some magic involved I guess, and I do believe in magic.
And I am not talking bout post-processed image here, as the photo that you see here hasn’t been post-processed and is - as is - straight from the camera.
The reason for my long silence were some serious server problem that we had in the last two weeks. And not only the blogs were affected as you can imagine. Everything should be up and running now however, and no further problems are to be expected.
The hoverfly on the photo is how I felt in the past two weeks due to the server problems…
A quote from William Feather - 1889-1981, Writer - was the reason for the above title, and for some pondering too. “Plenty of people miss their share of happiness, not because they never found it, but because they didn’t stop to enjoy it.”
I must admit that I am one of these types of people, and the decision to stop more often and enjoy the enjoyable was taken. It’s not that I never feel happy, or that I never enjoy myself. But being always in the pursuit of happiness without seeing it as being already there is what my own mistake is.
My advice to myself and my readers is to cut the withdrawal, and isolation as much as possible starting now. And to stop trying “getting it right.” All that we are looking for is already before us, if we only have the eyes to see it…
The title above is from the daily message I am getting daily from The Universe, and I happen to agree with it. But how about you?
The rest of the message is:
Let everyone else off the hook. Besides, it’s doubtful they’ve lived as much, dreamt as big, or will ever be able to saunter quite like you.
And to stay on the same track as in my previous posts, here is what George William Childs once wrote:
Do not keep the alabaster box of your love and
friendship sealed up until your friends are dead.
Fill their lives with sweetness. Speak approving,
cheering words while their ears can hear them
and while their hearts can be thrilled and made
happier. The kind things you mean to say when
they are gone, say before they go.
And the photo here above is a Self-Portrait shot a few days ago. What Dick Eastman wrote seemed very appropriate with it: “Only those who see the invisible can attempt the impossible.”
With these thoughts I am wishing you a splendid weekend and will talk to you soon
Please note that non of my photos may be used without my explicit permission, and every work of mine is copyrighted. Contact me if you wish to use any of my photos and do not download any without having received my written permission. Thank you.
“Really big people are, above everything else, courteous, considerate and generous - not just to some people in some circumstances - but to everyone all the time.”
Thomas J. Watson 1874-1956, Founder of IBM
Many of you know the saying: “Don’t cry over anything that won’t cry over you.” But do you agree with it? And do you act this way with any of the circumstances that you encounter and have to deal within your life? As for me - I simply can’t work it out and keep crying over things that won’t cry over me. Not always with the real tears, but, than my heart is crying, or my soul, and everything brings out some types of tears. Even so with my photography.
Or the things that I write. But than artists are overly sensitive and easily hurt.
This is why I am always trying to be sweet and friendly with people, also with the once that I don’t know. A person cannot always be sweet, but one could be polite, and friendly always, and should be really. Think about it for a minute… A simple smile could mean the world to someone who is feeling lonely and abandoned, or simply sad. It’s much cheaper than the petrol prices at the present, but the energy and power a simple smile could bring is enormous! A good word could make this person feel better right away, and make him/her see the world and everything in a new light.
And with these thoughts I am wishing you a splendid week ahead…
Please note that non of my photos may be used without my explicit permission, and every work of mine is copyrighted. Contact me if you wish to use any of my photos and do not download any without having received my written permission. Thank you.
As most of you know I am away from home, and have a very hard time keeping up with all that I have to do here, and my online business is suffering from it too.
But to get down to the story, and the why of this title…Yesterday night, about 24 hours ago, I found through StumbleUpon.com (where from much traffic is going to my Crystal skulls blog) that someone has STOLEN the following photo of two of my crystal skulls… To be more exact, from Elie together with Jolly Zee.
I know it’s happening to about everyone placing their photos online without taking as precaution an ugly watermark in the middle of the photo, so that it cannot be cut off without ruining the photo completely.
Even while my partner Willem cautioned me I did not want to ruin the beauty I was capturing with the cameras and decided to take the risk, thinking the people will be honest and appreciative enough to link back to the site of mine that they found the photo on at the least. And even better, if they contact me and ask permission first and, before doing it. I will most certainly consent it as the photos are online already. But to steal, to not even link back to where the photo was found is downright STEALING. This is totally obnoxious and unacceptable behavior and I will definitely fight it.
I wrote the guy last night and gave him 24 hours the time to either link back to where he took my photo from, or take the photo off his blog ASAP. No reply until now whatsoever, and I decided to write about it on Totally Useless, and to write a review on his blog on Stumble Upon too. And if he does not as I am asking I will take it higher up.
Who knows how many of my photographs have been “stolen” until now online. In any case, if any of you have used any of my photos without linking back to where you found them posted - I’ll find you sooner or later, and will act exactly in the same manner as I am doing right now. And hopefully people will use their mind in a better way than this guy did, or I will be forced to start using an ugly watermark somewhere in the middle of my photographs from there on. So friends of mine, enjoy my photos without watermarks while I am still in the mood to leave these as they are.
This video shocked me so much that I had to share it with you on Totally Useless.com.
Think about your daily commute and compare it if you can with what seems to be normal in Japan…
And the most important part of it all - be sure to choose other means of traveling while in Japan
Than I’d like to ask if you know the name of this wonderful flower? Is it maybe some type of an orchid? I shot it a few weeks ago in an orchid garden, and the same goes for the photo of the “angry orchids”, the name of which I also do not know.
Time flies quicker than we imagine it would, and while I was planning to let you all know that I will be away for an undetermined period of time - I did not tell you so. The photo above is a weird paradox really. No post processing was used and I was amazed about the mask on one of the dice and the weird forms the bokeh made on it. The title is about this photo.
I am away from home, and in another country, and I don’t know for how long I will remain here but it could be for months. This doesn’t mean the end of my blog, and I will definitely keep posting as often as I can. Here are some resent photos that were meant for Mother’s day and am sorry that I wasn’t able to post these in time, and as many things lately - the old cliche - better late than never…
Freeze for a moment if you please and think about the lack of human rights in so many countries around the world.
Posting a few of my newest photos for the Bloggers Unite for Human Rights - today - 15th of may 2008.
My heart goes to all the innocents that are imprisoned, and to all the hungry and devastated by natural disasters, such as in Burma recently. May their situation change for the better and ASAP. And how is it possible that 2 million people’s lives are endangered because of the refusal of the junta to open up to a full-scale relief effort? Wake up world!
The photos above are an experiment that I was planning to do for quite some time. I decided to place some flowers in colored water and freeze these in. Under a certain angle the sun light hit the ice in such a way that a shine and rainbow colors came up from within and surrounded the daisy. Check the few leaves of the daisy pointing towards heaven like fingers … ( I like that ) It reminds me that there are certain powers that could change events even when we tend to loose hope…
Totally Useless is all about my personal philosophy, and how I interpret what is happening
in our lifetime, what is important to us, and how
come. It is about all those things that often
appear as totally useless but mostly are not.
