Stjarna's Eirie

Stjarna's Eirie, Verbier (142.818,156.448,168.82)

I love the Alpine regions, which can feel cool on a hot day in real life.

On our small patch in Verbier, located by trails, there is a tubby spaceship rezzer, A Stargate teleporter that connects to our other locations in Second Life, a Bus Stop that will take you on a magical mystery tour of other Bus Stops around Second Life, and a board with a Notecard, which includes Landmarks for many Alpine attractions.

One day we may buy enough land to have a chalet in the snow, and an Alpine art gallery, a place with a large raging fire to snuggle in front of.

Apmel found our Alpine location, and made a story about it ~ 
https://apmel.blogspot.com/2016/10/apmelsprivatabankman-jumped-on-bus-to.html

Race Day ..... poem

Race Day

With a huge hollow tree, unique

towering high over the town

Lava Tree folk held an annual race

which drew in heaps of renown

With a race like no other, ever

held every last Sunday in May

the folk would test their wit and mirth

in a most unusual way

Crowds gathered in town from miles around

some to race, and some to rage

and news hounds came too, with cameras

to report from the country stage

The sheep parade came first

to select the prettiest ewe in the land

freshly washed wool, and coloured ribbons

made them all fluffy, alluring and grand

Then came time for the unexpected

with the sheep that were taught a tune

trained to bleat songs with a range of barrrs

they were thunderous when in the mood

As if no act could beat the ewes

the dancing lambs were extra cute

it doesn't take much to make a lamb jump

and prance to a spirited tune

Then the hour came for the race of the day

that all in the town were expectin

when the competing thrones were revealed

the outhouses rigged up for racin

The farmers sat in their dunnies on wheels

with seven strong rams for the pullin

and a dog on their backs for the barkin

to make them go faster than sinin

Poised on the line for a run round the town

the rams all frisky and ready to go

the dogs making circles on the sheep's backs

and the farmers all poised for the show

Never had there been such a colourful field

of outhouse painted like jockey race tops

all of the rainbow, with pennants to fly

and ready, set, go from the stops

Then the pig was released. But why?

There was never a reason, just tradition

to tell the field that its time to fly

to leap to the fore, and no hesitation

Distracted by pig, sheep stood and stared

despite canine bark, snarl and goad

then farmer Maple gained the jump

and her rams were off down the road

But poor farmer Maple was on her back 

in an outhouse now left on the road

as her rough team of rams led the field

and all she could do was go home

Penants a'flyin and outhouses jumpin along

farmer Cripes missed the turn with a streak

takes to the air like a mythical god

and makes a mighty splash into the creek

At the turn by the tree, farmer Muddle

left the road, where the rams ran inside

the hollow tree, which was busy

where squeals and screams ends his ride

Surviving outhouses were flying with zest

in a cloud of barks and barrrs

where farmer Doom took to the lead

until losing a wheel midst a flock of galahs

The home stretch came into sight

with crowd roaring the teams along

dogs barking with all the  excitement

as rams barrred louder and strong

The finish line ribbon was snapped

and the winner awarded the prize

in tradition a tiny outhouse, in bronze

as a reminder of a jolly good ride

So ends the Lava Tree race day

with everyone gone to the bar

singing songs from the old days

leave'n the sheep outside to barrr

Jaqi

Bluh

Saturday

8

December

2018

NOTE ~   A great day!!! This is poem number 21 in the Poems Galley. If you haven't read ~ Lava Tree ~ it may help if you do, as this poem is the second in a series about a country town with a very large hollow tree.

"With the invention of indoor plumbing, outhouses have mostly become a thing of the past. Yet many frontier cities in the United States still hold an affection for the wooden sanctuary, paying it a special kind of homage each year."

http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20130605-toilets-take-to-the-streets-in-annual-us-outhouse-races

And there be rules for Outhouse Racing in the Iowa State Fair ~

https://www.iowastatefair.org/upl/downloads/participate/contests/fairtime-contests/outhouse-races.pdf

While asking Mr Google about “outhouse racing”, try the Images, and you will see that it even happens on the snow.

And in Canada.

I like the steam train version.

And a TARDIS.

And one loo in a prison cell.

Toilet paper for a finnish line.

Will there be outhouse racing in space? ~

https://www.boreme.com/posting.php?id=38953&src=pin-toilet-lift-off

And also ~

https://www.businessinsider.com.au/video-portable-toilets-make-surprisingly-good-rockets-2014-12

There’s a whole other world out there in the crystal ball for outhouses …..

When living in Murdunna in the 1980s, the owner of the service station in Dunalley asked me to make a drawing from his house across Boomer Bay. It was quite a wonderful scene. But round to the right, in awesome view, was an outhouse on a an upraised platform as high as the outhouse. Ummm. I wrote a poem about that, on the spot, likening it to a rocket on the launch-pad, ready to go into space. Later, after receiving the drawing, and paying for the artistry, the service station owner went home with his sketched prize, and after a while, notice the poem that I had left behind. Well, that's one way to crack somebody up (which means, to make them laugh).

Listening ..... poem

Listening

OK, I hear you
so, please speak
and tell me your story
What happened up the creek?

Saw a car in Mountain Creek, one day
with a number plate that read "UP THE"
took me 3 seconds to get that
the car was UP THE creek

Sorry, it was your turn
you were going to say
something about XXXX
and the barbed wire way

of building a canoe
that can also leak
and no paddle needed
what a crazy feat

I'm listening
do tell
I won't interrupt
it was a bit like hell

that proverbial creek
no place to be
without a paddle
and leaking free

It's up the hill now
without a creek
but it was up for a time
in Mountain Creek

A canoe, you say
that's quite a whopper
made of XXXX
and wired up with copper

So what's ya story
I'll stop to hear
promise to listen
would ya like a beer?


Jaqi
Bluh

Thursday

6
December
2018

NOTE ~   Have you ever met anyone who talks, and talks, and talks? They never seem to stop. They can be very nice people, but they are compulsive speakers, and they are not always very keen on listening. Or, have you been in a crowd and tried to catch on to a story being told, only to hear disjointed fragments, hear enough to know there is a story, but not hear or get the full story. This poem is a bit about both of those things. And the poem is twisted into a story about an old expression, called “up the creek”, or “up the creek without a paddle”, or “up shit creek without a paddle”. When I made a barbed wire canoe in Tasmania in 2005, I began investigated the origin of the saying. The Wiktionary description below sums up what I found at the time, except for the detail that I had built a barbed wire canoe, to fit the Australian version, “up shit creek in a barbed wire canoe without a paddle”. So, where did the "barbed wire" come from? An extensive search showed no evidence for the “barbed wire” addition, until an Australian movie called The Adventures of Barry McKenzie. I once wrote to the Producer of the movie, Phillip Adams, but he could shed no light on whether barbed wire was added to the saying for the movie. On the long running Late Night Live show on Radio Nation on the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Commission), hosted by Adams, he would often use the polite version of the earthy saying, with “inadvertently detained in the upper reaches of a proverbial creek in a well-known means of conveyance without any method of propulsion”. When moving to Brisbane in 2007, so did the barbed wire canoe, and then north to Caboolture, and then to Mountain Creek on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast, further north of Brisbane. So, my barbed wire canoe has genuinely been “up the creek”. How many barbed wire canoes built by crazy artists can boast that? The canoe returned to Tasmania in 2015, and now sits up the hill above Ross, overlooking the town, but with no creek. Have barbed wire canoe, will travel, even up the creek.

My investigations revealed a separate origin for “up the creek without a paddle”, in the United States of America, referring to a paddle steamer getting stuck on a sand bar. I also looked into the origin of barbed wire, but could find no use of “barbed wire” in the US version of the term, before the Australian movie, The Adventures of Barry McKenzie.

XXXX ~   This is a Brisbane beer, and is also a slang term for barbed wire, and other expressions involving 4 letters.

Up the creek without a paddle ~   "This phrase may have come from England's Haslar Creek in Portsmouth harbour, a 'salt' creek. (It may also be the origin of the alternative 'up shit creek'.) Wounded sailors during the time of Admiral Horatio Lord Nelson (1771–1805), were taken there to be transported to the Royal Naval Hospital in Haslar to die or recover. The ships moored up in the Solent and the wounded soldiers were transported up Haslar creek by tramline hence 'Up the creek without a paddle'. They were held prisoner so that they would not desert while being treated, and some tried to escape by going through the sewers to the creek (another suggested origin of the alternative 'up shit creek'). Without a paddle this would be hopeless, hence the phrase 'up the creek (without a paddle)' to mean being trapped, stuck or in trouble. Some very obscure navy related jargon entered the popular culture of the seafaring peoples of the British Isles, and thus entered the English language as a whole.”

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/up_the_creek

Haslar Royal Naval Navy Hospital

https://www.qaranc.co.uk/haslarroyalnavalhospital.php

The Adventures of Barry McKenzie

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Adventures_of_Barry_McKenzie

Barbed wire canoe in Ross, Tasmania ~

Silence ~ Tasmanian Times

The poem ~ Silence ~ has now been published in the Tasmanian Times ~

https://tasmaniantimes.com/2018/12/kim-peart-silence/

Buried Man dead and buried

Now the Buried Man art region is truely dead and buried. ~ All gone. ~ I was so looking forward to making more art images there, like the one above, and those below ......... 

Bell ..... poem

Bell



The ferry bell rings 
through the morning fog
ding ding, ding ding
tells other boats it comes
through the briny deep
ding ding, ding ding

The paddle steamer
plied the harbour
where wind-blown waves
white in a sea breeze
whipped in after noon
on many sunny days

The old Double-guts
the Kangaroo
connected West and East
plied the river
for horse and cart
on its river beat

Grandfather went that way
with a cow from the farm
escaped into the lagoon
was caught again
and herded hard
to ride the ferry at noon

The great guns at the fort
crossed the river 
on the Double-guts
hauled to their nest
to guard the town
against Russian guns

Years swam by
until the ship died
to fade into history
then the old bell
was a gift to the school
becoming a memory

Hearing that bell as a child
call the school into class
ding ding, ding ding
one day I played the fool
hid in the bushes
ding ding, ding ding

Wandered in later
might have been caned
don't remember that displeasure
then the school moved
with a nice loud siren
so the bell became a treasure

Stolen once as a joke
stolen again with intent
when the bell really did escape
never seen for decades
despite many hunts
until seen in a dead man's estate

Far across country
north of Bass Strait
the buyer knew where it belong
gifted to the Maritime Museum
who were quite pleased 
until my old school came along

"That's our stolen bell!"
the teachers cried
and students wondered what was there
like Solomon's baby
a deal was struck
between school and museum to share

So the treasure returned
a circle through time
ding ding, ding ding
an echo of history
from an earlier age
ding ding, ding ding


Jaqi
Bluh

Monday
3
December
2018

Note ~ I never knew the Kangaroo, it was gone before my time, but I knew the bell, as a child, in the old Bellerive School, which may reveal my age. I went in search of the bell from the Kangaroo when seeking to found a local history museum in Bellerive in the 1990s ~ and could not find it. The bell had gone to Victoria, north across Bass Strait, but now it's back, to give form to its story, and a solid brass window into history. Looking at the photos, it is interesting to know and see that this ferry was a paddle steamer, but with only one wheel, concealed in the central area: and also that the ferry was a catamaran, with twin hulls. During its life, the Kangaroo, or the Double-guts, as it was popularly known as, served to transport people, animals and wagons across the River Derwent, between Hobart and Bellerive, in Tasmania, the island state of Australia. During the fear of a Russian invasion of Australia in the 1880s, forts were built around the harbour, including the Kangaroo Bluff Battery in Bellerive. The great guns for the battery at Bellerive were made in Scotland, transported to Hobart by ship, carried across the river on the Kangaroo, and were then hauled to the Kangaroo Bluff Battery, where two can still be seen. In a poetic twist, the Russian threat vanished when the emerging Japanese Empire defeated the Russians in a naval battle. Before the Second World War, scrap metal was being sold off to the Japanese, and two of the smaller guns were blown up at the Fort. This sent a shock-wave through the mudstone of the bluff, and cracks up through the brick house near-by. As a consequence, no more blowing up was permitted, so the two large guns have survived. When the smaller guns were blown up, pieces of metal rained down all over Bellerive, with some falling into the school playground, not far from the Fort. One piece of metal struck a duck, killing it, which is the only known death from the great guns that defended Hobart. When my art studio was in an old shop in Bellerive, I would walk around the Bluff, were Darwin once walked on his World cruise on the Beagle, and go to the Fort as dusk fell, as the stars appeared above, and as the lights of the harbour were spread around like a great twinkling necklace. One day I was lying there, by one of the old gun emplacements, and I thought, that is not a stone. And it wasn't. I had found a piece of metal from when the guns were blown up for the Japanese war machine. The Japanese did visit Hobart during WWII, flying a plane from a submarine, and soldiers stationed at the Fort duly shot at it, but the plane survived and returned to the submarine waiting out at sea.

Graphic ~ I found a really good looking brass bell in the Second Life Market Place, but that was only an image to advertise a sound. Rats. So then I bought a sculpt of a bell, lacking a texture, and applied a colour as best I could. The water wheel on my house is reminiscent of the single paddle wheel in the centre of the Kangaroo.

"In 1926 the bell off the paddle steamer P.S. Kangaroo was presented to the school by James O’May and was hung at the main entrance and was used to signify special times during the school day. Unfortunately the bell was stolen from the Leslie St site however was found again in 2013 and donated to the Maritime Museum. While the Museum owns the bell the school is the custodian of it and it can be viewed in the administraion area of the school.” ~

https://belleriveprimary.education.tas.edu.au/SitePages/history.aspx

Sedja Gallery

At the Sedja Gallery I have a photo essay of the show ~ Naked with a Chair ~ created by Mind Carlberg. And in the Sedja Sky Gallery above, I have an exhibition of ancient nude photos. To follow that, I have been gathering images of the nude in art, from ancient times, until now, and looking into the future. In this journey I have found many renditions of the Greek myth, Leda and the Swan. So now I am seeing how many works in the theme of this myth I can find. At this stage I can see that enough could be found to go into the Sky Gallery ~ over 200 images. This really follows on from writing the poem about Leda and the Swan ~ Feathers ~ where there are question to explore. Are depictions of this myth in one way, religious art. Not just myth, or erotic. Exploring this theme could raise the question of the nature of religious art. Of the religious experience when it rises to ecstatic, to bliss. What is the meaning of this?

Should we consider the experience of Saint Teresa .....

"Beside me, on the left, appeared an angel in bodily form. . . . He was not tall but short, and very beautiful; and his face was so aflame that he appeared to be one of the highest rank of angels, who seem to be all on fire. . . . In his hands I saw a great golden spear, and at the iron tip there appeared to be a point of fire. This he plunged into my heart several times so that it penetrated to my entrails. When he pulled it out I felt that he took them with it, and left me utterly consumed by the great love of God. The pain wasso severe that it made me utter several moans. The sweetness caused by this intense pain is so extreme that one cannot possibly wish it to cease, nor is one’s soul content with anything but God. This is not a physical but a spiritual pain, though the body has some share in it—even a considerable share." ~ Saint Teresa

https://courses.lumenlearning.com/zeliart102/chapter/berninis-ecstasy-of-st-teresa/