Thinking... the garden has had enough water for now!
It's been chucking it down all day. Cats can't go out and I just got soaking wet from cycling 400 meters to the supermarket and 400 back!
Wearing a woolly hat to keep my hair dry and my thick winter jacket which is water resistant.
Totally insane at this time a year. I cannot recall ever having this weather in May before.

Then had to scoop a ton of moss out of the garage's gutter as it was clogged by it. Took me 10 mins.

My jeans soaked, can almost wring out my winter jacket and my woolly hat.
Thursday we're going to get more rain...
I worked so hard on a new section of my garden, at this rate it's all going to chit!

Thank you!

I got myself a new Christmas tree last year, the old one had had it. That was large, so is the new one :)
I too love having it up, cosy lighting etc, but it does take away quite a lot of light where I'm usually sat so at a certain point I'm fed up with that.

Thank you so much, Merry!

Happy to hear you enjoyed seeing the progress of the painting!
I've got the seascape up on a wall. Made space for that one, haha. Had to take another one down as I simply don't have free wall space anymore.

You're kidding me?! No Christmas trees allowed after my birthday!! Which was May 13th.

Thank you so much, Sir!
I keep challenging myself the last couple of years so I'm learning new techniques, how to paint new things etc. I really enjoy that!

Thank you, Julie :)

Enola Holmes 1 & 2.
I really enjoyed them!

Thank you, Julie :)

I now see I never got to post the finished version of the other one as the forum wasn't accessible for quite some time.

This is the Scottish landscape finished:




And I did another one after that, a seascape :)
Somewhere off the coast of Guernsey.

Thank you, JaanDoh!
I have been thinking to at some point have them published as an oracle card deck.
At first I didn't have enough paintings, but now I do :)

----------------------------

My latest painting, not entirely finished but close to...

I started a new painting a couple of days ago, based on the beautiful roses and daisies that are flowering in my garden.

This is the first session, trying to paint in yet a different style than I've ever done before. I was in doubt when done with this, I'm not really a flower painter either, but seeing it the next morning I felt I could really work with this!





Second session I had this:





Right now, after the 4th session, I got this and I'm really happy with it. I will add a few more things, then I will call it a finished painting :)

Right before the war began and tensions were very high, I looked up what it was all about.
If that was correct, it is the US that caused this.

What I read... Ukraine wants to be part of the west and as such it had to join NATO, whether it wanted that or not.
NATO = US basically, forcing other countries to allow their military bases and meddling in the member countries.

If Ukraine would join the west and for that had to join NATO America could also have bases on Russia's doorstep and Russia did not want that.
Can you blame them?
I can't. Quite logical. You don't want your arch enemy that close, within shooting and spying distance.

The whole "join the west, MUST join NATO & MUST allow military bases" is what caused this shizzel to occur.

If Russia had had a similar thing with Mexico and would then be able to have Russian military bases on America's doorstep we'd have a war as well.
America would go ballistic, just like what happened with Russia & Ukraine.

They could've sorted it, saved everyone a helluva lot of money and save a lot of lives if a compromise had been made:
Allow Ukraine to join the west to trade etc. WITHOUT the military bases.

Again, if this info is correct then I totally understand why Russia did what it did.
Doesn't mean I agree with this war or what has happened and is happening, but I do agree America should take its finger out of every pie in the world.

As it is there aren't even a handful of countries that could take on America if need be.
Russia is one of them.

The ones that want & try to control the world also reside in the US for a big part, although these days I do suspect also in the EU.
That means we cannot have the US be all-powerful.

Personally I'm not chuffed about the opposing countries that (can) keep the balance, but without them America would be way too powerful.

In any case, based on that info I read, this war could have been prevented if only a compromise was reached. For instance no NATO bases in Ukraine.
I believe Russia would have agreed, albeit cautiously.
I believe the only reason it escalated is that America refused to even think of backing down from having military bases in Ukraine.

This whole "Yes, join the west, it's great!!" thing is just a (American) power scheme to get military bases in as many countries as possible.
The ultimatum of "yes you can join, but only if you allow our bases" is sheer manipulation and part of a carefully construed plan.

At least Russia is smart enough to see that.

The result of that scheme is what has been going on in Ukraine since.

Ooooh, that's a bummer! Hopefully you'll succeed at getting another one!

Thank you, Julie :)

Thank you so much, Merry! I came across a photo of a Scottish landscape and that's what I'm painting :)

I totally missed that, haven't been here for a few days.
Nevertheless, happy belated birthday, Merry!
I hope it was a memorable day full of joy!

I started a new painting a couple of days ago.
After the first session I felt like it wasn't gonna go anywhere and I considered Gesso-ing over it.
But I gave it another try and suddenly I felt it coming along :)

Lots of work left to be done of course. Third session today and it's beginning to get some "body" now.

I don't have to search on the conditions they live in in such countries as I've lived in one for 2 years.
I've seen it up close and personal every day.
I've seen people whose home was a cardboard box. Not kidding. Family with young kids.
I've been to a kampung (domestic village) that they then made sure was really tidy and clean so it'd look its best. Their homes prettied up with some drapes and stuff, not even the size of my bedroom, and trust me, my bedroom isn't big.
No electricity, no clean running water, no loos or showers, no washing machines and so on.

Our driver lived in a one-room-house which was quite normal and he had it better than most as his salary was relatively high.
Yet during rain season there often were floods that went through his and other people's home and this also meant snakes would come up.
Then the whole family had to sleep on something higher, like a table, to stay dry and safe.
The next day they still have to show up at work in clean clothes and look the part.

May be sad, but don't forget it's their normal. Bear in mind we lived in very similar circumstances ourselves not that long ago.
Both here in Europe as well as the colonists in the US.

It's also not our responsibility but their country's government's.
About half the world lives in similar way that we deem unlivable in spite of the billions the western world has pumped into them for over half a century.

I also know from living there (my stepfather was high up, had contacts in government etc.) that most of those billions truly never reach the people they were meant to reach.
It disappears directly into the pockets of the already rich & powerful. Mostly the ones running the country & rest of government.

All we're doing is milking our own poorest people to give for those poor people over there while in actual fact those hard-earned dollars only feed the rich over there.
So it's our poor lining the pockets of the rich over there.

As Gerard Butler said in the movie: "And that's the ugly truth!"

I don't typically watch scary movies as they scare me too much.
But tonight I watched "Willow Creek".
I think a very low budget movie and yet it scared the Bejesus out of me.

Clear. Thanks for taking the time to explain :)


This is normal as the pay in such countries is lower due to cost of everything there being lower too.
That's exactly the reason why many have people from such countries do our work. Helluva lot cheaper than paying their own people.
And probably no sick pay, no pension, no unemployment benefit, and healthcare costs either. All stuff an employer over here would immediately get.
People often don't understand those things.

This is from the net:
Is it cheaper to live in the Philippines or the US?
The cost of living is significantly lower in the Philippines than in the United States. The average cost of living for an individual is 72.4% lower than in the United States. For a family, the average cost of living is 68.9% lower in the Philippines than in the United States.

To be honest, I didn't know mods got paid, even if a little.
I thought you mods always said it was volunteers work.
It would stand to reason you would get some form of reward considering the amount of work & time is involved in moderating a large forum. But I do recall you (former) mods saying it was volunteering.

No matter what, it is totally rude to just cut people off without any notification or explanation.

Well, if that's how it's gonna be here now this site will sure go down the tubes very fast as well.
Won't take long for the creeps, bots & scammers to figure out there's no one monitoring the site.