I raved about it for months, but never posted. I went to France for the first time in April. I won't go on pathetically about it in a long post like I did Germany. However, there are lovely pictures up, now adequately annotated:
Paris proper Photos
Day Trip to St Denis
Day Trip to Versailles
Saturday, May 31, 2008
Thursday, May 15, 2008
A little Bush revisionism for the day
I don't typically post from work, but someone pointed me at this and I cannot help but make a note for posterity.
This morning our completely inept and uneducated President made the following bizzare statement:
"And that is why the president of Iran dreams of returning the Middle East to the Middle Ages and calls for Israel to be wiped off the map."
I cannot even begin to ponder what he was thinking. At what point in the Middle Ages was "Israel" to be wiped off the map by Islamic Persians or Islam at all? Aside from the very creative historical revisionism he's engaged in, let's all just ponder to ourselves what the damage such rhetoric has.
This morning our completely inept and uneducated President made the following bizzare statement:
"And that is why the president of Iran dreams of returning the Middle East to the Middle Ages and calls for Israel to be wiped off the map."
I cannot even begin to ponder what he was thinking. At what point in the Middle Ages was "Israel" to be wiped off the map by Islamic Persians or Islam at all? Aside from the very creative historical revisionism he's engaged in, let's all just ponder to ourselves what the damage such rhetoric has.
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
A few interesting finds this morning.
In the midst of panic over a daunting book review, I took some time to clean out my history feeds in Google Reader. Waiting for me was an exciting article on a new hoard found in Sweden. Composed mostly of English and Danish coins, this hoard represents a fairly significant amount of medieval English silver. There are a few rare German coins apparently as well, but no indications which ones.
Also of interest was the discovery of the Nero era walls at Köln (Germany) during - not surprisingly - a train tunnel dig.
I've moved this blog over from Livejournal in an attempt to make better sense of my money spending. I feel a slight pang of guilt over this move considering that I've been a loyal LJ consumer for well on eight years now. This will be a better imposition on my pocket book, however.
flop.org has also moved to a cheaper home - namely Google Apps (free!). I highly recommend it.
Also of interest was the discovery of the Nero era walls at Köln (Germany) during - not surprisingly - a train tunnel dig.
I've moved this blog over from Livejournal in an attempt to make better sense of my money spending. I feel a slight pang of guilt over this move considering that I've been a loyal LJ consumer for well on eight years now. This will be a better imposition on my pocket book, however.
flop.org has also moved to a cheaper home - namely Google Apps (free!). I highly recommend it.
Sunday, December 9, 2007
On silence
I'm going to force myself to write something up since it's been so many months of radio silence. A lot has happened in my life, exciting and new things, and all of them are great. Classes continue, although my medieval images class is done. Overall I think it went very well, and I certainly enjoyed the class immensely. I have just one final exam left for my history of Christianity class and then the semester shall be completed.
About two months ago I started dating a lovely guy, someone I had a crush on for a long time. We had met long ago at a previous workplace but we were both distracted by other things (work and relationships). Fate threw us together once more and the result has been awesome. He helped me bake and put up Christmas lights. We've gone hiking, climbing, and traveling together. In January we're going to Hawaii. I can hardly put into words how happy I've been so far.
The current phase of the house remodel is done. The pictures are up for all to see. So far so good, except that one of the toilets leaks and my roof needs repair. No, the two aren't related, but it is so close to Christmas it makes me nervous!
We're eagerly anticipating good snow in the mountains for snowboarding.
About two months ago I started dating a lovely guy, someone I had a crush on for a long time. We had met long ago at a previous workplace but we were both distracted by other things (work and relationships). Fate threw us together once more and the result has been awesome. He helped me bake and put up Christmas lights. We've gone hiking, climbing, and traveling together. In January we're going to Hawaii. I can hardly put into words how happy I've been so far.
The current phase of the house remodel is done. The pictures are up for all to see. So far so good, except that one of the toilets leaks and my roof needs repair. No, the two aren't related, but it is so close to Christmas it makes me nervous!
We're eagerly anticipating good snow in the mountains for snowboarding.
Sunday, October 14, 2007
A few updates
I've been spending most of my time studying and preparing for assignments in class. I have an ardent desire to get things right. I gave a semi-decent short talk on the movie Becket in its historical context. Considering I had the flu I suppose it went alright. Now I'm slugging through a few hundred years of Gnosticism, Christian apologetics and the Bible. To all that I have added 10-12 hours days at work. Better men than I have been crushed under less.
I did have a wonderful little surprise while sitting in the Starbucks last week, despite nearly dumping a large non-fat latte all over myself. While reading for class Henry Chadwick's The Early Church (a rather short book for good old Chadwick as he's rather prolific and I wonder if he sleeps), I discovered a little hint of jolly goodness. He references Pope Gregory the Great giving filings from St Peter's chains to the "barbarians" You can imagine my surprise at just randomly coming upon these words out of the blue. I proclaimed something aloud that must have been rather ridiculous since all the Microsofties and Zeitgeisters looked at me funny. While following up (turns out Gregory gave some filings to Recared) I happened upon a letter to Constantina Augustus, indicating that Gregory sent links to her in Constantinople. Another reference indicates they were kept in the "great church" (probably Hagia Sophia). So... what happened to them? Did they get taken in the Fourth Crusade? Apparently not as they were spotted in the 15th century, not in the west, by an Armenian pilgrim. Thus I have to conclude, no, they weren't taken back to the west. So, chains from Hagia Sophia, where have you gone? Are you waiting for me in Vienna? :-)
I did have a wonderful little surprise while sitting in the Starbucks last week, despite nearly dumping a large non-fat latte all over myself. While reading for class Henry Chadwick's The Early Church (a rather short book for good old Chadwick as he's rather prolific and I wonder if he sleeps), I discovered a little hint of jolly goodness. He references Pope Gregory the Great giving filings from St Peter's chains to the "barbarians" You can imagine my surprise at just randomly coming upon these words out of the blue. I proclaimed something aloud that must have been rather ridiculous since all the Microsofties and Zeitgeisters looked at me funny. While following up (turns out Gregory gave some filings to Recared) I happened upon a letter to Constantina Augustus, indicating that Gregory sent links to her in Constantinople. Another reference indicates they were kept in the "great church" (probably Hagia Sophia). So... what happened to them? Did they get taken in the Fourth Crusade? Apparently not as they were spotted in the 15th century, not in the west, by an Armenian pilgrim. Thus I have to conclude, no, they weren't taken back to the west. So, chains from Hagia Sophia, where have you gone? Are you waiting for me in Vienna? :-)
Sunday, September 23, 2007
Last rants....
I upgraded iTunes today and plugged in my iPhone to buy/download Paramore's song "Misery Business" (btw, I think the video for this really sucks; she has a great voice but absolutely no stage presence). That's when I noticed that there are now ringtones in iTunes (yes mentally I knew this, but hadn't put it to practice). I am sadly disappointed. I have all of Depeche Mode's albums, legally in many^20 copies, and I can't make ringtones out of them!^#@%*& Yet the iTunes store tells me it has ringtones for all of them. I'm seriously underwhelmed about this. Maybe tonight I shall install the hacked up stuff and figure that all out. But honestly, I just want super mario ring tones.
I gave in. I'm now on facebook. If you are, you should add me (argv@gmail.com or hadkins@google.com).
And with that, I'm off to dinner with Mike.
I gave in. I'm now on facebook. If you are, you should add me (argv@gmail.com or hadkins@google.com).
And with that, I'm off to dinner with Mike.
House Remodel
Phase 1 of the house remodel is done minus some curtains in the "red room" and the ceiling light (being installed very soon!). Project entailed: paint in the old pink/green rooms, new baseboards everywhere upstairs but the master, new doors and hardware, replacing the closet doors in the 3 guest bedrooms, furniture in the red room and "interesting features".
Green Room - The green room used to be pink, barbie pink, and was awful awful awful. I said to Sheila [from Harrell Remodeling]: "Japanese Zen" and she came up with the neatest idea for shoji screens and wooden beams along the top of the ceiling. These beams project light up into the vaulting to make it seem more bright and airy. The screens were made locally and the "fill" is a product called Lumicore:
Shoji over the Window:
Shoji over the closet:
Beams and lights projecting:
Adorable reading lights:
Hallway - the upstairs hallway isn't terribly interesting but this is a good place to talk about the door replacements and the new hardware. This will be what we use throughout the house:
Red Room - this room used to be neon green with brass mirrored closet doors. It's now red. Only half of the ceiling used to "slant" so that was evened out. We added lights in this room (as with the green) as there were none at all! Sheila had in mind to make this a very medieval room but we've toned that down a bit to keep with my desire for simplicity. The light that will go in that room is very medieval though, she won me over on that!:
Beams on the ceiling to carry on the theme:
Fun little furniture (the painting is one I bought in Ireland and I've been remiss not to frame it yet):
New closet doors:
Green Room - The green room used to be pink, barbie pink, and was awful awful awful. I said to Sheila [from Harrell Remodeling]: "Japanese Zen" and she came up with the neatest idea for shoji screens and wooden beams along the top of the ceiling. These beams project light up into the vaulting to make it seem more bright and airy. The screens were made locally and the "fill" is a product called Lumicore:
Shoji over the Window:
 |
| From House Remodel... |
Shoji over the closet:
 |
| From House Remodel... |
Beams and lights projecting:
 |
| From House Remodel... |
Adorable reading lights:
 |
| From House Remodel... |
Hallway - the upstairs hallway isn't terribly interesting but this is a good place to talk about the door replacements and the new hardware. This will be what we use throughout the house:
 |
| From House Remodel... |
Red Room - this room used to be neon green with brass mirrored closet doors. It's now red. Only half of the ceiling used to "slant" so that was evened out. We added lights in this room (as with the green) as there were none at all! Sheila had in mind to make this a very medieval room but we've toned that down a bit to keep with my desire for simplicity. The light that will go in that room is very medieval though, she won me over on that!:
Beams on the ceiling to carry on the theme:
 |
| From House Remodel... |
Fun little furniture (the painting is one I bought in Ireland and I've been remiss not to frame it yet):
 |
| From House Remodel... |
New closet doors:
 |
| From House Remodel... |
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