Summons stones lost!

I found my stone on the beach, Sandy found hers on the bottom of the sea off the southern Tasmanian coast (well, the D'Entrecasteaux Channel) and Lexie found hers on the top of the Malvern Hills.

And now we have all lost them, well, not lost exactly, but we don't have them anymore.

Please, is you find a stone like this, email me and tell me where and when.

Many, many thanks.

Find out more at

http://marijsak.googlepages.com/thestonesummons

The Stone Summons (ID #1063661): http://www.lulu.com/content/1063661

Order online Paperback book or download

Aurora Australis unleashes southern spectacle – The Mercury, 16 October

Hobart - An explosion on the Sun's surface wowed Tasmanians with a spectacular night sky .

The Aurora Australis, also known as the Southern Lights, was visible from most of the southern half of Tasmania, and it was a truly stunning spectacle.

Astronomer at University of Tasmania Mt Pleasant Observatory at Cambridge, Dr. Kit Saklat, said the lights, which were unusually active, dancing across the night sky, were caused by activity on the Sun that sent gases towards Earth.

"It's basically an explosion on the Sun which throws a cloud of gas outwards. Earth's magnetic field channels it to the north and south poles," he said.

However, some experts have cast doubt on this explanation for the fireworks show, and believe there to be some other cause. At the moment, they are not committing themselves to further explanation.

Find out more at: http://marijsak.googlepages.com/thestonesummons

The Stone Summons (ID #1063661): http://www.lulu.com/content/1063661

Order online Paperback book or download

Thousands watch spectacular fireworks display (breathtaking!) – The Hastings Observer, 15th October

Hastings - Thousands of onlookers packed the the seafront on Saturday night to watch the Hastings Week annual fireworks display.
This year’s display, watched by record crowds along The Esplanade, was truly breathtaking – it was as if the sky itself was taking part, with darting lights and what may have been thunder and lightning. The Hastings Meteorological Station says there was no indication of a storm but there was unusual meteorological action.

One onlooker told The Observer: "It was a fantastic display – surely the best ever. We did wonder if it was the Northern Lights in the sky."

(Our reporter respectfully pointed out that this was unlikely, but to be sure he checked with Hastings Meteorological Station, who confirmed his opinion, but conceded there was definitely some meteorological activity going on, and they had fielded hundreds of phone calls reporting an unusually large waterspout.)

Find out more at http://marijsak.googlepages.com/thestonesummons

The Stone Summons (ID #1063661): http://www.lulu.com/content/1063661

Order online Paperback book or download

Heavenly Firework Display may have been result of activity in Europe's most destructive seismic hotspot. – Kaθημερινη, 16 Οκτωβρίου

Athens - Skies lit up over Southern Greece and the islands, giving rise to the rumour that the Aurora Borealis was once again playing in our skies.

But meteorologist, Christos Nikolaidis, of National Observatory of Athens, Institute of Geodynamics, said that while certainly something unusual was going on, he understood the authorities were awaiting confirmation from The Seismological Laboratory, University of Athens, that in fact the display related to a localised hothouse of seismic activity.

Aurora Borealis is named after the Roman goddess of the dawn, Aurora, and the Greek name. for the north wind, Boreas.

Plutarch gave a description of the northern lights in 467 BC but it may have been a quotation from missing writings of Anaxagoras rather than his own observation: "During seventy days there was an enormous and furious figure in the sky. It was like a flaming cloud, which did not stay at its position but moved windingly and regularly, so that the glowing fragments were flying in all directions and fire was blazing as the comets do. Those fragments came loose during rushing and unexpected movements."

The northern lights occurred one to three times per decade on the horizon of ancient Greece. Altogether dozens of reliable observations of the northern lights are known from the years BC.

There are very few references to the northern lights in the Middle Ages in Europe. Every written text is more or less superstitious and often they are embellished with warlike predictions. The northern lights seen on the 3rd of March, 451 were connected to the historic defeat of Attila at Chalons-sur-Marne, in what is now France.

Often, the blood of martyrs flowing up into the sky was seen in the northern lights. Such was the case when Thomas Becket died in 1177.

Some observations of the aurora borealis in Greece found that the appearances of the phenomenon aurora borealis are not exceptionally rare. These appearances coincide with the years of maximum solar activity and especially 1–2 years after it. Except of two appearances of this phenomenon all the others were observed in Spring and Autumn or near these seasons. The most southerly geographical latitude at which at least hints of the aurora borealis have been observed in Greece is the latitude of 35 N.

For more information on this see
The Stone Summons (ID #1063661): http://www.lulu.com/content/1063661

Order online Paperback book or download

Slideshow Updated!

Heading says it all really, have added some new photos, including one of a sea urchin, under water!

Still no-one has visited from New Zealand, at least, nothing that shows, it is very strange! And no one from the whole continent of Africa.

Haven't had a lot of time lately to add much, such a lot going on, but it will soon be over.

On the other hand, the project (both projects, really) is coming to an end. I would just like to get a visitor from every continent in the world.

If you're reading this and know someone from a country not yet marked on the map of visitors, please email them, and ask them to take a peek. I will record the results here, no matter what else happens. - Σας ευχαριστούμε πάρα πολύ

Sorry, really busy!

Things have been going on, remember on my birthday, my brother Stefan and I saw this tornado. He described it to me and said something about a vortex. I had been meaning to check out this word for ages, because I had heard it earlier. I went online and I found some fascinating sites and information.

Apparently in the US (and in the old USSR) the scientists are experimenting with using weather to fight wars, and change the economy and things like that, really frightening if it is true, but I do know that a lot of what is on the Internet is based on false rumour and conspiracy theories (my brother, lots of our tutors, and my Yiayia, keep on going on about it) so I don't know whether to believe it.

But when I tried to blog some of the information I found out about vortices a couple of days ago, I got hit by a lightning ball! (Well, my PC did) Honestly, and the computer died on me. So I am not blogging about that (please note Artemis, if it was you) but just a few interesting sites I found, which might count towards a science credit - he said hopefully.

Like it says in the Business Week article "There's no shortage of such conspiracy theories on the Internet. Search for "weather warfare" on Google, and you'll get 68,000 hits." [So I just did that search, because this is a 2005 article and I wanted to see how it had grown. If you use the inverted commas to search it as a phrase, you only get 29,200 English hits - but if you just use the terms - 1,940,000 English hits - and a lot less in Greek!]

Κλιματολογικός πόλεμος
Θα ήταν δηλαδή ένα κανονικό Κλιματολογικό Όπλο (Weather Warfare), που θα προκαλούσε απότομη και μεγάλη άνοδο της θερμοκρασίας του πλανήτη μας! ...

New look for ball lightning (September 2003) - News - PhysicsWeb
Ball lightning - a slow-moving ball of light that is occasionally seen at ground level during thunderstorms - has puzzled scientists for centuries. ...physicsweb.org/articles/news/7/9/13 -

Ball lightning - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Ball lightning is an atmospheric phenomenon, the physical nature of which is still controversial. The term refers to reports of a glowing, floating object ...en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ball_lightning - 69k - 30 Jul 2007

The Vortex Theory (wasn't sure if that one was going to work for reasons mentioned above)

And this one didn't work - www.weatherwars.info but I've looked at it before; you can tell what it was about! I have found a link to at least one of the items, posted elsewhere - The Tsumami Called Katrina

http://www.gaiaguys.net/weatherwar.htm

NASA Funds Weather Modification Technology

WEATHER AS A FORCE MULTIPLIER: OWNING THE WEATHER IN 2025MILITARY APPLICATIONS OF WEATHER MODIFICATION

This site has a lot of other links - http://www.freedomdomain.com/weather.html

Who Controls the Weather? - BusinessWeek
Theories about Russian agents steering Hurricane Katrina may be off base, but research into weather manipulation has been going on for decades

Weather Engineering Over North America

12th Birthday

When I blogged before about my birthday I was still thinking about the other things I found out, and forgot to tell you about my birthday, which was really great. I woke really early and it was already hot. I went for a swim and my Pateras came too. After breakfast at the hotel we met Stefan off the ferry, and there were friends and family all day coming with presents and food and eating all day long.

In the evening we went to the taverna. There was this huge thunderstorm and Stefan and I saw a waterspout, tornado sort of thing out in the middle of the water.

The next day we went beachcombing; it was good fun to do it with Stefan, although I like to do it on my own as well. We found sponges that looked as if they had been ripped from the floor of the ocean, loads of driftwood, mis-shapen glass, bits of china, makes you wonder where it all comes from. No treasure though, or bits of galley or other shipwrecks.

I will try and find time to post some photos - but I don't know when!

Maybe not so amazing!

First, I entitled this blog 'Just so amazing!' but I have been thinking about it and now realise it is not so amazing at all, just part of the greater scheme of things, or whatever.

I was chatting online with two friends (e-friends?) one in Tasmania and one in England, and it turned out that we all share the same birthday and we all turned 12 yesterday. (Ευτυχή γενέθλια σε μας / Happy Birthday to us). But it was even weirder than that. You'll be able to read all about it soon, but not until it is over, and I don't know when that will be.

Name Day, Birthday - all in one

Sorry for the lack of blogging but the fires on the mainland made it seem vainglorious to rabbit on about nothing, or mostly nothing. Thank goodness, and all the foreign firefighters who have helped, as well as our own brave firefighters, it all now seems to be under control. So I think it is alright to blog about tomorrow.

Tomorrow is my name day and tomorrow is my birthday. Stefan is coming, but not Yiayia, she says she can't afford it this year, but is saving up for next. I am so looking forward to tomorrow - I feel all jiggly, so I think I will go for a swim.

It is over two weeks now since I mentioned no New Zealand visitors registering on the map, or anyone from Africa - I had hoped that that would stir some activity, but alas no.

For my birthday I would like some people from New Zealand and some from at least one country in Africa to visit my blog. Please.

New Zealand, New Zealand wherefore art thou?

Just had an email from Sandy. (I've put her subject line in the title.) She says this all started when her Dad's cousin emailed her from New Zealand about the blog.

(That's not quite true - it all started with the stones, really, but it was that email that was responsible for our making contact at that point. Interesting to know how it might have happened, because it would have had to have happened, if I hadn't put the picture on the blog)

Anyway, Sandy emailed me and says she was checking the cluster map and it doesn't show anyone from New Zealand. So he didn't even bother to look at the blog! Just passed it to Sandy as she was 'about the same age'. Yet he played a big part! I've suggested she email him and tell him! Well, some of it anyway, she'll have to be careful.

Meanwhile, it would be nice if someone from New Zealand logged on, please!

And I'm a bit short on visitors from Africa, South Africa, Numibia, Tanzania, Malawi, Egypt, Israel, Palestine, Morroco, Tunisia, to mention just a view.

From Sandy (who wasn't flooded)

Floods, landslides hit Tasmania
WILD weather and huge downpours have seen three major valleys flooded in Tasmania, triggering evacuations, car crashes, fires and a dangerous landslide.

Crisis: Tasmanians count losses as floods subside
Damage assessments: Floods ease in Tasmania's northeast
Rivers break: Forty homes evacuated in Tasmania floods
Wild weather: Evacuations as Tasmania flood waters rise

From Lexie (ditto!)

Rail services disrupted
Malvern Gazette, UK - 25 Jul 2007THE torrential rain and floods has had a serious effect on rail services on the line through Malvern, Colwall and Ledbury. Services between Malvern and ...

News Item
Many towns and villages in Malvern Hills district were severely affected by the worst flooding in living memory over the weekend. ...

Tales From The Flood Front Line Sky News, United Kingdom - 22 Jul 2007
Brian Waite, from Malvern, said: "The volume of water that has come down is quite unbelievable. I have been driving for 45 years and I have never, ...

Residents cling on as the flood turns their town into an island Times Online, UK - 22 Jul 2007
The medieval town, which nestles between the Cotswolds and Malvern Hills and holds an annual Water Festival and Mop Fair, is renowned for its timber-framed, ...

Farmers Face Ruin In Flood Disaster (from Malvern Gazette)
Malvern, Worcestershire, news, sport, what's on, leisure, property, jobs, cars and local information, - All from The Malvern Gazette.

Tasmania's Turn!

You may remember, back in July I blogged this:
Calamity!
England drowns and Greece burns! So far, Tasmania appears to be alright.So is it just coincidence.

And now my friend Sandy has sent me this! (from her local paper, The Mercury)

Warnings of more wild weather
THE Bureau of Meteorology has issued a series of weather alerts for the state, which remain valid until midnight on Saturday. Visit our weather site Pics: Huonville under flood

Flooding brings a tide of woe
FLOODING and high winds cut power and flooded homes and businesses across Tasmania yesterday.

Page turning on history book (Kathimerini)

This item amused me.

http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/_w_articles_politics_100010_31/07/2007_86310
"Changes to a controversial primary school textbook, whose content had been deemed to give pupils an inaccurate insight into Greek history, are to be made public in the next few days."

Two things, totally unrelated!

I was doing a search for something, and my blog was in the results!

Alex's Beachcomber Blog: April 2007
ekathimerini.com Lack of trust wipes smile from Greeks .... he had more than a million fireworks. Police think he was going to sell the fireworks ready for ...beachcomber-alex.blogspot.com/2007_04_01_archive.html - 108k - Supplemental Result
- Cached - Similar pages - Note this

I was just scrolling down, checking, and there it was. this is the first time that has happened, so I was quite pleased. (I was g-talking with Barney, my friend in Canada, and he says I am pathetic! He also keeps suggesting unethical tactics for me to increase traffic to my site - like mentioning Harry Potter! - Happy, Barney? But I am not putting it in the keywords.)

The other thing (and I just realised, they are related, in a way, as they were part of the same research) I came across this quotation:
“combines history with technology, earth with fire and water”.

That is what is going on in our lives at the moment, it seems quite spooky!

Calamity!

England drowns and Greece burns!

So far, Tasmania appears to be alright.

So is it just coincidence.

Was talking about it with Laki (he doesn't know the background, at least, I don't think he does, thought sometimes I wonder) and he says there is no such thing as coincidence.

I find that very frightening; what do you think?

Very Interesting!

• You may (or may not!) remember that I was confused, bemused, but interested, to note that even though I knew I had at least one visitor from Tasmania, it didn't show on the map on my site. [ See here ]
  
• I checked it as late as yesterday, and there was a dot in Western Australia, but not on Tasmania. Today, Tasmania is obliterated by a red dot! And the one in Western Australia has disappeared. None-the-less, I am most pleased.

Of course, you can have a look in the left hand column, and click on it to go to an enlargement, but I am preserving the evidence. (Pity I didn't think to do it before!)

Could be quite interesting?

Turns out my lat post has made me unpopular with my classmates. (virtual!) The head of college saw it and thought it a good idea - so we have a project to create a newswiki (under the collar banner, (Φυσικά!) with similar items for each of our home countries. Of course, there are more than one person from some countries (including from Greece) so we must make it more local, but ensure that national items are included as well.

Please Barney, no more complaining emails, texts, GoogleTalk or FaceBook postings! I've got the message, but it is a fait accompli, so live with it. Same goes for the rest of you Int studs.

My poor country is not in a very good state at the moment!

Greek forest fire close to Athens 29 Jun 07

Heatwave fuels Greek forest fires 28 Jun 07

Tourists flee Greek island fires 12 Jul 07
Hundreds of holidaymakers have been evacuated from hotels on the Greek island of Skiathos to escape raging forest fires.

Rescue operation : Fifteen people were safely rescued early yesterday when the sailing boat they were traveling on ran aground off the island of Aegean island of Patmos, authorities said.

Passengers unharmed after vessel en route to Aegina catches fire : A hydrofoil full of passengers caught fire yesterday...

Fire threatens homes on Skiathos : A fire that broke out on the island of Skiathos yesterday morning ravaged forestland and forced the evacuation...

Strike shuts down the Acropolis for six days : A strike by archaeological site guards will shut down the Acropolis, the country's most visited monument...

See also Link at the bottom of the page!

Two upmanship?

Lexie, another of my Blog friends, has sent me this photo, she says she may not live by the sea, but she does live in the landscape that inspired Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, Elgar, Mari J Sak, William Langland (Piers Plowman) and many others.

"C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien used to walk on the Malvern Hills. The story goes that, after drinking in a Malvern pub one winter evening, they were walking home when it started to snow. They saw a lamp post shining out through the snow and Lewis turned to his friends and said "that would make a very nice opening line to a book". And so it did. (Wikipedia)

Lexie (without knowing the above) took the photo below last winter.

One upmanship!

There has been so much going on lately which I can't really write about, so I apologise for not doing anything on the blog. Just thought I would take a moment to mention that through my blog I have made a number of new friends; I was talking to two of them about going out looking for some sea urchins, because I wanted my mitera to prepare them for supper - and I couldn't find any. So one of them, Sandy in Tasmania, has emailed me a photo of a sea urchin shell she found while on a walk on the East Coast of Tasmania. It is interesting, but our shells are a lovely deep purplish blue - and of course, I can't eat the contents of this one. (Sandy, don't bother telling me there were no contents, I do realise!)

Uncanny? Coincidence?

This is the kind of thing that keeps happening, and I find it quite scary.

I had been working on the Internet for school, and as I went to close the browser I found behind it this window open which was offering demos of free screensavers, and the one highlighted was a tornado at sea!

Is it a warning, or a clue, or simply a coincidence? It seems too uncanny to be a coincidence. I need to check with the others.

Weather woes may be due to natural change

http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/_w_articles_politics_100019_22/05/2007_83672
A report in Ekatathimerini says volatile weather conditions across Greece in the last few weeks, including some of the highest May temperatures recorded in the last 47 years, could be due to abrupt seasonal changes rather than the greenhouse effect, according to a leading weather expert.

Since 47 years ago higher temperatures were recorded, either he is right, or global warming started long before the governments jumped on the band-wagon. (My brother Stefan says "global - globalisation, may be some sort of Freudian clue here"; probably he knows what he means!)

But then there is the other question, which I have already referred to several times. Those who know, will know what I am referring to.

• Freaky Weather
• Earthquake excitement
• Weather

Freaky Weather

I am sitting here thinking about what to say. Things seem to be getting serious. I have had another email from my friend who sent me a link. To both of us, it seems too much of a coincidence, not global warming or climate change, but 'them'. I don't even dare name them, in case it draws their attention. I did think about putting it in code, or maybe in Greek, but whileI was thinking about it, my stone, which was (and is) in my shorts pocket, turned so cold my leg is still aching. So now I will just call them - 'them'. Luckily my friend wasn't hurt or anything (this time!) but she is finding it quite freaky, though it could turn out to be useful.

Hippocampus Zebra

Someone from Tasmania has sent me an aerogramma

with a picture of a rare seahorse, so I don't think I am likely to find one around here, but I thought I would share it with you.

Seahorses are chameleons (not the lizards, like the lizards!) and can change colour to avoid detection.

Earthquake excitement

Very tired today, as we didn't get much sleep last night. I was hunting about down among the rocks near the beach yesterday afternoon when there was this odd wave, or anyway, movement of water, right out in the bay, then last night we had these tremors. Nobody was hurt, according to our newspaper, but Baba had to go to work to check out the IT system (and help calm the grockles - alright, I know I said I was going to call them barbarians but that doesn't seem very nice, and Baba was reading my blog and he liked grockles, so, to spiti mas, they are grockles.)

I was looking on the web and remembered this site I'd seen before; it took me a while to find it, but I checked and yesterday there were 8 recorded earthquakes in Greece. Couldn't tell which one was ours looking quickly, will check them all out later. (You have to click on the Richter scale to get to the information.)

You might have to be quick if you want to look at this site, well, unless you want to register:
"We kindly inform you that the AlertMap, RSS, CAP, Google Earth, email and WAP services provided by RSOE EDIS are only accessible with registration after 15th May 2007. Without the registration only the graphical map with icons will be available without detailed information. Please register at the REGISTRATION page, due to the fact that access rights are being authorized manually. "

May already!

May 5th already, and I haven't written anything since April 30th. There are reasons for this, walks, parades and picnics for May Day, school work, and a slowdown in people contacting me re the blog.

I think anyway, I have almost completed the assignment, I just need to write the final report, so if anyone would like to add comments or email me, especially with something I could use in the final report, I would be very grateful.

I will add bits and pieces if and when I can find time, it just seems to be flying past so fast at the moment, it is difficult to keep up.

Speaking of time flying, I was checking that newspaper for the earth's rotation article and found a generic address, with other articles on weather; I imagine the earth's rotation one will be added in due course. (Probably Monday!)

Weather

I meant to go beachcombing after the thunderstorm and gather some items so I could add them to the blog but there has been so much happening I didn't manage it, and when I did go quickly there didn't seem to be anything of interest.

But someone I know (well, not really know, am in touch with) sent me some interesting links to do with weather after she saw my post. (It is a photo, and I used software to change it into a painting; I was working on it for Art & Design but I think it has lost something along the way.)

Anywhichway (my Yia-yia says that) this someone is one of the people who has a stone like mine.

Here are the links:
Whirlwinds, Tornadoes, Water Spouts and Dust Devils
By Paul Damari

Hurricanes
By Paul Damari

I have just seen that next week they are looking at the Earth's Rotation - this is getting scary!

Thunderstorm! Θύελλα βροντής

Greek politics forty years on

ekathimerini.com Greek politics forty years on

I am emailing again; because I am reading this, and I have posted this Lack of trust wipes smile from Greeks last Saturday and didn't even realise that it was the anniversary!

And so I thought also I include a bit more onTheodorakis. (Sorry to all the tutors who don'tlike Wikipedia but you can correct it, if you find something wrong, at least, I think you can.)

Μίκης Θεοδωράκης - Mikis Theodorakis (b. July 29, 1925, Greek island of Chios)
"He has consistently opposed oppressive regimes and was a key voice against the Greek Junta 1967 - 1974."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikis_Theodorakis

Karaghiozi

Did I mention I thought my stone (sorry, Stone) looked more like Karaghiozi - he is a shadow puppet, he is on the radio (how can that be, you wonder) and travelling shows come to the island (and other others, of course). (Not E.T.)

You can find more information here if you are interested.

Some people (and websites!) say we got Karaghiozi from Turkey, duing the reign of the Ottoman Empire, but I think it is the other way round and the reason I think this is because there are shadow puppets in India, as well. Also in India they have a lot of food like ours, which some people again say is from Turkey, but it makes more sense that when we were the underlings and doing the cooking and entertaining, we introduced our own culture, just as Alexandros O Megalos (Αλέξανδρος ο μεγάλος) and his men took our traditions to India.

Well, that's what I think, anyway! (To be honest, I have to tell you that some people called Alexander "the terrible" - we just did that in History but I think he did lots of good things as well, have a look at http://www.mpt.org/programsinterests/mpt/alexander/overview/ )

Apologies!

I was thinking about my blog while I was doing other things and I realised that although it is called 'Beachcomber Blog', because that is what the first one was called, I haven't really included any beachcomber items in it - apart from the story of the kounboloi, and the finding of the stone (somehow, I feel I ought to write 'The Stone').

Then I thought, although it isn't a beachcombing collection, it is a collection, a collection of various IT experiments. But I will try and do something about the beachcombing side - if I can find time with everything else that seems to be going on.

Lack of trust wipes smile from Greeks

ekathimerini.com Lack of trust wipes smile from Greeks

Hi-ho! I don't believe this, but I thought I would do another email blog for the fun of it. Well, maybe I believe it a little, about the government, and about the television being lousy (the reception, as well as the content - luckily we don't watch it much in our house!)

Just think, if I had posted this during the Junta I might have been arrested! Laki knows people who were, just for saying they liked Mikis Theodorakis' music.

Not sure about this, until I publish it, but think if I want keywords will have to edit and add them later.
Well, it's all a

Okay, Εντάξει! I can't show off above until I have posted, and saved. (If then!) But I am going to try.

Hooray! done it!

I had an email from someone in America asking if my Mana would do bed and breakfast - so for this person, and anyone else, here are some sites where you can find that kind of information. [Attention Int.K.vi - I used 2 different search engines - who knows which two?]

Greece Travel Information Lonely Planet Destination Guide
Of all the ancient sites in Greece, Delphi is perhaps the fairest of them all - the one with the most potent 'spirit of place'.

Greek National Tourism Organization - GNTO
Official site offering a travel guide, directory of licensed travel agencies, and photo gallery. Also offers details on tourism policy, events, ...

Greece Travel and the Greek Islands: Greece Hotels guide - Greek ...
Greece Travel and the islands of the Greek seas: Complete Greek islands and Greece Guide with ... Greece, Greek islands, Travel Greek Islands, ...

Around Greece Travel Greek Islands Holidays Greece Hotels Athens ...
Around Greece - Travel Guide to Holidays in Greece and Greek Islands. Around Greece has tourist ... clips added to our Greece Videos section.

Weird, weird & weirder!

Someone else, in England, has a stone the same as mine, and the one in Tasmania; I know it is true, but I don't understand what it is all about. Other strange things have been happening as well.

Today's Find (Actually it was the day before I started the new blog, but I wanted to be dramatic.)

Weirder & more weirder

Twin stones?

Realisation strikes -

I've just realised, when I was playing with changing the dates of posting etc., I was originally blogging to tell you about the 6 degrees.

1. I sent an email to Yia-Yia
2. She sent one to some neighbours
3. They sent one to their son in Malaysia,
4. He sent it it to an ex-workmate colleague in New Zealand
5. Who sent it to his relative in Tasmania (the one that that has a stone the same as mine)
6. Who emailed me back

QED!

Theories of Relativity

I've had another email from my Tasmanian correspondent, and have been told how my email reached them. It really looks like six degrees of separation, but when I was telling Stefan about it before he went back to University, he said the six degrees was to do with being related, a sort of genetic thing, two strangers will have a relative in common, six generations back.

So I showed him my blog on Six degrees of Separation - he wanted to know why no one had emailed him about it! I said I had left him out on purpose, to see if someone else emailed him, to help prove my theory - but that wasn't quite true! I had forgotten to include him.

But it could be interesting, because people like Yia-yia probably didn't email him, because they would think I had, so if he does get an email it will come from someone unrelated and we can track it back to its source, and see if it is within six emails.

(I've only just added the heading for this blog, it just came to me as I was finishing. good, yes?)

Καλό Πάσχα - Happy Easter

Yia-yia from York and Stefan have been home for Easter, so I have been very busy. Have just got back from the ferry, after seeing them off.

The hotel puts on big celebrations for the tourists but there are always some people who think they are being original and like to troop across to the village and join in our local celebrations. My Yia-yia says they call the tourists 'grockles', she said lots of people think it is a West Country (in England, Somerset, Devon etc.) expression, but it has been used in Yorkshire as well for as long as she can remember.

So all those people who tried to claim my koumboloi are 'grockles', and so are the people who came to our Good Friday Mass. Laki said that wasn't very nice, when I told him, and then he said "we always call them ξένοι, or strangers anyway, if we don't call them βάρβαροι" - he laughed when he said that, so perhaps I won't call them grockles, just barbarians.

Laki also told me a good trick for the Αυγό Πάσχας, the eggs we decorate red at Easter time and use like children in England play conkers. (Yia-yia told me that a long time ago, when I was little). Anyway, Laki said I should use boat varnish and mix it with the red dye. I wanted to put a pattern on it, but he said it would take too long, as we would have to let the varnish dry, and then do it again, otherwise the pattern could create fault lines along which it would crack. As it was, we had to cheat and do it early to give the varnish time to dry. Laki put it in his boat shed for me. After I had used it for a bit, it made its own pattern! And it worked, mine cracked everyone else's eggs, so I get all the good luck!

Yia-yia says she loves Easter here best, all the church bells ringing (they don't ring really, not like in England, they clang) and the candles and incense and then firecrackers and bonfires. She says there is a greater sense of joy here. In Skouthaki we have a candlelit procession, and the saint is blessed and then there are bonfires and picnics, and feasts on the beach.

Καλό Πάσχα στην αλήθεια!

Greek investigators probe allegations against crew of sunken cruise ship - International Herald Tribune

Greek investigators probe allegations against crew of sunken cruise ship - International Herald Tribune

So alright, I know this may not be that relevant or interesting; ephemera, as Yia-yia said. I wasn't going to post anything over Easter, because Stefan & Yia-yia are here, but I was showing Yia-yia the blog and something she mentioned made me remember that I hadn't yet tried posting by emailing, which I ought to do if I am to demonstrate the full gamut of IT applications available. (Yia-yia told me to how say that)

We found the headline from the search results that run on the bottom of the page of the blog (in case you haven't noticed them yet!)

Whoops! I've been rumbled!

Don't you think that is a great word - rumbled? I read it in one of my Baba's books when I was staying with Yia-yia in York and I slept in his old bedroom, he has loads of his old children's books still there. I like to read them.

So there I was this afternoon online for an IT Design Session (we do sessions, not lessons) it was a joint one, not a one-to-one, and the tutor had a go at me. After he had emailed me about being relevant and contemporaneous (he said) he was keeping an eye on my blog for the next day or so (he's in the US somewhere) and I hadn't added anything, then suddenly, on the 3rd, there was a blog dated the 1st of April. He actually asked me if I was trying to make an April Fool out of him, but I pointed out that it was past 12 so if I had it would rebound on me, but he said, but it wouldn't have been in his time zone.

Then Barney said but he thought the complaint was that it hadn't been there on the first of April. Saskia said I was just demonstrating the technology, by showing that I could manipulate the date it was posted, and wasn't that part of the idea of my technology. (All our project briefs have been posted to the Intranet.)

Sir wasn't too pleased (and he was quite right) and said that if that was so, I should have included a paragraph to explain what I had done. (Only since that wasn't why I had done it, of course, I didn't think to include said paragraph. - so Sir, you can take this as a kind of apology if you like, and Barney & Saskia, many thanks, truly, for the support!)

Twin stones?

The person in Tasmania sent me another email - I believe now they really do have a stone just like mine. It is sort of frightening.

April Fool's Day

Had an email from my IT tutor, says I have left too long a gap in posting and the art of the blog is in posting everyday and being "relevant and contemporaneous". He also pointed out a typing error - well, I have corrected that! But he did say he liked my use of technology, and had noted that I wasn't 'stagnating' I was adding features to the blog all the time.

So here's contemporaneous, if not relevant:
"A 68-year-old man has been arrested after it was found (by police, but someone must have told them!) he had more than a million fireworks. Police think he was going to sell the fireworks ready for Easter."

Everyone lets of firecrackers after Church, and all through Easter, very noisy, Easter in Greece!

And, since it is 1st April - #94: Tomb of Socrates Found In 1995
the Greek Ministry of Culture announced that during excavation for the Athens metro system, archaeologists had uncovered what they believed to be the tomb of Socrates near the base of the Acropolis. A vase containing traces of hemlock (the poison used to kill socrates) and a piece of leather dating from between 400 and 390 BC were found in the tomb. The news agency Agence France-Presse immediately issued a release about the story. What it didn't realize was that the Greek Ministry was joking, forcing the news agency to issue an embarrassed retraction a few hours later.

[Note for tutor - if I had hyperlinked this to the main article I would have had to include instructions to scroll down, or use ^f to do a search for relevant terminology, by experimenting I found that looking at the comments included the article with a unique url.]

Later - I tried to check out that story of Socrates' tomb, because I find it hard to imagine the Ministry of Culture doing that, but all the accounts I could find are obviously from the same source.

Weirder & more weirder

Okay, the last about emails for now, but this one is really strange, (on at least two counts)

“Hi. My Dad’s cousin in New Zealand emailed me about your blog and when I looked at it, I saw your stone, the one like ET. I have one too. I live in Tasmania (the important bit at the bottom of Australia) and my home is also between two beaches.
Sandy”

Well, how can she have a stone exactly the same as mine, it just a piece of stone, it has definite markings. You can see for yourselves.
[http://beachcomber-alex.blogspot.com/2007/03/todays-find-actually-it-was-day-before.html]

And secondly, like the email from Minnesota, there is nothing on the map showing a visitor from Tasmania. I have thought and thought about this, and I wonder if it is to do with where the ISP is located. I might look into this a bit later.

Judgement of Solomon

I've had a whole raft (I looked that word up, so I know it is right) of emails about the koumboloi!

The first one explained that she was the owner of the koumboloi, she’d lost it while swimming and could I kindly return it to her. There was an address in California (but it wasn't signed Animal Liberator - see previous blog).

Of course, when I opned this, I felt guitly and wondered if I should post it off, or what I should do, then.......

The next email was from a man in Sydney, who said his wife had lost the koumboloi, and they’d appreciate its return. They’d refund the postage.

The third email claiming the koumboloi came from Minnesota (and I can't understand this, because there is nothing on my visitors' map to indicate someone from Minnesota has visited.

So I stopped feeling guilty, because how could I tell who it belonged to, if anyone. I replied to each of them:

“Unfortunately so many people, from so many different countries, have claimed the koumboloi, I feel I am unable to return it to the right person.”

I've even saved it to my drafts, so I can use it again in case I get any more similar emails.

Well, anyway, I was telling my Mitera about this and she said I should add to the reply:
rider “My only other option is to exercise the judgement of Solomon, and divide it amongst you.”

Then she said “Just for the fun of it I’ll get your Father to bring one home from the hotel gift shop, and if anyone accepts Solomon’s judgement we’ll send them a single bead.”

Weird email!

Someone has emailed me complaing about the dead seahorse - so, I can't help that it was dead when I found it! What am I expected to do about it?

But please, keep the mail coming, it makes interesting reading.

So thanks, Animal Liberator, of California

Six Degrees of Separation

When I was telling my parents about this blog (well, I was telling them about the IT project, which meant telling them about this blog) I said that I was going to email friends and family to email their friends and family asking people to visit the blog, so I could build up a chain of visitors, hopefully from across the world.

My Mitera said this reminded her something she had heard, about everyone being related within six links. My Pateras said she had it wrong, and she was thinking of a BBC programme they had seen. But he said there was a theory called "six degrees of separation." I thought this might be quite interesting, and I might be able to track something from the emails (If anyone reading this blog notices any evidence, please let me know. Ευχαριστώ πάρα πολύ.)

I went webwise to see what else I could find out.

"Six degrees of separation is the theory that anyone on the planet can be connected to any other person on the planet through a chain of acquaintances that has no more than five intermediaries."
http://digbig.com/4sbac [Points please, Sir - shortened url]

E-mail Study Corroborates Six Degrees of Separation
By Dan Cho
" Chances are, you don’t personally know any Australian policemen, Estonian archival inspectors or Norwegian army veterinarians. But you could probably get in touch with one of these distant individuals through a friend, or a friend of a friend, or a friend of your friend’s friend. The notion that every person on the planet is separated from everyone else by a chain of about six people has been around for some time. A report published today in the journal Science provides experimental data from the Internet in support of that claim."

And if you want to put it to the test - http://smallworld.columbia.edu/

Today's Find (Actually it was the day before I started the new blog, but I wanted to be dramatic.)

I had a sort of adventure this morning. I was on the beach at Skouthaki. The sky was grey and threatening, and the grey roiling sea, breaking on the wide curve of shingle that formed the shoreline. (Hope my English Language tutor looks at this, maybe I can score some marks there, as well!) I love it when the weather is like that, as long as I am warm.

I was counting the waves because, according to tradition every seventh wave is bigger, but I didn't know when to start counting? I thought I'd solved it, I just had to wait for an extra big wave, that would be number seven, then start counting from the next one. Flawed logic, as my Pitera would no doubt be quick to point out. How could I know that the next wave after the one I thought the biggest, wouldn’t be even bigger.

Then this wave came in, bigger than all the rest. There was a bird, black against the sky, screeching as if in warning. I felt sort of weird. And the next moment I must have looked sort of weird, flat on my back with the wave trying to wash me back out to sea. I was trying to empty the water out of my boots, standing on one foot, and shaking out the other boot. Something really painful hit my foot (the bootless one) and in my shock I dropped the boot and another wave grabbed it and tried to carry it out to sea.

Once I'd retrieved the boot, I started looking around to see if I could see what it was that had fallen out of my boot. And then, in the water, I saw it!

Κούκλες ανησυχίας

See, you learn things all the time. Had trouble uploading this photo into the last blog, because I hadn't resized it, (at least, I think that was the reason,) so now it gets a blog entry to itself, again, with many thanks.

Good News & Bad!

The good news is that my IT tutor has approved my submission for my project, the bad news is that I foolishly submitted it before cross-checking with the old blog, so I promised several things that I will have to cover for in some way. I could have played around with the posting dates but decided not to mess with them. I hope people (well, my IT tutor at least,) will just ignore them.

Update: more good news.
It urns out my old blog had at least one visitor; she (I think it is a she, apologies if not) tried to visit the old blog, couldn't find it (I told you I had messed it up!) and actually searched to find the new one. (The titles were/are similar!) Anyway, she has kindly sent me a photo of her worry dolls, (Σας ευχαριστούμε) because the photo I used before I had copied from the web, and as I said, I am being careful not to do that again!

Now of course you are asking - why did I mention worry dolls at all. I am sure you can work it out! All answers in an email! (No prizes)

Geneology, and other things

Was just thinking as I signed in that it would be quite good fun (and look good in the project report!) if people with a similar surname doing family history came across the blog, so I have added variations on the transliteration of the surname as keywords.

Old Blog
This had photos of things I found on the shore (Beachcomber, nai;) I had photos of a dead seahorse I found dried out on the sand at Nausicaa, lots of different bits of driftwood, some strangely shapped stones, and different coloured stones. Photos of sunsets and the olive groves and rocks above Skouthaki, that kind of thing. Just things I liked, I don't know if anyone ever visted the blog. (This time I will know, because I have included a map to record where visitors come from - another point for my project.)

Probably the best thing was the koumboloi - (the one I said yesterday, that I can't find the picture). I found it very early one hot morning. There was no-one around and the light was a bright, shining white, the world seemed to be waiting for something to happen - expectancy, that's the word. I walked round from our beach to Nausicaa Plaz. I waded across little bays and through rockpools, and the water soon felt quite warm. I was wading along the watermark, just looking about, in the water too, seeing if anything had washed up, and I saw this flash of blue in the water. (That just gave me a great idea - more good marks for the project.) I had to feel around in the sand, which eddied up so I couldn't see, but then I felt the beads, and I pulled them out, they were still a brilliant blue, and on the end was a flat blue stone, painted with a yellow and white eye. It looks quite evil, but really it is meant to protect you from evil.

So later on I took this great photo of Laki, who's a fisherman, and looks old, brown, with a cap on his head, just as he should. He was sitting on the edge of his boat which had the same (well, similar) eye painted on it, and he was playing with the koumboloi. I managed to get the boat's eye in, as well as the koumboloi, quite clearly. And now I can't find it, the photo, that is, but then if I could, I wouldn't have thought of linking to a photo on the web (not downloaidng it, Ο κ. δικηγόρος).

Sometime later
So, alright, I thought it was a good idea, but when I did an image search I got 733 hits, so I started looking through them and couldn't find anything like mine, so then I did a search on 'komboloi blue' and got 146 hits, but none of them look like the one I found, which had blue glass beads, silver links, and the matia on a separate little strand. So I've linked (above, under flash of blue, to a matia which is nearly like mine, although mine has a yellow iris, and there is komboloi on the same page, though not the right size, colour or what have you.

So I promise I will get around to photographing, or maybe scanning, mine again later, and posting it. (If you check the text and tags you might notice I've been quite clever, or you might not, or you might think it is simply commonsense.)

Trials & tribulations

I was going to try and get some of the stuff from my old blog into here, so at least it has some content, but some of my images are ones I took off the web, and I have had an email from one of my classmates in England, telling me that lots of people are being threatened with lawyers' letters, because they have downloaded images.

In one way this is good, because I can add it to the report on blogging, gives me more to say, but it means it will take me longer to get entries on. And I had a great photo of a koumboloi, which I really wanted to include, but I can't find it now - I've just had a quick scroll through Picasa and it isn't there. I will try and write more about that tomorrow.

I didn't use any keywords on yesterday's entry, so I think I will go back and edit that. That will be another element to document! I think I am doing quite well on that front. But I must get some content, so I can start sending out the emails to ask people to look at it. The idea is that they will then email their contacts, and hopefully it will grow like a ripple in a pond, or a wave in the ocean.

The first day of a new blog......

I woke up while it was still dark, and remembered I had to do an IT holiday project. At first I couldn't think of anything, but then I thought "my blog". I had to write a proposal, and in it I put I would be using keywords. Only after I had sent it off to the tutor, I realised my blog doesn't do keywords! (Or tags, labels, whatever you want to call them.) I tried to move the blog but must have done something wrong, so I've started again.

I wanted to use beach sort of colours, to reflect the content but couldn't find a good colour for hyperlinks. I may have to change it later.

There were some things in my old blog I really liked, so when I get time I will do them again.