Innuendo in pictures by Vermeer and other Dutch artists at the Fitzwilliam Museum in “Vermeer's Women: Secrets and Silence”

Yesterday, we went to the Vermeer exhibition at the Fitzwilliam Museum “Vermeer's Women: Secrets and Silence”. A bit of a misnomer as it should really be “An exhibition of 32 pictures by Dutch 17th Century Artists, including four pictures by Vermeer”. However, it prompted me to buy and read “Vermeer: The Complete Paintings”, by Norbert Schneider (a bargain at circa £9) from the museum shop. Consequently, I now want to go back and have another look at the paintings, as there is a more detailed symbolism in the images and finer detail to look at that suggests why Vermeer has gained such importance again.

The fast guide to the images of women in their domestic settings is the constant struggle between chastity and the potential eruption of passion in an age where more conservative values on marriage and chastity were being promoted by the authorities. Two Vermeers with women at the virginal are alternatively; The link between music and love in “The Music Lesson”; Hints of a lover's  departure before painting began in “Lady seated at a Virginal”, indicated by the abandoned cello and the picture of “The Procuress” on the wall behind the lady at the virginal.

The contrast is the chaste purity of Vermeer's “The Lacemaker” with her demure gaze downwards on a proper lady's activity, with a very uncluttered composition. This picture is on loan from The Louvre.

Pearls, by the way, represent either vanity or purity – depending on their use. Any picture of that age featuring a woman and wine (in a glass or porcelain decanter) hints at attempted seduction. Onions are erotic symbols and hanging chickens apparently indicate carnal desire! The symbolism of the day was codified, for example in Cesare Ripa's "Iconologia". Items that look innocuous to us had special significance in understanding the underlying message within a painting. A picture within the painting or a bowl of fruit, a gesture or particular posture and dress add meaning (as do the copulating dogs in "The Soldier and the Prostitute" by Frans van Mieris, 1658, though here the message is a bit more obvious).

Vermeer's artistic technique also differs from that of his contemporaries. Here are more aspects to look for.

1. The presence of slight visual and perspective distortions, blurring around the edge of the paintings and highlights. These are seen by some as evidence that Vermeer made extensive use of a camera obscura (a lens system that projects an image onto a screen) to aid his painting. Some of you may remember David Hockney's excellent TV program on the evidence for use of camera obscura by classical painters.
2. Point 1 and the use of colours and shade enraptured the early expressionists who saw in Vermeer a kindred spirit in the way he viewed and painted the world. In fact, when you visit the Fitwilliam Museum, go in at the main entrance, progress upstairs and wander through the Impressionists gallery on your way to the Vermeer exhibition. Then compare Vermeer's brush strokes and hints at detail to the perfect representations in some of his contemporaries' work.
3. Maps. Vermeer regularly and deliberately incorporated representations of real maps in his pictures to make a point. In fact Norbert Schneider uses the pre 1609 map of the Netherlands by Claes Jansz. Visscher and other elements, to re-evaluate the symbolism in Vermeer's painting commonly known as “The Art of Painting”.  Where most art critics see the entire imagery as referring to - the Art of Painting, Norbert sees the picture as a political statement. He claims that it plays homage to the re-ascendant House of Orange and recognises the positive change in popular opinion towards the Hapsburg Holy Roman Empire; all this in a critical period in the Franco-Dutch war, just before a favourable outcome in 1674. This would date the painting to about 1673, much later than others think.

With my interest in microscopy, an additional fascinating fact was that when Vermeer died, Antoniew van Leeuwenhoek took over the responsibility for managing the estate when Vermeer's wife fell into financial difficulty.

What this ultimately also reveals is that beauty and art is really in the eye of the beholder. When I go back to revisit the exhibition I will be evaluating the pictures in a totally different light.

Shubunkin and Light

Mr James has decided on using Optima at 11 point for his book so I reformatted the text and also included drop capitals for the chapter beginnings. The six images to be used in the book were then introduced into a separate word file with the same margins in readiness for insertion.

At Mrs Evan's Chinese Brush Painting class, I battled with fish. Strangely, the normal carp shape was the more difficult to master than that of the rotund Shubunkin. Unencumbered by dental pain this week, as the antibiotic appeared to have achieved its effect, I had more success and time this week to master the fish - at least in part.

Met up with Mr Cooper in the evening to discuss an evenings entertainment and education for the cub scouts. We explored a variety of options to play with light, using ubiquitous materials such as DVD disks.

Gadaffi's body and that of his son were buried at a secret location in the Libyan desert, to avoid his grave becoming a shrine or focal point for followers or opponents.

In Turkey, two days after the Earthquake, people are still being pulled out of the rubble alive. Over 400 dead so far and several hundred still missing.

Am now watching the luscious Joanna Lumley on her Greek Odyssey – Lovely!

Battles with Wordfast and the importance of tattoo aftercare

The tribulations of modern technology came to the fore again as I tried to use the translation software Wordfast for the first time on the new computer with an existing file that I had started previously. All seemed to be progressing well until I tried to save the partially translated file back into the Word document as I had been able to before. - A dreaded error message appeared.

An internet search did not come up with a suitable answer, so it was back to the Wordfast site to use their help hotline – except that was not available unless an additional hefty fee of over £60 was paid. Well, it was either that or waste the equivalent in time, so I reluctantly paid. This was a software element I was paying for, so I was very surprised to find that it was not immediately available. Delivery time anywhere between 6h and two days!

Went back to basics and set up a fresh word file on the PC. I started a new Wordfast project with a new translation memory. This worked flawlessly. Eventually, by trial and error, I found that by creating a new project for the existing file and running it from a PC based folder, rather than a dropbox folder as I had done before, I could resume work without problems. Spent the remaining couple of hours working away on the translation.

A short afternoon walk was interrupted by an impromptu haircut at the local salon, which was empty when I passed by. The discussion centred around the cling-filmed arm of my hairdresser, covering a new tattoo to complement the already very aesthetic grayscale ones on his other arm. Apparently this was to ensure that the tattoo set. It turns out that having a tattoo is only half or even a tenth of the job as a good tattoo requires considerable after-care.

A tattoo is effectively a wound and therefore it is important to wear the dressing given to you for at least the time specified by your tattooist. This is followed by a gentle antibacterial wash, drying gently and then applying protective lotion or ointment very thinly.

Initially during the healing process, tattoos may appear cloudy as one develops “onion skin”. The trick is not to scratch or remove peeling skin during the subsequent weeks. Total water immersion such as in a bath or with swimming are also out of the frame for a couple of weeks as healing continues, though a shower can be taken as long as the tattoo does not become too wet.

Tattoos are also photosensitive, i.e. will fade in strong light. So to keep the tattoo pristine and dark as the day it was made, it should be covered up – or protected with factor 30 sunblock. Two excellent links are by Wiki How and About.com.

Early evening I drove to Soham for the first Cambridge Open Studios committee meeting looking towards the next year. Productive but long, I did not return home till just after 11pm.

The Gasometer and it's 616 stairs.

Saturday, 23rd July: Today we did successfully make the trip to the Gasometer, which is actually in Oberhausen, to see the exhibition “Magic Places - Natural and Cultural Monuments of the World” (http://www.gasometer.de/en_GB/index.php?pid=3_1).

The exhibition featured large panels of photographs of natural and geographic features, interspersed with mineral and fossil samples on the ground floow. On the next level, there were beautifully recreated cultural artifacts from the Gipsformerei der Staatlichen Museen zu Berlin (Replica Workshop of the National Museums of Berlin). The low light was a challenge for photography, but I persevered in attempts to capture the bust of Nefertiti.

The centre of the hall was dominated by the giant sculpture of a rainforest tree that loomed up into the vast space and was illuminated by gradually changing lighting.

On the way in to the exhibition, I had noticed that the the outside stairs leading all the way from the bottom to the top of the 100m high gasometer were actually open to the public. After wandering around the exhibition, I moved outside to take up the challenge of making the ascent. An initial rush soon changed to a steady pace. I started counting steps but soon gave up as the stairwell had a varying number of steps around each quarter. I later established that there were 616 steps to a height of 115m (the total height of the Gasometer is 117.5m), making this one of the largest industrial stairs in the world.

At 30m, I was already looking down on a tree-top climbing activity. The view gradually expanded to take in the river, railway and related exhibition areas. The wind also picked up and my ears were beginning to freeze. It took me more than 20 minutes to make the ascent, breathless but with a feeling of achievement.

Last Open Studios day and completing work for Business Startup interview

Sunday, 17th July: The last day of my Cambridge Open Studios was accompanied by a steady stream of visitors, with a break over the lunch period. Today's guests were more sight-seers than serious buyers and it was good to see some younger families too.

At the end of the day, I was astonished to find that I had had about 120 visitors over the Open Studios weekends. Now it was over and the pictures came down, the studio turned back into a garage – until the next year.

The startup business notes expanded into 12 separate pages of an illuminated book. Writing a couple of relevant paragraphs took me into the night. I used the BBC i-player to view the Apprentice Final. This allowed me to skip over the filler repeats within the program. It was interesting to see the business plans by the four finalists be presented and taken apart. I was delighted when Tom, inventor and the one person who seemed to almost be out of place due to his positive, constructive and just plain likeable attitude, actually won on merit.

The notes were finished as a PDF book, sent a copy to the Andie Harper Show and uploaded to Issuu for good measure to share with anyone interested. I'd watched the Apprentice Final and, at 4am felt sufficiently well prepared for the Monday Radio interview.

Understanding sunflower seeds

Catch-up. Filtering 100+ e-mails. A quick comment on the COS blog. Booked a hire car for busines trip later in the week. The afternoon passed quickly – yet not sure how. Mr Straus had enquired whether he could drop by with his new partner in business and life, Ms J, and arrived for a coffee and conversation in the garden.

Most notable for me today was the late and repeated Imagine television program on the Chinese artists WeiWei. His childhood as a member of a “black” family (ostracised by the cultural revolution) and living underground. Rebellion and emigration to New York. Returning to China after the Tienanmen massacre and becoming part of the new avant garde. It gave me a much better understanding of the sunflower exhibition at the Tate Modern that I visited, and also left me feeling slightly cheated, that I had not been able to walk upon the seeds, touch them, feel them, bury in them as initial visitors had been able to. I could not touch or gaze closely at an individual seed in my hand. Because of safety concerns.

Now of course I could buy 100 on e-bay at £118, but the magic has gone.

Open Studio, day 2

The (garage) door to my open studio opened slightly ahead of time and I was able to bask in the morning sun for a while before the first visitors arrived. Today was a busier day, though there was a quiet period from about 1pm to 3pm.

Again, there were one or two familiar faces, however many new visitors appeared too, a significant proportion coming specifically to my exhibition. However, many commented on the benefit of having two studios open at the same time, close to one another, and that this was also a major deciding factor. Several independent groups came from St Ives. The furthest origin was from New Zealand, a couple visiting and accompanying their mother who lives in the county.

I was delighted that one young man had seen the invitation to come wearing headgear and be photographed, outlined on my Cambridge Open Studios website entry. He had brought a Fez – I forgot to ask if this was in response to the Dr Who episode featuring one – and wore it unselfconsciously and confidently for the photograph.

A number of parents with mature progeny were also willing to be photographed, mainly mothers and daughters, but I was pleased to also have a father and his two daughters.

The latter had arrived just 10 minutes before the planned close of the studio and it transpired that I was the last visit of a busy day. The two daughters were still college students. Yet they still had such a lively interest and curiosity, that our conversations continued to well after 18:30. It was so refreshing and rewarding, as usually it is the parents that are more vocal, with the youths being more tongue tied.

All in all, there were 57 visitors over the weekend, 19 on Saturday and 38 today. There was lively interest and discussion of the subjects portrayed, however, as in previous years, purchases were on low value items such as postcards. People are also taking the student notes and polarisation info sheet, many of them not students.

The last days of an era are in progress. The last ever space shuttle mission blasted off for space on Friday and docked with the international space station today.

The first day of my Cambridge Open Studio for 2011

I had probably not got to sleep before 4 AM in the morning and was therefore less than enthusiastic about the inadvertent sounding of the alarm clock at 7 AM. I managed to sleep for another hour or two before reluctantly clambering out of bed and getting ready for the first of my two Cambridge Open Studio weekend days.

The very first task before the studios opened at 11 AM was to assist Mr Cooper in setting up flags at the end of all road and further along the road towards the main route through Milton, to ensure that visitors could easily find both my studio and that of Mrs Cooper who was exhibiting under her artistic name of Alison Hullyer. We met and chatted with some other villagers on the way, gaining some juicy nuggets of gossip on yet another conflict within a village organisation.

Then it was back to direct our gazebo, under which I intended to sit and paint whilst waiting for visitors to appear. My studio was not only clearly marked with the Cambridge Open Studios flag but also with the banner that Mr Burt of Jamy Ltd had prepared for me a couple of years ago for when I was on the plinth. Walking down to the end of our close, I ascertained that anyone walking past and looking in that direction could not fail to miss the fact that there were two studios open along Hall End.
Sounds drifting over from the playing fields at the other end of the village reminded us of the fact that we were competing against the Milton village fair. I had a scant four visitors before lunchtime. However things picked up during the afternoon and by the end of the day, 19 people had visited my studio, meeting the expected average based on prior experience.

Seated under the gazebo, I took the time to practice my Chinese brush painting. The lack of practice over the past few weeks showed and it took some time to get back into the flow. The gradually improving sketches that were done were added to the special board within the exhibition as examples of practice work.

Now that the first day was over, this Sunday and the following weekend would be less stressful as the familiarity of the open studio set in.

The evening was spent reformatting my now old Asus EeePC and installing the new Natty Narwhal version of Ubuntu. This resulted in a more compact use of storage space and gave me more space for my own files on the little netbook, should I so wish.

Good news by text from Mrs Ekblom – she had returned home and was recuperating after a successful operation.

Processors, masks and micro beads

Friday - Today was the last day, for the final preparations before the Cambridge Open Studios tomorrow. All the written material that had been generated yesterday needed to be printed out and the pile of written material accumulated on my desk.

This delayed somewhat my departure for the meeting of the Huntingdonshire Business Network, for which I usually permitted at least an hour's travelling time due to the unpredictability of the A 14. It was therefore with considerable surprise that I found myself arriving in Huntingdon on time despite having departed a mere 25 min beforehand. Today's meeting was more of a conversazione, with a number of members having been away on holiday and we just generally catching up on the news. I had also taken along by stereo microscope so that Mr Howell could view the sound sample that he had brought back for me from the Greek island. It also afforded an opportunity to show the other members the lack of detail in the course reproduction of a fake one pound coin.

Progressing onto Mr Beal in Over, the usual Tutor cloud meeting had been deferred due to family circumstances preventing the ladies from attending. However Mr Beal's eyes lit up when I informed him of the presence of a microscope in the car. Mr Beal was battling with the difficult technical issue. For some time now Mr Beal had been purchasing laptops on eBay and repairing them. One of the issues was to reapply sold to the microchips that formed the core of the laptops processor.

In theory the principle was extremely simple. A mask would be oriented over the processor and minute beads of solder would be filled into the mask and then adhered to the processor itself. The practical reality however was a completely different issue. The mask had to be aligned to within the fraction of a millimetre, and also had to be a set height above the processor, so that a single solder bead would fall through the aperture.
Due to the submillimetre size of the solder beads, these were very prone to picking up a static electrical charge that would cause some adjacent pairs of beads to club together. The beads were held onto the processor after having been applied by virtue of thin smear of adhesive. We found that during the heating process, conviction occurred in the liquefied film of the adhesive, resulting in small ridges of liquid that moved the beads across the processor, again causing clumping. We spent a good two hours establishing the facts and practising adjusting the settings to minimise all the complications.

This left a scant 15 min for Mr Beal to inform me of the changes to my website that he had undertaken and how I might myself and new articles and corrections to the same.

Returning back home, my mind was still on the next days open studio. A number of the visitors from previous open Studios have been students who wish to know more about the motivation and background and technicalities of photography through the microscope and how this could be presented in an artistic manner. I thought that I could therefore prepare a short description of the process in advance that the students could take with them, providing them with suitable information for their school projects and minimising the post open studio work that might come my way. The writing and printing off of 10 copies took until late into the evening.

The anticipation of the next days opening of the studio also delayed my getting to sleep.

Dictating v Typing, and the patience of spiders

I was effectively chained to the computer and laptop today, producing labels and other written material for the weekend's Open Studio. Trivial items that still take up a considerable amount of time. However, from this point on, any additions will be icing in the cake.

The activity was enlivened by the use of a new speech recognition software bundled with an earlier purchase, Dragon 11. It is so reminiscent of futuristic fantasies, that when you speak , the words miraculously appear on the screen – with the odd correction or two. I did note that it is still easier for me to coherently type text than to dictate it. I am inclined to believe that this is due to different paths of the brain being used in verbal delivery as opposed to physical typing, though I cannot immediately find a suitable reference. No doubt increased practice will speed up the flow of dictation.

A small item of natural history has been residing patiently in its web on one of my office windows. The specimen is probably a common garden spider, Araneus diadematus, a well known orb weaving spider with a distinctive white cross on it's abdomen. Set up for over a week and tolerated by Mrs T, albeit reluctantly upon my request, It seemed to be in a region particularly devoid of prey.

Today this changed as an irritating slender bodied house fly entered the office, evading capture and eventually hiding in the paperwork by the window. Five minutes later, I looked to the window and saw a triumphant spider dealing with its already wrapped package of a meal with the same body length as itself!

Hanging pictures for my Open Studio

Most of the day was devoted to my Open Studio preparations. The framed pictures needed to have cord attached ready for hanging. I purchased some fresh white emulsion and polyfiller and then spent an hour in the garage sanding and then filling the holes from previous years exhibitions in the display boards affixed to the walls.

Miss T then valiantly donned protective garb and tackled the re-coating of all the mounting boards with the white emulsion over a couple of hours.

With temperatures in the mid twenties Centigrade, the emulsion dried extremely rapidly, so we progressed to planning the hanging of the chosen collection. Having established a suitable arrangement, we then took another couple of hours to carefully align and hang the pictures.
The slow progress in hanging is due to the need to ensure that there is an underlying structure to the pattern of the pictures, most commonly, ensuing that pictures in a row across a wall all share the same height from the floor at their top side. This gives a clean line to the eye. Second rows and the attention paid to alignment of columns is also critical.

The evening was spent entertainingly at the Huntingdonshire Speakers meeting of our Toastmasters International Club.

The day still left me drained as my body apparently continued to be in recovery from the weekend's illness.

From OCR to Open Studios

Tuesday was a day of catchup. There was an enquiry about a possible translation to be done, based on a PDF containing a news item about Green Ventures in Potsdam. It provided an opportunity to test out the new Omnipage 18 OCR software to convert the article into text.

The complexities included the need to OCR and recognise German text, The fact that the layout of the article included images and text in both fields and columns, plus the start of the article itself began in a column half way down the page and ended with a column at the top, plus additional separate text fields set within the columns; all this made it a challenging opportunity to learn very rapidly how to use the software to positive effect. In the end, the translation was not actually commissioned but I am now much better prepared for similar future challenges.

Yet another interpersonal conflict has arisen, in which I have been involved as an intermediary. Fortunately, fast action and bringing different parties to talk to each other appears to have actually ameliorated a potentially venomous situation.

Today’s news was still full of the impending humanitarian crisis in the Horn of Africa, where 10 million people are being displaced by drought. Save the Children has initiated a campaign which I condone and support.

Dr Maunders dropped by early evening with the prints prepared of my photographs by Mrs Maunders And Miss T assisted in getting these framed and added to the stock of pictures to be displayed at my Cambridge Open Studio this weekend.

Posters, ebook conversions and irises.

Mr Beal had facilitated the uploading of audio files to the Cambridge Open Studios website, so the edited interview recording was made pubic on the COS blog this morning. With less than 9 working days till Open Studios, also designed two posters for my exhibition, one on publishing and the other, to be produced in a limited run of 20 copies, with stereo-images. Digitally ordered, I await digital proofs in two days, followed by a next day delivery.

An interesting diversion this evening, trying to photograph the iris of an eye close up , intiated by some excellent images seen elsewhere. We achieved a fair success but were hampered by low light. This suggests that another trial could be attempted during daylight.

Continued the research into the various ways of transforming documents into e-books and finding interesting differences between those generated from plain text, Microscoft Word and Open Office and converted using different programs.

Late news: Large forest fires in New Mexico close to nuclear facility at Los Alamos. 12000 people evacuated.

A morning of calls and three middle eastern conflicts in the news

A hectic morning of telephone calls, with potential and current collaborations.

My conversation with Mr Heker via Skype was interrupted twice, however we managed to pursue the possibility of another publication with a prestige journal in his field of expertise. The existing publications (see http://german-smile.info/Publishing/publishing.htm) now generating interest in both China and Russia.

The first interruption was from another business friend, Mr Burt of Jamy limited with news and also the opportunity to touch base about work for Mr Straus. The second call was from a Suffolk author, asking about the options for assistance with publication, which also digressed on the benefits of using pectin versus Jam sugar for strawberry jam making and on sourdough cultures.

A third and enjoyable call was to Mrs Maunders, a renowned botanical illustrator. Mrs Maunders had printed my photographs in the past and offered to do so this year; this call was to check whether this was still the case as I have four outstanding images for printing prior to framing for the Cambridge Open Studios. Fortunately, printing was possible – I now have to prepare the digital files to permit printing at the correct size.

The afternoon was spent in completing design work, for embroidery on corporate garments, name tags with two different affiliations for three people and a revamp of a business card design, again to be used as a template for three people.

The news is full of middle eastern conflicts, starting with planned troop withdrawals from Afghanistan over the next few years from the longest conflict that Britain has been involved in for a century or more. The cost of innocent lives – children and wives, through allied air attacks in Libya was also in the forefront of media interest. What is less visible is the overall level of casualties, which are now estimated around 10000 with at least 3000 being civilians. The brutal repression of the uprising in Syria also grips the media in a conflict where the the world is watching from the sidelines.

An pleasurable excursion to Kings Lynn

Mrs T, Miss T and I set off by Rail from Waterbeach station to distant Kings Lynn for a days outing. The 39 minute journey was a refreshing change to the drive by car and deposited us at the terminus station just off the Town Centre.

Miss T garnered a guide of walks through Kings Lynn and we set of at a measured pace in the occasional sunshine. The photoalbum with some of the sights that attracted my interest can be found here https://picasaweb.google.com/miltoncontact/ExcursionToKingsLynn# .

In the more modern shopping centre of Broad Street, I learnt how the Fent shop that the ladies dived into to view fabrics and related craft materials derived its name. Fent used to be a term for fabric remnants and was applied to the original market stall that then developed into the current well situated and stocked shop now present on the street.

We wandered into increasingly picturesque parts of the town, with the Pilots Lane and the St Nicholas' Chapel affording some considerable interest. One of the houses (a licenced premises till 1906) was named Pilots Hoy. The term hoy used to apply to a small sloop-rigged coasting ship or a freight barge and perhaps gave the feeling of a land based home from the sea to the busy mariner.

St Nicholas' Chapel is currently being lovingly restored with the help of its friends and the Churches Conservation Trust. Once the country's largest chapel, the south porch was well decorated externally. Inside, the beamed ceiling was adorned with an impressive array of large wooden angels and two other figures, very reminiscent of the All Saints Church at Landbeach. I spent some time photographing the 19th century stained glass windows in detail, with the possibility of a separate article again as for Hereford Cathedral – if I find the time.

We progressed to the Quays, and it was there that I learnt about the strong connection of Kings Lynn with the Hanseatic league, something still recognised by the German Government. Indeed, the Hanseatic league of cities has undergone a revitalisation. The old “Hanse”existed to promote trade between cities and also protect their shipping from piracy though mutual protection. The modern Hanse again has trade and cultural links at its centre.

Purfleet Quay had a derelict looking building that caught my eye, because all the windows had been painted with scenes by local artists. Apparently this was to draw attention to the fact that redevelopment was needed.

The occasional heavy showers were fortunately avoided by lunch and afternoon tea on our circuit of the town. Our last stop was the Red Chapel in the Gardens before we boarded the train back home.

Planning for the Nile trip and e-book formatting

In addition to the current days tasks for a variety of parties, including Mr Straus with further ideas and inspirations for design modifications required to his branding, there were three elements of interest today.

The first was the complex decision making leading to the decision for me to accompany Miss T on a Nile trip to Egypt's antiquities. The country had been featuring in the news during its revolution during the earlier part of this year, with concern about security and safety therefore being uppermost in my mind. I consulted with my Insurance Brokers to ensure that we could get appropriate travel and health cover for the trip later in the year. This was complicated by the fact that a prophylactic medication that I take, which retains me in the good health that I enjoy, meant that the medical health insurance element resulted in a higher premium for me (still providing an overall premium a good 15 to 20% below that from other sources!). Once the steps were put in place, it was then possible to book the tickets with the reputable travel company Thompson.

The second point was an idiosyncrasy arising from payment. I had paid with a credit card. The sum, despite the heavy discount, was not inconsiderable and I wished to transfer funds from my bank to the credit card. In all other instances, I make payments over the internet to other accounts. However, I could not transfer monies from my bank account to my credit card! Ah, the impenetrable and inscrutible financial services – no dount there will be a charge involved in the final solution to my problem.

The third element of interest was a discussion with fellow author and interested party in e-book publication, Ms Ekblom. We had an interesting exchange of information on the use of software such as Sigil for the editing of the formatting in the underlying HTML language of texts and the subsequent formatting in Calibre. Ms Ekblom had an eagle eye as a proof reader that complemented my knowledge on the formatting language as we shared a common view of a screen through the medium of Skype internet telephony.

A pleasant diversion was the arrival of the empty picture frames for my Cambridge Open Studios exhibition. Miss T was instrumental in carefully opening the frames and then mounting selected pictures, after I had signed them. It now remains for me to arrange the printing of four outstanding images and also painting two images using the newly acquired art of Chinese Brush Painting.

Ms Riches, our publicity officer for COS, also contacted me over lunchtime via Skype and we exchanged text comments whilst listening to a short interview on the Peterborough Open Studios of circa 40 artists. COS was also mentioned and we were pleased that this year we were starting public awareness of Cambridge Open Studios early.

Newly published book, QR quilts and inspirational talks

Finalised the data for my Icelandic client and sent of an optimised long list of contacts in readiness for the impending telephone research.

Received a copy of Malcolm Mc Arthur's book that I had published with his dedication today. It was so satisfying to see the final product completed. Ka Sefofane (by aeroplane) the story of Flying Mission was a surprisingly heavy book (600g) yet with a spine of only 18mm in Royal size. The quality silk finish paper and laminated gloss cover giving full justice to the story that Malcolm McArthur, OBE, FRCS(Eng), the founder of the Flying Mission had painstakingly written over the past year. The difference between this, an offset printed book, and digital printing being apparent. This was the ninth book I had published:

1. Journey into Solitude by Ann Petre
2. Nimrod; A Memoir of Mischief and Mishap by Peter Newman Brooks
3. Dear Ruth; A Lament for bygone Africa by Pamela Cotton
4. The Lost Priory; A Cambridge Story by Ann Hales-Tooke
5. All Saints' Landbeach: The story of a fen-edge church by Ray Gambell
6. The Milton Chronicle 1771 - 1901 by R S Tonks
7. And Only the Seagulls are Laughing by Norman Setchell
8. The Ukraine Carpathians: Europe's last great wilderness by Alexander Stemp
9. Ka Sefofane: The story of Flying Mission by Malcolm J. McArthur

Mr Wishart and I had arranged for him to collect me so that we could drive together into Cambridge to the William Art Gallery in Gwydir Street to view an exhibition of quilts, one of which was in the form of the QR code of the artist, Nancy Fève! The remaining quilts were actually more astonishing in their detail, with an excellent combination of fine needlework and patterning matched to the selection of fabrics. Mr Wishart and I engaged in conversation with a number of artists and visitors to the gallery, one of whom would also be going on to the evening's business event at Scotsdales.

We continued on to Scotsdales for The Inspired Group meeting, featuring presentations by Magpas and the inspirational Marcus Orlovsky (see separate articles beginning at http://www.hbn.org.uk/node/2847). This event resulted in a new idea which I discussed with Mr Wishart, who in turn had had his own.

Back home, I wrote late into the night, finishing with this article!

Translation, E.coli and Hunts Speakers

Started the morning with a German – English translation for a Columbian company, which was completed and returned by midday. Edited, formatted and uploaded a second video, demonstration of painting roses by Mrs Evans before conducting more mundane letter writing and some internet research. Registered Mr McArthur's book Ka Sefofane with PubMed, having established its weight (650g), the last detail required before registration.

Radio news focussed on the E. coli contaminated cucumbers in Germany, which now are believed not to have originated in Spain. Cases in Northern Germany have risen to more than 2000 and the source is still unknown.

The evening was enlivened by attending the Huntingdonshire Speakers group of Toastmasters International. An event full of emotion as two members had recently suffered bereavement and each gave an eloquent and moving speech. My role this evening was to introduce and then evaluate Mrs Ekblom, who gave an inspirational presentation on “Killer Islands”. She was referring to the continents of plastic waste accumulating at mid oceanic gyres, where the detritus is mistaken for food by sea-birds and other oceanic denizens, thus causing lethal damage.

An unusual fact that I was unaware of – the storm drains of Bangladesh were found to be blocked by waste plastic bags, contributing to the devastation caused by floods and this has led to the use of plastic bags being banned in cities in the region and in India.

For the second time in recent time, drawn outside by the noise of a Helicopter circling over Milton for a couple of minutes before departing.

Wisteria video, painting poppy and migraine

Tuesday - A routine catch up after a long weekend and installation of new software.

Notable was editing, formatting and uploading the video of Mrs Evans demonstrating the representation of Wisteria using Chinese Brush Painting on YouTube.

Today was also the last lesson with Mrs Evans' group, where we tackled poppies and some insects as well as bidding each other adieu until late Autumn. Stopping off in town, I was unsuccessful in finding slightly patterned Japanese papers for Cambridge Open Studios, whilst finding some screw-cap pots for paint.

That evening, migraine gave an advance notice before rapidly developing into a serious attack sending me to bed early.

GM Plants and the Eruption of Grimsvotn Volcano

Genetically manipulated plants as a solution for drought tolerance arose as a topic on the BBC Radio Cambridgeshire Andie Harper Show this morning and I therefore immediately offered to comment if required. Andie called me in the afternoon for a telephone interview, which he may use on Wednesday. I had also generated a quick article on the subject on the Miltoncontact blog, see http://miltoncontact.blogspot.com/2011/05/genetically-modified-plants-where-are.html

Met with David Chamberlain, the vicar of All Saints Milton, to view the rooms and equipment available next to the church. This to establish the feasibility of setting up the Milton Cinema as a community event.
Other minor tasks conducted included the delivery of a framed photo to Mrs Stamper, who is setting up the Cambridge Open Studios shop window display in Cambridge. Also completed design and order of Tutorcloud business cards.

The final stages of preparation for meeting with my German client at Luton for the start of his visit is still overshadowed by the Grimsvotn volcano, who’s ash is being dragged over Scotland by the current weather system. Will it descend further south and affect flights?