A Postcard A Day - Friday 21 March 2025 - Friday Smiles

 

Hello lovely peeps,

The week has sped by and it's Friday already. I have smiles and a special card to share with you. 

The card comes from Hungary and was sent by someone from Postcrossing called Viki:

It's the first time I received a birthday card from a Postcrosser. It will be my birthday on Sunday, so it's bang on time. 

I love the cute otter. In fact I love it that I got  card at all as I don't get many birthday cards these days. (Since writing this I have received, not opened, two more cards).

There are lovely wishes  and pretty stickers in the card. 

The stickers on the back are, well, Hungarian:

And the stamps are spectacular:

The stamp on the left is about Bánk bán. Wikipedia writes: Bánk bán is an opera in 3 acts by composer Ferenc Erkel. The work uses a Hungarian-language libretto which is based on a stage play of the same name by József Katona.  The main storyline is based on the assassination of Queen Gertrude, wife of Andrew II in 1213. 

The stamp on the right clearly features the Rubik cube. 

Hungary has honoured one of its most iconic inventions, the Rubik’s Cube, with a commemorative stamp celebrating its 50th anniversary. Recognized globally as a symbol of Hungarian ingenuity, the puzzle has left a lasting mark on science, education, and design.

Linn's Stamp News writes: In the mid-1970s, Rubik was a teacher at Budapest’s Academy of Applied Arts and Crafts in the Department of Interior Design. Although most accounts of the toy’s creation suggest that Rubik built the cube as a teaching tool to help his students understand three-dimensional objects, his actual intent was to create a device with moving sectional parts in an attempt to solve the structural problem of moving those parts independently without comprising the integrity of the entire mechanism.

At the time, Rubik didn’t realize he had created an imaginative logic toy until the first time he scrambled the various sections of the cube and tried to restore them to their original positions.

On Jan. 30, 1975, Rubik applied for a patent in Hungary for his “Magic Cube,” receiving the patent later that year on Dec. 31.

In the years since its creation, the toy has become an international phenomenon, reaching the height of its popularity in the 1980s, and is estimated to have entertained more than 1 billion users. Even today worldwide competitions are held in which entrants are timed in their efforts to unscramble the squares of the device.

The Hungarian Conservative published this on 03-02-2025: Celebrating 50 Years of the Rubik’s Cube and Ernő Rubik’s 80th Birthday in New York

A new exhibition, Rubik 80/50 — Fifty Years of Magic, has opened in New York’s TriBeCa district. Celebrating 50 years of the Rubik’s Cube and its inventor Ernő Rubik’s 80th birthday, the exhibit offers a dynamic journey through the legacy of a global icon.

Let's move from Hungary to where I am: Spain.

What have I been up to?

This week I have been in Granada to meet with my childhood friend Jenny. We hadn't seen each other for many years so I was very excited to see her. She was on holiday on the south coast, not at all near here but she was willing to get on a bus and we arranged to meet halfway in Granada.

We met at the bus station and we walked towards the bull ring. In the pouring rain! I was chatting so much that I didn't pay attention to where I was going and we walked too far. We ended up having to walk 20 min back again. 

The bull ring is still in use and this poster announces upcoming events.

 At lunch time it had stopped raining we stopped at a little tapas place to have something to eat We sat outside as it wasn't cold.

Eventually we walked along the Avenida de la Constitución (below an archive photo) which has ten sculptures dedicated to historical figures of Granada.

The first statue that was placed there is dedicated to Federico García Lorca, almost seventy years after his assassination. It is the work of the artist José Antonio Corredor

Here I am with the statue of Lorca (It looks like they have given him a new bench to sit on):

We had a lovely time in spite of the rain.

The other thing that has given me a lot of smiles this week is Ronnie, my cat. He has so much fun with this box:

Cats love boxes, don't they?

That's enough for today. I'm going to link up with Annie at A Stitch In Time and I will put some funnies at the end as per usual.

Enjoy your weekend,

Lisca

A Postcard A Day - Tuesday 18 March 2025 - T for strawberries, poke and a buffet

 Hello lovely ladies,

How are you today? How was your week? My week has been quite busy, but before I tell you about that I will show you my postcard. It's an unusual one today:

It comes to me from Rostock in Germany.It was sent by Emily who was visiting the Amber Museum/monastery in Ribnitz Damgarten.

What we see on the card is a north German saying:

Roughly translated: Whoever rejoices over the misfortunes of others, his own (misfortune) is at the door and blooming.

I found a picture of the Amber Museum on the Internet:

And the 'blurb':

You can expect an exciting introduction to the natural history and geology of the fossil resin and precious works of art from 3000 years on over 1,000 square metres. The exhibition on the history of the monastery and convent in the adjacent monastery church shows hidden and revealed treasures so that you can also trace the life of the Poor Clares and the Protestant landowner's daughters at this place.

The stamps are interesting:

Who was Immanuel Kant? Wikipedia comes to the rescue: Immanuel Kant (born Emanuel Kant; 22 April 1724 – 12 February 1804) was a German philosopher and one of the central Enlightenment thinkers.

The sentence on the stamp is translated below:

Kant believed that reason is the source of morality, and that aesthetics arises from a faculty of disinterested judgment. Kant's religious views were deeply connected to his moral theory. Their exact nature remains in dispute. He hoped that perpetual peace could be secured through an international federation of republican states and international cooperation. His cosmopolitan reputation is called into question by his promulgation of scientific racism for much of his career, although he altered his views on the subject in the last decade of his life.

So, what have I been doing with myself this week? Well, it's strawberry season here and I buy large punnets of them and eat them for breakfast with creamy greek yoghurt, yummm:

On Friday I did Pilates and I had a massage after that, then I treated myself to a Poke bowl at the local Japanese take-away (Just a minute's walk from the Pilates place):

On Friday I do archery at the local sports center:

This time I asked someone to take a picture of me:

I enjoy doing it, and that particular day we did a sort of competition with the 'boys'. The women won!!

On Saturday I went out with my girl friends. There are five of us and it is always difficult to get all of them together as three of them still work. 

As you can see below we were more than 5 (seven in fact) as two Dutch friends happened to be in town so we invited them too.

It was a Chinese buffet. Really nice, all freshly made. There was sushi, and lots of Chinese dishes, sweet things, fried stuff (like spring rolls) and a lot of things I didn't know. A journey of discovery.

As today is the T-Party hosted by Elizabeth and Bluebeard. I needed a drink. Plenty of drinks on the table above. Most people had beer. I was driving so I had a 0% beer. 

That is all from me today,

Happy T-Day all!

Lisca

A Postcard A Day - Friday 14 March 2025 - Friday Smiles

 Hello lovely girls,

How is everyone? Looking forward to the weekend? In my life every day is weekend (I'm retired). Hey Ho! Look on the bright side! It's nearly spring...

On the down side, it's been raining almost continuously for weeks. And there is more rain forecast this weekend. Our land needs the rain desperately as we have had a drought for a few years, but now everything is coming at once. Sometimes too much and there are areas in southern Spain that have been flooded. 

But let me show you my postcard for the day:

It was sent by my lovely friend Maggie, who always sends me postcards when she travels. This one is from Germany. The writing translates roughly as: Due to holidays, hardly any writing.

The words at the bottom right say: With Ready-Made Greetings.

And here they are, the greetings:

There are some statements about the holiday. Maggie wrote that she hadn't looked at the back of the card when she bought it and it came as a surprise.

At the bottom of the card it says: Deutschland ist schön - wir zeigen es! Meaning: Germany is beautiful, we show it.

Unfortunately, nowhere on the card does it mention where this magnificent aquaduct is (I assume it's an aquaduct.) Does anyone know? Iris? Or my Austrian friends? (Rostrose or Violetta)

The stamp features a wild gladiolus.

So, what have I been up to? I have been cooking nice meals all week, The weather is pants, so indoors it is. I made my own paella for the first time. Paella is the traditional rice dish of eastern Spain, but here in southern Spain, it is a proper party dish that is cooked in huge pans (outside) on a low gas ring. I made a modest home version of it and it turned out well (IMHO).

The only thing I can say is, that it was hardly enough. It was enough for the three of us (My friends Kim and Andy and me) but we would all have liked a second helping. OK, next time I will double the amount of rice. I had made a seafood paella, but it doesn't have to be.  Often it is mixed, or if it is a bring-and-share thing, whatever people bring to contribute, goes in. Could be chicken, pork, rabbit, fish, or seafood. I have used proper saffron and the round paella rice cooked in fish broth. There is a good recipe on a website called Spain on a Fork. If anyone wants to make paella, have a look at that one.

I'm just looking through my recent photos to see if there's anything else interesting I could show you:

These are 'prickly pears'. I don't know the official name. These are unripe. They will turn yellow eventually. I took this picture last week when I was on the coast.

I'm going to link up with Annie, at A Stitch In Time to share my smiles. I might just see you there.

I do have several funnies lined up for you, just to keep your spirits up in this cold weather.

But that's all for now,

Enjoy your weekend,

Lisca

A Postcard A Day - Tuesday 11 March 2025 - T for

 Hello lovely peeps,

Finally I have returned from my travels. I've had nothing but rain. Now I'm home and it's raining here too. This is great as we desperately need rain. For the first time in 14 years I had to dry my washing indoors. It could be because of the rain, but I have had trouble with my internet and my tv digibox doesn't seem to be working either. No TV is good in a way as I get more things done. I have got my scrapbooking stuff out again and have started making a lay-out following Sharon's (Foxy Stamping) suggestion of Calvinball.

But first a postcard:

It comes from (and Iris will be pleased to know) Western Australia. My friend Maggie is there at the moment with her husband and she sends me cards of things she thinks I might enjoy. And she certainly hit bull's eye with this one. 

The info on the back of the card reads:

"The Pinnacles Desert is found in the Nambung National Park, close to Cervantes and 200 km from Perth, Western Australia.Regarded as one of Australia's most unique landscapes, these thousands of incredible limestone monoliths rise eerily and spectacularly out of the sandy earth."

Wikipedia writes:

Some of the tallest pinnacles reach heights of up to 3.5 m above the yellow sand base. The different types of formations include ones which are much taller than they are wide and resemble columns—suggesting the name of Pinnacles—while others are only a metre or so in height and width resembling short tombstones.

The stamp is a colourful Christmas stamp:

As I said earlier, I'm home from my winter break. I was in a beach resort called Matalascañas, in the Huelva province of Spain. (Near the Portugese border). The beach there is 7 km long, a lovely sandy beach. 

At one end there was a 'rock' in the water near the beach. I can't remember what it was called.

I made new friends and every day there were a few hours without rain, so we go for long walks along the seafront.

 

Here the sky looks very nice but the angry clouds could come in very quickly and I could never leave the hotel without an umbrella.

One day when it was raining (we were walking in the rain) we saw some men barefoot with some special gear which we didn't recognised:

Of course we asked them and they turned out to be clam digging. Later we saw them at work:

    

They stand in a foot of water and poke in the sand with what looks like a spade. Then they move the utensil back and forth in the mud, then I see them bend down, probably collecting the clams they found. They also carry a basket to keep them in.

There were lots of sea gulls and these little things. I don't know what they are:

They are less than half the size of a gull, about the size of my hand.

Now as it is the T-Party today, hosted by Elizabeth and Bluebeard, I need a drink to join:

 Here I am in the hotel dining room with my new friends. Every table had a bottle of wine and a bottle of water. The lady on the right, lives in Granada and I will be keeping in touch with her and visit her in the future. The gentleman had his eye on me but I don't fancy a relationship, (I'll be 74 in a few weeks) so I won't keep in touch with him! (Although he is very nice and we got on well)

That is all from me today. 

Happy T-Day all!

Lisca