A Postcard A Day - Tuesday 30 August 2022 - T for Japan, white wine and Clutton

 Hello lovely ladies, 

We are still on our travels. In fact today we are in a village called Clutton, near Bristol. We are staying with our eldest son and his family. A bit further down I will post some photos of Clutton.

I'm scheduling this post as I always have issues when I try to write on my iPad.

Let me start with my postcard:

It comes from Japan and is entitles "Daimo's Procession" by Yoshu Chikanobu. Itoh, who sent it to me writes: "The picture is ancient people in Edo era. It was about 250 years ago. The dictator 'Shogun' forced local rulers to visit his palace ar Tokyo (Edo) from everywhere in Japan, so local rulers had to spend a lot of money and couldn't invest in their army. It's clever governance".

The stamps are cute with a white rabbit, a monkey mum and baby, and a pagoda (Tennei-ji Temple Three-Story Pagoda)

In the same week I received this card:

Also from Japan and according to the sender it depicts a firefighter from the Edo period. 

During the 267 years of the Edo period, there were approximately 1,800 fires, with 49 being Great Fires. When you break that down, it means there was a Great Fire every five years. The largest was the Great fire of Meireki which killed over 107,000 people. So fires in the city of Edo had the potential to have devastating consequences.

There were a couple of reasons for this. The dominant building material at the time was wood and bamboo, the city was densely populated and expanding every year, and Edo’s local climate also being a factor. There was even a fire season (January until April.) During which time women would typically leave the city for their own safety.

The Hikeshi (firemen) were a unique phenomenon of Edo. A cross between gangsters and firefighters, these men were heroes to the urban population and feared by the authorities for their lawlessness and bravado.

Japan's Tokugawa (or Edo) period, which lasted from 1603 to 1867, would be the final era of traditional Japanese government, culture and society before the Meiji Restoration of 1868 toppled the long-reigning Tokugawa shoguns and propelled the country into the modern era.

What was special about the Edo period in Japan?

Emerging from the chaos of the Sengoku period, the Edo period was characterized by economic growth, strict social order, isolationist foreign policies, a stable population, perpetual peace, and popular enjoyment of arts and culture.

This is a beautiful stamp released in April 2022.

Kitagowa Utamaro 喜多川 歌麿; c. 1753 – 31 October 1806 Woman Exhaling Smoke from a Pipe from his Ten Classes of Women’s Physiognomy.

It comes from a sheet:

I don't know much about Japan, so I'm finding all this very interesting.

A few days before we left for England, we  were invited by our Danish friends to go out for lunch. And as today we celebrate the T-Party hosted by Elizabeth and Bleubeard, I will show you some photos which have a drink in them. We went to a little restaurant just outside our village on the way to Baza, called Pata Negra. 

I am drinking white wine

And my lunch was a Cesar salad. Very nice it was.

Now, changing the subject, I promised some photos of Clutton:

Below on the map you can see where it is:

For those of you who are fans of Midsummer Murders, you can spot the village of Midsummer Norton just next to Clutton. I'm sure the village in Midsummer Murders is named after this one..

Happy T-Day,

Hugs,

Lisca

The stamp features an elegant lady, but I have no idea who it is. 

A Postcard A Day - Friday 26 August 2022 - Friday Smiles

 

Hello lovely ladies,

Here we are again on Friday, looking back over the past week and recalling our smiles and happy moments.

Please join us by linking with Annie's blog at A Stitch In Time.

For me a postcard in my mailbox is always worthy of a smile:

In German it reads:

Auch wer um die ganze Welt reist, um das Schöne zu suchen, findet es nur, wenn er es in sich trägt.

Even those who travel around the world in search of beauty, will only find it if they carry it within themselves.

The stamps are pretty:

The big red one is about organ donors.

Around 9100 people are waiting  for a donor organ in Germany, most of them for a kidney. In 2020 there were just over 900 post-mortal organ donations nationwide. So the need far exceeds the number of donations available. Especially for relatives, it is a difficult situation to decide on a possible donation if the deceased has not made a decision in his/her life time. Since the consent regulation applies in Germany, the BZgA (Federal Centre for Health Education) is offering a sample ID card for organ and tissue donation, which you can order free of charge or download from the Internet. (And some GPs have these ID cards in their practice). If you change you mind you can simply destroy the card, as the decision is not documented anywhere else. 

The 85 cent stamp was issued on 2 June 2022 and was designed by Jens Müller.

We are traveling in the UK at the moment. And today we are in a hotel /pub in Ringwood. 

We will be seeing a large part of the family and it will be a very busy day with grandchildren.

In England it is the beginning of a long Bank Holiday weekend, and one of the family are camping nearby with their offspring. Another of the family is coming down with her husband and children especially to see us, and we have booked a table at the hotel where we are staying for an early evening meal. We are 11 people counting the children, so we have had to book in advance. It's going to be great seeing them all.

A few days before leaving we paid a visit to the local olive press in our village. They sell a very prestigious olive oil.

We bought a few small bottles to give away. While the lady went behind this photo wall to fill the bottles, we looked around.

This is the office with the sample bottles on top of the cabinet.

Empty bottles ready to be filled.

That is all from me this Friday. Of course I will put some funnies at the end, but in the meantime I wish everybody a lovely weekend. Especially those in Britain, as it is an extra long weekend. 

Keep smiling,

Hugs,

Lisca

OK, most of these are not actually funny, but I found them interesting. 

Here is a quote that I liked:

This next one is a newspaper article from 1912!

The furnaces of the world are now burning about 2,000,000,000 tons of coal a year. When this is burned, uniting with oxygen, it adds about 7,000,000,000 tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere yearly. This tends to make the air a more effective blanket for the earth and to raise its temperature. The effect may be considerable in a few centuries.

This article’s authenticity is supported by the fact it can be found in the digital archives of the National Library of New Zealand.

Further attesting to its authenticity (and perhaps its role as a bit of stock news used to fill space) is that an identical story had appeared in an Australian newspaper a month prior, in the 17 July 1912, issue of The Braidwood Dispatch and Mining Journal, as found in the digital archives of the National Library of Australia.

An even deeper dive reveals that the text of this news item has its origins in the March 1912 issue of Popular Mechanics, where it appeared as a caption in an article titled “Remarkable Weather of 1911: The Effect of the Combustion of Coal on the Climate — What Scientists Predict for the Future”:

A Postcard A Day - Tuesday 23 August 2022 - T for beautiful door

 

Hello lovely ladies, How are you all? We are traveling at the moment. We should be on our way across Spain to get to the north coast where we will catch the ferry that will take us to England. 

For that reason I have scheduled this post as I don't know if I will be able to write anything on Monday evening.

First of all I would like to show you a postcard of a most impressive door. I love doors and windows and this one certainly is a beauty! 

The card comes from Germany and the building is called Haus zum Stockfisch. It is found in Erfurt, right in the center of Germany:

Wikipedia writes:

The Haus zum Stockfisch is an important Renaissance town house at Johannesstraße 169 in the old town of Erfurt . It was acquired by the city at the beginning of the 20th century and has since been used as a museum, since 1974 it has been the seat of the City Museum T

The site of today's building, outside the actual old town core , but still within the city fortifications , was already occupied in the Middle Ages with presumably ephemeral predecessor buildings. In 1606 these were acquired by the woad dealer (Don't know what 'woad' is? I didn't either. I'll explain further down) Paul Ziegler , who then had the Stockfisch house built here until 1607 using the older cellar facilities . Since the use of the name Zum Klein and Großer Stockfisch can already be proven in the previous buildings, it can be assumed that their names were simply adopted for the new building.

Dyer 's woad ( Isatis tinctoria ), Pastel or German indigo is a biennial plant of the cruciferous family (Brassicaceae). It is native to western Asia but has been cultivated in Europe as a dye plant since the Iron Age. Indigo (indigo blue) was obtained from woad.

Due to the early death of the builder, the outbreak of the Thirty Years' War and last but not least the loss of importance of the woad trade as a result, the interior work on the house dragged on until the late 17th century. In 1697 it was sold by the builder's family to Georg Heinrich and Johann Heinrich Gerstenberg , and in the 18th century there were frequent changes of ownership, during which the interior was also changed in baroque forms. Converted into a factory in 1836, it was initially used to produce leather goods, then coats. It was later used as a wine wholesaler.

The city of Erfurt bought the building in 1905 and used it to house various offices and exhibitions. From 1947 to 1965 it was the seat of the Natural History Museum. In the second half of the 20th century, three major renovations took place - in 1957, 1992-1994 and finally in 1998, during which the color scheme from the time of construction could also be reconstructed on the basis of findings. The City Museum has used the entire building since 1974.

The stamps are the usual pretty flowers. I have quite a collection of all different flowers.

What has been going on in the K household? If you have read my Friday blog, then you will know that we have celebrated our 30th wedding anniversary. We had a lovely day. Our friend Dian had brought us a Sacher torte. I have already posted a photo on Friday, but here is a different one:

It was the 15th of August, which in southern Europe is a national holiday, so most places were closed. We really wanted to go out for lunch, and we found a table at the hotel on the edge of our village,

 where we had a really lovely meal!

In the below photo, we sat right at the end wall. (Outside was too hot)

Of course today is T for Tuesday, so a drink is in order. Hubby's soft drink is poured into his glass and my white wine is just about visible behind the bottle. 

Hubby fancied a chicken burger, but still can't eat bread. So he asked if they could leave the bread off. They surprised him by making some delicious potato wedges, which went down very well!

The hotel is an old mill that they have refurbished. The old floor has been preserved by building a glass floor over it. It is quite spectacular.

There is coffee in the above photo, so an extra entry to the T-Party, hosted by Elizabeth and Bluebeard. Please join us if you have a drink or drink reference to share.

On Monday we will have left on our trip to England. First we travel to the north of Spain, to Santander, where we catch a ferry to the UK. The ferry takes  a day and a night and some. The trip to the north of Spain is 9 driving hours but we are taking it easy and have two stops on the way. 

So the next few blogs (if any) will be short, as we will be staying in a caravan on a campsite. The only internet will be the data on my phone, so I don't know if I can write, let alone post anything. I might not be able to link either (or comment).

Wishing everyone a happy Y-Day,

Keep smiling,

Hugs,

Lisca

A Postcard A Day - Friday 19 August- Friday Smiles

 

Hello lovely ladies, How are you? 

Today I will look back on the smiles we have had this week. 

As per usual, one of my smiles is a card I received. In this case it is a card from Germany and I love it! This is where I want to be, in the garden in the shade, reading!

It is a painting by the artist Peder Severin Krøyer ( 23 July 1851 – 21 November 1909), also known as P. S. Krøyer. He  was a Danish painter.

In 1870 at the age of 19 Krøyer completed his studies at the Royal Danish Academy of Art (Det Kongelige Danske Kunstakademi), where he had studied with Frederik Vermehren. In 1873 he was awarded the gold medal, as well as a scholarship.

His official debut as a painter was in 1871 at Charlottenborg with a portrait of a friend, the painter Frans Schwartz. He exhibited regularly at Charlottenborg throughout his life.

In 1874 Heinrich Hirschsprung bought his first painting from Krøyer, establishing a long-standing patronage. Hirschsprung's collection of art forms the basis of the Hirschsprung Museum in Copenhagen.

On a trip to Paris in 1888 he encountered Marie Martha Mathilde Triepcke, whom he had known in Copenhagen. They fell in love and, after a whirlwind romance, married on 23 July 1889 at her parents' home in Germany. Marie Krøyer, who was also a painter, became associated with the Skagen community, and after their marriage was often featured in Krøyer's paintings. The couple had one child, a daughter named Vibeke, born in January 1895. They were divorced in 1905 following a prolonged separation.

Krøyer's eyesight failed him gradually over the last ten years of his life until he was totally blind. Ever the optimist, he painted almost to the end, in spite of health obstacles. In fact, he painted some of his last masterpieces while half-blind, joking that the eyesight in his one working eye had become better with the loss of the other eye.

Krøyer died in 1909 in Skagen at 58 years of age after years of declining health. He had also been in and out of hospitals, suffering from bouts of mental illness.

The stamps are pretty too. There are two flowers and a new digital stamp called A Letter In Orbit:

Letter in Orbit by Bettina Walter. Here is a larger image of the whole sheet.

On Monday we celebrated 30 years of wedded bliss! They have been the happiest years of my life. We are still very much in love. 

Our friend Dian gifted us with a Sachertorte and here we are cutting it on the day:

We decided to  go out for lunch but on Monday most places are closed. We remembered the hotel on the edge of the village and (it being a hotel) was of course open. 

We could sit outside

But that was too hot. The lady told us there was a table indoors, so we had that:

The above photo is from their website, but we sat at the table by the far wall.

We ordered a drink and got these dear little tapas. They are tortilla de patates. (Spanish omelet).

We had a lovely meal and we will remember that for a long time to come.

We've had lots of friends visiting us this week but I haven't really taken many photos. But we have had a super nice week as you can imagine.

I have some funnies for you at the end. On Monday we will be leaving on our trip to England. First we travel to the north of Spain, to Santander, where we catch a ferry to the UK. The ferry takes  a day and a night and some. The trip to the north of Spain is 9 driving hours but we are taking it easy and have two stops on the way. 

So the next few blogs (if any) will be short, as we will be staying in a caravan on a campsite. The only internet will be the data on my phone, so I don't know if I can write, let alone post anything. 

Have a great weekend,

Keep smiling!

Hugs,

Lisca

The next one is not funny at all. Apart from the fact that this person can't spell, it is just a warning: