I love to travel, mainly to Africa where I was born, I enjoy reading and playing bridge. I go for rambles in the countryside. I collect stamps and go to T'ai Chi classes. I love my two cats and my garden birds. I adore the African wildlife and try to help Conservation groups.
I know I was very disappointed when I realised Andre Agassi was not going to be playing in Wimbeldon. I thought oh well, it's going to be quite boring this year. Well it has turned out anything but. I knew John McEnroe came over and did a lot of commentating for the BBC, and he is as always very amusing, informative and interesting, so when I saw Jimmy Conners with him this year doing the same job it all suddenly changed for me. The two of them chatting with Sue Barker is just great. Then today I got to see John playing in the doubles with his old partner Peter Fleming. (They won hands down and are seeded 2nd) Boris Becker also works for the BBC, and when they all get together it is a blast.
"Rain stopped play" - Today is the 1st day that this has happened and the BBC gave us a programme on Sharapova and her family, and her rise to the No1 Ladies in the world. She is an inspiration to everyone I am sure. Today when I watched her play she was dressed in a very attractive tennis dress, white with just a touch of yellow, and she won a very good game.
Great Day's Viewing today!
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Mona Lisa smile secrets revealed
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The smile on the face of the Mona Lisa is so enigmatic that it disappears when it is looked at directly, says a US scientist.
Professor Margaret Livingstone of Harvard University said the smile only became apparent when the viewer looked at other parts of the painting.
The Mona Lisa, painted by Leonardo da Vinci in the 1500s, has intrigued art lovers for five centuries because of its subject's mysterious smile.
The theory has been presented at the American Association for the Advancement of Science's (AAAS) annual meeting in Denver, Colorado, this week. The smile disappeared when it was looked at because of the way the human eye processes visual information, said Prof Livingstone.
The eye uses two types of vision, foveal and peripheral.
Foveal, or direct vision, is excellent at picking up detail but is less suited to picking up shadows. "The elusive quality of the Mona Lisa's smile can be explained by the fact that her smile is almost entirely in low spatial frequencies, and so is seen best by your peripheral vision," Prof Livingstone said.
The more a person stares fixedly ahead, the less useful is their peripheral vision. Prof Livingstone said the best example of this effect was if someone was to stare at a letter on a page of print. Concentrating on one letter made it difficult to pick out other letters even a short distance away, Prof Livingstone said. She said the same principle was used by da Vinci on the painting. The smile only became apparent if a viewer looked at her eyes or elsewhere on her face.
'Fundamental truths'
Da Vinci's painting, possibly the most famous portrait of all time, is housed at the Louvre in Paris. Prof Livingstone also used French painter Monet's Impression: Sunrise, which features a dazzling orange sun in a blue sky, to show how artists had understood human sight.
"I'm demystifying the procedures that some artists have known about for years, but not debunking their art in any way," she said. These artists - the Impressionists, Da Vinci, Chuck Close, and Robert Silvers, for example-discovered fundamental truths that scientists are only now unravelling."
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Illegal ivory on sale in Africa.
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Illegally obtained ivory is being openly sold in many African countries, despite recent pledges to clamp down on the trade, say conservation groups. Traffic, a network monitoring the trade, said the quantities available showed most came from illegal sources. It said hundreds of ivory items were on sale in airport duty-free shops in Mozambique and is calling for tougher action at a Geneva meeting this week. Ivory is also widely available in Egypt, most from Sudan, it said. Traffic said it wants the Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species (Cites) to toughen plans for a clampdown on domestic ivory markets. "Mozambique has ignored numerous opportunities to stop this violation of Cites but continues to allow illegal ivory trade with impunity," said Tom Milliken of Cites. "It's time to take decisive action and send a real message," he added. Strict curbs on the ivory trade have been in place for 16 years, following after a big increase in poaching in the 1970s and 1980s. |
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10 THINGS
 10 geese by Shaunette Babb, Norwich
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Snippets harvested from the week's news, chopped, sliced and diced for your weekend convenience.
1. Bono and Midge Ure say Freddie Mercury hit on them backstage at the Live Aid concert.
2. The moon's appearance is governed by an optical illusion, which makes it seem bigger the lower it is in the sky.
3. Grunting tennis players are nothing new - the first grunter is thought to have been US player Vicki Palmer, on the circuit almost 40 years ago, according to the Sunday Times.
4. Tim Henman swears.
5. The power consumed in Britain while electrical devices are on "stand-by" produces a million tons of carbon dioxide a years, according to the Independent.
6. The man who was the voice of one of the original Daleks, Roy Skelton, also did the voices for George and Zippy in Rainbow.
7. Americans spend $3bn less on their dads for Father's Day than they do on their mums at Mother's Day, when gift-buying tops $11bn.
8. The average guest at a Buckingham Palace garden party scoffs 14 cakes, sandwiches, scones and ice-cream, according to royal accounts.
9. Saddam Hussein's favourite breakfast cereal is Raisin Bran Crunch (known in Britain as All-Bran Sultana Bran). He also likes Cheetos and Doritos crisps.
10. Cloned animals are as safe to eat as conventionally-bred animals, according to America's Food and Drug Administration.
Thanks to Andy Ward, UK and Tom Morris, UK.
I have waited for quite a while for the paper back edition of Alexander McCall Smith's latest book to come out. I spotted it in a shop today and I bought two copies, one for me and one for my daughter. It is called "The Sunday Philosophy Club". The story is set in Edinburgh, Scotland and I cant wait to get into it. However I know once I start reading it, I will not put the book down till it is finished. Dont know about you, but when I have read a book that I have really enjoyed I always feel let down, sad, disappointed that it has come to an end and it seems there is even a void in my life. I have a lot to be doing just now, so can't risk starting on the book.
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Why does the moon look so big now?
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It can put a man in space, land a probe on Mars, but Nasa can't explain why the moon appears bigger when it's on the horizon than when it's high in the night sky. The mystery of the Moon Illusion, witnessed by millions of people this week, has puzzled great thinkers for centuries. There have even been books devoted to the matter. Not since June 1987 has the moon been this low in the sky, accentuating the illusion even further. But opinion differs on why there is such an apparent discrepancy in size between a moon on the horizon and one in the distant sky.
Two main theories dominate. The first, known as the Ponzo Illusion - named after Mario Ponzo who demonstrated it in 1913 - suggests that the mind judges the size of an object based on its background. Ponzo drew two identical bars across a picture of railway tracks which converge as they recede into the distance (see pop-up, right). The upper bar looks wider because it appears to span the rails, as opposed to the lower bar, which sits between the rails. In the same way, with a low-lying moon the trees and houses, which are familiar foreground reference points, appear smaller against the moon, which appears bigger than it really is.
Sceptics of this theory point to airline pilots who also see the illusion, although they have no ground reference points. Alternatively, there's the theory that the brain perceives the sky as a flattened dome rather than the true hemisphere it really is. Try for yourself The theory runs that we believe things immediately overhead, flying birds for example, are closer than birds on the horizon. When the moon is on the horizon, the brain therefore miscalculates its true size and distance. Then there are those who scoff that this is an illusion at all. They, at least, can be proved wrong. Hold a coin up to a low-lying moon to and compare differences in size. Any difference will remain exactly the same, as one traces the trajectory of the moon through the night. Indeed, it's said that by viewing a low moon though a rolled up piece of paper, to block out the surroundings, the illusion immediately vanishes. But experts have yet to agree on either or, indeed, any explanation. For the moment at least, the real reason for the Moon Illusion remains up in the air. BBC NEWS |
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WHEN THERE IS A SINGLE THIEF - IT''S ROBBERY.
WHEN THERE ARE A THOUSAND THIEVES - IT'S TAXATION!
It's Wimbeldon time again! Doors shut; phone off the hook; Diary empty; strawberries and cream in the fridge; Lovely sunny weather outside; birds singing; and my cats dozing in the shade. I have my T.V. on, my remote control at the ready, I get the digital BBC, so I can select which match I want to watch, and settle down to 2 weeks of bliss! But wait a minute - Where is Agassi, who is he playing, what court will he be on? - My heart sinks NO AGASSI.
I HAVE TAKEN A COUPLE OF DAYS BEFORE MENTIONING WHAT I READ IN ONE OF THE SUNDAY NEWSPAPERS!
THERE ARE MEN IN THE UNITED KINGDOM, WHO ARE PREPARED TO PAY WELL OVER TEN THOUSAND POUNDS
TO KILL A LION IN SOUTH AFRICA.
I AM NOT SURE WHO TO LOATHE THE MOST THE KILLERS,
OR THOSE WHO ASK AND GET THE MONEY FOR
ALLOWING PEOPLE TO KILL THESE WONDERFUL ANIMALS.
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Bidders go ape for chimpanzee art .
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Three abstract paintings by a chimpanzee named Congo have been sold for £12,000 - after being given a price tag of just £800. The animal art, painted when the chimp was three, went under the hammer on Tuesday at auction house Bonhams in central London. Congo's work was included in a 1957 chimp art exhibition curated by animal behaviourist Desmond Morris. The three works were bought by US modern art enthusiast Howard Hong. Bonhams said there had been a "fantastic" amount of interest in the paintings, which had been sold as one lot.
The chimp art was part of an exhibition at London's ICA put on by animal expert and painter Morris. Morris, author of The Naked Ape, had attempted to understand "chimpanzees' ability to create order and symmetry as well as to explore, at a more primeval level, the impetus behind our own desires for artistic creativity," auction house Bonhams said. His encouragement led to Congo producing about 400 drawings and paintings in the late 1950s which were received by the art world with a mixture of scorn and scepticism.
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I DESTROY MY ENEMIES WHEN
I MAKE THEM MY FRIENDS.
I wonder how often one buys a new C.D. to find that every song on it is wonderful? This has not happened to me all that often I have to admit. However I recently bought Bruce Springsteen's "Devils and Dust".
This afternoon I went again to see my new grandaughter - Catriona Rose 2 weeks old - and I was completely taken aback at my feelings for this little wee soul who has come into our lives.
I had no idea how much I already loved her in just the 2 short weeks since she was born. She has a nice head of hair, ten tiny toes and ten long fingers, eye lashes from her Mother to die for, and even at this early stage has a mind of her own. I sat watching her as she slept, without a care in the world except for when was her next feed, I wondered what lay ahead in life for her in this mad world we now live in.
I think Grandparents are very fortunate, in being able to witness another young life in the family starting to grow. Times change of course and new parents may perhaps not do the same things as we did for our children. It is sometimes difficult to know where the line is between, apparent interferance or kindly advice. The bottom line, of course, is that as long as the baby is loved by all the family they will grow up what ever is either done or not done. And what is that old saying "Mothers know best"!
YOU KNOW MORE THAN YOU THINK YOU DO!
I have just been watching a BBC 2 part programme on the original Live Aid. My daughter and I sat engrossed listening to all the information of how it came to be, and listening to all the various artists singing, and recalling how the day panned out for them. We both thoroughly enjoyed all the memories the programme brought back to us. There were a few things that stood out in my mind, so clearly about that day way back in 1985.
Bob Geldof's passion about raising money for the starving people of Ethopia; Queen's arrival on Stage and how they took full command of the Wembley crowd and how they, in fact, stole the whole show; "Drive" by the Cars, which was sung with a video showing just how bad life was in that country for the people there and in particular the children.
And here we are again 20 years later - Live 8 is soon to be with us, raising more awareness and money for people in Africa. I hope the money is used wisely for the benefit of those who desperately need it, and does not go into Swiss Bank accounts of the African politicians.
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