What's It All About, eh?

Cape Breton evokes deep memories and strong emotions for me as well as a deep appreciation for the beauty of my adopted island. My hopes are that you too might find the photos evocative - maybe a view you've not enjoyed before, or an 'Oh I've been there', or if from away that you may be encouraged to visit this fair isle so that you might come to love and breathe Cape Breton as I do. One word about place names that I use - some are completely local usage while others are from maps of Cape Breton that I've purchased over the years. I frequently post travel and other photos that are of interest to me - and hopefully you.

On the right hand side bar find my take on Single Malt whiskey - from how to best enjoy this noble drink to reviews (in a most non-professional manner) of ones that I have tried and liked - or not. Also musings, mine and others, on life in general.

Photographs are roughly 98%+ my own and copy-righted. For the occasional photo that is borrowed, credit is given where possible - recently I have started posting unusual net photographs that seem unique. Feel free to borrow any of my photos for non-commercial use, otherwise contact me. Starting late in 2013 I have tried to be consistent in identifying my photographs using ©smck on all out of camera photos I personally captured - (I often do minor computer changes such as 'crop' or 'shadow' etc but usually nothing major), and using
©norvellhimself on all photos that I have played around with in case it might not be obvious. Lately I have dropped the ©smck and have watermarked them with the blog name.

COMMENTS are appreciated as feedback is the driving energy of blogging - And if you like this site please pass it along to a friend. Thanks!

NOTE: TO ENLARGE PHOTO, CLICK ON SAME - If using Firefox also click f11 - photos will fill the screen ...... ----------------------------------- ......TRANSLATION BUTTON AT TOP OF LEFT COLUMN!

The eternal note

Here it is 10 p.m. and our house in the wood is quiet with only the sound of Brownian motion in my ear as I for reasons unknown find comfort in talking to this blog sending a ripple of minimum intensity out into the aether of the 'cloud' and looking to see what country, what individual might be seeking in the mystery of it all - and quite often when music is quiet and sensory input is at an ebb I think that poetry, poetry that rhymes in certain compelling ways, somehow conveys a momentary insight from the unknown into our repository of reflections, into our questing soul, a glimmer onto the gossamer gestaltness of our mind, a mental 'shadow nymph' that just eludes our searching eye ....... and like perhaps a late night disk jockey sending out the melody of sound that serves his sharing of life's unanswerables  I think that I should share the rest of Dover Beach so here-with the first stanza:

The sea is calm to-night.
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
Upon the straits; on the French coast the light
Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand;
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!
Only, from the long line of spray
Where the sea meets the moon-blanched land,
Listen! you hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
At their return, up the high strand,
Begin, and cease, and then again begin,
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.

Ah, Love, Let Us Be True To One Another



Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.

 Mathew Arnold - excerpt from poem Dover Beach

Mom Never Told Us About This Stuff


The following countries visited this blog
- in order of most visiting to least visiting -
other countries have also visited but the statistics available to me show only the top ten countries - the past week is probably quite accurate and complete but more than likely in the past month there have been a few visiting countries that don't make the 'top ten' cut and over the lifetime of this blog - a little over 3 years - there are at least another dozen countries that have stopped by


ALL TIME
PAST MONTH
PAST WEEK



United States
United States
United States
Canada
Germany
Germany
Russia
Russia
Canada
Germany
Canada
France
Ukraine
Belarus
China
France
France
Greece
Malaysia
China
Italy
Poland
United Kingdom
Poland
United Kingdom
Greece
Turkey
Turkey
Poland







Billowing Wavs and Far From Home