It's a picture + a few lines of text blog, featuring history, art, old photographs, maps, and more.

Dutch.Man.Amersfoort.Creative.IT.Music.History

 The World upside down

The convention that North is at the top on most modern maps was established by the Egyptian astronomer Ptolemy (90-168 AD) and was adopted by other cartographers.

Happy Halloween!

ButterMyButtons

Sometimes when playing pool it really helps to have a bridge stick around for those hard to reach, across the table cue shots. No self respecting billiard parlor would be complete without one. A while back I picked up a couple of shorty pool cues with the intention of fitting one with a bridge head while keeping the other one for the "why is there a bookcase here?" shot.

Today I finally decided I would take care of my "lack of bridge head" problem. I do have a scroll saw and figured if I couldn't use it to cut out a bridge head, what's the point? So I hop on the friendly interwebs and search for "billiards bridge head template" (thinking surely I can not be the only scroll sawyer with this idea.) I turned up some pictures but not a template per se. 

I found a head-on shot of a bridge head with the shape I am most accustomed to and PhotoShopped it into a two-color image and printed it to size. Click on the image below for a PDF template - ready to print out.

Download Template: BridgeHead.pdf

I cut out the printed shape and headed out to the workshop to find a piece of quarter-inch plywood to impart this shape unto. The scraps I had on hand were slightly too narrow (and I would not waste anything larger on this project.) A glance in the right direction revealed a "drop" of quarter-inch plexiglass that would be just the ticket. This plexi had its protective paper covering still attached. I laid the template shape on the plexiglass blank and spray painted over it to transfer the outline.

A slow and steady pass through the scroll saw, a stop at the drill press and some judicious sanding resulted in the handy-dandy bridge-headed shorty pictured above. For the record, the first shot taken with this device in a real game resulted in the successful pocketing of the desired ball - what more do you want?

Oftentimes I come across something on the internet that draws me in and sends me on a grand adventure. Once again I have only my fondness for Vintage Everyday to thank for today's excursion. It was the image ["A Girl on a Scooter"(New York City, 1965)] that lead to my entering the name "Joel Meyerowitz" into the search engine.

I first chose to consume a video commentary by Joel (embeded below.) I enjoyed his insights on human nature. This lead to an image search for more of his works. I collected several images from random sites around the internet and present them here in BlogDogIt Slide Show fashion. The source pages for these images are in the list of links at the bottom of this post. Pay them a visit and see where they lead you. Take a walk with Meyerowitz and see the streets.

Enjoy!

[ MORE...]

A pet turtle? When I heard talk of my grandson wanting a pet turtle my thoughts turned back to a time in my youth when I too kept a turtle. He lived in a small "turtle bowl" that had a built-in platform in its center. Under a goose-neck desk lamp that for turtle was Sun. As I recall the turtle was a very interesting pet and seemed to require far less care when compared to the hamsters and gerbils that some of my friends had in their homes. But the fact is, I am sure my turtle was not given the level of care that should have been afforded him and as a result he ended up paying with his life.

My childhood turtle was obviously just a hatch-ling - barely the diameter of a silver dollar. The turtle we found for my grandson was easily five time that size. Of course it was only after acquiring the new turtle that we realized the small reptile tank - previous home to a friendly little cricket frog named Hedy Hopper - would not be sufficient to provide a comfortable existence for the latest member of the family, "Crush."

The internet - not surprisingly - is a wealth of information (and likely miss-information) about the care, feeding, health and habitat of "Sliders" (the only available species of turtle for sale at our local pet shop.) This article is presented here in an effort to [1. Add something to the miss-information side of things] and [B. Encourage anyone desiring to keep a turtle as a pet to do their homework and prepare a suitable home prior to bringing the little guy home.]

Below is a slide show showing the steps we have taken in an effort to give Crush a fighting chance, on a budget perhaps better suited to raising earthworms. While the habitat is not optimal it does show a move in that direction. At this time the requirement for proper UVA/UVB illumination remains to be met. For now at least, he seems to be very happy, adjusting well and eating food.

For more information on the care, feeding, health and habitat of turtles kept as pets please search the internet - that's what it's there for...

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