Week in the life ~ Friday

Friday, 5/08/2011. Accordin to the weather forecast, it's going to be a very wet day, with heavy rains and thunder and lightning. I'm glad that when I get off the train in the morning, it's not raining. But the grass is all wet, and sparkling in the early morning sun like a thousand diamonds.

My bicycle is at the library, so I have to walk. I decide to take a different route today. First I pass some beautiful gardens with a lot of colourful flowers in full bloom. Well, no surprise, after all it's been raining almost every day since the beginning of July.

The path leads me to down and along the river...

 ... which looks wonderfully peaceful in the morning light.

After some rain during the morning, it's dry again at lunch time, so I decide to go for a walk. I see some wild blackberries near the path and when I get closer to take a picture, I notice this wonderful insect, all bright blue and red. I've never seen one like these, and I have no idea what it is. But it's beautiful.

There's a big cabbage field along the way. I simply adore the wonderful colours of the red cabbage!

I spend quite some time there, at the cabbage field. I find the different colours and textures of the red and green cabbages really fascinating.

In the strip of grass next to the cabbage field, I can hear loads of grasshoppers or cicadas, or whatever they are, but I can't see any at first.

At last, I see them, but they're too fast, quickly jumping away and hiding behind the leaves. But a bit of patience pays off, and I finally spot a beautiful bright green one. He eventually stays on a blade of grass, deciding that I'm not too dangerous, but keeping an eye on me and scratching his head, wondering what this big black thing might possibly be that I keep pointing into his face.

 I'ts Friday, so I need a fence shot as well. Here's one with a bokeh lama or alpaca which will do. Those animals always make me smile :)

I'm doing some research for a small exhibition at the library. The book on top is a copy of Olaus Magnus' Historia delle genti et della natura delle cose settentrionali, an Italian translation of his description of the Scandinavian countries, printed in 1565. The book's bound in vellum, and you can see the title "Gotho. Historia. S." written at the bottom of the pages, which tells you how the book was once stored - lying flat in the shelf. The storing of books standing up, spine outwards on the shelves, as we know it today, isn't how books were originally stored. Always nice to see such clues. It's a lovely book, but I can't read any Italian, let alone some 16th century Tuscan Italian, unfortunately. I have a modern German translation, but the book has some lovely woodcuts I want to use. These old books just look so much better for display in an exhibition than modern reprints.

As this week's project seems to have somehow developed into a kind of musical survey of Swiss music, here's another sample. One of the most popular bands in Switzerland, Züri West. The song, I schänke Dir mis Härz (I give you my heart), is from 1994. I was in school back then, in Gymnasium, and I have very fond memories of this song and that time. But I just can't believe that it was such a long time ago! Where have all those years gone??? Still a wonderful and popular song. Love it.

Time to leave work, taking the bicycle to the station. It's the weekend, yay!

I've decided that I need to look after myself a bit better, after my health and shape. I've already started cutting back on sugar, but I need to do something for my fitness as well. I've decided to go swimming after work, and have taken my stuff with me. I'm so tired that I fall asleep on the train and it's very tempting to just go home and lie on the sofa instead, but I actually manage to drag myself to the swimming pool.

I swim for a whole hour (and three minutes), and I'm sooo proud of myself! It has done me really good, and I'm feeling fabulous. It's a 15 minutes walk from the pool  to my home, and when I step out of the building, it starts raining and I can hear some thunder nearby. But I don't care. I'm feeling too good to be bothered by a bit of rain. There's a saying in German, "rain makes you beautiful". So I'm not only getting fitter, but pretty as well on top of it. What a day! ;). And it's Friday, weekend! And I'm back home just in time for Terry & June :)