Last two years were rather difficult for me. For some time I lost interest in blogging and I even stopped learning painting.
Fortunately, days come after nights.
Below is my first painting of 2017.
Life, days and nights
8
Tag Archives: learning
Hollywood gallery
This morning I learned how to create a gallery of photos on this blog.
I created the page “HOLLYWOOD GALLERY” and placed there selected photos from the Media library.
Please take a look and let me know if everything works properly.
Thank you!
PAINTING by JF
From summer to spring.
Soon my wife and I again will move from summer to spring. We are looking forward to it. Why? Please read the old post below and you will understand. Please click on “original” to see photos.
Best to you!
Enjoy life!
Not too long ago I published the post FROM WINTER TO SUMMER.
Several months passed. We had wonderful time in Hollywood, Florida.
Now is time to move from summer to spring, from 84 degrees in Hollywood to 65 degrees in Queens, from palms to blooming magnolias, from our friends here to our family and friends in New York and New Jersey.
It takes only three hours to come from summer to spring and to enjoy wonders of New York City. In a week we can walk in the Central Park, we can go to the St. Patrick’s Cathedral, we can visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
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Life is wonderful! You don’t need to be a millionaire to enjoy it! Just walk and look around you, smell flowers, soak wonderful views, greet people with smiles, listen to laughter of children, to music in churches, in some buildings on the 5th…
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Quotes about youth
“In youth we learn; in age we understand.”
Marie Von Ebner-Eschenbach
“Youth is easily deceived, because it is quick to hope.”
Aristotle
“You can only be young once. But you can always be immature.”
Dave Barry
“The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently.”
Friedrich Nietzsche
“There is a fountain of youth: It is your mind, your talents, the creativity you bring in your life and the lives of people you love.”
Sophia Loren
“The error of youth is to believe that intelligence is a substitute for experience, while the error of age is to believe experience is a substitute for intelligence.”
Ernest Hemingway
“Years may wrinkle the skin, but to give up interest wrinkles the soul. You are as young as your faith, as old as your doubt; as young as your self-confidence, as old as your fear; as young as your hope as old as your despair. In the central place of every heart there is a recording chamber. So long as it receives messages of beauty, hope, cheer and courage, so long are you young. When your heart is covered with the snows of pessimism and the ice of cynicism, then, and then only, are you grown old. And then, indeed as the ballad says, you just fade away.”
Douglas MacArthur
Rule of thirds?
Discoveries
It is never late to learn!
My first brush painting
You like it, don’t you?
What is this animal?
He has wonderful dreams, he is walking to stars!
I hope to learn to paint too.
About leaders
Where are good leaders? Who of leaders in the West “knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way”?
If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.
A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way.
Good leaders make people feel that they’re at the very heart of things, not at the periphery.
To my friends!
Dear friends!
This blog started in October of 2013.
I never expected that blogging will bring so much joy to my life.
At 79-80 it’s not that easy to meet 3,000+ talented people of all ages from many countries and learn from them, enjoy their creativity, kindness and friendship.
I am glad to know you, to see your posts daily, to travel with you, to read your writings, to enjoy your photos, to suffer and to overcome with you.
Happy New Year to you and your loved ones!
I am very grateful to everybody who created and maintains WordPress.
Happy New Year to you and your families! You are builders of happiness!
In 2014 I learned more about blogging. In January I started to paint using PC paint program. In June I got my first digital camera and after more than 20 years’ interval started shooting what I liked.
I learned a little about painting and photo processing programs.
With your help I overcame my fear to write in English.
i even wrote several book reviews. You can read one of them HERE.
I liked “Shadow of the Raven” by a fellow blogger Millie Thom very much.
I hope that in 2015 I’ll be able to share with you new posts that you’ll like.
The very best to all my followers everywhere this year!
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The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2014 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 38,000 times in 2014. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 14 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.
Quotes of Larry Winget
“Be authentic. Don’t try to be someone you aren’t. You’ll hate yourself for it & the effort to maintain the facade will exhaust you. BE REAL! Many won’t like the real you but that’s better than having people adore the person that isn’t you at all.”
“I have discovered there are only a handful of good ideas in the whole world. You already know them. You have heard them your entire life. Here are some of the main keys to being more successful:
Take personal responsibility.
Things change, so be flexible.
Work smart and work hard.
Serve others well.
Be nice to others.
Be optimistic.
Have goals; want something big for yourself.
Stay focused.
Keep learning.
Become excellent at what you do.
Trust your gut.
When in doubt, take action.
Earn all you can. Save all you can. Give all you can.
Enjoy all you’ve got.
Above all keep it simple.”
“Nobody ever wrote down a plan to be broke, fat, lazy, or stupid. Those things are what happen when you don’t have a plan.”
“Your thoughts, your words, and your actions created the life you are living. You create your results—no one else.”
“Success comes from what you do, not from what you say you are going to do.”
“Make yourself happy and surround yourself with people who are cool with that.”
Today’s achievement
I continue to learn what the paint and photo editing program I discovered can do.
Surely, it does not act on its own. We are partners.
Only together we can do good deeds.
This time I took my picture of a squirrel, placed it in a proper place in the program and then made some adjustments.
You can see the result below.
SQUIRREL by JF
The smallest achievement
I am now in the process of looking for a good FREE painting and photo editing program that produces images acceptable by WordPress.
The major problem I have so far is that programs I found don’t have good tutorials. I would appreciate your help in this matter.
However, in the process of experimenting with one program I got an image that I liked. It is an UNIQUE image (I am unable to recreate it).
Still I got something beautiful and it’s an achievement.
Before sharing this image with you I edited it on my PC with a program that is in it.
Please let me know if you like the image below.
EXPERIMENT by JF
Sharing news and thoughts
1. Creativity and learning make people happy.
2. During my morning walk I saw in the distance three princesses, zoomed and shot them (not with a gun). See the photo below.
PRINCESSES by JF
3. I added several posts to the page “Travel”.
Among them are reblogs of posts of very talented bloggers Antonio Violi (SIRACUSA, ORTIGIA) and Victor Tribunsky (PETRA IN JORDAN).
Both posts have wonderful photos and stories.
I will add more posts to this page this week.
4. So far I made all my digital paintings using a paint program on my PC. But a couple of days ago I found that there are many other free programs for painting and photo editing. Today I am starting to learn one of them. Be ready for new paintings (it’s not a threat!).
5. I am going to add more paintings to the page “My paintings and tests”. Hopefully, all of you will test YOUR KNOWLEDGE OF PAINTING AND PAINTINGS.
Several good quotes.
Does life teach us anything? Do we learn how to think? Can women and men be partners? What do you think?
The first quote gives me hope that I am an educated man.
The second one makes me think and the last quote makes me laugh.
I hope you’ll like at least one of them.
A story about my first short story.
There are many aspiring young writers all over the world. I reblog this post for them. Learn, write and never give up!
After three very difficult years in US I worked as an accountant in the publishing house Grosset and Dunlap (by that time I graduated in accounting from Queens College). After working many years in the USSR in research and management positions I found my job very easy and dull, but we needed it badly for living.
My old friend recommended me to start writing to make life more interesting. The idea was very tempting.
In the Soviet Union I published three textbooks and many scientific papers but I never wrote a short story. So at the ripe age of 44 I decided to try it. I wrote a story in Russian about our first experience in the high school of overrunning Americans.
I rewrote this story in English for this blog. You can find it HERE.
I am a very humble person (not everybody believes it) but I liked my…
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Life is the best motivator!
I think that majority of my followers did not read this post.
During our 40 years in America we often heard: “I want it and I want it now!” My responses are: “What did you do to get it?” and “Go for it!”
There are many good motivational blogs in the WordPress blogosphere. They are well written and many of them contain beautiful uplifting photos and wise quotes of famous people.
However, I believe that life is the best motivator.
Let me share with you our experience.
My wife and I came in the USA in 1975 with two children. My wife did not know English at all. I believed that I knew English as in the USSR I translated many scientific papers and was able to communicate with foreigners in English. However, my first days in New York were terrible. I could not understand people and people could not understand me.
What did we do?
I found a job as a cutter in a tie factory. I worked 8 hours daily and spent 4 hours to go to work and back. There were 4-5 hours for sleep. All remaining hours I read books by…
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A value of one word.
There are many wonderful writers in the WordPress’ family.
Surely, I am not one of them.
I am a reader.
But for 80 years I learned that every word you say or write is very valuable.
I learned that it is possible to describe a real story using only 2-6 words.
To describe a fantasy I usually need more words.
Here are some examples:
He was.
He was hurt.
He was badly hurt.
He was hurt by her.
He was hurt by her rejection!
As you see there are five real stories above.
And below is an example of fantasy:
He was hurt by her rejection of his money!
I hope that from now on you will choose every word you say or write.
It is always good to hope!
MY PAINTING #15
Monochrome madness?
Today I noticed that several my followers submitted wonderful photos to Leanne Cole’s “Monochrome Madness – week 24”.
I got my first digital camera less than two months ago and so far I took only colour photos. I am not sure if my camera has mono mode. However, I learned today that it is possible to convert a colour photo to B&W on PC.
Am I mad enough? Sure, I am.
I took a colour photo of our protector at the Carriage House.
This guy protected guests for many years in all seasons. It was extremely difficult and dangerous job. His wonderful little son was kidnapped one night. He lost his right eye. His right side is greatly damaged. However, he stays bravely on his post and we feel safe near him.
Below is his photo converted to B&W on PC. Does it qualify as monochrome photo?
In any event, I hope you’ll like him.
Our protector (B&W) photo by JF
Then I thought that we live in a beautiful wooded area. It is summer now and everything is green. Could it be that the original colour photo is better than the converted one?
Please take a look below and let me know your opinion.
Our protector colour photo by JF
Our beautiful world!
I recently got my first digital camera. After many years with great pleasure I started to take photos again. Below is my first digital picture.
MY FIRST DIGITAL PICTURE.
PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS 