Tuesday, March 26
Mar. 27th, 2024 12:25 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gottawonderToday I am grateful for:
A fairly mild day temperature wise, though there was quite the wind.
I did a bunch of small but useful things before I went to the barn. I washed a load of laundry, I changed the cat litter, and swept the floor.
I spent some time with my singing bowls. I don't really go in for the whole sound therapy aspect of them, but I find them beautiful and relaxing.
I had a very brief conversation with Sister E.
I went to the barn and chatted a bit with R (she celebrated her birthday recently).
R used River yesterday to be a lesson horse for a woman who needed a very quiet mount, mainly to work on biomechanics stuff. R said she really liked working with him, so I said if she ends up doing more lessons its fine if she uses River for those.
R worked with Quidley while I worked with River, which is good experience for him, and if it triggers his ear pinning she gets the chance to correct that behavior. At some point Quidley will either go on to another home (he's a horse she's working with in partnership with a local horse rescue), or R is thinking of keeping him, but he has to be trustworthy enough to work with students if he stays.
I felt like River was more "with" me today, which is nice. I did have to work a bit to get him moving, but not like some days where I am having to push him the whole time. He did a lot better on the turn on hindquarters, and so on, and nicely on the ridden work of making smaller trot circles and good halts from the canter.
I came home and my Sweetie brought me flowers (a few roses) since he is going to see his family this week. I thought that was pretty nice of him.
We did watch an episode of "Boardwalk Empire", then chatted for a while before he had to go to bed. He has to get up at around 7:30 am to leave for his flight, but that's later than he usually has to leave for work.
Finland has about 5.6 million people, mainly ethnic Finns. It has a LOT of lakes (if you look at it with Google maps, it literally looks like it's merging with the ocean, more like a series of inter-connected islands than proper land)."Finland has about 168,000 lakes (of area larger than 500 m2 or 0.12 acres) and 179,000 islands.[103] Its largest lake, Saimaa, is the fourth largest in Europe."
"Finland was first settled around 9000 BC after the last Ice Age.[17] During the Stone Age, various cultures emerged, distinguished by different styles of ceramics. The Bronze Age and Iron Ages were marked by contacts with other cultures in Fennoscandia and the Baltic region.[18] From the late 13th century, Finland became part of the Swedish Empire as a result of the Northern Crusades. In 1809, as a result of the Finnish War, Finland was captured from Sweden and became a Grand Duchy of Finland, an autonomous state ruled by the Russian Empire. During this period, Finnish art flourished and the idea of full independence began to take hold. In 1906, Finland became the first European state to grant universal suffrage, and the first in the world to give all adult citizens the right to run for public office.[19][note 2] Following the Russian Revolution of 1917, Finland declared its full independence. In 1918 the young nation was divided by the Finnish Civil War. During World War II, Finland fought against the Soviet Union in the Winter War and the Continuation War, and later against Nazi Germany in the Lapland War. As a result, it lost parts of its territory but retained its independence"
Mostly agricultural before the 1950's, Finland rapidly industrialized after the second world war, and is a pretty modern place now, with good human rights and is a welfare state on the Nordic model (people say "we don't want a welfare state" without seeming to understand that a welfare state literally means that the state's priority is the welfare of the citizens) and so on.
The terrain of Finland has been mainly created by the glaciers. There are some mountains, but a lot of the land is scraped flat, and there are the (familiar to us Canadians) deposits of sand, gravel, and rounded boulders left behind as the glaciers retreated.
Finland is low-lying because it is still "post glacial" (the weight of the ice literally pushed it down), and over millions of years the land will rebound and be higher above sea level, and so may not have as many lakes at that point.
Finland is far enough North that it has taiga ecoregions, as well as mixed birch forests. It has reindeer, wolverines, and Brown bears. So, not quite tundra but getting close. Lapland is one of the territories in Finland, so when you think of Lapland, and you think of snow and near arctic conditions and reindeer, that's part of Finland.
"The endangered Saimaa ringed seal, one of only three lake seal species in the world, exists only in the Saimaa lake system of southeastern Finland, down to only 390 seals today.[112][113] The species has become the emblem of the Finnish Association for Nature Conservation.[114]"
It has warm summers and very cold winters, tempered somewhat by the Gulf Stream. It would have been a LOT colder there if not for the Gulf Stream.
There is some cereal farming in the South, and they raise animals, but it is not that suited to agriculture.
The economy depends heavily on forestry, also mining, but they do have manufacturing (automotive, electronics, machinery) and a large service sector. They are considered a very innovative country and were ranked sixth in the global index for innovation, creating "intellectual property".
There's LOTS of tourism here, and that makes a lot more sense than some of the other countries out there who were scary, dangerous places with bombings all the time who still seemed to have tourism. At least Finland seems like a place you really might enjoy.
Culture wise, Finland is apparently "Heavy Metal Heaven", and I am pretty familiar with at least one band from Helsinki; Apocolyptica.
They are also very big into sauna. BIG TIME INTO SAUNA.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finland#Largest_cities
https://youtu.be/DxxZOsfsIUM?si=q_eHtLknHWwGRcwl
A fairly mild day temperature wise, though there was quite the wind.
I did a bunch of small but useful things before I went to the barn. I washed a load of laundry, I changed the cat litter, and swept the floor.
I spent some time with my singing bowls. I don't really go in for the whole sound therapy aspect of them, but I find them beautiful and relaxing.
I had a very brief conversation with Sister E.
I went to the barn and chatted a bit with R (she celebrated her birthday recently).
R used River yesterday to be a lesson horse for a woman who needed a very quiet mount, mainly to work on biomechanics stuff. R said she really liked working with him, so I said if she ends up doing more lessons its fine if she uses River for those.
R worked with Quidley while I worked with River, which is good experience for him, and if it triggers his ear pinning she gets the chance to correct that behavior. At some point Quidley will either go on to another home (he's a horse she's working with in partnership with a local horse rescue), or R is thinking of keeping him, but he has to be trustworthy enough to work with students if he stays.
I felt like River was more "with" me today, which is nice. I did have to work a bit to get him moving, but not like some days where I am having to push him the whole time. He did a lot better on the turn on hindquarters, and so on, and nicely on the ridden work of making smaller trot circles and good halts from the canter.
I came home and my Sweetie brought me flowers (a few roses) since he is going to see his family this week. I thought that was pretty nice of him.
We did watch an episode of "Boardwalk Empire", then chatted for a while before he had to go to bed. He has to get up at around 7:30 am to leave for his flight, but that's later than he usually has to leave for work.
Finland has about 5.6 million people, mainly ethnic Finns. It has a LOT of lakes (if you look at it with Google maps, it literally looks like it's merging with the ocean, more like a series of inter-connected islands than proper land)."Finland has about 168,000 lakes (of area larger than 500 m2 or 0.12 acres) and 179,000 islands.[103] Its largest lake, Saimaa, is the fourth largest in Europe."
"Finland was first settled around 9000 BC after the last Ice Age.[17] During the Stone Age, various cultures emerged, distinguished by different styles of ceramics. The Bronze Age and Iron Ages were marked by contacts with other cultures in Fennoscandia and the Baltic region.[18] From the late 13th century, Finland became part of the Swedish Empire as a result of the Northern Crusades. In 1809, as a result of the Finnish War, Finland was captured from Sweden and became a Grand Duchy of Finland, an autonomous state ruled by the Russian Empire. During this period, Finnish art flourished and the idea of full independence began to take hold. In 1906, Finland became the first European state to grant universal suffrage, and the first in the world to give all adult citizens the right to run for public office.[19][note 2] Following the Russian Revolution of 1917, Finland declared its full independence. In 1918 the young nation was divided by the Finnish Civil War. During World War II, Finland fought against the Soviet Union in the Winter War and the Continuation War, and later against Nazi Germany in the Lapland War. As a result, it lost parts of its territory but retained its independence"
Mostly agricultural before the 1950's, Finland rapidly industrialized after the second world war, and is a pretty modern place now, with good human rights and is a welfare state on the Nordic model (people say "we don't want a welfare state" without seeming to understand that a welfare state literally means that the state's priority is the welfare of the citizens) and so on.
The terrain of Finland has been mainly created by the glaciers. There are some mountains, but a lot of the land is scraped flat, and there are the (familiar to us Canadians) deposits of sand, gravel, and rounded boulders left behind as the glaciers retreated.
Finland is low-lying because it is still "post glacial" (the weight of the ice literally pushed it down), and over millions of years the land will rebound and be higher above sea level, and so may not have as many lakes at that point.
Finland is far enough North that it has taiga ecoregions, as well as mixed birch forests. It has reindeer, wolverines, and Brown bears. So, not quite tundra but getting close. Lapland is one of the territories in Finland, so when you think of Lapland, and you think of snow and near arctic conditions and reindeer, that's part of Finland.
"The endangered Saimaa ringed seal, one of only three lake seal species in the world, exists only in the Saimaa lake system of southeastern Finland, down to only 390 seals today.[112][113] The species has become the emblem of the Finnish Association for Nature Conservation.[114]"
It has warm summers and very cold winters, tempered somewhat by the Gulf Stream. It would have been a LOT colder there if not for the Gulf Stream.
There is some cereal farming in the South, and they raise animals, but it is not that suited to agriculture.
The economy depends heavily on forestry, also mining, but they do have manufacturing (automotive, electronics, machinery) and a large service sector. They are considered a very innovative country and were ranked sixth in the global index for innovation, creating "intellectual property".
There's LOTS of tourism here, and that makes a lot more sense than some of the other countries out there who were scary, dangerous places with bombings all the time who still seemed to have tourism. At least Finland seems like a place you really might enjoy.
Culture wise, Finland is apparently "Heavy Metal Heaven", and I am pretty familiar with at least one band from Helsinki; Apocolyptica.
They are also very big into sauna. BIG TIME INTO SAUNA.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finland#Largest_cities
https://youtu.be/DxxZOsfsIUM?si=q_eHtLknHWwGRcwl
no subject
Date: 2024-03-28 06:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-03-28 07:04 am (UTC)The better the bowl, the longer it will sustain a tone. You can get nice sounding less expensive ones, but the tone dies quickly. The sometimes less flashy but more expensive bowls can discernibly still be making sound well over a minute after you stop touching it, which is nice for blending tones, and makes for nicer meditation since a lot of the meditative stuff happens when you just sit quietly and listen to the fading tone.
There are seven chakras, thus if you want to do the chakra thing you probably want one bowl in each frequency, but a lot of people just have one or two to enjoy the sound.
They are meant for balancing chakras, but I really just find it incredibly peaceful as a meditation.
If you look on YouTube, you can find long, long videos that I like to use as background sound for doing yoga or meditation.
Here's a decent one that gives you a good idea:https://youtube.com/shorts/F3unh_RsU2o?si=hhRGZr0T5n86HM_N
no subject
Date: 2024-04-01 04:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-04-01 05:07 am (UTC)Sensory pleasures.
no subject
Date: 2024-04-02 07:34 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-04-02 09:32 pm (UTC)