Dahlias

 

Here is a picture of a dahlia looking in my window. It's a spectacular one whose name escapes me at the moment. Sadly, I've lost one of my favourite dahlias, a pale orange large cactus-type - the guys who came to do the house after the earthquake stood all over the tuber and flooded it with cold water, because it was near the garden tap. I thought this one was it. I couldn't remember whether I'd moved it to a safe place or not before the EQC'ing; I'd forgotten that I had this one. So it goes with gardening; you win on the roundabout, you lose on the swings. On the left of the picture is a little marble image of Ganesha, bought at the Red Fort in Delhi. On the left is a terracotta jug made in Italy that my Mum bought in Woolworths about fifty years ago.

 

The duck looks a bit mad, and I like the colours and the freedom with which it's painted.
 

 

Here's Ganesha, in a rather martial incarnation with axes held over his head. I like the depictions of him as the God of writers best. There is a nice story about Ganesh that explains why he is the God of writers. Shiva was dictating the Upanishads to the sage Valmiki, when Valmiki's pen broke. Ganesha promptly broke off one of his tusks and continued the writing with the point of his tusk, ensuring that the precious sutras were preserved as they came from the mouth of Shiva, with no interruption. 

 

Here's another nice piece of bird-pottery, a little Elisabeth Lissaman piece that I picked up at a church fair.  Again, I love the freeness of the painting and the colours, and the way she has contained the figure within the circle. And storks are auspicious.

 

This weekend's score - two retro glasses in pale green, bought from a little boy who was garage-saling his toys. Anything pale green just seems to catch my eye. I remember we had a set of these in the 'sixties. You drink mix-up Tang from them. Or Raro, since Tang has gone the way of all products.