The Photo Album

This page has some serious potential (=risk) for growth! Go and make coffee while all the pictures loads!

Let us start with some very small pictures! Stamps. I am no philatelist, but who would not be intrigued by the phenomenal skills of the engraver Czeslaw Slania?

The stamp in the middle above is Mr. Slanias favorite, but I like the Antique Series (the outside two) better. In time I will make sharper images myself. How does the man do it? Engraving little lines in a steel plate, and when it is printed it really looks like a porcelain urn and a silver coffee pot!

I lifted these .GIF files from the site of the Swedish Postal Office, department for stamps, and I am sure they do not mind. Go to www.posten.se to see more of their beautiful stamps and read more about Czeslaw!

Here: proofs of "The Coronation of King Gustaf III

From a painting in Storkyrkan, in the Old City, Stockholm

Only 8000 of these sets were printed.

In the "Dark Ages", before Mr. Slania, this is about as inspired as the Swedish stamps ever got. In comparison it looks almost home made.

It pictures "The old King", 2 kings ago. Gustav V. He was supposedly good at playing tennis, among a few other things… Traveling incognito as "Mr. V".

There was actually one more king of Swedn between him and the present one, Gustav VI Adolf.

This is how I remember most of the old stamps.

It is interesting to notice that in an American series (of four) about stamp collecting, one of them have a picture of two Swedish stamps!

STEKY

It takes a camera to take a picture.

A PLAY WITH WORDS

During the WWII sayings like: "Loose lips sinks ships" were common. The meaning is obvious. In Sweden the saying was "A Swede does not talk." Not to talk is 'tiger' in Swedish. Another meaning of the sentence, in Swedish: "A Swedish tiger".

So, here: the Swedish tiger!

I have heard that the Swedish National Security Agency own the copyright to the picture. I hope they do not mind me putting it here. They are so secret that I would not know whom to ask for permission!

"Big Mike", now Silent Key, in charge of the BBQ at an event up at Winchester Canyon Gun Club in the mountains above Santa Barbara.

I think Mike was a security guard, and with some 6'4" and 250 lb. he was an imposing figure.

My mother met him while visiting here, and it was quite an experience to hear them exchange recipes for cookies!

This is picture from about 1986.

	Jennie and her wonderful dog Page. He was the most clever dog I have ever met. His intellect superseded that of most bean counters and some of the Manufacturing Managers I have met! On the right I can tell he was up to something no good! The cat is probably in for a big, wet, lick! Rest in peace, Page.
	One day, in her kitchen, Jennie told off Page for something he had done. When the lesson was over and Jennie turned around, Page mumbled: " wa-wa-wa-wa-wa-wa!" Imitating Jennie. We both laughed so hard and Page wagged his tail, clearly understanding that his comment was appreciated! What a dog! Page and I got to be very good friends. Much later, when I had not seen him for several years, I wrote a letter to Jennie and Page. I draw a circle on it and rubbed my nose once there in. I asked Jennie to let Page smell it, and Jennie said he got all wired up and definitely recognized me! So, this dog could "read" letters also! Or I have an unusually dirty nose..
Jennie airing the Walter PPK.

Peculiar clouds outside Vancouver!

Maybe condensation tracks from ships or airplanes?

Taken August 10, 1997 at 14:30 PDT (21:30 UTC) by weather satellite NOAA-14

What's next? Let's run over there and take a look!

From satellites in space, and running girls, down to Earth.

There are some cute bugs here too!

I found this Black Widow in the garage the other day. It is not what you like to grab when you reach behind or under something. The bite of this one may not kill you, but the wound can get seriously complicated, including the onset of necrosis (gangrene), the death of tissue around the wound. The coin is the size of a dime (10 cents).

The "potato bug" as they are called here. Apparently they are common in New Zealand. I do not remember what they are called there, although I saw a PBS program about it. Waba or Walla or something the like. These poor things looks really ugly, but are harmless. I have learned that they are related to the grasshoppers. In the picture the one to the left is dead. I found it wounded on the road following the kids to school. I had never seen one before. Richard was not yet in school, and we brought home the wounded one. Remarkably a second one showed up in our back yard the same day! Here the live one is pushing around the dead one.

DeSoto Avenue in San Fernando Valley is a busy street most of the day. It would not be a good idea to park your car by the curb here! So, you can see the signs discouraging this at about every 50 meter in the picture above. The second one down the street has an added sign to it, as you can see in the picture to the right! It looks very official, but I have my doubts. Especially the last line: "Violators will be shot" may not fit the city code.

Sorry that you had to wiggle all the way down here for to see this one, but I hope it was worth it!

From a Siemens advert in an electronic magazine 1998. I think this one is just too good for to be left out of a Photo Album Page. Reproduced without permission.

Sorry for to add another 120 kB to the page, but this is another good one:

This one (caricature of me) was outrageous a few years ago, and is still pretty funny!

History changing…

As I keep digging through the collections of STUFF, old pictures surface now and then. Here a few late ones:

These pictures from about 1966:

While visiting my friend Lennart up north in Sweden we used to go out to the little shooting range in the forest and empty some boxes of 9mm ammo through the ol' M45B submachine gun. It has no switch for fire mode. Always full automatic.

And here with the 1935 Lahti (by Valmet, Finland) 9mm Parabellum pistol. My first, and I still have it.

On one competition I shot 180 of 180 possible (18 x 10's) at 30 m (100 ft). Nerves and all! The 10 circle was ~ 8 cm.

Updated August 12, 1999

		While visiting my friend Lennart up north in Sweden we used to go out to the little shooting range in the forest and empty some boxes of 9mm ammo through the ol' M45B submachine gun. It has no switch for fire mode. Always full automatic.
And here with the 1935 Lahti (by Valmet, Finland) 9mm Parabellum pistol. My first, and I still have it. On one competition I shot 180 of 180 possible (18 x 10's) at 30 m (100 ft). Nerves and all! The 10 circle was ~ 8 cm.