Bill Murray's Blog, page 139

We All Act Silly. We Are Not All President of France.

Friday Photo Quiz #184

Here we have a really varied country, don’t we? Judging from the first an fourth photos, it’s both flat and mountainous. The two in between suggest it’s both old and militarist. Or is the guy in the third photo just a ceremonial guard, say, at the tomb of the father of the country? And it has at least one medium-largish city that appears to be on the sea. I’ve selected this country for today’s quiz to celebrate the fact that this week we bought tickets to spend the end of this year here.

Can you guess the country? Click through for the answer. And a good weekend to all from CS&W and EarthPhotos.com.

And the answer is …………………………………….. it’s Vietnam.

Top is flooding in the Mekong delta south of Saigon. Second are ruins from Hindu temples built roughly between two and one thousand years ago at My Son, in the middle of the country near Da Nang. Next, that’s the Ho Chi Minh mausoleum in Hanoi. Fourth are rice terraces up near the Chinese border at Sa Pa, and that’s Saigon (a little bit of a trick photo for those who have been there lately, as it was taken several years ago) AKA Ho Chi Minh City, in the south.

There are much larger versions of these and hundreds more photos in the Vietnam Gallery at Earthphotos.com.

And take all the CS&W photo quizzes.

Rock Guitarist in a Prom Dress

I don’t know, exactly, it’s just strange. It’s the Rocky Theme performed by Moranbong Band, an all girl group in North Korea whose other work includes “Song of Bellflower Root,” “Song of Red Bean Paste,” “Let’s Meet at the Front Line” and “Drink to Victory” according to the source, an article on The Atlantic’s web site by Robert Foyle Hunwick. It only lasts 2:12. Check it out.

How to Write

Binyavanga Wainaina started it in Granta 92, with How to Write about Africa. Tim Hannigan followed last December with How to Write about Indonesia.

Now please enjoy How to Write About the Balkans.

Moving On

Common Sense and Whiskey is moving from Typepad to WordPress. The content here is already there, and the Typepad version will expire in June 2013. The only way you should come directly here now is if you have bookmarked

"commonsenseandwhiskey.typepad.com."

If that's you, please change that to

"commonsenseandwhiskey.com"

and you'll be all set.

Thank you and thanks to Typepad for the first five years.

Bill

Shop Talk, and A Plea for Indulgence

Common Sense and Whiskey is moving from TypePad to Wordpress. This should cause you no grief, but as I learn about Wordpress there will be fewer posts for the time being.

Once completed, I predict there will be formatting inconsistencies with the content created on Typepad over the years and I ask your indulgence. I'll bet that somewhere in the transfer process, things will be left behind - comments, sidebar information, surely something. Please be gentle.

I will leave the CS&W URL point...

The Golden Horn, Istanbul, Turkey - Wednesday HDR

Shot at sunrise from the lower level of the Galata Bridge toward Beyoglu as nine exposures, processed as an HDR in Photomatix, finished in Photoshop. Texture and a spin through Pixel Bender to make it like an oil painting. Click to see it bigger. And there are currently 357 more photos from Turkey here.

Funny Place Names

These two maps are really entertaining. Just click through and go see:

Map of Orkney, Map of Shetland

Photo Quiz #178 - Where in the World?

Not an easy quiz this week, so here are three photo clues. Can you name the country? Extra credit for naming the capital city, which is shown in the middle photo.

Place your bets and click through for the answer. And a good weekend to

all from CS&W

and EarthPhotos.com.

And

the answer is ............................................ it's Madagascar, and the capital city is Antananarivo. That's the Zoma, the Friday market in Antananarivo pictured in the middle.

See more phot...

It's Ukraine. Ukraine, I tell you.