This blog is still alive - just

Pheewww, it's been a long time, partially it's been plain old boredness with the blog, partially just all sorts of things have taken up my time, work and other things.

I DIDN'T get the museum job that I applied for a couple of months ago. I'm not really surprised, the times being what they are: there were 211 applicants for one position, so clearly everyone who thought they had a chance applied. At the moment I have no funding so I'm just trying to get published and send applications, fingers crossed that something will turn up. One article I have already sent, it was based on the conference paper from last August, about interaction between citizens and foreigners in the religious life of Hellenistic Athens. A volume is being compiled of the papers of the conference, to be published by the Finnish Institute in Rome, but there's still a review so I don't know if it'll get accepted. The other article I'm just about finishing and am hoping to get it printed and sent early next week. I have a handful of alternatives (international journals of the field), so if this first one doesn't want it, I'll try another one. In any case, even if the journal does accept it, the process may take months. So, all there is to do is to wait and see. I'm of course also keeping my eyes open for job possibilities.

Quite a lot more advance has happened in another field: the photography thing has taken off. I've already two photos sold through the photo bureau since the start of this year, and I got one of my pictures in page two of last week's edition of a fairly big weekly paper. It's a church paper but with a circulation of a bit over 200 000 so it's excellent publicity - and yes, they did include my name with the picture. Below is the picture - taken in the old cemetery of Helsinki on Easter weekend, at which time there was a fog which created an appropriate atmosphere indeed.

And now it is spring, and what could be better than that? Granted, in the recent days it has been a rather cold and rainy spring, but spring nonetheless. And spring can only turn into summer. The other weekend (when it was warm and sunny) I had such a brilliant day in Suomenlinna. A hint of tar in the air in the dock area - real or an imagined scent from the bygone days of sailing ships? Walking on the cliffs and battlements - the sun and warm; the sounds of the sea, the waves, the cries of the sea gulls. My round ended with coffee and mouth-melting home made apple pie in the delightful little cafe of the toy and doll museum, out on the terrace of course. Those sort of days make you want to write odes to the spring, like the poets of old did. I did, too, but only in my imagination, as I am not blessed with the gift of poetry.