Wild Donkeys

10.02 am – Thursday 29 May 2008

The world is full of amazing creatures. Just read the Bible – Job 39 – for a sense of their wonder. This was inspired by Job 39:5-8. I’m drawing from memory. There’s many species and subspecies of wild ass, onager, donkey, etc., each unique and with incredible endurance and swiftness of foot… or hoof.

Random extra information: on this passage of Scripture!

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Job 39

5 “Who let the wild donkey go free? Who untied its ropes? 6 I gave it the wasteland as its home, the salt flats as its habitat. 7 It laughs at the commotion in the town; it does not hear a driver’s shout. 8 It ranges the hills for its pasture and searches for any green thing. (Today’s New International Version, from http://bible.crosswalk.com/.)

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From ICR’s Online Study Bible reference to Strong’s Concordance:

6501

arp , peh’-reh: or pereh (Jeremiah 2:24) {peh’-reh}; from 06500 in the secondary sense of running wild; the onager:–wild (ass).

Job 39:5
Who hath sent out the wild ass free? or who hath loosed the bands of the wild ass?

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Wikipedia on wild asses…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asinus

10,000 Visitors!! Thank You!!

Another statistics post.

Thank you very much to all my visitors. In the last 24 hours The Amalgamation reached the 10,000 hits mark!

Christmas Devotionals And Feeds

Coming up soon I’m planning on writing some pre-Christmas, Advent-themed, non-denominational personal devotionals on the message of Christmas in the Bible. If that interests you, stay posted, I expect them to begin around November 24. Make sure you check in regularly, or subscribe to the feed. The feed URL is http://darthmaulmakesmesmile.wordpress.com/feed/. On my browser (I use Firefox) it makes subscribing to a feed really simple. Just click on the little RSS logo box in the bit where the web address goes, it’ll bring up the feed with the most recent posts, and ask you if you want to subscribe. Then it’ll let you know when I update the Blog. My email programme also allows me to subscribe to feeds, which then appear in my email inbox.

*

A big thank you to all who have visited, and especially for the thoughtul, friendly, encouraging and constructive comments that some of you have left.

Roughly a month ago (28 August 08 to be exact), the statistics were:

Top Posts

196. Red Horse, 507 views

The Amalgamation Home, 431 views

218. Pretty And Girly Giraffe, 430 views

Top Searches

horse,  horse art,  Giraffe

Most Active

249. Stallion Sketch, 33 views

218. Pretty And Girly Giraffe, 29 views

Pentecostal Priorities?, 26 views

At last count, there have been 7,097 hits since the blog started in February 2008.

Now, late September, there’s been a big leap.

Here’s the current stats:

Flag Counter tells me that, since I added it maybe 3 or 4 months ago, the countries of origin of blog visitors have been:

USA – 2749 hits

GB – 666 hits (no mark of the beast jokes, please!)

Australia – 559 hits

Canada -338 hits

India – 174 hits

Blog Stats

Total views: 10,090

Busiest day: 164 — Wednesday, September 24, 2008

Views today: 10

Totals

Posts: 231

Comments: 230

Categories: 14

Tags: 632

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Top Posts

218. Pretty And Girly Giraffe
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242. Inspired by Arabian Horse
Funny!
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202. Sable Antelope

Top 3 Posts

196. Red Horse, 699 views
218. Pretty And Girly Giraffe, 643 views
The Amalgamation Home, 488 views

Top Searches
giraffe,  horse,  horse art

Most Active 3
218. Pretty And Girly Giraffe, 38 views
196. Red Horse, 36 views
249. Stallion Sketch, 30 views

293. Colourful Heart Thing

Coloured beeswax crayon on lined notepaper, August 2008.

Umm another abstract rambling in beeswax crayon! It doesn’t necessarily have some deep meaning, it just is what it is!

Funny!

http://www.andrewschwab.com/writings.php

I know I’ve mentioned Project 86 perhaps more than once on here. Ok, maybe lots. Probably because, when I’m on the computer there’s usually a Project 86 CD playing somewhere in the background. If not them, then perhaps it’s something along the lines of Kutless, Disciple, P.O.D. or, Hillsong United (when I want something more mellow) and, if I really want to confuse the neighbours, it’s ‘Kashmir’ and ‘No Quarter’ by Led Zeppelin pumping at full volume… Anyway, where was I? Oh, in case that didn’t make sense, the neighbours are undoubtedly confused because roughly 90% of the time what’s blaring from my stereo is music by artists who happen to be Christians. And Led Zeppelin is known to be controversial among Christian circles. I still argue that you don’t need to play ‘Stairway to Heaven’ backwards to get pagan ideas, the New Age connotations are really quite obvious playing it in its normal direction. Oh but how awesome is that guitar riff, and I can’t help but start yelling, “and as we wind on down the roooooaaaaaaaaddddddddd….”!?!

Roughly on that topic, I’ve just been reading some of the writings at Andrew Schwab’s website. I am pretty much in tears with laughter. It’s been a long time since I’ve been that amused. Go check them out.

Shadows

If there’s one band whose lyrics have been speaking to me lately, it’s this one. Here’s an excerpt from one of the albums that’s been getting the most action on my CD player (yes, I buy CDs!!)…

It’s so poetic, I find it really inspiring.

So take me in these fleeting moments of solitude in you

Remove this sordid fascination with shadow

And remove this shattered self of preservation

All that you forgave and give all you promised to…

Can you see this shadow lifting?

Drifting home again

“A Shadow on Me” by Project 86, from the album Songs to Burn Your Bridges By.

Excerpt from http://www.christianrocklyrics.com/project86/.

Project 86 info at http://www.project86.com/ and http://www.andrewschwab.com/.

Interesting Website For Apologetics

Just came across a website I hadn’t noticed before, it’s for people interested in Christian apologetics that focusses on science and faith. It’s at http://creationwiki.org/Main_Page and looks surprisingly similar to Wikipedia. I haven’t had much of a chance to look around but if it’s your kind of topic you may want to check it out.

292. Cutesy Horse In Pencil

Graphite pencil on paper, March 2008.

I think it’s cute, if I may say so myself!

291. Elfish Girl In Coloured Beeswax

Tinted beeswax crayon and graphite pencil on lined notepaper, August 2008.

Sometimes art is more fun when I just grab a notebook and start drawing. This came after a raid on my children’s pencil case. I have noticed a definite hint of Ancient Egyptian influence on the style of drawing I employ, with the person in profile, yet having a distored perspective as the eye is viewed front-on. Well, I can see this, even if no one else can!

I find Egyptian culture fascinating. Earlier this year I read a really interesting book, Unwrapping the Pharaohs, which offers an interesting possible harmonisation of Ancient Egyptian archaeology with that of the Ancient Hebrews. It’s written by Australian* authors John Ashton and David Down, and you kind find out more information at the publisher’s website. Click here for more information. I bought my copy from Koorong Books in Australia.

*That is, I’m reasonably certain they are Australian!

290. Pastel Unicorn

Pastel pencil and pigment liner on tinted paper, April 2008.

Doing the more traditional cloven-hoofed, lion-tailed Unicorn vibe here. Unicorns represent for me strength, nobility, purity and all those wonderful knightly things that postmodern society has lost in its pursuit of hedonism-at-all-costs.

289. Pastel Girl With Big Eyes

Pastel pencil and graphite pencil on tinted paper, May 2008.

Mmm swirly…

Talk Like A Pirate!

288. Jump, Horsey, Jump

Graphite pencil on paper, approximately 2008.

I still find horses’ proportions difficult to draw. Sigh!

287. Swing Set With Evil Ivy

Photograph, September 2008.

A backyard swing set with slide and soccer ball. I find the suburban backyard almost suffocating. Perhaps it is just our yard, but the whole fenced-in, surrounded, everything confined and contained, it feels very frustrating to someone who spent the first 23 years of their life living in the wide open spaces of the country. The ivy is a weed around here, it is not meant to be growing in our yard but unfortunately the stuff has taken over our entire back fence.

286. Pontificating Porpoise

Permanent Marker on yellow tinted linen paper, August 2008.

Hehehehe I’ve been mucking around with whale-themed sketches at the moment. I had to alliterate it, didn’t I?!

Linen paper is fascinating – I found it on the scrapbooking shelf at a local department store. It has this cloth-like texture and is fairly thick. I bought a packet of it to use for craft activities for my teen Bible study group, though ended up using about half of it for my own drawings!

285. Tower Of Little Cars

DSLR Photograph, May 2008.

A tower of little cars in Melbourne.

284. Rainbow

Scanned film photograph, October 1999.

Rainbow in the clouds… We used to see some spectacular storms from our carport!

Art Available…

Just to let you know about a new page I’ve added to the Amalgamation, “Art For Sale.”It’s where you can find out more about my husband’s and my art that is available in framed prints, etc. At the moment it’s only a new thing. There is currently, at the time of writing, one photo available from my husband’s collection, a black and white of Melbourne’s Yarra River at night, mid-2007.  However, the Art For Sale page will be your place for any updates. As it is just a hobby at this point, as opposed to a business, I can’t guarantee that we’ll be updating it too regularly. So bookmark the page and check in once in a while to see whats happening!

Thanks!!

http://darthmaulmakesmesmile.wordpress.com/art-for-sale/

283. Clover

Photograph, May 2008.

Looking out the laundry door is like a carpet of green!