MARINA SOKOLOVA

Gypsy music day on my blog.

Bournemouth beach.

We went to the Bournemouth beach this weekend. I was laying on it and thinking that it feels neither democratic (very few free benches, elevators are a bit overpriced for pensioners and parents with prams, etc) nor it is upscale (no serious resort businesses, looks slightly run down). I was wondering why don’t they develop it (there are plenty of space for beach cafes, restaurants, water sports, etc) and make it prettier. Then I remembered the fact that all the beaches in UK are private. And for people to lay on them local councils have to pay hefty rents to the owners. Yes there are some town parks owned by councils, but no beaches. So it is up to the private owner to develop or upgrade the beach, which is a huge task for one person or one family, who probably can happily live on just the rent from the beach anyway.

Another thing: we have spotted 2 paedophiles in just 2 hours on the beach. They were so openly trying to approach schoolgirls that it was hard not to notice them. I guess all those language schools in town, where kids come to spend part of their summer break, make this place very interesting for freaks.  They should really have some kind of CCTV or a higher police presence there for kids’ safety.

Tajik music day in my blog.

War Craft 3 The Frozen Throne.

I have been playing War Craft 3 The Frozen Throne a lot recently. I have completed the campaigns and I am now playing custom games on medium level. I have found the ultimate strategy that helps me win these games and I am going to share it here. The gold mines that are guarded not by your opponent, but by original monsters are marked by brown spots on the map. If you save your game and reload freshly saved game, you will notice that some of those brown spots in the places of the map that you haven’t uncovered yet have disappeared. This is where your opponent is. When an enemy has more than one location I start sending one warrior to each of it’s locations constantly. I find the flying units more convenient. At the same time I build my own additional goldmines at the map’s end opposite an enemy, I strive to have 2-3 running goldmines. Warriors that bug an opponent keep its army busy and away from my goldmines. Eventually, even those tiny single warriors wear out an enemy. By the time computer’s army gets from one location to the other, one unit can easily destroy few buildings or kill all enemy’s miners. If you destroyed the mine, keep one or two units there to prevent enemy’s workers from building new one. Save and reload the game once in a while to spot where else they are attempting to build new mines. This strategy quickly cuts your enemy from resources and it starts falling behind you in development.  There is no use doing it when an enemy has only one town. Computer starts with a big army, which will meet you half way, kick your arse, and come to bash your town. Speaking of half way: if all of enemy’s towns are on the same trajectory, you might need to take the warrior farther to the side of the map and then to where you want it. It would then make a circle around opponent’s army. Obviously you need to do this all very quickly.

Male contraception.

Considering the fact that the male reproductive system is so much simpler than the female, it is weird that there is still no male pill available. In fact males have amazingly fewer contraceptive choices than women. I guess this is because if male pill existed then humans definitely wouldn’t breed anymore. Where as without a pill they are still at the mercy of occasionally broody women.

Sand Animation by Kseniya Simonova.

Greeting cards.

I have made these new 3D decoupage greeting cards yesterday:

 

 

 

Enigma-Voyageur

Flying Stars and 4 pillars.

I have been reading a lot about flying star feng shui over last month. I knew a bit about it already and I decided to update my knowledge and thoroughly understand this feng shui system. I think I can recommend the most these 2 following books about flying stars: Flying Star Feng Shui by Stephen Skinner and Flying Star Feng Shui for the Master Practitioner by Lillian Too. I also found in a local library The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Feng Shui by Elizabeth Moran that teaches Flying Stars, 4 pillars, and more basic Feng Shui. I wouldn’t recommend it for learning Flying Stars. The knowledge given in this book is limited compared to the 2 books I mentioned above. However, I think this book is good for learning 4 pillars (also known as ba zi or paht chee), it has one of the best explanations of this system that I have seen.

 

Speaking of 4 pillars, if you haven’t started on it yet, I would also recommend another book that I have by Lillian Too: Unlocking The Secrets of Chinese Fortune Telling. It has a nice colourful step-by-step introduction to this system.

 

I think you would also appreciate these free flying star and 4 pillars calculators on the Too’s website, if you haven’t tried them yet: http://wofs.com/index.php?option=com_custompages&Itemid=82, http://wofs.com/index.php?option=com_custompages&Itemid=88. And if you can read Russian, then you would like this 4 pillars calculator even more: http://feng-shui.ru/calculators/4-stolpa-sudby/.

 

Learning alone can be boring, so I like to search for some interesting forums where helpful people gather together. I think feng shui forums that I read the most are http://www.wofs.com/index.php?option=com_smf&Itemid=2 and http://www.bezproblem.org/index.php. I guess I am lucky to be bilingual, it is very convenient for learning and gives me twice the amount of online resources to choose from. Sometimes I find information in one language that is not available at all in another language and that feels thrilling.