Dr Murs is driving a car

The rain. The rain is really annoying. The rain and the wind together are like huuuuuuuuu. Dr Murks and his colleague Mdm Eye had planned to spend nice days on the island, the days for making fieldwork on bikes, picking strawberries, swimming and spending fishy time with the Seals family. Two days were almost fine. Mdm Eye counted 120km by bike on the country roads per one day... But the rain, but the wind. On a third day the clouds were pouring water from a bucket. Mdm Eye and Dr Murks decided that on this day they should not bike. They should take a car for the field trip. Difficult decision as one was worse driver than the other. But the work needed to be done and biking with this weather sounded only unhealthy. Brrrrr, the decision was made that Dr Murks will be the driver as the car happened to be with automatic transmission and Mdm Eye had never been driving this kind of car.. Dr Murks some years ago did for about 10km :S. Anyway, in the end the car was perfect as they needed to drive slow between the villages fast on the main roads and make many U-turns in dead ends. Juhuuu, finally they had driven about 300km when they gave their "nice small box" back to the car rental guy who was so cutely speaking in the local dialect. Dr Murks was really proud of his driving skills been improved and Mdm Eye even told that she never had any fear while driving.
Still, nothing was supposed to end as happily as they hoped. Mr Local Dialect found a huge dent at the bumper, really huge... Dr Murks and Mdm Eye had no glue where and when it happened but if taken into account the quality of all the roads they were using - it might have really happened. So, they had to leave a small fortune for the "nice small box" to be repaired. Even Mr Local Dialect felt bitty for them. "Shit happens," he told with red eyes.
So, find a dent on the picture. Not difficult.
Will there be a time when Dr Murks dares to drive a car for the next time?

Dr Murks on a ladder

Dr Murks went to a conference. A scientific conference. To see the people alive from whom Dr Murks has only read of heard about. Most of the names Dr Murks did not know before.
The conference had really boring title - "Meeting the Waves of Globalization". Could it be more superficial? At the same time - one can make a speech about anything under this topic. No problem to relate to anything and this fact makes it even more boring and bla-la-la. In addition to the topic of "globalization" Dr Murks noticed that there are many other phrases that can be a roof-concepts to anything: "mobility", "neo-liberalism", "landscape", "sustainability", "transformation", etc, etc.
By the way, when one needs to be seen as a real educated person, a simple rule is to use in speech: "etc, etc". Really impressive and high-educated expression!

Reporter: Dr Murks, can you please explain us what was the main impression of the event?
Dr Murks: Hmm, that is an interesting question. There were many ideas and the atmosphere was very inspiring for me. Somehow it was great to see that all these people were just people and nobody seemed to be on higher level than the others. Maybe they were, but it did not look like it. There was, indeed, very friendly atmosphere. The biggest surprise for me was the fact how much the social science is related to geography in these Nordic countries. Many times I had to question the real outcome of the projects some people had made... At the same time it was something totally different and quite much more interesting than all this quantitative frameworks done in UT. At the same time all this not-so-professional just gave so much energy to see that there are more people looking for ladder to climb out from the hole they have just fallen during their research project. For me it seemed that I found the bars and tools to built one and climb out. And of course I hope to keep the contacts that I made with some nice and interesting researchers.
Reporter: Thank you very much for the answer!
Dr Murks: Any time. No problem.

Dr Murks is a gatherer

It seems the thoughts are place-located. The ideas are lazy to move around and sometimes they are hidden - have to be really cleaver and even brave to find them. Dr Murks made a weekly trip in medium speed to pick up some of them. So, where did he find the thoughts?
The ideas were
- in the foaming water after a ship,
- on a hand hold by gypsy foreteller,
- in snow blocks by the road,
- in the snowstorm,
- in summetine,
- in pizza with French fries,
- in the settlement of urban type,
- in diviloopment,
- in fish market,
- in sleeping man during boring presentation, in sleeping man during hyperactive presentation,
- in bossanova music from the open window,
- in neo-liberalism,
- in jokes that sound old even you hear them firs time,
- in butterflies that fly through the chest and stomach when...,
- in rational planner vs rational user,
- in mindscapes, in landscapes,
- in geography that links,
- in an elderly professor who smiles you so widely every time he passes and finally reveals "what a pity that we did not talk earlier. you can always write me if you want",
- in second homes,
- in chocolate,
- on Karl Marx
- in toes that are playing with another toes,
- in woman with pink classes,
- in the screw that drives himself happily into the soft rubber,
- in coffee,
- in the backseat of a bike,
- in...
Maybe also in the tears of a small girl who was crying so badly in the metro.

Dr Murks is a teenager

It seems that nobody should ever tell anybody what the one does not know or is incompetent in. The person should discover it by own or there will be no change. Otherwise the person starts to blame oneself in it and do not see the possibilities or reasons to gain different knowledge, act differently. The person thinks: "This is what I am and you have to accept."

Dr Murks sings Shallallallaaa!

And it is not an example of figurative language. Dr Murks was really singing "Shallallallaaa!" on a concert in the botanical gardens together with the other members from the Choir. "Beautiful, excellent, grandiose..." as the audience commented afterwards. Surprisingly it really felt so good to sing to all these people who specially game to listen US. There were not only birds and exotic plants. There were real people, real friends... Thank you all so much for coming! (Although some songs probable sounded in U-major - hmmm, in English sounds better J-major)... :) :)

Dr Murks sends old man to the West

An old man goes first time to the west. And during his life he has been traveling almost everywhere in former Soviet Countries. Hiking in the mountains, deserts... Skying over the hills and lakes, boating on the rivers. So fun to read the old diaries by the hiking-groups. Even Dr Murks remembers him coming home all over hairy and sunburned bringing weird stones and snail-shells, once he even brought us a scorpion that we kept long time in a 3 liter bin and Jaan was skilled caching living flies for it. In the end when the scorpion got dead we made a nice coffin for it out of matchbox. And once the man brought turtles from the desert. They lived in a special small fold in our garden but their destiny was not the brightest one - better not write it here. It really seems that the old man is to blame for Dr Murks interest in foreign countries, in places far away, in hiking, in nature, in...
The old man has always dreamed of going to the western countries. To see the difference of the nature, of culture, of places. But there have always been distractions on the way. His knees reminded the cold nights spent in a tent during his youth and did not let him make long walking trips anymore, specially on the mountains.. There was that and this and years went by. But tomorrow he will make it. He will make his first steps in central and western Europe. Hope he will bring some weird souvenirs as he is used to. This will be a surprise..
Have a nice trip, dear father! Take care of yourself!

Dr Murks is smelling the Betulas

It is Pentecost today. In old Estonian tradition it is called Birch-day, people took young birches to their houses as we do now with spruce at Christmas. The day was full of joy and dance and swinging on huge swings in the center of the villages.
Dr Murks had forgotten the meaning of the day. But the birches reminded. They were just so strongly smelling by the path that one could not leave without noticing. Dr Murks did not want to break them and bring them home because the birches looked so bright, tender and at the same time powerful standing there. Just take some hanging branches with leaves into palm, but the nose in it and take a deeeeeeeeeeeeep breath. Dr Murks could inhale it for hours. The smell is energetic, the smell is so bright, the smell is mmmmmmm