THE BIG TOP

Today's blog is made possible by the genius of the man on the left.For those not familiar with his photo this is Richard Buckminster Fuller. The real thing. You might want to take a glance aside at his Wiki entry before you continue here. Bucky invented or dicovered or designed the buckyball and in doing so he made possible the goedesic dome which he spent a lot of time refining.

Well, our two intrepid men in red have been building a geodesic dome, or buckydome as they prefer to call it, over the past 3 days. It was Shem's idea but needless to say when it came to hands getting dirty he enlisted the willing boys: Eddie and Ceddie. Under Shem's watchful eye the boys have been cutting bamboo into lengths and wiring 5 and 6 way joints together never knowing what came next or how the whole thing was supposed to work. My own opinion is that Shem rather than keeping them in the dark didn't know himself how it all worked. Shaun now and then popped out to hypervise and picked up the odd error that had to be corrected. Shaun can "do" multidimensional imagining but I suspect that Shem cannot.

It must have been unsettling for the people next door to see the work progressing and not to know what to expect. Nowhere near as entertaining as were the trellis sagas for us but then where their bizzare behaviour regularly attains the Everestian heights of strange ours wanders constantly around in the foothills of the odd. And the killer is that the final stages of assembly were carried out beyond the gaze even of their binoculars. Far from prying eyes. The completed dome now sits proudly and happily down by the mulberry trees where G intends to use it as a meditation and recueration centre.

How wonderful to see the glint of joy come into G's eye as she mentally traced the buckydome from its humble founding pentagon to the point where she pleaded to have the completed thing for herself. A genuine pleasure to oblige. She has become like a child with a new and much anticipated toy. She is happy and we applaud that joy and happiness. Aching backs and blistered hands are a bagatelle by comparison.

Note for Mick and Chick - it's OK I didn't let them use your bamboo - that is safely stored to one side!