No apology needed, sonofgloin - for thinking I was a bloke. What could I expect when calling myself "Poirot". However, I note that you appear to be a gentleman of the old school. Why, you'd probably open doors for me as well - something I find completely wonderful! (but then that preference probably emanates from my alter-ego, the "Countess of Grantham")

Cheers : )

Luddy>>So…..at what point did full frontal nudity and total freedom of written sexual expression become unrestricted??

Luddy I was a city kid in Sydney, lived ten minutes from Hyde Park. When I was twelve I worked mornings and afternoons in a supermarket. The milkman, who was an ex copper (it’s funny how so many ex cops bought milk runs) sold me two porn magazines, they had full frontal and penetration graphics. They cost an absurd amount of money but were truly scarce and undistributed in the society that Australia enjoyed at the time, people still went to church en masse back in 1965.

There were no sex shops in 1965 and a Man magazine or Naturalists Monthly was the only genre of publication available. Less than ten years later the first set of titties to be displayed on our TV’s (other than deepest Africa documentaries and the odd “film nouveau” offering) came to Sydney via the soapie called Number 96. Then the same program offered up two faggoty guys in bed, along with a kiss. It all went downhill after that.

I believe that the loss of a religious component to the credo of our society is the cause of that era’s moral decline. Society can evolve or be engineered and the moral shift in the western world was engineered. We moved from a time where the governance of moral and ethical behaviour was not legislated, to an era where there is legislation for everything that society did as a matter of course back then.
TBC

There is a great deal of truth to the observation that religion is the cause of friction between nations and peoples, but there is also a great deal of fact that behind almost all of these wars there was a financial or other gain involved. Religion has always been used to motivate the plebs in times of war. Stalin sent all the priests to Siberia in the 1930’s and brought what was left of them back in 1941 after the Germans invaded to motivate the people to give up their lives for Russia.

Luddy the dismantling of religion driven by UN protocols and mandates have taken the stick away that kept 90% of society towing the line to some extent. They pro actively stripped religion from the first world, but puzzlingly are now filling the first world with Moslems. I certainly do not want the archaic legislation as was in place to criminalize the act of sodomy by consenting adults and I believe we have the right to do absolutely anything non lethal in the privacy of our own home, again by consenting adults. But the proliferation of sexual material in common areas in retail is offensive, even if you do not look at it. Sex has always been a commodity but now it is a marketing staple.

Hasbeen,

What a beautiful oil is Chloe.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_and_Jackson_Hotel
In my house, we have a few prints of Monet and Cezanne and Renoir, because I love the Impressionists. We visited the art gallery in Perth recently as they are hosting some "big" pieces of modern art from New York's MoMA. I'm not a huge fan of modern art, but it was a buzz standing in front of Picasso, Matisse and Warhol. Picasso had a nude in that collection, but it was impossible to work out which bit was attached to what - if you know what I mean.

Dear Ludwig,

Waiting in anticipation is half the fun isn't it?

Dear SOG,

No, I did not smoke weed at uni.
I didn't ever feel the need to. I was high on life.
I swam naked in the surf, went to jazz clubs,
listened to folk music, and danced the tango.
Just to name a few things - oh, and of course
the theatre was a vital part of my life. It still is.

Dear Hasbeen,

I'm familiar with Chloe at Young and Jackson's.
I used to work nearby. My painting is also
done in a distinct certain style.

My diaphanous
body seems to radiate moonlight. My tumbling red-coloured
locks, through which are woven long strands of pearls
and other gems form a cloak over my shoulders and
cascade down my back. The artist gave me flowerlike
dainty feet, elfin ears, and deep woodland green eyes
that reflect the mysteries of the forest. My crystalline
wings shimmer like cobwebs after a rainstorm. On my head
he placed a magnificent crown made of amber, metal,
and feathers. In short - he painted me as an elfin Queen.
A Goddess - knowing my love of legends and myths.

Lexi,

I'd love to see your painting.

In keeping with the woodland motif, how about this Baroque marble by Italian, Bernini. "Apollo and Daphne".

http://www.shmoop.com/apollo-daphne/photo-famous-sculpture-by-bernini.html

Excited by Cupid's love-exciting arrow, Apollo is consumed with desire for Daphne. But Daphne had been fated by Cupid's love-repelling arrow. She flees Apollo and in desperation prays:

"Destroy the beauty that has injured me, or change the body that destroys my life. Before her prayer was ended, torpor seized her body, and a thin bark closed around her gentle bosom, and her hair became as moving leaves, her arms were changed into waving branches, and her active feet as clinging roots were fastened to the ground--her face hidden with encircling leaves." (from wikipedia)

Apparently as one circles the sculpture, Daphne's figure is transformed - from a maiden into a tree.