Odd and whim – I sort of had those synonyms for quirks to get into the stories I wanted to relate today. The stories are both about professional activities that could not be further from my repertoire of skills and capabilities.

One is related to art restoration, but as the film clip will show you, requiring such an amount of patience and sleuthing that I would go insane before the first week was over on the project.  The short version: some years back someone found an old rag stuffed into a chimney flue to prevent drafts. Turns out it was a priceless treasure of a medieval map that guided seafaring Dutchmen. It is now in the hands of a museum restaurateur and the painstaking work of reconstruction inspires awe.

http://www.slate.com/articles/video/video/2017/05/a_scottish_chimney_rag_turns_out_to_be_a_17th_century_map_of_the_world.html

Not as much awe, though, as the situation depicted in the second link below. Here we learn about the assignment of women prisoners, upon arrival at prison, to fight California wildfires. No training, not much safety instruction, put onto the bus, hiked for hour and miles up steep hillsides to the inferno and then thrown to the flames, or at them, or whatever.  I would faint at the first bend in the hike. The hidden slave labor in our prison system(s) is worth a whole other blog, but suffice it for today to hear this brave report.

I figured ships needing maps and wood that burns would be appropriate imagery.