Today I want to

Lie under trees and look up at this view.

Instead I have to do a million and one things including:
1. Do washing
2. Tidy up
3. Write (finish writing) paper for BERA
4. Send final version of article (not yet revised) for Encyclopaedia thingy deadline end August.
5. Send final version of chapter (not quite done) for book deadline end August.
6. Send 2 reviews of articles for Language and Education off (not done) deadline end August.
7. Read at least 7 MA student dissertations and comment in intricate and profound ways by end of today.
8. Notice that children exist and wonder what to do with them.
9. Feed children.
10. Get ready for meeting tomorrow and panic (do not feel at all ready).
11.Wonder what will wear for meeting (readers please help is it Autumn yet?)
This is called Going back to work after the holidays and luckily I think we all feel the same.
Good luck everyone!

free Estonia

is the theme for the blog today and with that I remind you that the blog will celebrate Estonian independence day on 20th August.
However, being interested, as I am in cultural geography I became obsessed with the Estonian collective farm.
More about them here.
From 1944, when the Soviets illegally took over Estonia, until glorious independence in 1991, much of Estonia was covered with collective farms which looked like this:

Note the 1980's brick and state of total neglect.
Being a dissident kind of blogger, I would have been sent to one, and so I became fascinated by them and our journey (Tallin, Tartu, Parnu, Muhu island, Saremma, then Tallin) became a spot-the-collective farm experience.
All of them were nameless and fallen into total disrepair in stark contrast to the loved restored Estonian farm buildings.
Our friends in Tallin told us they were invisible parts of the landscape.
I thought, ofcourse, of South Yorkshire, of the mines and the foundries, now closed down.
I thought also, that I have moved from objects to landscapes.
I have become a cultural geographer.
This explains why Andy and Zahir and I decided to move our focus for this project from objects to houses, buildings and landscapes.
They reflect changing identities and shifting cultural and social ideologies.

PS Dr Joolz is right.
The whole world lives on Flickr.
See more on Estonian life here.