Fantastic stumbles

       Higher Dimensions from String Theory

Firefox has become my favorite browser, and today I found an extension called StumbleUpon.  It works a bit like del.icio.us, in that you can save sites you like and comment on them, as well as read other people’s opinions, but what makes it very tasty is that you hit the stumble button, and you are taken to a new site based on the interests that you have entered in your profile.

I was so entranced by The Elegant Universe that I spent three hours learning about string theory. Perhaps this is just a new way of surfing around, wasting time, avoiding writing my thesis, or perhaps not, perhaps it’s all connected in the 11th dimension.  And reading about Quantum issues in Architecture makes me wonder why people aren’t thinking about Quantum issues in Art too, or maybe they are, just not at the Slade.

Art, truth and politics

Wow, no wonder they gave this man the Nobel Prize for literature

Not war games

 

Doppelganger’s intelligent and articulate thoughts on war as the “messy, stupid, tragic failure of human nature”   have left me feeling really sad.  Not just in a sad “oh war is bad and I feel sad” kind of way, but in a bleak powerless sort of way.

Exceptional humans like Ghandi, Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela have all helped to make the world better without resorting to war, and certainly in the case of Mandela have prevented civil war, but they are rare.

As just one person, what can I possibly do to stop war?  As someone who abhors the idea of war, of violence against others, I am still plagued by the question of how to respond when someone – whether a school yard bully or a global super-power, uses force to get what they want.

Turning the other cheek seems like just asking for more of the same, only harder.  Any other ideas?

Lumalive – hacking the T

and

I’m really excited by this new development from Philips. I’ve been waiting for this for quite a while now, and with Electric Skin obviously have a fairly vested interest in the whole area.

While advertising is the obvious revenue generating use for this – what about T – shirt hacks? Spam for clothes? Electronic measles?

Harrods’ new dog wedding chapel

  Timmy and Muffin leave Harrods in a horse-drawn carriage after yesterday’s wedding.

The bride, an eight-month-old shih tzu called Muffin – arrived for the ceremony at London’s Harrods department store in a horse-drawn carriage, dressed in a white frock and veil. She and her groom,  a two-and-a-half-year-old bichon frisé named Timmy – were married before a group of guests at an event costing up to £3,500.

Perhaps the bridesmaid looked like this:

For more dog outfits, see Tinkerbell’s Closet

And in case the cat is feeling left out, there is always the Japanese Taylor for cats

Of course it is always reassuring to know how George Bush feels about things:

Bush has expressed his belief that marriage ought to be reserved for heterosexuals: human heterosexuals.  Bush  is vehemently opposed to any wedding involving animals, including but not limited to monkeys, cats, parakeets, Gambian rats, zebras, donkeys, elephants, birds and/or bees and gerbils.

Well, what more is there to say?

Gunpowder, Treason and Plot

Today is Guy Fawkes here in England – It celebrates the failure of the Gunpowder Plot, in which a group of Catholic conspirators attempted to blow up the Houses of Parliament in London on the evening of 5 November 1605, when the Protestant King James I (James VI of Scotland) was within its walls.

Halloween passes by very quietly here in London from what i’ve seen – no bevvies of littlies dressed in sheets or mandarin outfits going round for candies, no pumpkins on porches and no fancy dress for older kids (other than the bog standard black goth gear that is always to be seen around Camden any day of the year).

Guy Fawkes night is the main celebration at this time of year, with fireworks and bonfires lit in all the main parks tonight, the 5th of November. I find it interesting to see how the Celtic festival of Samhain, the festival to mark the end of summer and the final harvest, has changed and mutated to result on the one hand in the north American pop culture version of Halloween and on the other to a celebration of historical religious and political rebellion.

The celtic roots of this time still show through though, much like eggs at easter. I was intrigued to see that the word bonfire originally came from the Gaelic word “bone fire” …. Anyone for a spot of burning?

City of Gold

The best thing about Johannesburg, South Africa, is leaving it. I had the misfortune to be born there, and the good sense to leave it as soon as I could. Unfortunately my father and sister still live there, despite my many enticements to leave.

There are beautiful things about Johannesburg: the perfect weather, endless blue skies and sunshine, the thousands of birds. At heart though, the city remains an overgrown mining town, inhabited by people chasing the dreams of gold. The empty ostentation of luxury cars and gated mansions is sharply contrasted by the many shanty towns that don’t even have sewerage or running water. The cultural life of most is lived in shopping malls.

Of course going there to be with my father who is in icu in a coma doesn’t help up the enjoyment stakes of being in Johannesburg – parents in a coma suck no matter where you are in the world.

The Gobbler

      I love Canada, and being Canadian – even though, or perhaps because I came to Canada later in life from free choice rather than by birth default.  I love being in a country that has a day dedicated to thanksgiving, even if that mostly translates into getting stuffed on turkey and collapsing on the couch in a triptophan haze.

So for your turkey-enhanced entertainment, I suggest an online tour of the 70’s retro homage to turkeyness, wittily presented by James Lileks – the Gobbler motel and supper club.

Sometimes we need all the thanksgiving we can get.

5 best home-remedies for flu

  Flu

After two intercontinental flights in less than a week, the shock of being back in polluted London, starting the second and final year of my MFA and working like a demon to get new work made and installed for our interim show which opens on Monday, my body is rebelling by having the flu.
Not just a few sniffles, but lung-wracking coughs and violent sneezes. Fuzzy head and aching bones as though I am in a submersible 1000 meters under the sea.  I thought I’d make a list of the 5 best home-remedies I’ve tried so far:

1. Hot toddy made with fresh ginger, lemon juice, cayenne pepper and most important of all, a healthy slug of brandy
2. Hot bath with 5 drops of Tea Tree essential oil
3. Large quantities of freshly squeezed orange juice, as well as vitamin C and zinc
4. Tasty teaspoon fulls of Nin Jiom cough syrup
5. Foul and disgusting drops of oregano essential oil

Maybe I should just get some more sleep …. Any other remedies gratefully received.

Hey Nostradamus

    I am ashamed to confess that I have never read one of Douglas Coupland’s books after trying and failing miserably to get into Generation X.  But Hey! now I can’t say that any more.  After paying a flying visit to casa Doppelganger, I returned to London bearing generous booty (in the piratical sense) from the treasure troves/library shelves of the description defying mme Doppelganger herself.

Almost brand new still shiny and delicious smelling copies of Hey Nostradamus and Black Swan Green, both of which have already been devoured in the midnight midsts of my jetlag.

I was really surprised by Hey Nostradamus – it confounded my preconceived expectations of slick, glib hipness and pop pastiche that for some reason I was expecting from Douglas Copeland.  The book tackles big questions of belief, faith and the nature of humanity without dropping into sugary cliches, sentimental fumbling, or whitewashing over darkness and suffering.  For a more considered review – see 50 books.