That's right, put your feet up. Breathe. Soon be all better.
Showing posts with label blogging. Show all posts
Showing posts with label blogging. Show all posts
Saturday, October 13, 2012
New needlework blog
Sorry about the mess, but I'm doing so much knitting and sewing these days that I thought I'd put it all in place where those of us who enjoy such things can wallow together. Meanwhile, those for whom the word crochet recalls the abomination of 70s macrame owls, Fair Isle tank tops, fitted bathrooms in puce and avocado, and living rooms dominated by noxious purple, brown, green or orange wallpaper in interlocking geometric patterns...... well, it's changed a bit since then, but I understand that - like me - you may never fully recover from the trauma. So you just go away and lie down till you feel better, and maybe pop back here from time to time. I tend to pop in during school holidays and then disappear for another three months, so you've got time.
That's right, put your feet up. Breathe. Soon be all better.
That's right, put your feet up. Breathe. Soon be all better.
Saturday, September 18, 2010
New Look
Not me, this.
Thought for the Day:
Something nasty snuck into my blog from the host site, causing Google to flash up an
¡¡¡ADVERTENCIA!!!
(er... alert...)
if you tried to access it.
Being a technophobe (a.k.a. normal human being; esp. f.; esp. of mature years) and also a complete wimp when it comes to interpreting an English language help page, never mind a Spanish one, I did the obvious, and dumped the host that has maintained my blog lists perfectly well since Day 1, and moved my site to Google (This had better not be a marketing tactic...).
And this involved changing my template. My lovely, dappled spring day template. Sigh......
Mostly, I want my blog to look soothing. If I have to focus on a screen for any length of time, (and focusing is becoming more of an issue each year: next time I grope my way to the opticians, perhaps I should enquire about share options...) I want said screen to be either cheerful or soothing, and preferably both. So that means green
An Armenian friend (olive skin, amber-flecked green eyes, and the craziest strawberry blonde curls you can imagine) wears a lot of lime green and chartreuse, both fabulous on her. I adore green, and pretty well every variation thereof, with the exception of chartreuse. And lime green's ok, I suppose, but a bit sixties circles and white patent leather boots......
No, give me the sage and olive that are so comforting in northern light; give me spangles in tree tops, shadows among branches, gleaming moss on riverbanks and wet rocks, powdery lichens on grey rocks and tree bark; blue greens, grey greens, brownish greens.
But yellowish greens? No thanks.
For me, there's something unsettling, a suggestion of hidden danger, about yellow greens - perhaps a sub-conscious association with watchful cats - specifically the evil Mr Grey, a round-eyed, grey Burmese from two doors down in Liverpool, whose preferred daily entertainment was to settle in a high, visible, spot, and simply watch our bog-standard, not-terribly-bright tabby - the inappropriately named Gremlin - until she cracked and skittered into the house, eyes wide and fur sparking. (Should have called her Mogwai.)
Now, though, I associate chartreuse with Sophie, who I miss, and may never see again; and zingy lime, so cowed and feeble under blue northern light - works a treat here in Spain, several degrees closer to the equator.
So I've gone for a green blog template.
Thought for the Day:
Friday, May 01, 2009
Monday, February 09, 2009
Just a thought
Now there was a time when they used to say that behind every - "great man", there had to be a - "great woman", but in these times of change you know that it's no longer true, so we're coming out of the kitchen, (This is a good thing, as otherwise my beloved couldn't get in there, and I would get totally fed up of a diet of fried egg butties - Even though I make excellent fried egg butties.) 'cause there's somethin' we forgot to say to you: Sisters are doing it for themselves; standing on their own two feet, and ringing on their own bells. ..........
Now we ain't making stories, and we ain't laying plans, 'cause a man still loves a woman, and a woman still loves a man................... Habiiiiiibiiiiiii!
P.S. Oh, and this may be a foolish move, but since I generally mean what I say, and more or less manage to say what I mean, and I'm sure none of it really matters anyway, I thought I'd quit hiding behind my adorable little duckie. But for all her fans, I give you the one, the only,
MamaDuuuuuuuuck!!!!!!!!!
Of course, MamaDuck thinks the fuss is quite riduckulous, and was heard to mutter, "Cor, luvaduck, what a lot of fuss for little me." at a recent press conference, but for her many, many fans, there never was a happier day than when she was - at last - induckted into the Hollywood Hall of Fame, and left her distinctive signature in the wet concrete of Hollywood Boulevard.
See you at the Oscars!
See you at the Oscars!P.P.S. Annie & Aretha O.K!
Friday, December 14, 2007
Monday, January 08, 2007
More of the below: 3 self and selves
Blogging. Telling it how it is. Oh absolutely!
How interesting to be invisible in public.
Who shall I be today?
There’s some kind of public self: a compound (stable but not fully fixed) of nature and nurture overlaid with subjective experience; unconconsciously filtered through personality; consciously filtered through personal morality, consideration for others, and an instinct for social survival and preservation of the core self.
By the way, how much of that gets filtered out of the blog version? What gets, um, enhanced? Arguably, you can’t fake intelligence, humour, culture, etc., though some may try. All blogs, to some degree, represent personas.
Assuming a straightforward relationship with one’s immediate colleagues, readers, whatever, there’s the other person’s – subjective - perception of ‘me’.
Friend, do you recognise and accept, or recognise and ignore, my less appealing qualities?
Foe, how does that question apply to my finer qualities?
Both, do you agree on which are which?
The public self: perhaps a matter of perception, perhaps only measurable by what it does, and how it does it.
And by way of illustration, here are one blogger’s impression of other bloggers she reads.
The family self: subject to closer and more frequent observation, and in a wider variety of situations; especially if some of the observers are children. Children are, after all, the most dispassionate of observers in many ways: while they may not immediately recognise the significance of an action or word, it takes its place in their expanding sense of the world in which they live, perhaps only to be examined years later; whereas partners, on the whole, come under the category of friends - friends, moreover, who have chosen us, which introduces a few more quirky variables to the equation.
The real self: possibly darker or more vulnerable than either of the above; certainly more complex. Who sees it? Perhaps everyone, including me, is aware of part of the whole, but probably no-one, not even me, gets it all. Certainly no-one, not even me, can predict with complete confidence what I will do in any particular circumstances. Variables again.
Nor would I want to be 100% predictable. To even want to know oneself so well suggests a worrying degree of self-absorption, and detachment from the curious business of living. This does not of course apply to me, because I’m a pre-menopausal woman and I’m supposed to think about stuff like this!
To want to know someone else to that degree suggests other problems, at least to me!
On the whole, it seems to me that the person I am now is fundamentally the person I was at birth. Had I been part of a cloning experiment, and the collection immediately dispersed throughout the world, then even allowing for some of us being placed with families of different races, or not even with conventional families, if those who survived to adulthood were brought together, I suspect that we would find we shared many common threads of experience – had made similar choices - because our different upbringings and environments would have worked on a common genetic, physiological inheritance, and the undefined, and undefinable elements that make me - me. Arguably, if our collective nerve held, we would discover as many differences and similarities amongst ourselves as exist between brothers and sisters in a single family, who share common genes and upbringing, in addition to the elements that mark them as distinct from each other.
At the same time, however, there must surely be significant differences, because our different upbringings and experiences would have encouraged or discouraged, perhaps even suppressed, specific aspects of the original me.
As a teenager, I was interested in ESP for a while, and worked my way through the local library's collection of books on mind and spirit. This brought me to Sybil, a fictionalised account of living with Multiple Personality Disorder, which was made into a miniseries in 1976, though I haven't seen it. I didn't see the 1957 film The Three Faces of Eve until years later. Such is the depth of my research.
As I understand it, multiple-personality disorder arises when a child experiences something so far beyond what its complete self can cope with, that a facet of its personality, its strength unalloyed by other, less forceful facets, assumes control for as long as necessary. However, if this happens once, it can happen again, with other difficult challenges triggering the emergence of other one-dimensional independent selves. If enough such selves emerge, or if those selves who do have sufficient strength to come through frequently, the 'original' adult experiences the loss of days and weeks. The novels and films - with different degrees of integrity - are based on doctors' documentation of the condition, and the process of therapy and eventual recovery.
Much more common, I guess, is schizophrenia, including the type that involves hearing voices which harangue the victim to do things that are utterly contrary to his or her wishes and values. The only schizophrenic I ever met was an old lady who lived alone in a flat, with a daughter who never visited, and upstairs neighbours who tormented her by playing 'Three Blind Mice' over and over on their stereo. In fact, the daughter visited frequently, only to be accused and abused; and the nursery rhyme only played in the old lady's head. Maybe it wasn't even schizophrenia, but a hideous form of senility; I never found out.
But when it comes to the voices version of schizophrenia, where do those unacceptable urgings come from?Returning to the bounds of the normal, we have play, fantasy, make-believe, theatre and cinema, and also role-play as used in training (as well as therapy). Dolphins, cats and chimpanzees may play, but only humans play-act, which requires not only imagination, but spontaneous creativity, and the ability to willingly (and temporarily) suspend disbelief.
Konstantin Stanislavski, from his base at the Moscow Art Theatre, devoted his life to developing and refining his System of actor training, which would enable his actors to play the new realistic dramas becoming popular in northern Europe at the turn of the 20th Century. The flamboyant skills required for melodrama and variety shows did not serve actors trying to portray the nuances of individual experience in Ibsen's 'A Doll's House' or Chekhov's 'The Three Sisters', or the works of Shaw in England, and O'Neill in the States. and later.
Lee Strasberg went on to develop the more famous Method, or 'method acting', on the back of Stanislavski's work. Associated with Marlon Brando, The Method is the foundation of realistic acting, and the central plank for actor training in the US, whose popular culture favours naturalism over symbolism or stylisation on stage and in movie-making.
Among the techniques Stanislavski developed at the Moscow Art Theatre, was 'The Magic If', a rehearsal tool that could enable an actor to get 'inside' the character s/he was playing. Actors would work through a series of questions 'as if' they were their character, questions such as 'Who am I?', and 'What do I want?', to establish an alternative reality to inhabit in the play. Emotional Memory is another technique, to be used with training and understanding, which can channel the actor's memory of an emotional experience into his playing of a role. At no point should the actor 'lose' himself in the role, but just as an audience suspends disbelief during a play, the Method actor can be said to inhabit a role.
Stanislavski and Strasberg are now so mainstream that schoolchildren and amateurs of all ages, without ever having heard their names, use elements and developments of their techniques. A piece of advice often given to actors is that, whoever you're playing, you need to have some sympathy with your character.
This is fine as long as your character is the good guy; rather unnerving if it's Hannibal Lecter or the Marquis de Sade. How do you have sympathy, or any kind of common ground with such a character? What does that say about you?
Then again, how do you play a fully rounded 'realistic' character while disapproving of him?
Just as most children demonstrate an instinctive aversion to playing the bad guy in games, and to investing baddie role play with any depth, we need to reassure ourselves that it's only pretend, and maintain the distance between our wholesome selves, and the depraved 'fantastic part' we're playing. However, the process of opening up a connection between the two is unsettling, because if we have a shameful memory of a petty cruel or dishonest action that gave us a buzz of illicit pleasure at the time, then drawing on that to play a part raises personal moral questions.
There are a number of actors I admire, among them Denzel Washington. In the DVD bonus material for 'Man on Fire', Tony Scott describes how, when Denzel Washington comes out of his trailer, he's in role as Creasy, a man whose entire way of life hinges on being a loner. He (Tony Scott) was worried that Dakota Fanning, who plays nine-year-old Pita Ramos, would be upset by her co-star's touch-me-not coldness, but she knew enough to recognise his particular approach to a role.
More worrying are stories of actors who deliberately stay in role, on- and off-set, for the duration of shooting. No wonder Hollywood marriages strain!
It may be the party animals who get the headlines, but most of the finest actors are remarkable only for their ordinariness in day to day life. They must be tapping into something when they're on stage or on set, but they can leave it behind when they leave the theatre or lot. Benign sybils.
Final thought: the Sybil was a medium. Cinema and theatre are media through which we are transported, without leaving our plush seats and popcorn, into another experience, another view. Doesn’t this endow live performance with an element of shaman ritual, with the actors as shamans?
As for cinema, you could say they’re our link to the bigger picture, especially if they’re on IMAX. ;)
How interesting to be invisible in public.
Who shall I be today?
There’s some kind of public self: a compound (stable but not fully fixed) of nature and nurture overlaid with subjective experience; unconconsciously filtered through personality; consciously filtered through personal morality, consideration for others, and an instinct for social survival and preservation of the core self.
By the way, how much of that gets filtered out of the blog version? What gets, um, enhanced? Arguably, you can’t fake intelligence, humour, culture, etc., though some may try. All blogs, to some degree, represent personas.
Assuming a straightforward relationship with one’s immediate colleagues, readers, whatever, there’s the other person’s – subjective - perception of ‘me’.
Friend, do you recognise and accept, or recognise and ignore, my less appealing qualities?
Foe, how does that question apply to my finer qualities?
Both, do you agree on which are which?
The public self: perhaps a matter of perception, perhaps only measurable by what it does, and how it does it.
And by way of illustration, here are one blogger’s impression of other bloggers she reads.
The family self: subject to closer and more frequent observation, and in a wider variety of situations; especially if some of the observers are children. Children are, after all, the most dispassionate of observers in many ways: while they may not immediately recognise the significance of an action or word, it takes its place in their expanding sense of the world in which they live, perhaps only to be examined years later; whereas partners, on the whole, come under the category of friends - friends, moreover, who have chosen us, which introduces a few more quirky variables to the equation.
The real self: possibly darker or more vulnerable than either of the above; certainly more complex. Who sees it? Perhaps everyone, including me, is aware of part of the whole, but probably no-one, not even me, gets it all. Certainly no-one, not even me, can predict with complete confidence what I will do in any particular circumstances. Variables again.
Nor would I want to be 100% predictable. To even want to know oneself so well suggests a worrying degree of self-absorption, and detachment from the curious business of living. This does not of course apply to me, because I’m a pre-menopausal woman and I’m supposed to think about stuff like this!
To want to know someone else to that degree suggests other problems, at least to me!
On the whole, it seems to me that the person I am now is fundamentally the person I was at birth. Had I been part of a cloning experiment, and the collection immediately dispersed throughout the world, then even allowing for some of us being placed with families of different races, or not even with conventional families, if those who survived to adulthood were brought together, I suspect that we would find we shared many common threads of experience – had made similar choices - because our different upbringings and environments would have worked on a common genetic, physiological inheritance, and the undefined, and undefinable elements that make me - me. Arguably, if our collective nerve held, we would discover as many differences and similarities amongst ourselves as exist between brothers and sisters in a single family, who share common genes and upbringing, in addition to the elements that mark them as distinct from each other.
At the same time, however, there must surely be significant differences, because our different upbringings and experiences would have encouraged or discouraged, perhaps even suppressed, specific aspects of the original me.
As a teenager, I was interested in ESP for a while, and worked my way through the local library's collection of books on mind and spirit. This brought me to Sybil, a fictionalised account of living with Multiple Personality Disorder, which was made into a miniseries in 1976, though I haven't seen it. I didn't see the 1957 film The Three Faces of Eve until years later. Such is the depth of my research.
As I understand it, multiple-personality disorder arises when a child experiences something so far beyond what its complete self can cope with, that a facet of its personality, its strength unalloyed by other, less forceful facets, assumes control for as long as necessary. However, if this happens once, it can happen again, with other difficult challenges triggering the emergence of other one-dimensional independent selves. If enough such selves emerge, or if those selves who do have sufficient strength to come through frequently, the 'original' adult experiences the loss of days and weeks. The novels and films - with different degrees of integrity - are based on doctors' documentation of the condition, and the process of therapy and eventual recovery.
Much more common, I guess, is schizophrenia, including the type that involves hearing voices which harangue the victim to do things that are utterly contrary to his or her wishes and values. The only schizophrenic I ever met was an old lady who lived alone in a flat, with a daughter who never visited, and upstairs neighbours who tormented her by playing 'Three Blind Mice' over and over on their stereo. In fact, the daughter visited frequently, only to be accused and abused; and the nursery rhyme only played in the old lady's head. Maybe it wasn't even schizophrenia, but a hideous form of senility; I never found out.
But when it comes to the voices version of schizophrenia, where do those unacceptable urgings come from?Returning to the bounds of the normal, we have play, fantasy, make-believe, theatre and cinema, and also role-play as used in training (as well as therapy). Dolphins, cats and chimpanzees may play, but only humans play-act, which requires not only imagination, but spontaneous creativity, and the ability to willingly (and temporarily) suspend disbelief.
Konstantin Stanislavski, from his base at the Moscow Art Theatre, devoted his life to developing and refining his System of actor training, which would enable his actors to play the new realistic dramas becoming popular in northern Europe at the turn of the 20th Century. The flamboyant skills required for melodrama and variety shows did not serve actors trying to portray the nuances of individual experience in Ibsen's 'A Doll's House' or Chekhov's 'The Three Sisters', or the works of Shaw in England, and O'Neill in the States. and later.
Lee Strasberg went on to develop the more famous Method, or 'method acting', on the back of Stanislavski's work. Associated with Marlon Brando, The Method is the foundation of realistic acting, and the central plank for actor training in the US, whose popular culture favours naturalism over symbolism or stylisation on stage and in movie-making.
Among the techniques Stanislavski developed at the Moscow Art Theatre, was 'The Magic If', a rehearsal tool that could enable an actor to get 'inside' the character s/he was playing. Actors would work through a series of questions 'as if' they were their character, questions such as 'Who am I?', and 'What do I want?', to establish an alternative reality to inhabit in the play. Emotional Memory is another technique, to be used with training and understanding, which can channel the actor's memory of an emotional experience into his playing of a role. At no point should the actor 'lose' himself in the role, but just as an audience suspends disbelief during a play, the Method actor can be said to inhabit a role.
Stanislavski and Strasberg are now so mainstream that schoolchildren and amateurs of all ages, without ever having heard their names, use elements and developments of their techniques. A piece of advice often given to actors is that, whoever you're playing, you need to have some sympathy with your character.
This is fine as long as your character is the good guy; rather unnerving if it's Hannibal Lecter or the Marquis de Sade. How do you have sympathy, or any kind of common ground with such a character? What does that say about you?
Then again, how do you play a fully rounded 'realistic' character while disapproving of him?
Just as most children demonstrate an instinctive aversion to playing the bad guy in games, and to investing baddie role play with any depth, we need to reassure ourselves that it's only pretend, and maintain the distance between our wholesome selves, and the depraved 'fantastic part' we're playing. However, the process of opening up a connection between the two is unsettling, because if we have a shameful memory of a petty cruel or dishonest action that gave us a buzz of illicit pleasure at the time, then drawing on that to play a part raises personal moral questions.
There are a number of actors I admire, among them Denzel Washington. In the DVD bonus material for 'Man on Fire', Tony Scott describes how, when Denzel Washington comes out of his trailer, he's in role as Creasy, a man whose entire way of life hinges on being a loner. He (Tony Scott) was worried that Dakota Fanning, who plays nine-year-old Pita Ramos, would be upset by her co-star's touch-me-not coldness, but she knew enough to recognise his particular approach to a role.
More worrying are stories of actors who deliberately stay in role, on- and off-set, for the duration of shooting. No wonder Hollywood marriages strain!
It may be the party animals who get the headlines, but most of the finest actors are remarkable only for their ordinariness in day to day life. They must be tapping into something when they're on stage or on set, but they can leave it behind when they leave the theatre or lot. Benign sybils.
Final thought: the Sybil was a medium. Cinema and theatre are media through which we are transported, without leaving our plush seats and popcorn, into another experience, another view. Doesn’t this endow live performance with an element of shaman ritual, with the actors as shamans?
As for cinema, you could say they’re our link to the bigger picture, especially if they’re on IMAX. ;)
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Statistics
Um.... that little wander down memory lane took 3463 words.
Average 282.5 words per year (1994-2006)
23.5 words per month.
Quite paltry for any self-respecting blogger
Really
;D
Average 282.5 words per year (1994-2006)
23.5 words per month.
Quite paltry for any self-respecting blogger
Really
;D
Monday, September 04, 2006
Where's Duckie?
Arg. Blank white page all day. No Little Yellow Duck. Unless she's buried in the snow?
So I made myself a new blog just in case. (Remember that addicts and the classically insane (i.e. the Frank Capra variety, as in virtually every character in 'Arsenic & Old Lace') have a logic all their own.......)
So she's back now, but I posted some bits on Decoy Duck, if you'd care to visit. You can see the new image, which was retired after one appearance on my profile, cos I'm not like that really!
(The duck! I mean the duck!)
I think I'll keep Decoy Duck for backup, just in case I fill LYD one day.
So I made myself a new blog just in case. (Remember that addicts and the classically insane (i.e. the Frank Capra variety, as in virtually every character in 'Arsenic & Old Lace') have a logic all their own.......)
So she's back now, but I posted some bits on Decoy Duck, if you'd care to visit. You can see the new image, which was retired after one appearance on my profile, cos I'm not like that really!
(The duck! I mean the duck!)
I think I'll keep Decoy Duck for backup, just in case I fill LYD one day.
Wednesday, May 31, 2006
OK. I give up. I'm just stupid.
I'm upset - I could cry. I'm not very good with IT, as you'll have realised if you've been reading regularly. Today my visitor counter that I had endless hassle installing has disappeared from my sidebar. The code's in the template, but the counter I was so happy with has gone! I dunno.
So there I was, having given up on hard stuff for today, searching for blogs to do with organic farming, keeping chickens, sutainable development - all that stuff for the happy-ever-after plan, and I found a 'live journal' that I liked, and wanted to link to, so I thought I'd say hi on Meredic's comments page.
Oh no. I don't think so. This outfit have got their members locked in and battened down so hard that I can't get in to leave a comment unless, it appears, I join up and start a journal with them.
This is where I was up to when I thought that I could use the "Anonymous" option, having sprained an ankle on their other hurdles:
'My God - scary OpenID - I just wanted let you know that I LIKE your blog and am going to link to you, but the fun's rather gone out of it now...... don't want a journal and can't work out where to start on OpenID. Don't like anonymous comments but can't work out alternative. If designed as unnatural selection process to intimidate bear of very little brain, IT WORKED!!!!!! Hoooooooowwwwwwwlll!!!!!! '
When, a little later, I tried to post, their bloody spam robot detectors wheeled into action, asking me to confirm that I was human below (uh...yeah..) then rejecting my 'anonymous' comment four times before informing me that "Your IP address (number given) is detected as an open proxy (a common source of spam) so comment access is denied. If you do not believe you're accessing the net through an open proxy, please contact your ISP or this site's tech support to help resolve the problem."
I've already looked at their Help page and there are so many FAQs and so forth that seem entirely for journal holders that - as a poor outsider who just wanted to be friendly - I am completely baffled and demoralised. The well-meaning architects of these cyber-forts should realise that the rogues and sad-hats who hack and spam will always get through anything they throw up; it's only harmless saps like me who can't get through.
Who needs this?
So there I was, having given up on hard stuff for today, searching for blogs to do with organic farming, keeping chickens, sutainable development - all that stuff for the happy-ever-after plan, and I found a 'live journal' that I liked, and wanted to link to, so I thought I'd say hi on Meredic's comments page.
Oh no. I don't think so. This outfit have got their members locked in and battened down so hard that I can't get in to leave a comment unless, it appears, I join up and start a journal with them.
This is where I was up to when I thought that I could use the "Anonymous" option, having sprained an ankle on their other hurdles:
'My God - scary OpenID - I just wanted let you know that I LIKE your blog and am going to link to you, but the fun's rather gone out of it now...... don't want a journal and can't work out where to start on OpenID. Don't like anonymous comments but can't work out alternative. If designed as unnatural selection process to intimidate bear of very little brain, IT WORKED!!!!!! Hoooooooowwwwwwwlll!!!!!! '
When, a little later, I tried to post, their bloody spam robot detectors wheeled into action, asking me to confirm that I was human below (uh...yeah..) then rejecting my 'anonymous' comment four times before informing me that "Your IP address (number given) is detected as an open proxy (a common source of spam) so comment access is denied. If you do not believe you're accessing the net through an open proxy, please contact your ISP or this site's tech support to help resolve the problem."
I've already looked at their Help page and there are so many FAQs and so forth that seem entirely for journal holders that - as a poor outsider who just wanted to be friendly - I am completely baffled and demoralised. The well-meaning architects of these cyber-forts should realise that the rogues and sad-hats who hack and spam will always get through anything they throw up; it's only harmless saps like me who can't get through.
Who needs this?
Sunday, May 28, 2006
New Toy!
Look in the sidebar! I've got a Guest Map! Do be my guest!!
Well it keeps me happy....................
Well it keeps me happy....................
Buggeribollox! Nemesised!
It did it again!
Well, relieved as I am that I'd taken my own advice, I don't think this the day to do a post on Nemesis.
Where's my teddy?
And my blanket.
Can I have the light on?
:/
Well, relieved as I am that I'd taken my own advice, I don't think this the day to do a post on Nemesis.
Where's my teddy?
And my blanket.
Can I have the light on?
:/
Post off
You know when you've spent however long on a post, and maybe stuck in some links and pics, and maybe even looked things up just to confirm that the capital of Guatemala is Stoke Poges, Rodgers and Hammerstein was an Austrian boy band, and that's how you spell encyklopoodia?
A little time, a little care. Then you hit the PUBLISH POST button.
And find you're being prompted to log on......
Well, don't cry, because the RECOVER POST button works, even when nothing appears to be saved. I didn't retrieve all of my last post, but I did get most of it, enough to be able to remember the missing portion. Be brave!
And follow Samurai Sam's advice for your next oeuvre - Save it in Word first, then cut and paste!
Actually, I usually select and cut before pushing PUBLISH - just in case.
A little time, a little care. Then you hit the PUBLISH POST button.
And find you're being prompted to log on......
Well, don't cry, because the RECOVER POST button works, even when nothing appears to be saved. I didn't retrieve all of my last post, but I did get most of it, enough to be able to remember the missing portion. Be brave!
And follow Samurai Sam's advice for your next oeuvre - Save it in Word first, then cut and paste!
Actually, I usually select and cut before pushing PUBLISH - just in case.
Thursday, May 18, 2006
Yeugh!
Ugh! Internet Explorer 7! Yeugh! Yeuch! Yick! What is this?
Using this last night, not realising that it's a new release, I thought that Habibi's laptop was crashing, if not giving up the ghost completely.
What's with the horrible blurry back-and-forward buttons? I thought I'd picked up the wrong reading glasses!
And all that crap at the top, that distracts from what I'm doing. Duh! Am I at primary school that I need wallcharts of the 3 Rs in large reassuring letters with cheerful explanatory pictures? In duplicate?
And the pages and toolbar fields of bloody security warnings every time I click on anything at all! Do they think we're stupid? When I buy a bag of peanuts, I know that it may contain nuts. Hello-o! Patronising marketing alert.
It wasn't broken! Why 'fix' it?
Using this last night, not realising that it's a new release, I thought that Habibi's laptop was crashing, if not giving up the ghost completely.
What's with the horrible blurry back-and-forward buttons? I thought I'd picked up the wrong reading glasses!
And all that crap at the top, that distracts from what I'm doing. Duh! Am I at primary school that I need wallcharts of the 3 Rs in large reassuring letters with cheerful explanatory pictures? In duplicate?
And the pages and toolbar fields of bloody security warnings every time I click on anything at all! Do they think we're stupid? When I buy a bag of peanuts, I know that it may contain nuts. Hello-o! Patronising marketing alert.
It wasn't broken! Why 'fix' it?
Friday, April 21, 2006
Ever-decreasing circles
My 'I like' blog of a few weeks ago started out as a parenthesis illustrating something else entirely, namely reasons for a two-decade aversion to PCs and the Internet. But I was having such a good time with my raindrops-on-roses party (subject: all the things the PC/Internet is not, does not and can not.) that I dumped the other stuff and kept going (something I'm pretty good at, as we know.)
Here's the aversion bit.
For years I have described myself as either technomoron or technophobe, depending on whether I was going for laughs or accuracy, but essentially, I DON'T LIKE COMPUTERS VERY MUCH, though I liked the concept of Elle's cute pink Legally Blonde Mac. (In practice, don't like Macs even more than I don't like PCs - horrible keyboard.)
Basically Habibi got his first computer in 1990, and installed it in the spare bedroom. From then on, he would retire upstairs most evenings, only emerging hours later, weary, dazed, and smiling sheepishly, to collapse into bed. I tried not to kick up about something that made Habibi happy, but ooh I resented that machine!
OK?
The next bit would have been wry reflection (Whaddya mean apoplectic rant? We're doing emotion reflected in tranquility' today, for which I would like to thank my English teacher Mr Richards, who first put university into my fluffy head, my parents, who paid for it, and William Wordsworth, nice man, pretty good poet.) - yes, wry reflection - on how time passed, Habibi got his modem working, and was finally liberated from the daily commute to the office, embarking on the USS Microsoft, with Mama Duck, Habibibaba and millions of other families, for New Lifestyle, eventually settling in Global Village, I.T., where he revelled in the freedom of flexible hours, and the convenience of 24/7 Information Access. Meanwhile Mama Duck, while admiring his dedication, and absolute brilliance, chafed at the slow realisation that working from home meant never leaving the office. Didn't Habibi deserve a better quality of life than this? And where did Mama Duck and Habibibaba fit into the equation?
Of course, these issues have been part of traditional family life for as long as the traditional family, with breadwinners and dependants, has functioned. Yet even with two breadwinners, since the 80s and the cosy Thatcher/Reagan double act, the psychological pressures to work harder, faster, longer have been exacerbated by the presence of at least one computer in every home. Just as Japan's famously company-orientated society began to loosen up, the West started heading in the other direction! Taking individual character and choices into account, it all seems a bit much. (Still doing reflection here!)
And I don't think computer games are so healthy either - if we're not working on our computers, we're playing on them. Surely our ability to deal with other people only comes with practice, so if you chicken out in favour of rescuing Lemmings for hours on end (I love them!), how are you going to get the hang of real people with no re-set, no hot-air balloon, no AK47 or ICBM, no - omigod - no cheats? So says she who spent most of her childhood with her nose in a book.................. but of course that's different!
So what of my new blog lifestyle? Here's the irony: I WAS RIGHT! Ever since April 6th, when Mama Duck went online, it seems I'm either writing or revising my blog, or checking for comments, or reading someone else's, or thinking about something I want to write. I even dreamt I was in a blog the other night, on the page like something out of an admonitory children's film - nice page, though... In short, total obsession. Not doing much else. It's a BAD THING!
On the other hand, instead of being stuck with my own company because it's too hot & humid outside, or Habibi's working, or I'm spent-up/too tired or lazy to do something or go out/can't drive and can't face the bus, I've been to see grannyp in the Canaries, another Englishwoman abroad who's given me plenty to think about; and la petite anglaise in Paris - a pleasure to spend time with, even at this remove; and whoever-that-is turning his cave in Andalucia into a home - no, go see, this is great!; and Karma in Mumbai, with her glorious colours and Sunday competition , which she suspended, just as I found it -Aargh! - and some Spanish language blogs that I can't read without my dictionary, but give me something to look forward to; and of course, Ayalguita in Madrid - now there's another fabulous woman getting on with things. And it's already working both ways, though how nzm ever finds time to write her blog, never mind read anyone else's, is remarkable: go see, as I do, what Dubai has to offer those who'll get off their asses and join in!
I'd follow her example, but I've got places to go in cyber-space.
Here's the aversion bit.
For years I have described myself as either technomoron or technophobe, depending on whether I was going for laughs or accuracy, but essentially, I DON'T LIKE COMPUTERS VERY MUCH, though I liked the concept of Elle's cute pink Legally Blonde Mac. (In practice, don't like Macs even more than I don't like PCs - horrible keyboard.)
Basically Habibi got his first computer in 1990, and installed it in the spare bedroom. From then on, he would retire upstairs most evenings, only emerging hours later, weary, dazed, and smiling sheepishly, to collapse into bed. I tried not to kick up about something that made Habibi happy, but ooh I resented that machine!
OK?
The next bit would have been wry reflection (Whaddya mean apoplectic rant? We're doing emotion reflected in tranquility' today, for which I would like to thank my English teacher Mr Richards, who first put university into my fluffy head, my parents, who paid for it, and William Wordsworth, nice man, pretty good poet.) - yes, wry reflection - on how time passed, Habibi got his modem working, and was finally liberated from the daily commute to the office, embarking on the USS Microsoft, with Mama Duck, Habibibaba and millions of other families, for New Lifestyle, eventually settling in Global Village, I.T., where he revelled in the freedom of flexible hours, and the convenience of 24/7 Information Access. Meanwhile Mama Duck, while admiring his dedication, and absolute brilliance, chafed at the slow realisation that working from home meant never leaving the office. Didn't Habibi deserve a better quality of life than this? And where did Mama Duck and Habibibaba fit into the equation?
Of course, these issues have been part of traditional family life for as long as the traditional family, with breadwinners and dependants, has functioned. Yet even with two breadwinners, since the 80s and the cosy Thatcher/Reagan double act, the psychological pressures to work harder, faster, longer have been exacerbated by the presence of at least one computer in every home. Just as Japan's famously company-orientated society began to loosen up, the West started heading in the other direction! Taking individual character and choices into account, it all seems a bit much. (Still doing reflection here!)
And I don't think computer games are so healthy either - if we're not working on our computers, we're playing on them. Surely our ability to deal with other people only comes with practice, so if you chicken out in favour of rescuing Lemmings for hours on end (I love them!), how are you going to get the hang of real people with no re-set, no hot-air balloon, no AK47 or ICBM, no - omigod - no cheats? So says she who spent most of her childhood with her nose in a book.................. but of course that's different!
So what of my new blog lifestyle? Here's the irony: I WAS RIGHT! Ever since April 6th, when Mama Duck went online, it seems I'm either writing or revising my blog, or checking for comments, or reading someone else's, or thinking about something I want to write. I even dreamt I was in a blog the other night, on the page like something out of an admonitory children's film - nice page, though... In short, total obsession. Not doing much else. It's a BAD THING!
On the other hand, instead of being stuck with my own company because it's too hot & humid outside, or Habibi's working, or I'm spent-up/too tired or lazy to do something or go out/can't drive and can't face the bus, I've been to see grannyp in the Canaries, another Englishwoman abroad who's given me plenty to think about; and la petite anglaise in Paris - a pleasure to spend time with, even at this remove; and whoever-that-is turning his cave in Andalucia into a home - no, go see, this is great!; and Karma in Mumbai, with her glorious colours and Sunday competition , which she suspended, just as I found it -Aargh! - and some Spanish language blogs that I can't read without my dictionary, but give me something to look forward to; and of course, Ayalguita in Madrid - now there's another fabulous woman getting on with things. And it's already working both ways, though how nzm ever finds time to write her blog, never mind read anyone else's, is remarkable: go see, as I do, what Dubai has to offer those who'll get off their asses and join in!
I'd follow her example, but I've got places to go in cyber-space.
Saturday, April 08, 2006
Habibibabapapa
What do you you call your nearest and dearest when you blog about them? Shouldn't there be a witness protection scheme for the relatives of us sorry individuals who feel compelled to share our all with every Tom, Dipti and Hagrid?
The arabic word for beloved or dearest is habibi. Say it out loud: it's simply a perfect word: light, warm, sensual, breathless, reassuring, resigned, humorous, all the things that love is. Try it on your mum, your two year-old, your Significant Other - see? When I'm right, I'm right.
In my blog, Habibi stands for my beloved husband, and decades (plural since last Wednesday!) of the whole range of the marriage vows: richer, poorer, better, worse, sickness, health, love, cherish, drive, cook, work all hours, fall asleep in cinemas, snore through concerts, sense of humour, tolerance, creativity, discipline, ethics, quiet determination, piercing intelligence, loyalty, aversion to green vegetables, great legs, impressive liquid grain storage facility, wit, Terry Pratchett obsession, friend in need, in touch with his emotions.... - eh?! Oops - sorry - too many fridge magnets.
And Habibibaba - you can work it out. And if you're reading this, O Habibibaba, here's one for you, courtesy of sensitive lyrical Ogden Nash:
First Child..
Be it a girl, or one of the boys,
It is scarlet all over its avoirdupois,
It is red, it is boiled; could the obstetrician
Have possibly been a lobstertrician?
His degrees and credentials were hunk-dory,
But how's for an infantile inventory?
Here's the prodigy, here's the miracle!
Whether its head is oval or spherical,
You rejoice to find it has only one,
Having dreaded a two-headed daughter or son;
Here's the phenomenon all complete,
It's got two hands, it's got two feet,
Only natural, but pleasing, because
For months you have dreamed of flippers or claws.
Furthermore, it is fully equipped:
Fingers and toes with nails are tipped;
It's even got eyes, and a mouth clear cut;
When the mouth comes open, the eyes go shut,
When the eyes go shut the breath is loosed,
And the presence of lungs can be deduced.
Let the rocket flash and the canon thunder,
This child is a marvel, a matchless wonder.
A staggering child, a child astounding,
Dazzling, diaperless, dumbfounding,
Stupendous, miraculous, unsurpassed,
A child to stagger and flabbergast,
Bright as a button, sharp as a thorn,
And the only perfect one ever born.
I rest my valise.
The arabic word for beloved or dearest is habibi. Say it out loud: it's simply a perfect word: light, warm, sensual, breathless, reassuring, resigned, humorous, all the things that love is. Try it on your mum, your two year-old, your Significant Other - see? When I'm right, I'm right.
In my blog, Habibi stands for my beloved husband, and decades (plural since last Wednesday!) of the whole range of the marriage vows: richer, poorer, better, worse, sickness, health, love, cherish, drive, cook, work all hours, fall asleep in cinemas, snore through concerts, sense of humour, tolerance, creativity, discipline, ethics, quiet determination, piercing intelligence, loyalty, aversion to green vegetables, great legs, impressive liquid grain storage facility, wit, Terry Pratchett obsession, friend in need, in touch with his emotions.... - eh?! Oops - sorry - too many fridge magnets.
And Habibibaba - you can work it out. And if you're reading this, O Habibibaba, here's one for you, courtesy of sensitive lyrical Ogden Nash:
First Child..
Be it a girl, or one of the boys,
It is scarlet all over its avoirdupois,
It is red, it is boiled; could the obstetrician
Have possibly been a lobstertrician?
His degrees and credentials were hunk-dory,
But how's for an infantile inventory?
Here's the prodigy, here's the miracle!
Whether its head is oval or spherical,
You rejoice to find it has only one,
Having dreaded a two-headed daughter or son;
Here's the phenomenon all complete,
It's got two hands, it's got two feet,
Only natural, but pleasing, because
For months you have dreamed of flippers or claws.
Furthermore, it is fully equipped:
Fingers and toes with nails are tipped;
It's even got eyes, and a mouth clear cut;
When the mouth comes open, the eyes go shut,
When the eyes go shut the breath is loosed,
And the presence of lungs can be deduced.
Let the rocket flash and the canon thunder,
This child is a marvel, a matchless wonder.
A staggering child, a child astounding,
Dazzling, diaperless, dumbfounding,
Stupendous, miraculous, unsurpassed,
A child to stagger and flabbergast,
Bright as a button, sharp as a thorn,
And the only perfect one ever born.
I rest my valise.
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