words fail me

I heard what was perhaps the saddest thing in advertising in a long, long time.

The latest Discover card ad begins with, "We live in a consumer society. And that's OK."

Erm. That is so wrong, on so many levels. Talk amongst yourselves.

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adrift (bis)

OKm in my last post I stated that a mostly "miss" blog had yielded one interesting link. But crazy lazy me kept reading, and the further back I dug, the more stuff I uncovered. So I wish to publicly retract my "miss" and call attention to said blog, A cup of Jo. I'll admit, I didn't give it too much credit because I feared it would be too fashionista for my taste. Fortunately, I am mistaken; the author has a keen eye for design as a whole, and has sent me on quite a number of side adventures, including:

• The 100 most common English words quiz (I must sit to discuss this longer.)
• Stranger photos have happened (I must tell my colleagues on trois choses about this...)
• Ideas for sale
• For you (This is another that deserves further pondering.)

Now I know what I should be doing instead of being carried by web currents: SLEEPING! But like I posted as my Facebook status, Carpe noctem - seize the night.

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web drifting

I can't even call it surfing - it's not directional enough. The pace is also slower, as I stop to find delightful details where I wouldn't expect anything mind-boggling.

So here we go, somewhat randomly:

From Word Ferret (a usual haunt), a quote from Gustave Flaubert: I am irritated by my own writing. I am like a violinist whose ear is true, but whose fingers refuse to reproduce precisely the sound he hears within.

Or rather, in the original French:

(...) j'ai si peu l'habitude d'écrire et je deviens si hargneux là-dessus, surtout vis-à-vis de moi-même, qu'il ne laisse pas que de me donner assez de souci. C'est comme un homme qui a l'oreille juste et qui joue faux du violon ; ses doigts se refusent à reproduire juste le son dont il a conscience. Alors les larmes coulent des yeux du pauvre racleur et l'archet lui tombe des doigts...

Looking for the original quote, I stumbled upon another too-true thought of his:

Pour qu'une chose soit intéressante, il suffit de la regarder longtemps.

Moving along, I laughed until I cried while discovering a recent blog of note, Cake Wrecks. The tartan wedding-cake fiasco is absolutely priceless. This is one blog that I read from front to back in its entirety.

Which then led me to Cakelava, cake decorators in Hawaii, whose work is completely at the other end of the spectrum. Pat thought the Tiki cakes were really cool, but then, who wouldn't?

On the main blogger page, you can see the names of blogs flash by as they are updated. Sometimes I click on one when the title appears promising. It's a hit or miss process, but in a relatively "miss" click, I found a link to a book whose concept is so insanely appealing I may just order it: A Field Guide to Weeds, by Kim Beck. Once again, my fondness for dandelions shines through.

What does this show? That I'm procrastinating again. I should be doing something more productive (it's been fairly quiet lately on the freelancing front, so I actually have my evenings to myself...W00t!) but then, isn't this what summer is for? And for my sake, please don't mention that September is just around the corner!

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blame it on the Olympics

Yeah, I've been a real couch potato these days, partly due to the Olympics.

Hearty bravos to Alex Despatie for his "golden" silver. I think he really epitomizes how we should react to silver or bronze medallists: if the athlete's thrilled with the result, then so should we. Bottom line. A lot of American silver medallists see it as being "the first loser", a take I have a lot of difficulty comprehending.

As to Canada's medal count, let's put it this way: the States have ten times Canada's population, and got just over six times our medal count. I won't compare with the Chinese, whose setup is such a paradigm shift from Western world athletes that there's just no reconciling the two. (But let it be known I agree that at least two of the Chinese gymnasts were underage.) And in figuring out how to sort country medal counts, I say this: doesn't sorting gold medal winners higher than higher total medal-count countries just run against the Olympic spirit? I agree a silver or bronze will never be a gold, but still, to me, total numbers should be the main factor. If you can put thirty people on the third step of the podium, you are more worthy than a country who has a single silver medal, period.

Some of the highlights for me (apart from the obvious Phelps and Bolt) are Australian Matthew Mitcham stealing the gold from the Chinese in the 10-m platform dive. I keep wondering what the competition would have looked like if Alex's back had held out...Nonetheless, Mitcham was quiet, absolutely solid and beautiful to watch. Another was watching Priscilla Lopes-Schliep celebrate her unexpected silver in the 100m hurdles - in the arms of Sally McLellan from Australia. In a race where the 2nd to 6th positions were determined by 2 one-hundreths of a second, it was a wonderful display of true Olympic spirit.

See you in Vancouver, y'all.

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5/8

As soon as I published my predictions, I realized they were a little face-heavy, so I knew I would be off on some matches.

I nailed the four main matches, and technically Matt hardy did win (so I gave myself a half point), and Shawn will be back (another half), regardless of what he said. (Points to Rebecca for taking that punch - it looked really, really good.)

I screwed up on the Winner Take All match; I'm OK as far as the Women's title is concerned, but I really miss the days when the IC title meant something. Now it's just for the king of the mid-carders.

It really is too bad that they haven't just thrown Jeff Hardy right back in the mix after coming back from his suspension. I am pleased for MVP, who I believe has grown by leaps and bounds since breaking out of that Matt Hardy rut. By the way, am I the only one that thinks CM Punk is the happy recipient of the path that had initially been laid for Jeff Hardy?

I also wonder whether Cena hasn't gotten so comfortable in being the company's spokesperson/go-to guy/whatever that he's forgotten to be a little selfish, a little hungry for the title?

Lastly, HIAC matches are awesome enough as it is, especially when they turn into TLCIAC - they don't need that fluffy, what the hell was that ending. I wish they'd leave the ring surface well enough alone. It might impress the kiddies, but it really doesn't do the wrestlers justice, and it doesn't do it for me.

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really quick Summerslam picks

PPV starts in under ten minutes. Here goes:

Shawn Michaels - don't care, but I think he'll be back. D'uh.

Winner take all - Go with the faces; the heels will at least have each other.

MVP vs. Jeff Hardy - Could really go either way. Jeff Hardy.

John Cena vs. Batista - Could also go either way. Batista.

Mark Henry vs. Matt Hardy - Please, please, Matt Hardy.

CM Punk vs. JBL - Please, please CM Punk.

Triple H vs. Great Khali - Trips all the way.

Edge vs. Undertaker - Nothing can stop the Deadman's return.

on Heath Ledger and the Academy Awards

I went to see Batman: the Dark Knight tonight. I must admit, I haven't enjoyed a movie like that in a long time, and a large part of that is due to Heath Ledger's performance as the Joker. Now, it should be noted that I was never the type to fawn over the man. I did see his performances in The Patriot, A Knight's Tale and The Order, and didn't think particularly highly or poorly of them. (Yup, I know, I really do have to get around to seeing Brokeback Mountain.)

But this one blew my mind. I mean, he put Jack Nicholson to shame. The only comparable performance for a villain in a movie that I can think of is Anthony Hopkins in The Silence of the Lambs, who won an Oscar for Best Actor. I thought it was that good. Yet I read that people are petitioning for a Best Supporting Actor award. I wonder where the line is between the two categories; it seemed to me that he had plenty of screen time to justify a Best Actor, but I yield to the powers that be.

OK, so if we look through the Best Supporting Actor, we see nominations were given to Pat Morita for The Karate Kid, James Cromwell for Babe and Burt Reynolds for Boogie Nights. That in itself tells me that consideration for a nomination is not excessive, and in my opinion the least this performance deserves. The rest is up to the Academy.

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writing prompt: sleep

Sleep. A delightful pastime. One that in our hectic modern life is underestimated and sometimes even vilified. How can you sleep for so long? Don’t you realize how much you’re missing? Besides, there’s work to be done!

From my earliest days, I was a sleeper. Once I started school, just as it became apparent that I was sorely nearsighted, it was discovered I wasn’t a morning person. My body simply cannot adapt to being awake early in the day. My mother, the typical morning person, would hop out of bed and head straight for the kitchen. I, on the other hand, cannot stomach the concept of food right out of bed. She was so worried that I never wanted to eat before leaving for school that she began smuggling a beaten egg into my morning glass of chocolate milk, the only thing I would agree to. To this day, I have breakfast once I get to work, at which point I have been up for at least two hours. On the weekends, I do have breakfast sometimes, usually around two in the afternoon.

For the most part, my mind doesn’t fully wake before high noon. I wonder whether the correlation between the time at which my classes were given and my grades would be apparent. At the very least, morning classes were the stuff of daydreaming and rereading the same line in my textbook three times. The same holds true today: morning meetings result in an increase in doodling and coffee drinking. As a translator and writer, mornings are best spent taken on new projects and producing really rough drafts to be molded into some legible shape later on in the day.

For those who would have me be bright and perky at seven AM simply by going to bed earlier, I say I have tried. Not only is it incredibly difficult to turn off my mind in the early evening, but even if I do manage to fall asleep, I will simply sleep right through to late morning anyway – 10 AM, at the very earliest. I’ve gotten to know my sleep pattern well: it’s nine hours, in 90-minute cycles. Yep, I’m above-average that way. Is it laziness? Nope – it’s simply listening to my body. On weeknights, when nine hours is simply impossible, I aim for one of those 90-minute intervals. Seven and a half hours, or even six hours, is better than eight, when the alarm sounds while I’m on a downward slope into deep sleep. That’s the most horrible way to wake up.

As well, as a migraine sufferer who only finds relief through sleep, I am keenly aware of its therapeutic function. I simply don’t understand why people struggle through the day with a head cold or a migraine or the flu when sleep can help your body get rid of it all. People understand that PCs simply need to shut down once in a while to work out the accumulated bugs and reset themselves. It would seem god wasn’t the only one who created something in its own image. Yet people constantly undermine the intrinsic value of slowing down, recharging batteries and beginning anew.

In short, sleep, to me, is the ultimate victory on the rigid, contrary schedule the adult world tries to impose on me. I claim victory over my alarm clock on Fridays, when I turn off the alarm, and only reluctantly turn it back on on Sunday nights. The bottom line is I enjoy sleep immensely, from the warmth of the blankets pulled tightly under my chin, to finding a cool spot on your pillow on warm summer nights, to glancing at the time and realizing you have two more hours to go before the alarm pulls you from your reverie. *yawn* Gotta go.

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writing prompt: raindrops on roses

Well, there are no roses in my back yard – I’m not nearly attentive enough a gardener to go down that route. I tend to prefer plants that fend well for themselves; I have lilies, peonies, hydrangeas, lily of the valley, and some raspberry bushes that reward me with tart treats right around my birthday. This year as a whole has been strange, weather-wise, and our summer has been soggy, to put it mildly. And oddly enough, I haven’t experienced a single instance of that warm summer rain that you walk barefoot in, completely oblivious to the fact you are drenched through and through. It’s a blissful occurrence that I warmly recommend to everyone.

I was once caught in such a downpour as I was walking home from the mall. It was coming down hard, but it was warmer than any swimming pool. In any event, I must have looked pitiful, because I actually had four separate cars slow beside me and ask whether I wanted a lift. I thanked all four profusely, but with a beaming smile, declined their invitation, saying it was a lovely experience. I remember one lady, a soccer-mom type, who wistfully smiled back at me before driving off; for a moment, I think something clicked inside her, a long-forgotten memory of treating herself to silly things like walking in the rain. That glimpse in her eye seemed to betray a sudden urge to pull over and join me. I do hope she did eventually yield to that harmless temptation.

The last time I was blessed with such summer rain was during a street fair event in Montreal. Sainte-Catherine Street is the commercial artery stretching east-west through the downtown area, bustling at all hours of the day or night, both on the sidewalks and the street itself. It had been closed for a huge sidewalk sale/community fair, all the way from Atwater Street to University Street, if memory serves me correctly. That’s a stretch of almost 2 kilometres reclaimed from vehicular traffic, if only for a few days. The train station was at one end of this route, and the booth where I was volunteering at the other. As the day wrapped up, it began to rain, first a few drops that barely gave visitors pause, gradually growing to a forceful shower that prompted people to take cover. We were soaked by the time the booth was taken down anyway, so I enjoyed the stroll back to the train station, fully appreciating walking down the centre line of what is usually a safety nightmare for pedestrians. (OK, so Montreal pedestrians themselves are a nightmare, but that’s a whole other post!) The majority of people huddled under shopkeeper’s canopies, while the rest of us ambled about, smiling knowingly at each other in acknowledgement that we were sharing a delightful secret in the midst of the unaware.

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writing prompt: a room with a view

I’m cheating a bit with this prompt.

My office cubicle has no window, and even if I prairie dog over the partition, there is no window in sight. There’s a window in the conference room, but the door is almost always shut. Managers in closed offices have windows; while I don’t particularly envy the ones with a lovely view of the parking lot, I must admit it is useful to remote start your car on cold winter nights. I am jealous of those who see the wooded lot on the north side, as they get to see the ongoing adventures of our small woodland creatures – birds of all kinds, a lot of squirrels, the occasional groundhog or hare.

My bedroom window has a window, but no view really – unless you consider the garage roof and the neighbour’s hedge a view. Besides, I kept the drapes open for years, until I started dating Pat, who can only sleep in absolute darkness but often goes to bed at dawn. It also helps to avoid a repeat of an unpleasant incident that occurred a few years back, as I awoke (in very little clothing) to the sight of a man right outside my window, on the garage roof, trimming the neighbour’s hedge with no forewarning whatsoever!

Like I said, I’m cheating here. The prompt made me think of the “masked thief” Pat and I caught peeking in from our ground level windows earlier this week. Cats are regulars, but this was a first. I can’t say what attracted him; it’s not like we were cooking anything. Perhaps it was simply the fact that it was the only thing to look at, really, under the back porch, a spot that affords some protection from the apparently endless drizzle and downpours we’ve been having this summer.



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abstract art

Sometimes, technology provides things I'd never even thought of, much less wanted or needed. Case in point: my new digital camera features, among a plethora of special settings, a setting for fireworks. Whodathunk? So I tried it out at China's entry in the International des Feux de Montréal fireworks competition. Turns out that it does, in fact, yield really neat pictures, even though the long exposure time requires you to be very very still.

Among the more typical shots, though, a few appeared that almost transcended simple fireworks, into neat little displays of abstract art.

Then again, maybe it's just because I like dandelions.

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