24/04: The hardest part of finding a new job is discovering how it's done.
I have never been a "networker." I think it's silly to believe that people get jobs because they 'know' someone...and what does one do? ...cozy up to someone who might be helpful even though they are otherwise uninteresting? It's distasteful. I've always been big on collecting information though:))I have had some really really good jobs, jobs that I shouldn't have got if logic ruled. I got them by walking into a place I might want to work, that had I job I thought sounded interesting and lucrative and asking for it. Yep, that simple. No education, special training, previous experience...nothing. Except that I knew from the Ad who the contact person was and how to get them on the phone.
I still don't know why my potential employers even agreed to see me, let alone said 'when can you start'.
Now I'm in trouble. I can't get to the people who can hire me. I can't get information--at least not REAL information--about the job, the company or the employer. All I can do is send a resume to an unknown place and person for a job that barely has a description. I am loath to do it. What could be a more monumental waste of time? For everyone.
I actually know people with considerably more education, experience and 'connection,' than I have, who send out 40 resumes a week and get ABSOLUTELY NO RESPONSE.
I can't do it, what kind of employee would I be if I were such a time and resource waster. What kind of person would I be? Other people do it because they think they MUST. I think there MUST be some other way.
So I am wondering what will happen if I forget about all the jobs that don't list company names (people who hide their company names usually do it for a reason!) walk right in to the others and ask for a few minutes of time from the person who is hiring. I could even try to close. It is unlikely to be closed just like that, but a gentle attempt to close will certainly be a start and I won't have to do anything that makes me feel like vomiting because it makes so little sense.
At very least I can drop a hard copy resume on that person's desk or well no it could be worse... I could be the person who actually came into the office with a resume and expected to speak with my potential employer on the spot and 'how weird is that?'
That's better that being an unread e-mail:)) :)) In fact whatever anyone thinks or does in response to this is better than being an unread e-mail.
So far I've sent out one half of a resume (I took all the good jobs off so that I wouldn't be over-qualified) and I've gone to one interview.
The interview was for a very low level sales job. The description made it sound like a Public Relations job. The interviewer was a young version of a used car salesman or a door to door salesman. He interviewed two of us at a time. He talked too fast, tried too hard to SELL the job, and every time I caught his eye he seemed frightened. He ignored any effort I made to interject a few words into what was becoming an endless monologue. It seemed like he had already made up his mind so I was wondering why he didn't cut it short. I knew that my forced little smiles that were meant to stop him looking frightened must be getting dangerously close to grimaces. Everything shows on my face.
I could hear all the 'two bit' sales manager instructions going around in his head. Don't lose control of the interview, stay with the pitch, only ask questions the client will say yes to, then wind up and go for the final yes. Apparently there are people in the world that are so oblivious or spineless that they fall for this. This is what passes for sales these days. I watched it all indulgently. I could hardly wait to get out of there.
I am a wisp of a thing with a soft cheery voice. I am as unassuming as one could wish. A lot of people might wonder how I could sell or promote anything. If you were to ask clients why they bought they would say it was because I seemed 'nice' or because the offer worked for them or because I was there when they we ready. They might say the whole process was sort of fun or sort or interesting or that I seemed no nonsense and reliable. What they are really saying is that I did not sell to them at all, I was just thoughtful--but there is some art beneath the surface. The cheeriness is a bit persona, but really it's just me with some spin.
Nigel does it too, he is much better at it than I am and I love him for it.
So at the moment I am working on a long resume and the resume in crib sheet form (skill sets only). They will both go together, hopefully directly into the right hands, so that the no one wastes any time. If the short form isn't working, if nothing is working, it's "I've got to go I'll call." and then I won't:)) and everybody will be happy:)) If an employer 'prevaricates' too much, well he/she will just have to settle for someone inferior because I am not holding my breath :)) :))
Wonder how it will work.
Judging from the job search experiences of other people, how could it work out worse.
25/02: It's a new day!
Despite relentlessly bad news about the economy and the state of the world, I find I am more optimistic and happy than I have ever been. The cynicism has inexplicable fallen away.The company I work for is closing it's Toronto office shortly. Several hundred people, including myself will be laid off. I have thought this could happen for sometime. Our work involves American contracts to do with financial services, pharmaceuticals, oil products and telecomunications. I have worked for the company off and on (mostly off) since 1998.
Since I only have a bachelor's degree and I cannot afford to do a Masters given the current economic climate, I thought of training in something specific. There is funding available for people who have been laid off that even covers living expenses. It is Bursary money not a loan, but two years at a community college especially after attending one of the best Universities in the world (check the polls) I can't muster the enthusiasm.
On the other hand there is bursary money for contining education courses, a sufficient amount that I could wind up bi-lingual at last if I am willing to put in the work. Although I wish I could do the courses at a University or other school with better credentials, this I think is a time comprimise.
The world is trying to metamorphisize into a world that is better for all it's inhabitants. I still believe it will be painful and take a long time but I will be happy to be a part of it regardless of the sacrifices.
Nigel is magical or I should say the combination of he and I is magical. We unfailing bring out the best in each other. So people who are waiting, enjoy single life and hold out for the best because the best does happen even though it may take it years to happen.
I have finally learnt to peel potatoes:))
My interests have changed drastically and it seems suddenly, although looking back on the journal parts of the blog I realise this has been a long time in the making. My mother and I are studying Opera together. I snagged an old laser disc player from eBay and a pile of laser discs on Opera and she bought the best books she could find. We will listen to/watch La Traviota next. We started with Verdi's Macbeth.
My father has almost every Opera known to man, on vinyl. His classical vinyl collection could be without parallel--hmmn that might be an exageration--but it seems that way (except in institutions and libraries) so we have heard all of it without being about to name it or describe anything about it.
I made some good guesses at the Symphony a few weeks ago, we had gone to see a specific part of the program so the other pieces were a surprise. I could hum them after the first few bars but I can't name it:)) So strange, for it to have been in the background of my life all my growing up years, but in such a way that I was barely aware of it.
We are seeing more Symphony and Dance soon.
THIS IS IMPORTANT! Have you noticed that almost all television, all film, all literature is about unhappy events. I suppose if the stories were happy there would be no story. A constant diet of unhappiness MUST effect one's mood and perspective.
I barely watch television any more. I read the New York times on my iPhone and that's all. I can't bear the news about my own country, and I will not give it any energy unless I think there is something I can do about it. Our current Priminister shames our country. He has only been brought into line (kicking and screaming--the long silent scream of an adolescent who miskenly believes himself to be right) by a minority government and Obama. Still many Canadians are so dumbed down and intimidated by authority (postering) that they don't see it.
There's a lot more to blog re television now that I am sufficiently distanced to see it, but that will be another possibly surprising blog.
Camarades server crashed and my cam page is down. I did not take it down. I will leave it down for a while but then it will go up again. I'll ask nigel to take some descent photos so that I might be remembered as I am.
Meanwhile, we are starting to visit grunge clubs, with live music too. A Toronto landmark is the Horseshoe. Wear your grubbly clothes though because you will come out soaked to elbows in spilt beer:))
I don't want to abandon the site and yet I haven't the time to do it. I have enjoyed the few nights I spent deciphering html and css though. It's just language. I suppose people who give it a lot of time write it the way I right English.
Yes I am very very happy, and feeling I have a new understanding of the world and it's people, but my brother pointed something out to me that hit home--he said my version of religion was adulterated--his exact words were "according to you, it's blessed are the A**H**** for they shall be forgiven from a great distance. "Precisely," I said. I responded that I hadn't read anything in the Bible that required me to keep company with destructive, psychotic or badly behaved people. I read FORGIVE :))
06/01: Happy New Year 2009!
Sunny mornings in Toronto are amazing. The air is crisp and clear, the light reflects off the glass sides of the skyscrapers, the streets seem strangely quiet and the little clumps of snow left by the street sides are dazzling.It is minus 10- Celsius, but it will warm up to 1 degree by the afternoon. Everyone seems cheerful, no one is tired from a long work day yet. For several years now brightly coloured scarves and hats have been the vogue, and although there are not yet many people out yet the people who are out look like exclamation marks on the streets. Business people are in dark tailored clothes, looking, oddly, like clergy. (Is that how we get mixed up:))
I haven't even washed my face or brushed my teeth. I've thrown on jeans and a long sleeved t-shirt (no undies) lipstick, sunglasses and a long down coat and got into the car in search of milk. I feel free confident and happy.
When I get home I feel like going out again with the video-camera but I don't because I am looking for a new job (still have my old one) and it looks as if it's going to be a long haul. I can't spare more than the few moments it takes to write here.
I think I'm going to enjoy it though.
nigel and I are well. One of the things he got me for Christmas was oil paints and all the necessary paraphernalia that go with them. I have never painted in oil before. The test run painting came out well (at least nigel thought so.) I mixed oil paint with linseed oil to make washes of different colours (the paint was almost sheer) and then built up sort of linear patterns of colour on top of the washes so that the painting became 3 dimensional. The colours and shapes were balanced. Some of the colour combinations were subtle, and because nigel had got thirty brushes I was able to keep using new brushes for each colour so that every colour was distinct. There was no muddiness. I guess I will keep going. I will paint small canvasses in sets of three, to be framed in a single frame.
Whenever nigel comes back I paint.
nigel paint also. He paints landscapes in a style that is like a cross between The Group of Seven and The French Impressionists. I like his paintings. They are full of soft aqua colours and white-yellows with emphasis in dark browns and greens. When we have time we drag each other off to Art Galleries.
My mother put on a beautiful Christmas Eve spread. My father did Christmas Dinner. Everything seemed the same as always. The nightmare of the last year is fading away. I got Logastina Pots (6) for Christmas (the ones with the tempered glass lids), because I had expressed a desire to learn to cook, but as I was making Irish Stew (generations old recipe--two secret ingredients, it turned out:)) dark thoughts passed through my mind.
The worst of them was when I was peeling the potatoes. I had had to buy a potato peeler because I don't peel potatoes, at least I never have, and my thumb started to hurt from pushing the peeler across the potatoes, and I thought, good God, there are some women who have to do this every day in order to get laid. Their lives must be a hell!
Then I thought of Martha Stewart--her TV shows that teach women how to waste as much as their time doing precious projects as is humanely possible. It's bad enough having to fuss about clothes and hair, which you may have noticed, I don't do, but add this into the mix... Then children (who actually do need one's care and attention.) Where's the time to live, to think, to learn, to change.
If nigel saw me turning into, this he would stop me. He has stopped me, 10 years ago (fondue).
So life is good and so was the stew, and now that nigel will eat spicy foods and I have enough pots, maybe I will try Thai and he will make me promise never to do it again--at least not for him:))
24/11: More Online Diary
All seems well for the moment.My Mum has recovered fully, but it has taken many months and many weeks in the hospital. There were times when she was unconscious or only semi-conscious, that I was in deep despair. We spent weeks watching each system in her body shut down and then be brought back only to watch another go. There were moments when I thought to myself, 'You're in denial, this is what dying looks like.' So I would sit and hold her hand...
...but there is something indomitable about us...about her...it seems that we are on this planet for a pre-ordained time of 90 years or more (several of us have made it to 105) regardless of any disease...I might have the genes too...although I am not likely to have all of them.
So she has come out of it with a hip replacement. She fell trying to get out of bed by herself when she was still ill. She is walking now and she will not use any kind of support. It amazes me. She is just as she was, coming through it all without (somehow) ever losing a shred of dignity. And this is what she can still teach me...because I only know how to be light, I never mind what I say, and if I am deeply troubled, I am lamely silent, or detached.
My mother speaks--no exists--with a certain finality. She will not be crossed, and in any case people rarely desire to cross her. When she is happy her eyes twinkle and she sometimes has a little smile that is hypnotic--an instant of pure joy.
When you think you might lose someone you love forever all things that disturbed you about them in years gone by, suddenly appear to have been their strengths...no use to write more about this, it could never be understood by anyone who was not actually there.
I have done my physio-therapy and my shoulders are almost completely better. The Orthopaedic Surgeon I saw said they would be, and that this would never happen again. My condominium is freshly painted and the floors are laid or repaired and all the little things are fixed.
Nigel didn't have to help, although I thought I would never get it done myself. He complemented me on the paint job. There are so many walls and baseboards that have highly contrasting colours and the place was built so sloppily that it was usually not possible to get straight lines with tape and many times the baseboards had to come off and have this gooey stuff scrapped or cut off them and nailed back on or it all would have looked very shoddy. I painted many edges free-hand because there was no other way to get them straight. Although it's not perfect. I feel strangely proud...more proud than I would feel about a more momentous accomplishment.
I keep feeling like I am about to make some huge change in my life or perhaps reclaim my real self, and yet I don't see it. I can't point to anything.
With Obama in, there is not much likelihood that I will feel the need to flee my own country to avoid cowboys:)) I have my EU passport though, it is red!
Nigel is on the fringes of my life, being sensible and strong and adding another dimension to my existence. He said quite casually the other day, "There has never been a time that I did not love you, just times when you weren't there." He says these things as simple comments, rather than proclamations, and I barely notice at the time--it hits me later.
I almost bolted again, my mind invents reasons seemingly without my permission. This time I decided I wasn't sufficiently important to him. It's always some variation of this sentiment that makes me go. He said I can't defend against something that isn't true. Is it that you want more? I said no no no no no NOT more...he said yes, I know, everyone is always trying to own you. This overwhelmed me utterly, because this is the first time any man has ever UNDERSTOOD. I was overwhelmed by a feeling of gratitude. I might have melted into him at that moment, but I am unsure that I can make him feel loved.
I am not certain that I have ever been in love, infatuated occasionally, obsessed (very rarely) but in love? Really, really think about it. Have YOU ever been in love? Truly? Normally I don't think much about love, this is an aberration.
Nigel and I first met 14 years ago. He was very young, and he is still here, although he has been banished (kindly) several times, for no good reason.
We've only ever had one fight. It was composed of two sentences--I said disdainfully, "You are so self-centered." He answered without a shred of malice, "two self-centred people together how's that going to work?" It was incredibly funny after the fact. I am laughing about it right now, and I must have laughed about it at least a dozen times in the past. The fact is that it works out incredibly well, if the two people are self-centred in tandem:))
Nigel is not Nigel's real name of course.
Beware the economy, this is not a mere credit crunch recession like we had in the late 80's and early 90's. This is a vast reorganisation. It is unlikely our governments will be able to buffer us sufficiently. There needs to be new economic policy, new legislation, and a new way of thinking about financial resources. I can't say EXACTLY what is needed, I just know it's drastic. I am never wrong about these things.
We can't get there if we keep focusing on control by corporations or oil or any of the issues that have held centre stage for sometime, although these things vicious. We need to take the proverbial quantum leap in thinking. Probably people are beginning and I am just unaware...but why are we not hearing outpourings from the economists. There is chance for a genius or two to become recognised:))
I hope I won't have to move, I am just getting comfortable here, but there are certain things I will not do to save it all. I believe I know what I can do. During the last Depression only 20% of people were actually unemployed.
No one in our families ever suffered, or went without in any way during the last depression--although no one was wealthy--maybe BECAUSE no one was wealthy. On my mother's side of the family much of the family were contractors, who did as much of the labour as possible themselves and there were government contracts...bridges and government buildings and houses and I think schools. It is rumoured that a lot of money was lost or married out of the family around the depression or shortly after, but it is just lore at present. I think I am afraid to document things properly because I am afraid things that I think I know about this family that I haven't said to anybody, ever, might turn out not to be true and there are several things that I think I know about this family that I don't want to be true. Or maybe it is because it is going to take hours of pouring through microfiche to do it. We hit the newspapers a lot back then. Sometimes we WERE the newspaper. My mother started to research it when she was young and came back with a folder of copies of newspaper clippings. I can't find it. So why did she stop and why does she not want to talk about it? What did she find? Something dreadful? She was a newspaper clipping herself--a good one...
On my father's side of the family they were trades people during the depression, shop owners, tailors, shoemaker's, a bricklayer, a newspaper writer, things like that (somewhat entrepreneurial.) My Grandmother's family owned a little part of a block on the main street in the village where they lived. There was always work, they are perfectionists by temperament. When conditions got better most of my father's family did extremely well. They did something that had rarely been done until that time in Britain, they jumped class.
Maybe the change that is happening in me is that I am finally going to show what I am made of...it's just that I'm not sure what that is:)) Maybe, probably, it is nothing special, but at least something definitive. Maybe, though, it will have nothing to do with where I came from or who went before me.
There were seemingly small errors in judgement when I was very young that had surprisingly serious ramifications. It is all gone now. I hadn't really thought about it all (or not thought about it) for the longest time, it was just there. Until I realised a few weeks ago that it was gone.
This has got to have made up for a few months worth of blog. And yes I DO know that I am not all that interesting:)) In a few ways I might be a typical Canadian, that is if I weren't so willful and self-centred:))
28/07: Where did all the comments go? I mean mine as well as the comments other people have made in the past.
The tab for comments has vanished on the board and all the comments I have put recently are not showing on the blog! ...they are still in the .php site though :))O.K. I remember--they don't show until you click the topic headings. If I'd designed the board I would have sacrificed visual elegance for obviousness.
It's my intention to run the cam on Sundays and Mondays at least until the Toronto Film Festival starts. I want to see if there's still anything cooking here. That will mean I will have to set it all up and turn it on, nuisance.
I am making MP3 files now, but the microphone is so bad that it when I clean up the noise the message sounds absolutely flat--the voice melody is gone.
Nigel won't record in MP3 even if the quality is high. He says it flattens everything out, so he can't help, but he can get a good mic :))
IT IS POSSIBLE TO LOG IN and make a comment again NOW. Just a little reminder. I get an e-mail of your message and if your comments are not 'G-rated', or if they are spammy, I must block you for the sake of the site. If things get out of hand either I or Web Hosting Elite, will just turn the comments off. No one will trouble themselves over bad behaviour :)) We will be monumentally unimpressed and unruffled. The net is dead as innovation--dull now. How could we, or at least I, be invested? :))
22/06: Starting a Journal or Diary-- most recent entries at the bottom
I've been considering doing on online journal or diary. There's a constant running dialogue in the back of my mind. I am not at all happy with the world at the moment. It's obvious that I can't be the only one. The question is whether I have any worthwhile or even unusual insights to offer. I used to have more time to consider. I used to be more 'in the world' even though on cam I appeared to be decidedly out of the world. Now I turn on MTV and hear my thoughts, even though I am totally out of touch. I also see thoughts and ideas I had years ago on serious news/interview shows, but I'm quite sure that won't happen with the thoughts I am having now....but maybe people might want to know that they are not alone with their ideas...with the ideas that are too bleak for cocktail talk or discussion with acquaintances. Maybe they might want to add or put me straight.
I've been thinking of doing an online journal, to let that running dialogue ( out of my head so I can concentrate on the every day. I am always arguing pros and cons with myself)
I will definitely do it. Probably 2 or 3 times a week, until it dries up. I think I won't censor it. Maybe I will just write anything.
Today I was thinking of several things: ...at 1million new people every four days, we certainly do not need any more people. The people who are saying the earth can sustain us, and we her, if we live medievally, or retro-fit, or conserve, are wrong. I was thinking that the drastic backslide re women's rights that is demonstrated by the objectification of them, sex, and sometimes even men, has much to do with the fact that procreation isn't helping the world anymore.
Another thing I thought is that the earth will balance itself even if it has to take humans out of the mix to do it. Most of our medical and technological pursuits and advances have been efforts to stop the earth from doing just that.
Alvin Toffler wrote years ago that if we packed too many people into too little space as is happening as major cities 'urbanize' there will be inevitable violence. It's starting to happen in Toronto now--globalization doesn't seem to have much to do with it (although I am aware the culture mixing in many major cities is having serious repercussions).
We have too too too many people in the world. I decided when I was very young that I was not going to make any new people--full stop...although I briefly reconsidered it several years ago and decided it would be a self-indulgence. If I leave anything or anybody to posterity it is most likely to be just a word here or there that I have said to the right person at the right time in the real world--a word that made a moment a little brighter or gave hope when it was waning.
There are people who are feeling they are being pushed out of the world because people from some cultures procreate at a wild pace and people from their own cultures don't. I have said to them (I really have said to them:))) what difference does it make when the thing that they do will lead to the complete and utter destruction of the world...that is, if you think this is a game or a competition you are wrong, because there is no way to win. (Short of a wide spread and long lasting plague:))
I am normally an optimist and I am not feeling depressed per se, so if I am thinking this way, there is a good chance things are a great deal grimmer than even I know.
Women need to step up. This site has very few female viewers or readers so I know my message will not be heard. We need to refuse to reproduce and insist on taking our place among men on equal footing. I emphatically do not mean that we should become blue stockinged spinsters, or heterosexual 'dykes'.
There is no real psychological imperative to have children (or rather I should say that for me and for many women I have spoken with, it was silenced by the understanding that social conditions were not conducive to child bearing.) Men too frequently do not stay to raise their children and there are social reasons for this for which they can not be blamed. Women pay far to high a price looking after children that over-tax the resources of the world--children that appear to be so little valued (except in privileged circumstances) that they are neglected, abused, starved and left to wither like unpicked fruit on a vine. There is little help for women who need to raise children by themselves and extended 'families' of educationally and financially marginalized women are not the answer.
The world is looking like Babylon or the Roman Empire in decline...and maybe we should just flatten it and start afresh...I am fairly sure there is no way to stop it. We needed to have started at least 30 years ago.
A thing that I have noticed is that enduring and trusting relationships between men and women develop and are sustained more easily when children are out of the mix. The best friends/lovers/cohorts in life forever (fairytale...no!) ideal--can be, is in fact, real, but it seems to happen when two people are self-sustaining in their own right and chose to be together, not because they need to (in ANY way) but because they want to.
Maybe at this stage of the world (sic) we should concentrate on that...and perhaps, as is happening in Germany, China and I am sure many other countries, creating homes, offices, and vehicles that neither take anything from the earth or dump anything back.
Maybe the only reason we have too many people is because women believe it is the only way to validate themselves and men require their surname to survive. There are so many people right now that all of that will be irrevocably lost in the chaos. Good thing I say--in these circumstances children are mere manifestations of ego in the worst sense of the word ego.
Never mind as the world becomes more toxic we will lose the ability to procreate. It is happening already.
I have written straight into the text box again--I hope I don't regret it. I hardly ever do:)) :))
18/05: Musings convergence, money, democracy, alternatives
You know you've come full-circle (later about circles) when your 79 year-old father asks you about moving his computer to his living room, buying a really big monitor and watching news stream from sites all over the world. He has been listening to and watching stream from BBC for years now, it was only logical that he should want a little more variety and better quality video and sound.Still I was surprised. Although we tend to be early adopters, we are pretty conservative too. I thought 'oh so this is it, this is where it all winds up...this is THE convergence... it wasn't worth the extra 50 dollars for the HD television set.'
Maybe the jury is still out.
I have learned that the only things that really thrive on the net are things that make money...the technology that makes the most money is the one that will become come alive despite the simplicity, stability and beauty of the other technologies...I learned that many people are suspect of things that don't make money...don't even try...like my site:)) So service provider costs have climbed and climbed. The first few years I was on the net it was all completely free, all you needed was the right code to connect--but where's the commerce?
One of the reasons my father wants to watch stream instead of TV is because he is tired of being held hostage by the cable company for inferior quality TV. He wants to know what is REALLY happening in the world. I know of at least half a dozen other people who have done the same thing. Another reason will be (if I know him:)) that he has seen a possible future, and return of a class or caste system that divides along the lines of how much technology or information one can buy. (And then we've all heard about the proverbial (I think?) 'dark net.' He is voting with his dollars on a particular way of distribution in that is (at least for the time being) democratic.
My mother, arguably the brightest of us all, simply will not use the computer or watch TV. She reads, and reads and reads. She spends a fortune on books that end up being read by all of us and our friends...books--cohesive or semi-cohesive little worlds...but that's another
blog.
I am just now going to check my internetInternet bill to find out how I could have wound up with a 25 dollar charge when the payment is made automatically by the bank. There has not been a month in the last six months when I have not had to call either the phone company, the mobile company the TV company or the internetIcompany to have a hefty charge removed that shouldn't have been there to begin with. (don't even think it--bundles only make it easier to sneak in extra charges or for the 'provider' to make those nasty little "mistakes").
There are at least two hundred candles in here and quite a few good books in the condo
library downstairs. I have actually contemplated flipping all the circuit breakers and canceling all the 'info' accounts. It would be like a vacation. It would be like what I did for the five years after McLuhan's first big seller came out. I could, as my mother would put it, "hear myself think." "Be quiet!" she would say, "I can't hear myself think!"
:)) :)) Full Circle.
...there's another blog...maybe we don't want to think or scrutinize what we are thinking.
Maybe it's just one big escape with tsunamis on the brink...
...And about the computer in the living room--This is huge as the TV was always been banned from the living room--it's always had it's own room, even though the room my mother called the den (read globe, encyclopedias, back editions of Atlantic Monthly, folios of prints by famous painters, books books and more books, desk, leather arm chair) had to be sacrificed for it. Television wasn't allowed to be where people were talking and thinking!)
Check out the arrangement of your furniture:)) It could be telling:)) At the moment I have two computers, all the TV paraphernalia, the phone, the mobile phone and a two radios (one works with the power out and no batteries) jammed into the bedroom. Check the whole environment. The space my windows face is full of people designing web site--there must be at least a dozen. I have Chinese screens up--otherwise I'd be completely surrounded. And I think it is significant that that space used to contain a commercial photo studio. Then I go to work and sit in front of a computer screen non-stop.
Surrounded...
Maybe I will morph into something stranger:))
I'd really like a vacation, but I'm just too busy.
Nigel calls--one of the computers is his--or I guess he's given to me, he's like a vacation, a walking celebration...he always comes bearing gifts, like Dremmel tools and voltage meters or tiny tiny Allen keys...the things I really like :)) :)) He brings other things like Mexican silver and crystal paper eights, but I like the tools the best. We are going on photographing trips this summer. I want to photograph the caverns and ponds and ravines at the Hart House Farm. We have come to know them well over the years...I'll resurrect my ancient cowboy boots...I only ever use them for hiking...they are black with lavender and blue stitching. I ordered them that way.
16/04: How to make annoying pages:)) and why we do it.
Why, in this age of information, are so many of us, including myself, making such crumby pages? I found a link for one of my old favorite sites. If I'm not mistaked the author of this site had a cam on .ww for a short while. Go to16/04: Video media Psych.
eople sometimes ask what I mean by "cam psychology." One key point is that most viewers have little or no capacity to imagine outside the boundaries of the box around the video image to understand that there is a real life outside this 'box.' There is also a tendency for viewers to 'project' and see or understand what they want to see and understand about the image in the box. The fedback I get re what people are seeing is totally inconsistent and completely conflicting. There is very little connection between what they perceive and who I (for instance) actually am and how I live.From the point of view of understanding how people 'read' various kinds of media--this is a little frightening. To me it means people don't think when they are watching the news, a movie, or Britney Spears. Their understanding of what they are seeing is extremely limited. The relationship of visual media to reality seems questionalble. It may be that visual media is not in fact very representational of reality even when no one is attempting to manipulate it. When there is manipulation involved it could be (best case scenerio) that visual media creates nothing but utter nonsense.
I have been EXTREMELY surprised to learn that people don't make a clear distinction between what they see on television, in magazines and especially in live stream (where there is even less 'information') and what they experience first hand (in real life). Maybe because I have been thinking about media for a long time I have always thought that the point of it was to present a point of view, a different focus on an issue, or to coerce people into buying product. I have always thought of it as being some kind of fabrication, with intent, either benevolent or benign. How much does a few seconds of news footage tell about a war? How much does the photo of the birthday party tell about the birthday and how much is in the eye of the beholder?
McLuhan's idea that the medium shapes the message implies that even if we want to we cannot get the 'truth' onto paper or film or into a stream.
Meanwhile, we mimic and desire things, people and ways of life that we only know of via visual media. We try to be things that don't really exist, at least not in the way that we perceive them.
There IS plenty of room for deception using these types of media and we blame organisations and people for using it to deceive us, but fail to realise the obvious that these mediums just don't allow the truth to be conveyed with much accuracy. It is a sure bet for example, that someone who spoke a few words to me in a grocery store line up could more accurately describe me (the kind of person I am and the way I look) than someone who has watched me on this stream for hours, weeks or months...
You might want to think about this when you are watching the stream. You might want to think about it when you are watching the news, or a film. There is immutable fact and actually experience and there are impressions. They are two different things. The world is in a precarious state at the moment and I think it is because we have failed to make this distinction. We are now failing to make it globally:))
At another level we are failing to make the distinction between surface/appearance and substance. Because the world has become to visually focused we have begun to think if people or situations LOOK a certain way, they are very likely to be that way. About two seconds of concentrated thought will help you understand that this is almost never true:)) But that's another discussion.
21/03: Welcome to the Global Village!
This is the new concatenations blog/forum. It is being tested right now and it's features and appearance will change as I get more creative and discover what works well for concatenations.The livelog board is fantastic, but I wanted more inter-activity. As a member you should be able to post photos, movies and music to this site. The blog from the cam page will appear in the archives as soon as I get a chance to do it.
I am going to try using this board without a member sign for the comments area, because when I go to blog pages and have to sign in I usually don't and I suspect there are a lot of people like me:)) Just click a heading scroll down and type in the comments textbox.
I want to change the focus of the blog to Globalisation, Computer technology, Inter-active Media, including Art, Music and Film. I am especially interested in the psychology associated with live video streaming, digital video technology, and covergence of digital audio/video with conventional mediums like television.
There's lots of leighway for politcal views and personal point of view in these topics.
There's always e-mail if you have something to say that doesn't fit at all. I regret that I cannot respond to mail of a personal nature.
The board will be periodically purged of personal comments eveb mine:))
Consider the presence if the webcam to be a catalyst to your thoughts on the topics above.