David Pogue again displays his near-unique talent for combining the informative with the entertaining.
Friday, January 05, 2007
Pogue on YouTube and backups
David Pogue again displays his near-unique talent for combining the informative with the entertaining.
Thursday, January 04, 2007
A CD player
This thingy is very beautiful. Only it really should have come out five or ten years ago, before we all burned all our CDs. (Or is it "ripped" our CDs? It's pretty tough plastic to rip, and they don't burn well either.)
Wednesday, January 03, 2007
The Monkey's Paw
Just another example of how art can help you: Laurie Anderson's wonderful song Monkey's Paw ("I got everything I ever wanted. Now I can't give it up. It's a trap, just my luck!") made me think, back a decade ago, about the philosophical principle of the title. You may know it already: Apparently in India, they trap monkeys by hollowing out a coconut, securing it, making a hole in it just large enough for a monkey to get his hand in. They put rice in the coconut. The monkey put his hand in, grabs some rice... but he can't get his hand out with his fist closed! And he is not willing to give up the rice, so he is trapped.
Basically, anything you can't give up, money, sex, status, special relationships, ego, fame, emotions... it traps you.
The key principle to spiritual freedom is to LET GO.
Thinking about this has helped me immensely in recent years, and it is taken to new levels in A Course In Miracles. Get the book for free, I've made a PDF file. (5.4 MB)
Holed up in Texas
Did you know that in Texas, you can be jailed for owning more than six dildos? (Not a joke, there are people in jail.)
(Reading further, it seems the law was changed recently. Still a worthwhile view at humanity though.)
(Reading further, it seems the law was changed recently. Still a worthwhile view at humanity though.)
David's blog
There is a new photo blog from my friend David in Liverpool.
First time I met David, I told him that he actually do look a little like John Lennon. He made a face, I was never quite sure if he did not like the idea, or if he did not believe the compliment.
The blog is called Chapter Thirteen, but he says it does not refer to the American term meaning bankrupt.
Me and David (frig grammar) spent a nice afternoon in Liverpool photographing. For some reason I never posted those images, maybe I should if you think. Here are the first two. (Obviously the bloke on the bench with the huge Canon is David.)
First time I met David, I told him that he actually do look a little like John Lennon. He made a face, I was never quite sure if he did not like the idea, or if he did not believe the compliment.
The blog is called Chapter Thirteen, but he says it does not refer to the American term meaning bankrupt.
Me and David (frig grammar) spent a nice afternoon in Liverpool photographing. For some reason I never posted those images, maybe I should if you think. Here are the first two. (Obviously the bloke on the bench with the huge Canon is David.)
Tuesday, January 02, 2007
"Blogging on a Beautiful Spring Day"
Michael Johnston has perpetrated another excellent satire in:
Blogging on a Beautiful Spring Day
Blogging on a Beautiful Spring Day
Monday, January 01, 2007
Sepia, blue, sepia, blue, red, green
This is a different definition of "sepia", hehe. (Number four instead of three.)
se·pi·a (s?'p?-?)
n.
1. A dark brown ink or pigment originally prepared from the secretion of the cuttlefish.
2. A drawing or picture done in this pigment.
3. A photograph in a brown tint.
4. A dark grayish yellow brown to dark or moderate olive brown.
By the way, it is funny, this happens sometimes: originally when viewing the series of shots I took of this subject, I thought I had failed with it. But looking over them now, I really like this one.
Sunday, December 31, 2006
About failure
"People are fond of spouting out the old cliché about how Van Gogh never sold a painting in his lifetime. Somehow his example serves to justify to us, decades later, that there is somehow merit in utter failure. Perhaps, but the man did commit suicide."
-- Hugh Macleod, How To Be Creative: 29. Whatever choice you make, The Devil gets his due eventually
Well, this is quite funny, well done Hugh.
On the other hand, I think Hugh's main point is misses its target. For one thing, it is either uneducated or disingenuous to hint that Vincent committed suicide because he was not selling well. If you read about him, it was clear that while he had existential angst out the wazoo, he was happy if he just had food and paint.
For another thing, if Vincent was actually a "failure" would anybody be using him as an inspiration? They use him because he was one of the biggest successes fine art has ever produced, only he died too young to see it happen. So the example is not "merit in utter failure", but merit in being highly successful even if it has not happened yet.
You can also see Vincent as an example of somebody who saw the bigger picture. Sure, he was agonizing about not being able to live the "real life" as he called it, with family, house, money, and respectability... and yet his art was so important to him that he sacrificed all that for it. And the world is much richer for it.
-----
Anyway, looking this up, I see that Hugh is being a bit quoted out of context on Quoteoftheday. His full point is more complex. (Or less clear...) Lo: (like usual, italics is quoted text)
"29. Whatever choice you make, The Devil gets his due eventually.
Selling out to Hollywood comes with a price. So does not selling out. Either way, you pay in full, and yes, it invariably hurts like hell.
People are fond of spouting out the old clich about how Van Gogh never sold a painting in his lifetime. Somehow his example serves to justify to us, decades later, that there is somehow merit in utter failure.
Perhaps, but the man did commit suicide. The market for his work took off big-time shortly after his death. Had he decided to stick around another few decades he most likely wouldve entered old age quite prosperous. And sadly for failures everywhere, the clich would have lost a lot of its power.
The fact is, the old clichs work for us in abstract terms, but they never work out in real life quite the same way. Life is messy; clichs are clean and tidy.
Of course, there is no one true way. Whether you follow the example of fame-and-glamor Warhol or poor-and-miserable Van Gogh doesnt matter in absolute terms. Either extreme may raise you to the highest heights or utterly destroy you. I dont know the answer, nor does anybody else. Nobody but you and God knows why you were put on this Earth, and even then
So when a young person asks me whether its better to sell out or stick to ones guns, I never know what to answer. Warhol sold out shamelessly after 1968 (the year he was wounded by the gunshot of a would-be assassin) and did OK by it. I know some great artists who stuck to their guns, and all it did was make them seem more and more pathetic.
Anyone can be an idealist. Anyone can be a cynic. The hard part lies somewhere in the middle i.e. being human."
-- Hugh Macleod
-- Hugh Macleod, How To Be Creative: 29. Whatever choice you make, The Devil gets his due eventually
Well, this is quite funny, well done Hugh.
On the other hand, I think Hugh's main point is misses its target. For one thing, it is either uneducated or disingenuous to hint that Vincent committed suicide because he was not selling well. If you read about him, it was clear that while he had existential angst out the wazoo, he was happy if he just had food and paint.
For another thing, if Vincent was actually a "failure" would anybody be using him as an inspiration? They use him because he was one of the biggest successes fine art has ever produced, only he died too young to see it happen. So the example is not "merit in utter failure", but merit in being highly successful even if it has not happened yet.
You can also see Vincent as an example of somebody who saw the bigger picture. Sure, he was agonizing about not being able to live the "real life" as he called it, with family, house, money, and respectability... and yet his art was so important to him that he sacrificed all that for it. And the world is much richer for it.
-----
Anyway, looking this up, I see that Hugh is being a bit quoted out of context on Quoteoftheday. His full point is more complex. (Or less clear...) Lo: (like usual, italics is quoted text)
"29. Whatever choice you make, The Devil gets his due eventually.
Selling out to Hollywood comes with a price. So does not selling out. Either way, you pay in full, and yes, it invariably hurts like hell.
People are fond of spouting out the old clich about how Van Gogh never sold a painting in his lifetime. Somehow his example serves to justify to us, decades later, that there is somehow merit in utter failure.
Perhaps, but the man did commit suicide. The market for his work took off big-time shortly after his death. Had he decided to stick around another few decades he most likely wouldve entered old age quite prosperous. And sadly for failures everywhere, the clich would have lost a lot of its power.
The fact is, the old clichs work for us in abstract terms, but they never work out in real life quite the same way. Life is messy; clichs are clean and tidy.
Of course, there is no one true way. Whether you follow the example of fame-and-glamor Warhol or poor-and-miserable Van Gogh doesnt matter in absolute terms. Either extreme may raise you to the highest heights or utterly destroy you. I dont know the answer, nor does anybody else. Nobody but you and God knows why you were put on this Earth, and even then
So when a young person asks me whether its better to sell out or stick to ones guns, I never know what to answer. Warhol sold out shamelessly after 1968 (the year he was wounded by the gunshot of a would-be assassin) and did OK by it. I know some great artists who stuck to their guns, and all it did was make them seem more and more pathetic.
Anyone can be an idealist. Anyone can be a cynic. The hard part lies somewhere in the middle i.e. being human."
-- Hugh Macleod
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)