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October 31, 2004
Splitting numbers
I always split phone numbers to make them easier to remember, for instance, the phone number for Peats (of Parnell street - is there another?) is 8727799. I would always write and pronounce that 8727 799. I always split it into fours and three's and always in such a way that the rhythm of the numbers flows evenly.
For instance, taking the Peats number again - 872 7799 is a mouthful, and its inelegance does not promote memorisation.
As with so much in life - rhythm is everything ;)
Posted by dottie at 11:17 PM
Steam Punk
You may have heard of cyber punk novels where the protaganists are often half-humna, half-computer and the fashions, technology and social dynamics follow a fairly rigid structure - no countries only company affiliations, people are hard-wired to the internet through interfaces directly on their bodies, etc. Damn good stuff.
There is a little known niche of that called 'steam punk' where the writers indulge their anachronistic desires by imaginig if technology before the turn of the century had flourished, usually using the Babbage Engine combined with steam power and the rise of computational mathematics to drive social dynamics in a very different direction than it actually went. The result can be sublime like 'The Difference Engine'. I havent read too much of the genre so I cant give you an example of the ridiculous..
I do enjoy it though, and I would love to see this movie made:
Larry Blamire has created a whole backstory for the premise that at the turn of the century steam power and engineering were combined to make walking, anthropomorphic mabhines that were manned by a full crew, armed to the teeth with cannon and guns and sent into battle.
The artwork shows off the lotechnology really well, full of character. I would love to see a 'Sky Captain and the world of tomorrow' treatment of this, sepia tones, crumbly textures. Lovely!
Posted by dottie at 12:46 PM
October 30, 2004
Quality and quantity
I know the quality and quantity of my blog postings has reduced of late, but I have a reason. I havent had much to say for myslef.
This is of course an excuse as well as everyone knows that once you dip into your experiences, desires, hopes, fears then it is almost impossible to staunch the flow of ideas enough to get a coherent thought out of your head. This also is the reason that I havent posted - the flow of thoughts too great and I am incapable of 'grabbing a fish' from the river, so to speak.
Wll, I just got my hands on a copy of 'New novelist'. I have long aspired to be a writer of some description or another, but the usual problems have raised their ugly head - where do you begin?
This program is great as it holds your hand through all the aspects of creating a novel - planning the sory, the outline, the characters, the style of the story, the locations. Its great. One hour with it makes me realise that while I have plenty of ideas for the ephemera of the story, the main plot is a *little* lacking in focus.
Give me a while....
So far I have a title, sort of - either 'Faffing about the world on 5 hundred euros a day' or 'Feck them if they cant take a joke' or even 'Dont buy this book for less than 5.99 (less the dealers rebate)'. I think the last one is a goer.
What do I want to write about? I would like to take 'the left hand of darkness' by Ursula K leGuin as a template - if you havent read it, do. Cross that with Kafka, Philip Dick, Socrates 'debates', throw in some gratuitous flesh scenes, option it out to a few directors and I think I have a bestlseller on my hands! Word' sout that Spielberg is looking for a new script (cox he cant write one - rawr! saucer of milk table 2...)
Posted by dottie at 12:16 AM
October 29, 2004
Smell the flowers
I have tried three time to write this post and rid it of invective. For some reason tonight I feel like I need a hug but I also want to tell everyone just to feck off - especially certain people.
There is a lovely story from the Zen teachings of an old monk traveling with his pupil to a distant monastery.
As was there custom they said little. At length they came to a waterway where a geisha was standing at the edge wondering how to ford the river. To the pupils astonishment the elderly monk offered to carry the woman across the river and did so, insisting that the pupil carry her few possesions.
The woman thanked the monks and went on her way. The monks turned toward their destination and continued walking, the elder monk with the same beatific smile and serene air, the pupil quietly seething.
After a few more miles of silence the pupil finally erupted and said to the elder monk - 'I cannot believe you helped that low woman across the river'. The elder monk turned to the pupil and said - 'I put her down when we crossed the river - are you still carrying her?'
Posted by dottie at 11:54 PM
No access to Bush by Johnny Foreigner
George Bush has blocked all access to foreigners who try to access his website on the 'internets' - ask yourself, do you want such a xenophobe being in charge of most of the worlds nuclear arsenal?
Posted by dottie at 3:22 PM
Mobile technology comes one step closer!
This is great - another step along the road to cyborg heaven!
Imagine where this could go - smaller electorincs to the point where you could embed one of these in your eye! No need to put it in the field of vision, you could nestle it off to the side of your eyeball and reflect the beam off the back of the front of your eyeball. Hook that up with whatever the latest incarnation of Bluetooth and WiFi (GPRS?) will be at that stage and implant some of these (thought operated sensors implanted in your brain) and you are good to go with keyboard less, screenless, wirless always on connectivity.
You could watch porno movies while at church and no-one would be any the wiser! well, there might be *some* evidence but that can be explained away as 'religious ecstasy' :)
Posted by dottie at 3:16 PM
October 19, 2004
Gazillion Bubbles
Brendan just bought my niece a fantastic present!
A bubble machine that literally blows gazillions of bubbles!!
I cant wait to see her face when its starts blowing out all those bubbles and she tries to catch them al land eat them no doubt!
Yeah, yeah - gush, gush - she's me only niece! and I love her to distraction!
Thanks Brendan - you're a star!
Posted by dottie at 8:35 PM
October 18, 2004
Kinetic sculptures
I never really grokked the term 'kinetic sculpture' until I saw this site
Fantastic stuff.
I think the main reason is that previous exposure to kinetic sculpture consisted of large metal sculptures outside, rusted immobile. So not *actually* kinetic then...
Posted by dottie at 1:01 AM
October 16, 2004
Legg, Shatter and Payne Ltd.
I am so glad I found these guys, check out this quote from their website:
We are so confident of our ability to solve your overdue account problems that we offer the following, incredible terms: No payment in advance, No collection, no fee
Fuck yeah! If only I had found these guys a few weeks ago..... ah well.
Debt collectors extraodinaire!
Posted by dottie at 8:03 PM
October 13, 2004
Un. Fucking. Believable.
I was in the local superripoff buying some food for me din dins.
When I walked in first there was a knot of four people in one ailse, two staff (one an Irish lad and the other from Estonia or somewhere similar) and two scobies. One an auld fella, who looked like he was homeless the poor fecker, and the other a little shleebheen drunk out of his mind.
From the little bit I heard the scobies had attempted to lift something from the shop and now the little fecker was take a good long climb up to the higher moral ground, revving his disgust into high gear, talking about his pride, the right of a hungry man to eat, and offering to pay for the food with such indignation that you would think it was the staff had tried to shoplift.
And then he said it.
'Let me tell you something you foreign cuntchya - you come to our country, taking our jobs...'
I couldn't believe it.
I'm afraid that I ended up shouting a little bit, and telling HIM to go back from where he came from as he certainly wasnt Irish, and what did the patriots die for and did he not remember the signs with no blacks, no dogs, no Irish with the Irish at the bottom lower than the dogs on the street?
I had a little of the moral indignation thing going on myself you understand.
What the fuck? Where do these asholes come from?
Anyway, this is captain SHamrock keeping the streets safe from racist thugs.
See you next week, same shamrock channel, same shamrock time.
Posted by dottie at 8:23 PM
October 11, 2004
Interesting jobs...
Was talking to a chap recently who in his spare time from working as a bouncer, collects gravestone rubbings (from as far away as Singapore making them all himself) and also indulges in a spot of debt collecting and err... 'associated activities'
Yes, this man breaks legs. I'm paraphrasing her but this is the jist of what I was told:
You would be surprised how little it costs to get someones legs broken. Apparently this is because it is easy when you know how and can be done without having to wrestle with the person (as you would have to when breaking an arm...).
The preferred tool is a baseball bat or wooden stick drilled and filled with lead or even, in some cases, concrete. Basically you want a bit of heft.
Approach the target from behind or wait until they pass you and swing the bat at the side of their knee just as they drop their weight onto their leg.
With a bit of practice this will causes instant dislocation of the knee and if you are unlucky means that your kneecap is destroyed as your femur pushes forward under the descending weight of the body.
Instant unconciousness results from the extreme pain involved and the target might never walk properly again, if ever. The assailant can make a quick getaway and never have been spotted by the target.
Scary motherfucker.....and while its not strictly a broken leg but very effective and for more long lasting in its effects.
Nice collection though. Of rubbings that is...
Comments
Tim Gillen
This story has been going down well with my Ammerican colleagues here in Fairfield, deepest Iowa. Especially when I tell it in my thickest Northern Irish accent.
Posted by dottie at 11:26 PM | Comments (1)
October 10, 2004
Getting it from all sides....
Last week I discovered that yet another client has apparently decided, in their wisdom, that giving me money would be reckless endangerment, or something like that - I've discovered that its not mentally healthy to pry into such motivations. Additionally they suggested that my cashflow problems were not their concern.
Uh? Earth to moon base! You haven't paid me, therefore I think you have a *little* responsibility in my cashflow problems - or am I just stupid or something?
Great. Fucking great. Food had better be optional this month...
I feel another 'open letter' coming on :)
Posted by dottie at 7:35 PM
October 7, 2004
Dave Grogan is God!
A big shout-out to Dave for landing me a three month contract with Xelector (where he works also...).
Interesting (mind-bending) work with XML, Tomcat, and very old and crungy HTML :) - I have three months to feck up but I'm doing my best to get that all over as quickly as possible.
The folks working there are all cool, its truly a pleasure to work there, and hey, the paycheck aint too shabby neither! (I might be able to afford christmas presents this year!)
Despite getting me in the door, Dave does about five different jobs all day every day. God-like? Titan-like, like!
So all together now - w00t! for Davey!
Posted by dottie at 8:16 PM
October 6, 2004
Plagarism
Every time you make you your sweet love shiver by whispering distillations of your animal magnetism into her ear.
Every time you slag your firends new haircut or a strangers voice.
Every time you condense into ink and scawl on a page the sunshine from a beautiful sunset.
Every time you give directions to a stranger and curse yourself for getting them wrong three steps from their back.
Every time you cry out in your anger and your pain 'I am leaving, I am leaving' and the boxer still remains like the same song sang under the joshua tree on a lazy sunny afternoon (it was such a perfect day)
You can be sure its been done before. Nothing is original at this stage.
But fuck it. As long as its the first time YOU did it :)
Posted by dottie at 11:58 PM
October 1, 2004
Why the upcoming election in the US is the most important event of the century
George Soros is a stand-up guy. He has been steadily promoting REAL democracy around the world for the last few decades (or at least since he was wealthy enough to make a difference).
The US republican party has insinuated that he has made money from drugs. This has been further bolstered by 'reports' into the 'rumours' by the Fox News network - font of all that is ultra right wing in the US. This is deplorable but encouraging at the same time. This means that they have acknowledged that George Soros is a Threat (captial T is intentional!). This is a good thing as it opens up the battlefront for the republicans (small r intentional) who are having a little bit more of a hard time since George Lakoff has started influencing the ideology, or at leats its expression, of the Democrats (yes, D intentional...)
George Lakoff has analysed the way republicans speak about certain topics and has noticed that they use certain phrases and words to 'frame' the debate on their terms. The Democrats for years have been trying to argue against the republicans policies using their language and failing as the republicans have carefully chosen the phrases that are valid in the debate, indoctrinating the audience (ie the people of the US) so that they have a negative reaction to certain trigger phrases and can immediately brand anyone who uses those phrases as a liberal monster who wants to kill babies, abolish the bible and only allow men to marry men.
Finally the Democrats have broken away from this, by using their own language independent of the republicans, robbing them of the power to trap them within the internal illogic of their arguments.
Anyway, what I am trying to say is that this election is the most important thing that will happen in the world in the next century. I believe that if Bush gets into power for another four years and has his way, the world will dissolve into chaos within twenty years. There will be a huge increase in terrorism and the brutality of such terrorism. More and more nations and peoples will be drawn into the morass of fighting through confusion, anger, misdirected rage, disinformation and greed.
If Bush gets into power, we are fucked.
There are a lot of good people trying to make reasoned arguments that will get US citizens to vote and vote right. Arguments that are far more balanced than the republicans claim that 'if John Kerry gets voted into power the United States will be attacked' - this was said by Dick Cheney. Makes you wonder how he can be so sure, doesnt it? People like George Soros who I used to introduce this slightly meandering essay (my apologies, I wrote it off the top of my head, so to speak).
The republicans will stop at nothing. Already we have had the 'swift boat veterans for truth' who lied about serving with Kerry (they never did and hardly knew him). We have had the whole 'flip flop' bullshit, which can more honestly be applied to Bush (here and here)
And now we have the partisan voter registration forms from Arkansas. Below you can see actual voter registration forms that were produced by the republican party in Arkansas. These were thankfully banned and prohibited from distribution before they saw the light of day, but shows what the republicans are capable of stooping to.
If you are a US citizen please register to vote and vote for Kerry - even if you dont like the guy! If you know a US citizen get them to register and vote for Kerry - even if you dont like Kerry!
Kerry has his flaws, hell every politician has his flaws (Clinton the great 'peace maker' is responsible for spreading 70 tons of depleted uranium over kosovo during the conflict there).
The important thing to remember is that Kerry is not Bush. Kerry does not believe he has been chosen by God to restore palestine to its 'rightful' people by any means and preside over the end of the world and the ascension of the righteous into heaven.
Bush is a fruit and nut case who will stop at nothing to gain absolute power and dominion over his target empire - the world. Kerry likes to snowboard.
You make the decision.
Posted by dottie at 12:26 AM