I intended to blog tonight, and I even made a bit of an effort to think of decent ideas for once, but obviously this plan has not come to fruition. Please forgive me. I've just spent a cozy two and a half hours snuggled up to my Greader. So many blogs and articles and essays all queued up for me by topic or author. I have barely gotten through half of it. What a pleasure. If only I could read it on the couch.
The major distraction tonight was catching up with new posts from Club Orlov. One of the things I love about this blog is the "been there, done that" nature of the analysis and information. Just because the big big mass of Russia is a long way away (in all the different nuances that hang around after the cold war) doesn't mean we can't learn a lot from their recent history and experiences. It is one thing to look at a bunch of graphs and say, "This is going to be bad" and another to hear exactly how bad (and I don't mean just having to live on cabbage). There are little tidbits too, such as the value of bronze nails.
"It also makes sense to establish stockpiles of non-perishable materials that will preserve their usefulness far into the future. My favourite example is bronze nails. They last a over a hundred years in salt water, and so they are perfect for building boats. The manufacturing of bronze nails is actually a good use of the remaining fossil fuels - better than most. They are compact and easy to store."
I didn't even think about the possibility that nails might be made of stuff that erodes. I mean, that's a stupid idea, right?! What a perfect example of how our thinking as a system is faulty. Not that I'm ever going to be able to build a boat. Or even that I can use a hammer without hurting myself. Who am I kidding anyway, I'm almost certain to die off as soon as the chocolate supply gets dodgy. I've got three lightfittings in my house where I can't even get a lightbulb to work. Plus, I live nearly 150 kloms from the ocean. And I don't eat fish. Now. I reckon if rotten cabbages get on the menu, pretty much anything goes.
But I digress.
It's not just the handy hints towards a happy post-peak-oil-life that I enjoy and it is more than the fabulously footnoted details, it is that Club Orlov presents with a fabulous sense of humour. Anyone who can make me laugh involuntarily about global economic collapse due to the denial of the (easily projected) minimum production volumes and maximum affordable costs of energy has to be clever, resilient and fundamentally very, very funny.
I don't want to spoil it for you in case you have the urge to explore for yourself, and maybe you won't think so, but I'm still chuckling now. Anyway, that's the reason there will not be a blog from me tonight. I've been deliciously distracted and suddenly it is past my bedtime and time to don jammies and sleep. Ah, but my mind is spinning, trying to recalibrate my plan to take in all the knowables, the unknowables, the things we don't know we don't know and now to do all of this and yet remain flexible, with lots more humour!
Showing posts with label It's a Joke Joyce. Show all posts
Showing posts with label It's a Joke Joyce. Show all posts
Monday, July 06, 2009
Tuesday, January 06, 2009
Cheerful or Bust
One of my intentions for 2009 is to be more cheerful.
My consulting medical professional suggested that I should "have fun" more often. Apparently he refers to something more active than simply snidely snickering at pointed political essays in The Monthly.
This project was meant to commence last year but was largely unsuccessful. I did discover a couple of odd things. Firstly, that on TV I find Top Gear very funny, but only in the UK version - the Australian version failed to excite. Also, somewhat shamefully, Two and a Half Men can make me laugh aloud causing the dog to startle and check for intruders. This has been waning in the newer seasons, but the mantle has been taken up by the new show by the same writing team (Chuck Lorre & the other guy whose name I've forgotten - sorry mate) Big Bang Theory, which is also stereotypical fare (Geeks don't do social well) but despite my misgivings - makes me laugh.
Next week I'll be going to a music concert. It has been along time since I did this, and I'm already finding myself mentally planning to take a book for the slow bits. Obviously this plan for "having fun" will have to rollout in very small increments. Perhaps I should have chosen someone a little more upbeat than Nick Cave - but you have to go with what you know.
Swimming is still a good option, but there's little scope for snorkling in my sister's pool, so it remains in the 'float around and daydream' mode. Listening to 'cheerful' music is another idea... I've tuned the car radio to a dance channel and that is pretty hilarious, but still seems to fall into the snickering snidely box more often than not. There's a very David Foster Wallace type moment that happens when one is 'faking it till one makes it' where you're watching yourself going through the motions of whatever it is (such as, trying to sing along to inane dance lyrics while cruising downtown Ipswich in the beatup Mazda 323) and this witness character is saying to the other internal selves "Do you really think this is working?! In *any* way?! You are delusional and humiliating the rest of us. Cut it the fuck out now."
Sure it's funny, but is it fun?
On the other hand, laughing at myself is still laughing, and a small step forward, is still a small step forward. Yes. Cop how freaking zen that is!!
My consulting medical professional suggested that I should "have fun" more often. Apparently he refers to something more active than simply snidely snickering at pointed political essays in The Monthly.
This project was meant to commence last year but was largely unsuccessful. I did discover a couple of odd things. Firstly, that on TV I find Top Gear very funny, but only in the UK version - the Australian version failed to excite. Also, somewhat shamefully, Two and a Half Men can make me laugh aloud causing the dog to startle and check for intruders. This has been waning in the newer seasons, but the mantle has been taken up by the new show by the same writing team (Chuck Lorre & the other guy whose name I've forgotten - sorry mate) Big Bang Theory, which is also stereotypical fare (Geeks don't do social well) but despite my misgivings - makes me laugh.
Next week I'll be going to a music concert. It has been along time since I did this, and I'm already finding myself mentally planning to take a book for the slow bits. Obviously this plan for "having fun" will have to rollout in very small increments. Perhaps I should have chosen someone a little more upbeat than Nick Cave - but you have to go with what you know.
Swimming is still a good option, but there's little scope for snorkling in my sister's pool, so it remains in the 'float around and daydream' mode. Listening to 'cheerful' music is another idea... I've tuned the car radio to a dance channel and that is pretty hilarious, but still seems to fall into the snickering snidely box more often than not. There's a very David Foster Wallace type moment that happens when one is 'faking it till one makes it' where you're watching yourself going through the motions of whatever it is (such as, trying to sing along to inane dance lyrics while cruising downtown Ipswich in the beatup Mazda 323) and this witness character is saying to the other internal selves "Do you really think this is working?! In *any* way?! You are delusional and humiliating the rest of us. Cut it the fuck out now."
Sure it's funny, but is it fun?
On the other hand, laughing at myself is still laughing, and a small step forward, is still a small step forward. Yes. Cop how freaking zen that is!!
Sunday, March 30, 2008
Frack Me
Dogs and Sci Fi - they just bring people together.
A pretty social and crafty weekend, mostly with the Sisters. It's great having two sisters - it makes for three of us which is a good mischief number, and every now and then when we cackle over something dreadful, I feel a faint shudder of Macbeth fog rolling over some poor guy's back somewhere.... nahahahahahahahaaaa!
Anyway, we made resin fridge magnets (cool and toxic!), I made mustard pickles (I don't know why ok, and I already gave it all away), I won the b'day poker tournament (go me! With a flush no less!!), I threw more old crap away (hurrurah!), and I decided to visit the dog park on the other side of town that Yvj takes her two to.
I love the acceptance of dog parks. I imagine that perhaps this is what AA meetings are like, at least for the dogs. You just are who you are. You're into balls, or you're not. You run or you don't. Whatever. It's all cool. Of course the humans are more fraught. However, I had left on my fab-o "Frack Me" T shirt (purchased over the ever loving interweb) and this opened up an unexpected conversation about Sci Fi with a dalmatian owner. There you go. He recommended a few things, I threw a few suggestions into the mix, we patted dogs (apparently he bathes his dogs in the shower with him, and yes, uses the wife's shampoo on his favourite hahahahahahahaa). Turns out we like very different Sci Fi, but it was a pleasant social conversation interspersed with a running commentary from Yvj for my benefit on all the locals and their humans as they arrived. Quite the scene happening over there!
Back at Chawton, the pace has been pretty languid. I'm reading Lama Sura Das (letting go of the person you used to be) and my favourite quote from it today is "Let go or get dragged". Hi-larious. It's vying for quote of the book along with "Don't just do something, sit there!". Who knew buddhists made their own meditiating jokes? It's a revelation.
I slap my own thigh.
There's loads has happened.... um.... yeah ok, new neighbours. There's a kinda weird vibe and possibly 4 cats, so I'm not looking too closely at that side of the fence these days. Also, working bee at Chawton - the family came over on good friday and OBLITERATED all the problem trees (including "pruning" the mulberry tree to being 3 stumps about 2 feet off the ground). Basically they descended like locusts with electric chainsaws and I now get "quite a lot of light" into the yard. This was traumatic for me, but it's a case of tough love. The dead trees, homicidal trees and the barbed trees all had to go to make way for trees that grow food and give love (not pain). Also, word on the street is that S4 of BSG is about to really kick off.
Frack me, that's good news!
A pretty social and crafty weekend, mostly with the Sisters. It's great having two sisters - it makes for three of us which is a good mischief number, and every now and then when we cackle over something dreadful, I feel a faint shudder of Macbeth fog rolling over some poor guy's back somewhere.... nahahahahahahahaaaa!
Anyway, we made resin fridge magnets (cool and toxic!), I made mustard pickles (I don't know why ok, and I already gave it all away), I won the b'day poker tournament (go me! With a flush no less!!), I threw more old crap away (hurrurah!), and I decided to visit the dog park on the other side of town that Yvj takes her two to.
I love the acceptance of dog parks. I imagine that perhaps this is what AA meetings are like, at least for the dogs. You just are who you are. You're into balls, or you're not. You run or you don't. Whatever. It's all cool. Of course the humans are more fraught. However, I had left on my fab-o "Frack Me" T shirt (purchased over the ever loving interweb) and this opened up an unexpected conversation about Sci Fi with a dalmatian owner. There you go. He recommended a few things, I threw a few suggestions into the mix, we patted dogs (apparently he bathes his dogs in the shower with him, and yes, uses the wife's shampoo on his favourite hahahahahahahaa). Turns out we like very different Sci Fi, but it was a pleasant social conversation interspersed with a running commentary from Yvj for my benefit on all the locals and their humans as they arrived. Quite the scene happening over there!
Back at Chawton, the pace has been pretty languid. I'm reading Lama Sura Das (letting go of the person you used to be) and my favourite quote from it today is "Let go or get dragged". Hi-larious. It's vying for quote of the book along with "Don't just do something, sit there!". Who knew buddhists made their own meditiating jokes? It's a revelation.
I slap my own thigh.
There's loads has happened.... um.... yeah ok, new neighbours. There's a kinda weird vibe and possibly 4 cats, so I'm not looking too closely at that side of the fence these days. Also, working bee at Chawton - the family came over on good friday and OBLITERATED all the problem trees (including "pruning" the mulberry tree to being 3 stumps about 2 feet off the ground). Basically they descended like locusts with electric chainsaws and I now get "quite a lot of light" into the yard. This was traumatic for me, but it's a case of tough love. The dead trees, homicidal trees and the barbed trees all had to go to make way for trees that grow food and give love (not pain). Also, word on the street is that S4 of BSG is about to really kick off.
Frack me, that's good news!
Monday, December 24, 2007
Festivus
Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit, our best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low stress, nonaddictive, gender neutral celebration of the solstice holiday, practised with the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion or secular practices of your choice with respect for the religious/secular persuasions and/or traditions of others, or the choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all.
We also wish you a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2008, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make our country great (not to imply that Australia is necessarily greater than any other country) and without regard to the race, creed,color, age, physical ability, religious faith or sexual preference of the wishee.
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This greeting is subject to clarification or withdrawal.
It is freelytransferable with no alteration to the original greeting.
It implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the wishes for her / himself or others and is void where prohibited by law, and is revocable at the sole discretion of the wisher.
This wish is warranted to perform as expected within the usual application of good tidings, for a period of one year or until the issuance of a subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first, and warranty is limited to replacement of this wish or issuance of a new wish at the sole discretion of the wisher.
Note: No trees were harmed in the sending of this message; however, a significant number of electrons have been electromagnetically relocated.
We also wish you a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2008, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make our country great (not to imply that Australia is necessarily greater than any other country) and without regard to the race, creed,color, age, physical ability, religious faith or sexual preference of the wishee.
By accepting this greeting, you are accepting these terms:
This greeting is subject to clarification or withdrawal.
It is freelytransferable with no alteration to the original greeting.
It implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the wishes for her / himself or others and is void where prohibited by law, and is revocable at the sole discretion of the wisher.
This wish is warranted to perform as expected within the usual application of good tidings, for a period of one year or until the issuance of a subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first, and warranty is limited to replacement of this wish or issuance of a new wish at the sole discretion of the wisher.
Note: No trees were harmed in the sending of this message; however, a significant number of electrons have been electromagnetically relocated.
Friday, July 20, 2007
Meet me Half Way
George prayed every day for three years to win the lottery, but never heard from God or hit the jackpot. Finally, God woke him up in the middle of the night.
"George, is that you who's been praying so hard to win the lottery?" the Supreme Being boomed.
"Yes, Lord, desperately!"
God paused for a moment, then said thoughtfully,
"George, I'll tell you what. I want you to meet me halfway. Buy a ticket, OK?"
"George, is that you who's been praying so hard to win the lottery?" the Supreme Being boomed.
"Yes, Lord, desperately!"
God paused for a moment, then said thoughtfully,
"George, I'll tell you what. I want you to meet me halfway. Buy a ticket, OK?"
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