Olympic post

In case you hadn't noticed the Olympics starts today, I know it hasn't had much publicity, but this Olympics are being held in Beijing, China.
If you can't get there, you might be able to catch some of it on the television, good luck with that.

I'm watching the start of the opening ceremony, there appear to be thousands of men in silver dresses doing interpretative dance and banging drums, quite good so far then.

Oh there are now dancers writing as they dance across a giant scroll of paper - shame about the shithead Australian commentary I have - this opening ceremony is stunning.


Once it begins I am interested in only the men's gymnastics, and the women's synchronised swimming and diving to me they are the most visually interesting sporting activities. Running and throwing things and team sports are so pointless as to be beyond understanding.

Peter and the Wolf

Picture inspired by reading the short story by Angela Carter - Peter and the Wolf - in this story, a girl's parents are killed and she is raised by wolves, her cousin encounters her twice, once when they are both children, and later as adults. At the second meeting he is about to enter a seminary when he encounters her by a river with two cubs in tow, after seeing her and her 'natural state' he loses his religion. It is a great story the description of a wolf woman is stunning.

Some new pictures in a surrealist style

Look I have found proofs (sort of)!

From J Krishnamurti's At the feet of the Master (1910) Theosophical Publishing House, Adyar, India.

Lucy Speaks

The Animals Australia - Lucy Speaks campaign - to end the factory farming of Pigs (see http://www.animalsaustralia.org/lucy_speaks/) is doing well and is now in its fourth week, these radio adverts are now being funded by donations coming in from the public.

The adverts rely on the premise that a pig has roughly the same mental age and capacity as a 3 year old human child. Using the voice of a 3 year old girl the adverts attempt to give an insight into what pig captivity is like, very effective it is too.

Chrystie Hill talk

As a librarian I get to go to many many meetings and presentations. Today however, I went to one I actually enjoyed - Chrystie Hill from WebJunction - so nice to hear such a positive view of libraries and how they can interact and serve and create community. The first part of the talk discussed place and community building, the second an exposition on WebJunction. For the longest time I haven't heard anyone in the library world talk about the role of place or community within libraries and so I really enjoyed this as I am intrigued by the sense of place, and it is really why I went into librarianship in the first place.

As a child I found in my local public library a space that I found immensely warm and accepting (even comforting), it would be nice if we could create an online environment for library users as conducive.


On my must read list now is Great good place ... which she mentioned in her talk.

Austinist

'Such parodistic methods have often been used to obtain comical effects. But such humor is the result of contradictions within a condition whose existence is taken for granted.' - A User’s Guide to Détournement

Situationism an occult reading

I came across this sentence, which I make no statement about, let it seep in.

"3.2 To conclude: I suggest that :

3.2.1 The work and life of Guy Debord and the Situationist International must be analysed, understood and critiqued from an occult perspective."

From this fascinating blog.

Oh BTW if you are not au fait with Situationism go here or better still just read all the Spectacular Times series written by Larry Law available here (an Internet Archive no less!). They are all well worth reading. If you've got no time just read this The Boy Scout's Guide to the Situationist International

IVU Dresden Conference

I missed the IVU Conference, but hopefully will be able to make North Carolina 2012. Herewith the Minutes of the Meeting of The IVU International Council, 29 July, 2008.

Lazy blogging

OMFG! I was going to use this, but couldn't be bothered!

My Town

I took a camera on my walk around my neighbourhood this Sunday. Click on the images, and like magic they will open up huge in a new window.


View from Fadden


Kangaroos!


A tree in my street


A dead Wombat

The night Ape Sex came to town

Ape Sex is a band in Love & Rockets, duh!

John L reminded me of this, and I do agree that it is a very fine band name indeed. There is a website and a Wikipedia page for fictional bands. While Ape Sex is fine, Creme Brulée (both a real and fictional band name) is my favourite.

Cake

My new cake, tastes better than it looks.

1 cup SR flour
1 cup raw sugar
1 cup margarine
1/3 cup oats
1/3 cup ground almonds
1/3 shredded coconut
some currants
2 egg substitute eggs (check health food store), or 2 free range eggs if you wanna


If you want you could add 1/2 tsp nutmeg as well, it works well with or without.

Mix together (should be reasonably sloppy) and bake for half an hour in the middle of the oven at moderate heat.

Update

OMFG, sorry I forgot to add listening advice, you will want to play it something soothing like The Pastoral while its cooking (it will help it really), and Eroica while you're eating it.

Italy

If I could go anywhere
That I would wish to be
Why this week (rather 10 days) it'd be Italy!