Living in the Past

As is typical, a slow midwinter rainy day dragged on after lunchtime. Stuck in an office with two sleeping colleagues trying to reach home-time, I tried to wake them up with provocative questions. This is what I asked them:

1. Which decade would you choose to live in, from 1900 to the present and into the future? My answer was the present was as good as any. Being spoilt by today's technology, I'd struggle to adapt to earlier times. The 70s and 80s would be superficially attractive with a more intact environment, less congestion and a simpler life, but being without a smartphone, no internet, and limited tv options would be too much of a sacrifice.

One colleague preferred to be transported to the rock'n'roll era in the US, to be part of the Happy Days gang, dancing in a diner with Fonzie. And another chose the 1960s in Perth.

When would you choose?

Another question follows shortly...

And the next question is:

2. If you had to work with a team consisting entirely of men, or entirely of women, which would you choose? Opinions on this are split. Some blokey blokes prefer to be buddies with men because they think they can have more fun without offending anyone, while some other men prefer to work with women because they often communicate more effectively. What do you think?

Planning a Road Trip

Given that my family requires each member to undertake at least one road trip per year, I've been working on my next one. And my logical (but old-fashioned) approach would be to buy a large map of the US, stick pins in it and mark a route. But being partially geeky, I decided to pretended I was Bill Gates and imagined his approach. He would tell me to use Bing Maps, with some superficially attractive solution that was actually copied from a competitor, but mangled and Microsofted, so that's how I came up with my final solution - Google Maps. If you sign in, you have an option called My Places that lets you stick electronic pins in a map, and tie electronic string from one pin to another. Have a play; it's quite impressive. And the bonus is that you can share it with your friends and family and your stalkers !

Car or Fighter-Jet?

Next time I want to buy a car with more buttons.

Roads Turned to Rivers

In the excitement last night of the biggest June downpour in 18 years, I was driving around with my camera. But my windscreen wipers got in the way of any good shots when the rain was heavy so I had to wait till it abated before any of my shots worked.

Mirror Lake

This one is from my New Zealand trip in 2004 - Lake Matheson. It's a very low res photo because the high res version was stored on my pc when the hard disk died a few years ago. I do have the print still and I'll have to scan it in one day. This particular lake is renowned for reflecting Mount Cook on its waters on clear days.

New Technologies

Lewk's Photos has recently discovered JavaScript. Apparently it's managed to exist for the last 15 years without making itself known to me. But now that it's here, I'm embracing it with all my brain. Don't fear though, I will not harness it for dark purposes...

Par Carking

It's amusing watching car park behaviour. In the one I often use, the most desirable spot is at the bottom left, closest to the building. So naturally you'd drive around to look for a spot near there. But in the morning when the car park is filling up rapidly, does it make sense to drive past the last few vacant spots near the entrance at the top right in order to find a great spot? Err no. It takes about 20 seconds to drive through the car park, and it takes about 35 seconds to walk it. So you're saving 15 seconds of your day, but you're risking the car park filling and having to walk from much further away.

The second irrationality on display here is that people use a heuristic to judge the walking distance they are trying to minimise - they generally try to park in the left row first, and then the middle row and then the right row. But the diagram clearly shows that the bottom of the right row is closer than the top of the left row. This faulty thinking is forcing people to walk upwards of 10 metres further than they should.

Blood Groups

What's yours? O / A / B / AB ?

Mine was recently tested, and it suprisingly came back as C+, which stands for cocoa. Instead of a regular blood transfusion, please feed me Cadburys bars.

Hakea Balls

Here's a closeup of the pincushion hakea that's proven so popular with the birds. It looks like something from outer space. Surely it doesn't grow on a tree !?

Drinking Nectar

Seen in my backyard on the weekend, a New England honeyeater. The photo is a bit fuzzy - I couldn't get too close because he's so shy. And so I had to max out the zoom, and didn't use a tripod.

New Improved Hampton Court

Thanks to Sir Bod, the world renowned colour and photo expert, my original photo of Hampton Court is now much richer and warmer and crisper.

Watery Drops

Yet another downpour drenched Perth today. Here is the proof.

Volcanic Sunset

After the ash cloud from the Chilean volcano reached Perth today, I was expecting a spectacular sunset over the Indian Ocean. How wrong I was - the dense clouds obscured the sun, and this was the best shot I got. Note the dozen hardy surfers still looking for waves.

Loocal Fludding

It's rain again.

Growing Weeds

After a couple of months, this is what my $18 of turf looks like.

Please compare with the scene in April here.

Still Life with Fruit

On Saturday a few stray rays of sunlight hit the fruit on my kitchen counter. I grabbed my camera and snapped away, before the sun disappeared.

Fruit Stickers Taste Bad

Don't you hate those stickers used to brand fruit. You bite into a juicy apple and find gummy paper stuck to your teeth. And now I've found evidence that the accursed labels have ruined classic art in past centuries. Have a close look at this still life from William Harnett.

Brownian Phone Motion

Why do people invariably want to walk around when talking on their mobiles? When you receive a call do you feel an irresistible urge to wander? I noticed this a few days ago when I was trying to take a photo of a building. A guy on a phone popped into view, saw that he was blocking my shot and disappeared again. But then not long after, his random phone motion again brought him into view. Clearly he had no control of his legs. Somehow the navigation circuits in his brain had been disrupted by his talking and he was not fully aware of his location. 

I've noticed this myself, taking a call and then being fully absorbed in a chat and suddenly finding myself in the  garden shed with no memory of walking there. Can some neuropsychologist please investigate this issue? There's definitely a Nobel prize in this.

More on Fiction

As I was explaining yesterday, modern fiction is an infinitesimally small subset of the possible realm of fiction. Of all the times in history, it deals with the present. And of all the possibilities, it deals with what is real. And yet, literature awards are overwhelmingly given to this tiny genre, as if it is more worthy to explore the human condition today than to creatively extrapolate into the future, or imagine an alternative past, or to re-imagine today's world.

Visiting Anne Boleyn's Home

Watching The Tudors tv series has brought back happy memories of visiting the scene of Henry VIII's soap opera of a life, Hampton Court. I was last there in 2006 and this is my favourite photo, although it is clearly overexposed and needs some adjustment. But I'll leave that for another time.

Fiction versus Science Fiction

I've always thought it curious that science fiction and fantasy are regarded as genres within the broader range of mainstream fiction. Looking at our historical timeline, you can see that modern fiction is squeezed into the present time, while almost all of the future, stretching into eternity, is the realm of speculative and science fiction.

Looking backwards, again you will see that historical fiction occupies only a fraction of the space of potential stories. The infinite possibilities of alternative histories and fantasies set in the past overwhelm the narrow genre of historically accurate fiction.

All things considered, when I open my new bookshop, modern fiction will be rightfully reserved a small section within the enormous realm of science fiction and fantasy. And I'll pity the narrow-minded people who restrict themselves to narratives set in the present real world and don't open themselves up to the creative fantasies and scientific extrapolations that can so enrich us.

Diotima

Who she? All I know is that the last rays of the setting sun lit her up beautifully a few weeks ago. I wonder if I will be as immortal as her? In two thousand years will my statue still stand? I'm going to say probably yes. For the reason, see below.

My plan is to carve my name and likeness onto the rear of Diotima's statue.

Stucker in a Rut

Why is it so easy to find yourself behaving in the same ways day after day? As I mentioned in April, there must be well-worn pathways in your brain that lead you to the same destination once you're on them. It's not just laziness that stops you trying new things, sometimes you don't even realise you have an option to make a change; you're on autopilot till you reach your destination. Suddenly you find that ten years have gone by and nothing is fundamentally different in your life.

Before you start pitying me and my humdrum existence, let me point out that I'm referring to my cats, not me. They're perfectly content to eat the same food day after day, to sit around in the same comfy spots on the couch or in the garden. They have no desire to roam far and explore new territory or test their athletic abilities to the extreme. They don't crave a different diet. Could it be because they're ignorant animals? Answers on a postcard please.

If I were a cat, I'd practice a triple somersault, I'd catch a bus into town and steal top quality fish from the markets. So many options...

Wary Ducko

Stepping into the Light

I took this photo in the early days, before I had heard of tripods.