Time

Time - can't live without it

Silent Explosion

I don't know what this looks like to you, but the first thought I had was "explosion." The entire "cloud-explosion" happened over a twenty minute period at around daybreak. Another bloger pointed out to me that the cloud movement is also interesting. This animated-gif is made up of twenty two frames.

Blogers-block and Other Non-fatal Conditions

Gonzo

A creative bloger is one who has no sense of bloging purpose from the first keystroke to the last. Being confined by a sense of purpose, order, spelling, grammar and hideous rules of composition will only stifle creativity. The only rule for being creative is that there are no rules. Creativity is the art of letting the neurons be themselves and letting them have fun. Neurons are like children, they grow and flourish when left to explore. Naturally, I wouldn't recommend children play near a cliff which is unguarded nor would I let my brain be artificially simulated by substances know to be neuron-unfriendly. Ok, that'’s a rule, so what? I am being creative.

Some complain about suffering from blogers-block. I have also suffered from this blockage and now realize there is no single cure. This is no laughing matter since a blocked bloger can wreck havoc on the planet in search of the perfect creative laxative. I unfortunately can offer no real hope since I have recently taken up the dark art of blog-commenting rather than bloging in my own space. I reasoned that blogers-block is caused by the idea we must have something meaningful and worthwhile to say. Don't be caught in this trap since life itself is struggling to find even one universal meaning and any blog is likely to be more meaningful than that.

I have seen meaningful blogs in the form of an eye drawing, the observation of dry to green ferns, and the dressing up of feet with foot gloves and then snapping it with a cell camera. There are no rules and they all make perfect sense.

Blogers-block should never happen since the easiest thing in the world is to have nothing to say and then just type it. Can you imagine what would happen if a bloger did have something to actually say? I shudder at this thought :)

p.s. this blog is subject to change without notice for reasons never to be revealed to the general public and itergalactictic friends.

It Breaks Every Day

Daybreak

"If it ain't broke don't fix it." These are words of wisdom born from ages of experience by those who broke many things and whose wives, girlfriends, or lovers have had enough. A day breaks every day and that is natures way of telling us he answers to a Female. He? Nature has a Male side? Yes, yes and yes. Father Nature does exist and is responsible for daybreaks (day breaks). Mother (or Female) Nature ensures that it happens more or less on time.

I took this series of pics from my front porch today. They were taken over a 6 minute period sometime around 6:15 a.m. My philosophy is "if you can't sleep then snap."

My Doughnut Comment

Dangerous Nut

This is the comment I made on a very inspired blog called Sirius83's Journal of Insanity under the heading A donut with a rash . I have recently become an uninspired bloger and I decided to draw on my comments on other blogs to tide me over until my normal level of abnormal creativity resumes. What lies below was hardly modified to fit this blog.

Over the years I have become quite sympathetic to the plight of the doughnut, not only locally but internationally. This up-and-coming modern-day food group has been subjected to the most despicable treatment by food sellers and food buyers alike. This affectionate food has been callously dunked, sprinkled, jellified, choclified and now appallingly fungerised, much to the indifference of mankind, and certain educational intuitions. But all is not lost.

Hope is once again on the horizon since a lone bloger, Sirius, is raging a one-man campaign against food-group abuse. In Sirius's latest book, Doughnuts - The Hole Story, several hundred appalling cases of doughnut-abuse are documented. This graphic book also lashes out at the TTSPCF and accuses them of sitting on their collective butts while doughnuts are mercilessly squished and squashed by two-faced doughnut lovers. Some even go missing, never to be found. He is also championing the fight to extract finances from various notorious sources to help fund research into the cure for doughnut fungus and selected jelly diseases. Donations can be made to the Save the Doughnut fund by calling 800-DNUT, and you can be rest assured that the money will be very well spent :)

Cloud Formation

For reasons unexplained, I captured this rain cloud formation on a Friday afternoon. This can be considered time-lapse photography. I think it looks scary but exciting. It looks like life, coming for us, whether we like it or not.

The Rice Mother

A great book is one which causes the reader to think about it long after the last words are read. It is a book which makes you forget you are reading and throws you through the pages into another world. The Rice Mother by Rani Manicka is one such book. This book drained me emotionally at times but I don’t know how it did, or will affect others.

Before I finished reading The Rice Mother, I started to think about my ancestors and realizing even more there is merit in understanding our relatives of old. I don’t only mean understanding them historically but also emotionally. This is not about dwelling in the past but about understanding the struggles which brought us here today. You may find out that you are a chip from some old blocks, a replica of a good soul, or a completely new but unclassifiable branch of the family tree.

In every family there are skeletons in the closet but some families have more than the average amount of skeletons and, as a result, closets. However, what is more important is appreciating the day to day burdens which people endured in order to ensure the future generations are born, and hopefully into a better life. It is important to understand where the skeletons came from. Studying our ancestors may show that we are a product of both kindness and cruelty, and sometimes to the extreme.

While reading the book I kept asking the perennial question; how could the same two parents raise children, some whom came out as angels, while others ended up as perfect examples of strife and family shame? The reality is that no two people are alike and parents are rabidly judgmental about their children. Life is never fair and parents even more so. Yes, in the end both parents and their children are responsible for their own actions but when one family member takes misguided action, the others members also suffer, and shaped or distorted by its results. Whether we like it or not, a large part of who we are today is a result of who our ancestors were, the choices they made, and the fate they were handed. The rest is our history to create for the future.

p.s.1 - This book was recommended to me by Tunks :)

p.s.2. - I took the photo above during the wee hours of this Sunday morning. I clicked the shutter while the book lied captivatingly on a table which, incidentally, might be Malaysian :)

Night Lights

The night lights of St. Augustine

I took four photos last night (22nd. July, 2005) using a 2-second exposure time. I actually took more than four shots but the choosen four were shot from the same position on the tripod. I was trying to capture the streaks of light (white and red) from the passing cars. I then put the pictures together in an animated GIF file. I think the inspiration to do this came while flipping through the pictures. The effect created is almost the same as a movie flip-book.

Bin and Bomb

Humor masks our greatest fears and an event yesterday proves I am still full of it, the fear I mean. This blog is my mask.

Blame it on a sick sense of humor and fear, but I laughed when Shelly Dass on TV6 reported that the police were still investigating what caused a "garbage bin to blow up in down town Port-of-Spain on July 11th ". I laughed when a friend told me that the police was now on the hunt for Dust-Bin Laden. I laughed all the way to St. Anne's.

The reason is not important, but only the fact that I had to take a trip to mid-town Port-of -Spain starting from somewhere on the extreme west of Park St. My regular route through Victoria Square soon turned into a nightmare when I suddenly noticed that I was surrounded by bins upon bins (see illustration above). If the amount and the placement of these bins (poor attempt at small circles on the drawing) were typical, I could not say because like most people, I never paid attention to garbage bins before. Take a look at the drawing. Wouldn't you say the amount of bins and their placement are strange? This had to be the work of a sanitation engineer gone mad or the Government.

Gripped with fear, my mind, independent to my brain and body, told me "get the hell outta here." The only two other people in the Square were vagrants. I made this assumption because they had that very calm, not-a-care-in-the-world look about them and their sense of fashion begged to be forgiven. Their calmness was reassuring but their distance from the bins weren't.

As good fortune would have it, I came out of the square physically intact but mentally shattered. I couldn't help but wonder if I was the only one in the country who reacted, and is reacting this way. I think not. My humor only hides my fear but my ski mask probably does a better job.

Imperfection

This is the first real drawing exercise in the book. The actual drawing from the book is much better and much less flawed. It's strange though, how people admire perfection, never realizing the better part of interesting is the imperfection.

Flat Glass Bottle

I distorted this image using Photoshop while waiting for the ever-popular Tropical Storm Emily to either hit, or not hit. The original image was that of a flat glass bottle. Yes, such bottles do exist and this image is partial proof of that. The full proof is on its way, threatening to silence the skeptics forever.

Hitch Upon a Star

Shouldn't a blog tell you something about the bloger? It should, but what is says is not always useful. I posted this blog to prove my case.

I decided to collect ticket stubs from Movietowne because years from now I hope to retire and live a lavish, and occasionally vile lifestyle, on the vast sums I will have made from the sale of these collector's items. The future is brighter than I could have ever imagined, as you can see from the preview of my collection above.

What's the saying again, Hitch upon a star, or is it Wish upon a star? I could never remember but that’s what I have done.

Q.E.D

Girls of Red Square

I captured these shots from the DVD Paul McCartney - In Red Square. This photo montage I put together could be called Girls of Red Square, The McCartney Red Square Concert Girls, The Cameraman Likes These Concert Girls or Aka's Picks. The pictures were sewn together using Corel Draw 11. The DVD was called a concert film, but since there is no film in a DVD I prefer to call it a docu-concert. The DVD was put together by the A&E/History Channel people so that should give you an indication what the DVD is like. Amazing; that's my opinion.

half -a-brain

Almost three years ago a small but rebellious bunch of brain cells, nestled somewhere in my head, formed themselves into a pressure-group. This seditious group immediately jumped into action and complained that I was unbelievably boring and I didn't seem to support neuron growth. With my ego shattered, feelings hurt and sedation wearing off, I listened to their grievance. "What do you do in you spare time?" the loony pack of neurons asked in a most neurotic tone. "You sit around waiting for the sun to rise with a Canon strapped to your eye. What is that about, its boooring, that's what?" "Don't you get it? It's the same sun everyday. You point and click, point and click. True you play around with a few settings, a few angles but so what. Move on, do something different, get a life." The truth hurts but not as much as the headache these poor excuses for a thought process were giving me. This headache forced me to take up an interest in peace and neuron growth. This also led me to take up drawing, not because it would be a challenge but because it was something I was sure to fail at. I would show these neurons who was the real brains!

What this fore-paragraph is leading to is the book "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" by Dr. Betty Edwards. I bought this book because it was designed to make non-sketchers into sketchers by using a revolutionary method of right-brain activation. Apparently learning to draw is learning to see and seeing is not as easy as I thought, especially if you have only half a brain.

The sketch above was one of my early and few efforts. It represents me trying to reproduce a sketch I saw in a book called "Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark." (This book is a challenge because reading in the dark is not easy).

The yearning to restart this journey into the right side of my brain, after a three year absence, was inspired by Words Unspoken, and also my insatiable quest to cause public outcry. The reason for bloging about it is to put myself up for further public ridicule if I slack off, or not.

A Simple Sample and All That Jazz

A picture is worth a thousand words, but a picture of a desktop is worth considerably more, especially if it was painted by Picasso.

I have a feeling that the lost art of desktop-reading will soon replace toothbrush-bristle-reading as the number form of fortune telling and psycho analysis. "Show me your desktop and I will tell you who you are. Give me a hundred dollars and I will tell you what you want."

What can you tell about this bloger by a simple sample of his desktop? Simple Sample is the latest method used in the psycho analysis of the distorted mind of some Blogers. It is based on the theory that things are arranged on the desktop as it is arranged in the mind. You allow things to happen in the physical world as you do in the mental world. This has to be true since there is mounting evidence which suggest that I do have a set of headphones and a pen precociously lodged among my neurons. You see, I have been hearing things that nobody hears and writing things which nobody reads. These writings have turned up mainly on my blogs and lately as graffiti in washrooms of certain alien spaceships. These sounds have not turned up at all. What else does Simple Sample reveal about the Bloger in question? Wonder no more - – it says the bloger has the writing ambitions of a master storyteller, the smile of a 21st century female jazz singer and either looks like a Russian or a used Post-it. It also says the Bloger quite likely has the IQ of a used ticket stub. But all of this is only on the surface, and what lies beneath is even more disturbing, and yellow.

Batman: Before The Beginning and Whatever

Before The Beginning:

Batman Begins (aka Batman Begi, aka Bruce and Alfred, The Early Years, aka Why the Well Should Be Covered Well) was fraught with fear and uncertainty as parking spots were much more than scarce. It was a night of warlike tension when what seemed like hundreds of incensed potential moviegoers converged on what looked like nowhere in particular. It was a night of high parking lot drama as the once peaceful drivers from all walks of life, of all ages, of all levels of stupidity and varying degrees of sexual activity and inactivity, resorted to primordial instincts in their quest for nonexistent parking spots. It was the ideal night for the parking lot Batman to intervene, but he never showed. The bastard!

Almost At the Beginning:

An Audi A6 reversed and gave me my first real hope of seeing Batman Begins that night. My Honda flashed its headlights in gratitude and the Audi A6 honked her horn in acknowledgement of our show of appreciation by way of our flashing headlights. I smiled and blushed as the pretty female A6 driver and I made, not only retina contact, but also made my retinas glad to be male retinas. It’s strange how the simple things in life can make a fool happy. That’s why I stayed a fool for so long, it’s cheaper and happier.

Closer than Almost:

The line to see this movie looked like a National Geographic aerial snapshot of a desert snake in motion. The paid up moviegoers were only pseudo-aggrieved since the time spent in the line gave people the opportunity to mako each other. That was 60% of the reason for going to see the movie in the first place. The other 30% was for the popcorn and the remaining percentage was attributed to boasting to the unsuspecting that you actually got a parking spot and saw the movie.

The Movie:

It was a good movie which I, like Thomas Cruise Mapother IV, will eventually get on DVD. I give it a 3.5/5, aka 7/10 for those fearful of the decimal point.

Could it be?

"Could it be that a contributor to "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" is on this planet? Is it possible? Could it be?"

These words were echoed not too long ago and not too far from here and not too loud so as to disturb the neighbors. The answer to this three-pronged question was only known by the few select Muddleruts who were involved in the initial towel-finding exercise. Legend, and fortune-seeking Muddleruts looking for a book deal, claim THHGTTG, 1st swamp edition, not only answered these questions but also revealed The Secret of Life. This Secret would have remained intact but, by their default nature, Muddleruts and Earthling Women are famous for their leaky disposition to secrets. Six weeks ago a profusely leaking Muddlerut wanting to impress a female Muddlerut suffering from too much curvature, with a triple chin and nicely corrugated forehead, revealed to a crowded pub on the Redder Side of The Planet, The Secret of Life and also of lint-free towels. According to the grapevine, The Secret of Life was so desperately elusive since life began only because it was cleverly hidden in the labels of towels disguised as washing instructions. Who would have thought? Washing instructions are short, confusing and of the finest print, much like life. We should have known.

The Secret revealed:

"Use the recommended washing programme. DO NOT DRY CLEAN/GENTLE WASH ONLY. Limit the use of fabric conditioner on your towels. Whilst they give your towels a soft feel, overuse of conditioner leaves a coating on the towels and reduces the absorbency. Made in China."

These profound words confirmed what philosophers had suspected for hundreds of years, but no one knew what that was.

If you were so moved by the Words of The Towel Label then I say, Dry your tears on the towel of life but watch for lint.

umbrullat!

Ants, Umbrellas and Prehistoric Martian History

My recent blog and forum readings have left me fearful of ants and umbrellas and also deeply suspicious of oxygen enriched Martians. Before I go any further I want to make something quite clear; I am not a Martian and I have never knowingly seen one, at least in the last month within fifty meters from where I live and on Sundays before 11 p.m. According to scientist studying the mating habits of unspecified fruits the Zabalian, pictured in a previous blog, is not an alien, but a cross between a Zabacado and an undetermined mammalian. A paternity test is to be done on the usual suspect.

Back to the topic at hand, but since there is none that should be easy.

Since reading a particular blog about umbrellas, I seem to have developed an eye for these notorious devices. It’s strange how just a few lines on a simple blog can be a real eye-opener. Incidentally, the word umbrella has its root in the in the early Martian word umbrellat, meaning ouch. And, by a very strange coincidence, the Government of Mars is also known as umbrullat. I have also become painfully aware that these devices have many uses and that no one can remember what original necessity sparked their invention. What I do know is that many a good street-fight was triggered by these gadgets and they are now in a close second to women as the root cause of all misery on our walkways.

It is written in prehistoric Martian history that ants were on our planet before life started. Prehistoric Martian History, published by Aliens Anonymous, is the only source of Prehistoric Martian History ever published on a Wednesday. In this book, chronicling the woefully unsavory history of Martian lust and sensuality, ants are portrayed as being shameless creatures of the night, invading kitchen counters, foods and certain novels, long before they were invented, cooked, or written. Earthly scientists have only recently done studies to determine if ants can make sounds. Early findings suggest that these pesky creatures do in fact make sounds but their only decipherable words so far were "get back in line you idiot!"

Since I don’t want to take pointlessness to new heights I will say what my chemistry teacher said at the end of class, "Argon."