Nasty Bug
by Kimliatach

Arrived home today to find all three of my family members vomiting and miserable on the lounge room floor. Whatever vile virus has struck them down has skipped me so far, fingers crossed it stays that way.

Anyway, all my best intentions of a productive evening painting were dashed. We ate jelly and watched a ‘Secret Life of Pets‘ (silly and predictable but amusing) . I was inspired to go looking for a jelly mold but the only one I really took a shine to is a bit out of my price range…

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Antique-Copper-Jelly-Mould-/141942360552?hash=item210c6c89e8:g:gIcAAOSwPc9W1888

Last night was Westworld E06 and E03 of Black mirror. Late to bed. A full episode by episode review of Black Mirror in the works.

Doing a spot of painting now.

To share

The exquisite and bizarre sculptural works of Yoshitoshi Kanemaki  (Also here & here)

 

Semiproductive
by Kimliatach

A morning in the sun, finished the wicking/ self watering garden bed. I filmed the process but struggled with poor battery life in my main camera throughout. The new garden bed will need to settle for a week or two before we plant a fresh crop of seedlings.

I spent the afternoon fighting with software. What I had intended to be a simple hour or two’s editing was derailed by Premier inexplicably deciding not to recognise the audio from an odd assortment of the clips I was using, all shot with the same camera, on the same day. Having gone deep down the rabbit hole of settings alterations, refreshes, restarts, system file alterations and many other possible fixes besides, the trick that finally solved it was as simple as renaming the files from .mp4 to .mov. Hours later I have not finished editing that brief vlog together as I was quickly derailed again by the obtuse interface of that unfamiliar adobe app. I have a working project file to return to now at least.

This evening was spent at a family barbecue and following up on loose ends and odd jobs around the house and online.  Some things taken care of, other tasks thwarted by lack of knowledge and time. A big week at blue school ahead.

 

On Politics
by Kimliatach

I have participated in two elections this year. I voted remain in the UK and Green in the Australian federal election for both houses. Both of those elections were close and extremely disappointing. Obviously the AU Greens were never in with a shot at many more seats in the house of reps but the LibLab battle was a close one. The depths of my dissapointment in the Australian electorate cannot be overstated. Yet another three to four years of corrupt, visionless, selfinterested nincompoops in charge.

As for Brexit… Well lets just say that I’m glad my UK passport is via Scottish heritage. UK Labor continues to shoot themselves in the foot and seems willing to spend decades in opposition rather than, you know, listen to their constituents and represent some progressive democratic socialism.

I obviously cannot vote in the US election.

Earlier in the year, back during the primaries I watched with bated breath as Clinton and Sanders battled it out. Even as a Clinton Candidacy became a forgone conclusion I predicted vocally that if it became Clinton V Trump, Clinton would lose.

I really, really hope I was wrong.

I backed Bernie and I think it is one of the great tragedies of modern politics that thanks at least in part to malfeasance within the DNC we didn’t get to see Sanders actually wipe the floor with Trump.

Depending on where you look the US presidential election looks either a sure thing for Clinton or scary close.

hillary-clinton-evil-woman-3-777x437

Until recently I  honestly wasn’t sure who the worst candidate was. It is very much a Beast vs Smiler affair and there was not an immediately apparent least worst option for me. Don’t get me wrong, I am saying that I don’t like either of them with fairly equal vehemence. Clinton is a neolib a warmonger and firmly represents the status quo, she has deep social and fiscal ties with the fossil fuel industry and the banksters. She will perpetuate some of the worst elements of American foreign policy through the next decade. Worst of all I have absolutely zero confidence in her willingness to act decisively on climate change, which is now beyond urgent.

nostradumpus

Trump though, Trump is a monster. He has clearly outed himself as the worst option. He is perceived as an outsider candidate, to paraphrase Michael Moore, he is the Molotov the poor, disillusioned and disenfranchised can lob into the parliaments that have failed them. He will of course, if elected, fail them in new, interesting and spectacular fashion. The fact that he was and is even given the dignity of attention represents a failure of the media globally. I mean this is a man who managed to bankrupt a casino, A Casino! That shouldn’t even be possible. He should be treated like the repugnant prolapsed sphincter that he is and forgotten.

The status quo is not good enough, but it is nowhere near as bad as a Trump presidency could be for everyone on earth.

 

The link that got me started:

“Also, the large number of people that was unable to interpret our tool as anything but an effort to support or oppose a political candidate — and that was true for both liberals and conservatives — speaks to me about an ineffective public sphere. And that’s something I think we should all be concerned about. This polarization is not just a cliché. It is a crippling societal condition that is expressed in the inability of people to see any merit, or any point, in opposing views. That’s a dangerous, and chronic, institutional disease that is expressed also in the inability of people to criticize their own candidates, because they fear being confused with someone their peers will interpret as a supporter of the opposing candidate. If you cannot see any merit in the candidate you oppose, even in one or two of the many points that have been made, you may have it.”

https://medium.com/@cesifoti/what-i-learned-from-visualizing-hillary-clintons-leaked-emails-d13a0908e05e#.b70rr743z

Discussing this tool: https://clinton.media.mit.edu

 

 

 

Cursed images
by Kimliatach

Daily

Kindergarten is hard. I am honestly not sure I could take a whole year with a kindergarten class. They are such exhaustingly high maintenance. Give me upper primary any day. For now I have two days of freedom; creativity to unleash and garden work aplenty.

I was simply too shattered to post by the time the boys went down last night. watched some TV and hit the hay early.

Media

‘Before the Flood‘ is well timed and pertinent. There are some really very good interviews and some excellent visual storytelling. Good but not great as it is a bit too americocentric for broader international appeal. In trying very hard to not be alarmist it waters down its impact some too.

Watched Ep2 of season 3 ‘Black Mirror‘. I would be happy to slam the season over a couple of nights but N finds them all so deeply uncomfortable that we have to pace them out. Also gave an episode of ‘Billions‘ ago as N had watched some on a plane and liked it.

Episode 1 of S3 Black Mirror is still repeating on me. All in all it was a better episode than the second. One of the best to date in fact, rare insofar as it left the viewer with some catharsis. A deeply challenging look at reviewing culture. Rating people has been tried and fortunately roundly rejected a number of times so far. But, well ebay, AirBnB, Uber and a thousand other apps all encourage the daily ranking of both participants in every transaction. Will it ever get as bad as depicted in Black Mirror?

Hopefully never.

 

Found this collection of fantastically weird disquieting and disturbing images. Some I have seen before, some that will haunt my subconscious for years to come.

Enjoy, I love it.

 

 

Before The Flood
by Kimliatach

Daily

For a blessing today a day without a call out, spent productively at home with family. Mostly cleaning and fighting back the tide of disorder and filth that threatens to overrun our house in a tornado of play every day.

Tonight I am watching ‘Before The Flood‘ The Di Caprio climate film.

So far so good. Painting on my primary screen.

 

Found a lovely toy in this thread.

digitaldoily

https://codymoose.github.io/web-applications/DigitalDoily/index.html

Dubbo
by Kimliatach

Daily

Dubbo is not my favourite town. We got there and back in a day with mixed success; a number of tasks were completed but a few things, like the office chair I wanted to try sitting in and the lime tree we were hoping to plant were unavailable. We did do a massive shop at multiple stores and have laid in supplies for weeks ahead as well as many small bits and pieces that have been being missed. Our goal is to avoid purchasing anything other than regular and occasional perishables locally to avoid the paying the exorbitant Cobar tax.

Work is coming in thick and fast, another day with a kindergarten class today. Also continuing swapping rooms around, now almost complete. Big fight with my router to try and get USB storage accessible to all on the network Router 1: Kim 0. Not giving up yet though.

Yet again no painting today.

barcelona-mural

 One of many cool Barcelona street murals. A scene sorely lacking hereabouts.

Room Reversi & Green Thumbs
by Kimliatach

Daily

Huge I say ‘uge day. Finished laying a long path, began packing the edges, planted tons of seeds, dug up, split and replanted clumps of comfrey and arrowroot. Harvested carrots and began digging what I hope will be the final path to the new compost heaps.

Inside we bought car insurance, sorted toys and swapped our living room and office rooms around. A couple of items still need shifting but the office, bookshelves and couch are set up in their new locations.

I am officially wrecked and tomorrow I am forgoing a day of work for a one day Dubbo trip. We need to visit a number of businesses in our regional center on a weekday. Thankfully leaving the boys with grandparents prior to 7 AM. It will be a massive day involving 6+ hours driving 3 big box stores, 2 supermarkets and a certain government office to officially change N’s name on their systems.

No painting today, but a nice new spot in the house to do it in and a cleaner desk to boot.

new-path-pano

The new path connects the garage to two older paths and provides a pair of nice long straights for the boys to ride on with a graded curve between.  The new garden bed made from tin on the left is a right angle isosceles triangle 3.5m on the hypotenuse. The area between the paths is undergoing soil conditioning from a near clay pan state, today we planted a portion of the area with ‘Clucka Tucker‘.

Sweat and tears
by Kimliatach

Daily

A massive day in the garden left everyone hangry and fraught with a touch of sun. Most of a long new path complete and construction of the frame and walls for a new raised garden bed from recycled materials completed. I began filming the build process for this bed but due to lack of foresight lost battery. Tomorrow I plan to finish the path early and get some creative work in, time allowing I’ll begin filling the new bed as well.

This evening we went to the park to participate in the Festival of the Miners Ghost a local event with fireworks, market stalls and music in the main community park. We brought out my big bubble kit to enthusiastic acclaim from the target demographic.

 

Media

L'Image et le Pouvoir - Buste cuirassé de Marc Aurèle agé - 3.jpg

Image from Wikipedia

Yesterday I began listening to ‘Meditations‘ by Marcus Aurelius which is already pretty incredible. It is hardly an original comment, but it really is extraordinary how, apart from a few points of lifestyle like slave keeping, the day to day life and worries haven’t changed much even over two millennia.

During our time away I have listened to and read a number of books worth discussing. So I will endeavor to work my way through this list in time:

‘A wizard of Earthsea’ Ursula K LeGuin

‘The Fatal Shore’ Robert Hughes

‘Reamde’ Neil Stephenson

‘Quicksilver’ Neil Stephenson

‘Religion for Athiests’ Alain De Botton

‘To Hell and Back’ Ian Kershaw (Unfinshed)

‘Pyramids’ Terry Pratchett (Unfinished reread)

‘A Time Traveler’s Guide to Medieval England’ Ian Mortimer (Unfinished)

“Three Men in a Boat’ Jerome K Jerome and read by Hugh Lorrie (I think I may have talked about this one many months ago in one of the few posts I did while away.)

Sailing to Sarantium & God of Emporers by Guy Gavriel Kay (reread for me at least)

Tonight however, I am leaving it at that.

 

Sports Day
by Kimliatach

Daily

Crashed early yesterday after a day with a different year one class and mayhap I will tonight as well. Today was a massive inter-school sports day hosted by one of the local mines as community outreach. I had the pleasure of shepherding a kindergarten class through the experience.

Despite best efforts I have a touch of sun and will retire early again. Very keen to get into the garden tomorrow and hopefully get some art made as well.

My new phone arrived yesterday, what a joy functioning, fast tech can be. A chunk of my tax providing a sorely needed upgrade over the iPhone4 that has been limping along in my pocket since Christmas. N is also getting an upgrade over her GS3 to a GS7.

I’ll just keep sharing little things as they occur to me. One at a time is probably for the best though.

barcelona-bubbles

L chasing bubbles in the back streets of Barcelona.

PAINting
by Kimliatach

Daily

I’m painting tonight, roughing out some visualised drafts for evolution cards and maybe tinkering away a bit on a T-shirt image.

I have been torturing myself in dissatisfaction with some cards, in particular the castle card for months now. I have finally resolved to just get on with the evolution cards and leave the terrain cards alone for a little while. I figure provided I can start finishing things again, it will get easier as it goes.

I had another wild and wonderful day with year ones today and I have another lined up at the other school tomorrow. It is an exhausting business and all I want to do is paint and garden.

This sat unpublished in draft a long time. In the end I did get a good bit of painting in but I spent most of the evening having a good chat with an old friend which was well and truly worthwhile.

Memory

half-head

One of the striking experiences from my first trip to Amsterdam. The Bodyworlds exhibition by Gunther Von Hagens is incredible and confronting. Above the head of a human man plastinated and sliced neatly in half, below the brain, ganglia and primary nerve branches of another human man. 

brain-ganglia-and-nerves

Another memorable event for which we booked our first ever Airbnb (Affiliate link) the opening one off performance of the Edinburgh International Festival. Deep Time was projected onto Edinburgh castle and the cliffs below with musical accompaniment by Mogwai. Mesmerising and almost vertigo inducing the projections were superb.

It was really very special and our apartment on the royal mile set the standard for all the excellent Airbnb accommodations throughout the rest of the trip. In fact every apartment we booked that way was wonderful in one way or another. By contrast Booking.com, our other goto accommodation site was often extremely disappointing.