(I'm the red dot on the top right-hand 'corner' of the "3" - not visible at this size. If you click on the photo, it'll take you to a larger size, and I should just about be big enough to see.)
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Friday, October 23, 2009
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
survey day two
Turns out standing/walking/sitting around outside for twelve hours leaves you feeling a bit wombled. Who knew?
Yesterday seemed to drag on much more than Saturday had: maybe it was starting two hours earlier that did it, maybe it was that the novelty had worn off, maybe it was down to being in two different locations. Certainly, yesterday seemed not to be my day: I kept dropping things, ripped a hole in the leg of my shorts (I did a very geeky/punk-rock - not two terms you'd expect to see in combination, I'll admit - mending job on them, with electrical tape and safety pins), almost lost a couple of the maps I needed, fell over and scraped my palms and bruised my knee rather impressively... Like I said, not my day.
But, it's now all over and done with, and I will at least be rewarded for my (sadly all too literal, what with the bruised knee, not to mention the safety pins holding my trousers together that kept stabbing me in the leg) pains.
Yesterday seemed to drag on much more than Saturday had: maybe it was starting two hours earlier that did it, maybe it was that the novelty had worn off, maybe it was down to being in two different locations. Certainly, yesterday seemed not to be my day: I kept dropping things, ripped a hole in the leg of my shorts (I did a very geeky/punk-rock - not two terms you'd expect to see in combination, I'll admit - mending job on them, with electrical tape and safety pins), almost lost a couple of the maps I needed, fell over and scraped my palms and bruised my knee rather impressively... Like I said, not my day.
But, it's now all over and done with, and I will at least be rewarded for my (sadly all too literal, what with the bruised knee, not to mention the safety pins holding my trousers together that kept stabbing me in the leg) pains.
Sunday, October 18, 2009
here comes the sun
No wonder we were all complaining about the heat yesterday: turns out we hit a maximum of 36.9 C. And it was 36.5 at three in the afternoon.
This was all made extra fun by the fact that I was mostly outdoors between 8am and 10pm, having signed up to help with a Public Life, Public Space survey in Midland Town Centre. This involved, among other activities, standing at various points along a pre-arranged circuit, counting the number of pedestrians passing in a ten-minute period. I lucked out and was able to sit in the shade at most of the points I had to cover, but it was still just a tad warm.
Thankfully, yesterday seems to have been a bit of a fluke, as it's back down to 24 degrees right now. Still, summer is definitely on the way: soon, it will be time for barbecues and beach trips, flip flops and ice creams - and lots and lots of sunscreen.
This was all made extra fun by the fact that I was mostly outdoors between 8am and 10pm, having signed up to help with a Public Life, Public Space survey in Midland Town Centre. This involved, among other activities, standing at various points along a pre-arranged circuit, counting the number of pedestrians passing in a ten-minute period. I lucked out and was able to sit in the shade at most of the points I had to cover, but it was still just a tad warm.
Thankfully, yesterday seems to have been a bit of a fluke, as it's back down to 24 degrees right now. Still, summer is definitely on the way: soon, it will be time for barbecues and beach trips, flip flops and ice creams - and lots and lots of sunscreen.
Monday, October 05, 2009
libraries
I'm feeling unreasonably proud of myself for renewing my library books in a timely fashion, thus avoiding my third set of fines in a while. I don't particularly mind paying library fines, as a) they're always my own fault, and b) they go to support libraries, which I'm all in favour of. Still, it's nice to know that I won't have to make sure I have change on me when I take my current stack of books back in a week or so.
Have I mentioned before how much I love libraries? Because I really do. There's something amazing about being able to read books for free, as many times as you like (as long as, unlike me, you return them on time). I suppose you could technically read books for free in a bookshop, and some bookshops actively encourage this type of long-term browsing (Borders, I'm looking at you and your comfy chairs), but it's not really an ideal solution. I certainly feel guilty if I read more than about a book chapter in a bookshop, but not so in a library!
Plus, libraries in my experience have always had a nice atmosphere: quiet, but not too quiet, and with plenty of activities to encourage reading, particularly among children. And then my local library also has things like a bookswap, and a community jigsaw puzzle (they put all the pieces and the box on a designated table, and anybody can sit down and add a few pieces; when the jigsaw is completed, the put out a new one), and a battery collection point, and so on.
Speaking of libraries, I should probably head into the campus one myself (I've just been having a cup of tea and checking my emails in the library cafe): work calls!
Have I mentioned before how much I love libraries? Because I really do. There's something amazing about being able to read books for free, as many times as you like (as long as, unlike me, you return them on time). I suppose you could technically read books for free in a bookshop, and some bookshops actively encourage this type of long-term browsing (Borders, I'm looking at you and your comfy chairs), but it's not really an ideal solution. I certainly feel guilty if I read more than about a book chapter in a bookshop, but not so in a library!
Plus, libraries in my experience have always had a nice atmosphere: quiet, but not too quiet, and with plenty of activities to encourage reading, particularly among children. And then my local library also has things like a bookswap, and a community jigsaw puzzle (they put all the pieces and the box on a designated table, and anybody can sit down and add a few pieces; when the jigsaw is completed, the put out a new one), and a battery collection point, and so on.
Speaking of libraries, I should probably head into the campus one myself (I've just been having a cup of tea and checking my emails in the library cafe): work calls!
Saturday, October 03, 2009
Saturday Poem
Poem in October
Dylan Thomas
It was my thirtieth year to heaven
Woke to my hearing from harbour and neighbour wood
And the mussel pooled and the heron
Priested shore
The morning beckon
With water praying and call of seagull and rook
And the knock of sailing boats on the net webbed wall
Myself to set foot
That second
In the still sleeping town and set forth.
My birthday began with the water-
Birds and the birds of the winged trees flying my name
Above the farms and the white horses
And I rose
In rainy autumn
And walked abroad in a shower of all my days.
High tide and the heron dived when I took the road
Over the border
And the gates
Of the town closed as the town awoke.
A springful of larks in a rolling
Cloud and the roadside bushes brimming with whistling
Blackbirds and the sun of October
Summery
On the hill's shoulder,
Here were fond climates and sweet singers suddenly
Come in the morning where I wandered and listened
To the rain wringing
Wind blow cold
In the wood faraway under me.
Pale rain over the dwindling harbour
And over the sea wet church the size of a snail
With its horns through mist and the castle
Brown as owls
But all the gardens
Of spring and summer were blooming in the tall tales
Beyond the border and under the lark full cloud.
There could I marvel
My birthday
Away but the weather turned around.
It turned away from the blithe country
And down the other air and the blue altered sky
Streamed again a wonder of summer
With apples
Pears and red currants
And I saw in the turning so clearly a child's
Forgotten mornings when he walked with his mother
Through the parables
Of sun light
And the legends of the green chapels
And the twice told fields of infancy
That his tears burned my cheeks and his heart moved in mine.
These were the woods the river and sea
Where a boy
In the listening
Summertime of the dead whispered the truth of his joy
To the trees and the stones and the fish in the tide.
And the mystery
Sang alive
Still in the water and singingbirds.
And there could I marvel my birthday
Away but the weather turned around. And the true
Joy of the long dead child sang burning
In the sun.
It was my thirtieth
Year to heaven stood there then in the summer noon
Though the town below lay leaved with October blood.
O may my heart's truth
Still be sung
On this high hill in a year's turning.
Dylan Thomas
It was my thirtieth year to heaven
Woke to my hearing from harbour and neighbour wood
And the mussel pooled and the heron
Priested shore
The morning beckon
With water praying and call of seagull and rook
And the knock of sailing boats on the net webbed wall
Myself to set foot
That second
In the still sleeping town and set forth.
My birthday began with the water-
Birds and the birds of the winged trees flying my name
Above the farms and the white horses
And I rose
In rainy autumn
And walked abroad in a shower of all my days.
High tide and the heron dived when I took the road
Over the border
And the gates
Of the town closed as the town awoke.
A springful of larks in a rolling
Cloud and the roadside bushes brimming with whistling
Blackbirds and the sun of October
Summery
On the hill's shoulder,
Here were fond climates and sweet singers suddenly
Come in the morning where I wandered and listened
To the rain wringing
Wind blow cold
In the wood faraway under me.
Pale rain over the dwindling harbour
And over the sea wet church the size of a snail
With its horns through mist and the castle
Brown as owls
But all the gardens
Of spring and summer were blooming in the tall tales
Beyond the border and under the lark full cloud.
There could I marvel
My birthday
Away but the weather turned around.
It turned away from the blithe country
And down the other air and the blue altered sky
Streamed again a wonder of summer
With apples
Pears and red currants
And I saw in the turning so clearly a child's
Forgotten mornings when he walked with his mother
Through the parables
Of sun light
And the legends of the green chapels
And the twice told fields of infancy
That his tears burned my cheeks and his heart moved in mine.
These were the woods the river and sea
Where a boy
In the listening
Summertime of the dead whispered the truth of his joy
To the trees and the stones and the fish in the tide.
And the mystery
Sang alive
Still in the water and singingbirds.
And there could I marvel my birthday
Away but the weather turned around. And the true
Joy of the long dead child sang burning
In the sun.
It was my thirtieth
Year to heaven stood there then in the summer noon
Though the town below lay leaved with October blood.
O may my heart's truth
Still be sung
On this high hill in a year's turning.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
you are feeling sleepy
When I come home on the bus in the middle of the afternoon, I often get the overwhelming urge to take an afternoon nap. This is of course tricky to do on public transport, so I tell myself to "just stay awake until you get home, and then you can sleep!".
Of course, the five-minute walk from the bus stop is then just enough to wake me up to the point where I no longer need a nap, but unfortunately, it doesn't wake me up enough to be actually awake and alert. Since this is generally fixable with a nice cup of tea, I don't mind overly much, I could just do without the "on bus, need sleep, must stay awake to get off at the right stop" bit.
Of course, the five-minute walk from the bus stop is then just enough to wake me up to the point where I no longer need a nap, but unfortunately, it doesn't wake me up enough to be actually awake and alert. Since this is generally fixable with a nice cup of tea, I don't mind overly much, I could just do without the "on bus, need sleep, must stay awake to get off at the right stop" bit.
Monday, September 21, 2009
Get Excited and Call People
I just called the government! And it was really exciting!
To explain: today is the Global Wake-Up Call, and thousands of people worldwide are calling their governments, asking them to go to Copenhagen in December with the goal of signing a Fair, Ambitious, and Binding (FAB) treaty on climate change action.
Now, I hate calling people I don't know, especially Official people I don't know, so this was a little bit of a reach outside my comfort zone. But this is definitely something important enough to make that reach, so I did it. And I'm really glad I did: all the flaws in our version of democracy aside, it's rather cool that I can call the Prime Minister's office, or any other government department I choose, and at least leave a message.
And yes, it's only one message, but multiply that by the hundreds of callers in Australia so far (and people have only been calling for two hours at this point), plus all the other countries in the world, and it adds up to something pretty big. As the email from Avaaz said: "14,000 calls reversed the Brazilian President's position on a new climate protection law, 3,000 calls persuaded the German Chancellor's party to engage with climate groups, just a few hundred calls got the attention of top advisors to French President Sarkozy."
That's pretty amazing, and worth being part of, and I'm really glad I overcame my fear of the phone for the ten minutes it took to place those calls.
To explain: today is the Global Wake-Up Call, and thousands of people worldwide are calling their governments, asking them to go to Copenhagen in December with the goal of signing a Fair, Ambitious, and Binding (FAB) treaty on climate change action.
Now, I hate calling people I don't know, especially Official people I don't know, so this was a little bit of a reach outside my comfort zone. But this is definitely something important enough to make that reach, so I did it. And I'm really glad I did: all the flaws in our version of democracy aside, it's rather cool that I can call the Prime Minister's office, or any other government department I choose, and at least leave a message.
And yes, it's only one message, but multiply that by the hundreds of callers in Australia so far (and people have only been calling for two hours at this point), plus all the other countries in the world, and it adds up to something pretty big. As the email from Avaaz said: "14,000 calls reversed the Brazilian President's position on a new climate protection law, 3,000 calls persuaded the German Chancellor's party to engage with climate groups, just a few hundred calls got the attention of top advisors to French President Sarkozy."
That's pretty amazing, and worth being part of, and I'm really glad I overcame my fear of the phone for the ten minutes it took to place those calls.
Sunday, September 13, 2009
a jumbled list of thoughts for your perusal
- It's time to pull out the Moleskine again and get creative. To which end I've just 'painted' a couple of pages with a wet teabag. Once it's dry, let the sketching begin: I need to do a little something that has no purpose other than that I enjoy doing it, something that is what it is and is good the way it is. That's what happens when you're in the middle of writing an essay on the role of the courts in protecting environmental rights and are having a hard time getting a handle on your answer, I suppose.
- Said essay question is interesting but slightly oddly phrased, and I can't help feeling that I'm going to end up talking about the roles of other organisations as well, which (since they're not specifically mentioned in the essay question) concerns me rather. I dislike feeling like I don't quite have an answer to the exact question of the essay: the solution is either to find a new answer, or to rephrase the question, and I haven't exactly managed either. Oh well, it's the first assignment for a module that the organisers themselves admit is tough, so at this point I'm not too worried.
- The other day I was walking to the bus stop and noticed that the fig tree at the end of our street had suddenly started leafing. The leaves were simultaneously delicate (all crinkled and veined and fragile) and feisty (the brightest new green you can imagine), and the sun shone through them with such joy and enthusiasm: it was a real gift from the day to me, and made me smile all the way into town.
- I've been laid low with some sort of stomach bug/food poisoning/virus thing for the past few days, which has been rather unpleasant. Much ginger ale and many crackers later, I seem to be recovering, huzzah.
- Said essay question is interesting but slightly oddly phrased, and I can't help feeling that I'm going to end up talking about the roles of other organisations as well, which (since they're not specifically mentioned in the essay question) concerns me rather. I dislike feeling like I don't quite have an answer to the exact question of the essay: the solution is either to find a new answer, or to rephrase the question, and I haven't exactly managed either. Oh well, it's the first assignment for a module that the organisers themselves admit is tough, so at this point I'm not too worried.
- The other day I was walking to the bus stop and noticed that the fig tree at the end of our street had suddenly started leafing. The leaves were simultaneously delicate (all crinkled and veined and fragile) and feisty (the brightest new green you can imagine), and the sun shone through them with such joy and enthusiasm: it was a real gift from the day to me, and made me smile all the way into town.
- I've been laid low with some sort of stomach bug/food poisoning/virus thing for the past few days, which has been rather unpleasant. Much ginger ale and many crackers later, I seem to be recovering, huzzah.
Tuesday, August 04, 2009
title
Semester started up this week, and I'm having distinct "get off my lawn!" feelings about the number of people on campus. Apparently, it's the biggest intake of new students ever, which somewhat explains the massive crush of people in the halls and on the walkways. It's also likely that a lot of people are attending their first lectures before deciding they'd rather listen to them online, which should bring the numbers down a bit.
In slightly more exciting news: my parents arrive in about eleven hours! This means we'll be driving out to the airport at about midnight to pick them up, but them's the breaks. And it should make it a little easier for them to deal with the jetlag.
*excited*
In slightly more exciting news: my parents arrive in about eleven hours! This means we'll be driving out to the airport at about midnight to pick them up, but them's the breaks. And it should make it a little easier for them to deal with the jetlag.
*excited*
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