Emerging

People are strange

Spotted
Originally uploaded by mentalese.

The recent visit to Saltaire and in particular the Charlotte Street Social Center was a real eye opener. This is a picture of the locals that I took undercover with my camera at the start of the night. The characters in this room each had a movie in just their faces. As for The Act, a singer with gags then...

Of course I was mesmerised. A southerner Op North. On enquiry then apparently these Phoenix Nights are quite common and not the invention of Peter Kay.

Fly

oko w oko
Originally uploaded by leniwiec72.

This is where photography comes into its own for me, the so-called 'Macro' shot. We don't see this, we see an average world. Millions of pictures spliced together but here we get one perfect shot. Okay it looks a little staged...

Moving frameworks

Old Tree
Originally uploaded by abozaid.

Everything exists in dimensional space. We form ideas with expressions received through our culture. New expressions are emerging into common langauge that can gather more thought, position ideas better, hold more fruit.

Language is the tree we hang ideas from. Jesus must now be crucified on n-dimensional virtual reality for his association with good to be re-affirmed.

We cannot hang modern ideas from ancient trees.

Half awake

Half asleep. Art. Trance. A Zen moment. When we are all senses and without thought, reasoning instinct, neuro-pharmacologically sublime.

When pictures flow large and whole, unadulterated, unquestioned, uninterpreted.

When we can just stare at something and feel content.

Minds melt. Mine akin water.

Lake District

Another batch of pictures have just been uploaded to my Flickr account.

I found a nice tool called JUploader which made the batch upload nice and easy.

I am also starting to get used to using the flickr hyperlinking on comments, favourites, tags and searches to find my "picture network".

The Lake District

First let's get that bad stuff out of the way. This English haven for walkers and the out-door types is pretty much inaccessible to those without a car. The roads are very narrow and there are rarely paths through the surrounding farm land so anyone wanting to walk between two towns has to risk their lives with the local S.U.V.s, Land rovers and city-dweller Mercedes. Even the Lake District is an unsustainable playground for the rich. I am sure there is a way to get into the wilderness without using too much oil buts its far from obvious how.

Anyway, less of the rant, the Lake District is an incredible place once you find the footpaths. We walked for hours without seeing a soul. Its like being in a postcard but without the cheesiness. Water is everywhere, streams, lakes, drizzle and waterfalls. The whole landscape is sculptured by blue gold.

And camping, I'd forgotten what a joy it is. If you live in Oxford you really appreciate waking with sweet fresh air in your lungs. Then a quick dash to the showers to freshen up starts the day and gets you ready for the camping stove fun. We did porridge with cranberries and bananas which when accompanied with a big hot cupper set you up beautifully. Hiking out with a belly full of energy is a joyous moment. I noticed we could not stop rabbiting on about all sorts of things. Like those teenage stoned moments without the herb.

I was in an incredible good mood when I got back. Of course the 800+ emails I had to sort through on returning to work had a dampening effect but the inner chi is energised. I just denoted £50 smackers to the WWF (And No! Mr Adsense guys, this is not breaking your rules, I really did just do this!)

Anyway, while I am still dizzy on nature, my message: our cities stink, get out of your cars, turn the TV off, alcohol only subdues your problems...Get out there, natural beauty pisses over anything man-made.

Cricket Road

Is has damp but is a robust house.

Rangoli

There seems to be a lead here, rangoli have striking similarities to fractals but were obviously conjured millenia before. I should learn more about the origins.

From looking at wikipedia it seems rangoli refers mostly to the method of art and geometric patterns are not the most common type (mostly images from nature such as peacocks, mango and flowers) but geometric rangoli there are and this seems to be my link.

It seems the swastika is a common motif.

Charles Street

Is damp.

Paddington cannot be forgotten

Homage to paddington bear.

Childhood stories - pooh bear

What was it about these characters that I loved so much when I was young. I had Pooh world above my bed headboard in the form of a poster and could stare at it endlessly. Is this why I like honey so much, why I seem to adopt tigger as a nickname, and last week watched a film about a donkey. Piglet bemused me a bit but otherwise I loved reading the antics of this funny crew.

Paddington bear too had some sort of good old english charm, a security in familair innocence, a rare bit of solidarity.

Ah, happy times!

Take 2

This is the moment when six weeks of rehearsals at the kids summer camp in Andalucia should have born fruit. Here you can see three witches (they were actually just little terrors) just after the curtain had been raised and they were s'posed to start chanting their incantations...in english. Giggles turned into hysterical laughter and we had to lower the curtain, unleash some consternation and basically try again. Ode to being a eighteen year old english teacher.