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| Okay punks
I can't make you visit my blog at its new address
but i can tell you what you'll find: spaceships, someone who thought i would prophetically tell them the secrets of their heart, a bathroom where you'll really get to know the neighbours, everythig you ever needed to know about money (except strategic investment strategies with a high return) and even your friendly neighbourhood drugstore and why it might be better than slurpees.
Okay. My new PR SUCKS. but I do have a cool picture at the top, and you'll have to go there to see it.
http://www.meredithbroughton.blogspot.com
don't think. just do it.
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| http://meredithbroughton.blogspot.com
(i'd only had about 2 hours sleep before that entry, but it's now or never)
seeyas.
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| as some have done before me, i'm considering switching sites over... mostly due to simplicity of use and visuals, not that i don't appreciate the Xanga community at large anymore. However, the bigger issue is that I have far less to write about these days - far more, in a sense, but far less given the audience. For example, I really wanted to tell the story about running into Bullhorn Guy last week. I told the story in St. Catharines. I told it to my coworkers. But to tell it online and put it in a final format keeps those words out there permanently, and I'm not sure if I want to do that - even though it's the most dramatic thing that happened in weeks. (However, ask me about it in person ;)) And there's much less coming in to inspire me these days, and I don't want to pass on the same dragged-down feelings to others, so I'd rather go to a format more suited for sporadic posting --> and perhaps create multiple blogs with multiple foci. So, all that said... new site(s) coming soon :) And in my (last) post of borrowed genius, I saw some furniture by the architect Zaha Hadid yesterday, but was really intrigued by her buildings. After doing a few minutes of further searching for her work I found this October 2007 article about "Architects that Changed the Way We Travel" with her work and many others' in it. Both those are interesting, but I really admire her aesthetic. I find that as I live in a city that possesses both a rich architectural history and some truly awful building and planning decisions, I think a lot more about future building decisions and the shape they will take. I also think about how the world will build residences in the future - their aesthetics, function, efficiency. I don't have many answers... but I would like to look at this type of thing, rather than my own words, for now. | | |
| i was just about to leave, and then this started at 5 p.m.
Wow. I knew there are sea creatures that glow, change shape, change colour. I had no idea this shapeshifting, lightning-fast colour changing creature was out there - or that it could change shape as well to resemble coral or other creatures.
Click the "watch in high quality" link (just below the volume control) on this video to see the "strobe light" effect.
Or watch them camoflauge themselves instantly around 0:22 into this one.
Whatever humans can make - and we make a lot of amazing stuff - its nowhere near the complexity and brilliance of one little cuttlefish darting across the ocean floor.
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| Today didn't start out so well.
I went to return this book, (which I tried to do a week ago, and was informed that I was two days too early to return anything.) Apparently today was a day or so too late to return the book, and just as they kindly told me I could wait around until the manager returned from somewhere else on campus and speak to him about an exception, I kindly replied there wasn't much chance I'd be spending my day doing that. Not that my time's worth everything and I can't be bothered to wait around, but when you schedule six things into your day, an extra half-hour is precious time for a return that's not guaranteed. (I just listed the book on Amazon, since I doubt any of you want to do some light cardiology reading.. teehee.)
The rest of the day went somewhat better... I drew a heart diagram to illustrate some particular vessels, and remembered I do have artistic talent.. I was going through some sketchbooks last night, and realized work that I was previously very critical of... really was alright.
Time, again... always the factor..
But the interesting stuff came tonight!
I (attempted) to attend a meeting about Hamilton Light Rail - it was at a downtown coffeehouse. While I did get to the meeting eventually, I was there an hour early (as planned; to do a little reading).
While immersed in my book; however, an entirely different meeting started around me! It wasn't what I was there for, but it was a group reflecting and discussing a project done in Portland with public community space; and what might be done here in the same vein.
The girl reading a prize-winning novel beside me at the table was just there for a coffee, and had no connection to either meeting.
And as is typical at such events, the warm and bubbly and personable and hopeful organizer of the meeting also had her speech sprinkled with resentment against certain categories of people.... and the eyes of the poor girl beside me started to bug out right around her mention of said "warmongering capitalist pigs" in the Alberta tar sands (don't ask me how that connects to creating community space in Portland :P). Unfortunately, this is about the time I finished my coffee, got a refill, found out where the other meeting was........ and, I suppose, effectively abandoned my acquaintance.
I wonder how much longer she stayed? 
The HLR meeting went well. It was good to meet a couple folks who have worked very hard first of all to research and clarify what light rail might mean... and then worked very hard at educating and informing people about it and thinking creatively of ways to promote it.
What always hits me about this project... aside from all the financial benefits, and all the costs to build.... the end result, if it's done and done well, will be (in my mind) one of the bigger things that can be done to unify the suburbs and the downtown, and bring the mindsets of each group closer together.
Image, speed, reliability, normalizing of commuting by transit, greater accessibility of all areas of the city to each other, many financial benefits to the city as a whole... sure, there's all these things involved... but it always hits me "hm, in 10 years, if this is all said and done and executed to the top of what light rail transit does offer, and not a shoddy half-bit budget solution, how will people's thinking change?" Looking at other cities gives me a lot of food for thought on how this might progress, and it's overwhelmingly positive.
(There's much, much, much more to this of course... and a long way to go before this is even happening for sure.... city funding committed, for one. This is just one of the things that always hits me about this project).
(This game looks extremely fun (like "Bejeweled, Attack Version!"). I'm going to play it again.. my single attempt didn't work out so well.).
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