Monthly Archives: August 2007

Golden Mist

Monday, August 20, 2007

Watching some of the Presidential debates I'm really disgusted by the questions on gay marriage and gay rights. One of the real red herring questions in my opinion is the “do you think homosexuality is a choice?” question… While I do find the question interesting on a scientific level, I find it wholly irrelevant because it has such a nasty, nasty undercurrent — the idea that homosexuality is vile at face value, so it can only be somehow justified if “God made it so”. When it comes to making policy, who cares if someone chose it or had it “forced” on them — there's nothing wrong with it, so it's totally irrelevant.

Nefarious and I went to my doctor today, who reluctantly prescribed me Lyrica, a new drug that aggressively targets neuropathic pain (phantom limb pain basically). While I healed in a week from the knee surgery, I still have escalating Type II CRPS from when nerves were severed in my biopsy back in January — I can't wear pants, socks, or even have a blanket on my leg at night because it hurts so much… It kind of sucks.

That said, I'm a little worried about the side effects. I like one of them — “euphoria” — but there are plenty that are less fun like weight gain and worse stuff like memory impairment, lethargy, speech disorders, loss of libido, erectile dysfunction, and other crappy stuff. I quit smoking pot a month and a half ago (totally), and am in really good shape right now, and really don't want to deal with any of that crap… so I might not take it for long, we'll see. I'd rather be in pain when it comes right down to it.

Hopefully I won't have any side effects and it won't come to that.

I've been eating mountains of fresh sprouts lately. Mountains. A big salad bowl or two a day! I've been eating a lot in general and have put on about five pounds this week I think, haha… For supper I made a noodle and bay scallop dish in sort of a lime-honey hosin sauce, using the strange secret ingredient of goat parmesan cheese which sounds weird, but actually worked incredibly well.

Other than that I got a MIDI controller keyboard. In between a couple hours of doing a wide variety of medical and dental procedures on every one of Nefarious's toy ponies (they're very sickly it seems), I probably annoyed everyone who could hear it with endless prog rock keyboard riffs… I love big fat analog synth sounds and random noodling away with whatever instrument is nearby… Nefarious did the same although she's more of a free jazz aficionado than prog rock fan.
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I like working my wood

Monday, August 20, 2007

I did another carving experiment today after looking at Islamic art at the museum. It's a really simple experiment (with the bumpmap drawn in Photoshop by hand by the way) of some simple weaving just to get an idea of how detailed the machine can produce it, as well as giving me more ideas on how to generate the source images and how they translate into wood.

I wanted to do a “woven” design because I think my next project is going to be a simple chair — a three legged stool, with either a pillow or a rope coil pad, and then a carved rim. The legs will be out of flat board (rather than dowel) and carved as well. That said…

…I really need to make some picture frames! These types of patterns would work nicely on those as well. The funny thing is, as I've hand finished a lot of it, I find that I much prefer working with my hands than I do designing on the computer. The one good thing about the world economy being about to collapse is that hopefully working with your hands will finally become competitive again with what can be mass produced.

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Back to the land! Next week I am going to go and look at some yurts… I figure it's the ideal structure for me to have. It's a portable structure that I can pay off without debt (there is no way I'm going to have a mortgage — I was talking to a friend about their beautiful farm, and while I am very jealous of the fine land, I am not jealous of their bank relationship), is portable, and can be anything from a temporary home (and then guest home) while I built a sand-bag house (or whatever), to something that I live in long term.

A few people have questioned whether it's good parenting to want to live somewhere rural and build a house from scratch and live in a glorified tent (which is what a yurt is, I suppose), but personally when I think back on my own upbringing, most of the memories I have — and thus I assume the things that shaped me — are of farm work, my parents making things and building things, and independent thinking and living. Who knows how I'd have turned out if they'd stayed in the city. Maybe better, maybe worse, but I have nothing but good things to say about my childhood.

Why should I mourn the passing of my people? Tribes are made of men, nothing more. Men come and go like the waves of the sea. Even the white man, whose God walks and talks with him as friend to friend, cannot be exempt from the common destiny. We may be brothers after all, we shall see.

One thing we know which the white man may one day discover. Our God is the same God. You may think now that you own Him as you wish to own our land. But you cannot. He is the God of man. And hit compassion is equal for the red man and the white. This earth is precious to Him. And to harm the earth is to heap contempt on its Creator. The whites, too, shall pass - perhaps sooner than other tribes. Continue to contaminate your bed and you will one night suffocate in your own waste.

But in your perishing you will shine brightly, fired by the strength of the God who brought you to this land, and for some special purpose gave you dominion over this land and over the red man. That destiny is a mystery to us, for we do not understand when the buffalo are all slaughtered, the wild horses are tamed, the secret corners of the forest are heavy with the scent of many men, and the view of the ripe hills is blotted by talking wires. Where is the thicket? Gone. Where is the eagle? Gone. And what is it to say goodbye to the swift pony and the hunt? The end of living and the beginning of survival.

We might understand if we knew what it was that the white man dreams, what hopes he describes to his children on long winter nights, what visions he burns into their minds, so that they will wish for tomorrow. But we are savages. The white man's dreams are hidden from us. And because they are hidden, we will go our own way.

That's a quote from Chief Seattle in a letter to the US President Franklin Pierce in 1854… I was thinking of it today because it's excerpted in a book I was reading on how to build a house for $500. Seems like a good deal for a house?

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Seafood Dishes

Monday, August 20, 2007

Today and yesterday were both seafood dinners. Yesterday I got a cheap tray of salmon remainders (like where it's all chopped up strips — really cheap). It was really basic — just a stir fry with mixed veggies, the fish, udon noodles, and all put together in a Thai green curry sauce (yeah, from a jar, but it was really good). Nothing too it.

That dish was fairly heavy, so tonight I decided to cook something really light, and make it totally from scratch as well — and with the condition that I use an avocado in the dish, because today was the last day it was going to be nice and solid. In the photo on the right you can see everything I used.

I started by stir-frying some red pepper and red onion in macadamia nut oil, fresh garlic, and dill, with half a lime's juice, and some seaweed and sea salt (no other spices). After I think about five minutes I tossed in the shrimp, and then a few minutes later the udon noodles (which I'd done the two minute pre-cook on while doing the stir-fry). A moment later I added the rest of the dill, some green onion, and the other half of the lime's juice. Finally, I added the chopped avocado, cooked that for about thirty seconds, and took it off the heat.

It sat for a few minutes, and was served with a very light drizzle of lime. I'm really happy with how it turned out. I wasn't sure if the avocado would fly or not (I was pretty sure about the dill and lime, but that's basic) — it totally did. Success! Yay!

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Stretched Lobes on Beverley Hills 90210, circa '93

Monday, August 20, 2007

I'm always interested when people in the mainstream are first exposed to body piercing… in part because it reflects the popularity of the lifestyle, and in part because when body modification cracks into the mainstream a lot of people who wouldn't have otherwise have a “eureka! that's for me!” type moment and decide they want to do it as well.

Anyway, I was watching Beverly Hills 90210, Episode 4.03 (”Little Fish” if you want to find it on YouTube or something — 2:58 in that clip by the way, not that the quality is very good) yesterday — yeah, laugh it up — and at the start of the episode, where they're in line signing up for classes at university, there's a guy that appears to have on lobe stretched to about 3/4″, as well as a labret piercing. This episode first aired September 22nd, 1993.

That predates the opening of nearly every piercing studio currently in existence. If it's not just a trick of lighting or something (I'm sure the labret is real, but am 50/50 on the lobe stretching), it's an incredibly early body piercing exposure in the mainstream media.

Can anyone confirm this or get me a higher quality shot for the BME encyclopedia? Or maybe even I'll get lucky and someone knows who this is so I can find out if the piercings are real, fake, or imagined? And is this the earliest TV body piercing reference in truly mainstream pop culture? It's got to be close… The earliest movie I can think of is Silence of the Lambs (1991).

(Original forum unavailable, sorry)*
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ROM disappointments… not really

Monday, August 20, 2007

Nefarious and I went to the ROM (museum) this morning. I'd heard the dinosaur exhibit (as well as the crystal) was open so I told her we could go check it out — unfortunately when I got there I overheard something that sounded a lot like “we're sorry, the dinosaur exhibit is closed” so when we got to the desk I asked the same question the previous guy had… And yes, it was still closed.

The good news was that first it got us (well, half of us — the smaller half) free admittance, and also, they told us we could go up to the “under construction” wing where they were setting up the exhibit and look at the T-Rex which was already out, and watch them uncrating and setting up the rest. But mostly the time was spent in the kids areas, the Egyptian part (all the burial stuff generates the most questions), and of course running through the bat cave.

Hopefully on Friday some friends are coming up to Toronto to visit and we'll go to the Science Centre or the CNE (and if not, I'll do that another day because it's always fun). Anyway, after the ROM we went on a super long walk — probably put another ten km on my well healed leg — and had some vegetarian food for lunch… It's healed well enough that I managed to sprain it a few days ago while running around! I was temporarily worried, but that's all better now. As soon as school starts I'll be back at the gym.
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Latest Carving Project

Monday, August 20, 2007

I made a box today; my first “real” one that was intended to be kept rather than just a throw-away test piece. It was a three piece carving — a lid with a carving on the top (a polynesian pattern with a Dr. BME raised in the middle), a bottom panel with a raised skull, and a riser because the board was quite thin.

The skull and Dr. BME designs were essentially two dimensional so they didn't look the greatest, so I re-carved them by hand with a Dremel, which greatly improved them. The recessed edge on the bottom of the lid (to make it sit in place) was carved with a Dremel and then cleaned up with a file (which a wise person once told me was “the poor man's milling machine”).

I glued it together (which you can see happening in the background above), sanded it all so everything fit nicely and it was smooth, and stained it (three colors; the skull and Dr. BME are lighter than the box itself which is sesame colored), and put some rubber feet on it. The picture isn't really very accurate in terms of color but you get the idea.

It's far from perfect but I think it turned out fairly well for a first attempt. It really does look nicer in person, but here's a shot of the final piece.

I probably got a bit lazy and should have done a touch more filing and sanding, but now that I've done this, I have lots of other ideas… I really need to do picture frames because that's why I got it in the first place, but little things like this are a lot of fun so who knows what I'll make next…

Tomorrow I'm thinking about going to the ROM because they've re-opened the dinosaur exhibit…

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