Skip to content

The Iron in Our Blood

For a couple of days I was down for the count. Back to normal now, more or less, and the week has come to an end. Nothing particularly noteworthy about it. Other than we’ve got one more to go before Spring break. We’re going to sit down together this weekend to figure out what needs to go on our Seattle and Portland lists. And which items are absolute MUSTS vs. Would-Be-Nice-Tos. Squeezing in time with family and friends goes at the top. Spending an evening with Karl Urban while watching Dredd at the Cinerama would be nice.

Five random good or interesting things for Friday:

  • This piece about The Overprotected Kid hit a chord with me. “A preoccupation with safety has stripped childhood of independence, risk taking, and discovery—without making it safer. A new kind of playground points to a better solution.” I’ll admit to being an overprotective parent and my son’s childhood is vastly different from my own. But he has autism and is far too trusting so it’s been harder to allow him more autonomy. I worry that he will always be vulnerable.
  • Oh how I adore thee, Felicia Day. She totally nails it. “Most lead characters and lead actors of movies are white.” What we see on the big screen (and on smaller ones) doesn’t reflect our nation’s or our planet’s populations. On a related note, “7 Problematic Lessons Disney Movies Teach Boys About Masculinity
  • Why Creativity Necessitates Eclecticism: Nick Cave’s Influences and Inspirations and a bit more in depth about Networked Knowledge and Combinatorial Creativity
  • Getting a lot of attention this week: NASA Study Concludes When Civilization Will End, And It’s Not Looking Good for Us. More here:

    Analyzing five risk factors for societal collapse (population, climate, water, agriculture and energy), the report says that the sudden downfall of complicated societal structures can follow when these factors converge to form two important criteria. Motesharrei’s report says that all societal collapses over the past 5,000 years have involved both “the stretching of resources due to the strain placed on the ecological carrying capacity” and “the economic stratification of society into Elites [rich] and Masses (or “Commoners”) [poor].”

    Clearly humanity needs to get its act together as a whole. Not just pockets of forward thinking folks here and there. But they are out there. Many being supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. And some folks trying to tackle the overpopulation angle, among other things, have come up with the Electric Eel condom. Interesting stuff. Read more about it and/or contribute here.

  • Last Friday I photographed a Dinner on the Farm event at Fika, the lovely restaurant in the gorgeous American Swedish Institute. And next Friday I’ll be seeing more Swedes, at The Hex. The awesome Allvaret - from Gothenburg, Sweden - will be playing with my friends’ bands Hot Rash and Rabbit Holes. Should be super fun.

Hoping to keep this weekend a quiet one as next week is unusually busy. Monday I plan to see the documentary: Jamel Shabazz Street Photographer by Charlie Ahearn at the Trylon. Tuesday there’s another documentary showing, at the Bryant Lake Bowl, about Beijing punk bands and some of those Beijing bands will be playing here later in the week. Always something interesting going on.

Dianne and Emily

Post a Comment

Your email is never published nor shared. Required fields are marked *
*
*