Bloggers, and whats it's really about?

On of the many 'little things' i stumbled on (the net of all places?) yesterday is video on blogging.

It was about the first bloggers, this medium (the internet), back to cave men.

A blog is defined (thanks google) as:

blog/blôg/

Noun:	A Web site on which an individual or group of users record opinions, information, etc. on a regular basis.
Verb:	Add new material to or regularly update a blog

This got me thinking of all the examples of blogging through different times in history? 

• Benjamin Franklin used to pen letter's to newspapers under the name 'Poor Richard'
• In Canada, the native Indians stacked stones on top of each other as signposts (the Lonely Planet of the day)
• Early stone writing in Egypt
• Hobos had a whole language which indicated important details to newcomers to the area  
• Dogs, peeing to mark their territory (do you need a link or picture?)
• Voice blogging, people calling each other on the phone and saying the same thing they said yesterday? Yakiety yak! (Then your government records it and put's your voice on their website, as evidence?)

Some Hobo's posted there messages where other hobos language lovers could read them (notice how 'Can you put the cat out' isn't there? Interesting yeah!)

It's all communication really. Lets take a look at the history of communication

Yeah, well who was it then, the first blogger?


But its more than this, one of the books i'm reading is about the animal kingdom refers to how animals that are territorial

If you can read this, that goes for you too!

Since i dont have assets, land, dog, house, my blog is about all i have, (besides a declining, not for profit, bank account) it's 'who i am' as opposed to who i thought i was, the blogging has helped me figure a lot of things out.

I've invested more time in this than any other hobby, therapy, it'd my domain, .net or otherwise, until death do me part, the domain will continue, i know this, i pay $10 a year for it!

The Rosetta stone (it was the translate.google.com of its time)

Blogging stimulates me (stimuate being the opposite of boredom), just like how animals seek out stimulation through interaction with each other in their environment

Are we done yet? I'm getting tired of writing this
No, just a little bit more? Ok, so...

Which gets me thinking, in the animal kingdom, animals co habit area in the same species as they stimulate each other in that environment, never a dull moment

The study of animal behavior is called Ethology
Did you know until the 1930's only birds and insects were researched

Dance like a bee

The most sophisticated investigation of this kind was the study on Bee's by Karl von Frisch of the so-called "bee dance language", when we begin to understand animal communication, we begin to understand another layer of just what makes us tick

Maybe should blogger's be aware of Fixed action pattern, it is an instinctive behavioral sequence that is indivisible and runs to completion, the animals senses are stimulated into operation, the animal in essence comes alive and becomes more aware of its self, maybe a bit like myself reading a woeful book by a well know author, to turn around and say 

'Right, i can do better than that novel and i'm going to start threading that path!'

When i was a caveman (i love this song)


My blog is my territory, it's my domain. My habitat, my habit, my environment, my world, you can shop and  buy something on Amazon (and i wish some one would, then maybe i could afford a sandwich, with cheese!)

My blog is my legacy to the world and since it's owned by Google, my hope is that it can be accessed long after i have set sail to the eternal never never land and who knows? Someone might get a laugh?

Some people buy a house and that's nice, i am making a home in my art (i dwell in the white space between the words, some spell checked too!)
I have bought a lot of art for my family, they have lots of walls to hang them up

Maybe i make the world a better place, maybe i wont? Maybe it takes time?
When you change yourself, you change your vibe, maybe you have to have a certain vibe to convey messages, whats the right vibe!!!? Oh, god, someone tell me soon!!

The writing's on the wall, or something?

Which reminds me of how Graffiti artists who do art installations (and then run like hell), when you look at graffiti art, environmental art, symbolic clues are there in the art and a messaged is being conveyed

Somehow, you dont see that vibe or see life that way when your pockets are loaded with cash, and you driving around in the latest Peugeot, pity?

Somehow?

And old people, you too don't get it, Graffiti artists are not trying to sell you anything (i just wish you would shop from this site and buy something really expensive, a sports car would be a good thing to get, it would make you look 40 years younger, the ladies will love it!)

All i know is, i have to blog, blog or go crazy, maybe if i bought land and lived on it, my desire to have my thoughts reside on a server somewhere out on the WWW as a series of 010101010101010001010010101....and it goes on... would cease?

Humans are forever evolving and learning to (for better or worse) finding new ways and mediums of communicating, now would be a good idea to look at those old episodes of Star Trek, it doesn't seem so far fetched now, does it?


Chris Smither, Origon of species

A novel idea...write a...novel?

If you familiar with Julia Cameron, you might know that she is of the opinion that you must be willing to make bad art to make good art.

Life, so it seems folks, rewards productivity, it all about doing, if you do it (Don't look down at your shoes, you might think this is a clear case of plagiarism)

It will come the desire, passion or if you like inspiration (in etymology 'to be of god'), so don't wait to be inspired, should we wait for god? What if he's just running late? Too late god, I'm inspired, I'm off!

Carpe Diem

The day you don't feel like producing, that's the day you really should do it, that was my inspiration for running yesterday and now another thought has crept into my universe.

I started reading Annie Proulx, her first first novel 'Postcards' and the first few chapters are difficult to grasp, it's was like the fat guy scrambling over the obstacle course in some war movie, minus the drill Sargent. Oh, you can laugh, but this is a serious novel, the review said good things, so why was it such an effort?

Read the damn novel!

I liked the post card idea, i send people postcards myself, they are such a novelty to send and receive, i just don't think the first few maximised the benefit of the idea for the story

Last night i was struggling with this novel before i put the light out for my grown up regular 6 hours sleep,  i put the light out as i prepared to put the world on pause for a period

And i switched the light back on and wrote this in my notebook:

First time novels

You must be prepared to make bad art to make good art, reading Annie Proulx and i think (sorry Annie) its rubbish, if this was organic matter you could fertilize your vegetable patch, but no, nothing much fertile there and if there was ever an incentive to start writing, this is it, which reminds me of Alexandre Dumas first novel, it was bad too.


 In the preface the young author did say he was 20 years old and didn't have much experience in the world yet and it took a lifetime to write a great character, and you could see signs of 'The count of Monte Cristo' in that first book

He needed to write it (the bad novel) for one of the greatest (and true) stories ever written to be wrote, its like it was somehow lurking within him, in the shadows, waiting to be exposed?

And like the first guy to run a mile in under 5 minutes, as soon as he did it everyone started to do it

 Well folks that's what i wrote last night, this morning i saw a video by Marcus du Sautoy on Ted.com about symmetry and the Marcus said this

In everything… uniformity is undesirable. Leaving something incomplete makes it interesting, and gives one the feeling that there is room for growth… Even when building the imperial palace, they always leave one place unfinished

— Japanese Essays In Idleness, 14th Century

 I had a definite feeling i could contribute (for better or worse, till death do us part) to the English language, it could grow, like some bread, that will soon be ready for the oven?

By pasting my series of words into translate.google.com, who knows? Others could gleam insights into the universe (internal and external) of only i made a start and got the writing circus on the road?


Roll up, roll up!!

And i have been quietly contemplating this all day, just how i would go about it, not in a conventional sense, but more in the idea that Tom Robbins would with quirky characters that cover Zen topics, and those topics are 'explored', through the characters or Émile Zola would have done in his Ragoun series.

Introducing Zola

For those not familiar with the Zolas Rougon series, there is 20 books in the series, each book explores a topics like:

• Workers conditions in coal mines at the time,
• Poverty
• Alcoholism,
• Interfering in human nature to prolong life with the book Dr Pascal

I'm pretty sure if i picked the right aspects i wanted to cover, like a mechanic looking at lots of small bits of metal on the floor, a purring engine would be heard in no time before you could get the milk from the fridge.
(i once saw a bus full of people in Laos that looked like they were going to go at any second with 2 guys looking at the entire engine out the front, the fact that they had little bits and parts in front of the bus seemed chaotic and hilarious, depending on which side of the steering wheel you were positioned)   

Tom Robbins

So i have been ticking this over during the day, reading Annie's Postcards and now that I'm half way through, the book has picked up tremendously, from the first few chapters i read when i had the burst of confidence till the middle of the book, it would appear Annie has found her writing voice, and i'm somewhat losing confidence.

Maybe her novel is like a new born horse struggling to walk and before you can say 'I love you in Helvetica', the novel idea is slowly galloping out of sight?

Who loves you?

I once read if you re write any novel eight times, you will have a best seller, Jeffery Archer writes his novels by pen and rewrites them a few times.

The lesson for me, i think as a reader is if Annie had rewritten the first few chapters in the same style she found her self writing midway, the experience as a reader would have been greatly enhanced

Like a great orator, you have to be considerate of the people that are listening to you, this means what ever i do, i should consider rewriting, so it's all consistent, now i know what it's like reading that, i wouldn't want anyone feeling like i did and having to turn any damn light on to write a commentary of my lack of consistency, or worse my careless string of words caused someone (including myself) a restless night  

So this is the idea, i will give it until September and until i will get producing
I think i will fashion myself a butterfly net, to get those words and catch me some words!

Coca leaf flashbacks

Coca leaf's

A guy on the farm yesterday said to me as i was sitting down to do a bit of 'habitual reading'

Hey Kieran, you've been to South America, you try the coca leaf

Does the pope wear a funny hat? I piratically lived on a diet of things consisting with the letter 'C', it wasn't an episode of Sesame st, i had food poisoning really bad, i at the time thought it was the chlli i had at the market, i remember ordering chicken soup, i got chicken and rice, since i was trained as a kid to eat what i was given, i ate.

Maybe i had a cookie here and there, probably there?

Big mistake, recently i was told it would have been the chicken that was responsible for the next month of non eating food, i was sure for the past 3 years it was the chili, how wrong was i?

I proceeded to 'lose weight' at such an alarming rate, it was actually a good thing, the food repulsion hit me so bad, the people i hung out with seemed to be always eating, just finished eating or about to eat.

I chewed the coca leaf and felt just fine and dandy and yesterday i had them again for the first time in 3 years and the memories all came back. As it turns out, coca leafs will set you back $120 in Australia for a small bag, in South America, only a few cents?

Particularly about my time at the end of Death road  and this too

A cat amongst the pigeons?

Whats interesting is how your senses are linked, this has been proven recently by a chef called Heston, your sight of food, hearing, taste, touch is all linked to how you experience eating and tasting food. By playing sea side sounds with one of his dishes, he had people in tears, such were the emotions he was able to stir. Sounds like an interesting guy, self taught too

I knew about this association this years ago, anyone that tries to give up smoking, that likes to drink coffee or beer, all of a sudden has to give up coffee and beer as the associations are linked in your brain, breaking the associations in your mind is the hard part of giving up.

When i was home in Cork, i used to walk the dogs every morning and listen to electronic music, but the experience was linked to the times i would party all weekend, i could re create the uphoria of those times, just by listening to the music and moving, so i would go for big walks, with the dogs.

The mouse at the controls in my brain looked a little like...

The dogs were small too, i was told later over exerting little dogs can kill them, after the walks (14kms) the dogs would sleep the rest of the day, it's a dogs life indeed, we would be back by 10am and they were done for the day, good night, not me, i was only starting off the day with a little exercise

The memories from a little leaf, it would make you wonder?

Google is saving extinct language's, hurray for Google!!!

What language do you have?

Just when the world needs a hero, for real people all over the world who are caught up in progress, up steps Google, and they are in the process of saving 3000 languages, including a few hundred Australian languages as part of their endangered languages project

Half of the 7000 languages spoken today in the world were not expected to survive in the coming years.

Thousands of languages were spoken in North and South America prior to first contact with Europeans between the beginning of the 11th century

I was watching Wade Davis talk about cultures and the significance of language in how indigenous people see and experience the world, take a look below.

Introducing Wade Davis



I was reading a book about Irish Spirituality called 'Anam Chara' by John O'Donohue

 The anam cara was a person to whom you could reveal the hidden intimacies of your life. This friendship was an act of recognition and belonging. When you had an anam cara, your friendship cut across all convention and category. You were joined in an ancient and eternal way with the friend of your soul.

 I remember reading in this book that the 3 things that make that make you who you are are

1. Your attachment to your land
2. Your culture
3. Your language

How interesting that that Australia has more extinct languages than anywhere else in the world, about 2000 languages extinct, how interesting.

And now Google is about to do us all a favor and record a few hundred languages for future generations to come so that they might understand the the land and culture in the same way the indigenous people understand life.

Hip hip hurrah for Google, this is the project that this century will be remembered for!

Languages have structure, they have words, words have deep meaning and long histories, the study of the history of words is called etymology

It amazes me how English borrows words from other languages from all over the world, they are called 'loan words', check out the translation examples in the history of English, the English we speak has been on a bit of a journey from the following

1. Old English
2. Middle English
3. Early Modern English
4. Modern English  

Who knows what journeys all these indigenous languages have been on, do they even have passports?

Broken Irish is better than clever English

My own country Ireland is on the list for Google, it would appear Irish is in the endangered category, the Irish language has a history too, its now the 3rd most spoken language in Ireland

When the census is done in Ireland, the amount of people that 'think' they are fluent is staggering, something is better than nothing, if you 'think' you are fluent in Irish, that's better than nothing, it's a start and a half a loaf of bread is better than no bread, but maybe not if you work in the Census office?

Take a look at the top 10 rare languages

A language gives you an identity, when you think about how languages might evolve, to lose them due to the western culture idea of progress, is completely illogical, we are selling our souls and becoming strangers to ourselves.

'Congratulations again for everybody at Google', or using translate.google.com

Comhghairdeas arís do gach duine ag Google

Who's going to save Google?

Coffee with an Estrange....er?

First photo from

I got a mention here and not here, i was thinking when i was reading of how the 'Coffee with a stranger' story and how the conversation started and it's funny [quickly checking what Jess wrote again] to see that people listen to the stuff i say, maybe i say too much and none of it ends up going in?

Isn't it funny the people you meet, just like Jess wrote, when you are somewhere and someone tells you something, you overhear something, a story, you get switched on to an idea casually and it becomes a major driving force in a thought process. It's happened to all of us, whether you want to admit it of not, maybe you cant remember?

To give you a few examples, i remember meeting meeting:

Malaysia
An old very well educated elder man in a dirt town in Malaysia, i played checkers and had tea with him for hours, he told me he read the Encyclopedia Britannica, all of it and told me facts from it, like...

According to Socrates, the difference between advanced people and primitive people was their environment, they live in:

• Hot climate, writing originated in Iraq 
• Cold climate, Nokia and many technology companies from Finland  

Dont quote me on it, but...introducing Socrates

Harsh climates can kill you quick, so you have to become efficient with resources and time, oh Socrates said other stuff too, but that happened in the last place i expected it to happen (i also remember trying to walk in thongs/sandle's in that town, but it was a failed attempt, not until years later would i master that fete)

Thong dreams?

In the Amazon basin it would seem, a guy goes out to catch fish and collect food, no problem, he did it yesterday and he will do it tomorrow, the have been able to to that since the dawn of time, you dont need the Australian dream, it's the Amazon, there's never anything on TV, outside the window mother nature is working flat out and not getting paid overtime either

Moody in the mornings?

India
 An old French guy at the Kerela Airport (Southern India) told me:

Dont trust people that are in a bad mood in the morning, when you wake up you should be full of life to start off the day

 
Ireland:
I have to agree, i met a retired boxer on the Aran Islands that used to wake up jump out bed in the morning, say 2 'Hail Mary' prayers and do some shadow boxing, i plan on doing the same, minus the religious devoutness, minus the super sonic explosions when my fists colliding with air as the galaxy expanding even further into the void.

 Shadow play?

I met some New Zealander's many years ago in my favorite live music bar in Cork and one of them told me

'What makes you who you are is not what you do for your job, but what you do outside your job'

Too true, my job does not define me, this is probably why i am volunteering on an Organic farm and enjoying that immensely?

Estranged


How might i remember the estranger in me, or Jess?

Well, i met a Canadian, Jess, who seemed to have a bit of a sense of humor. She told me about her nightmare night before, and it wasn't before Christmas either!

We were all partying in a room downstairs, and she was upstairs with not one to talk to in the common room.

The group i was with were a band of odd sorts, the only commonality would have been the alcohol content of out blood streams, not fitting into the 'Common' group upstairs, a mostly 'Motley Crew', not yet 8pm and we registered a noise complaint, so we were banished to one of the basement dorms, better known as staff quarters, the party was getting legs and was off at a bit of a gallop.

My crew, (that's me on the right!)

While upstairs some French backpackers that wanted to rip her off in their quest to check out early and get their deposit from Jess and after this had the pleasure to hear some French love making, entwining a regular auditory sense to be savored, maybe a 'Midnight in Byron Bay'?  

Has Woody Allen copyrighted his 'Midnight in...' idea? I can tell you about my 'Midnight in Melbourne' experiences.

After we start rapping, Jess says 

'Dude, where were you last night?' 

Truth be told, this is where i was...

Everywhere, except the side of this Canadian girl, it would have been funnier if i said i was the guy (with a poor French accent in to top bunk last night transcending the world, as if in the rhythm of the universe, each thrust a little near the eternal, unattainable, filling the gaping void vacuum, momentarily exposed in your cosmical soul!)

But, no.

Part of Jess's story happened in the past, which led on to the present, because it is a gift, if you can pick the little bits of gold, and stick them in a little basket, the basket being a notebook, ingredients for your perspective and maybe your soul?

Different ingredients and balm, the hell fired eggs becomes a 'Crepe', but not yesterdays eggs, maybe tomorrows eggs, for a little hint of 'Oh, la, la'? and before you know it your strolling down the Champs Elysees and your seen parroting waving your Gucci bag...

'Où est la Tour Eiffel'

And we do, as you can see.  

Dont dig for gold, just use your imagination, yea dig?

Everybody needs a hobby!

 
And what did i say again last time?

Oh yeah, 'Middlemarch and me', well i got about half ways through the book and as much as i enjoyed getting the little bits of gold and recording them in my notebook, i came to a point where i just couldn't imagine the scenes, some turn of phrases were excellent, but i wanted to read a story and just wasn't getting it.

My imagination was on holidays, that or i just was not interested in what was going on, it didn't matter how i counseled myself, the cognitive apparatus declared how i was visually experiencing the word to be a complete bore, quite a conundrum, you might agree?

Imagination, also called the faculty of imagining, is the ability of forming images and sensations when they are not perceived through sight, hearing, or other senses. Imagination helps provide meaning to experience and understanding  to knowledge; it is a fundamental faculty through which people make sense of the world, and it also plays a key role in the learning process.

Digging for gold isn't something i just made up yea know? They based a whole country on it and called it Australia

The guy in the front could have been me in a previous life!

I was getting little bits of gold for George Eliot and committing them to paper, but unlike the 3 other books i have read by the author

• Adam Bede
• Silas Mariner and 
• The Mill on the Floss

 These 3 books typified the classic stories from the 19th century of honest hard working people, who did an honest days work with wonderful philosophy

The cast of Middlemarch was made up of a bunch of rich folks that pranced around making their servants lives a tad bit difficult, not my cup of tea, i don't dig cucumber sandwiches at 2pm either missus!

It was all a bit Sense and sensibility with some good bits thrown in, Jane Austin is dead to me, in every way and this is not a bad thing, no one speaks your language no more neither Jane, DEAD, fo real!!

The only difference between my life and a Jane Austin novel is my life is starting to make sense

To be fair to George Eliot, her step son died while she wrote the book and continued writing after a break of a year.

The memories of her previous books kept me going, the little bits of gold were an added welcome to my notebook of 'Things i like', very comforting and hard work!

But you wouldn't get much if you tried selling my gold to a man from China, but that's not to say you shouldn't try

And this song came to mind by Metallica

The memory remains 


This is not how people mining for gold in places like West Australia feel, an ounce of gold for every tonne of rock crushed is more than ample for them to keep on digging, just look at the share price of BHP Billiton and the size of Gina Reinheart, she looks like she lives on Mississippi mud cake flown in from the USA each morning, take a look for yourself!

Introducing Gina, You thinking what i'm thinking?

That and my imagination wasn't coming back from holidays any time soon, it was time to stimulate myself in a whole new way, next!!!

Speaking of stimulation, check out how the Danes stimulate their animals


So much for the mighty Vikings, or were they... Days before the days, of hanky panky with Porky pig?


Give us all your virgin pigs!!!

It occurred to me last night at a poetry night how important it is to use your imagination while reading, writing and listening, its much easier also!

Hell, maybe it's important to the other senses too? And maybe give them a work out when your not running laps of the park?

Introducing Sensory exercises, it seems a better idea to me, instead of trying to process the world, just let it come out of you

Middlemarch and me...

Ahem...

So i've been doing a bit of reading recently, that and i've been busy, on the farm (it's certified Organic, vegan readers might want to know more? But that's another story!)

True story...

 The farm volunteering has been going well, i have been working 4 days a week, the weekends off and today, for example i had the day off, so i was reading, all day long!

Not just reading, i have been climbing a Mt Everest of reading challenges, i've been reading a book that has been on 'The list' of books to read one day, and today was one of those days.

I remember seeing this book in Goa, in India and wanting to read it, that was 2004, it's one of those books that you have to build up to, in reading time, for me it seems like i have to be reading for a few hours every day

To be reading so much it's like your not even reading, your eyes are like a vacuum hoover, hoovering up the words and your imagining the scenes in question, so that you can see the characters in your minds eye and then it starts to get interesting, then your ready to hit Middlemarch!

What i quite like is the comparisons she makes when discussing topics and the descriptive language, after all we are talking about a chick here and she was a Professor of English, so i guess, she had the credentials for kicking a few literally field goals?

Introducing Ann, AKA George Elliot

If i was to do a University course now, literature would appeal (but that's not going to happen)

I'm still reading Middlemarch, so this post is a bit presumptuous (maybe there's room to be post presumptuous?)

Sometimes i'm lost in the plot, (google maps is no help either) sometimes i get it, sometimes i reread passages, sometimes i write the passages in my note book, it's very 'hands on', eyeballs too, both!

Middlemarch, kind of reminds me of a book called 'Tom Jones' by Henry Fielding, a bit hard to understand, but if or when you get it, Balm, it's gold, gold, gold!!

It's quite an experience when i do understand what the train of thought is, and to re read and to figure out what the train of thought was and to keep going to grasp the vibe of the scene!

 I have been writing a few of her quotes, with a mind to recreate them in the year 2012 and beyond, maybe drop them on Gen Y kids and beyond in the future that have never heard of books, i cant wait, i will 'seem' smart, intelligent, witty, composed, plagiarist?

Do you think i should get a pedicure? Will all the farm work give me away, calluses from hard work, would that be my downfall in my big break in the literary world

Something to read that i didn't write, take it away Ann

"Miss Brooke had that kind of beauty which seems to be thrown into relief by poor dress.

"One must be poor to know the luxury of giving!

“It is never too late to be what you might have been.

”Blessed is the man who, having nothing to say, abstains from giving wordy evidence of the fact.

Ignorance gives one a large range of probabilities. 

One of my favorites:

"Correct English is the slang of prigs who write history and essays. And the strongest slang of all is the slang of prigs”

And passages like this...

"I fear you are a heretic about art generally. How is that? I should have expected you to be very sensitive to the beautiful everywhere."
"I suppose I am dull about many things," said Dorothea, simply. "I should like to make life beautiful - I mean everybody's life. And then all this immense expense of art, that seems somehow to lie outside life and make it no better for the world, pains one. It spoils my enjoyment of anything when I am made to think that most people are shut out from it."

"I call that the fanaticism of sympathy," said Will, impetuously. "You might say the same of landscape, of poetry, of all refinement. If you carried it out you ought to be miserable in your own goodness, and turn evil that you might have no advantage over others. The best piety is to enjoy - when you can. You are doing the most then to save the earth's character as an agreeable planet.

And enjoyment radiates. It is of no use to try and take care of all the world; that is being taken care of when you feel delight-in art or in anything else. Would you turn all the youth of the world into a tragic chorus, wailing and moralizing over misery? I suspect that you have some false belief in the virtues of misery, and want to make your life a martyrdom."

Will had gone further than he intended, and checked himself. But Dorothea's thought was not taking just the same direction as his own, and she answered without any special emotion -

 What George Elliot taught us?

She wasn't the only one that made a big splash in the written word, even though Shakespeare didn't much believe in writing things down