I watched Alfred Hitchcock’s Rear Window on Friday, and it was so funny to see how James Stuart’s character L.B. Jefferies, a photographer by profession, was ridiculed by his small circle of companions because he spied on his neighbors all day. His spying was a result of his broken leg confining him to a wheel chair for the whole summer. However, once his companions realized that there was something interesting to watch, they were also captivated by looking out the window.

Much like today, many people spend the better part of their day spying on virtual neighbors via facebook, twitter,
& the like. In fact, I sometimes pride myself in being a ‘Google-meister’ (though now I should alter my title to ‘bingster’), & my ability to find anything on the internet.

This is all a part of this culture of information consumption in which we live. There are probably countless photobloggers that are currently stalking around neighborhoods, parks, & alleyways looking for a great shot. Likewise, there photographers that spend their days looking from windows capturing scenes from the daily lives of passersby.

Jefferies asked himself a curious question though, “is it ethical?” He questioned if it is ethical to spy on someone with binoculars of a telephoto camera lens.

Go throw some leaves in your kettle!

Der Erlkönig

Through the wonders of YouTube, I have discovered some awesome performances of Der Erlkönig. I particularly love the cold determination of Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau. However the comedic rendition done by Marco Rima certainly offers a new perspective on this old story. He speaks in German the whole time, but if you know the story, you should be able to follow and enjoy. Even Ian Bostridge manages suffer himself through the classic, though the grimace on his face makes me wonder if he enjoyed the singing. And, his shifty eyes & dramatic facial expressions distract me. It is opera, your voice should tell the story, not your face. If your face tells the story, that is called theater.

Der Erlkönig is, hands down, my favorite storyline from any opera. I can’t go so far as to say any fairy tale, but it is on my Top 10 list.

I think that the fairy tales are the best part of German literature. If only the real German versions were taught in our schools. There are so many that I love. I will not even try to make a list, in this post at least.

There have been many adaptations of this quintessential story. Rammstein pays homage with a modern spin on their album Reise, Reise with the song Dalai Lama. In this version, the story takes place on an airplane rather than a horse, and it is titled  Dalai Lama because the Dalai Lama is quite afraid of flying.

I watched the documentary “Helvetica” today. I enjoyed it quite a bit. As far as the content goes, I do not know which side is for me. On the one hand, I completely agree that Helvetica as a font is tired and used. I don’t think that it conveys the same message that it did when it was first designed. But, on the other hand, I think that there is something fresh, clean, & timeless.

It would certainly be hard to argue that Heltvetica had no impact upon the world of type. Because it had one of the most profound impacts upon type that has ever occurred. Every graphic designer has defaulted to Helvetica at some point in their career. Who can blame them? Helvetica can be a fairly bland type. It is used by countless government agencies because of its clean emotionless feel. Thought most people substitute the word “emotionless” for something like “concise” or “clear”.

Most of me thinks that if a font is too clearly readable, one tends to not even notice. Type should be like handwriting. Your personal handwriting changes as your write, and type should too. Type has emotion.

It has been 3 months since I have updated this dusty old space. I can’t say that I regret my lack of activity here. I certainly wish that I had made time these last few months, but more than that, I wish that I would have stayed on top of my Sea Kayak St. Marys site. But, life has been getting in the way. There are no signs of it slowing down either. I am not complaining. Well, maybe a little bit. I just need to budget time better.

One thing that I am making time for is gardening. I am going to try to grow as much of my own produce as I can. Living in an apartment limits me to container gardening or using a plot at a community garden. However, the St. Marys Community garden has no available plots. I have already started some radishes, and they seem to be doing quite well actually. I am trying to get a handle of all the planting/growing schedules. But at the same time I have to remember that none of it really matters. Since everything will be in a container, it can be inside or outside. This should allow me to grow some things year-round. I will also be able to better control the amount of water that each plant gets.

I am quite excited about taking another step toward sustainable living. Wish me luck, and give me some advice if you have any.

I cannot stand spammers. It is one thing to advertise a legitimate product, even if the advertisement is pervasive it drives me crazy. At least it is a real product that is being marketed. Oh well, I guess I will just have to live with it, at least WordPress has good spam filtering!

The development of the tangled friendship that exists between Yale and Isaac is interesting. But I felt that the entire movie was spent creating a conflict, but at the end no resolution is made. Well, to some degree there was. I mean Isaac does decide that he wants to be with Tracy. However this is quite boring. Tracy exhibits little resistance to the idea, and the fact that she is going to London for 6 months is the only complication. Issac is not comfortable with the idea of her going to London, but she convinces him that it will be fine.

Isaac’s relationship saga is, at times, secondary to the more interesting conflict between Yale, his wife, & Isaac. But, Allen does little to resolve this, or at least develop it. I became disinterested with Isaac & Tracy toward the end of the film as I sensed what would happed, and to no surprise, I was right: Tracy welcomes Isaac back.

Oh well, it was still an entertaining film. If you are confused about the whole relationship back and forth, you most likely haven’t seen the film. So, watch it.

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1. It is a sign of growth. You will see the infamous “fail whale” when the Twitter servers are jammed up with people tweeting. The image should just be a reminder that there are thousands of other people trying to do the same thing that you are.

2. It reminds you that you value the service. I am not suggesting that downtime is good, but you only miss Twitter when it isn’t available. If you are using Twitter you must value the service, or you would not be using it.

3. It is not necessary to life. There may be some of us that feel addicted to Twitter & think that we couldn’t live without it. However, at the end of the day Twitter downtime has not yet killed anyone. It isn’t that big of a deal. Just send a tweet of relief when Twitter gets everything up and ready.

4. It is a free service. Lets face it: Twitter is free. You don’t pay a single penny to use it. You are not subjected to dozens of adds on your Twitter profile, & there are many free 3rd party apps that will update your Twitter status. Twitter continues to gain in popularity as many corporations, small businesses, & individuals begin to use the service. we all need to appreciate the freeness of Twitter because you can use Twitter to promote your blog, podcast, or business.

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Feel free to let me know if you would like a different size image. I will be updating the gallery as I sort through my photos. Hope that you enjoy.

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