serendipityoucity

I was chatting with my pal Michel on skype in Trinidad this morning.  In between discussions about health indicators and socio-economic status determinants of health models he mentioned how he stacks up his New York Times magazines for when he travels so that he may have some reading material when dining out alone - he is a father of 4 so out alone is a luxury.  He mentioned Lewis Hyde as someone he finds interesting he is

a poet, essayist, translator, and cultural critic with a particular interest in the public life of the imagination.

So as we were chatting I looked him up and lo an behold, he wrote the following book: Trickster Makes this World. Ah! When I feel like am becoming a conformist, I like to think of transgressions and to recognize that my nature whether I like it or not or whether I intend to or not is subversive.  This subbersion articulated into how I live, do and think things very often gets me into trouble, whether I am trying to get into trouble or not.  Bref it was fun to read a few short essays about Hydes Trickster book and to know that there is a place in the world for rascals. So now back to finishing reading this WHO health determinants report, take the bus to Ikea to purchase a new frying pan, make a dish for the vegetarian potluck I am going to, think of what I am going to bring for late night movie viewing at Emre’s and to enjoying the fact that that none of these geodemographic profiles have me figured out and therefore marketers cannot figure out what to sell to me!

hmm! this Hyde fellow is also involved in the Cultural Commons:

a book offering a model and defense of our “cultural commons,” that vast store of unowned ideas, inventions and works of art that we have inherited from the past and that we continue to create.

[He is] building the book around a brief history of the commons as an idea (how it came out of medieval Europe and what happened to it when it got to America), and around a parallel history of how we have imagined the creative self.

Always in the background lies the question of the commercialization of culture, exemplified at the moment by many things–the ‘enclosure’ of the public domain, the patenting of aboriginal medicines, proprietary control of genetic materials or of the internet, and the general market triumphalism that has followed the end of the Cold War.

This is a wonderful story of a young 11 year old boy’s dying wish to help the homeless.  His wish sparked volunteers in cities around the US to take action on that wish just before he died.

Brendan Foster (1997-2008)

I was reading articles this morning about the terrorist attacks in Mumbai in the Globe and Mail.  Beyond the usual reporting I was surprised to see links to citizen media and a to see a Google Mashup as part of the article.  I heard last night on Radio Canada that the telephone system (land and cell) cannot cope with the volume and I wonder if these citizen media sources were chosen as the best sources at the moment to get information out to worried Indo-Canadians and Indian Nationals living here.  I don’t recall seeing so much of this being made available in a mainstream newspaper before.

My pal Megan sent me a note today stating that she voted for my blog in the Best Canadian Blog Awards!  I did not even know it was nominated for anything - but alas it is three categories for round 1:

a) Best Local Blog

b) Best Sci/Tech Blog

c) Best Personal Blog

Go figure!and kinda fun ay!

Tuesday Talks about Social Applications of the Web: Photo Sharing Tools

starts at 7PM!

Mike Gifford from Open Concept is the gracious speaker at the ever so wonderful Octopus Books.

Octopus Books 116 Third Avenue

Hear a talk about how neighborhood groups, event organizers and non-profits can benefit from learning how to effectively use photo sharing tools like Flickr.  Gathering good, compelling photographs is a challenge for even the most visually interesting events.  Learn why photo sharing is a useful community tool, why it is beneficial for your organization to host your photos in a social networking site, and how to choose your tag to maximize your exposure.   Explore ways to use photo sharing in campaigns and how to make use of the viral nature of the Internet to bring in more supporters.  We can also touch on how to incorporate photos your supporters have posted onto Flickr onto your website.

I went to a regional Outaouais Judo Tournament today.  It was great to hang out with 6 different clubs (Club de Judo Ginkgo, Takahashi Dojo, Ottawa Judo Club, Club St-Jean Bosco, Nicolas-Gatineau and Lysée Claudel Private School)!  This was a first and it was a great success.  I fought 4 fights, lost 4 and during the course of the last fight I self inflicted a wound to my eye!  (but you shoulda seen the other girl!).  It was still so much fun.  Next time I may even get to fight womyn and girls who are not 8-20kgs heavier nor 30 to 11 years younger! This is my favorite photo of Elena holding down Ruth (see more photos here!).  So I ate pizza, drank gingerale and now I will take a very long hot bath as stuff really hurts!

It’s Saturday, I just talked with my two friends Chenoa & Sylvain on skype. Their baby Erwin has been home for three weeks now, she is a very premy twin who has been in hospital for quite sometime.  They live in Castleman thus a virtual visit with them was the best option.  It is just wonderful to see this couple finally home with their baby and to chat with them while Erwin was considering waking up, streatching and looking for a snack!

Afterward, with a cupa tea, I fired up my rss feeds to see what was new and came across my currently favorite blog, the Kitchen Table.  I am learning so much from these two women about US American culture. Their blog is a conversation between Melissa Harris-Lacewell, Associate Professor of Politics and African American Studies at Princeton University and Yolanda Pierce, Associate Professor of African American Religion and Literature at Princeton Theological Seminary.

Then I checked out Polymeme,  (I can’t recall how I came across this one!) but it is awesome.  This is where I found the Kithchen Table.

Polymeme helps you navigate the new networked public sphere and keep your fingers on the intellectual pulse of the blogosphere.

Polymeme helps you discover intelligent content that lies beyond the usual echo chambers of tech news, celebrity gossip or American politics.

Our site uses a unique buzz-tracking approach to identify what’s currently hot in 20 areas, ranging from economics to evolution, and present it to the reader along with all sources that are currently talking about it. Thus, you can track how ideas – or memes – propagate through this new emerging networked public sphere. We would consider our mission a success if we expose you to the maximum number of new ideas on every 100 news items you read!

Today’s Polymeme find was just plain lovely and it brought be to tears.  Lately, when I witness the subtlely simple aspects of our humaneness I am overwhelmed.  It strikes me at the core of my soul and reminds me of the beauty of what we are and can be, and what we are when we are at our best, our potential.  I just get tears.  I have no words to express the sentiment, the moment triggers something that is beyond what I can explain, label, analyze, so instead I experience it and try to remember what it was, so that I may recall it, and allow myself feel it and make this a part of my way of engaging with the world, myself and to embody beauty.  Last week it was hearing & seeing Romeo Dallaire speak, it was his words, charisma, presence, the knowledge I have of where he has come from, what he has seen, what he is currently doing, the difficulties of that work, his frailty & vulnerability contrasted with the most manly of all contemporary archetypes as an army general, his heart for us to witness.

Today, it was the Touching Strangers photo series by Richard Rinaldi.  It was not so much the photos, which are absolutely great, it was the idea that something so essential to our being - touching was mediated, it reminded me of how there are few people I can touch, how few people touch me, how we do not touch each other. I am in many context where touching is acceptable, judo is one, my closeness with my children, greetings and goodbyes, touching someone on the shoulder when you are tryng to get by them, the holding of friend’s babies, shaking hands, helping an elderly person get on the bus, posing for a photo, hugging someone who is grief stricken (which I try not to do unless I touch them in other contexts as I do not want that to be the only touching memory with them) beyond that!  No touching. There are some people that I just want to walk arm in arm with, some I want to lean on, in other contexts it is during a conversation, and I just want to lie on their lap with my eyes closed or them on mine and roll their/my hair in my/their fingers. There are some people I want to have a nap with.  I am less interested in sexual touching, I am just interested in being in friendship situations where touching is a part of the conversation. And it makes me terribly sad that that touching is something somehow we cannot easily do and how absent it is in my life and how beautiful it was to see Rinaldi’s work, and to imagine how the world would be if we touched each other more, strangers, friends, family and loved ones. 

The Geomatics and Cartographic Research Centre was at the Carleton University GIS Day event!  We got to showcase our atlases to hundreds of high school kids!

If I don’t get a lift to judo wed.  I may go to this event.  It sounds a bit creepy.

Science Cafe - Constructing Nanotechnology with Nature’s Tools

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