wendy house

crouching in the back of a black cab,  I’d volunteered to hide from the cab dirver  so that all  6 of us could  travel together and share the cost.  

Kaff:   I don’t like wendy’s hair, its thick with hairspray, stiff and sticky

Kaff leant forward and grabbed a handful of my hair, yanking my head toward her sharp knees and pushing tears from my eyes.   I watched my tears splash on her expensive Italian buckskin suede shoes then  silently added a good dose of flemmy gob to the mix.

Glen: wendy’s hair is  soft and fluffy, nice to touch, I like it

Glen leant forward and stroked my hair,   pulling my head away from kaff’s threatening knees to rest on his tear-drying warm thigh.

The men they couldn’t hand sang rain, steam, speed

• Human or computer?   Can a computers intellignce make it indistinguishable from a  human by another  human?     Turing test
• Hererosexual or gay?   Can a gay persons behavior make them indistinguishable from a  heteresexual to the UK law?   Turing failed this test

The UK prime minister apologises to the now deceased Alan Turing for the government removing his security clearance and hence his job when Alan was found guilty of being gay.   Reprogramming involved chemical castration,   Alan committed suicide.

This morning BBC Radio 4  appeared to focus  on the

• Prime Minister’s apology to Alan
• broadening of police record checks for people that have regular or intense contact with children
• Afghanistan election irregularities

September 11th 2001 was mentioned, a brief comment on the lack of progress in redeveloping the site of the former Twin Towers.

Before metro-sexual, with the aide of Niel Innes,  people like me imagined urban spacemen.   I grew-up with a crush on Niel Innes.   He wears hats, plays the piano, and has eyebrowse that raise towards the centre of his brow.   Excellent.

Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band sang I’m The Urban Spaceman

The lines ‘hey you, you’re such a pedant, you’ve got as much brains as a dead ant, as much imagination as a caravan site…  …but I still love you’   have a touching brilliance that appealed to me as a child and are still poignantly pertinent

Niel Innes sang how sweet to be an idiot

The soulful behatted pianist who does not sell his songs to product advertising,  and does proactively support peace and respect for fellow human beings.   I was lucky enough to see him perform live in 2004 on the Real Gone tour.   Hero.

Tom Waits sings Tom Traubert’s blues

In 1986  a friend  was sectioned with psychizophrenia.   Before he was sectioned he talked of his fear and knowledge of the condition he suspected that he had.   He knew what was happening to him,   he knew something of what was to come,   he was profoundly scared.     Another friend talked her way through why she should take her own life.   I listened one night.   I listened another night.   I listened again. I listened into the early hours of the morning.  It was overwhelming,   I didn’t have the answers,   she did.   She killed herself.   I moved into the  room she had lived and died in.   The rape stories,  like a gushing tap that you can’t turn-off.    You have to listen.   The often all to vivid knowledge of how their pain has changed their world-view  for them, stays with you.   Always.  

Meanwhile I was  trying to live in a  crumbling contorted fantasy where girls had full human rights and fell in love once, forever.    By 1986  I was denying the dream was dead while engaged in a futile, depserate, effort to resuscitate it.   Everyday could be the day the dream came true…

 The The sang  this is the day  

(warning: this video includes 1980′s hairstyles and  a brass section)

I started smoking. The The sang  slow train to dawn

 A fairly typical secondary school conversation  about my brother in the late 1970′s:

Secondary School Peer (SSP):   you know your brother?

Wendy:   yes, I know  both of them,   do you mean [name]?

SSP: No,   the other one,   what’s wrong with him?

Wendy:   What do you mean ‘what’s wrong with him’

SSP:   well,   you know he’s not normal…

Wendy:   how is he not ‘normal’?

SSP:   you know,   skipping down the corridors, laughing to himself and clapping his hands

Wendy:   Oh (signifying acknowledgement that my other brother does all these things), yes, he does that when he’s happy

SSP: he’s happy in the corridors at school?

Wendy: yes,   he’s always been able to entertain himself and find things to make him smile

SSP: He’s weird

He  is still a happy soul, able to entertain himself and skip down the street when he’s happy.   It’s as cute in a man in his 50′s as it was for a boy in his teens.   I just bounce,   I find that the less complex up-down movement reduces the likelihood that I will fall over.  

A deficit of skipping must be a very sad thing,   as indeed the beautiful, be-hatted, talented,  lip-synch-averse, wiggly, much missed Billie MacKenzie recognised:

The Associates sang Skipping

Trevor Bayliss is an inventor of   heroic proportions  here in the UK.   He invented the wind-up radio.   Portable and with no need for chemically based, environmentally damaging, batteries.

My fabulous hand-crank radio also includes a solar panel.   I’ve never yet had to wind it up because the light in the Wendy House conservatory keeps it going longer than any duracell battery would….    

I do occassionally wind it up because, like the gravity-powered exit,  the action is very pleasing.   Pleasing is more than the ‘satisfactory’ experience required to establish conformance with usability standards.

I tried to complete a ‘System Usability Scale’   (SUS) for my fabulous radio    incase I meet and usability people that would like to know,   in numbers, exactly how fabulous it is.    Unfortunately I was  unable to complete the SUS because  I don’t know what ‘integrated functionality’ is and am confused by the concept of an ‘inconsistent’ product,   so I couldn’t answer questions that included  these things.      I’ll just tell the usability people its a 7000 on the SUS scale,   they’ll get the general idea.

person:   I’ve got a ticket to see Michael Jackson,   tickets are now selling on the  Web for over £1000.

Wendy: Oh!    I’ve got a ticket to see David Byrne,   it was much cheaper and,   for  me, will be a more fabulous experience than a Michael Jackson concert.

person:   Who’s he?

Wendy:   (gulp)

Your task,  should you choose to accept it, is to convey the essence of who David Byrne is in less that 500 characters, without the aid of sound or graphics.

Since 1981 my dress sense has been significantly influenced by Julian Cope.   As the Guardian recently reported:

Julian Cope arrives on my doorstep looking exactly like he does in all his photos. He is wearing leather trousers, heavy boots (it is midsummer) a flowing camo jacket and The Hat. He politely takes his boots off when asked, but The Hat stays on throughout the afternoon

Julian was the front man for one of the first  bands that I saw live in concert, Teardrop Explodes, the band included Alan Gill who co-rote rewards and joined Teardrop from Dalek I Love you   who’s Compass Kumpas album is one of my favourite vinyls.    Through the years Julian has supplied much worth attenting to including a couple of treasured books (e.g. The Modern Antiquarian).   Fabulous fellow.

Teardrop Explodes sang Rewards

also known as:   Remembering what to remember

I first encountered the currently popular (in Psychology of memory circles) ‘prospective memory’ as a term to describe  remembering what to remember through Baddeley & Wilkin’s 1984 article ‘Taking memory out of the laboratory’ .   The Laboratory,  Lab, was typically where British psychologists studied  human memory  using rigourous exprimental methodologies.   The lab was normally a windowless, beige, unadroned room lest participants, then ‘subjects’,  be distracted or inadvertantly influenced by non-experimental phenomena that might undermine the effect of the experimental manipulation.    

I liked Baddeleys work because he’d systematically estabished the positive  impact of re-instating memorising context on  recall levels through various studies including  the influence of alcohol (Vodka) or physically being under water (diving)  when memorising,   and recalling.   Both these experimental studies sounded fun,   were themselves memorable,  and were even repeatable* in less rigorous forms with colleagues at University during normal studenty nocturnal activities.  

‘Taking memory out of the laboratory’ was published in a book called ‘Everyday memory, actions and absentmindedness’  .    This was ground breaking news to me in 1984.    There I  was in the middle of a degree course, approved as official content and jargon by the British Psychological Society,  where I had focussed my study  on memory research.    I had just about got the hang of the technically specific language of psychological memory research such as retro-interference, auditory-loop, digit-span, recognition vs recall  and much more.    Then,   THEN!   Those gosh-darn leading memory researchers sprang some non-technical terms that made sense and weren’t  part of the current disciplin jargon.   How cheeky is that?

Absentmindedness?  

Cognitive psychologists study the absense of mind.   It was too much,  I had a couple of vodkas and fell in  a local canal with my miss spelt revision notes to celebrate.  

PS:   If I remember I’ll tell you why I’m telling you about prospective memory in a later post…

* Actually conducting the experiements makes them  more memorable and easier to understand an evaluate than just reading or thinking about them over a cup of tea.

The local corner shop is a large old co-op,   opened in 1901.   I’m thrilled,   customer  owned stores are worth supporting with custom.  

Official Co-op website:   http://www.co-operative.coop/

Megalithic    graves across Europe.   Populated, or not, 3  to 4 thousands  of years Before Christ.   While in Ireland I toured the Burren and stopped at the Paulnabrone dolmen.   Very atmospheric.   “The Modern Antiquarian” a fabulous book by Julian Cope lists megalithic sites throughout Europe.    The book is one of my most treasured possessions.   Websites selling the book under-detail the sheer volume and depth of research that Julian put into constructing this fabulous book.

Before the advent of anti-aging products these dolmen represented the celebration of aging,  death,  and life beyond.   Julian Cope is  one of the most  influential celebrity individuals in my formative years,   I blame him alone for a pair of black leather jeans being a main stay of my wardrobe and, or  course, my RAF orignial flight jacket.

The graffiti in Bristol provided a pleasant surprize, especially this humerous piece by Banksy.  I am completely soppy  about Banksy’s work.

Joanna Lumley was an early  ‘Bond Girl’  in ‘On her Majesty’s Secret Service’.   She became a big  star in the UK as a secret agent in the 1976 revival of British TV cult classic drama ‘The (New)  Avengers’.   This drama was unusual for having a female lead  that was  intellegent, pro-active, assertive,  witty  and sexy.    Her character called ‘Purdey’ (after the gun) had a distinctive haristyle that became very popular in 70′s Britain.  

Since that series  Joanna Lumley has remained an icon of British female sexiness.   She is probably more well known internationally for her role as “Patsy” in “Absolutely Fabulous”.   Less well know for her long term support of  the Free Tibet Campaign.

Last night Paul Weller deservedly won the Brit Award for outstanding contribution to the British Music Industry.   From  ’The Jam’   through  ’The Style Council’ to his solo work Paul has always been involved in producing musically interesting, lyrically astute, songs.   The award was presented by another gorgeous, talented, Londoner; Ray Winston.    Double GUSH!

(gush warning)  

 only the very young and the very beautiful can be so aloof

this opening lyric of Tom Robinson’s song ‘War Baby’ (1983) spoken softly over  saxophone with the  keyboards creating a gentle relaxing atmosphere hints at sadness.   His alternating soft then demandingly passionate voice dominates and drives the song in stark  contrast to  the gentle pace and tone of the music.    He paints the fun and tensions of living in the gay scene “hanging out with the boys,   all swagger and poise…”  ”…I’m scared,   so scared”  then  deftly shifts focus to bigger themes as he raises the pace “corresponding disasters every night on the TV,   sickening reality keeps gripping  me in its disgust”    The song just has so much in it.   It sounds good too     23 years later it’s still one of my favourite songs.   Tom’s been one of my personal hero’s since the late 1970′s.       The directness and poigniency of Tom’s beliefs and writing  in so many forms (songs, web-pages, DJ-ing)  is extremely impressive. To me he is awe inspiring.

Despite the original BBC ban on “Sing if you’re glad to be gay” it was heard in streets, homes, clubs and  during political  protests.    It was a wonderfully positive rallying song in a time when homophobia was much more overtly prevalent than today.    Followed by a notable turnaround  when the  BBC employed Tom as a World Service presentes then DJ and gave him awards for his documentary on the history of ‘gay music’.  

I was lucky enough to attend two of Tom’s birthday parties  in the mid 1990′s.  Able to luxuriate in listening to his conversations and singing in the intimacy of a small room….  

(gush over)

this post title is a classic chorus lyric line from the song “Bryan Rix” by a cheerful yet sadly obscure British indie band from my home City of Bristol – “The Brilliant Corners“.   Wikipedia explains that Brian Rix was an actor comedian who specialised in farce.   On film

“Rix was regularly seen on screen without his trousers on“

Occasionally I have needed to laugh when seeing someone with their trousers down…

* Spaz.

Cummings, the  fragrance  official site. The photographic pun’s on traditional perfume marketing images are worth a look.  The whole site is both professional and gently tongue in cheek.   These qualities have  left me wanting  to try this smell.

Excerpts from Cummings, the fragrance site

“With a name like mine it was made to be sprayed all over people’s body’s, what do you think?” A Cummings

“an assertively masculine combination of bergamot, whiskey, cigar, leather, highland mud, and… condom.”    (Allure)

“Mild. Nice. Not obtrusive” (Martha Stewart)

“One secret enemy, a physician named Weulles, secretly poisoned Descartes, under the cover of medicine. The great mathematician was buried in Sweden, but his head was severed from his body. ” (Source)

 

There is even a book that refers to the missing skull as part of a conspiracy that isn’t called “The Descartes Code”…     Lets put the Skull on hold for a moment and follow the body’s journey as detailed on internet pages:

“As a Catholic in a Protestant  nation, he was interred in a graveyard mainly used for unbaptized infants in Adolf Fredrikskyrkan. ” (source)

“In 1667, his remains were taken to Paris and buried in the Church of St. Genevieve-du-Mont.” (source)

 

Burial # 3:   Paris, Pantheon

“During the French Revolution, his remains were disinterred for burial in the Pantheon among the great French thinkers.” (source)

 

“The French treasurer general, who supervised the move of the body,  kept the bones from Descartes’ right hand as a personal souvenir. About this, the great mathematician Jacobi said, “It is often more convenient to possess the ashes of great men than to possess the men themselves during their lifetime.”   (source)

 

Burial # 4:   Paris, St. Germain-des-Pres

“His tomb is now in the church of St. Germain-des-Pres.” (source)

Museum of Natural History in France.”   (source)

“they lie in separate locations: his body in a crypt and his skull on display in a tawdry museum.”     (Source)

 

There is a macabre irony in the possibility that since death his  head has never been united with his body.  

This entry was inspired by a marvellously entertaining (fictional) discussion in the excellent  novel I’m reading;  Malcom Bradbury’s ‘The Hermitage“.  

W

“An American critic wrote that she would rather be forced to read the New York telephone directory three times than watch the film A Zed and Two Noughts, a third of which was a homage to Vermeer. Conceivably, if you are a list-enthusiast like me, the New York telephone directory might be fascinating, demographically, geographically, historically, typographically, cartographically; but I am sure no compliment was intended.”  

 

"Tiffany was a painter and interior decorator and designed stained glass windows and lamps, glass mosaics, blown glass, ceramics, jewelry, enamels and metalwork."

 

Frank Sutcliffe was  a photographer based in Whitby in the late 19th Century.   Whitby is  most well  known for its key role in Bram Stoker’s Dracula,   its sailing history and Jet works.   This is his most famous photograph, the Water Rats:

Frank Sutcliffe's Waterats from http://www.whitby-yorkshire.co.uk/sutcliffe

I have a copy of the Water Rats in  my Water Closet.   With 11 almost naked young boys there are no ‘winkles‘ showing.   An outstanding achievement in tastefulness.   Unfortunately the bum exposure did get Frank excommunicated from the local church for potentially corrupting girls.    I was already irrevocably, severely, corrupted by the time I found this photograph.

W wemembewing-whitby

Silent companion  

Complete pussycat

Erotic God(dess)

This picture was part of a card he  made to let me know that he had won the Alternative Miss World Competition as ‘Miss Gale Force” in 1991.  

We met when he was responsible for the set design for a production of Rumplestiltzkin.    I was cast as Rumplestiltzkin.   His set was wonderful.   He let me help him paint it.  

In Birmingham UK, we often found ourselves in the same nightclubs.    We would dance near each other without acknowledging we knew each other.   I would call for him in the small hours of the morning and sit on his bed drinking tea,   reading, writing, or watching TV while he worked on some project, for hours at a time.   In those days when he wasnt clubbing  he looked like a young Jim Morrison .  

He leant me clothes.  

We rarely spoke.  

His last spoken words to me were about 4am on a 1986 June  morning as I left his room

Wendy: “bye”  

Burnel:  “Do you want to talk about it?”      

Wendy: “No.   I would  cry” <left room then cried>

Even then the moment was a  flashbulb memory  for me;   as if I somehow  knew that  I would never see him again.    We wrote  across the years before he died.   More was said in any one letter than passed between us when together.

I miss him most during the dark long winter nights  of the party season.   Sometimes when I’m very sad I imagine he’s there,   just there,   silently working on a project.   I’m glad he once was.

W Missing

Stories from the Hague #2

The “Het Palais” is a museum dedicated to the life and work of MC Escher.   I happily spent hours looking at his wonderful prints, reading about his life,   looking at photographs he’d  taken of his inspirations,   objects he’d owned,   watching videos,   playing in the virtual reality and with the optical illusions.  I’ve always admised Escher’s work.  Being able to visit a museum dedicated to  him  was a real treat.

I learned that Escher had designed a version of “Metamorphose” for the Hague Post Office.  

A short walk from Het Palais is the “Maurithuis”.   Another compact palacial gallery.  The contents of this Gallery were exquisit: Rembrandt,   Ruebens, Van Dyjck, Vermeer,  Frans Hals and others I’ve forgotten how to spell.   As with Het Palais,   the Palais itself is a fabulous place worht visiting.    The paintings were awe inspiring.    As  a novice,   I paid particular attention to the brush storkes and techniques used.  

I thought that I would never see “girl with a pearl earing” in my lifetime.  I shed a little tear of joy.

Geek warning    I get over-excited about most of Peter Greenaway’s work.    You can watch a striking 4 minute piece called “Windows” online  from his website:   http://petergreenaway.co.uk/windows.htm

Wendy-Not-Testing-Parachutes-From-Windows  

Charlotte, NC: #10

Andrew Jackson state park is actually in South Carolina, less than an hours’ drive from Charlotte.  

The park is relatively small,   including an  ampitheatre.   It looked like a wonderful place to  BBQ and listen to live music.  

Andrew Jackson   was the 7th US president, known as ‘Old Hickory’  

There is some controversey about where he was born, Carolina or Tenessee.   The lady guide at the park described how every year they held a football match to decide who gets bragging rights to his birthplace for the year.   She was an actress in over 20 films including “The Patriot’   that was mainly filmed locally.   She speculated there probably were no bears left in Britain because they must have killed so many to make the uniform hats.   The actual museum,   though small was very child-friendly,   interactive,   they had examples of all the clothes used to make clothes that you could touch and example clothes that you could try-on.

She warned us about the fire-ants which were in adundance outside.   More gently and more noticable in their presence were huge bumble-bees in the air outside.   They were so big that I originally mistook them for Hornets.   Hornets are represented on Charlotte cities ‘flag’.   They were chosen becuase a British general likened being in charlotte to being in a Hornets nest.   The flag also reminds me of the Scottish national flag,   but it is not menitoned on any of the web-sites I’ve read so far.

UK TV cooks #3:  1990’s thru now

Jamie Oliver.  

Jamie Oliver wins school food fight is the title of a March 30th item in the London Times.     The title made me giggle.   A pun where  food fight could be either fighting for food or fighting with food.  

Its inspiring to think that a ‘celebrity’ chef with a passion for health and social planning can influence government school-food funding policy.   The article does point out that this could be the government playing for the popular vote in the upcoming May elections.   Disappointing that they didnt  remove junk food.   They merely “introducing complicated nutritional standards” which will likely  increase the cost of effective regulation.  You can track his current activities on the blog on his own website: http://www.jamieoliver.com/

Jamie shot to fame in the UK with his friendly cheeky, chirpy, cockney chef’s program called “the naked chef”.   Named because of the “principle of stripping down recipes to their bare essentials”.   Hah, and we all tuned in because he was a pretty boy with a sense of humour who was good in the kitchen….

I (heart) powerpoint

E.E.E.I.
Envisioning Emotional Epistemological Information

A lecture  on art, emotion and Powerpoint by David Byrne (3/6/05) University of Washington.

David gave a typically relaxed, personable and humerous presentation.   He detailed his explorations with Powerpoint  from  personal (likes),  artistic (what can I do with  this?)  and academic (how effective is it at conveying ‘information’?) perspectives.

He used a specially constructed  Powerpoint slide deck (on an Apple Notebook) to illustrate  his presentation.      He made some obvious,  poignient, observations.   For example, that bullet points are impactful in business presentations.   Power and impact.   Power points.   David commented that he had recently started using bullet points in personal emails.    Sometimes its difficult to tell if David is being increadibly earnest or facetious.   That’s half the fun.

At the end of his story  the audience questions were entertaining  in how they reflected the diversity of Davids themes and the audiences make-up:

• “What feature would you like to see added?” (Software development  question – the event was 20 miles from Microsoft)
• “how do you think  digital media influence culture”   (Exam paper essay question – the event was in a University Hall)

David answered all questions with powerful, pointed, insight.   Answers  gently delivered in an un-rushed mild manner.    

I’ll probably update this entry as I recall the humor of his points…   …that weren’t bulletted..

Thanks for visiting – Wendy