statement

Spare an organ, anyone?

A little bit behind on this, but PROJECT GRYPHON appears in the July - August issue of Pedestal Magazine (issue 58). Was hoping to have an illustration go with this, but getting all the angles right for a head made of twenty-three holophones has turned out to be more challenging than typing up the words 'twenty-three holophone' in the first place. Here's a little drawing to go with it, one that falls short of the mood and holographic projections that I can see rather clearly in my head, I'm sad to say(so what else is new?).

Early sketch, showing how the head may come together, a rather complex thing really...

...necessitating a 3D model, to assist with the angles.

Had this sleek idea for a taser that I couldn't really translate into paper, until I found out about the TASER C2, truly a beauty by design. 

"...with pocket tasers for fingers..."

The final shape of the atomizer came about from the sensibilities of the tetraheron, as enspoused in this article. For the body, the drawing below does not necessarily illustrate the effect of fusing a bunch of screens together(the sketch above does a slightly better job), although the final shape was a nice surprise.

Summer arrives: the warriors fall

fallen, originally uploaded by windupbaerd.

Summer arrives on wings of death, raking in its wake the final breath of many a fallen warrior denied sanctuary and safety from an ultraviolet glare, delivering a silent demise in the now, and a promise of cutaneous malignancy (for the rest of us) in the morrow.

because your word...

because your word..., originally uploaded by windupbaerd.

...just isn't good enough.

If you ever happen to get caught in a train that's been delayed and therefore cannot make it on time for work, please avail yourself of one of these "Late Notifications," issued at the station office, that magically imparts an air of authenticity as you explain to your boss later in the morning why you were REALLY off by five minutes.

Yamakasa

The Hakata Gion Yamakasa ended just last week, and in the rain I am told. In the few days leading up to the festival the floats that will be carried during the matsuri can be found dotting several locations in the city, like this one, outside the Fukuoka Asian Museum of Art.

Phror. Becadom, sissirishic and huwf.

Finally got around to reading Alan Moore's Voice of the Fire earlier this year, and it's still an experience that resonates with me six months later. Above and beyond the amount of research that went into it, and perhaps one of those great examples of an alternative take on the whole phenomenon of psychogeography, is the overwelming sense of warmth and humanity throughout the book. By the time I had read the first few lines of the chapter with the witches (dealing with the last of the witch hunts) I had gained a whole new level of respect for the warlock from Northampton. The final chapter was perhaps the riskiest, since every preceeding one had an element of... danger heaped upon a character instantly accessible by some drive or some inherent flaw or another, capped off in some narrative form; when the spotlight finally turns upon the city of Northampton itself, the risks that Moore comes to place upon himself as an author in the public eye becomes apparent, because unlike the rest of the book it is an entirely raw take where he's already raised up the curtains, and still expects the reader to follow him while he lays bare the tricks of his trade. It's probably one of those ballsy things that people have come to like him for.

There I go, talking as though I actually understood it all.

For Use/Numen

Vienna/Croatia. Love

...and whom do you share your sunsets with?

and with whom do you share your sunsets with?, originally uploaded by windupbaerd.

;O

Here's an interesting can of worms:

Japan Zines : Never Mind The Bloggers

"The hardest thing to crack into is the world of underground comics in Japan, not because they are hard to find but because there is so much it's almost impossible to find a point of entry. There are tons of stores selling dojinshi but, without exaggerating, 90 percent of it is either porno or parody — or parody-porno. As cool as it is to see Darth Vader having sex with Luke Skywalker, I really wish I could find more substantial stories. There are only so many naked Harry Potter pictures you can see before you just lose interest."

Of course, things could never be THAT simple, have a look at what an Eric Blair has to say about it:

A Nice Cup of Tea*

If you look up 'tea' in the first cookery book that comes to hand you will probably find that it is unmentioned; or at most you will find a few lines of sketchy instructions which give no ruling on several of the most important points. This is curious, not only because tea is one of the main stays of civilization in this country, as well as in Eire, Australia and New Zealand, but because the best manner of making it is the subject of violent disputes.

When I look through my own recipe for the perfect cup of tea, I find no fewer than eleven outstanding points. On perhaps two of them there would be pretty general agreement, but at least four others are acutely controversial. Here are my own eleven rules, every one of which I regard as golden:

• First of all, one should use Indian or Ceylonese tea. China tea has virtues which are not to be despised nowadays — it is economical, and one can drink it without milk — but there is not much stimulation in it. One does not feel wiser, braver or more optimistic after drinking it. Anyone who has used that comforting phrase 'a nice cup of tea' invariably means Indian tea.

• Secondly, tea should be made in small quantities — that is, in a teapot. Tea out of an urn is always tasteless, while army tea, made in a cauldron, tastes of grease and whitewash. The teapot should be made of china or earthenware. Silver or Britanniaware teapots produce inferior tea and enamel pots are worse; though curiously enough a pewter teapot (a rarity nowadays) is not so bad.

• Thirdly, the pot should be warmed beforehand. This is better done by placing it on the hob than by the usual method of swilling it out with hot water.

• Fourthly, the tea should be strong. For a pot holding a quart, if you are going to fill it nearly to the brim, six heaped teaspoons would be about right. In a time of rationing, this is not an idea that can be realized on every day of the week, but I maintain that one strong cup of tea is better than twenty weak ones. All true tea lovers not only like their tea strong, but like it a little stronger with each year that passes — a fact which is recognized in the extra ration issued to old-age pensioners.

• Fifthly, the tea should be put straight into the pot. No strainers, muslin bags or other devices to imprison the tea. In some countries teapots are fitted with little dangling baskets under the spout to catch the stray leaves, which are supposed to be harmful. Actually one can swallow tea-leaves in considerable quantities without ill effect, and if the tea is not loose in the pot it never infuses properly.

• Sixthly, one should take the teapot to the kettle and not the other way about. The water should be actually boiling at the moment of impact, which means that one should keep it on the flame while one pours. Some people add that one should only use water that has been freshly brought to the boil, but I have never noticed that it makes any difference.

• Seventhly, after making the tea, one should stir it, or better, give the pot a good shake, afterwards allowing the leaves to settle.

• Eighthly, one should drink out of a good breakfast cup — that is, the cylindrical type of cup, not the flat, shallow type. The breakfast cup holds more, and with the other kind one's tea is always half cold before one has well started on it.

• Ninthly, one should pour the cream off the milk before using it for tea. Milk that is too creamy always gives tea a sickly taste.

• Tenthly, one should pour tea into the cup first. This is one of the most controversial points of all; indeed in every family in Britain there are probably two schools of thought on the subject. The milk-first school can bring forward some fairly strong arguments, but I maintain that my own argument is unanswerable. This is that, by putting the tea in first and stirring as one pours, one can exactly regulate the amount of milk whereas one is liable to put in too much milk if one does it the other way round.

• Lastly, tea — unless one is drinking it in the Russian style — should be drunk without sugar. I know very well that I am in a minority here. But still, how can you call yourself a true tealover if you destroy the flavour of your tea by putting sugar in it? It would be equally reasonable to put in pepper or salt. Tea is meant to be bitter, just as beer is meant to be bitter. If you sweeten it, you are no longer tasting the tea, you are merely tasting the sugar; you could make a very similar drink by dissolving sugar in plain hot water.
  
  Some people would answer that they don't like tea in itself, that they only drink it in order to be warmed and stimulated, and they need sugar to take the taste away. To those misguided people I would say: Try drinking tea without sugar for, say, a fortnight and it is very unlikely that you will ever want to ruin your tea by sweetening it again.

These are not the only controversial points to arise in connexion with tea drinking, but they are sufficient to show how subtilized the whole business has become. There is also the mysterious social etiquette surrounding the teapot (why is it considered vulgar to drink out of your saucer, for instance?) and much might be written about the subsidiary uses of tealeaves, such as telling fortunes, predicting the arrival of visitors, feeding rabbits, healing burns and sweeping the carpet. It is worth paying attention to such details as warming the pot and using water that is really boiling, so as to make quite sure of wringing out of one's ration the twenty good, strong cups of that two ounces, properly handled, ought to represent.

(*taken from The Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters of George Orwell, Volume 3, 1943-45, Penguin ISBN, 0-14-00-3153-7)

I must say that I disagree with the bit about milk - tea should be drunk as it is, but then, when you put it like these gentlemen below here do, it seems that so long as you are drinking tea everything is well and dandy, regardless of whatever else that comes between the two of you:
 

But keep the milk to yourself, all the same.

 

Time to leave, originally uploaded by windupbaerd.

When I first came to Japan perhaps a little mistakenly I projected my image of an idealized foreign country onto the sport that was sumo; it occupied a large part of my mind, on both an analytical and even an artistical level - in that way I came to see beauty in two heaving bodies slapping against each other for a brief handful of seconds. Controlled chaos as a spectator artform, the elusive prelude glimpsed only in the early minutes of a pornographic movie when the viewer can still appreciate such things as choreography and technique before all the blood shunts yonder.

With the knowledge of match fixing much of this came to pass and quite understandably clouded my viewing eye, ultimately colouring all inlets of news related to the sport that came my way. Foolish moments that turn rarer with time. Yet still I could feel a sense of passion run through hardened veins if but to see some of my favourite rikishi in action; though I long favoured the local boy, it is only because everyone naturally roots for the underdog, the alpha male in this case being that much more unattainable.

Asashoryu's announcement yesterday of finally stepping down owing to his poor behaviour outside the stifling environment of the sumo ring marks the end of a very strange era; for a long while the only poster child of a dying sport the vacuum left behind seems ill filled by the likes of fellow countrymen Hakuho, skilled though he may be, or even ozeki Kaio, who has refused to leave long after the party ended. Commentators who have their claws deep in the former yokozuna's back, their own relevance indivisible from their feisty target, turn teary eyed and remorseful, although it is unclear for whom they are crying for. How long would it take before the sole yokozuna now succumbs to whatever obligatory pressure that he has hitherto been shielded from?

The real story behind the cover of todays Mainichi Shinbun however, only becomes apparent as we take into account the item placed to the side of Asashoryu's announcement: that of DPJ Secretary General Ichiro Ozawa, who has more than enough reason to step down but manages nonetheless to escape blame, displaying an iron tenacity to shame even the most persistent of shit stains while inspiring tears of approval from a growing echelon of politicians who rub their hands in their pockets, and sit in the sun for a good six hours just to warm their blood.

The lights go down, and the sun comes up. Tomorrow will be much like today, though we would be poorer off for not knowing the difference.

Pallas Athene

Ultimately, this Athena is certainly more frightening than the idiocy to which the Medusa Gorgon is reduced by comparison. What is more dreadful, the monster or the goddess? Klimt seems to deliberately frame both faces with the same coppery hair to draw the comparison in the viewers’ eyes: the monster is only semi-divine whereas Athena’s power is fully divine. This is not a goddess to oppose in mind or in weapon, as Klimt’s Pallas Athene is the epitome of apotropaism: not just a mask to ward away evil but the real thing. Thereby any would-be besieger - or friend or even worshipper - of all that is Athens by her strength of wisdom and arms should be completely intimidated. Klimt has made her eyes alone tell one how sensible it is to lay down any weapons of futile resistance. These eyes bore right through mortals.

Link

What doesn't kill you...

...makes you stranger.

Originally including a paragraph about customizing your babies-in-the-making, hopefully not too much was lost in the final version of Strange Machine. Shaved down to the bare bones, I remember laughing into an empty room each time I checked the word count as it crept ever closer to hitting below the 950 mark.

(-_=)

Been ill for the past two weeks, which rarely happens. What started off as a simple upper-resp tract infection on the first week was followed by an opportunistic one on the second; a lonesome affair, the mind is certainly given over to entertaining all sorts of unpleasant thoughts during times like these. A strange start to the new year, here's to the rest of it!

Otherwise, with a little more than two months left to my stay here in Japan the pressure is certainly coming in from everywhere, and not the first time I wonder what made me decide on the name for this blog.

I'm sitting at the bench coaxing little cells to divide when Ian Curtis surprises me on the iPod, singing this interesting number made all the more curious because I've never heard of it before. That's nothing to go by, I'm not the biggest Joy Division follower, and might not know all their songs, although this one's catchy enough I can't believe I'd've missed it. The other thing muddly thing is that - and understand that I don't know what I'm talking about here - the track seems to have more layers to it than most Joy Division songs.

Turns out it's not Curtis, but an Alex Novak from the band Venus Fly Trap, singing 'Morphine' (link takes you to the myspace page, recommend the above mentioned track and '28th March'), one of the many songs from the free CD that comes with Dodgem Logic, the new underground magazine spearheaded by Alan Moore (interviewed here at Wired), who also has a track on it with Downtown Joe & the Retro Spankees. I'm going to have to ask you not to pass judgement based solely on this YouTube video recorded at the launch party, late last year:





I was going to write more about Alex Novak, but I'm afraid that I got a little sidetracked by this article on Amber Heard, what a talent! Damn you internet!