inspiration

I was in St. Louis, MO, over this past weekend, and went to the St. Louis Science Center as my gallery. Though it may seem less than a true gallery, perhaps these photos will change your mind:


The photos are of a Marbleworks-style large scale ball track that overwhelms you the moment you enter the facility. Partially kid-powered and partially electrically powered, the system sends croquet-sized balls around any of about ten different paths that spin, rotate, bounce, and flip different elements. It's a sublime blending of the low and the high tech, and it certainly sets the tone well for the building you're about to enter.

There were other inspiring elements, as well. A floor panel (sadly unphotographable by virtue of losing all effect when you did) showed an image projected down from above, which kids could step on, causing water to "ripple," glass to "break," and bubbles to "pop" as a result of the infra-red scanner above them. It was a lot of fun.

And I got an idea.

A kid-controlled electrical ball track. The screen that they step on will sense their presence, allowing them to wave their arms around, pushing virtual balls toward a virtual chute, which will trigger a real auger that will pull real balls into the air. Another screen will sense their arms' motion and decide which paths they are sent down into. As the balls roll back down into the reservoir beneath the first screen, it will be dropped back in to the virtual reservoir on the screen, which can take the shape of any number of things; perhaps a factory, a game court, a field, et cetera.

Unfortunately, I have neither the resources nor the knowledge to be able to put this together. But it would certainly be fun!

Happy Bliss

Ever since my sister Bethany moved into an apartment upstairs from mine, she's been asking for a cat. All her life, she's had one; my mom has been a cat lover for as long as I've been alive, and probably longer. Ripping her away from the ones in the home we grew up in was like torture, if you believe the way she was asking. But the building we live in charges extra for apartments with cats, so the decision was a difficult one for her and her roommates.

Her birthday is on the Thirteenth, and so her roommate Natalie (my girlfriend) cooked up a plot, and involved me. We planned it for Friday (the best day for everyone involved). Once she got home from work, we packed her up in the car and drove her up Michigan Road. She had no idea where we were going until the moment my girlfriend handed her a litterbox comb. Surprised and disbelieving, it didn't quite sink in that she was getting a cat until we actually pulled into the Humane Society.

The first one she met was the one she fell in love with. We looked at all the others, but her heart was with Elwood from the very beginning.

That's right; Elwood.

No, not that one. Elwood is a four-month-old, golden colored kitten. He's a very talkative kitten with the typical kitten energy, able to race back and forth across their apartment at frightening speed.

When he came home, it was obvious that he understood their apartment as his new home. He took to the litterbox like second nature, he began playing with everything that dangled or moved, and he got into every open box he could (and some he couldn't).

My "bliss" assignment was going to dinner with my girlfriend and her family on Saturday night. But I think what I found still more enlightening about bliss and its effects on productivity wasn't my own.

Everyone involved got bliss from the same event: the cat's adoption. But it was for much different reasons. Elwood was mostly happy to have a place to run and a person to pet him (though you could tell how he bonded with Bethany immediately), while Bethany's happiness came from having a soft, squishy, furry companion to watch as he darted about the apartment, attacking feathers and dust. Natalie's was in watching Bethany and Elwood find one another and be happy with finally getting what they wanted.

I'm ordinarily a pretty happy person. In fact, this was one of the toughest assignments for me- not because I couldn't do anything that made me happy, but because I didn't know what I could do that would make me more happy than usual. My "bliss time" was watching my brother perform in a marching band competition, and then dinner with my girlfriend and her parents (wonderful, fun people). Nothing out of the ordinary, really, but very de-stressing and blissful time. But watching the kitten and his new owner really brought me full circle.
(Elwood, October 11, 2008)

What tнe #$*! Dө ωΣ (k)πow!?

In a sense, the movie is correct; reality is truly what we make it. We shape our perception and ideas of the way the world around us is until it becomes what we want it to be.

As a piece of entertainment and thought provocation, it becomes very successful. I've found myself thinking about the Caribbean natives who "couldn't see" Columbus' ships on the horizon - a historical myth, in fact, but an interesting thought nonetheless - and as a result, have tried to see things I can't see in the past several days.

Seeing Sideways, so to speak.

No alien Columbus sailing in on his space-Nina, though. Sadly.

Pienar?

My "sixth sense" is Pie Sonar. It's a strange gift, characterized by the ability to sense pies anywhere nearby, by composition, taste, and even texture.

When I first woke up on Sunday the 5th of October, I discovered a strange little niggling in the back of my mind. It called me forward, into the kitchen, where a lemon meringue was sitting on the counter.

As I went about my day, I felt the strange niggling pulling me in all sorts of directions - and, somehow, the taste of pumpkin would slide in to the left side of my mind, the taste of boston creme to the right. I decided I wanted some Pecan Pie; my Pie Sonar directed me around a corner and into a pastry shop. Just as I suspected, they had a pecan pie; I purchased and ate it. Twas delicious.

It was distracting for a while, but as I went about my day, I learned to tune out the sense I had developed that morning. It was much easier to sleep than you might expect; the tastes were actually rather soothing.

This just makes me wonder...what use could this sense possibly be?

Odditory

I like music, as anyone who knows me knows about me. So for the Auditory sense, I mashed together some bits of fifteen of my favorite songs.

The mixmash is here.

The songs included are:
AFI's "Miss Murder"
Electric Light Orchestra's "Mr. Blue Sky"
Billy Preston's "Nothing From Nothing"
Maroon 5's "Won't Go Home Without You"
Anberlin's "Never Take Friendship Personal"
38th Parallel's "Hear My Cry"
Sergio Mendes' "Mas Que Nada"
Nickel Creek's "Ode to a Butterfly"
OK Go's "Here It Goes Again"
David Crowder Band's "...neverending..."
Massive Attack's "Teardrop" (Theme from House)
FreePlay's "The Esteemed Professor"
Futurama's "Theme Song"
John Williams' "Imperial March"
Inspector Gadget's "Theme Song"

This was a lot of fun.

I can see!

It's amazing to me just how wonderful a gift the visual sense is. With it, I can see my lovely girlfriend (pictured, left) or a beautiful space scene from the NASA archives (pictured, right). No matter what I see, it triggers a reaction of some kind: whether it is a reaction as simple as simply moving to one side in order to avoid colliding with a wall, or running to gather a loved one in my arms, or stopping to look up at a beautiful starscape, the vision I have is one of the things I am most thankful for.

On Friday, I had time to go to the Library, and I made a concerted effort to notice the things around me that caused me to act:

After the front doors of my apartment building, the street I had to cross, and the cars on it, the first thing I noticed was the IndyGo bus which took me down Meridian Street. My reaction was to board. I got on and noticed people all over the place. My reaction was to find a slightly less populated place and stand. I noticed St. Clair street approaching. My reaction was to pull the Stop Requested cable.

Once I got off the bus, I noted the Library's location. I noted the street in my way. I noted that there were cars coming. My reaction was to not cross. When I noted that the cars stopped, I went across (from which I realized that we notice not only things, but the motion thereof, when we formulate our actions). I noted the location and entrance of the library, and I moved toward it. I noted that there were stairs in my way, and I climbed them. I noted that I was very near to the door, so I pulled it open.

It's a very pretty place, the Indianapolis Central Library. I like it. Plenty to see there.

Feeeelinggggs....

The Tactile Sense.

On Thursday, I went to my dance class. If there were anything more suited to the tactile sense and expression thereof than dancing, I don't know what it is. It it truly a fascinating sensation: the touch of clothing to skin, the touch of hand to shirt to back, hand to sleeve to arm, and hand to hand, the touch of feet to socks to floor...it's all very interesting.

After a while, I started to play around with it; to see if I could feel every sensation on every part of my body. I found that, with some effort, I could feel the clothing on my skin (especially when I was moving). I could feel the hair on my head, and I could feel my body interacting with itself (such as on my armpits); however, try as I might, I could not feel the touch of skin to air, except when I moved rapidly.

It made me think, though: is it really a sense if we don't sense anything with it? For instance, deaf people don't have the sense of hearing. So do we lose the sense of touch if we're not touching anything, and get it back if we ever do touch something again?

Existentialism makes my head ache.