“The question is not what you look at, but what you see.”
― Henry David Thoreau
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Posts Tagged ‘creativity’
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Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2021, creativity, inspiration, quotes, Thoughts, writing on October 24, 2021| Leave a Comment »
The Answer
Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2021, cake, creativity, Douglas Adams, Fiction, genre fiction, humor, inspiration, sff, Thoughts, Writers, writing on October 18, 2021| Leave a Comment »
Forty-two years ago this month, we learned the answer to life, the universe and everything. Even if humorous sci-fi isn’t your thing, Douglas Adams’ work has permeated pop culture.
42 years later, how ‘The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’ has endured
The influence of the Hitchhiker’s Guide “is everywhere,” says Marcus O’Dair, author of The Rough Guide to the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
“We can see it in culture, where Adams’ story is rumoured to have inspired everything from the band Level 42 to comedy show The Kumars at No. 42,” he says. “We can see it in tech: in the real-life ‘knife that toasts,’ for instance, or in-ear translation services reminiscent of the Babel fish. The most visible sign of its ubiquity, though, might be the fact that we can celebrate its anniversary not at 40 or 50 years but at 42 — and everyone knows why.”
This book let me know that there was a place for humorous absurdities in writing, and that it really doesn’t pay to take yourself too seriously.
“The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy is an indispensable companion to all those who are keen to make sense of life in an infinitely complex and confusing Universe, for though it cannot hope to be useful or informative on all matters, it does at least make the reassuring claim, that where it is inaccurate it is at least definitively inaccurate. In cases of major discrepancy it’s always reality that’s got it wrong.
This was the gist of the notice. It said “The Guide is definitive. Reality is frequently inaccurate.”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
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Be Cinderella
Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2021, creativity, inspiration, perfectionism, Thoughts, writing on October 16, 2021| Leave a Comment »
My public service announcement for today: Good does not equal perfect. While they may be related, I’m pretty sure that Good is Cinderella and Perfect is the wicked stepmother. Just saying.
It’s an idea I’ve discussed before but needed to hear again, and I thought you might too.
Go forth and be awesome!
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Practice Better
Posted in Likes, Other, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2021, creativity, environment, inspiration, remix on October 15, 2021| Leave a Comment »
You know how sometimes you see a thing and it sets off little creative sparkles in your brain parts? Well, that’s what happened when I spotted this striking piece of art:
Giant “Faucet” Spewing Single-Use Plastic Urges Us To Reconsider Our Plastic Use
When I saw this my first thought (after “Ok, that’s insanely cool”) was “How can I do that?
Lucky me (and you, if you’re so inclined), the artist has not only created this installation* but turned it into an interactive opportunity. Just as I was visualizing the steps needed to trim a tap like that and build a fountain of plastics, I spotted this:
If you are an artist or creative that would like to participate, join us in creating a remix of the Giant Plastic Tap
— This three story tall giant art installation is leaking plastics into different environments – Von Wong Blog
Don’t mind if I do! If you want to join the fun, all files needed to remix your very own giant plastic tap are available here:
Remix the Giant Plastic Tap – Photoshop Challenge! – Dropbox Paper
Check out this post for more details on usage.
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I’m practicing new photo processing techniques and thought this was a good place to start. Lots to learn (ugh, lighting and color balance! I was in a hurry, but still) and this challenge is a great way to do it.
* Von Wong’s mind-bending original project was sponsored by the Embassy of Canada in France. Because Canadians are awesome. Every single one!
Comma Chameleon
Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2021, creativity, inspiration, Jane Austen, literary analysis, Thoughts, Writers, writing on October 14, 2021| Leave a Comment »
I spotted this article the other day:
What I Learned About My Writing By Seeing Only The Punctuation
Hmm, I said, “That’s interesting in an upside-down sort of a way. I wonder what my writing looks like without, you know, words?”
My first thought was that I probably use too many commas. I headed over to the site developed by the article’s author and lo! I was right.
My second thought was to see how that story compared to other authors’ work. I visited Project Gutenberg and evaluated first chapters from a selection of famous and/or cherished books.
Now that was interesting, both for the differences in punctuation and for the variety and length of chapters. (Nineteenth-century authors also loved commas, it seems. Is it time to hang up my keyboard and pick up a quill?)
Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen 
The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett 
The Count of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas 
Great Expectations, Charles Dickens 
Ulysses, James Joyce 
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, L. Frank Baum 
Frankenstein, Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley 
The Souls of Black Folks, W.E.B Du Bois 
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, Arthur Conan Doyle
This approach certainly provides a new perspective on the building blocks underpinning different authors, eras and genres of writing. Will it help my writing? Maybe, maybe not, but it was fun.
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Queen of Meh
Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2021, Affinity Photo, creativity, habits, inspiration, learning@lunch, practice, Thoughts on October 8, 2021| Leave a Comment »
I’m bouncing from project to project again, doing some work work and some practice work. I’ve also started about half a dozen posts but nothing feels right, because none of them said what I was really thinking, which is that today I am the Queen of Meh.
This is not to say that things are not a-ok, I’d just prefer to be making more progress.
Mood: pretty groovy, thanks for asking.
Fine, let’s roll with it.
I did nothing amazing today but do things I did. The project I had the most fun with was practicing photo compositing. Here’s a chimera that is not very good but I like anyway: Behold, the Winged Buffabear!
daguerreotype overlay from Spoon Graphics
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I think I’ll try to follow this advice by Christine Carter, and my own, and aim low:
The 1-minute secret to forming a new habit
Here’s why we need to be willing to be bad: being good requires that our effort and our motivation be in proportion to each other. The harder something is for us to do, the more motivation we need to do that thing. And you might have noticed, but motivation isn’t something that we can always muster on command….
The goal, remember, is repetition, not high achievement. So let yourself be mediocre at whatever you’re trying to do, but be mediocre every day.
— Christine Carter
That I can do!
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Photo by Alexander Schimmeck on Unsplash
Beauty and Courage
Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2021, creativity, inspiration, quotes, Thoughts, Writers on October 6, 2021| Leave a Comment »
“Perhaps all the dragons in our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us act, just once, with beauty and courage. Perhaps everything that frightens us is, in its deepest essence, something helpless that wants our love.”
— Rainer Maria Rilke
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Be Fun
Posted in Other, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2021, creativity, family, fun, Mark Twain, quotes, Samuel Clemens, Thoughts, Writers, writing on October 4, 2021| Leave a Comment »
A long-time family friend always says goodbye by saying “Be good!” My father always answers the same way: “Have fun!”
You can see which side Samuel Clemens occupied.
I at least try to split the difference.
Shining on the Inside
Posted in Food and..., Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2021, creativity, home, Thoughts, writing on October 3, 2021| Leave a Comment »
You know those days when hoped-for sun never arrives and the design project that should have taken half an hour takes three and the pears you thought would be perfect in a fruit torte are rock hard and the bananas you need today aren’t anywhere near ripe, even after you bake them in a 300F oven for an hour?
It’s that kind of day.
So, ok, not great. But then I came up with not one but two solutions to the design issue and turned the pears into slow-cooked lemon, cinnamon and cardamom pear butter and made blueberry Grand Marnier tortes and I can work around the banana problem, I probably didn’t need the extra sugar anyway.
And you know what? It’s fine if the sun doesn’t come out today.
I’m shining on the inside.
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Imagine Better
Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2021, climate change, creativity, Fiction, free fiction, genre fiction, inspiration, sff, writing on October 2, 2021| Leave a Comment »
The good news is that there is a lot of up and coming fiction addressing issues of climate, change, and the environment. (The bad news is that we need it.)
Grist/Fix: Solutions Lab has a new climate fiction issue out, with discussions about the role of fiction in fixing reality and a dozen new stories from their “Imagine 2200: Climate Fiction for Future Ancestors” short story contest to get us started.
The Climate Fiction Issue: How fiction can change our reality | Fix
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