“Look up at the stars and not down at your feet. Try to make sense of what you see, and wonder about what makes the universe exist. Be curious.”
— Stephen Hawking
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Posts Tagged ‘inspiration’
Ever Curious
Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, creativity, inspiration, Thoughts, Writers on September 15, 2024| Leave a Comment »
This Could Get Tricky
Posted in Science!, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, art, biology, color, inspiration, perception, Thoughts on September 13, 2024| Leave a Comment »
Mr Man and I recently went on the hunt for the perfect blue gift for a friend. We did eventually find a beautiful piece of handblown glass in a dark blue with silver flecks. Lovely.
The only issue, we later discovered, was that our goal should have been a color that was closer to teal. So not the deep blue of a falling dark sky, but the vibrant green-tinged hues of a Caribbean sea over a white sand beach.
Regardless, the piece was still pretty. And it brought up the question of whether one person’s idea of blue is the same as another’s.
And then this site came across my desk: Is My Blue Your Blue?
If you think the page color is blue, click the button at the bottom right. If you think it’s green, click the bottom left. And don’t be surprised when it starts to get tricky!
For more on this topic, check out this article on the variability in color perception, and interpretation, in humans.
The science of color perception
A lot of factors feed into how people perceive and talk about color, from the biology of our eyes to how our brains process that information, to the words our languages use to talk about color categories. There’s plenty of room for differences, all along the way.
For example, most people have three types of cones — light receptors in the eye that are optimized to detect different wavelengths or colors of light. But sometimes, a genetic variation can cause one type of cone to be different, or absent altogether, leading to altered color vision. Some people are color-blind. Others may have color superpowers.
Superpowers? Yes, please!
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This Beautiful Dance
Posted in Science!, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, geology, inspiration, science, Thoughts on September 12, 2024| Leave a Comment »
How did we get the landscape that we have today? I’m talking the big stuff, geology, not horticulture. Plate tectonics. We all know what Earth looks like now, but how did we get here?
This animation starts with the world we recognize, then rolls back time to show how the planet’s macrostructure has changed. Fun, right?
Witness 1.8 billion years of tectonic plates dance across Earth’s surface in a new animation
Mapping our planet through its long history creates a beautiful continental dance — mesmerising in itself and a work of natural art.
It’s a beautiful dance.
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Hey September, What’s Up?
Posted in Science!, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, astronomy, inspiration, NASA, science on September 6, 2024| Leave a Comment »
If you’re the sort of person who enjoys looking up, you might like this list of September skywatching tips from NASA.
What’s on the roster? Another supermoon, a partial lunar eclipse, Saturn doing its ring thing, and something called International Observe the Moon Night, plus more more more.
Check out the article or watch the video here:
Have fun!
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Tinged in Red
Posted in Other, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, fall, inspiration, nature on September 4, 2024| Leave a Comment »
Nights are cooler, the afternoon sky is a crisp blue, and the outermost leaves of the giant maple tree across the street are tinged in red. It must be time for fall foliage predictions!
Fall foliage map: When and where to expect autumn colors
Click through for animated maps and links to more info, explainers, and a printable coloring book for the kiddos (or you, I don’t judge!).
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We Are Connected
Posted in Holidays, Other, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, inspiration, quotes, Thoughts on September 2, 2024| Leave a Comment »
“From the standpoint of daily life, however, there is one thing we do know: that we are here for the sake of each other – above all for those upon whose smile and well-being our own happiness depends, and also for the countless unknown souls with whose fate we are connected by a bond of sympathy. Many times a day I realize how much my own outer and inner life is built upon the labors of my fellow men, both living and dead, and how earnestly I must exert myself in order to give in return as much as I have received.”
― Albert Einstein
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You Can Do Anything! *
Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, art, creativity, inspiration, itch reflex, NASA, persistence, the world-changing powers of caffeine, Thoughts, Writers, writing on September 1, 2024| Leave a Comment »
Delightfully Humbling
Posted in Holidays, Science!, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, inspiration, museums, ottawa, Thoughts on August 31, 2024| 1 Comment »
The Canadian Museum of Nature is situated in Ottawa’s Victoria Memorial Museum Building, a giant stone edifice built over a hundred years ago. Its mosaic tile floors, carved wooden bannisters and stained glass windows provide a lovely backdrop for exhibits old and new.
Can’t go in person? Here’s a brief video tour:
We started at the top, in a temporary exhibit on insects. Some icky, yes, but the longevity, creativity and adaptability of that class of creatures is fascinating.
Next stop wolves, then the Arctic, then Earth, Mammals, Water, Birds and finally, Dinosaurs.
The fossils throughout were impressive. Giant whale? Check. A complete Daspletosaurus torosus (a cousin of T. rex) skeleton? Check!
A bit of fun from a Museum palaeobiologist:
I also picked up a box of Canadian rocks to remember the beauty and complexity of the geology beneath our feet.
And in the floor of the Fossil Gallery, an embedded spiral* shows the extent of geological history as we know it, complete with a tiny section at the end for the Cenozoic era, age of mammals, with an even smaller epoch at the end featuring the rise of humanity.
* I should have taken a picture of this but did not, and can’t find a picture of it online. Here’s a different version to give you an idea.
This is why I love history in general, and museums in particular. On the one hand, a long-term perspective is very good at making one feel small, but on the other hand, there is real joy in knowing that you are a part of something so very big.
The experience was both humbling and delightful.
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Why Not Enjoy It?
Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, creativity, first drafts, genre fiction, inspiration, quotes, Thoughts, Writers, writing on August 30, 2024| Leave a Comment »
“This afternoon, burn down the house. Tomorrow, pour critical water upon the simmering coals. Time enough to think and cut and rewrite tomorrow. But today-explode-fly-apart-disintegrate! The other six or seven drafts are going to be pure torture. So why not enjoy the first draft, in the hope that your joy will seek and find others in the world who, by reading your story, will catch fire, too?”
— Ray Bradbury
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Crazy or Cool?
Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, creativity, genre fiction, inspiration, Thoughts, Writers, writing on August 29, 2024| Leave a Comment »
I’m toying with an idea and I can’t decide if it’s crazy or cool. Here’s a peek inside my head:
“Hey self, maybe we should try something a little bonkers.”
“Why not? Sounds fun. What do you have in mind?”
“What about writing a bunch of drabbles?”
“One-hundred word stories? We do that all the time, so sure.”
“What about writing a hundred drabbles?”
“A hundred? As in, One hundred? 100? Ten times ten? Roman numeral C?”
“Yep. Because numerical symmetry. One hundred hundred word stories.”
“I know you like challenging goals but that’s completely bonkers.”
“Yeah?”
“Absolutely. Also… pretty cool, actually. Hmm.”
So there you have it, my current writing target dilemma. A project like this would be a fun challenge but the real question is whether it would help my writing or distract me from larger projects.
What do you think, is this idea too much or not enough? Crazy? Cool? Bit of both?
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