Category: Random

• rolling

  April 22, 2018

  

  It’s been ten years since I owned a bike. I started, as so many kids do, with a little BMX, then around my late teens I was gifted a refurbished hybrid to get about the backroads of the Hawkesbury hills. When I moved on campus, the hybrid became a handy mode of late-night transport between my 4×4 cell room and the computer labs (that had better internet, and printers).

  But given the lack of space available, the only place I could store the bike was lashed to a post outside my room. It wasn’t ideal, and it wasn’t too long before rust started to appear on some of the more delicate-looking bolts and parts. Before it progressed too far, I decided to throw it on ebay. Since saying goodbye and handing that bike over to some rando who frankly could’ve looked happier to acquire such a beloved machine, I’ve wanted another bike.

  Cue several years of stop-start savings, getting close only to have some life event empty the coffers, getting up there again, repeat ad infinitum. A couple of weeks ago, I finally got one: a mid-range cyclocross bike that handles road and trails with ease. It’s a joy to finally be out there again — it’s cliched but I really have missed that mixture of agony (uphill) and bliss (downhill). Melbourne is good place to have a bike, too, with a surfeit of dedicated paths and trails and bike lanes on most major arterials.

  Here’s to many happy spins henceforth.

• dust to dust

  March 19, 2018

  I’ve attended three memorial services this year. March isn’t over yet.

  Annihilation is one of my favourite books, and I can’t tell you why. It’s something about the way humanity is reduced to just its connection with the world around us, and done so simply, and only in words. Names, backgrounds, the trimmings with which we identify ourselves. None of it matters.

  Today’s memorial service was secular. It was a fitting and touching reminder of how life is about family, it’s about vitality, about making the most of every day. But it was primarily about the connections we form with each other, be they familial, be they long-lasting, be they fleeting.

  There is no real rhyme or reason to this post. Sometimes you are a member of the expedition, working your way through the unknown; sometimes you are Area X itself, all-knowing, but also uncaring. Sometimes you want answers; sometimes you want to just give in, let go, and be.

• Hypnosis

  May 28, 2017

  

  Like the boy reaching out in Persona …

  … like Neo, who cannot resist the mirror …

  … cinema is hypnotic, and we are powerless to its mechanisms.

• Entering the matrix

  January 18, 2017

  I’ve found myself frustrated in the last twelve months or so with a few mundane computer tasks that I have to undertake regularly, both for life admin and for work. Things like sorting out variable savings budgets, typing the same sentences over and over again in emails and other correspondence… I have also found myself wanting to play with websites in interesting ways, and am looking forward perhaps to looking at some of the intersections between cinema and code for research. All this — along with an institutional subscription to Lynda — has led me to undertake something of a crash course in programming. My initial efforts are the usual (Hello world, guess my number etc), but it’s enlightening to see how much work goes into the simplest of applications.

  Stay tuned…

• What a difference…

  August 10, 2016

  Sometimes the gurus get it wrong… it may not be best to ‘mark’ down when you feel like your life is on a trajectory. Since the last blog, the contentedness I felt at managing things vanished.

  In its place was left a gaping hole of uncertainty. Doubt. Fear. And most keenly felt of all: a crippling lack of productivity.

  Bottom line? I think it’s important to acknowledge what things work and when; it’s also just as important to note when the train has derailed.

  Deep breaths. Multiple cups of tea. The train is back on the rails; now carefully re-stoking the boiler.