The other day I swore to myself that I would never ever sing in choir again, especially not alto, that I'd quit as soon as the Easter concert was over. Well, it's over, it went really well (I botched up only once, when I started one of the hosannas too early, and the lesson learnt there is 'look at Ben, whatever you do, just friggin' look at Ben') and we'll be singing again (not the whole cantata, but the same hymns we did last night and the last number of the cantata If Ye Love Me, which is the second-best song of the whole thing, after Hosanna to the Son of David - btw, hosanna is now my favourite word :3) on the 21st when elder Ballard comes to Coventry to give a talk (wewt, I get to sit next to the apostle, though it's also slightly lame that I have to sit on the stand for choir, and then look at his back while he speaks :/) So yeah, I guess it's fair to say that I'm not quite given up on choral singing yet.

I'm also greatly enjoying reading Finnegan's Wake, as impossible as it is. It's not a novel, it's not even a story. It's not exactly a poem either, though it is poetry, I would say. It just tickles so incredibly much, it's doing to language what surrealists did to realism: twisting and changing it, making it funny, makign you see relations and correlations that you hadn't really seen before and that aren't really there either. :3 It's one of a kind, I don't know anything alike it. I don't recommend it to anybody (except maybe Linderel and Silvie, maybe), but I do encourage people to be aware of it, and maybe someday willing to take up the challenge with an open enough mind to say "I will not understand this when I read it - but I'll read it anyway. All the way through". No, I haven't got through it just yet.

Elder Jeffrey R. Holland talking about Easter: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EpFhS0dAduc

I love elder Holland, he has this really evocative, emotional, strong way with his words, it's marvellous (I recall a few months back him talking about Joseph Smith and the time he spent in Liberty Jail (gotta love the irony in that name) and it still is one of the best talks I've seen).


Today's dialogue of the day:
-Boy, do you have any pornography in your bag?
-No sir, we don't even own a pornograph.

Amg, where is Silvie? I need my Silvie. Silvie is in French? I mean, France? I need my Silvie ._.

So, with the lack of Silvie and a thing I need to say, I'll encumber you people with it:
Amg, what is going on? People are, like, social to me?! In real life! People talk to me on a bus stop! Some kid on the bus was all smiles and "how you doing" flirty, and and and... I said hi to a totla stranger on the street, thinking she was my housemate *spatzes* Also, the other day, I had Chinese take-out. By myself. I'm frightened by my urbanite habits.

I don't know if I should do updates... But I will: choir needs singing, church needs attending and God needs believing in, photos need editing, work needs... going to and coming back from and doing stuff at and being social with people I like, events need arranging, mission papers need sending, movies and arts need seeing in Birmingham, reviews of movies and events and arts and books attended seen and read in Birmingham and London need writing, art needs making, house probably needs cleaning but I'm not going to so no point in mentioning that...
Meh a lot.


*edit* Z0mg, you can strike the mission papers, they're finished! :D :D :D Just had the final bit (chest x-ray) info given me, and it's all doooooooone! :D Now I need to have an interview with the bihop and then the stake president, and then... they'll be off! :D Amg, it's unbelievable! My papers, let me show you tham! (I won't, but let me anyway!!)

...Yet another ET-crash wiped diarying. I really flipping hate that so incredibly much that I... don't know what to do. Maybe I'll just go away from ET and internet for 18 months and add ET-diary-crashes into my list of "things I won't have to worry about on my mission" -_- *is really friggin' unimpressed* You'd think I'd learn and make back-ups or some such of diary entries I want to keep. But I don't (learn, that is). Meh. I can't even remember what diary-entries I lost. The one with the circus review and other random bits, and an invitation for people to watch General Conference last weekend (which was pretty brilliant, by the way, I went to three of the four sessions and loved every minute of it, and I may or may not be linking you at some point to specific talks, if I can pick ones to share).

I'm sure I had something more interesting to share, but I can't remember what, I'm so annoyed now. *sighs and goes to do photo-editing*

This made me go "oh noo! XD
http://xkcd.com/557/

Also, I propose a new game based on http://xkcd.com/561/
What is the uncomfortable truth the well would tell you? (Feel free to take your time, I'll need to think of this for myself for a while).


Also, the recentest Order of the Stick (Varsuuvius' story line) made me cry ;_;

Waltz with Bashir review

After a recent link in [Viking]'s diary to a Jeffrey Tucker article about Intellectual Property in LewRockwell.com (I really need to learn to read that place), I got interested in this guy Tucker and started to look at his archive, and in this http://www.lewrockwell.com/tucker/tucker135.html there is a great paragraph:

All market failure arguments have the appearance of plausibility about them. Let's say you have a poorly managed apartment unit with a porchlight that is out. Everyone would benefit from having the bulb changed. But if one person benefits, so does everyone. All dwellers enjoy the light and only one pays. That's not going to work, is it? No one would act. Except that at some point, someone comes along and befuddles the failure theorists by changing the lightbulb.


I just wanted to share that because it's been a while since I've been looking into IP-stuff, which is one of the rare things (alongside drivers that don't indicate when they turn) that drives me to an indignant rage and therefore would be something that I would be interested in being actively involved in professionally, in regards to policy-making and intellectual public debate (by this I mean that I would consider IP-stuff a career - though I'm not sure if I'd ever consider a non-indicating-drivers -related career, but I sure would bash their heads in if given the chance).



I have recently been more actively researching mormonism and art, and did indeed find huge amount of incredibly useful things that really help me understand how my newly-adopted religious background affects my work (because it has to have some effect and therefore I need to know what this effect is). I will share some of the results with you at some point, because not all of it is only applicable to me (some of it is, of course, because out of the people who see this text I think I'm the only one who is freaked out by the fact that one of the apostles said that if you don't use your artistic ability in a way that the Lord would have you use it, you might not have that ability in the Kingdom - this worries me, because an eternity without being arty? no thanks. But I doubt anyone else cares about that :P). But I've discovered some absolutely wonderful texts about photography, poetry, art as a tool for improving families and individuals, there's a lot of talk about beauty, and a lot of condemnation of this romantic artist-as-God/cult of fame notion that is around a lot - that last thing made me particularly joyful because I've been anti-that for a long time. But yes, that is to come in drips and drabs in the future.

I still also need to write some reviews about/from the Flatpack Festival. I've had this strange nagging idea, that if I attend or witness something temporal (an event), I should write and publish about it for the benefit of all those people who didn't have the same opportunity. It's like it's my duty to do that, so that things that are done but tied in time will not be forgotten. It also grieves me to think of all the marvelous things in the past that are tied in time and lost. I think this kind of ties to the IP thing, because copyright causes destruction of creations, when all they would need to continue living is a copy.

Amg amg amg so very full of WIN!

http://xkcd.com/556/

<3

Sorry for cross-posting Facebook-friends, but...
Why Do Mormons Build Temples:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-x_-TQivCx8

I'd just like people who know/like me to watch that because you'll get a small insight into what is important to me: the temple of the Lord. Also it helps to explain why I go "amgsquee!^_^!!" at times after having been to the temple (I'm going on Good Friday to do baptisms, and on 23 May hopefully to go properly <3)

*runs off to exiting art happenings* See you Monday or something :P

Well, Chelsea won Coventry lost, photo shoot went great, and I found out they make Earl Grey Rooibos tea <3

Tomorrow is the 7th of March, 2009. It is a Saturday. I plan to go round a friend's house to do someone I know a favour: a photoshoot for someone's daughter who turned legal this month. Her mom reckoned it'd be a pretty cool and special and different birthday present, something she'd remember and keep for a long time. And it helps that the girl is pretty too, and not camera-shy I hope.

Also tomorrow Coventry Sky Blues will play Chelsea in the Ricoh Arena in Coventry in the FA cup quarter finals. Which, for some reason (reason which I know but won't say here), I care about despite the fact that footie means very little to me. So hopefully I'll be able to catch at least a bit of that on the radio or TV or something (if I wasn't doing this photoshoot I'd go to a pub and watch the game).

Today I had a day off work 'cause I needed to get stuff done and run a lot of errands. It was a really gorgeous day today and hopefully tomorrow will be too.

Also tomorrow is exactly two years since I got baptised. Two years. How marvelous. Two years since I last drank coffee, tea or alcohol. Two years since I made a covenant with the Lord and took His name upon me, to remember Him and keep His commandments. Two years of having the companionship of the Holy Spirit. I look at how my life has changed in two years and I marvel at the miracle. (I can obviously see how it needs to change even more for the better, but it's all good so far.) I can honestly say that I am happy. Not just today or this week or something, but I am honestly happy with my life, even with the problems and difficulties that I have. It all makes me happy.

A proposal for a new reading practice: Extreme Reading.

I made a NotFunny wiki. You can look at it if you agree it's not funny.

In case you've missed it so far, Minesweeper is pretty cool for a contest, and people should enter. :3

The Urban Word of the Day:

February 20: double freeture

When you pay for one movie at the cinema but sneak into a second flick once the first one is done.

I went to see Hancock, but then it was over instead of leaving I decided to treat myself to a double freeture and snuck into watch Wall-E.

So, what do you call the feeling when you try to get a double freeture but are caught by the cinema staff when the movie is just about to start and have to leave all embarrassed and stuff and never set foot in the establishment, and start to go to a small independent cinema in the next town? >_>

The single most important thing about art is context.

Meaning, medium, message, skill, idea, beauty -- all of those are completely worthless without context. And that is the difference in 'modern art' (i.e. contemporary art) that makes people go "waah, so-and-so is paid ridiculous amounts of money to splatter paint on a canvas and I'm not appreciated for drawing photorealistic pictures of elves!" The paint-splatterer has context. Context is the difference between amateur and professional.

Now, I did just say that without context it's all worthless -- but at the same time I don't mean to say that anyone should stop doing whatever they are doing. For all means draw, people! It's great fun, you're doing yourselves nothing but favours in being creative in any way you like (keeping your mind active through creative processes will help you in the long run). I'm not saying there is no value whatsoever in having a creative hobby. It's just like the difference between having an interest in crime fiction and being a detective. I simply ask you to see this difference. Without context it is nowhere near being professional.

Now admittedly, I am only talking about what I know, which is fine (read: useless) art. I'm not talking about the useful arts of making pretty pictures for other purposes (illustration, decoration, design, advertising...) because those other purposes hold very little interest for me. So, again I'm not exactly saying that you can't be a professional creative without context (though I will be very very surprised if you are - I'm sure even designers are aware of their context).

Context is really difficult. It's knowing what's around, it's the other things that exist that influence meaning and effect. A crude example: if I were to make a piece of art where a dead diver was suspended in a humongous tank, knowing the context (=Damien Hirst's shark-in-a-huge-tank -thing) makes it what it is. Without the context it isn't what it is, and frankly, I don't know what it would be. Possibly nothing.

Obviously this is a huge simplification to illustrate a point. Context is far more than one piece of work by one artist, and it's not limited to art: context is the culture, the time we live in, the moods and tastes of the world, the things we feel and think about - everything. That's why it's important, because it's the only thing that ties art into everything else. Art is not a solitary practice. No man is an island and so forth.

I think the question that needs to be asked is the same important question that is presented to us in the end of that viral Muppet Show video Mana Mana: What is a Mana Mana? Err, no, sorry, that's not it, I meant the other question: who cares? So what? Context is about as important to artists as having webbed feet is to a duck: it doesn't affect very many people in the end, so if you are not a duck, I mean, an artist, why would you care? If I just have told you in no uncertain terms that you are not really an artist, why should you care about context? Well, because it makes what you do so much better. It actually helps. And the principle of context can be applied across the board, to all walks of life. So maybe I have something to say that might be useful to learn (I say maybe because I'm pretty much typing this off the top of my head and I have no idea where it's going anymore, so I might forget to say anything useful in the end).

So lets have another simplified example. If you were an ET artist, making the kind of art that populates ET, what would you do with the principle of context? First, you'd need to look around you. See what everybody else is doing. For the sake of the example we'll restrain it to ET (though in actuality you'd need to be looking at a lot of stuff. A lot). There are people here that are doing a Thing, their Thing, and that is the most interesting sort of work that can be done (anyone who isn't doing their own Thing is probably doing someone else's Things - which is fine, that's how a lot of people start, but that's not an interesting Thing to do so finding your own Thing is pretty important).
Second, because so many people are doing their Thing, there are a lot of Things, and some of them are more similar than others. So for the sake of context you'd need to be able to identify Things that other people do that are similar to what you do. Note, I didn't say "look similar to what you do". I don't meant that the work/pictures/medium is similar, but that the Thing is similar. You are allowed to be a solitary genius with a completely unique look and style - but your Thing will still have some similarities with other people's Things. The long and short of it really is the ability to see connections (which is also a mark of genius: a genius will be able to see connections and associations between things that others wouldn't see) between what you do and what other people do.

So once you've kind of made yourself aware of what is around you, you will pretty much be thinking about that stuff even without me telling you to do so. But that's what I'm going to do anyway: think about stuff! That's the third on the list: look at stuff that other people have made, think about it, let it have an effect on your thinking, and let that thinking have an effect on your doing. And in anticipation of the plagiarism-accusations and 'z0mg art thief' -cries: just no. That has no bearing to this matter whatsoever. Context pretty much cancels the whole idea of stolen ideas, because all ideas of the world are a recycling -- with emphasis on the cycle: what we do affects what has been done in the past just as much as what we see having been done in the past affects what we do. It is not a linear progression. I call it 'standing on the shoulders of giants' - but you need to be on friendly terms with the giant in order to stand on him, and that way you both will reach higher. This is the purpose of art/culture/philosophy/human activity.

This mutual influence back and forth in time is a great big heavy responsibility that art has to bear. You musn't do something that'll ruin the past to lots of other people. That's why the 'real art' is such a protected discipline, not just about anyone can do it. A non-real artist can't ruin the past for others, only a real artist can. Because if you 'do it rong', you will wreack havoc amongst everything that we hold dear. An example is Tracey Emin and her unmade bed. Before that there was a theme in photography, it was a kind of a ticklish theme, very interesting, felt almost naughty... theme of these art photos of unmade beds. These beds had an aura, a mystery, a story. They talked about taboos, about human existence... And when Emin showed everybody her bed, she broke that boundary (which is good, don't get me wrong, breaking boundaries is important!) and those bed-photos lost some of that appeal they had. It was like seeing that glamorous rock star you idolise throwing up his liquid dinner in the gutter: you are better off having seen what you saw (increased knowledge etc) but at the same time... you will never look at him or listen to his music in the same way. Now imagine that somebody else had caused that loss to you and to lots of other people. That would sting. But still I maintain that stinging isn't bad, ruin isn't bad - but you do have to be careful.

To bring all that back to our ET-example, without knowing context, you might ruin another ETer's work. (Here I trust my readers to be responsible artists and not take this as a hint to use context as a weapon in whatever little feuds you have in ET. Really, art should transcend all of that.) So be careful with it.

* * *

Here I ran out of steam. I have no idea what made me write all that, it just kind of spilled out of me incontrollably. I was intending to simply mention that context is the most important thing and then move on to tell you about Extreme Reading and my jumbled thought-process about my anti-conclusionism, but somehow there isn't really space for all of that right now, sorry. :S I'll do those next, but they'll probably be really long entries too, so I apologise in advance to the less patient ones of you :3

And as a reward to all of yous who read all the way to the end (or at least scrolled down), a link to a really cool interactive web-toy-thing. http://www.onemotion.com/flash/spider/ One of the coolest things I've seen in a long while, and a really cool example of the new Flash 3D stuff that is emerging.

Went to have another vaccine yesterday, and the vaccination schedule effectively prevent me from going on the mission any time before mid-July. *sighs* This thing is constantly being pushed back and back and back, it's vey frustrating. And I'll have to duck when I tell my bishop that it's pushed back yet another month >_>

I'm contemplating changing my ET-stylesheet from the green to be a bit more inconspicuous for work. Because let's face it, it's very green.


I have far more interesting things to think about. I don't know why I made you read those boring bits before giving you the following interesting bits.


I have come to the conclusion observed that my life revolves around fear and fascination (which is convenient because when I did Experimental Practice in university my teacher told me to explore something I have both a fear and fascination for (which is where my choice of words comes from) and I think I botched some of my Exp.Prac module by exploring things I only had a fear or fascination for, not both - though I pulled through in the end, and clearly learnt something from all of it so issallgood). Anyhoo, back to my observation. I claim that any emotion, experience, thought, etc etc that I have is something that I have either a fear or a fascination (or both) for. And that everything I can observe can be catalogged under one of those three categories. Of course it's not quite as simple and straightforward as that since there are different decrees of fear and fascination, some things swap sides depending on other factors etc... But still, it's very good to know.

Also I have a new project idea (I should consider finishing some of my previous ones... >_> That drawing of a typewriter with the text about Snowden dying in Catch-22 bleeding out of it needs to be shot... I know someone who might be of help but I'll need to investigate...) for photography-typewriter-mailart. If you would like to be a part of it, give me your mailing address at some point (I won't give out any details right now, I'll try something out first, so it's one of those trust thingies - sides the surprise would be totally spoiled if I told you what it was all like :3)

As you know (or may not know), I commute to work, which means I get the daily newspaper Metro on the bus (yeah, England's awesome like that). And while this keeps me more or less posted on the what's on in the world, there are also some incredibly funny things there in the text messages section. And in the fear of forgetting them, I'll share a couple good ones with you now.

A couple weeks back there was all sorts of industrial action/strikes over jobs in Britain going to foreign labour, and these strikes were called wildcat strikes. So someone sent a text message to the Metro saying "These recent wildcat strikes are so frightening. I hope that the wildcat doesn't strike me."

And today someone sent a text saying "There was a message on the office printer saying 'Jam in tray 4'. You can imagine my disappointment when I discovered only a crumpled sheet of paper stuck there."


Yes, that is pretty much the most exciting thing in my life right now. :P
^{Well ok, no it's not, my life is plenty exciting, but for some reason I'm out of that phase where I need to tell everybody everything. So yeah, feel free to ask and talk even though I'm pretty absent.}

This bizarre thing is making the rounds in Facebook. So here we go for my Facebook-deprived ET-friends:
The REALITY of iippo revealed

(because I like reading about people >_> So dooo eeet)

Rules: Once you've been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged. You have to tag the person who tagged you. If I tagged you, it's because I want to know more about you.


1. My Finnish is really bad. Really. It's my native language, so I obviously understand it just fine and speak it too - but I speak it with a ridiculous English grammar, and I can't tell when I make ridiculous English grammar -influenced mistakes in Finnish.
2. This one most people should know: I'm planning to go on a mission. Hoping to leave aroud early June. It's for 18 months, and I can be sent literally anywhere in the world.
3. I love walking. I love being on the road. Ever so often I get the urge to go far and wide. The furthest I've walked so far is 30miles, from Coventry to Leicester. Took 16 hours.
4. I like machines. I don't know why. But I also want to be a Borg, or a Cylon (or have the Cylon Leoben's babies... <_<)
5. I also like older men (not sure if I should tell people that, but hey, it's random).
6. My taste in music is reversing along the decades: I started out liking 90s stuff back in the 90s, then change of millenium I got into punk and through that to other 70s stuff (I conveniently skipped the 80s), then I grew up a bit more and got into 60s stuff (Beatles, Stones and all the other classic rock), then I started liking rockabilly and proper rock n' roll with the King etc... and then I slid back a step and hit the crooners like Sinatra and co.
7. I don't take myself seriously, and therefore I struggle to take other people seriously.
8. Harpo Marx is my soulmate separated by a hundred years. I miss him, and can't wait to see him. ;_;
9. I had a personal Free Hugs campaign going on for a really long time. I wore a badge that offered free hugs. I got a lot of free hugs as a result, even from strangers, even in Coventry. That helped me believe a little bit in humanity. And I had my butt pinched only once.
10. Terms defined in the UrbanDictionarycom that define me are: "WoWBagger", "Butterfaith", "mouse potato", and "imaginary bluetooth"
11. I play pokemon. And no, it's not a thing like "I still play it" indicating that I used to as a kid. I started when I was over 18.
12. I can't wait to get old and be a granny and beat youngsters in the shins with a walking stick. :D This is my way of saying that I don't believe in the cult of youth.
13. I also don't believe in the cult of speed. I am for the Slow movement in every aspect of life.
14. I have crushes on pretty much everyone around me. A poet once said "I didn't fall in love; no, falling would be far too graceful for me - I face-planted." That describes me well.
15. I like my hair short - in fact, all shaved off. I could make a list of 25 points why it's best to be bald.
16. I should probably mention that I'm a properly trained Media Artist. That's still so weird to say: I'm a qualified artist.
17. My smile is man-made, and I love the fact.
18. I've decided that I want to die of hypothermia. It sounds like a fairly pleasant way to go, plus it'd be subtly ironic, because I'm such a chilly-cat and get cold easily.
19. Me and my dog turned 21 on the same year (that is, he turned 3 which in dog-years is 21). He's pretty much my best friend.
20. I'm dead afraid of wasps, bees and most flying, buzzing animals. There's a traumatic summer in the background there.
21. I'm stubbornly holding onto my mobile, which is 9 years old at the time of this writing and the back cover is held in place with masking tape... But if/when they close the GMT network and force everyone to go 3G, I shall boycott and not have a phone from then on.
22. I desperately want to play croquet and cribbage. Please someone play with me ;_;
23. I hate it when people praise Firefox at me. It's just a browser! Get over it! (I've also decided that to people who insist on telling me about how wonderful Firefox is, I will tell them how wonderful Jesus is).
24. I obsess over the "right colour" which is a sort of light-beige, off-white, old colour of tea stains and sand and light wood and pale skin etc etc etc... and only recently I found out why: it's the colour of all the light in the universe averaged out! (Sidenote: the opposite of the right colour is not the wrong colour, but the left colour).
25. I go to the cinema a lot by myself, because I'm selfish: I don't think anybody will like a movie, or get into the experience as much and as deeply as I do. Please someone prove me wrong :3

Halp halp and plz can I has some moar halp?

Alright my literate friends, I turn to you. I am faced with two questions. One is for me, one is for a friend. Firstly, mine, because it's 'easier' (that is, easier to write down, but it'll take more research).

I want a passage from a book that describes a character being shot and bleeding (preferably to death). It's for art. It has to be pretty long, because I'll type it with my typewriter (in red) and cut it up and use it in an art to make a puggle of blood (for a typewriter that is bleeding to death - all this makes so much more sense when- no, wait, it doesn't actually. But anyway, I need it all the same) - it's a big paper and a big puggle so I'll need big text. So far I've thought of Godfather, James Bond, The Dark Tower, 100 Years of Solitude, Silvie suggested No Country For Old Men. And preferably it'd be a book that is not super-recent (like... pre 90s maybe) so that there's a possibility it was written on a typewriter by a writer who could have possibly written stuff on a typewriter. And I'd like the death to be not particularly heroic, although at this point of shopping around, I'll look at even the heroic deaths (I don't want it to be heroic death because of this whole necronaut thing - "the necronaut doesn't die well, or right"). But even a heroic death might be necronautical death, we'll see.

[Edit] Nevermind, this is totally solved by the awesomeness that is Catch-22. Snowden's death is necronautical, a turning point for Yossarian, the book is a seminal piece of literature and it was written in the 1960s. Fits the bill perfectly. And the death-scene is dealt with in more than one place, so if it's too short at a point, we'll just take the next bit. :)

* * *

Then my friend's question.
I know this guy, and he's a bit like me (no, this isn't one of those stories where I try to admit to some problem by referring to "my friend" and meaning myself, I actually mean someone I know who actually asked me something he thought I'd know) - he's quirky. Arty. Shy. Anyway.
One time we were walking home on a Saturday night, and I stopped at the bookstore window (this is actually a really good story about High Fidelity, if I haven't told it you yet, do ask, it's good), and yesterday he called me and said that the way I was outside that bookstore window really left an impression on him. That he witnessed passion for books there, that I'm someone who doesn't only read to learn stuff, that I read because I love to, because I love books. And it's true (and it's kinda cool that he could see that from watching me at a bookstore window). And then he told about the shoe in the other foot, how he doesn't like it when he has to read stuff in order to do stuff: he loves to cook but he hates it when they have to pour through cookbooks to construct a menu; he loves to draw and make models, but he hates it when he has to read how to do something before doing it. Having to read something to find something out. And I can understand that - after all, who really reads manuals? And he said he wanted a passion for books too. He wanted to love reading, love books. And he came to me for advice.
Which leaves me in a pickle.

How can I help him? o.O The way I feel about literature is as natural as breathing to me. My mom is the original bibliophile, I've gotten books for presents ever since I was- heck, even before I could read. I learnt to read at the same time as my older brother, when he went to school - and I envied him going to school and me having to wait for two more years before I could go. He had to tell my mom to remove me from the room when he was doing his homework because I was doing it for him and it annoyed him. And when I started reading books without pictures in them, I walked to my mom all dazed and amazed and told her that I could see pictures in my head while I read. Ever since then I have had hundreds of friends that I have met only through pages of books, most important one being my soulmate separated by a hundred years, Harpo. And books without stories have taught me things and helped me to think and draw parallels and see connections between separate things -- all of which is important mental capital that I treasure and will carry with me throughout my life.
Yeah, I have a passion for books alright. But how can I share that?

At this point (of initial shock and awe of 'dude you're so awesome but this question is too hard') I'm kinda thinking it's to do with experiencing things that you wouldn't experience otherwise. I have never done drugs or been raped, but I have experienced those things. But then again, surely you can get that kind of vicarious experiences from other media (movies, TV etc) ((oh, oh! Sidethought Silvie! Vicarious experience horror movies? We like being scared by horror movies because it's a way we can have those experiences and emotions safely? Not only the experience of being stabbed in the eye, but also stabbing someoneelse in the eye?)) so why would books be so special? Why is it that "the book is always better"? Well, there's the imagination. You get to have things your way (my Ford Prefect isn't black >.<), and I've noticed that environments in books tend to be more familiar - because I'm imagining them as something I know (in the forest behind my home has been visited by hobbits and ringwraiths, lost dalmatians, the seven brothers, World War II soldiers and Moomins.) But then at the same time I have visited far-away places (and places that don't exist) by staying in and reading. So it's not all about the familiar mixing with the fantastic. And even the hyper-realistic books that describe reality in such gory detail that you'd think you don't need to read about that since you're living it - even all that I love. So. It's probably less about the content of the books. Could it be about the book itself as a medium, as an artefact? The action of writing, producing, bringing forth words. The other human being making something that reaches me and... and... and... all I have to do is think of Harry Potter to realise that this isn't the case (I don't really adore J.K. Rowling for having written such amazing books, I don't marvel at her mind and praise her imagination - I love Harry as I love Harpo: I want to be there. I don't want to be him, but I want to be with him. And through books I can: I grew up in New York and chatted with the Algonquin wits; I went to Hogwarts).

But that leaves out all the books that don't talk about doing stuff. As a child I loved our set of children's encyclopaedia - I knew everything I child needed to know about the American giant redwood trees (they build roads through them trees!) by the age of 8. And now one of my favourite books at this time is (no, not Finnegan's Wake :P) The On-Going Moment, a book about photography. So there is an element of learning something I didn't know before. Which is what my friend doesn't seem to be much impressed with. Then again, I didn't need to read about trees or photography in order to do something; I had no need for the knowledge. But I acquired it and loved it all the same. But would I have if it had been presented through other medium? Would I watch a documentary about trees? At this point in my life - no. As a child I probably would have. But I have no passion for television. Would I read about photography on the internet? Well, probably yes. But it's again not the same. I wouldn't love it uberly.

So. If content isn't king... it must be the package. I love the smell and feel of books - but that can't be the reason I love books.

Also, I love it that the same book can be read by more than one person. Books build a life as they touch the lives of different people. That's why second-hand bookstores are better: the books in them have lived and are ready to live again. And don't even get me started on libraries... :3 But that's digging a bit deeper, and probably doesn't have a lot to do with the question at hand. (That's to do with aura)


This turned into an essay. I hope you didn't read all that. Just answer the question: how do you develop a passion for books And don't give me any of this "you're born with it" bollocks.


Later:
My boss went with the sort of "I grew up with it" angle too, observing that it was a way to exercise imagination (and he added that he feels sorry for the kids of today who have everything spoon-fed to them visually). But while we were talking about the "damn it's hard to think of life without having been into books since kid" and wondering if it would be possible to develop that book-thing later in life, he made a poignant parallel: he couldn't imagine not being a mormon for all his life, while that change is something I have done, and therefore I have an insight into what a change like that is like.

I got Finnegan's Wake from the library. And everything I had heard of it before did not prepare me for it at all. I'd heard it was a difficult book - what an understatement. o.O Even 'book' is the wrong term, 'reading' does not describe what you have to do with this... object. But true to my idioticly stubborn nature, I picked it up and I must finish. I've gotten through about five pages, and... well... I do... like it. But not as reading, as... some other kind of activity where a text is heard and seen (I read out loud, otherwise it doesn't work) and you just kind of let it come out of you and up from the page and swirl around and you do your best to not suck and you accept mistakes and not understanding words. Grah, I'm suddenly very self-aware of the fact that I'm trying to describe Finnegan's Wake >.< Ok, moving on. That didn't make any sense, but at least you know that currently there is something... big/small/strange/difficult in my life at the moment :P


I read in the paper about someone figuring out how to make an uber-energy-effective LED bulb and not have it be stupidly expensive (like LED is at the moment), and it said we might replace Tungsten lights with those. But with all this green stuff raving it seems that often we don't think of anything else but greenness. I can't be the only person who thinks that Tungsten bulbs are nicer than other sorts of bulbs because of the way they look and feel. They have soul. I have never met anyone who thought tube lights were nicer - how likely is it that LED lights will have that soul that Tungsten bulbs have? It's a different kind of light, and though you might think "so what" I think the quality of light actually makes a difference to how you are feeling.

Now usually I don't care about people fussing over the green option (there's lots of options around for all sorts: low fat stuff that doesn't taste as nice as the bad-for-you stuff, etc... I personally have to opt out for the coffee-substitute which isn't as nice as the real thing) but I'm worried that this'll be one of those choices they make for you. That Tungsten bulbs will be pulled out of existence and we're left with crappy soulless LEDs that make you feel miserable. If that happens, I will opt out for candles and large windows -_-