I always say this when he finds a quote that resonates with me. Good old whiskey river: Read carefully, then don’t read; work hard, then forget about it; know your tradition, then liberate yourself from it; learn language, then free yourself from it. Finally, know at least one form of magic. – Gary Snyder WR has been on a bit of a “quotes about writing” tear at the moment. It’s worth perusing his recent entries if that sort of thing interests you.
There is something in this story that endears me to Io, Jupiter’s spitting moon. I think it’s in the tagline: “Beware: Io Dust. Jupiter’s moon Io is shooting tiny volcanic bullets at passing spacecraft.” Apparently Io’s volcanos are erupting all the time, shooting streams of dust into the solar system. These streams get picked up by Jupiter’s gravity and accelerate to around 300km/s which is pretty durn fast. If you happen to be a spaceship passing by, you get pelted by high speed smoke. It’s an elegant defense for our solar system’s gas giant, even if its not terribly effective.
The Tyee ran a short photo essay from the Tribal Journeys 2004 event this year. This is an annual celebration of the canoe culture of west coast First Nations. Photographer Elaine Briere captured some of the spirit of the gathering: They come from places with names like Snoqualmie, Songees, Muckelshoot, Squaxim, Suquamish, Clayquot, Kyouquot, Hesquiaht, Ohiaht, Nit Nat, and Tsawout. Some of the big canoes have crossed the dangerous waters of the Strait of Juan de Fuca to get here. They circle the bay before lining up on the shore for the greeting ceremonies. As drumming and chants fill the air, …
At a meeting the other day someone was heard to utter the phrase “lead, follow or get out of the way.” Quietly, the reply came: “You mean lead, follow AND get out of the way.” That changed EVERYTHING!
Euan Semple was the first blogger I ever read. The night I discovered Blogger back in 2001, he had just been picked as a “Blog of Note” and so I cruised over to his page and loved what I saw. There was a link to this interview with Brian Arthur which has turned out to be a pertty influential piece to me. When I declared this blog’s parentage, I represented myself as the grateful child of a same sex union of The Obvious and Wood s Lot. And now I know the reason why I groove on Euan’s stuff. It …