Adults with Building Blocks

I’m pretty sure many architects are simply kids who couldn’t let go of their obsession with lego, choosing instead to move on to yet bigger building blocks. Now, you might laugh at such a statement, but wait – I have evidence.

Think about the blockiest thing you know. Ok, skip lego and its knockoffs – I talking about something you can use to build houses out of. Ok, skip brick and concrete blocks, they’re not big enough. Skip straw bales, they’re mostly used for insulation when used for construction – architects don’t want to think about sensible things like that. Ok, I’ll give you a hint :

“Hey!”, you say to yourself, “That’s really blocky!”

Yes, my friend, that is really blocky. And as a general rule, out of blocky stuff one can make bigger blocky stuff. And yes, you can quote me on that.

Take a look! Bigger blocky stuff :

(http://www.noticiasarquitectura.info/especiales/chk-lot-ek.htm)

At least we can console ourselves with the fact that this is a fad, right? No one is about to make a major construction project that looks that blocky! People wouldn’t stand for it.

(If you believe that, don’t look at the next picture…)

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habitat_67)

What fun!

I wonder where my Lego went…

From many a fun memory…

… and from a story that I heard from Tamara.

(Seriously though, I had a blast as a kid. Everyone should grow up on a farm with multiple siblings. If there was enough farmland to accomodate all the families in the world, maybe we’d be happier. This quasi-ridiculous comment brought to you by the letter ‘Z’. ‘Z’ needs some attention since he lives at the end of the alphabet and is constantly harrassed and abused by cheap marketers and by the illiterate. ["That wuz EZ!", "Cloz fer Kidz".. gah!] )

The life of a Canadian

Life in Canada has many rules. One rule is that you may never take the last of anything. Despite protests by greenpeace and sierra club activists over the large number of cookies, muffins, and baked squares that go to waste, this protocol has remained one of the key social skills for broad cultural acceptance.

To give credit where credit is due, this comic is the result of a conversation between me and Pedro some years ago while working on the farm.

Something Different

A response in picture to both Kristofer Straub ( http://www.starslipcrisis.com , http://www.halfpixel.com ) and to the work of Randall Munroe ( http://xkcd.com/ ).

Straub recently started the second website listed under the philosophy that he should be creating something new every day. I’m not sure how well the philosophy works with creative minds, and whether “creativity block” is ever a problem but it sounds like an interesting idea. Although I am not of an exceptionally creative bent, I like the concept when restated as such : “Everyone should strive to not only consume but also to produce.” Consumption and production here refers to the creation / assembly and use / enjoyment of music, art, food, technology, anything and everything… I guess I’m thinking mostly along the lines of cultural and technological grounds, although the concept does extend to some degree to include physical resources such as the food farmers produce for us, etc. Consumption is, of course, necessary and unavoidable in any society. Then again, maybe that restatement doesn’t cover it – it puts creativity as a social obligation. If you were alone on an island where no one would ever find you or your artifacts, would it matter what you created and devised? I think it would.
The idea also suggests the topic of the laughable comic strip I drew up (artistic style was heavily influenced by Munroe). I think the basic idea presented in the strip is clear, and something that we often forget in the monotony of job, family, school, sleep. Part of the idea is also expressed the following XFCD comics :

Permission to copy these pictures was given at http://xkcd.com/about/. If my tenuous leaps of logic between these comic strips is to much, let me know.

Language

You ever have those moments when you hear or read the same words as everyone else, but extract a completely different yet completely valid understanding of what those words mean? (completely valid here refers to the different understanding being a valid language construct, but may not necessarily agree with the context in which it is seen)

Case in point : the other day, working on some aluminum parts in a workshop at an undisclosed location, I saw a small package of parts – a typical package of N parts enclosed within a clear cover with a cardboard backing giving the relevant name / description. The package backing proudly declared that these parts were butt connectors. I don’t think I have a particularly dirty mind, but the accompanying mental image was unavoidable. Maybe Ryan can hand these out when playing huckle-buckle…

The incident reminded me of some years back, when at a supper for intelligent university students (read : the computer science students), this book was found in the hosts bookshelves :

Some may not understand. A second look would then be in order.

Why do we sell this stuff to kids?

An occasion to celebrate

The red mule turned 1400.0 today. I was there to celebrate with it (fortunately… another worker, A., almost had the pleasure when he went to move red mule so that green mule could get by). Admittedly, it wasn’t a huge party, but the red mule didn’t really want a big birthday anyways.

I tend to notice nice round numbers like that. Today I spent some time thinking about numbers. Important points of my pondering were :

• I don’t like odd numbers as much as even numbers, in general. Especially at work. Unless they’re divisible by 5, in which case they’ll barely tolerable.
• Prime numbers, while enjoying a place of prestige (even though, yes, all but one are odd) have no place at a tree nursery.
• Just touched briefly on a few of the many relationships between numbers and music. For instance, the eight note system ends up giving you a great example of modular arithmetic. Also, anything in which the terms “third”, “circle of fifths”, and “time beats given in fractions that used to drive me crazy until somebody finally managed to make me understand the differences between them and that no you can’t just play different timed pieces the same way” have a place of importance clearly has an appreciation for numbers.

As a disclaimer, I don’t think about numbers everyday. So I’m only partly crazy.

Everyone wants a piece of me

Being tall, I’ve received my fair share of related jokes and comments. One of the more interesting suggestions, likely made by social aggitators who demand equality in all things, is the suggestion that I receive surgury to remove several inches from my legs which can then be grafted into the aggitator’s legs in order to equalize height. As attractive as this offer may sound to those who don’t like being tall, I have up to this point graciously declined all such offers.

But today, I’ve found someone who wants another part of me. I was at work at a prestigious tree farm, where my task of the hour was to move a large number of potted trees from one location to another. Potted trees may occaisionally look like this :

They didn’t look like these this time, since I was moving Larix laricina, not a random assortment of deciduous trees. At any rate, the foreman (here named ‘S.’) commented on the amount of walking I was doing. In response, I half-jokingly gestured at my stomach and said, “S., I’ve got ten extra pounds I need to burn off here. Walking is good for me!” The middlesized, skinny S. looked at me and said, “Why you burn them all?? Give them to me!”

So there you have it. Someone does want your fat. But instead you choose to either burn it or to hoard it closely. How very selfish.

A Job Well Done

Where ever you work, it is always important to have a sense of how your work is progressing. There are many ways to do this, from meetings with supervisors, key deadlines, etc. All the same, having a visual cue can be extremely valuable for showing how far you’ve gotten, boosting morale and spurring future efforts.

Take, for example, coffee cups. How better to measure your workplaces’ coffee drinking progress than collecting the used cups and constructing architecturally significant works of art with them :

[ "Cups". SAS,IN,MW, 2006, Cardboard and plastic. 56 cm x 68 cm x 68 cm]
One esteemed art critic in the CS lab commented that this masterpiece “… contains a true expression of the humen dillema …” and that “Its use of both symmetrical and asymmetrical elements … shows the order and chaos of our shared experience.”

Another critic wrote this short critique :

The masterwork, “Cups”, from the CS lab, defines the drama of the workplace in a humanistic context of real data. It speaks to the soul of the burdened worker – torn between the realities of drug abuse and the chaotic yet symphonic manifestation of essence. The medium is a striking appeal to the senses, bringing to play elements of satire in conjunction with corporate highlightig. No topic is to deep for the work, it is a commentary on life, both as we know it and as we will find it. In short, it forms a refreshing and sophisticated dialog with the viewer both entertaining and inspiring.

The artwork will be on display until Sept. 2, 2006.

Abraham

My father has seen Abraham today. Ask a Dutch person, they’ll tell you what that means.

Ok, ok, I’ll give you a hint:
John 8:57 “You are not yet fifty years old,” the Jews said to him, “and you have seen Abraham!”

The Pineries

So this past weekend I reached another milestone in our current solar-based year system. In addition to this event, it was also the youth group camping weekend for my church, which was held once again at Pinery Provincial Park. On Saturday various people came up to celebrate with me, and we ensured that Redeemer was not under-represented at the beach :

This worked out well, since while sitting at tables by the park store we were approached by a couple with a few young children and asked if we went to Redeemer. Upon hearing the affirmative, it was revealed that alumni of ‘94 do occasionally frequent the Pineries. Good times.