Finally something to write about

For the last month I’ve been lost in an essay regarding who started the Cold War, with a little bit of pro cycling (watching not taking part) thrown in to keep me sane.  But the essay is submitted and the end is in sight, even if it does involve an exam and lots of revision.
Anyway this morning something really exciting happened.  The welcome pack for my next module arrived.  The next module is U101 Design Thinking: Creativity for the 21st Century and with luck will be my last.  But what was so exciting I hear you ask, only the fact that rather than a big heavy box filled with text books, this box only had one book in it and that book only had 22 pages.  The rest of the box was filled with exciting design stuff including a pencil, baby steel rule, postcards, sticky notes and masking tape!  Much as I want to start playing now I’ve put it all back for the moment, but I’m really really looking forward to getting started.

Of course ‘im outside saw the box upside down and is now insisting on calling the course Lola, so if I start talking about Lola you’ll know what I’m talking about.

An ecological business card

Life has been a little crazy these past few weeks, what with a restructure at work, the last double length TMA to write and a car crash which wrote my car off and left me with stitches to the back of my head.

That last one really does put your life into perspective and remind you of the good things in your life right now.  But it has also made it hard to get going with the essay when you can’t help but think how little importance it has compared other things.

Now I’m recovering from the shock and things are getting back to normal I wanted to share this amazing idea for an ecological business card.  It’s basically a stamp which you can use on any found material so maybe a napkin from that business lunch, or my favourite an empty envelope.  I love that this makes me think.  Why does a business card have to be a rectangle of card?

New bike

As I’ve been getting fitter and reading more about the things we can do to make our environment a better place to live, I’ve started to think about buying a bike.

On the top of the list of things we should do is ‘get rid out your car’ which does make sense to me and I’d be willing to do if it wasn’t so darn useful.  If I lived in London for instance I’d be more than happy to ditch my car, but living out in the sticks makes it just that little bit harder to convince myself that I can live without it.  Going to see my parents would be out as they have no public transport to speak of, getting to work would take a little longer (but not by much unless you include the walking at both ends) but would cost quite a bit more along with a change half way through.  Seeing my friends would be more difficult.

But do I really need my car if I’m just popping into town to visit the library? 

And the answer to that is not really.  And this is where the idea of a bike really is attractive, 30 minutes walk both ways is just that little bit too much, but easily half that on a bike.

So meet my new bike.  A Land Rover hybrid; I’m hoping we can go on many adventures together and not just to the library.  And it looks like I might have encouraged ‘im outdoors to dust his old bike off and join me.  I can’t wait to find out where we’ll end up.

Junes writers group

I had to run the writers group a little later this month due to exam boards being run in the room, so we clashed with the poetry reading group.  It might have been a smaller group than normal but we still had some lovely stories and poems read out.  I didn't have anything to read this month, but at last I've had some ideas that I hope to work on in the very near future.
Homework - Choose between the following as the starting point for a story or poem: Coffee, toast and three paracetamol…  Or;  There was something unbelievable in the desk drawer…

Business and consumerism and Buddhist principles

Last week one of my good friends set me the link to a 20 minute speech/lecture about business and consumerism and Buddhist principles. 

Clare Melford was the speaker and that 20 minutes flew by as I listened to her ideas which make such sense.  As she says what individuals do is important but business can make more of an impact over a wider audience.

The three principles which she thinks businesses should take from the Buddhist mind set are:

• That everything is connected
• Mastery of our impulses and desires
• And finding a middle way

These are all things that can be taken into personal life not just in business;  thinking about the consequences of our actions, learning to understand ourselves and trying to live in a sensible way rather than by extremes.

There was so much to take in I shall have to listen to it again (and again).

If you’d like to listen to it you can find it on the Radio 4 Four Thought site, look for 2^nd May, Clare Melford.  I don’t know how long it will be there for but having looked at the rest of the podcasts in the series I’ve downloaded a large number to listen to later.

Rocking Chameleon

Did you know that chameleon's rock?  No neither did I until I came across one of Rob Ives new projects - a rocking chameleon.  It's taken me a few weeks to create due to all the other stuff I'm also doing but I'm pleased with the end result, even if the rocking is a little creepy - check out Rob's video to see it in action.

The Electric Tooling Iron

For my birthday this year I was lucky enough to receive an Electric Tooling Iron.  This is a tool that book binders use for marking their books with metallic foils or for marking directly onto leather.  It might be words or just decoration.  Below is an example of how you would use it. 

First you need to know what you are using it for.  In this case I have traced the title of one of my favourite books, which has a beautiful title font.  I would do this if I was repairing the book and going to replace the cover.

First the metallic foil needs to be stuck to the new cover with masking tape.  It must be perfectly flat. 

The tracing is then placed over the foil.  Using the iron, once it is hot enough, you trace the design onto your book.  This takes a little practice as you can't hold it as close to the tip as you would a normal pen.  It doesn't matter too much if you need to go back over it as long as your design doesn't move half way through.

The finished design.  If I had another coloured foil I could go over it again as long as it was lined up right.
This is a great tool and I look forward to having some more practice with it.

May's writing group

The writers group met today and although numbers were low it was an interesting meeting.  With my head filled with totalitarian regimes and fascist Italy there was no room left for creative writing so nothing to read out again.  But we did have time to do a short exercise which was interesting so managed to read that out instead.
This months homework: To think of nursery rhymes from your childhood.  Take the first line of whichever appeals the most, ignore the original context and use as inspiration for a poem or short story.

For instance: ‘Little Jack Horner sat in the corner…’ Was he hearing voices?  Was he being bullied?  What happened next?  (borrowed from Mslexia)