The interests meme

[firecat]

via computerchix and just about everyone else:

Go browse through my list of interests and ask me about one that 1) you know nothing about but sounds intriguing or 2) you know something about but can't fathom why I would be interested in it.

Or ask me about an LJ community I read.

Comments

[therealjae.livejournal.com]

I think I know what you mean by "unintentional communities," but tell me anyway. :-)

-J

[firecat]

I've always had a problem with the concept of "intentional community," which is common in the poly communities I hang out in. The implications in my head about what the concept means and how it's put into practice leave me feeling trapped and judged. (Note: I think this is my own baggage, to a certain extent, and so I'm not trying to judge people who believe in it.)

I came up with the statement "I don't want an intentional community, I want an unintentional community" while watching Bagdad Cafe, which is one of my favorite movies, which is about unintentional community.

Unintentional community is a feeling of community that grows without your realizing it, rather than being consciously created.

[keryx.livejournal.com]

Hey, that's the one I was going to ask about, too. I like the answer.

[futabachan.livejournal.com]

"Ambivert?"

[firecat]

An ambivert is someone who is sometimes an introvert and sometimes an extrovert. I seem to be one. I usually test as an introvert, but there are definitely times I'm energized by being around people.

Who is

[janetmiles.livejournal.com]

David Case?

Re: Who is

[firecat]

David Case is my favorite reader of audio books. He's got the kind of voice that sounds good reading the back of a cereal box, but fortunately he chooses to read books that are a lot more interesting than that! My favorite audio book is his rendition of John Le Carré's The Night Manager.

[supergee.livejournal.com]

Why Robert Graves?

[firecat]

I am in awe of Robert Graves's spiritual passion, as manifested in The White Goddess and other books.

The White Goddess is a lie from beginning to end, but it's a marvelous lie.

[datagoddess.livejournal.com]

"bhms"?

[firecat]

Big Handsome Men, yum! Bear of the Day usually features one. (Might not be work safe.)

[quasigeostrophy.livejournal.com]

"Steampunk"?

[firecat]

Steampunk is a genre of science fiction. I think the name derived from cyberpunk. Here is a good explanation of the term.

China Miéville's Perdido Street Station is a really good example of the genre.

[supergee.livejournal.com]

Paul Di Filippo's Steampunk Trilogy is excellent.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

shapeshifting?

[firecat]

It's a theme I'm interested in that crops up in my spiritual practice and my writing.

[bobbylevi.livejournal.com]

Peets?

[firecat]

http://www.peets.com is the SF Bay Area's home-grown gourmet coffee company. They started around the same time as Starbucks, compared to which their coffee is rich, dark, and strong.

[bobbylevi.livejournal.com]

Now that's something I could be interested in. :-)

[lysana.livejournal.com]

Dale Chihuly?

[elynne.livejournal.com]

*hisssss*

Uh... sorry, firecar... bad reaction on my part. :/

[elynne.livejournal.com]

... how about firecat? Yeesh, I'm ill. :P

[firecat]

Why do you dislike Chihuly?

[elynne.livejournal.com]

I don't like his "art." The reason he's a household name is because he has a master's degree in marketing. In fact, the larger installations of his I've seen bug the crap out of me; they strike me as tremendous wastes of time and effort. But that's all stylistic, and I know that other people have other views.

What really bugs me is that he's apparantly an egotistical asswipe in person, that he's tremendously exploitative of the people that do the actual glasswork for him, that he's repeatedly had huge tantrums over public works art projects that haven't gone exactly the way he wanted them (including repeated threats to withdraw his investment unless he gets top billing).

I suppose, if I loved his work, I could forgive him being a jerk; but him being a jerk and his work being IMO crap... I think he's one of the most overrated art hacks alive, definitely the biggest such in the relatively small world of glass art.

Interestingly enough, when I rant about Chilhuly to my parent people (who actually do art glass for a living), they usually defend him. My mom's opinion is that he has done a lot to bring glassworking to the public eye, and that has opened a lot of doors for glassworkers that simply weren't there ten or twenty years ago. Which is true... I still don't like him. :P ;]

[firecat]

I aree with your mom that he's done a lot to put glass art in general in the public eye. I did get an impression of assholeness from Chihuly Over Venice. I know any artist who is as well known as he is must be doing heavy marketing.

I love his glass art. I hate his paintings.

[elynne.livejournal.com]

I can understand loving his glass art... I admit, when I stop being cranky about him as a person, I can see a lot of depth and interesting detail in his work - I just wish he'd explore it a bit more, take more risks, take more responsibility for what he makes... I dunno.

His "paintings" - we had one in the lobby when I worked for Amazon.com. It was one of the ones where he put a canvas on the floor, hung a bucket with holes on a couple of strings, poured paint in the bucket, and then spun/shook it around. Yeehah. Instant Office Art! Have a Big Name Expensive Painting without running the risk of offending anybody in any way whatsoever! Cover a large portion of otherwise bare wall with something that nobody will ever pay any attention to after the initial "Oh, that paint splatter is supposed to be art" reaction!

Not that I'm Opinionated or anything. ;]

[firecat]

I just wish he'd explore it a bit more, take more risks, take more responsibility for what he makes.

I'm satisfied with the amount of exploration and risk in his glass art, especially after seeing the Chihuly Over Venice DVD and what it took for his crew/students to organize making glass in so many countries and working with local artists, not to mention packing up and shipping all the stuff and hanging it all over Venice.

Besides, I'm too chicken to even go near a glory hole, I don't have a basis on which to judge him for that. (Yes, I know he doesn't go near them very often now, because he's lost the sight in one eye.)

The squirting or pouring paint on a canvas and calling it art, though, doesn't appeal to me. I don't see any effort or technique - something that is evident in the glass art, and something that's required for me to consider a thing art.

Oddly enough, I do think that Jackson Pollock's work shows effort and technique.

[firecat]

Chihuly is an artist and teacher who specializes in blown glass. I first encountered his work in an exhibit in Minneapolis and I was thrilled by the seaforms and the chandeliers. I loved the organic flow of it. His work is what got me interested in working with glass myself (although I haven't done any blown glass, just lampworking, that is, glass bead making.

[circumspectly.livejournal.com]

artisanal cheeses?

[firecat]

The whole story started when the OH and I discovered Iron Chef back in the mid-90s. A San Francisco chef named Ron Siegel battled on Iron Chef, and recreated the meal he made in his restaurant back home. The OH and I went to this meal and loved it. A while later, Ron Siegel moved to a new restaurant, called Masa's. So we went to Masa's to see what he was up to there. One of the dessert options was a selection of artisanal cheeses from around the world - cheeses handmade in small amounts, and in some cases from unpasteurized milk, which gives the cheese a more complex flavor (and I understand it's also technically illegal to import, but I guess restaurants have a way around that). The cheese tasting was one of the most sensual food experiences of my life.

[elynne.livejournal.com]

No dharma? (not even a little bit?)

[firecat]

When I was a manuscript editor at Yale University Press in the mid-80s, I edited a manuscript called Nonduality by David Loy. It included this quote:

The dharma of the dharma is that there are no dharmas. But now that the no-dharma dharma has been transmitted, how can the dharma of the dharma be a dharma?

For some reason that I have yet to be able to put into words very well, that has become a motto / philosophy of life for me.

[the-ogre.livejournal.com]

"collecting other people's hobbies"

'Splain, please.

[firecat]

I periodically get fascinated by something other people are fascinated by, partly by the sheer weirdness and wonder of it ("whoever thought this up and why are people so interested in it?") and partly by the sheer weight of detail that many hobbies involve. When I get fascinated by a hobby, I make a point of reading everything I can get my hands on about it, and I sometimes attend events, but (this is important for it to count as collecting) I don't actually get involved in doing the hobby myself.

Some hobbies I've collected recently: dog agility, Iditarod, sumo wrestling, lapidary.

[elynne.livejournal.com]

*fascinated*

... you know... if you wrote about this, and I avidly read everything that you wrote without collecting anybody else's hobbies... that would be ridiculously recursive. :D

[firecat]

collecting other people's collecting of other people's hobbies?

[elynne.livejournal.com]

Oooh... collecting recursiveness collecting!

[jb98.livejournal.com]

What is "being" in this context and how do you relate to it?

[firecat]

I think the easiest way to explain it is in contrast to "doing." Sometimes I feel like people are always doing stuff and they forget to just be sometimes. Another way to put it:

If you can spend a perfectly useless afternoon in a perfectly useless
manner, you have learned how to live. --Lin Yutang

[fattest.livejournal.com]

where'd you get your avatar?

[firecat]

I'm pretty sure it was from here: http://www.dookyweb.com/avatars.swf
but not positive because the site is down.

[kshandra]

The sound of mutual degrumplement in my head just makes me giggle, regardless of what it may actually be....

(OBTW - your link to xevin's searchcode is b0rked. Try http://www.livejournal.com/users/xevinx/151317.html instead.)

(BTW2 - Got the NARAL pin last week; thanks muchly! It's living on my purse now.)

[firecat]

Mutual degrumplement is a phrase that my sweetie kyubi and I made up for the way we magically make each other feel better even when we both start out in a bad mood.

Thanks for correcting the search code!

Glad you like the pin!

[19-crows.livejournal.com]

What kind of things do you like to crochet? (I liked your link to the crocheted Willenddorf Venus!)

[firecat]

I just finished this.

[19-crows.livejournal.com]

Beautiful! I love purple and red together.

[firecat]

Thanks!