see-saw

Adrift on sinusoidal waves of Passage
bottles and corks searching for a Message,
Surfing the swells of a Moebius strip
Past, Present and Future are on a trip.

Within the alabaster oysters of our minds
are colliding reveries and memories
and memes from forgotten times.
The pearl spawned there from froth and fume
is but a precious fork out of tune
not yet struck by its creation myth,
riding the crests of nadir and zenith.

Sick from the seas' pendulous rise and fall
the pearl turned inward and made a call -
"What i see is but the present of a past that I saw,"
And lo (and behold) -
that calmed the seas and stilled the see-saw!

Serve our Masters

Life was raised by mother Evolution to probe, question, think and look under the hood. To listen for loose tappets in the engines around them, for signs of impending failure. And to boil it all down to a neat cause-and-effect continuum in our minds.

Life did this because it lead to understanding, and understanding lead to a greater chance for survival, of seeing another sunrise. These organism strains survived and thrived, and spawned more like themselves, that were driven to understand, dissect, analyse and model with ever increasing efficiency.

Evolution was on its game - the creatures were reared to be hunters on the great plains, to kill when called upon - for providing food, for protecting kin, or for sport.

Somewhere along this path humankind took an exit to Neverland - they stopped being nomads and settled down, because agrarian. Brains gradually became less preoccupied with thoughts of the next meal or the next predator. All the spare time started being employed in self indulgent pursuits such as greed, depression, sloth, envy.. (wink wink).

How do we serve our only real master, how do we serve Evolution? Are we to continue the push upwards, ever onwards, faster, sleeker, stronger, longer - is this instruction wired into our genome somewhere? 

All of Creation serves Evolution - but in two diametrically opposite ways. One group is sacrificed, the other does the sacrificing.

Is Selection still operational, or have we stifled it with concrete housing, health -care, creches, AFFIRMATIVE ACTION? 

2 days, three movies

Some friends are leaving for India on a 3 month long vacation, so there's an urgency to fill every passing day with lots of family time and togetherness. This has translated into me watching 3 very agreeable flicks in the last 2 days (don't look now, but that is the title of this post....!)

One down, two to go -
Cars:
Watched last night in the neighbourhood strip mall, was John Lasseter's version of "how green was my rally" - a very adult film with adult themes like the pangs felt over the contemplation of a lost way of life, a soliloquy aobut "how good it is to slow down sometimes" - all encased in an extremely photo-realistic kid-friendly veneer - such as cars with homologous appurtenances such as eyebrows, eyes and mouths - and of human feelings behind said appurtenances - such as loneliness, friendship and love. A story about a small town - Radiator Springs - that was once the jewel along the necklace that was Route 66 (where America once Got Its Kicks). This old route did not cut through the landscape, but flowed with it, curved with it, stopped to gaze, went uphill and went downhill with it.

Route 66 was bypassed by an outpost of the Interstate system - I-40, and suddenly Radiator Springs was literally dropped off the map. This is a nice piece of nostagia, in that it has more than self-indulgence. Its a reminder of when people took to the roads to "have a good time, and not make good time". One thing to be said about the "good old days" - if ever they existed in reality - they cost the earth a little less in carbon emissions and non-degradable junk than the current day.

But lets not get misty eyed about any industrial era, people - after all, do you prefer rat poison in Rocky Road or Vanilla - or do you prefer (as I do) the wonderful aftertaste of NOT having eaten it at all?

Two Down, One to go -
IMAX 3-D short feature called "Deep Sea" - a spectacular of underwater life - jellyfish, starfish, sea anemone, manta rays, sharks, and the "creatures of your nightmares" - squid. Simply superb. There is lots of violent animal-on-animal action, with realistic sound effects thrown in, and scenes of squid in a frenzy attacking anything and everything that moves, including each other. These squid weigh 130 Lb and change colour several times every second.

Three -
Poseidon - a very expert remake of the "The Poseidon Adventure" of a ship that turns turtle after being hit by a rogue wave. Lots of tight claustrophobic water logged rooms with breathing room for nose-only situations, the inevitable heroic death, the inevitable leader, and the inevitable whimpering women. Why, why, why??
Well made, superbly crafted, worth a watch - a notable addition to the genre of water-bound disaster movies.

Yellow & Pink

Yellow & Pink
Originally uploaded by prakar.

My first attempt at super closeups, with a tripod and decent natural light. Loved the result!

And its so simple, too. You will see more of this,