Friday Unrelated Information
1. What a week. In all the wretched news, did you hear the awesome news that New Zealand legalized marriage rights for same-sex partners? Here is Rep. Maurice Williamson giving perhaps the most brilliant argument in favor of passing the legislation I have ever heard. It includes physics, a Bible verse, and the phrase “big gay rainbow”:
And then when the votes were in and the legislation passed, the gallery and parliament burst into song—a WWI-era Maori song about longing for one’s beloved. Just try to watch this and not be moved:
Way to go, Kiwis. Way to go.
2. One more thing to make you smile: Sports Balls Replaced with Cats.
Thursday Poem
My inner hippie likes this one (love is all there is, etc.):
So, there’s no way to be sure. Not
about much of anything. No more about
anyone else than ourselves. Perhaps
not even of death, except that it’s bound
to happen. To you, yes; to me, us: the lot
of humankind, given how humankind sees it
from this near side. So what.
So nothing that we here and now
can perfectly know. Save, though the lens
our eyes raise, the old here and now.
The this, the already-going that moves us.
The red-shift we’re constantly part of.
And why not? Between what we were, and
are going to be, is who and how we best love.
Kermit On Advertising
“You mean, just say what the product does?”
The moment at 1:30 is pretty great, too, since I’ve gotten that reaction more than I care to admit.
Another video I like today: Stephen Colbert on the spirit of Boston (scroll down).
Tuesday Project Roundup: “Knit on…with hope”
I’m working on some legwarmers for yoga (the yarn is making the colors, not me):
After yesterday’s bombing in Boston, the Elizabeth Zimmermann quote: “Knit on, with confidence and hope, through all crises” is on my mind. This is, too. And this.
Happy Birthday To My Mom
It’s my mother’s 65th birthday today! How do you even talk about someone who’s such a part of your life? I email her every morning, we talk nearly every day, and she’s just started going to yoga with me, too. (She’s fearless about trying new poses.)
I’m really lucky to have my family be my support and my safety net, and I’m extra lucky to have such a good mom. Happy birthday!
Friday Unrelated Information
1. Pablo Neruda is on my list of favorite poets but he exists in a vacuum for me, since like a good American I’m pretty fuzzy on any other country’s history. So this was fascinating (and educational): Chile Exhumes Pablo Neruda Over Murder Claims.
2. Here’s something to remember for us (hippie) planners:
“What you can plan is too small for you to live.”
(From Mystic Mamma)
NINA
I’ve been on a big Nina Simone kick lately (and think her name should be all caps, the way the Go Fug Yourself blog refers to Tilda Swinton as SWINTON). What’s not to love about a classically-trained, turban wearing woman with that voice? Here’s my favorite cover of a sad song:
(I’m also pretty sure the photo on this video is not NINA, so try to ignore that.)
Wind
Reading The Little Duck must have gotten my mind thinking about other kid books, because in the last 24 hours of a north wind I could only think of this poem from an old anthology. (I wanted to say it was A Child’s Garden of Verses but I just learned that’s all Robert Louis Stevenson.)
Who Has Seen the Wind?
Who has seen the wind?Neither I nor you:But when the leaves hang trembling,The wind is passing through.Who has seen the wind?Neither you nor I:But when the trees bow down their heads,The wind is passing by.
Tuesday Project Roundup: Grawlix!
The company I work for makes printer-sized machines that cut paper, vinyl, stabilized fabric, etc. into shapes, kind of like a mini CAD/CAM system. This Thursday we’re launching a new material the machine can cut: Iron-on film. Prior to the launch, we got to experiment with it a little bit at work–so of course I decided to cut out a pink glitter grawlix. I finally got around to ironing it on to a t-shirt this weekend:
I also got started on the tunic:
And I finally got all the quilt squares cut out for the t-shirt quilt: