This Is Blogging World, Free Your Mind And Put Your Head Back Into The Clouds

Image by Emre Güven

I have come across quite an interesting article today (below is an abstract from it) - a take on social networks and blogging. I can't disagree with the author on many points and definitely think the society has changed a lot recently as far as privacy is concerned. It all made me think about what is applicable to me and what keeps me going with this blog. I'm quite interested in your thoughts about what blogging is for you as well of course :)

'...The explosion of social networking sites has promoted its own denunciations, jeremiads against the constant erasure of the boundaries between public and private. We have grown accustomed, if not inured, to previously 'intimate' exchanges or arguments being played out on the public stage, and many people blame the blogosphere for a proliferation of pathological narcissism and delusions of grandeur - not to mention delusions of reference, the misapprehension that we are the pre-Copernican center of our own infantile universes. Narcissism is the flipside of paranoia: it's not just that the world is after me, it's that the world IS after me.

From this perspective, social networking simply encourages us to blather banalities and mistake them for profundity, while also separating us from the actual human contact that the networks replace, and fostering a fantasy of control over our environments that life will not respect. It promotes a delusional egocentrism on a spectrum with The X Factor Syndrome, the conviction that we are, or should be, the stars of our own show, creating a society of grotesque Norma Desmonds waiting for the close-up that never comes.

But it is also true that the impulse to share is a primal one. We transfrom our feelings into representations: language, music, painting, sculpture, dance, rituals, dreams - and tweets...'

Pop Magazine, Issue 21, Autumn-Winter 2009

Life's Natural Highs

Images via lolita


Falling in love
Lying in bed listening to the rain outside
Long conversations late at night
Traveling and discovering new places
Lazing on the beach
Surprises
Running through sprinklers
Laughing at a funny joke
Laughing at yourself
Laughing so hard your stomach hurts
Laughing for absolutely no reason at all
Hot Mediterranean nights
Friends
Hearing your favourite song
When someone likes you
Rolling in the snow
Reading a good book
Bubble baths

Almost Weekend

It's been a busy week for me with lots and lots of work, even more snow (with digging out the car every morning!), a little bit of sun, lots of teas with lemon and honey (and candles), taking care of the sick (get better, Susu!), cosy movie evenings at home, a night out with colleagues & friends, sports, shopping, ..., ... Now I need a good loooong night sleep...

Have a good weekend!


Image by Arek


Image by Arek


Image by Arek

cold IS relative

Image by Visualize.us


Image by Visualize.us

You know what is happening when people get too tired of constant cold? They start making jokes about it :). Here is one from today (I loved it!) and because so many of you are from the countries mentioned I thought it would be nice to translate it from Polish and share. Of course these are all stereotypes :P - so no one should really get offended!

COLD is a relative concept:

It's + 20°C: Greeks start putting on sweaters

It's + 15°C: Jamaicans turn on the central heating

It's + 10°C: Americans start shivering. Russians crop cucumbers at their dachas.

It's + 5°C: One can see one's breath. Italian cars stop obeying their drivers. Norwegians go swimming in lakes.

It's 0°C: In the US water freezes. In Russia water becomes thicker.

It's -5°C: French cars stop obeying their drivers.

It's - 15°C: Your cat insists on sleeping in bed with you. Norwegians start putting on sweaters.

It's - 17.9°C: House owners in Oslo turn on the central heating. Russians go to dacha for the last time this season.

It's - 20°C: American cars won't start.

It's - 25°C: German cars won't start. Jamaicans are extinct.

It's - 30°C: The authorities raise a debate about the homeless. Your cat is sleeping in your pyjamas.

It's - 35°C: Too cold to think. Japanese cars won't start.

It's - 40°C: You are planning to stay in a hot bath for 2 weeks. Swedish cars stop obeying their drivers.

It's - 42°C: Public transport in Europe comes to a complete halt. Russians are eating ice-cream outside.

It's - 45°C: Greeks are extinct. The authorities actually start doing something about the homeless.

It's - 50°C: Your eye-lids freeze while you blink. In Alaska people start closing vent doors while taking shower.

It's - 60°C: Polar bears migrate to the South.

It's - 70°C: Hell freezes.

It's - 73°C: Finnish special services evacuate Santa Clause from Lapland. Russians put on their fur caps with ear flaps.

It's - 80°C: Russians are not taking off their mittens even while pouring vodka.

It's - 114°C: Ethyl alcohol freezes. Russians are furious.

Wintersweet

Image by Olga

While I'm waiting for all my photos to be sent back to me (they were successfully recovered - yay! - but the hard drive had to be sent to Warsaw for that) here are some from the last year's winter trip to Brussels I have got back from my Dad when I was at home - he tends to collect the photos from my trips.

I thought these are very winter-like and very sweet (literally so!).


Image by Olga

Please

Image by Haeshu

Party Tonight

Image by Wai Lin Tse

My good friend is leaving to Wroclaw for good. That's around 450 km away.. So today's the farewell party. Good luck, Michalis :)

Call me, Sheep

These are Jean-Luc Cornec's sheep made of rotary telephones from the Museum of Telecommunication in Frankfurt. I keep being amazed at the ideas which can arrive to some peoples minds and how enormously creative they can be..!

If I ever count sheep to fall asleep - my sheep will be special :)

The 80s Are Behind The Wheel

Video via You Tube

I recently very much fancy the glam 80s with their music, movies, music videos and of course fashion styles. Some music videos from that time remind short movies - many of them actually tell a story and they are much less explicit, compared to those we watch today...This Depeche Mode video is a great example, I think.

Some more things I love from the 80s: bold colours, pixel creatures from 'space invader' game, acid-washed jeans and denim jackets, straight 'boxy' cars, Ray-Ban sunglasses, Gostbusters, Rubik's cubes, off-the-shoulder tops, Back To The Future, big earrings, enormous shoulder pads (...headbands, leggings, leg warmers...) and big hair styles!

Minimalistic

Image by Olga

My inspiration board turned out somewhat minimalistic this time...

Simplicity is so perfect - nothing distracts you from seeing plain objects and noticing their beauty. And noticing is key here.. To think of it, when we surround ourselves with little unimportant 'nice' things - we stop noticing them at all until they get dusty and we abandon them...

Things... Why do we get so attached to objects? It is time to get tired of the majority of them and stop accumulating more and more of the unnecessary ones. The less of them we possess - the more space we have to live, think and create - the more freedom there is for us.

I have a friend who made a decision to get rid of the things he was not using for more than 6 months and he was quite amazed by the result... There were not many things at all left at the end. I'm wondering if I would ever be able to do something like that.

The Dreamers

Image by Google

There are movies which can absorb you from their first minutes, sometimes by too many coincidences with your own life, by the mood they set (however elusive and hard to define it might be at times), sometimes by the pure beauty of the images. The Dreamers is one of those films for me...

Undoubtedly the shots of The Dreamers are very impressive. As in other films by Bertolucci, practically every shot could be cut out and studied hours at an end for its elegance.


Image by Google

But more important are of course the views put into the eyes of the film's main characters (living in 1968), who seem to live within the movies they love, playing with their favourite lines and imitating the protagonists.... The cast brings the vividness, beauty and tension into every scene of the movie, making it really hot. Ignoring the political chaos taking place in the streets, they surrender to their own experiences, developing their views on life, to the wild discoveries, to the game between friendship and love, pleasure and suffering. Eventually this game clashes with reality like it happens in real life and I think this is what makes the movie and its ending very particular... Needless to say the soundtrack is also great.. (You are listening to it now :)


Video via Sapo


Image by Refinery 29

Dreamy Snowy Blue(s)

And so today's winter morning gradually turned into an even more magic snowy night...


Image by Arek


Image by Arek

Winter Light From My Window

Today when I woke up I was mesmerized by what I saw from my window... I felt like I found myself in a winter fairy tale. It was foggy last night which is why every twig of the tree got glittery icy white and all the trees look magic. Now the sky is not blue anymore and its getting foggy again - it is white and very calm all around. I think this winter is very special around here - a beautiful snowy kingdom. What is your winter like? I hope you are enjoying your weekend!


Image by Olga


Image by Olga


Image by Olga


Image by Olga

Decisions... Decisions!

Here I am back to blogging again after a short break - I had a nice time with my family and friends back in my home town over last week. Got a bit snowed in on my way back (...so as I guess did many of you living in Europe :), but I definitely need to visit home more often, it's such a bliss to be there!


Image by Olga

It is a bit late for decisions for 2010 now - I know - but I've kept the list in my head for a long time now and I thought posting it will somehow make me more committed to fulfilling many of things I'd really like to do in 2010. Those are mostly experiences, education and travel plans - I tried to make it a challenging list with some so-called 'stretch targets' and now the idea is to come back and see what has been achieved at the end of 2010... :)

So here it comes...

1) Improve Swedish
2) Tell your closest people you love them more often!
3) Go to India
4) Fly a balloon
5) Read the original 'El Amor En Los Tiempos De Cholera' by García Márquez
6) Do more sports!
7) Visit the museum of Dali in London
8) Take driving lessons
9) Take risks, do something crazy you'd later regret (or it can also pay off! :))
10) Go skiing
11) Change job role or get promoted
12) Plan a trip to French Polynesia
13) Try oysters... (...in the South of Portugal! :P)
14) Create a series of collages
15) Read 'Ulysses'
16) Visit Saint Petersburg during white nights period
17) Write a poem
18) See Paris in spring
19) Do some graphic design work
20) Kiss in the rain...

P.S. for me: Learn Learn Learn!