hinshlai asked: Quina il·lusió trobar-te per aquí!! Quan tingui més temps aniré llegint. Espero que tot et vagi moltbé!! :)

Lo mismo digo! També t’estaré seguint :).

McTwitter

I can finally say that I am a well-integrated and up to date member of my generation. Why? Because I now have a twitter account. As a recent convert I can’t help the urge to add my little grain of sand to the ongoing debate. I have to admit that, to start with, I was quite sceptical of the whole idea and disagreed with those who consider that you cannot be a well-informed citizen of your time without a blog, a Facebook profile, a twitter account etc. In my mind, fast news was equal to fast food: full of bullshit and ready to inflate you with inaccurate information that causes an obesity of biases. I know, I sound like the most wrinkled of dinosaurs. However, now that I have tried it out I have to say that the amount of news that shoots back and forth through these channels is shocking, and one can truly benefit from being part of the network. Did you know that in Japan they have square watermelons?! And that you are more likely to die on your way to buy a lottery ticket than you are to actually win the lottery?! Of course there is the inevitable question, at what cost does this speed come? In the US, McDonalds sure came with a high price: more then one third of the American population is now overweight, and when one imagines the typical American it’s a chubby and unhealthy figure that pops up in our minds. If we were to adjust the price of a McDonald’s hamburger to incorporate its expense to society and the medical system, it would amount to 120 dollars. Could the bite-sized pieces of information Twitter presents us with come with similar hidden costs? Will we end up with an extensively but inaccurately informed population of cyber-addicts who gulp down massive quantities of crap through their computer screens? I guess we will find out soon enough. It seems though, that up to now we have been able to maintain the delicate balance between the proportion of rigorous and that of fast information ingested. As long as one keeps that stability in mind, it is safe to dive into the strong current without being carried away by it.

My present assessment: fast news is convenient and useful if considered critically and combined with a good, slow, conventional home-cooked meal of information every once in a while. It isn’t a burger a day that keeps the doctor away! 

Get Up.

Having been confronted with myself in such a direct way these past months, which have gone by so fast, I have had to learn to pay closer attention to that which hooks and awakes me. I have had no one but myself to rely on when filling the time and space I am composed of. Emptiness inevitably catches up at times but it’s getting easier and easier to leave it and other pressing uneasiness behind, while knowingly jumping into my skin, getting up, moving and enjoying every moment of it. I have come to realise, accept and love my need for constant stimulation; it is the only way to fight off that boredom that constantly lurks over us. I need the buzz, even though I sometimes try so hard to hide from it, and it is becoming clear that the only way to achieve it is to push oneself into it. Patience in this case is just something to hide behind, and for now I’m done hiding.

Caramelized Pear Tea

As I sat there, sipping my caramelized pear tea, I realised that I felt fulfilled. There were no unattended needs pressing inside of me, no nagging was going on in the back of my mind. There was only that peace and quiet that borderlines apathy but escapes it in the just necessary measure. The dark clouds outside framing the black bony trees of Flevopark only add to this sensation. However, as the financial crisis has proven, bubbles don’t last long, when will this one pop? I always feel at my best when I’m in this state, more then comfortable with solitude and in fact desiring nothing else. Boredom seeps into me until it is overcome, replenished, outgrown. What I ask myself now is what leads to these moments of serenity? How can I provoke them, make them last? I want to keep swimming in this conscious lethargy.

The answer is not far. Of course, it is within the relations with the outside that lays this inner calm. In order to feel it, the connections with all others have to be fed and cared for. It is only when that is achieved that I can attain independence from all others. It is a paradoxical notion, but one I cannot argue with for experience always proves it right. I guess balance is the answer to everything.

FRIDZITALITY

Fridzitality

We are nearing the present-giving holiday of the year. Everywhere we are bombarded with images and texts that suggest every type of gift imaginable, until the creativity that used to be involved in gift making is completely killed by the overflow of information. This makes originality impossible; anything you think of has already been come up with, and is already on sale. We end up taking are pick from the infinite list we are supplied with, and go with that. Of course, that just takes away all the fun.

However, I ran across an interesting suggestion while reading the newspaper the other day. There were a few propositions, all related to language, but the one I liked most was the “give a new word” one. I decided to go along with it and make my Christmas present an invented word. Because we understand our world through language, if I were to make up an expression for sensations that have not been translated to our code before, this would allow others to experience them as such, through the vector of that new word. There is an experience I would like to share; since the temperatures are going down, why not give a present that can help increase the appreciation of the winter chill?

Fridzitality: The startling revitalization that one feels when incredibly cold. A chilly weightlessness that takes over you as you fight against the pressing numbness. That slicing through the air of one’s interior burning activity, while it is measured against the enveloping freeze.

You can say, for example, it is a “fridzal day today”. And it certainly is.