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Mar. 1st, 2019 10:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkat1. I've decided to take next Friday off work and go into the City to view
The JRR Tolkien and Middle Earth Exhibit at the JP Morgan Library -- It's free Friday nights. But I think I'll go during the day and pay the $22, which goes to support the museum.
I rather like the Morgan Museum. It's smaller, and not quite as overwhelming. Also this looks like a really interesting exhibit --
I'm admittedly a bit of fan of Tolkien. I fell in love with The Hobbit as a child. It's the first epic fantasy that I read...and I even got to perform in a theaterical adaptation one summer -- I played the Great Goblin.
Haven't read all the books though. Got bogged down in Return of the King (too many battles -- battles bore me), and never made it to his lifetime achievement The Silmarrion. Perhaps someday?
And haven't done anything fun in the City in a while -- just lots of Doctor's appointments. Could go see the MC Escher exhibit that is in South Brooklyn at Industry Park -- but it's hard for me to get to, and it's not a lot of fun to go alone to, also...I can't say I've ever cared one way or the other for MC Escher -- the graphic artist. It goes until the end of March though -- so I might still go.
There's also an exhibit of Frida Kahloa's works and personal effects at the Brooklyn Museum of Art (where I'm a member) that I might check out. And...the Andy Warhol exhibit at the Whitney, although I am NOT a fan of Warhol. (I know too much about him, my sister-inlaw's parents went to school with and hang out with Warhol.)
2. I find the news scary. All of it. There is very little that isn't scary. I can't help but wonder about the journalists these days...when did they all decide to become horror writers?
It's either scary or overwhelming...and it's hard to know what is true and what is a lie half the time.
3. My headspace keeps notifying me to get off my phone and not look at notifications or messages for a while and see what happens. I find this amusing for a couple of reasons.
* I am rarely looking at my phone.
* Very few people call or message me -- so there are no notifications, outside of various subway delays. (As an aside, the subway is always delayed. One weekend there were no notifications -- and I wondered what happened. Did the app go kaput? No, they were just operating on or close to schedule for two to three days.)
* Headspace notifies me more than anyone else -- to not look at notifications.
Co-worker and I had a lengthy discussion about phones. She has the new XS and loves it...it's also $1200 which is about the same cost as year's worth of subway passes.
And the smartwatch, which is hooked to it. It tells her when her heart rate is up, when she should walk, etc. (Personally, I think it would drive me nuts. Also, I'd have to program the thing on my phone and get it to sync with it. Considering I have enough troubles with the wireless earphones. I'm not a fan of gadgetry.)
While I probably should get a new phone, I'm procrastinating because it doesn't have a jack for earphones, which would be an issue. I use earphones on it all the time and haven't gotten savy enough to figure out how to do the wireless version. Also, I really don't want to spend over $800 or more on a new phone. Remember when phones cost nothing? Remember when we didn't carry phones around, and there was blissful silence on subways, street corners, restaurants, movie theaters etc...? No rings. No flashes of light as people text in a darkened theater, because if they aren't in contact with their loved-ones twenty four seven the earth will implode.
My father is right, we live in a perpetual phone booth. Was life better without the cell phone? Hard to say.
4. I've been struggling with my writing again. But I read about Tolkien and that gave me some inspiration. Tolkien didn't care if he published or not, or if anyone read him -- he just loved writing and building his own little world.
There's something to be said for that. Just love doing it...and see what happens.
The JRR Tolkien and Middle Earth Exhibit at the JP Morgan Library -- It's free Friday nights. But I think I'll go during the day and pay the $22, which goes to support the museum.
I rather like the Morgan Museum. It's smaller, and not quite as overwhelming. Also this looks like a really interesting exhibit --
“In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.” With these words the Oxford professor J.R.R. Tolkien ignited a fervid spark in generations of readers. From the children’s classic The Hobbit to the epic The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien’s adventurous tales of hobbits and elves, dwarves and wizards have introduced millions to the rich history of Middle-earth. Going beyond literature, Tolkien’s Middle-earth is a world complete with its own languages and histories. Tolkien: Maker of Middle-earth celebrates the man and his creation. The exhibition will be the most extensive public display of original Tolkien material for several generations. Drawn from the collections of the Tolkien Archive at the Bodleian Library (Oxford), Marquette University Libraries (Milwaukee), the Morgan, and private lenders, the exhibition will include family photographs and memorabilia, Tolkien’s original illustrations, maps, draft manuscripts, and designs related to The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion.
An exhibition organized by the Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford in collaboration with the Morgan Library & Museum, New York with the support of The Tolkien Trust.
I'm admittedly a bit of fan of Tolkien. I fell in love with The Hobbit as a child. It's the first epic fantasy that I read...and I even got to perform in a theaterical adaptation one summer -- I played the Great Goblin.
Haven't read all the books though. Got bogged down in Return of the King (too many battles -- battles bore me), and never made it to his lifetime achievement The Silmarrion. Perhaps someday?
And haven't done anything fun in the City in a while -- just lots of Doctor's appointments. Could go see the MC Escher exhibit that is in South Brooklyn at Industry Park -- but it's hard for me to get to, and it's not a lot of fun to go alone to, also...I can't say I've ever cared one way or the other for MC Escher -- the graphic artist. It goes until the end of March though -- so I might still go.
There's also an exhibit of Frida Kahloa's works and personal effects at the Brooklyn Museum of Art (where I'm a member) that I might check out. And...the Andy Warhol exhibit at the Whitney, although I am NOT a fan of Warhol. (I know too much about him, my sister-inlaw's parents went to school with and hang out with Warhol.)
2. I find the news scary. All of it. There is very little that isn't scary. I can't help but wonder about the journalists these days...when did they all decide to become horror writers?
It's either scary or overwhelming...and it's hard to know what is true and what is a lie half the time.
3. My headspace keeps notifying me to get off my phone and not look at notifications or messages for a while and see what happens. I find this amusing for a couple of reasons.
* I am rarely looking at my phone.
* Very few people call or message me -- so there are no notifications, outside of various subway delays. (As an aside, the subway is always delayed. One weekend there were no notifications -- and I wondered what happened. Did the app go kaput? No, they were just operating on or close to schedule for two to three days.)
* Headspace notifies me more than anyone else -- to not look at notifications.
Co-worker and I had a lengthy discussion about phones. She has the new XS and loves it...it's also $1200 which is about the same cost as year's worth of subway passes.
And the smartwatch, which is hooked to it. It tells her when her heart rate is up, when she should walk, etc. (Personally, I think it would drive me nuts. Also, I'd have to program the thing on my phone and get it to sync with it. Considering I have enough troubles with the wireless earphones. I'm not a fan of gadgetry.)
While I probably should get a new phone, I'm procrastinating because it doesn't have a jack for earphones, which would be an issue. I use earphones on it all the time and haven't gotten savy enough to figure out how to do the wireless version. Also, I really don't want to spend over $800 or more on a new phone. Remember when phones cost nothing? Remember when we didn't carry phones around, and there was blissful silence on subways, street corners, restaurants, movie theaters etc...? No rings. No flashes of light as people text in a darkened theater, because if they aren't in contact with their loved-ones twenty four seven the earth will implode.
My father is right, we live in a perpetual phone booth. Was life better without the cell phone? Hard to say.
4. I've been struggling with my writing again. But I read about Tolkien and that gave me some inspiration. Tolkien didn't care if he published or not, or if anyone read him -- he just loved writing and building his own little world.
There's something to be said for that. Just love doing it...and see what happens.
no subject
Date: 2019-03-02 06:31 am (UTC)We're not phone people but my son is in thrall to his video games and my husband can't take his eyes off Twitter. I bring a book everywhere I go--but I don't walk down the street reading it.
This inspires me.
no subject
Date: 2019-03-02 01:33 pm (UTC)I find Tolkien inspiring --unlike many of his contemporary writers and other speculative fantasy writers, he didn't really have any agenda outside of just creating a world that he saw vividly in his head. He just did wrote and drew what he loved.
no subject
Date: 2019-03-02 11:55 am (UTC)ETA that Kahlo exhibit is based on the one at the V&A that I had some very niche input into last year!
no subject
Date: 2019-03-02 01:27 pm (UTC)I nearly burst out laughing when the special exhibition in all that plush splendour was on Thoreau! Mr I Will Lead A Simple Life By This Pond And Take My Laundry Home To Mother Each Week. Hah.
Oh that's hilarious. I wonder if he was turning in his grave?
ETA that Kahlo exhibit is based on the one at the V&A that I had some very niche input into last year!
Very cool. I like the V&A (used to hang out in the V&A a lot back in 1987, when I was studying theater in London, we were staying in a series of flats nearby).
And the Kahlo exhibit looks really interesting.
no subject
Date: 2019-03-03 04:58 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-03-03 05:18 am (UTC)Long answer?
As I keep telling my apple-hating male co-workers...
I used other brands for years...had a Samsung. And it was always breaking on me. None of the apps worked. I couldn't text on it. And the battery kept burning out. I remember the problem was I always had to keep it charged, and the Samsung can't handle that. While the Iphone in stark contrast has lasted the longest.
Also I hate the Android System, really despise it -- which is sooo high maintenance. My brother kept telling me to get the Iphone, because he'd worked on writing the owners guide for the Android and he said it's interface wasn't intuitive at all and unless you were a computer coder or programmer or into gadgets, you'd find it difficult to work with. I ignored, he's my brother.
But, my friend who is knowledgeable about these things and uses her phone for work among other things -- talked me into the Apple. She'd also gone through the Samsung, and the Google model, and the Windows (which avoid at all costs) and said the Apple was weirdly the easiest and by far the cheapest in the long term. Sometimes the cheapest option in the short term is by far the most expensive in the long term. (Dell computers are more expensive than Mac, because they get viruses and fall apart, MAC last longer and don't get viruses and fall apart. I know have both -- Dell or PC at work, and Mac at home.)
The nice thing about the Apple phone? I have a laptop that's a MAC, so it works well with it.
So..I'll just keep my Iphone 6 for a bit longer.