New Blog: Kirkwood Tales

I've created a new blog for my stories etc. It's called Kirkwood Tales  The Page Stories  and Other Fictions on this blog will be transferred to the new blog, and I will add new stories.

New Blog: Meditations

I've decided to move all my sermons to a new blog. Its name is Kirkwood-Meditations. I hope it will be helpful and interesting.

Reread of Ngaio Marsh's Light Thickens.

 I've added a note to my review of Ngaio Marsh's Light Thickens, which I've just finished rereading.

Judy Martin, textile artist.

OK, this is an excuse to post a photo of Judy Martin, a textile artist who lives on Manitoulin Island. See her latest blog entry here

She describes the inspiration for her work, and posts many, many photos of it. Enjoy!

The photo shows Judy at Four and Friends, Bruce Mines, July 2008.

Family Album on LensCulture (link)

 One of the photo sets on LensCulture. The backstory behind these photos is fascinating. A sample:

LensCulture: photo site worth visiting

I've kept this site bookmarked, always worth a look: LensCulture.

Some examples from different photographers:

 

Two Songs

 I occasionally write song lyrics.  My Friend Lois Jones has set some of them to music.  In December 2020, her group Women in Song released their first album.  Two of the songs use my lyrics:

The Prairie's an Ocean, and True Love Waltz.

Enjoy!

Comment on anti-vaxxers updated 2026-01-11 (link)

I've updated the post. Click on this one.

Great photos

Great photos here.https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-suffolk-53819803
One sample:

Social distancing and covid-19 (link)

Well-done aimation showing why social distancing matters:
https://youtu.be/dSQztKXR6k0

Dave Brubeck at 91: Take Five at Montreal in 2009.

 

Just listened, again, to this Dave Brubeck version of Take Five at the 2009 Montreal Jazz Festival. He was 91. IMO this version is the best ever. It's 10 minutes long, so be prepared.

Latest Monty Python Skit: Brexit: Britain 'will not be aligning with EU rules' - Raab

The UK will not be aligning itself with EU rules, according to Dominic Raab.

It's become impossible to satirise the delusions of the Brexiteers. You just can't make this stuff up.

Update Wednesday, 5th February 2020: Here's a link to The Toronto Star's Michael de Adder. (Published Monday, Feb 20.) I think it captures the delusions of the Brexiteers perfectly.

A subway by any other name....

Here's one of the stories about Elon Musk's proposal for underground roads for autonomous electric vehicles: Musk's Hole. Looks an awful lot like a subway to me.

This whole autonomous car thing is an attempt to combine the indvidual convenience of the car with the safety of rail. From a rail passenger's point of view, a subway car is an autonomous vehicle. "Leave the driving to us", Greyhound used to say. Well, when you ride in a train, someone or something else is driving. Properly controlled and isolated from cross traffic, a railroad is a horizontal elevator (as George Kneiling said many decades ago). The first elevators were controlled by human operators. Now they are automated. There's no reason not to automate passenger rail, except our weird notion that we should all be able to come and go as we please, and damn the expense.

Dr Hu, no not the Time Lord, but a cool guy anyhow (links)

Check out Dr Hu on research into animal movement. Interviewed on CBC's Radio One Quirks and Quarks. Will be available as a podcast by the end of the day.

Update 2026-02-14: No longer available. However, his book on animal movement is available from several sources: 

How to Walk on Water and Climb up Walls: Animal Movement and the Robots of the Future

• David Hu

HAL is Dead: Douglas Rain

Douglas Rain, the voice of HAL in 2001: A Space Odyssey, has died.

Katherine Westphal, textile artist

I like textile art. Katherine Westphal is another textile artist I didn't know about.Sample of her work:

Richard Stein, architect: Energy Conservation n the Building Trades.

Richard Stein was Ethel Stein husband. His obituary includes some interesting calculations about the efficiency of buildings.

Textile Artist Ethel Stein (link to obituary)

Textile as an art medium is of course underrated and often dismissed as mere craft. Ethel Stein is one of many people who have been overlooked for this reason. Which means that I knew nothing about her until I read her obituary. I suppose some would say that's a minor deprivation, but I disagree.

Wisdom is more important than IQ.

So you think being smart is what matters? Nope. Wisdom beats intelligence, according to a BBC article on the downsides of a high IQ:

From my experience, being clever tempts you to believe that your notions are better than other people's. After all, you have such excellent clever arguments supporting them!

Beware of trusting your own cleverness.

Is Banksy's popularity evidence of inability to see art?

Found in the Guardian: Something that needed to be said about Banksy and other easy-to-assimilate art. Including music, which the iPod and iTunes have reduced to sonic wallpaper and mere ear-massage.