My Calendar Says

I was sitting at my desk one day, bored, when my eyes settled on the calendar on my desk. Usually, the advice or saying seems to mean something but mostly it’s rubbish.

Then I wondered about all the other calendars out there today? Calendars in other countries, other cultures? And that’s why this blog exists. Hopefully it’ll also be a bit of fun.

So please take a moment - your calendar is right there beside you on your desk - and enter what advice you got today.

http://twotitsandavote.com/ (from http://sabrinadent.com/)

Two Tits and a Vote is a political action campaign, designed to get women to use their muscle as voters to take action around a single issue at a time. Men are very welcome to take part; the platform is merely aimed at mobilising women.

It’s built around the concept of “armchair activism.” Armchair activism enjoys reasonable take-up online, but is often decried as ultimately being rather useless because it rarely translates into the real world. I started to think a lot about how to merge all of the good stuff about armchair activism – it’s fast, it’s accessible, it’s not a big ask, and it delivers a feel-good factor to the participant – with actions that could actually take form in the real world.

It’s not a complete list of what I read daily but it’s the cream of the crop.

Enjoy!

Recently I bought two compilation CDs called ‘Holding Up Half The Sky: Voices of African Women‘ and it’s companion, ‘Voices of Asian Women’. The African cd is very good and I’ll look into getting more music by some of the artists.

I’d only heard of Angelique Kidjo before but some of the other singers include Stella Chiswese, Ami Koita and, my current favourite on this cd, Netsanet Mellesse.

It was released on the Shanachie label in 1999 and the ASIN(?) is B000000E3U.

Incidently, Sinnotts shop is on Michael Street in Waterford. It’s basically the main shopping street in Waterford. It’s just up from ‘The Square’ plaza (which is actually triangular in shape!).

You can also see what other music I like on my lastfm page.

Is that a record?

P.S. This is pretty cool. I’m writing this from The Moorings Pub in Dungarvan, Co Waterford. Eircom has a scheme where you can get free wi-fi (until next April if you’re a customer) in various locations around Ireland. The Moorings is one of those places. It’s a nice bar (it does food too) and it’s even better now that they have internet access.

Actually, I wasn’t asked for any passwords etc so I think The Moorings had free internet access anyway and maybe they’re just piggy-backing on the Eircom scheme??

I’ve had a Garmin satnav gadget for my car for the past couple of months. It’s a stupid thing really: paying a couple of hundred euro when a map costs around a tenner. But it gets me from A to B. It broke recently in that it would detect the satellites in space but the two wouldn’t talk to each other. Their website said you could email or phone for help. Unfortunately, they didn’t list an email address so I had to phone their British call centre.

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Their operative listened to my story and didn’t try any nonsense. She even knew there were no post codes in Ireland when she took my address. She just gave me an Returns number and told me I’d have to pay the postage to their UK centre. So, last Wednesday, I paid €11 to send it by registered post to the UK. I didn’t hear anything from them until today when a courier dropped a brand new replacement unit! That was a one week turnaround, including postage!

So, all in all, I’m a happy camper. I’m disappointed that it broke so soon but their customer service is friendly and efficient.

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<a href=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/isadub/1873139491/” title=”Photo Sharing”><img src=”http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2096/1873139491_bc858019ed_m.jpg” width=”240″ height=”161″ alt=”Skip” /></a>

The flickr link above is what flickr says you’re supposed to do… The link below is ‘just’ the photo’s url.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2096/1873139491_bc858019ed_m.jpg

It’s Sunday evening and I’m wondering what programme will caress me gently into sleep mode before tomorrow’s return to work. Hmm, Channel 6 have a listing for “Law and Order” at 9.30pm. Now I like Law & Order, but there’s so many repeats on so many TV stations that I like to check in advance what episode I’ll be watching.

Channel 6′s website is weird and very non-functional. For example, their main page advertises ‘The Airfield Sessions’ (live music) but doesn’t tell me when it starts or when it’s on*. Crucially, I can’t find any info on what tonight’s episode of Law & Order is about.

Heck, they don’t even have listings for Sat or Sunday…but they do have pretty girls** who present the music videos. So that’s alright then!

* Update – There’s no link on the main page but there is this page but it’s effectively a dead link!
** Are there any male presenters (not voiceover) on Channel 6?

Maybe they should call the station Chanel 6?

Sigh, here we go again…

A Brazilian friend is moving to a new apartment. It’s all a bit sudden…her partner died recently and she can’t afford the rent. Her English isn’t very good and she’s a bit nervous about ‘officialdom‘ because of her dealings with the immigration people. She wanted to cancel her NTL subscription and asked me to do it.

Long story short…I eventually spoke to a real human being and explained the situation. It went something like this…
.

– You can’t cancel on her behalf.
– But her English isn’t great and she’s in a bad place right now.
– She’ll have to phone herself to cancel. We’re open until 10pm [I maybe misunderstood the closing time]
– But she’s working until late [Spar-type shop] and she’s gotta move out tomorrow. [I didn't mention she didn't have the money to waste waiting and waiting for someone to answer the phone. Nor would she understand the 'press 1 for, press 2 for...]
– I’m sorry but she’ll have to phone herself.
– Do you have anyone there who speaks Portugese or Spanish?
– Err, I’ve no idea. [Puts on helpful hat]. You could write in to cancel?
– Let me get this straight. You’ll accept a cancellation letter from me but you won’t accept a verbal cancellation from me?
– Yes.
– 10% of the population are non-nationals now. Do you have anyone there who speaks foreign languages.
– Err, I’ve no idea.

Let’s be honest realistic. If we wrote the letter, NTL would lose it and they’d maintain they never got it. They’d chase her for the arrears, threatening her with court action etc and further traumatise her.

So I’ve now got to send registered letters to NTL, my friend, myself, and copy the bank to cancel the direct debit. And, in six months time, I’ll almost certainly write again that they’re chasing her for money that she doesn’t owe.

Three small negatives to get out of the way first:

– The graduands should be encouraged to work out of their comfort zone. Too much of it was self-centred or introspective, and there was little or no representation of people, say, over 30.
– The assistants were students – they’d probably be offended if I called them s’curity guards. Perhaps some of them were even the artists themselves. It is perhaps disrespectful to visitors, and their own work, to stand around gossiping and sniggering and generally being a distraction.
– The signposting was non-existant. I’m pretty sure I missed about 20% of the exhibitors. The exhibition was staged across 3 buildings (?) and I found the buildings. But once inside, it was a different story.

Now that I’ve got that off my chest, I’d definitely go again next year because:

Roisin Morris was the star of the show for me. I think I even saw her in the corridor!! Her photographs were just stunning. Her theme, albeit introspective, was relevant and insightful. There were only 6 photographs but I think they transcended the limitations of ‘ink on paper‘ and she really got her message across. There was a real depth and a tactile feel to them and her ‘What Waited Inside Herself 4“* was rightly the centrepiece of her display. Oddly enough, the catalogue just called it No. 4 or something like that. This is her college website and her personal website (although it’s not working yet).

* This pic is a scan of one of many postcards given away on the day advertising the work of the Graduands. Please contact the college or the artist if you want to reproduce, buy, etc their work.

I also liked Valerie Curran’s Vanishing Points. It was a fresh approach that I haven’t seen before and, as a former scientist, the concept appealed to me. She majored in Fine Art and her piece was displayed in a 3m cubed space and it consisted of styrofoam balls and thread. Have a look here at a small pic.

I, and I’m sure all the other children, blew as hard as they could into the space to see the balls vibrate on their strings. Sadly, the college website doesn’t list a personal website (or a better pic). I hope some gallery takes it in and displays it but, strangely, the pricelist says it Not For Sale.

Final mention goes to Manus Goan in, I think, the Animation class. The catalogue lists him but I can’t find him on the IADT website. His name is unusual and a google search returns up bebo page. His animated video was called something like Dusk to Dawn. The animation, ‘flashing lights’, and music all tied in together smoothly although it was a tiny bit repetitive. Bebo’s Manus Goan is a ‘Hardcore Raver 4 Life‘ so that might explain it! Still, the rendering was realistic and it was a good ‘take’ on Dublin. I’m not being dismissive when I say it would make a good screensaver, or if adapted, a good music video.

Only joking but you heard it here first. I just wanted to highlight justwhisperz photo’s on flickr. She, and she=teenager, only has 50+ photos in flickr but they’re exceptional. I’ve fav’d one and made 3 comments after one visit.