Categories
Photography Places

Brer Fox

I’ve only had the time for two fall photo shoots, though I hope to get out a little more in the next few weeks. I’ve included some photos from the Botanical Gardens in this post.

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When at Botanical this week I noticed out of the corner of my eye a small, orange animal running across the sidewalk. I thought it was a cat at first but when I looked over, it was a red fox, not five feet away. I later found out that she is the resident fox and that she recently had five new babies. I hope to return in a few weeks and gets some photos of fox kits.

Considering that Missouri Botanical Gardens is in the middle of the city, one wouldn’t necessarily expect to see fox. However, she’s encouraged because she makes a terrific, natural rabbit control officer.

Botanical Gardens Japanese Lake with colorful fall foliage

Seeing her reminded me of Brer Fox, which reminded me, again, of the Disney movie, Song of the South. Rumor has it that Disney may release the movie on DVD this November in honor of the 60th anniversary of the original release of the movie. Disney is still concerned about the reprecussions about black stereotypes in the movie, as well as the sugar-coating of the post-slavery south. However, I think the movie would provide a terrific point of discussion about the history of the south and the interaction and attitudes about and between blacks and whites, as compared to fictional representations of same. It is these latter day fictional representations that influenced the majority of us who did not live in the south.

Missouri Botanical Garden: Burning Bush

Seeing this movie when I was young, probably more than any other event, is what sparked my early interest in the south: the culture, the people, and the history. It may have presented a view that wasn’t real, but it was intriguing to young eyes, nonetheless. I would list it in my top five movies that have had the most impact on me (right up there with To Kill a Mockingbird, which just added to my interest in all things southern).

Spider Mum in Fall hues

Returning to the Botanical trip, when the fox appeared, I had already put away my camera. I kicked myself for having done so and missed a photo opportunity; however, I spent the entire time frozen with mouth open in surprised, so doubt I would have gotten much of a photo. Doesn’t lessen the moment not having ‘proof’ of the event.

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Categories
Just Shelley Web

A work in progress

Recovered from the Wayback Machine.

I apologize for late replies to emails and such. I’ve not been checking either email or weblog posts that frequently lately, and will only be doing so erratically for the next couple of months. If I don’t reply, don’t think me rude. Well, don’t think me rude only because I’m not replying right away.

As mentioned in the last post, I’ve had a heck of a time trying to figure out what I want from my new sites. The trend now, especially with tech sites is white or gray or gradient backgrounds, centered content, no or minimum graphics, and ads. It’s all very purposeful, professional, but there’s not a bean of personality in most of it.

I don’t think returning to the days of yore when we had paisley backgrounds and bright blue fonts is necessarily the way to go, but I wonder sometimes at the parsimonious nature of web sites–especially ones related to technology. True, we don’t want to load the sites down with graphics, but we all dump in photos from Flickr and videos from YouTube, so I don’t think bandwidth is the consideration. It’s as if we’re afraid that adding our personality to the page lessens its value, which is a hell of a thing.

Regardless, I do want the new sites to project a level of competency along with the personality, and therein becomes the challenge. I just couldn’t come up with a general theme to drive out the sites, not until this last week.

I’ve taken up book binding as a hobby again. I really can’t spare the time, but I find it helps with stress, and I need something other than work on tech, work on book, work on weblog, shuffle out for a walk and a pic, and repeat. I need something to do with my hands, and I find it wonderfully soothing to touch the many different hand pressed papers; to enjoy the rich colors and the infinite variety of patterns and forms.

This has, in turn, acted as inspiration for the design of the new sites, each of which will celebrate a specific form of craft: such as batik, bookbinding, engraving, stained glass, and the delicate enamel and metal popular in the Art Deco period. I like the idea of writing about modern technology in a site whose design is inspired by a textile method as old as time. At a minimum, it’s a fun challenge and a way of growing my design skills, slight as they are.

Speaking of crafts, O’Reilly recently started a new magazine and site, Craft as companion to its Make magazine. One reason given is to attract a female demographic, which made me wince at the stereotyping. I think, though, if the site dumps the obvious pink lettering and doesn’t completely focus on female centric projects, it can successfully attract both men and women.

The whole concept of ‘craft’ encompasses both culture as well as artifact and goes beyond that which was taught in home ec or shop. Any person who has seen a person lovingly oil a hand carved cherrywood table, spin a pottery vase, create a magnificent mosaic of glass–or bind a book–understands what I mean when I say craft. Many people would disdain to call themselves ‘artist’, preferring the more solid craftswoman or craftsman. Not all boys want to build robots to scare the dogs, and not all girls want to knit mittens, but both sexes can take pride in their skill working on a craft, whatever that craft is.

Book binding, batik, wood carving, embroidery, weaving, engraving and metal work, and so on–there is nothing in any of this that’s inherently unique to any specific sex, though there are gender specific practices. In Jakarta, for instance, using a pattern tool or cap in batiking is traditionally done by men, while batiking by hand is traditionally done by women. Why this difference, I don’t know, but it is an interesting question. Therein lies the point: a site that’s focused on attracting both men and women leads to such questions, which in turn generates discussion and understanding, which can lead, someday, to a lessening of such gender-based boundaries and stereotypes.

O’Reilly can do much to ensure a good audience of both men and women in Craft–as long as the company remembers the long history and legacy associated with the word ‘craft’, and doesn’t focus only on knitted iPod holders and making Halloween decorations out of tampons, (though kudos for such imaginative use of every day material).

Categories
Writing

Learning JavaScript on the streets

Recovered from the Wayback Machine.

I received my first author copy of Learning JavaScript this week and it’s now for sale at Amazon and elsewhere, though it may take a few days to reach full stock.

O’Reilly really moved on this book in order to get it into the store shelves before the Christmas rush. Just in time for all of your holiday gift shopping. Now I need to get the book support site up. Layout and tech is easy: design, now that’s hard.

If you happen to buy it, I hope you’ll feel moved to add comments out at Amazon and elsewhere.

I’ve also modified the organization and focus of the Adding Ajax book. There’s a great number of Ajax books on the street, so we really needed something that sets this apart. Luckily we have some time to slide with this book so that I could do a re-organization. I feel now that it’s a much better book.

Categories
Diversity Weblogging

This is not a feminist weblog

Recovered from the Wayback Machine.

I’ve been informed that I can no longer call myself a feminist because I don’t agree with the other feminist webloggers as regards to the Alas a Weblog issue. To be honest, after reading some of the responses, I must say I don’t feel too unhappy.

I’m not sure where this new breed of feminist webloggers has come from. I do know that I’ve seen a breathless amount of intolerance practiced this week, not to mention enough group think to bring down the house.

It’s not an issue of disagreement–no one denies anyone the right to disagree (including myself). It’s that we can’t disagree and still call ourselves ‘feminists’, at least within these so-called feminist circles of weblogging. In a way, this is rather scary stuff: the more we participate as a ‘community’ member, the less freedom we, as individuals, have.

This has been a rather eye opening experience.

Categories
Weblogging

Gems

Recovered from the Wayback Machine.

Better than diamonds:

Mark at Wood s lot just celebrated six years of doing what he does so well, without apostrophe, comments, and a syndication feed. He also seems to be very happy, as well as a member of a community of people who hold him in both affection and respect (which implies that one doesn’t have to have the ‘trappings of technology’ in order to be part of something).

Mark also stubbornly persists in doing what he wants in regards to his space. I must remember to chastise him for this…someday.

Jeremy Zawodony writes on using Amazon S3 as backup and the concept is intriguing for those of us with multiple discs full of photos or movies or music or whatever. Unfortunately, though I thought tools were helpful (especially Jungle Disc), I found the backup to be abysmally slow and failed more often than not. Another approach that might be better is to get one of the monster accounts at Dreamhost, where you pay 9.95$ a month for 200GB of space and 2T (that’s terabytes, that’s huge) of bandwidth for the express purposes of backup. Then I can just use FTP to upload all my stuff. 

Why do this? For redundant backup in case my primary backup fails. Additionally, if there’s a fire I’ve got my stuff all backed up offsite. Plus, if you have multiple machines like I do (Mac and Windows), this allows you to access the backed up material from both machines, or when you’re on the road.

I like the S3 approach if the bugs ever get worked out. In the meantime, I may look at DH as a backup site.

Any other options?

I remember once reading about a new hard drive coming out that was going to have a whole gigabyte of space! Wow, we could never fill that up.

I’ve been critical of much of the Ajax stuff, probably because there’s a dangerous amount of hype in some of it that will backfire against the tech. But I did want to point out some of the more positive things I’ve seen recently.

Fellow O’Reilly Ajax author Chris Wells pointed out this site providing free mind mapping software.

Ajaxian pointed to new photo slideshow software, called Smooth Slideshow. I have my own slideshow software, but I may end up ‘stealing’ some of the ideas from this, because I think it’s a really nice implementation AND it validates!

Did you all know that Missouri played host to Jesse James and the James/Younger gang AND Bonnie and Clyde?

Reading 3 Quarks Daily on a regular basis is a guarantee to boost your IQ at least 10 points, but I especially wanted to point out a recent post, The Real Lady Chatterly that, in turn, posts to a fascinating article on Lady Ottoline Morrell and the Bloomsbury group.

That’s Bloomsbury, not Doonesbury.

Proceedings of the Athanasius Kircher Society points to a wonderful story and new artist exhibit based on Humbolt’s parrot: the parrot that was discovered by Alexander von Humboldt in the early 1900’s that could speak 40 words from a extinct South American tribe.

Battlestar Galactica just released its new season on iTunes this morning! Now I can watch it. Joy, joy, joy!

Sheila Lennon’s Subterranean Homepage News is becoming another one of those must read sites that point out fascinating stories you might not hear about otherwise. For instance, Twisted Sister does Christmas, and this story in how not to apply for a job.

I promised to leave for a time, so we could have the joy of a reunion in the future. Well, here I go.

Seriously, a personal matter has come up that requires my attention. And though the Weblogging Rules and Procedures Handbook states we don’t have to say anything if we’re going to be offline for a time, I didn’t want those who see this as something more than Yet another Block of Text in an RSS feed to be concerned that I have a) fallen into the Mississippi, b) been eaten by a bear, or c) am off making a deal with a porn site to sell Burningbird.

Though come to think of it, “Burningbird” has a slightly erotic sound to it.