3D in 2D

Looks like a great gig, and I'm truly sorry I missed it. There's only half the song here but hopefully the album won't be long coming.

Telling

I do keep telling myself that I should keep going, and that I'm doing so well and all. So nice that when it's impossible to listen to myself someone else will write my thoughts for me.

More tomorrow

Will you?

When I was little(r) I thought clouds were blue and the sky was white. I suppose this was on the assumption that 'nothing' (as I considered the sky to be at that time) would be white and 'something' (which is what the clouds seemed to be) would be blue. I thought this for a very long time. At a similar sort of time also developed the notion that, as I saw it, there was no reason to believe that since the sun (or sky, or clouds for that matter) were there today they would be there again tomorrow.

I realised that I had been wrong about clouds being blue when first in the window seat of an aeroplane. Since I was then above something white (which had to be the clouds) and the 'nothing' was still above, well then the sky must be blue. I did toy with the brief idea that there had to be something higher for it to be blue, but that didn't come til later still. It seemed pretty logical to me.

The idea that the sun would be coming up tomorrow, however, never really left.

Recently I was asked what the probability of the sun coming up tomorrow was. This was asked by someone who probably knows or else could easily work it out I'm sure. Since I couldn't reason a calculation to establish an actual estimation I said 0.5. This almost certainly arises from my failure to understand the concept of probabilty but also beceause of my lack of belief in empirical data. I may be wrong, but I don't see that the sun coming up today means it will come up tomorrow.

And so to Bayesian theory. This method is probably best summed up by saying that there are not only yes/no answers, there are part truths and part untruths. Karl Popper was of the view that science should aim to falsify untruths. This is, in essence, the null hypothesis, a concept which on a day-to-day basis I find quite depressing, and yet also true. We should, I suppose, always be trying to remove all the wrong ideas we have. Bayesian theory, on the other hand, suggests that the hypotheses we have should constantly be modified by the data that we acquire. So yes, it is ok to say that there are only white swans, until that little black signet arrives on the Queen's lawn. Hilborn and Mangel gave a nice discription of this (involving squirrels!) which is talked about here.

Taking Bayesian theory, however, it would seem that, you can never have a probability of 1, and you can never be sure.

I suppose its strange to not live by empirical rules, especially being a (part-time) scientist, and especially as it is the general basis of most human reasoning. What is certain, however, is that living this way means every today you go to bed terrified and every tomorrow you wake up astonished.

Rubbish

I'm talking here now because I need to talk to somebody and there is no-one else. Funny how here there seems to be both the possibility of everybody and nobody. The needs arises from a general failure to understand anything that is happening in the immediate vicinity. I don't understand this,



Although I imagine it to probably be a very simple thing. I didn't understand the majority of what was said during the two hour meeting I attended this morning.

Some people drive themselves mad trying to find the single unifying pattern to their world, but it seems that for me even the things which are clear and sensible to the rest of the world are just a step too far.

Where the melody takes you

I remember very clearly my first thought about learning to play the guitar. I'm sure there are plenty of ideas about why exactly I did this. Not many will know that as well as all the non-guitar related reasons, there was the fact that for a long time I had already told people I could play the guitar. Sure I'd messed around and heard tunes in my head that I couldn't make my fingers play. I had no idea what the names of the strings were or what chords went where. I had lied about a lot of things for a very, very long time. I didn't really think that I could or would every actually play. I'd never met anyone who made me think things that I hadn't considered were possible.

I learnt quite quickly. Don't get me wrong, I'm no Sally Murray, but I learnt to play other people's songs, even if I'm told that I do so with such woefull inaccuracy that it is both an insult and a compliment.

The cello was another matter entirely. If I'm honest, I have absolutely no idea why I started learning the cello. I know I found lots of J du Pre on YouTube having had a particularly nasty argument about the letter J. I tell people that I actually wanted to play the harp, but cello was close (in my wonky mind). I'm not sure that's true. I do want to play the harp, along with making felt, speaking numerous languages, learning capoeira, doing a brilliant tango and blowing glass. I didn't know cello was a favourite instrument and I didn't know about the ex-girlfriend. The truth is that we don't know what switch inside our skull makes us do things. Why am I writing here when there are an uncountable number of other possibilities. Why do the birds sing? And why do I play the cello?

I know I'm definitely pretty keen on it though, for it's shape, it's deep humming melody (mostly when in the hands of others), and for a teacher who says 'you must see through the fear that you create'...and then prods you in the boob (I wasn't expecting it either!)

Fearing the inevitable fall

It's that time of year again when almost everyone promises to do that little bit more, eat that little bit less, and generally be that little bit better all round; and I've certainly been doing my fair share of a little bit more.

Last week I went skiing for the first time. Now I've always been led to believe that 'there is nothing to fear but fear itself'. There may be brackets involved: 'There is nothing to fear but fear itself (and hurtling to your death)', for instance.

Certainly for me 'there is nothing to fear but being discovered to be utterly afraid and pathetic', is definitely high on the list. It's not the fact of being afraid of falling over, it's being watched as you stand at the top of a mountain utterly paralysed. It's having to say 'no I haven't read that book', 'no I don't know that answer', 'no I've never done that'.

Perhaps it is that we have nothing to fear but the holes we create in ourselves.

And in order to fill some of those holes I shall be resolved in acheiving the following things (though undoubtedly not this year):
1. Read the lady with the lapdog - Chekhov (tick)
2. Learn to ski
3. Go and see some plays/ballets/musicals

ho.

It may be a little pre-emptive, but I fear I may be preoccupied when the time comes...

Mewwy Cwistmas to all and their grandmothers

Give or take?

Should I have helped or taken the picture?

Not to be forgotten

I know it's been quiet of late, but there really has been so much going on. There are lots of things to talk about, one of them is my aunt Myrna. She's pretty poorly really, so much so that it's getting to that point where you think about how you will try and not to forget. So I had a look on the inter-trap and found this article from the Yorkshire Evening Post. Pretty amazing what you can miss in the world.




Myrna Wilson has always had stars in her eyes – if anyone can tell you about A-list celebrities, she can.

The 73-year-old grandmother-of-two from Moortown has worked with all of the greats. She convinced Frank Sinatra to play a gig, two of the Beatles once borrowed her car (and one of them her sunglasses) and she coaxed Gracie Fields out of retirement in 1970. She's also met Bob Hope, Bing Crosby and Spike Milligan, among others.

She said: "The Sixties was a wonderful era and is even better in hindsight. When all this happened to me, I don't think I appreciated it fully. Some of the big stars were absolutely fantastic."

Belfast-born Myrna Malinksy was the youngest of two daughters to father Joe, a cabinet maker and mother Dora, a furrier. She was educated at convent school and in 1948 moved to South Shields.

Star-struck

She began working for a credit drapers in South Shields in the 1950s, then in 1956, star-struck and adventurous, she went to London to see if the streets were paved with gold and by 1963 she was a theatrical tycoon.

She became secretary to variety bookings manager Alec Fyne on ITC (Independent Television Corporation), which made and sold programmes to ITV.

Two years later she became Fyne's casting assistant and worked on shows such as Sunday Night at the London Palladium and Saturday Spectacular with Harry Secombe, Peter Sellers and Alma Cogan.

"I booked everything and everyone from a St Bernard dog to Spike Milligan. When Jonathan Routh of Candid Camera fame requested such bizarre casting as a girl prepared to lose her skirt in a door or a chimpanzee who wouldn't mind being measured for a suit, I took it all in my stride and delivered the goods."

Plum job

Myrna was head-hunted in 1961 by impresarios George and Alfred Black and returned to the North East to work as casting director of light entertainment on Tyne Tees.

"This led to me being approached by Brian Tesler and eventually landing the plum job of casting director for all light entertainment programmes with ABC in London at Teddington studios."

Apart from working on big TV projects with Bob Hope and Bing Crosby, Myrna secured the Beatles from Brian Epstein for Blackpool Night Out, which took over from Sunday Night at the London Palladium in the summer.

"It was 1966 and they were staying at the Imperial Hotel. I will never forget John and Ringo borrowing my car. They asked to take my Hillman Minx convertible, which I always kept in immaculate condition. When they somewhat sheepishly returned it the whole interior had been ripped to pieces by hysterical fans."

A big feather in her cap was when Myrna persuaded Frank Sinatra to make his British TV debut for ABC TV when he was doing a show at the Royal Festival Hall.

"I practically camped outside the Dorchester Hotel, where he was staying, just to meet his manager. After nearly six months of negotiating I succeeded in booking him – I just wouldn't give in."

The thrill of the scoop proved to be heady stuff; after Sinatra said 'yes' it cost Myrna's office £10,000 in fees – and Ole Blue Eyes donated it all to three charities.

"As a reward I was invited to afternoon tea in his Savoy Hotel suite. I threw caution to the wind and bought a new suit, white leather gloves and a new hair-do. It was all worth it – just to look into those amazing blue eyes, the handshake alone turned my knees to jelly."

In 1968 Myrna, now married, started a family – two boys, Scott, now 39 and Kyle, 34 – and shortly afterwards was approached by Yorkshire TV to come to Leeds and freelance for the Les Dawson Show for six months – but six months became 10 years.

It was Myrna who finally coaxed Gracie Fields out of retirement in 1970. She also recalls meeting Bing Crosby, a "gorgeous and very unassuming" man, who appeared on Stars on Sunday and arrived with a toupee in his pocket.

Lovely time

She said: "He went and met all the people in the canteen, but went to say hello to the kitchen staff first."

After that, she formed her own company, before retiring.



See you soon x

A tokenization of gratiude

I'm really busy at the moment, so it's always great when the stupid person within me escapes and reaks havok. Yes they say, you want to delete and not rename that file you've just saved, the one that took you three days to do, delete, DELETE! Bugger i say.

So it's especially nice to know that somewhere in this virtual world there is someone so much more intelligent and sensible than i, that they actually took the time to design freeware that will find these files despite the fact I have just hidden the path and may never find them again. So you ring up the handy University helpdesk and they say - try this! Oh yes, yes, Recuva.com, you are brilliant. I don't suppose you exist for fame and accolade, but honestly I, and probably many others, appreciate you. You quite literally made my day.

So then, when I get home to find that my good old lap-machine has died for some inexplicable reason, it is very nice to find an old bit of paper which says you have some kind of magic insurance to fix him. Oh yes, yes Tecguys, i think you just made my night!

It's strange because I have, really, honestly tried to learn HTML. The progress is extremely slow. I guess it's not my naturally bent, but it's nice to know that the virtual people out there who can, will help. I just hope they didn't look through my pictures.

Going and coming

I disappeared for a while from here, which if you noticed probably warrants an explanation.

Living alone, and being alone most of the day, means that your thoughts are your own, and with no-one there to distract you with this or that, they certainly can take a wander. There is a lot I have done recently which I feel I should apologise for, not that apologising any more will make things any better, in fact it may well make everything worse. The trouble is that knowing what you deserve will make you fear what is to come. All the time, every moment between the seconds you are being reassured that things are ok. This can make you a little highly strung. I felt that this feeling was spreading onto this place. So I stopped.

Tonight, I took a wrong-turn when walking from work and got to thinking. Our thoughts being all we have, it is no wonder we cling to them so. Every moment is spent trying to make our thoughts 'be' something, a play, a song, a book, an article, a building, a painting, a photograph. All in the hope that the thought won't perish with, if not before, us. In making these things, however, we do not acheive our aim. We do not crystalise our thought into anything at all. All we do is make something new. Decartes would tell that all these newr things instantly become tricks. Illusions of our intepretation. It is true that after some time we look back at a photograph and feel a vague warm feeling of familiarity. But it is probably a familiarity with the picture. We are no longer there and those thoughts are gone. Funny how we always think we will remember but are forever forgetting.

So I guess this is why this place has been put back, because it is a special thing in it's own right. These are not thoughts but words, they will mean something else at some other time, but they are still necessary.

Watching as the clock face changes

I've been staying up too late and getting up too early of late. There is, as ever, an endless fear of time running out, but sometimes it's more apparent than others. Now is one of those apparent times (in more ways than one i suppose). When you say that, if someone (specific) met you now, they wouldn't be attracted to you in the way they were when they did happen to come across you, it's hard to know what is meant. Perhaps it's that the past is always far away, and hence blurred to give the appearance of romanticism. Perhaps you are just older and less (attractive) than you once were. Whatever it means, it's probably not great.

Timely then, that when watching the above video, i received an entirely unprovoked message from a new (but good) friend that read 'I know we will. I really enjoy working with you. If you love neil wait. Follow your heart. It is hard, but time passes quickly'. I don't know what all of it meant, but it certainly meant something.

Indeed it does pass quickly, and the leaves all around us are serving as (not such) a constant (but a) reminder.

things you don't know, teapots, and finally...the point

I've not really seen anyone for a couple of days, which has provided plenty of time to have a think about things (and to try to do some work).

Thoughts have come back to things that are not known. I only recently found out, having spent a good few years with the same letter, that he was in a film that I've watched many times, with many people. Weird.

Of course you only get a chance to realise how strange it is that you didn't know, once you do.

I realised too, that I actually harbour quite strong feelings about teapots, courtesy of same letter.

Potty

And finally the point - I am (currently) working in research. I have to think about the things I don't know. How in the name of < insert deity > do you do that?!

P.s. I also now know, having written this, that writing things in triangular brackets makes them disappear. I also realise that I don't know what these are really called. I also realise I am a bit special.

Slow down for that cyclist

You know me well yes you do. I’m the one who’s edging past, squeezing through. That perpetual irritation, that’s in your way, and wasting your time. Why am I in the middle of your path
Going too slowly.

Tell me, those pennies you’ve been spending. They are ours. And how much farther will they get you? Here I am. My head surrounded to protect me from your kind. I am shining like a fluorescent light bulb. It was your idea to get further and go faster and all for free. And where will it get you? Not to point B.
A total waste.

My fuel is me. And maybe I don’t want to inhale the festering fumes, which you exude, whilst I fly. And tell me why do I have to dress like a clown, just so you cannot refuse to see me? And still you do, don’t you? Still you will not see that you’re movement is not free. You keep proclaiming that you cannot. But I say yes you can, you just don’t want to. And I say it as I pass you by, in your dirty queues, day after day, round and round. So please, do not park in my path. When I am going so fast,
In the right direction.

Recycle this message

I've never wanted to use this place as a source of shameless vocalisation (typolisation possibly) but the long and short of it is that I want to build a recycling centre in a country that I have been to twice and have no idea how to do it or who to ask. If you think anyone can offer advice please send them here or tell them my email address.

In Ghana, as in many countries where clean water-sources are not readily available, water is sold in small plastic bags, which are then discarded, generally into a gutter which then becomes blocks and floods. This is stupid on a number of accounts, not least because people die during the floods, the plastic could be remade into bags or alternatively used to make things (like gutters). There are no recycling centres (that I know of) currently in Ghana. I want to get one built and then use it as an example to build others. Not only will this provide a source of income for many people in the area but it will save expenditure on clearing drains. I have no expertise in this area (other than going to Ghana and picking the bags out of gutters on occasion). If you can offer anything to this, even if it is a sentence of advice please contact me. Thanks.

typo

http://www.hoohlr.com/

Growth

Tonight I went to a talk about Rita Levi-Montalcini, one of my personal heroins. You may already know that she won the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1986 (the year of my birth amongst other more exciting things for you). This prize from the peace loving dynamite inventor was in honour of her work in identifying Nerve Growth Factor, a protein that makes neurones do pretty and perculiar things like stretching out and talk to other neurones. She did this as an Italian Jew in the middle of the second world war witb the use of a laboratory in her bedroom consisting of a microscope and a few chicken eggs (which after using in experiments she cooked and ate). When moving to work in America she included in her hand luggage two chick embryos with transplanted tumours to begin work on (certainly beating my current record of a swiss army knife, a soft-toy rat and plenty of literature). She was, in short, a bit alternative in her technique, and a complete inspiration to me. If anything she has taught me to do whatever you think is important, no matter what people think, even if your father is raving victorian luddite. The talk was followed by some Italian snacks and wine, but being on my own I felt somewhat awqward and hence soon left. Walking past plenty of lairy medical students in pyjamas i kept my eyes down, which meant they easily passed over the chap sitting in the entrance of Manchester Museum. I don't know if he asked for change because I had already told him I didn't have any and apologised. At this point it struck me that I had just left a table full of biscuits, crackers and grapes that he probably wouldn't mind. I didn't really want to go back because I would look odd coming from outside and I would have to wrap things up and I was already on my own and so felt naturally displaced. I went back. I went back because Rita Levi-Montalcini did what she thought was important. After a few inquisitive looks and some half-decent wrapping I headed off with a small package that I quickly passed on with a brief explanation and a smile. It felt great! All I had to do now was to get passed the pyjamas without anyone noticing.

On seeing the light

The dark road

In the last couple of weeks I have made my way back into the enthralling world of lab-based academia. Aside from the more obvious benefits of things that go funny colours when you put them together, getting to wear a lab coat, and comments such as ‘oh yes, that’s just the wee of death’, it has also led to my placement firmly back in the bosom of my favour building in Manchester – the Stopford building.

There are many reasons that I love this place. Not least because there are so many nooks and crannies that I have metaphorically peed on, that is to say that I’ve made my own. There’s the corridor which I jittered down before my interview for University ( flying low throughout I might add), there is the chipboard walling on which I frantically searched for my first year exam results, the wall at the bottom of a shallow flight of stairs that I casually walked passed (oh yes, I am damn cool) and then returned to one particular evening. There are so many places that most of them I don’t remember, I have just gained a vague familiarity which it’s corridors. Oh it is ugly, ugly as hell, brown and grey and lacking windows in most walls.

But one of my favourite things about the Stopford building is something I found out in my first year of Medicine. It happens that if you stay late enough, as I often did, and you walk the corridors, as I also often did, then the lights behind you begin to turn on. It’s probably a feature of many buildings, but there was something about being here late at night, just a bit of magic I suppose.

So tonight, after more than one frustrating day at this new place in this old building I decided to go for a walk. There were other things to do, but I’d put them off long enough that it had become a habit. I walked along the corridors and looked forward at first. Everything was dark and unclear, blurry not least because I need glasses and I wasn’t wearing any. I was feeling pretty low, like there didn’t seem to be any light at the end of all this. So I walked backwards for a while, must have looked pretty stupid had anyone seen me. I realised that the light is behind you, the clear things, the things you understand have passed and can now be appreciated. The corridors which you have already walked are the ones illuminated. Sure it does mean that you will bump in to things and feel like rubbish on the way, but it’s necessary to gain anything at all.

Perhaps that’s what the end of things is like, perhaps once things are coming to a close you can look at things in the light you have created.












The lit path.

Instead of sleeping

Here's a list of things that have happened in the past few weeks (in no particular order of importance or chronology)

1. I had my first cello lesson
2. I saw the library we built in Ghana (see below)
3. I moved into my flat
4. I booked a flight to NY (leaving in approximately 6 hours)
5. I started a masters in research
6. I decided I'd had enough happiness (should a black-hole be created)
7. I started Hebrew classes

It's no wonder I currently feel approximately 70 years old.

Anywhere here is a beginning of a poem. Please finish it, because I can't...

How will I look after you? In the aftermath. After all. That has past. As I come, as I go, as I please. How/will I be careful? What do you see, in all that is before you? In the aftermath.

And finally, some pretty(ish) picatures ...









At the bottom of the valley
At the top of the mountain
At the library
At the Durbar

Square one

I'm very angry...honest


I haven't written here in a good while. This mostly has to do with me 'busying' myself. And what a lot of busying i've been doing.

There is a theory that if you keep yourself busy then things don't get on your mind. It's one of my personal favourites. But today, having protested in London, met a few hundred people i didn't know, been to the Zimbawean embassy, had a 9 hours meeting about the charity and slept for fifteen hours I found myself with the dreaded DAY OFF. dun dun dun.

First i busied myself going in to work and printing necessary things, practising the talk i'm giving, reading things. But i just couldn't do it. I'm too tired. So mostly i ended up sitting still. Sitting still is most definitely bad for you. Listened to some old records - had been reminded of the Throwing Muses so found them again - but still the stillness catches up.

Where do i find myself? Right back at the beginning. Square one. Which, having checked, is definitely, one. Why do things end up this way? There are so many decision to make, none of which i have, so many things that i know are important. I wish square one was two.