Sun Kin: Here we go Down

Posted on December 20, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

Two listens for this one.
I slowed down a bit toward the end of the first so I thought that going for a second listen would be beneficial and it kind of was. I added a bit more, but not much.

I think I captured an idea of this song, but I feel that what I captured may be a bit removed from what the song is about.

Sun Kin’s “Here we go Down” is from Painting Whales, part 1.

I hope you enjoy.

—

Calm spreads and soon dips to meet something lower. Keys soon appear from that depth and rise up, as does that lowness. The melancholy moves back, moves down, the lowness spreads out further and the keys find something they lock into. A tender beauty, and a beautiful sadness reveals itself in the implied minimalism as slowly fragile images reveal themselves as though memories returning.

Other sounds find their way in and they are faint, soft and gentle. Something seems to shimmer and shine far above but it is vague and so it is hard to work out what it is. The sounds underscore and widen, and seem to flow closely to what is already formed. More thoughts turn inward as all travels along slowly and with a sense of grace, and the weight remains but it does not press down.

Perhaps in all the majesty there is something that connects, that reaches out and touches and it is almost overwhelming and it continues on as sound fades, leaving the lowness to linger before it too fades away at the song’s end.

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Five-Hundred Word Challenge 1196: Full Steam Ahead

Posted on December 19, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

Alright, it’s time to be alive.

Still tired, still punching on. No overly long rambling about being tired and other things today, though maybe there will be, assuming that I change my mind. However, right now I am not changing my mind and instead steaming myself so as to be able to make the claim that I am indeed moving full steam ahead.

Maybe I’m moving full steam behind, but I am yet to work that out and so for now it is full steam ahead. I don’t have a steam engine but I am steaming myself in a strict non-literal sense, though I wonder how badly it would go if I did indeed steam myself.

Would I steam myself with a steam machine? Maybe that would be the best way to go. Really hot steam and use it to clean myself. I know that that would be highly inefficient, but sometimes you gotta live and try and do these things. You gotta go ahead and try and live a little and experiment and experience things you would not normally experience, and really, what better way to do so than through the power of a machine that steams?

Maybe it would be better to just set up about fifteen kettles and then steam myself that way. I wonder as to how that would turn out. Surely it would not be very efficient, but perhaps it would be better than the previous option that I mentioned, and if it is, well then, I guess I’m set for being on top of things, or something.

Maybe I’ve thought about this far too much and need to retrace my steps and work out the meaning of what I am saying. There are implications from the results and I should try and weigh and consider those as they may hold sway here and if they do, then perhaps I need to just trash the whole thing altogether.

Now that I think about it a little bit more, maybe it is not me being steamed, but it is me steaming the things and so there is no ahead or behind, but only purely being on the spot and I steam the spot for there is nothing else that can do any steaming and so I’m now feeling pumped about the whole thing, really.

Actually, no I’m not. I’m not feeling pumped and I’m not feeling good about it at all as now I’m realising all the work that I need to put into doing anything and that’s not something that I want to do. I want to just sit here and let myself boil for a while and not worry about the steaming. I am not an engine and I am not some sort of punk and so it’s just easier to be much like the person that I am and just go from there. Much easier, but also I’ll take the boiling, but only if no steam at all is not an available option.

The time it took to write five-hundred words: 05:54:44

Not sure what I was doing here, but I feel that, in hindsight, this would’ve worked better as an attempt to deconstruct the phrase “Full steam ahead”.

Written at home.

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Sydney CBD’s Fading Day

Posted on December 18, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

Something quiet about this photo. Perhaps it’s due to the sunset disappearing and the way it hits the visible buildings, as well as the large amount of sky making the city seem small.

I like how a large amount of space does that.

Maybe the quiet is due to how the sky seems uncluttered and how most of the building’s lights aren’t on. It’s nice.

This is my submission into the two hundred-and-thirtieth Lens-Artists Photo Challenge. The theme for this one is “Last Chance“.

Even though this is a much more recent photo, it still fits the theme.

As an aside, here are seven photos of Sydney CBD that were taken around the same area as this one here. It’s a CBD that has changed and remained static since the first photo linked, and I imagine will remain in that state for many years to come.

The host of the Lens-Artists challenges cycles weekly between the following people:

Week 1 – Tina

Week 2 – Patti

Week 3 – Ann-Christine aka Leya

Week 4 – Amy

Week 5 – John Steiner

Week 6 – Sofia Alves

Week 7 – Anne Sandler

Week 8 – Guest host

This one is curated by Tina. John hosts the next one which will be in January.

Also, Donna of Wind Kisses joins the Lens-artists team next year. It’ll be nice to see how people approach her challenges.

I recommend participating in the challenges. They’re open enough to allow for a fair bit of thinking about approach and closed enough to keep focus on meeting the theme of each one. If you don’t participate, you should still check out what others of the Lens-Artists community are submitting.

I hope you enjoy.

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One Thousand Word Challenge 197: Squeeze Words Out of a Rock

Posted on December 17, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

Sometimes I feel like I’m struggling to squeeze words out of a rock and my increasing fatigue is something that is trying to push and hold me away, and the longer it does so, the greater chance of success it has. Still, I stubbornly refuse to stop and go elsewhere. Need to do what I can where I can.

Anyway, today is one of those days. It is a day far longer in the tooth than I’d expect a day to be and it just seems to keep on pushing on. I struggle against its tide but all am is driftwood and I am not able to leave the water long enough to avoid being pulled back in.

There still are quite a few hours left in the day, however, and there still is time to push past all of this. I’m struggling to get these words out, but I’m getting there and I think I can get there, or I should say rather that I think I can continue to get there. Just a bit of an uphill.

The day itself is cold and windy and perhaps dreary, but in a way it makes it better for writing, though of course I’m just idealising the day as something that allows focus as it actually is not allowing focus. Still, if I can delude myself just enough to be able to finish some writing off, then I can do what I need to do and get to where I need to get, and perhaps that will soon be bed. Perhaps more rest will soon be needed.

I wonder if sometimes I’ve just pushed myself too hard for too long and now I just need to rest and that’s it. Sometimes I wonder if that is indeed the case. Of course that’s not necessarily limited to the continuing creation of waste here, but in all aspects. I wonder that but instead of changing things around I’ll just continue on as that’s what I’ve always done. I don’t seem to stop even though I strongly desire to and I don’t seem to rest in a healthy manner even though I increasingly need to and so on and so forth.

This isn’t really doing anything to benefit the writing today but I feel compelled to mention it as I’m in a state of fatigue and all that and you get the idea. Still, whilst probably undesirable, the weather is strangely appreciable. It offers something and even though I’m yet to discern what that is (at least in terms of symbolic meaning of the personal variety), it still is something I just like. It’s a bit cooler and there’s something about how the sky looks kind of dulled and unpleasant that I find pleasant.

The sky is bright. I might be willing to say that it feels brighter than it usually is, but the clouds hang there, smothering everything. They are almost uniform though there are subtle changes in the shading. Actually, maybe it isn’t subtle, but it seems to be subtle to me so I’m going to say the changes in shading are subtle.

Anyway, the changes in shading are subtly and at parts its almost as though the brighter bits are lines of brighter light breaking through, refusing to be smothered. Eventually they will get there, but as they do the sky will become less bright in appearance, or maybe it will remain as is as it returns to a familiar blue and the clouds make the light seem brighter due to their reflective nature.

Maybe I should try and take some sort of influence from the clouds and try and make my writing more like them; menacing and threatening. They threaten to rain upon my parade, but I will not let them. My parade will be out of the storm before the storm even knows what is going on. It will need to be so it can pull me away from the tide and so I can get up and go for a walk and take it easy and so on and so forth until the eternity finds something new to throw at me, though of course there is no eternity and I am merely being dramatic.

now the question becomes about why I have chosen to be dramatic, though there never was any question at all. There’s little to worry about in terms of questioning when it comes to this writing, but there certainly remains a need for sleep. I am going to push on through the rest of the day; I think I can get to the end, but I need to try and plan things out a bit so I actually can get there. If I can do it then I am set and it is smooth sailing for an hour and in that hour it is just rest and then it is sleep. If I can’t do it, well, I still have things I have to do today and so it will be in a dutiful manner that I see those things to completion.

However, that is the future and now is now, and I can’t live in what will come for I am here now and I only exist now. I will exist later, but I can never exist later as later is ahead of the present and I will always be here and so in this state of fatigue, of trying to squeeze words out of a rock whilst being pushed away by said fatigue is something I have to live now and cannot postpone, but I so very much wish I could. I wish I could push it to the side and never have to worry about it, but I cannot and so I will keep on squeezing that rock. I will keep on doing so and get through this and get to the end and then I’ll be able to rest.

That said, I do wish the rock didn’t require as much force.

The time it took to write one thousand words: 13:22:14

This was a bit of a struggle to write and I probably could’ve kept it a bit shorter.
It drags a bit in places and the writing is clunky. Still, I get something across.

Written at home.

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Sydney CBD in Red

Posted on December 16, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

This came from stuffing about and it’s not the best, but I like it anyway. I think it’s due to it being stylised and rough. Seems almost gritty.

I hope you enjoy.

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Jun Fukamachi: Quark

Posted on December 15, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

I made an attempt on this last week and was too tired to get a good start on it and so I put it aside. Took me until a good few minutes ago to get to it again due to long days of work and other things getting in the way.

Anyway, this was over one listen and I did my best to write freely, so to speak, and I think it worked. I don’t know if this does a good job of capturing a sense of the song but I think the writing works well enough as it is… sort of.

Jun Fukamachi’s “Quark” is from Quark.

I hope you enjoy.

—

Rapidly something expands outward, growing almost overwhelming, rising and rising and surrounding all as it continues to expand, rising and rising until it suddenly stops.

Something new arrives and heralds an arrival. It is new and celebratory and jaunty. Keys beep and shimmer and soon disappear and it all relaxes and becomes cool, but not slinky. It beeps and stays smooth and almost sultry and soon it steps outside and calls and cries into the great beyond.

Keys strike specific moments and a tension comes in; it is sort of an edge and a bite and it seems like something is marching and approaching the rest of the sounds push themselves along. A moment of drama as voices underscore and drone on in a menace and it all stops whilst the voices continue on. It then continues and stops, and continues and stops and continues and the voices grow louder, as does a howling in the background.

Suddenly it all falls as one sharp sound and it falls over a vast landscape of nothingness. The menace has changed and some sort of static cracks over and around the sounds. It almost seems like some sort of deception and then a grand cosmic smallness plays out whilst more sounds seem to interweave and stay apart.

More sound descends and expands with new imagery and something shimmers above, and maybe this is all a moment stretched out across all. It could be regal as the sounds take on some regal form of sorts when they now seem distant and small. Regal and adventurous and jaunty. Soon something akin to an idea of percussion comes in and plays along whilst others change to keep rhythm and melody to allow some exploration and then it all snaps back to this jaunty regal procession.

Something closer to piano comes in and quite rapidly takes over and brings all back to something closer to home and closer to the heart. The keys glitter and keep the melody going and it seems so like it can be touched but the sound is out of reach, and it slows down and a brief breath is taken.

The keys play slower now, under the stars, under the cosmos and sounds appear hear and there as objects move above the sky, and maybe it is daytime but it could be night. The keys roll along; they are running through a field and they are moving beyond themselves and for a slight moment they ask a question and roll off and float away.

Something new arrives and heralds an arrival. It celebrates the grandness of it all and it sound rises underneath the jauntiness, and then it moves into a world of the cool, and it’s almost mysterious. It moves with a smoothness and gradually fades out before anything can be answered, and the song ends.

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In Sunset’s Shadow

Posted on December 14, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

Another of this tree, though with more space and more of an atmospheric and perhaps sad feeling.

I like photos like this and I think it is in part due to the minimalism and in part due to the weight of emotion they can carry. I think they beget introspection, among other things. I also like how they draw attention to form as well as perspective; this tree almost looks like it’s a gigantic growth.

This is my submission into Leanne Cole‘s “Monochrome Madness” for this week.
I suggest checking out Leanne’s photography, as well as checking out what other people submit.

A lot of what people are submitting will likely end up here.

I hope you enjoy.

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Bocuma: A Small Cluster

Posted on December 13, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

One listen for this one.

I think I threw myself off a bit. I’ve listened to this song a few times but I don’t think I was expecting it to be as simple as it was and so I didn’t allow myself to get loose and more vivid, or write in a way that expressed imagery. As such this captures the song, but not as expressive as I hoped.

Bocuma’s “A Small Cluster” is from The Day of Purple Dawning.

I hope you enjoy.

—

Sound pulses back and forth with a steady rhythm. It underscores a nothingness and an emptiness that seems like it will soon fill. It is not long before this sound starts rising and falling, moving toward something else and keeping a melody forming. Something else pulses in the background, eventually moving forward as though it is rotating into prominence. These two sounds almost seem like they’re out of sync, but they continue their careful motion around and alongside each other, almost trying to stay that way.

Suddenly they stop and voices come in, and they are clear and vague, and there is some sort of firmness and worry, and more sounds come in, filtering through, carrying a cold warmth and seemingly pulsing some more, and remaining almost not like sound, or at least like some sort of dulled crystalline object, but it fades, as does the conversation as though it was just something passing on by, and the song ends.

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Various Clouds

Posted on December 12, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

I feel like this is some sort of spread, so to speak. It might have to do with the cloud positioning relative to where I was when I took the photo.

There certainly is a good feel of massiveness here, I think, which likely has a bit to do with how little land is in the view. Maybe. Clouds usually look pretty massive anyway,

This is my submission into the two hundred-and-twenty-ninth Lens-Artists Photo Challenge. The theme for this one is “Perfect Patterns“.

I don’t know if I could clearly articulate an idea of what a perfect pattern in nature would be, but I think the patterns that clouds form are pretty neat, so I feel this counts.

The host of the Lens-Artists challenges cycles weekly between the following people:

Week 1 – Tina

Week 2 – Patti

Week 3 – Ann-Christine aka Leya

Week 4 – Amy

Week 5 – John Steiner

Week 6 – Sofia Alves

Week 7 – Anne Sandler

Week 8 – Guest host

This one is curated by Leya. Tina curates the next one.

I recommend participating in the challenges. They’re open enough to allow for a fair bit of thinking about approach and closed enough to keep focus on meeting the theme of each one. If you don’t participate, you should still check out what others of the Lens-Artists community are submitting.

I hope you enjoy.

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Five-Hundred Word Challenge 1195: Cicadas, Libraries

Posted on December 12, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

So right now I’m working against another timer and that is the timer for when my breakfast will be ready. Trying to maximise my time and all and I haven’t put any sound on as of yet. Trying to also work past some slight blistering on my fingers but I can do it. I’m an adult; I can get past all of this. There are worse things out there, so… yeah.

Once more I’ve no idea as to what I’m gonna crap on about and perhaps that is what I should let be the way of things. I should just let it all flow out of my fingers and follow the things and maybe try and write about the presence of libraries and how we need to protect them but the sound of cicadas grows present and so that takes over all that is and all that will ever be in this moment of presence.

The sound is here and it is now and it exists as an eternal thing, but soon it drops away and moves off to a form of silence and therefore it no longer exists in a way that I am meant to perceive it due to it no longer existing in this particular space that is around me, or something.

That said, I think I need to think about the sound and why it starts and stops. I have a feeling it has to do with mating calls, but maybe it also has to do with predation. Harder to track prey when it is not making much noise and so maybe cicadas stop making the noise when they sense predators are in the area.

Maybe they stop as they need to rest for a moment, or maybe they stop due to finding a mate. Maybe they start due to finding a mate.

I know very little about cicadas and I know very little about libraries, but I think both are goo things for differing reasons. Cicadas as they function as part of a healthy ecosystem (depending on where they are, of course), and libraries as they provide some important services, and of course act as a large resource of literature.

Maybe these two things can grow in tandem and maybe we can create libraries full of cicadas, or at least have strong environmental support in the immediate area surrounding libraries and so therefore will have more cicadas, or something. Need the right plants and other stuff, of course.

Maybe we need to think about how we can integrate nature properly and effectively into the urban sprawl and make the urban sprawl look less developed. There is plenty of space for trees, among other things and so we should really start looking at better design.

There probably are a lot of things at which we should be looking but we don’t look at them so… yeah. But more trees would be a good start. Other than being nice, it would help make our living space healthier.

The time it took to write five-hundred words: 06:23:19

I wrote this earlier today at the start of what turned out to be a rather intense work day.
I think I was hoping for something silly and parts of this are, but it also touches on an optimism for the urban environment.

Written at home.

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