The World of Super-art. · Friday December 1, 2006 by colin newell
I know some pretty talented people.
Lot’s of them.
I am an average guy and I tend to gravitate towards the bright ones.
Learning by osomosis I hope.
Then there are those with some extreme talents.
Elizabeth Wegerif is one of those extreme talents.
What does she do? Well, she is an artist.
An artist with super-human abilities.
She can look at any photo or object and within minutes or hours produce a duplicate of it in virtually any medium; paint, crayon, acrylic, digital. Makes no difference to Elizabeth.
Elizabeth has helped me out in the past. You know, fine tuning the look of some of the web-pages I do.
She has one of those special talents artistically – You know. The ability to see between the molecules
and electrons of the paint in the palette… and then to reproduce it flawlessly.
Quick remarkable actually.
Check out her stuff.
Simple rules to drinking coffee... · Wednesday November 29, 2006 by colin newell
So. I am taking enthusiastic sips of my coffee today…
And…
Let’s back up shall we.
This brew was a blend of Cafe Misto (Hines Coffee) Decaf (Sumatra I think) and Level Ground Trading Organic Bolivian; full bodied, sweet and chewy enough to enjoy with one of my home made pumpkin spice muffins.
The Level Ground Coffee (a wonderful local roaster who only does Organic Co-op grown beans purchased direct from the farm and from the farmers. No middle people.) is a regular pick for me when I am between shipments of sample beans.
I sample coffee from everywhere. And profile it. If it’s good, I will plug it. If it’s bad, mum’s the word!
Fast forward.
Here is a good rule for coffee drinkers: If you are doing something at your desk (surfing net, sending e-mail…), make sure you leave a few CPU Cycles for actually watching what you are really doing in the real world.
I didn’t for a second.
I placed my almost full coffee mug down on top of an object on my desk. And then I let go of the coffee cup. Which, by the law of probability, fell in my direction instead of the other direction (more towards the computer and keyboard). Good thing I guess.
It’s easier to launder me (or my clothes) than it is to remove coffee from a keyboard and flat-screen monitor.
So. Coffee on my sweater (one of my favorites)
Coffee on my pants (my beige jeans). Coffee on my ergo-seat.
Coffee on the floor.
Next time, I’ll try and keep the coffee in the cup… or between the cup and my face.
Snow in Victoria... and Ice · Tuesday November 28, 2006 by colin newell
Weather like this is a rare thing indeed.
25-35cm of snow. That is more than a foot deep.
Temperatures to -10 C. That is, I dunno, about 15 degrees F.
Pretty cold no matter how you slice it.
Still, there is an upside to a good freeze-up and dump of the white stuff:
People slow down. They get out of their cars.
While walking through largely pedestrain only avenues and side-streets, yesterday, with my wife – I noticed how people say hello and acknowledge the weather and this temporary environment.
Sure, the odd person gets into their vehicles, ill-prepared for the challenges of driving on sheets of ice. We stay out of their way and I accept the fact that people need to get out. That is life.
Anyway – the beauty of this weather is:
People slow down. And for a brief moment in time accept the fact that they alone are not in charge of their environment.
Stuff happens. In Victoria it tends to rain. Or the ground shakes.
No tornadoes. No vermin or locust plagues.
Just the ocassional Earthquake and chronic and implacable rain.
I accept it and enjoy it.
The future of the coffee web... · Thursday November 23, 2006 by colin newell
I have seen the future of the specialty coffee web…
and it’s JimSeven.Com
Sure, I have been webbing or blogging for 12+, almost 13 years.
The new generation of coffee savvy writers have taken the World-wide-web and its readers to a totally new place.
There was a time, not so long ago, that I viewed (with suspicion) a few of the competing specialty-coffee sites. It was not so long ago that there we were a handful of sites. Now there are more.
Many more.
And I take great comfort in the quality of these blogs and the positive energy of the writers and hosts.
So much so… that if I quit tomorrow, I know that the audience for these websites and blogs would be in good hands.
Good hands indeed.
But I am not done… just yet.
