Medium is one of the new social media that I’ve been interested in for a while, and yesterday, I received an invitation to post there. Yay!
If you haven’t heard of Medium, this is its explanation. And this is my page.
The potential for conversation and collaboration on ideas is so promising that I’m excited.
Sometimes life holds some joyous surprises. I wandered into Perth on the weekend and ended up visiting the Art Gallery of Western Australia. Since I can never work out who holds what copyright, I’ll share an old photo of the gardens outside it, rather than the artworks inside — which is a shame because the art is good.
Anyway, once inside the gallery, I pursued my usual strategy of not knowing what I wanted to see, but just looking. That brought me to the Your Collection 1800-Today exhibition and in particular to its Your Collection 1800-1920: Here and There section which was housed in the older section of the gallery, a location that worked perfectly.
Having a memory like a sieve, I can’t tell you the names of the artists or their creations, but I saw wonderful old glass, paintings of life a hundred years ago and fabulous watercolours and sketches of Fremantle and Albany. The latter was fun to try and match current day landscapes to those of more than a century ago. I do remember that a painting by Arthur Boyd finally showed me why he’s so famous. Though I wish I could remember its name! The mountains in the background heaved with life.
The exhibition was a lovely experience outside of time. Quiet, reflective and yet humming with the energy of much-loved art. It reminded why I like the Art Gallery of WA: It always offers a visitor a welcome and a gift.
It was blowing a gale, but ever intrepid in pursuit of running-away-from-current-manuscript, I ventured out to snap some photos of Fremantle mid-week. Above is Bathers Beach. So is below. And the very last snap is just a back gate … just to prove Fremantle is more than gorgeous beaches 
Thanks to Sonya Heaney for introducing me to 500px. I now have a page there.
Over the weekend I was reading The Guardian Weekly. An article caught my eye. Now, I try to keep off the topic off politics online. So, although the article by George Monbiot is “Ultra-rich suffer from bad case of Romnesia” I don’t actually want to talk about its social critique as such. You are free to agree or throw tomatoes at the screen when he says:
Rich lists are stuffed with people who either inherited their money or who made it through rent-seeking activities: by means other than innovation and productive effort. They’re a catalogue of speculators, property barons, dukes, IT monopolists, loan sharks, bank chiefs, oil sheikhs, mining magnates, oligarchs and chief executives paid out of all proportion to any value they generate. Looters, in short.
Okay, so either you think these people create wealth or, like Monbiot, think they just siphon it off … the point is, doesn’t the list look like a list of alpha heroes? That’s what struck me.
And then Monbiot ended the article with:
A century ago, entrepreneurs sought to pass themselves off as parasites: they adopted the style and manner of the titled, rentier class. Today the parasites claim to be entrepreneurs.
Hmm. I know it’s not a revelation: the lords and dukes of Regency novels are the CEOs and billionaires of contemporary romances. But it kind of was a revelation for me. I’m thinking through what it means when we frame romance novels as fantasies. Do we look for heroes who don’t actually have to work — is that our fantasy as readers?
Of course, there are lots of romances where it is the hero’s work that defines him – the defence force heroes, the policemen, the whole protectors/guardians theme, or the medical romances where the doctor is a hero. But still, there are plenty of Cinderella themes where the hero is a prince.
I always thought the appeal of the lordly alpha hero was that he was top of the pyramid. Now I’m wondering if the appeal is also that he doesn’t have to build the pyramid, he just lounges there like Pharaoh, supervising.
I’m still thinking on the question, but I thought I’d share it. And if you go along with Monbiot’s critique, it’s interesting to consider that these lordly alphas are merely parasites!
Have you noticed how once you know something, know it to the point that it’s comfortably part of your everyday life, you tend to think everyone shares your knowledge? Or is this just my quirky mind?
Anyway, I have a handful of blogs that routinely offer me interesting info and which I really shouldn’t assume everyone and their cousin knows about. So here goes:
Mind Hacks for neuroscience (and psych stuff more broadly).
Past Horizons for archaeology.
Dear Author for romance novel reviews and publishing news.
ArtDaily is one of the few e-newsletters I’ve signed up to receive daily. It goes beyond the art world to include interesting happenings in related fields, like archaeology.
Tiny House Blog for tiny house news, inspiring photos and stories.
These are all pretty much my “lurker” blogs where I love what they do, but seldom–never–comment. Then I have a ton of other friendly, interactive blogs authored by cool people … but that’s another post!
Oops, almost forgot BoingBoing for weirdness and attitude. Also informative.
Any must-read blogs that you’d like to share?
I’m not a crafty person. I’m too impatient. So when I tried to think of a vaguely steampunk, vaguely vintage project I wanted something fast. Well, how does five minutes strike you?
Start by soaking some florists’ foam in water, then stuff it into a tea cup. You won’t need much.
Add some greenery. I stole some ferns from the garden.
Poke in the flowers
Decide it would look better in a different cup…simply switch.
Seriously, putting this post together has taken longer than throwing the arrangement together. Yes, it doesn’t look steampunk-ish, but you can add details, maybe a fob watch spilling from the saucer? The lovely thing about using a tea cup as a vase is it has a built-in spill tray, the saucer, which makes it a nice “get well” gift. Also, you can source lovely vintage tea cups from op shops. And I’m darned sure that you, crafty people, can make far more beautiful arrangements than this quick attempt.
What makes Valentine’s Day fun for you? Well, over at Here Be Magic, we’re hoping a giftcard or two might make you smile. We have two Happy Reading giftcards up for grabs. The contest begins Feb 10 (New York time) and ends 8 pm on the red hearts and chocolate day, itself. What could be more fun than the chance to share happy memories or your plans for this Valentine’s Day? And yes, this contest is open internationally!
