Monkey Wrench Puppet Lab. These Seattle puppeteers describe themselves as the “most creative, most courageous and most disturbing puppeteers, dedicated to creating ridiculous, inappropriate and artistically excellent puppet plays and events”. I recently saw their rendition of Bram Stoker’s Dracula (after brushing up on the story with SparkNotes!). I found their performance “creative” and “artistically excellent”, perhaps mildly “disturbing” and “inappropriate”, though not at all “ridiculous”. One might not think that watching adults play with dolls is entertaining, but it absolutely is—and stimulating and thoughtful entertainment at that. (Thank you to the person who introduced me to them.)
Right- or left-brained? It’s an optical illusion and, like most optical illusions, is simultaneously perplexing and fascinating. If you have difficulties making her spin in the opposite direction, look at another part of the page (i.e. not directly at her) and purposely blink a few times.
Autumn in New York. Not the movie—the beautiful song as sung by the lovely Billie Holiday. Autumn has settled upon Seattle and, as expected, is gorgeous… and I hope I shall have the opportunity to experience autumn in New York City next year.
How does it feel to die? An interesting article, if not mildly distressing. I personally experienced the most discomfort upon reading the section about decapitation—I feel compelled to rub my neck to reduce my anxiety, presumably because I want to ensure that my own neck is still intact.
The Now Habit. I snagged a copy of this book upon learning about the “Unschedule” as a means to increase productivity. The methods in the book follow the tenets of cognitive-behavioral therapy. Aaron Beck would be proud. And Neil Fiore would appreciate your patronage—I think it’s a useful book, even if only as a counterpoint to the rabid fanaticism associated with Getting Things Done.
14 Oct 2007 |
Right/left brain: not sure if I accept this as a test for this. I found that when I first looked at it, it was going clockwise, then shifted. I would think seeing it either way would be a rather right-brained activity.
How does it feel? Interesting how some people obsess about this. I thought the views on asphyxia were largely wrong as presented. Asphyxia at high altitude/low pressure should be largely painless/distressless. You’re not going to feel short of breath since CO2 isn’t building up. Jonathan Miller demonstrated this once on TV breathing in a rebreather mask that filtered out the CO2 — he felt OK until he passed out.
So bring on the drunk puppets!
Comment by Greg P | 15 Oct 2007 @ 7:22pm
I liked the right/left brain test. I saw it clockwise only for a long time until I finally started reading the article a bit and in the corner of my eye, she switched directions. I sent it to my boyfriend who could only see it counterclockwise. Interestingly enough, we were JUST talking about this like 2 days ago, and he had said he thought he was left-brained and I am right-brained. Which led me to bring up the subject that I actually never had a bad subject in school (I am seriously not saying this to brag - it is the honest truth), so I never really knew for sure what my strength was. I was good at math and at English, and I loved them both - I don’t recall a subject I had much trouble understanding. But then I went on and got a degree in music, which I suppose makes me a true right-brainer… Or does it? Music appeals to both the logical and emotional sides, based on form and structure, but also feeling and emotion.
So Maria - which way did she turn for you?
Inquiring minds want to know! :)
Take care,
Carrie :)
Maria says: Hi Carrie. She rotates clockwise for me.
Comment by Carrie | 15 Oct 2007 @ 7:36pm
thats truly interesting.
Comment by Health articles | 16 Oct 2007 @ 1:29am
I could only make it turn clockwise in my brain. This is baffling and makes me doubt this thing, because I have few “right brain” traits to speak of. In particular, I am always getting lost, even in places I have been to before. Also, I was terrible at the parts of organic chemistry that required mentally rotating structures in my head.
Comment by LadyGrey | 16 Oct 2007 @ 10:54am
That test is plum goofy and I doubt it proves anything. I started out staring at her planted foot (thinking, “you ain’t gonna fool me, stupid test”) and she went clockwise. Somebody in the comments for that article said if you stare at her lifted foot she goes the other way–and it works! So it’s basically a test of which foot you look at first.
Comment by Justin Slotman | 16 Oct 2007 @ 8:29pm