Human Archives

Cold Beer & Satisfaction

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My father raised me right.  Among other things he taught me how to appreciate beer. He used to tell me that on a hot day nothing quite quenched thirst like an icy, cold beer.  I’d like to add to my father’s wisdom with a few more scenarios where beer can be thirst quenching and exquisitely satisfying.
In August I went to NYC and Connecticut for a week to visit friends and family. Getting to my mother’s house from Toronto is an epic journey requiring 8 different modes of transportation and 10 separate legs:
  1. Bus
  2. Subway
  3. Streetcar
  4. Ferry
  5. Airplane
  6. Monorail
  7. Train (NJ Transit)
  8. Subway
  9. Train (Metro North)
  10. Car
  11. Plus some walking in between – does this count? 
As I approached leg #9 I spied the bar cart. Saved!
First thirst quencher was sucked down at the tail end of a long day of travel.

First thirst quencher was sucked down at the tail end of a long day of travel.

Some travel could be reduced by taking cabs, or by taking a direct shuttle from Newark Airport to Grand Central Station.  It wasn’t possible this time.
A couple days later I headed to my friends’ beach house on Fire Island via NYC.  It happened in this order:
  1. Car
  2. Train (Metro North)
  3. Subway
  4. Train (Long Island Rail Road [LIRR])
  5. Shuttle
  6. Ferry
  7. BEACH!!!
Along the way I ran errands between legs 2 & 3 and between legs 3 & 4.  I reached Penn Station loaded with fresh bagels, wine, beer, chocolate and a jar of homemade pesto.  Only the heavy stuff.  The voyage to Fire Island was during the Friday afternoon rush hour bustle.  If you’ve never had the distinct pleasure of being in NYC during rush hour it can only be described as organized chaos! You have to know where to go. All movements are carefully orchestrated.
I lucked out at the bar cart before boarding the LIRR with a tasty can of The Crisp, by a very good local brewer called Six Point. Totally hit the spot and gave me a nice memory of Dad. Double win.
Getting into beach mode after hours of moving fast.

Getting into beach mode after hours of moving fast.

And finally, the best and most thirst quenching beer of the whole voyage.  Also gave me a chance to work on those weird tan lines with my summer toes!
The ultimate satisfaction!

The ultimate satisfaction!

For all the conveniences and comforts technology offers us, you still have to put in the hours to get somewhere.  At least for now…but fortunately opportunities for cold beer exist along the way.
Uncategorized

Binge Watching

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I’m always amazed at the difference Netflix has made to the experience of watching television. I remember as a child having to wait a whole week to watch an episode of a show I liked.  And if I had to miss it, I had to wait for a rerun, at least until recording devices came along.  Netflix-created shows, such as Orange is the New Black and House of Cards, has really changed the viewing experience by releasing the entire season at the same time.  Netflix understands people like to binge watch and will devour an entire season within days.  Here are some of the main differences:

The spoilers!  If you watch TV like me it will take months to finish a season of something.  This means I run the risk of having something ruined.  My friend and I watch Orange is the New Black together whenever our schedules coincide.  Consequently, we’re only on episode 12. Recently my friend told me she overheard some girls talking about Orange on the bus and had to cover her ears so she wouldn’t hear anything.  Spoilers can also come in the form of social media, such as tweets, so it can be hard to avoid them sometimes.

It’s not an established event anymore.  Before Netflix, I can recall having set dinner/TV dates with loved ones to watch an episode together.  Even though I do this with my friend to watch Orange, it’s usually done on an informal and ad-hoc basis.  It ceases to be an event the same way it feels to watch the Oscars or tournament games.

The discussion is missing!   It’s difficult to discuss binge-watched shows because everybody is likely at a different point in the story.  And since it’s the first time they’re being aired…

Everything blurs together.  I sometimes find it hard to keep the episodes straight when I watch so many continuously.  Without a week off in between episodes, my brain doesn’t have any time to process what happened either by spending time thinking about it or by discussing it with others (see previous point).  Before Netflix, binge watching was strictly for reruns, meaning that episodes had been seen at least once before.

It’s interesting to observe how our viewing behaviors have changed and how many other aspects of watching TV have also been affected with unlimited opportunities for binge watching.

Patagonia

Patagonia: Tierra del Fuego – Wulaia Bay

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After our stormy morning at Cape Horn the ship turned north again and we stopped at Wulaia Bay for an afternoon hike.  After about an hour of walking through many marvels in the forest we ended up at the lookout point.  Wulaia Bay was definitely a trip highlight for me.

We hiked up to the lookout point for this exquisite view.

We hiked up to the lookout point for this exquisite view.

Along the way we could see clumps of edible fungus called “dura dura” which means sweet sweet in one of the native languages from the indigenous peoples of Tierra del Fuego. It was everywhere. Hanging out in the trees in bright orangey clumps, or laying softly on the ground beneath our feet.

Sweet edible fungus.

Sweet edible fungus.

At one point we saw a beaver dam on the hike, which was kind of odd because beavers are not an indigenous species of Tierra del Fuego. Many decades ago, somebody thought it would be a good idea to start a fur trade industry by importing beavers to Tierra del Fuego to hunt them for their shiny, luxurious pelts. The beaver has no natural predator in this part of the world.  Apparently beavers need this predatory fear to produce hormones and chemicals to make their fur shiny and lush. So the beavers of Tierra del Fuego have dull fur and are destroying the habitat because nothing is around to kill them. I didn’t show the beaver dam because I thought the natural, unspoiled scenery was a lot nicer.

Here’s some of the natural landscape complete with dura dura fungus.

Running stream at Wulaia Bay.

Running stream at Wulaia Bay.

After descending from the lookout point I snapped a few pictures of the surrounding landscape at the ground level.

A scene from the ground level of Wulaia Bay

A scene from the ground level of Wulaia Bay

Next stop Ushaia, requiring another border crossing via the boat from Chile to Argentina. And then back up to Buenos Aires for a night and then off to Iguassu Falls!

Deletion, Spring Cleaning

Musings from an Organized Minimalist

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I’m not quite sure how or when I decided to become a minimalist, but it’s served me well over the years.  Since I moved out on my own over 15 years ago, I’ve moved many, many times, including relocating to different coasts in different countries.  Each time I always felt irritated at how much stuff I had to deal with, much of which I ended up not needing or using when I got to the new location.  And then I spent time wondering why I invested so much time and money to move it in the first place.

Over time I just kept purging always emphasizing quality over quantity for every thing I brought into my home.  I started prioritizing differently and being honest with myself about what I needed.  Becoming a minimalist was a handy solution for me, my lifestyle and my habits.  I think most people are surprised to find out I’m actually kind of messy, so in this regard being a minimalist served another important function.  Even at its messiest, my place is always within one hour of being clean because I just don’t have as much stuff to make a mess with.

Although being an organized minimalist sounds ideal for a lot of reasons there are actually some problems with it.

  1. You quickly run out of places to search for missing stuff.
  2. Little opportunity exists to discover hidden or forgotten gems.
  3. Sometimes I don’t process things because I put them away too quickly.

Notice how I never once mentioned that I needed something after I threw it out?  This is not to say that I haven’t been burned a couple of times, but it’s rare.  Too often we focus on that one scarring incident where we threw something out we should have saved instead of recognizing the hundreds, or even thousands of times, we’ve tossed something without any negative consequences.

The idea is to be confident about what you need to save and what you need to purge.  The benefits of strategic saving are numerous and include, but are not limited to, the following:

  1. You have what you need when you need it. 
  2. It’s easier to find what you need because you don’t have as much stuff to go through. 
  3. Even if you can’t remember if you purged something, you spend less time looking because you have less places to search. 

Happy purging!

Digital Photos, Social Media

The Selfie

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Selfies.  People love taking them.  It’s like capturing something ephemeral, like a giggle, since selfies are most often taken when people are enjoying themselves.  I personally don’t understand the fascination, but I will admit that pictures with people are usually more interesting.  However when a close-up of somebody’s mug is taking up all the image real estate, the picture becomes less interesting for me.

I’m not a fan of taking selfies, which could be attributed to my short arms.  My few selfie attempts end up looking like my reflection in the back of a spoon.  Also selfie sounds a little bit too close to “selfish” for my comfort.

Ironically, people take selfies to capture the moment they’re in without realizing that simple action actually takes them out of the moment.  In an article titled “The Documented Life”, Shelly Turkle, a professor at MIT who studies technology and human relations writes, “A selfie, like any photograph, interrupts experience to mark the moment.”  So what is it we’re trying to capture with a selfie?

Recently I discovered two new apps catering to selfie lovers.  One app is Shots of Me and serves as an integrated platform exclusively for sharing selfies.  Follow, post, like and comment all in one place for all your selfies.

In August a new app, Selfie Analyzer, was released that analyzes selfies based on some sort of criteria and scores the results.  Allegedly based on “science”. My friend downloaded it for us to try.

I received a “C-” on this one, so no trophies.  I felt secretly relieved my spirit animal wasn’t a possum or a muskrat…

My spirit animal according to Selfie Analyzer.

My spirit animal according to Selfie Analyzer.

Just for fun, we analyzed a picture of my friend’s ex-boyfriend.

Selfie Analyzed of my friend's ex-boyfriend.

Selfie Analyzed of my friend’s ex-boyfriend.

Who knew the spirit animal could be inanimate?  Must be based on more of that “science”.

Spirit "animal" of my friend's ex-boyfriend.

Spirit “animal” of my friend’s ex-boyfriend.

And my friend’s spirit animal.

Friend's spirit animal. Adequately captured her luscious, flowing locks.

Friend’s spirit animal. Adequately captured her luscious, flowing locks.

One does have to wonder why a company would work so hard to make a game out of analyzing selfies and offer it for free.  Where is this leading?  To more targeted advertising, naturally.  Many companies are tapping into the selfie craze.  Recently Kraft Macaroni and Cheese hired a company called Ditto Labs to analyze publicly available selfies for brand recognition.  Ditto Labs has a program that can recognize and analyze brands that appear in photos, including those represented in selfies, which gives retailers new ways to target consumers.

If you like taking selfies, watch where you point that camera!

Social Media

Yo! New updates!

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I first blogged about “Yo” in July. Just to recap it’s a new app that allows for 2-way communications between people, but only by using the word Yo.  Or if you’re feeling chatty you can send Yo-Yo to somebody.  From that point on, it’s entirely up to the recipient to infer the intended meaning of the two-character message.

Recently Yo has released some new updates that increase its functionality. The new features, which are described on the Yo blog include:

  • Enhanced user profiles – now users can add details to their username such as a name and photo.  The username details are revealed by simply swiping the username to the right.
  • Link attachments – it is now possible to send a link to somebody attached to a Yo.  Once received, the recipient can seamlessly connect to the link by tapping the Yo notification.
  • The Official Yo Index – many companies are tapping into the capabilities of Yo to provide customers with notifications related to specific products or services.  The Yo Index provides a place for companies to list their names and which services will provide notifications.  For example, if you sign up for the FedEx Yo, you will receive a Yo notification when your package has arrived.
  • Trending Hashtags – ok, here I have to admit I’m a bit confused by this one, but that could be because I don’t use Yo so I haven’t actually tried out this function.  Apparently Yo users can create hashtags and then get support for them by receiving Yo’s.  I suppose it’s similar to the “like” or “favorite” feature on Facebook and Twitter, respectively.  The Yo website even has a page for trending hashtags, featuring those that have received the most Yo’s.

Initially I didn’t think much of Yo. I still don’t have a terribly high opinion of it, mostly because I feel like it doesn’t do anything that hasn’t already been done before.  However, I can appreciate what Yo is trying to accomplish, which is a seamless experience of connecting you with the things you care about, such as people, links, notifications, updates, images, comments, etc. all in one centralized location.  It’s making the process of linking people with information more efficient and seamless.  What’s not to like about that?