Freedom to think

Posted on May 13, 2023 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Children, dailyprompt, dailyprompt-1935, Fact checking, fake news, freedom, Knowledge, Learning, School17 Comments

What does freedom mean to you?

Above all, freedom means being allowed to think, to care about people, to learn and find out things.

It must be important to have freedom of thought and speech. I don’t mean hate speech, or sharing violent or abusive beliefs though. Too many times people have been bullied and harassed by others who think they have all the answers. But it’s hard to work out what is the right thing to say… One person’s truth is another person’s lie?

Fake news does not help. Fact checking is important, if it’s done properly, I use websites like Snopes to check dodgy facts. I think the freedom to receive a good education is very important for both boys and girls. There should be knowledge shared around everywhere. If it means that all the world can act together and reduce pollution and save energy. Something must happen to improve everyone’s freedoms. I’m probably naive but we must try.

Trumpet player

Posted on May 8, 2023 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Music, Trumpet, Dream, Playing, Sound, Learning, frustration, dailyprompt, dailyprompt-1930, one day, thrillingLeave a comment

What’s a job you would like to do for just one day?

I would play the trumpet at a gig! I started learning before the pandemic, but of course that intervened. I am also having problems with my health and I haven’t held or played my trumpet for three years now. It’s probably seized up, I know I have!

I’d learnt enough to play scales and a few short tunes. But the trouble now is fear. Fear of failure, of not being able to do it any more. So the trumpet sits in its case in the living room. It’s not a good thing to let go of the start of something, I regret not pursuing the skill.

I admire jazz trumpeters and also players in brass bands. But holding it and positioning my mouth wasn’t easy and I wanted to be better at playing than I was. Perhaps that is the problem. Too much expectation, not enough skill.

To play for one day. To an audience. That would be a thing. Maybe I should start again, ask for someone to teach me?

Maybe…. It would be thrilling!

Mostly scientists

Posted on May 7, 2023 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Astronomy, Biology, Chemistry, dailyprompt, dailyprompt-1928, History, Learning, Life, Memories, Physics, robots, Scientists, Time4 Comments

List the people you admire and look to for advice…

Issac Asimov, three laws of robotics

Carl Sagan, pale blue dot, astronomer and scientist

Noel Fitzpatrick, exceptional veterinary surgeon

Marie Curie, discovered Polonium and Radium

Sir Patrick Moore, famous amateur astronomer,

Sir Oliver Lodge, invented the spark plug

Dr Jane Goodall, primatologist

Rosamund Franklin, jointly discovered DNA, British Chemist

David Attenborough, naturalist, broadcaster and environmentalist

Chris Packham, Environmentalist and broadcaster

Professor Dame Jocelyn Bell-Burnell, discovered Pulsars

Mary Anning, discovered fossils.

Albert Einstein, General and Special theories of relativity.

Richard Feynman, American physicist. Wrote ‘Surely you’re joking Mr Feynman’ and other books.

Is that a long enough list? I like to try and understand basic science, I don’t know enough, but I try and get some understanding. I think Asimov got me thinking about science at an early age. He not only wrote science fiction, but books about chemistry and other sciences. So I found out about the early chemist’s, physicists and astronomers. By reading his books they introduced me to Carl Sagan, who wrote books such as Cosmos.

At the same time I used to (and still do) watch ‘The sky at night’ on TV. So I learnt a bit about astronomy, but also about people like Jocelyn Bell-Burnell who discovered pulsars, and other scientists including Issac Newton.

David Attenborough introduced me to gorilla’s, in his TV programme ‘life on earth’ and so I heard about Jane Goodall and her work with primates.

Finally in the 1970’s there was a TV series that dramatised the lives of Marie and Pierre Curie. Having read about her in Asimov books it was fascinating to see what she had been doing in the early twentieth century.

It’s a random list, but it helps me explain my interests…

Imagination

Posted on May 4, 2023 Posted in UncategorizedTagged dailyprompt, dailyprompt-1926, direction, Imagination, Learning, Life, Poem, Poetry, Safe, Short poem, Survival, Thinking, Writing2 Comments

What gives you direction in life?

Imagining a direction to take

Decisions made when I wake,

Thoughts my mind makes….

It’s a hard question when you get older and most of your life is behind you. I’m not very religious, so mainly I want to stay safe and keep going. No one wants bad things to happen.

I guess what direction I take could include going round in circles, always turning right, heading north. But mainly it’s just survival. Not in a preppy, survivalist sort of way, but just managing with what we’ve got, helping others when we can. Not expecting too much. Just trying to support each other. It’s not always easy, and questions have to be asked about whether the direction we are heading in now is still the right one.

The world should be fair for everyone. I know that’s a hard thing to expect, and people can be selfish and jealous of what they have. But I hope people will consider others as well as themselves. I think John Lennons song ‘Imagine’ is a good thing to follow…..

Learning photoshop 2002

Posted on April 29, 2023 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Art, blocks!, exploded blocks, Fun, Learning, Memories, Photoshop, Profile2 Comments

This was an experiment using photoshop from 2002. It’s actually a woman’s profile. And goodness knows what filter I used for it. I like finding ols things. It makes me remember I’ve been doing things like this for twenty years!

Onomatopoeia ?

Posted on April 24, 2023 Posted in UncategorizedTagged History, Learning, Life, onomatopoeia, Rosetta stone, Sound, Talk, Thinking, VoicesLeave a comment

Glung! The springs in my bed make that noise. Shhhhh the wind in the trees.

It’s the word that is written that sounds like the sound that is being made. Cats Miaow (or miroaw), sheep go Bahh. So lambs are called Baa Lambs. There is a Baa lamb hill near here.

Just thinking, maybe that’s how language started? Imitating sounds, and then other describing words. How can we know.

Translation of language was helped by the Rosetta stone which had three languages carved into it. Because each was a translation of the previous one it took linguists back in time to understand ancient voices.

Question

Posted on April 19, 2023April 19, 2023 Posted in Fine Art, UncategorizedTagged Architecture, Art, cost of living, Design, economy, inflation, Learning, Life, Music, Painting, Question, World4 Comments

Is the cost of living crisis affecting whether you buy or collect art?

As a small time seller of art I’m interested in how the rises in inflation and reduction in pay rises is affecting the Art economy. I’m sure decisions are being made that people either put off buying, or don’t buy art at all.

Art is everywhere, in designs of clothes, furniture, architecture, advertising, maps, car design, and even the Art in people’s walls. The Art economy is worth Billions to the economy as a whole, but I think it is under recognised. We like to be surrounded by visual and auditory stimulation, but do people even notice it’s there. Do you notice a painting on a restaurant wall? Or classical music played in a supermarket. I wonder how things will work out?

Why?

Posted on April 14, 2023 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Bronze, Brown, icons, Learning, Life, Mobile, Phone, Question, Settings, WorldLeave a comment

Some of my icons on my phone are a horrible browny bronze. I wish I could find out how to change them. I’ve looked at themes and I can change the background but not the icons. I’d like to set my own but I have no idea how. Does anyone know how to change the settings? Is it simple or very complicated. Meh, it’s a first world problem! Ignore me.

It’s funny how you can be so attached to your phone that it makes such an impact your life!

Password protected?

Posted on April 14, 2023 Posted in UncategorizedTagged communicating, direct contact, Learning, not authorised, Post, Question, Thinking, View10 Comments

A friend has just posted here and the notes with it say the post is password protected. It says go directly to the post.. But when you click on the post it says ‘you are not authorised to view this post’

So how do I view it. I tried to link to his site but it wouldn’t work. Should I post to another of his posts to tell him? I hope he (I’m assuming it’s a he?) sees this and either changes it or posts how to open it?

Lots of questions. I sometimes see posts that you can read but that you cannot ‘like’ I suppose that is fair enough, except its like ghosting yourself? They won’t know if you would like to appreciate their writing.

So anyway, sorry to witter on, you know what it’s like, you just have to ask sometimes!

High school?

Posted on April 13, 2023 Posted in Fine Art, UncategorizedTagged Art, College, dailyprompt, dailyprompt-1905, Fine Art, French Impressionism, Learning, Life, Memory, Pop art, Sixth form, surrealism28 Comments

Describe something you learned in high school.

I did go to Sixth form at school, but it wasn’t a separate high school. I think things have changed in the UK since I was there. I guess different places in the world run their school systems differently and now Sixth form colleges are often stand alone institutions.

We didn’t have computers when I was at school, they were just coming in when I left. So that’s another thing I didn’t learn! There were typing classes (which I didn’t do) and I think the typewriters were pretty old!

So what did I learn? I did A Levels. One of them was Art, and I loved it. I started to learn about subjects like Pop Art and French Impressionism and Surrealism. It was good to actually learn about the history of art as well as finding out about different techniques. I learned about Andy Warhol and Monet, Cezanne and Salvador Dali. I remember pictures of Campbell soup cans, haystacks and melting clocks. I didn’t learn about female artists though, that came later when I went to college. The Art course made me decide I wanted to do an Art degree, and here I am still being an Artist all these years later.

Mallaband-Brown

Tag: Learning