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Photo booth rentals for weddings or parties is such a great idea to make your event memorable and the memento personal to the guests.

Creativity

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30 circles challenge

Customer journey mapping

d.school

Struggle to recall where I read of it recently

There has to be a word for it.
I 'struggled to recall where I read of it recently' when I came across The Death of Archimedes by Antoni Slonimski.
I searched all the essays in my email. I recalled the recent poetry books I read. BJWard, Billy Collins? But I knew it was a female writer. I was going to look in the library reading history.
This blog is a Reading log

The power of adjective

1. Wax candle stays with you long after you read the following poem. The next time you read of a candle (flame), you are sure to think of this 'wax candle'.

Virgin and Child in Quentin Masys poem by Jaroslaw.

To get your creative juices flowing, look out for adjectives that can be added into any drab piece of reading to make it  unique and memorable.
Wax candle would strike redundant at first but now since we have the Flameless candle , its a point in time from where man has learnt to seperate the light and warmth from the flame.

2. I recall reading about Archimedes death recently in The Calculus diaries  that he was frought in geometry while the death not knocked on his door but really barged in. This poem To the Germans with the reference to adder nests in the marble of the house, through its plunge in image takes the mind along the process of dislocating the floor reflecting the disorbitation of the guy who could move the earth from a firm spot.

Multitude

When do we think of plural

when teacher asks for many

of a singular form

Does a musician fixate

on one instrument?

Tree work ahead

Friend says

For a preschooler

everything is work

When you drink tea

its tea work for them

What is tea work?

Making

Drinking 

Clean up

What is tree work?

Hssh. the trees are at work

sprouting

The tree is the sign 

of 

nature at work

All things pink

are iconic
Pink flamingo

MCSweeney poetry series

Recently I came across Mcsweeneys poetry series and now I am reading The Boss by Victoria Chang which is a part of that.


Trimeter

old 20 note goes out of wallet faster than a fresh 5

Men tip more. Does it align any one way if its a waiter or waitress?

Younger students perform better. But what if students joined the school system a little later like say at the age of 5 instead of 3.

Clive James poems

Taw in the memory game in Stagedoor Rocket science

Poems with pictures
Whitman and moth
Shark

Exercises:
1. Write a poem with strong first, second, third lines - Nefertiti in the Flak tower
2. What is poetry to you? for e.g Poetry as Numismatics. In this poem, the poet compares the process of writing poetry to making coins out of Planchet
3. A petrels fast movement is likened to an agile dancer in Against gregariousness.

 The movement of spreading out your wings or limbs does look similar like skydiving.

What if the dark nights were mountains

like the illustrations in A snowy day. 

360 degree story weaving

City of refuge project

Business writing

A colleague of mine writes very good emails about the history of a problem, its solving.

1. Whats in it for them.

2. Benefits not features.

3. Using Relationship building techniques. But we feel a certain way and only then ask about.

Older book

Why Literature

View from the top of a slidy mountain

Al Jaffee's Mad Life

Recently I started reading 'Inklings: A memoir by Jeffrey Koterba', but I had to put it away as it was too evocative of the family conditions. I am not made to read well written books like 'Angelas Ashes' by Frank Mccourt.
The material that Al Jaffe has could have been written in a similar way, very well and never be read. But written in the collabarotive way that it is, with Jaffe's unique sketches of his childhood and Weisman's writing, 'the book will be read' (Paraphrasing Adam Levine).
Even if you try to get ahead of the book with the sketches, they need explanation of all the mischievous things that Al Jaffe has been upto in his life. This way the writing and the sketching take the yarn ahead smoothly. This book is an example of how difficult situations like displacement from your familiar environment into a different culture back and forth, can be looked at in a 'funny' perspective at some cost to the author.
Talking of funny, its the 'funnies' that he looked forward to in the tough time and little surprise that he grew up to be such a big contributor to MAD magazine. Fold-ins. Tall tales.

Feb 19, 2011

Go put your apron on

Pure and Simple: Vidhu Mittal

I tend not to make pulao dishes for the excessive amount of rice in it, but this book has cast a green spell on me with its 'Broccoli-Zucchini-Spinach pulao'. It tastes good and while chewing spinach, you get to understand why this dish does not need many spices. Yellow looking 'Sabz Pulao' with cauliflower, potataoes and peas is a good way to get all the veggies in.
The book increases your interest in cooking. Its both the pictures and the simple steps. Finding a pictorial how-to for the 16 layer paratha, I dived in.

Jan 11, 2011

Companies and culture

Things I learnt

1. Non-compete clause - Meredith Whitney worked for Fox to be out of bank business for a year.

2. Customer service agents get incentives for short calls.

3. Zappos rotates who mans front desks to keep egos in check.

4. Method Products innovation and weirdness

The profiles of the business leaders in the book are an easy way to know what was it that clicked for them instead of having to plow through their biographies. Wait they are under 40, so not all of them think they have even lived enough to think of biography. Eric Ryan has his The method method book.
When I read the Method section I was very curious to know of their products. Even the bowling pin structure didnt click in my mind that I have already seen their products. Same with under armour. Their logo is hidden in the annals of the consumer minds. I feel a small picture of the company logos would have added to the reader's bonding of the profiles right from the beginning.
This book set straight some of the perks of a company that get exaggerated by word of mouth. I also gave a friend a recommendation of a to do in Vegas - visit Zappos.
Some of the people profiled are media darlings while the others are not too heard of.

Ants and watermelon

Yesterday a weather forecast showed ants whisking the watermelon away. What is the connection between ants and watermelons?
Is it just the sweet?

Poets note

How a night is different from another.
How tomatoes/produce different in another month

A killdeer sound approached with 9 killdeers following it.
A butterfly visited the Brazilian skyflower and left in the same haste

Sofa journeys

Lately I want to look at pictures for inspiration. At first I thought what better than google maps. i forgot about the photos option.
Golconda Khurd
A map is the best way to begin with when you have no particular destination in mind. But once you follow the paths, your heart will lead you.
OX elephant illusion
The clouds over 'the Irrawady delta' make a satellite image of maps, the real ride.
Long Island - We take the nouns for so granted that we dont dissect them for the words and meaning they contain. There should be a word for it. 

In The country, the starting point triggers like a firework and then the poem traces the spark.

Velocity

How More than a woman began.

Aimless love - Roving in search of love.

Paris

Inspired poem by Istanbul

Love irrational

Obituaries

Creatures

Missingdustjacket

I have been to London to look at the queen

Deer and Cherry blossom

Deer Deer where have you been?

cherry blossom deer and Faux Taxidermy cherry blossom

From a bleeding goat

The dying goats last words

To write what I want, I need to break the twig which seems to take the courage of the hiker in 28 where to live and to die both need courage. When the opposites dont maintain their tension, the minutes, hour and second have all fallen in line. Even the hour glass needs upturning. It aint counting when its done counting. The hour glass needs to be on an inclined trapeze.
For the first time, the hour glass looks like a wine glass too.
Timewheel and Giant Hourglass

Three things that stopped me in my tracks

1. A presentation at work showing the design in schematic.
2. How to sketch with electronics
3. Cowboy up sticker in the parking lot

This book belongs to

This life
belongs to
me be longs
to be me
Esse

The best author is the one who is ashamed to become .. - Nietzsche

Lemon juice

Lemon slows
decay of rice
Pulihora

A bowl of Pulihora is left in the open overnight. I took it for grante dthat it would be spoilt. While gettin ready to clean it, I smelled it for bad odour. And then it occured how on trips on trains and flights, we take Pulihora and air it a bit so it stays fresh longer.

Crisp pear

Patricia Donegan


Why fresh fruit is crisp?

Dream

A lady bought
a decoration
with a cross of her
and another religion
to hang on her door

Putting the skin of aloneness on

A while ago at a lonely bus stop I saw a LED display with moving indicators of time and temperature. On the wintry night that moving display gave a cozy feeling. That place felt like you wouldnt feel alone even if you were.
This book with vibrant illustrations with background changing constantly spread by spread seems like that display. If you read the book fast enough you can match the rapping tune of the makers in the video How to be alone, of the same name as the book.

Smooth pebbles

Look at the red throat of the humming bird - then tell your story again by Ronald Baatz.

A child looking at ants

Cedar cones tumble

Half of the minnows

A turtle on a turtle

Mule dragging dawn across the bridge

dawn.. the rooster for sacrifice calls in the temple - K Ramesh

Some writers like Gail Sher have made Haiku practising famous. 

Kigo - spring rain?

poet Title clarifies poem

She picks paper white
as boiled egg

From the haikus that I liked best, I take lessons in
1. How few words can encompass the world. Like the Worldsowrth's world-grain-sand
2. Actions in nature, traced back to its origins, find company - cedar cones (Gerald Vizenor)
3. Ilusions - James W hackett - minnows in shallow
4. Origin of certain thoughts like Peggy Willis turtle on a turtle on a rock

Dawn.. the rooster for sacrifice calls in the temple - K Ramesh

My favourite - Mule dragging dawn across the bridge - John Willis

At the beginner level you will be taken by aleast few haikus and enjoy the moments of when the poetry was written.
I can memorise this poetry if not Shakespeare.

Good find

I have never heard of the poet BJ Ward. The cover of the book ’Jackleg Opera’ with its exposed piano is like Billy Collin’s poem ‘Building with its face blown off’. Rubberneckers welcome.

My favourite is ‘Upon learning that hearts can become stones’. It is easy to relate with poems that have a tangible inspiration. This poem triggered by a newspaper clipping is a good example of his enchanting poetry. For a beginner poet just coming to the acceptance or realization of this metaphor would be the start and the end, while the poet here draws out the evolution of hearts to stone through the channel of life and language.

In most poems, the lines are of equal length but the pacing of words split the lines in the readers mind while reading. Visually the poems have a formal long line look. But the verbs in the middle break the line causing the illusion of bite size literature. There is the occasional Emily Dickinson style dashes. Often I would auto read the poems and then go back to the beginning of the poem to make sure, I didn’t miss anything.

Most of BJWard’s poems address a definite subject ranging from banal like stapler to universal like love. It could be a turtle, answering machine, cats, lovers, absence, unavailable father. Father poems steer clear of bitter but not without leaving a chilling effect. Many of literary figures too show up for some humour.

Having been a poet for more than 2 decades, poetry workshops and book tours too find find place in the book. In one such, the poet compares writing poetry to skiing

‘spreading easily across white surfaces,

Making our way from one margin to the other

And leaving marks-‘