Sunday

new shorts, tiny grown chilies, vic market, sundown in NMelb

Say No to Instagram

Today Melbourne looks like this. In April! Without Instagram!

Do you even remember what real colour looks like?

So facebook bought instagram for one billion dollars and everyone had a field day with that titbit. I think the instagram backlash has been creeping up for a while. People making sneaky snarky comments about how anyone can make anything look awesome and indie cool with instagram etc. But all of the instagram photos look the same. They must.

I'm not against instagram really. I have it on my phone but have never made the effort to set it up. I'm good like that.

But what gets me is that sometimes what you are looking at is actually pretty good already. Do we need snazzy-jazzy camera effects to make life look any better? Apparently we do and it is worth one billion to get it happening. 

Don DeLilo wrote a book called White Noise that I studied in my arts undergard days and something in it stayed with me.

When characters Murray and Jack travel to see The Most Photographed Barn in America, Murray stands and watches everyone taking photos. Thousands of photos. Then they leave.

"No one sees the barn" Murray says.

"We're not here to capture an image, we're here to maintain one. Every photograph reinforces the aura...being here is a kind of spiritual surrender. We only see what others see....we've agreed to be a part of a collective perception. It literally colours our vision. 

A religious experince in a way, like all tourism"

 

I think instagram creates this collective perspective of how life should look when we're having fun or having a moment or whatever. Instragram literally colours our vision. Instagram blurs the actual colours and create a false nostalgic image based on photographs styled on the 70s. I'm guessing most people who use instagram were not around in the 70s so for them, this is their 70s photo moment. Which is pretty strange if you think about it.

Sometimes, maybe say no to instagram and take a photo anyway. With all the instagram fans out there it might almost look retro agin.

Running from the law

Surviving the JD is a tiny bit easier with running

I am nearly (but not quite- exams and hell yet to come) half way through my law degree and man it is tricky some days. So much inside time staring at computers or books or each other. So much staring and typing in law!

Last year I lived in a little house with very few windows. Those were the days. To cope we started running one day out of the blue. We just decided that as a house we should run. It would be good for us and we'd feel better. For me, the thing about running is that you feel better after and maybe at the very beginning but not during. Ever. At all. Which is why its so easy to not go and to stay inside and stream stuff or highlight stuff or facebook stuff. This is not good. 

My friend was diagnosed with vitamin D deficiency in the midst of her arts degree heyday because she got so caught up and forgot to go outside. In such a sunny country when outside is right in front of us we could maybe get out amongst it a bit more. It feels better.

https://www.mja.com.au/journal/2002/177/3/vitamin-d-intake-and-vitamin-d-status-australians

We now live in a different house on a different street but we still run when one of us can be bothered. Today was the most beautiful day in Melbourne so after hours of useless computer time I finally got outside and ran around and really it was pretty good. End sunlight rant because of all people I am probably most likely to get skin cancer but you can't win them all.

Today in Melbourne:

Ps some sneaky indie yarn-bombing in Princess Park.

Wye River in the autumn time.

Looking fine old Wye

Getting into the blog of things

What you want in a good blog

As of this year I have spent many an hour in trusts law perusing the blogosphere. There are so many clever little blogs doing different things and many bloggers actually earning a living on their creations.

Not really the goal of this blog. 

It's more of an outlet. An extension of twitter if you will. People says blogs are public diaries but I don't think that fits either. The blogger presents a very select view of life. My posts and tweets are really but a drop in the ocean of my strange but mostly routine days. I think it is for the benefit of everyone if I subsist from posting extensively about trust law. Although it probably would help me with the actual learning of trusts.

I have blog envy for a strange and specific category of blogs. The Mormon Mummy blogs of Utah have captured my attention like no other! The fascination lies in the beautiful "mamas" who post about the beauty of their lives. They are often close to my age but are married and have at least one super photogenic child. They spend time walking around American cities with red lipstick on and their babies strapped to their chests, instagram at the ready to capture the idilic-ness of it all.

Emily Matchar wrote of the success of the mormon mummy blog on Salon.com and about her own obsession with such blogs. As another unmarried overly educated student with zero kids in my life (or in my friends lives) I don't quite understand my own attraction to these blogs.

But really I do, because these woman make life seem happy and beautiful. Which I guess is what most blogs do in some way or another.

Principle lesson from this blog: it is not a real portrayal of my life or any other- but merely a snapshot of life on a good day, with an iphone camera and rose coloured glasses. But that's ok too.

 http://www.salon.com/2011/01/15/feminist_obsessed_with_mormon_blogs/ 

Hanging out in the home of the Mormon Mommy Blogger

Blogging for calm

An experiment in procrastination 

This year is my second year of law in Melbourne and I have slowly but surely come to the realisation that if I don't do anything but law, I may just die. As a course the JD is all consuming, amazing, exhausting, exhilarating and everything in between. However, I cannot go on like last year- as a mad woman constantly rushing against the clock to get to class, home, work, yoga, work and bed. I just don't have enough energy to be rushing all about.

So, this year I have made some small changes. Nothing major. I am still a law student but I am now learning to breath and smile and enjoy my classes without the mad rush. It's not worth it and it doesn't get me better grades or relationships or anything.

Small changes include mostly quitting sugar (still have fruit and easter goods) taking up running again, spending more time in Wye River (pictured) and in just generally in places that force me to feel calm.

Something about going back to the beach and seeing nothing but water or bush is just oh so soothing. Through this little page I am hoping to blog it up about ways to feel calm and rush-free. Even when i'm back at uni and not in my easter-break-uni-free state of mind- even in SWOTVAC. Perhaps maybe.