Just Fun

Writing for MindTweaks is an exercise in staying focused, on track, on  topic and targeted.  I know, I know…  MindTweaks  may not *seem* particularly focused, but in the great creative chaos that is my life, this blog stands out as a beacon of consistency and order. (scary, isn’t it?)

Still every once in a while, I need to indulge in a bit of writer-ly spring-break madness, let my hair down and spew out free-form insanity. 

It may not be spring, but I need a bit of madness this week - and lucky you! I’m willing to share.  So without further ado, I present my notes for the Next Big Hit!

It’s a novel.
It’s a movie.
It’s a hit album.
It’s an uber-moralizing-epic-eco-horror tale.
It’s…

Volcano Virus!!!!

[click to continue...]

It’s been a slow week here in Tweaksville, thanks to my webhost’s server upgrade and Wordpress security issues (both of which caused my brain short out. Much smoke was involved).

After all of that seriousness ( most of which I shielded you from, dear reader, see how I take care of you?) I thought some silliness was in order. [click to continue...]

Without (much) further ado…
*Trumpet Flourish*

Tweak Me Now

(Pop up blockers off, please…
and you need to have the Flash player installed.)

And a big thanks to my friends at GhostDog(alpha)
for hosting this on their Dogpark!

The BackStory: [click to continue...]

Don’t try to deny it, I know you’ve had them - everyone does - those embarrassing instants of mind-numbing stupidity. You’re faced with a task, question or action that you’ve done a thousand times, and yet, you flub it. Even worse, you may even recognize the problem *as you make it*, you may know that you’re about to screw up colossally, and yet, you’re unable to stop it. Brain fart. <cue obnoxious sound file>

Turns out, it’s more than just a cutesy way of explaining away our embarrassment over mental glitches. Brain farts are real. No, the brain doesn’t actually belch noxious fumes, but still — they are real, measurable events in the brain, and even more interesting, they’re predictable. Here’s the deal:

Researchers were looking in the brain for cues that a mistake was being made - hoping to spot some sort of activity blip that signaled an error, perhaps an instantaneous loss of concentration.

[click to continue...]

The Brain is wider than the Sky,
For, put them side by side,
The one the other will include
With ease, and you beside.

The brain is deeper than the sea,
For, hold them, blue to blue,
The one the other will absorb,
As sponges, buckets do.

The brain is just the weight of God,
For, lift them, pound for pound,
And they will differ, if they do,
As syllable from sound.

-Emily Dickinson
Complete Poems. 1924.

College students apparently aren’t: In a test of working and visual memory, the 5 year old chimp Ayumu and his friends came out on top. Find out how you stack up with a version of the test , available by courtesy of the good folks at Lumosity.

Ok, so yes, we’re muddying the definition of “smart” again… the study really tested a very limited skill set. Overly simplified, a series of numbers appeared on a computer touch screen, then were hidden with white squares. The chimp or human was required to select the squares in order of the numbers they replaced. (And yes, both the chimps and college students had learned to count to 9.)

The results varied depending on the details of the test, but over all, the chimps did better.Sometimes they were faster, sometimes they were more accurate. Ayumu (immortalized here on YouTube) did the best, with an 80% success rate in at least one set of tests. Even with 6 months of training, the students still couldn’t out perform their young primate cousins.

The difference was clearest when the numbers were shown very briefly, appearing for less than 2/10ths of a second. That’s too fast for our eyes to scan the pattern, much less attempt to consciously remember it, so the chimps probably have a better eidetic memory than we do — meaning they have photographic recall.

The researchers suggested two possible reasons for this: humans may have given up some memory and processing skills in order to develop those areas of the brain for other uses, like speech. The difference might also have to do with age; the chimps tested were young, and the task requires a skill children have, but which fades with age. (Apparently, in a later test, Ayumu’s mother, Ai did worse than the college students, so they can take some comfort in that.)

On a personal note, the mention of children losing a sort of photographic memory with age interested me - I had something akin to it up until high school, when it started to fail. I chalked the loss up to some health issues, but maybe it was just normal maturing.

For those of you into such things, here’s a link to the actual study (or at least an abstract of it): Working memory of numerals in chimpanzees

________________________________

MINDTWEAK: I still have a photographic memory, you know. It’s just that I forget to take the lens cap off.

________________________________

Today’s post was supposed to introduce you to your “inner donkey”, that bit of your brain that has to be alternately tempted into action, or beaten between the ears with a two-by-four.

But my own inner donkey refuses to be motivated today. I’ve tried carrots, chocolate, and self-flagellation. I even found an inspirational video…   but Mr.BurrowBrain isn’t budging. 

Maybe I should have offered him a Budweiser?

Ever tipped a sacred cow?

No?! Why not? It’s the cow’s meow, er… I mean moo, of course.

Here’s how to go about it:

Tonight, when your significant other is all cuddly and just on the edge of sleep, put on your most sincere expression, lay a hand gently on their shoulder, lean over quietly…

.. whisper one of the following in their ear:

__________________

“Sweetie, are you awake? No, I mean.. really.. are you sure? What if you’re already asleep, and you’re dreaming this, and I’m not really here asking you this? What if I don’t exist at all, what if I never existed, and YOU NEVER WOKE UP?!?”

__________________

“Honey? What if God is secretly invests our tithings in offshore gambling casinos? Do you think we should ask Rev.Jones to request an audit of God’s books? ZOMG, what if He invested in Enron?!? ALL OF CREATION MIGHT BE BANKRUPT”

__________________

“Do you ever wonder if maybe the Earth IS flat after all? Maybe all the spherical science is a government conspiracy, and all that separates us from the vast emptiness of outerspace is few yards of tree roots, sewer piples, and gophers?? OMG, what if we fell into a gopher hole and THROUGH THE EARTH??? Get UP! We have to go to Walmart for gopher bait RIGHT NOW!!!!”

__________________

Any of these queries should cause your victim partner to roll over and give you “That Look”.. the one that freezes ordinary mortals in their tracks.

But you are not an ordinary mortal, are you?

No, YOU are a Sacred Cow Tipper and you will not be intimidated. When they give you The LOOK, stare them straight in the eye.

Now, let out a great big MOOoooOOOO, right in their face.

Properly executed, this moove will cause your partner to reach over and shove you off the bed with a satisfying THUD.

It’s not QUITE as much fun as actual cow tipping, but you can stay in your pajamas, and there are fewer cow-patties to step in.

Ok, ok, stop looking at me like that!

There is a method to my madness!

Before I explain, let’s be sure we’re all on the same dictionary page.

The term “sacred cow” is often used to describe a belief, idea or assumption that is beyond question, often religious.

“Kicking a sacred cow” means to break a strong taboo (such as questioning the unquestionable) and sometimes, its used to mean testing a belief, to see if it really holds up under scrutiny.

“Cow tipping” is a time-honored practice among bored country folk. Every so often, we sneak into the pastures at night, slip up behind a sleeping cow, put a hand on their flank, and then SHOVE. If the conditions are just right, the cow’s knees buckle, and down the bovine goes. (If conditions are wrong, the cow *doesn’t* fall, but turn on us with a vengeance. This never ends well.)

“Tipping sacred cows” describes my habit of sneaking up on a subject, then shoving over, flipping it upside down and checking its teeth. (I know, the teeth thing is an entirely different metaphor. Sorry about that. )

Mixed metaphors not withstanding…

Tipping sacred cows is a powerful mind tweak. Every so often, it’s a good idea to turning your most cherished assumptions on their heads.

Your world view *will* be challenged. Some of your beliefs will crumble and fall away, some of your foundations will be shown as unreliable, but the ones that remain will be solid, sound, and unshakable. And even if you discover your beliefs are on solid ground, the process will lead to insights, a deeper understanding of your self and the world around you.

So.. Tip a Sacred Cow Tonight!!!

(but don’t tell your partner I sent you, and don’t blame the bruises on me!)

Now, on with the pwn -oops.  I mean point.

Ahem.

The sense of participating in a community has been an unexpected side-effect of blogging for me, and I’m really enjoying it.

I’d like to expand on it, to find a deeper sense of community with all you similarly tweaked minds out there. The Social Sites seem like a no-brainer, but…. the number of them is overwhelming, none seem a perfect fit, and I don’t exactly “get” the point of most of them.  

So…  I need your help : )

Which social sites do you belong to?  

What’s your reason for belonging?

And how’s that working out for you?

(I’ll show you mine if you show me yours…)

That’s the question that Roger von Oech of Creative Think was asking this week.

For those who aren’t familiar with Roger, he’s the creator of the Creative Whack Pack, the Ball of Whacks (a tool for innovation) and a lot of other cool stuff I’ve meant to review for some time now.

As you might imagine, he’s prone to asking creative questions.

Questions like, for instance, “What does your bookshelf say about your worldview?”

I thought it was an interesting question, so I decided to sit down and ask my bookshelf about it.

Almost immediately, I found a problem.

WHICH bookshelf should I ask? There are the two closest to me, in my studio. There’s one under my bed, 2 small ones and one huge one in my old office/current store room. Another large one in the spare bedroom/astronomy/weight room, the empty one in the living room, or those boxes and boxes stashed under the spare bed make a total of .. well..

…I lost count.

However many there are, they must all be very opinionated, because each and every one of them seems to

have something to say.

All at the same time.

To be honest, they are giving me a headache.

I’m sure you’d be amused by their individual commentaries, but I’m a bit pressed for time, so I’ll settle for relaying the gestalt of their views.

To start off with, they say my worldview is many layered and fractured, and far too complicated to sort out in one blog post. They’ll settle for telling you a bit more about me, personally, in a somewhat disparaging tone.

They want you to know things like how I really should have completed the refinishing job before stacking books back into the antique library case. That I keep promising to get rid of the riff-raff titles, but never do, and that the book on Biblical scholarship REALLY should not be sandwiched between to “Flesh of the Gods” (hush, its an anthropological study) and “1000 Nudes” (ok, that one is exactly what it sounds like.)

Further, they are of the strong opinion that cardboard boxes are NOT suitable as bookshelf brethren, but they rather liked the dresser-drawers I used to use as shelving, mounted on the wall.

They say that I am a packrat. That I believe if I own a book on a subject, I own the knowledge, and one should never turn from knowledge. I value the old, and am in lust with the new. I’m spiritual, I’m technical, I’m fascinated with creativity and imagery and symbolism and cultures. They say that I like things to *look* pretty and neat, but that eventually the stacks of knowledge overwhelm me, and things wind up “wherever”. I like the surreal, whimsy, and a pretense of order.

And so they clamor, and fuss, and look down their stacks at me.

All but one.

The empty shelf over the fireplace is the littlest voice, but the most telling.

It has not yet served as a bookshelf. Cleared off at Christmas to make room for the obligatory nativity set and victorian villages, the regular knick-knacks never got put back in place.

So the shelf waits. Quietly, patiently, smiling, a still quiet voice.

I’ve been thinking that meaningful, attractive, library-bound books would be good there. Books that would impress, enlighten and reveal. A readers-digest condensed version of who I am. Foundational books. Life changing books. The books that find their way into my daily metaphors for life. The books that tell my life stories, even as I tell theirs, over and over again. Classic, eclectic, intellectual whimsy.

The bookshelves like that idea.

I can hear them nattering at other, debating which of their treasures they would give up for the cause, and which ones would need to be replaced with better volumes.

There seems to be only one title they all agree on: Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (one with Arthur Rackham illustrations, of course. Collectible leather bound preferred).

Apparently, they feel that if I’m going to go about having profound conversations with my bookcases, it might as well be in a world where such things are not altogether remarkable, and one with pretty pictures.

So here’s my question to you:

What does your bookshelf say about you? About life? About anything? (Oh now, stop groaning. You had to KNOW this was coming.)

And along with what your bookshelf says, I’d like to know *how* it says.

Does it speak with a Scottish accent? Does it use $10 words or colloquialisms talk like a hick? Does it offer you a cup of tea or sniff disdainfully and point out the feather duster?

Leave a comment, write a post, take a picture, do a podcast. I don’t care.

But please give your bookshelf a voice, for it’s own amusement. (and mine).

MindTWEAK: “Oh, you can’t help that,” said the Cat:
“We’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.”
“How do you know I’m mad?” said Alice.
“You must be,” said the Cat,
“or you wouldn’t have come here.”

(And if you still haven’t checked out Roger von Oech’s blog?
Check out how *HIS* bookshelf talked back. In full color, yet. Now THAT’s creative.)