Life

General ramblings connected to my personal life and activities.

This weekend…

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…had a great weekend out running around in the sun. Spent Saturday with Prairie and her sisters H and K, and Sunday Prairie and I went out to the Woodland Park Zoo.

Swinging is fun!

This swing is great. Suspended from a pulley on a wire, it’s got about thirty feet of wire to build up speed before the pulley hits the tire and you go flying up into the air. I may have turned 30 a few months ago, but as far as I’m concerned, you’re never too old to go play on a swing on a sunny day.

How not to catch a frisbee

This is not a recommended method for frisbee catching. ;) However, if instead of a hard plastic frisbee, you’re using a “flippy flier” (a cloth circle lightly weighted down around the edges with sand…works great as a frisbee, and can be wadded up and stuffed into a pocket), it’s worth trying once or twice just for the amusement value.

Two butterflies

Two butterflies, at the Woodland Park Zoo butterfly house. I’d only been in something like this once before, and this one was definitely the better of the two. Hundreds of butterflies all over the place, and all sorts of different varieties and patterns.

Another butterfly

Even slightly out of focus, the coloring on this one was gorgeous.

Three turtles

These three turtles were just sitting on a branch, right under the water level in this display, watching everyone go by outside. I took the shot on a whim, putting the lens of my camera right up against the glass, just under the waterline, and more or less guessing at the right point to aim at — looks to me like I guessed right.

Toucan

This was the first zoo I’d been to that I can remember seeing a toucan at, and this one was just a few feet away from the front of the display. The chain-link fence made getting a good shot a little tricky, but I was able to aim through one of the openings and only catch the tinest bit of fencing in the corners. I’m not sure what the bird thought of the experiment, though — he seems to be eyeing me somewhat warily.

I’ve got to say, I was really impressed by the Woodland Park Zoo. While it’s not the largest zoo I’ve been to, the exhibits were by far better than any I’d seen elsewhere. They’ve done a great job of creating “natural habitats” for most of the animals — the glaring exception was the penguin exhibit, and it was so shoddy in comparison to the rest that I wouldn’t be at all surprised if it’s just waiting to get upgraded. Easily my favorite of the exhibits, though, was the nocturnal animals exhibit. The entire thing is extremely dimly lit, in order to let the animals exist in their normal lighting, and you really have to take your time to quietly watch the exhibits before you’ll start to see the animals moving around.

Anyway, that was my weekend. Now, back to my usual mix of who-knows-what…

911survivor: Game? Art?

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A couple days ago, I linked to something called 911survivor (the site is down as of this writing) in my ‘Destinations’ sidebar. The site was about an Unreal game modification that replaced the standard sci-fi battle arenas with the World Trade Center towers during the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. At the time, it looked to me like a surprisingly disturbing attempt to capitalize on the tragedy of the day, and I commented on the link as being tasteless.

This morning, Kirsten left a comment letting me know that while at Siggraph, she had met one of the creators of the 911survivor mod.

something to think about – the game is not a ‘game’ but an art mod (game modification). there are no points, there is no way to win, etc. the point of the game (art piece) for them was to explore the real experience of the victims in the WTC and to combat the commercialization of the event by big media. players also must realize the real experience and the real horror of that day (which has been glossed over by an administration and media that capitalizes on the event).

I mentioned that perhaps they should have made more of an indication of their intent on their website, as it wasn’t clear at all to me upon first viewing it what the point actually was.

Later, Kirsten was able to come back with a little more information, and she also said this:

if this is art…then truly the artist doesn’t have to offer you their interpretation on the subject. modern art never does. it simply presents itself, and then lets you decide. you therefore become a part of it through interaction and the decision process.

While searching around for more information on this piece of work, as their site seems to have gone down, I found this post at Fridgemagnet. In one paragraph, they managed to both grok the concept of the piece long before I did, but also touch on the very reason why I made the initial assumption that I did:

The level of customization allowed by Doom, then Quake, Half Life, Unreal etc, makes for an interesting artistic medium. We’ve had all sorts of ideologically-driven mods and FPSes already – see the America’s Army game (now available for Macs it seems) and that race-hate Quake mod where you get to kill Jews and blacks. It doesn’t appear that this is a propaganda piece, but it is going to be designed to deliver a message of some sort, whatever the designers want to say about 9-11. Assuming it’s not just publicity trash.

This started me wondering about two things in connection to this. Firstly, the role of the media used for a piece of work; and secondly, when introducing a new type of media, what responsibility the artist might have when the public finds that work.

I think that part of the issue I had where 911survivor is concerned is simply that the medium used here — the game interface — is one that hasn’t been used before (that I have heard of, at least) as an artistic medium. When presented with a gaming environment, my first thoughts are that the subject matter is intended to be just that: a game, some form of entertainment. Hence, when I was browsing the 911survivor site, seeing their concept art of panicked businessmen and women and a schematic of the floors affected by the impact of the airplane, and looking at the screenshots of walls of flame and bodies falling to the ground, I didn’t make the assumption that “this can’t be a game, therefore it must be some sort of interactive art project.” Instead, it appeared to simply be a game — a game with a truly disgusting choice of subject matter.

Given that, then, should it have been more obvious what the intent of the work was? Kirsten says that the artist “doesn’t have to offer you their interpretation on the subject.” Certainly true enough, but the majority of the time when seeing art, even when it’s art we haven’t seen before, we do know that it is art. We may not understand it or like it, we may wish that there was more interpretation provided for us, we may not understand the artists intent — we may not even agree that it should be called art. But whatever our reaction, we know that the artist intended their creation to be some form of art. With 911survivor, I had no such reference to work with.

While I’ve been working on this post, Kirsten was able to update her site with more details on what she heard during the workshop where this project was discussed.

The game was made by a group of students for a class (if memory serves) who had not been present at the fall of the towers in NYC, but felt that the media had been capitalizing on the situation and thus glossing over the horrific reality of the event). The game was never supposed to be publicized, it was simply a way for the students to understand the event and to ‘be a part of it’ as it were. The speaker mentioned that so often memorials of wars and tragedies gloss over and distort the truth of the situation, that the horror and the sorrow that was truly there is covered up as much as possible, and instead an idealistic presentation of the situation is given as a sort of ‘reaffirmation’ of life. However, this prevents future generations from understanding the pain/sorrow/horror of the original event. This game actually presents a significant attempt at building a new art form (in my humble opinion) by creating a truly interactive medium in which people feel trapped, upset, frustrated, frightened, disgusted, etc. by a piece of art that is truly interactive….

That bit of information alone does a lot to explain the nature of the project to me, and I have to say, I agree with a lot of the motivations mentioned here. The media (and the government) has not only glossed over the horrors of that day in the intervening months, but has gone on to capitalize on it in ways far more disturbing and far-reaching than I originally took this game to be attempting. Over the past two years, the fall of the WTC has gone from being presented as the tragedy that it was to being the justification for our incursions into foreign governments halfway around the world. 9-11 has become a motivation for revenge for far too many people (and to make it worse, that revenge hasn’t even been directed at the right targets, thanks to the propaganda techniques of our current administration).

I guess it was the combination of the medium of the game engine; the lack of a clear disclaimer that they were using the game engine because it was the best technology for their purpose, not because they were actually attempting to create a ‘9-11 game’; a website that seemed to support my initial assumption that it was a game; and the horrific imagery based on real events and real deaths that disturbed me. Knowing more about it now, I can understand and respect the aims of the creators. However, given the combination of a new medium not traditionally used for anything other than entertainment purposes, and the subject matter of the work, a little more caution and straightforward stating of ideals on the website may have been very much in order.

Construction is fun!

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The building I work in on the Microsoft campus (123) is flanked on the south and east by two buildings that used to belong to another company, but were purchased by Microsoft sometime in the past year. Until yesterday, the buildings had sat unused for the past few months. However, yesterday barricades went up blocking off the parking lot for the two buildings, and today signs declaring ‘DANGER: CONSTRUCTION AREA’ went up. Looks like there is going to be renovation work on the two buildings, plus the addition of a four-story parking garage (I’m guess that that’s going to replace the parking lot, but I’m not terribly sure on that). The barricades are up, workmen are starting to clear out some of the landscaping, and trucks are starting to fill the parking lot.

Talking about this with one of my co-workers, I found out that there’s also a rumor that our building might be slated for work, too. This one’s purely in the rumor stage, so who knows how accurate it is, but still.

I just can’t seem to escape construction these days. If it’s not my apartment building, it’s my job. What fun!

I wanna push da button!

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Rock on — there’s a couple workmen poking around at the elevator right now. I’m not going to lay any bets that it’ll be working today (or even in the next month), especially since it’s been broken for the past three months or so (this apartment wasn’t a fourth-floor walkup when I moved in), but at least someone’s looking at it. This gives me hope.

Remembering Binky

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Can anyone find me the famous picture from around 1994 of Binky the polar bear prancing around his cage in the Alaska Zoo with the Australian tourist’s sneaker hanging out of his mouth?

Just in case you’re not an Alaskan (or Austrailan, I hear the story was pretty popular down there, too), and want to know what I’m babbling about…

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP)- A polar bear that chewed on a couple of folks may seem an unlikely cult hero. But this is Alaska, and, well, things are different here.

Not that people don’t feel sympathy for those nursing their wounds, it’s just that Alaskans think you get what you deserve when you act stupid around a wild animal – even one that lives in a zoo.

“I feel sorry for the people who got hurt, but in both cases it was their own fault,” says Sammye Seawell, director of the Alaska Zoo in Anchorage, where Binky the polar bear lives.

The first problem arose in July, when an Australian tourist paid a high price for venturing too close to Binky’s cage.

The woman was climbing over the second of two safety rails to get a close-up photo when the 850-pound bear stuck his head through the bars and grabbed her in his jaws.

She escaped with a broken leg and bite wounds. Another visitor caught the scuffle on videotape, including a shot of Binky pacing around his pen later with the woman’s red and white running shoe in his mouth.

That attack spawned a T-shirt featuring Binky, the shoe and the words \”Send more tourists – this one got away.

Alaska shook its collective head and chalked the mauling up to tourist naivete. The woman later earned a measure of local respect by admitting she was at fault and promising not to sue.

Six weeks later, the 20-year-old bear was back on the front page. Two Anchorage teenagers decided – apparently after a long night of drinking – to take a dip in the pool Binky shares with his furry companion, Nuka.

Police say the pair snuck into the zoo and were stripping down in front of the cage when Binky showed up and locked his jaws onto one of them.

The teen was pulled away by his friend, but not before Binky had left him with leg injuries. Both teens face trespassing and underage drinking charges.

Since then, it’s been take-no-prisoners Binkymania.

There are jokes – “The state won’t be asking for any jail time for the kid – it already has its pound of flesh.”

There are more hot-selling T-shirts – “Binky for Governor: Take a Bite Out of Crime.” There is music – a local comedy revue worked up a rap song by “Bad Blood Binky” that includes the lines “Drink a case of Bud and act real cool – Like a teenage mutant brain-dead fool.”

There have been editorial cartoons – one shows Binky saying to Nuka, “Mauled teen-ager, my butt – how about ‘Hero bear prevents youth from drowning?”

And there have been letters to the editor of the Anchorage Daily News. Lots of them, all pro-Binky.

“When foolish people place their name on Binky’s dinner menu, we should have the decency to allow Binky to eat his entire meal, in peace,” one said.

Another encouraged zoo keepers to set aside a day for people to come and play with Binky if they want to: \”This program would solve two problems. The food bill for Binky would be reduced and the test scores for our schools would certainly rise.

Zoo director Seawell says she’s gotten more than 100 letters from around the world, and not one of them blamed the bear.

To protect the bears from the visitors, the zoo has erected two strands of electric wire outside the cage and installed a motion detector that blares an alarm.

— AP report from Sept. 1994

Man-U 4, Celtic 0

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That. So. Rocked.

Manchester United vs. Celtic

Phil and I bailed from work a little after 7pm, caught the bus into town, and got off just about four blocks from Seahawks Stadium. Walked in, and found our way to our seats — which, as you can see from the above shot, were incredible! About thirteen rows back, practically right on the goal line. Even better, the entrance that the teams came out of to get on the field was directly to our left — there were a few too many people in the way for me to get a really good shot of them taking the field, though. Still, just being close enough that I could clearly see their faces was great.

Turns out that Seattle is definitely primarily a Man-U town. There were definitely Celtic fans in the crowd, but the roar every time Man-U scored or prevented a goal was pretty telling. The game itself was almost schizophrenic, though. Celtic played a very offensive game, and Man-U couldn’t seem to keep the ball out of their side of the field for the majority of the game, but the few times they did manage to push the ball down the field they scored almost every time. Their goalie, though, did an astounding job for the whole game — while the defense was good enough that Celtic didn’t get too many shots, he didn’t let any of them get through. Just gorgeous to watch.

In the end, Man-U took the game, four to nothing — a total shutout. There was also an announcement midway through the second half of the game that the final attendance tally was 66,722 people in the stadium! Blew my mind, and apparently that was record attendance for the stadium, too! Kind of funny when a soccer game creates more of a draw than the local sports teams do — but then, this was one hell of a soccer game.

All in all, one hell of an evening. While I’m sorry that Phil’s girlfriend couldn’t make it…damn but that was fun!

Update: Writeups are already posted on the local news sites.