We somehow decided to try spinning the air hockey paddles as tops and they turned out to be really good! Note how well they self-correct and save themselves from spinning out of control multiple times. Maybe top tips should be round instead of pointy.
stable top from Mary Qin on Vimeo.
I’m tempted to put some water in the center. Wouldn’t that be cool?
air hockey top from Mary Qin on Vimeo.
At night in LA, there is often this marine layer that comes in and gives everything a foggy feel. Makes the entire night sky a sort of glow.
When I was in Thailand, I wrote about the day I found a bunch of clams on the beach. Then I posted some videos of them burrowing into the sand. Here now are videos of the two that I took back to the hostel, climbing around, burrowing, and otherwise doing amusing things. I’m not the only one to find this fascinating, am I?
sea snail and clam blending into the sand from Mary Qin on Vimeo.
happy clam from Mary Qin on Vimeo.
(Yeah, I know, it’s slow going. But check out how the sea snail flips itself over and burrows away, whereas the clam goes in tip first and squeezes its shell.)
It just glides so smoothly. But out of water, it finds it’s no match for gravity:
Part claw, part… lotus? You decide:
Based on the previous video, now can you find the part of the clam that is sticking out?
And then the grand finale! The clam is so happy it burrows a little, then thrusts itself out of the sand. Meanwhile, the sea snail decides to come out to play too.
Hahaha, what a cheeky way to bring attention to their store, which is kind of blocked by the gas station.
Ever wondered how a cilantro leaf gets to be the way it is? Well, here’s a step by step guide for you!
First you get the buds...
...that bloom into flowers!
Then they give way to little, unrecognizable leaves.
The little leaves start to thicken.
Eventually they start to get the shape and form of cilantro leaves.
Finally they look like the leaves you get atop your favorite dish!
They get to a point where they won't get bigger.
After awhile they begin to die and lose their coloring.
Finally, they end up limp and wilted as they give way to new sprouts.
And the whole life cycle can be seen from top to bottom. 🙂
Last night I was describing the Huntington Gardens (at the Huntington Library) to a friend and realized that I’ve never heard of a German garden, or a French garden, or a Spanish garden. Why is that? Instead, there are Japanese gardens abound, and a fair amount of Chinese gardens as well. Other than that, there are themes based on plant type or ecosystem – rain forest, desert, wetland… I find that Japanese gardens tend to focus more on the features – zen gardens, bonsai trees, and bamboo – whereas Chinese gardens have a slightly stronger focus on architecture – pagodas, stylized gateways, and small buildings. Both definitely have a water element present (particularly a lake), which isn’t always the case in other gardens.
Western gardens seem to be more about flowers, an open field of grass, and greenhouses. But in terms of a country or culture having a particular type, I can’t say that I’ve heard of any. Is it just me or do Asian cultures have greater cultural identities than Western cultures?
Go check out this TED video and if you’re not interested in the beginning bit, skip over to about 20 minutes in. I find it fascinating, the way he’s describing how our lives are going to resemble a game more and more. And it’s true! I mean, it’s already so prevalent – think of all the things you’re signed up for to earn points. Credit cards, store member cards, search engines, and really just about any service these days are using points to entice you to use them more. I mean, I search with Swagbucks.com because I want to earn Swagbucks. I use only one credit card (my Chase Sapphire) because I like racking up points on it. My mom obsesses over getting frequent flyer miles every time we travel. I never forget to enter my Ralph’s customer card number when I buy food there (not only to get the discounts, but also to collect the rewards).
I think it’s pretty brilliant. When you make life into one massive game full of a series of mini-games, people have greater motivation to get things done. Even better is when things are transparent and these accounts are linked to your social media account, so your friends can see how you’re doing. People like to win, so seeing someone else did better than them encourages them to spend more time and effort to get a higher score. Then with sensors, just about everything you do can be tracked and have consequences. If you don’t have healthy habits, your insurance premium will go up – there’s a strong motivator to just fit in that quick half hour each day!
I think it comes down to accountability. When people are easily able to hide what they do (or don’t do) and lie to themselves about how well they’re taking care of themselves, they’re more likely to continue with those bad habits. But the moment everyone knows if you’ve flossed today, or had too much to drink, or didn’t get enough sleep, you want to do what you can to improve yourself. Plus, having some friendly competition to egg you along doesn’t hurt. If you see on your friend’s profile that they worked out every day for the past month and you haven’t done squat, it makes you reconsider, doesn’t it?
In a way, it’s bad though – if companies and the government can track you so closely, they’re going to make assumptions about you that may not be true. Just because you don’t eat healthy doesn’t mean you can’t appear perfectly healthy in a physical and feel great. There have got to be certain controls put into place protecting people’s privacy so insurance companies can’t rip people off because they don’t have the healthiest habits. After all, the whole point is to protect against the unknown. Trying to make too many predeterminations can lead dangerously close to a sort of eugenics and determinism. But overall, I think turning our lives into games would lead to better results. Let’s see how long it takes to happen!
In Los Angeles, you know they’re filming something nearby when you see signs like this. The distinctive yellow with black lettering, and a word or phrase that doesn’t mean much. I was once told that the Mission Impossible 3 signs said “Heyday” so people wouldn’t really know what was going on. We had them for Wristcutters!
I'd pronounce this "Europe" - wouldn't you?
Yesterday I actually meant to post a video, but Vimeo was doing maintenance and I couldn’t upload the videos of this little mouse, mousing around. So here you go, an encore presentation:
field mouse scurrying from Mary Qin on Vimeo.
wobbly mouse from Mary Qin on Vimeo.
mouse scampers off from Mary Qin on Vimeo.
I love wildlife of all kinds, so it thought this field mouse-looking critter was quite cute, but I must admit that tail isn’t a very pretty sight… maybe it’s a deer mouse?
He walks/runs with this awkward sort of gait, bouncing off the tips of his toes.
This positioning looks very much like the toy mice I would buy my cats...
He was less than a foot from my feet and I was squatting, so I could have reached out to touch him!
