stargeek
Technical niggles keep Fable from fabulousTechnical niggles keep Fable from
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 The idea: A fable about uncertainty, and courage. For thousands of years the chickadee community of Albion had weathered the cold winters as all non-migrating birds in temperate climates do: They hid food (often tens of thousands of tree seeds each) in the fall. They moulted new heavier plumage just before winter. They scavenged nutrition from pine cones, maple sap, and even the dead prey of coyotes, which they'd learned to imitate to alert their community to the presence of fresh carcasses. They maintained a generous 'grazing' area for the flock, which normally included a dozen chickadees, plus a few nuthatches and titmice. And they hibernated at night, burning just enough fat to maintain their body temperature above the hypothermia level, so they could reawaken themselves the next day without depending on solar warmth. But then one day some loud machines arrived in Albion and bulldozed down many of the trees the chickadees and their community-mates depended upon. Fortunately one old human put up a set of feeders in one of the clearcut areas, and another planted sunflowers in another clearcut area. So there was still an abundance to live on. But one of the chickadees was worried what would happen if the human destruction continued. That fall, she looked longingly at the flocks of other birds. Calling to the other birds in her community, and bidding them to follow, she rose up to join a flock of migrating geese. They briefly responded, thinking perhaps the agitated little chickadee was alerting them to a fresh source of food. But when they saw she was flying beyond the limits of their community, they broke ranks and returned. Deserted by her community, the would-be migratory chickadee turned around and rejoined her flock. The following year, the humans destroyed more of the natural bounty of Albion, and where there had been sunflowers growing there was now a huge building filled with frightening sounds and a terrible smell. That year snow came early and for the first time, the chickadees knew they would have to depend on the old human's feeders. Once again, the agitated chickadee urged the others to join her in migrating to a new and more natural home, but the other chickadees ignored it. Chickadees don't migrate -- they bulk up and, when necessary, hibernate. This was the only life they knew. Except this time, the worried little chickadee didn't turn back. She flew higher and higher, lagging behind the other creatures in their graceful formations all headed to a more hospitable home for the winter. She headed in the same direction, determined to follow them, until she disappeared from view. The following spring the kind human stopped coming out each day to fill the feeders, and yet more of the trees were cut down and its natural vegetation replaced by the humans' hard and barren constructions. But the migrating chickadee didn't return, so the others didn't know if she'd found a better home, a kinder and more natural place, or not. The alpha chickadees told the others that they would just have to make the best of a difficult situation. But the rest of the chickadees were not happy. Maybe the migrating chickadee was right, maybe she had found a new home untouched by these terrifying humans and their machines of destruction and scarcity. But chickadees weren't meant to migrate, they weren't built for it. Yet they noticed other small birds and even butterflies migrating -- perhaps this was the natural way, perhaps chickadees had merely forgotten how to migrate. When the fall came, some of the chickadees practiced migrating, and they watched the other birds intently. And as the first snow began, one of the remaining chickadees called to the others, using the alarming call of the coyote: It's now or never. We cannot continue on like this, or we will all die. And the other chickadees, all of them agitated now, called back: How do you know? Maybe it will get better again. This is our home -- we cannot leave. But their debate was drowned out by the roar of the bulldozers, making room for yet more of the humans' strange and unnatural buildings with their deceptive and dangerous invisible walls, and more of the humans' loud and frightening creations with the four rolling feet and the two eyes bright as suns. And all of Albion was filled with dust and tar and screaming.  Item: House sparrows have virtually vanished from London; declared endangered species. |
I love the idea of prefab homes using the most modern materials and layouts with a nod to energy savings. It's probably just my inner geek talking, but since computers and electronics keep getting faster and cheaper, why can't the advances in technology carry over to similar savings in things like homes? In the past 50 years, we've learned a lot about the psychology of spaces, how best to insulate a space, and how to take advantage of wind and solar energy. Yet most American homes are using the same designs post-war housing was built to, just with larger rooms, better windows, and better insulation in the walls.
Some enterprising architects have attempted to tackle this problem of how to design and build custom modern housing at an affordable cost. These homes look incredible and although a bit small, pretty close to what I'd want in a dream house. Lots of open floor space, seamless living, cooking, and dining areas, and simple bedrooms. I wonder what the costs would run to build a place like this, hopefully just a couple hundred grand or so, though I'm sure building the whole thing from scratch in most markets would run you almost half a mil. [via Doug]
My friend Guy is considering
the purchase of a stylish prefab home. He pointed me to FabPreFab, a
mind-blowing clearinghouse of prefab dwelling design.
"Predominant mass-market housing programs such as project homes or tract housing largely fail to meet the desires of people who appreciate a modernist design aesthetic. Custom-designed modernist architecture is beyond the financial reach of many people and so prefab is viewed as a design and production ideology that has the potential to deliver affordable modernism."Some of these abodes can be ordered online and delivered on several trucks. Others are airlifted onto rooftops. Don't miss the transformed shipping containers either! Link
Screenwriter/Director/bon vivant Lloyd Fonvielle
recently relocated from New York to Las Vegas, and teamed up with
NYC-based graphic artist John Sosnovsky to create the Official Nowhere
T-Shirt, available only through the end of this year. Says Lloyd,
"Someday owning one of these shirts will be your only way of proving
that you were on the road to Nowhere before the rest of the world
caught on. Be sure to buy some extras to keep in mint condition for
sale on eBay in years to come, when they will undoubtedly become
passionately coveted big ticket items!"
Link,
and link to Lloyd's Fabulous
Nowhere blog.
Some might call the M-bird XT-21 digital audio
player ugly, and it a way they would be right - it certainly is
anything but understated. But in a way, really, I think it's awesome;
it sort of lets everything hang out in a way I appreciate. It's like
Maycom said, "You know what, screw the new future. I want my cyberpunk
back," then tried to figure out how to glom as many knobs and switches
and weird curves into the flash memory player that it could. It even
has built-in stereo speakers.
This looks exactly like the sort of thing I expected to plug my mirrorshades into.
Read - Product Page (Korean) [MBird via I4U]
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