The Ideas Bazaar

Now you see it, now you don't

A while back Transport for London ran a neat little film which challenged viewers to spot something obvious but easily missed - a bear walking through the middle of a set of basketball players. The point being that cyclists are nearly as easy to miss, even when we're looking for them. There's a new film in the series which makes the same point: 

Today

This book is a perfect little addition to that pile of books next to the toilet which require little concentration but demands something absorbing (if not also absorbent): Indexed.

It joins that ever-growing section of the bookshop which is 'Books that were formerly read as Blogs' (anyone remember Belle de Jour?)

Indexed is a one-a-day index card with a ideograph. Simple idea, cleverly and executed regularly i.e., daily. Here's a few which seem to nicely summarise things.

First today in my bit of Intel towers

Second, my area of interest as seen from the perspective of this point in the economic cycle:

And finally, a nice take on recent state intervention in the banking sector

Do One Thing

via

Bucket and Spade

Go here (Priory Bay, Isle of Wight)
Take on of these
Get the kids one of these

And you have yourself a proper British seaside holiday...til the end of July.

Wordsworth

Picture cred

You learn something new everyday. Today, I learned a new word - DEMONYM. Sounds ghoulish but is actually "a word that denotes the members of a people or the inhabitants of a place", according to this definition.

The word comes from the Greek word for 'populace' (δῆμος demos) plus the suffix -onym and was popularized in 1997 by Merriam-Webster editor Paul Dickson in his book Labels for Locals.

The term is not widely employed or known outside geographical circles and does not appear in mainstream dictionaries. (Which explains, perhaps, why it popped out from the page at me.)

Salad Days

Well, I'm not in my salad days - "...My salad days, / When I was green in judgment, cold in blood..." - but my children are and looking back on the last, long, hot days this phrase came to mind. How nice to have so few worries. But what worries they might be inheriting from previous generations...

This picture was taken at Loughcrew Gardens, near oldcastle, Co.Meath.

Rubik's Cubed

So this is where all the Rubik's Cubes went...

via curate

I want a potty

On a recent trip to Laytown, a large sandy beach north of Dublin, I stumbled upon a group of friendly, hardy and enthusiastic land yachters.

There were some very sleek and fast looking models.

And there were a number of 'potties' - mini land yachts.

Andy, over from Pembrokeshire for the weekend, is a maker and purveyor of these land lubbing crafts. I nearly drove away with one in the boot. I'm sure I'll buy one yet....

A Present from America

Saying goodbye to my five year old son this morning, I asked what he wanted from America by way of a present (to assuage my guilt at being away for 10 days). I loved his answer (I use the word 'loved' advisedly): "a visa card"

He's clearly heard what Massive Attack once noted, in the lyrics of a song on Blue Lines, which was something like "getting a visa card nowadays isn't hard". Given the tenderness of his years what he hasn't yet appreciated is something called the 'credit crunch'.

The Adoration of the Magi