Chelsea Break

Family Life

Jon and Laura bank tightly on the luge run
Jon and Laura bank tightly. Sorry for the bad composition—I was up to my midriff in a snowbank and could barely see over the course wall.

Peter Off we headed to Chelsea Quebec last weekend, for our annual luge-and-computer-tech-support weekend extravaganza. As always, Jon loved the luge part, getting about 20 runs in.

It was a nice break for all of us, save Photon. Yes, you’d think hanging out on a large plot of land with plenty of forest would be relaxing for her, but she’s a bit of a worrier, and Keski, our hosts’ younger dog, just couldn’t help but constantly expect her to play. So Photon never could really settle, even overnight.

Photon is chased by Keski in the snow
Keski pursues Photon—but this year Keski is bigger and tries to stay close! (Compare to last year!)

Along with a great couple of luge sessions (now with more banking turns!), Paul and Judy invited 11 kids (plus their two, plus ours) over for broomball. In the -25°C evening. It was great, though we had to pull out about halfway into the game when Jon’s wheelchair wheel dropped off!

Jon digs the side of the boards on Paul's backyard rink
Jon digs the side of the boards on Paul’s fully lit backyard rink (but no raising your stick when you get a goal!)

(Entirely my fault: I had detached one wheel for better packing for the ride up; the chair has an easy system for that. But the system is mechanically hydraulic, and since I had stored the wheelchair overnight in the cold car ’til shortly before game time, the catches were too lugubrious to fasten securely. It held—purely mechanically—for 30 minutes without a problem, but as we started getting cockier, and spun into the corner to intercept a wayward pass, we pushed the join too much.)

So Jon was effectively benched for the rest of the game. Mind you, first into the warm clubhouse meant benefits: Jon’s first-ever Wagon Wheel (or here) treat was awaiting, and he stuffed it down happily!)

Thanks Paul and Judy and Jamie and Willa, and yes, Keski too!

Imagine Lincoln’s Surprise

Thoughts & Musings

the Obama family at the Lincoln memorial on Tuesday, Jan. 14
The Obama family visits a confident Abe on Tuesday (Gerald Herbert/Reuters)

Peter I had a laugh at the photos of Obama when he was speaking at the pre-inaugural concert at the Lincoln Memorial yesterday: it looks more than a tad surprised, unlike just a few days before when he visited with his family.

Barrack Obama and Michelle in front of the Lincoln memorial on Sunday Jan 18
But by Sunday, Abe seems kinda surprised. (Jason Reed/Reuters)

What happened? What did he say? Why the sudden split between the Illinois boys? Lighting of the sculpture. This is a known effect. From one of our art books:

The “startled statue” is an accidental effect of light and shadow. The sculptor of the Lincoln Memorial, Daniel Chester French, was so concerned about the potential of light to alter Lincoln’s expression that he sent the commission responsible for the memorial a photo showing: (A) how it should be lit, and (B) how it should under no circumstances be lit.

Lincoln statue lit from above, showing confidence and below, showing surprise

…In correct lighting, eyebrows [give the] impression of lowered, thoughtful brows. Incorrect lighting from below cast shadows…which appear like raised, arched eyebrows;…Eyelids repeat [the] pattern…[making the] upper lid appear enormously high above iris;

The Artist’s Complete Guide to Facial Expression, pg. 266
Gary Faigin

This isn’t the first time the instructions have been ignored, Bush Sr. and Quayle were at a pre-inaugural ceremony and the same thing was done.

Uh, guys? The artist usually has a decent idea about what he’s talking about…Oh, well, it’s an amusing lesson in how easy it is to draw a cartoon.

Doggelgänger

Cool Stuff, Photon

Laura The other day—thanks to dogpark-friend Ingrid—we watched a DVD of an HBO TV movie a few years old called Something the Lord Made. Despite the cringe-inducing title, it’s the fascinating (nonreligious) story of the relationship between Dr. Alfred Blalock, the doctor who helped develop a revolutionary surgical cure for “blue babies”, and Vivien Thomas, his black surgical assistant. Thomas—a carpenter’s assistant with only a high-school education—started working for Blalock in Nashville as a labratory assistant during the Depression. His intelligence and abilities were so manifest that before long he was performing delicate surgeries on animals and aiding Blalock in innumerable ways. Blalock considered Thomas so indispensable to his work that he refused to take up the post as head surgeon at Johns Hopkins unless Thomas came along as well. When Blalock performed the groundbreaking pulmonary bypass surgeries that now bear his name, he insisted Thomas stand on a bench just behind his shoulder so he could whisper guidance and advice on how to proceed. Due to his surgical chops Thomas also trained many (later well-known) surgeons over the years.

Due to the prevalent racism of the time (as well as denegration of non-doctors), Thomas didn’t receive recognition for his pioneering work until the 1960s. Eventually he was recognized by being elevated to the medical faculty with the title of “Instructor of Surgery”. He also received an honourary doctorate and a portrait in the main foyer (which was usually the privilege of medical bigwigs.)

The movie is well-worth seeing, and the cast of Alan Rickman and Mos Def sure doesn’t hurt!

Since it was such an interesting story, we looked at the DVD’s special features, one of which was a slideshow of historical photos of the story’s participants. One of these was a dog named Anna, who was the first being to have the pulmonary bypass surgery performed on her and survive. She ended up living a long and happy life as a beloved pet in the hospital. Anna even got a portrait as well. What took us aback was Anna’s resemblance to someone we know:

Anna and Photon
A painting of Anna at left; Photon at right. Right down to the ears!
Painting from the Alan Mason Chesney Medical Archives of The Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions

More toothy fun…

Family Life

Laura …NOT! Over the holidays I managed to crack an upper back molar, eventually shedding a large chunk of filling and tooth. (At least it didn’t hurt, and no I was not eating anything hard at the time.)

I got the thing patched up at the dentist this morning, and he informed me that a filling had fallen out of a lower back molar on the other side and needs re-filling, and the premolar two teeth in front of that has a deep crack and needs to be repaired.

Geez Louise, did I own a candy store in a previous life or something? Apparently the dental gods are not very happy with me!

The Winner of the “Short & Sweet” Film Challenge

Cool Stuff


Photograph of Jesus by Laurie Hill in association with the Getty Images Short & Sweet Film Challenge from Hulton Archive on Vimeo.

Peter Getty Images, one of the big stock photo houses, had a contest for up-and-coming filmmakers to produce a short film using images from their libraries. The winner Photograph of Jesus, a short documentary about some of the odd requests that Getty’s Hulton archive gets is great fun.

It certainly rings a bell about a select few of the clients I’ve had over the past 20 years, especially in the world of freelance illustration. But no tales out of school, I’m afraid. 🙂

Wii Music

Family Life, Jon

Laura One of Jon’s favourite Christmas presents (thanks Grandma and Grandpa!) is Wii Music, a music game for the Wii console.

We weren’t sure how he was going to take to it, because we had no idea what level it would be at. Another popular music game that we tried once, Guitar Hero, is difficult for Jon—it requires very precise rhythms and accuracy in mashing buttons on a fake guitar. (Though he enjoyed the game’s music. Do we have a nascent heavy-metal fan in our household?)

In Wii Music, you basically mime an instrument using your Wii remote—guitar, piano, violin, tympani, or a myriad of other instruments—which creates music. Your rhythm and smooth (or not) motions determine how tunefully the music comes out. In some sections of the game you can choose your instruments and lay down separate tracks (percussion, harmony, melody lines) and combine them together to make a complete performance. Well-played tracks come together as a tuneful piece; badly-played tracks, well, don’t.

Since we initially knew very little about the game we read a few reviews in the gaming press, which were mainly negative. However, as it turned out, this didn’t matter much. A lot of Wii Music is not really “game-focused”, i.e. you don’t win points or beat other people by playing well. You mainly get personal satisfaction for having played well (you can save your favourite performances as videos, so you can watch your Mii avatar sawing or pounding away. This tickles Jon no end, and he’s already saved dozens of performances of himself playing songs in various instrumental permutations. Wii Music is probably closer to Play-Doh or Lego in that it leans more towards creative exploration. That’s a concept that works for us!