Hillary Clinton - Fall Back

On the cuteness of nephews

For a person who's conversational skills consist mostly of randomly listing modes of transportation ("Bike. Car. Pwane. Pwane. Pwane...") and repeating the word "hi!" I find young Roan Grace Morgan Millar to be some of the best company I could ever imagine.

In fact, I love the youngster so much it makes me wonder how one's heart could possibly stand fatherhood. I guess the sleepless nights and mountains of shitty diapers paint a more balanced picture...

Even still, it's perplexing.

He has, of course, strengthened his cuteness case by being almost entirely tantrum free thus far in Europe. Although he did throw a mini-tantrum this morning because he didn't want me to leave for work. He just hugged me and said "no" anytime I tried to put him down. And when I finally could put off work no longer, he started to cry.

Did the ensuing wailing make me find him less cute? Not by a long shot. Those tears were mirrored by my own internal tears of joy at being, even if just for 15 sweet minutes, the favourite.

All Millar, no filler

The rest of the family is here. My favorite, is my nephew Roan. In fact he's everybody's favorite so no feelings were hurt in the making of this designation. My day off yesterdya was pretty hectic, to-ing and fro-ing and cleaning and drinking, but now we're in business. Looking forward to some good good weekend times and the slow and steady build to wednesday's departure for Rome.

For now I'm just going to soak up family time, and as chaotic as it all is, I'll just try and keep relaxed, and keep the bride relaxed...

Muto - animation by BLU

This is the awesome. Stop-motion street art animation all over the place.


MUTO a wall-painted animation by BLU from blu on Vimeo.

Family comes

My sister and her boyfriend Jay arrived on Sunday. The awesome times have just been coming fast and furious. I thought there would be more adjustment time or more of a shock adapting to seeing my sister over here. But in fact it's been so easy and comfortable it's like they live up the road, instead of a 9 hour flight away. There have been plenty of laughs and drinks and games of Dutch Blitz, just like it should be.

Tomorrow arrives the rest of the clan. I'm loving it already, but I can't say all the external stimulation and excitement really helps my productivity or focus.

As if that matters..

Platypus smells

The platypus is one crazy fucked-up animal. It's a game-set-match argument against creationism and intelligent design. But it gets cooler.

Turns out scientists at Washington University in St. Louis sequenced the genes and found a combo of reptile and mammalian features. Obviously, that's how you get a furry, warm-blooded, egg laying, adorable abomination of nature.

While they didn't explain how the fuck a mammal-reptile hybrid gets a duck beak they did discover something else you didn't know:

"the platypus has [an awesome nasal receptors] which suggests that their sense of smell is important while foraging underwater."

Just think about it.

Phunk Studios

Here's a great little feature on Phunk Studios, some rad Singaporean designers.

In the interests of full disclosure: I wrote aforementioned 'great little feature', and both Chiara and I wear the fresh Levi's/Phunk collab tee's often. They're so dope we'd be fools not to (thanks Filip!)

I particularly like how the tee makes my head match my body so perfectly. Good clothing does that.

No New Enemies

Saw the No New Enemies show at Le Botanique last night and it was a truly jaw dropping, eye-popping, awe-inspiring collection of art. Street artists doing gallery art. Not a new thing, but an awesome one.



The London Police, Flying Fortress, Jermey Fish, Shepherd Fairey, Microbo and a bunch of people who I didn't know, doing stuff I loved. The free beer was far from the coolest part. I missed the cool live installationing and the artists, but I was still clamhappy to soak it up.

Get your info here.

Business Shorts

I saw my first and only pair of 'Business shorts' or 'suit shorts' in Antwerp last weekend. This trend NEEDS to catch on. NOt just for the sake of climate change but also because I need to liberate my legs from their office trousers. OK, so my office trousers are usually just jeans, but if that's true (and it is) then why can't I rock shorts? Girls have great business shorts and skirts options.

What's with the stigma against the legs of man? Unfair! I cry.

And I'm not talking runners shorts, I'm talking sensible, long shorts, cut for the dapper man about the office. I'm talking about shorts for me!

Cerveau disponible

I saw this wheatpasted poster while on break from French class as I was on my way to get some frites. I like all of the things in the last sentence. Though the prospect of French class is alot less appealing on these warm & sunny spring days. I'd prefer to make my cerveau disponible for patio beers, grass between my toes, boombox music, barbecues, homemade lemonade, shorts and sandals and the diligent daily fight against climate change.

Camels love expensive oil

Skyrocketing oil prices are now joined by skyrocketing food prices, both taking winged flight to make daily life just that much less affordable. That is a double dose of bad news; though the weather sure is warm...

The whole issue is exacerbated by the thirst for bio-fuels. A few years ago we all knew bio-fuels would be the way to go. Now we know otherwise. The processing of some types makes them worse polluters than old fashioned fossil fuels, and the demand for these bio-fuels means farmers are switching crops, causing food production to drop off and become more expensive to boot. How's that for ironic poetic justice with globally heartbreaking real-world implications?

But there's an upside to the ongoing geo-political climate change fuck-uppery. As far as unexpected actions-consequences go, finally one Rube Goldberg marble rolls in favour of preservation of the population... of camels.

High oil prices are driving Indian farmers back to the 'ships of the desert'. Their population was in free-fall, but now everybody is all 'Sorry camels. We forgot you were awesome. Help me dismantle this piece of shit tractor.'

Satur-BQ-day

Saturday sunshine, outdoors, art and music. Puttering around done. Skateboard the neighborhood, hot new Atmosphere album in earphones. Pop in at this shop and that for barbecue tools. And stuff.

Check.

Marinade marinating. Yes. Various recipes for various items: mushrooms, chicken and tofu. Salad is at the ready, and remarkably, the sun hasn't left. Countdown is on for family arrival and departure for Roman wedding. t-minus 7 days.

But for now, for this four day weekend, we're gonna soak up the sunshine and relaxation.

And the barbecue. Especially the barbecue.

Bush loves Cheney

Put that in your brain and smoke it. Yeesh.

An unrelated, but completely engrossing and awesome flickr photo stream is here. To cleanse your palate.

Misunderstanding Plastic

I silently seethe when I go to the supermarket (as I plan to do after work today, FYI) and find all kinds of perishable goods wrapped up in plastic: apples, bananas, cucumbers, etc. Mother Nature (Bless her ingenuity) has provided all of these items with protective skin.

'What a fucking waste of packaging,' I mutter to myself self-righteously as I sancitmoniously fondle the produce.

According to the Financial Times seeing plastic at the end point actually means less of it was used in the overall process. Now I know.

According to one example cited in the article, they tried to get rid of the condom wrap on cukes. The cucumber growers argued that as a result more packaging was used: and the cukes suffered from a one-week loss in shelf life and frost damage.

And in fact, the loss of shelf life that results from unpackaging leads to wastage. Especially because you and me don't live so close to the farm. In India, there is more than 50% loss in the supply chain. In the UK it is about 3%.

Apples, the fruit whose packaging gets me hottest under the collar, is a similar story. Helene Roberts, Head of Packaging at Marks & Spencer, found that wrapping apples four per paper tray and covered in plastic resulted in a 27% reduction in packaging.

So here's me not getting hot under the collar when I see packaging anymore. Now I'm gonna get all fired up when I see food being wasted. Especially now that there's a food crisis going on. And I will accept that packaging on the consumer end means a (likely) saving earlier on.

Waste not, want not. Out of sight does not mean out of mind. A broken clock is right twice a day. And a single swallow does not a summer make.