Minimal Update

Since I am way behind in documenting my knitting, I have decided to just minimally update with a few photographs.

Bear 295 - Epiphany




Beat 296 - Spring



Bear 297 - Gregor



Bear 298 - Philomena



These are the Bears I have knitted in January, besides Silvester, who was finished on January 1, 2014. around four in the morning.
Mostly I was consumed with Marley and her little brother Lorenzo, two dolls I have developed as my "Jamaican children." Lorenzo's hero is Zinedine Zidane, a former soccer player, and he is still waiting for his own soccer ball.
Marley has just gotten her braids and I am in the process of dressing her. I am having a wonderful time imagining the two siblings' wardrobe and their lives.

Lorenzo and Marley























Because of the intensity of my doll knitting - yes I am still in the throngs of this obsession - my kitchen table was a mess for the last three weeks. And in the middle of it all I had to put potted daffodils. It seems to be spring; winter never really materialized in California, it seems. In the shopping center parking lot the trees are in bloom. I love it, but we need water, and lately I am using a stop watch to take a three minute shower.















That's it for now. More to come as soon as Marley is ready for her official portrait.

P.S. My brain hasn't been standing still while my hands manipulated knitting needles for many hours at a time; I have thought about some of the interesting options this decade provides. Eventually I will have to think more about a few concepts and their influence on our modern lives. For instance - how has "technical snow" changed skiing vacations? And - what will 3D printing add to our life styles, our handicrafts, our economy? Will it bring us more advantages or further do away with precious old skills?

Automated Reasoning

Scientists seem to find it more interesting to collect data about criminal potential than to use their brains for promoting a goodness gene. I imagine, of course, that a goodness gene has been discovered somewhere in this digital mass of probability.

Criminologists are using software to help them find hotspots of aberrant behavior which allows them to zoom in on particular areas. Tom Cruise and "Minority Report" are becoming less fictional as computing capacity increases and more sophisticated formulas are used for automated reasoning. The definitive catch phrase is "automated reasoning."

There is nothing wrong with reasoning I have always been pro reasoning. I don't mind the word "automated" either. Automation has freed mankind of many tedious tasks. But when has reasoning become so tedious that it needs to be automated? I always thought that there is a certain danger in automation because it deals with repetition. Well, I am sure scientists know this too, and have incorporated detective capacities in their algorithms. But what about reinforcing trends? It is all the rage nowadays to reinforce trends. On Twitter, by forcing a thought into its broadest accommodation within the narrowest letter capacity. At the online book or grocery store, by telling the customer what he or she wants to buy next. In television programming, by providing entertainment based on the lowest common denominator.

The digital age changes our culture - medicine, entertainment, shopping, communication, travel, education, every aspect of our lives is affected. Automated reasoning dictates that we must keep up or we will be left behind.

Will we have enough unique self left to step aside occasionally? To open that unfamiliar parcel in the corner of the mind? To search out an unaccounted for tidbit of information that got lost between zeroes and ones? Will I, already handicapped by my age, have enough energy - between computer pass codes and self-parking cars and shrinking income - to perform random acts of kindness?

This brings me to my New Year's resolution. I have to admit that I am addicted to a large daily dose of Internet. And so, one day a month, on the last Sunday of each month, I will do my best to devote my energy to "undo" my own automation of the mind. No iPad. No desktop. No tweeted or posted or emailed data. I hope this will leave me with a new sense of exploration.

And here, for those who want to know what I have knitted lately, here are the finished pieces of the last week.

Bear Number 293 - Silvester, begun December 31 and finished in the early morning hours of January 1, 2014.



Camisole, panties, and boots for Marley, the doll not yet begun.