Archive for June 2008
On Thursday we looked at the five day weather forecast and Saturday was going to be sunny intervals with no rain whilst Friday was going to be overcast. Let’s go on Saturday, we decided. Well, here it is and we sit here on Saturday looking out of the window at the pouring rain having had a lovely sunny day yesterday wondering how it is the Metereological Office staff keep their jobs and why weather reports are not listed under Fantasy & Fiction. Best guess is that they have a pack of cards with weather symbols on and just flick a few down for the coming five days and then when each day arrives they do what we all do and look out the window first thing in the morning. Then they quickly change today’s weather forecast to whatever looks most likely for the day. When I was twelve years old our geography teacher explained cold fronts, weather patterns, wind speeds and then exclaimed that all this shows why weather reporting is so accurate. He was most upset at the howl of laughter that went up from thirty young kids yet all these years later we still go by these predictions that are so often wrong … must be to do with the wrong type of leaves or something 
Much has been made of the great progress made by mankind. There we were banging our flints together to get a tiny spark to light a fire and then within a short time, geologically speaking, we’re setting up the barbecue and smoking out the neighbours! But has it all really been progress? You know, it wasn’t so long ago you’d go into the nice warm bank to draw your money out while now you stand outside in the rain. Once upon a time you had a nice check-in person at the airport to sort everything out and now, unless you want to queue forever, you check yourself in. Once upon a time at the supermarket your goods were scanned and totalled up for you but now you use the so-called “fast lane” and scan and pack your own groceries etc rather than queue at the checkout. Even the Inland Revenue have got in on the act and many self-employed business people now calculate their own tax.
At Artists UK, rather than try to buck the trend, we have decided to offer a similar new service in which we invite our customers to paint a picture, arrange their own printing of it, mount it, frame it and dispatch it to themselves (after they have paid us, of course). Looking at all the progress that has been made by supermarkets, banks, airports and the Inland Revenue we feel sure that this new scheme will be a surefire hit
“Hi, my name is Hiro Nakamura and I have a BIG problem. It is my birthday soon and my American friends want to know how many candles for my cake. It might not sound difficult but I can bend space and time. Space is no problem. I just move around to different places. But when I bend time it stops for everyone else but me or I go back in time six months and end up six months older when I get back to where I was. I’ve been doing this for many years now so I don’t know how old I am or even when my birthday really is! I hope someone buys me a calculator for my birthday, then I might be able to figure out how old I actually am and when my birthday is!”
Of course, if you haven’t been watching the incredible series ‘Heroes’ then none of the above will make much sense and we apologise for this but we don’t usually expect people not resident in our solar system to be reading our Blog
American Indian inspired art by Susan Seddon Boulet - click on Athena to go there!