One of a whole host of wonderful Twaggies – an online crowdsourced comic where a group of illustrators take the funny tweets they’ve seen and turn them into a gorgeous piece of artwork.

Wow. That was amazing (not the photograph, obviously, there’s only so much an iPhone 3GS camera can cope with a mix of darkness and very bright lights from a long way away).

I really wasn’t sure what to expect, but Jonathan Coulton is an excellent live performer. He appeared relaxed and jokey with the audience which gave the concert a very informal and friendly atmosphere. He even confidently navigated a minor disaster when the G-string on his guitar broke, with quips about angering the string gods, a quick impromptu Q&A session while the (only?!) guitar was restrung and deliberately singing a comedic off-key version of Skullcrusher Mountain when the new string kept slipping out of tune for the next few minutes.

We also got to hear a number of new songs from the upcoming new album – they sound great and I will definitely buy it when it’s released (I think he said it was due the end of summer).

The support band were also very good – Paul and Storm – I didn’t realise at the time that they were originally part of Da Vinci’s Notebook. Great comedic duo who also provided backing for some of JoCo’s songs later on.

So, if you get a chance to see him in concert, I highly recommend going. Only, sit nearer the front and take a better camera with you.

Writer

Writing 24 (out of 66) scenes complete – structural/continuity revision

Finally made some progress! Impressive as I only had two available writing days. The break definitely did me good. Looking forward to working on a new scene next week.

Reading “Mindfulness In Plain English” by Bhante Henepola Gunaratana

Recommended on a recent Back to Work show. It’s a really good and clearly written introductory book on mindfulness meditation. I downloaded the PDF for free from UrbanDharma.org and imported it into iBooks. I’ve been wanted to reintroduce meditation back into my life, if only in a small way – it has been the push that I’ve needed.

Fighter

Really enjoying training at the moment. In class we’ve been taking a back to basics approach with different strikes which has coincided with my own resolve to work on basics. Lots of opportunities for repetition and getting it right.

I’ve been able to keep home training going a little better this week, but it’s noticeable that I slacked off last week. It’s been hard going.

Geek

My research obsession this week has been about guinea pigs. It’s been triggered by a forum post looking to rehome some and I stopped to seriously consider whether it would be a good idea for me to offer.

I had a rabbit when I was a kid and I like the idea of our sons having a small furry animal in their lives. Piggies do seem a good choice in term of temperament and sociability. Me being me, though, I’m having to research it to the nth degree to make sure that I would be giving any creature we take on the best possible home, plus husband is not terribly keen. Either way, I’m getting a lot of joy from the research process for its own sake!

In other news, going to see Jonathan Coulton‘s concert in Manchester tonight. Squeee!

I’ve just finished reading this post: The need to understand human violence. It discusses the need to study different violent scenarios (e.g. testosterone-fuelled posturing vs predator/prey) to understand the why and the how in order to make the best self-defense decisions. This was the section that stood out for me the most:

I think that women have a particular problem here. It is much harder to study violence against women because it is more clandestine in nature. There is a lot of mobile phone footage or CCTV footage of men attacking other men on the internet –even of the predator/prey variety because men will openly attack each other in daylight in a public place.

Men rarely attack women in a public place in daylight. So shameful is the act that even hardened, violent criminals do it secretively, away from the public gaze. There is no video footage of men attacking women that can be studied. I’m not passing judgement on this – it is just a fact. It would seem very distasteful to watch such a video. However, this means that women have to rely on victim testimonials, witness statements, criminal statistics or ‘experts’ knowledge to find out the nature of the threat to them – how exactly are they likely to be attacked and what, therefore, is the best way to learn to defend yourself?

It’s an excellent point. Reality-based self-defense systems, by their very definition, focus on the threats you are most likely to face in the real world and how to deal with them. But are these geared mainly for the attacks its male students are most likely to face?

It’s not just about which physical techniques a smaller, weaker person might be able to pull off in the event of an attack. It’s the whole scenario set-up and the advice that goes along with it. For example, a de-escalation technique we’re often reminded about is “just hand them your wallet, it’s only stuff.” But I’m guessing it’s much less likely for a woman to find themselves in that situation. If it’s a property-motivated attack, wouldn’t it be easier for the attacker to go for a snatch bag and run? If a weapon is involved, isn’t it a more likely scenario that it’s an attempted rape?

We face more grabs than punches, more likely to feel hands or a knife at our throat than a haymaker to the head. There are far more grey areas – a threat against a woman can often initially seem minor and low key before it escalates. There is a social pressure to always seem polite and not to make a scene and what if my interpretation is wrong? And I’m sure there are many more differences.

So I guess the question is, should we all be spending more time looking at the psychology behind those common attacks? Should we be looking at verbal self-defense as well as the physical? And should martial arts schools spend more time working on the very different common attack scenarios for women if that means 90% of the class won’t ever be in that situation?

I seem to have accidentally created a new family game.

We’d been discussing the origin of words (thank you Alistair from Storywonk) and the kids have been fascinated. Unfortunately, I’m both lazy and usually away from a computer to look up the exact etymology so mostly we do what any writer would do if they are not sure of the facts – invent our own and resolve to look it up later.

Our best so far has been Orangutan (once I’d won the heated argument enthusiastic debate whether they were apes or monkeys). It seemed easy enough. Orang – that’s bound to be from the same root as orange and they are very orange. So that must mean utan is translated as “big hairy thing” in someone’s language, surely?

Later, I looked it up on Wikipedia. To our intense disappointment, we were miles off.

The word “orangutan” comes from the Malay words “orang” (man) and “(h)utan” (forest); hence, “man of the forest”.

I think our version was better.

Yesterday evening, we got the wonderful opportunity to explore Spetchley Park Gardens after closing time with the Worcester Flickr Group.

There’s something rather magical about exploring a place like that once the general public have gone home. The atmosphere is totally different and you can take photographs you’d never be able to get during opening hours. The kids ran around like maniacs playing super-spies and hiding behind bushes, while my husband and I filled up our DSLRs’ memory cards super-fast.

I’d definitely go back again and would highly recommend a trip there to anyone visiting the area. As an extra bonus, with so many photos to process afterwards, I now feel a lot more confident using Aperture and don’t feel as reliant on the preset adjustments any more.

I’ve included a slideshow of the photographs I took below for those who are interested:

No, really.

When we were planning the house move, it was very exciting. We were going to have so much extra space. We would have big sheds and wouldn’t need to use the garage to store stuff anymore. It was going to be my space. I hadn’t ironed out all the details, but at the very least I was going to get a punch bag in there, maybe rescue my old exercise bike from my mother’s house…

Fast forward to now. The removal van is long gone. It turns out that the sheds weren’t quite big enough. Plus the move went a bit over budget so I can’t really justify spending money on non-essentials. It’s not like I can’t make do and be more creative with the equipment and space that I’ve got.

But every time I go out there (usually to rummage in the freezer for dinner), I start plotting again.

One day, I’m going to clear out that space. That picture above? That’s just the before photo.

This weekend, we took our caravan up to Kingsbury Water Park – our favourite campsite situated on the edges of a beautiful country park with lakes, visitor’s centre and (to the kids’ delight) a narrow gauge railway that takes in a large circuit of the park.

We took a couple of trips out, but the highlight of the trip for me was the luxury of reading. The weather was glorious, easily the best we’ve seen here this year, so the kids were out playing for most of the day, leaving us back at the caravan with books and beer – within the space of three days I’d read two books and made good headway on a third. More reading than I managed for the whole of last month!

Oh, and a fair few Angry Birds levels were completed too. Can’t imagine how that happened.

Writer

Writing 23 (out of 66) scenes complete – structural/continuity revision

No progress as the kids are off for the half term holidays.

Reading “House Rules” by Jodi Picoult

I few years back, I went through a phase of reading everything Jodi Picoult had ever written and overdosed on them somewhat. I do love her books, particularly her characterisation but find the endings rather hurried (as if she thinks “crap, I’ve got to wrap this up in just two chapters” and panics) and they got a bit samey after a while.

So, I’ve picked this one up from the library with some trepidation but I have to say I’m enjoying the early chapters and already feel fiercely protective of the main characters.

Fighter

I’ve missed a couple of days exercise due to half term, but have tried to stay generally active instead. I did make training this week, which I’m pleased about. Life got in the way a lot in May and my attendance had been a little shabby as a result.

Kettlebell routines are going well. Even after only a couple of weeks on the beginner routines, I’m already seeing strength gain and able to increase reps. Unfortunately, muscle soreness has also increased!

Starting to practise 100 straight punches a day in the mirror to try and get form right. Ideally, I’d like to get some pads or a punch bag (and clear out the garage to keep it in) for training at home, but as I am still on an unnecessary spending freeze that will have to wait for a while.

Geek

I’ve picked up Sims Medieval again. It’s still not going to light the world on fire, but as a casual game it’s quite fun when you get further into it.

I’ve reset Plants vs Zombies on the iPad. It’s such a great game even on repeat plays.

Mostly, though, I’m killing time on casual games until Skyrim and Mass Effect 3 are released. It’s going to be a long wait.

Because it’s been a while since I inflicted a Minecraft video on you.