[Emailed to Lego on 5/2/2012 since they have a charlimit on their comment form]
Hey guys,
I’m a woman who has been a Lego fan since I was a little girl. I loved cars, and I loved hotel rooms, and I made the coolest spaceships and space stations from the random Lego sets my parents bought me. My style was “Airstream meets 2001: A Space Odyssey, plus Holiday Inn” (because, c’mon, every space cruiser needs a pool!). It was super fun building vehicles for imaginary adventures. Luckily, I still create stuff as an adult even though they aren’t space Winnebagos.
I gotta say though… I have yet to see one girl represented in your “Cool Creations” shout-out spread where you feature works by kids.
Granted, I may have overlooked some issues, but this kind of layout is typical.
And yet, your advertisements for your Legolands have a pretty fair split between the sexes.
What gives? It’s 2012 already, and we should be beyond this gender-skewed thing.
I’m guessing it’s one of two things. Either you’ve got a photo editor who favors boys’ creations, or you’re just not getting enough girls to submit the stuff they’ve made. If it’s the latter… that’s kind of disturbing, and I’m perplexed why you haven’t addressed it.
I love what your company represents–creativity, architecture, engineering, “building worlds” all that. But as I flipped through my last issue, I did notice it’s emphasis on superheros and cartoon drama. While that’s necessarily not a bad thing, you’ve created the heros as males, and since the viewer is supposed to identify with the protagonist, you might be turning off girls who “can’t see themselves” in that situation.
Don’t you think girls should be welcomed into fields of engineering and creating? It might be a bigger question that you as a company can simply answer and solve, but I’d really like to hear your thoughts on these issues.
Sniffles is basically an “albino” in the dragon community. Through a strange combination of recessive genes, he doesn’t breathe fire, he breathes frost, which means he chills whatever he breathes on. While he later learned that this was useful at house parties without enough fridge space for all the beer, when he was growing up he had to deal with constant ridicule, just like deer Rudolph. Talk about awkward! Needless to say, he quickly learned not to laugh in the face of people telling a joke (frostbite is super uncool). And another uncool side effect for his “power” is that he constantly has a runny nose. Think about it–if you breathe frost you’re going to get sniffly. Sniffles has gotten used to is, and so his trusty sidekick is A Box of Tissues. So here you have Sniffles and his trusty sidekick, A Box of Tissues. Enjoy your time with these guys, and chill all the things! Download him now!
So, yeah, this “chef” with a most-unhealthy TV cooking show, Paula Deen, who has not only has kept her diabetes diagnosis secret for 3 years, she endorses Novo Nordisk, a drug company that services one of the most profitable diseases to “treat” (yep: diabetes). First off, I’ve got family in the South, and I can appreciate the need of people with a common, turbulent past, to carry on those traditions that inspire future generations to persevere despite hardship. People of Jewish faith do this, as do Christians, among others.
But, this particular “southern traditional diet” also happens to be very high in calories, and taking in more calories than you need means you store it as fat, and that throws your system off whack, which is a precursor to diabetes. This high-caloric diet was totally necessary when humans had to put in hours of hard labor just to take care of basic physical needs. A big part of the South’s economic value related to agriculture, and that, in the time, it meant physical labor was required.
Our physical energy requirements have been evolving over time
Since then we’ve evolved beyond the human labor requirement just to survive, via complex machinery and systems that can basically run themselves. It started with Eli Whitney’s cotton gin that extracted useful bits from prickly bits of the cotton plant, then Watt’s steam engine that increased efficiency just by putting in a separate condenser to an already existing steam machine…which meant machines could be powered without human or animal direct energy. Hooray!
Now that humans don’t need to spend all their time working on survival we can now do things that are more intellectually rewarding: creating art, building alternative energy sources, constructing innovate buildings, making systems more efficient… you get it. Instead of just maintaining “now” we can relax and start thinking about and creating what’s next.
A personal story about moving towards a new system
When I was younger, I naturally inherited my parent’s values about food and nutrition. We were financially stable enough where food access wasn’t a problem, but my parents may have inherited some “scarcity” mentalities from their parents that were likely passed on unintentionally (their parents had to deal with the realities of the Great Depression). I wasn’t that into sports or outdoor activities, and preferred using computers to play and build computer games, build and use servers, that kind of thing–very “cerebral,” so I didn’t need very much food. I was a very picky eater, and remember only being able to eat meat if it was drenched in some sort of sauce. Chicken needed a Bearnaise / Hollandaise sauce, hamburgers were required to have cheese and to be absolutely drenched in ketchup (and if they came with a toy, even better!), etc.
In college, with free will to schedule my day and my eating habits, I made new friends who turned me onto environmental sustainability issues, and the realities of how factory farming and government subsidies played a part in easy, cheap accessibility to animal meat for food.
I’ve always loved animals–even wanting to be a vet when I grew up–and when I learned how hamburgers were made, it was basically the equivalent of watching Soylent Green [spoiler]. and I went vegetarian, then vegan, then back to vegetarian because I paid attention to what my body was asking for.
[Sidenote: The vegan-to-vegetarian story is actually kind of amusing: I was in the south of France for a student exchange program, and was struggling to apply my dietary choices to living abroad. I happened to find the local "Whole Foods" within a small local store that sold natural, organic, sustainable goods, and popped in for lunch. In French, I asked what vegan options were available. The proprietress then came all the way around the counter to face me in person and then explained to me that since I was living in the south of France, I should appreciate the south of France, in so many words, while pointing at wedges of cheese that were made by her friends who lived close to the town. She told me to stay here and she would explain. I was caught off-guard, but interested, so I waited while she hurried off behind the counter. She then came back around with a plate full of cheese samples, and while I tasted them, she told me about the cows, what they ate, who their owners were, and how cheese is aged. Granted, she was highly technical, but she made her point. The cheese was deLICIOUS. I could mentally see a happy cow eating clover while her milk was made into cheese by her owner. And all the love put into the process from cow to now. So... yeah, I very much appreciate and enjoy cheese these days.]
I now grow herbs and have learned the delicate survival needs of plants, and appreciate their natural cycles. I share a local Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) membership and have been learning more intensely about seasonal vegetables and what makes them seasonal. I got a sprout kit for Christmas and it’s like getting a chemistry set for Christmas (which I seem to remember getting quite regularly): lots of instant gratification and application of the scientific method. And, real greens in Winter! Woo-hoo!
The CSA I’m a part of [Tomato Mountain] is very “boutique-y” in some regards. It’s run by someone who has farming in his blood, and who wants to see his traditions continue. Obviously they know tomatoes, but for me, I enjoy the newsletters that talk about how weather patterns affect plants, and why (yeah, that’s the nerd part of me). Also, it becomes Iron Chef / Chopped IRL: What do I do with obscure oriental radishes that are in season today?
Anyway, my personal choices have worked out pretty well for me, but everyone has their own rhythm of healthfulness and they’ve got to figure it out themselves. All of these things have pulled me back into the loop of real human sustainability potential here on this planet.
It’s totally possible and easier that you might believe now to live sustainably. And this is coming from someone who makes electronic music and basically lives on the internet, so that should tell you something. This is not about preaching that there is a “right”way to live, it’s about syncing up to an individual daily lifestyle, based on what feels right and what does not.
I’ve noticed that people who are faced with an illness start to question their daily choices when something starts going wrong with their physical bodies. Diet is an easy way to approach non-well-being, because we all need food and energy to keep going through our days on our planet. And when you start to pay attention to what your body really needs and by relying on instinct and not news reports on antioxidants, protein or a similar buzzword, you will start to learn a language with yourself on a very personal level.
I’m being general on purpose here, but when you step back and listen to your body’s subliminal cues and rely less on society’s expectations, you will find the natural rhythm of what makes you work the best while you’re here.
Like Ms. Sherman, my creative process involves being alone, thinking, devising, mentally-sketching, tweaking, re-tweaking, re-thinking; sharing for feedback, and then re-tweaking some more. It’s emblematic of the contemporary, technology-enabled artist, in a way. Creative types have so many resources available: so many mediums to muck around in, so many visual sandboxes (like Adobe CSx–Photoshop, Illustrator, Premier); audio playgrounds (like Reaktor, Ableton, FL Studio) and platforms for interdisciplinary / cross-medium work (like Max/MSP, etc).
…
When I applied to art colleges, I was so disheartened by the rampant insistence that I choose a medium. I didn’t like the feeling of being forced to create within an established “language” (medium) that could be critically evaluated (by critics who specialized in media). Then I found California Institute of the Arts, was accepted, and played and played and played and finally found my voice. A voice that was me, and not limited to choice of media, but one that used media to express the ideas I wanted to introduce to the world.
And that, I feel, is true contemporary artistry. Knowing that the clay of the world is yours to play with and yours to enjoy.
My adorable, lovable, cuddly, relentlessly independent, intelligent fur-baby left this physical operating system to upgrade to to cloud computing yesterday.
She was facing a very uncomfortable future that I couldn’t bear to put her through, and I miss her terribly already.
She migrated peacefully, surrounded by loved ones, favorite toys, her adored bed and the blue comforter that she always insisted on pulling off my bed to sleep on when I wasn’t around.
In blurringly reverse order: she got to systematically olfactory-inventory (“categorize by sniffing”) most of Logan Square, and even bookmark interesting bits (by peeing on said interesting bits); innovatively coerce treats from her grandma; enjoy exclusive innovative house / techno after-parties and impromptu electronic music jam sessions; play tug-of-war with and receive beef jerky from many talented electronic musicians who passed through my existence; trot around Wicker Park and sniff up said park; run away in Pilsen and get rescued; run away in the suburbs and get rescued; run away in a suburban forest preserve and get wrestled to the ground and rescued; learned how to walk on leash like a lady; learned to pee in the snow; and realized that even if she destroys two couches she will still be loved.
From a puppy in a shelter cage with an uncertain chance of adoption, she ended up with 10 years of unexpected amazing dog fun-ness.
She touched the hearts of many humans, from casual acquaintances, dear friends, random people on the street, and certainly the amazing doctors and nurses who treated her over the years, and who lovingly referred to her on visits as “sweetheart” or “gorgeous.”
She’s in a much better place now than the sudden, extremely uncomfortable one she found herself very recently.
So, cheers to Ms. Madeline McLean Knight. I love you, and thank you for all you’ve taught me and the unconditional love you’ve given and returned.
Greeting cards are in full circulation during the holiday season, and I had been thinking a while about something that would be geeky and retro, so I went searching for old-school punch cards.
A punched card (also known by various synonyms) is a piece of stiff paper that contains digital information represented by the presence or absence of holes in predefined positions. Now almost an obsolete recording medium, punched cards were widely used throughout the 19th century for controlling textile looms and in the late 19th and early 20th century for operating fairground organs and related instruments. They were used through the 20th century in unit record machines for input, processing, and data storage. Early digital computers used punched cards, often prepared using keypunch machines, as the primary medium for input of both computer programs and data. -wikipedia
The CSA I’m a part of [
