Amplification Through Simplification

I was recommended Understanding Comics by my boss, and truly, it is a good read. It is pretty unusual in actually reading a comic book about comics. But what's more interesting is that the book is really on quite a serious discussion of what comics are about and how they work. It's also quite a treatise on how design in general works, and how the human mind processes it.

I find it quite clever, choosing the medium of comics to present the content of a formal book. As they say, a picture paints a thousand words. But in this case, it helps to greatly summarize what the author is trying to say, without having to go through the linguistic gymnastics in order to precisely explain concepts and their nuances. Anyone who's written documents for others would know how hard that can be, without using images.

I especially liked the suggestion that comics worked through amplification through simplification. Design in general does do something of the sort. By cutting out the noise in the message, the key features left emphasized are the ones that the audience will tend to notice first. Which is why most photographs need to have a very prominent subject matter, so that the correct feature of the photo is presented to the audience.

I have not finished reading the book just yet, but overall, I do think it will be quite an enjoyable read.

Where The Wild Things Are

Once in a while, you get a movie that's pretty heavy...in the emotional sense. Where The Wild Things Are is one of them. Now, I do vaguely remember reading such a tale when I was younger, but I am pretty sure it wasn't presented quite the way this one was.

Now, there are often tales of young kids (usually boys) running off to some great adventure, meeting fantastic creatures and then coming back to reality with unique experiences. Most of the time, however, they take the form of a coming of age story, whereby the protagonist comes back all mature and better for the experience, while the characters in the magical land end up happy and contented. Not so, in this one. In short, it really is more of an end of innocence story. Everything starts off on a high note, then gradually goes south till everyone ends up miserable.

Now, some of my friends do say that I feed and grow fat on misery and despair...they're probably not wrong. This is the sort of story that appeals to me, and I find it to be a refreshing twist on an otherwise common childhood genre. 8/10

Empathy For Cloth

I just realized that I do have a tendency to have empathy for objects, and more often so than I would with people. I have this handkerchief that I owned for quite a while. It's soft and really quite nice to handle. In fact, I handle it so much that it's gone somewhat ragged.

That's normal enough wear and tear, of course. I can no longer bear to use it now, however, since every new tear in it makes me feel as if an old friend's being hurt. And of course, I'd rather that my friends didn't get hurt. So basically, it's in retirement now.

The thing is, on further analysis, I find that that's also why I would not use certain things, because their inherent beauty or some other positive attribute of them would wear out...and I'd feel their loss. It is a strange thing, and I am not sure why that is so, but that's basically how my brain works I guess.

On Lock Picking

I got my lockpick set today, and of course the first thing I did was try it on some locks I had lying around from my trip last year. Now, lockpicking was something I've intended to do for a rather long time, but I've never managed to get my grubby hands on a set before.

Naysayers like to point out that Hollywood movies show people picking locks as if they're using keys, opening locks mighty swiftly using a simple pick set. Obviously, such techniques are highly unlikely when one's faced with a high security lock. But I only had my cheap travel locks at hand, so I tried my hand at those. Being a complete newcomer to the lockpicking business, I was shocked and frankly quite alarmed that I could open those locks within around 5-10 seconds of picking them. Clearly, cheap locks aren't just vulnerable to the lock cutters of thieves: they're also easy pickings.

The next step would be for me to try out higher end padlocks, to see if they're as easy to bypass. I expect them to be more of a challenge seeing as how budget padlocks tend to have a rather limited number of pins and the higher end stuff just makes it that much more difficult given their higher level of sophistication and increased complexity in their mechanisms. As someone who's crazy about figuring out systems, this is something that should occupy me for awhile.

Making A Stand

I always believe that we should make a stand for what we believe in, even if sometimes the consequences for doing so can be quite...unhealthy. Today, I got a chance to prove myself, when my family and I were at a food court. After waiting for a long time, there was a table that was clearing up. A couple was sitting at the far edge and we needed another seat to allow everyone to sit together.

I looked over and noticed that one of the seats was taken up by a pair of bags. Knowing what this normally meant, I asked the nice fella if the seat was taken. His response was that no, but he had to put his bags there. Things went south pretty rapidly when I asked him if he could move them. Clearly, this was a fella who was unwilling to give up the seat taken by his bags, and was perfectly willing to be nasty about it. It's common enough that the blow by blow account can be passed on. I only wish I had enough self control that I didn't have to resort to flipping him the finger, which I do feel to be a rather unintelligent way to present a point in an argument.

The point is that I'm pretty sure he thought he was in the right for hogging the seat, and I thought he was wrong about it. Perhaps it was my bad for not asking him nicely enough, perhaps with a few kowtows thrown in (no, sorry...don't do that). Either way, it was a rather vigorous verbal agreement and I was at the limit of my self control. It's been awhile since I managed to let myself slip up like that.

Anyway, the good thing about it is that I managed to stand my ground without completely losing it and ripping his throat out (or something similarly unpleasant) even though I think I was visibly shaking by that point. Ultimately, I hate being shoved around, and I'm sure he feels the same way. Nothing personal. I am, however, proud of the fact that I was willing and able to stand firm even though he was clearly trying to strong arm me into backing down. After action review would suggest that I be less sleep deprived, however, so I don't cut things so close with my self control.

On a related note, I find the physiologic changes quite interesting when the aggression comes on. For one, recognizing the changes and thinking "Calm down" have little to no effect. The heart beats so much faster and harder. The muscles tremble. Everything appears so much brighter than it used to be. I do wonder if I filmed myself getting pissed, would I actually see my pupils dilating? Hmm...