Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Learn Something Everyday Last Day!







After three whole years Learn Something Everyday says goodbye... today!
For August, their last month they called in some of their favourite artists & illustrators.
Have a look, is totally worth it! :)



Tuesday, August 30, 2011







"Happiness is the longing for repetition."
Milan Kundera

Monday, August 29, 2011

English Test



I took an English test today and I approved! I'm going to be taking a course for the IELTS starting tomorrow (really early in the morning). If you happen to know tips, web pages or anything that can help me to prepare for this test, feel totally free to write me (please, write me!).

Thanks, bye! x

PS. The photo is from a piece of Finn Stone called Bear Necessity. I saw it in the Summer Show of the Apart Gallery in London.

Sunday, August 28, 2011

About MTV and the VMA




I wrote an article about the MTV Video Music Awards for the online page of E! Entertainment Latin America and, for practicing purposes, I made my best to translate it to English, so here it is:


---

Once upon a time, maybe you don't even remember, there was a TV channel called MTV. This strange channel was so edgy and avant-garde that it was exclusively about music. MTV used to mean pop culture. It was a platform for new artists and a window to the fans to be connected with their favorite artists.

Be a musician in the 80's and have your video in MTV was a huge achievement and at the same time a serious commitment to continue creating quality video material. It wasn't only about the music anymore, you also need a jaw-dropping video. MTV definitely killed the radio stars.

The first Video Music Awards was delivered in 1984 and the ceremony took place in the emblematic Radio City Music Hall in NYC. Perhaps you can remember Madonna's iconic Like a Virgin performance, where she descend from a cake dressing like a bride, touched for the very first time, and with a massive MTV logo as a backing.

A lot of other performances that made history also happened in the VMA's stage. Kurt Cobain in 1992 singing the beginning of Rape Me, the only song that the executives of the show had forbidden Nirvana to sing. Michael Jackson in 1995, shinning with an unforgettable performance that mixed his greatest hits and lasted more than 15 minutes. Madonna, again, singing and dancing Vogue with enormous Victorian dresses. The Gallagher brothers exuding hate while performing the lovely Champagne Supernova in 1996. Elton John playing the piano for Guns 'n Roses' November Rain in 1992. The kiss between Madonna, Britney and Christina in 2003. The most polemic, daring and over-priced performances that you can remember, probably happened in the VMA's.

Now, the ones on the top of the charts are different kind of artist, more commercial, more pop (?), the performances doesn't look that amazing anymore, and the polemic is reserved for Lady Gaga's outfits or for when Kanye decides to interrupt someone. But nonetheless, going home with the silver astronaut still is everyone's dream, and also, the ceremony, presentations, outfits and new plastic surgeries always are a good topic of conversation.

This Sunday (today), is the 28th MTV Video Music Awards ceremony in the Nokia Theater in L.A. And among the live performances there is two of this year favorites: Adele and Pitbull. It will be a homage to both Britney Spears and Amy Winehouse's careers. In the favorites list are also: Katy Perry, Cee-Lo Green (if he can beat Justin Bieber, fingers crossed), Foo Fighters and Kanye West.


Léelo en español en la página de E! haciendo click aqui.

Friday, August 26, 2011

Helter Skelter




Probably everyone else knew already that the Helter Skelter is a slide. I didn't. Even thought -I know- is explicit in The Beatles' lyrics:

When I get to the bottom I go back to the top of the slide
Where I stop and I turn and then I go for a ride
'Til I get to the bottom and I see you again...

I discover that when I get to see one in a couple of Summer Festivals in and around London. For those -if there's any at all- who didn't know about this particular kind of slide, here's a picture of a beautiful Helter Skelter in the Secret Garden Party Festival, and some interesting facts about the origin of the helter skelter according to The Phrase Finder:


Helter-skelter has been in common use in England for the past 400 years and has been known in the USA since the 1820s.

Neither helter nor skelter had any meaning in themselves. Like many word pairs of this sort (called rhyming reduplications), they only exist as part of the pair - although skelter was used alone later, but only as a shortened form of helter-skelter.

Another reduplication with a similar meaning is pell-mell (a confused throng or, in disordered haste). This originated around the same time - the first recorded use dates from 1579. Others which came later, but which are in shouting distance in terms of meaning, are harum-scarum (reckless rowdiness) and hurly-burly (commotion and confusion).



Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Tic toc







A week ago I was on my way to Heathrow.

I don't know what else to say, except:
Let's dance put on your red shoes and dance the blues!




Monday, August 22, 2011

Music Monday: I wish that I could see you soon





...but there's no way to say and there is nothing I can do.



Is there something called "travel cold"? The typical cold you get whenever you return from holidays. By now it must be a thing already. A certified disease that you can quote from Wikipedia and let you skip at least a day of work (not my case, cause at the moment I'm not working in an office, but still).

This Herman Dune's song, that my friend Carola sent me, it's been keeping me in a nice state of quiet happiness. It sounds happy, but deep down, when you finish listening to it you're a little bit sad, or at least nostalgic. Anyway is a nice song, and it also reminds me of Paul Simon (that's when I remember my holidays and start to cough again, damn travel cold!).

This song was also used for the brand Estrella Damm as the Summer song in Spain, the video is a whole other story with a BIG budget, but also really really good, you can see it here.

Enjoy this chilli Monday (holiday in Argentina) with this happy-sad-winter-summer song.

Saturday, August 20, 2011

Sunday Morning Mix



Turning points in the evolution of love are not always the result of dramatic events; they often stem from something that at first seems completely inconsequential.
—Milan Kundera

- I've just read this phrase in the amazing Flickr page of Eduardo. Please be sure to have a look to all the stages of his photographic work.
- The fucking flower (Oil on Linen. 150 x 110 cm.) belongs to the most recent work of the Spanish artist Lino Lago.
- Finally while I was writing this post, started to sound Down in Mexico by The Coasters.




There you go, a little mix of info for this 4 degrees Sunday morning-ish.
I reckon that I'm going back to the regular cold Sunday activities: reading in bed + fall asleep. Maybe I'll be around here later x

Breakfast




Breakfast is without a doubt my favourite meal. Today, accompanying the wonderful crumpets with butter and Marmite (I brought with me a lot of typical English food to help me cope with the return to my "real" life) and my regular Earl Grey tea, I ate a 3 Minute Egg. It's been at least a decade since I ate my last boiled egg, I guess simply because I didn't have a cup to put it on, because otherwise is as delicious as I remembered it!

When was the last time you ate a 3' egg?


Friday, August 19, 2011

West Country Tour (III): Lyme Regis












So, the Jurassic Coast of the UK is like a bunch of little lovely towns, one next to the other, one more beautiful than the other, with Lyme Regis, on West Dorset, being one of the nicest. Maybe is because is on a hill and so the Sea is kind of omnipresent, or because the beach is (or at least seems) warmer, or because of the contrast between the amazingly green garden on top and the salty sandy beach (I think that's pretty common in the UK, but for me it's a wonderful surprising sight). Probably because all of the above.  

We left Sidmouth at noon and in the way to Lyme Regis pass a Donkey Sanctuary (yes, we drove into the Donkey Sanctuary, for 10 minutes, but come on... it's a Donkey Sanctuary!) and another town named Beer (also yes), and arrived just in time for lunch. We share a typical English salad which name I'm just incapable of learning: Ploughman's lunch (I juggle with Google to came up with that) and some other salad made with crab. The day was sunny and at the beach they were celebrating the Lifeboat Week, so there was a lot of people, music, boats, seagulls, fudge. It was perfect.  

Some other interesting facts about Lyme Regis, according to Wiki, are: the town lies in Lyme Bay, on the English Channel coast at the Dorset-Devon border. It is nicknamed "The Pearl of Dorset." The harbour wall, "The Cobb", features in Jane Austen's novel Persuasion. And last but not least, the town was home to Admiral Sir George Somers, its one time mayor and parliamentarian, who founded the Somers Isles, better known as Bermuda.

World Photography Day




"World Photography Day originates from the invention of the Daguerreotype, a photographic processes developed by Louis Daguerre. On January 9, 1839, the French Academy of Sciences announced the Daguerreotype process. A few months later, on August 19, 1839, the French government announced the invention as a gift "free to the world"."

Flickr and The Guardian and I guess a lot of other sites are making groups to share the photos you take today and/or during the weekend... so, take a photo, take, take, take a photo! :)

My photo is part of the West Country Tour that I recently made. I promise I'll keep writing about starting today. It's the perfect Mr. Whippy and was made and eaten in Durdle Door and is illustrating this post because it was the first thing that came into my mind when I read the world gift. A Mr. Whippy, is also a gift to the world. A delicious one. No doubt about it.

Thursday, August 18, 2011

Jet-lag




Up: Seagull in the Southbank, London.
Middle: Installation in Playgroup Festival.
Down: Earl Grey Tea.


I've always thought that the jet-lag was some kind of fancy lie. I guess I have never stayed enough time living in a country 5 hours ahead of my own to be able to fully experiment it on my return... until now.

This morning I woke up at 8:18 (London time), made myself sleep a couple of hours, to wake up at 10-ish without an iota of sleep in my eyes. So, with a little bit of jet-lag and another bit of denial I cooked breakfast: Lady Grey tea, toasts with butter and Marmite and I'm listening to Lauren Laverne in BBC 6 Music. I mean... what am I supposed to do?!

In terms of motion graphics animation this would be an Easy-Out/Easy-In, and maybe that's what everything is all about. Body and mind asking for a little time to re-adapt. Maybe not. But I'll try to make the best of this moment when I get to live 5 hours in the future... this is so far my most productive morning in a lot of time, only because my body is convinced that is 12:41 pm and not 7:41 am.

Cheers for as long as it lasts!

X


Saturday, August 13, 2011

Spirals


Soho, Londres. July, 2011.

There are days where everything seems to fit in a structured silent symphony that you're not able to hear, but you feel somehow is playing at the distance.

The rush, the Milky Way, the absolute beauty of Maths and their mysteries, spirals, Japanese postcards, fight fire with gasoline (or petrol, for that matter), forgotten bottles of wine, old realizations that appear new, and new determinations that have the force of thousands of thoughts revolving around my head. Energy, you know, it's just a matter of transform it.

I'm out now. The Sun awaits.



*This photo is now in my Etsy Shop.


Friday, August 12, 2011

Today



I've been SO busy in these last days of my holiday that I hadn't have time to blog. A shame, I know, but also good news for the future because I have the most amazing stories to tell and photos to share.

For now, a nice quote from Babatunde Olatunji, a Nigerian artist, I found in the Public Library returning from Brighton (oh Brighton) the day before yesterday. The photo is a little blurry, so is my present, but that's life, no? Some times funny peculiar, but other times simply brilliant... so lets enjoy the present as it is.

I'm out to live today's gift right now! x




Monday, August 1, 2011

West Country Tour (II): Sidmouth












Once again, accordng to our friend Wiki, Sidmouth is a small town is a small town on the English Channel coast in Devon, South West England. The town lies at the mouth of the River Sid in the East Devon district, 15 miles (24 km) south east of Exeter.

Sidmouth is the town where some of my new English friends were born. A lovely town in the Jurassic Coast of England. This past week they had a Folk Festival and we went to have a look Friday night and Saturday morning and it was lots of fun, based on hog roast, pub chanting, Folk dances, walks on the beach and lots of cider. Totally recommended.

A photo of the night sight of the beach :)