Chess an Iconic Battle

Just post the last two pics to my set of Talitha and Rachel playing Chess. This is part of my on going plan to make Talitha a geek pin up girl, having done a set with her and her battle axe last year. So that's the Role Playing club and the Chess club covered. Not sure what we're going to do for the A/V club.

I think it speaks to how natural these two are in front of a camera that a number of people have wondered if I just stumbled into a chess match. Before a wedding perhaps? There are hints in the set that something else is going on, but I was expecting a chess nerd to object and no one has. I deeply appreciate Talitha and Rachel's support of my photography. Not only by throwing them selves into the roles but also arranging access to the impressive space, providing the furniture and creating such wonderful outfits. They are a joy to work with.

- Peace

Tony Campolo

Inn from the Cold is brining in Tony Compolo, tomorrow night. This is Tony Campolo on the Hour.

See the Inn From the Cold site for details.

- Peace

Games as Liturgy?

It was probably the photo shoot of a chess game in an old church that got me thinking of games as a form of Liturgy.

Games structure our interaction
We take turns, move icons

There are moments of passion
Moments or contemplation

House rules and orthodoxy vary

Cheats are known to be common
but we play on

- Peace

East Advocate on Google Maps

OK enough Google Buzz, how about Google Maps? This week Google Maps expanded to cover a great deal more of Canada with Street View. The view below is of East Advocate.

View Larger Map
East Advocate is just down the road from my Grandfather's place, Kim and I were there this summer. I took this picture:

Just blows me away how comprehensive Google wants to be with this project.

- Peace

Getting Your Blog on Buzz

If your blog isn't showing up as one of the sites that Google Buzz will connect to, then try adding the Google Web Master Tools. That worked for me. Thanks to LT for the tip.

- Peace

Buzz Day One

Back in October Google launched Wave
with a great deal of hype, but Wave washed out almost instantly. Wave's big mistake? No integration with email. When someone sent you a wave, you had to check your wave inbox. Wave also rolled out slowly, so by the time other people you know tried it, you had moved on. I just checked, I have 10 new waves since I last checked in Nov!

Google launched it's latest social network attempt Buzz yesterday. I think they've learned a thing or two. Most of my contacts in gmail have it today, even my wife who joined Gmail very late. Buzz is built right in to gmail and seems to gaining people rapidly.

That said there are some things that strike me as strange:

Adding your Bloggger blog is not automatic, even though google knows the blogs your own via your google id. Linking to my google profile might fix that.

Email integration needs work. Buzz is part of gmail, it notifies you when someone replies to a Buzz post. While the notifications are in your inbox, they are not emails. There is no from address. This makes filtering them, like I do with Facbebook and Flickr notifications painful.

Few women. Most of the posts I see on Facebook are from female friends. All the posts I've seen on Buzz Today are from guys. That's just day one, but if that keeps up and few weeks it's just me and the guys then Buzz is in trouble.

- Peace

I'm not a Lost Geek

OK, the words "Do you actually watch the show?" have come out of my mouth when talking to a coworker who didn't get a number of references I made to Lost. He said we watch it at different levels. After a rare blog post form Joe Kirk on the premiere episode of the final season of Lost, I now know how my coworker felt.

- Peace

Of Lost, Narnia and the Other Story

"Oh, Aslan," said Lucy. "You don't mean it was? How could I? I couldn't have left the others and come up to you alone, how could I? Don't look at me like that, oh well, I suppose I could. Yes, and it wouldn't have been alone, I know, not if I was with you. But what would have been the good?"
Aslan said nothing.
"You mean," said Lucy rather faintly, "that it would have turned out all right somehow? But how? Please, Aslan! Am I not to know?"
"To know what would have happened, child?" said Aslan. "No. Nobody is ever told that."
"Oh dear," said Lucy.

Prince Caspian - C. S. Lewis

Watching Lost Season Six Premier last night I couldn't help but think of the response Aslan gives more than once in the Narnia Series, of the stories we're not told. Lost has chosen to tell the other story, what would happened if flight 815 hadn't gone down and it was very well done. It gave a deeper understanding of why Jacob could put people on doomed flight. I don't know how Lost will finish, the beginning of the end was well done.

Another Narnia quote along the same lines.

“I do not call you unfortunate,” said the Large Voice.
“Don't you think it was bad luck to meet so many lions?” said Shasta.
“There was only one lion,” said the Voice.
“What on earth do you mean? I've just told you there were at least two
the first night, and-“
“There was only one: but he was swift of foot.”
“How do you know?”
“I was the lion.” And as Shasta gaped with open mouth and said
nothing, the Voice continued. “I was the lion who forced you to join
with Aravis. I was the cat who comforted you among the houses of the
dead. I was the lion who drove the jackals from you while you slept. I
was the lion who gave the Horses the new strength of fear for the last
mile so that you should reach King Lune in time. And I was the lion
you do not remember who pushed the boat in which you lay, a child near
death, so that it came to shore where a man sat, wakeful at midnight,
to receive you.”
"Then it was you who wounded Aravis?"
"It was I"
"But what for?"
"Child," said the Voice, "I am telling you your story, not hers. I
tell no one any story but his own."
"Who are you?" asked Shasta.
"Myself," said the Voice, very deep and low so that the earth shook:
and again "Myself", loud and clear and gay: and then the third time
"Myself", whispered so softly you could hardly hear it, and yet it
seemed to come from all round you as if the leaves rustled with it.

The Horse and His Boy

I understand what Lewis is saying and agree for the most part. However at times we get glimpses of the other story, and though never the full story they are still important so I'm enjoying the indulgence of the other story in Lost.

- Peace