A Cartoon For Prospect Magazine And An Unrelated Bit Of Text Explaining My Absence From The Cyber Realm
For the past two weeks I have been living in the early nineties. Not in the 'thinking Jellyfish are the future of music' sense. No. But rather, in the no-internet sense. I am moving house. Or, as British Telecom would describe it, 'holding on to my career by the skin of my teeth because BT are the multiverse and I am but a mere end-user wormy clown man, say it, say it, WORMY CLOWN MAN ha ha ha'.
It's quite nice, actually. Quite stressful at first, but I rather like it now. The library is the king of my info-world. I come here to do my job. Well, here and my girlfriend's parents' house. ANd her school. (Where she works, I'm not - oh never mind).
It doesn't help that my Mac laptop - bought partly to ease the changeover from London to Hertford - started farting its soul out on my first day of the changeover. I was left stranded. So I've had to devise a system where I do the work at home, scan it at home, work it up, then run red faced and mad-eyed around this lovely country town, deadline ticking past, trying to find an internet connection. Generally I end up pelting it into Hannah's classroom to use her computer (after hours of course, I think I'd get arrested if it was before 4).
Anyway, today I am at the Library, and tapping this out furiously to keep my blog-oar in. No more am I able to instantly satisfy a vague curiosity as to whatever happened to Tanita Tikarem, or read entire Wikipedia pages about things I already know about. (Why do I have to read the Wiki page of every book I've just read? Or every album I am currently listening to? And why doesn't it really feel like they exist unless I've read the Wikipedia page? Does anybody else think like this?)
So yes, I am an info-vagrant. Scurrying around, picking up unwanted bits of internet connection wherever I can find them. I actually have to list in advance what I want to look up, and then queue for the internet. Whilst reading a book. It's almost... civilised. I think I'm going to make a habit of it. No more internet dawdling. Instead I'll just list everything I want to look up as it comes into my head. Then at the end of the day look at it and be glad at all the time I've saved.
I'm a bit worried I'll end up with too much time to do, you know... real stuff.
Hmmm. What did happen to Tanita Tikarem. I can't find out cos I've got no time left. Answers please.
X
[Click image to enlarge]
For the past two weeks I have been living in the early nineties. Not in the 'thinking Jellyfish are the future of music' sense. No. But rather, in the no-internet sense. I am moving house. Or, as British Telecom would describe it, 'holding on to my career by the skin of my teeth because BT are the multiverse and I am but a mere end-user wormy clown man, say it, say it, WORMY CLOWN MAN ha ha ha'.
It's quite nice, actually. Quite stressful at first, but I rather like it now. The library is the king of my info-world. I come here to do my job. Well, here and my girlfriend's parents' house. ANd her school. (Where she works, I'm not - oh never mind).
It doesn't help that my Mac laptop - bought partly to ease the changeover from London to Hertford - started farting its soul out on my first day of the changeover. I was left stranded. So I've had to devise a system where I do the work at home, scan it at home, work it up, then run red faced and mad-eyed around this lovely country town, deadline ticking past, trying to find an internet connection. Generally I end up pelting it into Hannah's classroom to use her computer (after hours of course, I think I'd get arrested if it was before 4).
Anyway, today I am at the Library, and tapping this out furiously to keep my blog-oar in. No more am I able to instantly satisfy a vague curiosity as to whatever happened to Tanita Tikarem, or read entire Wikipedia pages about things I already know about. (Why do I have to read the Wiki page of every book I've just read? Or every album I am currently listening to? And why doesn't it really feel like they exist unless I've read the Wikipedia page? Does anybody else think like this?)
So yes, I am an info-vagrant. Scurrying around, picking up unwanted bits of internet connection wherever I can find them. I actually have to list in advance what I want to look up, and then queue for the internet. Whilst reading a book. It's almost... civilised. I think I'm going to make a habit of it. No more internet dawdling. Instead I'll just list everything I want to look up as it comes into my head. Then at the end of the day look at it and be glad at all the time I've saved.
I'm a bit worried I'll end up with too much time to do, you know... real stuff.
Hmmm. What did happen to Tanita Tikarem. I can't find out cos I've got no time left. Answers please.
X
13 Comments:
OMG, this is me. The worst thing about it is that I did a degree in biochemistry too.
Re: T Tikarem, I also wonder about her brother. He was in a band at the university I did the biochemistry at.
There you go..
Good to know I'm not the only one that does this!I do it with other things too, vague politics, vague architecture, vague history...
This is me too! (and I'm an illustrator, so maybe there's something about it that makes us like this)...
Also, Ramon Tikram (her brother) is an actor, he played Ferdie in seminal 90's series This Life and has been in Major Hollywood Motion Pictures too (just can't think of any at the moment)...
I've been reading your blog for a year or so now and it never fails to entertain.. cheers
Jago
You think you've got problems, I'm just coming to the end of series 5 of The Wire and am thinking of reading the Wikipedia entry on the lot. I think it takes up about a third of the site.
Wow. Totally forgot about This Life appearance and I loved that show...crap brain o mine.
Wish you hadn't alerted me to the Wikipedia entry for The Wire, Royston. Haven't made it past series two yet, as boyf wants to watch them again WITH the subtitles on.
Hi Stephen,
Your cartoon just did the rounds here at New Scientist at it got some BIG laughs. Nice one.
All the best
Sean O'Neill
Sub-Editor | New Scientist
sean.oneill@newscientist.com
Alex, you *have* to use the subtitles on when watching The Wire. Too much stuff gets missed otherwise!
love this cartoon! bx
Wow, thanks Ben! Am honoured to have you visit, I am a fan of bad science. Glad people liked it - esp at New Scientist - cheers Sean. NS is actually one of my favourite magazines, and I think it does an excellent job of explaining things in an engaging way without being patronising. Obv the cartoon is more about people's perceptions of science and how it can never really remain accurate once it's been through a layman's brain and out of his (ie, my) mouth. I don't know about you but I just end up describing the illustrations. "The internet is like a big eye made of loads of zero's and ones, and that's sort of bad but isn't". That's about all I can actually retain.
Got here via bioephemera and now putting you on my Google Reader. Thanks for the laughs :)
Your Vague Scientist cartoon is the Rosetta Stone to my brain. I love science, but I've always been easily confused. Discovering that I'm a Vague Scientist is reassuring. I would definitely subscribe to the magazine.
Very good Stephen.
Haven't checked in on here for a while...
My wife would love this publication. It would be full of "useful" info and "facts" learnt at coffee mornings over the years..!!
Rob
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