A few small blessings and taking back the languange.
Tuesday, October 3rd, 2006Another bad day in the free world. Three school shootings in seven days. A bridge collapse in Quebec. Planes lost. And the wars, of course. But it is not all bad news. There are always a few small blessings:
Regent Park Pathways to Education Program: a unique program that has attracted 97% of the youth in one of Toronto’s poorest neighborhoods. Since the program began, the high-school drop-out rate in the community has dropped by two-thirds. 75% of the first cohort is expected to graduate a year from now.
Toronto’s very own Nuit Blanche: a “contemporary art thing” modeled after (ok stolen) similar events held in Paris, Montreal, etc. It was a peaceful, intriguing and whimsical evening that brought over 400,000 people out to explore art in the street. And sadly, I completely missed it.
Matchbox-sized, high-speed turbines: 95% efficient, these tiny devices spin at up to 500,000 RPM, possibly providing efficient 100-Watt power sources, smaller and more accurate drills and god know what else. Not earth shattering, but it sounds like a technology that could help solve other technical problems. Maybe it could be used to process islet cells for diabetes patients or for other medical treatments (besides dentistry).
I think that’s it.
Or did I miss something? I did stumble upon a small film called ~Backspace~ FLOAT. For me it illustrates something I’ve been thinking about for a while: every day we are forced to read thousands of words — maybe a whole novel’s worth. Instead of blindly taking in all of these targeted messages, this film-maker peels the words off the urban canvas and mixes them up to produce a joyful, transcendent message. Thanks Swatstuff.
