Since returning from Zürich, I’ve mostly been embedded in Final Cut Pro X, turning four very different performances of Mars Attacks! into something approximating a single version. It’s not the kind of work that can be said to have one authoritative performance, but the video as document will become that de facto. Much forgetting of old versions of Final Cut also, as the X release is so different it’s just a hinderance to dredge up memories of how it works.

And, buying of cycling gear, so now I look the part when I go careening through the forest at speeds best not thinking about the consequences of a rapid stop with. I found a very nice pair of cycling glasses that dim when exposed to UV light – photochromic lenses! Also amazing how little I squint when the glare is cut out, and how delightful the absence of insects in my eyes is. I am enjoying cyclocross very, very much lately.

Also climbing, with the discovery earlier this year (I think) of a bouldering hall of massive size a mere 10 minute lazy bike ride away. My climbing ability has plummeted – it was never especially good on indoor holds which tend to the overhung; far from my preference of thin, balance-y edges on large amounts of vertical granite. Still, it’s incredibly inexpensive, and it’s delightful to be regularly hauling myself up stuff.

And reading! Which I was most lazy with this year, being distracted by the internet and other things, and my late-evening focus too scatty and distracted to apply itself to even medium stretches of reading. I have many good books though I’ve been enjoying lately, which shall appear here soon-ish.

And! Once more working with Das Helmi, this time for the Dahlem Museum (ha! all my museum-ing turns out to be for a purpose!): a project on Adrian Jacobsen, who went to Northern Canada and Alaska in the 1880’s and acquired a vast number of artefacts from the Eskimos, Aleut, Yupik, and Inuit. It seems to have percolated memories of things I learned in Canada … it’s an unexpected direction for me, reading beyond a cursory level on the First Nations in the North, and a fascinating one also, not the least because mountains, snow, and glaciers everywhere.

And! Rehearsing with Dasniya for a performance in Heppenheim in July!

Which is not all that’s going on, but I think that’s enough for the moment. And I shall endeavour to blog with consistency in the coming weeks also.