Running out of oughts

We've made it to the end of another year; time to fill the air with showers of confetti and sparks. The blue moon is already up there, quietly taking care of itself.

Blue New



It's amazing to think that's it's going to be 2010 tomorrow. When I was a kid, the idea of a year with a 2 at the beginning of it seemed impossibly far away, some kind of fantastic science-fictional future. Now that we've had ten of them, the future has become the present, and an awful lot of it is disappointingly ordinary. But then I have to remind myself that I can type things that appear on a magical glowing screen, and push a button, and then people on the other side of the world can see them more or less instantly. And if I want to, I can carry around a thing smaller than my hand, that lets me access the world's largest and most random reference library. That's pretty awesome.

Turn the crank

This is a small offshoot of a project I'm working on: a distraction which turned out to be quite nice on its own.

untitled [mecha-noir]

Silent night

It's been a beautiful clear day, not really cold enough to be icy, but with that perfect winter clarity of light. I love how quiet and deserted the city is on holidays: empty streets, empty parking lots, strange but restful stillness in every direction.

untitled [winterurban]



Merry Christmas to the internet, and to the internet a good night.

Happily, the snow is on the other coast

Oof, I seem to have abandoned fractals lately in favor of typesetting, furniture-moving, and hibernation. This is always my least-productive time of year. I'll be awfully happy once we get past the solstice and the light starts to increase again.

Here is a picture made during some weather that seemed especially dark and inexorable.

Event Horizon

Zoomable!

Finally, with some help from my able assistant (who knows how to talk to the terminal window) I've gotten the process working, and put a large zoomable fractal online. If this one seems to work out all right, and doesn't give my web host trouble, I'll do some more.

Rusting Dragon



This was one of my contest entries. I like the metallic texture that becomes visible when the picture is magnified, and I also like the sort of hunched, brooding quality of the thing. It reminds me both of the shipping cranes down in the industrial end of town, and of my cat, when she's tensely coiled and watching pigeons. Motionless, but with the sense that it might do something if you turned your back and didn't watch it too closely. Or that it's only standing still because it's been there for an enormously long time, in all sorts of weather, and all its gears and pulleys have corroded and fused themselves into immobility.

Here we are again

Home again, to all my favorite domestic conveniences. Here is a picture in honor of our beloved Coffee Engine (although strictly speaking, it refers equally well to tea, chocolate, or even cola).

Dark Stimulant



I'm completely torn between Pittsburgh and Seattle lately. Pittsburgh is where I grew up; it has wonderful decaying-industrial architecture, rents seem ridiculously low, and many of my favorite people live there. Seattle, on the other hand, has a huge amount of delicious local food, a lovely temperate climate (only it's cold lately!), and plants that don't make me sneeze & itch for ten months out of the year. Now that I'm done with school, it's my big chance to decide where I want to end up establishing myself, and I can't decide where I want to be. Somewhere else entirely, perhaps.

Tinsellitis

All is madness and chaos. I'm slinging a couple of quick pictures onto the internet before I leave town. Man, I mostly can't stand holidays in their usual overwhelming & commercial form, but that doesn't stop me making pictures of them.

Evergreen Holiday

Aluminum Holiday

Fortunately, this upcoming trip isn't actually for the holiday. So I'll be able to get home and go back into hiding before the full onslaught hits.