Naturally, there’s a lot to catch up on

Starting with: http://showdown.contagiousmedia.org/

In an era where the proliferation of information has been accelerated through technological advancement and the Internet, how do people decide what information they will share with others? Contagious Media explores this question in an exhibition of recent projects developed specifically to quickly spread socio-political messages through the digital equivalent of “word of mouth.”

Someone once asked John Cleese what his #1 ambition was. He replied ‘to speak while inhaling’. Or was it to laugh while inhaling? No, to speak, I think.

Anyhow, I followed a link from Contagious Media to the fabulous conceptual site http://cryingwhileeating.com/. Why is it so funny to watch people crying while eating? Perhaps it’s to do with the tension of opposites; the pathos of the sobbing rubbing up against the mundanity of nachos consumption. Perhaps it is in the choices of the ‘performers’.

‘Do I cry now, do I take another mouthful, do I attempt the triple-spin, the pike-and-scissor, the great impossibility (I am so struggling to make up quasi sport-sounding terms here) of the crying/eating world — the cry WHILE taking a mouthful? Do I have that in me? Do I? DO I?! OK, no, looks like I don’t.’

A man’s reach must exceed his grasp, they say (‘man’ standing in there for ‘human’, for those unfamiliar with the quote).

My vote goes to Afshin, for his convincing eclair work & the way he wholeheartedly throws himself into the crying. He is really, really upset about the lack of positive news stories. I watched him four times and he was just as upset on each & every viewing.

You know, as an aside, a psychologist once said to me there was no difference in counselling men or women, except for the fact that women could still converse while crying. Men, she said, usually have to give themselves over to the crying. (And by ‘men’, I mean … eh, you get it, right?).

I think I would like to combine a couple of my online interests now. What about an ‘overheard in Sydney, usually uttered by hobos, while crying and eating’.

Or maybe ‘crying over eating Sydney hobos’. ‘Overeating hobos crying in Sydney’?

Such potential.

Also, http://thebrainfreeze.com/ is funny.