Genius (Part II)

Genius is when someone does something amazing that you could never ever do in your life. Because their genius is theirs, and yours is yours. Each can only be like itself. When we put them all together we will have found all the missing pieces of the jigsaw again. But your piece can only ever be completed by you - that is why you are you. That is why we need you. That is why you have your own genius to guide you.

It's fruitless to try to reproduce someone else's achievement. It was theirs - any copy would be imperfect. It's pointless to covet someone else's ability - just an excuse for delaying our own development.

But it is fruitful to emulate genius. When you do not know where to look or where to begin, you could always begin by examining the path of someone who arrived to a useful place. Don't you think? I like to read stories from great people. I heard what Paderewski said. I heard what Michael Jackson said. I heard what Marcus Garvey said. All imperfect examples and none of them the same as me, but somehow knowing about them helps me to arrive. Don't you think it's good to know there is somewhere to arrive to?

Let's forget about TV talents and news stories. Real ability is not newsworthy. "I Fought Cancer Battle to Play Harmonica". "Dog With 3 Legs Plays Football for Blackburn Rovers". That's the news. "Man of 60 Realises Goal of Life Without Noticeable Fuss"? You're not going to hear about that one, folks.

Genius can be a painful condition that tears at the raiment of life because the two are always in contradiction. It can be painful and confusing for precocious genius that seems not to know the ways of the world but knows the paths of the stars. But it is never painful itself. It's nice. And if it has been hard getting there, or if it is difficult now you are there, you're not likely to talk about it. Who would know what you mean anyway.

So that kind of story's not getting in the news either.

But we are not concerned with the news. We are concerned with the truth. If all we have done is what we truly were able to, what we truly saw and heard, what we truly believed in and what we always truly were, then: we will have done a good thing. And that thing was not yet genius, but it might become like it...

We will see some further steps you need to take next time.

A frog grew up. A silkworm took to the skies. A rose grew where only darkness once was. Good night my budding geniuses! Sleep well, don't forget your fertiliser!

Goo (gle)

Now you can go and vote for your favourites among 30 Google logos drawn by children aged 4-18.

I voted for mine!

I'd better not say which ones I liked though. Don't want to affect your judgement!

Speed

I have just read an article about children and the effect of fast modern life on them.

I completely agree. It has an effect on me too. That's why I've started going outside and so on.

Really the best thing to do is put all the TVs and things in a big bag and then go outside with all the little children and start playing. You will miss most reports like this one but by then maybe they won't need to write any.

Boy

I like this one. By Henri Cartier-Bresson.

English Weather

Mister Men

Something strange is happening to the Mr. Men!

The Mr. Men is a series of children's books written in the 1970s by Roger Hargreaves, and published first in England. Roger died in 1988 so after that his son Adam carried on writing the books. He still does, but the whole Mr. Men "brand" was sold for a lot of money - so much that if you spent all the money on Mr. Men books and laid them out end to end, they would stretch round the earth five times! (They cost £2 each and I hope I worked that out right!)

Actually, they are worth more than that. They are very good.

I have two that were printed in the 1970s (because I was produced in the 1970s!): Mr. Sneeze and Mr. Funny. At that time, here were the other books you could get:


And, on the front, this is the kind of thing you would see:



Today, the only difference on the front covers is that the signature by Roger Hargreaves doesn't slope anymore. It is upright:

That's ok. Which do you prefer? (PS Mr. Silly looks funny, eh?)

The other changes are not so OK, in my opinion. First of all, look at what has happened to the back cover line-up of Mr. Men. They have all changed! Look at Mr. Funny and compare him with his picture above:



This is not the same Mr. Man! I don't think the colours came out right here, but one major difference is that his gloves aren't the right colour! Mr. Funny's body is green and his gloves are yellow. In the new picture his body and his gloves are green. Hmm, not good I think. Then look at the eyes. This is the most disturbing change. What is wrong with the eyes? Look at them! They are completely different now, and have no character! The bold lines of the original have been replaced by this hideous cosmetic surgery nightmare operation look. Maybe someone thinks he looks more human? Well, these days, perhaps that is true - when so many people in the public eye do have this weird plastic surgery/botox injection eye-look. Is that what it is? Has Mr. Funny had botox??? I don't believe it! He would never do that! This is the man who cheered up all the animals in the zoo when they had colds! But now they would have us believe that he is a fading star of the 70s, clinging on too long to his share of the spotlight and sinking ever deeper into a whirlpool of alcoholism like many before him (Krusty the Clown?)

Hmm. The Mr. Funny inside the books is the same one as before. Perhaps this back-cover image is some look-alike or impersonator they used for publicity material. Obviously Mr. Funny, like Saddam Hussein, is a person of such importance that he has many doubles for use in public work. I understand.

Having suggested that the insides of the books have not changed, I am afraid this is not true in the case of Mr. Dizzy. What on earth has happened to the images? They look like they have been scanned in by dogs. Or hamsters! (They find it harder to operate the mouse. Which wasn't supposed to be a joke. But I suppose you could see it as one if you want). Just look at Mr. Dizzy's edges:


Dear me. That's what it looks like in the book, I am afraid. Not good!

So you see, I am not completely happy with the state of the Mr. Men books today. But I can tell you: if you want to read them, they are all still with us, even if there is something strange on the back, even if there are a few odd things about them today. The insides are the same (except Mr. Dizzy and I haven't checked all of the books so I can't promise everyone else has escaped this treatment).

They come highly recommended (by me). They have been translated into 20 languages, so you should be seeing some near you! In fact, you are reading this in English so I would recommend you look for the English ones. They are the first and best!

Let me know what you think.

Crayon Carry-ons

Wax crayons are very popular. People like children to use them because they don't have sharp points, so you cannot cause injuries with them. This seems quite a reliable principle to go by. However. There is one documented instance of crayon-induced harm that I know of. As a child, Homer...


...Simpson, fond of putting crayons in his ears and nose,


got one stuck. Not realising this, over time the crayon found its way into his brain. Detected by X-ray photograph,


it was removed surgically. The surgery effected a radical change in Simpson's brain-power.



The new Homer, unhappy with the responsibility of free thought, started to yearn for the old days when all he had to think about was where his next beer was coming from. His daughter Lisa's fears were realised when she noticed her powder blue crayon was missing...So perhaps crayons also bring tragedy, of a kind. But let's hope there is a lesson we can all learn from the story of Homer Simpson.

Remembering at all times to keep crayons clear of the orifices of the head, let us look at the evolution of the wax crayon colour rainbow. In the beginning, there were only eight colours. This was in 1903 when Binney Smith & Co. first started manufacturing the Crayola crayon. The colours were black, blue, brown, green, orange, red, violet and yellow. Quite good choices! No controversy so far.

In 1949 another 40 colours were added. Lemon Yellow, Burnt Sienna, Periwinkle, Thistle - more exciting names. One of them was changed in 1958 - "Prussian Blue" was thought to have no meaning at that date, since it was decided children no longer knew of the deep blue colour of the Prussian army uniform. OK, I understand I suppose. It turned into "Midnight Blue".

Some of the names were a bit too exciting. Oh dear, what's this one - Flesh? Well, it was a pinky colour. Except not all flesh is that colour, is it? So they changed the name to Peach. That was the Peach that we used at my school. It was the one that always ran out the fastest. We were always drawing people, of course, and seemingly the people all had Peach-coloured flesh - yes, flesh was "Flesh" at that time. Not surprisingly, because I never saw any other colour skin for many years. One of the dinner ladies was Italian, and I thought she looked a bit strange! Where did I go to school, you may ask? Nazi Germany? No, it was an ordinary English school. So we thought. Anyway, I have seen lots of different skin types now. And I'm not sure I would use Peach for any of them - though it does come in handy as a base, if blended (I'm really talking about coloured pencils here; I haven't used wax crayons recently).

So goodbye Flesh. 16 further colours were added in 1958, among them Indian Red. The name referred to a famous type of pigment used in paint. But I suppose people were a bit nervous. They thought about the Native American (name for the people who lived in America before the Americans lived there) and remembered they were called "Red Indians". That's what we called them too, once - and yes, I learned all about them at my school. But they weren't Indian, and they weren't Red any more than I am Peach or Marcus Aurelius Garvey was Black.

Nervous people thought Indian Red could be seen as Red Indian, so it became Chestnut in 1999.

The strange thing is that in 1998, when the latest addition to the Crayola rainbow brought the total number of colours to 120, one of them was called Fuzzy-Wuzzy Brown. Hmm. "Fuzzy-Wuzzy" is a racist term for a person of African genetic origin. A Brown person, one might say (or "black", I suppose, though I already exempted M. Garvey from being painted with that exact colour. I would like to say that I don't find anybody to be quite black. Some people come close-ish - a very nice colour of skin I think! Other colours are nice too, of course. Please can't we just say everyone is human-coloured?)

So there was a crayon called Fuzzy-Wuzzy Brown. There still is, as far as I know. It didn't get changed. But Indian Red did. How odd, to me. To you?

Please note that I have refrained from giving examples of possible other upsetting names that crayon companies may wish to mysteriously overlook. There is no "good taste" control on my humour when I'm being harsh, and I'm not trying to offend people today. Please imagine your own. In fact, don't imagine them. You don't need any practise thinking like that. We've had enough racism now. We've all seen enough of it. Come on, think of some nice names instead. And if there is a skin colour you don't like, think harder. Give it the most beautiful name you can, please.

Thank you.