Most of my ideas for posts have expanded to book length. Now all I have to do is actually write them

That is my coinage. I sometimes write as if in a debating club, letting a nice phrase form on the page and then seeing if it actually says something defensible. I can hear Johnson’s tutor saying “strike it out” loudly at the back of my skull, but I can’t kill all my darlings.

I don’t dislike the Romantics, just the way their view of the world and how to react to it has become an exclusive one. There’s not much shuddering at the prospect of one’s imminent destruction when surrounded by hopping bunnies, but there is a sense of forces beyond one’s ken, of wonder, which doesn’t fit any of the standard pidgeonholes.

Struan

“The experience of the acutely uncanny without any trace of the sublime”: I like that very much — is that your own formulation?

Mike

‘Usine’ (factory) turned up a fascinating mix of media and styles. It also made it clear just how derivative much photography was and is, and how good the good photographers really are. Did you know Nadar took photos of mining railways? Perhaps it’s common knowledge, but not to me.

I can control my book lust online, but I rarely emerge unscathed from a secondhand bookshop. I guess that makes me a hands-on reader.

I must admit I had similarly conflicted feelings when I first started turning people on to abebooks (or the Advanced Book Exchange, as it originally was) — it’s not my fault if someone can’t control their book-buying habits…

Thanks (I think),

Mike

Leigh

I know that some organisations ban access to YouTube or online games to prevent skiving off by the workforce. In my case they would have to block online maps and charts.

Google has been tidying up some of the more visible imagery seams and seasonal mismatches. In many ways it makes the experience less interesting, and reduces the reminders that you are viewing a presentation, not a raw feed. The little cloud over the nuclear armament depot at Coulport doesn’t seem to have moved though

Struan

It won’t surprise you to hear that one of my favourite pastimes is “flying” Google Maps, zooming in on interesting features in the landscape, and discovering the true orientation and relationship of places of which I have a pragmatically oversimplified “London underground map” understanding. As you suggest, it’s also an endless primary source of aesthetic interest. I love it when I encounter a change in the weather or light from one “square” to the next. I also occasionally get virtual vertigo.

I’m going to read this post a couple more times, as I suspect there’s some useful things for me in there I haven’t yet spotted. Thanks!