lightning strikes twice

by Eugene O’Kelly

It starts “I was blessed. I was told I had three months to live.”, and from there we follow Eugene O’Kelly’s last days alive. He takes a very pragmatic and planned approach to how to best spend this time, which is strange on one hand, but makes complete sense on the other. Probably the most enlightening portions of his story are about how he learned to tackle life better, in the face of death. He constantly focused on “staying in the moment”, and spent the bulk of his time tieing up loose ends with friends, colleagues and family. If we all approached life like he approached death, we’d probably have a lot more peace in our lives.

• Perfume – a solid interpretation of the book (which I’ve also read.) In particular the scenes and costumes are amazing and have a very fine level of detail. The movie is very faithful to the plot of the book, and the casting was adept. A good film, but I doubt I’d watch it again. 7/10
• Valley of the Dolls – A surprisingly good film from 1967. Starring Sharon Tate amongst others, I quite enjoyed this story of fortune and fame in a world of uppers and downers. Three women – a beauty, a singer and a girl next door – are thrust into stardom and all the baggage that this entails. Is it worth everything that it costs them? 7/10
• Six Degrees of Separation – Great film from 1993 about family, privilege and connection. Paul is a streethustler who makes a chance connection that introduces him to a world that he wants to be a part of. Watching this just makes me mad about the rest of Will Smith’s career.
• Everything is Illuminated – loved the Ukranian b-boy, but I fell asleep during this film so can’t really say too much.  Seemed to be winning the “too earnest American indie film vs great insightful quirky film” battle (that has been lost in the past by films such as Garden State)

Great article by Paul Sheehan in the Sydney Morning Herald a couple of days ago about the realities of World War II:

Australia lost 40,101 war dead in a nation of 6.9 million (0.6 per cent of the population), twice as many, per capita, as the United States, which lost 410,662 war dead from a population of 129 million (0.3 per cent). Australia even suffered loss almost as much as Great Britain, 366,000 war dead out of 47.5 million people (0.77 per cent).

then:

In Western Europe, at its peak the war was fought between 15 Allied and 15 Wehrmacht divisions. On the Russian front, more than 400 Red Army and German divisions clashed for four years. This is where the Nazis lost 88 per cent of their military dead.

and:

So ruthless was Russia’s scorched-earth policy that the Soviet Union lost about 35 million war dead, including 18 million soldiers, from a population of 195 million – 18 per cent. Almost one person in five. Compare this with the 5.6 million German war dead (7 per cent) or the British, Australian and American war death rates.

One of the most fun things I’ve done recently is kart racing.  On the recent trip to Cairns, we all had an absolute blast tearing up the kart track.  Actually, we tore up two tracks.  Not content with our first racing experience at the “touristy” track, we then trekked an hour into the Cairns hinterland to try our hand on faster karts and a more professional track.  Man, that was fun.

The Economist has a summary of a report on the liveability of cities around the world, and Sydney ranks #7.  There are 4 Australian cities in the Top 10 (and two Canadian cities in the Top 5).

Liveability | Where the grass is greener | Economist.com

A reminder that I live in a pretty amazing place, with a hell of a lot to enjoy and celebrate.  Doesn’t make the housing any cheaper though, dammit.

Wow. I’ve just finished a fashion trip to Cairns, part holiday and part work. Wifey is up here for a few photo shoots, and I decided to tag along (I would have missed her too much if I’d let her go without me.) Anyway, that was an excellent decision, because Far North Queensland turned out to be fantastic.

Firstly, the people I went with (photo shoot crew) are wonderful. Rae, Georges, Dave, Laura and Carlie (plus wifey) are really happy-go-lucky sorts. There’s no ego involved at all, and they were very cool with all my questions and accidentally getting in the way. It was also incredibly inspiring to hang out with people who are at the top of their game. They work hard and truly give it 100% all the time. The photos from the shoots are absolutely top notch.

Secondly, the weather and scenery were top notch. We went from a pretty cold winter period in Sydney to late-twenties weather in Cairns, with excellent water and nothing too sticky. Beautiful.

And the activities have been great. From helping out on photo shoots, to taking a rest day trip to the go kart track and Mossman Gorge, everything was memorable. I probably ate a little too much, but a couple of trips to the gym and a fast 5.5km run along the water was perfect to balance that.

Highlights in point form:

• Arrived late friday, then hit the waterside grill for some meat.
• Saturday we went up to Port Douglas to stay at Pool, an as yet unopened but spectacularly beautiful resort being opened by a new favourite person, Rob Potter — champion guy who made us feel right at home.
• Sunday was busy, as we completed TWO shoots in one day. Everyone as exhausted at the end, but also energised by the results, which were spectacular. Laura the model was a champ. The hardest things I had to do were get breakfast, climb a ladder with a bowl of fruit, make a two hour round trip back to Cairns to get a new set of clothes for the second shoot, and hold a reflector against super strong winds.
• Monday was pretty much a rest day — no one got up to much, but we trawled around Cairns town and ended up having Indian for dinner.
• Tuesday: Go Karting (results of three races basically went: Dave, Me, Georges, Carlie, Inez, Laura), Mossman Gorge, Pool for sunset, crocodile and pizza).
• Wednesday: the only disappointment of the trip so far — there was only space on the helicopters out to the sand cay shoot for six people, so I couldn’t go with the crew (hence I’m back in the hotel room right now tapping away, which ain’t too bad when you are overlooking the gorgeous mariner).
• Thursday: with the photo shoots over and done with, we booked a full day cruise out to the Great Barrier Reef to do some snorkelling and general cavorting. Spectacular wildlife under the ocean’s surface, but the trip out and back was quite long and bumpy (2 1/2 hours each way).
• Friday: our final day was loooooong. A morning run with George followed by a Pilates training session with the ropes, late breakfast, then on the road for a late lunch at the Australian Coffee Center. Final stop of our trip to Cairns, more Go Kart action at Mako Trac. Then a rush back to the airport and hurried check in. When we arrived with Sydney we even fit in an 11pm dinner at Super Bowl on Dixon st (which is not the Super Bowl we thought it was!), but by that time everyone was shattered.

All in all, it was amazing trip, one of the best experiences of the year for me. Saturday was spent recovering and reminiscing. Great fun.

Thanks to Ben Casnocha, I came across this interesting article today about friendships in the cyber-age. The general premise is based on Aristotle’s idea that there are three types of friendship:

Aristotle categorizes three different types of friendship: friendships of utility, friendships of pleasure, and friendships of the good. Friendships of utility are those where people are on cordial terms primarily because each person benefits from the other in some way. Business partnerships, relationships among co-workers, and classmate connections are examples. Friendships of pleasure are those where individuals seek out each other’s company because of the joy it brings. Passionate love affairs, people associating with each other due to belonging to the same hobby organization, and fishing buddies fall into this category. Most important of all are friendships of the good. These are friendships based upon mutual respect, admiration for each other’s virtues, and a strong desire to aid and assist the other person because one recognizes their essential goodness.

The author Tim Madigan essentially reinforces this view, but notes how easy it is to continue friendships in these digital times where we are all connected by just a few button clicks. It’s a good point, and one that Facebook has made clear to me in the past few days. An old school acquaintance has added me as a friend — part of me wonders if we have anything in common anymore, but on the other hand, can it hurt to have these loose connections everywhere?