OK so … I’m in hospital … but I just can’t stop modding. When things are not right they demand change. This is the bedside system I’ve been using for the last 9 days. It’s based on an Epia Mobo with a via processor.
 

 
There are two handsets. one is a phone, the other controls the built in TV (30 channels) and radio and when you flip it over and open the cover, inside there is a 6 inch long qwerty keyboard with a built in mousepointer.
 
I use the net a lot … but this absurdly designed keyboard is difficult for an individual in full health to use … I am right handed and all the muscles behind my right shoulder have failed over the last three years … so after a few days of using this I now have a repetative strain injury and my wrist hurts like hell.
 
Something had to be done. MODDING TIME YAY !!!!
 
I called in the Occupational Therapist and asked for her help. I needed to somehow get the handset mounted on the table so I might be able to type with just my left hand.
 
Now that was a smart move: Lindsay the OT turned out to be gorgeous. Bright blue eyes, amazing smile … and it puts a on my face every time she visits. BEST medicine I  have had in nine days. ACTUALLY THE ONLY MEDICINE.
 
She built a little cradle for the handset for me out of plastic and returned the next day. It wasn’t very rigid so I used the broken lid off the handset - Lindsay was a bit shocked I think .. not very mod-aware lol) and got the sellotape (scotch) out and used the lid as a brace.
 
SO … between the oh-so-gorgeous Lindsay and myself this is what we have come up with …. and it works a treat I can tell you. The whole of this post has been typed with it
 

ps thanks to DaveW for getting  the pic up

RT at untwistedvortex.com has been running a logo contest for his blog. Despute the appalling current design scene at freedomforall.net I put pixels to screen for fun. The best fun in the world for me is doing something simple for someone else.

UPDATE: Full story here:

I got really fed up with having a great big white computer box on my desk and wires all over the place. You know the situation: cables and computers are not pretty. There was only one solution: My desk and my computer needed to be merged.

This was not your typical computer maintenance project. I did use a phillips screwdriver - quite normal - but the widespread use of a hacksaw, jigsaw and hammer to get everything in the right place and operational differentiated this project from most rebuilds I have done (lots).

Having managed to get the case cut down to provide a backplate and mounting for the motherboard and PCI devices I then cut out the back of the desk drawer for the cable access. The hammer was widely used throughout this project.

Amazingly I managed to get everything nicely located. Both the DVD drive and CD writer will appear from the front of the drawer. Have yet to cut the slots to locate them. And can’t decide if I want to go to the trouble of getting some matching veneer and giving them a wooden fascia to match the rest.

The old lock on the drawer was removed and the barrel emptied and cut down to become the power button. Locating the power switch behind the lock was easy enough. The main thing was trying to organise all the bits so they would a) fit b) connect with standard cables and c) not cook each other. Currently she is running in the drawer, in the cabinet at 43 degrees C CPU temp - thats low enough for me and only 4 degrees higher than when the beast was in a case.

Time to power up and see if this thing will actually fly. Holy cow she does !!!

Finally I have to do some cabinetwork on the desk she is going in. It’s an old base unit from a large office desk

few more bits to finish: cutting the CD drawer openings, securing the lock barrel to the power switch (don’t try no more nails - I discovered it dissolves the power switch plastic ) and then I have to cut down the cabinet and rebuild the desk. Nearly done. Will post a pic when the final details are completed.

Just her smoked glass top to come.

Full story of the build here

At last. Finished the poster.

 The photographer had six feet. Amazing.

A friend asked me to do a poster. It’s her nephews birthday coming up and they are having a party. I like doing things for other people. Sometimes little things like this. Sometimes other, bigger things. It’s the same family for whom I made arrangements for their cousin to have free reconstructive surgery to free her from the worst effects of having her face burned off with acid. She’s well happy now as she has eyerbrows and lips and can see out of both eyes. Next off they are trying to restore her hearing.

I like doing things for other people because that is the most rewarding feeling in the world for me. To know I have helped. And I like doing things well. I was asked for a poster for a five year olds party … and that is what they will get.

It’s not quite finished yet. The black paint has to go on the wheels and firebox and coal and roof. Then the carriages to paint. His aunt will stick the words “Happy Birthday X” on the carriages after they are painted, cut out from paper.

Mortido and Libido, Freud said, ruled our lives. These ad-hoc structures are but points on a scale, limits within which one finds all aspects of self. Habits of perception and being dictate patterns that assume control. Parts of a whole, a system of control. A little commitee.

The low in the sky late afternoon sun casts shadows longer than the people in the queue waiting to enter the Pompidou centre.

A woman as Matisse wanted her to be seen, one supposes.

A bowl of fruit detail from the same painting.

This mans stern face made me think a lot. I didn’t like it but I did like the picture.

The Violinist

What is art? Does it have purpose? In the moment of creation it has purpose. In those moments of it’s creation the artist may or may not concieve of a purpose for it beyond his immediate one of expression. It may be political, or educational. Or accidental. Or none at all.

This guy, guarding works in a hall at the Pompidou, was being art in real time. How do I know … he was being turned into art by many artists including myself. Of course he didn’t mean to become one of the museums most popular displays. His art was accidental, whilst mine was not.

The view from the balcony high in the Musee D’Orsay, heading for their single Matisse …I’m on a hunt to find what a certain someone loves in his work. She loved it when she was three years old and shocked a museum guard, at that age, asking where to find his works. When I arrived at the Orsay I was told they had only one! But this view was a work of art in and of itself.

Finally I track down their Matisse … I approach from a distance … wondering what draw it will have for me.

Up close and personal I am looking at this sole painting by Matisse at the Orsay … which unfortunately does little for me.

However, not far away I am drawn into and towards this painting by …I don’t know who Segall perhaps? i don’t remember. But I loved it. And later, at the Pompidou I found some more Matisse and found some things therein I did love.

And then I draw a deep breath and am blown away, shocked into silence, almost gasping for breath at the sight of this painting “The Villas de Bordighera” by Claud Monet. The finesse of the light and the style of this work shock me and for a moment there is just me and this painting only I am not there.