A.C. Flory's Blog, page 22

Would you live in any of these houses?

I love innovative architecture, but only if it also allows itself to become a home. Of all the houses featured in this video, I found only two that I, personally, could call ‘home’. The first is a semi-underground dwelling that still manages to feel light and airy:

You can see this one at 7:53 minutes. If I were to build this design here in Australia, I’d do away with the portholes, add a wide overhang and install fire-resistant shutters to ensure the house survived bushfires.

The second building isn’t a house at all, it’s an apartment complex:

You can find this one at 10:26 minutes. Each apartment has it’s own outdoor area which is angled so that none of them overshadow, or directly overlook, any other outdoor area. For me, this would be a great place to retire with just enough space to potter around and not feel hemmed in, whilst retaining the ability to interact with other residents if I wanted to.

So, what do you think? Are there any houses you could see yourself living in?

cheers,
Meeks

We made jam doughnuts. :D

The Offspring and I love jam doughnuts, especially the ones you can buy hot, so it should come as no surprise that I’ve always wanted to make some. But yeast dough and I do not make a great partnership. The Offspring, however, seems to have a feel for it, and this is the proof:

I deliberately photographed the mess to prove that we really did make them. And they were delicious. Sinful but delicious.

And the man we have to thank for this miracle? John Kirkwood, a retired chef from the UK. Not only is John a great cook, he’s a brilliant teacher whose how-to videos show you all the little steps, and little tricks, that newbies don’t know.

Here’s the video we followed:

The only point at which we diverged from John’s how-to was with the jam. We didn’t wait for the doughnuts to cool down and filled them while they were still almost too hot to handle. Were they delicious? -smirk- Remember that messy picture? We had twice as many doughnuts to start with.

cheers,
Meeks

Just for fun!

Ahem, misspent dotage…

The Mystery of Saintspire, Part 2

Sorry it’s taken so long to complete the next part of the story, but I’ve been on another massive learning curve trying to get around the technical limitations of making a ‘movie’ using the tools available in a game. Plus, I have to admit that I was more ambitious this time.

The bottom line though is…do you see the limitations, or do you see the story? I hope it’s the latter.

If you haven’t seen Part 1 of the story, you can find it here. Part 3 is in the pipeline, but if possible, it’s even more ambitious, and I have no idea if I can pull it off so…stay tuned.

Last, but not least, I’d like to draw your attention to the music. It’s all by an amazing Japanese composer called Seiko Kawasaki, who goes by the handle of ‘Peritune’. If you click on the description in Youtube, you can find the full list of tracks used in Part 2.

All of Peritune’s music is Royalty Free, and I love it for its beauty, variety and almost limitless ability to express emotion without words. You can find Peritune on both Soundcloud and Youtube.

cheers,
Meeks

Torvill and Dean – perfection on ice

I’ve been watching a lot of ballet and ice dancing lately, so when I stumbled across this very old video of Torvill and Dean [from 1984], I couldn’t help wondering how they’d compare to modern ice dancers. Would they be as good as I remembered?

The video quality isn’t the best but the dance? Oh. My. God. Torvill and Dean are still the best, and I was literally mesmerised by the sheer beauty of their creation. It’s not often that artists turn out to be even better than you remember them to be. Torvill and Dean are two such artists:

Enjoy.
Meeks

AI voice replication – now this is creepy

‘Basically, all you have to do in order to replicate someone’s voice is feed the program an audio clip as short as two seconds long. Voicebox will then “match the audio style,” and boom: with little more than a written prompt and the click of a few buttons, you can get an AI-powered replica of your friend or family member’s voice — and the ethical and legal implications are palpable.’

https://futurism.com/the-byte/facebook-ai-replicate-friends-voices

That quote comes from a Futurism article looking at the new AI announced by Meta [Facebook]. The AI, called Voicebox, is not being made available just yet, because even Meta is aware of how much abuse it could cause. There are already documented instances of parents receiving messages from their kids in which the kids say they’re in trouble and need urgent funds. The parents send money only to discover that they have been scammed. And those are text messages.

Now, imagine if your son or daughter rang you and begged for money to avoid some terrible fate… Unless that offspring were standing right next to you in real time, how would you know if their voice was real or faked? I feel ill just thinking about it.

I’ve imagined the future with AI quite a bit, but somehow I always assumed that no AI would be capable of faking someone’s voice. Or at least, not well.

Of course, we have only Meta’s word on how well Voicebox can fake a given human’s voice. I suspect that a two second exposure to a human’s voice would not give the AI enough material to work with when it comes to whole sentences. Our voices change, depending on how we feel. For example, we can generally hear when someone is smiling, or angry, or in some other, more subtle mood.

Yes, an AI could be told to fake ‘fear’, but how would it know how that particular person sounds when they’re afraid? Generic fear, the type you see in movies, is rarely what real fear sounds like. Unfortunately, a parent might not know what their son or daughter sounded like when deathly afraid either.

At the moment, the best way to avoid being scammed is to go directly to the source, but what if that source is thousands of kilometres away? What if they don’t answer their phone?

I fear that when this particular genie slithers from its bottle, we’ll be forced to give each other ‘passwords’ to prove that the voice on the other end of the phone really is who we think it is. What an appalling prospect.

Meeks

[Apologetic] Book Reviews

Would you believe I got caught in a time-loop and lost four months? No? How about ‘the dog ate my reviews? -cough- Without further ado, here’s another lot of reviews. Click the link to go to the book’s location on Amazon.

5/5 A delightful fantasy in a Western setting

Rachel Aaron is one of my favourite authors and I’ve thoroughly enjoyed every one of her novels. And this one is no different, even if it does have cowboys and Indians!

That was a bit tongue in cheek as the main character – Mary Good Crow – is an Indian, so right from the start, the story sets the genre on its head. I love that.

I also love how elements of real history, such as Custer’s last stand – are woven into a story that is first and foremost a fantasy. The thing it shares with Westerns though, is the integrity of the main characters. They shine, but not in a goody-two-shoes kind of way. They are real people in a fantastical situation, and their journey makes us wonder how we would fare if we were placed in such straits.

Very highly recommended.

4/5 Light, fun, murder mysteries

There are times when what you want is chocolate and a fun read that takes you out of real life for a while.

That’s what this boxed set of murder mysteries did for me. I enjoyed the mystery plots, I had a laugh at the characters, and I drooled over the descriptions of food [which are plentiful]. What’s not to like?

Highly Recommended.

5/5 A very human story

Aster is born dead and is brought to life by Barus, a necromancer. Not exactly what you would call normal people, and yet…two more loving people would be hard to find. And /that/ begs all sorts of questions about good and evil, love and hate, integrity and lies.
How can giving life be evil when taking it is not?
How can kindness be evil when cruelty is not?
How can living according to one’s beliefs be evil when deception is not?
These are vital questions, and give The Necromancer’s Daughter a depth that I absolutely loved. Brilliant story masterfully told.
Very highly recommended.

Once again, abject apologies for being so slack. I really will try to post the next lot a bit sooner!

cheers,
Meeks

Les Machines de L’ile

Thank you, my Nameless Friend! lol Life really is full of amazing things.

cheers,
Meeks

‘All By Myself’ by Dimash Kudaibergen

I love it when Celine Dion sings this song, but this young man from Kazakhstan is in a class all by himself. For starters, he’s singing in English. Then, he gives the song the same emotional heft as Dion. But then…right at the end, when you think it’s all over, he does what his fans are waiting for, he sings an upper register that a Coloratura soprano would envy. And it’s NOT falsetto!

Dimash’s vocal range is beyond belief. I’ve read that it’s 6 octaves, but that’s 4/5ths of the notes on a piano! To fit that many octaves in, he’d have to be singing two octaves below middle C, and I haven’t hear him sing anywhere near that low. I think six octaves is hype by fans.

The only other singer I’ve ever heard with a similar, freakish range was Ima Sumac, a Peruvian singer of the last century:

‘In one live recording of “Chuncho”, she sang a range of over four and a half octaves, from B2 to G♯7.’

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yma_Sumac

In this song, Sumac jumps octaves right at the end. Amazing, but…I kind of like Dimash better.

cheers,
Meeks

New Repulse Chronicles title, cover reveal, and pre-order links

I’ve reblogged some of Chris James’ posts before because of their biting wit and yes, even humour! This time I’m happy to announce that he’s getting ready to publish the second last book of the Repulse Chronicles.

For those who have never heard of the Repulse Chronicles, they’re a series of hard/military scifi novels set in a relatively near future, and yes, they’re about war. The thing that makes this series so powerful is that they’re told as the /history/ of that war…as seen through the eyes of the people who fought it and suffered from it.

Until Repulse, I wasn’t a huge fan of military scifi because I saw it mostly as a ‘boy’s own adventure’ just set in space, with precious little in the way of real science behind it. Repulse is very different. The science feels real because it’s extrapolated from what we’re already seeing in our everyday lives – e.g. AI and 3D printing etc. It’s also based on a deep understanding of human beings, their strengths and their flaws. Throw in some very real sounding politics and you have an over-arching story that almost feels too real.

Anyway, Chris has got a nice pre-publication deal going so I recommend you go check it out.

cheers,
Meeks

Chris James's blog

The Repulse Chronicles, Book Six: Operation Repulse will publish on Saturday 12 August. Regular readers will know the next bit: the Kindle version is available to pre-order now at the special introductory price of $2.99 or equivalent where you live, and that price will stay until the title leaves Amazon’s Hot New Releases’ list 30 days after publication. Then, the price will go up to the usual list price for my novels, $4.99. But if you’re that keen to get a copy, I’m delighted to let you have it for a lower price.

Once again, I would like to offer my sincerest thanks to all of you who spend your time reading my stories. It remains a huge pleasure to do my best to entertain you. And to think: there is only one more novel left in this series. The one after this one will be the last. But for…

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