the windows are illuminated.

meet clara.

there’s a reason it’s taken me so long to write here. to be honest, all the house-hunting has been pretty all-consuming lately. i’ll spare you the details, but the end result is that we are now the proud owners of this little gem.

we were in a bit of a bidding war and were just so invested in this house, both emotionally and time-wise, so we really couldn’t be happier. it isn’t perfect right now, but we will make it perfect for us. we’re so attached to her and can’t wait to research her history. she was built in 1891, and i’ve decided to call her clara, the 7th most popular girl’s name that year. it also happens to be the name of the daughter of the head honchos at my absolute favourite home blog, young house love. i hope they’ll not find it offensive — i wouldn’t want to do anything that would keep them from being my friends someday.

clara is the most darling thing i’ve ever seen. i have so many photos, and shall sort through them soon, to show you more of her. she is so lovely. i just can’t believe she’s mine, all mine!

it’s complicated.

so, my husband and i are trying to plan our wedding, and we… wait, did i just say that? how strange. but true. you know how i said that i live in canada and my husband, graeme, lives in the u.s.? well, here’s the story.

the g-man and i got married just over a month ago, based on some complicated green card applications. which makes it sound like one of us responded to an ad or something to help the other person flee a developing country, but that is certainly not the case. after ten years, we decided we didn’t want to spend any extra time (potentially 3+ more years) apart. so we got hitched. but we still want to have a “real” wedding for our friends and family and ourselves. we didn’t exchange vows or anything like that, and that is something we both really want to do.

planning is sort of complicated, since our relatives are all over the place. we’ve decided to only invite our immediate families, but even still, the 9 people that will be there are spread throughout 6 cities. so, the world is our oyster.

morocco? zambia? chile? france? vancouver island, canada? turkey? italy? poland? i just can’t decide!

in search of a sleeper.

when graeme and i started searching for a house, we lived in a fantasy world, where we imagined ourselves buying a beautiful old home with lots of large, open, bright and airy rooms. we figured we would have our master bedroom, a guest room, an office for each of us, *and* a craft room for me. that was a nice dream. now, we’ve cut back on that… if we get the house we bid on, we’ll have three bedrooms: a master bedroom/my office, an office for graeme, and a guest room/craft room. the room that will be the guest room/craft room is the smallest of the three, so it seems there won’t be a way to have a regular queen-sized bed in there. so, the search for a beautiful (and comfortable) pull-out sofa is on.

i won’t be mean to any sleeper manufacturers and show how ugly most of them are. but… they’re really ugly. really really ugly.

why can’t i find a beautiful, (preferably tufted) pull-out sofa like this west elm one?! i know it must exist! please help!!

step one.

a key part of living the “our house” life is, well… having a house. graeme and i have been looking for our first house for about six months. he said something recently about how house-hunting is basically all about beating down your dreams until you submit to the fact that not only can you not afford a perfect house, it also doesn’t exist, at any price. but we finally found a house we both love and can really see ourselves living in. we placed a bid on it today, and are extremely excited about the potential it has. i want to tell you all the wonderful details, but don’t want to get my hopes up too much. our bid hasn’t been accepted, and due to some complicated bank stuff on the part of the current owner, it will be around 3+ months until we know if it will be ours. but for the sake of posterity, this is the first house we loved enough to try to buy.

edit: it turned out that this house had an oil furnace, and it just seemed like it would be too much work/hassle/expense to live in fear about the whole thing, so we retracted our bid.

map of the world.

one item that i’ve been looking for, for, oh, 20 years, is the perfect world map. i’m looking for one that is quite large, and something a little more creative/unique-looking than the traditional style.

i really like this concept, but it’s probably not too practical. graeme’s memory isn’t so great as it is, so i’m pretty sure that in the distant future, he sure won’t be able to remember what country a lot of pins represent.

i’ll probably just end up getting a simple one, but in case anyone happens to know of something a little different, please let me know!

introduction.

i intend for this blog to be sort of like my diary, something for me to look back on in the future. but if you come across this, you’re certainly more than welcome to follow along with the development of my life and become a part of it.

here’s a little bit about me.

my name is kristel. at present, i’m a 29 year old wedding photographer. i currently live in vancouver, canada.

i’m thrilled to be married to the kindest human being, and my best friend of ten years, graeme. interestingly, he lives in seattle, usa.

we hope to live in the same city sometime soon. because my job is more flexible than his (and, let’s face it, less lucrative), that city will be seattle.

my favourite things are food — cooking, reading about food, talking about food, thinking about food, eating food, etc. — and travel. this blog will probably have a lot of talk about those two things (sadly, probably less travel than i’d like it to contain). i also like a lot of little hobbies and activities — sewing, knitting, home design, etc. i’m not really especially good at any of those things, but i hope to be much better and more skilled as time goes on.

graeme’s favourite thing is me. graeme spends his (little) free time reading nerdy interesting books and articles (what, you don’t think books on investing are interesting? what about his books on physics? no? hmm..), watching tv, and wishing he was traveling. he’s really good about humouring supporting me in my interests.

i’m excited to document our life together.

here’s a photo of us in kenya 7 months ago.

our house.

i can’t remember which album it was on, but i remember, when i was around 11 or 12 years old, i had a cd with the crosby, stills, nash & young song, our house, on it. my mom came into my room and i think she asked me to turn it off, because the song made her feel sad, and that she couldn’t listen to it without crying. being so young, i couldn’t imagine why anyone would be so moved by any song, let alone that one. it wasn’t for several years that i realized how beautiful this simple song is. and when i picture the life that i want, it is this song that plays in my head.

i’m finally getting started on that part of my life that i’ve dreamed of. i want this blog to be a personal record of my simple life, and the things that i care about. something that i can look back on, to see that all my fantasies of that song, were realized.

minus the two cats, because i’m highly allergic.

OUR HOUSE :: CROSBY, STILLS, NASH and YOUNG

I’ll light the fire, while you place the flowers
In the vase that you bought today
Staring at the fire for hours and hours
While I listen to you play your love songs
All night long for me, only for me

Our house, is a very, very, very fine house
With two cats in the yard
Life used to be so hard
Now everything is easy ’cause of you

Come to me now, and rest your head for just five minutes
Everything is done
Such a cozy room, the windows are illuminated
By the evening sunshine through them
Fiery gems for you, only for you

Our house, is a very, very, very fine house
With two cats in the yard
Life used to be so hard
Now everything is easy ’cause of you

The windows become ‘illuminating’

The OLEDWIND project starts, which sees ENEA collaborate with the Campania company Materias S.r.l. to develop innovative organic light sources, the OLED (Organic Light Emitting Diode), to be integrated in windows to illuminate the interiors of buildings in the absence of natural light. Thanks also to the use of cheap and sustainable materials, the new devices will reduce the cost of lighting and improve people’s living well-being.

«This new technology will allow the creation of ‘smart’ windows that will carry out the ‘normal’ task of letting in natural light during the day, while from dusk onwards, thanks to the OLED inserted in the glass, they will maintain the desired level of brightness in the rooms», explains Maria Grazia Maglione, researcher of the Nanomaterials and Devices Laboratory in the ENEA Portici Research Center (Naples).
People spend most of their time inside buildings where natural light contributes only minimally to the necessary lighting. In general, homes, workplaces, public offices and schools use artificial light sources, such as fluorescent (neon) and LED lamps, which rarely replicate the spectral and intensity content of natural light. This has consequences for the living well-being and the health of the occupants, especially in the event of prolonged presence in such environments. «Hence the need to rethink the lighting methods of living environments, using new types of light sources that are more similar to natural light, that is, produce diffused light, are not glaring, have a possibly adjustable spectral content, but which are also efficient, that is, low consumption, cheap, use easily available and sustainable materials, but also biodegradable and that at the end of their life are easily manageable and recyclable, therefore environmentally friendly «, adds Maglione.

In the first phase of the project, the research will be focused on the development of semitransparent OLED prototypes that involve the use of materials and processes with low environmental impact and eco-sustainable, for their possible use in smart windows for interior lighting. «Here the collaboration with Materias S.r.l. will concern the identification of materials, the improvement of some process phases and the evaluation of the results achieved to plan the development of OLED with improved performance «, underlines Maglione.
In a second phase, the emission area and the general performance of the devices will be increased, including stability over time. «This will allow us to interface with lighting companies potentially interested in new lighting solutions — a sector in which the Italian industry is among the first in the world — but also with the manufacturers and installers of fixtures and windows, which would have the possibility to present innovative windows with integrated OLED devices ”, concludes Maglione.

OLED technology is configured as the evolution of lighting methods for closed environments, thanks to the peculiar characteristics of the devices, such as: large area of ​​light emission with diffused light generation, thin and light devices, high efficiency, ample opportunity to adjust the color of the light emitted, heat dissipation which does not require additional heat sinks and therefore low operating temperature, possibility of being made with low cost processes and on flexible substrates, transparency, with the possibility of creating any shape and geometry. In this regard, from a design point of view, OLEDs allow you to think of light as a material and not only as a function, and therefore as a real architectural element, allowing superior versatility in terms of design compared to LEDs, in harmony with the approach to new «Made in Italy» industrial productions.

The OLEDWIND project obtained a financing of 46,500 euros from the «Proof of Concept» program implemented by ENEA for the development and technology transfer to industry.

9 questions about the Illuminati you were too afraid to ask

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When it comes to shadowy cabals that supposedly control the world, the Illuminati should be at the top of any conspiracy theorist’s list. An Illuminati Facebook page has 3.4 million likes, Madonna writes songs about the group, and YouTube channels calling pretty much everyone Illuminati notch almost 200,000 subscribers.

To sort out the truth about the Illuminati, I consulted a variety of experts on the subject. Mark A. Fenster, a law professor at the University of Florida and author of Conspiracy Theories: Secrecy and Power in American Culture, sums up the group’s long-lasting appeal. “It’s absurd on its face that you’ve got this sacred group that’s more than 300 years old and continue to see arguments about its relevance today,” he says. “The fact that the discussion is alive is amazing.”

Lizard people: the greatest political conspiracy ever created

The Illuminati wasn’t always just some crazy chimera — it used to be a very real group with ambitious goals. And even though it doesn’t exist anymore, the fact that many people still have paranoid beliefs about it reveals a lot about power, our culture — and, of course, what we think about Jay Z.

1) What is the Illuminati?

A drawing depicting the initiation of an Illuminati member. Universal Images Group / Getty Images

In a historical sense, the term «Illuminati» refers to the Bavarian Illuminati, a secret society that operated for only a decade, from 1776 to 1785. This organization was founded by Adam Weishaupt, a German law professor who believed strongly in Enlightenment ideals, and his lluminatenorden sought to promote those ideals among elites. Weishaupt wanted to educate Illuminati members in reason, philanthropy, and other secular values so that they could influence political decisions when they came to power.

«It was pretty ambitious for six or nine guys, but they really wanted to take over the world,» says Chris Hodapp, the co-author of Conspiracy Theories and Secret Societies for Dummies with Alice VonKannon.

The Illuminati’s goals — and reputation — often exceeded their means, Hodapp notes. In its early days, the group was just a handful of people. And even at its largest, it only consisted of somewhere between 650 and 2,500 members. The group grew to that size by becoming a sort of sleeper cell within other groups — Illuminati members joined Freemason lodges to recruit members for their own competing secret society.

2) What did the Illuminati believe?

A drawing of an owl from the 1780s, the short period of time the Illuminati was active. Universal Images Group / Getty Images

There were two sides to the historical Illuminati: their odd rituals and their ideals.

The Illuminati did plenty of unusual things. They used symbols (like the owl), adopted pseudonyms to avoid identification, and had complicated hierarchies like Novice, Minerval, and Illuminated Minerval that divided the ranks. In the beginning, Hodapp says, Illuminati members didn’t trust anyone over 30, because they were too set in their ways. Other reports of rituals are harder to confirm, but we know that members were very paranoid and used spy-like protocol to keep one another’s identities secret.

But while they were following these bizarre rituals, they also promoted a worldview that reflected Enlightenment ideals like rational thought and self-rule. Anti-clerical and anti-royal, the Illuminati were closer to revolutionaries than world rulers, since they sought to infiltrate and upset powerful institutions like the monarchy.

3) Did the Illuminati manage to control the world?

Historians tend to think the Illuminati were only mildly successful — at best — in becoming influential. (Though, of course, there are also those who believe the Illuminati successfully took over the world — and still control it today. If an all-powerful group does dominate the world, we probably wouldn’t know about it. Δ.)

It’s also difficult to untangle the success of the Illuminati from that of the Freemasons, which they infiltrated and commingled with. It’s just as tough to tell what influence the Illuminati actually had as opposed to the influence people think they had.

We do know the Illuminati had some influential members — along with many dukes and other leaders who were powerful but are forgotten today, some sources think writer Johann Goethe was a member of the group (though other sources dispute the claim). In a way, Illuminati influence depends on what you believe about them. If you think their revolutionary ideals spread to other groups, like the French Revolution’s Jacobins, then they were successful. If you think those ideas would have prospered regardless, then they were mainly a historical curiosity.

4) Why did the real Illuminati disappear?

This is the duke of Bavaria, the guy who singlehandedly took down the Illuminati. Wikimedia Commons

«They were wiped out,» Hodapp says. «People have tried to revive them over the years, but it’s a moneymaking scheme.»

In 1785, Duke of Bavaria Karl Theodor banned secret societies, including the Illuminati, and instituted serious punishments for anyone who joined them. Most of the group’s secrets were disclosed or published, and, if you believe most historians, the Illuminati disappeared.

From the moment of the disbanding, however, the myth expanded. As described in Conspiracy Theories in American History: An Encyclopedia, documents found in the homes of high-ranking Illuminati members like Xavier von Zwack confirmed some of the spookiest Illuminati theories, like their dreams of world domination and cultish behavior (even though those documents may exaggerate the truth about the group).

5) If the Illuminati vanished, how did their legend live on?

In debunking the Illuminati, George Washington inadvertently promoted it. Graphica Arts / Getty Images

Almost immediately after the Illuminati were disbanded, conspiracy theories about the group sprang up.

The most famous conspiracy theories were authored by physicist John Robison in 1797, who accused the Illuminati of infiltrating the Freemasons, and Abbe Augustin Barruel, whose 1797 history of the Jacobins promoted the theory that secret societies, including the Illuminati, were behind the French Revolution. Historians tend to see these as the first in a long line of conspiracy theories (though, again, for those who believe the Illuminati run the world today, this is arguably proof of the group’s power).

Later on, some of the Founding Fathers managed to stoke interest in the Illuminati in the United States. In 1798, George Washington wrote a letter addressing the Illuminati threat (he believed it had been avoided, but his mentioning it helped bolster the myth). In the panic caused by the anti-Illuminati books and sermons, Thomas Jefferson was (baselessly) accused of being a member of the group.

Though these early Illuminati panics fizzled out, they gave the group a patina of legitimacy that, later on, would help make a centuries-long conspiracy seem more plausible.

6) Are the Illuminati related to the Freemasons?

The cryptic pyramid on the dollar . but it’s not about the Illuminati. Hulton Archive / Getty Images

Conspiracy theories have always been popular in the United States, but for centuries, the Illuminati were less feared than the Freemasons. The 1828 Anti-Masonic Party was based on an opposition to the Freemasons, and though the party died out, Freemasons remained a focal point for paranoia in America. Because the Illuminati recruited many members in Europe through Freemason lodges, the two groups are often confused for each other.

To some degree, Freemason paranoia grew out of the Freemasons’ influence in the United States. Many Founding Fathers were members, after all. And some key American symbols may have been derived from the Freemasons: There’s a strong argument that the floating eye on the dollar, the Eye of Providence above a pyramid, comes from Freemasonry. (There’s also an argument that it was meant as a Christian symbol; the only thing we know for certain is that it has nothing to do with the Bavarian Illuminati.)

That early Freemason paranoia can help us understand the conspiracy theories about the Illluminati today. «People will use a term like ‘Illuminati’ to define anything that they don’t like that might challenge their values,» says Joseph Uscinski, a political scientist at the University of Miami and co-author of American Conspiracy Theories with Joseph Parent.

7) Why do people still believe in the Illuminati today?

The Illuminatus Trilogy, some of the books that set the tone for our modern idea of the Illuminati. JVK via Creative Commons

The Illuminati never completely disappeared from popular culture — it was always burbling in the background. But in the mid-1970s, the Illuminati made a marked comeback thanks to a literary trilogy that gave the group the simultaneously spooky and laughable image it holds today.

The Illuminatus Trilogy, by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson, depicted the Illuminati with ironic detachment. This trilogy became a countercultural touchstone, and its intermingling of real research — Weishaupt, the founder of the real Illuminati, is a character — with fantasy helped put the Illuminati back on the radar.

«It was a great example of the post-’60s ways of ironizing elite forms of power,» Mark Fenster says. «That ironic vision of conspiracy theory is extremely widely distributed. You can be both a serious conspiracy theorist and joke about it.»

From there, the Illuminati became a periodic staple of both popular culture — as in Dan Brown’s massively popular novel Angels and Demons — and various subcultures, where the group is often intermingled with Satanism, alien myths, and other ideas that would have been totally foreign to the real Bavarian Illuminati.

Uscinski clarifies that most Americans today don’t actually believe in the Illuminati. In a survey of conspiracy theories he conducted in 2012, he says zero people claimed that groups like Freemasons or Illuminati were controlling politics. Even so, the Illuminati seem to persist in our collective consciousness, serving as the butt of jokes and the source of lizard people rumors (explained here).

8) Are Jay Z, Kanye West, and other celebrities in the Illuminati?

Jay-Z and Jamal Crawford make the Roc-A-Fella Records diamond (or, to conspiracy theorists, an Illuminati triangle). Scott Gries / Getty Images

We contacted Kanye West and Jay Z’s spokesmen, but they did not return our request for comment. Jay Z has previously said that he thinks rumors of his membership in the Illuminati are «stupid.» Kanye West has said it’s «ridiculous.» Of course, to conspiracy theorists, that’s exactly what a member of the Illuminati would say.

In a broader sense, rumors about the Illuminati and celebrities speak to their place in our culture. Fenster sees the half-ironic, half-serious accusations of Illuminati membership as the latest expression of an old American phenomenon. «It marks that Jay Z and Beyoncé seem to live in a different universe than us,» he says. «They have secret lives and secret access that seems reptilian. We notice how bizarre their lives seem to be and how powerful they seem to be.»

Uscinski also notes the ties between power and conspiracy. «The thing that ties conspiracy theories together is that they always point at someone who is supposedly powerful,» he says. «You never hear a conspiracy theory about the homeless guy in the street or a gang of poor children.»

Both Fenster and Uscinski noted that conspiracy theories can, in many ways, represent genuine anxieties about social problems. In a global, media-driven world, celebrities represent a new and unusual form of power that has an appropriately conspiratorial response.

9) Will the Illuminati kill me for reading this article?

If they do still exist, you already know too much.

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