Another Sisyphus

Sisyphus was condemned to forever push a rock up a hill only for it to roll down the other side and for him to start pushing it back up all over again. This story was the inspiration for the title of Albert Camus' book 'The Myth of Sisyphus'. I remember how, when I was young, the first season of football that I followed was very exciting. Especially as my team - Spurs - started an unbeaten run beginning with the first match that I ever saw. As a result of this run, they won the FA Cup that year (1967). With subsequent seasons, the excitement waned and I now sometimes wonder what all the fuss is about (especially among those who are not making vast sums of money out of it and may even be spending huge sums watching 'their team' each week).

Remembering that Camus was once a footballer - in particular, a goalkeeper - might the Sisyphean footballer be one...

Condemned to kick a ball into a goal over and over only for it to be replaced on the centre spot and the cycle to start again (until the final whistle, that is, after which one awaits the next match when the whole process begins again - a Sisyphus with breaks).

Perhaps Camus, as a goalkeeper, was condemned to be the one who had to keep picking the ball out of the back of the net.

Why are you here? - 1

The question of the meaning of life is an old one and perhaps an unanswerable one. For various technical reasons, it may not even be a valid one. Even if it is not a valid question as such, it does provide pause for thought...

...and having paused and thought, to come up with some suggestions (each of which with their own snippet of value and/or usefulness).

Here is one such suggestion:

"Perhaps you are here to understand your own particular bit of the universe... and to do what comes of that understanding."

Epictetus - 8

From: The Golden Sayings of Epictetus (translated by Hastings Crossley) - from Project Gutenberg.

XCIV
Whether you will or no, you are poorer than I!
"What then do I lack?"
What you have not: Constancy of mind, such as Nature would have it be: Tranquillity. Patron or no patron, what care I? but you do care. I am richer than you: I am not racked with anxiety as to what Cæsar may think of me; I flatter none on that account. This is what I have, instead of vessels of gold and silver! your vessels may be of gold, but your reason, your principles, your accepted views, your inclinations, your desires are of earthenware.

Barcode - 22

And finally...

Tthis is the last of a set of barcodes (and the like) I made over four years ago and have been publishing sporadically since. This is a Telepen barcode:

5 - For November 5th

During a trip to Edinburgh in August, I came across the work of Sol LeWitt (1928-2007) for the first time. This was at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art. Amongst other pieces, I was able to see 'Five Modular Structures (Sequential Permutations on the Number Five)'. What is not immediately obvious - but which makes these structures particularly interesting when one knows this - is that they all have the same 'footprint': they take up the same two dimensional outline and space on the floor, yet are each quite different given the addition of the third dimension.