Tuesday, 30th of August 2011

"Burning the candle at both ends..." is the name of the concept that was chosen today by the group to further explore. The loose definition is as follows:
burn the candle at both ends Fig. to work very hard and stay up very late at night. (One end of the candle is work done in the daylight, and the other end is work done at night.) No wonder Mary is ill. She has been burning the candle at both ends for a long time. You'll wear out if you keep burning the candle at both ends. 
OR

burn the candle at both ends to get little sleep or rest because you are busy until late every night and you get up early every morning (usually in continuous tenses) She'd been burning the candle at both ends studying for her exams and made herself ill.

Basically referring to working too hard at a particular activity. However, other areas can be explored - 

• Work/study - Can we use the concept to motivate or inspire each other to keep working late in the night by literally burning the candle at both ends... Will it affect the study or working as a possible distraction or something to send someone to sleep?
• Romantic setting - How will the couples react with something bobbing up and down in front of them? How can it stimulate the senses - Aromas? Level of light?
• Competitive - Can it be seen as a timer? How long has the other been racing etc. A varied intensity and speed can tell who is winning. Are there other variables? 
• Music rehersal - The bobbing candle could adhere to being useful in musical practice - particularly with music having such a dependence on  tempo and timing. Is there also a way of having the candle applied for tuning purposes? - evening out when the right note is played or when the right notes are played. A simple input is the music being played but with the output at the other end..? Evens out with harmony?
• Artists and writers - Co-authors may need to ability to easily know the progress of another writer - input may have to come from either "time spent" or a computer plug in for word processing. For artists it would be as simple as whether a piece has been created dependant on the artwork type.
• Insomnia and sleeping issues - Due to the candles relaxation properties it could be used to help with various sleeping problems such as insomnia. Inputs would be - noise monitoring - movement (micro & macro) - breathing patterns. The output at the other end would reflect the sleeping pattern of another person - erratic or slow and relaxed. May be able to calm each other down if they know someone else is sleeping calmly.