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I found this again a couple days ago: http://marc.info/?l=djbdns&m=99055803519517&w=2

Some traveling

  • Last Friday: took the train up to Belfast. Didn’t stay very long (though I did get to see the most bombed hotel in Europe). It looks fairly similar to Dublin, except that it’s smaller, it has a slightly darker shade of grey, they use those funny British money, and their accent is funny as well (although I like it a bit better than ye aulde dubspeak).
  • After Belfast, the next destination was Rathlin – this small, rainy island in the middle of nowhere – home of the Jigs and Rigs 2007 music festival (no link for that, but it was pretty cool). When I first heard about it I somehow compared it with Sziget, but this this was much smaller and retreated. Fun, friendly people, and so much rain that the Dublin weather now seems completely reasonable.
  • I took a late speedboat back from Rathlin on Sunday, and this put me in the novel position of being stuck in Ballycastle with no way to leave (until the morning when the buses were running again) and nowhere to sleep (every single B&B, hotel, hostel, motel, whatever in the city was completely booked out). It all worked out when the owner of one of the B&B’s I tried took pity on me (thanks again, Ms. Jennifer :) ) and let me sleep on a couch for a tenner and the promise that I’ll have breakfast at 8:00 then fuck off (because “I’ve got the place full of guests”).
  • I’m writing all this from Mountain View, CA – I just arrived after what has probably been my longest and least precise Atlantic crossing ever. I could rant forever about Delta Airlines, the wisdom of setting up US Immigration & Border Control in Ireland (!) or the various other things that made the trip last more than 6 hours longer than intended, but hey, I made it into one piece and I have all my luggage with me :) I’ll be staying here until the 27th of this month.

Nostalgia

This is probably old news, but it’s fun and at the same time amazing: DHTML Lemmings!

The best place to visit this summer

Discover Ireland!

No

No is the answer. I forgot the question.

(inspired by a tshirt I saw the other day)

Google eats babies

This is a first for me. Here’s the transcript of a chat I just had with an old business contact. Edited to remove the irrelevant bits, and to protect the clueless:

XXX: you probably don’t know this, but google is a big part of the govt plan to monitor people, and google’s in the world’s best position to do that. my favorite is google’s idea to remotely activate the microphone on people’s pc’s and record everything that happens while their pc is on

me: so it’s obviously useless for me to point out that you might be wrong, since I don’t know what’s going on

me: instead, I’m going to nicely ask you to share whatever you’re smoking :)

XXX: that is public information, so whatever

me: conspiracy theories don’t exactly qualify as “public info”, you know :)

XXX: oh fuck off. i really cannot handle that kind of insult to my intelligence.

XXX: get educated about things before you insult someone who has done some research

me: and you are in a better position to know than somebody who works at google, why exactly?

XXX: obviously you haven’t even bothered to spend 5 minutes googling it for yourself, so stop wasting my time.

(XXX has changed status to: Busy)

me: you can tell well founded arguments when the other person gets rude and aggressive instead of presenting arguments… but whatever

me: have a nice day too

XXX: facts are not something you debate. you verify facts to be true or false. you haven’t bothered to check the facts, have you? presenting arguments is done when there is an opinion to be argued. do you understand the difference between opinions to be debated and facts to be verified? now, really, don’t waste more of my time.

XXX: and you’re who started the aggressiveness and rudeness by implying that i’m some kind of dope smoking conspiracy nut.

Boli psihice

news.com ne anunță că experții de la American Medical Association au refuzat să clasifice dependența de jocurile pe calculator drept boală psihică. Experții de la Adevărul ne anunță că, de fapt, este exact pe dos (fără sa explice de ce – e menționat în titlu, restul articolului e plin de speculații bazate pe nişte “studii recente”).

În altă ordine de idei, mi-am configurat tastatura româneasca pe OS X şi o să scriu, din când in când, pe româneşte. Partea proastă e că nu gasesc nicaieri în layout litera ş – nu-mi dau seama dacă-s eu chior, sau dacă e un bug.

Who am I?

You are The Hermit

Prudence, Caution, Deliberation.

The Hermit points to all things hidden, such as knowledge and inspiration,hidden enemies. The illumination is from within, and retirement from participation in current events.

The Hermit is a card of introspection, analysis and, well, virginity. You do not desire to socialize; the card indicates, instead, a desire for peace and solitude. You prefer to take the time to think, organize, ruminate, take stock. There may be feelings of frustration and discontent but these feelings eventually lead to enlightenment, illumination, clarity.

The Hermit represents a wise, inspirational person, friend, teacher, therapist. This a person who can shine a light on things that were previously mysterious and confusing.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

I’m not dead

Seriously, you should know by now that my blog tends to lapse for months at a time. Anyway, I’ve recently been under a constant flood of spam comments – I’ve now installed the (very cool) reCAPTCHA plugin. So, go ahead and comment, you’ll be helping to digitize books :)

In other news, Dublin weather was particularly shitty over the last two weeks. Quite unlike back home, where they’re all suffering from massive heat.

Romania joins the EU

It’s official. Yay!