Advanced pumpkin carving.
Saturday, November 01, 2008
Rita Rudner
[Thanks to TC.]
"I'm so afraid of natural childbirth. It's backwards, it seems like everybody is taking drugs except when they need them."
"I'm so afraid of natural childbirth. It's backwards, it seems like everybody is taking drugs except when they need them."
links tip
Here's a tip I invented to supplement browser bookmarks:
if you have a web server, make and upload a page of simple text links to the sites you visit the most, and then set this page as the home page in your browser.
if you have a web server, make and upload a page of simple text links to the sites you visit the most, and then set this page as the home page in your browser.
Mike and the Sony A900 (updated)
Mike Johnston said he would take a few days off from the tOP blog. But then he got his loaner Sony A900, and clearly he could not stay away.
He's very impressed with its resolution.
Update: he expands on resolution.
He's very impressed with its resolution.
Update: he expands on resolution.
Military think and Iron Man
I'm just watching Iron Man on blueray*. It's a good movie, like Transformers it's both well written and visually gorgeous. And funny. (I'm not much into action movies, but when they are fused nicely with SF and humor, that's a different matter.)
One scene illustrates well the problem with military think: Iron Man goes in and wipes out some terrorists that the marines can't get at. The air force don't know who or what it is doing that, so what do they do? They shoot at him.
Military people and others who love to fight say that they are necessary because the world is full of enemies. But the problem is that shooting is not their last resort, it's their first instinct. When they face something they don't understand, they shoot.
Another thing the film illustrates well is the principle that you make superior weapons to protect yourself, and then you better make sure they don't "fall into the wrong hands". Only the problem is: quick, mention one single weapon in the history of the world which did not fall into "the wrong hands" sooner or later. Usually sooner.
The Dissonance said...
In the twenty years I spent in the U.S. military from Private to Major we were always taught that killing was the last step in a line of escalation. When the US troops went through those huts in Panama I was never so proud as to see that no civilians were shot even though they popped up at very strange times and suddenly.
I don't know how they are trained today, but we certainly never shot first and asked questions later. Not in any unit I was in.
Eolake said...
Well, that's very good to hear.
I wonder about stuff like napalm, though. I think it's very hard to bomb or napalm villages without innocents getting hurt.
Also, like most human Minds, the military minds is split: there's the sensible mind, and the mind which for example in 2003 planned and promoted "Operation Shock And Awe", which was simply to bomb the city of Baghdad into rubble, murdering at least tens of thousands of innocent men, women, and children. (In the end it didn't happen. Maybe they promoted it to see what level of sadistic destruction they can get away with without too much of an uproar.)
* I can spell Blue-ray right, but I don't, as a mark of disrespect for a format where the machine takes two minutes to load a disc, and doesn't remember how far it played the disc last time, a huge annoyance for me since I always watch a movie in several chunks. So every time I come back to it, I have to wait several minutes for the machine to boot and load, and then I have to find the point where I played to last.
TTL added:
"In the twenty years I spent in the U.S. military from Private to Major we were always taught that killing was the last step in a line of escalation."
Your humor is rather macabre, don't you think?
Yes, I can see you were probably "taught" all kinds of things. But look what U.S is actually doing. Over one million iraqis killed. Most of them children. And since U.S. had absolutely no reason to go into Iraq* in the first place you surely must be joking about the "last step of escalation" part.
Or perhaps you meant: Last step unless the nation willingly hands over control of their natural resources and lets you freely rape their women and torture the males for funny tourist photos. And lets your build a military base the size of the Vatican on their land. Is that what you meant?
*) Same for Panama, Vietnam and every other country the U.S. has attacked since WW2. There have been absolutely no valid reason for any of those wars. In each case U.S. has been the aggressor.
One scene illustrates well the problem with military think: Iron Man goes in and wipes out some terrorists that the marines can't get at. The air force don't know who or what it is doing that, so what do they do? They shoot at him.
Military people and others who love to fight say that they are necessary because the world is full of enemies. But the problem is that shooting is not their last resort, it's their first instinct. When they face something they don't understand, they shoot.
Another thing the film illustrates well is the principle that you make superior weapons to protect yourself, and then you better make sure they don't "fall into the wrong hands". Only the problem is: quick, mention one single weapon in the history of the world which did not fall into "the wrong hands" sooner or later. Usually sooner.
The Dissonance said...
In the twenty years I spent in the U.S. military from Private to Major we were always taught that killing was the last step in a line of escalation. When the US troops went through those huts in Panama I was never so proud as to see that no civilians were shot even though they popped up at very strange times and suddenly.
I don't know how they are trained today, but we certainly never shot first and asked questions later. Not in any unit I was in.
Eolake said...
Well, that's very good to hear.
I wonder about stuff like napalm, though. I think it's very hard to bomb or napalm villages without innocents getting hurt.
Also, like most human Minds, the military minds is split: there's the sensible mind, and the mind which for example in 2003 planned and promoted "Operation Shock And Awe", which was simply to bomb the city of Baghdad into rubble, murdering at least tens of thousands of innocent men, women, and children. (In the end it didn't happen. Maybe they promoted it to see what level of sadistic destruction they can get away with without too much of an uproar.)
* I can spell Blue-ray right, but I don't, as a mark of disrespect for a format where the machine takes two minutes to load a disc, and doesn't remember how far it played the disc last time, a huge annoyance for me since I always watch a movie in several chunks. So every time I come back to it, I have to wait several minutes for the machine to boot and load, and then I have to find the point where I played to last.
TTL added:
"In the twenty years I spent in the U.S. military from Private to Major we were always taught that killing was the last step in a line of escalation."
Your humor is rather macabre, don't you think?
Yes, I can see you were probably "taught" all kinds of things. But look what U.S is actually doing. Over one million iraqis killed. Most of them children. And since U.S. had absolutely no reason to go into Iraq* in the first place you surely must be joking about the "last step of escalation" part.
Or perhaps you meant: Last step unless the nation willingly hands over control of their natural resources and lets you freely rape their women and torture the males for funny tourist photos. And lets your build a military base the size of the Vatican on their land. Is that what you meant?
*) Same for Panama, Vietnam and every other country the U.S. has attacked since WW2. There have been absolutely no valid reason for any of those wars. In each case U.S. has been the aggressor.
Friday, October 31, 2008
Ham 'n cheese
Breaded ham and Dutch Edam cheese. (It's about the only yellow cheese I can find in this country, which shocked me a little, since in DK, yellow cheeses are abundant and varied.)
Earthenware by Denby, a lovely brand with understated design.
Phil said:
Can you explain "breaded ham" to the American?
Eolake answers:
It's when you cover a ham with bread crumbs.
The main thing for me is that the products which are called 'breaded' are, for some reason, higher quality. Instead of small and thin, greasy slices which look processed, I get big, thick slices obviously cut from a real ham.
Earthenware by Denby, a lovely brand with understated design.
Phil said:
Can you explain "breaded ham" to the American?
Eolake answers:
It's when you cover a ham with bread crumbs.
The main thing for me is that the products which are called 'breaded' are, for some reason, higher quality. Instead of small and thin, greasy slices which look processed, I get big, thick slices obviously cut from a real ham.
Prawn sammich
I've decided to generally have some decent ingredients around to make myself good sandwiches. I have the skills to make better sammiches than four out of five British cafes (not hard), so I might as well do it.
Home baked wholewheat bread and of course good quality ingredients.
Home baked wholewheat bread and of course good quality ingredients.
A street photographer
Here's a street photographer who is not afraid to get (really) close. I'd like to learn that.
In related news, in the UK:
"The Home Office has admitted that the police had, at times, acted inappropriately in restricting photography in public places"
... This is the same page, only in a version where I can't copy any text. Does anybody know how they do that? (And how to get around it?) (Funny, I can copy in Firefox, but not in Safari.)
... Nope, I was wrong. I can copy all the text by using command-A. What I can't do is drag over any text to select it. Very odd...
In related news, in the UK:
"The Home Office has admitted that the police had, at times, acted inappropriately in restricting photography in public places"
... This is the same page, only in a version where I can't copy any text. Does anybody know how they do that? (And how to get around it?) (Funny, I can copy in Firefox, but not in Safari.)
... Nope, I was wrong. I can copy all the text by using command-A. What I can't do is drag over any text to select it. Very odd...
The MacBook and media longevity
David Pogue writes about the new MacBook and is sad about FireWire going away. Without it you can't repair a dead Mac from another Mac, and you can't import DV tapes.
"Last week, on the phone, I got a chance to vent my unhappiness to Steve Jobs himself. I told him about my long-held intention to edit down those 100 tapes, maybe when I'm retired.
I must admit, he gave me quite a wakeup call. He pointed out that in 10 years, there won't be any machines left that can play them."
----
Note: I almost wrote: "... and laments the departure of FireWire...", but I am trying to stay aware of when I'm just imitating the generic journalist phrasing of the world, and avoiding it.
Update: also from NYT: Google settles book scanning law suit.
And MS announces an upcoming slimmer and more responsive OS, named Windows 7. They clearly feel hurt by the perception of Vista as bloated and flawed.
"Last week, on the phone, I got a chance to vent my unhappiness to Steve Jobs himself. I told him about my long-held intention to edit down those 100 tapes, maybe when I'm retired.
I must admit, he gave me quite a wakeup call. He pointed out that in 10 years, there won't be any machines left that can play them."
----
Note: I almost wrote: "... and laments the departure of FireWire...", but I am trying to stay aware of when I'm just imitating the generic journalist phrasing of the world, and avoiding it.
Update: also from NYT: Google settles book scanning law suit.
And MS announces an upcoming slimmer and more responsive OS, named Windows 7. They clearly feel hurt by the perception of Vista as bloated and flawed.
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