Month: April 2004

The Memespread project is a little experiment in the way information travels across the blogosphere.

I’ll bet somebody like Jerry Bruckheimer sees a movie in this. During the Sadr militia’s Sunday attempt to seize the U.S. government headquarters in Najaf, the building was defended not by U.S. troops but by a small group of Blackwater Security Consulting “employees”. The Blackwater commandos, most of whom are former Special Forces troops, are on contract to provide security for the U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) in Najaf. It turns out that the four men brutally slain Wednesday in Fallujah were also Blackwater employees.

Spectacularly interesting article about the standoff. Hey, if it was a movie, I’d probably go see it.

SYDNEY, Australia – A retired Australian crocodile hunter saved a young girl from the jaws of a 10-foot crocodile when he jumped on top of the man-eating reptile and gouged its eyes, local media said Tuesday.

This article was of particular interest to me, given that I used to work in The City of Medicine Hat’s GIS department.

When the 40,000 subscribers to Reason, the monthly libertarian magazine, receive a copy of the June issue, they will see on the cover a satellite photo of a neighborhood – their own neighborhood. And their house will be graphically circled.

Free Registration Required or you could go to Bugmenot.com and pickup a username and password there.

Cbrown posted this little gem via their blog, and I thought it worth mentioning.

I had to share this find. I recently purchased a high-quality computer sleeve from a small boutique manufacturer. I was checking if it could be washed. The photo is the attached tag with the washing instructions in both English and French. The English is exactly what you would expect and so is the French, for the first 6 lines. The last three lines of French are most interesting. “We are sorry that our President is an idiot. We didn’t vote for him.”

Update: Salon has an article about the french labels.

An intesting look at categories of blog posts from BoingBoing’s Guest blog:

Informative: short, sweet, linked. Makes a quick point and backs it up with a link to another site. Boing Boing has made this into an art form.

Blisdom (blog wisdom): can be short or long, relies on a narrative to make a subtle point. Often pulled from a life experience. Here’s an example from a conversation with my wife:

Wife: I just had the strangest dream. I was on a train…

Me: Coach or First Class?

Wife: Honey, I don’t dream in coach.

Vanity Post: Often inane. Represents everything that journalists like to point to and say, “See, blogs are worthless.”

‘While the unexamined life may not be worth living the overexamined life is not worth reading.’

–Scott Simon of NPR on “inane weblogs”

That doesn’t mean these blog entries aren’t interesting when read as part of the whole blog…it just means that if there is a point, it is often missed by the casual visitor, like going from Sopranos series 1 to series 4.

Fiction: There is a lot of emerging fiction popping up from blogs. Harder to find, but worth the journey.

Then comes the post that has had the biggest affect on my life. I don’t have a clever name for it, so let’s just call it the “shoes” post…as in walk a mile in another’s shoes. Sometimes it has a clear point, and other times it just resonates inside you. Whatever the author’s point behind the post, it takes on new meaning in your own mind. Sometimes you learn something about someone else, but often you learn something about yourself.

I like to think of my posts as a combination of Informative and Blisdom, giving a tiny slice-of-my-life to readers while at the same time posting short sweet links along with my thoughts on the matter.

BitTorrent is the greatest! For example, even though I went to Calgary to watch the BareNaked Ladies last Thursday and Anna forgot to set the VCR, I was able to download her a copy of the newest episode of ER and we could just watch it on the computer. But using BitTorrent gets even better when you use RSS. With an RSS feed you can use your news aggregator to let you know whenever there is a new episode of your favorite show available for download, this way you’ll always be up to date on whatever Tony Soprano and/or Homer Simpson are up to. It’s the greatest!

What a movie! Magdalene Sisters takes place in the 1960’s in Ireland. It’s about the Catholic practice of taking unwedded women who were accused of being sexual active in some way or other and placing them in a kind of laundry slave labour camp. Based on a true story, the last of these asylums was finally shut down in 1996.

The IMDB description:

Ireland in the sixties: Four women are given into the custody of the magdalene sisterhoood asylum to correct their more or less sinful behavior: Crispina and Rose have given birth to a pre-marriage child, Margaret got raped by her cousin and the orphan Bernadette had been repeatedly caught flirting with the boys. All have to work in a laundry under the strict supervision of the nuns, who break their wills through sadistic punishments. Some of the inmates develop countermeasures, while others perish under the treatment.

This is one of those movies that you hate to watch because it’s such a miserble fate that has befallen these women. It was a huge relief to see (and while not wanting to ruin the show for you I think it’s worth saying) that in the end at least 3 out of the 4 main characters make it out of that place and return to living a somewhat normal life. Very intense show not one that I would recommend to most people, but it’s definitely a good independant / Irish production.

At first I thought that “Something’s Gotta Give” would only appeal to a much older audience than myself, but I was pleasantly surprised by this quirky and original comedy. Jack Nicholson plays Harry Langer, an aging, wealthy bachelor whom only dates younger women – much younger woman. He is dating the young and beautiful Marin, played by Amanda Peet, and together they go to her parents beach house for a romantic weekend. Her mother and aunt show up unannounced but after some awkward (and funny) moments they decide they can all spend the weekend at the house together. When Jack’s character suffers a heart attack he is sentenced to a few days alone at the nearby beach house with Marin’s mother Erica as his nurse. Things get interesting as Harry begins to fall in love with the accomplished lady more his age.

The IMDB description:

Harry Langer (Nicholson) is an aged music industry exec with a fondness for younger women like Marin (Peet), his latest trophy girlfriend. Things get a little awkward when Harry suffers a heart attack at the home of Marin’s mother Erica (Keaton). Left in the care of Erica and his doctor (Reeves), a love triangle starts to take shape.

It’s a cute love story that, while a bit on the chick-flick side, I really liked. It’s something that’s definitely worth renting.