M-L's blog

git on Windows

2012-01-03T15:27:00.003-05:00

If you have had problems using Git on Windows, and the error refers to something called a "Git entry point" and you get a popup that mentions "libiconv2.dll" or "libiconv-2.dll", I fixed it by copying the libiconv*.dll files in the Git 'bin' directory to C:\Windows\SysWOW64.

I was going to mention this on Stackoverflow.com, but I didn't want to create a question and then answer it myself. So there.

Clay Shirky stole my idea

2008-04-30T11:42:00.002-04:00

Or rather, I had the inklings of the same idea years ago when I realized the video games and interactive media, turbo-charged with fast networks, are more active and participatory than TV or, dare I say, books and printed materials.

Wright is (was?) the only thing stopping Obama

2008-04-30T09:26:00.004-04:00

Finally Obama denounces Rev. Wright. It's about time.

I completely understand why Rev. Wright is so bent on ruining Obama's campaign. Obama as president is a terrible idea for racists like Wright: it robs the pastor of much of his raison d'être. What a complete and utter moron. Why do people tolerate people like Wright? Because if they don't, they are automatically labeled as racists.

Torontoist is SOOO white

2008-03-14T19:35:00.003-04:00

If you haven't checked out Stuff White People Like, you should take a look. Torontoist has finally caught on. By the way, Torontoist is so white. Uh oh. How soon will SWPL be self-referential?

Paris and PDP

2008-02-22T20:26:00.002-05:00

It's a tired, overtransmitted meme, but I am definitely one of its carriers: I have the love of Paris, France. Every so often, I say to myself that if I had large quantities of cash, I would buy an apartment somewhere within the city walls. I then wonder if I would still like it as much if I really lived there. And then I conclude that yes, I still would.

I am so obsessed with the city's geography, layout and all aspects of its urbanism that I am google-mapping the Paris Daily Photo entries whenever it makes sense. I hope the author of this blog doesn't think I'm stalking him.

Until there's a more clever way of doing this with the use of the Google Maps API, I am gladly doing this every day by hand, like a dedicated Paris nerd.

back to blogger...

2008-02-06T01:06:00.000-05:00

martyloo is back on blogger... Martyloo doesn't want to pay for web hosting and thanks to very handy software, moving back was a breeze. This not a very interesting post, but I thought I'd mention it for anyone who is trying to write a Wordpress to Blogger migration script. Unfortunately, migrating comments didn't work very well (at all?) I might dig into this and figure it out if I have time. For the few for whom comments have been unceremoniously deleted, I apologize. I'm on blogger for good (as long as it remains free).

movember

2007-11-20T00:27:00.000-05:00

Movember, a fundraiser to fight prostate cancer. I'm participating this year and have been faithfully growing what I can since November 1st. I didn't think it would be worth it to put up my pic here, but I've raised $90 already. Please propel me over the edge to get a free Gala Parté ticket. This is a serious charity with a funny face.

the best show... ever?

2007-10-23T22:17:00.000-04:00

I've watched the first season of Mad Men. I think it's better than Six Feet Under. It's better than The Sopranos. Maybe.

more democracy

2007-10-02T21:49:00.000-04:00

I don't know how peeps can justify staying with the First-Past-The-Post system we currently "enjoy" in Ontario. With that in mind, the upcoming referendum is much more important than the actual election. We need more democracy before we start forgetting what it really is.

I attended the Great Referendum Debate last week, held at the great MaRS facility, and Christina Blizzard from the Sun was embarrassed by Andrew Coyne. The quality of her arguments was woeful, and to makes things worse, she was offended on a personal level when the audience laughed. Repeatedly, she was dared to suggest that the current system always ended up reflecting the will of the people. Even if this claim had a modicum of truth, there wouldn't be any way to prove it. (We vote for a reason.) At one point she used the sports metaphor of winner-takes-all: if the Leafs and the Canadiens faced off in the Stanley Cup Playoffs, and Montreal won 7-6, the winner is still Montreal and it doesn't matter how close the Leafs were. No one responded to this idiocy, but it was an opportunity missed: the winning team, freshly victorious, would not have the match score adjusted to 9-1 after being crowned champions. She partially made up for herself when she blasted Marilyn Churley for reducing MMP to a kind of affirmative action plan for female politicians.

As for Andrew Coyne, mad props.

wise lessons learned from software development

2007-09-12T22:07:00.000-04:00

Greg Wilson, from the University of Toronto, compiled the following list of maxims accumulated from years of experience writing software. I recently found them stuffed in the confines of my archive folders and I thought I'd post them here. Just so I don't get accused of plagiarism or some other IP violation, I emphasize that this is his compilation, not mine. When I was still in school (years ago), I remember him going over the fine points of some of these ideas. What he had to say was very enlightening: he was the first professor that stressed to me the importance of the more practical aspects of software development. The following is worth more than any clever algorithm or mathematical technique. I include them here because they apply to more than just software development. Also, you may find yourself editing some code at some point in your life. (Did you ever think you would need to use Excel? Look where you are now.)

A week of hard work can sometimes save you an hour of thought.

Anything worth repeating is worth automating.

Anything repeated in two or more places will eventually be wrong in at least one.

The three chief virtues of a programmer are laziness, impatience, and hubris.

It's not what you know, it's what you can.

The deadline isn't when you're supposed to finish; the deadline is when it starts to be late.

Never debug standing up.

Tools are signposts, not destinations.

Not everything worth doing is worth doing well.

Code unto others as you would have others code unto you.

Every complex file format eventually turns into a badly-designed programming language.

Tools are amplifiers: they allow good programmers to be better, and bad ones to be worse.

They call it computer science because it's experimental.

Programs come and go; data is forever.

There's no such thing as one program.

Discipline matters more than genius; reality matters more than rulebooks.

Christopher Hitchens

2007-08-06T22:59:00.000-04:00

Christopher Hitchens is the modern day Voltaire. Check him out.

Avi Lewis: ass

2007-08-02T21:09:00.000-04:00

I can't believe Avi Lewis is taken seriously. Here he makes a fool of himself interviewing Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Face it, Avi, you're simply ... out in left field: Islamists are a bigger problem than America. And if you take your head out of your ass, you'll realise that America is not what is wrong with the world.

liberals, pork

2007-08-01T21:22:00.000-04:00

Liberals eat more pork than Convervatives and NDPers, apparently. Interesting, the article shies away from the party members' religious affiliations or lifestyle choices. Maybe those weren't deemed to be statistically significant. Are the number of vegetarians who are on the left, and the number of orthodox Jews and devout Muslims on the right not a factor? I ask the question.

Iraq wins Asian Cup

2007-07-29T21:22:00.000-04:00

Sectarian violence in Iraq is not inevitable: the Iraqi national soccer team won the Asian Cup this weekend. The team is composed of Shias, Sunnis, Arabs and Kurds. Under Saddam's rule, this team would have been tortured by Saddam Hussein's son Uday should they have produced unsatisfactory performances. There is no way the team would have competed successfully under Saddam's rule. Now, when Iraq is one of the most unstable nations in the world, they won it all. FIFA President Sepp Blatter praised the players on Saturday.

perspective, scale

2007-07-11T23:30:00.000-04:00

This is a cool, nerdy and old video. I'm the only nerd who had not seen it until now.

quality goods

2007-07-08T22:59:00.000-04:00

I don't want to pick on Chinese companies exclusively, but this post makes me worried. Sane, accountable, transparent and enforced government regulations save lives: this doesn't seem to be working in China right now.

death of a blog....

2007-07-05T23:44:00.000-04:00

... birth of another. I've had the domain for a while now and, being the stubborn, dogmatic person I am, refused to look at canned solutions for blog/CMS/publishing software. I thought I'd design and implement my own to be able to cut my teeth on the latest and greatest web technologies. Well, after reading up on the latest web programming frameworks, i.e. waffling, I've finally uploaded Wordpress. It took me literally 15 minutes to figure out how it works, install it and import all my blogger posts.

creepy

2007-06-28T00:19:00.000-04:00

This creeps me out. I don't want to be uncritically anti-Chinese products, but there's some serious accountability problems going on over there. Needless to say, I don't think it's just Chinese products that we need to worry about. I don't drink water from local streams, so I guess I should be skeptical about ALL products. Thanks to this article, I am now paranoid.

e-waste

2007-06-22T00:40:00.000-04:00

Today, I think one of the grossest environmental problems is the amount of electronic gadgets we dump into landfills. That stuff is nasty: electronics are full of lead, mercury and other toxic substances. This week's Technology Quarterly in the Globe (how boring am I) is all about the "greening" of the information technology industry. Very substantially, the issue largely avoids the oh so tired flower-power politics of the environment and instead focuses on health, energy saving and the financial benefits of going green.

Anyway, if you're looking to get rid of e-quipment without poisoning land and water for future generations here are some urls for recycling your computer.

www.hp.ca/recycle
www.dell.com/assetrecovery
www.apple.com/environment
www.rebootcanada.ca
www.littlegeeks.org

martyloo

2007-06-17T20:27:00.000-04:00

The martyloo.com domain was silently dropped from blogger.com 2 minutes ago (intentionally) and will be used for other purposes... This blog is simply reverting back to http://martyloo.blogspot.com. If you didn't even know I was in possession of martyloo.com, don't worry about it.

fat idiot

2007-05-27T02:27:00.000-04:00

It's amazing how some people are taken seriously despite being complete morons: people like Moqtada "Eric Cartman of Iraq" Sadr do not give me hope for peace in the middle east.

kids and guns

2007-05-17T23:33:00.000-04:00

Laugh before you cry:
Never mind the gun: it should be a crime to name your kid Bubba.

NYC

2007-05-12T15:37:00.000-04:00

I went to New York City last weekend with Lemon. We had a blast. The weather was beautiful, we saw an excellent play (Talk Radio), we went to the Museum of Natural History. We also went to the Museaum of the City of New York where we saw an exhibit on Robert Moses, and another on the Spanish civil war. We walked around a lot: Central Park, Tribeca, the lower east side, the upper west side, Little Italy, Chinatown. We saw a public debate at the New York Public Library between Al Sharpton and Christopher Hitchens. The topic was "God Is Not Great", the title of Hitchens' new book. Sharpton was lame while Hitchens was his usual sarcastic and contrarian self... We did a harbour tour, passed by Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty. We also watched HBO live, went to a comedy club, had a few drinks, and I met some co-workers I'd only called, e-mailed or IM'ed.

élections présidentielles

2007-04-22T12:12:00.000-04:00

Participation has reached exceptional levels: French peeps are voting en masse for the presidential elections.

Yesterday, I cast my vote and the lineup was insane. I waited an hour and a half to vote. A lady ahead of me in line had her 2 kids with her. This was not a walk in the park: the 4 year old was getting cranky and she breastfed the 6 month old on site in order not lose her spot. That's patriotism.

not the brightest solution

2007-04-19T23:09:00.000-04:00

When Lemon pointed out to me that Ontario was banning incandescent light bulbs, I was wondering what our provincial government was smoking. I thought the city's "upgrade your toilet" campaign was weird, but it was voluntary and sort of made sense.

I think I know why this bulb thing is going down.

It has become impossible for politicians to even suggest that electricity should stop being subsidized at current levels. Everyone knows that we're all paying substantially less for electricity than what it really costs: why would we change our consumption habits or buy new technology to limit it? This, despite the August 2003 blackout.

Faced with a difficult political dilemma, what does our government do? Brainwash us and outlaw perfectly good technology. This is completely backwards and idiotic. What they should do is make people pay more for what they use, and let economizing technologies take hold. No brainwashing, no guilt trips, no wasted advertising money.

90 years ago...

2007-04-05T14:40:00.000-04:00

Whoever thinks Canada has a history of neutrality and international impotence, check yourself. Today marks the 90th anniversary of the battle of Vimy Ridge, considered to be a turning point in WWI and Canadian history. After that event, the international community looked at Canada in a different light. The Canadian National Vimy Memorial is very eerie and beautiful. It's located in France on the site of the former battle field, and it is officially Canadian territory. The mortar shells have so warped the soil that it now looks like huge grassy mogul hills.

hijab

2007-03-03T19:26:00.000-05:00

Recently, a Muslim girl was ejected from a soccer match because she was playing with her hijab. I'm not a fan of the hijab, but preventing hijab wearing girls from playing a sport seems excessive. Many Muslim (and non-muslim) parents take strong issue with their girls playing any sport at all: I think the fact that she's playing, with or without a hijab, is something to be encouraged. The hijab doesn't put any of the other players in danger, which was the rationale for the FIFA anti-headgear rule. I'm not sure if I still agree with the anti-hijab ruling in schools in France.

civet coffee

2007-03-01T00:29:00.000-05:00

I bought a paper copy of the Globe and Mail last week. All I really wanted was the Dell advertisement to hopefully get a discount code on a computer for my parents. That didn't work out and today, as a sad consolation, I flipped through Report On Business Magazine. A short paragraph on Indonesian Kopi Luwak coffee caught my eye. Apparently, this variety of coffee is the most expensive in the world. Its production is rather peculiar...

The process is as follows. Our good old friend the Asian Palm Civet (remember S.A.R.S.?), a beast local to where the coffee is grown, eats coffee berries as part of its natural diet and passes the beans through its digestive tract, excreting them partially digested onto the jungle floor. The beans are gathered by locals who sell them at $600 USD per pound. Available at Pusateri's.

Who said Tim Horton's tastes like shit? Really? What KIND of shit?

Soros

2007-03-01T00:25:00.000-05:00

Hypocrisy

muzak

2007-02-26T18:03:00.000-05:00

There are 2 songs that never cease to be played in elevators, shops and malls all over Toronto:

"Bad Day" by Daniel Powter
"Closing Time" by Semisonic

I absolutely hate these 2 songs and I wish I would never hear them again. That is, however, an impossibility. Have I put unpleasant sounds into your head? Sorry: go and listen to your favorite music to save yourself from meltdown. If you can't remember the songs (because there's no way you haven't heard them), consider yourself lucky.

Oscars

2007-02-25T22:12:00.000-05:00

I'm watching the Oscars: I'm in a pool this year and so far I'm doing very well. Ellen DeGeneres is hilarious.

stoned

2007-02-25T22:00:00.000-05:00

According to this study, I've got the IQ (or attention span) of a total stoner. I've read about another study that came to a similar conclusion, I think. It was slashdotted.

Le Penis presents his plan

2007-02-25T18:37:00.000-05:00

The Martyloo writing process is as follows: 1) Martyloo gets an idea that might bloggable or thinks of a story worth telling. 2) Martyloo imagines how he might write this on a blog. 3) Martyloo fails to string two words together on his expensive computer and wallows in his abject failure to a) express himself and b) use and contribute to the hinterweb he so loves.

Well time to cut the crap and just point to the story, when it can't be created.

I've been following the French presidential race in some detail for a long time. Some find it intolerable but I find the Sarko vs. Ségo battle to be fascinating. More so than in Canada, it seems like politics is a more passionate and meaningful activity in France, probably because the state has a more important role in society than in the overwhelming majority of the anglophone world.

Ségo and Sarko are 2 candidates that are popular in a rock star sort of way. Populist and/or popular depending your point of view, I suppose. I've read Sarkozy's book, Ségolène Royal's Paris-Match interview, discussed politics with a highly ranked French civil servant (my aunt, who worked for Ségo a few years ago), read countless articles on lemonde.fr, liberation.fr, blogs. I've come to some important conclusions for myself , and I will share them with you.

There is an economic crisis in France. The current social safety net is completely unsustainable, and it is degrading. Whatever cash Ségolène Royal pulls out of her ass isn't going to save it. In fact, I think Ségo doesn't have cash up her ass: it's her head. She hasn't even costed her grand plans to alleviate the suffering of the masses. When I was in France a couple of months ago, I saw trailer parks so appalling they made Sunnyvale look like the Jardin du Luxembourg. Ségo will do nothing to change this. Nicolas Sarkozy is much more honest about the severity of the problem, and is much more realistic about its solutions. This is difficult for die-hard socialists to swallow, just like it's difficult for them to accept that France is part of a global capitalist trade system that still provides livelihood for most of its citizens.

Then there is Le Pen, who recently explained his presidential campaign platform. He is a disgrace, an embarrassment and would be a disaster for France. Why is he still on the scene? It has been well argued, and it makes complete sense to me, that the huge dick that is Le Pen could only garner so many votes in France if right-wing reforms have had absolutely no chance of being implemented. Let me explain.

France is a socialist country. For Canadians, imagine Jack Layton being the leader of Canada: that's an appropriate parallel. For Americans, there's simply no possible comparison. On a global political spectrum, Sarko is economically a red liberal. If he were to be elected, there is no way that the social safety net would be dismantled, as his opponents want everyone to believe. That's like saying that Hilary Clinton would nationalize the American automotive industry: it's not going to happen. Similarly, Le Pen will never get elected.

What has happened is that all the financial and economic reforms that occurred during the 1990s in the rest of Europe and in Canada (remember the Liberals balancing the budget?) never happened in France. The socialist promise of happiness for all was never delivered, and sensible economic reforms were systematically buried. This is the kind of environment where Le Pen and extremists thrive: they present themselves as a radical departure from a paralyzed and broken system.

Luckily, more sensible politicians exist on the right today: Nicolas Sarkozy and François Bayrou. Unfortunately, if you are a leftist, the options are awful.

That's it in a nutshell. You heard it here. Not first, but still here.

The new Kevin Costner

2007-02-11T21:28:00.000-05:00

Nicholas Cage has become the new Kevin Costner: everything he does is crap.

The Shins

2007-02-10T16:17:00.001-05:00

I didn't post in the entire month of January 2007. This is a record low, even though my three readers probably haven't noticed since I don't post frequently anyway.

Much has happened since 2006. I went to France before Christmas with Lemon. We had a smashing time. I hoped to post about our adventures, but so far I only have pictures, a few notes and a old Michelin map with our Parisian touristic footprint. Something to Google map.

Most of my blog post ideas fall by the wayside as I daydream at work: I can't access Blogger and quickly upload them as any serious blogger would.

Anyway...

As you know, I'm not up to date on most things pop culture these days, but
I've listened to the new album by The Shins, entitled "Wincing the
night away". It's quite smashing. Think of The Smiths, slightly more
pop, much less self-indulgent.

If there's anything better out there right now, I welcome your recommendations.

Engrish

2006-12-08T15:21:00.000-05:00

I love Engrish.

I found some notes I took in Greece in 2005. Among other trivia were some Engrish expressions from a menu in an Athens taverna:

"Fresh proposals to escort your drink" (appetizers)
"Spicy Suggestion" (a hint of spice)
"Hot Meet Collection" (spicy meat entrees)

Prayer in the workplace

2006-12-08T13:26:00.000-05:00

I happen to work from noon to 20:00. It's an annoying shift because evenings are essentially spent at work. Less importantly, I love the 24h clock and that's why I wrote "20:00" instead of "8:00 p.m.". The whole "p.m." bit is annoying to type all the time. 20:00 is unambiguous and modern. Disorienting? At first, yes. But then you remember a few landmarks and everything falls into place. For me it was that 6 p.m. is 18:00. Or just remember: 3 p.m. is 15:00, 6 p.m. is 18:00 and 9 p.m. is 21:00. After that, add or subtract an hour to get appropriate times. One hour before 18:00, when normal people get out of work, is 17:00. One hour after is when crappy TV gets into full gear: 19:00.

I was at work the other day. It was 18:00 and everything was quiet. Most people except those with retarded shifts had gone home. All of a sudden I hear what I believe to be a heated discussion coming from one of the rooms no one usually uses.
I listen more carefully and it's someone chanting. I get up and stroll by, and I discover that it's someone praying. To Allah.

I'd always wondered if my company had a prayer room. But maybe this was just some dude catching a quick one while he thought no one was looking. Maybe that's part of the thrill...

In any case, I don't know where I stand on the issue of prayer rooms. Part of me rejects the idea outright as an appeasement measure for the religious fundamentalists. But maybe it's just a question of being tolerant: it doesn't hurt anyone to pray, even if it seems completely arbitrary and out of place to me.

Anyway, the picture above is a bit of religious vandalism that I caught on camera at Sheppard station.

fetus in fetu

2006-11-30T23:09:00.000-05:00

There are probably more important things to talk about in the world, and after such a long silence, I feel somewhat guilty to break the ice with sensationalism... But this simply has to come off my chest... Or rather, out of my stomach.

What an absolutely amazing and horrible thing. It's as if Alien and South Park's Conjoined Fetus Lady weren't completely far-fetched after all. (Were they?)

Eerily, I bought a copy of Alien very recently from Vortex, a reliable used media store. I almost never do that anymore, but I really love that movie.

Tres Tacos

2006-10-09T20:50:00.000-04:00

"Best"
Originally uploaded by martyloo.

Commercial signage should always be checked by many people who are preferably literate.
Or have pride in the product they sell. If it's the best, be proud of it. Or lie. Own it, baby.

warhol

2006-09-17T02:18:00.000-04:00

I know it's been mentioned in other blogs, but if you're in Toronto in the next couple of weeks, you should check out the Warhol exhibit at the AGO. The exhibit is guest-curated by David Cronenberg. This means that you listen to Cronenberg's commentary from a handheld museum listening device as you walk through the exhibit at your own pace. It is very, very interesting and deserves much props, even if you have no interest in Warhol or Cronenberg. Cronenberg's anecdotes and discussion are well worth the admission price. It sounds corny but I felt like he was giving me a personal tour. It's obvious he is a huge fan and that Warhol has influenced his film making. I'm thinking of the "Disasters" especially. This exhibit is probably the best thing I've seen at the AGO.

Fried

2006-08-24T21:28:00.000-04:00

I visited my grandparents in Tennessee last week. Both were well, my grandfather will be 98 on August 28th. He is amazing and still sharp as a tack, despite being very frail.

Aside from good times with my grandfather and grandmother, I mostly caught up with my parents. A week with one's parents can be a long time, but in my case I was happy to be with them. I feel like I've really caught up with them, even though I live only 10 minutes away and I see them almost every weekend. 32 hours of driving, a large part through the most boring landscape on earth, Ohio, tends to bring out subjects rarely discussed otherwise. My mother, in particular, was in good spirits. They had been in France for 5 weeks prior to this trip to the USA. In Tennessee, I managed to do some cool things with their France pictures on my new MacBook, which I had purchased the day before the trip. Je suis un geek.

In Nashville, we saw 2 great exhibits at the Frist Center for the Visual Arts, in beautiful downtown. Yes, there's more to Nashville than the Grand Ole Opry and the Nashville Predators... Not much, but still.

The Quest for Immortality was an ancient Egyptian artifact collection, brilliantly narrated by Jeremy Irons. Yes, the gynecologist twins from Dead Ringers explaining how the Sun God's earthly form is a dung beatle is quite a powerful experience. The objects were very beautiful.

The other exhibit was a collection of the top Pulitzer prize winning photographs of the last 100 years. It was very, very good. The picture of the starving Sudanese child crawling towards a refuge camp and away from a lurking vulture was very chilling. It's what awaits us all if we don't smarten up.

I ate fried foods and pork throughout most of the trip. Tennessee peeps need some slimming down. A majority of people are overweight. They need to snap out of it. At some point, if one is already a mastodon, it's a good thing to realise that it's suicide to eat chicken fried steak. Try a salad, some greens, some delicious tomatoes that are produced in your own back yard. (We ate tomatoes all week too.) Not eating quite as much can still be patriotic and "country", all y'all don't worry.

ethics

2006-07-29T12:00:00.000-04:00

I'm reading a very interesting book about a dry subject. It includes the following tale:

On a very cold morning, a farmer is walking in his field and hears some very loud chirping. He bends down and it's a bird with a broken wing. Because it's very cold, the farmer picks up the bird and places it gently into a steaming cow dung then moves on to his busy day. The bird keeps chirping. Alerted, a fox arrives and eats the bird.

There are so many ways to interpret these events. For example:

a) Someone who puts you in shit doesn't necessarily mean you any harm
b) Someone who takes you out of shit doesn't necessarily mean you well
c) If you're in shit, the best thing may be to shut up

Comments?

Veuve Pourrie?

2006-07-16T21:30:00.000-04:00

Veuve Pourrie?
Originally uploaded by martyloo.

What do you think of this? Is it funny, creepy, gross, or cute?

Coupe du monde

2006-07-11T01:45:00.000-04:00

I don't want to give excuses for my absense on this blog in the last month, but I'm going to anyway. I’ve been watching the FIFA World Cup rather obsessively, and I’m just barely coming down off the Sunday final’s low. Yes, I was rooting for France. I am a French citizen in addition to being 100% Canadian. I am completely bilingual, although I now find translating to French is more difficult than translating to English.

More relevantly, I love football (the world variety, not the american variety, in case it wasn’t clear). I play every week in a recreational league here in Toronto. I played when I was a kid in a house league and at school. I’ve watched the FIFA World Cup since 1990, when it was held in Italy and Germany won it all. The symmetry of this Cup is amazing: unless you have been living under a rock, you know that Italy won it’s fourth cup in Germany 2 days ago. I watched the English Premiership games and the Serie A Italian games far too frequently this past year. I read Nick Hornby’s Fever Pitch and enjoyed it. I saw a bit of myself in it and it was scary. You’ve seen the Adidas commercials with José, the little kid from a non-descript (Spanish speaking?) poor neighbourhood who selects a series of current and past professional players for his game of pick-up… I've dreamed like José. That clip does a great job capturing the joy of the game. There’s a freedom, joy and creative element to playing football that is just unmatched by any other sport I’ve played. That Joga Bonito stuff is true.

I’ve been a French national team fan since the victory against South Africa in 1998, the first match of the world cup that year. (The next World Cup will be hosted
in South Africa in 2010.) I liked what I saw and followed les Bleus through victory and defeat until now. I follow the players, I read l’Equipe online and
off. I was embarassed when they lost in 2002, not even scoring a goal.

However, the World Cup is much more than just the sport, isn’t it? There’s the politics, the business, the giant party that grips the world for a month every four years. The cup generates a lot of emotion, a lot of it wrapped up in nationalism.

There’s the good nationalism. The consciousness of being a part of a larger community, the nuggets of wisdom found in our parents' culture(s). The knowledge of an older country’s social and cultural insitutions and all the good things that brings and/or hopes to bring to the world, but also the warnings about the bad things. The Cup teams are an advertisement, of sorts. I love to see the “good” nationalism. I like it when Mexican families go to the pub and cheer on their country (but not when they call Argentina's goalie a faggot), or the cab driver from Ghana light up when I tell him how I think Appiah is a better player than Essien. I like that a guy from Djibouti or Brazil starts a conversation with me on the Vomit Comet because of my French jersey. And as much as I didn’t like the endless honking of the Italian fans on Sunday, I liked the fact that the victory coincided with the Italian fest here in T.O.

Then there’s the “bad” nationalism. It’s unerving to see fans taking the result so seriously but not caring about the game being played or being in any way realistic and/or modern about what a national soccer team really is. It's frustrating to see people have hopelessly vague and dangerously confused notions of race and culture. In 2002, I went to little Italy to watch a few games, and I thought I’d attended a giant funeral. It was awful. And driving around in a car honking your horn if you are 1/8th Italian or Portugese or Croatian and you haven’t watched the game is not cool. It’s pathetic. The whole “it’s in my blood” argument has pissed me off for a long time now. Is Serie A match fixing in the blood too? (Tomorrow, Italy’s biggest club will be relegated because its administrators were involved in a match fixing scandal.) The worst aspect of the "bad" nationalism is outright racism. For now I'll just say to those who thought the number of blacks on the French team was somehow inauthentic or a dubious outcome of mercenary colonial recruiting: all the black players on the team are 100% French and you're racist for not thinking so.

Aside from whatever Materazzi said to Zidane, I don’t want to take away from a hard fought campaign by the Azzurri. Most of those guys are consummate pros and they deserved to win the world cup 2006. You’ll notice how Buffon gave Zidane a genuinely sympathetic embrace after the game in which Zizou ended his career in shame… Those are some amazing moments in sport. Pirlo was superb throughout the tournament, like Cannavaro and Grosso. Gattuso, the guy who looks like a rabid dog, was
simultaneously a monster and a clown in midfield. Couldn’t care less about Totti, Iaquinta and Materazzi, they were wankers.

On the French side, the games against Spain and Brazil were superb. They attacked and defended as one tough and fast unit. Arguably, the final against Italy was in French hands for the end of the first half, the 2nd half and extra time before the penalty kicks. Henry, Ribéry, Malouda, Vieira, Sagnol and Zidane (before the headbutt) were fantastic. The gargantuan play of Thuram in defense was simply unbelievable for a player who many thought was too old to be selected on the national team. Thuram was a extra goalie for France, more of a goalie than Barthez. If France had won, he would have been man of the match. Both France and Italy moved the ball, attacked and defended as a team and it was great to watch.

Of course, in the end Zidane threw the match away in one of sport’s most bizarre gestures of violence. Italy had the extra confidence it needed in the
penalty kicks. Barthez, who should never have been selected (Gregory Coupet of Olympique Lyon should have been the #1 French goalie) seemed lost while the
Italians hit their penalties flawlessly.

Zidane broke my heart. The headbutt was so unzidanesque I thought it was a bad dream. Whereas Zidane lifting his second world cup on the last day of his illustrious career would have been a peak in the ongoing history of football, the result instead shocked the world and ended his last match and otherwise stellar career in shame. Materazzi is probably a piece of garbage for what he said to provoke Zidane. But Zidane is the one who is suffering most now, I'm convinced of that. And if he’d just kept his cool, like everyone thought he would, like we were accustomed to see him doing, everything would have been OK, even in defeat. Tragic.

For me, Zidane is still up there with Pelé and Maradona. Despite the headbutt incident, he is:

- Classier than the drug addicted melodramatic midget known as Maradona
- Right up there with Pelé
- The best French player there ever was, dethroning Platini
- A great ambassador for the game
- One of the reasons the French got to the final of the 2006 Cup, and possibly the reason they didn't win.
- The FIFA golden boot winner.

Today the (slimy) French president Jacques Chirac had these words for Zidane and the rest of les Bleus (quote translated by me from article in Le Monde):

"You are a virtuoso, a world football genius. You are also a man of heart, commitment and conviction. That's why France admires and loves you" he declared in the gardens of the Elysée. To all the players, the president said: "You have made
us live a sports epic of tremendous proportions that will remain deeply ingrained in the memory of the men and women of France. You have demonstrated to France that it is strong when it is united in its diversity and confident in its own ability."

http://www.lemonde.fr/web/article/0,1-0@2-669420,36-794181@51-793747,0.html

sleeping elephant

2006-06-12T23:11:00.000-04:00

Net neutrality: is it worth fighting for? You'd think there would be a bigger buzz around this issue.

No one's given me any argument why we should mess around with the way we send packets flying around the net currently. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

For example, when I make my mockworldcup.com site for 2010, I want to be competing on equal footing with the big boys. Whatever that means.

Update: I've got other plans in life aside from one esoteric website. Well, I should, anyway.

google ads

2006-05-29T17:45:00.000-04:00

I've checked my google adsense account and I've made $0.04 on the advertising on this blog. Yay! Hilarious! I love Google. Those ad pimps.

Creative Tree Pruning

2006-05-25T01:27:00.000-04:00

Creative Tree Pruning
Originally uploaded by martyloo.

Why cut down a tree if you don't have to?

Flickr

2006-05-25T01:23:00.000-04:00

This is a test post from , a fancy photo sharing thing.

world cup diplomacy

2006-05-24T20:46:00.000-04:00

My patience for totalitarian, authoritarian or theocratic regimes, while it was never really there, is at an all time low. My patience is in general at an all time low. That's why a dubious report about religious labeling made me nod in agreement as our Prime Minister "blasted" the Iranian government.

The fact remains that the international community is too tolerant to regimes like Ahmadinejad's. Regimes that are simply stupid: those governments continue to deny their citizens anything but a marginal future despite existing in a global community that isn't fooled by antics and childish propaganda. Unfortunately, they tend to ruin things for everyone else. Party-pooper is Ahmadinejad's middle name.

There's one diplomatic card that no one wants to deal in the Iran Nuclear stand-off for reasons that are probably not valid, given that the alternatives are surely worse for all parties if Iran continues to drive down the fascist road at full speed. (I don't care if the clothing labeling report was false, Iran's is still a fascist regime.)

It was suggested that Iran be banned from the FIFA World Cup. I think this is an excellent idea. It's a diplomatic measure, largely without humanitarian or economic costs, but it's embarassing. Embarassment is the least that idiotic governments deserve. And football is just a game ...

V-Dub in da haus

2006-05-04T13:10:00.000-04:00

My blog makes me look like a serious, frustrated person. I am these, but I also like to laugh.

Check out this.

I have to watch these commercials at least once a day to hold down my sanity tip.

Also (indirectly about Deutschland), the FIFA world cup is coming in 36 days. If you like football/soccer, this is not news, and you're getting more excited by the minute. However even for you non-footballers out there, nike soccer has a bunch of videos that are absolutely insane.

The dorky French promoter guy in the clips is Eric Cantona of 1990s Manchester United fame.

"scream" for Darfur

2006-05-03T08:26:00.000-04:00

On Sunday I went to an anti-genocide protest called "Scream for Darfur" held at Queen's Park in downtown T.O. The turnout was rather pathetic contrary to the organisers' insistence on it being fantastic. More importantly, you would think the monumental humanitarian disaster that is occurring in Darfur (400000 people dead and counting, 2 million people displaced) would mobilize more citizens. It's been all over the news and recently George Clooney jumped on the bandwagon and proclaimed his outrage (though he didn't scream into the microphone, like Jack Layton did). There has to be at least as many diehard Clooney fans in Toronto as there were demonstrators.

I don't think the Clooney crowd showed up. The folks assembled were mostly of the "Kumbaya" left: the love-not-war, white-peeps-with-dreads crowd. I was mostly annoyed by them, but in fairness, they did show up (the event was kickstarted by highschoolers) even though it seemed most people didn't really understand the depravity of the issue. Also, at every opportunity, the organisers insisted on asking if we were having a good time, telling us what a good time they were having, what a nice afternoon it was, and urging us to relax and party, which seemed highly inappropriate considering we were there to protest a genocide, and a clearcut failure of the international community. The local Darfuris (Darfurians?) stood by stoically, perplexed by this display of vacuous freedom. A band consisting of a rapper, a guitarist and a congo player, droned on endlessly before the speakers lined up to talk. The lyrics (delivered with an Eminem Detroit accent) were mostly about how we should stop oppressing all organisms of the earth. The guy insisted on using the term "organisms" over and over. It would be nice if we first stopped oppressing homo sapiens.

You can get pictures and an accurate summary here.

TV

2006-04-19T18:47:00.000-04:00

I've always had a problem watching too much TV. Ever since I was little I was always the one to be completely mesmerized by it. I'm not someone whose critical thinking goes into overdrive when sitting in front of the telly. In fact, I can barely maintain my brain's basic state of passive attention. I become extremely lazy and my ass can't move itself. It's now a convenient excuse for explaining why I'm not an accomplished musician or haven't developed the cure for cancer. I probably don't have the talent and I'm not smart enough however I like to think I just watched too much TV as a child.

Actually, for several years, roughly from 1995 to 2005, I rarely watched. I had better things to do and didn't want to spend the monthly. Then I moved into a new apartment. My roomate wanted TV and I wanted an internet connection. We got a digital "bundle" and saved our dollars. The outcome has been that I've watched a lot of TV in the last 6 months. Hours that I will never get back.

The shame of it is also the manner in which I watch TV. I become a zombie. Practically all my friends have more knowledge of what shows are actually playing and worth watching. They seem to be able to filter the good stuff. I can only zap from shitty to shittier. I merely take my friends' advice, rent the good shows on DVD (haven't downloaded them ... yet), then continue to watch regularly scheduled crap on top of that. My blog (and state of mind) suffers tremendously. Have my posts become dumber? I wouldn't be surprised. I can't judge anymore, I'm too stupid. Anyway, if I'm not posting, it's surely because of TV.

Lately, however, I've been cutting down a lot. I've become extremely bored by it. Bored and digusted to the point of discomfort. If only my brain could vomit! It's Spring, and I think that my soul is full of dust and bile. All thanks to TV, I take no responsibility. My hate-on is in full force. The incarnation of my disgust is currently CNN Headline News anchor Nancy Grace who looks demented and has the personality of a hyperkinetic ghoul. I think the satirical show The Wrong Coast derives considerable material from this maniac. Her makeup crew must be doing it on purpose: there's no way they're attempting to make her look saner than she really is. I can't look at her or listen to her for more than 5 seconds.

It's mean, but someone needs to tell her she looks like a witch. OK I'm done.

I heart Spring

2006-04-18T19:26:00.000-04:00

The warm weather in T.O. is arriving. The sun is out and my ankle hurts. Good weather signs.

it's about time...

2006-04-14T22:31:00.000-04:00

I'm posting this on martyloo, not nerdyloo, because it ain't nerdy. It's about time, folks, and time is something everyone should care about on some level because life is too short. That's not a complaint, by the way. I'm trying to say that I.T. is about time: faster, smarter, better. Your computer is supposed to make your life more enjoyable, by furiously automating all the mundane and tedious tasks that make you unproductive and grumpy. In many ways, information technology is in a constant struggle to live up to this expectation.

Calendar/scheduling software has been one of the most fruitful application areas in which computers were morphed into useful, ergonomic, effective and productive tools in addition to being specialised and nerdy calculation machines. Just like e-mail, calendar software is a "killer app", the expression used liberally by I.T. folk to refer to applications that economically justify sets of related but independent technology and industry. However, until recently, calendar/scheduling has been almost exclusively the domain of desktop PC applications like Microsoft Outlook, confining the calendar to a particular machine, corporate network or suite of proprietary tech. Face it: as far as ubiquity is concerned, the good old paper agenda book was superior to any silicon tech before Microsoft released Outlook Web Access or the ical standard started to gain market traction.

OK, that was nerdy. Let's just say that I continue to be amazed at how cool Google is, by how they respond to organic technology and market needs. I guess that's a bold statement because I'm not an economist and have only a subjective idea of what general I.T. needs are. Nevertheless, despite not being a typical computer user, some of my needs are run-of-the-mill and Google takes care of those brilliantly.

Philosophy aside, Google has created Google Calendar, yet again scratching my computer itches and proving, in my mind, that they just get I.T. (corny pun intended). Does anyone have to develop anything anymore when Google just cranks out the killer apps for free, and better than you could have imagined? We are truly spoiled.

Here's the google blog announcement.

magic ass

2006-04-07T00:36:00.000-04:00

The locks on my building are unlocked by those magnetic cards that you wave in front of a square area mounted on a wall beside the door. These things are great: the satisfaction of unlocking the door, as if by magic, never ceases for me.

My usual habit is to put the card in the front pocket of my bag and I wave the bag in front of the magnetic square and just like that, beep! clink!, I'm in my building a la James Bond checking into MI-5.

Occasionally, I put the card in my back pocket. The magnetic squares beside the doors are at about the level of my buttocks. So I'll casually turn around, point my ass at the magnetic square, and beep! clink! the door is unlocked. Today, an old lady was sitting in the lobby when I did this, and I swear the look on her face was of absolute astonishment. She must have thought that a) my ass had magical door opening properties or that b) I was blowing a fart in the intercom.

Bitter Lemon gets Slated

2006-04-06T15:35:00.000-04:00

For those who doubted the Bitter Lemon (you did?), she made it to Slate's "Today's Blogs" yesterday. An accolade well deserved. Keep bloggin'! Power to the blogger!

stabbin' it old school

2006-03-31T08:44:00.000-05:00

Hey Peeps!!

I'm proud to report that guns were not used in the violent crime that occurred at my old high school (although gun possession hasn't been ruled out). Yay! It's reassuring when you can go to Miss Sogawa's math class and say "At least I won't get a cap popped in my ass! (I might get stabbed though.)"

Ah yes... This will no doubt fuel another generation of bad rumours about the old VP. Don't get me wrong: this school had issues which it apparently hasn't dealt with since the early 1990s. However, it probably is just an average school. Does that make you feel better?

Genet, PDD, Shnatz (a.k.a. Sausage). You know what I'm talkin' about.

Genet forces me to divulge my musical tastes...

2006-03-11T19:32:00.000-05:00

... And to see if I actually have 7 friends who have blogs. Or even if I have 7 friends. (Is a friend a friend if the friend doesn't blog?)

Here's the deal:

"List seven songs you are into right now. No matter what the genre, whether they have words, or even if they are any good, but they must be songs you’re really enjoying now. Post these instructions in your blog along with your seven songs. Then tag seven other people to see what they’re listening to."

Genet, you couldn't have chosen a better week to get a weird list out of me. I managed to save my friend Dali's hard drive from total destruction, and copied all of his music in the process, about 40 GB worth. So 7 songs is very limiting. But I'll restrict myself to 7 songs that really had an impact on me this week, for whatever reason: maximum effect per unique "impression" of the song. In no particular order:

1. Chopin - 2 Nocturnes, Opus 48

Hauntingly beautiful.

2. Dave Brubeck Quartet - Stardust

Smooth as silk.

3. Hot Hot Heat - Middle Of Nowhere

Pop that's really catchy. This is what The Killers secretly want to be.

4. Zero 7 - Polaris

Coooooool.

5. Metric - Dead Disco

ROCK

6. Wham - Everything She Wants

Best of the eighties.

7. Fantastic Plastic Machine - Black Dada

Weird and funky.

Genet's got Depeche Mode and Miss Kittin on his list: coincidentally, I listened to both this week after not doing so in a long time.

new member of the martyloo franchise

2006-03-01T01:12:00.000-05:00

After bringing you martyloo, and its multimedia incarnation, I'm proud to launch nerdyloo, the technology blog for martyloo. Yes, all that stuff I'm itching to post about but would bore most of my 7 readers, will be thrown into the "wired" (such an outdated term today when wireless is so ubiquitous) offshoot of martyloo.

Boo hoo

2006-02-14T16:55:00.000-05:00

Poor Saddam Hussein. He's being "mistreated". Solution: let him starve himself. He'll do us all a favor and the funds for the trial can be used towards rebuilding the country that he, in fact, starved.

The News: now you can laugh AND cry

2006-02-13T19:59:00.000-05:00

Is it me or is the "normal" news getting just a tad edgier and ever so slightly more irreverent?

For example, a recent article from msn entertainment suggests Christina Aguilera might be getting "less dirty". That's hilarious. Who do they think they are, the Onion? "Big changes are afoot in the media." You read it here first.

Hitchens does it again

2006-02-09T17:23:00.000-05:00

I can't agree more with this article.

Just in case you missed them, the cartoons.

How you gonna act now? Gonna put a fatwa on my ass?

Another slam dunk

2006-02-08T00:49:00.000-05:00

Yet another reason google keeps rockin'. Google understood why I don't like instant messaging.

hot chocolate

2006-02-07T10:27:00.000-05:00

I think they put crack in Tim Horton's hot chocolate. I've been having cravings for it for the last week or so. There's a Tim Horton's just about everywhere you turn, including across from my building. Strangely, every time I go to the store in front of my building the music playing is always Peter Gabriel's "Shaking The Tree".

energy and exercise

2006-02-07T00:28:00.000-05:00

I had this idea in 1995. I didn't act on it... I could have been an artist.

You knew this was coming

2006-02-06T12:21:00.000-05:00

This kind of headline was inevitable.

UPDATE: They've since changed the headline from "Resentment over Shiite justice in Sunni areas" to "Sunnis feel heavy hand of Shiites".

I wonder why.

airport lounge

2006-02-03T01:28:00.000-05:00

Since Lemon went on her anti-fundamentalist tour de force, I thought I'd recall a certain situation, because I, too, have been thinking about some of the issues addressed in her post for quite some time. The fires were rekindled around the time of the renewed French secularity laws which forbade any obvious religious symbols from being worn in French public classrooms. This caused all sorts of controversy because the people most inconvenienced by this law were young Muslim women. In practice, I think at least some may have welcomed it. At the time, France was labeled as intolerant, heavy-handed and regressive. The debate is still open about that particular verdict. One thing to note, before you read further, is that in France and other non-theocratic states, there is public debate about religion and belief systems. I've already insulted at least a good number of fundamentalists by suggesting that at least one Muslim woman was genuinely happy to take her Hijab off (no, it isn't the Muslim Barbie doll), so fundamentalists are welcome to stop reading here.

I was forced to think about religion, belief and intolerance, on December 23rd 2005, when I was at the Toronto International Airport on my way to France with my parents. Hence, France and Islam are à propos, though on a microcosmic scale, and circumstantially. I've mentioned many times to a few different people that I would write about the trip, so consider this a start.

We were sitting in the departure lounge. I had the latest issue of Rolling Stone, having picked it up because it contained an article by Chris Rock critiquing his top 25 favorite rap albums. Strangely, my mom didn't want to read it. There was also an interesting article on Jay-Z, confirming his talent as the pre-eminent rap businessman, but not convincing me that I should listen to his music. I distinctly remember reading an piece on the insurgency in Iraq (also in Rolling Stone), the author's interactions with an anonymous insurgent seeming implausible.

At that instant, I looked up to see my parents staring past me with a puzzled look I've seldom, if ever, seen on their faces. I turned to see, behind me, two dozen people, bowing, their heads to the ground and asses in the air, in front of the window, outside of which was parked the Airbus 340 that would take us all to Paris. Consternated, my father noted, not without sarcasm, that it looked like everyone was praying to Air France. (The praying position is called Ruk'u and Airbuses aren't required.) Apparently, my family was sitting in what had effectively become the Muslim area of the airport lounge. Prior to that moment, I had noticed lots of people wearing head scarves, skullcaps, and tunics, but there was nothing really odd about it: after all, we were in multi-cultural Toronto, in an airport, en route to a hub for passengers going the middle east. I hadn't felt awkward in the slightest until I had witnessed the intense praying, the complete concentration. I'm accustomed to the bizarre and I welcome the exotic. But this was different. I remember thinking that this was a kind of self-segregation. That it was incredibly ostentatious, boastful even, as if they were attempting to show off the depth of their faith. Cynically, my mother wondered whether the prayers were for Allah to grant us a safe trip across the Atlantic, or whether we were witnessing the last prayers of suicide bombers. This obviously wasn't reassuring even if I really didn't believe the people in question were Al-Qaeda.

The scene was so impressive that I wanted to take a picture. My mom strongly disapproved: I suspect she, like me, believed that it would somehow be taking advantage of people in a state of submission and would thus be disrespectful. But my voyeuristic tendencies were in full tilt. I argued that I could be very discreet about it due to my spy size digital camera. But I chickened out. This was a shot that I regret not making. I felt I'd been unwillingly thrust into ethnography and hit the ground running. But I couldn't make my mother upset on the eve of a trip to France. And I genuinely felt a tinge of guilt. Taking a picture would have been tantamount to running up along behind them and slapping their ass cheeks in quick linear succession, like a scale progression on a human vibraphone. I've heard some North American natives feel that taking pictures of people takes a bit of their souls away... That isn't what I thought at the time. I didn't feel anything was sacred: I just felt weird.

In France, we explained what had happened to Sausage. He thought that it was too precious a scene to go unremembered and, humorist that he is, made up for my inaction by cooking up this:

If you think this is an anti-muslim post, think again. This is simply a demonstration of how religious ritual is often absurd to those who don't take part in it. The current post happens to be about Muslims at an airport, but I could have talked about Christians, Jews and Bhuddists. If anything, I hope you appreciate the profoundly secular (perhaps even ecumenical?) nature of my point of view.

Please feel free to add comments. Unlike some governments, I won't censor them, or behead people for posting them.

It makes me sad

2006-01-23T00:19:00.000-05:00

Never have I been so confident and comfortable with my own political views. Yet I remain incapable of aligning them successfully to any of the major parties' platforms in the upcoming federal Canadian election. But this is not what is most troubling. Most of all, I find it disconcerting that in our “vibrant” democracy, my vote counts less than someone who happens to live in another riding blessed with a smaller population. It's also weird that my riding is regarded as a Liberal fiefdom, just like others are Conservative, its population's views as immovable and static as the concrete of their condos.

Electoral reform was first brought up in the current (thankfully almost over) campaign by Jack Layton, then touched on by Stephen Harper, then brushed aside by Paul Martin. Jack's NDPs, of course, have the most to gain by proportional representation, which is why Stephen Harper talked about Senate reform, and why Paul Martin put his head in the sand. However, not even Jack had the political savvy to underline that proportional representation is more democratic. That's because...

Why I can't vote for the NDP

Jack has an activist mentality. For him, democracy is something you lobby for and siphon off towards your "core constituents”. Layton doesn't even want to be prime minister, he'd rather criticize from the sidelines, which is what he'll end up doing. Listen to his response to Steve Paikin during the second CBC debate: he couldn't say that he wanted to be Prime Minister. If he were to be elected, you'd see an instant “Oh shit!” reaction, though he'd probably actually say “For goodness' sake”. Someone prove to me that Jack Layton is not an obsessive compulsive activist lunatic. Look at him and listen to him. He is self-absorbed by his own rhetoric. He gesticulates in Hitlerian fashion. The sound of his own voice titillates him to near orgasm.

His platform consists of paying lip service to traditional socialist ideas, and transforming our health care into a value instead of admitting that it's a service. Ultimately, Jack is still a demagogue: the kind that narrows in on the people he thinks he can brainwash.

Why I can't vote for the Liberals

The biggest demagogues in this election are the Liberals. They will say absolutely anything to get into power: they are definitely power sluts. I agree with both the Conservatives and the NDP when they say that it's time for change, that the Liberals are the party of entitlement and corruption. The attack ads and anti-American stance is annoying. The Chrétien/Martin Liberal party has attracted the worst kind of politician: the Machiavellians and the demagogues. Paul Martin pisses me off with his scratchy-voice fake passion pleas. He's going to save Canada? My ass. Please, if you could just clarify what you want to do if you get elected, you might have a chance of convincing me.

Actually, probably not. Re-electing the Liberals would mean that Canadians approve of a government that accepts small amounts of corruption as matters of operational cost and a diminishing role in international affairs, although on the latter item Martin has done better than Chrétien.

On a positive note, Canada is now one of 3 countries in the world to recognize gay marriage. It should be proud of this. But is this because of the Liberals? Their arms had to be twisted. Wasn't it the judicial system that upheld homo rights? So let's get real when we talk about “progressive” Canadians uniting under a Liberal banner. Sounds like flattery to me.

Why I can't vote for the Conservatives

Throughout this campaign, Stephen Harper has, in my opinion, been the most convincing of all the leaders. I find myself agreeing with many of his ideas in terms of fighting gun crime, government accountability, addressing the fiscal imbalance etc. But I still don't like him. Unlike many Canadians, I don't think he'll build an Aryan super-soldier camp in Alberta and start a national gay bashing campaign. Having said that, he has not convinced me that he would, in fact, stand up strongly for gay and other minority rights in the way that I think the leader of Canada should. I can't vote for a social conservative. I can't vote for a party that has not squarely addressed the points for which it is criticized most strongly and frequently. Even the Liberals have done some of that.

Conclusion

So, as you can see, I can't vote for any of the big parties. I don't even know if I can vote for the Greens because in the past they've attracted crazies from both left and right. Where's that Natural Law party when you need it?

2 cases of neglect

2005-12-21T16:53:00.000-05:00

More subway stories.... Sorry, I can't think of anything better right now. Also I just wanted to try out a new internet browser software derived from Mozilla Firefox called "Flock" (www.flock.com). So far it seems neat because blogging is built into the default features of the application.

Anyway, I was coming back home today when out of the corner of my eye I see 10 year old emaciated south asian looking kid get into the subway alone at Eglinton station. We're in the front car, and he immediately runs to the front to watch giddily as the subway leaves the station and down the tunnel. Nothing out of the ordinary here.

Then, as if possessed by demons, he proceeds to act like a chipmunk in the most earnest and outrageous way possible, completely oblivious to his surroundings. He was very, very loud, chirping and jesticulating wildly, while continuing to stare out the window and down the tunnel. The rest of the passengers didn't seem to notice or were embarassed or didn't know what to do because it was obvious that Stewart Little was possibly mentally retarded or had something akin to Tourette's syndrome or was hallucinating that he was a species of rodent. Whatever he was on, hamster boy stared at me with sad eyes as I got out of the train at Sheppard.

Who lets a kid with mental problems onto the subway alone? Who gives a 10 year old hallucinogens?

Less concerning, but also sad, was the golden retriever I noticed attached to a railing in front of the revolving doors of the Sheppard Centre (the picture in this post). The owner was nowhere in sight and the poor dog was desperately sniffing everyone that came within 5 feet of him.

What do you think about this, peeps? I think both these incidents are examples of neglect.

subway grooming

2005-12-14T00:32:00.000-05:00

I haven't posted much in the last little while... I'm either becoming boring or less full of myself. However, I do have to mention something that bugged me today, and I'm hereby warning you that I may sound slightly embittered. I'm not sure if I'm more sensitive to the behaviour of the general public than before, but I got really pissed when someone started to cut their nails on the subway.

Tonight I was staring at advertising when to my left I heard the click, click, click of someone cutting their nails with a nail cutter. It was a middle-aged middle-class lady, and after cutting she started filing. Her sense of style was difficult to describe but she looked like she could have eagerly shopped at the "Rainbows 'n' Things" store inside Yonge-Sheppard subway station, which mostly sells "Cheap Handbags 'n' Shit".

What is wrong with people? I was thinking I should start plucking my nosehairs on the subway. Or shaving. That's appropriate!

Also, apparently the new fad is to slow down to a snail's pace and plant yourself in the subway door threshold when there's a million people trying to get on behind you. WTF? People: move your fat Galapagos turtle asses out of the way so others whose heads aren't in the clouds can pass you. No one else cares if you've had an epiphany reading the subway map.

"Anthropologie"

2005-12-06T22:45:00.000-05:00

"Anthropologie"
Originally uploaded by martyloo.

I took a trip to California in 2003 and I finally dug up the pics. Here's one of the more banal shots but...what a name for a retail chain.

Ooohh it's French, it must be must be sophisticated. And cultured. It has to be, right? By definition. Are the sales people leathery hominid beatniks who try to upsell the latest mammoth hair loincloths and fossils? (Will they kill me with blow darts if they find out I've taken this picture, thereby stealing their souls?)

I have an idea! I'll call my café "Scatologie", and it'll be hip, swank and earthy.

Engrish

2005-11-30T10:42:00.000-05:00

My contribution to the Engrish language.

art

2005-11-28T15:09:00.000-05:00

It's amazing what you can find in old backups. In the past I've always been eager to wipe out my hard disk and try the latest linux distributions, so I've got a pile of CDs and DVDs full of old pics, mp3s and miscellaneous stuff that I couldn't be bothered to organise.

The pictures are especially exciting to retrieve. Like this one, a shot of the only piece of art I've ever made in the last 20 years. It was a collaboration with my old roomate. We used to drink a lot of tea, and always bought tea bags because the loose leaf version of English Breakfast wasn't as good. The black Prince of Wales tea bags form the Chinese character for tea on the red background of English Breakfast sachets.

Feel free to criticise.

Who eez zat gigolo on ze street ...

2005-11-28T02:55:00.000-05:00

Once in a while I watch a French variety show on TV5 called "Tout le monde en parle". Usually, there's nothing worse than a French variety show, but this one has proven to be excellent most times I've tuned in. I found out there's a Quebecois counterpart too and, not to be un snob, it doesn't do the French one justice because the hosts aren't as funny. Thierry Ardisson and Laurent Baffie don't butter up their guests like Jack Asstor's garlic bread: instead they ask probing and interesting questions. "Why do you generalise and stereotype?", "What's your greatest film?" or "Are those tits real?"

The show easily beats any anglophone talk show I've ever seen. However, I can't say I'm a talk show expert. Beyond being generally humorous, TLMEP also has a novelty factor that anglophone pop culture afficionados can appreciate. The show's musical interludes and segues are selected in a corny and awkward yet interesting manner that only mainland Europeans seem to have mastered. For example, Nene Cherry's "Buffalo Stance" was used throughout the last show to introduce new guests on set.

Also, if you care to test your French and watch, you'll notice what I'll call the French clap. No, it's not an STD, though there could be a French version of that too. Whenever the audience in any French TV show gets fired up they start clapping in unison like the bass beat in Boney M's "Ra Ra Rasputin". It doesn't matter if the music that's playing is actually Destiny Child's "Independent Women" or Beethoven's 5th, the clap is inescapable.

Last week's guests included:

Robert Menard, a big shot for Reporters without Borders in France, who discussed the U.N. conference on freedom of information, which was held in... Tunisia. Better than Saudi Arabia, but still a horrible choice for a host nation for that event.

Francois Ozon, director of "Swimming Pool", "8 women" and "5 x 2" who will release a new movie called "Le temps qui reste" (The time that remains).

Russian pop bimbos, taTu, a topic of one of Genet's posts.

French rocker Jean-Louis Aubert, who released a new album called "Ideal Standard" which happens to be an internationally ubiquitous brand of commercial toilets and urinals. What happened to American Standard?

Also, in light of the current riot situation, two authors with strongly differing politics and opinions sat beside each other and ignited the debate:

Aziz Senni, with his book "L'ascenseur social est en panne ... j'ai pris l'escalier." (The social elevator is broken... I took the stairs)

Charles Pellegrini, "Banlieues en flamme." (Suburbs on fire)

Also in attendance was Antoine De Caunes, a comedian (famous in France), and the king of french advertising, Jacques Seguela.

To round out the roster, there was Francois Mitterand's personal chauffeur, who apparently never had a driver's license and wrote a couple of books. The womanizing of the former president was discussed in significant detail, but not his politics. It's a variety show on state-sponsored TV, I guess you can't expect too much.

Clocking in at 3h, each episode is too long to watch. However, this is also an advantage because the part that you catch will probably have a real discussion instead of the typical 2 minutes of banality followed by a commercial break. Few issues seem to be taboo: music, tv, movies, art, business, politics. Even sports, apparently. Former Manchester United striker turned actor, Eric Cantona, famous for his kung fu moves directed at fans, was a guest on yesterday's episode, which will be re-broadcast on Tuesday and Wednesday. So was Canadian Paul Anka. How weird is that? Throw in figure skater Philippe Candeloro and you've got yourself a party.

I promise not to post about talk shows ever again.

Christopher Hitchens in Toronto

2005-11-18T02:11:00.000-05:00

Wednesday I went to Holy Blossom Temple to hear Christopher Hitchens speak. There are many layers of weirdness in that, which I hope to cover later in this post. For those who don't know Hitchens, he is a well known left wing thinker who shocked everyone when he supported America's war on Iraq. I've read, and enjoyed, many of his articles (but I haven't read his books). Hitchens is a contrarian. I think I have penchant for contrarians much like Genet (and the real Genet) has a penchant for the underdog. I think that's in great part why I like Michel Houellebecq too. The two tendencies might be related. I find myself agreeing with almost everything Hitchens says, which is kind of scary, though yesterday I was willing to challenge him on some points.

He didn't seem to think the absence or presence of WMDs should have made a difference in the decision to remove Hussein from power and even characterized the current focus on WMDs as stupid. I don't think it's stupid, even though I agree that it may not really matter in the end: the removal of tyrants should make everyone happy. Nevertheless, it remains true that many people were convinced that WMDs were the big reason for the war. They think this because that's what they were fed by the government and the media, regardless of the overriding humanitarian and political aspects of regime change. The immanent threat was emphasized by the Bush administration, not the eradication of Baathism, that ghastly “marriage of stalinism and fascism”, as described by Hitchens. At best this is confusing. Not everyone is smart and an expert on the Iraq war(s) like Lemon, therefore things need to be explained. If they have merit, your plans will stand up to public scrutiny, Wolfowitz.

Hitchens was introduced to the audience by David Frum, the son of Barbara Frum, famed Canadian journalist and broadcaster. He was also a white house speechwriter, and notoriously, the author of the phrase “Axis of Evil” that everyone loved (to hate). Almost incidentally, because he had to actually remind himself of it, Hitchens touched on Iran, the third member of the axis after Saddam's Iraq and North Korea. He admitted that a few years ago, Iran was to him a glimmer of hope in the region because reformists were gaining power peacefully there. So much for that. If I remember correctly, a large portion of the flak Bush (and Frum by proxy) received was because of the inclusion of Iran as a part of the axis of evil. Today it would seem that Frum is vindicated somewhat.

David Frum was nevertheless annoying, even though he said great things about Hitchens, about his courage to go to hot spots in the world, which he called physical courage, and his moral/intellectual courage to take an unpopular stance, and a seemingly contradictory one. Frum's fake modesty was in full force when the rabbi introduced him as a public intellectual and he tried to distance himself from this, claiming that “public intellectual sounds like public lavatory” and that such things (intellectual discourse? thought?) should best be done in private. I wonder what he was doing speaking to a packed synagogue.

This brings me to the issue of listening to intellectuals ramble on in place of religious worship. I find it really fantastic that intellectuals, even those whose opinions about organised religion aren't positive, are invited to speak by clerics in a religious establishment. I've never heard of this being done in any other religious denomination. I can't picture this event happening in a church, a mosque, or other temple of any kind so props to the Jewish faith here: never have I more wanted to wear a kippah. (The event was funded by the deep pockets of Heather Reisman and Gerry Schwartz. It is not lost on me that I'm jobless partly because of Schwartz's Onex, which controls Cineplex Entertainment, which acquired my former company, leading to my layoff. I don't care: I was able to come to this event without having to get up early the next day to go to work. And I was going to change jobs anyway. This has been a major digression). To add more, the event was open to the public, so goyims like me were allowed in, and we did so in large numbers, even causing a line-up outside the temple.

There were awkward moments. Starting with me, of course. I rarely go into any religious establishment, so this was bizarre. I had a very dark blue jacket of some rough material that could pass off as vaguely military if colored differently (a Gap purchase). If there is ever to be a Canadian middle-class white suicide bomber, I felt as if I looked like one. And I'm French, which makes me that much more likely to be an anti-semite and a bomber in Canada. There was security present at the door, and I was relieved when they asked me to open my bag and show them the contents.

France was, as it always is in anglo discussions of war, the object of discontent, if not ridicule. David Frum tangentially brought up the topic of the riots in France and enthusiastically suggested this was a sign of islamo-facism. David, islamo-facism is so far a negligible cause of the violence in France. (We'll see if this remains the case.) The jobs are scarce enough, the social barriers (racism at the forefront) are high enough, and the media is pervasive enough to explain the violence without the added impetus of radical Islam. This week's Economist is with me on this one. I think he mentioned this only because it was a mostly Jewish audience. Some comments were made about the French government's inability to deal with the problem, which everyone laughed at. Hitchens said something about France lacking an exit strategy. Newsflash: La Courneuve isn't Fallujah. Is that why it's funny? I wonder how many people in the audience were French.
I hope to post something else about the France situation (racism, secularism, anti-semitism, riots, socialism, integration or lack of it) later.

The most awkward moment came when Hitchens, not caring one bit that he was in a synagogue, a contrarian to the core, praised some kind of secular institution in the middle-east and welcomed further secularisation. Part of the audience started clapping. I would have clapped too, except that we were in a synagogue. People really have no tact. Both David Frum and the rabbi clambered to recover from this apparent faux-pas by, respectively, suggesting that truths can be discovered between the lines of the most sanguinary religious texts, and that the “new” old bibles of Holy Blossom were interesting reading. Sorry guys, I don't think you're going to convince him.

clueless

2005-11-17T01:47:00.000-05:00

A post from JR reminded me of my very poor observation skills and general naïveté. When I was in high school I'd occasionally get called a BATI MAHN by some Jamaican kids. I thought they were calling me "batty", like I was crazy. Crazy wasn't anything out of the ordinary in my school so I didn't think much of it. Maybe a year or two ago, there was some public outrage at some homophobic dancehall artists and I finally put it together. I was being called a butt man. BATI = BUTT. Who knew?

More graffiti

2005-11-15T11:21:00.000-05:00

More graffiti, this time from Greece in August 2005. I saw some of the most bizarre/funny comments all over Athens. Not the prettiest scribbles, but some were definitely funny and witty. A lot of them were anarchic or proclaimed freedom of expression etc. A lot of English. Some were of the ethereal-bimbo-freedom-kumbaya variety. Here's a representative sample.

Detail oriented graffiti

2005-11-14T12:48:00.000-05:00

Graffiti can be an art. It's occasionally really good and/or requires a lot of skill. Unfortunately, the vast majority of it really sucks: these are largely illegible "tags" that gangs, angst ridden teenagers and other assorted nerds scribble on buildings or vehicles.

But even the crappy kind of graffiti is fun sometimes. Like the detail oriented bit of vandalism on the right. This picture was taken at Spadina station in Toronto at some point in the year 2004 (you see the "dina" of Spadina). The black bit of iconography represents a streetcar. And much like streetcars are tagged, this symbol of a streecar is too. Cute.

Yet more evidence that the world is getting smaller...

2005-11-09T23:09:00.000-05:00

I went to a "meetup" tonight for MySQL. I figured that it would be a good way to get useful, practical information about who uses this software and maybe see what kinds of employment opportunities existed for people with experience using and programming that software, i.e. me.

The organiser had created a whole bunch of meetups for different web design areas and combined them. About 25 nerds met at the Fiddler's Green in downtown Toronto. It turns out the whole thing was largely about him and his take on "the industry" (something he couldn't really pin down, frustratingly), and in his case it was all about search engine optimisation. So we heard him ramble on for the better part of painful, painful hour. Overall, it was a pretty useless gathering, harmless but not quite as informative or fun as I had hoped.

Most interesing, I did meet a friend I had lost contact with in grade 9. It was quite funny because his physical appearance and mannerisms were unmistakable, even after more than 15 years. In junior high, he was a pretty scrawny, ectomorphic kid, and now he's got a 5 o'clock shadow, a deeper voice and the early signs of a beer gut. Our conversation was brief, but he seemed like a nice guy. He started a web design company and wanted to hire a "web integrator" for a decent amount of cash. I wasn't interested in the job and that was the closest I got to tangible job search results in the evening.

I probably won't be going back to this meetup, but maybe I'll sign up for a random one and see who turns up...

violence

2005-11-07T01:09:00.000-05:00

I'm really getting pissed off at the attempts to "negociate" and "dialogue" with the gangs who have been setting cars on fire in Paris and other French cities for the last 10 days. These youth aren't making a sophisticated political statement: they are reenacting their collective MTV fantasy. It's really just a fun night out, a chance to galvanise their ghetto self-identity and absolve themselves from any kind of responsibility. The cars they burn and the property they damage belong to the poor immigrants who are their neighbours, not the rich and racist the media claims they are retaliating against. This is positive feedback for an infernal cycle of bullshit. I bet some of these guys' parents' cars were destroyed in the fray.

French racism definitely exists and the Paris suburbs are definitely poor, dismal places, not the elegant and glamourous boulevards in the old city. But this is also France, not Baghdad. The social subsidies these people have are more than most would even dream of. I bet their schools are better than the ones in poorer neighbourhoods in Toronto.

And for fuck's sake this is not a Muslim thing, so stop "consulting" with leaders in the Muslim community. Way to reinforce the stereotypes. This is about arbitrary violence so is what Mohammad Imam has to say entirely relevant? I guess it doesn't hurt to have voices in favour of peace. But implicitly, it polarises the issue.

Actually, an interesting (and scary) theory was put forward to me today. The government's soft response so far has been carefully planned. The idea is to let the public outcry build until sympathy for the "disadvantaged" is greatly reduced. Then the army, C.R.S. and other cops will fall down on those neighbourhoods with probably too much force, and this will go unchecked. The French government has done this before...

UPDATE: It appears that some of the kids set their friends' cars on fire. Dumbasses.
http://www.lemonde.fr/web/article/0,1-0,36-707261,0.html

"Locked out and starving"

2005-11-03T02:28:00.000-05:00

Apparently, it's difficult to find a local story to report on these days. When NOW Magazine's “Newsfront” article (October 27 – November 2) is a ridiculous piece about the green bins pushing starving racoons to desperate goldfish eating measures, Toronto must not be doing so bad. Gun crime, corrupt municipal politics, job losses to suburbia, rising homelessness, and urban sprawl are clearly under control: stop the press, we're making it just slightly more difficult to feed the city's raccoons! Guess who's desperate? NOW magazine.

To be fair, I think their arts reporting and food reviews are great. But their news is a terrible forum where facile socialist rhetoric is the norm, as if the paper takes an activist stance for the purpose of being cool and different. (I love the word “facile”. It mashes easy and dumb. It's also used the same way in French though more generally, it means “easy”. Easy like NOW.) How else could one publish an article like “Locked out and starving”, talking about raccoons having their food supply reduced due to (cleverly?) designed garbage cans. Would NOW profile “The Pussycat Dolls” as the hot new music act? Incidentally, would someone please make a t-shirt with the words “Don't cha wish yo girlfriend was a bimbo-like-me?” across the chest? Maybe put “(Bimb-oh!!)” on the back as well.

The article in question is a complete disaster. It starts by praising the organic waste diversion program Toronto has started as a way to reduce the overall output it sends to Michigan (the city has not done it as some ecological incentive). And yes, I concede that there is a point to this program. Quickly, however, the article shifts to explaining strategies to protect the fish in the three ponds in the author's back yard, “various species of koi and long-finned sarasa comets” he's been keeping. Because, you see, the raccoons can't eat garbage anymore, they have to decimate the fish population of this guy's back yard. I think it's perfectly natural and kind of cute. So, now dude wants to buy an electric fence to surround the ponds, which already have waterfalls and fountains. And he's apparently not the only one to want to do this, after visiting a Toronto pet store uncovers more concerned backyard fish lovers.

The tragedy of his lost fish is a “devastating loss”, the author's own words. Yet he's become “something of a zeolot in directing his household's organic waste into the two-wheeled receptacle so it can be returned to the earth.” This strikes me as nothing other than good old fashion petit bourgeois. So NOW, cut the crap. And when you're done, I'll leave the choice up to you to put it in your green organic bin, morons.

Halloween

2005-11-02T01:38:00.000-05:00

Halloween is fun! I was a cult leader this year. A creepy, Mormon, polygamist, Raelian cult leader. Check out my voodoo cobra!

Seriously, cults and cult leaders are creepy. Michel Houellebecq's new novel, the Possibility of an island, is very dark illustration of this. I'd say it's his best novel yet, but includes all of his previous novels' flaws and ego trips.

It's essentially a post-apocalyptic science fiction novel in which most of humanity has been destroyed by war and ecological disaster, the survivors regressing into a cavemanesque existence. However, a small group of "neo-humans" have emerged, completely independent and isolated, the genetic descendants of the members of a very Raelian-like cult.

The novel is very, very dark, very honest and quite funny at times.

formatting change and I feel ill

2005-10-25T07:09:00.000-04:00

Formatting change. Title change. My blog doesn't have a pretentious I'm-trying-to-be-a-new-media-whore-and-I'm-blogging-about-it title anymore. Because I'm really not. And the site looks less orange.

I'm trying to finish a horribly confusing assignment for a course on computer operating systems I'm taking (yes, genuine interest in the subject matter) at U of T. Procrastination is a serious problem for me, but will be seriously curtailed after this post.

In other news, I feel slightly ill, enough to warrant blogging about it because the cause is too obvious to ignore. The only thing I can think of that could have made me feel this way is a McDonald's hamburger that I ate yesterday, after not eating any for a very, very long time. If you're thinking "I could really have a McDonald's burger right now", resist the urge. You won't know to thank me because your intestines will be happy, content that they haven't passed cardboard tasting hormone injected irradiated meat. WTF was I thinking.

publish your own books for free!!

2005-10-22T23:20:00.000-04:00

My grandmother knows you can buy, sell, and comment on books online at Amazon.com but you now can also publish! Check out www.lulu.com. A former executive from Red Hat is behind it.

Also, collaborate to make documents online with Writeboard.

I have to re-iterate that internet entrepreneurs are the best. OK, maybe not in every case, but online, the cool shizzle, though it may fizzle occasionally, is still so greatly innovative. This gives me a warm and fuzzy feeling as I try desperately to finish a programming assignment. Unlike me right now, at least some people know what they're doing with computers, allowing other smart people to create wonderful things.

Like Google? How much?

2005-10-14T00:41:00.000-04:00

How much is too much? There's a quiz you can take... I scored an 8. I like them a lot.

First things first

2005-10-13T16:59:00.000-04:00

In general, I'm all about cultural exchange, opening one's eyes to the world, considering other ways of life, examining others' value systems etc. to take what's best and improve our overall lot in life. But changing the governance of the web to make it fall under some kind of U.N. controlled committee is simply RETARDED. Remember Oil for Food? Well now, get ready for another monumental disaster. The management of internet infrastructure, if anyone can be responsible for managing it, is something (that falls under the "governance" category maybe) that the American government, at least in its incarnation as Department of Commerce, has not been too shabby at. I say IF IT AIN'T BROKE DON'T FIX IT: listen to your own engineers you European technocrat power sluts. Do they want this? Who would this really help? Even people (from the world over) who are extremely critical of ICANN do not want more international bureaucracy to hinder what is primarily a technical enterprise. This is a sure path down the road from bad to worse.

Here's a quote:

"The internet has been a remarkably reliable and stable network of networks and it has grown at a rate unprecedented in human history," he said. "What we are looking for is a continued evolution of the internet that is technically driven. We do not think the creation of new or use of existing multilateral institutions in the governance of essentially technical institutions is a way to promote technological change."

Here's another quote:

'Michael Gallagher, President Bush's internet adviser and head of the national telecommunications and information administration, believes they are seizing on the only "central" part of the system in an effort to exert control. "They are looking for a handle, thinking that the DNS is the meaning of life. But the meaning of life lies within their own borders and the policies that they create there."'

Actually, for a moment, let's forget the main thrust of the argument and clarify that DNS is NOT the meaning of life. You could argue that DNA might be, in some sense, but not DNS. Ah yes, but this is Bush's internet adviser...

boo

2005-10-12T00:41:00.000-04:00

pooo. This is a first post. A brain dump. It can only get better. Better than my previous blog at least....

emoticons

1999-11-30T00:00:00.002-05:00

I remember new emoticons being devised by an engineering student a long
time ago. I received an elaboration in a mass e-mail. Whether the source is
the same is unimportant, but here they are.

You all know "smileys" or emoticons

:)     means a smile and

:(     is a frown.

Sometimes these are represented by
:-)

:-(

Well, now there are "assicons":

(_!_)       a regular ass

(__!__)     a fat ass

(!)         a tight ass

(_*_)      a sore ass

{_!_}      a swishy ass

(_o_)    an ass that's been around

(_x_)    kiss my ass

(_X_)    leave my ass alone

(_zzz_)   a tired ass

(_E=mc2_) a smart ass

(_$_) Money coming out of his ass

(_?_)     Dumb Ass

Plantagenet

1999-11-30T00:00:00.001-05:00

Plantagenet
In memory of Richard III, last Plantagenet King of England, who died 22 August 1485, defending his crown against the usurper, Henry Tudor. Memorial Service on Sunday, August 20 at 10:30 am.m at St. Bartholomew's , 509 Dundas St. E., Toronto. Loyaulte me. lie. Richard III Society of Canada, c/o 5238 Woodhaven Drive, Burlington, ON L7L3T4

http://home.cogeco.ca/~richardiii

perspective, scaling

1999-11-30T00:00:00.000-05:00

This video is cool, nerdy and ... old.