There are, out there (here), evenings that simply don’t look like they’ll ever end.
They just keep going on and on again, without bringing you anything if not bad news (from home in this case…) and a general sense of uneasiness and frustration.
You start thinking about going to bed very early for your standards, especially counting you’ve a day off tomorrow and so no real reason not to enjoy the night you so much love, but the hot weather and/or the noisy neighbors still going on with their barbecue dissuade you from the idea of crashing on your pillow, and so…
…and so you end up living this awkward evening, helping yourself with loud music in your ears (Tool in this case) and you try to lose yourself in the vast and placid sea that can be the Internet.
Then, exactly when you were thinking again of switching everything off, you stumble upon a piece of great art, in the form of a video, and you end up grinning like a fool exactly like the title of the post you got the link from was suggesting.
The amount of incredibly moving stories of victims, rescuers, volunteers is simply shocking at the moment. I have been collecting newspapers of all the stories, and telling them in the form of comic strips. I hope these stories could show the UK readers the love, warmth and courage of the Chinese people, also the sad and cruel reality of the horrible 5.12 Earthquake.
This series of comic will make you cry… it sure made me cry. Those illustrations are moving, and the stories told just tear you apart.
Something sure worth reading and sharing.
This was too great, amazing, incredible and geek in its own (japanese) way not to be posted here too.
Actually, it’s really a nice version of a never too old song, which should be known by anyone pretending to like good music.
Outstanding.
I’m back right now after a night out in Shepherd’s Bush which ended with half a roasted chicken for dinner, which is definitely a good way to end a nice Saturday.
Anyway, not the point, the real point is that I was out with a couple of house-mates to watch I Am Legend. First of all, before all the comments (not many in fact), a couple of things you need to know about me:
I love science-fiction and the apocalyptic branch of it,
I’m a fan of Will Smith since the times of Indipendence Day and Bad Boys
Now, this said, the movie is good.
It’s not a masterpiece, and it wasn’t probably meant to be one, but it’s 158 minutes of good fun and a good two or three jumps on the chair too, if you know what I mean ;)
Will Smith is just superb, and for most of the movie is basically acting all alone, with just a dog to share the scene with, which I’m sure must have not be really easy. The setting is quite amazing, and the loneliness of his character is well portraied in how the abandoned New York is pictured out; I’ve actually heard that to shot the movie they basically closed half of downtown N.Y. to everyone… let me tell you I’m not surprised to know that the people living (& working) there were quite upset with that. But hey, the result is quite nice.
So what: I haven’t read the book yet (it’s in my Amazon.co.uk wishlist waiting its call…) so I can’t tell how the transposition had been made from paper to screen. I’m usually more a book fan than movie in this kind of situations, so I’ll probably end up liking the book more when I’ll read it. For now the movie is a product good enough to be suggested to friends.
If you haven’t done it yet, go and watch it! :D
This is a match.
This is sport.
This is having fun playing with a ball. This is how every other sports should look like.
A great (and storic) victory, superb performance of fair play, good playing, loyalty and devotion to an amazing and incredible sport. Thank you Italy and honor to Scotland for giving me a wonderful Saturday afternoon. *yay*
A quick consideration before leaving to take a flight (off-duty) to Mombasa to be repositioned in order to operate the inbound flight from there to Milan on Wednesday. Actually: my first time on a long-haul intercontinental route as a passenger. And the first time on a B767 too! I’m excited.
Back to the consideration. Indeed, there are actually two of them.
Last 10 days I’ve been in Maldives for work, on a long shift, and like it’s my common habit there, I literally devoured 3 books (from start to finish).
Two of them are definitely worth a quick note each.
[Putin’s Russia by Anna Politkovskaya]
I loved it. Well, not in the common sense of the term. It’s a sad book, especially for someone like me that is so fond and so fascinated by the fate of Russia.
Very revealing and reading it while following on SKYNews TV the poisoning spy-game that was going on in the UK (and in Italy too) has been a little strange adding more and more thoughts on the “whole” status of the Russian life/system now.
I am usually not very “fond” of the all against books or movies, always a little suspicion about they telling the actual truth, but even taking in mind a little “dramatization” due to hate towards the person (President Putin in this case, take President Bush for Moore and it’s the same…), the stories narrated there are more than just scary, are definitely tremedously scaring!
Looking forward to read also A Dirty War: A Russian Reporter in Chechnya as soon as possible, I suggest Putin’s Russia as a must read to anyone who would like to take a look in the present of Russia.
It’s probably not the whole story, but a lot of it for sure, and well written too.
[The Cathedral and the Bazaar by Eric S. Raymond]
Shame on me! Shame on me!
Still, up until 10 days ago, I haven’t read what could be considered one of the many pages of a possible bible of the Open Source community. In my defence I can say I had in the past already read the on-line version of The Cathedral and the Bazaar, so what I was really missing was the other essayes published with it by O’Reilly.
I know have filled that missing in my Open Source history culture, and I’m feeling better :p
Right now quite outdated in its examples (due to publishing date) but a must read for everyone interested in the subject!
…what I could have never thought was that this blog would have seen so much almost-book-reviews like it’s doing. Oh well, maybe it’s just because I love reading.
Now I go back to pack things, to play with my new Samsung SGH-Z560 and to get ready to leave.
When you start to read a book that won a Hugo Award, you are pretty sure that at least a little part of you will enjoy the ride and won’t be disappointed but the book.
But when you read a book that has won a Hugo Award (in 2002) and that is incidentally also written by Neil Gaiman, the more than just famous author of Stardust, Neverwhere and creator of The Sandman, you clearly know you’re going to enjoy every single word of the book and that in the end you would have wanted it to last for another five houndreds pages.
At minimum.
Let’s say Neil is not someone who will betray you neither this time!
American Gods is definitely brilliant, it’s one of those books who will keep you sit down on your sofa (or laying on your bed… whatever) just repeating to yourself: “one more page and I’ll close it for tonight…“.
It’s a mind capturing, fantasy stimulating and heart beating experience, and following Shadow (the main character) through all the story is something you won’t forget easily. Gaiman is really a superb writer, with a huge gift for fantastic imagination: it happears he can easily look into all these other worlds we’re only able to fantasize about: breath-taking.
Never the less to say, my Amazon wishlist is full of his works (I need to read again Neverwhere and Stardust in english… I am definitely starting to hate reading things that are translated in italian), included the brand new Fragile Things: so much to buy and so few moneys!
Anyway: I pretty suck at review (in general), but trust me, you want to take a look at Gaiman’s works!
They’re all worth it ;)
Floating around the net following the main stream from one link to another one, lead me to a wonderfulphotoblog.
I still have to go through all the pictures, but there are some amazing views of Edinburgh (like this or this) as well as to other subjects, including, San Francisco…
Curious, both two cities I’ve been always quite been fascinated about.
Anyway, thanks to the author (Paul - at least this’s stated by his whislist title) for a nice and well appreciated addiction to my favourites RSS feeds list :)
Update: if you want a good place where to start your photoblogging browsing experience, there’s not better place than Photoblogs.org.
My passion for anime & manga is famous.
My deep and unconditionated love for the Ghost In The Shell saga is almost legendary.
So imagine my whole self giggling and happily jumping around when I found out that an official trailer for the new chapter of the saga has been released! Looks interesting… even if the quality is not exactly HDTV ;)
I really don’t know if this YouTube embedd thing is going to work, but I’ll give it a try. In the case, let me know and I’ll change it to a plain old-fashioned link. Enjoy!
I’m sure all of you remember well the last video production of the swedish metal band Hammerfall. I blogged about it some times ago, pointing out how fun was the idea (even if clearly sponsorized by a contact lense brand… but hey, I use them almost every day too :p) of making a metal music video with sport stars of your own country. Last time was with the Swedish Women Curling Team (supporting them just before the Olympic Game), this time is with four athletes.
I must confess I recognized only the adorabole Kajsa Bergqvist, probably the greatest woman high-jumper actually in activity.
Any advice helpful in identifying the other three (I suppose swedish) athletes will be gladly accepted: when speaking about the Swedish Athletics Team I am able only to identify Kajsa and Carolina Kluft, both for obvious reasons :p
Anyway, thank to Pelle who wrote me an email about the new video, and enjoy it:
A new painting of François Baranger appeared recently on Dan Simmons’ website. It’s another portrait of the mighty Shrike from the Hyperion saga written by Simmons himself.
That’s not only one of the most amazing thing I’ve ever read, but as you can clearly understand by the name of this domain the Shrike is my favourite character from the books.
While I’m still waiting to hear the big news about the making of a movie on that story, it’s really nice to see in pictures things that I’m so used to imagine in my mind (after reading all the four books saga about three times by now, I’ve a clear imagination about everything that’s inside it - I must say I’ve only read Lord of The Ring more: seven times in total…) pictured in such an amazing way.
There are another two different versions of the Shrike on Baranger’s webpage, in the paintings 2002-2004 section. Take a look at them (and at all his other workings… they’re worth it) and follow my advice: read the Hyperion saga. NOW!
