Sinoc

opera on the wii

I am writing this entry from the confort of my couch via the wiimote, my tv, the wii and the opera browser available from today. It's pretty painful and slow at first. Let's hope it will get easier with time, but pointing at a virtual keyboard one letter at a time is much slower than using a real keyboard.

It's the Wiikend

December 8 it is and the Wii just came out here. I got mine at lunch time (I had reserved it) with redsteel and Zelda. Let the Wiikend begin!

Poor cat

Yuki the cat cut her paw this weekend. She left blood stains all over the house. I took her to the vet and she got three stitches. But worst of all she has to wear a silly plastic cone around her head. That is a real nightmare for the poor cat as she cannot clean herself and she bangs her head against the furniture. And she must keep this cone for 10 days. An unhappy cat, indeed.

[update: 2006 dec 05]: Yuki is now 'unconed' and incredibly happy to be able to run amok outside.

GTA vice city Italian ristorante

All Grand Theft Auto games have a healthy dose of humour. I took the photo on the right illustrating this strange humour. It's an Italian restaurant whose name is Ecoli.

sunflower

A photo of a sunflower taken at a botanical garden this summer 2006 (clickable).

mazen kerbaj's blog

Watching the French-German channel Arte yesterday, I saw an interview with Mazen Kerbaj mentionning his Kerblog. Mazen is a lebanese artist living in Beirut. It is worth taking a look at his work and take a minute to meditate about people suffering in Lebanon and elsewhere.

macro photos

I'll post some more insect and plant photos soon, but before that I have found this page in Russian of beautiful insect photos. Whao! I wish I could do that!

God & the USofA

The title says it all. In a recent book by the left wing American Jeremy Rifkin, entitled The European Dream, the author proposes that one of the main differences between the europeans and the americans is the level of religiosity. Surveys have shown that for 82% of americans, god is an essential part of their life. When half of the USA population goes to church at least once a week, about 10% in most northern countries in Europe go to church at least once every three months and the numbers are similar in southern Europe. This is not specifically European, since similar numbers can be found in most of the developed world. No, the exception here is the USA. This god-thing explains a lot of the behaviour of the americans (stem cell research or abortion laws for instance), but it sometimes get weird. Atheists are the least trusted group in the USA. They are less trusted than homosexuals or muslims (who are not the sweethearts of American fundies!). The linked article has got this beautiful quote:
Cole Ries, the president of the Maranatha Christian Fellowship said, "I don't believe that anybody is really an atheist. I believe that deep down everyone knows there is a god."
Dream on Ries, dream on. I would say "I don't believe that anybody is really religious. I believe that deep down everyone knows that it's all fairy tales". That's better!

High Nerd

My Nerd score is 84, which is not bad considering I am trying to have a life!

Jesus is a Zombie!

I saw a comment on a blog about Creationism vs. Evolution where someone joked that Jesus, the prince of peace should be called the prince of the undead since he rose from the grave.

Jesus is a zombie!

I never thought of that! George Romero is just another Mel Gibson.

Heterophobia

Homophobia is fortunately slowly disapearing from the western world. Debates about same sex mariages would have been impossible 20 years ago, and with the exception of some religious extremists and many old people, we might see an end to homophobia in the next generation.
But then comes heterophobia! Some gays have started calling (homo or hetero) couples with children "breeders".

This shows one thing: whatever the sexual preference of a group, the idiots are always numerous.

Wisdom tidbits - 1

The more keys are hanging from one's belt, the less reponsibility one has.

To bee or not to bee

I am learning to use my Olympus Mu Digital 800 compact digital camera. This is a close up of a bee (probably a wasp in fact) in my garden (click on img for larger version).
Addendum: The plant is a mint plant.

Yuki's activity

Cats like to sleep on the telly, since it's warm.

But they also like to play football. Some people seem to believe that cats cannot see TV, I think that mine can see that things are moving on the screen. I tested on my computer screen and she also tried to grab the mouse pointer. It's a cat after all!

Catholic view of evolution

This photo (click on it for a larger version) was taken at the Natural museum of Mdina in Malta in October 2005. The text reads:

An evolutionary explanation of the origin of life from non-living matter does not render the creative activity of god superfluous. God could have created different levels of beings directly or else through an evolutionary process. The fossil record, comparative anatomy and other evidence indicate that the present-day species of plants and animals have evolved from more primitive forms of life.

Scientists push back this evolutionary process to explain the origin of life itself.

Pretty scary read. Why a museum felt compelled to write this is unknown to me.