Regime Change Through Terrorism

Well it looks like the Madrid bombings were effective in ousting the old government. That's startling if you ask me. Governments like to position acts of terror as mindless and irrational but this shows that they can be an effective political tool. A radical minority effectively ousted a government. The future formula could be to use multiple terror attacks on vunerable targets a week before an election in a country.

How does the population react? It depends on a lot of things of course. If it happened that way in the United States, I suspect Bush would win hands down. If it happened in the UK, Blair would be out. I'm going to be edgy in the run up to the British elections and I'll avoid London commutes that's for sure.

The Hobbit

I've been reading The Hobbit (Tolkien) to R*. We're on Chapter 10. It's considered a children's book but the language and sentence construction makes it pretty hard going when you're reading it aloud. I can get pretty tongue tied and I consider myself pretty good at reading aloud. I've even got a fair repertoire of voices which are fun to invent. I've scared the kids sometimes to the point where they insist that I don't do the voice. Gollum is fun to do.

The Corporation as Pyschopath

Looks like a good documentary making the round in the theatres. Hasn't made it to the UK yet. Hope it does. Check out the blurb on corpwatch and the official website.

An Alternative Analysis of Lord Of The Rings (spoof)

Humour alert. Transcript of Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky on a political analysis and deconstruction of Lord Of The Rings.

Difficult Questions: Swearing Revisited

Another R* question.

"So why is sh*t a swear word but poo isn't?"

Ummmm.....

The Pianist (Roman Polanski, 2002)

Watched the DVD. Great movie although rather horrific. As described by IMDB:

 A Polish Jewish musician struggles to survive the destruction of the Warsaw ghetto of World War II.

And it's amazing that he did as it's based on a true story. Any film about the holocaust is bound to be emotional and invocative but it tells the story of survival in a unpatronising and realistic way. The fact that he's a pianist isn't that central to the film but acts as a theme to hold the story together. Recommended.

Coldplay : A Rush Of Blood To The Head

This is my favourite album over the last few months. I'd describe it as a fairly mainstream rock album (drums and guitar but dashes of orchestral instruments) with sad and reflective lyrics. It flows really well although some might find it monotonous. Not a dance or a summer album. Great to crank up loud on a cold rainy day.

Guardian: Short but not sweet (Malaysian Election)

Succinct article about the upcoming Malaysian election describing the incredible imbalance of it's so-called democracy. It's more like a benign totalitarian state than a democracy. Police are controlled by the executive, the media is tightly censored, patronage is rife and the opposition doesn't have a chance. No wonder the election campaign only has to last eight days.

Crufts 2004

Crufts, the world's biggest dog show, has been broadcast on TV for the last three days. We've been letting R* watch the hour long broadcast each night. She would absolutely *love* a dog and it's reinvigorated her campaign to get one. It all boils down to who is going to look after the dog and take it for walks and it just ain't gonna be me. And it can't be R*. Personally, I'm all for getting a cat!

Blogging Changes Afoot

My first blog post was made 17 March 2003 - almost one year ago. I've enjoyed it and concentrated mostly on putting up content and making it a habit. I'm going to carry on blogging but now is a good time to implement a bunch of changes:

• I've created a new domain to which I'm moving the "Software Adventures" blog. This will become my professional/career site and will be aimed at fellow geeks, technical colleagues, potential employers and customers. I'll annouce the URL once it's all ready.


• I'm migrating this site to use the .Text blogging software so the look and functions will change quite a lot. It's based on .Net which will allow me to modify the site easier. I'll also be able to blog while I'm travelling.


• I'll be creating more categories on this site but every entry will be displayed on the frontpage so you won't need to bother clicking on any particular category. Just read the front page and only bother with categories if you want to read certain kinds of past entries.

I plan to make these changes in the next couple of weeks so I don't have to renew my Radio Userland license. If your links or RSS feed breaks, you'll know why.

Caring For Your Introvert

Yes! Someone has finally articulated this really well. I'm more of an introvert than an extrovert and this article so right. There's plenty of quotes I could pick so just go read the article.

"The worst of it is that extroverts have no idea of the torment they put us through. Sometimes, as we gasp for air amid the fog of their 98-percent-content-free talk, we wonder if extroverts even bother to listen to themselves."

Second, when you see an introvert lost in thought, don't say "What's the matter?" or "Are you all right?"

Poker Night II

It's official. I'm now playing Low Limit Texas Hold'em once a month. We played last night and I'm pleased to report I came away with more than I started with. We've modified the house rules so that you just buy £10 worth of chips and at the end of the game, cash your chips in. I made £1.95. Coffee money! Then again, that's a 20% return which is far better than my other investments lately. It certanly helped spending a lttle time studying the strategy and tactics for the game - especially the starting hands.

Popdex

Useful place to find out what the popular articles on the 'net are based on links from 14,000 or so sites. Dangerous as you can easily kill your morning following links from it!

Seperate Rooms

R* and K* have always slept in the same room together all their lives - until tonight. We moved R* into her own room today after talking about for several months. She says it feels very strange and she's not very sure about it. K* seems ok albeit concerned R* might have the better room even though it's half the size. We think it's about the right time as R* needs space she can call her own rather than hiding everything around her bed like a rats nest. Their sleeping patterns are also different. One of the next projects is decorating and furnishing each room for their individual interests. With trepidation, I've agreed to show R* the Ikea catalogue.