Spring hits Moscow, populace proceeds to CAPSLOCK AT THE WORLD
As I've mentioned previously, I work for one corporate megalith that, due to tarantellic machinations, the vicissitudes of the market, and deliberate power plays, is now co-located in the same building as another corporate megalith.
The people who work for the other megalith across the hall are much cooler than the people who work for our megalith. Every interesting conversation that I have in the shared kitchen is with our (quasi-official) sworn enemies. The cool intellects, cool clothes, tattoos, and senses of humor are all across the hall. It makes me want to jump ship to the other side, but with the recession and all, that's not possible (because I've looked, believe you me, buckaroos).
However, I come to work this morning to find a hilarious e-mail from Voluable & Genial Moscow Colleague #1 that had the following line (among many choice others): "Nice to hear you. FINALLY HERE IS SPRING IN MOSCOW!!!1!"
I practically fell off my chair laughing. The Moscow Office makes everything better.
Fresh from NASA and astronomy sites everywhere: NASA's STEREO satellites have produced the first 3-D images of the sun.
Don't believe me?
From STEREO:
That's ionized helium rising from the sun.
National Geographic has a bit more here. Isn't that awesome?
But I also saw this on space.com:
The PSR B1509-58 nebula:
Not only does that look like the hand of divinity reaching out to crush some misbehaving stars, but it reminded me of something.
LOOK FAMILIAR??
Life imitates comics or comics imitates life? YOU DECIDE.
Gacked from nique, this is a fantastic little piece on the phenomena of modern pirates, Somalia, and the failure of the Western press to give anything but the narrowest perspective on recent events. Very interesting reading, in particular this quote:
Pirates have never been quite who we think they are. In the "golden age of piracy" - from 1650 to 1730 - the idea of the pirate as the senseless, savage thief that lingers today was created by the British government in a great propaganda-heave. Many ordinary people believed it was false: pirates were often rescued from the gallows by supportive crowds. Why? What did they see that we can't? In his book Villains of All nations, the historian Marcus Rediker pores through the evidence to find out. If you became a merchant or navy sailor then - plucked from the docks of London's East End, young and hungry - you ended up in a floating wooden Hell. You worked all hours on a cramped, half-starved ship, and if you slacked off for a second, the all-powerful captain would whip you with the Cat O' Nine Tails. If you slacked consistently, you could be thrown overboard. And at the end of months or years of this, you were often cheated of your wages.
Pirates were the first people to rebel against this world. They mutinied against their tyrannical captains - and created a different way of working on the seas. Once they had a ship, the pirates elected their captains, and made all their decisions collectively. They shared their bounty out in what Rediker calls "one of the most egalitarian plans for the disposition of resources to be found anywhere in the eighteenth century." They even took in escaped African slaves and lived with them as equals. The pirates showed "quite clearly - and subversively - that ships did not have to be run in the brutal and oppressive ways of the merchant service and the Royal navy." This is why they were popular, despite being unproductive thieves.
The piece goes on to talk about how Western ships began to illegally dump nuclear waste in the waters of Somalia's coast and began to loot the country's food supply after the collapse of the Somalian government in 1991.
I'm certainly not advocating piracy and kidnapping, but there are tangible reasons why, in such a resource-starved environment, people take such desperate measures and decide to sail the seas in search of a livelihood.
I'm also not particularly interested in soft news stories, but today I'm making an exception. I believe that this proves that we have the cutest First Family in the entire world:
The Obamas and Bo:
I love Portuguese Water Dogs! I've known a few, and they were fine and upstanding citizens of the canine community. Look at his little white paws!
Here's hoping that El Prez & Company get with a positive reinforcement training program for Bo; they're not experienced dog owners, and man, like most dogs, Portuguese Water Dogs need a lot of exercise.
The people who work for the other megalith across the hall are much cooler than the people who work for our megalith. Every interesting conversation that I have in the shared kitchen is with our (quasi-official) sworn enemies. The cool intellects, cool clothes, tattoos, and senses of humor are all across the hall. It makes me want to jump ship to the other side, but with the recession and all, that's not possible (because I've looked, believe you me, buckaroos).
However, I come to work this morning to find a hilarious e-mail from Voluable & Genial Moscow Colleague #1 that had the following line (among many choice others): "Nice to hear you. FINALLY HERE IS SPRING IN MOSCOW!!!1!"
I practically fell off my chair laughing. The Moscow Office makes everything better.
Fresh from NASA and astronomy sites everywhere: NASA's STEREO satellites have produced the first 3-D images of the sun.
Don't believe me?
From STEREO:
That's ionized helium rising from the sun.
National Geographic has a bit more here. Isn't that awesome?
But I also saw this on space.com:
The PSR B1509-58 nebula:
Not only does that look like the hand of divinity reaching out to crush some misbehaving stars, but it reminded me of something.
LOOK FAMILIAR??
Life imitates comics or comics imitates life? YOU DECIDE.
Gacked from nique, this is a fantastic little piece on the phenomena of modern pirates, Somalia, and the failure of the Western press to give anything but the narrowest perspective on recent events. Very interesting reading, in particular this quote:
Pirates have never been quite who we think they are. In the "golden age of piracy" - from 1650 to 1730 - the idea of the pirate as the senseless, savage thief that lingers today was created by the British government in a great propaganda-heave. Many ordinary people believed it was false: pirates were often rescued from the gallows by supportive crowds. Why? What did they see that we can't? In his book Villains of All nations, the historian Marcus Rediker pores through the evidence to find out. If you became a merchant or navy sailor then - plucked from the docks of London's East End, young and hungry - you ended up in a floating wooden Hell. You worked all hours on a cramped, half-starved ship, and if you slacked off for a second, the all-powerful captain would whip you with the Cat O' Nine Tails. If you slacked consistently, you could be thrown overboard. And at the end of months or years of this, you were often cheated of your wages.
Pirates were the first people to rebel against this world. They mutinied against their tyrannical captains - and created a different way of working on the seas. Once they had a ship, the pirates elected their captains, and made all their decisions collectively. They shared their bounty out in what Rediker calls "one of the most egalitarian plans for the disposition of resources to be found anywhere in the eighteenth century." They even took in escaped African slaves and lived with them as equals. The pirates showed "quite clearly - and subversively - that ships did not have to be run in the brutal and oppressive ways of the merchant service and the Royal navy." This is why they were popular, despite being unproductive thieves.
The piece goes on to talk about how Western ships began to illegally dump nuclear waste in the waters of Somalia's coast and began to loot the country's food supply after the collapse of the Somalian government in 1991.
I'm certainly not advocating piracy and kidnapping, but there are tangible reasons why, in such a resource-starved environment, people take such desperate measures and decide to sail the seas in search of a livelihood.
I'm also not particularly interested in soft news stories, but today I'm making an exception. I believe that this proves that we have the cutest First Family in the entire world:
The Obamas and Bo:
I love Portuguese Water Dogs! I've known a few, and they were fine and upstanding citizens of the canine community. Look at his little white paws!
Here's hoping that El Prez & Company get with a positive reinforcement training program for Bo; they're not experienced dog owners, and man, like most dogs, Portuguese Water Dogs need a lot of exercise.