My new toy

And some «starter» shots

Facebook results in bad grades ??? COME ON !

What a STUPID way to announce the results of a study... As if the students are all robots that have no free will.... Television results in bad grades, music results in bad grades, extra-curricular activities result in bad grades, friends result in bad grades... darn it !!! I just can't even begin to get my head around the fact that this stuff is actually being published with THIS angle everywhere... Some articles actually suggest that access to Facebook should be restricted for college students. GEEEEESH. They're not kindergarden children ! We're talking about young adults here. While you're at it, take away their TV's, their phones, their IPods and lock them up in their rooms with books. Come on. If they haven't learned to balance work & play by college - something else is wrong. Not Facebook.

Pain in the neck

We all know the expression.
She's such a pain in the neck.
Doing housework is a pain in the neck.
I understand it so much more now. For the past few months, I've been suffering from chronic neck pain. Stiffness and a constant dull pain radiating from the back of my neck down to my shoulder blade. Very hard to live with. It's almost as bad as back pain which I know well because I suffered severe back pain for many years after having children.

Ever wanted to operate heavy equipement ?

Introducing a «playground» where you get to operate heavy machinery. COOL ! But, they call it a playground for MEN : Männerspielplatz. Geesh. Not fair. And so wrong for business. I'm sure women would really get a kick out of it too ! I would just LOVE to get my hands on the control sticks of this baby !!!

Via Springwise

Swim like a dolphin... really !

Source : Scientific American

Quotes from the article:

«This new dolphin-inspired fin promises to fuel the biggest change in human-powered swimming in decades.»

«Using the Lunocet, some swimmers are close to being able to breach completely out of the water, like whales.»

«This design uses the largest leg muscles instead of just the calves and ankles, says DARPA Defense Sciences PowerSwim Program Manager Lt. Col. John Lowell. Top speed is about 2.5 miles (four kilometers) per hour, which still works with scuba gear, but more important, the PowerSwim is 70 to 75 percent efficient at translating effort into propulsion.»

Sweet foot note : In the article, there's a quote from a marine biologist... and his name is Frank Fish !!!

Out of the box...

Good idea. We should first avoid using packaged water as much as possible. But when you're stuck, this is probably the better choice!

Via Laissez Faire.

On the 4th of March

March 4, 1678 - Antonio Vivaldi, Italian composer was born in Venice. His most famous work is "The Four Seasons". Vivaldi was commissioned to compose ten concerti grossi for Johann Offenbach, which he completed in just three days. Source.

Also interessing : Famous quotes by people born on March 4th.

Happy Birthday to my musical & witty Marilou !

Buy Handmade.

Found this on My M Bags blog... When I went, there were 37 640 pledges to buy handmade !

Cool bags at M Bags

Cool stuff... Check it out : My M Bags.
It's in French but, handbag language is universal ! Young designer based in Montreal. All hand made. Some are made of recycled material. Each one is unique.

Waves smashing the coastline

When asked where I'd rather be, I think of a beach... but unlike most people, I'm not thinking about a hot beach under under the sun and a soft breeze. I'm thinking grey skies, whipping wind and huge waves smashing the coastline. I completely lose myself under such conditions. The sound of the wind fills your mind, the salty air sticks to your skin and hair, and the perpetual movement of the forceful yet graceful water is very soothing to me. I seem to be coming down with a little case of Winter blues. I'm bored. I'm tired... so yeah... I'd rather be there, sitting on that big rock on the left.

Palimpsests and Bailiwicks

That day after I wrote my last post, I was reading an article by Edward Hoagland in Harper's Magazine. I don't know this writer but throughout his article, I was stumbling on words for which I had no idea of the meaning and in most cases couldn't even deduce an approximate understanding through the context. And even after looking in the dictionnary, I sometimes still did not understand what the word was doing in that sentence. Palimpsests. Parochial. Discombobulated. Beseeching. Hoodwinks. Bailiwicks. Welts. Dotage. Just to name a few that sent me to the pages of my Webster. Funny how life works. You write something about (against) dumbing down the vocabulary in a text and the next day you come across an article sprinkled with new vocabulary! It was lots of fun though I did begin to think, after a few pages, that he was pushing it a little bit. Palimpsests? Bailiwicks? I don't think I can work those into an ordinary conversation over lunch!

Lowest common denominator

I have a rather good vocabulary in my every day language (French). I express myself well when writing professionnal documents. But my boss, very often revises them and changes words and sentence structure. She says that the words I use are too professionnal and wouldn't be understood by everyone. Hum. I'm not talking about a general public article here. These are internal documents for presentation to the board. And the words I use are still very basic vocabulary for an educated and cultivated person - nothing technical or obscure understood only by the initiated. I think that if everybody is always reducing everything to the lowest common denominator - to make sure that even the least educated person around the table will effortlessly understand every single word used - we'll all just turn stupid in the long run. Nobody will learn anything anymore.

When you encounter a new word, most of the time you can «guess» its meaning simply through the contexte where it is used. Once in a while you'll have to ask or fetch a dictionnary. I usually fetch the dictionnary even if I've deduced the meaning, just to get the whole picture of the word... and then I try very hard to use it in a conversation within the next 24 hours to help it stick in my brain !

That habit she has bothers me very much. Sometimes my text is modified so much that I remove my name from the bottom. I am proud of the quality of my writing. I worked hard the get it there and to keep it there. If the text doesn't reflect the quality of my work, I refuse to have my name associated with it.

RMR : Canada Explained !

Rick Mercer... Brilliant again ! Tuesday night he did a piece titled «Everything you wanted to know about Canada but were afraid to ask». Absolutely fascinating. Very educational. Bull's Eye ! How Canada works - simplified. He got me right from the start when he said that 75% of canadians could not answer the question «who is Canada's head of state?»... Of course, I said to myself - well, I know that ! - how horrible to think that 75% of canadians do not... BUT, it turns out I HAD IT WRONG TOO ! But, as Rick said, that's OK because the answer is ridiculous ! I was totally captivated and I listened with fascination and LEARNED a lot and laughed a lot too ! Just brilliant. As usual !

Desquiet, by Julia Leigh

Just finished reading Disquiet. Wonderfully written by Australian writer, Julia Leigh. I love this type of writing where «nothing seems to be happening», action wise but at the same time, you always having that uneasy feeling of the world shifting powerfully. Mingarelli's prose is like that. And this little book absolutely did that. It's the kind of story that stays with you for days after you've finished it. You have trouble starting a new book because this one is still lingering inside. The mood, the feeling is like a tinted fog that just hangs there. This review expresses well what fascinated me throughout the book. One particularity is that the main charactors are referred to as «the woman», «the boy» and «the girl»... except when someone was talking them (so we do know their names). This was disconcerting and very strange. It created, combined with many other little details, a certain disembodiement. A very good read indeed... I must now find her other books !!!

Old 404 - new dance

Cool. Much better than the drabby 404's we usually. I nice way to bring the visitor back in.
Click on the image to go to the article.
Source : colleague reference to SmashingMagazine.

Kinda puts things into perspective

Life's little hurdles are dwarfed when you see this. Majestic.
Source : Astronomy Picture of the day.

Bold Beautiful Biathlon

I watched Rick Mercer tonight. As usual. I love this guy ! He did a piece on the Canadian womens biathlon team. To fund the team, they are selling a calendar with artistic & professionnal nude photos of the athletes. Only 20$ for a 14 month calendar (Jan '09 to Feb '10).
Get the calendar : Bold Beautiful Biathlon

Writing in English about my favorite authors.

After my last post, I wanted to write about a few of my all-time favorite authors. And I have come to a strange conclusion. I've read many English or French translations of European and Asian authors. When looking for English links about the authors I wanted to write about first (Nina Berberova & Hubert Mingarelli), I found it quite difficult to find English language websites ! And the list of their books translated to English is either non existant or smaller than the list translated to French. Very strange. Is it just bad research on my part ? Or are these writers actually translated more often to French than to English ? If so, why is that ? I'll dig some more.

I recommend ;
Le Roseau Révolté, Nina Berberova (link to English language Wikipedia)
Quatre Soldats, Hubert Mingarelli (link to French language Wikipedia)

Those are the first book of each author that I stumbled on. I immediately researched their work and then read everything I could get my hands on. That's what I'm planning to do about Thomas Wharton... I have the list of his books in my wallet now...

Thomas Wharton - Salamander

A wonderful trip. I consider myself a heavy reader. I probably read over 100 books every year. This is now my top one. And I haven't even finished yet ! I'm looking forward to reading Thomas Wharton's other books.

ABOUT THE BOOK
Source & more review quotes : Here.
«Spellbinding, original, Salamander careens through a world of ideas and stories in which the transforming power of books, the thirst for knowledge, and the pursuit of immortality become erotic. It is also a universal story of love and obsession. Set in the eighteenth century, the narrative revolves around a world-spanning quest for the infinite book. Along the way the novel gathers stories that range from a Chinese tale of jealousy and lost love to the remarkable history of Alexandria’s other great library and to epoch-making moments on the battlefields of colonial America. At the centre of the novel’s unforgettable cast of characters is the London printer Nicholas Flood, a dedicated craftsman who is unprepared for all that awaits him when he accepts an unusual commission. Intricate, humane, infused with humour and pathos, Salamander is an exhilarating, elegantly crafted novel.»


ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Source & full article : Here.
«The process was more painful than it sounds. All of Salamander’s original frame story was dumped. Convoluted subplots hit walls for weeks on end. He wrote himself into corners and trashed “tons of material.” To free his mind, Wharton turned to nonsensical tasks. He points to an elaborate, two-page pop-up in the centre of his scrapbook. “That took me four hours. I came up from the basement and showed my wife and she just looked at me and said, ‘This is what you’ve been doing? I thought you were working on your book.’ Well, I was.”»

Thomas Wharton's blog : Here.

The wonderful world of Loya

The beauty that is expressed in the lines she draws is sometimes overwhelming to me. My daughter (16yrs), the artist.

See more : Loya on DeviantArt

I'd be late for work...

Yup, I'd be really late for work if this was the sky I saw when I walked out of the house one morning.

Awesome, isn't it ?

Source : Astronomy Picture of the day

New Day

Nothing more to say here. I'm a fan. I'm a believer.

I live in Quebec, I consider myself a Quebecoise (and a bit Canadian) but a deep part of me will always be American - I was born in the USA and raised there until the age of 13, long enough to have deep roots. Actually, I only discovered how deep on September 11th 2001... But I hated Bush. So much. So deeply. It hurt. He shamed my American heart.

It's new day. Good Luck Sir ! May God be with you !

Photo source : Vanity Fair

Deleted my old blog

Yup ! I was looking at the crap on my old blog to see if there was anything I wanted to transfer to this one. A few good posts that took time to write and sometimes research. I was going through the list and all of a sudden something just snapped and I decided to delete the whole darn thing. No second thoughts. Click! Wow. Feels good. Like fresh linens from the clothes line. Crisp. Clean. New.

New Space

I have found it rather inconvenient to have people I know bite me for things I wrote on my former blog. So this is my new space. I'll try to keep it interesting but I'm a selfish blogger. This is just a place where I mumble things to myself. Of course it's nice when others seem to appreciate too. But that's extra, not the goal. Sorry.