Off to NZ tomorrow, via LA and coming back through Australia. Whoo hoo!
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Chomsky Speaking Itinerary
I couldn’t find a list of Noam Chomsky’s engagements anywhere. Rather that sit back in my usual fog of apathy I thought that I’d start one myself. This is the unofficial, incomplete speaking itinerary of Noam Chomsky.
Please, if you know of a time/venue please let me know (if possible please send a web link too, or any other information). Better yet, if you know of a page that already does this, and that is kept up-to-date, please let me know and I don’t have to bother!
(Please also let me know if Noam is talking in London, as it seems that I’ve missed him.)
There’re also details here about how to get his schedule.
Date Where Title Other 22 May 2004 Liverpool, UK Part of the WOW Fesitval 22 May 2004 Manchester, UK University of Manchester 19 May 2004 London Simple Truths, Hard Choices: Some Thoughts on Terror, Justice and Self-defense Free Update: I was asked by Prof Chomsky’s staff to not do this. The dude abides.
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Noam Chomsky’s speaking itinerary
I have decided to start a speaking itinerary of the great professor as I couldn’t find one anywhere on-line. I hope that it’s useful and please let me know of any appearances (or if there’s a list already out there on the net).
And Noam Chomsky has a weblog called “Turning the Tide”
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Accessibility Links
That old chestnut, the corporate web site re-design has come around again. It was about this time last year that we were working on the upgrade. We rebuilt a hopelessly crap web-shite so that all layout and formatting was done with CSS, it was HTML 4.01 compliant, cross browser compatible back to IE4 and NN6 (the earlier Netscape efforts get text only) and gave a nod to accessibility (without embracing it whole-heartedly).
This time we’ll hopefully iron out more of the accessibility issues. I’ve found these links on accessibility really useful, and if you haven’t considered accessible web design before, these may act as a useful starting point:
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Freedom!
Wireless internet! Whoo-hoo!
Got a nice bundle from a supplier (who were slightly cheaper than e-buyer) that I will not name because they really screwed up – my order has taken nearly three weeks to arrive, they wouldn’t return my calls or answer my e-mails. I’m going to ask them for compo of some sort, and if I don’t get it I will name names. Bastards.
For those who are interested, I bought the D-Link DSL-G604T and got a free card thrown in. It seems to be great, I was set up in nearly no time. I had to bugger around with the config tool for a while as some strange stuff was happening (not finding the access point at all, or finding the access point but not connecting to the net) but it all appears to be ok now.
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Sasser blues
Another virus… go to MS, download the patch, install the patch, I guess this means that I’ll have to reboot, yes, it does:
Before you install this update, we recommend that you:
– Update your system repair disk (that fills me with confidence)
– Back up your system (stuff that)
– Close all open programsSo I have to shut down Putty which is running a MySQL session, Dreamweaver, Apache, Notes, several instances of Firefox with stuff in them I had found and wanted to look at later…. This is a drag.
And yes, I do decide to back-up my stuff (which takes ages) so hours later the patch is in place, and the firewall and virus checker updated.
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The Saddest Music in the World
Guy Madden’s “The Saddest Music in the World” is one of the strangest films I’ve seen for a good long while. And to boot, it’s a musical. Set in Canada during the depression in a surreal nightmare-like (I was going to say “dream-like”) version of Winnipeg, this film is hard to watch but worth-while if you’re up for something very “art-house”. I dislike the term art-house; I don’t think it really means anything; but it conjures up the right connotations for this film. Stylistically it resembles a music video or a cartoon; at times it has the overwhelming creepy/uncomfortable feeling that I remember experiencing when I watched “Eraserhead”.
What’s it about? I don’t think I’ll be 100% on the money saying what a film like this is about after only one viewing. Sure, it’s set in the depression and involves a music competition (to find the saddest music in the world) to which punters travel from all over the world. But I think it’s an allegory (or a parable, or whatever you want to call it) about the USA, (globalisation?), power, greed, and decadence. And as you might guess, it’s not in favour of its subject matter.
I didn’t enjoy the film but I’d like to see it again. I would recommend it – but only if you’re into “that sort of thing”.
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Eats, Shoots and Leaves
I’ve just read Eats, Shoots & Leaves . There’s no excuse for my poor punctuation now. I was really impressed by the writing style of Lynne Truss who is bloody funny (I didn’t realise that a book on punctuation could be funny) and it really was a joy to read. And now I also know what an Oxford comma is (among many other things). You should read it – we have to take action before written english is permanently damaged.
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Final episode of Sex in the City
Sometime back in March they showed the final episode of “Sex in the City” here in England. It occurred to me that this was a cultural event (albeit a minor one, like the final of M*A*S*H, or when they changed the drinking age from 20 to 18 in NZ) and so I recorded it photographically.
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May the First
It’s May 1st – that means it’s reboot day . Must be on Californian time or something, haven’t seen much yet to make me think that it’s a big deal.