miércoles, 31 de marzo de 2004

I hate it

So I overheard that on the train today: "I even went to the cinema yesterday, to disconnect from work". Nice. It was some crap Holywood movie. The guy knew the actors' names. He even knew one of these actors is also starring another movie these days. Not a word about the movie. Not a single word. Like when I tried to make some friends from the masters in LSE in London, and we went to the cinema and nobody talked anything about the movie after the movie. I guess that's how the world is today. More and more dumb people around. I hate it. I hate it so much.

jueves, 25 de marzo de 2004

EC

So finally I went to Eric Clapton's concert. In three words: it was deceiving. Yes, I am the first one to be really sad about it, but that's how the concert was. You know, I saw Eric Clapton ten years ago: same scenario, me ten years younger (man, I actually did things, ten years ago.. it's an annoying thought that makes me feel old) And so EC, ten years ago, appeared exactly and 21:30 on stage, got to the microphone and said: "Only blues".
And he started playing Motherless Child, alone with one guitar. And from here to heaven, and from heaven to the end of the concert, with EC alone again on stage, this time even without a guitar, singing a song by Billie Holyday. Man, that was a concert. That was the best blues concert I've ever seen, and probably will. Yesterday, I don't really know what it was. But I'll keep loving Clapton, like I still love my 16 years old.

martes, 23 de marzo de 2004

Smoke and EC

I need a smoke... oh I need a smoke so badly
(and that's why I write this stupid things)
Also... should I go to Eric Clapton's concert in Barcelona tomorrow?
I don't know how it is possible that I doubt about it, but it is happening... I actually have doubts about going there!
My God, I hope it's only cause I didn't sleep last night.

AlexDo II

AlexDo is in Viena already. I sort of miss him. Take care and come back soon!

AlexDo

So AlexDo the physicist had a violent argument with JorgeCro the mysticist. If you are at the hospital, and there's lots of people before you, what do you do? Imagine, for instance, that the doctor visits from 9am to 1pm, and that it is ten and he's visited only 3 people out of the 20 people he has to visit in the whole morning. Are you able to construct a mathematical model of the situation, and demonstrate that you will be visited before 1pm? Or do you react somewhat differently? What is more creative? What is more intelligent?

viernes, 19 de marzo de 2004

And now

And now... time to meet up with Palace for an interesting chat, because it is always interesting talking to Palace (even though he is too much of an economist type of guy... hehehe) But wait, I must make an appointment with the dermathologist first... there's this brown, round thing growing on my face, on the right cheek... And it's big, even though only my mom noticed it. Mothers, you know...

Friday evening

So I give up going to the swimming pool with my mom to be able to catch up with Joaquin's life (he wrote un email muy lindo to me yesterday). On my way around the blogosphere, I also find out that Joaquin and Begnaldo have joined my tribute to the madrileños. Begnaldo has even gone as far as giving me credit for (Bob) Dylan's verse "how many years can some people exist before they're allowed to be free?" I love you too, Bernie, both in a gay and straight way. (by the way, as I type the word "gay", Choche starts talking to me on msn... I know he likes these kind of observations)

Felicidades José(s) !!!

Well, I wrote this for José (I know, Choche, I need to write one for you too, because Choche comes from Jose, you know). I like to write this fast poems and send them by email.

"El día de hoy, es el dia de José.
La razón exacta, en verdad no la sé.
Pero beberé algo más que té,
Y tu nombre con orgullo celebraré
Hasta que ya no pueda rimar con la e
(yo calculo, de la noche, hacia las tré)."

Public life

So my friend Alex asked me yesterday about my IT journalism stuff. And I replied: "and how do you know about it?" And he said "well, I read your blog".
See? I went public but my shares didn't go up (and I'm not quite sure whether this play on words actually means anything or is funny to anyone)

6 mins to go

Just six minutes, and I am out of work for the weekend... ah, wild weekend! Those are the longest minutes of the week, but in a way also the sweetest.

miércoles, 17 de marzo de 2004

Salam Pax is alive (or more short films on the net)

Salam Pax is this guy that became famous because he reported the war on Irak from his blog. He wrote this yesterday:

"I am still alive. I have just been given a 10 minute breather from the small dark room I sit in to script and edit the films for Newsnight. The first one, about the one year anniversary not Karbala, will go out tonight. Check the Newsnight website to see if they put a version online. What you can go check out now is a very interesting poll (PDF file). Look thru it, I think it will give you a very interesting view. it is worth your time. And you are officially reading an award winning Blog, I have won a Bloggy Award. Yay me."

Short films on the net

"Hay Motivo" ("There's a reason") is the name given to a series of 32 short films made by Spanish directors as a critique of what they see as the injustices and falsehoods imposed on Spanish society by the (now defeated) conservative party Partido Popular. Higher-profile contributors to the project include Vicente Aranda, Julio Medem, Isabel Coixet, Iciar Bollaín and David Trueba. All the films can be seen by clicking though from here.

martes, 16 de marzo de 2004

About 11-M (2)

The second one from Puerta del Sol blog.

"Zapatero (Sunday 14 March elected new president of Spain) has called for all Spain's political parties to meet to develop a common strategy against terrorism. He has also reiterated his intention to remove Spanish troops from Iraq on June 30, referring to the war in Iraq as a "disaster which has only generated more disaster". When asked by a foreign journalist whether, when a terrorist attack changes an election result, it isn't a victory for terrorism, he replied that the foreign media should understand that in Spain, there was a desire for change.

Workers at the Efe press agency, the state TV channel RTVE and the local channel TeleMadrid have lodged official complaints about the censorship and manipulation that their work was subjected to during coverage of the bombings and its aftermath. They are demanding resignations."

About 11-M (1)

I don't usually comment on the news in this blog, but I'll publish a couple of good articles from Puerta del Sol blog, a really good blog with "Reflections on life in Spain and Spanish culture". And it's written in good English!

"On the one hand, the victors: the PSOE, led by new PM José Luis Zapatero (elected last 14 March), stressing, in an interview with Iñaki Gabilondo this morning, that Spain has voted for change and for peace, that young people have realized that their vote can make a difference, that he is prepared to take Spanish soldiers out of Iraq if necessary - this is where the international repercussions of the PSOE's defeat will be most strongly-felt - and that his mandate is going to be about dialogue, openness and democracy. On the other hand, the defeated Partido Popular, who must be in a state of shock and whose more hardline supporters suggest that this is a victory for Al Qaeda (or, if not AQ, then terrorism), that the PSOE's electoral victory shows terrorists that bombs can unseat a democratically-elected government. This may turn out to have been a defeat for José María Aznar which translated into a defeat for his party, not all of whose members were in favour of Spain's unqualified support for the U.S.

But it should be remembered that the PSOE's victory, though catalyzed by last Thursday's bombings, has also come as the result of many people's concern with the manner in which the PP has handled several recent political hot potatoes, particularly the Prestige oil spill, and its high-handedness with regard to its manipulation of the media, not least the state TV channel. (Apparently messages were sent to Spanish embassies following the bombing, telling them to report the bombings as the work of ETA rather than of Al Qaeda: the revelation of that particular fact was a further blow to the PP's electoral prospects.) Internal concerns, if you will. A month ago, Zapatero was not doing too badly in the polls, and though he never really looked like winning, to suggest that his election is purely the result of what happened last Thursday would not be correct for many of the Spaniards who voted for him yesterday. The PP actually lost less than a million votes: the PSOE has been partly elected on votes lost by the left-wing Izquierda Unida coalition, and partly on votes by people who did not vote last time around.

The reading that this election result has given a green light to terrorism generates the fear that it will encourage further pre-election attacks in other countries. Sadly, this will probably be the case - and it would probably also have been the case had the PP won yesterday's election. But I've seen it written in blogs that the Spanish electorate, therefore, are in some sense responsible for future deaths at the hands of terrorists (this is not something that would ever be said in Spain, and the people who say it are forgetting the support that the US has received from Spain's governing party thus far). This kind of reasoning gets us nowhere. Surely very few of the people who voted yesterday are pro-Al Qaeda, pro-ETA, pro-whatever. Quite the opposite. This, coming days after the worst massacre on Spanish soil since the Civil War, was presumably a vote against both war and terrorism, and against the circumstances in which war and terrorism flourish. It was a vote which said "something here's not right: let's use our democratic system to see whether a change wouldn't be better". It seems to me that, albeit in very particular circumstances, democracy has been exercised, pure and simple."

Quote

"Frequently the personalised, subjective, unpolished viewpoint [ of a blog ] strikes me as far more engaging than the Soho House arse licking of your average journalists' take on life."

Comment on -a

"Being shut up on this stupid island (could this be my eternal punishment?), I seem to be slowly loosing my sense of reality. I think my mind is playing tricks on me. "
Well, I guess we are all so shut up in our stupid islands, that we often forget there's also the sea around, everywhere, to swim and forget. But then you come back so tired from swimming...

Paul says

"It makes me so sad that common people are made to
suffer for the mistakes of the worst elements of society."

Emails

I have gotten so many emails from friends abroad. Some of them very good friends, but most of them known once and maybe forgotten in the day to day of a new life, but always coming back, always somewhere there. Very good friendships, like love, tend to end abruptly, like every exageration in life. But those more grey, those laying down in the background, like a star next to Venus, always remain. It's strange, but it happens with almost everything in life.

viernes, 12 de marzo de 2004

The song, my friend, is playing in my head

I travel by train to go to work. Sometimes I have written here about people who take the train to go to work. To them, once more, to each of them, I dedicate this blog today.
Yesterday night, before going to bed, having a cigarette in the bathroom, digesting all the dantesque images I had seen and figures I had heard, this song suddenly started playing inside my head. It's still in my head this morning, in some musical background of my brain. You can read it, and try to play it in your heads too.

How many roads must a man walk down
Before you call him a man?
Yes, 'n' how many seas must a white dove sail
Before she sleeps in the sand?
Yes, 'n' how many times must the cannon balls fly
Before they're forever banned?
The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind,
The answer is blowin' in the wind.

How many times must a man look up
Before he can see the sky?
Yes, 'n' how many ears must one man have
Before he can hear people cry?
Yes, 'n' how many deaths will it take till he knows
That too many people have died?
The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind,
The answer is blowin' in the wind.

How many years can a mountain exist
Before it's washed to the sea?
Yes, 'n' how many years can some people exist
Before they're allowed to be free?
Yes, 'n' how many times can a man turn his head,
Pretending he just doesn't see?
The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind,
The answer is blowin' in the wind.

jueves, 11 de marzo de 2004

Politics in this country, II

So much politicians did insist that terrorism was coming to an end in Spain, that today we might have witnessed here the worse terrorist attack ever.

miércoles, 10 de marzo de 2004

Children's wisdom

This is from an email Grace sent me.

Teacher: "Which is more important to us, the Sun or the Moon?"
Pupil: "The Moon".
Teacher: "Why?"
Pupil: "The Moon gives us light at night when we need it, but the Sun gives us light only in the day time when we don't need it".

Teacher: "Now, Sam, tell me frankly do you say prayers before eating?"
Sam: "No sir, I don't have to, my mom is a good cook".

Teacher: "Can anybody give an example of COINCIDENCE?"
Student: "Yes. My Mother and Father got married on the same day and at the same time."

Teacher: "George Washington not only chopped down his father's cherry tree, but also admitted doing it. Now do you know why his father didn't punish him?"
Student: "Because George still had the axe in is hand."

Teacher: "What do you call a person who keeps on talking when people are no longer interested?"
Pupil: "A teacher".

Politics in this country

The mayor of Toledo said this yesterday: "You can't change the Constitution of Spain even if you get most of the votes. You can't. Hitler also won the elections, and then you all know what happened".
This is the right in Spain, the rightist. Every day I want it less and less to belong to this country, and I hate it, because I really like it.

martes, 9 de marzo de 2004

Again the train

There was this young girl in the train who was making fun of the way Japanese speak English. She said they couldn't understand anything the yankees said at the conferences. It reminded me of Lost in Translation. Just that this girl probably didn't even speak English.

My friend Jorge

My friend Jorge Croissier, a.k.a. Jorginho, is a really creative mind looking for an opportunity to demonstrate his talent to the world. He gave me his CV so I would link it here, in the hope (very vague) that some joke of destiny would attract to this webpage a millionaire looking for an audiovisuals graduate to promote his short films. Anyway, his CV is there in the links section. It's quite a funny CV, just take a look.

sábado, 6 de marzo de 2004

Crimes and Misdemeanors

I'm heading off to see Crimes and Misdemeanors. I recommend it to everyone.

Choche sent me this email

A song about Ph.D. In the web page of the authors you can listen it:
http://www.swi.psy.uva.nl/projects/il/blues/

Lyrics

Ph.D. Blues (Prins/Wilhelm)

I'm a Ph.D. student,
I'm working night and day.
I'm writing a dissertation,
and get a lousy pay.

I thought I'd be in business,
but I could not decide.
I waited and I waited,
and ended up in science.

Getting a degree. If you don't know what to do.
I was looking for adventure
I was looking for the truth.

I started out with reading,
all pieces I could find.
Spent two months at the xerox,
till I was half blind.

Then I needed some data,
and much to my surprise.
I found low correlations,
Is this paradise?

Getting a degree. If you don't know what to do.
I was looking for adventure
I was looking for the truth.

Having a discussion,
with a senior or two.
Giving all these compliments,
'cause their egos need a boost.

Then I sent my work to a journal,
it was in the fall.
In springtime it got rejected,
'cause my sample was too small.

Getting a degree. If you don't know what to do.
You know how I feel?
Feel like a tiger in the zoo.

Had to do a presenation,
at a big big big conference.
I was in this great symposium,
which no one would attend.

When I got home my love had left me,
'cause she could not understand.
Leading your life in science,
makes you lonely in the end.

Getting a degree. If you don't know what to do.
Leading a life in science,
Makes you lonely in the end.

Leading a life in science,
Makes you lonely in the end.

Leading a life in science,
Makes you lonely in the end.

A post from Jojo

I think this is one of the best paragraphs in Jojo's blog, and probably one of the most surrealistically funny I have ever read, after Gabor's email, which someday I will put here:
"As I woke up today, I realized that I had the most perfect dream ever. There were vampires, and my friends, and my family, and the Same Guy, and I could fly, and I had ninja weapons and abilities, plus, I could use magical Catholic enchantmens that made some vampires burn as they tried to go into our refuge. Oh, and I also got to ride a horse."

Links, lemons and fruit power

So I looked at the paths people follow to end up in this site, and I found a funny one: somebody ended up here by typing "fruit clock experiment" on yahoo. So I made the same search, and found a link to the Electrical Fruit Experiment page. They explain you how to make a battery out of a lemon. I will have to explain one day how, being a fruit, not only do I have power, but I can also type.

CD found and played

Woke up around eleven this morning, and since I was alone at home (I mean free) I turned on the computer and looked for a CD to play. Strangely enough, I found this CD José sent me once to London: Dímelo en la calle, by Joaquinsito Sabina (who has nothing to do with Jojo, thanks God)
I remember receiving it with joy and warmness on a cold Saturday morning in London, a day I also woke up kind of alone. I remember opening the door of my room, and seeing the package there: my flatmates used to leave the letters and packages we received in front of each one's room door (sometimes I really miss my flatmates... I hate having lost contact with them) I could tell the package was José's: there's no way you can't tell his writing even from the address in the envelope: an innate elegance and style in writing and drawing, those gifts some people have and use and have and use and have and use so easily. And I found Joaquinsito Sabina's CD inside the package, and of course played it immediately, but it wouldn't play. Shit, I thought, it was broken on the trip from Granada to London.
This morning, I was saying, I found the same CD again on a lonely (but so necessary) Saturday morning. And I played it, and it worked. I am listening to it now. I suppose objects have their own lives.

martes, 2 de marzo de 2004

Happy day start

The day starts the best way it could start. I just got to the office, opened my mailbox, and read an email saying that I might get a job as a freelance journalist for an IT magazine. They want to try me with an article on videoconference first. I am really happy, yes I am.

lunes, 1 de marzo de 2004

White Barcelona

I was in the train coming to work. Suddenly, I left aside the newspaper and looked out of the window, and saw the mountains completely white. It was like 3 hours more of sleep came into my body. I felt a new energy. And everybody in the train was looking outside, with a new face.