Reply
Category Archives: Uncategorized
Funny English Gallery 2
Discovery relief mission is go • The Register
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/05/31/discovery_launch/
From the page:
“For those of you not up to speed on space toilets, the ASU failed on 21 May following a “loud noise” – apparently the failure of the air/water separator pump. Despite the ISS crew’s best attempts at DIY, they were obliged to request an emergency plumbing space-lift to tackle the problem.”
Well I never, good excuse for a nice pic though…
http://www.chevinforest.co.uk/Chevin%20Forest/Home.html
Orange-tip butterfly, Anthocharis cardamines feeding on a Common Bluebell Hyacinthoides non-scripta in Otley Chevin Forest in April / May.
Otley Website, town, community, Yorkshire, England
Although Reece Shearsmith & Steve Pemberton have been quoted as saying Otley helped inspire their creation of Royston Vasey. Otley is a beautiful, friendly and picturesque town on the banks of the River Wharf and overlooked by the Chevin.
Hong Kong Island SIM Buddha
http://slurl.com/secondlife/HongKong%20Island/57/211/22
originally seen on:
http://sleek77.stumbleupon.com/
中国第二人生
Chinese Second Life, sponsored by Lenovo
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Lenovo/128/128/0
The Future of American Power
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/04/the_future_of_american_power.html
The Future of American Power
“The emerging international system is likely to be quite different from those that have preceded it. A hundred years ago, there was a multipolar order run by a collection of European governments, with constantly shifting alliances, rivalries, miscalculations, and wars. Then came the duopoly of the Cold War, more stable in some ways, but with the superpowers reacting and overreacting to each other’s every move. Since 1991, we have lived under a U.S. imperium, a unique, unipolar world in which the open global economy has expanded and accelerated. This expansion is driving the next change in the nature of the international order. At the politico-military level, we remain in a single-superpower world. But polarity is not a binary phenomenon. The world will not stay unipolar for decades and then suddenly, one afternoon, become multipolar. On every dimension other than military power — industrial, financial, social, cultural — the distribution of power is shifting, moving away from U.S. dominance. That does not mean we are entering an anti-American world. But we are moving into a post-American world, one defined and directed from many places and by many people.”
A very thought provoking article which I found via my good stumble ‘friend’ atongchan
http://atongchan.stumbleupon.com/
Well it’s HMQ’s birthday, innit?
… I remember this one clearly…
Durham Cathedral
The Anglican Cathedral, Epiphany Island
The Qianlong emperor http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qianlong
好好学习天天向上
This is a famous saying by Mao Zedong and can often be seen in Chinese schools. A literal translation is ‘Good good study, day day up’ , a better translation would be ‘Study hard, keep improving’.
This is also an example of Mao’s distinctive calligraphy.
Not that you had been wondering, but this is where I have been for the last few days. Experiencing sun and snow in Cumbria.
More Second Life photos of my wanderings as a Hobo across the SLRR network.
The Ides of March, 15 March 44 BC
“The Ides of March denarius, struck by Brutus in 43/2 BC, is easily the most famous of Roman Republican coins. It was famous in antiquity — one of the few coin types mentioned in an ancient author (Dio Cassius), and imitated a century after its issue to celebrate the murder of Nero.”
“The reverse is the more striking face with the plain reference to Caesar’s assassination — the legend EID MAR with two daggers –, and the meaning of the assassination — the liberty cap, worn by slaves on the day of their manumission. The importance of the cap here derives from the Republican claim that Caesar was aiming at the kingship,”
“This example in the Fitzwilliam Museum (Hart collection) is one of finest known of this uncommon issue.”
The ford at Upper Slaughter, Gloucestershire.
Imaging Science, Chris Mullen collection
Meditations by Marcus Aurelius
“Say to yourself in the early morning:
I shall meet today inquisitive, ungrateful, violent, treacherous, envious, uncharitable men.
All these things have come upon them through ignorance of real good and ill.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meditations
‘WindLight’ Photos from Second Life.
The ferry terminal at Cecropia, Northern Continent.
The Railhead at Vicina, Northern Continent
“The rain falls hard on a humdrum town,
This town has dragged you down.”
Robert James “Bobby” Fischer (March 9, 1943 – January 17, 2008)
The most accessible book on chess ever written.
BBC – dot.life: Bill Gates – You Asked The Questions
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/technology/2008/01/bill_gates_you_asked_the_quest_1.html
Bill Gates – You Asked The Questions
“…we tried a new tactic – getting BBC viewers, listeners and readers to ask the questions. We had thousands, covering every aspect of Bill Gates and Microsoft – past, present and future.
…one gentleman was proposing himself as the next CEO of Microsoft, and another wondered whether the secrets of Windows software had been recovered from a crashed UFO.”
Comments:
6. “Microsoft’s technology might have originated with a crashed UFO; it certainly didn’t come from a functioning one.”
Man Through History at Kontraband
Sorry link no longer works…
http://www.kontraband.com/show/show.asp?ID=5920&genre=0&page=1
Pictorial record of history seen with a jaundiced eye.
Update: Contraband seems to have vanished sometime in 2020 and the wayback machine doesn’t have the original picture that I was referencing. Also it’s from2007 which is a long time ago – not all links and content can be restored
Is this festive enough?
My site is worth 2/6 * .
How much is yours worth?
* or half a crown to you guv’nor
The Space Frontier Rocket Garden by Jimbo Perhaps
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Space%20Frontier/73/148/27
The Rocket Garden is adajacent to the Space Frontier Sandbox provided courtesy of the Space Frontier Foundation, www.space-frontier.org
Caledon is a small, windswept forested country at a temperate latitude. Wild creatures, country estate life, sights and sounds that were common well over 100 years ago are the hallmark of the land.
Technology is approximately that of the 19th Century, though some astonishing breakthroughs have provided for incredible wonders. Ground vehicles, airships, and even a device known as a ‘telehub’ are made possible through the power of exotic material properties and the wonders of Steam Technology.
The government is an expansionist monarchy, supported by a strong aristocracy.
See:
http://secondlife.wikia.com/index.php/Independent_State_of_Caledon
TAIPEI 101
http://www.taipei-101.com.tw/index_en.htm
Taipei 101
臺北101
Steelworks | Flickr – Photo Sharing!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/interzone-inc/731070794/
Industrial Hartlepool at night, the visual inspiration for Ridley Scott’s dystopian epic Bladerunner.
http://www.wired.com/entertainment/hollywood/magazine/15-10/ff_bladerunner_full?currentPage=all
“I don’t think all directors do, but I certainly draw from personal experience
— sometimes I remember things, sometimes it will come out from the back of my head and I’m thinking, I never knew where that came from. And then I can analyze afterwards and realize that’s what it was.
Funny enough, the beauty in industry, which is probably killing us, but actually nevertheless is beautifully like Hades, is one reason why you start to feel the beauty in the godawful condition of the red horizon and the geysers of filth going into the air.
I used to go to art school in West Hartlepool College up in the north of England, which is almost right alongside the Durham steel mills and Imperial Chemical Industries, and the air would smell like toast. Toast is quite nice, but when you realize it’s steel, and it’s probably particles, it’s not very good. But I’m still here. So, you draw back on that.
And to walk across that footbridge at night, you’d be walking fundamentally above, on an elevated walk on the steel mill. So you’d be crossing through, sometimes, the smoke and dirt and crap, and you’re looking down into the fire.
So, things like that are remembered.”
By Nolligan
In Da Club
And when the wardrobe towers like a beast of prey,
There’s sadness in your beautiful eyes,
Oh, your untouched, unsoiled, wonderous eyes,
My life down I shall lie.”
By Nolligan
Virtually my home.
“Tigers don’t go out on rainy nights,
They’ve no need to whet their appetites.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bz6KHhRGVKs
“We serve an old moan in a dry season,
A lighthouse keeper in the desert sun,
Dreamers of sleepers and white treason,
We dream of rain and the history of the gun,”