In vino veritas

....in cervisio felicitas"

Wine's fine but beer drinkers have more fun

I have 2 passports

All very convenient, actually.

EU queue at immigration shorter than for sundry foreigners? Use the UK one.

Work in the EU? Use the UK one.

Visiting Turkey? Use the New Zealand one.

Want the warm fuzzy feeling when the girl at Immigration in Auckland says "Welcome home, John"? Use the New Zealand one.

But when I read shit like this, one of them is very close to not being renewed.

"Germany is set to kick up a Reich stink at the World Cup by playing in Nazi-style black shirts.

The strip, created by German firm adidas, resembles the first-ever colours worn by a German national team in 1898.

But they are sure to also conjure up memories of the notorious SS, who terrorised Europe during the war. Hitler’s personal protection squad wore a jet black uniform"

Yes, I know that it's the Daily Star.

Yes, I know that the majority of their readers show distinct signs of inbreeding and have an IQ only marginally higher than their (UK, not continental) shoe size.

What worries me is that there are close to 2 million of them, with sky-rocketing circulation growth.

What worries me even more is that their readers believe the Daily Star's self- aggrandisement:

"The hottest news of the day is delivered in a characteristically outspoken style, highly visual, yet with the insight and perception of British journalism at its best."

It's at times like this that I feel like biting into my desk....


"Insight and perception" my arse

This will go viral

Dear Apple

Who would have th(ink)ed

 

For the parsimonious (or pensioned - same thing) among us, here's a useful tool (and brilliant graphic) to work out which font will give you the most grunt from your outrageously priced ink cartridges

Source: Matthew Robinson

Via: Jason Kottke

"I want one with a lid"

Not that I have ANY idea what Apple's going to come up with next week (neither does anyone else, for that matter..), but I thought it might be a potential replacement for ageing Mrs jb's ageing iBook, given that its prime use is for scouring the interweb for clothes and receiving confirmations of purchase via email.

That's it.

It would, of course, be exceptionally cool if the frame would fold back as a support, if you could use a Bluetooth keyboard and if it had a real OS instead of the silly iPhone one, but we'll see.

(It would be exceptionally coolerer if I could set a filter for wimmin's apparel, but anyway..)

So I suggested that it might be Just The Thing.

Conversation went thus:

'What's it like then?" she asks.

"How on EARTH do I know - it's only being announced next week. You'll probably type on the screen - like the iPhone - and.."

"Type on the screen? Wouldn't like that. Does it have a lid?"

"What do you mean - "Does it have a lid?". No-one knows what it looks like, but, no, it probably won't have a lid"

"In that case, I don't want one. I want one with a lid"

So - if Steve Jobs is reading - this is the reason why Apple will only sell 9,999,999 units in the first 12 months.

Because it hasn't got a lid....

Superbly good film making

Espresso, Intelligentsia from Department of the 4th Dimension on Vimeo.

This has everything - skilled cinematography, content, beautiful visuals and a natural actor

via: BoingBoing
Source: DPT4D

...and good night

Source: Shirley and Ed James, of Russell
via: Sideswipe

This is frightening

This is the Supervisory Board of Germany's largest public health insurance organisation, the BEK.

The one that I'm covered by, in fact.

Look at all these old farts mature gents.

They all look like me.

And I CERTAINLY wouldn't want ME running the outfit.

(Not to mention the dowdy/nerdy-looking birds)

Note to myself

Time for a blood donation

Puncos and Incos

Blu Dot Real Good Experiment from Real Good Chair on Vimeo.

via: BoingBoing
Source: Shareable.net

I bet you they won't play this song on the radio

I bet you they won't play this song on the radio,
I bet you they won't play this new $%^& song.
It's not that it's %$(* or #$*&^&* controversial
It's just that the @*%$ing words are awfully strong.
You can't say ^&*@ on the radio,
Or $@#! or ^&*% or 4*%*
You can't even say I'd like to ?:"* you someday
Unless you're a doctor with a really large ~!*%
So I bet you they won't play this song on the radio
I bet you they don't *&%$ing well program it.
I bet you those &*(#ing old program directors
Will think it's a load of horse $&!#

mp3 here

Now, here's a treat - reloaded

This turned up today.

What a treat.

Tobi Ruhland plays the hammered dulcimer.

He's a DJ on Zündfunk, a "youth/scene" focused program on ever excellent Bayern 2 radio.
I'm wildly outside their demographic target market, but I listen anyway....

He takes his dulcimer along to interviews.
I have NO idea what musicians think when this dude fronts up with an instrument that dates back to the Babylonian Empire, but it does seem to break the ice....

He also keeps promises.

Mrs jb heard something on the radio a while back.
Tobi mailed back with a link to the program.
Mrs jb said she'd like to hear some more.
Tobi said he'd love to burn a CD.

This is it.

Introduction - Akron/Family
Ring of fire - RWF
Introduction - Coco Rosie
Jesus loves me - Coco Rosie
Kids - RWF
Take advantage - Lou Barlow
Two weeks - Grizzly Bear
New York, I love you - RWF

All in the very finest tradition of David Lindley and Henry Kaiser with Rakoto Frah

You Done Me Wrong - A World Out Of Time - Rakoto Frah with Henry Kaiser & David Lindley


When I heard Tobi and Lou Barlow on the show the other day, I was convinced it was Don McGlashan

Take advantage - Lou Barlow - Goodnight Unknown
This is London - Don McGlashan - Warm Hand

 
Plus some Grizzly Bear/Two Weeks for comparison.

Two Weeks - Grizzly Bear - Live on Letterman
Two Weeks - Ruby Weapon
Two Weeks - Grizzly Bear - Veckatimest

I think they're missing something.

Maybe a hammered dulcimer....?

Go with the flo

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Either......

the plate's too big or the schnitzel's too small.

Or the other way around....

At the ever excellent Exenberger in Frankfurt.







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Circling the drain

"If you don't like change, you're going to like irrelevance even less."  
General Eric Shinseki, Chief of Staff, U.S. Army as quoted by Tom Peters in Reimagine

I only flew JAL once and that was on 5 August 1972 London to Rome with That Man Strodel.

We flew First Class (probably only cost about £10 in those days @ 90%), got comprehensively ripped and spent the next three days looking for the Senso Unico.

We thought it must have been something like the Vatican or the Coliseum.

"Pretty important place" we though "what with all those signs"

(They broke it to us very gently)

I visited their corporate HQ sometime in the 1980s on a benchmarking exercise for a cargo IT project.

We thought they'd be red-hot, given that Japan made the best cars/radios/TVs/consumer electronics.....

It was like the Dark Ages.

They had a whole MINEFIELD of incompatible systems that didn't talk to each other,  MILLIONS of people filling out forms that substituted (sort of..) for efficient data interchange and a blissfull unawareness that there were perhaps other ways of doing things.

I guess things can't have changed that much...

Not that anyone in China can read this, of course...

 

HT Information is beautiful

Using Fibonacci Numbers to Convert from Miles to Kilometers and Vice Versa

For example, how many kilometers are there in 100 miles?

Number 100 can be expressed as a sum of Fibonacci numbers 89 + 8 + 3.

Now, the Fibonacci number following 89 is 144, the Fibonacci number following 8 is 13 and the Fibonacci number following 3 is 5.

Therefore the answer is 144 + 13 + 5 = 162 kilometers in 100 miles.

This is less than 1% off from the precise answer, which is 160.93 km.

And just think how much time you'd be wasting if you'd just multiplied 100 by 1.6.

Delve deeper here

Here she goes again - Sarah Palin displays her slow CPU. Again

Too good to miss

Grab a Tiger by the....

...tail?

Good morning, Victory Motors

In a past life, I ran the Cargo Reservations department for Lufthansa at Heathrow.

It was frantic.

British Airways moved to a new terminal. Nothing worked. They closed down.

We worked 20 hour days.

British Airways went on strike. Frequently.

We worked 20 hour days. Sometimes 36 hour days.

There was no time for niceties when you answered the phone.

It was "LufthansacanIhelpyou?" or just "Lufthansa".

But mostly "Lufthansacanyouholdthanks?"

This didn't go down well with Dick Haynes, the Cargo Manager, who was so impressed with the service that he got from his garage that he wrote a memo INSISTING that we answer the phone just like his garage did under penalty of death.

"Good morning, this is Victory Motors, Bruce Bayliss speaking, how can I help you"

Some people (stupid bloody Poms and not realising that they didn't work for Victory Motors and their name wasn't Bruce Bayliss) actually did answer the phone like that.

We did for about 2 minutes, before it became apparent that we'd be working 48 hour days at that rate and went back to "Lufthansacanyouholdthanks?"

I just called up Mrs jb at work and my mate Christoph the Janitor answered the phone with the classic Victory Motors greeting.

Turns out that the boss is back after his Christmas break and has nothing better to do than make up new rules.

Can't see Mrs jb buckling under on this one.

Just as much chance, in fact, as he had getting her to sign a paper declaring that she would comply with the various anti-discrimination (i.e. be nice to foreigners)  laws.

"Sod that" she probably thought "If I sign that, I won't be able to discriminate against my own husband. Can't have that...."

PS
Christoph asked if he should announce himself formally with all three Christian names.

Didn't go down well. Not at all well, in fact.

Well" he said "We certainly shouldn't employ the current Minister of Defence (Karl-Theodor Maria Nikolaus Johann Jacob Philipp Franz Joseph Sylvester Freiherr von und zu Guttenberg) then. By the time he's finished the Victory Motors into, the caller will have rung up a phone bill of €5

The amazing Catherine Moullé strikes again

Winter in the Provence.

More of her work here

Blast from the past

Delving in the genealogy bin

They must be joking

 

Air New Zealand is introducing a new unform, designed by Trelise Cooper.

Comments thus far:

Airline spokesman Ed Sims: "The uniform is "contemporary", based on New Zealand themes that still allowed individual choice by addressing body type and personality preference.


A flight attendant: "The flight attendants look like drag queens off the Air New Zealand 'pink' flight. I haven't worn that colour since I was five."


Jack Yan, publisher of fashion magazine Lucire:  "I know airlines find differentiation very important today, but I've some doubts on whether pink conveys any national values."

Me: "The only time I saw patterns and colours in that combination was when someone slipped some LSD into my beer at the "Three Magpies" in 1971. I don't think I want to go there again...."

I'm very sorry about this....

 

I used to have neighbours whose name - in German - was that of a tined eating implement.

A large wooden one even decorated a wall of their house.

The bloke is now living by himself.

His wife appears to have forked off....

If you're ever in Aix en Provence....

...take a painting lesson from the stunningly talented Catherine Moullé. She's quite phenomenal. Her New Year card as an example.

 

First met her in Menerbes in the Provence in 2003 at an open air art fair, was utterly taken by this and other work, got talking to her - actually, she suggested that I BUY the picture instead of just photographing it (which I did) - and we've been friends ever since.

 

Just the thing to shake off the winter blues.

And I can recommend "Charlotte", an excellently funky restaurant, too.

Which is where we go for lunch.

And if the locals (especially someone with Catherine's exquisite taste) eat there, just how bad can it be?

Pavlovian

 

I have a Pavlovian reaction to aircraft seats.

As soon as I sit down in one, I fall asleep.

It goes back to the mid-90s, when I was flying 120,000 miles a year on business in a constant jet-lagged daze.

See food - eat it.

See a bed or aircraft seat - sleep in it

So Loop 5, a new shopping mall, is just the place for me.

They've got a Mig21 suspended from the roof and pictures of Comet 4s.

And they've got Abandoned Husband zones with aircraft seats.

I've probably sat in most of them, come to think of it - standard Lufthansa 3-3 narrow body configuration, and if it's Business Class, you fold down the cushion of the middle seat and you've got 2-2.

And the magic still works.

Sat down.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz......

They wouldn't. Would they?

Rumour has it that Apple will announce the long-awaited tablet thingie on 27 January, for delivery in March

Rumour also has it that it's going to be called the iSlate.

They must be very sure of their delivery dates, then.

Or have exceptionally thick marketing people

The other jb

J A Bartlett "does weekends and fill-ins on the air at Magic 98, an adult-contemporary station in Madison, Wisconsin"

He's also the author of the excellent "The Hits Just Keep On Comin'" blog and organiser of the Vinyl Record Day blogswarm, honouring me with an invitation for both years, 2007 and 2008

His blog's much more than music, though.

Just found this gem

A choir and congregation cranking up the classic seasonal hits in a decorated church on Christmas Eve can be enjoyed for purely aesthetic reasons having nothing to do with religion.

But there’s another kind of music that’s largely absent from church services anymore—the music of language. That music began growing fainter 40 years ago, when I was a kid, as the Revised Standard Version and other translations of the Bible began to replace the old-school King James Version

And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

It’s probably not true that Shakespeare was one of the translators who worked on the KJV, but that only means his way with language must have been in England’s air during the early 1600s. And not just devices like rhythm and meter—the word choices are poetic, too. The reference (in an earlier verse not quoted here) to Mary being “great with child” was a word-picture I could understand even before I knew where babies came from, because I could remember how my own mother looked before my youngest brother was born. I also remember being fascinated by the term “swaddling clothes,” and my kid’s mind translated it into a picture of a loving mother wrapping a baby in a big white blanket, as the translators surely intended us to do.

Read on here. It's worth it.

How to call the police when you're old

Cousin Ruth sent me this. (And she should know...)


George Hewitson, an elderly man, from Norwich UK, was going up to bed, when his wife told him that he'd left the light on in the garden shed, which she could see from the bedroom window. George opened the back door to turn off the light, but saw that there were people in the shed stealing things.

He phoned the police, who asked "Is someone in your house?"

George: "No," but some people are breaking into my garden shed and stealing from me.

Police dispatcher: "All patrols are busy. You should lock your doors and an officer will be along when one is available."

George: "Okay."

He hung up the phone and counted to 30.

George: "Hello, I just called you a few seconds ago because there were people stealing things from my shed. Well you don't have to worry about them now because I just shot them."

Within five minutes, six police cars, a SWAT Team, a helicopter, two fire trucks, a paramedic, and an ambulance showed up at the Hewitson's residence, and caught the burglars red-handed.

Policeman said to George: "I thought you said that you'd shot them!"

George: "I thought you said there was nobody available!"

Y2.01K

Sneaky. Very sneaky.

The world gets all in a tizz as 1999 draws to a close with Doomsday predictions of nucular (sic) power station meltdown and civilisation grinding to a catastrophic halt at midnight when the world's computers say ""00". WTF? That's not a date, that's a toilet cleaner" and decide to stop working.

But nothing happens.

Ten years later to the day

The Y2.01K bug strikes.

Debit and credit cards issued in Germany stop working.

"Not all of them, not everywhere, just some of them" say the banks

Which is certainly helpful.

Certainly more helpful that my bank.

My bank appears to be blithely unaware of a problem.

• Nothing on their website (after almost a week)
• Nothing sensible to be learned from the Call Center flossie (and these are qualified banking staff, not your usual CCMs)
• Not a lot from my bank consultant (who is tops, btw) who had a tad more information in the form of an internal paper from Head Office (dated yesterday and telling him less than he could read in this morning's paper...)

In fact, all I learned from the Call Centre was that

• Other banks' customers are worse off (Does this really interest me? Hint: No)
  
• No, they have no idea if my debit and credit cards are affected.
• No, there is no way of finding out.
• No, they have no idea if I can use the cards in Thailand and the USA.
• Yes, they probably will work, but they might not.
  
• I get incredibly annoyed when I'm constantly interrupted when asking questions (Actually, I knew that already)
  
• Yes, it might actually be a good idea to put something on the website.
• I should take €2k in cash and traveller cheques on an upcoming trip
• No, they have no idea who's going to compensate me for my increased costs
  
• It's mostly a waste of time talking to Call Centres.

Actually:

They know when the duff batch of chips was manufactured.
They can thus exclude any cards issued before that date.

Having already identified the duff batch of chips,  they know which cards got the chips that don't know it's 2010.
So - each card having a number - they can thus identify which customer got a
chronologically-challenged card and issue a new one

And - they can set up a card reader to validate the functionality of the chip.
Distribute it to branches, let customers check their own cards

Programming time?

Maybe a day.

They've had 7 already.....

Kick-start your day

Best line: "How was this idea conceived? Well, you might say that it was immaculate"

The Big Shop

Not me (goes without saying...) but it's quite interesting to see what people do buy

5 packets of smokes, lots of sweets and convenience food, carrier bags.

Fruit & veg?
About €6 worth.

And some Speed.

SPEED?
For a mere €1.39?

My dealer's been ripping me off for years...

Please re frame from blame pointing out

I'm used to Call Centre monkeys mangling the language

As in

"...but you may want to re frame from logging in heaps whilst out of the country"

But I'd expect more of New York Times White House correspondent, Jeff Zeleny

(President Obama was) "unsatisfied and displeased with this sharing of information"

Er, shouldn't that be DISsattisfied - "make discontented, fail to satisfy"?

"....some blame pointing out might be coming in the future days"

And THAT sounds like the product of a Google translation from Swahili to English via Hungarian

This I need...Parrot AR.Drone

Baby Bingo.

Not to be confused with Bullshit Bingo

Give your day a kick-start

What politicians don't get...

The FDP, Germany's Centre/Liberal party was elected into the current coalition government on a platform of slashing subsidies and cutting taxes.

Fine with me, but I wish they'd thought it through.

As from January 1, the VAT/GST on accommodation has been halved to demarginalise the German hospitality industry vis a vis the neighbours.

And the hoteliers are going to pass the savings on to consumers.

Yeah right.

Why do hotels like Econolodge/Motel 6/Budgethost/Super 8 have neon pricing on their signs?

Correct - so that they can change prices at an instant.

Why do hotel chains use Dynamic Pricing?

Correct - so that they can change prices at an instant.

So if a hotel room costs - nominally - €100 pre tax and VAT is 20%, the room costs €120.

Cut VAT to 10% and the room costs....€120 because the chain will happily take the €10 on offer and thank-you-very-much.

And the consumer has NO IDEA what a hotel room costs at Hilton/Marriott/Hyatt because the room rates are up and down all the time like a whatsit's knickers.

Week-end rate, prepay rates, don't-like-the-shape-of-your-nose rates. Whatever.

"Actually, sir" they'll say "the rate used to be €133 with VAT at 20% and we've now cut it to €120"

Just how stupid do they think we are...?

The things you find....

Digging around in the back of what goes for a wine cellar around here, I found this.

Some misguided person gave it to me AT LEAST 15 years ago and it was put away as one of those "Drink on a special occasion" ones.

With a whole bunch of other similarly interesting ones.

Didn't have much hope that it would have survived the interceding period in a  drinkable state, but it had.

Not as good as it probably was at some stage, but certainly a lot better than it was going to be un-drunk.

True Stories

Thatcher is dining out with her Cabinet

Waitress:  Would you like to order, Prime Minister?
Margaret Thatcher: Steak, please.
Waitress: How would you like it?
Margaret Thatcher: Raw
Waitress: And what about the vegetables?
Margaret Thatcher: They'll have the same as me...

Spitting Image, 1984

HT The Economist

A gentle stroll through the snow

Not bad for an old bugger....

Now I know......

... why they don't give Senior Citizen discounts at concerts in the Cathedral.






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The best reason to learn German

If you ever needed a good reason to learn German, this could be it.

Manfred Lütz is a physician, theologian and psychotherapist.

He talks pure common-sense.

He was asked how many people in Germany have psychological issues and referred to a serious study which came up with a figure that represented 210% of the population.

"This" he said "is why we urgently need more immigrants" and carried on to say that around 30% of all people will have issues that need treatment at some time during their lives

Following the success of his recent book, he was asked why he'd wanted to write a best-seller.

"Well" he said "if I'd only wanted to write it for one person, I'd have written a letter"

More of the same here

Darwin Award Runner-Up 2009