pecus @ pecus . it   
|
 |
Agosto Dicembre Novembre Ottobre Settembre Agosto Luglio Giugno Maggio Aprile ... prima ... |
 |
![Underworld - Don Delillo [Einaudi]](/blog/imgs/books/underworld.gif) |
 |
 |
 |
Archivio del blog, Maggio 2001
Mercoledi 30 Maggio 2001
I got hit by a car while driving to work today: I got lucky and didn't fall off the scooter, so I'm fine. But I was shaky for a while...Oh, and I'm going to the seaside. Hopefully I'll feel better
Martedi 29 Maggio 2001
I like being Italian: I can listen to songs in English and happily ignore their meaning. Sometimes it's better than paying attention...Lunedi 28 Maggio 2001
Another lesson for happiness
- Pick a clear end-of-May day
- Go run in a park
- Play R.E.M.'s Green while running
- When you get to Stand, try to keep the beat running
- Look at the sky while you run...
Venerdi 25 Maggio 2001
Com' è difficile... PiqkuiPiqkuPiii!!! Is it a cell phone or a bird? The impact of technology on nature has subtle and unexpected (and sometimes funny) outcomes. While riding home last night, I caught a guy on a scooter at a traffic light taking off his shirt. I didn't really see how it started, he had the shirt partially unbuttoned and was pulling it out over his head, as if it were a tee-shirt.I caught a glimpse of him while the shirt was covering his head: the funny part was that he was wearing a big black helmet!!!MHUAHAHAH!!!
Giovedi 24 Maggio 2001
Happy BirthDay Mr. Tambourine Man![Barry] laughs if they don't have Blonde on Blonde, and they buy it; ...[ High Fidelity ]
Mercoledi 23 Maggio 2001
The concert was good, maybe a bit short. It wasn't packed but way too hot. I found a chair near the mixer and standed on top of it to get a good look. It was the sweet spot of the club: centered, perfect stereo effect, right distance from the speakers, good view, and so close to the sound technician it was easy to ask for the setlist.Martedi 22 Maggio 2001
My notebook has finally reached Milan. Maybe it'll be here by Friday: I can't wait to get my webcam back online...I'm going to Paul Weller's acoustic concert at Barrumba tonight. You know how I look, so say Hi! You can write XML in your blog, and insert it legitimately in a Blogger XML template, if you avoid <![CDATA]]> sections. Adding the encoding to the XML processing instruction <? xml version="1.0" encoding = "ISO-8859-1" > allows you to skip converting accented letters to character entities, which should then be declared in a DTD that you would have to embed in the XML template, otherwise, the document is not well-formed.
This is step 1 in getting subjects in posts and extracting them to construct an index.
I realize that I haven't written anything about two important events of the last few days. First, I threw a party (you don't make the ultimate compilation for nothing, right?), and last week, I attended Designing XML Applications for Windows DNA 2000.
The Party
I wanted to celebrate my birthday with a memorable party. It was the first time I didn't have to send my parents out to keep the house (it's mine!), my neighbors are permanently at the seaside and the lady living under my apartment is half deaf. Add that after two years my home finally looks almost finished and you have every ingredient for a great evening with friends.
The idea for the invitation came while rummaging through old business cards one night, looking for a restaurant near Alba where to take friends visiting from Tuscany. Among the business cards were two old passport pictures of mine. Later, while in bed sketching ideas for the invitation, I started playing with the concept of passport pictures and came up with the idea: you stick your picture, I cut the card and keep it, you keep mine.
So now I have all the "receipts" (with pictures) from the ones who came to the party. And after more than a week, I'm still eating leftovers...
I spent saturday morning and afternoon shopping for food and drinks, while Asia made homelets, rice salads, pasta salads, garnished eggs, and all sort of apetizers. She was amazed at her own work when contemplating two full tables of food...
We pretty much filled the house (it's not that big). Pixel, our cat, stayed under the bed for half the evening, then dared to come out and see what was going on, only to be scared by Paola, who can't stand cats.
As always, people tend to mix lightly: groups tend to be quite sealed, and rarely you leave having spoken with everybody. But I being the host, I liked to have friends gathered from different times and events of my life come together. I tried to have people blend in, I did it myself as much as possible, and in the end I think we had a good time.
The Course
The course was very Microsoft centric, and some of the readers will have to pardon it, but it was very good. If you can afford (or have someone pay) for a Mondadori/Microsoft course, it is definitively a good experience. Each "student" has a pc (a PIII Compaq) and can switch between his monitor and the instructor's. Paolo Pialorsi is really good, enthusiastic and eager to share his knowledge. You can ask him anything and he'll have an answer (and if not, it'll be in your mail two days after the end of the course). I really enjoyed it, and I'm thinking on how to streamline the publishing process of pecus.it using XSLT server side instead of building the page via VBScript by hand, parsing the XML generated by blogger. Last night I spent two hours trying to figure out whether to make a SAB myself for the thoughts area (I really need the archive by subject of Blogger Pro). Along the way I discovered it's hard to pass XML natively through blogger: you can output XML via custom templates, but you cannot "inject" XML in an XML template (write XML in a post, embedding non parsable content in a <![CDATA]]> section). If you have ideas, write!
Reveal
For the non geeks, I'm listening to Reveal. I think it's a bit too japanese for me, a bit too easy maybe, but some sounds are back from the Murmur and Reckoning days, so that's a definitive plus. As for all R.E.M. records, the more you listen to them, the more you like them.
Lunedi 21 Maggio 2001
Frederic, I'm open again: it's not too hard to find reasons to go on, even when you seem to have hit a wall...
I know why I'm not kicking as I used to be. I have found the cause of my saddened state, the lack of powers, the inability to think clearly and be witty, curious, ironic and happy: it's kryptonite! I'm wearing two superman costumes today, one on top of the other, but still, superpowers are weak. It's that block of kryptonite, it must be under my bed, or maybe I've ingested some, or it might have been vaporized on my hair...
I'm working on an antidote... it has to do with travelling to a far place and enduring a week or so of isolation from the world.
now, if you'll excuse me, i have to try flying yet one more time: taking the elevators to go down to the coffee machine is sooooo unsuperheroical...
Venerdi 18 Maggio 2001
behind the scenes, life goes onMercoledi 16 Maggio 2001
Pecus.it to suspend publication
Torino, 16/05/2001.
Pecus.it is sorry to announce that it is suspending publication. Our main character is becoming uninteresting and overall sad and hurt. This is not what the editor had in mind when this publication was started, hence the decision, curiously made this morning while driving to work, to halt it for as long as needed for our character to gain back his wit, curiosity, irony and happiness.
Please contact pecus @ pecus.it if you feel you can do anything to change this decision.
Martedi 15 Maggio 2001
I wrote a longer thought...Lunedi 14 Maggio 2001
Random Thoughts
- Blogger
iswas down. - Completely unrelated, today I am controversial.
- The elections are a débâcle.
- I'm getting sick.
- Pixel is marking territory: not a good sign (not a good smell, either...)
- I have work to do (that is, more than I can handle).
- C'è una bella differenza tra ravanare e indugiare...
Giovedi 10 Maggio 2001
I put together "The Ultimate Collection of Italian Dance of The 80's": from now on parties won't be the same anymore...
cd I
- Bananarama - Venus
- Berlin - Take my breath away
- Duran Duran - Save A Prayer
- Duran Duran - Wild Boys
- F.R. Davids - Words
- Falco - Amadeus
- Frankie Goes To Hollywood - Relax
- Giuni Russo - Un'Estate Al Mare
- Grease - Summer Nights
- Grease - The One I Want
- Grease - Theme
- Paul Hardcastle- Nineteen
- OMD - Enola Gay
- Prince - Kiss
- Rettore - Splendido Splendente
- Sandy Marton - People From Ibiza
- Spandau Ballet - True
- Squallor - Arraphao
- Wham! - Wake Me Up Before You Go Go
cd II
- Baltimora - Tarzan Boy
- Battiato - Bandiera Bianca
- Berlusconi - Il Comunismo È Il Paradiso In Terra
- Claudio Cecchetto - Gioca Jouer
- Elio e Le Storie Tese - Tapparella
- Esperanto - Paris Latino
- Gazebo - I Like Chopin
- Novecento - Movin'on
- Nick Kamen - Each Time You Break My Heart
- Pia Zadora & Jermaine Jackson - When The Rain Begins To Fall
- Righeira - No Tengo Dinero
- Sabrina - Boys
- Samanta Fox - Nothing's Gonna Stop Me Now
- Sandra - Maria Magdalena
- Spandau Ballet - Only When You Leave
- A-Aha - The Sun Always Shines On TV
- Ghostbusters - Theme Song
- Yazoo - Don't Go
Mercoledi 9 Maggio 2001
I always hated country songs: but there's one that I like, because it makes me smile, and because the performance of the singer was quite wonderful. And so was the movie. [ official site ]
Being quite down this afternoon, it was nice to have something to cheer up with.
Lessons for happiness
- Throw a party.
- Obvious, isn't it? But really, you wouldn't have thought of it.
Parties are fun and easy to set up: call people (even better, invite them!), get a good some together in one place, provide drinks (this is essential), blend in. - Make invitations for a party.
- It's almost as fun as the party itself! Let your creativity loose: get paper, scissors and envelopes, use your best talents, find a nice color laser printer, don't forget to write when and where, ask people to bring drinks (this is essential), deliver to your A-list.
- Take a bath.
- The party is going to be Saturday, so the hype has to cool off a little. Fill your tub of hot bubbling water, light four or five candles, switch the light off, put some music on, undress (this is essential), plunge into the water. Stay as long as needed.
Lunedi 7 Maggio 2001
When did you start drinking coffee? How do you like it?
I'm an ignorant coffee lover (let me explain): I have tasted very little different coffees, I started drinking coffee unsweetened just a few months ago, I know very little of the way coffee gets to be the black powder out of which we perculate our delicious drink. But I'm addicted to coffee, I am very exigent about how it is made, how it tastes and how it is served. Like, why does it have to be served in thick cold cheap porcelain cups? I love those thin, elegant and rather large, cups. In Torino the Torrefazione Beccuti on the corner of via Pietro Micca and via Monte di Pietà has one of my favourites sets: it reminds me of the care and attention to details more typical of the nineteen century. Then there's the temperature: some bars serve boiling black coffees, loosing the aroma and taste due to the high temperature of the water. And what about those restaurants where coffees made in an evening can be counted on the fingers of one hand (despite serving five times as much people): never never order a coffee in such a place -- it's gonna be cold, untasty, uncreamy, merely black.
I meant to write a post like this for a while, but the kick has been a friend confessing today that she's started drinking coffeee when she managed to make it taste like a coppa del nonno.
Last night concert was more of a happening than a musical fest. It was like going back 8 to 9 years in time, songs we danced at Murazzi, groups that were known only in the city scene, that urge to defend freedom and social brotherhood, the slogans, the jumping. Man I felt 30! It was a deja-vu and I was not 21 :-)In the end though, the music was average (and the sets very very short): Subsonica played a reggae version of Preso Blu, Liberi Tutti, and Tutti i Miei Sbagli. Africa ended the concert with Sotto Pressione, a Bob Marley's cover, and Il Partigiano John.
And for a while, it rained like crazy...
Domenica 6 Maggio 2001
Today I hurt Asia very very badly. I didn't mean to, but I was exasperated. There's always more than one way to talk about a relationship, and in general to say what you have in mind: I picked the worst one and now I'm sad. So take my advice: when things don't go the way you'd like, think twice about the words you use to voice your uneasiness.This is not how I'm apologizing. It's just something I need to remember.
Venerdi 4 Maggio 2001
Small Time Crooks sucks.I want to read more
There are good reasons for posting little to nothing.
Giovedi 3 Maggio 2001
Last night I watched Almost Famous, for the second time (the first was in September when I was in San Diego). It's a great movie, well narrated,honest and unmerciful. I liked it then and loved it this time. And I'm happy it Cameron Crowe took the Oscar for Original Screenplay, otherwise I doubt the movie would have been screened in Italy (that's how it goes).
Mercoledi 2 Maggio 2001
I was in Tuscany again, this time in Monteriggioni. This after a friday night at Caffè Blu which ended at 6 am. I'm getting the film developed and I'll be posting pictures in the next few days. As an aside, Friday I left my notebook in Verona. It means I don't have to work, right?
