Pundits and Wags

A few quick hits

2005-02-27T22:45:00.000+01:00

I don't have much time to write anything, so I've only got a couple of dealies to hold over the few that have been checking the site lately until I can hopefully put some better updates later. My flight leaves early tomorrow morning for England, and I'm dreading the early wake up.

First, it's cold in England, even colder than here (it's been unusually cold here lately). It snowed all week and from what I see of the weather report it's probably going to snow some more this week. It really hasn't accumulated much, but now I can say that this won't be the first winter in my life to never see snow.
Today was the start of the Fallas in Valencia. This really deserves its own post, but I'll have to write about it later. I went with my girlfriend today to see the first mascletá in the Plaza del Ayuntamiento and it was really cool. I'll explain it sometime in the near future, but basically a mascletá is a fireworks show at 2pm that they do daily until the end of the festival, March 19. Of course, it being in broad daylight, the point isn't about the visual spectacle like typical fireworks shows. The point is the noise. Imagine about 500 of those fireworks that just make a bright flash and a huge boom in about a 5-10 minute period, and that's a mascletá, more or less. It's really cool.
It's nice working in England, since at least I don't have to struggle with a foreign language. I'd make a joke about struggling with the English language, but the truth is that I haven't found it to be that difficult to talk with those who speak the Queen's English. I've definitely noticed a lot of little differences, but they're not anything that makes it too hard to communicate. One thing I've noticed is that there is a multi-purpose word there that isn't used too much in the US. The word is "cheers," and it's used as a hello, goodbye and you're welcome. I've seen it as a salutation in emails, but not too much else before now. It's one of those words that I would feel completely awkward saying myself because it just doesn't seem natural.

Well, that's it. I'll update more later. Sorry for the long gaps in writing.

Reading Railroad: $200

2005-02-18T23:32:00.000+01:00

I just got back from a week in Reading, England, where I'll be working every week until the end of May. This explains the silence this week and the time leading up to it as I've been extremely busy. I'll try to put some quality content on here this weekend, but from this point on my posting will likely be even more sporadic than it has lately. I've really got my hands full with this new project, and obviously it takes priority.

That said, I do plan to keep the site going. So please don't despair. Or do. Whichever you prefer.

Selling ice to Eskimos

2005-02-10T22:43:00.000+01:00

I've been pretty busy this evening evaluating Curricula Vitae1 2 for a position my company's trying to fill. It's actually pretty tough to go through a lot of Curricula at one time. Sometimes people write way too much in their CV's, sometimes not nearly enough.

The empathetic part of me wants to give everyone who applied a job (well, almost everyone), but at the same time I haven't seen one that really looked perfect for what we're looking for. It's like everyone has that one little fatal flaw.

Speaking of fatal flaws, that just reminded me of a story in early American literature. Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote a story called "The Birth-Mark" about a woman who was perfect in every way except for a birthmark on her face. Her scientist husband became so fixated on her one blemish that he attempted to perform an operation to remove it. Then with perfection achieved, she dies.

"Ah, wait for this one success,'' rejoined he, "then worship me if you will. I shall deem myself hardly unworthy of it. But come, I have sought you for the luxury of your voice. Sing to me, dearest."

Ah, Hawthorne, you sly dog.

But I digress. In the process of weeding through all of these Curricula I have seen some things that have caught my attention. One in particular was the person whose most recent experience was working in sales of "free software." For some reason that just makes me giggle. Or as a great sage of our time said (quote courtesy of Michael Beaver):

A fool and his money are soon parted.......I'd pay someone a lot of money to explain that one to me!
- Homer Simpson

Selling ice to Eskimos.

1 Curriculum Vitae is what a resumé is called here, and generally everywhere but the United States. One must wonder why we use the French word "resumé" if even the French call it "Curriculum Vitae."
2 Not sure, but I believe that the plural is Curriculums Vitae. [edit: I've been informed by the more Latin-inclined Dan Turkenkopf that the plural of Curriculum is actually Curricula, I've edited the post thusly]

I solemnly swear not to be a cow

2005-02-08T22:14:00.000+01:00

Jeff Jarvis offers some words of wisdom to those hypercompuglobalmegamarts that think it would be a smashing advertising ploy to put together a fake blog, purportedly written by an imaginery character (not even necessarily a Homo sapien):

This is a human medium, I said. It's about people talking to people. We don't want to talk to a cow; that's as off-key as coming to a wedding dressed up like a pig. We don't want you to lie to us and think we're stupid and that we want to talk to a character a marketer made up.

I agree. Really, blogs are kind of cool, but what makes them cool is the fact that they are a sort of grassroots medium for real people to conduct real conversations, often about real events or whatever else comes to mind.

For that reason, in the interest of fairness and full disclosure I shall take this opportunity to pledge to all of my readers that I am not presently a cow, nor have I been or ever shall be a member of any other species but that of Homo sapien.

Maybe I should rename my blog to www.letstalkaboutgettingaspanishworkvisa.com

2005-02-07T23:04:00.000+01:00

I'm probably boring people to tears with talk about this subject, but since I've started I might as well keep going. I found out today that the Spanish Consulate in Washington says that I can apply for my visa without having to leave my passport with them, therefore enabling me to return to the UK for the project I'll be working on while they process the application.

This is kind of bittersweet news. It's mainly good news, because it means that I can finally get this over with (and stop posting about it). The bad news part of it is that it means that my trip back to the US won't be more than a couple of days at a time, once to drop off the application and once to pick up the visa. This means that I won't be able to go to Florida to visit my parents, and that any attempt to finally tie up the loose ends I left in my moving process will be much more difficult. I doubt that I'll be able to take care of everything that needs to be done.

Oh well, the truth is that I'm so tired of dealing with this visa process that I'll just be happy to get it out of the way. There will be other opportunities to go to the US, I'm sure. They'll just be further in the future.

It's raining men!

2005-02-07T22:58:00.000+01:00

Well, not actually. It's actually raining water. Lots of it. And there's a bunch of thunder and lightning to go with it. It's pretty cool because it makes it feel like summer's coming. Ask me how I feel about summer in a few months though and I'll probably tell you that I can't wait for winter to come again.

On a side note I've heard the song "It's Raining Men" a number of times since moving here. It cracks me up every time I hear it. I guess the mental image is too much for me.

Obligatory Spanish visa process update

2005-02-02T23:10:00.000+01:00

Found out yesterday that the employment agency, INEM, now says they found four more people they want my company to interview before they will concede that they can't find anyone to fill the position that I'm supposed to fill. My company thinks they should be able to finish the interviews this week and get the rest straightened out next week. More and more, time is running out before I need to go to England.

I'm kind of numb to the delays now. I'm sure it will all be resolved eventually and the best potential time to return to the US to finish the process has already passed anyway, so no reason to get worked up about little delays.

That history exam I missed because I slept too late lacked legitimacy too

2005-02-02T23:06:00.000+01:00

So an Iraqi Sunni clerics' group, the Muslim Clerics' Association, says that the Iraqi elections "lack legitimacy because a large segment of different sects, parties and currents ... boycotted."

I'm not sure how I feel about boycotting elections and what rights the groups who boycott have to pass judgment on the elections afterwards. On the one hand, I can kind of understand the reformers boycotting the last elections in Iran, because they knew that regardless of what they did the elections were rigged from the beginning. A great number of their candidates had been disqualified by the conservative mullahs.

On the other hand, it seems like a different scenario in Iraq. This seems like a group who enjoyed extraordinary power before, despite being the minority in the country, trying to do everything they can to prevent others from getting a bigger voice. Of course, I'm not there, never have been. So this is just my perspective from far away.

In my view it seems to me more like these groups had their chance to join in the democratic process but failed to do so. They chose not only to skip the elections themselves, but to inhibit the ability of others to participate. Fortunately there is still a good chance for them as it sounds like they will be brought in the process of drafting the constitution despite having fought against the transition to democracy thus far.

Gmail invite offer

2005-02-02T22:54:00.000+01:00

I have a few Gmail invites that I haven't used if anybody is interested. Just let me know.

I'll start the bidding at.... one millllllllllllion dollars! Or just let me know and I'll give it to you for free. While supplies last.

Almost there

2005-01-31T22:12:00.000+01:00

The latest word is that all that is left in my visa process are two formalities. Out of the 700 candidates who came up in the search at the Spanish employment agency, INEM, 0nly 3 applied for the position and out of those only 2 showed up for interviews. Neither of the two were qualified for the position, so now my company just needs to return to INEM to get a paper from them certifying that they were unable to find a suitable candidate for the company. After that they will take the paper to the Delegación del Gobierno to complete the process already started there. At that point all that is left is for me to return to the US to apply for the visa at the Spanish Consulate in Washington.

That last step has become more complicated now because on the 14th I'll start a new project in England (I believe it will be in Reading, although I'm not sure). Technically, the process is that I'm supposed to leave my passport with my application at the consulate, and then it can take between 2-4 weeks (or more) for the consulate to have the visa ready. Obviously, I don't have time for that, so I must convince the consulate to let me keep my passport while they work on the visa. I believe that they'll do this, because at one point I was going to apply for a different type of visa at the same consulate (they later convinced me it was a waste of time) and they were willing to let me hold onto my passport for an even less convincing need. My only worry is that if I get stuck in the US for an extended period of time it could lose this project for my company. Let's hope all goes well.

The other drawback to this having taken so long is that now the prospects are not good for me being able to spend some time in the US to see my family and friends. I had planned to go to Florida to see my parents while I was there, but it's quite possible that I'll only be there for two very quick weekend trips, which obviously would not leave time to make a side trip to Florida. I also have some things in the US that I need to bring back with me, but if I'm going there on the ends of business trips, it will be much more difficult. Regardless, I'll just be happy when this process is over. I'm sick of the hassles, and I've been holding off some things that I've planned to do until I can get certainty that I'll have my visa, long term contract, etc.

I'll keep you updated on when I go back to the US, because I know a lot of my friends and family read this blog. Sometimes communicating with people back in the US is a little easier this way, with the difference in time zone and such.

Currently listening to...

2005-01-31T22:07:00.000+01:00

Camera Obscura - Underachievers Please Try Harder. This is the first time I've listened to this album and I'm quite impressed. A very pleasing, calming album. Check out the review at Pitchfork.

A movie that all must see

2005-01-30T23:05:00.000+01:00

Yesterday I saw the movie Hotel Rwanda. It was probably the best movie I've seen in years. I can't remember another movie that affected me the way this one did. It is the amazing story of a hotel manager in Rwanda who protected around 1200 Tutsi refugees in his hotel during the genocide that occured there. I've heard people say that it's like a Rwandan Schindler's List, which sounds reasonable to me, although I have to admit that I've never seen Schindler's List. That's another one that I'll have to see.

One thing that might explain why it resonates with me so much is the disbelief I have when thinking that after all the talk of "never again" after the genocide against the Jews (among other groups) in the second world war, something like that can happen again and the world will sit by and do nothing once again. It's time that the member nations of the UN get tough on stopping this sort of thing. It's happened so many times and it should never be allowed to happen again.

Democracy: the benign virus for which I hope there is no cure

2005-01-30T22:54:00.001+01:00

Today there was a monumental event in Iraq. Iraqis voted for their own government after decades of being ruled by a fascist dictator. Despite the numerous threats to kill voters from the enemies of democracy, there was a considerably high turnout for elections today. Currently the estimates appear to be between 60-70% of eligible voters, which is quite impressive considering even in a high-turnout election (like the last presidential election) the US had a turnout of 56%.

I hope that this virus of democracy spreads throughout the Middle East, and through the rest of the world. I personally believe that it's the only way that we'll defeat terrorism.

There are many blogs worth looking at regarding the elections today. So many that I can't possibly link to all of them here. However, for good links and Iraqi election coverage check out Instapundit, Buzz Machine and Andrew Sullivan. Our friends at HispaLibertas have a little bit about the elections too. And finally, hear it from the Iraqis themselves at Healing Iraq, Iraq the Model, Hammorabi and The Mesopotamian.

Congratulations, Iraqis. Let this be the beginning of something great.

Stupid stock market, and other business musings

2005-01-20T23:22:00.000+01:00

From Dan, over at the Tabularium, we get a duo of good posts. First he discusses the effect on corporate strategy of maximizing shareholder value. This obviously has a huge effect on what companies do and how they spend their money, and not always for the better. He wrote a good post about it.

Next Dan discusses something near and dear to my heart: the inexplicably negative effect that IBM's much better than predicted 4th quarter 2004 results have had on their stock price in the last few days. Apparently analysts are "bored" with how "solid" IBM's results have been lately. Eh? As disclosure I own stock in IBM as I worked for them for 6 years, so of course this bugs the heck out of me. Dan also throws a tie-in to the article about maximizing shareholder, pretty cool huh?

The real Super Bowl?

2005-01-20T23:19:00.000+01:00

I'm very excited for this weekend's game between the Steelers and the Patriots. The conventional wisdom is that the Patriots will win, and I'm glad that that is the conventional wisdom. Because last week the conventional wisdom was that the Patriots would lose to the Colts and that didn't happen. People also thought that the Steelers would roll over the Jets and that didn't happen. I think that the Steelers perform better when they are the underdogs (just like I think the Patriots do the same, in fact I've noticed them trying to play the underdog chip a bit this week... worried, Pats?).

The Steelers gave up 3 points on defense last week. If they can eliminate the costly mistakes they made against the Jets last week, I think they have a very good chance of beating the Patriots this weekend. I'm glad that they faced such a tough game against the Jets because now they have no reason to come into this weekend's game overconfident.

Also, let me say that I'm extremely jealous that my sister and her boyfriend are going to the game in Pittsburgh. VERY JEALOUS.

The little known corrolation between wind and hygiene

2005-01-20T23:15:00.000+01:00

Little did I know, but there is a direct correlation between the amount of wind and my capacity to maintain proper hygiene. Yesterday was extremely windy, and because of that I was unable to take a shower all day. Why, you ask? Because our pilot light for the natural gas water heater is outside (which makes sense, wouldn't be a good thing to have inside). Every time I tried to start it up it blew out within a minute. Wasn't too keen on a cold shower, so I opted to go without. Fortunately the wind died down today so I was able to get the hot water going today. That would be a tough thing to deal with in Chicago, I think.

Tastes like Grandma

2005-01-20T23:08:00.000+01:00

Time to introduce you all to a new blog. This one's all about the Simpsons (whereas my site's name is based on a quote from the Simpsons and I constantly mention and reference the Simpsons while trying to give the appearance of producing original content). A friend of Cynthia's was apparently inspired by her new blog and fortunately for us started Life Imitates The Simpsons.

Of particular interest is her post on the real life re-enactment of the tomacco invention from one of my favorite Simpsons episodes. I actually saw this episode on tv here yesterday, and was quite pleased. I was even more surprised to see the tomacco plant actually created in real life, minus the plutonium (supposedly).

Back in black

2005-01-20T23:03:00.000+01:00

I've been remiss lately about posting so I'm going to do some rapid-fire posts now to make up for it. Been studying quite a bit lately and tomorrow I plan to take the practice exam mainly to see what areas I need to study more. I don't expect to pass the practice exam tomorrow.

Busy as a beaver? Not me, but I know someone who is

2005-01-17T21:02:00.000+01:00

Well, I've been busy lately between personal life and work life, but Michael Beaver's been putting his efforts into more blog-a-riffic pursuits. I recommend you check out what he has to say... many cool things about music especially. I'd also like to congratulate him on his new dog, looks cute (in a manly dog sort of way).

Also, why don't you drop by and see what Cynthia has to say? She's been telling some deep dark stories of her life's past and present. One spoiler: she's a Madonna fan. Don't hold it against her.

Currently listening to...

2005-01-15T23:33:00.000+01:00

New York Jets @ Pittsburgh Steelers. Let's go Steelers! Won't be able to think about anything else 'til this game is over. Really wish I could see it.

Rebuffed once again

2005-01-14T19:03:00.000+01:00

Found out a few hours ago that the Delegación del Gobierno told my company's representative today that they could not give me permission for a work visa because of the number of candidates that were returned when INEM did the most recent search. The maximum that are allowed in a case such as this is 100, and seven times that came back from this search. Of course the reason for such a high number is because INEM did not in fact put the actual job requirements in their search, they did a search on a broad job category, simply looking for "Consultant with English," which could mean anything.

So this coming week my company will have to return to INEM to attempt to get them to run a search with the actual job requirements, as they are certain that there will hardly be any candidates with the qualifications they need... they would hire them if there were. If that doesn't work (INEM's system may not be flexible enough to actually do a useful search in this case) they'll have to go through the list of 700 candidates and evaluate each one and give justification to the government as to why they are not qualified for the position. Let me just say that it's not that there aren't qualified people here, it's just that my company's looking for someone with pretty specific skills that aren't common in the US and are less so in Europe, as the software and technologies they are using are rather new.

So let's hope they are able to find a way to convince the Delegación del Gobierno of the need to hire me. If they're not able to do that, it doesn't look good for me being able to continue with my career here in Spain. If they can't justify to the government the need to hire me for a position in which I know there aren't that many qualified people, how would another company be able to justify it for something that is more common (which is what the majority of the other jobs I've seen offered have been). I suppose one way to fix this in a last resort is to get some sort of certification of my French skills, although I don't really remember much French. I'll keep my fingers crossed.

Next: the robotic Richard Simmons

2005-01-14T10:55:00.000+01:00

Oh, yeah, what are you gonna do? Release the dogs? Or the bees? Or the dogs with bees in their mouth and when they bark, they shoot bees at you?

This article cracks me up. Nice to see that the Pentagon is using their time wisely. Not so sure about the severe and permanent halitosis, though. That not only sounds gross, but I've also known non-guerrillas who have had that problem. Now if they could only develop a weapon to get rid of halitosis.

Long day, short post

2005-01-13T22:29:00.000+01:00

Had a long day today, was pretty busy. Got an update on my visa application and not so sure that it's encouraging. Apparently when they removed french from the job requirements and put it back through the INEM database about 700 people came up nationwide (compared to just 4 the last time). It seems that when they put an offer into the database they only have so many categories they can select, so a job that requires a technical consultant with enterprise application integration experience who has developed with Java and Websphere extensively and speaks fluent English gets entered in as "Consultant with English." Of course that's going to bring up a bunch of results. We'll see what the Delegación del Gobierno has to say. I have to imagine that it won't prevent me from getting the visa in the end, but maybe it will extend the process while the company explains why the other consultants who came up in the search aren't actually qualified for this particular position. We'll see.

I hope they get it resolved soon, I need to get my visa. On the other hand, from what I've been told, the process is even more difficult in the US. Apparently there you have to hire a lawyer to get through it.

A few more worthwhile Spanish blogs and a cop out from yours truly

2005-01-12T22:52:00.000+01:00

I'm pleased to say that I'm adding a few more Spanish blogs to my links on the right side. I've toyed with the idea of making a separate section just for Spanish blogs, but in the spirit of the American mixing bowl I'm going to leave them all together for now. First, there's Desde Sefarad by Jose Cohen (in Spanish), a blog that was recommended to me by Manel from HispaLibertas (which I want to remind you is a great blog, also in Spanish). Next is Barcepundit, which is an excellent blog by Franco Alemán who is, you guessed it, in Barcelona. One especially cool thing about his blog is that he has both a Spanish and an English edition. And finally there's Iberian Notes by John, which is another Barcelona blog but is in English (as you may have guessed from his name).

Now comes the cop out. I had written a somewhat lengthy post in this spot but have now removed it. Sorry.

A Dram in the morning, and a drink of Grog at Dinner or at Noon

2005-01-12T20:47:00.000+01:00

I think I saw this guy when I was at Mount Vernon for my friend Trevor's wedding reception.

Link via Instapundit.

Everything's coming up Milhouse!

2005-01-12T15:32:00.000+01:00

It's funny how some things work out. Just last night I was saying to myself "everything's coming up Milhouse!" after finding out some fortuitous news. Then I thought to myself "I wonder how they say that in the Spanish Simpsons?"

Ask and you shall receive. Today they showed that very episode. The answer is "todo ha salido a pedir de Milhouse!"

[Note: edited to protect the innocent]

Little differences...

2005-01-11T21:51:00.000+01:00

I'm in a fantastic mood tonight so I'm going to start a new recurring feature (like the frequent "Currently listening to..." posts) that you'll see on this site from now on. I think that it will be interesting to my Spanish readers as well as my American readers. In this feature I'll describe little differences between life and culture here in Spain and that in the United States.

The first "Little differences..." feature will be much like a sit-com spinoff, like when Cheers ended and Kelsey Grammar went off to do Frasier and in the first season a whole bunch of Cheers actors made cameo appearances. In this case I'm going to segue from "Currently listening to..." to "Little differences..." by talking about the differences in what is popular music-wise here compared to what is popular in the States.

The interesting thing I find about what music is popular here is that a lot of it is music that is somewhat popular in the US, but not to the same degree that it is here. Sure, there's plenty of Spanish music that's popular here, and then there's the chunga-chunga dance crap- er, music that seems to eminate from all the cars that pass by. But what I think is interesting is the music that is popular in both places, but the people who like it here are much more passionate about it.

Some examples include Lenny Kravitz, Dire Straits (and Mark Knopfler solo) and Tracy Chapman. These all have been relatively popular in the US, but those people that I've talked to here who like them seem to really really like them. From the way people talk about Mark Knopfler (and in turn, Dire Straits), he appears to be their Jimi Hendrix. And Tracy Chapman was popular in the US for a while, but she's still kicking here. Meanwhile there's a whole world of music that's extremely popular in the US that you'll never hear here at all, but that would take way too long to go into.

Well that was it, from now on this feature will be shorter and more to the point.

One way or another, I'll be certifiable

2005-01-11T17:27:00.000+01:00

I've been studying for the certification exam for IBM WebSphere InterChange Server V4 and Toolset Deployment (it sounds exciting, I know) for some weeks now, but today I've tried to stay more focused. It's tough reading hundreds of pages of dry technical documents, but I must get it done. I'm taking a coffee break right now but I'll be going right back to studying in a minute. I want to take advantage of the offer I found yesterday on IBM's website where they'll allow first-comers to take many of their certification exams for free in the next few months.

I was just searching for my Easy Star All Stars - Dub Side of the Moon CD, but it appears that I left it in the US. As you might surmise, it's a dub remix of Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon. What you might not surmise, however, is how incredibly awesome it is. Alas, I do not have that to put in for my studying aid, so I shall settle for the original (which isn't really what I would call settling for anything). Now, I shall leave you with those thoughts and return to my studying.

Things people like me should already know to do

2005-01-10T22:03:00.000+01:00

As a person who has developed internet applications for almost 7 years, I should know that when developing a website it's important to test it in more than one browser to make sure that it shows up the same way in all of them. Apparently I was a little too trusting that the newer browser versions had sorted out those problems. My friend just told me that in Internet Explorer the whole right sidebar is showing up at the bottom of the page. I'm not sure why, I'll try to fix it. I've been using Mozilla Firefox the entire time and never thought that it would show up differently in another browser.

Does anyone else use another browser in which the page shows up kind of funky? I've noticed in my Site Meter stats that there are quite a few people using browsers other than Explorer. Also, if anybody has some ideas as to why it's showing up like it is in Explorer (Exploder), please let me know.

[Brian grumbles about browser differences, consoles himself with jamon serrano and quality cheese]

[UPDATE: problem appears to be fixed, let me know if anyone still has problems]

What I'm reading...

2005-01-10T20:24:00.000+01:00

El Sol de Breda by Arturo Pérez-Reverte, the third in a series of books that follows the exploits of Capitán Alatriste, a fictional 17th century Spanish swashbuckling hero. If you speak Spanish, these are good books, quite entertaining. And they're not too heavy for someone who still reads a little slowly in Spanish. Note that they should be read in sequence as each book builds upon the story in the previous one.

I have my wonderful girlfriend to thank for giving me this book for Christmas (as well as introducing me to the series by giving me the first one).

Currently listening to...

2005-01-10T17:53:00.000+01:00

William Shatner - Has Been. Honestly. This is actually an excellent album. My friend put it on for me once at his house and when he first put it on I figured he must have been just trying to be funny, but then I quickly realized that this album is no joke. Check out the review at Pitchfork Media, and I think you might want to buy it.

Link of the day

2005-01-10T17:24:00.000+01:00

From Jason Fleischman, Hillary in 2008?!!

Bienvenidos a todos de HispaLibertas

2005-01-10T16:02:00.000+01:00

Me gustaría agradecer a Manel Gozalbo Al Kaafr de HispaLibertas por sus palabras agradables y por enseñar mi blog a sus lectores. Me alegro tener tantos invitados de España visitarme hoy y espero que vuelvan en el futuro. Prometo escribir más en español aunque tendráis que perdonar mi español.

Os recomendo a mis otros lectores que visitéis HispaLibertas a echar una visteza. Es un blog genial y siempre hay algo interesante. Sobre todo escriben en español por eso sería útil hablar español, aunque también se puede traducir con la página de traducción de Altavista, Babelfish (aunque no será perfecto).

I'd like to thank Manel Gozalbo Al Kaafr from HispaLibertas for his kind words and for showing my blog to his readers. I'm glad to have so many guests from Spain visit me today and I hope that they return in the future. I promise to write more in spanish although you'll have to forgive my spanish.

I recommend to my readers that you visit HispaLibertas to take a look. It's a great blog and there's always something interesting. They mainly write in spanish so it would be useful to speak spanish, although you can also translate it with Altavista's translation page, Babelfish (although it won't be perfect).

The great salad debate

2005-01-09T22:49:00.000+01:00

Back in my scholarly days at James Madison University I used to associate with other scholarly fellows, the majority of whom I still associate with now (albeit from greater distances). One day I was eating with my friend and roommate, Darren, and he commented that he found it strange that I preferred to eat salads without salad dressing (which was my preference at the time, I now prefer oil and vinegar). I told him that there was nothing strange about it, I just enjoyed being able to taste the vegetables.

Darren then proceeded to tell me that without salad dressing what I was eating was not a salad, but merely mixed vegetables. He maintained that a salad by definition was mixed vegetables covered with some sort of salad dressing. He even backed this up with a dictionary definition such as this one:

A dish of raw leafy green vegetables, often tossed with pieces of other raw or cooked vegetables, fruit, cheese, or other ingredients and served with a dressing

I, on the other hand, maintained that since a salad dressing is used to dress a salad, that means that it was already a salad before the dressing was applied. Therefore a salad without dressing is still a salad. Also, from reading the above definition (which isn't from the same dictionary Darren used in his original argument), it still appears that they are describing the dressing as a separate entity from the salad itself.

This debate has continued between the two of us ever since then, and it is a strangely enjoyable debate. Does anyone else have an opinion to weigh in on this important, gripping question? What side do you take and what are your reasons?

Let me know.

Holy Sitz! A case of German over-engineering

2005-01-09T13:33:00.000+01:00

An interesting exposé on the state of German toilets. I must say that they sound rather dreadful, perhaps I'll find out firsthand one day as it's possible that my travels may take me there in the future. The sound of this so-called Sitzpinkler phenomenon is also unsettling. You would think that it would encourage some engineers in Germany to come up with another design (or perhaps to just start importing toilets).

Note that the author also mentions what for me has been the most uncomfortable toilet experience in my travel life (camping experiences notwithstanding): the dreaded hole in the floor toilet. I've had the displeasure of encountering this type of toilet in the Madrid bus station and I have to say that it's extraordinarily disappointing to find when you've just completed an 8 hour flight. I shall give no more details.

Link via Instapundit.

Currently listening to...

2005-01-08T23:27:00.000+01:00

St. Louis Rams @ Seattle Seahawks. I'm disappointed that the game I really want to listen to (New York Jets @ San Diego Chargers) won't start until 2am here, much too late for me. But I'll listen to NFL football anytime I can. The AFC playoffs should be very interesting. The NFC seems to be playing to see who will lose handily to the AFC in the Super Bowl (which I dearly hope will be the Steelers' fifth Super Bowl win).

When in doubt... more cowbell!

2005-01-07T18:40:00.000+01:00

I was talking with intrepid official Pundits and Wags advisor Michael Beaver and was musing that my traffic has been rather low in the last couple of days. I postulated that perhaps it was because of a lack of superb content to attract readers. Mr. Beaver set me straight though.

The answer is without a doubt, this site needs more cowbell!

Better look both ways before crossing my information highway. You're liable to get run over by the droves of readers I'm about to have.

Reader challenge: Find me a better cowbell related photo (another one from the same skit qualifies).

Attack, parry, riposte!

2005-01-07T15:22:00.000+01:00

This morning I had my meeting regarding my visa application. We came close, but were temporarily rebuffed because of a mistake my company made when they submitted the official job offer that they wanted to fill. The Spanish government is pretty strict about making sure that the person applying for the visa has all of the skills required for the job offered and putting any extraneous skill in the offer can be a mistake (especially if the person you're trying to hire doesn't have that skill... je parle français mais je ne le parle pas bien ni j'ai une certification de ma capacité en français).

Fortunately we should be able to rectify the error quickly by removing the unnecessary requirement from the job offer, running it through the national employment database again, and as long as no more than 100 qualified people come up in the search I should be able to head back to the US to get my visa very soon... possibly as soon as next weekend. We'll see.

[UPDATE: feel free to correct my french, also note the extraordinary run-on sentence in the last paragraph]

Tomorrow I shall claim Spain for... Spain

2005-01-06T23:04:00.000+01:00

Early tomorrow morning (well, 8:30am is early to me) I will be meeting with the Delegación del Gobierno de Valencia to hopefully finally get approval for my work visa application. I believe that would mean that I'd have to return to the US to formally give my application to the Spanish Consulate in Washington DC, but the truth is that the whole process is a little bit confusing and nobody really wants to talk about it. Apparently getting information from people in the Spanish government is a little like trying to find out about Fight Club.

I'm tired of being a wanna-be league bowler, I wanna be a league bowler!

2005-01-06T22:52:00.000+01:00

Saw a bowling alley next door to the mall I went to with my girlfriend tonight. That's a good enough reason to use another money quote from the Simpsons isn't it?

Wouldn't mind going bowling again. It's a fun hobby. I used to bowl a lot when I was working in Fort Wayne, Indiana for a few months. There was nothing else to do there. I even bought my own bowling ball, which turned out to be a bit cumbersome to bring back on the plane. Fortunately we had corporate apartments while we were there so I only had to bring it back at the end of the engagement.

Vienen los Magos Reyes

2005-01-05T23:16:00.000+01:00

Tonight in Spain the three kings of orient come to distribute gifts to the children here. Traditionally this is when they give gifts to each other here, although the influence of American (and other) culture has been creeping in and it's becoming common here for some people to do their gift giving on Christmas. But the tradition of "los magos reyes" lives on and tonight I got to see with my own eyes some of what goes on.

As the first disc of the Return of the King was coming to a close, I started to notice quite a bit of "jaleo" (spanish for festive noise) in the street in front of my apartment. Turns out that the King of Gondor wasn't the only king around tonight.

The streets were lined with people, many of them children, and after a while a slow moving parade/procession came through with all three kings, each of them on a float-like thing on the back of a flat bed truck (all the trucks said "Texas" on the front- note: don't mess with Texas). The children crowded around as the kings and their numerous helpers (themselves children) threw what looked like candy and sawdust (looked mostly like they were throwing sawdust, guess they didn't have enough candy). At the end of the procession was a band, playing their song.

All of this appears to have been done by the neighborhood organization, and I'm pretty sure that all of the other neighborhoods in Valencia did the same thing. It's interesting to see the neighborhood dynamic here, Valencia appears to have quite a bit of organization of its neighborhoods. Each one seems to have its own band and I know that I've seen our neighborhood's band marching through the streets here a few times that seemed random to me, but I'm sure there was some meaning to it (maybe even the time that they came playing through our street at about midnight one night after Barça beat Real Madrid).

In any case, it's another case of what I've begun to think of as "wonderful confusion" in Valencia. It's wonderful because whatever is happening is quite interesting and new to me. It's confusion because I usually have no idea what the hell is going on.

The end of an era

2005-01-05T22:24:00.000+01:00

More like the end of a really long movie. No, I didn't spend that entire time watching the movie, but I did spend most of it. I was thinking as the first disc ended that the movie seemed like it should be over soon, but I had forgotten how long the last part of the movie goes on. There was a pleasing distraction in between discs which I'll post about in a little bit.

Evil mountains and salted pork (now with more movie!)

2005-01-05T17:00:00.000+01:00

Watching Lord of the Rings - Return of the King, Extended Edition. The longest of the Lord of the Rings movies is now even longer. It's good stuff though, if you've got the time to watch it.

They call them fingers, but I never have seen them fing

2005-01-04T23:29:00.000+01:00

I've been busy today, without any time to blog, currently engaged in re-installing Windows.

Meanwhile take a look at this article, which shows that justice is a bit different in Iran. While murdering your own children gets you about the equivalent of a hefty speeding ticket, committing adultery there is a serious crime that must be dealt with with the most serious measures. The end result of this story? Everyone dies. Wouldn't be surprised if speeding was also punishable by death there... unless it was because you were trying to gather the necessary speed to run over your children, in which case it's just speeding.

Dr. Watson (Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love NTFS)

2005-01-03T23:10:00.000+01:00

Unfortunately I recently discovered that formatting my hard drives as FAT32 was perhaps not the best idea. I realized this when I tried to join a bunch of files to create a voltron-like file of larger than 4GB. It seems that FAT32 does not handle files of this size, so I'm going to try to copy all I think is important from my c: drive to my second hard drive and re-format c: as NTFS and re-install Windows.

Believe me, it is for a good reason. I originally formatted the drives FAT32 because I was told that Linux can't read NTFS drives, but now I'm told it can. It really doesn't matter anyway, since I hardly ever use Linux.

New Jersey, where they pump the gas for you

2005-01-03T18:15:00.000+01:00

I'm told that the movie Garden State is the bee's knees. I'll have to add that to my list of movies to check out.

[update: I'm now also told that it's the fly's thighs]

Currently listening to...

2005-01-03T16:59:00.000+01:00

Wilco - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. A fantastic album, one of my favorites. Check out the review (and note the 10.0 rating it received). Seriously, this is a great album.

All the tsunami news and resources you could want and more

2005-01-03T13:21:00.000+01:00

Just found this blog, The South-East Asia Earthquake and Tsunami Blog which has a ton of different information and resources regarding the tsunami and recovery operation. One thing that stuck out was their chart (courtesy of this WikiPedia.org tsunami page) which estimates that 470,000+ have died from the tsunami. It appears that a lot of that depends on the comments from an Indonesian diplomat who said he thought the number of Indonesian dead could be more than 400,000, so it's difficult to know how whether this is realistic or not.

On a lighter note

2005-01-03T12:46:00.000+01:00

Last night I finally got to see The Incredibles (well, Los Increíbles). It was a fun movie, I enjoyed it. One of those cross-over movies that's good for children and adults. I recommend it.

I had heard at one point that there was a trailer for the final Star Wars movie, Revenge of the Sith, but no such luck. Not to fret, I just watched the trailer on www.starwars.com and now all is right. Looks like it ought to be pretty cool. Hopefully better than the last two, although the last one was not so bad.

That sure took the air out of my balloon

2005-01-03T12:02:00.000+01:00

Here I was, excited about finding a cool looking website for expats in Spain, www.expatica.com. I had just added it to my Links of Interest section and was perusing the site when I saw this opinion article, titled "Why Aznar was the real appeaser."

I decided to take a look. I was interested to see what they were saying. I know that there are a lot of people here in Spain who have very strong feelings against Aznar (and against his party, the Partido Popular), so I thought I'd see what the beef was. I did not expect to see what I found inside.

Inside was a diatribe against Aznar (ok, that part I expected) and the rest of the Iraq coalition, especially the US. When I say "especially the US" that doesn't really convey the tone of the article. Basically the allies in the coalition are said to be Chamberlain-esque appeasers. But who are they appeasing? Well, they're appeasing the United States in the form of the Bush Administration. This article equates the Bush Administration to Hitler and Nazism. Take a look:

It is also conceivable that by appeasing the United States, the "coalition" has unlearned Chamberlain's lesson. For who is undermining international law more than the United States, with its willingness to spy on its allies and to split its closest partner, Europe? Only in the United States do we see this pre-emptive war doctrine, this doomsday cult of religious oppression and anti-intellectualism, and an unconscionably massive store of weapons which remain undisclosed to the rest of us.

No nation is so ruthless, so unrelenting, furtive and downright dishonest in pursuit of its own self-interest, often at the expense of other countries, as the United States of America. We trusted the United States based on two centuries of benevolence and its commitment to secular democracy and human rights. The Bush administration has swiftly eroded that trust, and US benevolence is no longer a certainty.

I find this not only to be incorrect, but a detestable equation. It looks like the article was written in March 2004, so perhaps we could chalk it up to the heat of the moment soon after the March 11 Madrid train bombings. But if that is the case, why is it still linked to prominently on the front page of the site? No, it's apparent that the site approves of this message and wants to continue to promote it.

For the moment, I'm going to leave the link on my list, but Expatica is on probation. I'm going to read the site a bit more before I decide whether or not it's worth my time. I'd like it to be a useful site because it would be really nice to have a resource to go to that specializes in information for expats in Spain. Needless to say, they didn't start off well with me.

If you're always complaining about something...

2005-01-02T23:58:00.000+01:00

People won't pay attention to you when you have a legitimate complaint. That's my feeling when I read all these articles that talk about the criticism of the Bush Administration for not immediately throwing a huge amount of money at the tsunami recovery situation in South Asia.

The United States may eventually spend billions of dollars to help Asia recover from last week's devastating tsunami, a leading Republican U.S. senator said on Sunday as the Bush administration battled criticism it had been slow to respond.

The thing that I think needs to be considered here is that it doesn't make any sense to arbitrarily commit a huge amount of money without having first studied the situation to determine what the need is. From what I've seen in the past this is the way the US typically handles disaster situations. They make an immediate small commitment, then after studying the situation make a much larger commitment that matches the requirements. Also note that the $350 million amount currently committed is the entire budget for foreign disasters, so they could not have possibly committed more right now, they'll need congress to do that.

Congrats to the Pittsburgh Steelers on their 15-1 regular season

2005-01-02T23:56:00.000+01:00

The Steelers 3rd and 4th string players, along with the equipment managers and a few Punt, Pass and Kick contestants, beat the Bills 29-24 today to end the regular season 15-1. The fact that they were able to do that against a team that was desparately trying to get into the playoffs and when they themselves had nothing to gain in the game is quite impressive.

I have my terrible towel here, I'll be waving it during the playoffs, you can believe that. Here we go Steelers!

BOOM!!! POW!!!

2005-01-02T11:28:00.000+01:00

"We'll understand how the comet is put together, its density, its porosity, whether it has a surface crust and underlying ices, whether it's layered ice, whether it's a wimpy comet or whether it's a rock-hard ice ball. All of these things will become apparent after we smack it."

Currently listening to...

2005-01-02T11:01:00.000+01:00

The Streets - Original Pirate Material. Ah, British hip hop. It's actually quite a good disc. I saw them once at the 9:30 club in Washington. Dizzee Rascal opened for them, but I found that he sounds better in the studio than on the stage.

It was an interesting concert because the opening act reminded me of the things that I don't like about rap concerts- two or more guys yelling unintelligibly into microphones while a DJ plays the background music... all of it blasted so loudly that it almost makes your ears bleed. The Streets, though, was a great show- a live band, showmanship, good musicianship and listenable volume levels.

While I'm on the subject of charitable actions for the New Year

2005-01-01T22:40:00.000+01:00

Thinking about the Amazon site for American Red Cross contributions reminded me of a site that I used to visit every day but for some reason stopped a while ago. It's called the Hunger Site and the deal is that you go to that website and click a link to donate some food (1.1 cups of food per click) which is divided between America's Second Harvest and Mercy Corps. The food is donated by the Hunger Site (it appears that their sponsors pay them per click) and you can click once per day... it doesn't cost you anything.

I'm going to add it to my Links of Interest and I plan to resume making it a daily visit.

Help the tsunami victims

2005-01-01T22:26:00.000+01:00

If you're checking out my blog please also take time to go to the link for the American Red Cross donation collection for the South Asia Tsunami victims. So far they've raised in excess of $11 million and the amount increases every second.

It's impressive that so many individuals have taken it upon themselves to help the millions of people who are in quite a dire situation right now. 140,000+ died (and I expect that the number will increase by quite a bit), but the donations are really for the tens of millions who are in serious danger from starvation, lack of drinking water and spreading disease.

Happy New Years, Feliz Año

2005-01-01T22:02:00.000+01:00

Welp, it's 2005 now. Every year goes more quickly than the last.

Spent last night and today with the girlfriend and her parents. Found that the tradition of gulping down 12 grapes before the clock stops chiming 12:00 is a lot more difficult if you haven't yet taken the seeds out.

Bueno, ya es 2005. Cada año va más rápido que el anterior.

Estuve anoche y hoy con mi novia y sus padres. Supe que la tradición de comerse 12 uvas antes de que terminen las campanas es mucho más dificil si no has quitado los huesos ya.

Are you reeeeeeeeally the owner of the Kwik-E-Mart?

2004-12-31T16:52:00.000+01:00

Well, Christmas is over. But I really want to get the Simpsons 5th Season on DVD. I really loved the 4th Season and I think that from this point on it's all going to be good... but the 5th is a particularly great season.

By the way, in the Spanish Simpsons they call the Kwik-E-Mart "El Badulaque", which has a few different meanings, including a foolish person, a person who eats too much and a store where you can buy all sorts of things.

Testing out BlogThis! (no, I'm not that excited, it's how the name is written)

2004-12-31T15:58:00.000+01:00

Yet another of Google's many useful tools is BlogThis!, which I just discovered. Now if I can just figure out if there's a way to categorize posts so that they're more easily searchable (that's what I was looking for when I happened upon this).

Currently listening to...

2004-12-31T15:20:00.000+01:00

The Walkmen - Everyone Who Pretended to Like Me Is Gone. So far I like it. It's poppy but not sugary. Here's a review from Pitchfork.

This is pretty cool

2004-12-31T13:38:00.000+01:00

I lived in Charlotte, NC for about four years and was snooping around to see if I could check out the status of the new NBA arena they're building downtown. I found this convenient website which not only has time lapsed photos of the construction, but by far the coolest thing is the live webcam. The best thing about the webcam is that by clicking a button you can take control of the camera and zoom in and swivel it to look around the construction site and the city.

Pretty fun stuff.

Two movies I'd like to see

2004-12-31T13:27:00.000+01:00

I've wanted to see The Incredibles since I first heard about it. I haven't gotten a chance yet, but maybe this weekend will be the time. I'm not usually one for these animated films, but from what I hear this one is enough of a crossover for children and adults that I think I'd enjoy it. Hopefully it'll be good to me even in spanish.

Another one I'd like to see is Michael Moore Hates America. I can't stand that pompous hypocrite, but not only that, this movie sounds like it would be entertaining in its own right. Instapundit says it's out on dvd now.

Ebert and Roeper gave thumbs up to both of them, you can check out the reviews here.

Now with 100% more site meter!

2004-12-31T11:47:00.000+01:00

Just added the free counter from Site Meter. So I'll be able to figure out if anybody actually drinks from this veritable font of information and knowledge.

Just created the blog

2004-12-30T23:07:00.000+01:00

Don't have much time right now so the blog's a bit underwhelming. I'll increase the whelming factor later.