Holiday planning

While everybody else is busy planning Roskilde Festival (what to see, what to sing, what to drink, what to wear, where to sleep, if to sleep, how to survive for a week living on beer alone) I am busy planning my vacation to Vancouver, Canada. Together with my parents and my sister we will visit both Vancouver and Vancouver Island. We plan on touring the magnificent landscape in our camper van, to spend time whale watching, bear watching, maybe kayaking, and definitely pay a visit to Josh and his family. After more than ten years of contact without ever seeing each other, I am very excited about finally getting the chance to meet my dear friend Josh.

Green yellow cabs

Last night I dreamt I was in New York, I was on my way out to go dancing with my sister. I saw the streets were filled with yellow cabs as usual, but then I noticed something strange: the colours of the cabs were changing. When they were driving normally, they were yellow, but when they were holding still or running slow as in a traffic jam, they would change to green.

I do not remember from where, but somehow my subconsciousness has picked up the headline that "NY yellow cabs to go green by 2012" and woven it into my dream in this special way. I had forgotten everything about this news item until I told my dream to a friend and realised that I had read something about the yellow cabs recently. Funny how the mind works.

Photo courtesy: www.jezblog.com

Spare time

The programming project I was doing for Roskilde Festival got finished last week. After several weeks of working both at work (doing my job) and at home (working for the festival), I finally have some time left over for hobbies and friends again. So I will enjoy my spare time in the two weeks I have left before my summer holidays to do some more dancing, do some reading and watch some more movies.

Genomic insights

The ENcyclopedia Of DNA Elements (ENCODE) project has published the first assembly of their findings from high-throughput experiments concerning 1% of the human genome. The paper summarises the new knowledge of genome function and organisation that was found throught the experiments. One of the conclusions is that most of what we used to think of as 'junk DNA', actually does have a function in the genome, although it is not by carrying information on protein-coding genes.

Read the news on BBC: Human genome further unravelled and read the publication in Nature
Illustration courtesy: Universite de Geneve

Zitzakken at work

Two weeks ago I was at a party arranged by NXP where they had the brilliant idea of using sandbag chairs everywhere. Good quality I thought, so we ordered some of the same type to our department. And then what happens?




I dare to say that if a beanbag chair cannot resist the full weight of a jumping professor, the bean bag is certainly not of academic quality...

Buy your own beanbags at zitzak.org

Bright idea

Philip got struck by a bright idea during lunchtime today: He will start a lightning company. Customers can approach the company with orders of lightning to strike at specific locations at specific times. The cost of the service will depend on the charge and precision of the strike. Expected customers are fun fairs (in competition with firework events) and private people who wishes to surprise or scare a friend with teeny weeny lightening charges that make your hair stand out in a funny-looking way.

Of course, the company needs a flashy name, maybe something like Thor Inc...

Photo courtesy: Will and Guy's Favourite Lightning pictures

Miruna and Bram

Last weekend Miruna and Bram got married in Amsterdam. It was a lovely day with sunshine and happy people, and umm nice petit fours for the reception. The church wedding will take place in Bucharest in August (sorry Miruna, I can't make it then). Cheers and best wishes!

Thanks to Abbie for the photos.

Frankie Martinez

A tip from Stanley made me look up Frankie Martinez on YouTube. Until now I thought the best footwork I ever saw was that of Mambo D (which I saw perform live in NY), but this guy Frankie sure has some moves too. Really smooth dancing!

Check out this solo performance from the 2003 West Coast Salsa Congress

All work and no play...

Uncyclopedia: All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy

Words are wise..

My friend Allan has made a cool application to generate random quotes mixed from quotes by Einstein, Descartes, Vonnegut, Twain and Voltaire. Allan postulates that if we wait long enough and if we are lucky, one of these randomized quotes might someday explain the meaning of life...



Try it out yourself at Allans Random Quote Generator

New York, New York

I bought the ticket, booked a hostel, yes, you got me right, I am going to New York again! This time for the NY salsa congress August 30 to September 2!

Ban Bamse & Kylling

The recent events in Poland, where Ewa Sowinska has pointed out the danger of homosexual tendencies expressed by the purple Teletubby Tinky Winky, gives inspiration to further investigation. We should seriously scrutinize all the innocent-looking children series for such more or less apparent "Bad Influence". For example I suggest we start with the Danish tv-series "Bamses Billedbog", where the two male characters Bamse and Kylling often hug, hold hands, or even dress up as husband and wife (Sven Herlig and Dorthe Elisabeth, see picture). This is of course an apparent example of how simple games is a direct suggestion for your children to become homosexuals.
Illustration courtesy: DR.dk