Archive for July, 2006
Right Across Time Lanes
Monday, 31 Jul 2006 20:58:03Since I had no Internet access for several hours today (the person where the switch was had left and didn’t pay his electricity bills, so they cut it off, thus leaving us with no net for the whole building), I decided to go out and search for a bag/purse/smth as well as look around for.. stuff.
Initially I wanted to go alone, but then I recalled that I’m a total mess when it comes to shopping anything non-computer related (not that I excel at those either, but still :D). So I grabbed the phone and called my neighbour (who’s totally into such mundane and trendy affairs :D), and asked her to tag along.
Said and done, off to the “big shops”. The bag or whatever I wanted had to be something neutral, not too elegant, but not to sportish either, so I can grab it anywhere I go, without worrying that it doesn’t fit – and manage to get a digicam, a phone and an mp3 player inside, without fearing of breaking it. Obviously, I found exactly none which matched that criteria: they were all too elegant, shiny and full of glamorous little things (like feathers, ribbons, pearls, chains, you name it) or too business-like. Of course, my neighbour liked them and kept dragging me here and there to see more of them.
But since the same rule applied everywhere I turned, I decided to give up and dragged her to the area where they have art things and other gift-related merchandise. And there I saw all those things I’m drooling for every time I pass through there – miniature replicas of ships, houses, old phones, rifles, swords and daggers, porcelain-faced dolls, Asian umbrellas and fans, all sorts of scented candles and sticks and things like that. As I wasn’t planning to buy anything else, I decided to go for a deliciously smelling coffee and vanilla candle.
Then we agreed to head home. But before we actually got back, we saw that right across the street from the area we live in there’s a new fast food boutique and we went to take a look and she went to buy a ham tortilla (link included, cuz I had no idea what that was). Then a funny thing happened. We were trying to pronounce that name, wondering whether it’s with or without the “l” and such. But when she went to ask for one, the guy there went like “Ham?” (read here “a” as in “far”, not as in the classical way of saying it :D) and we both started to laugh, thinking that we tried so hard to pronounce that “tortilla” word and that guy wasn’t even able to say “ham” the right way.
We laughed about it all the rest of the way home and we both ended up complaining that the English in our universities is so dull and pretty much below our level. Then we started recalling the kindergarten we went to and where we began learning English for the first time through all those pretty songs, passing through the elementary school years and the tough English grammar lessons and finishing with our high-school and the 6 hours of English per week (5 with basic English classes with grammar, vocabulary, literature and such + 1 with culture, history and geography related to the US and the UK). Yes, I like to brag about this. 
And I want to take a Cambridge Proficiency diploma, as well. Sometime.
Hard Candy
Friday, 28 Jul 2006 13:21:53Last night I saw another one of those movies which have that special “something” and remain vivid in your memories even long after you’ve seen them – Hard Candy.
Titled after the Internet slang for an under-aged girl, it follows a few hours of the life of a 14 year-old girl bent on taking revenge on a 32 year-old guy who, she thinks, is a pedophile. The thrilling part about it is the fact that you don’t know which one of them is exactly the insane one and they both sure have a marvellous way of playing their parts. Thus, the viewer tends to get surprised or shocked most of the times by the unexpected turns of events (there are no vulgar scenes or anything or sorts), as there are little hints or clues for the ending.
As a matter of fact, the ending itself is somewhat confusing, not in a bad way – but precisely to leave the viewers with a series of concerns, thinking a bit more about what has become a rather large-scale phenomenon over the Internet nowadays.
In any case, you definitely need an open mind to see this movie and understand it at its full potential.
And as a side note, I simply loved the way some times everything got psychotic and how all the colours were combined in both the indoors and outdoors scenery. 
Nights Out
Thursday, 27 Jul 2006 03:14:04I’ve been left alone for another week now and I must say I’ve realized I really can’t handle all the housework, “petwork” and job issues on my own. It’s simply beyond me.
Obviously, if I want to end up like a mad old lady living with her cats, I’ll definitely need to hire a maid to take care of such matters.
In other news, I went out with some former classmates and, as they’ve closed the place we used to go on such occasions, we had to search for an alternative. Since I’m not much of an adventurer when it comes to clubs &stuff, I was pretty much at a loss. But the worst part is the small number of decent places to go and hang out in GalaĊ£i, if you don’t want to find yourself obligated to buy food. They’re usually either closed at 23 – 24 or all full, bummer.
And if that wasn’t enough, two or three girls walking all by themselves at night is not good, since all sorts of creeps roam the streets. And I don’t particularly mean burglars or any other such things, but “cool” guys, who throw witty remarks at various passers-by and annoyingly tag along girls, given the chance. One word: disgusting. I want a place where people know what good manners are, or at least mind their own business and leave others alone.
The good part of the night is that I managed to spot a place where – amazing! – they sell pizza, sandwiches and various drinks non-stop. It’s kind of far from home and I can’t say the products are that good, but just for the record…
I’m still looking for a similar home-delivery service. Or wait till I’ll get to Bucharest, my (quite small, actually) need regarding shops and markets should be satisfied better over there.
And I hate absurd Internet traffic limits after exceeding not-so-big amounts of traffic. What do I care that I can have huge speeds on the network? I don’t give a damn about that, all I find there is porn, cracks for stupid brainwashing games and dumb music, anyway. Is there a good ISP in this city? 
I need sleep.
Ubuntu Counter
Tuesday, 25 Jul 2006 10:33:56The project can be found at http://ubuntucounter.geekosophical.net/.
The Ubuntu Counter Project is like a miniature version of The Linux Counter. It aims to catalogue the number of registered machines using the numerous varients of the Ubuntu Linux distribution.Why? Because, quite simply, Ubuntu rocks.
And I am registered as…
Via S. Cristian.
