A truly great man...
AirToob 
I like looking on the bright side. I relate very much to the Mediterranean extended-family, take-it-slow, money-isn't-everything outlook on life. I'm not a great cook but I like cooking, especially Mediterranean food (my recipe page is here). I'm interested in environmental issues. My main hobby is flying (on a PC simulator).The people I admire most are those who see no end to pain, illness, grief or disability and who still retain a sense of humour, people who spend time making life better for others in any way, and people with toxic parents who have "broken the chain" in bringing up their own children.
If you like my pages you will probably also enjoy my web site - do visit! You can get a quick flavour of it here.
PS: I'm a refugee from StumbleUpon. I have copied all of my old SU reviews (the ones containing images) here, except for some not-so-good and outdated bits.
As Michelle in 'Allo, 'Allo might say, please read the following very carefully - I shall write it only once!I'm a great believer in tags. SU restricted you to 5 tags per post (and then only for site-review posts), but here you can have as many tags per post as will fit into about 200 characters, so I have tried to take full advantage.
For example, you can select from this blog (if you want to) only posts to do with arts, science, photography, books, movies, music, environment and so on.
If you're feeling down (or even if you aren't), try this selection of things to enjoy in life, which is pretty much what these pages are all about.
You will find a larger selection of my favourite tags here (or click the White Rabbit below).
The main thing is: if you like something about one of my posts, try clicking the corresponding tag at the top of the post. If you keep doing this, you may find yourself navigating down some nice paths through this blog (for example, this one or this one).
Among these tags you will find the name of a Categorian or Stumbler if their work features in that post, so if you click one of those names (e.g. expressioniste or johnshaven) then you will get (hopefully) a nice selection of that particular person's work as it appears on my blog.Hover your mouse over the images to left and right (or any image) for more info...
There are plenty more tags to choose from. Enjoy your visit!
WHITE RABBITS - If you're pressed for time, and you would like a quick sample of what I think are the best of these pages, or help in finding quickly what you need, then go here or click the White Rabbit!Alternatively, if you click the chevrons >> wherever you see them (including here, where you will be presented with a multiple choice of starting places that will change occasionally) you will follow a (relatively) short path through my "special favourites".
Click the cat to chat!
... with words (thoughts on Life, the Universe and Everything) - click the image to the left
... with pictures (my photos and photoblogs) - click the image to the right!
HELP!
For essential Categorian help, just click Help at the top of your screen - and don't forget to make Help your "friend", that way you can easily see when new help information has been added.It can really, really help to know something about HTML and web pages, if you don't already.
Try here for pointers to some good stuff (even for complete beginners), and also the web design utilities that Matt lists here - and don't miss Karenak's Guide for Categorian Beginners and Borderline's Categorian Help.
When you look at someone's awesome web page and wonder "How do they do that?" then (if you know at least a little HTML) try looking at the source text ("Page Source") for that page. You can do this from the "View" menu of browsers (or Ctrl+U on Firefox or Chrome) - some later versions of browsers hide it under "Web Developer" or similar.
My own Categorian Help posts will be found here, and my Computer Help posts will be found here.
Do you want your reviews to be noticed by other users?
Do you want to find other users who share the same interests as you?
Do you want to be notified of new site reviews for topics that you like?
The Categorian Library is your key to all these things... if you need some help with it, you might find some useful stuff here (or click the image).
HERE BE TREASURE - or my archive pages, anyway:1 (Oct 2007) | 2 (Jan 2008) | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 (Jan 2009) | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 (Jan 2010)| 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 (Jan 2011) | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35 (Oct 2011) | Nov | Dec 2011 | Jan 2012 | Feb | Apr | May | Jun-Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec 2012 | Jan 2013 | Feb | Mar 2013 |
Archive pages 1 to 34, and part of 35, come from my StumbleUpon blog. Dates in brackets refer to original post dates on SU. Because I transferred the blog manually, dates in my Categorian blog prior to October 10th 2011 (unless marked as original dates) are the date of the transfer.
Archive pages present posts in increasing-date order (oldest first). This is the opposite direction to the "normal" blog pages which are in decreasing-date order (newest first). One effect of this is that the contents of a given archive page (page 5, say) always remain the same, unless you delete something, whereas the contents of a given page on the "normal" blog keep changing as you add stuff to the front.
My photo of the immense glass roof of the British Museum, from the stairs leading up to what is now the Ice Age Art: Arrival of the Modern Mind exhibition (see below).
Not having my camera with me, I took this with my Kindle Fire HD's front-facing webcam, which is really only designed for things like Skype. It was a case of point in several directions, take lots of shots, and hope for the best... We have only seen the sun a few times so far in 2013, so this was a lucky day!
From the British Museum's Facebook Page:
Here’s a sneak preview of an object being installed. It shows a reindeer engraved on bone and is around 13,000 years old.
We saw this exhibition yesterday... truly wonderful. The careful, intricate work and artistic imagination of people in those times (going back 40,000+ years) is amazing.
Click the picture for a very good review of the Exhibition, which runs until 26 May 2013.
Looking at the achievements of people who lived so long ago, I couldn't help imagining the title of a hypothetical future exhibition, part of which would read "departure of the modern mind". But that's another story.
If you're interested in environment issues, you may like to know that I have updated the Environment & Technology section of my web site. The updated parts include The "Negawatt Revolution", Hybrid and plug-in electric cars, Recycling, and Environmental documentaries, movies and videos.
Although the section is quite large, you will hopefully find that it is easy to navigate. I have tried to make it rich in high quality links (many of which have also been updated), so that what you see on the pages are just the tips of many interesting icebergs, so to speak.
If you visit it and really like it, then please share it anywhere you think it would help the environment - thank you!
I am sure that the section could be further improved. Any suggestions would be really welcome.
A celebration of the Curiosity Rover Mission, with beautiful images and music
Thanks to ensemble5 (whose beautiful pages are well worth visiting).
[How far is it to Mars? (nice video animation)]
An onlooker witnesses the annular solar eclipse as the sun sets in Albuquerque, New Mexico, on May 20, 2012.
Photographed by Colleen Pinski of Peyton, Colorado, for the the Natural World category. (© Smithsonian.com)
Thanks to my friend Overthetrail for this one!
The image above is mine - feel free to share...
It turns out that all the technology that is based on transistors - computers, mobile phones, the Internet, you name it - depends on the strange reality of quantum physics, as does almost everything that we see (and don't see) around us.
I recently read, or rather am having the great pleasure of working through in several passes, most of The Quantum Universe: Everything that Can Happen Does Happen, a book written by Professors Brian Cox and Jeff Forshaw. (I say “most of” because the the chapters in the book lead you up to a real worked example in the Appendix, a seriously high mountain which I have yet to attempt!)In 1927 J.B.S. Haldane famously wrote: “I have no doubt that in reality the future will be vastly more surprising than anything I can imagine. Now my own suspicion is that the Universe is not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we can suppose.”
The Universe is truly a queer and wonderful place, and this book clearly explains some of its most queer and wonderful mechanisms. The method of explanation, using familiar clock faces and waves, doesn't eliminate the occasionally frightening mathematics, but conveys brilliantly what is really going on.
(Anyone thinking "I can't do maths", by the way, has never had teachers like these (or Salman Khan, see bottom of this post). I wish they had taught me when I first attempted to learn this stuff!)Equally fascinating is the authors' explanation of how science reached its current understanding of the theory that predicts so accurately how the Universe behaves, from the chemistry of life (and table salt) to why (since atoms are mostly empty space) we don't fall through the floor, to the life-cycle of stars.
Unusually in a science book, the authors are not afraid to explain the limitations of science, either: scientific knowledge isn't perfect and fixed, but always growing, and here is a great description of how science helps knowledge to grow.
You can read a really good review of the book here. Click the images for more about the authors.
I find it sad that in today's world some religions still cannot accept science, but must imagine an alternative reality (with a bogus science that doesn't constantly test itself critically against evidence, as real science does) that doesn't conflict with their beliefs.
It is also ironic, as well as sad, that people following these religions promote their messages (and do much else) using technology that depends on the science that they don't believe in.
Creationists (or whatever they call themselves) have a perfect right to believe in whatever they want. However I find it horrifying to read about persistent attempts to have Creationism taught in classrooms, and teachers being intimidated for teaching real science.
Disrespect for science is no new thing, and not confined to reality-denying religions. The “mad scientist”, for example, has always been a popular feature of movies and TV shows (even in The Muppets, one of my all-time favourites!). Scientists have not always performed well, and have not always found it easy to communicate clearly with the non-scientific public (a hard but essential job when issues like climate change and health are at stake).
A while back, the UK woke up to the fact that its future prosperity depended on reversing this trend, and many popular science programmes (among other things) have resulted - from the BBC's Bang Goes The Theory to some extraordinarily illuminating programmes featuring Brian Cox.
J.B.S. Haldane, should he be observing from somewhere what is happening in physics today, might not change his suspicion (the inner workings of gravity, for instance, still have much to reveal to science) - but I am sure that he would be “watching developments with great interest”.
[More thoughts on Science and Religion]
[Is our weather getting worse? (major Channel 4 documentary)]
[Some wonders from NASA]
[Some thoughts on Science and Politics]
[One of the greatest FREE learning and teaching resources on the Internet: The Khan Academy]
And here is the weather report for England...
West Yorkshire, March 23rd - 2 days past the Spring Equinox.
A Scandinavian high pressure area, apparently permanently stuck in place, has been feeding biting easterly winds into England for what seems like forever.
The reasons for this are explained here (among many other places).
Yeah, right...
Hats off to guys who have to go out and fix things in this weather
Our nice Kate (the Duchess) out there with the scouts
Looe in Cornwall, where 24 hours of continuous rain caused a landslide of saturated earth, killing the unfortunate woman living in what used to be a house (the other houses in this row have been evacuated)
...and not too much fun being had in Newlyn, normally a pretty place (see paintings here) a little further to the west
If you're interested in this, see my earlier post...
[Is our weather getting worse? (major Channel 4 documentary)]
West Yorkshire, March 23rd - 2 days past the Spring Equinox.
A Scandinavian high pressure area, apparently permanently stuck in place, has been feeding biting easterly winds into England for what seems like forever.
The reasons for this are explained here (among many other places).
Yeah, right...
Hats off to guys who have to go out and fix things in this weather
Our nice Kate (the Duchess) out there with the scouts
Looe in Cornwall, where 24 hours of continuous rain caused a landslide of saturated earth, killing the unfortunate woman living in what used to be a house (the other houses in this row have been evacuated)
...and not too much fun being had in Newlyn, normally a pretty place (see paintings here) a little further to the west
[Is our weather getting worse? (major Channel 4 documentary)]
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