Maybe the day is not so far off when we can choose whether March goes out like a lion or like a lamb. Physicists in Toulouse, after an edifying battery of experiments with a high-powered laser beam (ion cannon) in the desert of Mexico, have demonstrated that they can redirect and guide, if not also trigger, a lightning bolt away from intended, Thor-chosen, target.
Saturday 31 March 2012
thunderstump or paratonnerre
catagories: ๐ซ๐ท, ๐ช️, ๐ก, environment
Thursday 29 March 2012
toxicity or mabel, black-label
The intangibles from the States are acquiring that flavour as well, including best-practices that have seen that same conduct go international. Elections too have become more a vote on personalities rather than platforms and the unseating process has become likewise prying, and fillers—tricks, short-cuts, hacks—have started to infiltrate German consumption as well. None here would tolerate anything toxic or questionable in their food yet, but the alimentary-hack of Aroma, essence and Ersatz is taking on. It's all very unpalatable and I worry for those under the tyranny of apparent and abundant choice.
catagories: environment, health and medicine, technology and innovation
Wednesday 28 March 2012
collectors' edition or canting-arms
catagories: ๐ฉ๐ช, ๐ช๐บ, ๐ซ๐ท, economic policy
interstitial or variety show
Tuesday 27 March 2012
cordon sanitaire or the moon of endor
While Poland was hosting the new German president on his first official state visit, to reaffirm the ties of the two neighbouring countries, Poland was declared, again, the unwilling football of dรฉtente and appeasement. I am sure a great deal of diplomacy is carried out in the footlights, in hushed tones and without attendant-minders, like this Cold War melodrama. Certainly, there is an element of smug fatalism, but it seems as if old rivalries are drawing the same lines in the sand and perhaps the same promises written on water. Starting with the rise of Bolshevik governments out of the chaos of World War I, America sought to staunch the spread of the Communist revolution, but it was not until the victors picked over the wreckage of the World War II, that the US policy of containment became such a formalized game.
catagories: ⚛️, ๐จ๐ฟ, ๐ต๐ฑ, ๐ท๐บ, ๐บ๐ธ, ๐, foreign policy, revolution, Star Wars
Monday 26 March 2012
รถsterlichen brauchtum or thanks easter bunny, bock, bock!
catagories: ๐ฉ๐ช, holidays and observances, lifestyle, religion
Sunday 25 March 2012
coffee and tv or tea and sympathy
catagories: ☕️, antiques, environment
Saturday 24 March 2012
olive tree, very pretty or gartenschlau
catagories: ๐ฎ๐น, ๐ฑ, environment, lifestyle
Friday 23 March 2012
vor ort, for you, die II. staffel
The debate over continuing financial assistance for former East German stabilization and development, sparked by the election season rhetoric of some municipal hopefuls, has now, fuelled by bidden commentary, broadened from a suggestion, that could have had xenophobic overtones, to a discussion about power of the purse and the sturdiness of statistics (DE). I am not sure how to translate the meaning of “poor-mouthing.” Unlike private banking institutions in Germany, like Deutsche Bank or Commerzbank, savings and loan banks (Sparkassen) are supported and partially owned by their host communities. Traditionally the profits of the Sparkassen have either been reabsorbed into the network in order to promote more growth and investment, locally, or have underwritten local charity initiatives, aside from shoring up capital, which can be problematic in an environment of tight credit, against expanding requirements for reserves.
catagories: ๐ฉ๐ช, economic policy, labour
socks cousteau
catagories: lifestyle
Wednesday 21 March 2012
beacon
Thank goodness for radio broadcasts and hobbyists, I was thinking while driving to work, since larger and larger swathes of the communication spectrum is going silent. First cable made aerials unnecessary, then quite a wide plateau followed with satellites but now analogue (and seemingly approachable) are being replaced wholesale by digital channels. Of course, everything is awash in an invisible smog of cellular and wireless transmissions but those do not have a significant range nor persistence.
catagories: ๐ญ, language, networking and blogging, philosophy
Tuesday 20 March 2012
revival
catagories: graphic design, networking and blogging, technology and innovation
lend-lease or ostalgie
Possibly in anticipation of a disgruntled electorate for regional voting in May, a very polarizing and divisive idea has been offered up for public consumption by some cash-strapped communities in North-Rhine Westphalia: civic leaders argue that the Solidarity Pact tariff (DE/EN) for helping integrate the former East Germany has become redundant and they can ill-afford to make further financial contributions.
catagories: ⚒, ๐ฉ๐ช, ๐ง , economic policy
conservation of energy or green-washing
Alexander Neubacher, writing for Der Spiegel’s international section (auf Englisch), presents a clever look at trenchant German environmental policies and psyche, suggesting that outcomes are sometimes marginalized for the sake of the movement and solidarity. Though I do believe that many ecological initiatives of Germany and the inchoate care and concern for the planet’s health are positive, like indoctrinating everyone at an early age to develop sustainable practices, wind- and solar-power and preservation of natural habitats, it is interesting to explore how some aspects of environmentalism, in practice, have perhaps become counterproductive and have been victimized by their own success.
Monday 19 March 2012
litotes or meno male
There has been enough deflection in the news in recent weeks, what with the American Republican party primaries, unrest and due unwelcome in Afghanistan, general simonizing of the economy, one could rightly wonder what happened with the aegis of sovereign default that was clouding Greece, Italy and other euro-zone members. One would be forgiven, in fact, for thinking that the situation resolved itself, and the Greeks and other Occupiers have grinned and bore it through austerity and virtual deficits met a spectacular and fiery demise, greeting their anti-debt counterparts (fabricated and negotiated in kind), as if real markets and future prospects unfolded to the same morality play script, the personified Laziness and Greed versus the righteousness of the fabulists and troubadours.
catagories: ๐ช๐บ, ๐ฌ๐ท, economic policy
Sunday 18 March 2012
sinecure or pretender to the throne
While back at the Bundestag, party representatives are holding their conclave to elect the next president of the republic, heir to a mostly ceremonial office that has perhaps made a lot of members of the public and constituencies across the government weary and frustrated with the latest succession of holders of that office.
I can’t imagine that above and beyond what state authorities already contribute to maintaining Germany’s hundreds of former royal residences that much more money would be involved, not to mention discounting the politics of elevating a private citizen to public office, though there is sure to be contention and consequence over legitimacy and right to succession. Nationally and on the state level (Bavaria, like every Lander, has a minister-president and a prince von und zu Bayern, down to dukedoms, baronets, palatinates, counties, marches and fiefs), these dethroned royal families and their adherents have been prepared for this moment--not preening and conniving, I think, but just simply there and rarely does an administration come fully-formed.
catagories: ๐ฉ๐ช, ๐ช๐บ, ๐ฌ๐ง, foreign policy
Saturday 17 March 2012
cornucopian or QED
catagories: ⚕️, ๐, ๐ก, ๐งช, environment, food and drink, lifestyle
d-base or memory hole
The British tabloid The Mirror (via Boing Boing) is reporting on a proposed scheme that could virtually over- night deputize all filling stations in the UK as agents of Miniplenty: closed-circuit television cameras, already installed at gas stations in order to catch motorists who dash off rather than paying for the fuel that they have pumped, will soon be cross-referencing tax-authorities’ and insurers’ databases to make certain that each and every car is current on its obligations.
pepperland
catagories: graphic design
Thursday 15 March 2012
rico sUAVe
catagories: ๐ฅธ, America, psychology
jump back loreta or velvet underground
Friday 9 March 2012
ahoj-hoj or bohemian rhapsody
Thursday 8 March 2012
centennial
There were firsts for aviators and aviatrixes, with national air defense forces formed in earnest—and the auto-pilot came into being. Bold experimentation in the arts took place, during the active periods of the likes of Picasso, Kandinsky and Duchamp, as well as the literature of Joseph Conrad, Willa Cather, DH Lawrence, Jack London and Thomas Mann--Bertrand Russell also philosophizing and Carl Jung probing the collective unconsciousness. Some of the art and personalities seem distant and unreachable—not dismissed and forgotten, but only just so, on the advancing edge of modernity. I wonder how people might remember about 2012 and how vital those far-off ripples from our time might heave or wash-out.
catagories: ⚕️, ๐น๐ท, ๐, ๐, ๐, food and drink, philosophy, transportation
Wednesday 7 March 2012
uncanny
Surely the mad scientists in the government that have seeded the clouds with drones and brought the public dragnet surveillance have always been churning out creepy and diabolical inventions but, I guess, were made to dip their flag to publicity and P-R (or just out of pride) and put their technological achievements on display. Dexterity and upright posture are only a question of degrees and will improve, I think (barring some unknown Pinocchio principle about balance), but as with aerial drones, a robot whose mobility can outstrip man's is unsettling.
catagories: labour, lifestyle, revolution, technology and innovation
Tuesday 6 March 2012
antidote
catagories: language, networking and blogging, psychology
Monday 5 March 2012
matryoshka or flying circus
In his work about the experimental Republic, Democracy in America, Alexis de Tocqueville made the initial observation that the country was too big, diverse both in terms of territory and population, for the democratic exercise and would most probably end with monarchy.
catagories: ๐ช๐บ, economic policy, foreign policy, revolution
blue laws
catagories: ๐ช๐บ, health and medicine, lifestyle, transportation
Sunday 4 March 2012
vor ort, for you
Though I sincerely hope that it remains otherwise and the rare exception, changes in the landscape of the German jobs' market are being politicized as assaults and affronts on labour, with the same shrill cries of their American cousins. Ensuring a fair and level venue for business is one part of legislation, so is aiding those poisoned or exploited, but governments cannot outlaw poor business practices nor incessantly cushion bad decisions through subsidies and bailouts.
catagories: ⚛️, ๐ฉ๐ช, foreign policy, labour
Thursday 1 March 2012
thesaurus or go ahead, NARC yourselves out
catagories: ๐ฅธ, graphic design, networking and blogging
face the book
catagories: ๐ฅธ, networking and blogging