Tuesday 31 August 2010
celtic tiger
One unintended result of economic rescue-breathing, however, may be becoming apparent there, besides our overwhelming selection of venues. There is an over-abdundance, as well, in the bigger towns of hotels--zombie establishments, as Bloomberg reports. Despite decreased demand for room, many resort hotels and guesthouses remain open but as vertible ghost towns, since hotelliers would be more indebted should they give up the business, shutter it because they would have to remit those stimulus funds that put them in business in the first place, taxing a lost enterprise. Empty hotels compete with lower and lower rates and make it impossible for businesses that would be otherwise healthy to turn a profit. This is all interesting--how one's tourist buck affects this macro-miasma--but we are more focused on exploring more of the country, whose charm will surely be able to withstand this sort of contrived catastrophy.
catagories: ๐ฎ๐ช, economic policy, labour, travel
pax romana
catagories: economic policy, graphic design
Sunday 29 August 2010
tarnhelm or with my sword and magic helmet
catagories: health and medicine
Friday 27 August 2010
bacchanalia
My mother found an excellent wine-service, a pitcher, for us, decorated with the face of Bacchus and grape leaves. I agree with H that it seems rather technical with the thumb-screw but the frame holds a bottle of wine perfectly secure and one could pour from this comfortably and neatly.
Given the general flimsiness and shoddy construction of most modern accessories, like plastic containers whose lids are ill-fitting, shirts that loose buttons, paperclips malleable enough to make an argument against recycling, or bag clips that develop a severe under-bite, one becomes unaccustomed to working with something that is perfectly designed, solid and ergonomically correct, like a fine writing instrument and not a pair of scissors embossed "LEFTY" treated as if they could be the perfect synthesis of form and function. I was equally impressed and someone struggling not to compliment dexterity when I found a nice old silver pair of sugar tongs, which grasped a sugar cube with a minimum of extra pressure and no effort.
catagories: food and drink, lifestyle
Thursday 26 August 2010
coyote savvy or chicken little
catagories: ๐ฅธ, America, economic policy, networking and blogging
Wednesday 25 August 2010
leechcraft
They seem like sensible and common enough experiences--shared to the extent I am sure I was not the first to make that mistake, but I suppose not intelligibly communicable until one experiences it for ones self. A battery of tests, including an MRI that was a strange and artistic experience, isolated among the sounds of laser blasts and techno whale music, and an ultrasound scan on the veins in my neck eliminated the most dire causes. The physcian admitted to me that 90% of the time, they never know what causes these things before discharging me the next day. I just never though a series of mundane irritants could mimic--at least what I imagine it to be--the feeling of something scarier and much worse. A panic attack, and I hope I am using the proper terminology, is by no means something innocent, and neither are the underlying anxieties and vulnerabilities that invite it in.
catagories: ⚕️
Monday 23 August 2010
mรคtzchen
Further, it is just like with the fancy transaction authorization number (TAN) generator calculators, which are meant to phase out mailing bank customers lists when they ran out of secure numbers. The calculator works out a supposedly unbreakable random number by reading the magnetic stripe on one's bank cards. This sounds to me like the algorithm that solves every Sudoku puzzle and takes the fun out of it. Some banks are forcing this on their clients, but these gadgets were a bit premature, since Germany is now moving, maybe as a result of more outside influences and in response to the wishes of the US to monitor transactions for terrorist activity, to adopt standardized SWIFT banking parameters for their accounts and banking identification numbers (Bankleitzahlen--BLZ). If the numbers can that drastically, I am sure those calculators will be useless and the banks will be obligated to buy a whole new batch of them.
Sunday 22 August 2010
unterhaltung
glass bottom boat
This manor, when my parents first discovered it in the 70s, had been abandoned for 180 years and had fallen into disrepair. My mother wanted to buy the neglected property, if she could, back then. The gardens and grounds were impressive, and there was a water cascade, like the one at Linderhof, overlooking the artificial lake, that had a very ornate depiction of the exploits of Hercules. I could make out the poor Nemean Lion and the foul birds and the golden apples, and Hercules being crowned by the Goddess of Fame. I remember Hercules did not get credit for all these labours because he took short-cuts, like cleaning the dirty stables--he had help of two Rivers, here represented as the Main and Pegnitz, and as a result was assigned a harder task.
Thursday 19 August 2010
al Kaboom
catagories: ๐, foreign policy, Middle East, revolution, Wikipedia
Wednesday 18 August 2010
rain dance or come Josephine in my weather machine
catagories: ๐ญ, ๐ฅธ, foreign policy
Monday 16 August 2010
sola fide
catagories: ๐ฉ๐ช, ✝️, Thรผringen
Sunday 15 August 2010
tagesblatt
Thursday 12 August 2010
dact and re-dact
Wednesday 11 August 2010
letterboxing
naukograd
Tuesday 10 August 2010
tarpaulin
catagories: America, economic policy, Star Wars
Monday 9 August 2010
vini, vidi
catagories: America, Europe, foreign policy, transportation, travel
Friday 6 August 2010
hen party or turkey in the straw
Environmental soundness, above and beyond keeping the alive and sustainable for future spending, will be the biggest thing going and will soon outpace the military-industrial complex and defence spending. Big Green, however, I hope would be incorporated on more sound and friendlier principles and not exploited as a means to influence and orchestrate sovereignty and choice. It took businesses eons to froth up the clout to dicate policy to people and governments, and I hope that genuine ecological stewardship won't be abused in the same way. Some augeries that world economies are verging towards a period of deflation. The scholarly embellishments that go with a seemingly simple direction are very ornate, like a wind-rose. Among other things, like making money worth more, deflation also, because it dampens the collective risks and rumours of risks that dissuade people from saving and expend their nervous energies on chancy schemes, could put an end to the gossip and back-biting.
Wednesday 4 August 2010
mass-transit
Tuesday 3 August 2010
pen-pals
Currently, the FBI's top investigative priorities are:
1.Protect the United States from terrorist attack
2.Protect the United States against foreign intelligence operations and espionage
3.Protect the United States against cyber-based attacks and high-technology crimes
4.Combat public corruption at all levels
5.Protect civil rights
6.Combat transnational/national criminal organizations and enterprises
7.Combat major white-collar crime
8.Combat significant violent crime
9.Support federal, state, local and international partners
10.Upgrade technology for successful performance of the FBI's mission.
In August 2007, the top categories of lead criminal charges resulting from FBI investigations were:
1.Bank robbery and incidental crimes (107 charges)
2.Drugs (104 charges)
3.Attempt and conspiracy (81 charges)
4.Material involving sexual exploitation of minors (53 charges)
5.Mail fraud – frauds and swindles (51 charges)
6.Bank fraud (31 charges)
7.Prohibition of illegal gambling businesses (22 charges)
8.Fraud by wire, radio, or television (20 charges)
9.Hobbs Act (Robbery and extortion affecting interstate commerce) (17 charges)
10.Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO)-prohibited activities (17 charges)
There seems to be a bit of a disconnect, and I doubt that deputizing every second US citizen as a spy and informant and being able to comprehensively and seemlessly babysit every hobgoblin could result in a decisive victory over terrorism. How was public corruption fought or civil rights protected? After all, it was not the work of a glamourous, glancing of Hollywood agent that foiled the Shoe Bomber or the Underpants Bomber but the slight viligance, attentiveness of the passenger sitting next to them.
double-rainbow