Pferde

Was walking back home after getting off the bus this evening and I saw a young boy (about 9 years old or so) cycling, then two youths on a moped came past blaring the horn, shouting abuse at him and deliberately trying (but failing) to knock the lad off his bike, then they sped off.  The boy wasn't hurt but he came up to me, shaking and crying, said he was scared and would I please walk him home. Home turned out to be a good 15 minutes hike away, but its a good thing I stayed with him because the youths came past again, still shouting and blaring the horn. No chance of tying to knock him off this time as I was inbetween them and the boy. The moped had no license plate on it (so definitely not insured), and neither youth was wearing a helmet. I'd happily bet a weeks wages that they were too young to have drivers licenses either.

I saw the boy to his home, had a quick word with his mum to reassure her that he was unhurt, just frightened, and offered to leave my name and phone number in case she wanted to involve the police. He reminded me of my own son.

When I was a kid I would have been out on my bike nearly all the time, and mostly my parents would have had no idea where I was, but it was safe (or at least any danger I might have been in was entirely my own doing). It's such a shame that it's not safe for kids now to be out on their bikes now, for fear that hooligans will hurt them.

Starpulse article

Why after 18 years they're finally making a sequel to Dances with Wolves, I have no idea. Unless it's because movies of the Western genre are suddenly more fashionable again. But apparently they are. And Kevin Costner has turned town the opportunity of reprieving the role of John Dunbar, so now the producers are apparently chasing Viggo Mortensen.  Which surprises me because unless the sequel story is also 18 years later, I think Vig's kind of old to be Dunbar.

Anyway. This story cropped up on my google alerts today and I am absolutely fascinated by one of the comments here. Which maybe explains WHY they're chasing Viggo for it.

Fri May 9 2008 19:27:56 By: TxRose ( 1)
Not surprising, since the book was written while the author was living in Viggo's house, the book is dedicated to Exene Cervenka (his ex-wife), and the role was originally written for Viggo. I tend to agree with Guy, though. No Costner, no movie. And even if it does get made, I would be surprised if Viggo took the role. Sloppy seconds? Thanks, but no thanks. Viggo would be awesome, of course, but IMO, not likely.

No clue if any of you will be interested in this but I'll plug it here anyway, seeing as its brand new and lacking members.

Some time ago I joined an online community called Sodahead. At first I really enjoyed it, had some really fun discussions on all sorts of topics, and made some good friends there. However lately, Sodahead has been Invaded. By children. Who want to talk about nothing but the Jonas Brothers, Miley Cyrus and other Disney Channel stuff.  And it's driving me, and many other adults on the site, round the twist.

Since SH administrators have no plans to make the site 18+ only, I have gone and made another forum. I found by chance a place called ning.com which is like a free create-your-own-social-network thing. Easy to do, no coding knowledge or paid hosting required. So I set something up as a trial and it looks pretty good.

So the idea behind the Soda Lounge is a general-discussion on any topic, for adults. The only restriction is to be 18+.  Hopefully it will show some maturity thats sadly lacking from Sodahead.

 because I'm wide a-fucking-wake with insomnia and vodka

Q. What is your wallpaper on your computer?
A screencap from Guildwars

Q. How many televisions you have in your house?
Three. I never watch any of them.

BIOLOGY

Q. Are you right-handed or left-handed?
Right

Q. Have you ever had anything removed from your body?
Only splinters

Q. What is the last heavy item you lifted?
Umm... bags of groceries

Q. Have you ever been knocked out?
Once by a cow and once by a human

BULLSHITOLOGY

Q. If it were possible, would you want to know the day you were going to die?
No

Q. If you could change your name, what would you change it to?
My first name is fine.I'd like to lose the middle name thanks.

Q. What color do you think looks best on you?
denim blue

Q. Have you ever swallowed a non-food item?
I don't think so. Maybe when very tiny, kids put all sorts of crap in their mouths.

DAREOLOGY
Q. Would you kiss a member of the same sex for $100?
easy money

Q. Would you allow one of your little fingers to be cut off for $200,000?
Yes but I'd never visit Japan again.

Q. Would you never blog again for $50,000?
No

Q. Would you pose naked in a magazine for $250,000?
Not any more

Q. Would you drink an entire bottle of hot sauce for $1000?
Yes but there better be a LOT of chilled beer for afterwards

Q. Would you, without fear of punishment, take a human life for $1,000,000?
No way

DUMBOLOGY

Q: What is in your left pocket?
Loose change

Q: Is Napoleon Dynamite actually a good movie?
No clue, never seen it

Q: Do you have hardwood or carpet in your house?
carpet

Q: Do you sit or stand in the shower?
stand

Q: How many pairs of flip flops do you own?
none

LASTOLOGY

Q: Last person who texted you?
I haven't had a text in weeks. It was probably Jack.

Q: Last person who called you?
nobody calls me. Its always for somene else

Q: Person you hugged?
Jack

FAVORITOLOGY

Q: Number?
7

Q: Season?
Summer.

Q: Color?
Blue

CURRENTOLOGY

Q: Missing someone?
So much it hurts

Q: Mood?
"want-sleep-nao-plzkthxbai"

Q: Listening to?
nothing. I already turned the music off

Q: Watching?
nothing

Q: Worrying about?
Heste

Q: Wearing?
brown jeans, grey and black stripey jumper

RANDOMOLOGY

Q: First place you went this morning?
to the store to buy milk

Q: What can you not wait to do?
go to Scotland with Heste

Q: Do you smile often?
Yeah. Even when I'm down, I smile.

Q: Are you a friendly person?
I hope so. You tell me.

all ur blogs

When SUP took over Livejournal, and there were rumours flying around about SUP being connected with the KGB, I was worried, in a sort of conspiracy-theory-paranoid sort of way. The sort where you don't actually quite believe it could possibly be true, but you daren't not believe it just in case.

News broke this week about a Russian blogger, 21-year-old Savva Terentyev, who was arrested for "hate speech" and was this week officially charged, a "crime" for which he may face a fine equivalent to half a year's annual wage for the annual Russian worker, or 2 years in jail with hard labour.

His "crime" was to make a comment (not a post, just a comment) on the Livejournal of another blogger, Boris Suranov, in which he was critical about local police. When Terentyev was arrested in August 2007 his comment was forcibly deleted (by livejournal.ru management, presumably) but a screenshot of it has been preserved here.  Not that I expect any of my friendslist read Russian, but, you know.

The website Pajamas Media reports the following response from our favourite Mr Nossik, whose position is unclear but he seems to have been at the time a very big fish in LJ.ru:

“The ignorance of local judges often plays a role in the outcome of cases connected to the internet. I hope that with many journalists present, the judge will look at the essence of the case and not simply hand down a guilty verdict.” Nosik later said: “The people who launched the criminal case are trying in this way to portray police-turned-crooks as a social group that enjoys protection from Russian legislation. It seems to me that it ought be us who are protected by the law, not crooks.”

And less than 4 months after this arrest, Livejournal.com was bought out by SUP, with Nossik as a major player somewhere in the decision-making (even though nobody can tell exactly where, right now, because "blogging evangelist" isn't much of a job description really).

It occurred to me right at the start that SUP's interest in Livejournal isn't advertising at all, it's nothing to do with business. It's purely a way to control Livejournal itself, which is by far the most popular website of any kind in Russia. Livejournal is bigger than Myspace, bigger than Facebook. Livejournal in Russia is very, very serious stuff. Now, seeing the timing of the takeover next to the timing of this very high profile case, makes me absolutely convinced of that.

Around the time of the SUP takeover, Mark Kraft, a previous employee of LJ admitted that there was code in place within Livejournal which could track when a LJ user logged on and off and which IP address they were currently connected to.

"Here's a secret that few people have talked about within LiveJournal.  Code was put into the site back when I was working for it that allowed administrators to track a user's IP address and notify administrators when they're online. It was added for the best of reasons because of a very serious criminal investigation in the US, but it could be misused by request of the Russian government if that authority and those privileges are unmonitored and that power is put into the wrong hands."

 Which means that LJ/SUP staff can tell not only when you are online but also where you are geographically (more or less). And therefore know where to send the KGB sweep to pick up the next poor Russian blogger guilty of exercising a basic human right for free speech.

And you know, anyone who says to me "Well I'm just so-n-so living in random-western-country, they aren't going to bother about me," I have just one thing to say. No they're not going to bother about YOU but are you really so selfish that you do not care about the rights of others? Livejournal under SUP scares the crap  out of me, not because I fear they might do something to me, but because of the many Russian-speaking bloggers who may find themselves in danger simply by posting their thoughts on LJ. It's them I fear for.

We welcome our new Russian Overlords.

Apparently I can crosspost to Vox and Livejournl at the same time. But, you know, I'm not going to, because I don;t want to use LJ ever again.

The most annoying thing is that semagic will not work with Vox.

So as from today - no, as from yesterday except they didn't actually announce it until after it was implemented, it is no longer possible to create a Basic account on LJ. Existing accounts remain the same but no new Basic accounts can be created. It's either see ads or pay up. They SAY it's to "streamline the registration process and make it easier" (ie "we think you're stupid") but it's plainly obvious that it's really just because they're not getting enough ad revenue.

I'll give it 6 months, max, before they decide to wipe out the basic account altogether even for existing users.

Firefox + Adblock + NoScripts = Much Love.

There is going to be another influx of users on IJ.

Totally did not expect this colour, but the description is dead on. Oh my god. Am I turning into an Emo/

Black

Your soul is painted the color black, which embodies the characteristics of modernity, formality, power, sophistication, elegance, wealth, mystery, style, anger, sadness, remorse, rebellion, loss, discord, confusion, and absorbing negativity. Black falls under the element of Earth, and symbolizes outer space and the universe, and in some cultures black represents fertility and wisdom.

http://www.quiztron.com/tests/color_is_soul_painte_quiz_31920.htm

Okay I admit I went to bed late, it was a little after 1.30am. But then I laid awake in bed for another 2.5 hours before finally dropping off to sleep. When I did though, I slept a good solid six hours, which is almost enough. It just annoys me that the day is half over before it starts.

I also have this nagging feeling that there's something I'm meant to be doing, or have done, and I've forgotten it.