Livin' the life...

I love photos, they tell exciting stories and capture a moment in time forever. Here are a few photos that a writer says, "Changed the world".

Just a few songs I like..

The Hoosiers - Worried About Ray

Rihanna - Don't Stop The Music

Kate Nash - Foundations

Basshunter - Now You're Gone

Blue October - Into the Ocean

(These links were all working at the time of this post but we all know how that goes. :\)

After seeing the poster I did guess that this was another "Scary movie"-like film and therefore, really should have avoided it! However, I am such an avid fan of 300, I simply HAD to watch its parody in Meet the Spartans.

But, as with the two Scary Movie films I watched (1 and 2), it left me totally disappointed. Rather than making me laugh, a great deal of it just seemed offensive and poorly done - also come on! A dance off?? A "yo momma" competition?? (n)!

In general, the movie mostly relied on vulgarity, especially "strong language", and anything that seemed even remotely "funny" to the writers/directors/producers.

But, to be honest, I did not expect much.. either from the movie itself, or from the 13 great Spartan warriors Spartans who set out to defend their homeland against the invading Persians (whose ranks include Ghost Rider, Rocky Balboa, and a hunchbacked Paris).

Rating: 3/10. The plot gave it that high score.

"The biggest earthquake in the UK for nearly 25 years has shaken homes across large parts of England.

People in Newcastle, Yorkshire, London, Manchester, the Midlands and Norfolk and also parts of Wales, felt the tremor just before 0100 GMT.

A man suffered leg injuries when a chimney collapsed in South Yorkshire.

The British Geological Survey (BGS) said the epicentre of the 5.3 magnitude quake was near Market Rasen in Lincolnshire.

Bev Finnegan, who lives in the town, said: "I was terrified to be honest. The noise was really, really terrifying... it was so deep and rumbling.

"It felt like the roof was going to fall in. There were people coming out in their dressing gowns wondering what it was. It was quite an experience. ..." (BBC News)

Well, this morning I heard people calling in to the local radio station saying that the earthquake woke them up as well. I however slept straight through! Maybe I was too tired.. Studying is a hard job you know!

Anyway, BBC News also has some video coverage of the quake and also the reaction of residents here.

Here's an note-worthy article on Portals (eg. Yahoo!) in a "Web 2.0" World.

Abstract..

"Web 2.0 refers primarily to two major paradigm shifts in the way people use the Web: thin client computing and user-generated content. The portal plays a pivotal role in both areas. In thin client computing, data and applications are stored on Web servers, and a user has access from any computer via a Web browser, thus turning the Web into a gigantic application server -- a penultimate manifestation of Web 2.0." Full story here.

For this week I'd like you to approach life and all its challenges with the following attitude:

I can't, but GOD can.

Have a great week and tell me how it goes! Also, I'm sorry this post is late - ideally it would have been done on Sunday - but I was a bit busy but I also could not find anything that appealed to me soo much that I could share it with you. Finally, I thank Jamel for bringing this lovely quote to my attention, :-)!

Take care and God bless.

Three days ago I posted about an article on some students in Barbados that were "Expelled because of their hairstyles". The following excerpt is a follow-up to that article, and I think it's just as good a read as the original article itself!

"MINISTER OF EDUCATION Ronald Jones is hinting that the new Education Act will take into consideration the now controversial issue of appropriate hairstyles for school, which is currently left to the interpretation of administrators.

He said the new act and new regulations would be presented to Parliament as soon as the necessary review of the current act and accompanying regulations had been completed.

One interpretation saw five students being barred from classes at the Samuel Jackman Prescod Polytechnic (SJPP) last week for wearing locks. But, deputy principal Merton Forde said the students would be allowed back in school if they presented documents proving they were part of the Rastafari faith.

..

He cautioned that it was impossible for the act to cover everything and, of necessity, it must still be general.

"Common sense always must dictate what we do. Even though there are laws written down, common sense must [prevail] in circumstances such as those that confronted the administration at the school . . . . There must always be general terms used in education, because from the time you start to demarcate, you're into a whole long troublesome process," he argued.

He said he was "puzzled" by the SJPP development, because the students would have been in school for seven months with the locks and it only became an issue last week [Even I picked up on this one; see the last paragraph of my previous post].

..

Minister Jones told the DAILY NATION last Thursday that as far as he was aware, all five students should have been back in school.

"One could not understand, or for that matter appreciate, the argument that a citizen of Barbados must bring any kind of document to any institution, asking them to prove if they belong to any religion, caste, sex or creed.

"That is trampling on a person's civil rights [and] their religious rights, their democratic rights in our society, which holds up the individual as paramount, even though within the confines of the law. And there should not be any law in any educational institution which debars young people from getting an education," he stated. " (Ref)

Wow! Well that surely is a mouthful! And a thought-provoking one indeed! I wonder what the repercussions are in store, if any! And also how far-reaching they will be eg. will Secondary schools have a more relaxed hairstyle rules?

I wonder...

Cooking Experiment #3..

In the pot	Pre-oven shot
Straight out of the oven!	Ah Fini!

Enough said!

I rarely post stories from Barbados (because it's a bit harder to keep up with the news!) but this one I found quite interesting. Please note that for this post I used the heading directly from the NationNews article (except they incorrectly spelt "hairstyle" as "hairsyle"), even though I am of the persuasion that the word "expel" may not have been used accurately. Anyway, the story!

"THE FIVE MALE STUDENTS of the Samuel Jackman Prescod Polytechnic (SJPP) barred from classes because of dreadlock hairstyles are questioning why there is nothing in their student handbook on hairstyles.

Two of the affected men, Carlos Adams, 22, and Damien Weekes, 24, who spoke to the SATURDAY SUN yesterday in The City, said there was nothing in the handbook which spoke to their hairstyles. They showed Page 3 of the handbook which states:

"The SJPP appreciates and values diversity in all forms and does not discriminate on the basis of race; sexual orientation; nationality; religion; disability; ethnicity; political orientation; colour; social status or family background."

However, the same handbook states that rules and regulations of the SJPP could change at any time without public notice.

"The SJPP reserves the right to alter, without notice, any of the regulations and policies stated in this publication," it is stated on Page 3. " (Ref)

Two questions/issues here: (a) At the UWI, are there such hairstyle regulations? I'm not sure but I do not think so. Can anyone clarify this? And (b), this "rules and regulations of the SJPP could change at any time without public notice" statement is just perfect for admin and is a tool used in many organisations. However, noting that students have been at the polytechnic for a year but are now being informed of this, are we to assume it's a NEW rule? I wonder...

"Firefox just reached 500,000,000 downloads. This is an absolutely phenomenal milestone for Firefox. It is sort of hard to imagine what that number means. For some perspective, that’s roughly the audience size of 10,000 Rome Colosseums combined. It would be the weight, in kilograms, of 8,500 Boeing 747 airplanes. In dollars, for $500 million you and 15 of your friends can fly to the International Space Station." (Ref)

Congrats!! (Let's try not to focus too much on unique downloads though folks!)

Well I had more ingredients left over from Experiment #1, so I figured, why not have another go! This time however, I took the opportunity to use a different 'main', as you'll see from the snapshots below. I think this one is a wee bit more traditional Stir-fry.

And how did I do? In my opinion and the opinion of a friend who dinned with me, it was quite nice! The only hitch I encountered was that I think I overcooked the noodles slightly! To be honest, I lost track of them whilst watching the veggies! Next time I'll keep a better eye and maybe a lower stove!

By the way, thanks for your help S! It was much appreciated!

Now! That's quite enough for Stir-fry! What next! Any suggestions for something to tackle? Then again.. I think I have an idea ..

Maybe missing an "if ($unread > 1)" statement somewhere Yahoo!?

Tonight is so cold it really is amazing. I rang a friend in B'dos and told her it was about 2/3°C in UK and she just laughed and laughed, then boasted that it was probably 28°C in Bim!

Anyway! Below is a bit of the forecast for tomorrow (nope, doesn't seem like it gets much better!). What I would like to highlight the most is that it can be BRIGHT and SUNNY outside yet still be an icebox! (For newcomers to UK beware of this! Don't look outside, see the sun and blue skies and think baggies and plain white Ts!) See 9am especially!

Luckily, I'm home for that part!

(Forecast taken from the BBC Weather web site.)

"Jason, at least on Sundays, you should have a proper, filling, cooked meal!" These the words often uttered to me by my beloved parents. So being the nice son I am.. this Sunday I decided to go all out! I popped into the local Tescos and came up with the brilliant idea to make my first official Cooking Experiment/Masterpiece a stir-fry! And well.. the rest,  as they say, is History! Below are two photos of the finished product.

Stir-fry in wok	Stir-fry close up

And yes, it did taste pretty good, it even shocked me at first! Hey, anyone willing to guess the (main) ingredients?

Don't be fooled by "Doubt"! We're under God's promise! :-) Have a great day!

Time for a refresher of sorts. This post mainly acts as an update to previous posts.

Documented civilian deaths from violence: 81,269 – 88,720

The preceding statistics were taken from the Iraq Body Count web site, or more specifically, this page.

A few nights ago I finally got around to seeing this highly spoken of film - namely I Am Legend - and for me, three words sum it up - not worth it.

There just seemed to be a lack of real depth to the story and at times I honestly could not tell if I was watching Resident Evil or not!

Mr. Smith's performance in general was OK but the movie, to me, did not do his talent justice. If you compare this movie to another one, such as I, Robot, I'm sure you will agree.

All-in-all, as I said, this movie was disappointing. On the bright side though, I like the official website. Well done!

"2008-02-12: Ten years ago, on 10 February 1998, W3C published Extensible Markup Language (XML) 1.0 as a W3C Recommendation. W3C is marking the ten-year anniversary of XML by celebrating "XML10" and extending thanks to the dedicated communities -- including people who have participated in W3C's XML groups and mailing lists, the SGML community, and xml-dev -- whose efforts have created a successful family of technologies based on the solid XML 1.0 foundation. The success of XML is a strong indicator of how dedicated individuals, working within the W3C Process, can engage with a larger community to produce industry-changing results. "Today we celebrate the success of open standards in preserving Web data from proprietary ownership," said Jon Bosak, who led the W3C Working Group that produced XML 1.0." (Ref)

Congrats! To consider it for only a moment, the amount of 'languages' and specifications that are based on, and associated with XML these days (RSS, Atom, SOAP, XACML, ebXML to name a few) is nothing short of astounding. And to think that XML's not done there either, as it also seems a key component in the realisation of the Semantic Web dream! This definitely has been one of the greatest "giant" steps in technology specs for a while!

There was a little boy visiting his grandparents on their farm. He was given a slingshot to play with out in the woods. He practiced in the woods; but he could never hit the target. Getting a little discouraged, he headed back for dinner.

As he was walking back he saw Grandma's pet duck. Just out of impulse, he let the slingshot fly, hit the duck square in the head and killed it. He was shocked and grieved! In a panic, he hid the dead duck in the wood pile; only to see his sister watching! Sally had seen it all, but she said nothing After lunch the next day Grandma said, "Sally, let's wash the dishes" But

Sally said, "Grandma, Johnny told me he wanted to help in the kitchen." Then she whispered to him, "Remember the duck?" So Johnny did the dishes. Later that day, Grandpa asked if the children wanted to go fishing and Grandma said, "I'm sorry but I need Sally to help make supper."

Sally just smiled and said, "Well that's all right because Johnny told me he wanted to help" She whispered again, "Remember the duck?" So Sally went fishing and Johnny stayed to help.

After several days of Johnny doing both his chores and Sally's; he finally couldn't stand it any longer.

He came to Grandma and confessed that he had killed the duck. Grandma knelt down, gave him a hug and said, "Sweetheart, I know. You see, I was standing at the window and I saw the whole thing, but because I love you, I forgave you. I was just wondering how long you would let Sally make a slave of you."

Thought for the day and every day thereafter?

Whatever is in your past, whatever you have done... and the devil keeps throwing it up in your face (lying, cheating, debt, fear, bad habits, hatred, anger, bitterness, etc.)...whatever it is...You need to know that God was standing at the window and He saw the whole thing. He has seen your whole life. He wants you to know that He loves you and that you are forgiven.

He's just wondering how long you will let the devil make a slave of you.

The great thing about God is that when you ask for forgiveness; He not only forgives you, but He forgets. It is by God's grace and mercy that we are saved.

Go ahead and make the difference in someone's life today. Share this with a friend and always remember:
God is at the window!

When Jesus died on the cross; he was thinking of you!

(That was excellent. Thanks J!)

This is a follow-up story to my original MicroHoo? post.

"SAN FRANCISCO - Yahoo Inc.'s board will reject Microsoft Corp.'s $44.6 billion takeover bid after concluding the unsolicited offer undervalues the slumping Internet pioneer, a person familiar with the situation said Saturday.

The decision could provoke a showdown between two of the world's most prominent technology companies with Internet search leader Google Inc. looming in the background. Leery of Microsoft expanding its turf on the Internet, Google already has offered to help Yahoo avert a takeover and urged antitrust regulators to take a hard look at the proposed deal." [Continue reading...]

They say that a picture is worth a thousand words, so I think I will let the pictures speak for themselves.

So thank you all for that, and I also thank the other people for their best wishes on my "big" day. :-)

(By the way, does T.G.I. Friday's in Barbados serve this? And is it - i.e. the portions - comparable? It would be interesting to find out.. Anyone know?)

Well, today is certainly a milestone of sorts for me! (And NO, I AM NOT 50! :\) Anyways, happy birthday old chap! Thank God He's let me reach another year. ! Wait.. surely we can't have a birthday without the song! *eh hem*..

Ok.. that was not very .. "manly" but it was the best vid I could find!! (Thanks Grey Worldwide!) Ways, have a good day all! And I hope the weekend is great as well!

Well, we're all entitled to an opinion and here is one person's take on the 10 Best-designed web sites in the world! To be fair though, he also does give some fairly decent reasons!

• Apple.com
• Mozilla.com
• Iconbuffet.com
• Boldchat.com
• Circografico.com.ar
• Enhancedlabs.com
• Protolize.org
• Bearskinrug.co.uk
• Corkd.com
• Sumagency.com

For me, I do agree with most however Boldchat... not so much. :\ If I were to swap that with something, I'm tempted to drop in Yahoo! - even though I do think it is about time they do a redesign. I say Yahoo! mainly because of the amount of content they have available and how well they designed the layout and present it. One other aspect I appreciate is their largely unobtrusive integration of ads (especially in the narrow layout).

At some point in time though, I think I'll try to pull together a Top 10 of my own.. Hmm, only problem is, I probably only visit about 10-15 sites! :\ lol! Anyway, let me know what you people think! Is this person crazy or what? I think Apple.com is a must for all Top 10 lists. Surely we concur on that?!

"3D Realms president Scott Miller commits to a new Forever release date after 11 long years of delays and beating around the bush. Xbox 360, PS3, and PC versions being planned." (Ref)

If you've known me for any extended period of time, you would know that in my "gaming life", there has only been ONE GAME, that has EVER, captivated me to enormous proportions. That game is Duke Nukem. I honestly enjoyed playing that game SO much, I could do it for hours. And, when I found out you could download maps, and also play with friends online, !!! Well, you can imagine what happened.

The thing is though, all that stuff that I mentioned above, happened between the years of 1999-2004; so in essence, quite a while ago! More recently I had tried playing one of the newer versions of Duke - Manhattan Project to be exact - but I didn't like it too much.. (To me, it seemed very much a 2d-ish game where you largely go back and forward. Also, I found it a bit difficult to find exactly where you need to go to get accessories/keys and finish the stage. I do take the point though that Duke was always like that, however, now it's much more complicated!) So now,  with this news, I have Forever to look forward too! That is one demo I'll definitely be giving a go!

Very lately I have actually been considering purchasing a game - you know just for 'fun' - and since I've tried Ghost Recon on Xbox, that has jumped to the TOP of my "desired" list! I can thank my flatmates for that one! Anyway, I'll postpone the decision until I give this 2008 release of Duke Nukem Forever a shot! If it's anything like the Duke Nukem 3D of the old days - of course with better graphics, and game play! - that may just edge out Tom Clancy's army-based blockbuster. taa!

By the way, here's the Official Duke Nukem Forever Teaser!

Here's a short history lesson on Ash Wednesday (which is 6 February - today - this year)..

"Ash Wednesday is the beginning of Lent for Western Christian churches. It's a day of penitence to clean the soul before the Lent fast. .. The service draws on the ancient Biblical traditions of covering one's head with ashes, wearing sackcloth, and fasting. ..

In Ash Wednesday services churchgoers are marked on the forehead with a cross of ashes as a sign of penitence and mortality. .. The minister or priest marks each worshipper on the forehead, and says remember you are dust and unto dust you shall return, or a similar phrase based on God's sentence on Adam in Genesis 3:19." (Ref)

For more info visit here or over there. And, as would be expected, Crosswalk has a nice Lent 101 article for the season.

Many thanks to 'Your Pastoral Coach' for the image used in this post.

Just saw this article on Yahoo! and found it a bit of a 'wake-up call' on the features - or lack there of - of the new, highly regarded MacBook Air. Here's a snippet from the story:

"Here's a look at the accessories you'll need, and their price. Hope you put some extra money aside.

USB Hub (Varies): Apple is anything but generous when it comes to extra USB ports, so I'm not surprised the MacBook Air only has one. ...

Ethernet Adapter ($29): One thing that won't be practical when you travel is the lack of an ethernet jack on the MacBook Air. ...

MacBook Air SuperDrive ($99): The MacBook Air doesn't have an optical drive which makes it impossible to download software or watch movies on your computer. ... " (Ref)

So, yep, it does lack some stuff but if you want them, no problem! As is said above, just add those accessory prices to the $3,098.00 ( ) price tag of the 13-inch 1.8GHz (Ref) and you'll be set!

There is a reason Jesus said, "Assuredly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will by no means enter it" (Mark 10:15). Check the clip below.

A real tear-jerker..  Have a blessed day! (Thanks for the tip M!)

"May 4, 2007 -- Stung by the loss of Internet advertising firm DoubleClick to Google last month, Microsoft has intensified its pursuit of a deal with Yahoo!, asking the company to re-enter formal negotiations, The Post has learned.

While Microsoft and Yahoo! have held informal deal talks over the years, sources say the latest approach signals an urgency on Microsoft's part that has up until now been lacking.

The new approach follows an offer Microsoft made to acquire Yahoo! a few months ago, sources said. But Yahoo! spurned the advances of the Redmond, Wash.-based software giant. Wall Street sources put a roughly $50 billion price tag on Yahoo!. ..." (Ref)

February 1, 2008 - "Unable to topple Google Inc. on its own, Microsoft Corp. is trying to force crippled rival Yahoo Inc. into a shotgun marriage, with a wager worth nearly $42 billion that the two companies together will have a better chance of tackling the Internet search leader.

Microsoft's audacious attempt to buy Yahoo, spelled out in an unsolicited offer announced Friday, shows just how much Google threatens the world's largest software maker's grip on how people interact with computers. ...

Forrester Research analyst Charlene Li expects Yahoo to resist, predicting the company "will do everything possible to stay independent," even if it means swallowing its pride and rehiring Google to run its search engine and sell ads on its site. ...

Google already controls 62 percent of the worldwide search market, and has been widening its lead, according to the latest data from comScore Media Metrix. By combining, Microsoft and Yahoo would have a 16 percent share of the worldwide search market, the Web traffic tracking company said. ...

The fate of Yahoo's brand also is unclear if Microsoft takes over. Both Ballmer and Kevin Johnson, president of Microsoft's platforms and services division, hailed Yahoo's strong brand value but did not commit to keeping the name alive." (Ref)

Tomorrow -  Who knows? Definitely, to be continued.