Autore: paolo

lectio difficilior

back in high school i was keen (not always) to go for the lectio difficilior, i.e. to make it short : the less likely interpretation of something, a translation or a text. to a greater extent i find out that i may tend to follow the less beaten track, not the main or most popular one, again, not always : heck, i’m using IE5.5. on Win pc 😉 so no wonders that this may lead (but not necessarily) to days like this one that i’d easily label borrowing the title of a Ben Harper song : just another lonely day . no i’m not whining or venting about that. and as a matter of fact i’m heading out for a ride with my mountain bike (while most of the people considering the 90+ F degrees out there and the humidity would go to a swimming pool), yeah i’m a little masochistic too

just realized indeed that with that version of the browser in my pocket pc you can post but not publish, well considering it’d be comparable to an old IE 3x that’s a limit

amazingly enough i’m blogging this from my compaq ipaq 3630 connected via ir to a nokia 6210 cell phone : tech wonders!

SF part II : when dreams come true
Got back home and found an Amazon box containing among other interesting reading and music : Shadows of the Past by Melanie Franciere . Now you may say, well so what’s the amazing story ? Well let me say that things are different when you know the author of something and when you know the not so easy path that sometimes it takes to get your art known to an audience. We met in a newsgroup long time ago, in 1996 and kept in touch since then, we met also in real life in 1999 when i went visiting her in the USA. During all the time she told how difficult is to publish a book and how she wished it, and i can imagine it’s frustrating when you just enjoy writing (and my opinion she’s really good at) and can’t get people to share with you your passion.

She writes science fiction stories, and even if as i was writing, i’m not at all an expert in that genre, (SF is not so popular in Europe and especially in Italy) i found that story intriguing and well written, that was my impression when i first got the chance to read the draft back in 1997 and now that i’m holding the book in my hands i’m just happy for her, so if you’re into SF and want to check it out, just follow the links above.

SF part I

just finished reading The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams, i’ve to admit that in the past when i was walking in a library and stumbled across a book with such a weird title was curious to see what’s about and it’s just fun, i’m not an expert in science fiction and this book althought belong to the genre is somewhat different mostly because of the irony spread here and there and there are some passages where i just couldn’t but laugh and when it happens when you’re in reading it on my daily commuting on train it’s hard to refrain.
And so i discovered also that at least two names origin come from there : babelfish from a tiny fish that plugged into the ear was able to translate different languages and the song “paranoid android” by Radiohead from the only depressed android character i’ve ever found in a SF story.

ping : ack

at least it’s over

so G8 is over, and as i was saying the overall sense is somewhat in between nausea and disgust in the name of violence : even on saturday night ,when we’d think that most of the war scenes were impressed in our eyes and we’re ready to turn page, after the beautiful words of peace and compassion that the father of Carlo Giuliani told after his young son was killed by the police, police attached the headquarters of the genoa social forum they said that the troublemakers that damaged the city were covered by this umbrella group that encompass a lot of peaceful organization.
A lot of mess and blood again. Someone instead says that the violent groups were backed by the police itself in order to deliberately make chaos, where’s the truth ? as someone said “in war the first casualty is truth” but besides the true facts, the approach, the violent environment that was created the brutal repression that doesn’t care to look who you’re, is somewhat that should make us wonder on what’s going on in this country.

Goodbye Indro

Indro Montanelli, one of the most famous italian journalist died today, he was 92 yo so he well saw and told all the most significant facts of the century. he was someone who doesn’t need to hide beside masks or influence of the power, and whenever there was something to be said he said it loud and so often found himself “against” something. He clearly opposed the current prime minister, mr. Berlusconi, that was the owner of the newspaper where he worked and that when he announced he wanted to enter politics wanted some support from the newspaper and Montanelly left. I appreciated his style and his attitude, and the fact that sometimes he was truly discouraged by the way things are in Italy reinforce his critic eye on the world.