What the Internet is for...

I had a short conversation with someone recently that went something like this:

Them: Well, they say most of what's on the Internet is porn.
Me: Have "they" seen how many recipe sites are out there?

I would be interested in seeing the comparative statistics on that at some point - just how much of the internet is porn and how much is cooking and craft. I think it would be a pretty close call.

Avoidance tactics

Just to put things in context: I'm supposed to be working on a referencing guide for Harvard.

We need a shop on campus which sells sushi.
I'd eat sushi for lunch all the time if there was a shop on campus and I didn't have to drive somewhere to get it.
It could just serve sushi and ramen - quick stuff that can just take a minute to throw together.
That reminds me, I don't know what ramen is, exactly.
I've been guessing.
Must confirm.
Wikipedia.
Ah, noodle soup.
Thought it was something like that.
We could have a shop in the student mall that does quick sushi and ramen easily.
They can go in the old post office or something.
I wonder how hard it would be to start up a Japanese fast food joint?
Have to hire a decent sushi person from somewhere.
No point having a sushi joint if the sushi's no good.
Could we convince one of the current Japanese take-outs in town to open a mini outlet?
If I had a quick-and-easy Japanese sushi bar I'd call it "Jaapani Söök".
Why did I say that?
What language was that one - oh, yeah, Estonian.
Hmm, wonder if naming my sushi bar "Japanese Food" in Estonian is intrinsicly amusing enough, or if I need a reason to put the two concepts together?
Estonia - Japan.
Japan - Estonia.
The latest food craze: Estonian Japanese Fusion.
Sushi with smoked Baltic herring and pickled cabbage as ingredients.
Could work.
Sashimi with head cheese as a side dish.
Not so much.
Sashimi works well with chips - I've done that before - and Estonians love potatoes...
Maybe have the Japanese and Estonian food on the same menu, but not on the same plate (unless someone asks for it).
Maybe just have the legends of Kalev decorated in a Japanese brush-work style around the room.
Something involving pearl barley and tuna?
This is a stupid idea.
I wonder what John Fiorelli is doing these days?
"Okay, John Fiorelli!"
Hey - it's actually "John Fiorella"!
Whoops.
Hunh, I've been getting that wrong for years.
I still like the way "John Fiorelli" sounds though - good name.

I have discovered the answer: Spreading German

Aha! I knew there would be a simple answer to the German problem. At least, I was hoping there would be, because eventually I'm going to need to have my system messages converted into English again.

Turns out that, when you use the Regional Language settings to add the keyboard sets for other languages, you have to remember to reset the language settings to English in that particular menu. If you don't, it assumes you want the default language settings for the computer to be in whatever you last selected.

IE and Firefox don't seem to care about what the computer's language preferences are set to, but Chrome pays closer attention. And, while Microsoft Office programs don't change their menus to match the system settings, they do change their automated content such as dates and number configurations.

This is why I noticed Chrome going all-out German before I picked up on the fact that it was more of a system-wide thing.

I have now fixed the computer at the reference desk, but I'm going to leave my own computer in German for the time being. I'm coping reasonably well at present, and it's always good to spend some quality time in the language environment of your target language.

Maybe I'll switch it into Estonian for next week...

Here's a picture of a marmoset:



No reason.

Zombie Alert!

The National Zombie Watch has reported a fresh outbreak of zombies in South-East Victoria, which seems to be travelling north along the coast, following the low pressure system off the cape.

This marks the fourth zombie outbreak to effect the south-east of the country in the past year, and residents are urged to stay vigilent. Although previous zombie outbreaks have not reached the plague proportions predicted by the NZW, people are reminded that it is important to avoid becoming indifferent to the threat of zombie infestation.

"It is tempting to say, 'oh, it's just zombies again', but you can't just assume that the zomie apocalypse won't happen to your family simply because you weren't caught up in any of the previous zombie waves," NSW spokesperson Nick Michels said at the press conference. "We can't allow ourselves to become lax when it comes to zombies."

The last major zombie infestation to sweep through Australia was the Queensland Zombie Plague of 1978, in which the entire south-east sector of the state was abandonned to the undead for approximately three years, until the plague died out. The National Zombie Watch hopes that such an extreme outbreak of zombies will never effect an Australian state or Territory again.

"Families need to establish a zombie survival plan," Michels stated at the press conference. "Most zombies will eventually rot and die as long as they don't have any fresh food. Decide in advance whether you are going to stay or leave. If you are going to stay, remember to make sure your home is zombie safe, have plenty of tinned food and bottled water and a good supply of napalm cannisters. If you leave, please do so long before the zombies are reported in your town. Once the zombies have come, you really should stay and defend."

Zombie protection kits can be obtained from any ambulance station throughout the country.

Background Photo / Open Air Museum

Just mucking about with the template because I can.

The background photo was taken at the Open Air Museum in Tallinn, which was one of the highlights of my trip to Estonia last year.

I thoroughly recommend it to anyone who is thinking of travelling through Eastern Europe at any point.

Mind you, I had some difficulty explaining the concept of an open air museum to a friend of mine recently.

You see, it's a museum of buildings and farms - as in, the actual buildings and gardens are the "objects" in the museum. It's brilliant - they grabbed old buildings from all over the country, took them apart, moved them to the museum and put them back together again.

It took a few goes to explain to my friend that I was talking about real buildings sitting in a park. It's such a brilliant concept, but one that we're not so familiar with here in Australia.

The Open Air Musuem has something of an extra significance for me, as well. I was standing next to one of the buildings, reading the sign, when my personal language goals cemented into place. You see, all of the signs in the OAM are in Estonian, English, German and Russian. I was looking at this sign, trying to make out the few words I knew of the three non-English languages, when I realised I didn't want to just play with these languages - I wanted to be able to read them, dammit. I want to be able to go back to the museum in a few years time capable of reading the entire sign - all four languages. Maybe, by the time I'm there again, I'll be able to do it.

It's spreading

Hmmm.

At first it was rather amusing, now I'm starting to get nervous.

Remember how my Google Chrome browser suddenly decided to switch my entire language environment to German? Remember how I said I was going to leave it like that and see if it switched itself back?

Not only has it not switched itself back, but the German is spreading.

I just noticed a couple of options in a drop-down menu on IE were offered in German (although the rest of them were in English, so that was odd) and another programme I use, Spark, had also switched it's language settings to German without instruction.

Not only that, but one of the programmes at the reference desk had also switched to German without being prompted.

Now, I'm willing to swear an affadavit that the only language settings I have changed on either computer in the last few months has been to add the German and Estonian character sets as keyboard options.

As far as I know, this is a normal function of computers and should not be encouraging the electronic world around me to spontaneously alter my language environments.

So what's with all the German?

Have I suddenly caught some sort of computer zoonosis that is causing me to spread German wherever I go?

Gold for Australia!

Man, these Commonwealth Games suck!

I know it seems a bit strange to complain about my country winning medals, but seriously! Have you seen the medal tally?

Australia has twice the number of medals as India and is practically wiping the floor with Brittain and Canada. The other countries seem to be competing as some sort of rent-a-crowd.

I know we actually have an Institute of Sport, which basically means our government is paying money to develop supermen (and women), but we are doing so well in these games it's starting to get freaky.

Granted, a lot of athletes decided to give this one a miss for various reasons (at least partly to do with the fear of dying from some dissentry-like disease or from the stadium collapsing, or something), so maybe we would have more of a run for our money if everyone who could have come out to play actually did.

But, still.

I remember, during the last couple of Olympics, I actually got bored with Australia's acquisition of metalic decorations and found myself barracking for Estonia all of the time, as it actually felt like an achievement when we won something.

Australia? Winning's just something we do. It doesn't seem like we have to fight for it any more. I don't want to lessen the achievement of our athletes, who have worked really hard to be as good as they are, but it just doesn't seem like it's a real competition any more.