Friday Affettuoso - my homework was never like this

I was one of those kids that was just bored in school. The teaching methods never worked for me and i just zoned out most of the time.

This is some footage of a teacher in Hungary who was given truth or dare at a school party. I guess she chose dare.




This woman has my full and complete attention. Perhaps i should move over there to finally live out my dream of becoming the real Billy Madison and begin school all over again.

I just hope she doesn't expect me to stand for the national anthem.

I dedicate this Friday Affettuoso to sexy stripper teacher. The rest of me might be all Aussie but from now on ive got Hungary eyes.

boom boom

Tagging in i-tunes on a rainy night

I bet you all know an iTunes hater.

You know these guys, the ones who poo-poo anything even remotely popular. These are the same people that use Linux instead of Windows and bring their own Sake to catered parties.

They probably use something like Media Monkey and are the very same ones that turn renegade on you in online games. They have the morals of an alley rat (cat is too good for them) and frankly they smell a bit too.

SoiTunes gets its criticism yes. Sometimes it is justified (this Genius obviously has never heard of classical or roots music before) but most of the issues you may come across usually have a solution if you just look hard enough. Lifehacker is one such site I would recommend for those wanting to learn more about making the most out of the application.

It was in that very site that I came across some great information regarding tagging. Now I just love this idea so much I had to share. I love that I can drill down to a song and associate all kinds of descriptive tidbits about it. Perhaps this appeals to a certain type of individual; one who likes labels. Or maybe those who like to consider the future.

I recently heard that this is a good signpost for marking intelligence. Those who consider possible future uses is the benchmark for our species evolution. Way back around 40,000 years ago when the Neandertals were still kicking around alongside our ancestors; it is believed that your dear old great great great …. well you get the idea…… grandparents began storing water by burying it in the shade of a tree in large ostrich eggs. This was to ensure there was water available when they came back that way. This is what distinguished us from our slack jawed cousins the Neandertals. We developed the skill of imagination and it is why we are here now with such bloody big brains. We won, go us.

This leads us thousands of years back to the future and we can see millions of examples of future planning; most of the time it’s the most boring topic imaginable. But tagging is definitely not my friends. Tagging is the emancipator from your staid and limited musical tastes. And here is where I round up this blog beautifully by finally making my point.

iTunes does not have a specific tagging option however you simply have to use the Comments field to add them. For example with a song like 'I love a rainy night' by Eddie Rabbit I would possibly use the following tags - Weather, rain, night, love, bad 80's music, OR with my collection of Mojo and Uncut magazine CD's is add the tags - magazine, uncut (or) mojo, etc

What this means is that once you start amassing enough tagged music you can begin to use the playlist option in i-tunes with some aplomb and panache. Forget the boring old 'Year of release' or 'Genre' or 'Least played' or 'Most recently added' playlists. By using tags you can create the most fascinating mixes by connecting music with a subject or theme such as 'Magazine' or 'Weather'. When I did this the resulting mix of music was a revelation. Rock,jazz, alternative, roots, reggae, world from any time all played beautifully together. It is almost like giving people a free pass to enjoy music they would normally not listen to. All you need to do is select Random and as long as you have enough music you can keep updating the random option and here new music for the same tag. I tell you it’s the bees knees.

My personal favourites so far have been 'The word blue', 'Seasons' and 'Bob Dylan' added with 'Bob Dylan covers'. Have a try yourself and come back to tell us your favourite tagged playlists.

And finally, as we roll into another Australian summer scorcher (hey that’s a great idea for a playlist, Australian songs with the word summer), don’t think that we at SOI are not doing our part. Water restrictions are on their way so to combat this disaster we offer to the gods a rain song to appease their cruel and jealous ways.

Do you come in a dozen OR have a heart.

Recently I have heard a few rumblings in print and podcast about Japan's Toyama University professor Makoto Nakamura. There is much interest in his research into using and inkjet printers to possibly produce human organs. Essentially the idea is instead of ink you eject cells with the technology to slowly build a 3D structure by applying layer after layer. Here is the article.

Being very new to biology I find it hard to grasp just how these cells are manipulated to become specifically heart cells. This process is so incredibly complicated. I don't get how he supplies the cells with the required ingredients. This is why learning about these things is so vastly superior to reading about UFOs for example. We have such beautiful complexity within us, so why are we so taken with crop circles and aura colours and past life regressions?

When I heard about this I was reminded of a terrific book by Michael Marshall Smith in which clones are created of people who can afford it and when emergencies arise doctors have an exact copy of the patient to take what is required. Smith takes the story into some strange territories that are not so science fiction any more. It is both disturbing and morbidly fascinating. In other words a great read.

It brings us neatly back to ethics in science. A subject of interest that I know Mark is keen to talk about some more.

Until next time.............

Sarah Palin, Parah Salin

I'm not sure why this is amusing. But it is.

Sarah Palin can't say 'nuclear' either

Sally Kern - amazing new evidence about Atlantis demise

Could you all please bow your heads. I am about to speak.

I once was knew a guy who started to record conversations with his friends without their knowing. The consequences of which were a bunch of people who were really pissed off totally betrayed. I cant tell you why he thought this was a good idea but it became something of an obsession for him. He would record phone conversations and then took to videoing people at his home without their being aware.

This could be viewed as a tremendous violation in itself however he took it one step further. During these converstations he would start to talk about other friends and would ask what they thought of this person or that. Now we are all a little gossipy at heart and it is not unusual for a person who feels secure in the privacy of a converation to start totally bagging the shit out of others. What they don’t expect is for this guy to then phone that person once they have left and play the conversation to them over the phone. Suffice to say nothing would be the same for any party involved. It was horribly sick of him and I soon cut off contact for good.

But you see nothing in this world is truly black and white and it got me wondering if perhaps this sort of underhandedness is ever justified.

And the answer is clearly YES.

It is said that God hears and sees all. But if God is supposed to be keeping track of all these conversations he appears to be content with hoarding them for some bizarre personal use. So its up to us on the ground floor as it were to start making people accountable for what they say. I say bring Big Brother to the streets. After all they say that if you make a comment that you wouldn’t say in front of your Mother then you shouldn’t say it at all.

Here is a terrific example of why some conversations you have with certain people should be secretly recorded. This is an audio recording of Oklahoma State Representative Sally Kern, who was secretly recorded speaking all kinds of vile crap at a party. The best bit is her 'evidence' that no society that supports homosexuality has lasted more than a few decades. This could possible go down as the stoooopidest statement ever made for so many reasons.




Here is some of the fallout.

Howling at the moon - A rollicking ramadan rant

I got this email from a friend living in a certain country with majority of people of the Muslim faith. I found it so amusing that I had to share it.


Ok. I am in another planet. Definitely. Totally and completely...During RAMADAN no one can eat or drink in public from sunrise to sunset. If you do, the police can charge you, fine you and lock you up. My alternative was to eat chocolates in the toilets. The only trick was to transport the chocolate without it melting before we got to the toilet. The muslims normally sleep late and party all night. Shops, beauty saloons, coffee shops, everything opens until after mid night... A huge party all over. The most amusing thing is how they decide when RAMADAN will end. A group of wise muslim guys watch and study the moon and based on it's position, declares EID (end of RAMADAN and 3 days public holidays). Today at 8:30 pm they decided tomorrow is EID. No schools or business will open. They told someone, who told someone else, the text messages started going around, the telecommunications were overloaded, no phone calls were going through...It is hillarious. I was trying to call people to come for dinner tomorrow and just could not reach most of them because the phone lines are totally overloaded. Imagine if you want to take advantage of these holidays. Can I please have a flight going there on the first day of EID and coming back on the last? And I would like to book my accomodation for the third day of EID, whenever it is...Can i please have a car rental too? When?? Not sure, when is EID going to be again? Oh, of course, we don't know yet...heheI am sure I will get used to it. At some stage...

PS: my friend has demanded she be named as the source - Inaie Ramalho from Bahrain.