we’re only gonna die from our arrogance

Después de un mes de agosto de descanso (Excursión por el Sulayr, Tarifa, Lagos, Algarve, Carrapateira y Lisboa), me sumerjo de nuevo en la presentación de JABBAH, que tendrá lugar el día 20 de septiembre en Tesalónica, dentro del ICKEPS, que a su vez está dentro del ICAPS 2009.

Foto realizada por mikegk (flickr)

Compartir experiencias con otros 6 equipos en esta competición es cuando menos prometedor, y ante todo, lo importante es participar, y aprender lo que pueda de todo lo que por allí vea. Es la primera vez que asisto al ICAPS, el congreso más relevante en el área de “Planning/Scheduling”, y espero que no sea la última .

2010 está ya a la vuelta de la esquina, ánimo.

*GMO/OMG: Organismos Manipulados Genéticamente.

Querido lector, considera ver los siguientes documentales. Yo los vi en el orden siguiente, uno cada día, claro, por no abrumarme:

1. La poderosa agricultura europea (enlaces en mi último post).

2. La guerra de la soja (online).

3. La guerra de los cultivos transgénicos (online) (download).

Si algo de esto te causa algún picor, hay guías que igual son de algún interés, y mucha más información por ahí (i.e. definición de glisofato en wikipedia).

Recientemente, DreamWorks compró los derechos de ‘Chocky’, novela de ciencia ficción escrita por John Wyndham en 1968 que sirvió de base para una serie televisiva, para adaptarla esta vez al cine.

Steven Spielberg ha revelado que ‘Chocky’ será la próxima película que dirija, antes incluso que la trilogía de Tintín en la que estaba trabajando, y esta vez no es un rumor.

Creo que no tengo que decir de nuevo que soy fan absoluto de la serie televisiva, que vi por primera vez cuando tenía la edad de 6-8 años, allá por el 82… y creo que a S.S. le viene la historia como anillo al dedo para hacer un buen trabajo.

Detalles en elseptimoarte.net.

Parece que finalmente empiezan a vislumbrarse algunos motivos por los que, tras la actualización a leopard 10.5.5, el sistema se cuelga en el arranque dejándolo totalmente K.O., y al menos me asegura que no soy el único. Es desesperante que una actualización de este calibre te deje el sistema en este estado, en el que puedes arrancar una vez de cada 40… espero que Apple saque una actualización para ayer…

Más sobre este tema en este foro.

Encuesta: ¿Cómo combates el calor en verano?

Respuesta: Lo mejor para quedarse helado es oir al sr. Solbes.

Firma: Juan.

[Visto en las frases de los lectores de elpais.es.]

Presentar el DEA, Ir al ICALT en Santander, y que te acepten un paper en un congreso bianual llamado IBERAMIA que ha tenido un ratio de aceptación del 28%…. no tiene precio.

¡Que alguien me baje de la montaña rusa!

Se hacen eco en segu-info de una bonita forma de tener acceso de administrador a Windows Vista (de forma local).

Más que ser interesante por su utilidad, es interesante por su simpleza extrema. Si alguien te dice alguna vez que Vista es seguro, demuéstrale que tiene que repasar algunos conceptos.

Accordingly to the amazing “On Intelligence” book by Jeff Hawkins:

• The neocortex stores sequences of patterns.
• The neocortex recalls patterns auto-associatively.
• The neocortex stores patterns in an invariant form.
• The neocortex stores patterns in a hierarchy.

Further insights in the book. Don’t forget that word (pattern) when you do your everyday tasks, or when you develop software. It will help you being efficient, even if you think that it is not necessary for a tiny simple shell script And read that book! I’m on page 70 and I’m hooked on it (and I think that I can compare this feeling with when I read “El quinto día” by Frank Schatzing, believe me).

I think I can’t explain in words what I lived being in Amsterdam, but anyway I surely should post something about it, as a reminder for the future at least .

Thursday 17th

Out in the morning, take the 11.00am. bus to Málaga Bus Station, then another bus to Málaga Airport, no check-in, nothing else to do that wait for the flight departure: at 15.20pm. Landed at Amsterdam Schiphol Airport around 18.15pm, where María is waiting. Took a train to Lelylaan Station, and then a tram to Rhijnvis Feithstraat stop, situated in Overtoom, near to the wonderful VondelPark.

We then left baggage at home. It was late day (as all thursdays) in Amsterdam, so we walk down along overtoom, and went to the sport center in the corner of Stadhouderskade (I loved to listen that word sitting at the tram!). There were lot of climbing and mountaineering things there, it was really something like the palace of the mountaineer, so we spent around an hour inside, drooling over every piece of sleeping inflatable pad . Then go into the centrum, go around Melkweg where we buy two tickets for the Millencolin show that will take time the day after. Then we have dinner in an Italian Restaurant near Leidseplein, absolutely gorgeous tagliatelli and pizza, beers and wine rosé .

Friday 18th

Wake up around 9.00am, I take a tram to Central Station, go to the back side where there is a nice restaurant called Pier 10. Then I walk down: Damrak, Dam, Rokin, Spui, Vijzelstraat, Keizersgratcht, Leidseplein and Overtoom. A nice walk of about 4 hours and a half:
Ver mapa más grande

I eat then a jam, vegetables and guacamole broodje, a coke and capuchino coffee (8 euros) at Toom Bar (logically placed on Overtoom , I rest for a while, and go again with my 2-trams adventure, to meet María at Vrije Universiteit at De Boelelaan/VU stop. Nice place to work, even with a pub within the department (I’m not lying at all, hopefully I can get some pictures next time…). Nice salaries also, much better that the ones offered in Spain, x2, x3 or even x4 for the same Phd/research jobs (are you defeated? just don’t!!! you only have to make use of our best and famous amendment: Spain is different . Ok, you have no tapas there, so that amendment can also be your salvation, just join it to the previous one and wait for paradise . But… no, I’m sorry but Amsterdam is not much expensive than Granada, forget about using that amendment also. That would be “to distort” reality

After that, we took our bicycles (they are called Amfu and Marilyn, the latter is from Francesca, and i would like to thank her here! , went back home crossing through vondelpark and take a tram to go again to melkweg (it means “Vía Láctea”). We saw Millencolin live, a really nice place to play, and an amusing band on top. Just check it out in Detox video clip, from their last album “Machine 15″ (which BTW was completely available at myspace some days ago):

Lot of songs, very nice songs i’ve been hearing since i was 21 as man or mouse, penguins and polar bears (melkweg version), no cigar, or the new songs brand new game or “who’s laughing now”. An absolutely amazing punkrock show in an amazing city as Amsterdam.

We could also see the last three songs from Adam Green show, which was playing in the same building. I didn’t like him much, i found it very psicodelic and sad. I really prefer his webpage .

We finished having dinner at Moshi Moshi, a little japanese restaurant where we have some pieces of extra-big futo maki’s and also an excelent tempura maki sushi.

Saturday 19th

Wake up at 10.00am, and now is time to visit Van Gogh Museum, going by bicycle, of course. Even if Van Gogh can be one of the artist I have always liked, I have to say that this museum is specially well organised. You have no feelings of being tired, as in other museums. There is just what you need to see, and when you begin to get tired, you’re out . Then you buy some souvenirs, (which have reasonable price). After that, we went to centrum, leaving bicycles near the museum.

After that we managed to go to a bar called (to be completed), where we tackled our first problem with the netherlands language. There was no menu, and we must choose from the kart… Finally we have some kaastengels, and other two dishes (vemertjes and olimpias i think!)…that were similar to “tapas”, but 3.75euros each. It was worthy anyway, sure.

Our next visit was a must: the redlight district in Amsterdam (flickr pictures), also known as “Barrio Rojo”. If something is really strange in that city is this. It is strange to have a woman showing herself at a shop window, at any time, and with lot of tourists walking around. But no, this is not a suburb or something like that, it is 5 minutes from the Dam, that is at the centrum.

Then went back walking to museum to take bicycles, and this is the result of an awesome auto-photo near the “I am sterdam” place:

Sunday 20th

We spent the last day of the weekend going to Marken and Edam villages following this path. For the price of 6 euros you can take all the buses you need in the area of these amazing villages. The latter is know by its cheese production, and the first one is a little village composed of little wood houses, ducks and bridges…hard to explain. Pictures are better descriptors again.

Monday 21th

Wake up at 5.25am. Time to go home. Departure of flight at 7.40am, and bus Malaga-Granada at 12.00am. Work in the afternoon in my office. Time to return to reality, with a great great injection.Thanks to whoever is responsible for this.

PD: This nice post title is not mine, of course, it is from “Life is” song from “The Sunday Drivers”.

Un nuevo intento de escalada, esta vez fuimos al sector “El hombre de Mentira” en Álfacar. Yo intenté las vías con grado (V+) de “las chatis con poderío” y la que da nombre al sector, “el hombre de mentira”. La primera se me atascó un poco y me faltó un metro para llegar a la reunión. En la otra me sentí más cómodo y pude llegar bien, aunque con algún que otro bajoncillo físico. Aunque me voy sintiendo más cómodo, la verdad es que noto que necesito bajar aún algo de peso (unos 4kg menos estaría bien), las navidades sentaron bien, pero no para trepar .

A la cita vinieron también Ana, Mariam, Jorge, Virginia, Jose, Olga, Loren, Marisa y Jaime (al que quiero desear toda la suerte en el examen que hizo el sábado del FIR, Radiofísica Hospitalaria). Jaime sigue en su línea de dejarnos boquiabiertos con su habilidad para trepar. Esta vez realizó “un soplo de libertad” una vía de grado (7a) y “Noche de plata”, un (6b) en el sector “La Cueva”.

Pronto, fotos en mi flickr.