Auton vaihtoa

Saab 96 -80? LCP-160, Nissan Sunny -87 LKR-201 (?), Mazda 626 -98 JCK-563(?), Mazda 6 -05 BYV-654 ... henkilökohtaista autohistoriaa parin kymmenen vuoden ajalta. Nyt sitten katoksena alla kyyhöttää ensimmäinen eurooppalainen auto sitten aiemmin poliisin miehistönkuljetusautona [sic!] toiminee Saabin -- The Passat Variant ja samalla myös ihka ensimmäinen työsuhdeauto. Uusihan se ei ole, tänään tuli mittariin jo 30,000Km.

Luettua: Clive Barker; Waeveworld & Heikki Aittokoski; Lihavan kptkan maassa

ja samana päivä luin loppuun kaksi kirjaa... alottanut olen tosin jo jokin aika sitten molemmat.

Clive Barker ... no jätti hieman kylmäksi

Heikki Aittokoski, nuoren HS:n kirjeenvaihtajan mietteitä yhdistyneestä Saksasta vuosituhannen vaihteessa. Zeitgeist joka oli ja meni. Nyt Alexender Platz ja Mitte ovat jo täysin porvarillistuneet.

edit: No kun kerran meni jo tuo vuosi vaihtumaan, niin kirjataan tähän vielä Esko Valtaoja Avoin tie: Kurkistuksia tulevaisuuteen.

Last few weeks...

been quite wild: first in Tampere for Einstürzende Neubauten, then some renovation at the apartment and three nights in Scandic Espoo, and lastly this week in Berlin and Munich.

Einstürzende Neubauten was great! It was their 30 years tour and for some reason they did passed Helsinki and went to Tampere instead. Someone at the venue said that at least Wilco said that the audience in Tampere is far greater than in Helsinki, but I guess that was just suck up.

First night was called "an evening with E N". There was all sorts of program: live show with the band, Blixa making his own performance, Rudi's band (did not catch the name)... It was all great and since it lasted about 1800 to 2200 it left convenient time to spend in various clubs and bars in Hämeenkatu.

I stayed at the Hotel Cumulus with view to the Tammerkoski and the dam there. Very nice view from 7th floor. The hotel is a bit worn out and the breakfast is nothing to talk about, but for the 75€ per night, that was not too bad -- although I have to say still overly expensive, but then that goes for the Finnish hotel stays in general.

The second night witnessed a two and half hours long concert, which unfortunately did not include Perpetum Mobile. The band also had to leave the jet engine in London due some restriction by logistics department and the audience was left to them own devices to imagine the whirling noise that is supposed to make the solo of the song I cannot just now recall.

I had the plan to take an early train to Helsinki and make in decent time back to work, but the nice n97 mini had a surprise for by losing the battery during the night and since I woke up around 9 am and had two hours train trip ahead ... well let's just say that trying to work in IC train without wlan and with crappy 3g is not too fun.

The Berlin / Munich gig was pure business. Got to take a lift with paternoster in Siemensdamm site. Stayed at Radisson Blu (ex-SAS) hotel in Berlin-mitte, just next to Museum Island. My room was facing the Berlin Dom at the other bank of Spree. Went to visit the Hitler and the Germans exhibition in the Deutsches Historisches Museum, travelled back with riksha (did not negotiate the price, since knowing all to well the it is not an easy ride), and went to shopping at Alexander Platz, which has probably changed most from the days of the wall: the plaza is now occupied by big departmen stores carrying all luxory items and the food store of the Galleria Kaufhof is just amazing (Stockmann could lear a lot).

Munich... well stayed at the Holiday Inn, with the room facing to Hilton on the other side of the street. Went to see John Hiatt at the Theatherfabrik, basically because that was the only even remotely interesting gig at the town that I was able to find. Hiatt was not too bad, pretty much American mainstream w/ some blues acts. Not bad, but not my cup of tea anyways. I bet Neil Young fans would have been pleased, though.

The area where the Theatherfabrik is, was pretty interesting though and I guess it does host lots of interesting happenings during the warmer part of the year. It's actually located just in the west side of the ost bahnhof.

HC JURvan POnteva -- Kausi 2011 alkutunnelmat

Checking the stats today makes me happy: Marian Hossa leader in Points and Goals, Henrik Sedin in Assists, and goalie Brent Johnson in number of Wins.

Brent is a late acquisition from last week, doing well this far. Other goalies have been a bit more on the disappointment: Steven Mason seems to be losing another year after the stellar rookie year, sophomore season was a great disappointment and this year looks no better. Brian Elliot is still a bit question mark, managed to ruin my goalie stats for this week after replaced by backup goalie when stopped only 17 from 22 shots, giving a GAA of almost 10.

From the bad news side, although the JPs defence department is of good JP quality: Zidlicky, Kaberle, Pronger, and Rafalski, only Kaberle has been off the DTD: Rafalski even should be in IR, but since Detroit has no roster issues they are just not putting him there leaving all the fantasy owner really dry. And what is really disappointing this far is: Pronger has only 2 minutes in penalty column, a thing expected to change any day now.

Current roster:


Henrik Sedin
(Van - C)
Ryan Kesler
(Van - C)
Ryane Clowe
Nikita Filatov
(Cls - LW)
Patrick Kane
(Chi - RW)
Marian Hossa
(Chi - RW)
Brian Rafalski
(Det - D)
Tomas Kaberle
(Tor - D)
Marek Zidlicky
(Min - D)
Chris Pronger
(Phi - D)
Mikko Koivu
(Min - C)
Steve Sullivan
(Nsh - LW)
Brad Boyes
(StL - RW)
Brent Johnson
(Pit - G)
Steve Mason
(Cls - G)
Brian Elliott
(Ott - G)

World debt comparison: The global debt clock | The Economist

World debt comparison: The global debt clock | The Economist

During the naughties Finland has doubled its public dept to $106,998,630,137 today. The share of the dept of the GDP has interestingly stayed about the same level raising from 44,0% to 48,5%

Ig Nobel awards go to slime mould and fruity bats | Science | guardian.co.uk

Ig Nobel awards go to slime mould and fruity bats | Science | guardian.co.uk

I like to idea of promoting people at random.

English Russia » Digital Technologies Available For Everyone!

It just makes one wonder, what is there in people's lifes. I have no connection to any of this -- now, I think a couple of scenes looked out something I've witnessed back way back when, anyhow please have a peepingtommish tour:

English Russia » Digital Technologies Available For Everyone!

Luettua: Juhani Aho; Minkä mitäkin Italiasta

Juhani Ahon matkakertomus Italiasta. Merkinnät vuosilta 1893 ja 1903. Juha innostuu kertoilemaan paikallisista kirkonmenoista, välttäen tiivisti kertomatta mitään paikallisesta elämästä, paitsi loppupuolella löytyvästä kantaaottavasta tarinasta pikkulintujen metsästämisestä ja niiden syöjistä.

Alun junamatkakuvaus on nykyaikana hieman huvittava, matka otti ilmeisesti viikonpäivät. Alppien eteläpuolta laskeutuvassa junassa muutaman tunnin unosille uinahtanut Juha vilahtaa hämmästyksekseen yht'äkkiä Italian puolelle: "Mutta näin nopean kulun aikoina saattaa tapahtua, että kun nukkuu yhdessä maassa, niin herää jo toisessa." Nykyään Italiaan lennetään muutamassa tunnissa, Juhan sanoin: "Enkä tahdo sanoa, että nautinto siitä olisi piemempi."

luettua: Carlos Ruiz Zafon; Enkelipeli

Kerrassaan upea kirja. Pitäisi varmaankin opetella espanjaa lukemaan, että saisi lukea tämän alkuperäiskielellä.

Coup de grâce - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

all kinds of coups:

Coup de grâce - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Coup d'état - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Coup de main - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Trees Killed by NYC Storm Number in Thousands - NYTimes.com

Two tornadoes in New York City: Trees Killed by NYC Storm Number in Thousands - NYTimes.com

Reminds me off the true "Boston massacre" in 1938 also called "The New England Hurricane of 1938 (or Great New England Hurricane or Long Island Express or simply The Great Hurricane of 1938)". If I am not completely mistaken most of the victims were due mistaking the hurricane as a normal storm and when people got out after the first violent surge, they got badly battered by the other edge of the hurricane whirlwind.

It anyhow seems to be a struck of luck that only one person in NYC lost her life. Would think that dual tornado in a city that populated would do far greater damage.

luettua: Robert Girardi; Vaporetto 13

There is no vaporetto 13 and it is not going to that remote island in the lagoon, or is there? People belong to barnobotti; to long defunct nobility shceme or are they still very much alive?

There you have your mysteries. The sad thing is that there is not much else. The visit to father, oh so boring and as pointless as it was needless.

Still to a fan of Venice this too is a must reading, it does muster things most have already forgotten. Some deep insight is given.

Part 1: Deeper dive into anything and everything that is filed under Ventiana

You know about the casinos, I am sure you do. Have you ever thought about the word itself: casino. Where does that come from?

In Italian language a house is called casa and you might already guess what is the diminutive of that very word, well it is of course casino -- a little house ... a casino in prairie might not be such a family TV series after all. Perhaps the a club house would be better translation.

Anyhow not all of the casinos are or ever have been for gambling, though that is one thing that may take place in such a place. The meaning refers to a place built for pleasure, such as music, dancing, and gambling. Other type of a house is casa chiusa, better known as bordello.

The first (known) casino was Ridotto in 17th century Venice. Later to be closed when it was conceived as immoral activity. City's often impoverished nobility the barnabotti, one of the reasons for city's final demise were only ones (apart from croupiers) that were exempt from wearing a mask in the casino.

Via Adriatico

I have not had time to write anything lately: I guess my travel report from Primavera'10 is still pretty much a draft if anything, perhaps I should now spend some time writing now although the weather outside is sure nice.

We left Finland on 25th of June, flying by Finnair to Venice Marco Polo. The flight was nice since all the kids were on the same row and us the care takers were having our own rows and since the kids did behave very nicely indeed the 3 hour flight was totally painless. I rememeber that the bread they served instead of any real meal was quite nice too and if I am not totally mistaken the coffee they serve is Robert Paulig's.

Marco Polo worked as a charm and we were in our rental in no time heading to Cesenatico. The navigator which comes with the Nokia phone adviced us to take the SS309 which goes by the coast and not to take the autostrada; a decision which we did repent a while later. The road itself is really nothing special. It does not go right by the sea, so that view has to forgotten and I have to frankly say that the coutryside thereabouts is not that picturesque you could imagine from all those country side pictures you've seen from Tuscany. The real treat was the couple of miles long road work that closed the other lane totally and caused quite huge traffic jam: we were really the lucky ones spending only an hour or so in the queue, since from the other direction from South the queue was some 5 miles long. Anyways it being Saturday of all days I am not sure if the motorway would had been any better.

We stopped at Sottomarina to have a snack, but did not have a look at the Chioggia and it will still remain as a open question whether it is a place worth to visit to. Sottomarina looks like every other beach resort there: thus probably worth to go.

The rest of the drive to Cesenatico did not take too long and after surviving some navigational gimmicks of the Navteq we finally made it to the hotel half dead after some 4 hours drive. We stayed at the hotel Esplanade almost next to the beach.

We packed the swimming gear and headed to the beach. 2x parasol and 4 sunbeds cost us 20€ to the noon next day. We got the evening free since there was about an hour to go.

Had a dinner in a place I cannot anymore remember the name. Every other being had pasta vongole, I had pizza Napoletana feeling way too hungry to settle for a spagetti. Everything was good and the total bill was 110€ for 7 -- not that bad.

The night was restless. Our room was on the first floor (that is the European first floor) with balcony giving to the main street. The noise died at 4 am: I guess. My clever little girl put it in the words: "Italy wakes up at night" and was so right.

The checking out was already at ten and the hotel did not have any luggage room, which gave us a certain amount of headache. We had our cars in a shared garage, but the ladies at the reception said that she needs the garage empty by eleven and since we had not reason to leave before early afternoon we had a problem -- to be frank it was me who asked about when to vacate the garage and thus creating the problem in the first place. Well we pushed a little bit and left by the noon, hoping not to put those lovely ladies in a bad spot with their management. Anyhow because of the noise from the street I cannot really recommend this hotel to anyone. The price for the night was some 120€ or so for a room for 3.

The next day we where in no time in San Giovanni in Marignano and decide to stay at the village before driving up the cottage/villa/whatever ... let's call it Ca'. S.Giovanni, altough us being there already for the second time, really revealed its secrets to us: it is one of the nicest towns I have visited this far. The centrum is just so lovely that one would like to live there forever (I do from time to time get this feeling in various places not home).




The Ca' looked just like we left it two years ago ... well not quite someone had cleaned it a bit ... we made the same room arrangements and headed to Tavulia Conad, where to my great surprise people spoke English!!! Ate a lot of salsiccia fresca and was happy. Found a half a liter gin and was even more happy. The next day find out that the mosquitoes had found me and I was a proud owner of some ten new gnat bites, which all showed up a good potential to really infect. Learning from the past I took all the care I could to stop them to get any worse and not to look like a junkie with
plague. Word of warning: learn from the zombie movies and do not get out after the sun is down!




The bagni 42 was just as lovely as we were able to remember. Got a decent deal (sic!) 2x parasols and 4x sunbeds for 4 days 130€. Swam, took sun and ate.... mcdonalds ... really ... to understand why you need to realize that in Italy basically everything closes for siesta and that includes all the food joints apart from McD and if you spend a day in the sun nothing really tastes better than a hamburger and fries and you really do not want to eat local hamburgers: thus we were guilty for the most gravest of all sins: eating McD in Italy.




We stayed at the beach for pretty much all the time, well apart from staying at the Ca' or visiting San Marino (the rip off joint), Gradara (nice little fortification near by), Maranello Ross Ferrari Museum and some outlets. The gyu managing the Bagni 42 Enrico was ever so nice bribing the young ones with shellfish necklaces and other treasures.




The last day in Cattolica was crowned by the Notta Rosa, which painted the town pink.
We visiting the pizzeria and although all the other pizzas apart from them frutti di mare I had were just excellent there is now no reason to go back: this was our 10th anniversary in visiting the place, but it seems that the new management has not really got how to really run the place. Saw the guy from Bagni at the evening and he wished us welcome back soon: well who know maybe next summer.




After Cattolica we drove back to the Marco Polo airport to drop the rentals. I was given the last day free althought I managed to return the car at 13.15 due heave traffic in the autostrada ( and leaving the departure a bit tool late). We took the motoscafo from airport to the hotel: funny enough the price quote I had got was only for 4 people and we ended paying 120€ one way. The ride to Lido was nice though and the Villa Mabapa had their own pier just at the front of the hotel, which was more than nice since the wheather was really warm and we did have plenty of luggage (58,5 Kgs to be exact, not counting the hand luggage).

The room was really not up to our standards: the view to the hotel garden was blocked by giant bush and the hotel room had a scent of menthol that our youngest one could not really bear. After one hour siege at the reception counter we were offered a delux twin room which could be fitted with a spare bed. The spare bed was later revealed to be a mattress fit for a small dog, but the room was just beautiful. The room was from the original 30's villa and had a view to the laguun. With a fishbone flooring and bay windows I could not but just love the room: although I later came to think that perhaps we paid a bit extra for the room, since it was a double room and they charged us for three.





Lido was everything you can expect and some more. It is full of beautiful villas form the time before the war and since you can get to San Marco with vaporetto in perhaps 20 minutes and there is only some half a klick walk to the beach, one can easily combine the city vacation to staying at the beach. The beach was not that nice though. There was all sorts of garbage floating in the water and the beach itself is not even half as nice as the beaches are in the Riviera. But on a too warm day it sure does the trick. The water was warmer than ever, which also kind of worried me, since warmer it gets more things grow in it. Well none of us got any rash or other symptoms from swimming in it so I guess it was ok.

Venice was as nice as always. We got there by private motorboat, first spending a twenty minutes in one glass factory and being exposed to some quite amateur ripping off efforts. There were some nice pieces of glass showned, but since the prices offered were just staggering we left without any shopping. They said something about Finns not spending money when we first time entered the premises. Well we did saw some cleaver glassworkmanship, when they made a glass horse right in front of our eyes, that was something worth to witness, otherwise the whole trip was almost like a visit to timesharing condo market presentation.

On our way back I learned that you should trust your hotel staff and let them handle all the reservations: I manage to reserve a motroscafo for 5 at 7, when I should have made the reservation for 7 at 5. Otherwise there was nothing really to report. Lovely trip really.

This review is brought to you by BBC -- twice

Andrew "and I have no clue" Mueller has kindly reviewed two albums from Canadian bands The New Pornographers' Together:

It seems self-evident that if you put a bunch of talented musicians together, they will come up with great music – just as it appears no less obvious that all you need to do to win football matches is put talented players on the park and let them get on with it. However, just as a team of overpaid athletes will occasionally get turned over by a lesser but better-drilled outfit, so the efforts of putative musical supergroups are often scuppered by ill discipline and a degree of vainglory. The New Pornographers’ fifth studio album, Together, is – to pursue a metaphor to exhaustion – something like watching a lengthy, impressive and pretty succession of passes that rarely lends the impression that anybody is going to score.

and Broker Social Scene's Forgiveness Rock Record:

It’s not that the umpty-dimensional indie-prog melange presented here is objectionable – far from it – but that it’s so unfocused that it becomes difficult to perceive Broken Social Scene as anything but the musical equivalent of a chimpanzee typing pool: when they do come up with something lucid, it feels like it’s rather more by accident than design.
Inevitably, Forgiveness Rock Record is the result of the deliberations of a committee. Hilariously unwieldy hodge-podges like this usually are, and often in proportion to the size of the collective that created them. Even after what the accompanying press release calls a “paring down”, Broken Social Scene’s current core line-up still consists of no fewer than seven people, and the giddying roster of guest performers on Forgiveness Rock Record runs into double figures, including contributions by members of Stars, Metric, The Sea & Cake and The Weakerthans. By about halfway through, it’s difficult to be entirely confident that you didn’t play bass on a couple of tracks yourself.

Anything even close to similar?

Rippi

luettua: Carlos Ruiz Zafon; Tuulen Varjo

Uskomaton teos. Luin yhtenä päivänä noin 600 sivua, valitettavasti hieman ahmien. Olisi voinut ehkä hieman säännöstellä.

En voi muuta kuin suositella! Enkä referoi juonta ollenkaan.

Openbook

Nonniin, nyt mä olen koukussa openbook:iin, palveluun, jossa voi hakea avainsanoja ihmisten julkisista -- siis joko tahallisesti tai tahattomasti julkisista statuspäivityksistä. Oma henk.koht suosikki on hakea sanaa "cunt":

Ruby Murray Harper: In preparation for the world cup i hung an england flag in my window. Not knowing wether it would offend any muslims, i wrote Allah's a cunt just to make sure.


En honestly tiedä mitä tuohon enää lisätä. Tosin en en ole ihan täysin varma miksi tuo Englannin lippu, ilman tuota kirjoitusta, olisi muslimeja loukannut, tietenkin siinä on linkki paikalliseen skiniaatteeseen, mutta muuten?

Gretchen Guarniere: I know a girl who is not my friend but she thinks my daughter brit is fat but she is a ugly pyschotic bi polar cunt that livep off her sons $ cuz she is too lazy to get a job

luettua: Chris Cleave; The Other Hand

Löytyi hyllystä -- lainakirja, jonka lainaaminen on jo unohtunut... The Other Hand kertoo nigerialaisen pakolaisen matkasta Englantiin tapamaan ainoita ihmisiä, joihin hän voi turvautua. Kirjan amerikkalainen editio on lainannut nimensä Little Bee tämän pakolaisen nimestä: ilmeisesti The Other Hand ei olisi sitten toiminut niillä markkinoilla. Ja kieltämättä tuo nimi ei oikein minullekkaan aukea -- tai sitten se on vaan sellanen pikkunäppärä nimi -- vähän niin kuin koko kirja. Ihan luettava se oli, mutta välillä oli vissiin niin kiire alleviivaamaan, että juonen käänteet olivat a) epäuskottavia tai b) lapsellisia tai molempia. Tarina on kuitenkin kokonaisuudessaan hyvä ja Chirs:llä on kertojan lahja. Olisi vaan saanut hioa hieman pitempään.

Isolation

A volcano in Iceland can stop all air traffic in whole Europe for a considerable time -- if the worst should come, maybe even for years! Something that tooks us by surpricse and it seems that this scenario has not been taken into account when thinking about how to connect Finland to rest of the Europe. Granted there's been some discussion about the railroad tunnel across the Gulf of Finland, connecting Helsinki to Tallinn, but that was more or less related to the greenness of rails compared to air traffic -- I do not recall anyone flashing the possibility that we would end up this grounded as we are now and have been since last Thursday when this volcano in Eujafjallajökull started to erupt.

I was able to find an estimate of how much this tunnel would cost. In 1997 the cost was estimated to be around 1,1–1,6 billion (am.eng) euros, converted to current value 1,3–2,1 billion euros. That is 2 000 000 000€. Sounds like a lot of money. Well, in today's Helsingin Sanomat published in their Sunnuntaidebatti (Sunday's debate) column Risto Sulkava's article about the peat production in Finland. He claimed that Finland uses every year 100 000 000€ as a public subventions to peat production, curiously enough that would mean -- well as an educated guess -- if the digging of the tunnel would take 5 years and cost the aforementioned 2 000 000 000€, that is 400 000 000$, then money spend from tax payers pocket to support very questionable peat production would already be 25% of the yearly cost of tunnel digging, you dig?

With a railroad tunnel we would not be so isolated from the rest of the Europe anymore. Some other option to be entertained: what if the tunnel would be from Naantali to Kappelskär, or from Vasa to Umeå.