Month: March 2006

el mejor amigo del hombre es el libro…

I am looking forward to buying a notebook (laptop) with the following criteria:

  • CPU Pentium M Centrino 1,7 GHz or better
  • HDD min 80 GB (100 GB)
  • 1024 MB RAM
  • decent graphics card (ATI & Co.)
  • WLAN b/g, Bluetooth, IR, modem, 10/100 NIC
  • built-in WEBCAM (!)
  • double-layer DVD burner
  • USB, (COM), PP, Firewire
  • battery runtime of at least 4hrs
  • decent keyboard with a normal RETURN key
  • built-in SD/MMCard drive
  • disengageable trackpad
  • max. weight ~ 3kg
  • …and a built-in MIC!

There are so many notebooks on the market, however, most of the good ones (read: good deals) lack a built-in ~50 cents microphone. Can you imagine? Even my old Acer Travelmate 513T of 1999 had a built-in mic…

Any recommendations? I thought of a Samsung X20, but these ASUS A6V/A7V notebooks are also nice…hmm…

im Metronom

1. Die Ansagen im Metronom zwischen UE und Gö sollten eigentlich mal von Dittsche gesprochen werden. Ma soagn, nä?
2. Ich brauche dringend ein Notebook, um unterwegs arbeiten oder aber mit 3. mithalten zu können…
3. Die Welt, so scheint es, besteht an einem Cebit Sonntag abend aus einer lustigen Horde von Informatikern, die man meist an ihren langen dürren Fingerchen erkennt, welche sie entweder in fast schon spastischer Haltung von sich strecken oder aber eifrig auf einem PDA herumfuchteln und Solitaire spielen. Natürlich gibt es auch dickere Informatiker – diese erkennt man dann meist an ihrem unvorteilhaften (da sperrigen) Rucksack. …die alle ganz tolles Spielzeug dabei haben!

Nein, ich war nicht auf der Cebit. Nur im gleichen Zug :-)

06-02-024.jpg 06-02-023.jpg

…dazu der passende Soundtrack: Eagle – It Was A Lovely Parade (mp3, 1,4MB)

bluu jino

bluetoothdongle.jpg
I bought this Bluetooth USB dongle earlier this week, plugged it in this morning, installed the software and went online – via mobile. IT WORKS! IT ACTUALLY WORKS! Can you imagine?

No need for any dumb Nokia modem drivers, no huge software packages that need to be run on autostart, no buggy user interfaces – this little stick just works the way it is supposed to be working. Technology that makes me smile again :-)

Hat tip to my ndugu Mzeecedric for pointing me to the updated wp-shortstat plugin as well as to SlimStat – on which I’ll need to have a closer look once I’ve decided on my next wp-theme/template: Regulus 2, Fauna Beta 3, Sirius 1.0 or K2 Beta Two? The latter one comes with an awesome AJAX-powered live search among other goodies. I especially like K2, but understand that it will be difficult to implement my neat (Tusker-styled) Flickr-badge. Stay tuned!
Haraka haraka, haina baraka :-)

matata?

Shida.

…so I spent the best part of the day trying to configure a new (great!) theme for my wp-powered blog, lakini there’s no real good template/theme out there which works the way I want it unless I invest a few more hours of stylesheet tuning. Curiosity of course lures me into this theme-switching-business, alafu there might be some changes to this site soon.

In the meantime, let me please entertain you with some more music – this time something from the 1970s Kenya I’ve mentioned earlier: Matata "talkin talkin" (with Steele Beauttah). An almost brutal song on which Pitchfork says: "Sweet mother popcorn, funk does not get any grittier than this. The bass and drums are tough as rawhide and the lead vocal is a dirty, filthy, nasty delight. The thousand-watt horns blare so brightly you can feel the air passing over the curved brass. Kenya only produced a few notable funk bands in the 70s, but Matata were truly world-class."

Remember, this is from Kenya! Enjoy :-)

Matata – talkin’ talkin’

more on AFT…

aftlive.jpg
Various hits from blogafrica.com today (thx, afroM!), which included a very nice audio stream of an Ali Farka Touré & Toumani Diabaté performance via (the feed of) "Imagens de África", made me realize that I also still have some bootleg recordings of an Ali Farka Touré live performace I downloaded some years ago with the (now defunct?) ethnobeat yahoo group (thx, Araceli).

Now, since Poxi Presha would definitely hate me for publishing anything copyrighted (yes, Bwana PP, we appreciate your battle and you’re not yet forgotten!), and since the music is (fortunately) available for purchase as well as streamable via The Hype Machine (Toure, Touré), let me please link to these live recordings FIY only.

Ali Farka Touré – Live1
Ali Farka Touré – Live2
Ali Farka Touré – Live3

Yani, I don’t know what YOU do when there’s Blues music around, but let me tell you: the first thing I did this morning was to grab my guitar and (trying to :-) play along with AFT & BT.
Again, le monde est fait pour qu’on s’aime. How true…

n.b.: …listening to these live recordings and the almost hypnotising "reiteration" of tunes, I am reminded of a great concert two years ago  with Abaji (Lebanon) and Boubacar Traoré (Mali) playing together. Unfortunately, we will never be able to hear Ali Farka Touré playing together with…well…the Dagar Brothers?

UPDATE: Alastair Johnston of muzikfan.com has just published his obituary of Ali Farka Touré. Please don’t miss this…