I just saw Spanglish. For a flick with a name as stupid as that, it was pretty good. I always sort of liked Tea Leoni (although blonde is SO not her color, she looked so much hotter in Bad Boys). But the star was Paz Vega, the hot spaniard.

And word has it that she's generous with the on-screen nudity as well, stripping faster than you can say Full Frontal (although not this time, stupid hollywood).

I like.

Dear Shirley Manson,

Your gig sort of sucked. Guess who'se not gonna draw you?

Respectfully,
Pendar

Dear Mr. Pendar yousefi,

We are delighted to inform you that you have been allocated the following TST series in the draw for ticket sales phase 1 of the 2006 FIFA World Cup Germany (TM), provided that the team you selected qualifies for the finals of the 2006 FIFA World Cup Germany (TM):

Number 1, TST type TST-4, category 3, country Iran, price (number x single price) 215,00 EUR

The payment for the tickets was successful and the sum of 240,00 EUR has been debited from your MasterCard.

This confirmation does not authorise you to attend the matches of the 2006 FIFA World Cup Germany (TM). Admission is via original tickets only. Provided further security checks are successful, the original tickets will be sent to you 6-8 weeks before the start of the 2006 FIFA World Cup Germany (TM).

Kind regards,
Your 2006 FIFA World Cup (TM) Ticketing Center

so the Taekwondo world championships are underway in Madrid. The Iranian olympic gold medalist, Saei, won the gold again yesterday (Link: IRNA).

Sort of a bizarre incident happened during the medal ceremony though. They played the wrong national anthem for Iran!!! Instead of the national anthem, they played 'Ey Iran' (Oh Iran), which is an old pre-revolution anthem (and I think at no point was the national anthem of Iran) nowadays strongly tied to nationalistic and resistive movements. Usually it's what they sing at most of the pro-democtratic student protests.

So, for them to play this instead of the actual national anthem, it's pretty fishy, and funny!!! The Iranian federation is furious now, and they're demanding an official apology and a new ceremony, they're also backing down from their initial support for Madrid 2012 olympics (Link: IRIB News). I'm pretty sure a humorous, maybe even political, Iranian is behind this. It's pretty funny I think.

Dose had a delightful little blurb about Europian Soccer chants yesterday. This one's pretty relevant now:

Chelsea — “Magic”
Dider Drogba’s magic
He wears a magic hat
and when he plays for Chelsea he’s a decent chap
He scores with his left foot
He scores ’em with his right
and when he plays against you he scores all fecking night!

crazy brits!

My desktop cleaning procedure:

1- create a new folder, name it 'stuff'
2- drag all the other icons and drop them in 'stuff'

repeat every 2 to 3 months.

This is something I have been wanting to write about for a long time now, but I haven't cuz it's a sensitive subject and might not go down too well for some people.

It's about the distinction between observations, and the conclusions one draws based on those observation, and being branded as sexist or racist.

Here's an example to make my point clear. I have observed, most of the people who I've met who smell bad are from south asia and the Indian subcontinent. This is purely based on my personal interactions with people, but it is a true observation without any prejudice. I have observed this living in the UAE, where there was a large contingent of south asians. I have observed this here, specially when I TA, and in the classrooms and labs. I have observed this sitting in the bus, or taking the subway. So it's not based on one or two particular experiences.

Also, some of my best friends here are from an indian background, and they don't smell bad at all, so I have nothing against the south asian people. I'm not even infering that they have poor hygene or they don't bathe. It's probably the oils and stuff that they use on their hair and bodies. But it is a true observation.

Now, obviously, I will draw conclusions from this, and it does have an impact on my behavior as well. Obviously, I do not like spending 3 hours in a poorly ventilated lab with someone who smells really bad. It is trivial, to draw conclusions based on observations. Isn't it the basis for scientific reasoning anyway?

Now, many of you have probably already labeled me as a racist, and that's what I don't get. Labelling everything and everyone as a racist has become so popular, that people, like me, are even afraid to talk about their observations, fearing this labelling.

Another example is the Harvard cheif speech, about women in science. Again, I will get some shit for this, but I really don't see anything wrong with that particular speech. Again, it's a matter of observation, and history. When you think about all the great scientists, I'm sure most, if not all the pictures that come across your mind are old bearded men. Think about history. All the great scientists have been consistently men. Opression of women, you say? I say that's bullshit. Surely the scientific mind can rise above any opression. Why should I be afraid of talking about this purely factual and true observation? Why should I be more afraid in drawing conclusions about the capabilities of males and females?

Anyway, if drawing conclusions based on solid observations makes one a racist, then I am a racist.

THIS is when it really feels good to be in Toronto. GARBAGE is coming for a show at the end of April. I couldn't possibly be more psyched.

My taste for music has dramatically changed in the past few years, turning more and more towards downtempo and ambient electronic sounds (before that I think my taste was pretty much non-existent).

But if there's one band I still absolutely LOVE from the old days, it's Garbage. I absolutey can't wait, not only for the concert and the new album, but to take pictures of Shirley Manson! Imagine this, with her in it!! holy crap. As my Vancouver friend Pejmun would say it, damnnnnnnnnn.

upate: thanks to Dean, I already have the new album. I've only listened to it once, it was slightly disappointing, but I'm sure it'll grow on me ... or I'll force it to anyway!
Also thanks to Dean, I listened to the new Morcheeba album, to be released on May ... I can't believe the vocalist has changed. I gotta listen to this one more as well ... overall an exciting month in music if you ask me.

So I'm back from the Ontario Regional Canadian University Press (ORCUP) conference at Windsor, hosted by the Lance (who don't have a website ? *gasp*), from University of Windsor.

I was representing the Window, along with a couple of other editors, althought our original contingent was supposed to be three times the size. Unfortunately people cancelled in the last minute, and I wasn't sure if I was going either, but then I sort of had to cuz I was the only driver.

Anyway, as far as the organization was concerned, the conference was perfect. The Lance people were uber-nice, probably the nicest people i've met, despite us giving them headaches with our last minute-cancellations. So, big-up to them.

Windsor was also much nicer than I had imagined. It was a pretty decent city. I have a couple of office-mates from Windsor and they always complained about Windsor so much that I expected a sketchy town. Not so.

Casino Windsor, one of the highlights. Thankfully I didn't lose much (goddamn $15 minimum bets almost screwed me, but then the Big Six Wheel came to the rescue [I hit the joker!! 1x40] yay).

What else? The talks were all good, specially for those who actually plan on becoming a journalist, which doesn't include me. The closest journalistic thing that might be in store for me is getting my comic syndicated by a paper. But unfortunately there weren't any talks related to that. Nonetheless, I enjoyed them.

I took a bunch of pics, a lot of them are crap, and the rest need thorough processing and it's too late for that tonight. I'll put them up sometime this week though.

irrelevant note: driving in crazy wind is NOT fun. Neither is driving in heavy snow, or showers, but the last two definitely beat the winds. Toronto was nice enough to greet us with all the three when we were coming back today, all the way from London.

slightly less irrelevant note: I was surprised and highly disappointed not to see the Varsity crew there, it wouldav been fun.