For the initiated: yes, she’s here. The wee alien lady is slowly adapting to this planet she calls MaBaAa and we call Earth. Future is here.
Please post no comments to this entry unless you are part of the right species.
Posts Tagged ‘phone’
Breaking News for the Normal Generation: Aliens Here!
Monday, July 6th, 2009How Not to Buy
Saturday, June 27th, 2009Yesterday I found on the Net a former colleague, maybe even friend. We haven’t been in touch for about fifteen years. I saw her last time in Europe, where we both used to live. Now she’s in North America and I’m in the South Pacific. So many years and so many miles apart, I thought of something that we must have in common, something that’s so universally valid, that I can share with my friend and she’ll immediately understand and perhaps agree. I dedicate this mockopost to Vianora.
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One of the silliest things I can think of is shopping. And I absolutely love it!
I fully accept that shopping is therapy for depression, obesity, measles, catalepsy and many other conditions I claim not to have. People go shopping even when their account is in red, they get deeper in debt, yet they fell better. If a new pair of slippers could make you fell reborn, a new car will take you straight to Nirvana (I experienced it eight times).
The daily act of shopping is a bit like having sex, maybe with a softer ending, but safer, generally speaking. Sometimes it can involve a little redundancy (daily dairy shopping across the road) but this is like being in a strong matrimonial relationship: loads of fidelity and no surprises. Yet some other times shopping is a heavenly experience: go to Paris or Melbourne, Milan or Tokyo, get a cab and ask the driver to stop as soon as you see a shop with the letter ‘N’ third on its name or just walk on a busy commercial street and pick the seventh shop on the left. Go in and I bet you’ll find something to buy. Now, this is like having a one night stand and waking up with no hangover and the love of your life bringing you breakfast in bed. The only significant difference is that with shopping you can experience this far more often than in real life.
Shopping is power: I can buy; therefore I must have money, which means I’ve got the power.
Shopping is kindness: I can buy something for you; therefore I show you how much I care and how important you really are for me. (And shopping for YOU means even more power: I’m so powerful that I can even afford to buy it for you, not for ME.)
In a way or another, for many years I sold stuff or I advertised for other people’s stuff so they could sell it better. I know the look in the eyes of a person who wants to buy as well as the expression on the face of somebody who can not afford buying. Shopping is a drug. It is more addictive than nicotine, it is compulsive and unforgiving. Its high is very short lived when compared to how much you spent for achieving it and, what’s worse, shopping is not only legal, but encouraged. In fact shopping is the vital force of our society and one of the few differences between our species and the others.
Having had a lot to do with shopping and selling, I thought I may write a book on how NOT to buy stuff. I’d put really cool little secrets in there, like how not to make eye contact with the salesman and how not to… Forget it! I’m hoping a smart publisher will read this blog and offer me a contract for the printed, podcasted, DVD recorded and the online versions of How Not to Buy. Sorry, this is why I won’t disclose any tricks in here. (Not just yet.) I hope you’ve enjoyed the introduction though.
History in the Mocking (III) – The True about the Book: Past, Present and Future
Sunday, June 14th, 2009The Mockoblog was mentioned yesterday on the Radio New Zealand National’s (we think) most prestigious cultural programme: Saturday Morning, hosted by Kim Hill (see http://www.radionz.co.nz/saturday – for archived audio interviews, podcasts, and information about featured guests and music).
For those of you not fortunate enough to live in New Zealand or to listen to its international and web casts, Kim Hill is like Oprah, with a few differences: her shows are made with less budget, have better content and the IQ average of the followers could be double (don’t quote me on this, I misplaced the stats this info is coming from, yet it may be underestimated).
Well, the mockoblog was not mentioned on air due to its merits. The producers didn’t look for it desperately. It was rather the other way around: I bumped into the show though an email. Kim had an interview about books, e-books and all sort of related stuff and this author could not help himself, wrote an urgent email on his smartphone and send it straight away. Here it is:
<<Dear Kim,
The book was born centuries ago as a veichle [sic!] for the story. Form vs content.
Yet the story had been created by the first humans to pass on information to the future generations. The stories were collective and intractive [sic!] in the old history of mankind but the book and now the ebook [sic!] became selfish forms, confining the screwing content and generating the concept of author.
The future of the story is its past: interactive as they are again, the true new books live on the internet, thus they are mortal and dynamic again.
Please check the concept of mockoblog as this is an example of new gendre [sic!] just being born as we speak. There’s an alternative history there, too.
Kind regards, […]>>
Kim red this email live on the radio and underscored the mistakes. I felt totally embarrassed. My English is poor enough. As it is. But the predictive text in my Nokia, which is perhaps the best fast spelling tool, is not good enough if you’re a bit slow with electronic devices, have big fingers, no glasses and don’t pay attention to the learning system inbuilt in this phone’s dictionary. She said I was inventing the word gendre. I was not but maybe I should add it to MOKOPEDIA anyway:
Gendre = this is to gender and genre what mule is to horse and donkey.
Thank you Kim Hill! I’ll keep on listening your Saturday morning shows unless in a deep coma or worse.
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Here the history of the book should have continued, but I was told by one of my many readers (that by now has exceeded two, excluding search engines and spammers) that my posts are too long and there size extends over the normal attention spam of the average blog reader. I tried to explain that my blog is not an average blog and that my readers are NO WAY average readers. I lost this debate, so, instead of telling you the true history of the book, I’ll just stop and just have my average dinner.
Yet, do you really think my posts are way too long?
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PS:
About the what to do and the what not to do in a blog I may comment later. But the length of my posts is irrelevant anyway. As you will see in the near future, we will be rejected from the blogosphere, thus becoming (as in the theory of the Universe and other mathematical big stuff) a singularity. This is not a nasty blog at all, thus it doesn’t obey the rules of a blog. It’s a nice mockoblog and it has its own internal laws, if any. To compare the two notions, think of dictatorship (the blog) and democracy (the mockoblog).
Another feature of a sucessful blog is not to post twice in one day. The readers will only read the last stuff you’ve published. This may be true for their readers. Future will prove that the mockoblog doesn’t follow this advice either. Think of Ronald Regan: he won the Cold War because he changed the rules of the game, of course. He was an actor for longer time than he was a president. The Soviet leaders, Gorby included, had always been communist politicians. Take their toys away and they’ll be lost.
The Devil in the Mobile Phone III (Just Cruising Before Crashing) – Updated!
Wednesday, June 3rd, 2009WARNING: this post includes information that may have to be removed or will be removed without the author of this blog having to give consent to any edit on this post. If you wish to keep this post or parts of it, you should copy and save what you may need for your future info.
If I were to keep the record straight as in Star Trek this should actually be:
MockoBlog MockoLog # 7
I’m jinxing the evil eye of Google so they may not see this post and ignore it as they have done with all my sublime (mocko)work so far.
My 23 (twenty-three is like two every three days since I launched this blog) readers should feel relief and joy finding out that I was too busy at work to further test my slightly personalized mobile in harsh conditions like pubs, bars, late night pubs and night bars, not to mention jeans/denim back pocket while playing pool under the influence (a magic game I never actually get involved in, unfortunately).
All I did through these last days that involved Queen’s Birthday Weekend was to just have the new phone on me and go to work and back home. And back to work. And again.
Well, having a smartphone casually left on the table at lunch time in the work cafe triggers some comments. It goes like: “Oh, you have Internet on your phone!” or “Oh, I didn’t think Blackberry make them so small?” or “Is it an Ipod?”
I can’t be bothered answering these type of comments, I just say modestly, looking intensely at my plastic fork penetrating the plastic noodles: “No, it’s just – err, it’s just a phone, it was the best ever made when they launched it last year, but actually now it’s not, you can get a more expensive one, it doesn’t have the same features, but it will look bigger, with a bigger screen, you’ll pay for the screen and not for what it can do, so mine is still better. I mean, in a way – anyway, I love my noodles and this phone’s got GPS! See?! And real radio, listen!”
It’s such a cruel comment I’m going to make: the Air France flight from Brazil that was lost in the Atlantic might have had better phones on board.
But they were all switched off. I guess.
Not the phones interfeered with the Airbus’ fly- by-wire system or with its main computer talking with the land-based systems. I may be wrong but in 1994 an Airbus plane flying towards Paris had the auto pilot taking over from the human pilot. It performed jumps up and down, almost crushed the plane while the real pilot was trying to switch the auto system off. The plane went straight up and then down. I think I remember the pilot was then held as a hero, then silenced and perhaps he lost his job. The line that was operating that flight was Tarom. This is one saga I know of, but there might have been other ones. Please don’t take this as 100% sure, it’s just a blog anyway.
If any of my next to zero readers thinks this is a joke, please read:
In case they remove it from the database, here’s a copy of the incident, as described in Franglaise:
INCIDENT TAROM
Le 24 septembre 1994 a 12H 45 le pilote du A310-325 perd le contrôle de l’avion en arrivant à Orly face Ouest. L’avion pique sur la ville de Villeneuve le ROI. A 240 mêtres du sol, le pilote réussit a redresser l’avion.
Incident description – Status:Final
| Date: | 24 SEP 1994 |
| Time: | 12.45 |
| Type: | Airbus A.310-325 |
| Operator: | Tarom |
| Registration: | YR-LCA |
| C/n: | 636 |
| Year built: | 1992 |
| Crew: | 0 fatalities / 11 on board |
| Passengers: | 0 fatalities / 175 on board |
| Total: | 0 fatalities / 186 on board |
| Location: | Paris-Orly Airport (ORY) (France) |
| Phase: | Landing |
| Nature: | Scheduled Passenger |
| Departure airport: | Bucharest-Baneasa Airport (BBU) |
| Destination airport: | Paris-Orly Airport (ORY) |
| Flight number: | 381 |
Remarks:
Tarom Flight 381 approach to Paris-Orly Runway 26 and the captain was at the controls. He decided to perform an automatic approach and landing. The flight crew started to put the aircraft into the approach configuration, with slats and flaps at 15/0 at 10.42:05, then at 15/15 at 10.42:53. The landing gear was extended at 10.42:57. Approaching the OYE beacon at indicated speed 250 kt and heading 325, before lining up with the runway, the Captain noted that the aircraft was not capturing the ILS glide slope automatically. He disconnected the AP and continued the approach on manual control, keeping the Autothrottle in operation. As the aircraft descended through 1,700 feet, at 10.43:22, with a speed of about 195 knots, the Captain asked for flap extension to 20 . The VFE, the speed limit authorized for this new configuration, is 195 knots. When the flap control was set to 20 , the thrust levers advanced and engine thrust increased. The flight crew countered the nose-up effect resulting from the increase in thrust by using the pitch controls, with the auto-throttle (ATHR) remaining in automatic mode. The throttle levers were then quickly brought back to the idle position. At the same time, the trimmable horizontal stabilizer started to move in a nose-up direction. The nose up effect that resulted was countered by the flight crew through gradual nose-down action on the elevators. When the trimmable horizontal stabilizer reached its maximum nose-up value and the elevators also reached their maximum nose down value, the throttle levers, according to the FDR readout, moved rapidly to their stops. In a few seconds, the flight path started to rise and the pitch attitude went to 60 . Witnesses saw the aircraft climb. It banked sharply to the left and the right and stalled before adopting a strongly negative pitch attitude (-33 degrees) towards the ground. The maximum altitude reached was 4,100 feet, while a minimum indicated speed of 35 knots was recorded. The stall and ground proximity warnings sounded during the descent. The flight crew managed to regain control of the aircraft, with the lowest point being around a height of 800 feet, that is 240 meters from the ground. The flight crew then performed a visual circuit, followed from the tower by the controller. The second approach was made with a configuration with slats and flaps at 20/20. Landing took place at 10.52:25.
Safety actions :
Source: (also check out sources used for every accident)
S185 ; FI 5-11.10-94(4) + FI 23-29.11.94(6); AW&ST 03.10.94(37) ; ASW 03.10.94(6) + 17.10.94(6) + 24.10.94(3); Bureau Enquêtes-Accidents Report on the incident on 24 September 1994 during approach to Orly (94) to the Airbus A 310 registered YR-LCA operated by TAROM (YR-A940924A)
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A more famous Airbus incident happened the same year, this time all on bord died in Russia. The conflict between the autopilot and the human pilots was involved in this crush as well. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeroflot_Flight_593
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I’ll get back to my mobile phone goodies in a later post. Let’s have a moment of silence for the 228 victims of the last Airbus crush – Flight AF 447.
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On 28/06/09 I received on my email two photos that are thought to be taken on a Casio digital camera by Paulo G. Muller, a Brazilian passenger on that flight, moments before he must have lost his life. It is my duty to say that what can be seen in these pictures more or less destroys my theory and tends to point more towards an explosion, a possible terrorist attack. I have no further comments but I’m sure there will be readers who will.
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Now that you’ve seen the pictures, I can tell you that they are just dirty advertising for a Casio digital camera, they arrive in your inbox as an email with a story about a Brazilian actor who took them on his Casio camera. The images are actually frames from the TV series LOST. My original theory on what caused that crash stands!