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ANTI-TERRORIST AND MONITARY CRIMES DIVISION FBI HEADQUARTERS IN WASHINGTON, D.C. FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION J. EDGAR HOOVER BUILDING 935 PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE, NW WASHINGTON, D.C. 20535-0001 Website: www.fbi.gov FUND BENEFICIARY THIS IS AN OFFICIAL ADVICE FROM THE FBI FOREIGN REMITTANCE/TELEGRAPHIC DEPT, IT HAS COME TO OUR NOTICE THAT THE C.B.N BANK NIGERIA DISTRICT HAS RELEASED $10.5MILLIOM U.S DOLLARS INTO BANK OF AMERICA IN YOUR NAME AS THE BENEFICIARY, BY INHERITANCE MEANS. ( very long and impressive text that follows )- Mood:bored
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...the surreal, fantasy-like quality of the chapters dealing with the history of shtetl, make the terrible truth of how it ended(which is the only non-fiction part of the book) even more real.
The inertia of human existence, described in the book, turns me to remember what I've been told of my great-grand father (or perhaps it was his brother), who made no effort to evacuate, reasoning that Germans, in his pre-war experience, were civilized people; he rests in Babiy Yar along with most of his family. - Tags:books, thoughts
- Mood:pensive
 - Music:Lynyrd Skynyrd, "Free Bird"
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- Do you speak English?
- Дую, но плохо. | |
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To yearn is fate usurped by man
To mourn that which he yearned in vain
To dust he shall return again
To rise as wheel of time is turning | |
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taken with a BlackBerry
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of my little jana: just got her US citizenship.
:)
UPDT: celebrated by getting some burgers a fries. The good stuff! :) | |
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... has a special place in the heart of any geek, I think.
It's like your favourite worn out t-shirt - just feels right.
Just saw the latest movie (is it 11th?) -- to my surprise liked it. And M. liked it too - even though she does not know what the vulcan neck pinch is. | |
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A pipe must have burst in the ceiling somewhere, and it just started flowing. A dribble at first, but more and more. Until finally - as I was writing this - a section fell down with a satisfying thud.
Wish I had a better camera, but a blackberry will do, the videos came out crappy though. Updt: Two more pieced fell out, and facilities have taken out a couple -- for shame; people were actually making bets which of the sections will fall next. | |
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especially for shoes and clothing, freaking waste of time.
Almost never can find what I like in my size.
Today, in two stores I was told that size 7 is children's size.
Since when? | |
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didn't know that chocolate would float up and down in champagne, like a blob in lava-lamp. | |
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Standing at the intersection of Ocean an U, not too many cars this morning, but enough. Hear a car honking, tires screeching -- see this kid, about twelve, running the red light, to get to the bus on the other side - backpack bouncing, hat askew - right in the path of an old Corolla. Both are trying to stop, the car swerves, and the kid unable to kill the momentum slams into the side of the car. He than sort of spins around, rolling against the side of the car, but never falling, or really stopping, and just keeps on running towards the bus. As the shocked car pulls to the side, the kid is the last to jump into the bus -- he made it, the doors close bus pulls off and he is gone. The car remains.
Are we all this dumb when we're young, or was this one running for Darwin award(pun intended)? | |
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sitting on a floor at the Ft Lauderdale airport.
A bunch of North Eastern flights are delayed, ours by at least 3 hours, not too bad I think if it does not get pushed further
There is a girl of about thirteen sitting on the floor in front of me. She is eating French fries, after each fry she wipes the grease on the carpet, than proceeds to the next one. The mother is sitting righ there, doing something on her laptop. | |
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 Last day here, Captain Bob, who's been pretty good to us till now, did not disappoint. For some reason most people canceled for this morning. So it was just the two of us, a 6-ft German guy from Minnesota, and the captain on the boat.
French reef is wonderful. That's a langouste(spiny lobster) consuming a jellyfish on the left.
( + more ) | |
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 Two awesome sites, packed the creatures. The Snapper Ledge, we were told, for some reason is a favorite hangout for schools of fish, snappers, pipe fish, bait fish. The smaller fishes attract larger ones, barracudas, sail fishes, perhaps even sharks. Well we did see a couple barracudas, but no other biggies. No worries it was still beautiful. And how about that turtle, got a nice vid of it too, gonna youbutbe it later.
( pics ) | |
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 A very nice night dive: sleepy parrot fish all over the wreck. A puffer fish got so disoriented by the light it would bump into everything including me, and allowed us to approach it close enough to touch. Too bad without a proper rig taking a good picture is nearly impossible; unless you get lucky. Actually I was fighting a desire to touch the critters all hour long, some, such us pipefishes, really let you get close when they are sleeping.
Got a fairly decent(all things considered) video of an eagle ray, but got to edit it before uploading.
On the way back we were treated to a great starry sky(no moon). Don't get to see that often in the city.
( +2 more ) | |
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 So we flew down to Florida to scuba dive for a few days. Just came back from the first outing. Two dives at Molasses Reef. First at the north end of it, the Spanish Anchor; than at the south, the Eagle Ray Alley. Spent a full hour under water at each spot. The water is nice -- about 75F, but after an hour it gets cold; gonna rent a wetsuit for the next one, visibility pretty decent, about 20 feet. The current though wears you out. The Spanish Anchor was a bit easier on the current, more welcoming. Saw a huge turtle there, had to be at least a foot and a half in diameter, but it passed too far, could not snap a picture. The place is teaming with life in general, smaller fishes hang out in large schools, bigger one's just show off on their own.
At the Eagle Ray Alley, M. caught the current an let it carry her out pretty far, by the time I caught up we've lost our way, had to surface to find the boat(the waves are at about 2 feet today) and than swim back against the current, pretty tiring, and she almost ran out of air so we had to stay on the surface. Still it was a cool dive. As I bobbed in the watter waiting for her to climb up to the boat, I looked down, and right under me, in 30 feet of water there was an eagle ray at least a foot wide. Just goes to show: don't be a showoff and swim far -- stay by the boat and pay attention.
Tonight we're going for a night dive, gotta rest up a bit.
( Some pictures under the cut, 5 to be exact ) | |
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Standing on a subway platform the other night a thought occurred that when visiting other countries, or even just other cities, their subways always have a completely different feel about them. There is a certain character that the subway system here has which makes it distinct from other places. It's a combination of colors, design elements (signs, station decor) and even smell, I imagine. Each city has something about it's public transportation that is not reproduced anywhere else. (other aspects of cities certainly poses just as much distinctiveness but I got into this with a subway and I'm sticking to it). I've been taking this particular subway for about 16 years now, it feels like my own, got used to it. But I still remember riding it for the first time. How odd and foreign it felt. Confusing and even scary. That night I was a bit drunk, just enough for the thoughts to flow at angles with each other, so I was immediately reminded of the entire experience of immigrating.... How everything felt surreal for the first months. The streets, the buildings, the people all strange (as they often are when you're a stranger). I thus traveled down the memory lane. So much so, that when the train screamed into the station it no longer felt familiar, it was as if I had traveled elsewhere in those moments. I got off the train to walk home, same street I take every day for a few years now; but that feeling of "newness" lingered, and the street seemed unfamiliar. I figure it is a neat trick, I can invoke that feeling of coming to a new place any time I get bored with the place I'm at, at those times when can't travel physically. | |
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Пришел пожилой мужик к учителю гитаристу, и просит научить его играть одну песню: "Smoke on the Water" от Deep Purple.
Гитарист согласился, и тактично удерживал распроссы по началу.
Но через какое то время регулярных занятий дедушка дейтвительно выучил песню и тогда гитарист все же позволил себе полюбопытсвовать почему одну песню и именно эту.
"Понимаешь" -- отвечает дед -- "Внук у меня, школу закончил, 23 года оболтусу уже, сидит дома, не хрена не делает только на гитаре брынчит вот эту песню -- и все никак не выучит. Я зайду к нему в комнату, возму гитару и отыграю всю песню от А до Я, а потом скажу; Ты видишь, даже я могу это играть, а ты бестолочь не можешь, иди работать, мудак!" | |
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An asian woman was playing an accordeon this evening in the West 4th Station. She was playing Hava Nagila. She was good! | |
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It is a fine thing to demolish something. But satisfying as it may be, it does not compare to building.
So this weekend we've devoted to building some recessed bookcases.
Took us a while to figure out what the heck we're doing, but at the end of two days there they were, seven perfectly set wooden coffins. All they need now is to be stained and set with some shelves, but that's later.
the images are taken with a cell phone
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( +2 ) | |
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Spent the weekend wrecking a house for close friends in preparation for renovations. They asked a couple of very close friends and family, of male persuasion, to help demolish a few rooms. This is kinda fun, would I want to do this for living -- probably not, though it would not be the worst career choice, but a couple of days on the weekend is not too bad. There is something incredibly satisfying about breaking through the sheet rock wall with your bare hands(I'm surprised how easy it is to break through it). Having broken through the wall it was discovered that some of the rooms still have the original walls from early 1920's when the house was constructed. It would seem that the builders used the recently invented gypsum-boards, the manufacture's label is still intact and readable on the back. The walls also had a few layers of wallpaper covered by paint. This is kinda like digging through history... a small, insignificant history, but history nevertheless :) It is amazing how well a wooden structure holds up through all these years. | |
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| The opening words to Echoes, make me think of Горький |
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Overhead the albatross hangs motionless upon the air
And deep beneath the rolling waves in labyrinths of coral caves
The echo of a distant tide
Comes willowing across the sand
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Над седой равниной моря ветер тучи собирает.
Между тучами и морем гордо реет Буревестник, черной молнии подобный.
....
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So than Blackberry Storm is coming to Verizon soon. And they are raffling out a bunch of them by the way of display cases spread all over Manhattan. So on my way from work I scouted 3 of the locations, wrote down the game-words and submitted them. Now waiting for my Storm -- this is going to be sweet! :) | |
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I looked into Mr. Putin's eyes, and I saw three letters, a K a G, and a B. -- Sen. McCain UPD: corrected the quote per transcript from CNN | |
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Александр Дулов, Durham (2003) "Хромой король"
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Fun movie, and funny too.
Every male character is a self-centered bumbling idiot.
Every female is a shrewd manipulative bitch.
I think it's some sort of commentary on the society at large. | |
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pensivecynic's journal
