today's one to watch

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/blog/2008/sep/10/cern.large.hadron.collider

thinking: join up

Population goes ZING. Need more food. Population ages, eats for longer. Fat people die earlier, but eat more.

Solution:

1) Ban meat
2) Expand the armed forces and drop entry criteria
3) Start an aggressive campaign to export the wonderful European model to the rest of the world; don't stop until achieved


Who needs an MSc?

Ask Oxford

In not-really-penance for swearing a while ago, I put up Ask Oxford's word of the day for a week. Of the seven that I featured, four were English, and perhaps loge is also in standard use. However, they are still arriving in my inbox, sourced from the Oxford Dictionary of English, Many of them appear to be misplaced from the Oxford Dictionary of Foreign.

Khanga – the East African fabric – is arguably in-place, since people in East Africa largely speak English (though khanga will have predated English presence there). But pensionnat and tupic are simply not English words. Likewise cantal and skyr, while several others have been legal or kitchen terms drawn from French.

The point of subscribing to such a service is to expand your vocabulary, to then slip those new words into your speech/use of words. So I guess it's fine if you are happy to keep explaining the funny words you're using (although knowing what a tupic is from having befriended a Canadian Inuit is preferable...). Of course, as an armchair polyglot I'm not complaining, but there are loads of obscure English words - or foreign ones that are used - which could feature. But maybe they've all been used in the years before I clicked on the service.

Having the time of your life

Wow. Forgive us, less than plugged in, for not realising that Mamma Mia would be a film based on ABBA. Flimsy plot, beautiful Greek-island scenery, clearly great fun to make. The older cast, women especially, had a riot, while the younger tried too much to act. The Julie Walters-Meryl Streep-ThatOtherOne WhoWasInThatOtherThing trio were great, the songs were fab. Meryl gets points for effort, Pierce gets points deducted for allowing the director to give him a second chance. Colin Firth, for the first time since he was frozen as Mr Darcy when I was but a whippet, made me realise that he is an actor. (Not, I must say, through his acting.) Didn't stop laughing :)

Mukuvani good, missiles bad

So Condi Rice and Ratko 'Radek' Sikorski toasted their missile defence deal with Georgian wine? I think they are missing a trick here. Recent events have shown the great capacity of NATO for defending its allies, members or soon-to-be. Makes sense for Russia to get its licks in now. What can Europe do to help? By now, Condi knows: Georgian wine is gorgeous. Su-perb, I can't put it strongly enough. The best I've had, including Hungarian. Especially the reds, lip-smacking, dreamy concoctions, legs up to here, and if it had eyes they would say take me seriously, and take me now. The whites were somewhat similar, but white. What? Never had any? Quelle shock. I've never seen a bottle of Georgian wine in London (or Bratislava, for that matter - or maybe one?) because the EU imposes import duties on it. Forget silly mutual defence pacts: as Kalman Mizsei, former UNDP Europe chief, said about Moldova, where he is the now the EC's man, it would make such a small difference to the European wine sellers, to have more access for Georgian wines, and it would bring plenty cash to Georgia.

Last year I met three Georgian ruling party MPs, who despite being in their twenties could say nothing about young people in Georgia. Perhaps the 'people' part was missing - like most of the population, they were in the Saakashvili's shadow. If Russia doesn't annex them and dispense with silly things like parliaments, these apparatchik cretins can carry on fighting with History as to who can screw Georgia most. Hard to be overshadowed by a fifty year old still living with his mother (or is that the brother?), so no such problems for Radek. A rising star, in the post-socialist free market radical mould, insulated by the deep resentment of Russia/communism. The role of the state? Out of the economy and into the bedroom (nobody said it was that consistent...). Getting the requisite CV testosterone as defence and foreign minister; next Polish president but one.

Crushed velvet

On 21 August forty years ago, loads of troops from Warsaw Pact countries moved in to Czechoslovakia for a few days, to crush any ideas of further democratising the regime t/here, which was already one of the more liberal socialist regimes. Of course, the Russians have been celebrating in Georgia, but here in the Little Big City, people are also remembering. There was a guard of honour greeting I. and I off the bridge this morning at Safarikovo Namestie (just what the traffic needs with the current roadworks); they swiftly got onto coaches, with their bumfluff and shiny toy rifles, too young to remember anything interesting about being a soldier in Europe.

The other remembrance activities involve the Mestska Policia (city cops) - all of whom were probably enthusiastic army chaps in their day - pushing gypsies off bikes, and what I can only hope is a T mobile promotion, in typically thoughtless Slovak style. Unless, of course, it is a take on the new value system in the ex-socialist countries, which I will mention whenif I put up pictures from the last visit to Danubiana...

In other news, some of my work:

Escaping Europe's biggest housing estate for similarly noteworthy lake

The great Balaton

Trabant convention!

Made of cardboard... cheap (once), fuel efficient, and if you crash, you die.

Trabis everywhere! (Iron cross noted...)

This man's writing is winding, like running home with shopping to avoid encountering a hoodie in the twilight; the physical effort mixing with the shame of cowardice and the knowledge that it was probably just someone else with their shopping nervously finding their way home.

When they finish on the Paprikahaz, they'll start with the abbey.

For whatever reason, a one-night holiday felt like a week away, in a good sense. The almost complete privatisation of the shore, and the slightly tacky feel of the resorts, makes it not an ideal destination, but the water is lovely, and apart from the Trabi rude boys, it was utterly relaxed. No organised Having Fun, at least where we went (the previous weekend on the south shore, last weekend on the north). Tihany is pretty, and has a sad cautionary tale: before the (pretty tasteful) building began in earnest, there was an echo that would repeat eleven syllables, and now there is not. Skoda.