the quality of mercy

"The quality of mercy is not strain'd,
It droppeth, as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath: it is twice bless'd;
It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes..."

The Merchant Of Venice Act 4, scene 1, 180–187
-William Shakespeare

and these his words
written about four hundreds years ago
make scintillate my soul
since the beauty they convey
is not only about the artistry of the English word
they are deeper,
they reach my core

if we all could be a bit merciful
then the enemies would turn into love

William Shakespeare, 1564 - 1616

Wallander: high brow TV

"These are our lives. And they are fragile. Precarious. Miraculous. They're all we have."
Detective Kurt Wallander in Firewall

I have seen only two episodes of Wallander
and I am hooked!

here the opening of the 1st episode I watched
Sidetracked




great darkish photography
great intriguing stories
great technoish music
and of course
superb acting: nothing less than Kenneth Branagh



i am a follower of PBS Masterpiece Mystery!
and this is probably one of their best series
(though i am a fan of Oxford's Inspector Lewis and his sidekick Hathaway too)

Wallander stories unfold in the town of Ystad, Sweden
and are based on the novels of author
Henning Mankell

if you have access to watch this series
give it a try
TV can be a good thing sometimes too

The Berlin Wall, 20 years gone - The Big Picture - Boston.com

The Berlin Wall, 20 years gone - The Big Picture - Boston.com
click to see these fantastic and soulful pictures from the fall of the Berlin wall and its twenty anniversary
Posted using ShareThis

grasshopper's back

another visit of mister grasshopper
these days grasshoppers visit less
they are careful 'cause of the cats and many birds

this gorgeous one, who i had to rescue from
herr Gato' fauces, who was playing with it
appeared this weekend

i grabbed him and placed him on the palm
where i've seen little holes afterward
meaning he's been around and munching on it

the close up shows his thorn-like back legs
& for me, it's always a pleasure to see my old
friends the grasshoppers around



hope you had a lovely weekend

frau Kitty's escapade

self-explanatory

Wallace and Gromit

all-time favorites Wallace and Gromit
are 20 now!
to celebrate, Nick Park answers 20 questions
submitted online by fans about Wallace and Gromit
a treat for those plasticine aficionados, like me


20 questions with Nick Park, creator of Wallace and Gromit


Gromit knits


Wallace (& many sheep) fret over Gromit's destiny plastered all over the headlines

now in case you want more from Nick Park's creations
i highly recommend you this episode
Cats or Dogs
from the hilarious series
Creatures Comforts


Creature Comforts: Cats or Dogs

happy 40th anniversary Internet dear

a day like today, but 40 years ago
the Internet was born
with a broken message: LO
the 1st message was supposed to be 'login'
but one of the computers crashed
sounds familiar?

today the news is all over, well, the internet
a self-celebration
and following back steps comes
the 1st attempt of connecting 2 computers
through a network, the ARPANET
y
i read it all a while ago
on a book my friend perro lent me

[ highly recommendable if you are interested
in knowing how is it that now-a-days you can read
posts like this, a couple millions more
and counting... then meet people online, and in my case
to actually have a job
(i spent about 80% of my time at work
writing HTML and CSS and plenty at home
surfing, reading, writing, posting, uploading,
downloading, eExisting...)]

ah yes, the book is
Were Wizards Stay Up Late:
The Origins Of The Internet
it's very exciting to read about
the guys who were able to transform
human communications forever
& why such a project was intended for

and i just realized, '69 is my birth year too
i am as old as the internet...

and i think there's no cooler way to celebrate
than to visit Kevin Kelly's superb project
The Internet Mapping Project
[don't skip reading his soulful eIntroduction]

he has collected 'sketches' or 'maps' of the internet
on his flickr site for a while now
these sketches go from cute & funny to bizarre
and you can even download, sketch,
and submit yours here!
a few of the maps, click to enlarge
and read the age, occupation, and hours
the drawers spend on the internet
very interesting!









and here you can see all the 113 Kelly has so far

Ligeia, pumpkins, y gatos

high winds and cold weather
doesn't sound like San Diego
but it has been like this the past two days
and i am immensely happy about it!
i finally get to wear a sweater for the 1st time
in about 8 months...

and the weather matches the October Halloweenesque mood
so I've running some of those infamous October errands
like reading Allan Poe's short tales &
getting a cheap, small & rather cute pumpkin for $1.99 at Von's



and i am not sure if to cook it and munch it down
or to carve with a silly face like last year
[halloween 2008]
although it's sad to keep it away from herr Gato
who is rather enamored with it



he's not supposed to climb on this table
but since the arrival of the pumpkin
every time i leave the house and come back
i find him sleeping by it
i moved the pumpkin
and the napping cat followed it
so funny!
my guess is he likes the smell



and on breaks and to break away from
obnoxious everyday issues
i've been reading this classic Allan Poe's tale
Ligeia
I read it many many years ago
I was a teenager, 12, or 14? maybe?
and I read it in Spanish
so it is pretty much a brand new story for me
and the old English style
it really takes you for a few minutes
away from it all, trying to understand and make sense
of all those complicated English sentences and especially
to imagine those scenarios that mister Poe so
delightfully narrated... by the time it all makes sense
you realize the obscurity of the matter handled
here here free eBook a simple & sober .txt file
courtesy of the wonderful Gutenberg Project
and you might as well read the whole compilation
where this story appears, Famous Modern Ghost Stories
selected by Dorothy Scarborough, Ph.D.
Lecturer in English, Columbia University
New York, March, 1921.
yes!! 1921, so old classic tales
really, you should...
enjoy!


Ligeia illustration
~by an author whose name i don't know but who has
a great illustration of Allan Poe's creepy tale in Google images

don't cage the hen that feeds you

little advice on how to make the burden less
on the animals we abuse every day to feed ourselves...
of course i could help more if i were a vegan!
but since i am not, at least i buy eggs from cage-free raised hens

i am claustrophobic myself, so i can only imagine what it's like
to spend one's lifetime inside a cage, let alone
putting tons of eggs for those ugly two-legged, loud-speaking
animals to collect them every morning and engorge on them
boiled, fried, or on muffins and pancakes...

so no posts, bad mood days, ah but a tea advice & more blah

i've been rather moody the last couple of days
called in sick 2 days
migraine (under control)
but still... &
tiredness, bad mood, and general down-lowness
all mostly courtesy of the jerky thievery
landlords & owners of the roach motel
the placed is rented
but they are trying to take advantage of me anyways
returning a misery of all that i gave them

so yeah
blah blah blah
gray gray gray
angry tired & a mess
thank God i remember
there is a whole long life
of mine before and after this sordid
episode
and at the end it will be all a silly post

and sure, i am not taking it
am going to the small courts claims
ah! i will for once test the American legal system
hooray????

so like with many other bad episodes in life
a smudge of grayness among the blue skies
of one's life

yeah, they might take advantage of me
but at least i am me and not them
heh heh

and then i opened one of these
philosophical tea bags


ah sighs!

[and the word you don't read complete
'cause of my dry finger is 'reason']