Month: June 2005

Guess Who

Guess WhoA few days ago we went to see “Guess Who” featuring Ashton Kutcher and Bernie Mac.

We saw the trailer for this movie a number of times and it looked really cool and funny. It turned out it really was, although I expected it to be just a bit funnier.

The story is about a white guy and black girl who fall in love, and who want to announce their engagement to her parents while visiting and attending their vow renewals. It has some really hilarious moments, and it reminds me a lot of “Meet The Parents”.

Ashton Kutcher did an ok job in this movie too. I believe stuff like this is what suits him the most. Bernie Mac was very funny in this movie. I don’t like his sitcom, but he’s a lot better in movies.

All in all, it was a really nice and funny movie.

My score for it would be: 7/10

You’ve got to find what you love

“You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.”

— Steve Jobs

I totally fully extremely agree!
I couldn’t have said it better if I wanted to.

Jordan Blogger Meetup

Tonight we attended a Jordan blogger meetup.

It was really great and so much fun meeting everyone, putting faces to the blogs and chatting with everyone.
It felt like we all knew each other really well but still were meeting for the first time, lol. Weird.

The meetup went on from 7PM to 11:15PM at Wild Jordan Caf

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time

Today, I finished reading “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time” by Mark Haddon.
It’s such a light and great book, I just flew through it.

It is a murder mystery told by an autistic 15 year old boy who is mathematically gifted and socially hopeless, raised in a working-class home by parents who can barely cope with their child’s quirks. He takes everything that he sees (or is told) at face value, and is unable to sort out the strange behavior of his elders and peers.

I loved the way the book was written and how simple it is. You really feel the boy telling the story and you go into his little world with all his quirks and thoughts and live it with him.

I highly recommend this book. It’s really fun and it will truly touch you too.

Tagged & Questioned…

I got tagged by Roba to do this. So here goes.

What is the one word you would use to describe your appearance?
Hmmm…

Favorite body part?
My face or my hands maybe.

Least favorite body part?
Love handles. Although I see nothing lovely about them. Oh and this slowly developing belly of mine.

Most often complimented on?
How nice and sweet I am.

Most often criticized for?
How I hold back and keep everything inside me.

Your romantic relationship?
I think I’m romantic in my own special way. Nobody agrees!

Continue reading Tagged & Questioned…

Flickr To Offer Print Service

Finally…

Flickr, the online photo service owned by Yahoo, is gearing up to launch a new print-on-demand service.

Flickr will partner with Qoop to offer a service that lets users select photos and formats to be printed into bound books.

Those who want to publish books can sell their books on their own Web sites or through online ads, including a link that takes the buyer to Qoop for payment processing, ordering and fulfillment.

[Source: internetnews]

This is great news. I’ve been wanting to be able to sell some of my photos online for some time now, and I hoped Flickr would do something like this.

Anyway, It’d be good if the end user could also have the choice of choosing which photos he wants to print and buy, with the original photographer getting a cut of the payment.

links for 2005-06-15

How many languages in your music collection?

Inspired by Kottke, I’ve counted how many languages are used in my music collection and found the following.

– English: Most of the songs.
– Arabic: A lot of artists.
– French: A lot of artists.
– Italian: Eros Ramazotti, Zucherro, Laura Pausini…
– Spanish: Manu Chao, Shakira, Il Divo, Enrique Iglesias…
– Turkish: Tarkan and others.
– Urdu (Pakistani): Nusrat Fatah Ali Khan
– Hindu: Punjabi MC, and others…
– German: Mo-Do, Die Toten Hosen…
– Thai: I can’t remember the name of the guy. (I got his album when I was visiting Thailand.)
– Latin: Enigma, Era…
– Russian: Tatu
– Gaelic: Enya
– Portuguese: Nelly Furtado
– Chinese: Don’t really know the names.

I’m sure there are a lot more languages here and there in my music collection, but well these are the ones I found now.

How many languages can you find in your music collection?
Post your list or a link to your blog post in the comments.

Atonement – Ian McEwan

I finished reading “Atonement” by Ian McEwan today.

When I bought this book a few months ago, I had never heard of it nor its writer. I started reading it and the first couple of chapters didn’t really get me that attached to the book as it was mostly character development, so I kept leaving it for a while and coming back a number of times. That’s until the story picked up and things started becoming interesting, then really interesting, then amazing and I was sucked in.

This is a truly great book. The characters feel so real and are so well developed you feel as if you’ve known them for years. The story is amazing and very well told in a fascinating writing style.

It tells the story of a 13 year old English girl (Briony) who lets her imagination overwhelm her judgement leading to close family ties being irreparably severed, and a promising young man’s (Robbie) prospects being destroyed.
The book goes on to track Robbie’s attempts to recapture the grace of his life before the fall, and Briony’s attempts to atone for ruining his future.

The ideas I loved most in it were how with a bit of imagination a number of different versions of a story can come to life, some of them really destructive.

I also loved how the writer told the story through the characters’ eyes and thoughts. It was so beautiful.

I really recommend this book. It was actually nominated for The Booker Prize award a few years back.

Backstreet Boys – Never Gone

Yesterday, I got to hear Backstreet Boys’ new album “Never Gone” while I was at a friend’s place.

Before listening to the full album, the only song I knew from the new album was “Incomplete” which I thought was a pretty nice song.
The album mostly follows in the same footsteps.

The boys have grown up and matured and it shows in their music and lyrics, it’s no longer that annoying teen pop music (which I bet wasn’t that annoying for everyone some years ago. You know who you are :P).

I quite enjoyed the album and like the style they’re going in. Sort of a mix of soft rock and r’n’b, some nice acoustic guitar and piano here and there, easy cool tunes and very nice vocals.

One little problem though is that their name “Backstreet Boys” doesn’t quite fit them anymore.
But oh well, who cares, the name sucked from day one.