Japanese lab creates 'Da Vinci' voices

Now you can listen to Da Vinci too...

The mind boggles

For some incomprehensible reason, I'm up in the morning, watching (I think) Good Morning America. I kinda feel that watching this show is making my IQ drop--as if waking up before 11am isn't bad enough. What's worse, they did a fairly lengthy segment about the Da Vinci Code controversy, and I think the very existence of this controversy (controversy!) is making everyone on the entire planet stupider.

The Da Vinci Code is a novel. Fiction. Bad fiction.

For example, opening the book at random, here's how chapter 20 starts (the emphasis in the quote is mine):

Emerging from the shadows, Langdon and Sophie moved stealthily up the deserted Grand Gallery corridor toward the emergency exit stairwell.

As he moved, Langdon felt like he was trying to assemble a jigsaw puzzle in the dark.

I swear, that's exactly what's written. Not only does Dan Brown start the chapter by repeating the same verb in immediately adjacent sentences, that verb is the vaguest, dullest verb available in the English language. A writer of D&D novels or Harlequins would probably have to expend effort to produce prose that leaden.

Anyway, Good Morning America informs me that Catholics in India (supported by Muslims--yay interfaith cooperation!) are threatening a hunger strike in response to the movie release.

Also, some pastor has called the Da Vinci Code movie the greatest threat to Christianity ever. Ever! Way worse than being fed to Roman lions.

(And according to Jack Van Impe, whose broadcasts I've been following with great interest, the Da Vinci Code is also a sign of the End Times. So, OK, it's a really terrible book, but I don't think the ugliness of the writing is quite that momentous.)

Next they did a story on the "Christian Deliverance" movement, which, as best as I can tell, consists of Protestants who go around conducting exorcisms despite never having been to seminary or studied theology.

Honestly, getting exorcised looks like fun. You thrash around, spit, talk in a scary voice... I think I would be a great exorcee if I ever got the chance. I could insult the exorcist and his ridiculous moustache to my heart's content, and blame it on the demon afterwards.

Then again, the "recommended donation" is apparently $120. So maybe I'll give it a pass.

Mom's Day

I don't usually go in for holidays perpetuated mainly by Hallmark. But every rule has an exception. So, here goes:

My Mom

My mom is a pretty good mom. Actually, really, she's a supermom. She's fed me a lot of really good food over the years. All kinds of food. Most of it was made from scratch. When I was in elementary school and junior high, she made me lunch boxes containing culinary delights that made the other kids gawk in open-mouthed wonder. And then I'd tell them: "It's too bad your mom isn't as good as my mom!"

Just kidding.

Anyway, given how much I love food (and how much I eat) I could stop right here--but I won't.

Here's another way my mom is a supermom: For the past few years, mom has been driving my sisters to and from school--the school being an hour away--each way. Just so they can go to a better school than exists in our little wee prairie town. She does this every day. It's pretty amazing. (Of course, she never did anything like that for me. But I'm sure that she would have been up for it if the occasion had arisen. Or so I like to think.)

When I was a kid, she used to scold me for getting 19/20 on a test. "If you can get 19 right, why can't you get just one more right?" she would say. She had a point. Anyway, I'm in grad school now, so I guess I must have ended up with a pretty good attitude towards academics.

And she's good about nagging. I mean, she still nags, of course, but she always prefaces her nagging with a warning that she's about to nag me. So, it's like I'm being nagged, but I still sort of count as an adult.

Anyway: To my mom: happy mother's day.

Missive missed

How rude! Ahmadinejad wrote Bush a letter, but the man himself probably never even read it. From the BBC:

Mr McClellan would also not confirm whether Mr Bush had personally read the letter, saying only: "I would just leave it at what I said: We've received it."

But of course Bush didn't read it. After all:

...it was said to run to 17 or 18 pages of history, philosophy and religion.

So there are at least four reasons why Bush couldn't possibly be expected to get through the thing.

As far as I can tell, the major American news media aren't providing the text of the letter. We have to turn to the French for that. (In this single-spaced format, it only runs for 8 pages.) I'm not sure why the full contents of the letter aren't being made available here.

Walmart Moves to Trademark the Smiley Face

You have got to be kidding me.

And so it begins

I just got back from a short walk to and from campus and the grocery store. Along the way I sneezed my first few pollen-driven sneezes of the year.

I've got antihistamines, but I may have to purchase kleenex for the first time since coming to this fine city. (So far I've been making do with pq.)

The many uses of PQ

In Canuckistan, the acronym "PQ" stands for le Parti Québécois, a separatist party advocating national sovereignty for Quebec.

Back in France, on the other hand:

..."pq" means lavatory paper - "p" for papier and "q" because it sounds like the French word for your rear-end.

As a properly anglo+francophone Canuckistani friend of mine remarked, the two meanings are really remarkably similar.

Some inspiration for the defenders of America's borders

Malaysia, much like the USA, has historically suffered from the terrible disease of illegal immigration. Unlike the Americans, though, the Malaysians actually had the resolve to do something about it. They decided to act just last year. Let's review how that went.

March 1, 2005:

Malaysia begins migrant round-up

Malaysia has begun rounding up and arresting illegal migrants following the end of a four-month amnesty. Those arrested could face heavy fines, jail sentences and whipping.

That's showing those migrants! Of course, a bold move like this was bound to be resisted at first.

March 2, 2005:

Illegal workers hide in Malaysia

Thousands of foreign workers may have gone into hiding in Malaysia to avoid a crackdown on illegal migrants, immigration officials have said.

Oh, sure, some tried to hide. For all the good that did them.

International media coverage of the cleansing of Malaysia died down for a while after this, so one can only assume that the location and expulsion of illegal immigrants proceeded apace.

Another difficulty or two did crop up, however.

March 24, 2005:

Malaysia reviews labour shortage

Senior Malaysian politicians are due to meet on Thursday to discuss a labour shortage brought about by recent moves to expel illegal foreign workers.

A panel is expected to discuss how to replace an estimated 500,000 migrants who left under an amnesty that allowed them to avoid various punishments.

Malaysians have been told to take the jobs themselves.

But unemployment is low except among graduates, who have shown no interest in the dirty low-paid jobs on offer.

Nothing but a hiccup, though! The plan was basically sound, and just needed a bit of an adjustment. Thus, less than three months after the fines, imprisonment, and whipping began:

May 26, 2005:

Malaysia U-turn on immigrants ban

Malaysia is to relax immigration rules to allow former illegal migrant workers to visit the country to seek work.

Having persuaded illegal migrants to leave with a threat of fines, jail and whipping, the government now desperately wants them back.

It has even set up centres in Indonesia, where most of the workers came from, to speed their return as legal employees.

...Malaysia will now allow the Indonesians to enter the country on tourist visas, without the promise of employment, to seek work once they arrive.

It is an embarrassing U-turn from a government that wanted to make political capital from its tough stance on illegal immigration - and a sign of just how badly Malaysia's labour shortage is biting.

OK, so the hardline stance didn't work perfectly in Malaysia. But Malaysia's situation is completely different from America's. And, in any case, any anti-illegal-immigrant legislation in the USA would benefit from superior planning, as well as lessons learned from the blindspots in the Malaysian strategy (careful planning and learning from the past being strong points of contemporary American policy). Obviously America would come up with some way to accommodate the economic damage that would inevitably result from imprisoning and deporting its illegal immigrants--by, say, NOT DOING THAT.