Israel et al

Having read the dead tree version ofHa'Aretz, especially the back pages, I am informed that from now on we have to drive with our headlights on. From tomorrow. Israelis consider the period from November to March as automatically bad weather. Personally, given that most days I have tinted glasses and the sun blind down, I can only emit a hollow laugh.
Compared to Manchester, or Hamburg this is just silly. For those not familiar with Israeli drivers count yourselves lucky.
The Eggheads have a relative visiting next month. She's brought a new swimming costume! I'm working on a cultural introduction course starting from the airport. If anyone know how to safely travel to Bethlehem I would be grateful.

and what happens if I do?

As an update, the rather cryptic numerals below the notice appear to be Unicode sequences.

Belief

As regular readers will know, we are fully paid up supporters of the Flying Spaghetti Monster Church. In short, we are Pastafarians. May his noodly appendages caress you. I regret to announce a schism in the core of worshipers. The Reform Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster has been created. Only prayer can heal this great divide. For those in serious spiritual need may I suggest this?

The USA and Israel

The Eggheads are partly back together, at least for an hour or two. The Eldest boy takes the bus back to where his heart is shortly. In the meantime, I'm over a bout of flu.

Whilst idling the time away , I stumbled across this rather inflammatory piece that seems to be widespread in the Israeli media. "Vote for Obama a vote for the Death of Israel". Why any sane journal would reproduce this bilious , revolting invective is beyond me. Attack ads are one thing. This is just plain stupid.

Whilst I am personally convinced McCain will win, it won't be because he won the hearts and minds of the American voter. He will win because he made the rather gullible people of the USA afraid. As a counterpoint, try this video.

John McCain Accidentally Left On Campaign Bus Overnight

Elections

The Eggheads finally have a poster on our fence. No, it's nothing to do with Obama/McCain/Palin and thingie. It's our local council. Sometime today, Zipper will decide whether to carry on with trying to build a coalition with the various other parties or throw the dice for a general election. Vox Pop suggests Bibi will win comfortably. Bummer. In the meantime, here's a picture I stole from the Internet.

This is for Racheli

The last holiday

The Eggheads had visitors yesterday. Old friends from Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, places we don't go to anymore unless we have to. We all went to Tzippori and saw the wonderful mosaics and were lucky enough to tack onto a very knowledge lady who wrote her thesis on one of them.



The Mona Lisa of the Galilee. Go visit and enjoy.

Qlink

Mrs Egghead was interested on the news item she heard Friday about a device that protects you from cell phones and 'other harmful radiation'. It's called QLink and before you waste your money, read this first.

If you believe in the healing power of stones, go find your own and save yourself a few hundred shekels. There is no device on the planet that can protect you from non ionizing radiation save living your life in a Faraday shield.

If you're worried about cell phone radiation follow a few simple rules:

• Children should not have them.
• Keep the phone away from your body.
• Use a hands free headset (BlueTooth is really low power)
• Don't use a phone in a car unless it's using an external antenna .

I spent a few hours looking up QLink and I amazed how much money people will pay for nothing. If you have that sort of spare cash, I am available at reasonable rates for technical advice on matters generally understood by sad old gits like me.

It's Friday and I'm not at work

As it's Friday and for once, I'm not at work I would like to share one of my favourite techie sites with you. The link is above. It's called the Daily WTF and contains many stories about "Curious perversions in Information Technology". No , it is not a porn site. No nudity at all, just the weird and wonderful world of Information Technology.
Mind you, these days the WTF acronym stands for "Worse then failure". In it's earlier incarnation it stood for something blunter.

If you're interested in what geeks find interesting in salacious material, try Goggle Sightseeing. Yes, you can visit the world from your own armchair and look at the top 10 people on the planet who have been caught by satellite in the nude. Low resolution though. Google Sightseeing are have a volcano period right now.

My other techie site is 'El Reg', aka "The Register" whose mission statement is "Biting the hand that feeds IT". Another great BritSite who provides serious info on software and hardware and manages semi serious stuff like keeping us informed on what Alan Ralsky and his associates are doing right now. Yes, you too can be 56, get rich from spam and get to visit Club Fed for a while.

Lastly, Scott Adams has had a blog for a while. Go read.

Just work

Whilst the team at work struggle on, we are now facing several fronts. The normal antagonism between management and Engineering reaches new heights. HR , commonly known as inhuman resources are only a minor nuisance now. QA and Engineering have reached a stalemate and a counter attack is planned.
Sales and Marketing have retreated with some of the spoils of war having bravely conducted many meetings and seminars somewhere near the battle. All the medals will go to them anyway.

In short , Engineering will win but will retire hurt.