UP!

Along with the albums on the sidebar under “Listening To”, I’ve also been listening to Shania Twain’s latest album UP!.

The album comes on two discs. Disc one known as the Red Disc has all the songs in their regular pop versions, while Disc two known as the Blue Disc has the same songs in their World / Rhythmic Sound mix versions.

I have to say that hearing the Red disc, i liked the album, but after hearing the Blue disc, i just loved it.

It’s got so many middle eastern and eastern sounds in it, it’s great.
My favourite song is UP!, although each and every song is beautiful and awesome.

This is one of Shania’s best pieces of work.
Rock on girl…

I hear the US version of the album has a Red & Green disc not a Blue disc. The Green disc has country versions of the songs.
I’m not really into country, but even if you are, you still have to get the Blue disc.

Desperate Redefined

I just came across what must be one of the most pathetic and cheapest money making schemes on the internet.
I can’t even think anyone is desperate enough to fall for this, but obviously I’m wrong.

The scheme is: A girl goes to ebay and starts an auction in which she’s selling 30 or 60 days of being a virtual girlfriend for some really desperate guy.
The girl promises to send the winner a letter every week scented with her perfume, a couple of pics, a few emails, maybe an online chat, and that’s it.
Easy money for any girl.

Here are some examples: Here, Here, Here, Here and Here.

What next ?

Back to Outlook

Every once in a while i find myself making a switch of email client from Outlook Express to the more sophisticated Outlook, only to jump back to good old Outlook Express after a few days.

Yesterday evening i decided to make the switch again.

Usually, what pushed me to switch in the past are the task-planning, note-taking and calendar features of Outlook. But after a while, i’d take those features for granted and i’d get pissed off because i can’t see a preview of attached pictures in an email, so i switch back to Outlook telling myself i don’t need something so sophisticated for a task as easy as reading emails.

Anyway, what triggered yesterday’s switch is the fact that i found a plugin for Outlook that enables me to read my RSS feeds in it too.
So, now Outlook is an email client, a RSS reader, a calendar and a task planner, which sounds great.
So, i’ve imported my emails into Outlook for the zillionth time and am currently getting used to it again.
Who knows, maybe this time my emails will stay in it longer than usual 😛

People who are interested in getting this cool RSS reading plugin for Outlook, here’s the site: intraVnews.

PS: Other than switching to Outlook and jumping back to Outlook Express, i’ve also made some other sprints through Mozilla’s email client, Eudora, Opera’s email client, …etc. But Outlook Express always suited me better.

Tunisia 2004 : Tunisia’s Second Match

So, we’re at work, and 4PM comes and the 2nd Tunisian match in the African Cup of Nations begins.
It’s the match between Tunisia and the Democratic Republic of Congo, and it’s an important one for Tunisia.
The football fans sit at their desks working and itching to know what’s going on in the stadium, while the rest of us don’t really give it much thought.

And all of a sudden, one of the guys pulls out a small radio and turns it on loudly for us to hear the commentators announce the first Tunisian goal.
Seconds later, and after a bunch of laughter, the radio goes silent again, only to come back even louder with the announcement of the second goal. Then after another silence, we hear that Tunisia scored a third goal.
A while after that, the match ended with Tunisia winning (3 – 0), a great result that will hopefully push Tunisia forward and raise the players’ self-confidence.

Hope the national team goes on like this and that we win the cup 🙂

Apples & Movies

What the hell is it with Apple computers and hollywood movies ?
I’ve nearly never seen a pc in a movie, it’s always an Apple machine or laptop.

Is there some sort of deal between Apple and the studios ?
Or is it that all these producers and directors have a weird big mad love for Apple stuff ?
Or is it just based on the looks and the fact that Apple computers look more stylish ?

If anyone has an answer, please let me know, it’s been bugging me for ages, and it bugs me even more with every movie i see that has a computer in it.

The Big Eid

Well, the big Eid (as we call it) or more formally Eid El Idh’ha is just around the corner (this weekend), and just like every year, everyone has gone sheep crazy.

The big Eid comes with the end of the Hajj, and is the day in which muslims worldwide sacrifice sheep in commemoration of the prophet Abraham’s story with his son.
They’re supposed to take half of the sacrificed sheep for themselves and donate the other half to the poor.

But in the world of today, this day has become a contest between people on who gets the biggest sheep and is more like a mad eating marathon after which people end up stuffed with meat and sometimes even being treated in hospitals.

I still have no plans for the day, although i’m sure i won’t be buying or sacrificing any sheep.
I’ll most probably be spending it with my wife at my parent’s place or something.

Animals & Man

First it was mad cow disease…
Then came foot and mouth for sheep…
And now there’s bird flu…

What next ?
Fish cancer ??!!

When are humans going to realize that the more they screw with nature, the more nature is gonna screw them back ?!

Don’t design for RFPs ?

I just read an interesting post by Zeldman about why not to design on spec or in other simpler words why not to submit design proposals for RFPs (Requests for Proposals).

You can read his full post here: Don’t design on spec.

The main reasons he gives are:
– It’s a lot of unpaid work.
– Design is only partly decoration. Mainly it is problem solving. You can’t create an appropriate design because you don’t yet know what problems need to be solved.
– It’s unsafe for agency and potential client alike.

I have to agree with Zeldman on the principle, but sometimes the project is big and juicy enough to take the risk.
Of course, not any company should allow itself to take that risk and spend money on an unsure project, and even the companies that can shouldn’t always take the risk.
I think there should be a certain balance, and that these efforts and costs should be factored into the companies’ commercial efforts where a limit is set on how far they should go and how much should be spent on them.