Anti US or what ?

I was just checking out some of my blogs from the recent days when i felt that maybe i was passing through the wrong message regarding the US, and so i thought i’d just blog about it and state my official position.

I’m not Anti US, never was, never will be. I’m just against the current US policies and leadership, just like millions of Americans and other people around the world.
There’s a huge difference.
I don’t hate Americans nor the US as a country, in fact i have very good friends who are Americans, and i’d even like to visit the US for tourism someday and visit all the beautiful places in it.

I totally think that it was a big mistake for Bush to become president. And i think that he is steering the US in a wrong direction and messing up things for the American people as well as the world.
If i were American, i would have voted for Gore in 2000, and would probably vote for Dean in 2004, but i’m not an American, and all i can do is watch.

I think the American people deserve a lot better than this leadership and that they should stand up for themselves in the next elections and choose someone who can fix this mess and focus on making lives better instead of ruining them.

Computer Randomly Plays Classical Music

God Damn It !
Now, after nearly 6 years, i finally know why the hell my old pc started playing that damn symphony !!!

It was exactly the night before i had to hand in and present my System Analysis project to the grumpiest and shittiest professor in the Computer Science department, a full Real Estate Agency system built using Oracle 7.
As if i didn’t go through enough pain with Oracle killing my pc’s memory and making me suffer to get it work right, when i finally sighed marking the end of the project, my once beloved pc started playing this symphony for me, and God knows i nearly shit myself right then and there.

After scanning the damn thing with every anti-virus software i could get my hands on and trying every possible thing that came to mind, the pc speaker was still buzzing away. by this time, in my mind, it was no longer a symphony, it was this damned pc telling me to go screw myself.

Having to take the pc with me to university for the presentation, i couldn’t allow it to go on with that maddening tune, so i unplugged the pc speaker and enjoyed the peaceful quiet that followed.
It got me through the presentation ok, although i was trembling in fear it would screw the whole thing at any second.

That pc speaker remains unplugged to this very day, holding a memory of a haunting tune that once threatened to give me a heart attack.

Movies i’ve seen recently

Well, for people who know me or who have been reading my blog for a while, they know it’s virtually impossible for me to go through a week without watching a minimum number of movies, but i just realized that there are a number of good movies i’ve seen recently that i haven’t blogged about yet, so here goes…

How to lose a guy in 10 days
I really liked this movie, it’s one of the best romantic comedies i’ve seen lately.
The idea and the movie are very funny and true. Kate Hudson and Mathew McConaughey are perfect for the lead roles.
The kind of movie you wouldn’t get bored of watching more than once.

Sweet Home Alabama
Another romantic comedy which is quite good and sweet too. The kind of movie you’d watch once and like and that’s it.

Father of the bride : Parts 1 & 2
Now this is a great movie. Both the first and second movie are great and come at the same level. I loved it. Steve Martin is awesome in these two. A friend of mine told me about it years ago, and i only got to see it last week.
I love the style of the movie and the humour it has in it. I’d see it again and again anyday.

I have a feeling i’ve seen another movie that i’ve forgotten to mention. But well, if i remember what it was, i’ll update the blog 🙂

Today, i’ll be seeing Matrix Revolutions (in French !!! AAARRRGGGHHHH !). Expect a post about it as soon as i’m done 😉

Eid

So the Eid was on tuesday 25th 🙂
As foreseen, my wife and I went for a tour among relatives, then finished it with a dinner at my parent’s place.

Yesterday, we just visited one relative we weren’t able to pass by on tuesday, and then i gave my wife another driving lesson (reminding her of driving a normal gear car), and then we went to Carrefour to develop some films and waste time 😛

That was basically the Eid for me this year 🙂

PS: Turns out things got messed up in my brain again, the Douz festival doesn’t start this week, it starts this week next month, lol…
Oh well, you can’t blame me for a simple mistake like that, i was hungry and mindless for God’s sake, lol…

Eid Mubarak

Well Eid El Fitr is just around the corner (tomorrow or the day after), ushering in the end of the holy month of Ramadan, and giving us our normal food-driven lives back.
Ahhh, i miss those coffee breaks at work 😉

The Eid in Tunisia is a great occasion for extended families to see each other and stay in touch, as they go around visiting each other and wishing one another a happy Eid.

This year, just like last year, we’ll call my wife’s family in Jordan, then we’ll be going for a spin among my relatives wishing them a happy Eid.
I think my mom will be cooking Mloukhia, which is my favourite dish. So maybe we’ll be having dinner at my parent’s place after we finish visiting the relatives.

The second day of Eid will most probably be a day of laziness for me, as i’ll try to cover all the close relatives in day one 😛
Maybe we’ll go out somewhere or just relax at home and watch a movie.

The Douz Festival starts this week too, so going down south again and attending it would be a great idea, if only i had the money to afford it.

Anyway, Sneen Dayma and Eid Mubarak to everyone 🙂

BlogAfrica

BlogAfrica is a new blog directory for blogs from Africa or that talk about Africa.

“BlogAfrica is a new project designed to increase the numbers of people
blogging in and about Africa and to increase the visibility of weblogs about Africa. We’ll be featuring great Africa-focused blogs created by authors within and outside of Africa, running workshops in Africa that bring together African bloggers with bloggers around the world, and, eventually, providing webspace for webloggers in Africa.”

The first BlogAfrica workshops will be taking place in Ghana in January 2004.

I think this is a very interesting initiative, and i hope it makes more people from Africa get into blogging.
I’d certainly like to see more bloggers blogging from Tunisia…

Flex

So, what once was code-named Royale at Macromedia has finally become Flex, and it’s in it’s Beta phase.

I’ve been reading some whitepapers and articles about this, and i’m really excited about it and can’t wait to play around with it, i’ve even applied for the beta program, i hope i get chosen.

Basically Flex is a Rich Internet Application Server that does almost everything the same as any other application server would, but generates swf flash files in the end.

It has a special markup language called MXML which is very XML-like, reminding me of ASP.NET and ColdFusion, but even easier, i’ve taken a quick look and i already feel like i’ve got a good grip on it.

It’s interface will be event driven using ActionScript 2, and it will be able to use WebServices, HTTPService and RemoteObject to access data.

Flex actually runs on a Java Application Server for the time being, but there will also be a version that runs on Microsoft .NET.

I think it’s great that developers will be able to produce rich user interfaced applications a lot easier now using Flex, and i hope that it works out great and grows into something big.
I think the main criteria that will make or break it is whether it’s fast or slow, if it’s going to mean minutes and minutes of loading time, then it will certainly fail.

An idea i have is that maybe Macromedia could have all the basic stuff such as the textboxes, buttons, …etc in Flash Player so that all the application would do is return certain tags for the player to interpret and display, instead of making it part of the returning swf. In short, something like the browser, where the load is thrown onto the user’s machine not on the server resulting in bigger files to download.