Fact: Yesterday, a 23 yo Nigerian man attempted to ignite a flammable substance aboard flight DL253, a short time before landing in Detroit. Other passengers saw a bright light and a sound of fireworks before the man was stopped and the device extinguished.

The plane departed from Amsterdam. The first …

Liu Xiaobo is on trial. The verdict is due on Dec 25th, 2009, when western media is on holiday so as to reduce international attention on the case.

Liu Xiaobo is a human rights activist and signatory of Charter 08, a groundbreaking manifesto requesting the modernization of the Chinese state …

Recently: http://www.gilestro.tk/2009/lots-of-smoke-hardly-any-gun-do-climatologists-falsify-data/.

Simultaneously, found on the Independer:

Climate models, which is what the “scientists” use cannot produce evidence. They give a large number of “what if” scenarios. Picking one of these because it fits with the political message is snake-oil selling; not science.

Go check …

In the Netherlands, you should register via the Donor Register. In all countries, the most important is to tell about your choice to your friends and family! They will support your decision and/or accept the request to donate if you end up in a position to donate without being …

Unsettling, surprising ways to learn about oneself.

As I am sitting here, a black ball of purring fur in my hoodie deciding whether to take its chance at staying on my lap in such an uncomfortable setting, I still wonder about how I will crystallize the train of though that …

Friends and colleagues subjected me yesterday to Team America World Police.

Frustration ensued, as I was not able to sort out my feelings (initially) nor communicate them properly (later):

• about the movie itself, general contempt broken down in five parts:
  1. blank disinterest for the “mission” of this movie in parodying …

The worst and best of the world wide web packed in three links:

• The father
• The son
• The holy spirit

A few keys: the “pregnant woman” is actually the “unwed mother”. Where’s Satan? Soldiers have no guns. Han Solo in the background.

Also, why this matters.

The trouble with nerds, when they stay in front of you looking into your eyes, not saying anything and not doing anything, with this awkward half-second of silence after a conversation ends, is that you don’t know how to handle them because it could be they are just being …

Strange and unexpected: those are the first two qualifiers that come to my mind for this evening.

For a start, I was not expecting such a successful date. The energiest, pretty and extra-ordinary girl I planned to have dinner with reached me with her life projects. As we went through …

In the process of sorting through archives and old stuff, I found a collection of sticky notes that colleagues and I used five years ago to evaluate students at EPITA. These were oral examinations with no computer, only pen and paper or whiteboard. As I am recycling the paper, here …

Last sunday my mind decided against the will of my body and despite one night dancing out I was ended up biking from Amsterdam to Marken and back. Fifty kilometers and a few sunburns later, I felt strangely relaxed, surprised again by the merits of exercise on my psychological sanity …

The recent months have kept me more busy than usual with work, but meanwhile my position in a University has altogether increased my consumption of news items, both on paper and in bit arrangements. One would assume that the flurry of world events would call for a steady stream of …

There is a quality to the urban sidewalk at night after a rainy day nowhere to be found otherwise, except maybe on a very quiet night with bright moonlight on a lake border.

This quality is the reflection of city life in puddle pools.

The eyes of the casual observer …

Looking at the world since 2001, according to WHO & other reports:

• >2,500,000,000 humans living with less than $2 per day (decreasing);
• 50,000,000-70,000,000 deaths per year, of which:
  • >7,000,000 deaths per year due to cancer (increasing)
  • >2,500,000 deaths per year …

Update (2012): this entry was reposted and updated, elsewhere.

Because you asked so nicely, Julieta, I am willing to play along…

Rules: Once you’ve been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose 25 people …

I am getting seriously annoyed by this question.

Not because it is somewhat intimate and still part of the social handshake, just between “what’s your name?” and “what do you do?”. The latter got me annoyed before but I learned how to cope with it already.

No, the reason …