Karekiet 39

Ons nieuw stadsmuseum M vierde de laatste dagen van de openingstentoonstelling rond Rogier Van Der Weyden met laatavondopeningen. We moeten dus niet teveel verschillen van de doorsnee Vlaming, aangezien ook wij bijna vergeten waren dat de einddatum eraan kwam. Dan probeer je natuurlijk nog een vrij moment te vinden, met als resultaat dat we op vrijdagavond 4 december 2009 om 22u nog naar het Museum gegaan zijn (de nocturne in M was tot 24u).

Nocturne

Het fenomeen van de museum nocturne is in België duidelijk aan populariteit aan het winnen. De grote tentoonstellingen maken er meer en meer gebruik van, en recent was er ook de ‘Nocturne van de Brusselse Musea‘, waar een hele reeks musea in onze hoofdstad een aantal opeenvolgende donderdagen in de herfst openblijven tot 22u00. Een mooi initiatief van een niet onbelangrijke groep musea, dat ook weer dit jaar een enorm succes was, als we de kranten mogen geloven.

Wij hadden onze tickets online gereserveerd, wat vlot ging. Het is hetzelfde ticketing systeem dat ook door Het Depot gebruikt wordt, dus het systeem kenden we al. Wat meeviel is dat je bij de reservatie moet melden in welk uur je zal toekomen. Dat geeft je een volledig uur om binnen te gaan, maar zorgt er ook voor dat het museum de toegang kan spreiden over de dag. Zo krijg je niet dat de volledige dagcapaciteit van bezoekers opeens om 14u00 tegelijk het museum binnen wil, met klachten en een slechte reputatie tot gevolg.

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Patrick Stewart, best known by the public for his appearances as Captain Jean-Luc Picard in television series Star Trek : The Next Generation and more recently as Professor Xavier in the X-Men movie trilogy, is scheduled for knighthood.

Way to go Sir Patrick!

The article is on CNN.

Joke spent last night almost 4 hours in her car to do 30km due to heavy snowfall here in Belgium. This made us reconsider our planned christmas shopping trip to Reims, as more snow is promised in the following days.

There were more than 500 km of traffic jams in Belgium yesterday evening. Not bad, considering that a traversal of Belgium is approximately 300 km.

At least, the rate I booked in the Holiday Inn Express (which is perfectly located in Reims if you come by car) allowed me to cancel without charge, so it didn’t cost us anything.

Can you imagine it’s kinda difficult to grasp the concept of global warming when you’re getting more than 20cm snow in a few hours, in a country that sees snow for maybe two weeks a year.

Update 19 Dec 2009 00:05 – It seems it was a smart decision. Everywhere, there have been loads of problems until late at night. The Ring around Brussels was a good imitation of a parking lot , like yesterday, with cars blocked for several hours.

And things are predicted to get even worse. Now a good part of the snow has melted thanks to the tons of salt that have been dispatched, and all that liquid (i’m hesitant to call it ‘water’) is now happily freezing again. You could say we created the largest ice skating in Europe : every single road in Belgium. The kids around here will love it Their parents might be less enthousiastic.

Update 2 – 19 Dec 2009 00:21 – And yes! It’s snowing again

Bohemian Mupsody?

Il numero dicembre 2009 di 3DWorld contiene un articolo interessante sulla nuova versione 2.50 di Blender. L’articolo descrive l’importanza cresciuta di Blender nel mondo grafico commerciale. C’è anche un’elenco sulle novità del Blender 2.50, e che cosa vogliono dire per l’utente.

Niente Blender Tutorial

Purtroppo, non c’è un tutorial specifico per Blender in questa edizione (Andy scriveva degli articoli nei numeri precedenti). Ma come sempre, la rivista contiene tips e trucchi che possono essere utilizzate con qualunque programma.

Contenuto del CD

Il CD contiene un elenco impressionante die modelli ad alta definizione.

Solo disponibile in Olandese in questo momento.

Na de vorige films elke keer rond de kerstperiode te kunnen bekijken, besloot Warner Brothers deze keer om de film pas in juli in de zalen te brengen. Juli kruipt stilaan dichterbij, en ik weet dat Joke hier ferm naar aan het uitkijken is. Hieronder de internationale trailer van “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince”:

Buona Pasqua a tutti! Il tempo qui in Belgio non è mica male, allora bisogno approfitarne al massimo. Il lepre di Pasqua è andato in vacanza, ma ci ha lasciato un qualcosina per tenere il tasso di cholesterolo ben elevato…

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One of the easiest ways to learn a language isto use it actively. I’m used to doing that by reading a publication in the language I’m studying at that time. While I was following the German course, I was frequently in the IMS store buying the german C’t magazine. I tried Der Spiegel, but the heavy language couldn’t really motivate me to read on. With a computer magazine, that problem didn’t really exist.

At the moment I’m following an English conversation course, which means we talk a lot. For that, my subscription to The Economist comes in handy. Earlier, I used to read Business Week, but a few years back publisher McGraw-Hill decided to stop the publication of the European and Asian print editions, and following that it became a bit too US-centric for my tastes. Hence my switch to The Economist, where the editors succeed in providing a balanced overview of what happened in the world, even without regional editions. Sadly, at least one of the editors is a convinced euro-sceptic, which translates itself in a column blowing up some parts of european politics out of proportion and making fun of ut.

The perfect magazine doesn’t exist, that’s true. To my great surprise, I saw today that The Economist is offering an Audio Edition since a few weeks. Gone are the days when only best-selling autors were distributed on a multitude of audio cd’s, enabling the people stuck in trafic to follow the adventures of Harry Potter or Dan Brown. The Economist now offers a weekly

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