esrosedotblog

I am told that Europe is a continent.

But it is also a lot of other things.

In the interest of our edification, I present:

Europes

I have no idea what the title means but then Europe doesn't mean one thing either.

I have been to Europe. Some parts of it. And right away we have to ask whether going to England is the same as going to Europe. Is the UK a part of Europe?

Yes and no. Go look at the Europes.

When it comes right down to it, I have been to France and Germany. Scandinavia various parts. I ate reindeer meat. It made me ill. Dancer and Prancer.

I am not bragging about all this travel. I went where the work took me and, I must admit, I had a limited curiosity about any of the countries other than the peculiarities of their conference centers.

I am not proud of this ignorance. But I am not ashamed either. It is sort of like I don't give a shit.

Sad but true.

Besides, there are too many Europes to handle.

Labels: geopolitics

AROUND THE WORLD

Big surprise today.

Somehow, I missed that my new iMac has the so called "widgets" on it just like my old computer did. Actually it is the system that has them. Now Mountain Lion.

As a result, I can put up a weather update and a time conversion for Melbourne, Australia where son Dave has gone for the duration.

The weather, of course, is summer and not nearly as hot as I thought it would be. Didn't they just add two colors to their weather chart to take care of rising temps?

The time is a bit more problematic in that one must not only correct for time difference but for the day as well.

It is Sunday there today.

But now I have a clock showing Melbourne time.

It is not so much that I need to know the time and the weather but it gives me a sense of being in touch.

I also have a weather widget for the Boston's South Shore. I know the time. Easy three hours later.

I suppose I could also get headlines from the papers there but that is going a bit too far*.

For now, it is enough to know the time and temps.

*Actually, after I wrote this, I went and bookmarked the local paper. When he moves to Canberra I will change it over for the capitol.

Labels: geopolitics

WHAT'S UP WITH THAT?

Here it is. Just in. Penis size by country.

So, we are shorter than Canadians? Is that the French or English speaking Canadian?

And Mexicans. There is some reason to believe this is true from local anecdotes. Nothing personal. I would assert that there is strong incentive here for more liberal immigration laws so that we can, over time, raise our average.

Look at China. What happened? Big country, small dicks.

It seems to me that releasing this kind of information without any explanation or analysis is irresponsible.

When I was a kid, I was sure that I was smaller than anyone else. This only shrunk me up further.

They don't mention here how they measured. There is such a thing as a grower, not a shower.

Put me in the latter case. Proudly average.

How does come about that any discussion of penis size comes down to the insecurities of the person reading or passing on this information.

The male is still concerned about the eternal question. Does size matter?

My experience is that the answer is "sometimes". That means that sometimes not.

Just something to think about over the weekend.

And oh, someday this will not matter for most men in the survey. Once you reach the age of 30 or so, you are invisible, no matter how heavily you might be hung. Or not.

Labels: biology, fun, geopolitics, not fun

JAPAN

A lot of surprises in here and not all of them positive. About Japan, that is.

Labels: culture, geopolitics

DUHHHH

Do you ever feel really dumb? Or left behind?

Listen to this.

When the terrorists hit Mumbai, I realized that I didn't know about this city. It was a financial center. Maybe that is it. Small but important nonetheless. Not big like Bombay.

It took a week for me to stumble into the fact that Mombai IS fucking Bombay. Or that Bombay is now and has been for 8 years or more Mumbai.

How did I miss this?

No one told me.

Granted, I don't have a lot of situations where Bombay or Mumbai come up in conversation or in my daily affairs.

But to miss this one. So lame.

John says that he read it was always Mumbai after the goddess or something. The Brits named it Bombay. The sun set on that didn't it?

Labels: geopolitics, life

STRAINING TO BE FREE

You can feel it in this large state; a strong momentum toward independence from the confines of national identity and policy.

We have long been held as 'different' than the rest. Now it is indelibly true.

We are working to have our own air standards.

We have established our own stem cell research.

We are at the forefront of the immigration question.

In these and many other policy areas there is a desire to go our own way.

It is an interesting process.

Others have noted it.

Here is a nice summary.

California Split

Labels: California, geopolitics, states rights