A few nore bits from budapest

  • I really, really need to get my head down and do some work. I had figured that getting out of Cambridge would clear my head, and in most ways it has, but not to the point where I can sit down and do what I’m supposed to do.
  • I find myself almost wishing that Hungarian was spoken by more people. There are some truly beautiful nuances to the language, but there’s no way I’m going to learn it just for 2 months and 13 million speakers. There are some very nice things you can do with affixes to slightly alter the meaning of words. But I’ve consciously decided not to aim higher than the ‘point and gesture’ level.
  • That riot thing. Since I’m living stupidly close to the parliament, I’ve beenoccasionally dropping in on the ongoing anti-government protest that’s been happening there since the Prime Minister. It’s impressive how old and calm everybody there is. I mean, an anti-government protest without an angry young man in sight? that’s quite something.

Congress, Iraq, sanity?

The US Congress has done something remarkably sensible, by tacking onto a defense spending bill a guarantee that they will not establish permanent bases in Iraq. As Reuters says,



Democrats and many Republicans say the Iraqi insurgency has been fueled by perceptions the United States has ambitions for a permanent presence in the country.

Yep. A [poll](http://www.worldpublicopinion.org/pipa/pdf/sep06/Iraq_Sep06_rpt.pdf) released a few days ago found that 77% of Iraqis believe that the US plans permanent bases in Iraq, down just 3% since January.

The problem is, not even most Americans are going to notice this little message in a corner of a bill, let alone Iraqis. US-funded propaganda outlets might publicise it if they’re smart, but they don’t have any credibility. And anyway, why should they believe what Congress demands, if Bush isn’t willing to state it openly, and if there is always a way to work around it?

Untitled

mmmmmm….Library porn. [worksafe]

yes, other things are happening in my life. Briefly:

  • Still waiting for confirmation on a flat, but unless something goes wrong I’ll be heading to Warsaw within the next 10 days. Yes, it is all taking longer than planned
    :(
  • I’m trying to remember how to work without an office and people looking over my shoulder to check I’m doing something. I thought I’d got fairly good at it by my last year of university, but obviously not.
  • Currently staying in Manchester, with a couple of very close friends I’ve not seen much of this past year. It’s great to realise that we’re still getting on as well as ever, and that they still understand everything about everything. [This is Mike and Rachel, people probably only rachelfmb, fiona_kitty and smhwpf know, but who I’ve long wanted to somehow introduce to several of the rest of you]. Plus, they get points for living right above a very nice delicatessen.
  • the_alchemist‘s birthday weekend in Llanerchydol Hall in Welshpool was stunningly beautiful, and fully of equally beautiful, talented and generally great people.

A place for concordances

IntraText Digital Library: a project to create a digital library with concordances, statistics, and other useful things,based around some XML structure, worked out in immense detail, so that you can do whatever you like to the texts.

Would be so much better, though, if you could use all the tools on an entire corpus, rather than a single text. Or at least, it’d save on the pile of ad hoc scripts I end up using to work out what’s happening with chunks of sanskrit.

Schadenfreude

I hate the amount of pleasure I got from seeing Blair looking so hunted and powerless on this evenings news. I mean, I don’t

really

have any reason to personally hate him. But seeing the smugness gone is so satisfying – even if it’s only because he has worked out that he’ll survive longer by looking humble.

I feel as though I should be donig penance for thinking things like this.

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