.cat and the new Statute

Two weeks ago, my beloved country Catalunya (Catalonia) saw how the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) approved the .cat domain extension, which "represents those Internet users who express themselves in Catalan". According to puntCAT, the association that's been in charge of the actual bureaucratic business for .cat to be a reality, our brand new patriotic domain will be available from next January.

On the other hand, Catalan MPs approved yesterday —after months of give-and-take between the parties that form our current Government— the new Statute for Catalunya, said to bring us, in essence, greater autonomy (with respect to spain, of course) and economic powers. Even though it's passed the thorough Catalan exam, the new Statute must still go through the spanish parliament for it to be put into practice. Let's hope they don't mutilate it too much…

Oh well, however it ends up, the two things are anyway really good news for us Catalans!! :-)

(By the way, the last sentence of BBC News' version of the story about our new Statute is something like: "The militant Basque separatists of Eta have been waging a violent campaign since the 1960s," which looks to me completely random at the end of that article. But you see, 'autonomy', 'separatists', 'Catalans', 'Basques', 'Eta'... for some reason everything seems to lump together. Hilarious. I had to laugh.)

: 30 Sep 2005 18:48 |  Comments (4) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

My maths web page

Writing about web page http://www.maia.ub.es/~taixes/

I did it! I finally finished my maths web page!!! :-) These are links to the Catalan version and to the English version

Well, thinking about it… it's finished just sort of lol! I mean I still have to put there some pix and random stuff, but at least there's something to see for the moment…

: 07 Jul 2005 16:36 |  Comments (18) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Marseille

So much to write about and so little time to do it! :-( Ages ago I promised to write about my trip to Kiel, and now I'd really like to say something about the conference in Marseille as well… but I think these posts will still have to wait a couple of days, until I am a bit less busy!...

Meanwhile, you can amuse yourselves with the pix I uploaded to my Marseille gallery or with Stu's post on his blog.

Comments are welcome! ;-)

: 23 Jun 2005 16:02 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Guacamole Party: el resultat

Follow-up to Guacamole Party! from Jordi's blog

Hola gent! Només un breu post per dir-vos que he penjat aquí al blog algunes de les fotos que vam fer durant la festa. Cau pel seu propi pes que són a la galeria 'Guacamole Party'... ;-)

And coming soon… Orangen Party! :-)

: 06 Jun 2005 11:57 |  Tags: Choir |  Comments (1) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Finishing touches

Follow-up to Guacamole Party! from Jordi's blog

Hola gent! Sento que aquesta serà l'entrada més breu del món, però no tinc gaire temps…

Finalment la Guacamole Party se celebrarà avui, ja que tothom que ha donat senyals de vida sembla que hi està d'acord (fins i tot el Txeram, que en un principi no li anava bé). L'hora oficial d'arribada a ca'ls Padreau (recepció de benvinguda, unes paraules, un speech...) és les 9 pm — sisplau sigueu puntuals perquè haver de baixar a obrir en compta-gotes és a pain in the arse. Si no responem feu una perduda a algun mòbil, perquè potser ja som al terrat.

Pre-requisit obligatori & no qüestionable per poder accedir al recinte de la festa (a instàncies de l'amfitriona): Portar posada alguna peça de roba de color verd guacamole. I no és conya.

Com que tothom té massa feina per posar-se a cuinar, hem decidit comprar i preparar el sopar entre dos o tres i després ja passarem comptes. Així també ens assegurem una cosa fashion, amb menjar genuïnament mexicà i fancy drinks… ;-)

Crec que això és tot; qualsevol dubte ja sabeu on em podeu reachar. Ah, sisplau assegureu-vos que aquesta informació arribi a tothom, sobretot als maromos, dels quals no tinc l'email i per tant segur que no ho llegeixen.

Que tingueu un bon dia i fins al vespre! :-)

: 03 Jun 2005 11:50 |  Tags: Choir |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Guacamole Party!

2001? 1998? Em podríeu dir, my dearest choir people, quan fou l'última vegada que (almenys més de quatre persones) ens vam veure els caretos?! (Això mateix, els caretos!) Doncs no cal que furgueu més dins dels vostres cervells, perquè jo us ho diré: Tara-taratta!
— No, és ta-ta-ta-ta-ta.
— Tara-taratta.
— Ta-ta-ta-ta-ta.
— Tara-taratta.
— Ta-ta-ta-ta-ta.
— Tara-taratta.
— Tara-taratta.
— Veus com no era tan difícil?...
És a dir, que fa sis segles i mig que no ens veiem decentment. Per pal·liar aquesta situació d'escàndol de grau 2 —que de fet els principals rotatius internacionals ja han qualificat d'insòlita, completament aberrant i lila—, un petit comitè format per un petit comitè es reuní fa uns dies i resolgué la necessitat d'organitzar un sopar amb caràcter d'urgència. El presumpte sopar tindria lloc durant el proper cap de setmana, no se sap exactament quan, no se sap exactament on. Però sí que es té alguna intuïció del que seria part del menú, car la presidenta del comitè, Srta. Чернобыль, féu esment i es vanaglorià de saber preparar certa recepta guacamolesca…

Costa de recordar quan ens vam veure per última vegada, però saber quan vam fer l'últim soparet preparat per nosaltres ja és una utopia… Per això em fa molta gràcia i m'omple de joia que fem aquest — com en els vells temps!

M'agradaria que comentéssiu (o sigui, que afegiu un comentari clicant a Comments, sota aquest text) explicant disponibilitat i/o interès pel sopar, per saber quants litres de rom s'han de comprar. Noooo, que és coooonya!... És pels de vodka, de rom com sempre, una caixa… ;-) Un cop sapiguem dia i hora, ja m'encarregaré jo personalment dels flyers… :-) I ja m'encarregaré jo també del tema fotam, que així penjaré una galeria aquí al blog!

Bé, doncs res més. Procureu pronuciar-vos aviat sobre el tema, ok? Petonets i força Guacamole Party!!!

xXx GG xXx

Per cert, el Xu arriba dijous a Barcelona, o sigui que ell segur que vindrà! :-)

: 31 May 2005 17:59 |  Tags: Choir |  Comments (6) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Three things, über die ich mich ärgere…

So my last post was all about optimism, contentment, and "how beautiful life is". Good. But —unfortunately— all that glitters is not gold, since this very life is also full of these little annoying facts that, for some reason, are always there for the sole purpose of making our lives a bit less pleasant. (Or a bit more difficult and complicated, depending on how you see the bottle…) So let me dedicate today this post to three things I'm annoyed about, which, though banal, I just feel like writing about…

The other day I was driving back home from the airport, when I found myself stuck in the middle of a sea of cars, in one of the main roads of Barcelona: la Ronda (the Ring Road). In any big city, this would be a normal-ish situation when one or two lanes turn out to be blocked by some road works or maybe an accident. But wait, where was the poor, misfortuned dented car that afternoon? Where were those annoying noisy road works?! Well, there weren't any! Oh actually, thinking about it, isn't it always the same story, back from the airport?! Yes, it is. So listen people of Barcelona's council: I can understand our roads get a bit busier during the rush hour; I can understand the city you run is quite big and hence difficult to manage. But what I (and common sense) can't accept at all is that people spend more than an hour to drive this bit (and have been doing so for ages!), and still the council doesn't do anything to fix the problem! Sometimes, when in such traffic jams, I just feel like arriving home to play this fantastic game that SimCity is, and design the nicest and most beautiful of the cities, where citizens would vote me because they enjoy the comfortable town I created for them and not just because the other parties' proposals stink more than mine…

But there's more to be annoyed about, yeah… what about German ‚Präpositionalverben‘?! Let's admit it: Learning languages can sometimes be a pain, that's an incontestable fact. So my German teacher claims that the way to memorise prepositional verbs —these adorable creatures that also inhabit the already complicated enough kingdom of German grammar— is by learning by heart sentences like „sich entschuldigen bei Dativ für Akkusativ“!... Insane, trust me! It's simply excessive having to learn six words (plus their meaning, of course!) to be able to use properly a single bloody verb!!! Definitely, ich ärgere mich darüber… ;-)

Finally, this is just more of a comment rather than an annoyance, but anyway: How can the weather be so hot already in May?! Is my body going to melt like an ice-cream in August?! If now a T-shirt is too much, what am I supposed to wear later on, apart from my skin?! :-( The problem about this is there's no-one to blame it on, but Mother Nature… :-S

Ok, it's almost lunch time so I'll better stop writing now! But my trip to Kiel, soon in this blog… :-)

: 27 May 2005 11:18 |  Comments (3) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

2 weeks in 5 paragraphs and 4 words

I know, I know… I know the frequency of my posting doesn't help much to keep this blog of mine a lively, nice place that needs to be checked often… well, actually maybe I should rather use 'turn into' instead of 'keep'... :-P

Anyway, so the reason why I haven't written much (at all in English!) since my first post is, as you can imagine, these days I've been pretty busy — this time with piano and German. Yesterday my Faculty organised what they call the Spring Concert, this yearly musical meeting where anyone somehow related to Maths is invited to take part in. And, because I'm stupid, I did; which means that I spent the last couple of weeks studying like a madman these two bloody pieces that now seem to be stuck in my brain… :'( Well, the concert was quite nice though: Loads of players, a wide variety of instruments, a range of styles. Cool! :-)

As for the German bit, the other day my teacher gave us a gift in the shape of a never-ending essay on some book we had to read ("how could I be mean to my beloved students? Hang on, I have an idea!..."), so recently this lovely thing has also been keeping me quite amused… :-S

Of course, all this extra business came on top of my PhD and regular duties, which I didn't forget about. (I wrote this sentence just in case my supervisor bumps into my blog at some point, please be understanding… ;-) ) Aaaaanyway, so back to the routine now I'm trying to catch up with all the stuff I've been putting off for about two weeks… such as this blog! :-) Indeed I realised that I like writing. (Congratulations, this might be a good starting point when one has just set up a personal blog!... :-D ) Well, what I mean is the more I write, the more I like it! It all started with my occasional random emails to the people of what once upon a time had been a choir… someone suggested me to somehow publish that big pile of nonsense (yeah, that's what my style is all about!), so this virtual place Warwick is so kind to provide seemed to be just the right thing, apart from allowing me to keep in touch with people over there! Of course I feel more comfortable and words come more naturally to me when I write in Catalan, but anyhow I enjoy writing in English as well. Yes, writing is something I definitely like, but in fact just as much as reading, since I devour books when I have time for it. And languages! I love learning new languages, and… and sometimes I wonder why the hell I'm actually studying Maths, „aber das ist eine andere Geschichte“! ;-)

Hmm… it's getting a bit late so I should better make a move to bed. The feeling of having again some free time to do random stuff is wonderful — writing this post and potentially telling six and a half billion people about what my existence consisted of during the last few days has been so refreshing! :-) Tomorrow I'll even try and go to the gym… there I haven't definitely been for ages! Though the difference between me and the photo in my card is now so big that I might have trouble to get in… :-S

And now good night…

: 29 Apr 2005 01:00 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Jo m'ho pensava

Doncs sí: Jo em pensava que la primavera era, per dir-ho d'alguna manera, l'estació de l'any per excel·lència. L'estació del retorn de la letàrgia a la vida, la de l'esclat, la de la sang que bull i que empeny a fer-ho tot i de pressa. Però també l'estació del bon temps, la del sol que enamora però que no crema, la dels dies de tranquil·litat passats en un jardí de roses que floreixen — fent més que res però menys que gaire. Sí, sí, jo estava convençut que la primavera era aquest període anual dedicat a la contemplació de l'existència de la natura (i de fet a la contemplació de l'existència mateixa), i dedicat també a deixar perdre la mirada en el cel per retrobar els ocells que tornen de càlides terres llunyanes, i a embriagar-se amb la flaire excessiva que pertot escampen els jacints, i a escoltar els lilàs com "diuen llur joia envejosa a les roses"...

De veritat, amics, que tot això jo havia cregut i creia. Fins avui.

Avui el cel no ha plogut rajos de sol, sinó aigua. I m'he mullat. :'(

xXx GG xXx

: 22 Apr 2005 18:17 |  Tags: Choir |  Comments (2) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Benvinguts!!!

Estimada família choiril: Benvinguts a la meva pàgina blog!!! :-)

Algú em va preguntar, una bona tarda de primavera que els pardals refilaven i les magnòlies flairaven més del que és habitual en elles, que per què no publicava d'alguna forma o altra totes aquestes imbecil·litats que rebeu de tant en tant de la meva persona — producte sens dubte d'algun (altre) cargol que novament se m'ha afluixat… (Algú = el Xu.) Bé, doncs aquí teniu una resposta parcial a tal suggeriment: una pàgina blog!

What the hell does 'una pàgina blog' mean?! Explico què és un blog pels qui no hi enteneu en astro-dinàmica: 'Blog' és un acrònim (o gairebé) d'alguna cosa que ara no recordo, però la qüestió és que és un espai de la xarxa on pots escriure els teus pensaments, prosa, o, en general, el que et doni la gana; fins i tot penjar-hi fotos! Els qui visiten el lloc, poden respondre i fer comentaris als posts originals, en aquest cas meus.

La University of Warwick és tan amable (i té tanta pasta) que proporciona un tal espai cibernètic a tot déu que d'alguna manera s'hi relacioni, des dels profes als alumnes… i suposo que, en algun lloc d'aquesta escala jeràrquica, em trobo jo com a visitant! :-) (En aquest punt del discurs, no és que vulgui posar cap dit a cap ull, però la UB no et dóna ni els segells, per enviar els teus pensaments als amics…) Total, que a mi no sé quant em durarà aquesta conya, però de moment la faig servir, que per això està.

Avui no tinc temps per extendre'm gaire més, o sigui que si de cas ho deixo aquí. Però us prometo que aviat escriuré un text kom kal, okey dokey? :-)

Petonets i cuideu-vos!

xXx GG xXx

: 12 Apr 2005 15:31 |  Tags: Choir |  Comments (6) |  Close comments |  Report a problem