iblog

Anna: I failed my driving test this week. If only I had been born Nigerian, I could have just nipped along to a licensing office, paid my 5000 Naira (20 quid) and got a license anyway. A taxi driver in the Nigerian capital, Abuja, once told me that they don’t bother with anything as boring as checking whether you know how to drive. He was incensed at the recent price hike, in fact. Previously you had to pay much less before you could hit the highway. As with most things in Nigeria, those with the money have the power (steering, in this case). Thinking about it, I have rarely been more terrified than when in Nigeria, on a bicycle, sharing the road with these license-toting “drivers”. Maybe I should consider myself the lucky one after all…

Rushda: A man has recently lost a wedding ring because he tied it to his son’s helium balloon and it got lost into the sky. The poor guy, who was trying to weigh down the balloon, is now in much trouble with his wife for his stupidity and is very unlikely to get the ring back. In a way I think there is something quite sweet about the ring reaching the clouds like that. What I find most interesting about the incident, however, is to imagine what would happen if the balloon came down in a far off place in someone else’s garden. Sounds like a great symbolic gesture for any idealistic youth who finds it and they may treasure it forever thinking that it was some special gift to them, magical or otherwise. Little will they know what really happened - that it was an accident and a middle aged man in another country is desperately trying to find it!

Caroline: f you are feeling guilty at not having given anything up for Lent, don’t, because it seems that although such sacrifices may benefit your spirit, it certainly doesn’t do your body any good. Take alcohol for example. Taken in moderation it confers health benefits, especially red wine because of its effect on the arteries, the heart and blood clotting. To stop suddenly could end up with problems such as strokes. Cutting out coffee suddenly can cause headaches of migraine-type proportions and now that dark chocolate with 70% cocoa has been proved beneficial for the cardovascular system, giving that up would not be a good idea either. It looks as though perhaps I should just try to kick my cream-egg habit. They sit at the petrol check-out tempting me every time I fill the car up and the sad thing is I can’t think of one single benefit from eating them except that a little bit of what you fancy does you no harm!

Caroline: Have you ever wondered who is your favourite writer’s favourite writer - if that makes sense! Distinguished authors from Britain, America and Australia have been asked to name their top ten books and some of the results are published in the Times today. There are no real surprises with the classics scoring heavily. Of the top twenty, almost half are by foreign authors and four of these are Russian. In fact Tolstoy takes first and third places and Nabokov, fourth. There is only one woman author in the top twenty, George Eliot and the highest scoring British writer is Shakespeare, with Hamlet taking sixth place. If you want to know the rest of the findings the book “The Top Ten” will be published by W W Norton on March 1st.

Steve Robinson: Rumours amongst Mac devotees have been ripe over the past week that Apple is set to announce a March release date for their latest operating system, OS 10.5 - otherwise known as ‘Leopard‘. Though the latest update to the Macintosh system was expected some time during Q2 (read: spring), a march release is certainly a surprise since Leopard was only unveiled for the first time last year. New features are set to include Time Machine, where the computer automatically stores copies of your files for instant retrospective access, improved email and video conferencing applications, and Spaces - the inclusion of multiple ‘virtual desktops’ - to name a few. Microsoft released their ‘next generation’ operating system at the end of January, and an earlier-than-expected release from Apple would signal an intent to win over Windows users who are undecided about switching from XP. The proclaimed ‘Vista-killer’ could well be in shops by this time next month, according to the word on the street, so watch this space…

Source: T3

Image: Softpedia

Stephanie: Student housing isn’t meant to be luxurious. It’s not unusual for heating to be temperamental if at all functional, and it just wouldn’t be ‘home’ without that rather suspicious looking growth on the bathroom ceiling. Cling film on windows, crumbling plaster, rattling windows and bathrooms with an entire eco-system of their own are the building blocks of student living - but where do we draw the line? In the two years I spent renting at University I never laid eyes on the landlord. What little contact I had with him revolved around a broken shower, an unhealthily mouldy ceiling, and a boiler held together by rust. Now by my reckoning, three problems in two years isn’t bad going for any landlord, but in each case by the time aid arrived I could’ve sooner imported new fittings from Mars.

Slowly, however, my attitude toward the shocking living arrangements began to alter slightly. With each new patch of damp, with every whistling breeze and every inch of peeling wallpaper I began to cultivate a sense of smug satisfaction. Sooner or later the lazy landlord will realise that what might have been a quick fix in the early stages now amounts to a fortune in renovation costs just to keep the building from crumbling around him. It is a very small sort of triumph, but when you’re sitting at your desk wrapped in blankets, having not showered for a week and with a worrying drip coming from somewhere in the roof - it’s all you can cling to.

Rushda: We’re all used to seeing visual effects in films, and most people don’t have a problem with them providing they fit in well and are realistic. Postproduction alteration is very common, especially where minor cosmetic changes such as removing blemishes and wrinkles are concerned. But now that technology is advancing, computer manipulation is doing things we may not be too comfortable about, such as even altering the acting itself.

Directors have been doing everything from changing expressions and removing breathing signs to making a limp more convincing, after the scenes have been acted. In a recent Oscar-nominated film Blood Diamond, modern visual effect technology was used to create the simple addition of a tear rolling down an actress’s cheek. A leading technician said such changes made him feel “dirty” and to change actor’s performances like that was “creepy”. I’m not sure about that but it certainly does seem to take away the merits of a good actor. I mean, if this carries on, we might as well just forget the actors completely!

Rushda: Many residents in Tanzania are currently living in fear as they believe there exists a demon bat in the woods which transforms into a human at night and then comes to rape both men and women. Named Popo Bawa (meaning ‘winged bat’), the demon is said to be a spirit cast by witches, and stories about him have been told for many years. Some believe that lighting fires will repel Popo whilst others smear pig oil onto their skins. Normally I find superstitious talk pretty harmless but kinds like these make me feel wary. Not only are these beliefs seriously coming in the way of living comfortably but they have the potential to hinder residents from finding the real attacker, who is probably sitting around feeling very smug. In what may end up being a self-fulfilling prophecy, the real demon may go unscathed.

Caroline: At a time when the celebrity world seems to be attracting the wrong sort of headlines with Britney heading for a breakdown and Robbie back in rehab, it is refreshing to read about Ricky Gervais. He is offering a reward of £1000 for the return of Elsa, a Staffordshire bull terrier who has gone missing from near Gervais’ home in Russell Square Park in London. He had seen posters appealing for help and his girlfriend then got talking to the mother-in-law of Elsa’s owner. Gervais felt so sorry for the family that he decided to dig deep and see whether a reward would help reunite Elsa with her family. She has now been missing for almost a month so let’s hope there is some good news soon.

Caroline: Teenagers leaving the kitchen in a mess is nothing new but I don’t suppose the parents of 18 year old Fraser Doherty are complaining. The enterprising teenager has just won a supermarket deal for his homemade jam. He has been experimenting with his jams since he was 14 and in 2004 when he was 15 won an Enterprising Young Brit award. He has developed a healthy alternative to using sugar, using grape juice instead. His new SuperJam range includes kiwi, lime and ginger and lemon marmalade. Watch out for it in Waitrose!