London / Paris / Rome

I'm sitting in front of a cup of espresso in a bar inside London'd St. Pancras International rail station, waiting to check-in on the TGV to Paris. I'll be back in Rome for one week: enjoying old friends, warm weather and good (and healthy) food! No computer screens (I hope) for a while, and enjoying the good life! A short, deserved, vacation. See you in Italy!

Never Resist...

I arrived in the UK a few days before the official launch.
I resisted, tried not to think about it, to ignore the giant reproductions in the shop windows, the commercials on tv, the billboards in the tube and all over on the streets. I tried to suffocate the geek that lives in me for a long time until today.
Today I gave up.

A few friends followed the compulsive shopping need via Twitter.

I finally bought an iPhone. Damn.

Camden Market on Fire

Camden Market ablaze this evening.
I was walking from home towards the Camden Road Train Station when, once arrived in Camden Town, I saw the huge column of smoke:

The inevitable cell phone video:

News: BBC, Breaking Today, Repubblica (it)..

Subterranean London

I've always been fascinated (in a true geeky style) by war shelters and abandoned constructions underground.
Rome is, obviously, full of catacombs everywhere beneath the city and it's very easy to find natural tuff caves just outside the city limits, since the entire area of Lazio is very "rich" of tuff, but entering the caves can be dangerous since these are quite deep and usually full of toxic exhales.
The building I lived in for 6 years in Testaccio with my family (built at the same time and by the same architect who made Roma Termini Train Station) used to have air raid shelters in the basement, used today as storage. The basement entrance to a tunnel passing under the main street, connecting the shelters to a bigger underground area under the Aventino is today bricked, and I was never able to get in and explore that fascinating and abandoned underground area.

Here in London, using the tube as my only mean of transport (yet) it's kind of fascinating to walk into the endless tunnels of the various underground stations. (Yes, fascinating: but I'd still rather prefer to have a car or motorbike here...)
Due to pretty logical archeological "features" (it's basically impossible to dig tunnels under the urban area without discovering ancient villas or other elements of relevant interest) of Italy, the underground system, called Metro, in Rome is pretty basic compared to the London tube, and consists in only two lines, with a third one in construction.

I was aware that the London Underground stations have been used as air raid shelters during war time, but due to my infinite ignorance I wasn't aware of the function of a strange white circular building, near my house, that I pass by every morning on my daily walk to my office in Camden Town going down Haverstock Hill Road.

It's actually one of the two entrances of the Belsize Park Deep Level Air Raid Shelter, one of the eight Shelters built during the WWII in London.
Part of the shelter is today used as document storage, part is abandoned, but it still sports a working lift powered through a fully functional 1941 Mercury Arc Rectifier (at least it was still working and glowing in 2001)!
The shelters were designed to have two separate power supplies: one from the London Passenger Transport power line and one from the local authorities. There was a switch room in every shelter in order to choose the power source and the rectifiers were used to, well, "rectify" A.C. power sources.

A few more searches led me to a bunch of interesting links about the shelters and some abandoned tunnels and tube stations beneath London.
It's basically impossible to visit these locations today. Maybe just with an organized tour with the Subterranea Britannica, if any.

So, a bunch of geeky underground links, informations, history and Silent Hill like photos:
Deep Level Shelters in London (8 of them)

Belsize Park Station Deep Level Shelter: Link One | Link Two

Subterranea Britannica

Euston Station Abandoned Tunnels
(The posters on the wall are amazing)

London Abandoned Tube Stations

BBC article on disused tube stations

Good Night and Good Luck.

"Italians: very good at keeping appearances"

Still no government in Italy: Naples still flooded with rubbish, italian people still concerned about next sunday football match. Looks like there's no way out.
A country, no government, a "miracle needed" to save it.
Italy: as seen from the UK. 10 minutes BBC video.
(you might need to install RealPlayer to watch the video, but it's worth it)

Falling Down

Who needs a government these days?
Next one please.

Aria of Disappointment

Well written article on Italy on the NY Times today.
It describes a quite sad situation for the nation, but it's (again) sadly the truth. This "stagnancy" of the country is something the italians are accustomed to. Or maybe they're "trapped" in. Something you can feel while living in Italy and it's even more clear when you look back at your country once you left.

A small excerpt from the article:

Italians rarely associate the current crop of aging leaders with a capacity to change. They are the same people who have traded terms in power for more than a decade. Last year, Silvio Berlusconi, Italy's richest man who became prime minister for the first time in 1994, was voted out for not keeping his promises for American-style growth and opportunities based on merit. When he left office, economic growth was at zero.

But the government has fallen once and threatens to fall again at every difficult vote. Small proposals bring protesters to the streets, one hurdle to making changes as protected interests seek to preserve themselves. Pharmacists shut their doors this year when the government threatened to allow supermarkets to sell aspirin. The cost for just 20 aspirin tablets at a pharmacy is $5.75.

That's it. Simple. The biggest italian problems summed up in three simple paragraphs: decrepit government (both sides), resistance to changes, and the "untouchables": lawyers, pharmacists, notaries, lawmakers, people in the public offices, and the labours protected by the big unions).

Buonasera Italia.
"Sono cazzi." [cit.]

Swap Meat in London

Can't resist buying stuff online.
I finally received my four Billy Davis Ghost Prints from Coudal's Swap Meat. The prints look awesome. I had them framed (Frame Factory, in Haverstock Hill, near my new residence in London), so now I have a new decor on the the yellowish walls of my humble studio flat.

Photo: [with the light] and [in the dark]

Observing the Observers

Along with a friend from Rome visiting me here in London, on Sunday afternoon we headed to the Tate Modern. A long tour to explore the building and the Tate permanent expositions (and take some "forbidden" photos too in the galleries).

The Turbine Hall, contains Doris Salcedo's Shibboleth, a semi-permanent art installation and, maybe one of the biggest attraction for casual visitors (like me) to te Tate Modern.

When nobody falls into the Shibboleth that, in my personal opinion, it's very difficult (if not intentional) since the cracks on the floor are pretty small, it's quite interesting to observe from the above floor how people "interact" and observe Salcedo's installation.

I've spent some time taking long exposure shots (from three to five seconds, no tripod, doh!) of people roaming around it. Here's the result:

Panic Button

Nick Bradbury, creator of FeedDemon, introduces the Panic Button, a new FeedDemon feature that he added to the pre-release 2.6 version.
It's a pretty neat feature that appears when "FeedDemon will automatically detect when you've got a ton of unread items" and asks you to mass-mark them as read.

I'm not using FeedDemon, but I think I totally understand what "a ton of unread items" means:

But I still think I don't need a Panic button. Maybe I just should stop to use NetNewsWire as a bookmark repository. Easier.

Buonasera.

Just a short note: I'm now broadcasting from London.
I moved from Italy to UK last saturday, I will start my new job next monday.
The sky it's overcast, they drive on the wrong side of the road, the tube is always on time... it's London. It's fantastic.
I'm now in the middle of setting up everything, phone, bank account, work contract, home... ahem: home.
I'll be working in Camden Town, so I'm looking for a studio flat nearby. And it's not easy.
In case you know someone renting a flat in the Camden Town / Kentish Town / Chalk Farm area, please drop me a line!

Little Thing

Travelling by train is always fascinating. The world flowing out of the window, and you. Alone with your music, or chatting with your single-serving friend if you are fortunate enough to find someone interesting sitting near you (rare case).

On the first days of September I had to go to Perugia by train to take my motorbike and drive it back home in Rome. So, 6 'o clock in the morning, wearing jeans, shirt and leather jacket and carrying the helmet with me, I jumped on the first of two Intercity trains I had to ride to go to Perugia.

Later that morning, before arriving at the station this girl sitting a few seats next to me asked if the next stop was Perugia's station. Yes it was. She was tiny, with beautiful eyes and smile and an interesting bracelet at her ankle.
We moved to the back of the car, waiting for the train to reach the station and we just chatted a bit: "what you do", "where do you come from"... I thought she was a student coming back from vacation, but she said me she was a dancer, and she had a show that night in Perugia (something based on clochards stories).
I totally loved the way she looked at me when she said she wasn't a student but a dancer.
"I'm trying to" she said.
She was almost embarassed, maybe waiting for a shocked expression on my face like she said she was a Serial Killer or Tax Inspector (you decide wich is worst).
I told her I worked as a graphic designer and I deeply appreciated she didn't asked if my job involved computers in some way or "are you good at drawing?". The train took a bit more than what I expected to reach the station, so we kept talking a bit more. Once arrived I helped her with her luggage, then I said "bye" and started walking towards the station exit.

Damn, she was fine!

A few steps, then I turned back, to ask her... her name, something. But she was gone. Disappeared among the crowd of people isterically jumping on and off the trains in the station.
I looked around, looked for her face, maybe to hear her voice again, but she was gone.

There are quite a number of times in your life when things like these happens. The girl that smiles at you while having a coffee in the morning, the way you and that lady sitting a table next to you at the restaurant keep looking each other in the eyes. Number of times.
But this was quite different. I loved the way she talked, her modesty in explaining what she was doing, the almost invisible scar on her lip, her eyes, her voice.
She was tiny.
And lovely too.

I almost considered the option to pass a night in Perugia and go and see her show... but I didn't remember the title... and I was worried to be disguised as a maniac! So, had the motorbike back, met a friend for lunch and then headed back to Rome under heavy rain with no waterproof clothing.
What a day.

Wherever you are now, tiny girl without a name, be proud of what you are doing, be proud of your what's your passion. You're not "trying to do it". You had a show that night. Right? You are doing it. Put love, passion, strenght in it. Do it at your best. Sure you do.
Goodbye.
Maybe another train will make us meet again.
Or maybe not.
Goodbye.

JPG Magazine #12

I'm, again, proud to tell you that one of my photos has been included in the upcoming issue of JPG Magazine (issue #12). The photo, called "Stripes" depicts the INAIL building located in EUR, Rome. Some more shots of it on my Flickr account. The photo was submitted to the "Creative License" theme sponsored by Adobe.
Now, I just can't wait to receive my printed copy of the issue!

Update: It's here [click for photo]

Barcellona

I'm writing from Barcellona (again and again) where I arrived this morning at 6 'o clock after a 13 hours drive from Rome. Just the time to unload the Ford Transit (clic for some photos), we are moving some boxes and forniture from Rome to BCN, then have dinner, and then back again to Rome.
Not exactly a relaxing trip.
The real "passeggiata di salute".

Update: just added a few more snapshots (click here).

Non voglio dimenticare

I don't want to forget.
My biggest fear now is to forget your voice, to forget moments passed together, to forget the small things.
There is nothing anymore, but I want to remember anything forever.
Time is passing, the pain is growing and is overwhelming.
There's no sense in what happened, there's no sense when anyone passes away, no sense when you loose your best friend. At 26 you never think you can die, you shouldn't. There's only pain now, and we can only learn to live with it.

Si un dia me faltas no sere nada
y al mismo tiempo lo sere todo
porque en tus ojos estan mis alas
y esta la orilla donde me ahogo,
porque en tus ojos estan mis alas
y esta la orilla donde me ahogo.

Ciao Fabio.

I'm a dotcom.

My new portfolio is now online.
This blog, Jnkmail.com, is for fun (as it should be) and I wanted the portfolio to be on its own domain, a different and simple to use website showcasing just my projects, nothing more there to distract the user. After some Photoshop comps (and a nice xhtml structure I had to turn down: thanks IE6), here it is: www.emiliovanni.com.
I'm a dotcom now!

Bye Bye Limbo.

Breaking News:
"The Pope is set to abolish the concept of Limbo".
Italian press: here, and here.

My deep condolences to Hermes.
Limbo lower now.

It's been a long time.

Sometimes it ends in the same way it begun.

E ancora proteggi la grazie del mio cuore
adesso e per quando tornerà l'incanto...
l'incanto di te...
di te vicino a me.

(Vinicio Capossela: Ovunque Proteggi)

27 Giugno 1980

"Il 27 giugno 1980, alle ore 21 esatte, i radar di Fiumicino cessavano bruscamente di registrare le battute del volo 870I-TIGI della Itavia, un Dc-9 in volo tra Bologna e Palermo con a bordo 81 persone. L'aereo sembrava scomparso, ma dopo alcune ore spese in frenetiche quanto disordinate ricerche, si raggiungeva la certezza che era caduto in mare a nord di Ustica. Non c'erano superstiti. Quel momento segnava l'inizio di uno di quei misteri italiani - come l'attentato in piazza Fontana o la strage di Bologna - che sono sempre rimasti colpevolmente irrisolti."

ITAVIA's Flight 870I-TIGI exploded misteriously nearby Ustica island on June 27, 1980.
The remaining parts of the fuselage and other plane parts have been moved, yesterday night after 26 years, from the deposit in Pratica di Mare (near Rome) to Bologna, where a museum about the (still unresolved) disaster will be built.

� Photo by my friend Luciano.
� Wikipedia page about Ustica's disaster (English).

Surprise!

Bastapococheccevò?
(I'll be back, sooner or later...)

Moved.

Almost done: I moved the site to dreamhost.com. There are still some DNS problems, the mail domain still points to seeweb.it, my former hosting company, and there are some minor problems and php errors. Maybe this will be the chance to restyle the site a bit.

The file transfer speed was faster with seeweb (at least here in Italy), but 4800 Megabytes of disk space, 75 users, multi-domains, sub domains, unlimited mysql databases, shell access and the Dreamhost control panel (excellent!) and other features will fill the gap!

But, actually, I just decided to move after seeing this on the dreamhost blog. Some tech guy running with a camcorder through a data-center following data packets in the wires??? Imagine that. They are the right people!

On the Track!

First day on the Track (ISAM) click for a bigger image!

Update: Another shot, finally testing the BMW's K1200R, thanks to BMW's free invite to the track.

Kings of Convenience, Rome 27/6/05

Yesterday Night we attended the Norvergian acoustic band concert in the suggestive roman theatre in Ostia Antica Archeologic Area (semicircle, middle of the satellite photo).
Well, I didn't met the Woz (damn), but the concert was amazing, way more than what I expected.
Erlend and Eirik interacted with the audience (and with the Light Engineer) during the concert, played a couple of songs with all the ligths off (amazing) argued a bit with the security guards when Erlend let some people come onstage. The acoustic was perfect and the beauty of the amphitheatre and the ruins surrounding us mixed perfectly with their acoustic music for a couple of hours.

Crappy camera-phone panorama here.

Next concert on schedule: Mr. Marcus Miller...

San Pietro, the crowd.

A couple of Quicktime VR panoramas of St. Peters these last days on the Repubblica's (national newspaper) website.
Note: reload the page if it appears empty.

Attesa.

This night, on my way home I drove through the lungotevere and, as usual, in front of St. Peters. I stopped at the traffic light near via della conciliazione, usually deserted late at night, so that you can stop for a while and stare at St. Peters facade at the end of the road.

Not this night. This night the street was filled with police cars, way up the church, blocking traffic. On my left, Largo Giovanni XXIII looked like an odd and chaothic camping: TV's transmitting vans everywhere, satellite dishes, lights, cameras, white squallid plastic tables surrounded by journalists nervously typing on their laptops.

The Pope's health is getting worse. Until Thursday late afternoon the Vatican has been very cautious about his health, but now the situation is critical. TV News are transmitting live, some say he may not pass the night.

Press:
Reuters this night.
Ansa (Italian).

Grand Theft Auto Cam...

The GTA: San Andreas Cam is up and working right now...
Update: idle now.

Dimebag Darrell: 1966 - 2004.

A 25-year-old man stormed the stage at a heavy-metal rock concert Wednesday night, shooting and killing Damageplan guitarist "Dimebag" Darrell Abbott and three others before a police officer shot and killed him, Columbus police said.

Washburn Guitars Press Release.
NBC4i.com.

Tim Turbo.

Please, please, please...
We're so over those cell phone commercials on TV.
Tim (Telecom Italia Mobile) one's are like mini soap operas in 30 seconds slots: it's like Beautiful stuffed between that smart guy driving the BMW 1 Series and the Choco Cheerios!

The one on TV these months (Tim Turbo) presents us the story of Diego (portrait) desperately trying to marry the astonishingly sensual Adriana Lima (portrait) while she escapes from him in the most exotic places of the world every damn week: catch me if you can style.

Diego: we're all supporting you. Please, please, please: 99.9% of the male italian population is waiting for it. Stop fooling around. Don't be late every time. Move your ass, hey: she's really something! Get serious now: go get her, we'll be all proud of you. Forever.

Welcome to the Jungle!

I've never been a videogame addicted. Since the Colecovision days I usually got tired after some (non consecutive!) hours on a single game. Never finished an entire game except, as I remember, Playstation's Silent Hill and... GTA, of course!
I admit, I bought the Playstation 2 in order to play GTA III and, some months after GTA III Vice City. Stop.

Love the characters, stories, the detailed city environment created by Rockstar for the game.

So, now, I can say, with great excitement, after some months waiting: Welcome to the Jungle!

Just a few days left.

Wayback!

Jnkmail.com: March 2003.

Reporters.

For the Italian readers out there: Tony Capuozzo (Italian reporter from Iraq) article, written a few hours before our hostages were freed, on "Il Foglio":

"Ma se c’è una traccia di umanità
in questa guerra sta nelle lacrime
di Bigley, sta nell’urlo disperato del
sudcoreano, sta nella rassegnazione
impaurita dei nepalesi, sta anche nei
volti che ci sfuggono di centinaia di
volontari che muoiono davanti ai centri
di reclutamento. Cosa sono questi
iracheni sconosciuti, i servi di Bush, i
cosacchi dell’America? O non sono invece
i segni muti di una disperata richiesta
d’aiuto, di una caparbia voglia
di normalità?
Sono volti che il nostro paese di dietrologi
farebbe bene a guardare in faccia,
davanti, per capire dove sta il nazismo
e dove la resistenza, e ricordarlo,
e cercare di non perdere la bussola.
E non perdere una guerra che è anche
una guerra di valori, che potremo
anche non combattere, ma che possiamo
perdere comunque."

PDF direct download: click here.

Arrivé!

Fast: from the Internet Point.
We arrived today in Rouen, after two days driving through Italy and Southern France (we are exhausted).
Everything was fine, the "Tour of Normandie", officially starts today.
Images and other news ASAP, on this entry.

update: photos here.

Leaving...

On friday evening I'll leave for (long awaited, as usual) vacations.
On the mini-banner under the title you can see a (relaxed) bit of trip planning: looking for routes and accomodations on our way from Rome to northen France: Normandie et Bretagne.
Starting from Rome, we'll stop roughly after 600km in Val di Susa, near Turin (Italy). The day after we finally will be in France to visit (among others): Noyers (our first night in France), then Rouen, via Paris (just to make a tourist-photo under the Tour Eiffel...), Mont San Michelle (obliged), St Malo, and, we hope, as many places we'll be able to pass through and visit in 19 days and an estimated grand total of about 5000km.

Obviously by motorbike.

And,

obviously we don't speak French...

update: photos here.

Finally!

I did it. After months thinking about it, I finally bought an Aiport Extreme base station for my home.
As a fan of the standard ethernet patch cable I always considered Airport as something suited for low traffic networks (and, it is), but after using it at my workplace for months, a big - stinking - monkey was sitting on my shoulder, beating me on the head everyday: "spend your money..." monkey said.

The best toy for the Broadband addict: in a couple of hours I found myself browsing from the bed (me, lazy bastard), living room, terrace (in the evening is wonderful), kitchen, just didn't tested the bathroom...

In the past I used my desktop G4 (a 733mhz revision A) with an airport card as a "fake" Base Station, but it was a bit noisy (consider a couple of internal SCSI hard drives...) and it missed some options the base has (since with MacOs X Apple killed Software Base Station). You can work it out using command line configuration, but it's complicated... and you still have the loud noise!
Then, since my ISP (Fastweb) it's, practically, an hi-speed MAN in the city of Rome, that connects you to the internet, I wanted to use the Base as a sort of "filter" for wannabe hackers who, every once a while, tried log into my LAN.

Now the house LAN is split in two parts: Wi-Fi, serving three laptops (two Macs, one PC running XP, connected via an Orinoco Silver Wi-Fi card - some problems: see below); cabled 10/100 network (gets internet access from the Base Station with Network Address Translation) for the desktop G4, and my Powerbook when it sits on my desktop, connected to the external monitor, external hd and a bunch of other stuff.

Now, troubleshooting:
I have some password problems with the XP laptop: it wont authenticate (does not prompt you for a password) on a password protected network.
If you create a Wi-Fi network without password protection works fine, but I'm not willing to leave my network unprotected (I'm using MAC addresses as access control while trying to solve this problem).
The Base is wall mounted: any drawbacks? Just a smaller radius?

Update: after nearly 200 Mbytes of Service Packs, Critical Updates and other crap, the PC finally connects to Airport network (with password protection). You just have to provide the exact exadecimal key: instructions here.

PS.
If you are asking yourself: yes it's me reflected in the Apple logo in the photograph.

Fiat Internet!

Finally, today the DSL connection has been installed in the new house.
I passed three weeks of deintoxication from "connection disease" (except for days passed in my workplace in Spoleto: DSL up and running).
Back online just in time to see the new AirPort Express, the new insane Apple "appliance" that works as an AirPort bridge and can remotely play music on any Hi Fi system and/or share a printer.
It will perfectly fit the new living room, managing iTunes via Sailing Clicker. (I'm a nerd... I know...)
I just don't understand if I have to buy a standard base station (right now, my old desktop G4 works as base station in the house) in order to use one or two additional Express Stations.

Bush in Rome.

Yesterday night, all the trash containers were removed from the streets near to the Cestia Pyramid square, an important subway station, just two stops after Termini central station.
The containers are now aligned in front of my new house (wow!), early this morning police officers checked everything with metal detectors (wow, again!).

The city is innaturally deserted (at least this morning); police everywhere.
Groups of manifesting people are slowly gathering in the center of Rome...

Come in, we're Open.

Here I am, another one in line, anxiously waiting for comment spam!
Let me personally experience the new century plague!
Since I, sometimes, receive comments by email: now my four readers can expose themselves on the site.

2 Giugno 1946.

Tax this, tax that...

This article, today on the first page of the paper edition of the International Herald Tribune, got my attention:
EU (Europe for friends) wants to tax computer monitors because you can use monitors to watch movies!!!

This paragraph says it all:

It could be considered the price of convergence: Computing equipment sold among Europe, the United States and Asia is supposed to be free of duties. But the EU imposes a 14 percent import duty on consumer electronics as part of an effort to protect European TV manufacturers.

It seems DVI monitors will be the first to be taxed.
Just a reminder: they taxed CD-ROMS, because you could use them to store movies.
They taxed Hard Drives and other mass-storage devices for the same reason.
They taxed CD Burners for the same reason.
Next step is taxing my hands because I can use them to operate a personal computer, and I could do something illegal with it.

In Italian this is called "Processo alle Intenzioni" (preventive fines), or going against new, innovative (read: money), markets to protect old ones.

Boxes Everywhere!

I'm moving to a new house.
Moving can become the most painful period of your entire life:
it starts with the little things.
You put away the stuff you usually don't use daily (or, at least, you think you don't...) then you start moving your kitchen stuff (dishes, glasses, everything), and you start having your meals on plastic dishes with soft, useless, plastic forks and knives - chinese torture.
Then you enter the last week before the movers will land into your apartment.
Histerically, you start trowing things into the boxes (boxes are everywhere in the house by this time): clothes, shoes, your towels, all the basic stuff you need to have a decent public life.
You are stressed, you can't find anything you need, everything is messed, you can barely walk into your (former) house that, now, is similar to a personal storage with numbered boxes inside.

But there are also some curious aspects.

I closed in (now famous) boxes all my design books, all my CD's, I found tons of Apple hardware: at least seven CPUs (from a Mac LC, to my new Powerbook - excluding newtons).
During moving times you have a chance to trash tons of useless stuff you once considered important and, now, are only unnecessary added weight you have to pay to be moved from the old house to the new one.
You find objects you once loved, you once desidered a lot, you had to buy, or obtain in some way.
Now, you just have some seconds (time is passing... fast!) to save them, or to orribly trash them - erase these, once important, little, tiny objects from your life.
(I'm getting emotional here, you know...)
In these cases we all learn that money is stronger than our feelings for that (say it again: useless) stuff.
Said this, what do you think I should do with this beautiful chinese restaurant gift???

On another topic: if my mother discovers this new yahoo uk service my mail inbox is fucked!
Via Kottke.

Force-reload!

Sorry, CSS play time today.
Expect weird behaviors from the site.

Googled.

What's up with the Gucci iPod case?
It's becoming popular?
It has been reviewed on some magazine???
Only today I received hundreds of visits from Google and other major search engines with query strings like "Gucci Ipod", "Gucci Ipod Case", "Gucci+Ipod", all pointing to my related entry.

The Lord works in mysterious ways.

Update: Punto Informatico, an IT News italian website, published an article about the Gucci case this week, without any link to their site.
Interested readers (a lot of interested readers) just searched Google for "Gucci iPod" and landed here.

Madrid 11/03/2004

While thinking about the people killed, and the wounded ones in this last cowardly bombing attak - one single question comes to mind.
ETA?

ETA or not, this Friday evening Rome was, oddly, almost deserted.
From Pantheon, through Piazza Navona, to St. Peter we walked with a strange, weird feeling: something was strange, after a while we realized.
No people in the streets, no noise, not much traffic, police cars parked in the corners or along the main roads.
People are scared.

Preorder Now to Avoid Disappointment!

Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, is coming!

IKEA?

It seems I'm the only humang being who never stepped into IKEA, yet.
I'll resist.

Untitled Document.

With all the money stolen from us, they could have done something better...
Look at the page title, now that's well done!

File Sync.

I'm having some problems with backups and files on my machine and on the webserver. If you spot some strange things like oddly, big, pure black, Times (or your default serif face) text, especially on the sidebar, please let me know!
On some computers the site seems to work fine (I erased cache files), but on some others it seems there are some problems with the CSS file.

Thanks for your collaboration.

Hate - Update.

Just a little update to last summer "Hate" post.

In a fast food you have to stand in the line for your orders, you can't sit at the table at the second floor and then bug the guy cleaning the floor asking for some meat. Idiot (again).

I'm pleased that I'm not the only one who noted that Burger King in Campo San Luca in Venezia, useful for a fast jnkfood lunch, is painfully slow (it seems that me and Ernesto were in Venezia in the same days)!

DMB.

This year I made myself a gift (among others received): Dave Matthews Band The Central Park Concert, that in Italy was published only a pair of months ago, and Live at Red Rocks, album I owned and lost a lot of time ago.
The Central Park Concert is wonderful, is exciting to listen to DMB live again, but the best part is Ants Marching on the Red Rocks live. More than exciting: pure energy pumped out by Mr. Beauford and the rest of the Band - terrific.
Too pity they don't have concerts in Europe: I love the band, but flying to the States just for a concert will be too expensive ;)

And I have a little problem with planes that I didn't revealed to you, yet.

Lutto Nazionale.

Going Mobile.

Yesterday I bought my new machine: a brand new 17" Powerbook.
After a couple of months thinking about it, i finally made the decision to switch from a desktop machine to a powerful laptop: I'm often out of Rome for work, so buying a new G5 and let it "alone" at home most of the time would have been useless.
That is what, in fact, was happening with my Desktop G4 733 (now adopted by my sister) these last months: I was always working on my Powerbook G3 "Pismo" laptop, a quite slow machine these days, while the G4 was at home, waiting for a few ssh or ftp connection per day, just to synchronize some files ore to use the home DSL for downloads.

This is my second day on the Powerbook: it seem quite faster than the desktop machine, I still got my beloved SuperDrive for huge backups and, when at home, plugging the laptop into my 19" LaCie monitor (since the Powerbook's 17" monitor is wonderful, I use an extended desktop setup with the LaCie as the main monitor - I still love CRT!) and external hard drives doesn't make me miss a desktop mac setup.
Size is the only drawback of the 17" Powerbook: it doesn't fit into my old backpack, and doesn't fit into my motorcicle's bagsters bags too, damn!
I need a new backpack: now I'm using an old school backpack (dated circa '88) that's big enough to safely contain the powerbook during my expeditions around center Italy on my motorbike!

I Want It.

I want this to replace my current Pismo 400 as my secondary machine!

This is the new Jnkmail.

Welcome back.
I'm into the process of updating Jnkmail.com: I'll be working on the site by the time you are reading this entry.
I need to solve some problems (like to align the friends box to the bottom of the gray sidebar...), and to finish to complete the updating process: you may still find some of the old, trusted, pale-pink pages around here!

As usual, if you spot any errors, strange behaviors, do not hesitate to contact me!

GTA Behind the Scenes.

This is for Gran Theft Auto fans.
Just visit the Rockstar North site, "The Lab" section, to discover a bit of the creation project behind GTA3 and GTA3 Vice City.
The video footage of the wireframed Liberty City is amazing: go dig the site!

Photoshop CS?

When, wandering through the web, I discovered that the new Photshop release (at that time known as Photoshop 8) was close to its public launch, I asked myself where all the middle releases (imagine Photoshop 7.5, Illustrator 10.3) had gone.
In archaic times, steps like Photoshop 2.0 to the 2.5 version where big: worth an upgrade or a brand new copy.
It's not trendy anymore.

No surprise when, these days, I discovered that Adobe (nicely) re-branded its products, suppressing the version number and replacing it with "CS": creative studio.

What's happening next? How would they name next releases of their software?
Will we distinguish the different versions in a Microsoft and, recently, Macromedia style like: Product X + Cool "makes the difference" Acronym + Year of Release?

Equal: mess.

Italy: Blackout.

We're having electricity for small amounts of time this mornig: 20 minutes and the blackout "comes" again.

I posted a couple of photos of Rome during the Blackout, taken yesterday, at 4 o' clock in the morning: go see.

They found Nemo!

Laughing in the morning: thanks Justin!

Update.

New portfolio online soon.

The need for speed.

If you think your heavily modified 1800cc dragster is too slow try this!

Pills of my life.

Here we are, back in Rome, back to the daily routine.
This September seems to be interesting: in these few days I managed to put my dirty hands on a Powermac G5, the 1.6 Ghz entry level model, I'll "test" it more accurately next week, it works with a newer version of Jaguar (for G5 processors) with some new bluetooth features like wireless mouse and keyboard.

My girlfriend gave me a new bonsai: it's a 27 years old (older than me!) Ficus Retusa, a pretty strong indoor bonsai: according to the information we have, it will survive me!
It can live for (year more, year less) 1500 years.

On the professional side I'm starting three new freelance projects, two sites and a book, while I'm looking for a full time job, to gain more and more experience, and to continue learning under the guide of older, skilled graphic designers, I'd better reprint my book and move my ass!

QTVR from Spain.

I'm downloading tons of photos we've taken this summer in Spain.
For you viewing pleasure I've uploaded a Panorama from the national park near Oiartzun, that is located on the border between San Sebastian (Spain) and Biarritz (France).

Help Request:Does anyone know how to make a 180 degrees panorama with QTVR Authoring Studio 1.0?
I want to delete that black line in the QTVR linked above: it is 180°, not 360° as the software did.
If you know, please mail me. Thanks!

Hate.

I hate people who are not able to place an order at fast-food restaurants, especially when I'm waiting my beloved double whopper with onion rings at Burger King.

It's pretty simple; they have numbers for any menu, the guy who serves you will ask you always the same questions in every country of the planet: USA, Italy, Germany, even here in Spain.

It's simple, anyone can do (I thought till today).

Example:

"I want menu number five, thanks."

"That's the money - bye!"

You can't make strange combinations of menus, you can't ask wine, or ask if they'll cook something only for YOU.
You can't ask if someone can bring you a coffee when you finished your meal, or if they have other thing than these listed on the panels.

Of course, we have some "Daurade à la crème d'oursins" from our secret French chef - idiot.

Since you usually have to stand in line for a few minutes, it may be intelligent to decide what to eat few seconds before the fast food guy asks you what.

San Sebastian

Ok, we arrived in San Sebastian (near the border between Spain and France).
Everything is ok (except, maybe, for the car that hit and damaged my motorbike in hotel parking).
For the 17th we'll be heading back to Barcellona and then back home (photographic documentation will follow)!

Have a nice day!

BCN .03

We safely arrived in Barcellona this morning, after "only" eighteen hours over the sea.
We're destroyed.
Tomorrow, we'll leave for Saragoza: see you soon in the next few days!
(the EasyEverything PC crashed orribly after editing this entry: low on memory... aaah Windows)

On the Road.

Finally, I'll be leaving for my long-awaited summer vacation!
It's 8:30 in the morning, in a couple of hours I'll be riding my motorbike, heading north for about 600 kilometers to Genova, where a ferry boat will bring us to the port of Barcellona.
Then from Barcellona, we'll pass straight in the middle of the north of Spain (we planned to visit Zaragoza, Pamplona, and everything else interesting we will find during the trip) till we'll meet the ocean at St. Sebastian.
Then (like Forrest Gump), we will turn back, return to Barcellona to spend there 3 or 4 days relaxing, and then back home.

So, my dear readers (all two of you): enjoy this insanely hot summer, relax, stay away from your monitor for a while, and stay tuned by the end of August: I think I'll post some news and photos near the 19th or 20th of August, when I'll be back in Barcellona (God Bless EasyEverything)!

Goodbye!

Oddities.

I'll never eat a wurlster again without dissecting it this way.

This is why whe all love receiving fragile packets via mail!

Back in Rome.

I'm back in Rome... bracing in this too-hot italian summer.
I leave behind me a wonderful week-end in my home in Porto St. Stefano, in Tuscany.
I'm just waiting for the next week-end, and the beginning of the much awaited holidays!

See the Photos.

Navigate.

I've added the dreaded "link page" to jnkmail.com.
It all started when I tought to publish my IE favorites (deleting, ahem, the porn bookmarks folder before, obviously!), but this is nearly impossible because I'm used to copy my favorites.html file from one Mac to another anytime I buy a new one.
So the file creation date is back from when I had Powermac 6100/66 (The first PowerPC Macs) and now it is almost 1 Megabyte for thousands and thousands of bookmarks: you can scroll my Favs menù for twenty seconds (ona a fast machine) to see it from top to bottom!
I think this gives an idea: now I'm (slowly) reorganizing it and I'm going to add bunches of links day by day.

I'm also working on a new a new portfolio, it will resemble my "real life", "real paper" made book, probably, I hope it will be online by the end of the week... I got a lot of free time now.

Misterious Puppet.

Please don't blame me about this, but...
What is this???

I downloaded the image linked above one or two years ago from a site I can't find anymore.

Geek note:Sometimes in the past, when we where using one program at a time, and sported 66 Mhz and 16 Megabytes of RAM, under the revolutionary System 7.x, if we manually downloaded a .gif, .jpg, or other from the internet, our mac used to stick it's original URL into the file comments...
We'll have classes back with Panther: maybe I'll get this back with Os 10.4!

Ok, get back to the puppet: it always fascinated me, I want it: big, small, any size.
Anyway: I just forgot it until today.

Today.

Today I caught it on the back seat of the weirdsmobile, and so I started again asking myself:

What the fuck is it?

Please help me, maybe it's a Television Suppastar, unknown to me, alone, here in Italy.
I need to know: mail me any details.

28th June 2003

Someone is getting married today in NYC!
Congratulations to Jeffrey and Carrie!

Modify me.

I'm still working on the new features on this site.
I've added a stylesheet switcher on the sidebar (it's not finished yet) that changes the site's background and the .gif images that simulates shadows.

Yes, using PNG, it would have been simpler (you don't have to reload images), but since IE/Win does not support correctly PNG trasparency... I had two choiches: bad visual rendering under IE for windows users (I think they are a lot) for years or CSS switching the images to deliver the right graphics to everyone!

As I said I'm still working on it, I'm using onClick event on the "modify..." button (made with .gif) that's not so correct... I'll fix it soon!

15 Minutes of Glory.

It happened.
I was checking my log and I saw it.
Anytime I check jnkmail's logs I always wonder about finding "famous referrers" between all the visits, and today was the day!

Jeffrey Zeldman says about me:

Emilio Vanni’s JnkMail is a well designed personal blog and portfolio.

Thanks, it's a personal pleasure to be appreciated by the author whose books we "study" on.
As we use to say here in this tiny town called Rome when someting like this happens: Caffè pagato!
(translation: we owe you a cup coffee!)

What a day!

Done.

Wow, I did it, yesterday we presented our thesis, they liked it, in the evening we went out to party, we got drunk, and now I'm officially vacated!
Here's a mini preview of the project, I'll upload the whole video as soon as I'll buy more disk space on the server.

(Near) Future plan:

1) Finish the freelance project (commercial site) I had to "freeze" due to the thesis.

2) Re-design this site (now I have time), and put up a decent portfolio.

3) Go out in the sun.

That's it.

Almost Done.

Tomorrow is the "great" day. Two months passed, we've almost finished our thesis video: my eyes are burning!

Stress.

I'm working all day long on my thesis project.
No time for anything else: no time for my girlfriend, no time for friends, no time for motorbike trips...
I received today my copy of Designing With Web Standards: no time to read it!

So, since there aren't interesting news here, you can jump to chicagouncommon.com and enjoy Chicago through the eyes of Dawn Mikulich.
Wonderful.

Technical Difficulties

I've got some problems with jnkmail.com yesterday, I finished all allocated disk space on the server, problems that could have blocked some services for a while.
I may have missed mails sent from the contact form (I've seen from my stats that some mails have been sent yesterday), so if you tried to contact me, please try again.

I'm sorry for the inconvenience.

Warblog

Whatever you think about the war in Iraq, in these last days I'm often checking Kevin's chinpokomon.com blog from Iraq.

Power of the internet: semi-daily news directly from the war zone (note: the biggest war in act now among the many others)!

Franz.

There's a new author on jnkmail: it's Francesco Zöschg
(don't even think about pronouncing his surname)!
Jnkmail.com, obviously, remains my personal site and portfolio (if I'll ever finish it), but I hope to post more interesting links and news in the future with Franz's help.

More to come in the near future...

War

It's 4:39 in the morning here in Rome,
war has begun about one hour ago.

Vice City

I finally completed GTA III Vice City this morning, 10:42.
GTA is, probably, one of the most playable game for the playstation: think I bought the Playstation 2 only to play with GTA III!

Anyway Rockstar Games has created, not a game, but an entire micro-environment (in GTA III and GTA VIceCity) that lets you do (almost) whatever you want, the neverending game.

Love Rockstar.
They let you download the original GTA game
(only for PC, I hope virtual PC could mange this...) from their site.

Now... it's time to check out GTA for any secrets!

I am Happy.

Yesss!
We (me and Francesco Zöschg) have been choosen to work on the "five senses" video as thesis for our digital design course.
There will be about 15-20 people working on it, I still don't know if we will merge in a single group or if we could freely decide how to join each other.
God only knows.
The video (five senses in five minutes) will be used by Apple Italy to promote Final Cut Pro.

I'm happy today!!!

Ciao Alberto.

This morning we lost Alberto Sordi.

Take the Cow!

As promised, I'm working on the site!
New desktops download section is online.