Routine Order

I am still trying to decide between an LCD TV and a Plasma TV, and so have been doing some research online. Did you know that Plasma TVs have been around since ‘92? Fujitsu invented them in 1992, and Plasma TVs have been available commerically since 1997. Wow, that is a long way going back!

Don’t the Panasonic plasma TVs look great? To its credit, Panasonic has built the largest commercial plasma TV at a massive 103 inches. The Plasma TV Reviews site also goes on to explain why these are better than LCD TVs. Briefly, they offer wider viewing angles and better black levels that drive a much higher contrast. So it makes sense to buy a plasma tv for viewing DVDs and HD tv. There aren’t too many HD channels coming down the pipe right now, so it has to be about the DVDs.

2Spare - Top 15 Strangest Coincidences.

Wow! These are really, really weird. The lighting coincidences are so spooky. Imagine people from three generations of a family dying by lightning at the same spot, or the same man hit by lightning and paralyzed to various extents many times before dying, and then lightning toasts his grave. Read it, you won’t regret it.

In the Preface to the Bibliography of American Literature(BAL) compiled by Jacob Blanck, he says:

“I am told that Chinese printers have a tradition which obliges them to introduce into their work a sprinkling of intentional errors; the reason for this curious action is to provide the careful reader with that sense of superiority which follows discovery of another man’s typographical lapse. We all know that strange pleasure; and while I would not rob you of such harmless delight it is nevertheless my sincere hope that no one will leave this Bibliography of American Literature with a violent attack of superiority complex.”

Wow! I wonder if this is another incident of someone using the “Chinese” as a vehicle for their imagination, like the old Chinese curse thingy.

However, it is interesting. I have always taken perverse pleasure in underlining mistakes in the books I read, as well as observing typesetting errors, like a top margin that varies in height from left to right. That a printer would intentionally introduce typos to make me feel smarter was beyond me!

I learnt that in the olden days, dictonaries, maps and authors used to intentionally misspell things, or even typeset some letters upside down to catch pirates. Copyright piracy, that is.

Otto Frank—who survived the Holocaust by living out Auschwitz—was trying to save his wife Edith, his mother-in-law Rosa Hollander and his daughters Margot and Anne. The 80 letters how his effort to get out of Holland, and how he failed in doing that. These letters were just released and became common knowledge.

Had he got out, Anne Frank, his daughter, might not have written her diaries.

No one writes letters anymore - emails are always to the point and never substantial. The art of writing letters, and documenting one’s own life via letters, is almost dead. One could say blogs are a replacement, but really, who puts their private thoughts, feelings and fears on a blog. Most, like me, just write about what they find interesting, not whats going on in their own lives. Blogs have almost replaced collections of letters as a way to look into particular periods in history and their effect on individuals. I remember reading quite a few highly linked-to Iraqi blogs, and Israeli blogs.

via Time