Since I have not say anything about Belgium (or anything else) in a while, I think it is time for some Belgiumness.

At first, I was very tempted to post about the luring story about the murder by cutting-the-parachute-strings, one of those stories that could only come from Belgium (or Florida), but I think this one is better. A bit dated, alright ( Read more... )

And so it came to pass, that the U.S. Navy has decided to rename the Persian Gulf as the 'Arabian Gulf':

The U.S. military (...) shifted its official policy and began referring to the Persian Gulf as the "Arabian Gulf." The name change provoked outrage from the easily provoked government of Iran -- which was known as Persia from around the sixth ( Read more... )

It seems that the British have decided to accept the obvious (that they are not an imperial power anymore) and are trimming their military... or have been forced to part with their expensive toys by the crisis: they are selling one of their aircraft carriers:

Sale by Tender - HMS Invincible ( Read more... )

The towns of the U.S. empty quarter keep their descending spiraling into oblivion: even when they offer very low costs of living and even free land, it seems it has been immpossible for them to attract "new homesteaders". Cultural differences, tiny economies and small-to-inexistent opportunities for proffesionals and younger people are the reasons ( Read more... )

And so it came to pass, that this Muslim commenter has decided she and her family should be subject to "religious profiling" in name of security:

For all those holiday travelers negotiating the Transportation Security Administration’s new cop-a-feel strategy, there is a difficult solution we need to consider: racial and religious profiling ( Read more... )

Yesterday, I was reading The Daily Beast list of "The 9 Most Shocking WikiLeaks Secrets". Corruption, real conspiracies & plots, North Korea's clear and present role in nuclear proliferation... terrible, terrible news.

But the one which stands out the most, in my absolutely-not-humble opinion, is number 7:

7. U.S. Offers Payouts in Exchange for ( Read more... )

Thanks to Facebook, The Economist, The New York Times and Al Jazeera have become rapidly my favorite news sources.

Of those three, my biggest problem is with The Economist and their policy of allowing me to read just five articles every week. But sometimes, Al Jazeera can be really annoying too:

On platform one at Bolton train station in England ( Read more... )

I am pretty sure 2014 will see some kind of remembrance for the centenary of the start of the Great War. I think I would like to attend.

Meanwhile, from The Economist a rather silly and funny joke:

Germany, Austria and Italy are standing together in the middle of a pub when Serbia bumps into Austria and spills Austria's pint. Austria demands ( Read more... )

And so it came to pass, that the muslim community of Murfreesboro, Tennessee, ran out of space: it seems that hey have grown quite a lot these years.

I suspect it is due to immigration: I really do not think it is due to the conversion of locals, I do not know why... :)Anyway, the community buys this parcel to build a community center/mosque, and ( Read more... )

It seems that not all those illegal (brown) immigrants are semi-literate monolingual Spanish-speakers, good only for picking tomatos. Some of them can form full sentences in English. And even some of them can make it into Ivy League colleges. Go figure:

When Mirta Gonzalez was accepted to Harvard in 2004, her relief was mixed with trepidation. As ( Read more... )