jeudi 20 mars 2003

Toying with food A Paris letterbox can fill up with junk mail as fast as people are expected to recycle the stuff: four or five a day on glossy paper, and with rare luck an unsealed envelope or two of a size unusual enough to keep and use. ISPs still send unwanted CDs. But this one was new to me. Junk office computer games sealed to oven-ready food on the supermarket shelves, for a fun time "during the break!" I can think of better ways myself... 10:48:32 AM  link   your views? [] Where's my cryptonomicon? Now it's begun, so have the more absurd reports already. If journalists with no inside information laid out plans for special shifts during the night, it's ridiculous for the British defence secretary to go on air to "deny that the prime minister didn't know" until after the attacks began. True, I think many of us were expecting the big one from the outset, rather than the "decapitation" bid that will now reassume its place in the lexicon of military-speak to be deciphered daily. Got a nice note from Chris Allbritton this morning (Back to Iraq 2.0 in the links): he was quick. My thoughts are with the Iraqi people, as well as friends and colleagues out there and all around. And the "boys" this side, for now, of what I suppose we'll have to call the "allied lines", average age reportedly 21. Such are modern newsrooms that in 1991 the blitz from CNN on the wall-sets was almost permanent, mercifully kept low most of the time. And there are the Beeb and Sky too. The rumour-mill trying to avoid feeding itself. The US military are presently said to have no plans for a press conference - now there's a surprise! The real job of decoding and sifting will be no easier than it was then. The contrast is inevitably stark with that successful exercise in regime change I wrote about on Sunday. The known death toll last night from that one was 13, other casualties uncertain and damage, mainly from looting, considerable. During the first few hours of that business, nobody even pretended to know what was going down. 10:43:55 AM  link   your views? []

nick b. 2007 do share, don't steal, please credit under artistic licence terms; contributing friends (pix, other work) retain their rights.