My girlfriend Naomi now has her own website! It’s a site to update her friends and family during her time at Berkeley (and beyond?). My website was set up to chronicle the musings of an American in England; Nemolie.org chronicles the musings of a Brit in America. Ah, symmetry.

I’m one to enjoy dancing. Matt does to, though he only has one dance. But Matt does it a lot. That’s because nearly-extinct Stride gum paid him to go around the world dancing after he randomly had a friend friend record him dancing in Hanoi and post it on the internet, becoming somewhat of a legend. Or, as he says on his site, he’s “that guy who dances on the internet. No, not that guy. The other one. No, not him either. I’ll send you the link. It’s funny.”

For some reason, this video made me cry. I think it was because you get to see people having fun from all over the world (except the DMZ in Korea, where it’s just Matt having fun). It’s a small world, and it’s good to rememberevery now and then that we’re all not so very different.

(Interesting trivia: can you find the goat on the motorcycle in the first frame?)

This is a pretty neat use of CCTV cameras. The new group Get Out Clause has decided that, rather than higher a camera crew to film their music video, they would play in 80 public places across Manchester and then request the videos recorded by CCTV cameras in the area. Places included a bus, an amphitheatre, and even an escalator. Doing so has given them publicity on Slashdot and the Telegraph. This is ingenuity that at the same time highlights the monitored culture that at least Britons find themselves living in.

I’m mostly ambivalent about CCTV. When I had one of my Oxford bike accidents on the corner of George and New Inn Hall St years ago, the not-very-friendly cab driver that broad-sided me (his fault, license plate MER M70) said he wouldn’t pay for my repairs. The whole thing was filmed on the CCTV of the local pub O’Neil’s, but because of so many other things going on in my life at the time, I didn’t get the chance to request the footage. My suspicion is that they would have complied though. . .

[Edit: it’s a shame that they decided to use the brightcove player to post the video, as there’s no easy way I know of to embed it in my blog. Click the picture to see the video.]

The BBC is running a story today about a Brazilian tribe (or actually about 100 of them) that are threatened because of destruction of the rain forests.

Part of me is curiously satisfied to know that there are still tribes we have not made contact with in the world.  Not that I want to contact them.  Quite the opposite, really.  There is something comforting in the idea that we are not all one collective, that there are whole groups of people that exist without the internet, without foreign aid, without the imposed ideas that they should strive to ‘better their condition’.

I may add more on these thoughts later, but I am interested to hear what others have to say too.

It’s been a while since this happened, but I thought I would wait until a good number of people had seen me in person.

As always, there have been mixed reactions from my friends and family.  It looks like you either love beards or hate them.  Personally, I’m happy for mine to come and go.  Bets on when it will come back?

Upon hearing that the London Times had an article today that cited the Wassenaar Arrangement, I thought, “maybe now we can start getting some properly researched journalism on the Arrangement.” Maybe, but not likely. (more…)

On this continent at least. For the time being. Naomi, after much thought over the past few months, has decided to turn down the full scholarship from Columbia. And the full scholarship from Stanford. And the the one from Oxford. And has instead decided to take up a full funded PhD position in the Classics department at UC Berkeley! As my supervisor said, “she’s too smart for you, Sam.” While she’s planning on moving out there in August, I will likely be staying on in Oxford until I have my final viva (oral exam) for my DPhil. . . probably around Christmas. If anyone knows of good postdocs in the Bay Area focusing on international affairs and technology, do let me know!

I will miss Oxford, but I am looking forward to getting out for a while. As I have mentioned before, Oxford is the longest I have lived anywhere, and I gladly call this city of dreaming spires ‘home’. Intellectually and culturally, this environment fits like a well-made leather driving glove for a TR4. I’ve never had a place that I would like to come back to like Oxford. Minnesota certainly endeared itself to me during my years there, and of course the 2- and 3-year stints in Hawai’i were quite enjoyable as well (though the first one is a little hazy, as we left when I was 5). I have always wanted to get back to Washington State, the place of my birth, as from all accounts I would love it there too. But Oxford holds a very special place.

So. America. Bring it on.

As many friends and family (ok, two) have pointed out, the New York Times today is running an article about Oxford Pubs.  I do love the pubs in Oxford, and can say that I have been to all of these!  I don’t have a favourite. . . it depends on my mood.  If you’re ever in town, I’d love to show them to you.

What a beautiful sight - to wake up and not be able to see out of my skylight because it was covered in inches of snow! In my six years in Oxford, I have never seen this much. So I did want any reasonable person would do - I turned into a 5-year-old with my friend Eve and we made a snowman. I also took lots of pictures.

That was a good break. Now back to the thesis.