thoughts

Paperwork logistics

My mother-in-law is going to come to Cyprus this Sunday. She lives in a far far away town of Mezhdurechensk, which is the Russian Sybiria. In order for her to come, there is some paperwork to be done.

Firstly, she needs visa. In order to get visa she needs either to get an invitation from someone in Cyprus or she needs to buy a tourist package, which is kind of expensive and not necessary. An invitation can be send to her by anyone who is legally resides in Cyprus. That is either a local or a foreigner who has a pink slip (residential permit). Neither I, nor Olga have pink slips at this very moment, since they are being renewed, but that’s OK, since my good friend Lev is helping me with this issue. With the invitation in her hands, she needs to apply for visa in Cyprus Embassy in Moscow. It will take them a couple of days to process the application. Meanwhile, she also needs some tickets to fly in and out.

In order to minimize the organizational time and expenses of this trip, my mother is helping, who lives in Moscow.

And now for the interesting part. The logistics. The path that information travels and people involved in the process, so to speak. Olga called her mother (that is my mother-in-law) by phone and instructed her to send her papers to my mother in Moscow. Papers travelled by train. I than called my mother and she gave me all the passport details and stuff like that needed for the invitation. I than emailed these details to Lev. He downloaded the invitation form from the web, filled it in. He went to certify the invitation and than faxed it to my mother in Moscow. My mother picked up the fax and went to the Embassy to apply for visa on behalf of Olga’s mother. She also arranged for tickets.

The funny thing here is that in order for Olga’s mother to come and visit us, the only people moving around are Lev and my mother. In other words, people who won’t benefit from the trip. Olga’s mother and we didn’t have to do much except for a couple of phone calls and emails.

Also, I find it interesting how information travelled around the world. All sorts of different media were used – phone, email, web, fax, and even a train. The whole thing took about two days to complete. Now this is globalization at its best!

On web design and my blog

Once in a while I stop and think about the reasons for changing the design of my blog.

My first reaction to such self query usually results in insults to myself. It has been some time since I noticed the design of any other site. This is mainly caused by me using RSS aggregator to read most of the websites on my daily menu. And with RSS the design of the actual site does not mean much anymore. All of them appear the same and exactly I want them to.

But I wouldn’t have had a blog if I’d only insult myself. Thus I continue.

I am updating and improving the design for a few reasons actually.

There are still a whole lot of visitors here who don’t use RSS at all or use it to get the notifications when I post new items. They all come to the site with their browsers.
First timers. Almost half of all the visitors on this site are coming here for the first time and will not return.
Historical reasons. There are some services, like archive.org which store the pages as they are. It is interesting to compare different stages of my blog evolution after some time.
Themes and perfectionism. I always wanted a professional website. I couldn’t make it myself because I am simply not a webdesigner. And I didn’t want to pay for it. Yet. Modern CMSs allow me to use themes developed by other people, who know what they are doing.
Boost of activity. Every time I play around with the maintenance part of my blog, I tend to use it more afterwards. I start posting more often and my posts get longer. I generally consider this to be a good thing.

Resume: as much as RSS is important in my daily surfing and in the lives of other people, there are still reasosn to pay attention to the look and feel of the website itself.

Jumbo

Maxim hasn’t seen much outside of our apartment. He has visited the pediatrician’s office and has been in the park and at Molos promenade. Today we took him to Jumbo hypermarket. Jumbo is the huge shop that sells kids’ products – toys, clothes, furniture, school items, etc.

Maxim slept through most of it though…

Olga and I though saw Jumbo in the new light. Firstly, we noticed how badly the shop is organized. There are rows and rows of products, but there is no signs indicating what is where. There are no resting places, like caffeterias or benchs. This is especially hard for the pregnant women to take. The tired ones are sitting on the floor.

Secondly, I noticed the looks of pregnant parents. I remembered how we were walking around Jumbo, when Olga was pregnant and how we were jelously looking at all young parents. We were checking all the kids, inspecting what they have, what there parenst are buying for them, how they behave, etc. Today we were walking around thinking nothing about anyone else, just choosing things that we need to buy. But all the pregnant parents were staring at us, at Maxim, at what we do and how we do it. Heh. The cycle of life…

Thidly, or course I noticed something obvious, something that always happens with Olga and me when we go shopping. We went to Jumbo to buy few specific items. When we walked out more than an hour later, we bought a lot of other stuff. But we haven’t bought anything from the things we intended to.

Overall, of course, we had lots of fun. Is there any other way you can spend time in the supermarket full of toys for all ages?

Love song gone wrong

I was listening to the radio today while in the car and there was this band singing a love song. Before the song began, in the intro, it is said that the song is about a woman, broken heart, and all sorts of usual stuff. The song was sang by two male voices, in turns, with chorus doen in duet. The funny part was that in the song itself there were like one or two references to a woman. If missed, the song sounded totally gay. I mean there were these two guys singing a love song to each other.

I almost died laughing. Imagine a band writing a great pop song. It sells lots and lots of copies. So they go out on a tour for additional promotion and money. They expect a whole bunch of young hot chicks jumping on top of them. And instead, they get a bunch of romanticallly mooded boys! Now that would be an eye openner!

On writing

Paul Graham has recently wrote a short, but non-the-less interesting essey about writing. He explains why writing is important and how to write well.

Writing well is a nicely covered topic. There are numerous books on communications in general and writing in particular. Most collegues require passing of at least one writing or communications course even for the Diploma.

Reasons for writing is yet another story. I have, of course, seen other people explaining why writing is important. But these are very rare and usually boring explanations. Paul Graham does a very nice job here.

I think it’s far more important to write well than most people realize. Writing doesn’t just communicate ideas; it generates them. If you’re bad at writing and don’t like to do it, you’ll miss out on most of the ideas writing would have generated.

This explanation, though brief, is very much to the point. It is so true that it is hard to emphasize. It reminds me of my own explanations on why learning touchtyping is important. People who can’t touchtype will try to avoid typing (willingly or not). Learning touchtyping clears a huge barrier between human and computer and allows said human to use said computer to a greater extent. Computer becomes more of a tool. Similarly, practicing writing makes ideas generation and control easier. Routine, if you will.

Just a couple of days ago I was telling Olga how daily blogging improved my writing and thinking. Slowly, slowly, but it sure did. Writing a few paragraphs from the top of my head has never been easier. And the fun part is that when I start writing I don’t know what I will write. It’s like a faucet. I just know the topic that I want to write on (like cold or hot water) and than I open the tap and let it flow. It feels amazing. At first, I realize that I didn’t just want to cover the topic, but that I had some thoughts on the background. They get out and get written. While I type them in, I have other thoughts about wheather I was right or not with each idea that I am writing about. It gets me thinking, and so I write about it too. And than I either come to some conclusion or realize that I have to do some more thinking on the topic. So I end the post either with a defined state or a rumpled sentense.

I feel glad when I end with some sort of conclusion. Having no crystal end doesn’t bug me a lot though. Becaus I know that at some later stage I will sit down and write few more paragraphs on the topic. And maybe conclusion will come than. The funny thing is that sometimes I write even more than I want to. This makes me feel guilty. Like when I have three or four long posts in one day. I am thinking “Who will be reading this? People like short posts and a link to some cool website.” But than I remember the important bit – my writing is primarily for myself. It helps me think and keep my head in clear state. I know that I will be the one rereading it. Multiple times.

And those who don’t like it can always skip/ignore it…