Calculated friday

December is time for making calculations. We must add up the monthly incomes, and subtract the usual costs, and other expenses not so common: the Christmas dinner, the gifts for family...

To do this, we use calculating machines. This way our mind doesn't get tired, and we can devote our thoughts to higher things.

All of us may think that calculators were invented by Mr. Casio, Mr. IBM or Mr. Hewlett-Packard. Nevertheless, it was a Galician man, Ramon Verea, who invented and patented it, in 1878.

Do you think he received any help from the Spanish government? Any prize or distinction? Did he do the patent in Barcelona, La Coruña or Sevilla? Did he become a millionaire? Is his calculator of iron and steel, weighting 26 kg, and named Verea Direct Multiplier, exposed in the science museum at San Sebastian, or Valladolid?

It was two centuries ago, but things have not changed since then. Ramon, with a brilliant academic record, was denied the scholarship that allowed him to study in Santiago de Compostela. So in 1855 he emigrated to Cuba, and from there he moved later to New York, Guatemala and Buenos Aires. He never returned to his homeland, and he died destitute in Argentina.

During this journey around the world, he had time to work as an engineer, a journalist, a translator, and an inventor. He directed for more than 10 years a newspaper in New York. 

His invention was patented in the U.S.A. He got the recognition of a medal at the World Exhibition of Inventions in Cuba. And his calculator (we couldn’t say it's a 'pocket ' calculator), is displayed at the headquarters of IBM in White Plains, New York.

So when you use a calculator machine this month, don’t forget about its magnificent inventor. It will be the best private tribute that we can do for him, because he hasn’t got any public one.

Friendly friday.

Friendship has been one of the areas in which the extension of social networking has had the greatest impact.

The dictionary defines friendship as "Personal affection, pure and selfless, shared with another person, which is born and is strengthened by the deal". Maybe we should revise this definition, or maybe not.

Today, thanks to Internet, we are connected with our lifelong friends, and with the most recent ones. Friends who have drunk with us many beers, and other ones with who we haven’t taken any at all. Friends who were there in difficult times, and others that I’m sure they will be there in the future. Friends who share likes, and others diametrically different. Friends from the school, institute, college. Co-workers and family, and in spite of it, folks. And some new acquaintances installed in the category of friends, and may be they’ll be so, because of the definition.

From time to time we look askance at the friends counter of our friends. Sometimes with curiosity, other times with some envy, or indifference, or admiration. We are used to measure everything, to quantify all aspects of life, as if the amount were the important, and friendship doesn’t escape from this contemporary fashion.

Some people are even obsessed with it. My new entry in Matifubol is dedicated to them, and to everybody in general. Hope you like it: Breakfast at Les Deux Magots.

And thanks for being there, even if you don’t feel like reading it. Or if you don’t like it.

Have a great weekend.

Vibrating Friday

August, a month with good vibrations.

I hope you'll enjoy it!

Angelical friday

Photo taken at the underground station of Kings Cross-St. Pancras in London on July 11, 2013 at 12:21 hours.

Germany is saving Europe.

It has spent €100 billion bankrolling bailouts in Greece, Ireland, Portugal, Spain and Cyprus.

It can afford these rescues only because Germans work so hard: per head, Germany has grown at more than twice the rate of the rest of the euro zone since the euro was created.

Slow-growing countries are reforming their sclerotic economies largely because of pressure from Germany.

Combined friday

Theory is when we know everything but nothing works.

Practice is when everything works, but nobody knows why.

In our current world theory and practice combine harmoniously: nothing works and nobody knows why.

Enjoy what still works, and throw away all that doesn't work.

Have a good weekend.

Santa friday

Santa is not Nordic, but Turkish.

Although he is traditionally dressed in a heavy coat and surrounded by snow and reindeer, the fact is that Saint Nicholas, the saint who refers the legend of Santa Claus has nothing to do with this land.

In fact, he also has nothing to do with Bari (Italy), a city where he never set foot, and that only has the privilege of being the sanctuary of his relics.

The truth is that he was a Christian bishop of Greek origin, born in Lycia, in modern Turkey, back in the fourth century.

And his reputation for delivery of gifts is based on a story about a poor man with three daughters, who could not marry them for not having the necessary dowry. Aware of this, Nicholas handed, when they get the age of marriage, a bag full of gold coins each. It is said that all this was done in secret by the priest who entered through a window and put the bag of gold into socks for the girls, hanging over the fireplace to dry.

So this year you should not be scared if you see him appear riding a magic carpet, and not in his traditional reindeer float.

Oneiric friday

I see efficient and honest politicians.
I see people who don't fight because they live on one side or the other of some limits set by the powerful to mark their possessions.
I see schools where children learn more and better every year.
I see worlds where everyone does their job and each receives a fair wage.
I see journalists and pundits who know what they are talking about.
I see prisons full of corrupt and embezzlers, who have returned the money they stole.
I see societies where taxes are properly used and guarantee a great welfare state.
..Only when I sleep, I often see just societies.

Lucky friday

Have you ever stopped to consider that Bugs Bunny, the famous 'lucky rabbit' is actually a hare?

Yes, it is a specimen of the genus Lepus, which differs from rabbits that his ears and eyes are more developed.

In fact, his first short film was called 'The Wild Hare'. But its creator had to start saying it was a rabbit so not to be accused of plagiarism for copying the character of an earlier short titled "The Tortoise and the Hare" of another artist.

Even in this thing we are cheated like children ...

Chinese friday

Chinese colonization continues: restaurants, shops, clothes, tools, compass, mandarin oranges, rice, gunpowder, whiskey ...

You said whiskey?

Yes, we all think it's a Scottish drink, but it was an Irish monk named John Cor who, in the fifteenth century, applied to the malt beverage distillation the process of Chinese liquor.

So this weekend please get drunk with the local wine of the country, please (grape juice for nondrinkers).

Good weekend.

Cloudy friday

Week of clouds over Palestine clouds, clouds around the rescue, clouds over the eurozone recession. And now somebody also manufactures real clouds indoors ...

Dutch artist Berndnaut Smilde has developed a way to create clouds indoors by carefully regulating the space’s humidity, temperature and light. The fluffy white clouds are summoned up temporarily using ...

a fog machine, creating a surreal experience in the middle of a room. Smilde has created his clouds inside different types of locations, ranging from corridors and hallways, to bedrooms and common spaces.

You can see the whole article: Clouds indoors