Paris

Check out this new scene of @EmWatson & the #BlingRing crew breaking into my house & jacking from my closets.

Did you know that the cure for trans Atlantic jetlag is to do everything in Paris in one day I exaggerate of course in true Kimberly style but we seriously did a crazy amount of things on precious little sleep. Arrived in Paris at 8am local tone 2am eastern standard time. Immediately enjoyed an airport cappuccino which was quite nice actually. Was ready to prefer my usual Americano coffee but

As a few more weeks have gone since I left the hospital, here are some news for the aficionadi (apulgaradi?). The wound on the thumb is  healing at a good pace, although the dressings are still on for one or two weeks. While I am still recovering from those weeks in the hospital, lacking energy at times (and getting quickly tired by metro rides), the only major after-effect is an intolerance to beer. Hopefully temporary! Once again, thanks to all of you who sent and keep sending me greetings and good  wishes, incl. special thanks to my friends in the Statistics department at QUT for their collective postcard [and yes they can laugh about ït]! And to friends from New York who called me several times. Although my scientific production is very limited at the moment, since the i-like workshop was both enjoyable and cathartic, I plan to attend the French statistical meeting next week in Toulouse [hopefully getting some kg back from the great South-West cuisine!], followed by ABC in Roma [another opportunity for great food]. On the following weekend, I should leave for Vietnam to give a course on Bayesian analysis and attend a conference as well. Filed under: Books, Kids, Mountains, Running Tagged: accident, BUY, cat, i-like, operation, recovery, surgery, thumb, Université Paris Dauphine, University of Warwick

You know how I like to support young entrepreneurs! Well I find two of them in my street yesterday... They opened a brand new shoe store (Thomaas & Nicolaas) where they mostly sell French manufactured (or at least designed) shoes (which is really not common these days...). But the real plus of this store is that you will find there models that you won't see everywhere in the world like in chain stores! Besides, let me remind you that in this very same street, you can also visit another extraordinary shoes store that I already featured on PDP.

The worldwide March Against Monsanto took place on Saturday in 250 cities around the world. The protest was planned to draw attention to the controversy surrounding the use of genetically-modified organisms (GMOs) — including wildly popular Round-up Ready soybeans, corn, and cotton which are developed to be resistant to the use of the herbicide which kills common weeds. Some scientists and activists have linked the use of GMOs to collapsing populations of wild butterflies and honeybees. The European Union has taken a particularly strong stand against GMOs, regulating them so strongly that some observers say that there is a de facto ban on the crops. As a result, in 2012 Europe produced less than 400 square miles of GE (genetically engineered) crops, mostly Bt corn, which has been modified to include an insecticide. However, GE crops are one of the most valuable agricultural products in the Americas, with the United States, Brazil, and Argentina leading exporters of GMO crops and animal feeds like corn and soybean. Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) had pushed for a new law to allow states to require the labeling of GMO foods. However, on Thursday, the US Senate overwhelmingly shot down the measure 71-27. Here are just a few of the images from around the world. From Anonymous: #MONSANTO is NO DIFFERENT THAN PUTTIN A GUN 2UR FACE &PULLIN TRIGGER.March Against them on Sat bit.ly/157kqeY twitter.com/OrganicLiveFoo… — Anonymous(@AnonOpsMob) May 24, 2013 In New York: I like this sign NYC March against Monsanto#MarchAgainstMonsanto twitter.com/KillerParrot/s… — Killer Parrot™ (@KillerParrot) May 25, 2013 In Washington D.C.: The bee’s are “dying in” in front of Monsanto office in DC at the #mamdc march ow.ly/i/2cBHj — Occupy Wall Street (@OccupyWallSt) May 25, 2013 Paris, France: Protesters in Paris wave signs”#Monsanto plunders farmers, kills planet”#MAM on.rt.com/1hmc5w#OpMonsanto twitter.com/RT_com/status/… — Anonymous (@AnonOpsLegion) May 25, 2013 Here is video from Tokyo, Japan: And another one from Sydney, Australia: We don’t yet have a final count on the number of people who participated, but the March Against Monsanto Facebook page predicted 400 marches in 50 countries with over 200,000 people. [Durban, South Africa of March Against Monsanto protest by Tracy Hinds and Revolution News via Facebook] March Against Monsanto Worldwide Protest Two Days After Food Label Bill Fails Senate is a post from: The Inquisitr

What you see above is a “map” of Paris created by collaging thousands of photographs shot in the city. It’s just one of the amazing pieces in Japanese photographer Sohei Nishino‘s Diorama Map project. The series contains maps of many of the world’s most famous cities, and all of them are photographed and collaged by hand. To create each diorama map, Nishino visits a city and shoots thousands of photographs while walking around within them. His goal is to capture his personal memory of traveling around that city, and this stage often takes weeks — or even months. Hundreds of rolls of black-and-white film and tens of thousands of photographs later, he develops and prints the film himself in a personal darkroom, brings everything into his studio, and then begins to edit them. He selects thousands of photographs that are representative of what he would like to show, and then sets to work creating a collage. Using a sketch of the city’s layout on a giant white canvas, he spends months cutting photographs and gluing them onto the map in the locations they belong. The maps are not meant to be accurate recreations of exactly what a city looks like from above, but are instead more representative of his personal memory and experiences. The process is tedious, but Nishino still manages to produce them at a rate of about three per year. Here are some of the diorama maps he has created so far: Berlin, Germany Tokyo, Japan Shanghai, China Rio De Janeiro, Brazil New York City, New York London, England Jerusalem, Israel Istanbul, Turkey Hong Kong, China Here are a couple of time-lapse videos showing Nishino creating one of his diorama maps: You can see more diorama maps and more of Nishino’s work over on his website. Diorama Maps by Sohei Nishino (via POTB) Image credits: Photographs by Sohei Nishino and used with permission

World No. 5 David Ferrer is back on court for the second Grand Slam of the season, as a 128-player field assembles in Paris for the French Open. The Spanish #2 enters into the tournament as the fourth seed.

It’s a time of substantial upheaval for the White Sox. -John Danks came back and was passable. Pitch F/X says he hit 91, which seems unlikely but is nevertheless nice. -Undead Paul Konerko is 5-9 in the last two games. -Hector Gimenez is starting at catcher for the second-straight night for whatever reason. -Angel Sanchez was waived, passed on, offered back to his original team, rejected, outrighted and placed on Triple-A Charlotte, which is great because now he can provide depth without that annoying obligation to keep him on the major league roster. Even if that depth is the sort of depth Ray Olmedo offered. -Gordon Beckham is apparently going to be enduring the normal amount of rehab for his surgically-repaired hand after experiencing soreness in his left wrist.. Dan Hayes has the explanation of how this isn’t a huge setback. “Hamate bone injuries normally take six-to-eight weeks from which to recover. So even if Beckham needed another 10 days to return to the White Sox he’d still be on par with most hamate bone rehabs.” -Alex Rios has an 18-game hitting streak going on. -Chris Sale still hasn’t been officially confirmed to start next week, but is keeping active. Chris Sale will play catch today .Side session Sunday. — Bruce Levine (@ESPNBruceLevine) May 25, 2013 But there’s still the Marlins in town, which proves to be a challenge that can be met even without all the pieces in place and in functioning order. The offense was spoiled milk on Friday night and was still enough to support a rusty and rehabbed Danks. White Sox lineup 1. Alejandro De Aza – CF 2. Alexei Ramirez – SS 3. Alex Rios – RF 4. Paul Konerko– 1B 5. Adam Dunn – DH 6. Dayan Viciedo – LF 7. Conor Gillaspie – 3B 8. Jeff Keppinger – 2B 9. Hector Gimenez – C Jake Peavy, SP Good thing Konerko is awake and responding to basic stimuli, since Adam Dunn and Dayan Viciedo have both added a lot more ineffectual waiving to their approaches recently. Dunn is hitless in his last three games and has struck out in half of his last 12 at-bats. Dayan Viciedo has only struck out in four of his last 12 at-bats, but the lack of restraint and balance is troubling. Since breaking a three-game hitless streak on May 15, Keppinger is hitting .344/.382/.500 and hasn’t struck out. His slump never made a whole ton of sense, so it’s leaving without a big mechanical adjustment isn’t something that needs much delving into. FanGraphs’ Jeff Sullivan said at the time of his signing that Keppinger “singles until he gets tired of singling,” so perhaps that’s what was going on. Not really, though, but you know what I mean. Marginal talents can fall on hard times very easily. Last night’s lineup didn’t exactly set the world on fire, but it being exactly repeated shows how much more stability the White Sox have compared to the Marlins Marlins lineup 1. Juan Pierre – LF 2. Placido Polanco – 3B 3. Derek Dietrich– 2B 4. Marcell Ozuna– RF 5. Chris Coghlan – DH 6. Justin Ruggiano – CF 7. Greg Dobbs – 1B 8. Adeiny Hechavarria – SS 9. Rob Brantly – C Ricky Nolasco, SP The Marlins switched last night’s leadoff hitter to the No. 8 slot because Juan Pierre is on a strict platoon and they seem to have no offense they can put at the first base position whatsoever. Given that they have Brantly at catcher, its odd that they give roster spots to both Jeff Mathis and Miguel Olivo, who are both deep shades of terrible with the bat. Traditionally–traditionally–Ricky Nolasco has struggled with the long ball. The two home parks he’s had in his career were a football stadium and the massive mausoleum they play in now. Where to Watch: Fox. Sorry, everybody who wanted to watch.

Juan Monaco warmed up for the French Open with a 6-4 6-3 victory over Jarkko Nieminen in the final of the Power Horse Cup in Dusseldorf.

the literate man of sioux citysurviving in a non literate citythe weekend was upon us, the Americans were celebrating the Mexican equivalent of the Day of the Dead, or the Vietnamese equivalent of the Tomb Sweeping Day.. it is called Memorial Day in the USA.Also symbolically denotes the beginning of the light hearted summer festivities: food festivals, so called cultural festivals, riverside festivals, in general an indication for people to get out and have a good time, as the winter has almost become a memory and no one has to worry about heating their homes up for few more months.. in this part of the world..I have been coming to visit the Indians who live in their reservations just few miles south of this city, which was once a centre of trade and commerce and now even churches have hard times surviving..the language is going from those of the European Migrants to those of Latin American especially Central American migrants and in fact, it is their presence that gives the city any sort of spark, otherwise it would have already joined the multitudes of middle american cities lying in their coffins.Iowa is a very conservative state, said an educated patient of mine, and in Iowa, Sioux City is the most conservative! so it is no wonder that I have made no friends here despite visiting the town for occasional eating adventures, mainly to the Vietnamese or Thai restaurants.with one exceptionthat is Steve Avery!Coffee Works on the top of Pierce Street was the first decent coffee shop in town which opened in 1994, by an photographer who had spent some time in Thailand. So i had felt comfortable that distant day when i entered and settled down with my coffee and a book.Sitting across me was a gentleman, who bears resemblance to Michael Douglas, reading the Sunday Edition of New York Times! In those days, Manna from Heaven was easier to find than NYT in a city of the size and temperament of Sioux City.As Roberto Menguel the erudite Argentine says in his book on READING, the book you are reading, changes the context of your personality. I dont think i would have said Hello to Steve Avery had he been reading the National Enquirer or Reader's Digest...we have been friends ever since even though our intense conversations are shared only once or even less per year. i am here to be with the indians and the less contact i have with Sioux City the better (the maltreated Indians call the city, the Sewage City). But on this day of remembrance, I had a desire to see and say hello to Steve, and what better place than Coffee Works. The owner, the photographer, was only glad to oblige to call Steve who was bicycling thirty minutes distance away.Tell him I would be there in thirty minutes..the next two hours, when the owner gave us the keys so that we can lock up when we leave, as he was going home, the conversation was intenseanalyticalinnovative creativesupportive..It made me think of Paris of Nin and Neruda, London of Naipaul and Vargas LLosa..cities that attract and cradle intellectuals ..but sioux city? it has to be the least literate place of all the places that i routinely visit, worse than Singapore or Kuala Lumpur ..I also thought of that erudite man of Kuala Lumpur, Mr Ho!How do such intellectual people survive these illiterate deserts where there are no oases?Steve is provocative, he has a reputation for READING and he shared his reading list with me. He is a conduit for me to American Literature since my inclination lie elsewhere. This book power gives him respect and the narrow minded well off residents of this city that lies in another century, grudgingly would saySteve you know more, because you read a lot!we touched on a thousand subjects, all related to our reading. somehow we had begun with philosophical reading, so he expounded on Benjamin from where we went on to Foucault and some ancient philosophies and the attractive aspects of Atheism..If you are a truly clever person, it is difficult to believe in these attractively clothed