Saturday, June 13, 2009

Farewell post

It is with some regret that I announce that I will no longer write any posts here.

The reasons are:

- I have had very little time to pause and write original stuff, which was the aim of the blog in the first place

- I have been using Facebook as a primary means of communication and opinion, and it has been working well. Facebook allows me to have the best of orkut (photos, private messages), twitter (short status), and blogger (notes, links) all in one place. Gradually I have been using all the others much less.

I guess the catalyst has been the Facebook username. I started it in the first few minutes of usernames being available - hence got myself a pretty useful link (facebook.com/pedro.fernandes). So I will cease posting here at blogger - but some of the features I used to include here will be shifted instead to Facebook. Things like my football predictions, what I'm listening to, so on and so forth. My Facebook page is public (at least the notes and status posts) so it should work out fine.

All in all I should remember this as a phase in life. A phase in which I thought I had an urge to communicate how I felt about stuff that I cared about. What started as a chronicle flirted with becoming a place for my personal view on world affairs. I relished most the football and music commentary, and I hope all readers enjoyed it. But as you could see, in the end I was just posting links and videos - which Facebook, I believe, handles best.

Does this mean I no longer have an urge to share stuff that I care about? Absolutely not. The urge is still there. It has never left - I've been updating Facebook constantly, not to mention posting comments in some of my favorite content providers such as The Guardian. It's just that times call for a different medium - just as in 2006 times called for me to switch MSN spaces for blogger.


Thanks for the worldwide audience (which I could track with the Who's Reading This gadget on the right side). It was really an honor and a pleasure to be THE source for searches on the lyrics of "Woman of the Ghetto". For 2 years, if you googled "Woman of the ghetto lyrics" the only page appearing was mine. And the other guy who appears now in the google search clearly copied me, because he keeps a typo I had!! I must have received a dozen congratulatory emails on posting these lyrics from ear.

If any comments are made to any of the entries, I'll still read them - I'm not terminating the blog, just pausing it. And as I said, I'll be reachable over Facebook (okay being repetitive now... so let me close this off).

Thank you and goodbye
Obrigado e até mais
Gracias y hasta luego
Merci, a bientôt

Sunday, May 03, 2009

Oba!

Sunday, March 15, 2009

A seemingly candid and heartfelt handshake



I have a positive feeling about this relationship.

Sunday, February 15, 2009

Three-year travel plan

When I moved back to Brazil in 2006, after a year full of traveling, I knew that any opportunities for non-business long-haul trips would become scarce. So I should really focus my traveling efforts to go to places that would be worth it, trying not to repeat places or go somewhere too similar to where I'd been already.

With that in mind, I set out to devise my first 3-year travel plan: 5 places that I should try to visit over a 3-year period. My list in early 2006 consisted of:

New York City
Moscow
Macchu Picchu
Madrid and Barcelona
South China (Yunnan)

Three years have just gone. I ended up visiting NYC on new year's day 06-07 and Macchu Picchu in new year's day 07-08. Moscow was covered in a business trip in 07, but I could do a fair amount of sightseeing as well. The latter two choices just did not materialize (I chose to ramble around countryside Argentina for new year's 08-09).

So now it's high time I devise the second version of my 3-year travel plan. I have to put a bit of thought into it.

What I do not want is:
- cities where the only leisure is the urban life (restaurant-museum-disco-shopping). Got plenty of that in São Paulo already.
- too touristic beaches
- too much underdevelopment (Mumbai slum? hm... maybe in another 3-year plan)

What I probably want is:
- cultures I have never had contact with - e.g. the Muslim world
- extreme faraway places where you just sit and gaze at nature
- cozy, midsized cities - in the mould of, say, Hamburg (by the way, the more I go to Germany the more I enjoy it)
- places where I know locals who could show me around

After a bit of Google-Earthing I came to the following places:

1) A glacier - either Patagonia, Norway or Iceland
2) A paradise island - either Noronha (Brazil), somewhere in the Caribbean, the Phillipines, or Polynesia (Cook Islands perhaps)
3) A hiking expedition - either Chapada Diamantina (Brazil), the Santiago de Compostela trek in Spain, or the Alps
4) A wine tour - either Chile, California, Italy or France
5) Ancient cities, especially if in a Muslim country - perhaps Turkey, Syria or Iran

So many places to visit.
So little time.

Monday, January 26, 2009

Keith Moon

Just genius. Plain genius.

Sunday, January 18, 2009

Mid season

Time for my first musings of the year. And why not start with my favorite pastime - English Premier League?

By now it's probably commonplace to say that this is the most exciting EPL season ever. So excuse me if it offends for being repetitive, but I just can't hide my awe. And especially today, since just by looking at the table a lot of things strike out:

- The 4th placed team (Villa) is 3 points behind the first (Man U) - i.e. could be tied in points in the next round (note that this will only last a handful of hours, since hopefully tomorrow the Reds are going to crush Everton and move to 2 points clear of United!)

- There are FIVE teams tied at the bottom of the table. In fact, yesterday Spurs were last, and had they defeated Pompey earlier today they'd have moved to 12th!

- Stamford Bridge is no longer a fortress - even Stoke almost nicked a win! By the way, I've grown accustomed to actually enjoying Rory Delap in action.

- Amazing away runs from Chelsea, Villa and Everton (all won more on travels than at home). On the opposite, Man City scored 25 home goals (2.3 per game) but have a dismal away record (with only one win)

I could go on and on but it probably wouldn't make for interesting reading. Let me just say that as much as I would love Liverpool to win I don't see it happening. The home draws to Stoke, West Ham, Fulham and Hull will eventually hand the title to Sir Alex in a silver platter.

But hopefully, I've always been crap in predictions (bar Euro 2008!)

Sunday, January 11, 2009

Pedro Music Awards 2008

Right. Following tradition, 4th year and running of my musical picks of the year. As usual the list ranks albums I got ahold of and songs that marked my year.

I was trying to write something deep, well-though-of and thorough, but after too much wrangling, procrastination and, why not assume, utter laziness, I gave up trying to do something complicated and decided to simplify the list.

Some observations over my 2008 musical behavior:

- I purchased less albums than 07, 06 and 05; also, dowloaded actually zero new albums.
- I ventured less frequently into impulse acquisitions of unknown artists (as compared to purchases of, say, Charlotte Gainsbourg or Fela Kuti in previous years). When I tried it this past year, it was either not good (e.g. Osunlade) or good, but not remarkable (e.g. Alicia Keys)
- As a consequence of previous point, have purchased mostly compilations and soundtracks.
- I caved in and am listening to more and more pop. An influence of a stint in England with only BBC Radio 1 in the car, definitely, but also an acknowledgement that mass may be good.

Contrary to the previous editions, I will limit my list of albums to 5, and the list of songs to 8 (songs which were not in the top 5 albums).

Music - Albums
1. Blue Note Trip - Movin' On
2. Into the Wild Soundtrack
3. Gilles Peterson in the House
4. 5 na bossa - Nara Leão, Edu Lobo, Tamba Trio
5. The Departed Soundtrack

Music - Songs
1. American Boy - Estelle feat Kanye West
2. Mika - Grace Kelly
3. Let's make love and listen death from above - CSS
4. Mercy - Duffy
5. I Kissed a Girl - Kate Perry
6. Men señará - Bebe
7. 1973 - James Blunt
8. Paper Planes - MIA


Call me sold, but that's what I heard in 08. Can't lie.

But one of the first things I saw on TV in 09 was a documentary on The Who - so who knows I get back to my rock origins?