News You Can Bruise for 2003 May 14

I like this sort of thing: Walking directions to Mordor. (from cl)

I'm going to give my configuration framework talk at EuroPython! It's in Charleroi, Belgium, and it looks like the easiest way to get there is to fly into Brussels and take the train. Charleroi is in the south of Belgium, so I should brush up my French (call me provincial, but I'm not going to learn DutchFlemish for a one-week trip to the part of Belgium where they don't speak DutchFlemish). What's the best way to regain lost fluency in a language?

Read from Quicksilver, if you dare. (I don't.)

An international team of losers has wasted countless man-hours drafting imaginary maps for a made-up planet. Thousands of population centers and geographical features have been named; elaborate cultures and complex political boundary rules devised; and no place on the planet has been neglected, from the polar regions to enormous cities right down to tiny islands ("BAY OF WRECKS (very dangerous)"). Ancient maps have been forged, as have all sorts of thematic and demographic maps. I don't know why I keep making stuff up the way I do. What I should have said is that there are lots of great maps of Earth at UT Austin's Perry-Castañeda collection.