“Broken”

September 21st, 2009

“You’re not God.”

There was a lot of response to “Broken,” as there is to many House premieres and finales. House, like many other shows which on a week-to-week basis only seem to dabble in serialized storylines, likes to pile on the sudden tension in the late and early parts of each season. It’s the time of year where Amber dies in a tragic accident, or when House begins hallucinating due to his use of Vicodin, or when House gets shot and goes into a dream-like state and regains some use of his leg. In all instances, the show presents us with a simple question: what if Dr. House changed? What if, after losing Amber or having his leg fixed or firing all of his fellows or the suicide of one of his fellows or (in the Season 5 finale) being institutionalized, he grows up in a way that changes his dynamic with the people around him and how he does his job?

Every year, however, the same thing happens: he and Wilson reconcile, he convinces himself his leg isn’t better, he hires new fellows and everything effectively goes back to normal. House is, ultimately, like every other procedural in that there are parts of its identity which cannot change as fundamentally as the finales want us to believe, the premieres always designed as a first step to righting the character’s universe. This is something that I’ve complained about in the past, but I think I’ve finally come to terms with it.

“Broken” is certainly, at the very least, the most impressive effort yet to make House’s re-entry into his world both believable and not without consequence. Taking the form of “House: The Movie,” ditching the entire cast save a cameo from Robert Sean Leonard in favour of a collection of doctors, patients and visitors from Mayfield Psychiatric Hospital, the two-hour episode takes the time to go through every stage of House’s process. It allows us to see his usual behaviour, conniving and manipulative, and then to deconstruct it in a way which never feels preachy, and which in the end reveals a character who remains acerbic and charming but who does seem a lot closer to what one might consider happy.

And while only time will tell how far these changes go, I’m not really concerned: long-term change or no, this was an extremely compelling two hours of television.

Hugh Laurie deserves to win an Emmy for this role, and in some ways this episode is almost cheating: he’s the only regular cast member in the episode and the two-hour running time allows him to demonstrate both the comic jerk side of House (which is entertaining to watch) as well as the vulnerable and weak side which seems to drive the previous behaviour. While the show normally tends to draw its impact (week by week) from people outside of House’s life, as the patients provide the emotional hook while House skirts around the edges entertaining us, this episode draws nearly everything from House. It takes its time to get House into a position where he starts to talk about his own feelings, but eventually he’s sitting in the chair and the episode is deriving its emotional impact from his own sense of love and loss, of happiness and disappointment.

The episode works tremendously well when it connects House directly to those ideas. His courtship with Lydia (Franka Potente) stretches out believability at least somewhat as she lets him steal her car and then doesn’t seem to mind that he was responsible for a young and delusional man to jump off of a parking structure, but it seems like a genuine connection that we haven’t seen House make in a long time. The episode starts with House in his element, diagnosing the patients around him and having a fun old time with it, but eventually we see him experiencing the types of things we haven’t seen in quite some time. I kept expecting the rug to get pulled out from under him, to have Lydia reject him for emotional reasons or to have her prove to be a figment of his imagination (unlikely considering the show will want to get back to normal, but likely considering the show’s desire to screw with us), but in the end the subtlety of the moment was what mattered: he cared about her, she cared about him, but they are eventually separated by circumstance and very little else, leading him to prove his sanity by feeling hurt and lost and going to a professional for help as opposed to self-medicating.

It’s a surprisingly subtle beat, which is why it works so well. For a two-hour premiere event, it never felt like it was going too far into theatrics, that it was shocking the viewer with twists and turns or anything else. Sure, Lin Manuel Miranda as Alvy, House’s roommate, was over the top and boisterous, but it nicely displayed the chaotic nature of the ward and how House’s first instincts are always to work with what he has to deflect from himself (first breaking them down and then rallying them together in protest). For House himself, it was more about trust and understanding, and the episode built that for us. It used its two hours not to cram a whole lot of content down our throats, but rather to slowly indicate House’s growing self-awareness to the point where we buy his “Re-Birthday” ceremony as genuine, if not quite so genuine as to fundamentally change his character.

Along the way, though, there were some hiccups. The moment with the deluded superhero as he jumps off of a parking structure was a bit too much of a tragedy that I don’t think even House would have overlooked (even in his “I’ll show you” mentality), and the eventual solution to Lydia’s sister-in-law (giving her the music box, as the defender had suggested) and her condition was contrived in order to fly Lydia away and to open House’s eyes tot he world around him. When the episode let the great Andre Braugher and House bond over Nolan’s father, or about House’s issues (such as the clever party scene), it felt like they were really getting at something. When they needed to turn a corner, though, the show demonstrated its roots in the procedural and cures seemed magical and flights from parking structures seemed sudden.

But, at the end of the day, “Broken” succeeds because of how great Hugh Laurie is at playing every facet of this character. Gregory House is far more human than he has any right to be, a fact which makes these occasional interludes so powerful. And while sometimes the episodes feel slighted and rushed in only an hour, as they take place in the hospital and have other stories swirling around them, this one was allowed to breathe and flow in a way that others were not. It wasn’t perfect, and it wrapped up a bit too cleanly like every episode of House, but it really did feel like a well-constructed piece of dramatic cinema that just happened to feature one of the best television actors working today. And while I can understand why some would want the show to return to the hospital and remain the procedural show it once was, it is the series’ willingness to go out on these limbs that keeps me interested beyond its basic premise week after week.

Cultural Observations

• It was a bit of a cliche to have a piano happen to be in the ward considering House’s penchant for the instrument, but it was well handled. I especially liked that House, discovering that the lid was left unlocked as he had requested of Lydia, plays a few notes but doesn’t actually play. He could have played it, but then it would have been considered behaviour and he wanted nothing to do with that.
• One would expect that Andre Braugher will join Laurie as an Emmy nominee with this episode: David Morse proved that you don’t even need to be good on house to grab a guest acting nomination, and Braugher was excellent and a two-time past winner (and multi-time nominee) for his work in Thief and Homicide: Life on the Street.
• Interesting to see them largely skip over (and ultimately ignore) House’s detox/pain period before entering War 6 – other than the montage set to Radiohead’s “No Surprises,” his own personal chaos was skipped over until the point where he felt he was fine and thus would start wreaking havoc.
• How much did Dr. Beasley (Megan Dodds) look like Kristen Bell? It was honestly driving me crazy.

Artículo escrito por Álvaro Ibáñez, de Microsiervos, para la revista La Linterna del Traductor de la Asociación Española de Traductores, Correctores e Intérpretes, en el cual hace un análisis del desarrolo de la Wikipedia y de suscacteríticas que la han llevado a ser uno de los sitios más referenciados y la mayor enciclopedia en internet.

Wikipedia, la popular enciclopedia libre de Internet que contiene millones de artículos en cientos de idiomas, ha conseguido desarrollar con el tiempo, mediante una combinación de factores técnicos y humanos, una peculiar capacidad «autocurativa» que protege sus contenidos de vandalismos y manipulaciones malintencionadas.

Suele decirse de Wikipedia, al igual que de la propia Web, que si a un grupo de expertos le hubieran planteado hace décadas crear tan vasto repositorio de información en unos pocos años, incluso con un presupuesto teóricamente ilimitado, lo hubiera dado por imposible.  En cambio, una buena base técnica, la idea del «contenido generado por los usuarios» y la colaboración altruista de voluntarios hicieron posible lo que parecía inalcanzable: un lugar que en la actualidad cuenta con más de doce millones de artículos, en más de 200 idiomas. Puesta en marcha a principio de 2001 por Jimmy Wales y Larry Sanger, la Wikipedia sólo tardó cinco años en alcanzar el nivel de exactitud y calidad de la Encyclopaedia Britannica, como indicó un estudio realizado por expertos publicado en la revista científica Nature.

El concepto básico de la Wikipedia –y de los sitios denominados wikisen general– es que cualquier usuario puede participar y cambiar el contenido de las páginas que está leyendo. Lo puede hacer creando una cuenta de usuario, pero también se aceptan las participaciones «anónimas», algo que dota de cierta agilidad al sistema, aunque también acarrea ciertos problemas. La enciclopedia se publica además con una «licencia libre» que anima a la gente a copiar y reutilizar sus contenidos en otros sitios, con total libertad. Esto hace que los voluntarios que participan consideren útiles sus aportaciones para la creación de un bien común y accesible para todos.

En un día típico de la Wikipedia muchas personas leen alguno de sus millones de artículos: si ven una errata pueden corregirla rápidamente; si ven un error de concepto o tienen algún dato que convenga añadir, editan la página y la corrigen o amplían. Si descubren que un tema interesante todavía no existe, pueden comenzar un nuevo artículo que poco a poco se irá ampliando con ayuda del resto de la comunidad.

Se podría dudar de que esta forma de «caos organizado» fuera realmente funcional, pero el hecho es que el resultado tras algunos años ha sido excelente y está a la vista de cualquiera: Wikipedia es uno de los sitios más admirados por la comunidad de Internet y sus artículos figuran entre los más enlazados desde otras páginas de la Red. Se distribuye en versiones «móviles», en CD-ROM y DVD e incluso existen algunas ediciones en papel.

>> Leer el resto del artículo en microsiervos.com

La Linterna del Traductor, Julio 2009 [PDF, 5 MB]

1. Denken Über

Denken Über es un blog propiedad de Mariano Armantino, en la Red desde 2001, centrado, como su propio autor describe, en “tecnología, estrategias y cosas de Internet”.  Su actualización es diaria, y ha sido capaz de convertirse en uno de los blogs tecnológicos de referencia en Sudamérica, y más concretamente en su país de origen, Argentina. Una de las claves de Denken Über es la contextualización y el uso de enlaces y material multimedia para apoyar las informaciones disponibles en el blog y para referenciar convenientemente las fuentes utilizadas. En su blogroll se encuentran webs con una estrecha relación temática entre sí (tecnología, mundo geek e Internet), que complementan de diversas formas la información que encontramos en Denken Über. Este blog posee el puesto nº 23 dentro del ránking de Bitácoras.com, y pertenece a una comunidad de blogs argentinos y en español representada por las webs  Blogdir.com y Weblogs.com.ar, aunque en la actualidad mantiene una completa independencia de otros blogs.

2. Enrique Dans

El Blog de Enrique Dans es, fundamentalmente un blog de opinión en español centrado en el ámbito de los sistemas y tecnologías de información. Su actualización es diaria, y su origen se remonta al año 2003, aprovechando la repercusión mediática creada por la compra de Blogger por parte de Google. El uso eficiente de las fuentes por parte de este blog ha ido evolucionando en los últimos años hacia una contextualización mucho más completa y ‘camuflada’ dentro de la propia entrada. El blogroll de Enrique Dans incluye algunas de las webs en español de tecnología con una mayor representación dentro de la ‘blogosfera’, como Alt1040, Barrapunto, Microsiervos o la propia Denken Über.  La web ostenta el octavo puesto dentro del ránking de Bitácoras.com, y no pertenece a ninguna red de blogs, sino que siempre se ha definido como un blog personal e independiente.

3. Microsiervos

Microsiervos es para muchos el blog más importante en español acerca de ciencia, tecnología e Internet. Su autoría es triple, representada por los bloggers Alvy, Nacho y Wicho (y más recientemente Cron, un “demonio” administrador de procesos al que los autores del blog llaman “El cuarto microsiervo”) . Recientemente, la web actúa en asociación con la revista de tirada nacional Muy Interesante, debido a  sus similitudes temáticas con ésta. Microsiervos actualiza con una gran frecuencia, lanzando varias entradas por día desde el año 2001. El blog enlaza de forma profusa a diversas fuentes, aunque con una particularidad: en un gran número de ocasiones las fuentes utilizadas son los propios usuarios de la web, que colaboran mediante el envío de contenidos y sugerencias. Es llamativa la ausencia de un blogroll, hecho que pone de manifiesto la alta independencia del portal dentro de la blogosfera. En el ránking de Bitácoras.com, Microsiervos alcanza el 4º puesto. Durante su trayectoria, el portal Microsiervos se ha ido diversificando, creando paulatinamente una red de blogs (la Red Microsiervos) formada actualmente  por las siguientes webs:  Aviones, Ecología, Fotografía, Juegos, Ciencia, Internet y WTF, y que abarca la mayoría de los puntos clave dentro del sector de la tecnología, la ciencia e Internet.

Continuei minha caminhada, infinita caminhada, ofício infinito em prol do finito. Não posso me deixar abalar por percalços ou barreiras emocionais que encontro no caminho. Não é esse o meu papel. Na verdade, meu papel não é muito definido. Não há como dizer exatamente para que serve o meu ofício, não deixo as pessoas mais felizes, não construo nenhuma relação da qual me orgulhe. Apenas caminho. E encontro com pessoas que não mais encontrarão com os seus. Sou culpado pela dor, pelo sofrimento, pelo fim da dor, pelo fim do sofrimento. Estou presente sempre que uma criança está longe de seus pais, ou quando seus pais se distanciam ou, pelo menos, se desumanizam. Estou presente sempre que um trem descarrila. Sempre que neva, que chove forte. Sempre que as pessoas querem roubar meu emprego. Querem se fazer passar por mim. Não entendo como alguém pode invejar (e invejam) meu emprego, ao ponto que querer me imitar (e me imitam, apenas imitam). Não me orgulho do que faço, mas faço o que nasci para fazer. Sou um perpétuo. Estou sempre com com alguém, à espreita, andando de mãos dadas, em seu nascimento, em seu desnascimento. Não posso me apegar, não posso. Tento me convencer disso. Não posso dizer que não me afeiçôo às pessoas que encontro pelo caminho, durante minha caminhada. Como aquela moça que esperou e sofreu na ante-sala da morte. Mas não posso. Não posso me lembrar. Tenho uma missão, continuar caminhando. Tenho que vagar e vagarei, serei o último a vagar. Sempre.

There’s an old joke – um… two elderly women are at a Catskill mountain resort, and one of ‘em says, “Boy, the food at this place is really terrible.” The other one says, “Yeah, I know; and such small portions.” Well, that’s essentially how I feel about life – full of loneliness, and misery, and suffering, and unhappiness, and it’s all over much too quickly. The… the other important joke, for me, is one that’s usually attributed to Groucho Marx; but, I think it appears originally in Freud’s “Wit and Its Relation to the Unconscious,” and it goes like this – I’m paraphrasing – um, “I would never want to belong to any club that would have someone like me for a member.” That’s the key joke of my adult life, in terms of my relationships with women.

Alvy Singer: Hey, is something wrong?
Annie Hall: No, why?
Alvy Singer: I don’t know. It’s like you’re removed.
[a ghost of Annie rises from herself, and sits in a chair to watch]
Annie Hall: No, I’m fine.
Alvy Singer: Are you with me?
Annie Hall: Uh, huh.
Alvy Singer: I don’t know. You seem sort of distant.
Annie Hall: Let’s just do it, all right?
Alvy Singer: Is it my imagination, or are you just going through the motions?
Ghost of Annie Hall: Alvy, do you remember where I put my drawing pad? Because while you two are doing that, I think I’m going to do some drawing.
Alvy Singer: [gesturing to the ghost] You see, that’s what I call removed.

Pensei muito antes de me mudar pra essa casa. À primeira vista, não era uma boa idéia, eu nunca fui bom em assumir tal grau de independência. Mas mudei. Os primeiros dias, as primeiras semanas, os primeiros meses são sempre estranhos, você acha que está faltando algo ou, no pior dos casos, sobrando algo, sobra que, se demora a ser identificada, pode comprometer a estrutura da casa. Depois tudo fica mais familiar, aquele canto da sala é o canto da sua sala e não mais o canto da sala da sua nova casa. É uma mera questão de mudar a posição do pronome, que tudo muda, para melhor ou para pior. No meu caso, para melhor. É, definitivamente, para melhor. E talvez isso me confortasse. Mas não, tem algo faltando. Não sei se é um capacho na porta da frente, ou uma daquelas pequenas geladeiras de hotel. Algo falta, isso eu sei. Às vezes fico me perguntando se algo, em algum momento, foi roubado, se esqueci de trancar minha casa e alguém aproveitou a oportunidade e me levou talheres, copos ou guardanapos. O que mais me incomoda é o fato de achar que o larápio aproveitou e deixou alguma coisa para trás, algum souvenir, um item que me incomoda por existir e por destruir aos poucos e eternamente minha casa, sem que eu possa fazer nada. Esse é o problema: algo sobra. Sempre precisei, de tempos em tempos, me reconectar com essa independência. Esse caso, nessa casa, não é diferente. Ela satisfaz todos os meus anseios juvenis. Aquela idéia de estar fazendo algo, de que agora vai dar tudo certo. Isso tudo seria suficiente para mim. No entanto, eu insisto em achar que o ladrão me tirou uma coisa importante e me presenteou com a chave que destruiria qualquer sonho construído mal e porcamente. Eu não quero voltar a ser dependente de um sonho de vida adulta. Eu quero ser esse sonho. Mas não sei se posso evitar, pois agora vejo: o ladrão me levou as bases sólidas que há séculos fincavam minha casa nas areias macias dessa beira-mar e colocou rodas em seu lugar. Agora eu desço em direção ao mar, rápido, e mais rápido. Não é uma situação muito estranha para mim. Já devo ter sonhado com isso. Ou vivido isso. Não importa o contexto, eu tenho certeza que nadei vigorosamente até a costa, perdi guelras, criei pernas e recomecei do zero. Agora já não sei mais se tenho fôlego, não devia ter fumado todos aqueles cigarros. Mas também não sei se quero nadar de volta. Sei apenas de uma coisa: tenho medo de viver à deriva.

Los Sistemas de Recomendación Inteligentes son aquellos que intentan ofrecer productos más adecuados a los clientes por medio de algoritmos. Muchos de estos algoritmos se basan en técnicas de Data Mining (minería de datos) y de Inteligencia Artificial.

Con motivo de las Jornadas sobre Sistemas de Recomendación Social que realizadas en la UPV, sobre el tema “Los Sistemas de Recomendación como pieza clave en las Redes Sociales y en el Futuro de la Industria del Entretenimiento“, el programa Tecnópolis UP TV realizado entrevistas a los ponentes para que los espectadores del programa puedan compartir la opinion y la visión de Enrique Dans (Instituto de Empresa) , Álvaro Ibáñez, Alvy, ( Microsiervos e internality.com) y Francisco J. Martín (mystrands.com) sobre el futuro de laindustria del entretenimiento, y cómo se verá afectada por los Sistemas de Recomendación Social.

Esta entrega de Tecnópolis UP TV se emite el miércoles 15 de Octubre, de las 13.30 a 14.30 h. y de 21.30 a 22.30 h. (horas de España). Y se re-emite el domingo 19 de Octubre con el mismo horario. La televisión de la Universidad Politécnica de Valencia emite en abierto en el área metropolitana de Valencia, por el canal 45 UHF; en TV por cable en España, por el canal 989 de Ono y, por el satélite Hispasat para Iberoamérica.

Para ver el programa los dias y las horas indicadas, clickear sobre la imagen:

Esse barulho de algo rastejando me incomoda. Eu sempre acho que está vindo minha direção. E sempre me dá uma sensação de impotência saber que eu não tenho como saber se ele vem ou não até mim. Tenho que esperar, fechar os olhos e esperar. Pra mim sempre foi muito difícil distinguir o som das coisas que rastejam. Tenho a impressão de que é sempre a mesma coisa. E é dessa sensação de impotência que eu falo. As únicas alternativas, para mim, parecem ser: sair correndo e nunca chegar a ver minha ameaça, ou esperar o bote para saber se ele, de fato, acontecerá. Não vejo muita diferença entre os dois casos. Por isso prefiro esperar o bote. Entre não reagir e não reagir eu prefiro não reagir e pelo menos ficar cara a cara com minha ameaça, cara a cara com meu semelhante. Quem não reage, rasteja. E é sempre bom falar olhando no olho, mesmo sabendo que o bote está próximo.

La blogosfera es uno de los ámbitos básicos de la Web 2.0

El Programa Tecnópolis de la UP TV quiere dar a conocer en televisión, en una serie de programas, las opiniones y las ideas de los autores y editores de blogs mas conocidos de los principales ámbitos de la blogosfera en español.

En este programa, participan algunos de los bloggers mas conocidos del ámbito del español en la red:

• Enrique Dans, profesor del Instituto de Empresa y editor de uno de los blogs españoles mas conocidos en el ámbito de empresas y tecnología;

• Alvy (Alvaro Ibáñez) co-fundador y editor del Microsiervos, un blog de tecnología, divulgación científica o informática. Alvy es uno de los españoles mas conocidos en el mundo de la tecnología.

• Eduardo Arcos, que desde España y México D.F, es el editor del famoso blog ALT 1040 (la dosis diaria para adictos a la información), y fundador e impulsor de Hipertextual, una red de blogs verticales con vocación comercial para ayudar a las empresas a usar y ’sacar provecho de este nuevo medio’. La entrevista fue realizada en la Campus Party de Valencia.

Enrique, Alvy y Eduardo y nos hablan en este programa de su experiencia vital como bloggers y también de sus últimos experimentos con nuevos medios de nanoblogs para redes sociales como Twitter, o con los “tomblers” (micro-concentradores) de medios en la red.

El programa se emitirá el miércoles 23 de julio, de las 13.30 a 14.30 h. y de 21.30 a 22.30 h. (horas de España). Y se re-emite el domingo 27 de julio con el mismo horario.

La televisión de la Universidad Politécnica de Valencia emite en abierto en el área metropolitana de Valencia, por el canal 45 UHF; en TV por cable en España, por el canal 989 de Ono y, por el satélite Hispasat para Iberoamérica (05:30 am del jueves y el lunes), en Internet,

Para ver el programa través de la internet a través de la UP TV -en streaming en día y horario citado (y pocos días después para descargarlo)- pulsar sobre la imagen:

Sofy:

We have come to a very important decision. Ms. Coggio, today in English class, had a talk with some of us about blogs. This whole confusion started with Renato’s blog’s name thing, which led to people, including us, leaving rude, insulting comments to each other. We have all already appologized, but again here I am, saying sorry once again, because we know that the things that were being written here were mean and hurtful.

I’m sorry Renato, for making such a big deal out of something like that, and you know that we were just very upset because anything to do with our friendship is very important to us, even when it might be immature to others. But that’s no excuse for the things I said to you. And I’m sorry Ms.Coggio, for making you feel the way you did. Like I said in class, I’d never thought of it that way, and I know that I would feel SO incredibly guilty if you got in trouble because of us. I’m lucky to have you as my teacher. Any other person would have gotten us into trouble with Davi or something, but you talked to us and worked things out. That’s why you’re so great, Ms.C. You understand us and give us a chance to explain our side of the situation. You know that we not only consider you a teacher, we consider you a friend. So I’m sorry.

Well, our little talk with Ms.C made us realize that maybe this blog thing wasn’t working that well. First of all, this was supposed to be Cary’s, Alvy’s, and my blog, but now Cary isn’t writing anymore. Also, we were writing about some things we shouldn’t be writing about and causing fights. So our conclusion was that we shouldn’t write anymore. In this blog, anyway.

As you people know, I want to be a writer when I grow up, and I absolutely LOVE writing. But the way I like to write is when I’m not being careful about everything, afraid that someone will read it. In the beginning, I told Cary I didn’t want to tell people the adress of our blog. She convinced me in the end, anyway. I write more freely (if that’s a word) when I don’t have to be thinking “Oooh, that teacher might read it” or anything like that. So this is all for the best.

Alvy:

As Sofy said, we will no longer be writing. We felt very embarassed in our meeting with Ms. Coggio. After that meeting, I asked Sofy if she really wanted to continue this blog thing and we decided it’s not worth it. We aren’t really getting anywhere with our blog, who wants to know about the lives of sentimental 7th graders who only care about themselves anyway? We also decided that deleting the blog would be too extreme, therefore, we will leave it up here for people to see our memoirs since the time we made it until the time of the fight (And the post of the fight is no longer here, it was limited edition post, well, tough luck…) I don’t know how I would write ever again in this blog, after Ms. Coggio’s speech, I’d be shameless by writing more, especially because it’s a hobby, and not something I ever want to work on, it’s a thing that has no future for me, so it will be easy to give up on. I hope you have fun reading about happy and sad times in our lives, since it’s all you’ll get from now on. I guess this is goodbye… thank you everyone for everything and even though we have stopped writing, keep commenting, we’ll still answer your comments and we’ll keep checking back, although our decision is permanent… So let these words be the last written in our blog: “Goodbye, and I think we’re finally on our way.”

Alvy:

I’m sorry, Renato for being so angry with you previously, you showed yourself to be a very mature, sentitive and friendly person, I’m sorry for writing that offensive post and having 39 comments just talking bad about people… you don’t deserve all of that.

Although, I have discovered how some of you are bad friends and people, so I am now thanking you, Renato for opening my eyes… I was being very rude and only thinking about my rage (I’ll never apologize for only thinking about myself). Lorraine, thank you for being polite and expressing your opinion with a nice and friendly discussion, I appreciate that. I also wanna thank Sofy, for standing up for our blog in my absence and who also helped me to open my eyes (I mean, how much farther can my eyes open? soon they’re just gonna pop right outta my face)

Once again, sorry, Renato, and thank you, Renato, Lorraine and Sofy, you are very nice friends which I don’t want to lose with such havoc as in this blog’s name, just make this a lesson: nobody ever messes with “On Our Way” again, and if anyone does, I would gladly love to know… Thank you everyone… You are now survivors of the “Holonourwaycaust”… One of the worst periods of time in our lives… But also the one who helped us gain so many friends!

Alvy:

I think that everyone knows that Sarah Michelle Gellar is my all-time favorite actress, she’s just amazing!

Sofy and I went to Cary’s house to watch a few movies and have fun, and we SO did, but the only thing that bugged me is that fact that Sarah Michelle Gellar dies in every movie that she makes. Cary rented “I know what you did last summer” and “I still know what you did last summer” and I almost cried when Sarah Michelle Gellar died. She escaped so perfectly wisely and prettyly from the hook fisherman dude, and I was just so nervous because I’d hate for her to die once again, since she’s so pretty and charismatic to die. But then after she saw her sister dead, she jumped off the window and onto the streets. She saw this parade going on and she was going there to run away from the assassin, and be with the crowd so she wouldn’t be murdered. When she was almost there, the lights faded, she looked back to see if the assassin was there, but as we all expected he was right in front of her when she looked to her front again. he got her and threw her in the middle of all these tires right in front of the parade and nobody heard her, and they were practically watched her die, he was massacrating her with his hook on her head, beating her with it continuously, non-stop with no mercy, while she would scream and wave her arms in the desperate attempt to wound him. I almost cried, I mean, I so was looking forward to see her in the other movies of the series, she escaped so wisely and so many times, just to die in the middle or right in front of a parade, that’s just too much for me to handle, she’s…but…but she’s too pretty to die, I mean, she dies TWICE in Buffy, and another time in the grudge 2, again, she escaped so many times from Kayako and then when she’s in the hospital, she dies… OH MY GOD!! that just makes me so angry, I love her movies and she brightens up every movie she’s in, and I wish there would be at least one series of movies where she would not die, just like Sofy loves Alyson Hannigan, I love Sarah Michelle Gellar, but I guess that Alyson Hannigan does not die in every single movie she makes.

Alvy:

Today was one of the worst days of my life because of the fact that for the first time, I actually realized who my classmates really are.

To start off, nothing to do with my classmates, I can’t reveal what Silvia told me, but I discovered one of my friends have suffered a great loss… So that already made my day worst, I felt so sorry for that friend, you know who you are, it must be so painful to you… I’m sorry.

Later on, in science class, this girl, Thais was copying the english homework from Victor, it’s already awefully wrong that she is copying homework from somebody, but from Victor? I mean, he gets F’s in every subject possible, even for the ones that don’t exist! I felt so angry at her that I could just jump at her, pull all of her hair off and rip her neck apart from her body with my teeth. Poor Ms. Coggio, she just wanted us to do our homework well, and then this girl just comes along, watches TV all day long thinking to herself: “You know what? tomorrow I’ll copy from somebody right before class.” Some time later, during english class, after we corrected our homework, she even lied about it, I corrected Victor’s homework and he got a 15, when Ms. Coggio asked her what she got she said that she got a 17. That totally made me angry. I told Ms. Coggio the truth and she talked to them. The first accused person was Daniel, until Talita told them both. I felt relieved, poor Daniel, imagine how he would get rejected by everyone if people thought that he did it? people only don’t hate me now because everyone loves me. I would love to tell Thais first, but Talita took care of it, I would just love to see her face. Ah, I just love being evil.

There are these stupid boys in our class that just think that everything is linked to sex. A teacher does anything and they start to gossip and laugh, they are just so irritating. Well, Ms. Coggio is an exception since she knows only a little bit of portuguese, but all the other teachers should get hearing aids, they just say all of these awful sentences, words and shout out disrespectful songs in the middle of class. I loved the day that we were discussing the rights of women in the middle ages and when Ms. Coggio asked them what they thought about it, Augusto shouted out that they belong in bed, I wish I had knife there just to cut off his neck verrrrrrry slowly for him to suffer while the rest of his body is paralyzed, but Ms. Coggio just made an espression that totally intimidated everyone, Augusto finally got what he diserved. I know I seem a little exagerated, extreme and troubled, but it’s just extremelly disrespectful to women.

Today, this classmate that said he was gay several times just said that he liked a girl. Suddenly, all of the other boys just surrounded hime and started to say that finally he was a man, or “macho” and one of the boys, Italo started to ask if he was gay and all, that angried me as well, he was just so homophobic, he said how he was worried and all, come on, as if he ever felt sympathy towards him, he only wants to make fun of him, I interupted them and asked: “And what does his sexual issues have to do with you?” He whispered to himself and left to his “group”

Today was just so one of the worst days, these event were only some that happened today, but today was the day that I finally opened my eyes to who the people in my class really are, I am now absolutly sure that I have the best friends a person could ever have, Sofy and Cary are the best people anyone could have as friends, I was lucky on not being influenced by the others who still have the courage of calling themselves “people.”

Ela sentiu um forte gosto de sangue na boca, sabia que algo havia acontecido, algo sério. No meio da confusão ela apagou, não lembra mais de nada. Apenas havia acordado com esse gosto familiar na boca. Agora sentia uma dor, a mesma dor que sentiu durante meses antes desse dia, mas que nunca conseguiu identificar. De fato, algo havia acontecido. Toda aquela correria não era gratuita. Aos montes, uns estranhos corriam, outros se amontoavam ao seu redor, algo aconteceu, pensava ela. A sensação de despedida era, agora, uma verdade. Ela estava se despedindo. Tentou balbuciar algo e, nada, além de um bom punhado de sangue, saiu de sua boca. Homens vinham, apontavam. Mulheres passavam, aos prantos. Pelo menos era o que parecia estar por detrás daquelas mãos trêmulas. Agora o sangue escorria por seu rosto, descendo até sua orelha, seu cabelo, seu pescoço. O sentimento de inutilidade, talvez seja o mais desgastante nessas situações. Ela já tinha desistido de lutar. As pessoas, pelo visto, já tinham desistido de olhar, apontar e chorar. O barulho da multidão deixava de ser dominante e começava a se misturar com o restante das máquinas barulhentas e previsíveis que ali estavam. Balões tomaram os lugares antes ocupados por pequenas cabeças a correr. Ela achou o colorido desse desfile o mais bonito que já tinha visto. Sorriu ao lembrar das cores que gostava quando pequena, que ignorava quando adolescente e que desconhecia quando adulta. Não conseguia mover-se, nem falar, tampouco fazer algo que a ajudasse a desvendar o porque de estar ali deitada, entre estranhos e balões, com a boca ensangüentada e com uma leve sonolência. A dor desconhecida ficava mais e mais forte. Ela percebeu, então, que algo poderia ajuda-la a descobrir que dor era aquela, que sangue era aquele e quem eram todas aquelas pessoas estranhas, que corriam, que paravam, que choravam, que sumiam. Assim, fechou os olhos, determinada a descobrir o que estava acontecendo. E partiu. Talvez o sono a tenha levado. A ante-sala da morte foi tão exaustiva para ela, que talvez a primeira desistência nunca tenha sido desfeita. E ela partiu, sem saber porque. E eu continuei minha caminhada noturna. Ainda tinha muito chão pela frente.

Esta entrada en el blog surge de la coincidencia de dos sucesos:

1. La conversación a la que se llega tras un comentario acertado de Miguel Ángel, gran profesional y mejor amigo en la entrada de este mismo blog que se titulaba “La España tecnológica en oferta“.
2. Una entrada de Consultor Anónimo en su blog con la entrevista a Alvy de Microsiervos (os pongo el enlace al final) al cual no conozco pero espero conocer algún día .

En los dos sitios se habla en sentido figurado de “abandonar Matrix” y “tomar la pastilla roja“. Ya Alvy había escrito sobre ello en la entrada: “Bye, bye Matrix” e incluso citaba una frase del comienzo de la película muy ilustrativa:

“Tiene dificultades con las normas, señor Anderson. Usted se cree muy especial, y que por algún motivo las reglas no están hechas para usted. Obviamente se equivoca. Está en una de las principales empresas de software del mundo. Cada empleado entiende que forma parte de un todo. Por lo tanto, si un empleado tiene un problema, la empresa también lo tiene. Deberá tomar una decisión, señor Anderson (…) o tendra que empezar a buscarse otro trabajo. ¿Me he expresado con claridad?”

Aunque, por supuesto, “The Matrix” es una película de ciencia ficción, nos ayuda en esta ocasión a explicar el salto que algunos hemos dado dejando de trabajar para una empresa “grande” y pasando a trabajar por cuenta propia asumiendo el riesgo que ello conlleva pero a la vez esperanzados por la satisfacción personal y profesional que puede llegar a dar.

Recomiendo el visionado del vídeo de la entrevista a todos aquellos que estén pensando en emprender esta carrera y a todos aquellos que no estén dispuestos a emprenderla pero que quieran entender por qué hay gente que sí está dispuesta a hacerlo. Ni unos ni otros son mejores, simplemente todos somos diferentes y unos más afines a otros.

Como el vídeo se explica por sí sólo no añado más y os dejo el enlace: Alvy en Vidadeunconsultor.com