Urusei Yatsura

.

To answer D‘s question, the girl on Index49 is Lum, the pretty alien-oni from Rumiko Takahashi’s Urusei Yatsura. That was one of the first animes I ever watched (along with Ranma, waaay back in the early 90’s), and I thought it was hilarious.

More info on Urusei Yatsura can be found at Tomobiki-Cho, which is also where I snagged the Lum graphic. (I wasn’t sure Lum’s trademark tiger-striped bikini was entirely appropriate, so I picked an equally endearing uniformed graphic instead. ^^,)

Interesting notes on my favorite [cooked] Japanese dish in the Tomobiki FAQ.

“ñ” and Stink Factor

.

Thanks, Bam! The reason my XML-RSS feed was messing up was because of all the “ñ” characters. I’ve replaced them all with “ñ” thanks to MT’s trusty search and replace function. As you can see, I still have much to learn about XML, XHTML, and the special characters they hate so much.

On to other things. Earlier on, Raffy blogged the Cinnamon Challenge at MichaelBuffington.com. Now, courtesy of the same guy, we have Stink Factor, with additional challenges to spice up your day.

Mr. Buffington, if you’re reading this, I invite your staff at Stink Factor to two traditional Filipino challenges: (1) Drink a small cup of white vinegar (“Datu Puti” brand, if possible) without making a face, and (2) siling labuyo. `Nuff said.

Dial-Up ARGH!

.

Maybe it’s just my frustration right now, but words cannot express how inherently pathetic it is to have a country trying to turn itself into a regional leader in Information Technology — when the meager 1% of its population with Internet access can’t even get a decent dialup connection from home.

I’ll let my browser status bar speak for itself:

sloooow connection speed

It just ain’t right.

Syndicate

.

You can now syndicate my weblog, but the RSS feed gets uppity whenever special characters come into it. Don’t know why.

Pque-NAIA Row 3

.

Rosanna of PEX clears up some of my misconceptions on the airport taxation row. It turns out that it’s not a matter of the airport being a government establishment; it’s the land the airport is on. And, um, the case is currently pending at the Court of Appeals. Boy is my face red.

I still find it uncouth of the local government to threaten auctioning off airport property — and the airport itself! — and closing down runways while the case with the Court of Appeals is still pending. Fund-raising for infrastructure projects should not be an excuse — this is a question of legality, not of the city’s need for money. Laws on taxation should stand whether the city is raising funds or not.

(Why am I so fixated on this airport issue anyway? I rarely comment on local news like this. Maybe it’s the fact that I might be using that airport soon to get out of here? ;)

Pque-NAIA Row 2

.

Airport auction stopped. Yay. Note that last paragraph: the Para˜aque local government is still trumpeting out loud how the hullabaloo over tax liabilities is aimed at “generating one billion pesos for infrastructure projects.”

STUPID STUPID STUPID!!! If the local government is doing this for the sole reason of fund-raising, then it doesn’t have a leg to stand on! The primary motivation should be lawfulness of taxation, and standard procedure on this should be a lawsuit, right? This is blackmail, plain and simple. I wonder why the government isn’t doing something to censure Parañaque for it?