Landscape

Instead of talking about "linguistic landscapes" (cf. the summary in Dutch I posted last Friday), let's enjoy this beautiful painting by Rob Alexander, an illustrator who works for Magic—The Gathering:


It's almost like in this commercial for Joival, the milk brand…

The World's Best Card Trick???

I was stunned – as I always am – when I watched this vid about "the best card trick ever":



Good for us, some guy revealed the trick. Enjoy being hit by the fact that you've just been tricked…

Big Mistake

Today, I came back to my digs in Namur in order to bring last year's course notes and syllabi, but also clothes and food. Staple elements.

At 11 am, I went to the city hall in order to hear the mayor's speech on the occasion of the Fêtes de Wallonie in Namur. The matter is this speech only started at 11.40. If there is any non-Walloon who reads this, I have to say there is an urban legend that says that Namur is a slower city, where people talk slower and… think slower. Even technology works slower. It appears to be true on some occasions.

Anyway, after the speech, we were offered a drink (beer or orange juice). I walked back to my digs. With no internet connexion, I was unable to do anything useful (and I'm not talking about writing posts on this blog), then I decided to go… walking, once again. I knew there would be another official speech to be given by Rudy Demotte, our Ministre-président.

I climbed at the top of the Citadel, and so did official vehicules transporting ambassadors, members of parliaments and ministers. But I realized I wouldn't be allowed to listen to the speech, for it was to be done in a giant tent that you could enter only if you were a VIP. On the opposite side of the road, roughly 50 people beloging to the RWF (Rassemblement Wallonie France, "struggling" for Wallonia — how dumb can be!) were demonstrating. Rather silently, I must say.

Later, I went walking in the city, where groups were singing and people drinking. The streets were slightly being filled with waste. I walked and I nearly bumped into Alexander, that old friend of mine. I was glad I met him, because I hadn't seen anyone else I knew. We both went eating crisps (delicious food, believe me), then we made our way into the overcrowded streets of Namur. At 10, there was a fireworks show to be seen. It lasted 30 minutes — definitely the longest in my entire life.

Then I met another friend of mine, a girl that was living in a digs in the same building as me and with whom I've always got on very well. I spend the following three hours with her and two friends of hers, we were all drinking tiny glasses of pékèt (the local Walloon drink). Round 1 am, just before my friend left us to go back to her flat, I was foolish enough to dare asking her "the" question (basically if she wanted to go out with me), because after all I was a little tipsy, otherwise I'd be too shy.

To make short, let's say that she turned on my invitation by saying that she wasn't interested in me and that I was the exact opposite of what she was looking for.

The last time I got rejected was 14 months ago, and the reason was that the girl I asked out had just been asked out ten minutes earlier!!! You can imagine how I was: destroyed, shattered, annihilated, obliterated. Something like this in my mind:


(Illustration for Magic card "Obliterate", by Kev Walker.)

And I looked like this:

(Illustration of Magic card "Assassinate", by Kev Walker.)

Or that:
(Illustration for Magic card "Incinerate", by Zoltan Boros.)

Basically the "Wrath of God" effect:
(Illustration for Magic card "Wrath of God", by Kev Walker. Man, that guy's great at drawing destruction and pain! By the way, this is my favourite piece of Magic artwork.)

So, I was devastated back in that time. And I had to deal with it alone, because it happened just before the summer holiday. I had hardly anything to do to busy myself with. I don't like losing social contact. That's why I'm so happy to go back to university — even if I know I'll regret these words very soon…

Back in June 2006, I got rejected because of a question asked too late, or else she'd accepted.

Since then, I never practised courtship with a girl. Maybe because I feared I'd need a great deal of time to go out with a girl, but also because I'm hopeless at asking girls out.

I went surfing Wikipedia to look how to translate "se prendre un râteau" and I found a link to another article about love-shyness. Here are some interesting bits:

Love shyness is a phrase created by psychologist Brian G. Gilmartin to describe a specific type of severe chronic shyness. According to his definition, published in Shyness & Love: Causes, Consequences, and Treatments (1987), love-shy people find it difficult to be assertive in informal situations involving potential romantic or sexual partners. For example, a heterosexual love-shy male will have trouble initiating conversations with women because of strong feelings of anxiety.

Dr. Gilmartin researched this phenomenon exclusively in heterosexual men, concluding that (1987, p.1) love-shyness "afflicts approximately 1.5 percent of all American males...[and] will effectively prevent about 1.7 million [U.S.] males...from ever marrying and from ever experiencing any form of intimate sexual contact with women."

There's also a list of criteria, enlightened by reseach on a large number of heterosexual men. I don't correspond to most criteria, but this one struck my mind:

(…) he is a male who desperately wishes to have a relationship with a woman, but does not have one because of his shyness. In other words, he is not a man who consciously chooses not to have romantic or intimate relationships; rather, he wants such relationships but cannot establish them.

That's my problem, I admit it, and I'm dealing with it. The proof is that I actually dared ask someone out. Real love-shy people could not. And most criteria don't apply to me, for instance because I do have many social contacts (I mean at university), including with girls. Apart from that, I also discovered I'm afflicted with involuntary celibacy:

Involuntary celibacy is the state of a person who has not established an intimate relationship or engaged in sexual intercourse for reasons other than voluntary celibacy or sexual abstinence. The term is used especially for adults who, despite general expectations, have had little to no sexual or romantic experience.

Definition

An involuntarily celibate person is someone who fails to initiate or sustain a sexual or romantic relationship, despite his/her desire to experience such a relationship. Afflicted people may suffer from loneliness, frustration, (…).

They also say there are criteria, but just a couple apply to me. My case isn't hopeless, after all. I really want to have a girlfriend. I'll turn 20 in five months' time and that's one of my goals up to then (apart from passing for all my exams). Wish me luck!

Goblin Bowling Team: One of My Favourite Illustrations Ever

The other day, I was telling you about my afternoon at a bowling alley. I found a perfect illustration that depicts the moment perfectly. Check out this card:


It's a brilliant piece of artwork painted by the talented Pete Venters, one of my favourite illustrators of Magic—The Gathering. This card is part of an expansion (Unglued) that makes fun of the game. Hence the silliness of goblins playing bowling…

The Eternal Struggle Between Good and Evil

I've already shown you some artwork from that card game I play (Magic—The Gathering). This time, I'd like you to take a look on this lovely picture, drawn by Kev Walker, a brillant British artist. This illustration isn't to be found on a card, yet. It's used on two boxes in which you can sort your cards, those two boxes being part of the Tenth Edition Fat Pack. That's, basically, a fat pack in which you get those two boxes + 6 booster packs (75 cards in total) + a 20-sided dice + a book about the game.

This painting depicts the eternal struggle between good and evil throughout magic; the fight opposes three beautiful angels to some demon from the Pit. I like it because it has such a dynamism to it that I'm wordless. And I've never been disappointed with Mr. Walker's paintings.

Never Play A Joke On An Ape

I heard recently that my uncle loathed any kind of juwelry. Thanks to the illustration on the right, you can get a picture of what it would look like if we decided to play a joke on him while he's asleep, putting such a thing round his neck…

Ok, maybe he wouldn't react like that, but would certainly throw that away asap.

The Little Blue Man

It was difficult, but I found a picture of Didier Reynders when he hears about Joëlle Milquet…



Ok, this little blue goblin (curious, isn't it?) was drawn by Paolo Parente, a Magic—The Gathering artist, as an illustration for a creature token. (If you don't understand what I'm talking about, good for you.)

Prerelease and Election

Today was not such a good day for me. It isn't dreadful at all, but not really nice.

Today, I took part in a card tournament, involving this game called Magic—The Gathering, due to the release of a new edition at the beginning of May. (That is to say that it was a prerelease tournament, as we call it.) This time, the prerelease introduced Future Sight, a curious set, I have to admit, full with old capacities and such things that I won't tell you about, because you won't understand anything. Unless you're a born Magic duellist.

Well, we all had to build a new 40-cards deck (i.e. pack of cards) with means of 75 new cards. The point is that my pack of cards was not really good, so that I ended up with a rotten deck. After two rounds (i.e. a best-out-of-three match), I changed my deck completely, but I lost three other rounds.

At the end of the tournament, I had zero point. Absolutely nothing. Usually, I get at least 3 points (from a concession or else), but not here. It was sad for me. But I got used to it. It was my 16th prerelease, and I'm not a good player at all. I attend these prereleases because I like that kind of small tournament, and it gives me the opportunity to play at least once every three months. And to get a foil promotional card, which you can see on the top.

The other thing that disappointed me a little bit is that Sarkozy and Royal are still in the race for being elected president of France. I was hoping that Bayrou would make it to the second round, because he seemed to be the only one with somewhat of a programme — unlike Sarkozy's fascistic views and Royal's shalowness. Polls were saying that if Bayrou was opposed to Sarkozy on the second round, Bayrou would win. And now, as I prefer that consensual woman to that angry, pro-war, anti-immigration little jerk, I'd vote for Royal.

The fact is that I'm not French. And that's a good thing. I wouldn't like to be French. Definitely not. France is a beautiful country, but they are too different; they quarrel and argue on everything, due to their lack of ignorance as far as the compromis à la belge is concerned. It's curious that we pay so much attention to these elections, while we hardly ever talk about Dutch elections, and never about that charming little country of Luxembourg…

Magic—The Gathering: Artwork (1)

Being also a real fan of the American trading card game (TCG) Magic—The Gathering, I think it would be interesting to show you some of the most beautiful artworks that the cards feature. This first one was drawn by Mark Zug, as an illustration for a dragon card called Vorosh, the Hunter. For more information about Magic, go and have a look on www.wizards.com/magic. (You won't understand anything, but still.)