Absolution Gap

Last night, while eating excellent mexican food at Taqueria El Rancho, I finished "Absolution Gap" by Alastair Reynolds. It was my second (or third, if you count that I just finished half of "Revelation Space" before it was destroyed by rain) Reynolds book. The whole book was very captive and the pace was incredible. From the start you follow three different settings in different parts of the universe, after half the book it merges into just two stories you follow. And in the last three high paced chapters all the loose ends tie up and you get eject into a reading frenzy that is unavoidable!

In Reynolds universe every book add to the details and it feels richer and richer all the time.

But this book is not for everyone, it's "hard" science fiction with a lot of reference to physics and space science. Reynolds has worked at ESA so he probably know more about physics than most people. His books are very careful to not break any rules of natures, even though they bend them pretty far in some cases (see the Hypometric weapons for example). The books also challenge the reader to follow at least three different story-lines.

I am looking forward to my next Reynolds book (I need to surf amazon I guess :)), in the meanwhile I will finish Gibsons "Pattern Recognition".

Nokia N800

I am seriously thinking about getting a Nokia N800. All the mobile phones with built-in webbrowsers and stuff has always let me down. But I would like to be able to go down to starbucks, read some webpages, update my blog and chat without having to bring the laptop. The lack of a keyboard is a bit unsettling, but I have heard that the on screen keyboard works just perfectly.

So maybe we will see a maemo xmms2 client soon? :)

Chilean...

It's funny how different the Chilean Spanish is to the Spanish Spanish. I almost forgot how funny and unpronounced they speak here. Some of the language changes I can understand, Chileans has a lot of indian (mapuche) words mixed in their Spanish, for example "Palta" for avocado which is Avacata in Spain. But there are things I never really got my head around... in Chile they never ever use "Vale", an expression for Okey in Spain and they look very funny at you when you say it. They do use "listo" instead (even though they can't pronounce it so it becomes "litto"), which brings us to the way the brutally remove 's' from words...

Anyway... I am still enjoying the fact that I am back in Santiago. Went downtown around lunch today and had some lunch at that place I "always" had lunch when I worked right next to it. Took a stroll around Plaza de Armas and used the metro, it all feels so familiar. Also, I miss the ensalada chilena in Spain, why don't people do it proper but here?

I am thinking about next weekend, maybe I should take a trip up to the andes or go out dancing at the disco place? Dunno yet...

Santiago 25-26th of August.

I am in Santiago for a week doing some work, but it also gives me some times to enjoy the city again. I really really like Santiago even if it shitty cold here right now (around 3-10 Celsius). It feels a bit like coming home again, the streets and houses all look very familiar.

Saturday:
I left Madrid late Friday (or very early Saturday) and arrived Saturday morning in Santiago. I could sleep ok on the airplane and I only had to kill 3-4 hours in the end of trip. I took a cab to the hotel and I had a flash of recognition when I rode the taxi into the city. The rest of the morning was filled with me checking in, unpacking and taking a shower.

I went for a walk from the hotel where I live on Richardo Lyon up towards Tobalaba and my old apartment. A bit of nostalgia hit me when I went up my old stream (Callao). By now it was time for a bit of lunch, so I went to my favorite italian (Tiramisu) and had a pisco sour :-) It was very good, haven't had any in a long long time. After enjoying this very nice meal I took a long walk to Parque Araco. I planned to kill some time by watching a movie and do some shopping. It ended up so that I had to kill some time until the movie started. So I went shopping, got a new pair of trousers, a music dvd with hooverphonic and a nice bottle of wine.

I watched transformers again, it was my second time. I selected that movie mostly because it was the only one that wasn't dubbed to spanish and was somewhat interesting. I still find it a OK film. The action is great and the humor is very funny. But it's not a film that sticks or leaves a impression. After the movie I went and picked up some sushi to take with me to the hotel.

Went home to eat sushi and sleep. I slept well.

Sunday:
Today I just had a walk to Los Leones, had some lunch at Subways and then walked over to a coffeplace and had a dount and coffe. Rest of the afternoon I have spent online. Tonight I will go out for dinner with my friend here in Santiago. Be back with more reports later on :-)