Jut read that Neuromancer goes into pre-production and filming will start in 2012. Since I have not yet read William Gibson’s classic I just ordered it together with Peter F. Hamilton’s Void trilogy. They will make a nice addition to the books that I will be reading first: Anathem, The Confusion and The System of the World, all by Neil Stephenson.
The New York Times has an excellent article showing an overview of all (current) Facebook privacy settings. To protect your privacy you should use a setting of “Only Friends” or “Only Me” (via Custom) and disable pretty much every kind of sharing. If you do not understand what a setting means and you value your privacy then be sensible and disable the setting.
The last and quite important one in the right side in the picture called ” Facebook Ads Page” can be found (when already logged into Facebook) by clicking on Account then Account Settings and then select the tab on the right side called Facebook Ads and set *both* options (at the top and bottom) to “No one”. You have to do that separately for each one. So select “No one” in the top option and click “Save Changes” and then do it again for the bottom one.
Or you could just delete your Facebook account by clicking on Account then Account Settings and then select Deactivate Account. Once you have done that, do *not* log in to Facebook for at least 14 days or else Facebook will magically reactivate your account. The Facebook help page on this subject can be found here.
Remember, Facebook’s business is your information so the more information they have, the more money they can make.
I was going through some really old stuff and found a picture of my first car. A silver-grey metallic Renault 5 GTL with bright orange upholstery which I bought in The Hague from a friend of a friend for FL 125 Guilders (less than 60 euros). Here is a picture:
My first car: a Renault 5 GTL
I have fond memories of this car. Obviously the freedom it provided. It drove well too except that the engine would always overheat. The car had a temperature meter and it even worked so I knew when to stop which was after about 20km. To get going again I had to release some of the pressure by carefully opening the cap of the cooling system. Since I had little experience with car engines I couldn’t figure out what was causing it. It took me quite a while before I understood that it was a broken pressure valve in that same cap… Nevertheless this didn’t bother me as I had a car that took me places, albeit with some stops on the way.
At some point the water pump decided to pump the water on the street instead of through the system. That really needed fixing so I got a replacement pump at the car junkyard for 10 Guilders (less than 5 euros) and in the midst of winter removed the old pump and installed the new one. At freezing temperatures this wasn’t fun but in the end I succeeded and I was mobile once again.
After about a year of being my partner in crime the elements won. Due to extensive rust the left rear suspension pretty much detached from the chassis and that was the end of it. I remember driving her on a beautiful day to the junkyard where my little Renault met her final resting place.
