Race report: Eeklo

Competed in the first ever Rhino triathlon in Eeklo yesterday, a non-drafting race (1000-38-10) organized by my training buddy Luc De Wispelaere. If Daniel Berkowitz can talk about what-a-story news, then I’d like to coin the phrase what-a-race: well-organized, a gorgeous yet venomous bike course, friendly folk and lots of sunshine. This was good, clean tri fun in the sun. With a total time of 2:09:09, I placed 52nd overall (165 finishers) and managed a PB in a non-drafting race. I could get used to this.

Soul sunday is sunshine lazy

Edition 25 of Soul sunday is a tribute to the remix talents of Tony Nwachukwu (‘WaH-cHU-kU’). Tony took the soul in Zero dB’s Sunshine lazy and, in the words of one anonymous reviewer, “extended it into one long, filtered, dubbed-out bruk joint”. The wonderfully erratic voice is that of Nouvelle Vague‘s Phoebe Killdeer. This postmodern laissez-faire tune is a handy excuse to break for summer. Soul sunday will be back in September. Check the Soul sunday archive for more soulfulness.

Picture by the2ne.

ZerodB – Sunshine lazy (Tony Nwachukwu remix) (Ninja Tune, 2008 )
Listen and marvel at ninjatune.net/zerodb or purchase on Audiojelly.com.

Epicurean retirement

After a whopping 36 years of teaching history, French and English, Geneviève Schockaert officially retired from teaching. Congratulations, mom! To celebrate the occasion, yours truly organized a small wine tasting party. 9 wines were on offer: 1 sparkling wine, 3 whites and 5 reds. Tasting notes after the jump.

Nick Davies on churnalism

UK journalist and Flat Earth News author Nick Davies will talk about the current state of news journalism on Thursday, 3 July 2008 in the Maelbeek Room at the IPC, Residence Palace, Brussels. Expect grim tales of churnalism, pseudo-events, commercialism and propaganda.

Tekstblad on health communication

Fresh off the printing press: a very timely special issue of Tekstblad on health communication. And also, more Tooltips and your favorite media scholar on media life. Excellent summertime reading.

Peekaboo

Test that bandwidth

Subnav. Mixtapes. Spread. The. Word. Eclectic. Goodness. Musical. Bliss.

MBenga loses his religion

Belgian newspapers De Standaard and Het Nieuwsblad are reporting a legal battle between inimitable Belgian basketball legend Willy ‘jheri curl’ Steveniers and reserve NBA center DJ MBenga. The former accuses DJ of contract breach: as DJ’s personal basketball mentor and self-proclaimed “lifetime” agent, Willy is suing DJ for failure to pay his 10% agent fee on DJ’s NBA contracts. In return, DJ is now suing Willy – whom he once called his God – for defamation of character and contract nullification.

Worlds of journalism

One way to advance theory formation in social science is to conduct large scale survey studies. The Worlds of Journalism research project does just that:

The overall objective of the project is to map journalistic cultures onto a grid of common dimensions and explore their variation across nations, various types of news organizations and different professional milieus. Another goal is to identify the driving forces behind the still existing differences in journalistic cultures.

Armed with a “deductive and etic” theoretical framework, the project aims to “deconstruct journalism culture in empirically measurable terms and assess its functionality across cultural boundaries”. That sounds ambitious but oh so timely and interesting. Download the project presentation here (.ppt). Methodological skepticism aside, this project is a beacon of clarity.

Get that dirt off your…er face

Meet David Clinger, extra from the 1994 feel-good movie Once were warriors and professional cyclist for Team Rock Racing. Rumor has it that David likes knitting and staring people down.

Picture by Solostandfound