Tech Roundup / Miyazaki

Various items of interest from the technology desk:

• Lately I've been playing with Knoppix. For those of you that are not ultra-dweebs, it's a version of the LinuxOS that is self-contained on one CD. Drop it in the tray, restart and viola - a neat little desktop with web connections and printer settings all hooked up nicely.
  
• Interesting article on the Tar Sands in Alberta. If you've got money to invest, I think it would be hard to go wrong with companies that produce advanced oil extraction technology. Or are you one of those people that thinks windmills and cow flatulence will really be a suitable replacement?
  
• Social bookmarking: because it's nice to share. (I'm new so there's not a lot of links.)
  
• Michael Dell may indeed be making goo-goo eyes at Steve Jobs over the prospect of selling Dell PCs running OSX, but nobody in their right mind seriously thinks former Dell Dude Benjamin Curtis could ever get a date with Apple Switch Girl Ellen Feiss.

Also, while not strictly a technology item - all geeks and otaku should be aware that the new Hayao Miyazaki movie, Howl's Moving Castle, is opening tomorrow in Cincinnati - nary a week after it opened on the coasts - a fact which is itself remarkable. If you never heard of this guy - or saw Spirited Away (which won an academy award last year) you should immediately leave work or your home and rent his movies.

For years I've been put off by Japanese animation - which seems antic and flimsy. (The characters seem to laugh at things that aren't quite funny.) Miyazaki is slower, thoughtful, and has an incredible eye for the true details of human critter experience - even while taking the most magical mythologies as his subject.

My nine year old girl loves these movies too. Howl plus a trip to the Indian place next door sounds like a great outing for for Father's Day.