Via Bootboy, a video of "Jesus" singing Gloria Gaynor’s I Will Survive.

More than two years in the making, Vim-7.0 is finally out!

(Vim is Vi IMproved, an enormously enhanced version of the classic Unix editor, vi.)

The main features of the 7.0 release are:

• Spell checking
• Omni-completion (In­tel­lisense-like)
• Tabbed pages
• VimL script language now supports Lists and Dic­tio­nar­ies

I’m going to take credit for some minor features of Vim 7:

• Making Vim build with VC5-VC8
• The Win64 port
• Syntax high­light­ing for FlexWiki

WikiPedia summarizes the history of Vim. This enabled me to pinpoint when I first became a con­trib­u­tor to Vim, back in December 1995. I cleaned up the original, rather buggy port of Vim-3.0 to NT, and posted it to the comp.editors newsgroup. Bram invited me to merge my changes into Vim-4.0, which was then …continue.

I saw a video clip of so-called Russian Climbing at work today. It turns out that it’s an extreme sport of French origin called Parkour or Free Running.

Parkour is "the art of forward motion in spite of obstacles". Its prac­ti­tion­ers (traceurs) run around urban landscapes, performing Jacky Chan-like leaps, rolls, stunts, jumps, and flips.

The excellent How­Stuff­Works.com has a good in­tro­duc­to­ry piece on Parkour.

There is a local group of traceurs, who are written up in a P-I article. Their website is Washington Parkour. It seems there’s a "jam" every Sunday at noon at Seattle’s Freeway Park. It sounds like a photo-op to me.

Three years ago, one of our must-watch shows was Fire Within, a doc­u­men­tary on the making of Cirque du Soleil’s Varekai show. It followed a set of would-be performers in the eight months leading up to the premiere of Varekai, as they train at the Cirque’s school in Montreal, developing potential acts. Some of them make it, some fall by the wayside.

Varekai has been on tour ever since, and it just opened in Seattle. We saw it tonight. Very little of the original show survives; mostly, the aerial strap act with the twins, Kevin and Andrew.

I recommend it. Varekai is a visual spec­tac­u­lar, with all the familiar elements of incredible acrobatics, clown …continue.

A lot of anti-war music and videos are appearing of late, and about time too.

Via Amer­i­ca­Blog, I learn today of Jackson Browne’s new anti-war video, Lives in the Balance.

There’s also Pink’s song Dear Mr. President.

Not to mention Neil Young’s new album, Living with War. You can listen to the entire album online.

And the Dixie Chicks’ forth­com­ing album, Taking the Long Way.

Today (May 6th) was our sixth wedding an­niver­sary. In some ways, it feels like only yesterday. In others, it feels like we’ve been together forever.

Six pretty good years. Lots of good memories. Quiet times. Happy times. Travel together. Staying home together. Going out together. Mixing with our friends.

Not perfect years. I’d change a few things if I could, like Emma’s health and her two long periods of un­em­ploy­ment. I should have quit Microsoft months before I did in 2004.

We celebrated by having some friends over for dinner. Raven came with Mr. Raven. Muhsin and Banu, newly back from a long trip to Turkey, came too. I made Afghan Chicken. It was a little …continue.

Here’s an in­ter­est­ing Campari ad, where things are not as they seem. Worksafe, but only barely.

Some background from Campari: The Secret

Some recipes from the back of a bag of Trader Joe’s Southern Greens Blend (Mustard Greens, Turnip Greens, Spinach, and Collard Greens).

Simple Greens – Serves 4

Saute garlic and onion in olive oil in a pot large enough to hold greens. Add vegetable broth and tomato juice. Bring to a boil.

Add greens and seasonings. Cover and cook over low heat for 35 minutes or until tender. Sprinkle with parmesan cheese and serve.

Mediter­ranean Greens – Serves 3-4

I found this recipe for dressing on the back of a bag of cole slaw.

Mix sugar, ground celery seed, and milk into mayonnaise. Add cider vinegar and whisk until smooth. Add to cole slaw.

I hang out on the Source­Forge-hosted inkscape-user mailing list, where I pick up useful tips for the Inkscape SVG editor (vector drawing program).

For months, the list has been plagued with spam; largely because anyone can send to the list. The policy has been not to require new users to sign up for the list before being able to send questions. This is com­mend­ably friendly and user-centric, but the spam has become a real annoyance.

One of the Inkscape developers finally said that, if a dozen or more people said "yes, restrict posting to list members only" and no-one opposed it, he would lock the list down. I attempted to vote yes …continue.