Toronto Beauty

A beautiful Hindu temple opened this year in Toronto. A Toronto Star article describes how the pieces were carved by artisans in India and shipped to Toronto for assembly. It sounds wonderful. The temple is open daily for visitors but one should check the web site first.

300 [2006]

Watched the Spartan 300 recently. Apparently, those warriors followed a 'Spartan' diet and spent much time at the gym doing crunches for the Abs and bench presses for the pecs to build 'bods that your average Bowflex buyer could only dream of... just kidding.

There is a detailed review over at IMDB. This movie presents a black-and-white world... Greeks good, Persians bad. Of course, there is plenty of violence but it seems abstract rather than horrific.

The Spartans valued loyalty, courage, and a never,never quit attitude. I suppose that counts for something.

Excellent Lisp Book

Peter Seibel has written an excellent book also available online.. Common Lisp tutorial

Quality Keyboards, Efficient Typing

Most people who learned to type on old-school computers with clicky keyboards realize that those discrete keyboard switches were more ergonomic than the cheap rubber membrane keyboards commonly used today. There is a vast selection of keyboards now available but there is little difference in feel between the pricey "ergonomic" ones and the bottom feeders.

Finding a good mechanical keyboard requires searching. I have already found and purchased a pleasing unit. And I describe a few choices here.

See the bold keyboard at DasKeyboard. The inventor of ''Das Keyboard'' must think that the letters on a keyboard are like training wheels on a bike. Just as those training wheels slow you down, so too will looking at a keyboard. So the keys are unlabelled. I can type normally on this unit provided I don't think about typing. It has an excellent feel with switches made by Cherry Corp. Canadians order it from Tek Gear

Those who don't care for the minimalist, all black, ''Das Keyboard'' might love the ''Tactile Pro 2'' originally for the Mac, but also for the PC. This board is all white with extra lettering on the keys. See it at Matias. The first production run is already sold out so you must wait with $150USD in hand.

The original Tactile Pro keyboard won a Macworld Editors' Choice Award for "Best Old-School Keyboard", and rave reviews from keyboard connoisseurs. The new Tactile Pro 2.0 builds on the best features of the original, and adds a few more.

Other Keyboards

Google "cherry keyboard mechanical" or "alps keyboard" will lead to a selection of sturdy keyboards.