Musing about relief maps and Saturdays

Don’t worry, I am not about to become a sudden expert on physical geography; this is about a different kind of relief map. The Sellar and Yeatman kind. I loved 1066 and All That, loved And Now All This even more. Which brings me to the point of this post.

The extended title for And Now All This reads:

And now all this : being Vol.1 of the hole pocket treasury of absolutely general knowledge in X consoling sections, with numerous memorable diagrams, 1 anagram, 2 test papers (bad luck), 3 relief maps, several pounds of figs, only 5 appendixes

The 3 relief maps they mention in the title are fascinating. Just the kind of thing a schoolboy needs in the middle of a deep textbook. The “maps” consist of box-like diagrams, maybe 3 inches square, inserted at random into the text, with notations like Figure 1: relief map. The authors suggest that readers should stare at the “map” whenever stressed, and thereby gain “relief”.

And that’s the way I wanted this post to go. I wanted to provide some weekend links for you, links that you can enjoy light-heartedly. And today’s choice is Yossi Vardi. Two videos by him, one at TED and one at Le Web 3 last month. I had the joy of watching Yossi give the second one “live” (I have yet to make a TED, not for want of trying).

Here are the links. Do visit them, you won’t regret it. Enjoy.

Yossi at TED: Help Fight Local Warming

Yossi at Le Web: Wi-Fly

Yossi is one of a kind, they broke the mould when they made him. If you don’t know him, don’t assume he is just a comedian. Check him out via Google or Wikipedia or whatever you use to do the checking, or follow the Edge link I provided. Thank you Yossi.