2:48AM - Entertaining Kuwait since 2003
Cajetan Barretto has been taking some amazing HDR shots here in Kuwait and a few days ago he posted a step by step guide on how to achieve photos of similar caliber. Its fairly easy but I haven’t been able to replicate anything as good as his stuff. Will keep trying.
Cajetan’s HDR guide [Link]
Cajetan’s Kuwait HDR pictures [Link]
Note: The picture above is by Cajetan
I don’t what the fuck happened but yesterday I took Nat’s camera to the H3 Ride & Drive event and shot a whole bunch of pictures and everything was fine the last time I checked the pictures last night. Then today morning when I conneceted the camera to copy the pictures onto my computer I couldn’t find the pictures. Not only that I couldn’t find a single folder or file on the camera’s memorystick. I even used Data Rescue I and II to try and recover the files but it also couldn’t find anything. Something really got fucked here…
If anyone is interested in getting a puppy or kitten then I would recommend checking with PAWS. They have a lot of cute dogs and kittens that need homes and you can check and see whats available by checking their gallery on their website. [Link]
I posted about the “My Puppy” store back in November and I talked about how the store was animal cruel locking the dogs and cats up in tiny stinky cages with very little room to move. Well TwaiF a regular reader of the blog had an experience with the place he she would like to share with everyone:
Last week I got a cute white kitten for my freinds birthday from the “My Puppy” shop. The shop smells like shit and there was no electricity or air conditioning. I saw this little cute kitten in a dirty cage and I couldn’t leave her there in that stinky shop so I took her with me for KD70. Guess what? Today she passed away!! She hadn’t been eating and when we took her to the vet the Dr said that she was too small to be taken away from her mother. She was 2 months old according to the My Puppy shop keeper although we now think she was a lot smaller. I called the guy who owns “My Puppy” and told him what had happened and he replied telling me that it was my fault becouse of the weather she passed away! I hope Mark you write about this stupid shop and how dirty it is and how cruel the owner is to the animals. -TwaiF
I think local organizations like PAWS or local vets should do something about this place. Its sickening.
Update: extinct.dodo another reader had a similar experience which makes you wonder how many people have purchased puppies and kittens from that store only to have them die on them??
I bought a puppy from that place last year for KD250, and it died less than 2 weeks later..
What I did was that I took my pup to the vet, got papers to prove that the dog was terminally ill (distemper) and went back to the shop. Although they wouldn’t give me my money back, they did however get me another dog, although by that time I was emotionally devastated over my sweet baby pup that I’d gotten so attached to in the days that it had been with me.
Update 2: I emailed PAWS today morning about the above and this is what they just replied:
Hi Mark, I don’t know if you’ve seen today’s press coverage (Arab Times and Daily Star) on WSPA’s visit to Kuwait. Coincidentally the reps from World Society for the Protection of Animals visited My Puppy just yesterday with officials from PAAF and our PAWS Chairperson. Though meeting no international humane pet shop regulations whatsoever, they did not actually witness the worst of what WE (PAWS and you) know goes on at this place.
Please be assured that WSPA and PAWS are working with the ministry of animal health to enforce current legislation and bring in new laws regarding pet shop regulations and standards. Sadly, these won’t happen overnight. We will report your findings to both WSPA and PAAF and ask them to send regular inspection teams.
Please keep the reports coming in….they are very useful and will be acted upon in due course if not immediately.
We also took the WSPA officials to Little Jungle…..words fail me, but please, please use the power of your blog to report on the horrendous conditions which exist at this so called ‘fun family’ spot…..It’s off the 207 from the Fahaheel Express way and if you haven’t visited….do so, at least once…it might make My Puppy look like an ok sort of place,
Best regards, and use that Blog to keep animal welfare issues front and centre, PLEASE!
Barbara
for PAWS
Seems like I need to pass by Little Jungle and check out how bad it is. If its worse then My Puppy then thats some scary stuff…
Pictures of Paris Hilton looking really cool next to her SLR. [Link]
This past week I have been having Booza Booza icecream for dinner. When I last posted about Booza Booza I spoke about how good their sorbet was but now I want to talk about how good their regular icecream is. Actually, what I think would be perfect is a combination of both. I really love their chocolate and pistachio icecream and I really love their strawberry and mango sorbet. I think thats what I am going to be ordering from now on, half icecream half sorbet. This is going to be a really good summer.
I am going to try the Special Forces technique tonight. [Link]
Can you identify a current generation videogame console by their fan & disc read noises? Here is your chance to find out! I was able to get it all right from the first try. [Link]
Maps.Google.com recently got updated with new high resolution images and Kuwait gained from it. For example Salmiya no longer is a blur on the map, the images are pretty good quality. Also I found a military base which was previously also blurred out. Check it out.
Marina Mall
Fanar Complex
American University of Kuwait (still being built in this picture)
Shaab Park
American International School
American School of Kuwait
Military base with planes
I was just looking for an image on Photodisc.com when I came across an image that looked very familiar. I think I found the image that was used as a starting point for one of THE One’s adverts. Its common for agencies to use a stock image during presentation and then go shoot the advert once approved but this ad I believe won some sort of recognition which I now think they shouldn’t have received since its basically a copy of a stock photo.
Thanks for everyone who participated in the H3 Ride & Drive contest. Over 60 people participated but sadly we only had 10 tickets to give away. I just sent out an email to the 10 winners, 8 were chosen by random and 2 were handpicked. I gave a ticket to the first person who sent in a picture of an H3 and I gave a ticket to one user who looked like he walked around the Marina Mall Alghanim parking lot looking for H3s because he found and shot 9 different ones. Anyway I hope to be seeing you guys at the event.
The other day I posted about bluetooth advertising and how if you are shopping in Sultan Center you can now receive ads on your phone. I like many of you had some concerns regarding this service and how easily it can turn into spam. Well someone from the company responsible for this bluetooth advertising commented the following:
Hi, I’ve been following your conversations regarding bluetooth. My company is actually implementing these bluetooth services in Kuwait and I’m always interested to hear what people have to say about it. I agree with everyone that spam is a major problem which is why when we put our network together we were sure to set non-spam parameters. If you reject the message once, you shouldn’t receive another request for at least a week. Also, no matter which location you go into, you shouldn’t receive more than 3 messages in a week. If this is not the case in any particular location it’s probably because we are doing testing and optimization. Within the next few months we hope to bring a number of services that you would actually find useful, so bear with us. I think you’ll be impressed.
I think the fact that its limited to 3 messages a week per person is a good thing. But the big problem is that I don’t think its possible for us to opt out of this service. This means anyone with a bluetooth phone is forced to receive 3 adverts a week. Sucks.
Update: Nibaq pointed out something very important regarding this bluetooth service. Read below:
Very interesting. So it registers your MAC address of your phone. Even though you aren’t accepting messages when the machine does a search it will regonize your phone and store it.
Spread these machines around town not sending anything but just registering phones and what do you have? A wonder tracking device.
Sultan can see how many times you visit the store in a month, and which stores. You can even track how long a customer is at the store.
Just another reason to have my bluetooh on Non Discoverable mode or simply off.
2.16 Intel Core Duo Processor
667 MHz front-side bus
Up to 2GB of RAM (667 MHz DDR@ SDRAM)
iSight Camera
MagSafe Power Adapter
ATI Mobility Radeon X1600 PCI Express graphics 256MB
Firewire 800, Firewire 400
Bluetooth, Airport Extreme
$2799
Still waiting for the new ibooks..
