René’s old blog

This site is some twenty-five years old, and it contains lots of ancient stuff, much of it utterly dated and useless.

Sorry about that.

If anything, I post very unevenly, and about whatever occupies me.

Some featured posts

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Most recent posts

  • Installing newer ALSA driver on an Asus Eee Pc 1000H

    Installing newer ALSA driver on an Asus Eee Pc 1000H

    I have Debian testing on my Asus Eee Pc 1000H with Linux 2.6.26.  The ALSA driver therein doesn’t fully support the Eee Pc 1000H (and  therefore neither the 901).Sound playback is fine, but the microphone doesn’t work. Installing Linux 2.6.28 was a no-go as the drivers for the wireless isn’t available there, so I decided…

  • iPod Classic finally working

    A while ago I had the opportunity of swapping my 60Gb iPod (5G) for a 160Gb iPod Classic (6G), and naturally I accepted, only to be bitten by the “No music” bug. The old iPod, and an iPod Nano I also use, can easily be updated with new music and playlists through number of Linux…

  • Dear Venice, happy 1588th birthday

    Dear Venice, happy 1588th birthday

    On Annunciation Day in AD 421, on the 25th of March, three Roman tribunes from the nearby Roman city of Padova participated in the consecration of the St. Giacometo church at Rivus Altus in the Venetian lagoon, thus formally founding the city of Venice. In the years that followed the Roman Empire broke down and…

  • Sardinia Circumnavigation

    Sardinia Circumnavigation

    Justine Curgenvan and Barry Shaw are almost on their way to Sardinia for a circumnavigation of the island. They’re in for an extraordinarily beautiful journey. I wouldn’t mind doing it again 🙂 I wish them the best of luck.

  • Theme park Venice

    Theme park Venice

    Venice used to be a big city. Actually, it used to be a small empire, but that’s a few centuries ago now. Venice grew slowly from 130,000 in 1861 to almost 175,000 persons in 1951, but since then the city has almost collapsed, with an exodus from the city on water to the city on…

  • Poor gondolieri

    The gondolieri of Venice are a poor bunch, working day and night and hardly managing to scrape a living out of their business. There are only about 400 professional gondolieri prowling the canals of the city with tourists. The official rate is €80 for 40 minutes, and a further €40 for 20 minutes more. This…

  • III Symposium Internacional de Kayak de Mar

    III Symposium Internacional de Kayak de Mar

    So, now we have signed up for the symposium in Spain – the III Symposium Internacional de Kayak de Mar – held in Llança/Port de la Selva in Catalonia on April 4-5-6 followed by additional activities in the following week, until April 12. We’ll be going to Spain by motorcycle through Germany and France and…

  • Weekend trip

    Weekend trip

    Its been a rather slow kayaking winter until now, I’ve only been out paddling a handful of times, plus a couple of pool sessions. This weekend I’m going to do a bit about it. My local kayak pusher Kajakhotellet.dk is organising a weekend trip around the island I live on, Amager. The trip is just…

  • Ancestors: Wils

    Ancestors: Wils

    My mothers maiden name is Wils. The name is of Dutch origin, and I’m the descendent of a poor Dutch immigrant to Denmark in the early 19th century.