Some things never change

Have spent this weekend at my parents' home in East Anglia, where it actually snowed hard last night. As usual they have stacked up some chores for me to do, mainly involving an electric drill. Aside from the obligatory DIY, we've been catching up by cooking and eating.

When I was growing up, Sundays were always cooking days. Both my parents worked full-time and so Sundays were considered sacred days to be spent together cooking and eating huge Indian feasts, from simple homemade vegetable samosas to elaborate lamb stews.

Thankfully, some things never change. Today's menu? A mixed vegetable curry with sweet potatoes, green beans, aubergines and red kidney beans; a red lentil dahl with spring onions; spring greens with spicy nuggets made from lentil flour and green chilis; and a lamb mince and spinach stew. The house smells divine.

Links today:

+ "The American military is working on a new generation of soldiers, far different from the army it has. 'They don't get hungry,' said Gordon Johnson of the Joint Forces Command at the Pentagon. 'They're not afraid. They don't forget their orders. They don't care if the guy next to them has just been shot. Will they do a better job than humans? Yes.'." The robot soldier is coming (registration required).

+ "A short film that tells you why podcasting can make your life better, and shows you everything you need to know to set up a simple program to have new podcasts downloaded automatically. In only four minutes!" Four minutes about podcasting.

+ The new edition of Vice magazine is devoted to design. "What ever happened to Herb Lubalin, Grapus, Tadanori Yokoo, Ken Adam (the Dr. Stranglelove/James Bond set guy), Kate Gibb, Saul Bass, Shinro Ohtake, Keiji Ito, Willy Fleckhaus, and all those Polish poster artists? Being a designer used to mean you drove a Benz and you could get good drugs. Now it means you own a computer. What the fuck? You start out thinking you're going to blow people's minds with your incredibly unique take on the beauty that surrounds us all, and by the time you actually get your career in motion you're essentially a wedding photographer chained to a desk."

+ Dave Navarro is blogging! "Last night's benefit was just insane. No Doubt were really great of course, as there is nothing that Gwen could do that would suck! She could sing over the sound of nails on a chalkboard and it would be sexy as hell. (No, I'm not saying the band sounds like that, they are all really incredible players.) I caught a few moments of Linkin Park with Jay-Z and I must say it was pretty rockin'." Um, okay.