I saw Revenge of the Sith at the Odeon in Leicester the other day. Best Star Wars Prequel Movie ever! At least that's my opinion so far, I will need to see how it sustains repeat viewings. I thought the Phantom Menace was cool the first time I saw it, before I exposed myself to too much Jar Jar in repeat viewings. I suggest you only view on if you don't mind spoilers or have seen it yourself!
It was a great film but the goodies get their asses handed to them, and it is very sad in places. I was amazed they managed to get through it all as George had left a lot of story to tell in Episode 3.
The Pros:
- Obi-Wan vs Vader/Skywalker - worth the price of admission alone.
- Jedi at war - it was actually cool to see the 3D map table and command centres the Jedi had constructed to fight the Clone Wars.
- The space battle at the start is amazing and somehow the whole rescue Palpatine sequence reminded me of the rescue of Han Solo in Return of the Jedi. Except Palpatine's evil and they'd all be better off if they'd all crashed Grevious's ship and died.
- Lots of lightsabre battles.
- Minimal Jar Jar content. In fact I doubt he got any real lines.
- Yoda put through the wringer in a suspiciously Empire Strikes Back fashion. All he needed to do was lose his little green right hand and it would be very similar.
- Jedi killed off in a really cool Lethal Weapon 2esque montage (remember the bit where the evil South Africans kill all of Rigg's team in various bizarre and bloody ways).
- Much darkness. And cute kids being killed to show this a no-holds barred, dark story. Why on Earth they didn't maintain this tone throughout the trilogy I don't know. It seems crazy to start a trilogy you know is going to end in almost total darkness with a Universal certificate toy commercial, but hey-ho!
- New Planets - Sith doesn't dwell on any of the old locales of the original trilogy, like Tatooine (which we could never seem to leave in Eps 1-2). Coruscant is where all the action happens. Naboo and Tatooine on the other hand are only visited briefly. We visit two new planets, a water world and a lava world (wonder what happens there!). And we see Alderaan for about 5 seconds. Simon Pegg once said in Empire magazine that the problem with the new trilogy was it shrank the universe rather than expanded it. Thankfully Sith expands it a lot, whilst feeling the most like an original trilogy movie.
- Death Star - they avoided the chance for silliness by having this only crop up at the end of the film, and Moff Tarkin was only a small cameo, 0 line part. The guy even looked like a young Peter Cushing.
- Lightsabre fights. Lots of them!
- Christopher Lee - he's a Sith Lord you know? Thanks Palps - he's also a vampire, wizard, ex-musketeer, mad-scientist. I ain't messing with him!
- R2D2 kicks some ass. He even gets a body count, or droid count.
- No politics (except extremist politics), and finally someone used the Republic Senate chamber for something that didn't send me to sleep.
Cons:
- Bail Organa - A lame characterisation of a potentially interesting character. This represents a crucial misstep in the trilogy. Bail Organa, Leia's adoptive father, is totally underdeveloped in the trilogy. In the 2nd film his appearance was basically a cameo with the understanding that in Episode 3 he would have a larger part. One of my chums stated that his role in RotS is "getaway driver" and that is true. There is no references to the beginning of the Rebellion, which he is supposed to be a crucial member of and now that I think of it there is no real appearance by Mon Mothma (despite her getting an action figure and all, oh well).
- Qui Gon Jinn - Apparently we're meant to be believe Qui Gon gained the ability to cheat death and speak to Yoda. We learn this about 5 minutes before the end of the film because Yoda tells us so. Huh? Again, a misstep. I smell deleted or special edition scenes on the cutting room floor, as the book gives mention of Qui-Gon speaking to Yoda. If Liam Neeson has flown the coop they could've got the fella who did his voice in the Clone Wars since, according to the book Qui Gon can only speak, he can't appear as his body didn't disappear at the end of the Phantom Menace. Qui-Gon was about the only cool thing about the Phantom Menace in my opinion.
- Christopher Lee - not enough of him. He turns up, says a few cool lines and is unceremonially killed off. Grevious on the other hand was a much weaker (and CG) character.
- Grevious - I wasn't that taken with him. He could wield 4 lightsabers at a time but Obi-Wan made short work of him. In the Clone Wars cartoon he took down 3 Jedi at once on 2 occasions. Also his wheezing and coughing didn't exactly make him seem threatening. I also wondered all the way through Clone Wars why, given he was a droid or cyborg that the Jedi didn't force push him around or force grab his lightsabres out of his hands. Obviously they couldn't have Obi-Wan kill Dooku as that'd get in the way of mirroring the Vader-Luke fight in Return of the Jedi with Anakin and Dooku and needed an extra villain.
- Chewbacca - didn't do anything. Extended cameo really, though thankfully the scene with young Han Solo (being raised by Chewie) hit the cutting room floor.
- Padme - her role in this film seemed to be to get pregnant, give birth and die. And give Anakin an excuse to turn to the dark side. Now I'm not fond of overtly strong women (I'm reading the Authority ATM and I don't like Jenny Sparks much) but she had no action in this film at all. Mind you if Lucas had done his job she'd have been preggers by the end of Episode 2 in my book!
- The Exile - To me at least it didn't make much sense that Yoda and Obi-Wan would go into exile for 20 years. They didn't do too badly in fighting the Emperor (at least compared to Luke's effort in Empire Strikes Back) that a repeat try a few months or years later would be worth trying.
Basically it goes Obi-Wan vs Anakin and Yoda vs Emperor. Yoda loses, but isn't killed, while Obi-Wan wins but doesn't kill Anakin. Not bad - if they struck while the iron was hot and Vader was still being built they could gang up on Darth Sidious... after all nowhere is it said that the kids are absolutely crucial.
There should've been a better reason given (other than the fact it needs to segue with A New Hope).
- A few unwrapped up plot-lines - Who ordered the Clones? Well apparently it was Dooku, but you only find this out in one of the books in the Expanded Universe. A little line during the Order 66 sequence with, "I am the one who ordered my apprentice to have you cloned. Now I activate your secret programming" or something would be pretty cool. Also - why do the Sith want revenge on the Jedi? Because they're evvvuulll I guess.. And Jar Jar is still out there, mocking us with his possible appearance on Naboo in Revenge of the Sith.
- Probably the most cheesy bit of the film was when Vader learns of Padme's death. James Earl Jones doesn't do a convincing, "Nooooooooo..."
I'd heard rumours that Anakin's fall was really dumb. Some of it did smack of, "I must become Darth Vader in spite of all your good advice because the script requires me to", but not on the same level as the Padme-Anakin romance in Clones.
On the other hand it does smack a lot of, "Betray my life long family? Turn on everything I believe. Sure why not!" but it made the events regarding Anakin's mother in Attack of the Clones make sense - Anakin's desire to keep Padme safe drove him over the edge and into Palpatine's camp.
Mind you Annie was a little dense to note that Chancellor Palps, the chap who cares about the plight of his missus, was all too eager to leave Obi-Wan Kenobi behind on the Separatist ship at the start, and that if he thought about it the Sith were behind the whole attack on Padme in Episode 1. By the end of the film Vader is in the presence of Palpatine when he orders the Trade Federation droid armies disbanded as they are no longer needed. He even effectively admits to Skywalker that he killed his master, Darth Palegius. Is this the kind of guy you'd trust to keep your chick alive? Really gents?
The montage of Anakin waiting in the Jedi Council while Windu deals with Palpatine is pretty cool. However I got the impression he wasn't totally irredeemable until after he killed Padme. Despite killing the Yonglings. Mind you after the cutesy bit in Ep2 who can blame him?
To be honest part of the tragedy in this film is that the whole turning of Anakin to the dark side could've been avoided if certain characters had said the right things at the right time. If the Jedi had respected Anakin a little more and let him in on their plans and suspicions in full instead of acting as they did. Or if Obi-Wan had made it a little clear he had duped Padme into helping him at the end of the film.
Anakin had Obi-Wan as his buddy, while Luke had Han, who was not some distant and unemotional cripple. Don't get me wrong - Obi-Wan is the most badass Jedi in all 6 movies, but despite his name "The Negotiator" (and where did that come from?) he can't teach the Jedi for shit. Same with Yoda. At one point in the film a conversation is as follows:-
Anakin: Master Yoda - I'm worried about er... someone. I've been having dreams they will die.
Yoda: Are you close to this someone?
Anakin: Er... maybe.
Yoda: Fear of losing someone close to you leads to the darkside... let go of that fear.
Anakin: Gee thanks.
So basically Yoda is saying if you are worried your spouse/brother/best-friend/barber is going to be chainsawed to death don't worry about it. At least that's how it sounded - perhaps Yoda could've instructed Anakin a little more constructively, "Don't let the future spoil the present" or summik. I dunno - he's the wise one.
There's also a few missteps in the story. For instance Obi-Wan and Yoda are sneaking (I use the word generously) into the Jedi Temple in Coruscant and in the meantime Palpatine declares himself Emperor (despite the fact the war against the Separatists is over). Next we flip back to the Jedi Temple where Obi-Wan is referring to Palpatine as Emperor. How on Coruscant did they learn that he was being crowned? Were they chatting to Bail the Get-Away-Driver?
I note they've left it open for the TV show to follow the adventures of more Jedi post-Sith as it is made deliberately ambigious if any more Jedi escaped the massacres of the Clone Wars. Rumours say Bail Organa could feature, possibly even with some characterisation. I personally hope it doesn't turn into a huge epic where tons of Jedi escaped. I doubt we'll see Ewan McGregor cameoing (I expect he's probably glad all 3 films are over now), but Yoda could conceivably feature in a bridge-gap series as he's a CG character and the film didn't show him going to Dagobah (that scene was also cut). Obviously Vader'll be really easy to use as a character given every fan-film can feature someone who sounds like him. We can only hope Jar Jar figures prominently! As a dismembered corpse. Or we watch him disintegrated...
So the Jedi get wiped out because they're asses. It's true. When I was a kid I thought the Jedi must've been truly great, but if you play Knights of the Old Republic 2: Sith Lords you encounter the ultimate Jedi-wanker, Master Vrook (also in KOTOR1 but not as annoying).
Stu's PC (cue dramatic music): "I have fought against the Sith, they have begun to reveal themselves to me. I have healed my connection to the force and chosen the path of the light side. I am now a Jedi Master. I have united all of you surviving Jedi Master. Now is the time we must stand against the Sith and strike back."
Jedi Master Vrook: "No. We must wait and watch as we always have done."
Stu: "Gee thanks."
Vrook: "You are a danger - we must strip you of your force powers."
Stu: "Er... I think not!"
Sometimes they have it coming you know...
Monday, May 23, 2005
Friday, May 20, 2005
Dammit Gym!
"So - where's the changing room?"
These are the words I uttered as I entered Leicester University's gym, aka Greenhouse 2 in Yuppy-speak. Looking around I saw rowing machines, cycles and various other torture apparatus but nary a sign saying "Changing Rooms". Something you might think is relatively common place in a gym, in fact wiser men than I might debate is essential.
Boy are they wrong.
The fellow at the counter looked at me in confusion, trying to hear me over the excessive decibels of MTV. Guessing from my confusion that I was new to the gym he said that I couldn't use the gym until I'd been inducted for insurance purposes.
That was yesterday. I've just returned from my 6pm induction. Lots of nodding, mmm hmming and sarcastically thinking, "So that's how a bike works" whilst straining to hear the imparted wisdom on weight training over MTV's dull clatter. The induction didn't involve me actually doing anything so I could completely misuse all the equipment out of ignorance and the instructor wouldn't know given I noted his propensity for surfing ebay on his computer.
What was more amusing was the Italian chick who was also on the induction with me. She was even more obvious in her, "Why am I here? I know how to work a bike!" and spent most of the time chatting up the instructor afterwards.
Gyms not bad apart from the obvious lack of changing facilities. You walk from the main building I work in to the gym, which is great in sunny weather but if it rains or snows it'll be a bit of a problem. The other problem is they left the door open and its next to the field where they cut the grass, so my hayfever is acting up for now. Time to go home, take some hay-fever remedy and have some food.
I'm off to see Revenge of the Sith this weekend but I'd better finish off the Clone Wars soon. Expect intelligent commentary (on Star Wars) by Monday.
These are the words I uttered as I entered Leicester University's gym, aka Greenhouse 2 in Yuppy-speak. Looking around I saw rowing machines, cycles and various other torture apparatus but nary a sign saying "Changing Rooms". Something you might think is relatively common place in a gym, in fact wiser men than I might debate is essential.
Boy are they wrong.
The fellow at the counter looked at me in confusion, trying to hear me over the excessive decibels of MTV. Guessing from my confusion that I was new to the gym he said that I couldn't use the gym until I'd been inducted for insurance purposes.
That was yesterday. I've just returned from my 6pm induction. Lots of nodding, mmm hmming and sarcastically thinking, "So that's how a bike works" whilst straining to hear the imparted wisdom on weight training over MTV's dull clatter. The induction didn't involve me actually doing anything so I could completely misuse all the equipment out of ignorance and the instructor wouldn't know given I noted his propensity for surfing ebay on his computer.
What was more amusing was the Italian chick who was also on the induction with me. She was even more obvious in her, "Why am I here? I know how to work a bike!" and spent most of the time chatting up the instructor afterwards.
Gyms not bad apart from the obvious lack of changing facilities. You walk from the main building I work in to the gym, which is great in sunny weather but if it rains or snows it'll be a bit of a problem. The other problem is they left the door open and its next to the field where they cut the grass, so my hayfever is acting up for now. Time to go home, take some hay-fever remedy and have some food.
I'm off to see Revenge of the Sith this weekend but I'd better finish off the Clone Wars soon. Expect intelligent commentary (on Star Wars) by Monday.
Dark Dungeons
Dark Dungeons - a scary, right-wing Christian anti-roleplaying comic, available here. I'm lucky enough to have a coyp someone gave me at a con. What a laugh.
It's also worth seeing Dork Dungeons - and the numerous other websites that "alter" the classic original.
It's also worth seeing Dork Dungeons - and the numerous other websites that "alter" the classic original.
Didn't expect to see on IMDB
Adolf Hitler has his own IMDB page here. I suppose he's made enough post-1945 appearances to justify it, and he commissioned a lot of films apparently. I suspect we all can guess at their subject matter.
Wednesday, May 18, 2005
Warhammer Burning a Hole In My Pocket
Warning: Rated high for geek content. And poor financial management.
Ok - I cracked. After I bought Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay v2.0 in the shops I went to Nottingham and bought Part 1 of the Enemy Within campaign. I liked it. I have to run it. Usually with campaigns I have so little time I do a really detailed first part to the campaign and by the time ten to twenty weeks later the PCs have completed it I never have enough time to give Part 2 any justice due to terms, papers or an addiction to Sims 2/Knights of the Old Republic and so forth.
My "Crimson Ascendant" Greyhawk campaign was an example of this - Part 1 was tightly plotted up until the end of it, where it descended into a shambles. Part 2 was horrible and in the end I folded it after a session where I had a fight with a player (though everyone agrees he was asking for it, and he later apologised in what was that most humble apology I've ever seen). What really sunk it was when I realised I was rerunning portions an old, retired and frankly crap core Living Greyhawk module to buy me more time to prep a tightly plotted story.
The Enemy Within on the other hand is tightly plotted all the way through. And bits of it are by Carl Sargent, the patron saint of post-Ashes Greyhawk and dark gritty fantasy. It was voted best published campaign ever by the French, the first part reads like a Cthulu scenario. It was reprinted oodles of times. In short it looks like a lot of fun.
So in the space of two weeks I've found someone selling parts 2 and 3 along with a few other books. I bought them for about £12 a book, but bought about 8 books off him. Then I bought the sourcebook over Ebay for £20. Then about 5 mins I found the ever-so-rare, not really reprinted Part 5, The Empire in Flames for £25 and bought it right away. Naturally every stall at Gen Con UK this year will have it on sale for £15. :)
Annoyingly Part 5 was, when being reprinted, due for a complete rewrite as the original does not accord with established Warhammer canon (the Emperor dies and is replaced with a new one, but this ending is dropped as he wasn't inline with Games Workshop's epic hero who contributes to miniature sales) and it doesn't really wrap up the Enemy Within storylines at all. Unfortunately the reprint company folded and the author/CEO had lost all the data in a computer crash. But the original still sounds like a really good standalone adventure for ridiculously powerful PCs. Plus it was written by Carl Sargent so it can't be that terrible!
With me spending a ridiculous amount (£150) on WFRP stuff in the past 3 weeks (though to be honest that's only £50 per week of my self-made spending allowance and there's not a lot else I plan on spending my spare cash on at the moment). Usually I have problems dreaming up what to spend cash on.
Anyroads I need to find some victims to inflict this epic on. And I suppose I should buy Part 4 at some point, but it doesn't sound that impressive anyroads.
Ok - I cracked. After I bought Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay v2.0 in the shops I went to Nottingham and bought Part 1 of the Enemy Within campaign. I liked it. I have to run it. Usually with campaigns I have so little time I do a really detailed first part to the campaign and by the time ten to twenty weeks later the PCs have completed it I never have enough time to give Part 2 any justice due to terms, papers or an addiction to Sims 2/Knights of the Old Republic and so forth.
My "Crimson Ascendant" Greyhawk campaign was an example of this - Part 1 was tightly plotted up until the end of it, where it descended into a shambles. Part 2 was horrible and in the end I folded it after a session where I had a fight with a player (though everyone agrees he was asking for it, and he later apologised in what was that most humble apology I've ever seen). What really sunk it was when I realised I was rerunning portions an old, retired and frankly crap core Living Greyhawk module to buy me more time to prep a tightly plotted story.
The Enemy Within on the other hand is tightly plotted all the way through. And bits of it are by Carl Sargent, the patron saint of post-Ashes Greyhawk and dark gritty fantasy. It was voted best published campaign ever by the French, the first part reads like a Cthulu scenario. It was reprinted oodles of times. In short it looks like a lot of fun.
So in the space of two weeks I've found someone selling parts 2 and 3 along with a few other books. I bought them for about £12 a book, but bought about 8 books off him. Then I bought the sourcebook over Ebay for £20. Then about 5 mins I found the ever-so-rare, not really reprinted Part 5, The Empire in Flames for £25 and bought it right away. Naturally every stall at Gen Con UK this year will have it on sale for £15. :)
Annoyingly Part 5 was, when being reprinted, due for a complete rewrite as the original does not accord with established Warhammer canon (the Emperor dies and is replaced with a new one, but this ending is dropped as he wasn't inline with Games Workshop's epic hero who contributes to miniature sales) and it doesn't really wrap up the Enemy Within storylines at all. Unfortunately the reprint company folded and the author/CEO had lost all the data in a computer crash. But the original still sounds like a really good standalone adventure for ridiculously powerful PCs. Plus it was written by Carl Sargent so it can't be that terrible!
With me spending a ridiculous amount (£150) on WFRP stuff in the past 3 weeks (though to be honest that's only £50 per week of my self-made spending allowance and there's not a lot else I plan on spending my spare cash on at the moment). Usually I have problems dreaming up what to spend cash on.
Anyroads I need to find some victims to inflict this epic on. And I suppose I should buy Part 4 at some point, but it doesn't sound that impressive anyroads.
Tuesday, May 17, 2005
More Popular than Porn
Star Wars is a more popular keyword on Google than the phrase porn. Check it out for yourself here.
Get your crushed dreams over here!
I can relate to this auction. Little punk probably had it coming.
Sunday, May 15, 2005
Another Acme Idea
Beer is bad. Beer gives me ideas, and this particular idea came to me on the cusp of my third pint on Friday night in the Gateway, Leicester.
The Lovebike
Working to bring love in tandem with you.
A new variant on the speed dating craze - 10 bikes, 20 people, 10 male, 10 female. 60 minute cycle in the country - 6 minutes with each potential partner.
Sad thing - everyone agreed this idea would probably make money.
You saw it here first. (c) me and if you use it I will sue for money as I'm too lazy to implement this idea.
The Lovebike
Working to bring love in tandem with you.
A new variant on the speed dating craze - 10 bikes, 20 people, 10 male, 10 female. 60 minute cycle in the country - 6 minutes with each potential partner.
Sad thing - everyone agreed this idea would probably make money.
You saw it here first. (c) me and if you use it I will sue for money as I'm too lazy to implement this idea.
No Place Like My Old Flat
Went and looked at a potential house share today. The chap was very friendly, we talked about sci-fi and games for about 45 mins and rent stuff for about 15 mins. We got on so well he's given me a tenancy form to look over and consider. The house was in a nice area of Leicester, a short drive from the uni.
The rent was £320 including council tax, playstation 2 (must buy him an eye toy for that), broadband, sky digital, DVD recorder for said digital TV, fully furnished, working shower, garden. This is totally unlike the one I have which you switch on and goes from scaling to freezing (you have to pick your moments to avoid burns). I should point out the rent for "The Dump" is £300 and includes er... the exorcist model shower/flesh burner, some old 2nd hand furniture and an antique TV.
Gee - should I move?
The rent was £320 including council tax, playstation 2 (must buy him an eye toy for that), broadband, sky digital, DVD recorder for said digital TV, fully furnished, working shower, garden. This is totally unlike the one I have which you switch on and goes from scaling to freezing (you have to pick your moments to avoid burns). I should point out the rent for "The Dump" is £300 and includes er... the exorcist model shower/flesh burner, some old 2nd hand furniture and an antique TV.
Gee - should I move?
Saturday, May 14, 2005
A Rare Saturday Post
Ah, the joys of flat hunting. I phoned up my first possible the other night, who sounded really nice until we discussed when I could view the place. Every time I suggested she was either working, meeting colleagues etc. Then when I told her I was paid up in my existing place until the 31st of June (which I'd originally mentioned in my module) she quite cheerfully told me that this was a problem as she had other interested parties, but I could just pay her the rent for June and move in at the end of that month. I thought I'd discuss this with her when I meet her, but I summarised my thoughts when I hung up and said, "Bollocks to that" given I have over a month to plan my next move and this is the first place I've considered properly.
The other person sounds a lot more promising. Given it is £320 a month for a room in a fully furnished flat, all bills paid including Sky digital and broadband I am very tempted and this person actually read my initial email enquiring about the place.
In other news my mobile phone is now fixed. Of course I had no messages on it from people outside of Leicester (feel the love, sniff sniff). I now have the joy of owning two mobile phones, the one I own and the one my parents gave me to get cheaper call rates darn sarth.
Anyway I'm off to play D&D now, like all cool dudes should on a Saturday night.
The other person sounds a lot more promising. Given it is £320 a month for a room in a fully furnished flat, all bills paid including Sky digital and broadband I am very tempted and this person actually read my initial email enquiring about the place.
In other news my mobile phone is now fixed. Of course I had no messages on it from people outside of Leicester (feel the love, sniff sniff). I now have the joy of owning two mobile phones, the one I own and the one my parents gave me to get cheaper call rates darn sarth.
Anyway I'm off to play D&D now, like all cool dudes should on a Saturday night.
Friday, May 13, 2005
Thursday, May 12, 2005
Why Ep2 is better than Ep1
Star Wars Episode 1 was dire, while in my opinion Star Wars Episode 2 was ok if you ignore the romance plotline and the fact Amidala must change clothes 3 times a day in an attempt not to seduce Annie. Here's my reasoning:-
Darth Maul - what kind of villain is he? He does nothing evil at all, he says nothing and just turns up to kill and be killed at the end. Dooku did some evil goatee twiddling stuff, Vader killed his minions and hell, even the really minor villain in Knights of the Old Republic, Darth Badon, electrocutes a minion for bumping into him on the bridge of his ship. The least Maul could've done was obliterated a few 'helpful' Sand People or cantina-full of dudes.
The podrace in Ep1 took forever and to be honest it was so obvious that Annie was going to win it. In Ep2 however if they'd failed to catch the shapechanging chick the movie could've continued onwards, so there was some actual tension in the speeder chase.
Ep1 had a nicer lightsabre fight but they forgot about dialogue, which made the fights in Ep4-6 fantastic (especially Ep4 which is not exactly an amazing fight but has some truly, deeply inspired dialogue). Ep2 had two lightsabre fights IIRC and they all had dialogue.
Ep2 had a decent "Star War" as opposed to being about some pishy little system under threat by some Japanese aliens and their army of kiddy-friendly droids.
Ep2 had less Jar Jar and no other Gungans. Enough said.
Ep2 had Obi-Wan Kenobi actually involved in the plot, not twiddling his thumbs only to save the day at about 1h 40 mins into the film.
Ep2 had someone who could almost act play Anakin. Ep1 had that kid who sounded like he was reading off a cue-card. "Sandstorms are very very... uh... dangerous."
Ep1 should've kicked off the Clone Wars, perhaps with about 15 mins at the start of Palpatine becoming Chancellor, the Jedi finding young Anakin etc. and then forwarding to when he's a sulky teenager. Ep2 should've handled the Clone Wars cartoon stuff and some of the stuff in the comics too (really cool, dark gritty battle scenes with padawans turning to the dark side with WW1 equivalent horrors of war stuff etc.), Anakin becoming a Jedi, his marriage at the end of AotC, and Ep3 should be pretty much as it is.
My main problem with the prequels is they jump around too much. Ep4-6 had an identifiable villain in Vader (with Sidious in the background). Ep1-3 should've had Dooku as the Vader equivalent unit all throughout the trilogy. Instead we have Darth Maul in Ep1, Dooku in Ep2, Grevious in Ep3 capped off with the Emperor and Vader at the end.
Darth Maul - what kind of villain is he? He does nothing evil at all, he says nothing and just turns up to kill and be killed at the end. Dooku did some evil goatee twiddling stuff, Vader killed his minions and hell, even the really minor villain in Knights of the Old Republic, Darth Badon, electrocutes a minion for bumping into him on the bridge of his ship. The least Maul could've done was obliterated a few 'helpful' Sand People or cantina-full of dudes.
The podrace in Ep1 took forever and to be honest it was so obvious that Annie was going to win it. In Ep2 however if they'd failed to catch the shapechanging chick the movie could've continued onwards, so there was some actual tension in the speeder chase.
Ep1 had a nicer lightsabre fight but they forgot about dialogue, which made the fights in Ep4-6 fantastic (especially Ep4 which is not exactly an amazing fight but has some truly, deeply inspired dialogue). Ep2 had two lightsabre fights IIRC and they all had dialogue.
Ep2 had a decent "Star War" as opposed to being about some pishy little system under threat by some Japanese aliens and their army of kiddy-friendly droids.
Ep2 had less Jar Jar and no other Gungans. Enough said.
Ep2 had Obi-Wan Kenobi actually involved in the plot, not twiddling his thumbs only to save the day at about 1h 40 mins into the film.
Ep2 had someone who could almost act play Anakin. Ep1 had that kid who sounded like he was reading off a cue-card. "Sandstorms are very very... uh... dangerous."
Ep1 should've kicked off the Clone Wars, perhaps with about 15 mins at the start of Palpatine becoming Chancellor, the Jedi finding young Anakin etc. and then forwarding to when he's a sulky teenager. Ep2 should've handled the Clone Wars cartoon stuff and some of the stuff in the comics too (really cool, dark gritty battle scenes with padawans turning to the dark side with WW1 equivalent horrors of war stuff etc.), Anakin becoming a Jedi, his marriage at the end of AotC, and Ep3 should be pretty much as it is.
My main problem with the prequels is they jump around too much. Ep4-6 had an identifiable villain in Vader (with Sidious in the background). Ep1-3 should've had Dooku as the Vader equivalent unit all throughout the trilogy. Instead we have Darth Maul in Ep1, Dooku in Ep2, Grevious in Ep3 capped off with the Emperor and Vader at the end.
The Man in the Hat
Proof that despite the fact I've been asked to help run a graphic's course in Leicester all my pals are better at doctoring images. The following continues from the Young Indiana Jones thread:-
Mare proudly present the poster for
Episode 22.5: Spring Adventure
Young Stuart Kerrigan and his chums were arrested by Mexicans, escaped from a penal colony on a boat and discovered they were in fact bound for Cuba. Fortunately Fidel Castro was on hand to discuss the finer points of Communism and in return for us respecting his personal beliefs the group is given a personal pardon for him and sent to Miami where we run foul of the vice squad and are asked to act as consultants on the set of Miami Vice. Edward James Olmos co-stars.
Mare proudly present the poster for
Episode 22.5: Spring Adventure
Young Stuart Kerrigan and his chums were arrested by Mexicans, escaped from a penal colony on a boat and discovered they were in fact bound for Cuba. Fortunately Fidel Castro was on hand to discuss the finer points of Communism and in return for us respecting his personal beliefs the group is given a personal pardon for him and sent to Miami where we run foul of the vice squad and are asked to act as consultants on the set of Miami Vice. Edward James Olmos co-stars.
It's a Frickin' Great Big Worm Man!
Ok - here's the heart warming story of one man's battle against his childhood fears.
I play computer games. Probably too much. I always have done, except until recently when I was either to busy or had a life. Now I play computer games a lot more.
I own a PC now. I used to own a Commodore 64 and then a Commodore Amiga. I played games on my C64. One of them was "Beyond the Forbidden Forest". You played an archer who had to run through a 3D forest shooting bad guys (not bad, 3D in a game in the early 1980s). It was the sequel to Forbidden Forest, which you did pretty much the same thing in, but in 2D.
The only difference is that Beyond the Forbidden Forest had really scary monsters and gory death scenes.
Like a fricking massive scorpion that just appears without warning!
Or, what really did my nerves in, a fricking massive worm that came out the ground and ate you (not pictured above but it's out there somewhere dammit!)
And Demogorgon appeared in it too, but I never got that far. I was like 9 man. Massive worms appearing out the ground and devouring you while the music changed like in a horror flick and really scare a guy and I think they've left deep-rooted scars.
Anyway couple of weeks ago I picked up a C64 emulator CD with BTFF on it. I'm amazed how scary it is, I frequently start to boot it up and during the slow and accurate emulation of it loading feel a bit nervous and decide to boot up another more kiddy-friendly game like Outrun, which is stupid considering I play games like Resident Evil, Doom 3 etc. that are infinitely more scary.
It's official - I'm a wuss! But tonight I venture into the pixelized Forbidden Forest to kill demogorgon - or play Outrun.
I play computer games. Probably too much. I always have done, except until recently when I was either to busy or had a life. Now I play computer games a lot more.
I own a PC now. I used to own a Commodore 64 and then a Commodore Amiga. I played games on my C64. One of them was "Beyond the Forbidden Forest". You played an archer who had to run through a 3D forest shooting bad guys (not bad, 3D in a game in the early 1980s). It was the sequel to Forbidden Forest, which you did pretty much the same thing in, but in 2D.
The only difference is that Beyond the Forbidden Forest had really scary monsters and gory death scenes.
Like a fricking massive scorpion that just appears without warning!
Or, what really did my nerves in, a fricking massive worm that came out the ground and ate you (not pictured above but it's out there somewhere dammit!)
And Demogorgon appeared in it too, but I never got that far. I was like 9 man. Massive worms appearing out the ground and devouring you while the music changed like in a horror flick and really scare a guy and I think they've left deep-rooted scars.
Anyway couple of weeks ago I picked up a C64 emulator CD with BTFF on it. I'm amazed how scary it is, I frequently start to boot it up and during the slow and accurate emulation of it loading feel a bit nervous and decide to boot up another more kiddy-friendly game like Outrun, which is stupid considering I play games like Resident Evil, Doom 3 etc. that are infinitely more scary.
It's official - I'm a wuss! But tonight I venture into the pixelized Forbidden Forest to kill demogorgon - or play Outrun.
News Update
So what have I been doing lately?
- Been invited to a wedding in Leicester (not a typical one either as it isn't formal gear apparently).
- Continued to have a fight with my co-worker when he decided to do yet another reassignment of the workload (can you say compulsive disorder?).
- Managed to drive my car three times now without some Ned feeling the need to create a near-death accident situation.
- Started looking for a new flat once I'm kicked out the dump at the end of June. This time I'm looking for a flatmate to keep me sane however. I've a couple of possibles to investigate this weekend.
- Bought £80 worth of old books online.
- Filled my freezer completely with food.
- Learned that grilled beef is very tasty.
- Actually done 30 minutes prep work for my viva.
- Been invited to a wedding in Leicester (not a typical one either as it isn't formal gear apparently).
- Continued to have a fight with my co-worker when he decided to do yet another reassignment of the workload (can you say compulsive disorder?).
- Managed to drive my car three times now without some Ned feeling the need to create a near-death accident situation.
- Started looking for a new flat once I'm kicked out the dump at the end of June. This time I'm looking for a flatmate to keep me sane however. I've a couple of possibles to investigate this weekend.
- Bought £80 worth of old books online.
- Filled my freezer completely with food.
- Learned that grilled beef is very tasty.
- Actually done 30 minutes prep work for my viva.
Monday, May 09, 2005
Free Comic Book Day
Bored with Leicester's shops I decided to take a day-trip to Nottingham on Saturday, but in true Leicester: The Most Dangerous Driving on Earth fashion and to fulfill the need for the typical obligatory "nearly had a car accident on Saturday post" as I tried to pull out of my parking spot some wifie came whizzing past at about 20 mph and nearly took my wing mirror off. Once again I'd made the mistake of looking in my mirror, taking a brief second to decide what to do, and then do the manouever. This wifie took a good few seconds to break, reversed back and looked at me, decided I'd made a face at her and thought she'd chastise me for making faces, not signalling (oddly enough I hadn't because the road was empty when I'd checked) and generally being a bad egg.
I went off to Nottingham feeling somewhat restless due to this incident and wasn't cheered up much when a group of Neds decided to overtake me in the slow lane, doing a mere 100 mph with their rap music blazing out at a ridiculous volume that somehow was louder than my own CD player. Such people seem to be everywhere in Leicester and Nottingham, riding around aimlessly in cars. But despite this I made it with no more mishaps and spent about 30 minutes looking for the local roleplaying shop only to discover it nests on the 1st floor of a Gamestation shop.
I relieved them of all their 1st Edition books of my new craze, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay and then discovered the wonders of Free Comic Book Day. So what's that then?
This is basically a day when comic book publishers release a number of er... free comics to promote their new and existing titles. Typically this is Issue 0, which cleverly comes before Issue 1 but isn't necessary to read Issue 1. The comic book shop puts these on a table and you help yourself to what you're interested in (or if you're like me, take everything).
Now this is my first such day as in Scotland it turns out most comic shop owners I know turn "Free Comic Book Day" into "Mildly Less Expensive Comic Book Day". For example I was talking to a guy about Conan Issue 0 last year, which I'd bought in a comic store in Edinburgh for 25p only to be told by this guy it was supposed to be a free comic.
The Black Hole in Dundee is a similar offender - in fact unsurprisingly the world's worst and most expensive comic store doesn't even run a Free Comic Day. It wouldn't surprise me if they ordered the stuff in and put a price tag on it. Mind you I've never forgiven the owner for telling me to leave when I picked up a Spiderman issue, got too involved in reading it and read a whole 3 pages of it.
Some of the free comics were very good. A Samurai story called Ronin Hood (very apt for Nottingham), a free Spiderman comic, a free Batman comic and some miscellanious crap for jobbing comic book artists seeking publishers.
On Sunday I made my first trip to Leicester's overpriced Odeon to see Kingdom of Heaven. Not bad - historically inaccurate, with all the Christians either being eviiilll or more or less agnostic, whilst the Muslims are portrayed as pretty moderate. Normally this can sink a blockbuster (imagine Braveheart with good Englishmen in it), with Druids being a good example of how a balanced portrayal of both sides can wreck a film.
Basically the overall message of the picture is that fanatacism is bad as it just leads to pointless deaths, but for the most part the only fanatics we see in the film are the Knights Templar, with the Muslims being displayed as moderate. This film seems to follow the worrying tradition in Hollywood now of making Christians fair game for making into evil-doers and whatnot, but negative portrayals Jews, Muslims etc. are all no-nos mainly because they write the scripts or have better representation respectively. :)
I went off to Nottingham feeling somewhat restless due to this incident and wasn't cheered up much when a group of Neds decided to overtake me in the slow lane, doing a mere 100 mph with their rap music blazing out at a ridiculous volume that somehow was louder than my own CD player. Such people seem to be everywhere in Leicester and Nottingham, riding around aimlessly in cars. But despite this I made it with no more mishaps and spent about 30 minutes looking for the local roleplaying shop only to discover it nests on the 1st floor of a Gamestation shop.
I relieved them of all their 1st Edition books of my new craze, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay and then discovered the wonders of Free Comic Book Day. So what's that then?
This is basically a day when comic book publishers release a number of er... free comics to promote their new and existing titles. Typically this is Issue 0, which cleverly comes before Issue 1 but isn't necessary to read Issue 1. The comic book shop puts these on a table and you help yourself to what you're interested in (or if you're like me, take everything).
Now this is my first such day as in Scotland it turns out most comic shop owners I know turn "Free Comic Book Day" into "Mildly Less Expensive Comic Book Day". For example I was talking to a guy about Conan Issue 0 last year, which I'd bought in a comic store in Edinburgh for 25p only to be told by this guy it was supposed to be a free comic.
The Black Hole in Dundee is a similar offender - in fact unsurprisingly the world's worst and most expensive comic store doesn't even run a Free Comic Day. It wouldn't surprise me if they ordered the stuff in and put a price tag on it. Mind you I've never forgiven the owner for telling me to leave when I picked up a Spiderman issue, got too involved in reading it and read a whole 3 pages of it.
Some of the free comics were very good. A Samurai story called Ronin Hood (very apt for Nottingham), a free Spiderman comic, a free Batman comic and some miscellanious crap for jobbing comic book artists seeking publishers.
On Sunday I made my first trip to Leicester's overpriced Odeon to see Kingdom of Heaven. Not bad - historically inaccurate, with all the Christians either being eviiilll or more or less agnostic, whilst the Muslims are portrayed as pretty moderate. Normally this can sink a blockbuster (imagine Braveheart with good Englishmen in it), with Druids being a good example of how a balanced portrayal of both sides can wreck a film.
Basically the overall message of the picture is that fanatacism is bad as it just leads to pointless deaths, but for the most part the only fanatics we see in the film are the Knights Templar, with the Muslims being displayed as moderate. This film seems to follow the worrying tradition in Hollywood now of making Christians fair game for making into evil-doers and whatnot, but negative portrayals Jews, Muslims etc. are all no-nos mainly because they write the scripts or have better representation respectively. :)
Friday, May 06, 2005
Stuart's Friday Link: How To Kill a Mockingbird
A very novel book report on To Kill a Mockingbird, and the sequel How To Kill a Mockingbird 2: The Return of the Revenge.
Thursday, May 05, 2005
Dark Sci-Fi Better
Watching Firefly this week has made me think - science fiction seems to be going through some changes in the early 21st century. In the 70s-90s era science fiction was all squeaky clean Jedi, starship captains of "the finest ship/crew in the fleet" and so forth. Then by the 1990s things got a little darker - the Star Trek Federation actually had warships, Babylon 5 had religion, religious wars and invented mainstream sci-fi characters that had shades of grey.
Now we have shows like Firefly and BSG '03 that are very dark. Both are in the mainstream (BSG in particular, Firefly having done some weird phoenix thing by coming back after being cancelled at the 14 episode mark). Curiously Star Trek Enterprise and Star Wars both seem to be in trouble (though Episode 3 is going to be pretty dark and may redeem Star Wars if you believe Mr. Kevin Smith and it'll make money anyway).
Let's take Firefly as an example of darker sci-fi. The basic premise of the show is that the Millenium Falconesque ship Serenity goes from week to week going around space looking for jobs, legal or otherwise. It's a bit like someone made a TV series of the old computer game Elite in that respect.
The main character, Captain Malcolm Reynolds is a bit of a Han Solo type - brash, arrogant and frequently biting off more than he can chew he turns out to be one of those loveable scoundrels that'll rob you blind but never kills an enemy with a speaking part (not that Firefly lacked any recurring villains). He hangs out with his first officer Zoe, her husband the pilot, and a host of whacky sidekicks.
Or Battlestar Galactica '03 - a bunch of military nuts on a big boat with a bunch of civvies pretending they're in charge, with a bunch of sexy evil humanoid robots chasing them. Much politicing - much darkness.
By contrast Star Wars Episode 1-2 - a bunch of Jedi and Senators fighting to protect diplomacy and generally being polite to one another. No Han Solo type character to do the whole witty banter, only Ewan McGregor's Obi Wan Kenobi.
Enterprise - a rehash of the 60s Star Trek, missing the opportunity to use the grittyness of First Contact by making everything shiny and Star Trekky. The first episode showed promise, the second involved a nebula - surely a first in Star Trek - and I haven't watched another Enterprise show since then.
Now we have shows like Firefly and BSG '03 that are very dark. Both are in the mainstream (BSG in particular, Firefly having done some weird phoenix thing by coming back after being cancelled at the 14 episode mark). Curiously Star Trek Enterprise and Star Wars both seem to be in trouble (though Episode 3 is going to be pretty dark and may redeem Star Wars if you believe Mr. Kevin Smith and it'll make money anyway).
Let's take Firefly as an example of darker sci-fi. The basic premise of the show is that the Millenium Falconesque ship Serenity goes from week to week going around space looking for jobs, legal or otherwise. It's a bit like someone made a TV series of the old computer game Elite in that respect.
The main character, Captain Malcolm Reynolds is a bit of a Han Solo type - brash, arrogant and frequently biting off more than he can chew he turns out to be one of those loveable scoundrels that'll rob you blind but never kills an enemy with a speaking part (not that Firefly lacked any recurring villains). He hangs out with his first officer Zoe, her husband the pilot, and a host of whacky sidekicks.
Or Battlestar Galactica '03 - a bunch of military nuts on a big boat with a bunch of civvies pretending they're in charge, with a bunch of sexy evil humanoid robots chasing them. Much politicing - much darkness.
By contrast Star Wars Episode 1-2 - a bunch of Jedi and Senators fighting to protect diplomacy and generally being polite to one another. No Han Solo type character to do the whole witty banter, only Ewan McGregor's Obi Wan Kenobi.
Enterprise - a rehash of the 60s Star Trek, missing the opportunity to use the grittyness of First Contact by making everything shiny and Star Trekky. The first episode showed promise, the second involved a nebula - surely a first in Star Trek - and I haven't watched another Enterprise show since then.
Work Thought for the Month
I am in serious danger of losing what little and diminishing respect I have for one of my co-workers.
2 Discoveries
I was off ill yesterday and spent most of the day pottering around the flat. I made two discoveries:-
1. Firefly rocks.
2. Being ill when you live alone sucks. No-one brings you chicken soup.
1. Firefly rocks.
2. Being ill when you live alone sucks. No-one brings you chicken soup.
Tuesday, May 03, 2005
This week I 'av been mostly watching...
Firefly: I've only watched the first 6 episodes or so, but this is pretty darn good. It's a Sci-Fi Western with a Han Solo type captain, Joss Whedon's great one liners and as far as I can tell a decent potential for an arc plot. Naturally it was cancelled. But it's coming back as a movie, which is unusual.
Millennium: X-Files spinoff with Lance Henrikson as a criminal profiler. Originally I assumed this was going somewhere with an arc relating to the Millennium prophecies and a count down to 2000. Instead it has the usual but it turns out it was cancelled in 1999 with a rushed finale in an X-Files 7th Season episode (conveniently packaged with the 3rd Season boxed set). Not cheery watching.
Best of Monty Python: Thanks to screenselect.co.uk I have been watching the classic episodes of Monty Python. Brilliant. I think my neighbours heard me singing the lumberjack song.
Meet the Parents: Saw Meet the Fockers a while back and I couldn't remember some of the finer points of its prequel. Not bad, not hilarious though.
Doctor Who: Nice Dalek episode. Hyped up to be something it wasn't, but it was pretty darn good.
Millennium: X-Files spinoff with Lance Henrikson as a criminal profiler. Originally I assumed this was going somewhere with an arc relating to the Millennium prophecies and a count down to 2000. Instead it has the usual but it turns out it was cancelled in 1999 with a rushed finale in an X-Files 7th Season episode (conveniently packaged with the 3rd Season boxed set). Not cheery watching.
Best of Monty Python: Thanks to screenselect.co.uk I have been watching the classic episodes of Monty Python. Brilliant. I think my neighbours heard me singing the lumberjack song.
Meet the Parents: Saw Meet the Fockers a while back and I couldn't remember some of the finer points of its prequel. Not bad, not hilarious though.
Doctor Who: Nice Dalek episode. Hyped up to be something it wasn't, but it was pretty darn good.
Addendum
Sunday I awoke with a terrible flu, which I was convinced was a combo of the lack of sleep and hay-fever from being in the park yesterday. After taking a hay-fever tablet I checked on my miraculously unscratched Stu Mobile. After more Sims 2 I decided another trip to the shops was in order. The evening was spent watching films and deciding that I did indeed have a flu, not hay-fever.
Monday was equally dull - I wandered down the market place as the mobile guy had said the part I'd ordered would be in on Monday. I was a little cynical myself, given Monday was a bank holiday. Obviously it wasn't a Market Holiday, or so I thought. I was wrong.
Monday was equally dull - I wandered down the market place as the mobile guy had said the part I'd ordered would be in on Monday. I was a little cynical myself, given Monday was a bank holiday. Obviously it wasn't a Market Holiday, or so I thought. I was wrong.
Dawn of the Drunk
Saturday night was poker night at a chum's place, so I went over and promptly managed to lose £5, reminding me never to bend my policy on gambling for money again. On the plus I managed to last 3 hours in the game and won my fair share of hands despite misremembering the rules.
More interestingly the game finished at 1am, and saw me driving back home. Getting into my car I saw a lone figure staggering down the street, moaning and walking in a distinct zombie-fashion. Some wifie had obviously had a skinful and seeing a car with its lights on at 1am assumed it was a taxi.
Now, if you've been paying attention to my photo blog you will notice that a lot of the residential areas of Leicester include narrow streets, some of which open out onto the main road, some of which don't. This one didn't and the only option was to somehow get past this wifie. Which involved reversing. Unfortunately when she was me reversing she tried to get behind me, which is nice and dangerous. When I went forward she tried to get collapse in front of the hood. When I tried to turn she was banging on whichever door was nearest. I even tried lowering the window and telling her to move it, which she took as an invitation to try to get into the passenger seat, which I had thankfully locked when I saw the way the wind was blowing.
Eventually I had to resist the temptation to go through her, knocking her down if need be and go all the way down the dead end, wait for her to catch me up and reverse at a ridiculous speed back up the road, turn, and zoom off, leaving her stood in the middle of the road.
However this had obviously vexed me, and affected my concetration as I nearly plowed straight into a taxi when I tried to do a U-Turn past the speed cameras in the left lane of a dual-carriageway. The taxi appeared from nowhere on the brow of a rise doing 50 mph (reasoning that past the speed cameras its fair game to drive at ridiculous speeds) while I was doing a mere 10-15 mph. It was kind of a check the mirror, slow down as I angst over whether I want to do a U-Turn or wait for a roundabout, decide there's no chance in hell of a roundabout because I am looking for one, remember the road was deserted 3 seconds ago so it's ok to full lock without a signal, have minor heart attack whilst thinking where the hell did that come from?!!
Personally I consider a miracle the car was not damaged, much less me.
I don't even remember swerving out the way of the taxi - I did feel a jolt as the wind generated by this errant and excessively fast taxi nearly blew my car over whilst I cursed having my steering wheel on full-lock to the right as this thing flew past me in the right lane.
Basically it felt like a forcefield went round my car and absorbed the impact, but I think more than likely I was just tired.
I went to bed, lay awake thinking about a near-death experience and convinced at the very least all the paint work on the car was gone. To add to the general pleasant atmosphere I was rudely awakened in the wee hours of the morning by a lightning storm. The bright flashing lightning really cheered me up.
So there you go - a story of conversing with the dead and nearly joining their ranks due to my tiredness and someone else's hurry to get their next fair. Joy... and the story of my 3 day weekend ain't over yet.
More interestingly the game finished at 1am, and saw me driving back home. Getting into my car I saw a lone figure staggering down the street, moaning and walking in a distinct zombie-fashion. Some wifie had obviously had a skinful and seeing a car with its lights on at 1am assumed it was a taxi.
Now, if you've been paying attention to my photo blog you will notice that a lot of the residential areas of Leicester include narrow streets, some of which open out onto the main road, some of which don't. This one didn't and the only option was to somehow get past this wifie. Which involved reversing. Unfortunately when she was me reversing she tried to get behind me, which is nice and dangerous. When I went forward she tried to get collapse in front of the hood. When I tried to turn she was banging on whichever door was nearest. I even tried lowering the window and telling her to move it, which she took as an invitation to try to get into the passenger seat, which I had thankfully locked when I saw the way the wind was blowing.
Eventually I had to resist the temptation to go through her, knocking her down if need be and go all the way down the dead end, wait for her to catch me up and reverse at a ridiculous speed back up the road, turn, and zoom off, leaving her stood in the middle of the road.
However this had obviously vexed me, and affected my concetration as I nearly plowed straight into a taxi when I tried to do a U-Turn past the speed cameras in the left lane of a dual-carriageway. The taxi appeared from nowhere on the brow of a rise doing 50 mph (reasoning that past the speed cameras its fair game to drive at ridiculous speeds) while I was doing a mere 10-15 mph. It was kind of a check the mirror, slow down as I angst over whether I want to do a U-Turn or wait for a roundabout, decide there's no chance in hell of a roundabout because I am looking for one, remember the road was deserted 3 seconds ago so it's ok to full lock without a signal, have minor heart attack whilst thinking where the hell did that come from?!!
Personally I consider a miracle the car was not damaged, much less me.
I don't even remember swerving out the way of the taxi - I did feel a jolt as the wind generated by this errant and excessively fast taxi nearly blew my car over whilst I cursed having my steering wheel on full-lock to the right as this thing flew past me in the right lane.
Basically it felt like a forcefield went round my car and absorbed the impact, but I think more than likely I was just tired.
I went to bed, lay awake thinking about a near-death experience and convinced at the very least all the paint work on the car was gone. To add to the general pleasant atmosphere I was rudely awakened in the wee hours of the morning by a lightning storm. The bright flashing lightning really cheered me up.
So there you go - a story of conversing with the dead and nearly joining their ranks due to my tiredness and someone else's hurry to get their next fair. Joy... and the story of my 3 day weekend ain't over yet.
Mayday, Mayday!
I had a long 3 day weekend off this week, in keeping with the University's apparent policy of giving me a holiday every week I work in this place.
Saturday afternoon was a lovely day, probably the best I've seen since I arrived. I discovered I live minutes away from Leicester Castle and Castle Gardens. Dragging my backside away from Sims 2 I went to the park where the May Day festival was in full swing by 2pm. It seemed every Goth, Pagan and Gandalf-look-alike had turned up for the festival, and I wandered around, listened to the folk music, mused on missing the maypole dance and chilled for half an hour. Not much was happening, so I decided after spotting several Frodo Baggins-alikes to wander off into town. I should point out that as a stupid fool I forgot to bring my camera as I could've taken some interesting photographs.
Thankfully there wasn't a wicker man in sight so I snuck off into town and relieved myself of some hard-earned cash by buying more Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay books, namely the Bestiary and a compilation of adventures. I'm supposed to be buying myself the Sandstorm supplement to work on a Greyhawk arc, but I can't seem to find the will to invest the £25 when I could be investing it in stuff I actually want.
Saturday afternoon was a lovely day, probably the best I've seen since I arrived. I discovered I live minutes away from Leicester Castle and Castle Gardens. Dragging my backside away from Sims 2 I went to the park where the May Day festival was in full swing by 2pm. It seemed every Goth, Pagan and Gandalf-look-alike had turned up for the festival, and I wandered around, listened to the folk music, mused on missing the maypole dance and chilled for half an hour. Not much was happening, so I decided after spotting several Frodo Baggins-alikes to wander off into town. I should point out that as a stupid fool I forgot to bring my camera as I could've taken some interesting photographs.
Thankfully there wasn't a wicker man in sight so I snuck off into town and relieved myself of some hard-earned cash by buying more Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay books, namely the Bestiary and a compilation of adventures. I'm supposed to be buying myself the Sandstorm supplement to work on a Greyhawk arc, but I can't seem to find the will to invest the £25 when I could be investing it in stuff I actually want.
Friday, April 29, 2005
Stuart's Friday Link: The Diary of a Crazed Mimbanite
In keeping with the whole Star Wars/Indy discussion - The Diary of a Crazed Mimbanite
Raiders of the Lost Code
Last night about 4:30pm last night there was a problem with a student's C++ code so I went to help her debug it. She had written all the code but the compiler was not compiling it, thinking it was an empty file. So I went along, closed down her existing windows and opened a few of my own to poke about. Net result - reverting from her finished code to an empty skeleton file.
Convinced I'd somehow lost a day's work for her, she got very stressed. I ummed and ammed, similarly convinced that I'd not done a very stupid thing and that in fact she had saved her work in the wrong folder, not lost all her work. I even (for I am a Linux noob it has to be said) got one of my colleagues in, looked around, found nothing and started talking extension. He thought it best we assume responsiblity given the doubt (and the student was very earnest in thinking she was screwed as she had 2 more assignments due in, a train ride home to catch, a project etc.)
About 15 mins later she came back to the office saying she'd actually saved her code in the wrong directory and was very apologetic. She even came back this morning to drop off a box of chocs for yours truly.
So the story had a happy ending.
Convinced I'd somehow lost a day's work for her, she got very stressed. I ummed and ammed, similarly convinced that I'd not done a very stupid thing and that in fact she had saved her work in the wrong folder, not lost all her work. I even (for I am a Linux noob it has to be said) got one of my colleagues in, looked around, found nothing and started talking extension. He thought it best we assume responsiblity given the doubt (and the student was very earnest in thinking she was screwed as she had 2 more assignments due in, a train ride home to catch, a project etc.)
About 15 mins later she came back to the office saying she'd actually saved her code in the wrong directory and was very apologetic. She even came back this morning to drop off a box of chocs for yours truly.
So the story had a happy ending.
Thursday, April 28, 2005
Get A Virtual Life...
On an unsuccessful trip to get my phone fixed at the market place I picked up a copy of Sims 2 really dirt cheap. You won't hear from me for a while... don't be worried. :)
Warm Weather Lately
I've been feeling a wee bit unwell of late (cue for awwww) as I woke up yesterday with a wopping temperature and staggered up to work. For the past couple of days I've been feeling really knackered and the usual 20 min walk to work has left me feeling uncomfortably warm while for the last 3 weeks it's been nice and relaxing.
I suspect this is my body telling me its time to stop the pizza and ice cream and go join the gym, but I think I've picked up some virus from the great unwashed. At least if my heating fails I'll be sorted...
I suspect this is my body telling me its time to stop the pizza and ice cream and go join the gym, but I think I've picked up some virus from the great unwashed. At least if my heating fails I'll be sorted...
Wednesday, April 27, 2005
Star Wars The TV Show and Young Indiana Jones?
Star Wars is going to continue after Revenge of the Sith with a TV show, maybe two. Rumours abound it will bridge the gap between Episode 3 and 4, or venture into the Expanded Universe (an animated adaption of the Zahn trilogy would be great, though Zahn's books are not exactly cinematic). It might be live action or a cartoon like Clone Wars, or pilot some new 3D technology George wants to play with. It's also mentioned it might be like the Young Indiana Jones TV show.
If you haven't seen Young Indiana Jones it's 3 seasons of stories featuring er... young Indy... learning life and eventually growing into Harrison Ford. Ford even had a cameo in one episode. Typically you'd see old Indy telling some story which would flashback to either him as a very small boy (played by some kid) or as a young man (Sean Patrick Flaherty), spanning from 1900s-1920s.
However to make things more artificial more or less every week without fail Indy would meet some historic figure that would impact his life. I assume this was some attempt to add education into the mix. It got a bit silly to be honest... for instance:-
"While going to college and working in a speakeasy, Indy meets up jazz great Sidney Bechet who teaches him how to play the blues. Unfortunately, Indy also crosses paths with Al Capone and it's only with the assistance of his dorm roommate, Eliot Ness, that Indy is able to solve a vicious murder and prevent himself from ending up dead. (jeez - Chicago is a small town isn't it?)
"To keep him from getting into any more trouble, Indy is sent to visit his aunt in New Mexico. While there, he is kidnapped by Pancho Villa and swept up into the Mexican Revolution."
"On a military mission, Indy rescues a small child in an African village, and encounters the legendary Albert Schweitzer, and helps him in his jungle hospital."
"Young Indy meets the 26th President of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt while on safari in Kenya."
"After being assigned to the Lafayette Escadrille flying squadron, Indy encounters notorious German flying ace Baron von Richthofen; then goes undercover to persuade aircraft designer Anthony Fokker to defect from Germany." (not bad going for a 19 year old American in 1916).
and my personal favourite...
"Love - well, first infatuation - smites Young Indy in colorful Old Vienna where he falls for the daughter of Archduke Francis Ferdinand. Needing emotional guidance in his own crisis, Young Indy sounds out Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung on what love is all about." (not bad for a 9 year old).
So as you can see this stretches the credibility of the show just a little. The show itself is not exactly brilliant in my opinion, though it does seem like the critics loved it. Ok - it's watchable and boasts a pretty stellar cast (though Sean Patrick Flaherty is no Harrison Ford, but he's good on the Dead Zone).
The first time I saw Young Indy was when someone loaned me the video "Train of Doom". They were giving it away free with the movie trilogy video set. I should've been suspicious given the fellow told me to keep the extra video.
Train wreck of doom more like.
Each Young Indy video had a documentary telling you about the historic period it was set in, and George mentioned how the series had won critical acclaim for it's realistic portrayal of World War I.
Yeah - like in the Treasure of the Peacock's Eye (I was a sucker and bought another video thinking it might actually be a proper Indy adventure), where Indy and his sidekick leap out of the trenches into No-Man's Land to chase an Indian guy who stole a treasure map off them. Thankfully all the German troops in the adjoining trench were taking a nap so they didn't bother to obliterate Indy, the side-kick or the Indian map nicker.
Or like in Train of Doom is set during World War I. Indy, a member of the Belgium army ('cos like no Yank was in the War until 1917) is sent from the trenches to join this regiment of old fellas to blow up a massive gun mounted on a train. He succeeds and ends up reporting to what can only be the fathers of the two British airmen from 'Allo 'Allo.
Realistic depiction of World War I? Chase sequences in No-Man's Land? American in the Belgium army?
I guess George was listening to his Yes-men at Lucasfilm.
As an addendum, the regiment of old British soldiers and possibly the gun is real if I remember it correctly.
Even more oddly I could not see how on Earth the Indy portrayed in Young Indiana Jones could grow into the relatively ruthless treasure hunter of the movies. In "Treasure of the Peacock's Eye" Indy re-encounters his old pal Albert Schweitzer who convinces him life is more important than finding treasure and rather than chase the Peacock's Eye he decides to go help some sick African kids. Err... ok.
Anyway, what cued this rant was that I watched yet another episode on BBC 2 the other day. This was was where Young Indy went to New York in the 1920s and got a job working on a Broadway musical with the help of George Gershwin. Young Indy gets to trade quips with the famed and razor-witted Algonquin Round Table when he is not soothing temperamental stars, romancing three different women at once, and worrying about suspicious backstage malfunctionings.
Basically, rather than getting Raiders of the Lost Ark I got a plot that Coronation Street has recycled three times and a "realistic" depiction of 1920s New York.
So - umm... in summary- George - don't make any Star Wars series the same way you made Young Indiana Jones! Step back and let the guy who did Clone Wars do his stuff!
If you haven't seen Young Indiana Jones it's 3 seasons of stories featuring er... young Indy... learning life and eventually growing into Harrison Ford. Ford even had a cameo in one episode. Typically you'd see old Indy telling some story which would flashback to either him as a very small boy (played by some kid) or as a young man (Sean Patrick Flaherty), spanning from 1900s-1920s.
However to make things more artificial more or less every week without fail Indy would meet some historic figure that would impact his life. I assume this was some attempt to add education into the mix. It got a bit silly to be honest... for instance:-
"While going to college and working in a speakeasy, Indy meets up jazz great Sidney Bechet who teaches him how to play the blues. Unfortunately, Indy also crosses paths with Al Capone and it's only with the assistance of his dorm roommate, Eliot Ness, that Indy is able to solve a vicious murder and prevent himself from ending up dead. (jeez - Chicago is a small town isn't it?)
"To keep him from getting into any more trouble, Indy is sent to visit his aunt in New Mexico. While there, he is kidnapped by Pancho Villa and swept up into the Mexican Revolution."
"On a military mission, Indy rescues a small child in an African village, and encounters the legendary Albert Schweitzer, and helps him in his jungle hospital."
"Young Indy meets the 26th President of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt while on safari in Kenya."
"After being assigned to the Lafayette Escadrille flying squadron, Indy encounters notorious German flying ace Baron von Richthofen; then goes undercover to persuade aircraft designer Anthony Fokker to defect from Germany." (not bad going for a 19 year old American in 1916).
and my personal favourite...
"Love - well, first infatuation - smites Young Indy in colorful Old Vienna where he falls for the daughter of Archduke Francis Ferdinand. Needing emotional guidance in his own crisis, Young Indy sounds out Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung on what love is all about." (not bad for a 9 year old).
So as you can see this stretches the credibility of the show just a little. The show itself is not exactly brilliant in my opinion, though it does seem like the critics loved it. Ok - it's watchable and boasts a pretty stellar cast (though Sean Patrick Flaherty is no Harrison Ford, but he's good on the Dead Zone).
The first time I saw Young Indy was when someone loaned me the video "Train of Doom". They were giving it away free with the movie trilogy video set. I should've been suspicious given the fellow told me to keep the extra video.
Train wreck of doom more like.
Each Young Indy video had a documentary telling you about the historic period it was set in, and George mentioned how the series had won critical acclaim for it's realistic portrayal of World War I.
Yeah - like in the Treasure of the Peacock's Eye (I was a sucker and bought another video thinking it might actually be a proper Indy adventure), where Indy and his sidekick leap out of the trenches into No-Man's Land to chase an Indian guy who stole a treasure map off them. Thankfully all the German troops in the adjoining trench were taking a nap so they didn't bother to obliterate Indy, the side-kick or the Indian map nicker.
Or like in Train of Doom is set during World War I. Indy, a member of the Belgium army ('cos like no Yank was in the War until 1917) is sent from the trenches to join this regiment of old fellas to blow up a massive gun mounted on a train. He succeeds and ends up reporting to what can only be the fathers of the two British airmen from 'Allo 'Allo.
Realistic depiction of World War I? Chase sequences in No-Man's Land? American in the Belgium army?
I guess George was listening to his Yes-men at Lucasfilm.
As an addendum, the regiment of old British soldiers and possibly the gun is real if I remember it correctly.
Even more oddly I could not see how on Earth the Indy portrayed in Young Indiana Jones could grow into the relatively ruthless treasure hunter of the movies. In "Treasure of the Peacock's Eye" Indy re-encounters his old pal Albert Schweitzer who convinces him life is more important than finding treasure and rather than chase the Peacock's Eye he decides to go help some sick African kids. Err... ok.
Anyway, what cued this rant was that I watched yet another episode on BBC 2 the other day. This was was where Young Indy went to New York in the 1920s and got a job working on a Broadway musical with the help of George Gershwin. Young Indy gets to trade quips with the famed and razor-witted Algonquin Round Table when he is not soothing temperamental stars, romancing three different women at once, and worrying about suspicious backstage malfunctionings.
Basically, rather than getting Raiders of the Lost Ark I got a plot that Coronation Street has recycled three times and a "realistic" depiction of 1920s New York.
So - umm... in summary- George - don't make any Star Wars series the same way you made Young Indiana Jones! Step back and let the guy who did Clone Wars do his stuff!
Tuesday, April 26, 2005
For it is an imminent date...
"Woe to me, oh Earth and Sea, for the convener sends the date with speed, because he knows the time is short...Let him who hath understanding reckon the date of the viva for it is an increasingly imminent date, its date is 24th of June 2005."
Found out when my viva is. Yikes.
Found out when my viva is. Yikes.
Monday, April 25, 2005
The Obligitory Weekend Post
Well if this is how exciting Leicester gets I must go back to Dundee soon or I'll be insane. I had so little to do at work on Friday I finished at 2:30pm and went into town.
I looked into getting my phone fixed. Maybe its me but I realise that mobile phones in this day and age are disposable but the numbers in this particular phone are not. It's not like I can just, say, phone someone up and ask them their mobile number is it? The guy in Vodafone basically told me to go buy a new phone from their crappy range, while some geezer down the market had the phone out of my hand and in pieces trying to work out why it was broke before I could say, "Oi! That's my phone."
As you may recall the problem with the phone is the power-charger interface is worn away on both the phone and the charger so geezer reckons for £10 he could get me an external charger to get the battery working again. When he slipped in a new battery the phone worked fine, so I am going to invest the £10 now to get my numbers back and then buy a new contract phone in the next 2 months or so.
Spent most of the weekend puttering around the flat doing DIY stuff like nailing down the carpet on the stairs, sorting out the light bulbs and buying a dust-devil to clean out the car with. The latter led me to discover just how ugly 1 year's worth of dirt in a car is, muchless the remnants of my dad's bananas and pears he'd eaten all the way to Dundee.
Overdosed on chocolate, ice cream and other nice things but I ate 2 bananas a day and extra veg with my roast beef dinner so that's cool. I watched the cinematic treat of Krull, the latest Doctor Who and the Paul McGann Doctor Who movie (which is still pretty good in my mind at least).
I even bought a copy of the "War of the Ring" and spent most of Saturday convinced I was the Alexander of Middle Earth (barring the Irish/Greek accent, 70s Pat Sharp quiff and homo-eroticism of course) until I got so bored I abandoned all sense of tactics, let Frodo wander off on his own and get killed by an orc and still completed the damn mission with 7 of the Fellowship dead or missing in Lothlorien. Obviously the "Easy Mode" does what it says on the tin. And I am no amazing general.
I also invested in the new Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay system. The book printing itself is fantastic, the insanity system is much more debilitating (like you no longer gain heroic idiocy: immunity to fear, but rather really chilling abberations like pyromania, paranoia and obsession are all distinct possibilities), the combat system does feel a little suspiciously D&D/D20 in that it is now divided into 2 half-actions, typically a move-attack combo, or with Charge and Defencive options (was this the case before?).
They don't use D20s though, the old percantile mechanic is still left in. Also you no longer get any choice on your starting character, in the olden days you chose Ranger, Fighter, Wizard or Academic if I remember correctly. Now it's all completely random.
Nice book though.
I looked into getting my phone fixed. Maybe its me but I realise that mobile phones in this day and age are disposable but the numbers in this particular phone are not. It's not like I can just, say, phone someone up and ask them their mobile number is it? The guy in Vodafone basically told me to go buy a new phone from their crappy range, while some geezer down the market had the phone out of my hand and in pieces trying to work out why it was broke before I could say, "Oi! That's my phone."
As you may recall the problem with the phone is the power-charger interface is worn away on both the phone and the charger so geezer reckons for £10 he could get me an external charger to get the battery working again. When he slipped in a new battery the phone worked fine, so I am going to invest the £10 now to get my numbers back and then buy a new contract phone in the next 2 months or so.
Spent most of the weekend puttering around the flat doing DIY stuff like nailing down the carpet on the stairs, sorting out the light bulbs and buying a dust-devil to clean out the car with. The latter led me to discover just how ugly 1 year's worth of dirt in a car is, muchless the remnants of my dad's bananas and pears he'd eaten all the way to Dundee.
Overdosed on chocolate, ice cream and other nice things but I ate 2 bananas a day and extra veg with my roast beef dinner so that's cool. I watched the cinematic treat of Krull, the latest Doctor Who and the Paul McGann Doctor Who movie (which is still pretty good in my mind at least).
I even bought a copy of the "War of the Ring" and spent most of Saturday convinced I was the Alexander of Middle Earth (barring the Irish/Greek accent, 70s Pat Sharp quiff and homo-eroticism of course) until I got so bored I abandoned all sense of tactics, let Frodo wander off on his own and get killed by an orc and still completed the damn mission with 7 of the Fellowship dead or missing in Lothlorien. Obviously the "Easy Mode" does what it says on the tin. And I am no amazing general.
I also invested in the new Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay system. The book printing itself is fantastic, the insanity system is much more debilitating (like you no longer gain heroic idiocy: immunity to fear, but rather really chilling abberations like pyromania, paranoia and obsession are all distinct possibilities), the combat system does feel a little suspiciously D&D/D20 in that it is now divided into 2 half-actions, typically a move-attack combo, or with Charge and Defencive options (was this the case before?).
They don't use D20s though, the old percantile mechanic is still left in. Also you no longer get any choice on your starting character, in the olden days you chose Ranger, Fighter, Wizard or Academic if I remember correctly. Now it's all completely random.
Nice book though.
Friday, April 22, 2005
Stuart's Other Friday Link
Dammit - it'd have been a sure shoe-horn for this link if I'd found it sooner. Enjoy this special mystery link.
Stuart's Friday Link: A Fellow Vauxhall Owner
A fellow Vauxhall owner details some small improvements he made to his car to allow it to fit his lifestyle. Brilliant.
Wednesday, April 20, 2005
This month I have been watching...
I watch films. Possibly too many. Here's my thoughts on them...
The Sword and the Sorcerer: Conan with no money, too much nudity and an illogical plot. If only I could erase it from my memory.
Bubba-Hotep: Elvis and JFK track down a mummy attacking an old folk's home. Bruce Campbell at his best, but this is pretty good, not stellar as the reviews I read implied.
Constantine: Keanu Reeves as Keanu saves the world from demons thanks to some twins. Passable but I'm told the comic is better.
Ring 2: Passable, but ultimately a retread of the original US Ring. The Japanese Ring 2 was much better.
Warriors of Heaven and Earth: Not a Power-Rangers movie as the title suggests, this is actually a pretty good movie set in the Gobi Desert, the story follows two protagonists, Lieutenant Li, who is being chased by the heroic Japanese emissary Lai Xi for not butchering innocents. Unfortunately the rivalry between the two chaps is not resolved properly, but the effects and story is good. I think they hired the voice cast of Icewind Dale and Baldur's Gate to dub this film.
Shogun Assassin: Hack-slash gorefest. Very good.
Hackers: Angelina Jolie? A hacker? Everyone else at this school hacks defence systems like they were going out of business. So you can hack into the school's computers and remotely set off the sprinkler systems? Pure crap.
Lethal Weapon 2: Mel and Danny blow things up but with Joe Pesci as comic relief. South Africans are evil, except for ones played by Patsy Kensit. Lesson learned.
Earthsea: Pure pish. A vacuous adaption of a good series of novels except with all the good bits either removed or mucked about with unnecessarily.
Krull: Cheesy classic sci-fi fantasy. Brilliant.
The Sword and the Sorcerer: Conan with no money, too much nudity and an illogical plot. If only I could erase it from my memory.
Bubba-Hotep: Elvis and JFK track down a mummy attacking an old folk's home. Bruce Campbell at his best, but this is pretty good, not stellar as the reviews I read implied.
Constantine: Keanu Reeves as Keanu saves the world from demons thanks to some twins. Passable but I'm told the comic is better.
Ring 2: Passable, but ultimately a retread of the original US Ring. The Japanese Ring 2 was much better.
Warriors of Heaven and Earth: Not a Power-Rangers movie as the title suggests, this is actually a pretty good movie set in the Gobi Desert, the story follows two protagonists, Lieutenant Li, who is being chased by the heroic Japanese emissary Lai Xi for not butchering innocents. Unfortunately the rivalry between the two chaps is not resolved properly, but the effects and story is good. I think they hired the voice cast of Icewind Dale and Baldur's Gate to dub this film.
Shogun Assassin: Hack-slash gorefest. Very good.
Hackers: Angelina Jolie? A hacker? Everyone else at this school hacks defence systems like they were going out of business. So you can hack into the school's computers and remotely set off the sprinkler systems? Pure crap.
Lethal Weapon 2: Mel and Danny blow things up but with Joe Pesci as comic relief. South Africans are evil, except for ones played by Patsy Kensit. Lesson learned.
Earthsea: Pure pish. A vacuous adaption of a good series of novels except with all the good bits either removed or mucked about with unnecessarily.
Krull: Cheesy classic sci-fi fantasy. Brilliant.
Shogun Assassin 2
Some person obviously liked Shogun Assassin enough to post an entire video capture of the entire final fight, so now you can see for yourself how cool it is to see three evil dudes standoff against our hero and get their behinds handed to them replete with the cheesy 80s pop music in the background. Additional gore can be found here.
Snails, Yanks, Football and Suspicious White Powder, Oh My!
Returned to Leicester yesterday but took a more interesting route home and only took about 9 hours to do so. I stopped in Jedburgh, my old home town long before I came to Dundee. It's been over 16 years since I visited Jedburgh and it is now a very pretty little town. I even bought two bags of Jethart Snails, the local sweets. Basically they're minty brown sweets shaped like snails and they're sitting on my shelf waiting for visitors to stop by to sample.
After the weirdness of visiting my old home town, including our old house and my old school, I headed on to Newcastle, where I discovered the service station's Burger King had been taken over by Americans.
I finally made it back to Leicester at 7pm in time to discover that every space for a mile round my flat/house was taken up with football fans getting free parking. I had to park at DeMontfort Uni and walk down. To pass time until 10pm (by which time oodles of spaces opened up as the match ended) I watched The Sword and the Sorcerer, a truly awful film. I joke not! Never have I wished for a film to end, only to discover with chilling horror there might be a sequel!
After 10pm I drove my car to Ullswater to unpack only to discover that for some reason my mother had given me a sugar-bin with sugar inside it. Now sugar bins are not the most sealable container so I discovered that as it was at 90 degrees to the rest of the contents of that bag it had spilled over my car boot. I spent about an hour unpacking my boot and removing the boot's floor to try to spill all the sugar on to the street. I also had a coffee-bin full of coffee. I should point out I have both sugar and coffee in my flat. In fact the only thing I need is bread in my bread-bin, was nowhere to be seen.
Weird.
So don't ask why there is a pavement of suspicious white powder outside my car. Or why all my possessions are coated in sugar.
After the weirdness of visiting my old home town, including our old house and my old school, I headed on to Newcastle, where I discovered the service station's Burger King had been taken over by Americans.
I finally made it back to Leicester at 7pm in time to discover that every space for a mile round my flat/house was taken up with football fans getting free parking. I had to park at DeMontfort Uni and walk down. To pass time until 10pm (by which time oodles of spaces opened up as the match ended) I watched The Sword and the Sorcerer, a truly awful film. I joke not! Never have I wished for a film to end, only to discover with chilling horror there might be a sequel!
After 10pm I drove my car to Ullswater to unpack only to discover that for some reason my mother had given me a sugar-bin with sugar inside it. Now sugar bins are not the most sealable container so I discovered that as it was at 90 degrees to the rest of the contents of that bag it had spilled over my car boot. I spent about an hour unpacking my boot and removing the boot's floor to try to spill all the sugar on to the street. I also had a coffee-bin full of coffee. I should point out I have both sugar and coffee in my flat. In fact the only thing I need is bread in my bread-bin, was nowhere to be seen.
Weird.
So don't ask why there is a pavement of suspicious white powder outside my car. Or why all my possessions are coated in sugar.
Monday, April 18, 2005
Who Should I Vote For
I took this test even though I am one of the disenfranchised few (I might be too late to register for a postal vote). I voted Liberal because my usual option of voting SNP wasn't there. Incidentally my real voting tendancies are not-Tory or Labour rather than SNP before you think I'm completely loony.
----
Who should I vote for?
Your expected outcome:
Liberal Democrat
Your actual outcome:
Labour -26
Conservative -27
Liberal Democrat 40
UK Independence Party 4
Green 18
You should vote: Liberal Democrat
The LibDems take a strong stand against tax cuts and a strong one in favour of public services: they would make long-term residential care for the elderly free across the UK, and scrap university tuition fees. They are in favour of a ban on smoking in public places, but would relax laws on cannabis. They propose to change vehicle taxation to be based on usage rather than ownership
----
Who should I vote for?
Your expected outcome:
Liberal Democrat
Your actual outcome:
Labour -26
Conservative -27
Liberal Democrat 40
UK Independence Party 4
Green 18
You should vote: Liberal Democrat
The LibDems take a strong stand against tax cuts and a strong one in favour of public services: they would make long-term residential care for the elderly free across the UK, and scrap university tuition fees. They are in favour of a ban on smoking in public places, but would relax laws on cannabis. They propose to change vehicle taxation to be based on usage rather than ownership
Sunday, April 17, 2005
Dr Stu on Doctor Who 2
Doctor Who - Aliens of London. I have to admit it, I am now sold on this whole Doctor Who thing. The new series is just awesome and its great having something to watch on Saturday nights that isn't totally vacuous like "Come Dancing" or Ant and Dec's sketch show, Blind Date or whatever other grue they dredge up. Sadly I missed the Victorian one but it didn't really impact on this episode and having BBC3 at home I watched the documentary afterwards as well.
Ok - maybe a few less fart jokes would've been good. Damn good cliffhanger though and its nice to have London as the centre of an alien invasion rather than New York or Washington DC. Someday soon they'll invade Edinburgh and Glasgow once some Sci-Fi writer finds those towns on the map.
One question though - how the hell did Rose's council estate get an American TV station? Is this some thing to placate the Yanks?
Ok - maybe a few less fart jokes would've been good. Damn good cliffhanger though and its nice to have London as the centre of an alien invasion rather than New York or Washington DC. Someday soon they'll invade Edinburgh and Glasgow once some Sci-Fi writer finds those towns on the map.
One question though - how the hell did Rose's council estate get an American TV station? Is this some thing to placate the Yanks?
No Place Like Phone
So I am back in Dundee this weekend awaiting my submission deadline tomorrow. Hopefully it should be a doddle - print 3 copies of a document and bind it with temporary binders. No doubt it won't be...
The journey back took a long time. We left at 1:30 and arrived in Dundee at 11:30. Admittedly the first 30 miles out of Leicester took 1 hour. The shortcut we took seemed to have shaved off no time whatsoever but my dad drove it at about 50 mph in the dark so it might be better on the way back. Or worse...
In other news my mobile phone is dead. Ironically my dad had bought me a "present" of a new phone he wanted me to change to as it costs him less to call me on it. I told him as I was using my existing phone as my primary contact number any last minute changing of my number would result in people calling me, getting a message phone and me never checking said phone.
The problem is about a day after that my attempts to recharge the battery in my existing phone have failed and now the battery has died. Apparently the charger interface on both my charger and phone are knackered and I need to get a new outer casing. So if you've texted or phoned me this weekend I ain't got it.
The journey back took a long time. We left at 1:30 and arrived in Dundee at 11:30. Admittedly the first 30 miles out of Leicester took 1 hour. The shortcut we took seemed to have shaved off no time whatsoever but my dad drove it at about 50 mph in the dark so it might be better on the way back. Or worse...
In other news my mobile phone is dead. Ironically my dad had bought me a "present" of a new phone he wanted me to change to as it costs him less to call me on it. I told him as I was using my existing phone as my primary contact number any last minute changing of my number would result in people calling me, getting a message phone and me never checking said phone.
The problem is about a day after that my attempts to recharge the battery in my existing phone have failed and now the battery has died. Apparently the charger interface on both my charger and phone are knackered and I need to get a new outer casing. So if you've texted or phoned me this weekend I ain't got it.
Friday, April 15, 2005
Stuart's Friday Link: Nintendo the Musical
See if you can recognise all the games in this musical number. This link was brought to you by the letter A and thanks to Stevie.
Thursday, April 14, 2005
All I Want For Christmas
In keeping with our vague samurai/kung-fu theme I would like to draw everyone's attention to this cool gizmo which I want. As everyone knows I am the master on the Eye-Toy, imagine the damage I could do with this fabulous machine! (The movies make it look even weirder).
Wednesday, April 13, 2005
The Visitor - Part Deux
After a relatively dull day at work during which time I thought my pa was out shopping I came back to find that he'd cleaned out the entire kitchen so it had that Flash-commerical-like-gleam and bought 3 fruit bowls worth of fruit. He's convinced I'm not eating enough fruit and veg at the moment (which is fairdos) and keeps trying to force-feed me pears, apples, oranges and cups of tea (which as some of you know I freakishly don't drink).
We went out for more shopping last night to get food for two at Morrisons and I bought us a freezer load of food and enough cleaning supplies to clean the place out and get rid of all the nasty odours. With the hot water on in the flat for more than 5 minutes it proved to be a lot easier to clean, so we finished off cleaning the kitchen and started on the bathroom (which was pretty shameful but now looks extra shiny).
I even had the energy to sort through my collection of junk mail, wherein I found a ScreenSelect DVD of Krull, which looks suspiciously like junk mail and could've been sitting there for weeks. Rather than watch that I hooked up the TV and DVD player downstairs and we watched some episodes of Sherlock Holmes and had pizza, chips, the works.
I'm actually really enjoying having someone else stay over in my place. I guess I'm officially all grownup now, but on my own I never seemed to have the energy to clean up the place properly (which it sorely needed initially). Obviously my dad has put the kyposh on watching such cinematic greats as Shogun Assassin again as ironically he detests all fantasy films and sci-fi shows except Lord of the Rings, but the old ITV Sherlock Holmes is pretty cool.
He was due to go back to Dundee on Thursday but I've reminded myself that I have to submit a thesis in Dundee on Monday, so rather than him catching his return train I've suggested we both drive up in the Stu Mobile (the nom-de-plume of my little Corsa which has so far avoided mention in this blog). Dad's happy with this, though Mum's a bit peeved he could've saved money by only getting a one-way ticket.
We went out for more shopping last night to get food for two at Morrisons and I bought us a freezer load of food and enough cleaning supplies to clean the place out and get rid of all the nasty odours. With the hot water on in the flat for more than 5 minutes it proved to be a lot easier to clean, so we finished off cleaning the kitchen and started on the bathroom (which was pretty shameful but now looks extra shiny).
I even had the energy to sort through my collection of junk mail, wherein I found a ScreenSelect DVD of Krull, which looks suspiciously like junk mail and could've been sitting there for weeks. Rather than watch that I hooked up the TV and DVD player downstairs and we watched some episodes of Sherlock Holmes and had pizza, chips, the works.
I'm actually really enjoying having someone else stay over in my place. I guess I'm officially all grownup now, but on my own I never seemed to have the energy to clean up the place properly (which it sorely needed initially). Obviously my dad has put the kyposh on watching such cinematic greats as Shogun Assassin again as ironically he detests all fantasy films and sci-fi shows except Lord of the Rings, but the old ITV Sherlock Holmes is pretty cool.
He was due to go back to Dundee on Thursday but I've reminded myself that I have to submit a thesis in Dundee on Monday, so rather than him catching his return train I've suggested we both drive up in the Stu Mobile (the nom-de-plume of my little Corsa which has so far avoided mention in this blog). Dad's happy with this, though Mum's a bit peeved he could've saved money by only getting a one-way ticket.
Movie Watch
I watched Shogun Assassin of Kill Bill vol. 2 fame this week courtesy of Mr. Torsten. Very good film. The plot is totally nonsensical but there is lots of blood-shed and gore. It's incomprehensible as it is apparently a dubbed hatchet job of the first 2 films of the Lone Wolf and Cub series. Worth checking out, but I bet watching all the films in the right order would be better.
Addendum: This is my favourite piece of dialogue in the entire film. The music in the background should tell you what the soundtrack is like as well.
Addendum: This is my favourite piece of dialogue in the entire film. The music in the background should tell you what the soundtrack is like as well.
Phishing for Trouble
Took the MailFrontier Phishing IQ Test here and got 8/10. I am so good at spotting spam these days.
Tuesday, April 12, 2005
Sound of the Sith
The Revenge of the Sith soundtrack sounds great. Looking back on Ep1 and 2's soundtracks they never were as good as the original 3's soundtracks which had memorable bits like the asteroid chase, the final duel in the Death Star, the first Death Star assault, the death of Obi-Wan and so forth. Ep1 had Duels of the Fates and I'm hard pushed to remember any memorable score in Ep2.
Ep3 however has the Anakin vs. Obi-Wan theme which is dark, dark, dark, and a lot of memorable gothic style choir sequences. Hopefully this film won't suck...
Ep3 however has the Anakin vs. Obi-Wan theme which is dark, dark, dark, and a lot of memorable gothic style choir sequences. Hopefully this film won't suck...
The Visitor
I got through to the Lettings Co at 10ish to complain about the boiler and they said they'd get on it. Around 12ish my dad called to let me know he was arriving in Leicester around 4ish. Unfortunately this meant I had no time to get food in or clean the place up a little more. I also didn't even managed to get the heating on, and as I drove down to pick dad up at around 4:30 I got a phonecall telling me that the Letting lot had got the boiler man to pop down around 5ish to show me how to work the boiler.
Taking dad to the flat, getting him and listening to him saying how the place looked so rundown as we unpacked I decided to show him the boiler. On my first try I managed to get the thing lit. Dad tried as well and it worked. Then we tried several times as we waited until 6:15pm Mr Pattel and his silent assistantant, pair of Asian handymen who as far as I could tell had no id or whatever and thus strike me as the local Delboy and Rodney, knocked on the door. They came around and subsequently completely failed to turn the boiler on or let me show them where I was going wrong. In fact they took it to pieces and then finally got it working.
After that it was a trip to Asda to buy a spare duvet and some necessaries like coffee, tea, cheese and crackers and so forth and a hearty stake dinner down the pub before we went back to the gaff and Dad nodded off in the armchair.
Taking dad to the flat, getting him and listening to him saying how the place looked so rundown as we unpacked I decided to show him the boiler. On my first try I managed to get the thing lit. Dad tried as well and it worked. Then we tried several times as we waited until 6:15pm Mr Pattel and his silent assistantant, pair of Asian handymen who as far as I could tell had no id or whatever and thus strike me as the local Delboy and Rodney, knocked on the door. They came around and subsequently completely failed to turn the boiler on or let me show them where I was going wrong. In fact they took it to pieces and then finally got it working.
After that it was a trip to Asda to buy a spare duvet and some necessaries like coffee, tea, cheese and crackers and so forth and a hearty stake dinner down the pub before we went back to the gaff and Dad nodded off in the armchair.
Sunday, April 10, 2005
Battlemasters
Boiler died again on Saturday morning. Perfect timing as the Lettings place is closed on Saturdays. Obviously I'm more than a little irked and after 4-5 tries of "start the boiler" I decided to not let it rule my every waking moment and go to Battlemasters.
Not a great start. The boiler had delayed me sufficiently that I was the first person to not get a bag of freebies for going through the door. Furthermore I discovered Battlemasters is the kind of con where there are two factions:- the Eurolog players and the Living campaign players.
Game 1 - Sokal: This is the Eurolog answer to a living campaign and they proudly state it is older than any other such campaign. Unlike most living campaigns you are given a pre-genned character who you advance throughout the scenarios. There are other players who have the same character so I presume if two Bill the Clerics turn up there are problems.
However the game itself was ok though there was a deluge of information I didn't rightly understand. As you play pregens I presume the missions are much more tailored to the individual characters, especially seeing as one of the PCs was Slick the Kobold King.
As I said the game was ok except for the fact we were relatively in the shadow of the kobold king, and I rightly didn't understand everything.
Game 2 - Cthulu: Best game of the weekend, we were playing factory workers in 1946 who discovered that the neighbouring workship was used as a site for numerous acid bath murders and that these grizzly killings had awoken something beneath the workshop.
This was a great game, though the DM didn't have any pregen characters, instead passing us Delta Green characters and telling us to tweak them for the 1940s. For instance it is not likely that factory workers are likely to have Computer Use as a skill. I tweaked mine, putting points into other skills like Spot Hidden and but it was obvious others hadn't done quite the same.
This led to the creation of another player's character, swiftly named "Clever" Trevor. Despite being only a factory worker Trev had a beyond professional skill in Psychology, knew martial arts and was an adept chemist. Clearly wasted in the manual labour profession Trevor was also prone to bouts of insanity that include smoking cigarettes dipped in sulphuric acid and trying to kill small children.
The other characters were much more responsibly put together and it was a relatively cinematic session.
Game 3 - Sarbreenar 1: Sarbreenar is the relatively larger cousin to Sokal, a living city set in Sarbreenar. I have a 2nd level character I've been playing for the past 3 or so years (advancement is extra slow in Scotland as there are so few cons Sarbreenar supports). Sarbreenar is probably Living Greyhawk's chief competitor, though overall Onnwal gets more bums on seats across the country owing to the fact you don't need to go to cons to play.
I played a 2nd level character in a 6th level party. To be honest after playing for 8 hours anyway I slept through most of this, not taking part in the first big fight as it was an arena fight and I was too weak. For the 2nd fight a Cause Fear spell took care of my character in the initial rounds. Somehow I came out of it as a level 3 charactr with a +1 longsword and doubled my gold. Oh well.
Game 4 - Sarbreenar 2: After the previous night's pathetic performance I decided I'd go play Cthulu as that had proven a lot more fun than the other two games. I was now on the Sokal radar though and kept being asked if I wouldn't mind playing it again (ah... bless!) It turned out however that it was only me and a girl I'd played Cthulu with in the other slot who were down for our table so I swiftly changed to Sarbreenar rather than not play anything at all.
This was a party of 3rd to 5th level PCs. After last night's performance I was 3rd so I was actually roughly the same power level as the rest of the party. However about 5 mins into the scenario I was embarassed to discover I'd played the scenario already. So we switched it.
The game was a lot better. We had to go into a city secretly held by the Zhentarim (a bunch of Scarlet Brotherhood clones who seem to capture cities miles from their country's border for no real economic gain that I can tell, but enough of that) and rescue a goblin. It was a lot of fun as because I play a human I disguised myself as a Zhent and put on a Darth Vaderesque accent and the fools bought it.
Overall a good con, and now I'm here typing about it. Yay!
Not a great start. The boiler had delayed me sufficiently that I was the first person to not get a bag of freebies for going through the door. Furthermore I discovered Battlemasters is the kind of con where there are two factions:- the Eurolog players and the Living campaign players.
Game 1 - Sokal: This is the Eurolog answer to a living campaign and they proudly state it is older than any other such campaign. Unlike most living campaigns you are given a pre-genned character who you advance throughout the scenarios. There are other players who have the same character so I presume if two Bill the Clerics turn up there are problems.
However the game itself was ok though there was a deluge of information I didn't rightly understand. As you play pregens I presume the missions are much more tailored to the individual characters, especially seeing as one of the PCs was Slick the Kobold King.
As I said the game was ok except for the fact we were relatively in the shadow of the kobold king, and I rightly didn't understand everything.
Game 2 - Cthulu: Best game of the weekend, we were playing factory workers in 1946 who discovered that the neighbouring workship was used as a site for numerous acid bath murders and that these grizzly killings had awoken something beneath the workshop.
This was a great game, though the DM didn't have any pregen characters, instead passing us Delta Green characters and telling us to tweak them for the 1940s. For instance it is not likely that factory workers are likely to have Computer Use as a skill. I tweaked mine, putting points into other skills like Spot Hidden and but it was obvious others hadn't done quite the same.
This led to the creation of another player's character, swiftly named "Clever" Trevor. Despite being only a factory worker Trev had a beyond professional skill in Psychology, knew martial arts and was an adept chemist. Clearly wasted in the manual labour profession Trevor was also prone to bouts of insanity that include smoking cigarettes dipped in sulphuric acid and trying to kill small children.
The other characters were much more responsibly put together and it was a relatively cinematic session.
Game 3 - Sarbreenar 1: Sarbreenar is the relatively larger cousin to Sokal, a living city set in Sarbreenar. I have a 2nd level character I've been playing for the past 3 or so years (advancement is extra slow in Scotland as there are so few cons Sarbreenar supports). Sarbreenar is probably Living Greyhawk's chief competitor, though overall Onnwal gets more bums on seats across the country owing to the fact you don't need to go to cons to play.
I played a 2nd level character in a 6th level party. To be honest after playing for 8 hours anyway I slept through most of this, not taking part in the first big fight as it was an arena fight and I was too weak. For the 2nd fight a Cause Fear spell took care of my character in the initial rounds. Somehow I came out of it as a level 3 charactr with a +1 longsword and doubled my gold. Oh well.
Game 4 - Sarbreenar 2: After the previous night's pathetic performance I decided I'd go play Cthulu as that had proven a lot more fun than the other two games. I was now on the Sokal radar though and kept being asked if I wouldn't mind playing it again (ah... bless!) It turned out however that it was only me and a girl I'd played Cthulu with in the other slot who were down for our table so I swiftly changed to Sarbreenar rather than not play anything at all.
This was a party of 3rd to 5th level PCs. After last night's performance I was 3rd so I was actually roughly the same power level as the rest of the party. However about 5 mins into the scenario I was embarassed to discover I'd played the scenario already. So we switched it.
The game was a lot better. We had to go into a city secretly held by the Zhentarim (a bunch of Scarlet Brotherhood clones who seem to capture cities miles from their country's border for no real economic gain that I can tell, but enough of that) and rescue a goblin. It was a lot of fun as because I play a human I disguised myself as a Zhent and put on a Darth Vaderesque accent and the fools bought it.
Overall a good con, and now I'm here typing about it. Yay!
Friday, April 08, 2005
Stuart's Friday Link: Superman is a Dick
For this Friday's link I present Superman is a dick - a series of actual comic covers that prove Superman is a dick. Among my favourite is...
The caption for this reads:-
List of more pratical uses Superboy can make of a machine that can see through time:
1. Betting on the outcomes of sporting events.
2. Forseeing natural diasters and catastrophhe.
3. Letting Bruce Wayne know that his parents are going to be gunned down in front of his very eyes in a filthy alley, you dick.
The caption for this reads:-
List of more pratical uses Superboy can make of a machine that can see through time:
1. Betting on the outcomes of sporting events.
2. Forseeing natural diasters and catastrophhe.
3. Letting Bruce Wayne know that his parents are going to be gunned down in front of his very eyes in a filthy alley, you dick.
Snow Good
Snow. For crying out loud. About an hour ago I received word it was snowing in Dundee and I sniggered into my computer, safe in the knowledge that I am in a southerly climate where snow in April is as likely as seeing a llama... oh never mind. About one hour later the heavens burst in Leicester and we've just had a snow shower.
Anyway, it's goodbye from me, and goodbye from him. I'm off to Battlemasters this weekend, a local games convention that better be worth the £20 price tag. I'll be seeing old friends and hopefully making new ones.
As an addendum I'd like to mention the passing of Pope John Paul II. He's been Pope longer than I've been alive and I tried to follow the funeral on the webcast. Not everyone agreed with what he said but at least he had the strength of his convictions, which in these mediocre times is something...
Anyway, it's goodbye from me, and goodbye from him. I'm off to Battlemasters this weekend, a local games convention that better be worth the £20 price tag. I'll be seeing old friends and hopefully making new ones.
As an addendum I'd like to mention the passing of Pope John Paul II. He's been Pope longer than I've been alive and I tried to follow the funeral on the webcast. Not everyone agreed with what he said but at least he had the strength of his convictions, which in these mediocre times is something...
Leave Your Menchies There
Ok - boiler has pulled a Lazarus, the panties are in the newly arrived wheely bin as is anything else not belonging to me that shouldn't be there.
I've started working towards finishing my thesis, but the every growing collection of DVDs I've got to watch is also taking up time, as is that thing they call work. Steve sent me a bunch of DVDs in the post along with a picture of my wheelie bin. He's currently beating the people at ScreenSelect who as part of my free trial emailed me yesterday to say they'd sent me a copy of Hawk the Slayer on DVD and then mailed me to say I'd successfully returned it and was now getting Krull (spot a theme here?). All without actually sending me the aforementioned classic Hawk the Slayer DVD. I suspect my 5 free rents will pass very quickly at this rate...
My folks just called to tell me pa is going to get a train down to Leicester on Monday, which should be amusing as he's never travelled more than 5 miles by public transport in years.
In other news I have written as a sample exercise in php a guestbook for people to leave menchies in. It's very primitive mainly as all I really wanted to do was master the basics of SQL and PHP and move on rather than make it pretty. Leave yer menchies there. Or here. Or don't.
I've started working towards finishing my thesis, but the every growing collection of DVDs I've got to watch is also taking up time, as is that thing they call work. Steve sent me a bunch of DVDs in the post along with a picture of my wheelie bin. He's currently beating the people at ScreenSelect who as part of my free trial emailed me yesterday to say they'd sent me a copy of Hawk the Slayer on DVD and then mailed me to say I'd successfully returned it and was now getting Krull (spot a theme here?). All without actually sending me the aforementioned classic Hawk the Slayer DVD. I suspect my 5 free rents will pass very quickly at this rate...
My folks just called to tell me pa is going to get a train down to Leicester on Monday, which should be amusing as he's never travelled more than 5 miles by public transport in years.
In other news I have written as a sample exercise in php a guestbook for people to leave menchies in. It's very primitive mainly as all I really wanted to do was master the basics of SQL and PHP and move on rather than make it pretty. Leave yer menchies there. Or here. Or don't.
Thursday, April 07, 2005
I'm Sorry...
Please don't look at this link and don't even think of visiting this one.
I bet you will now visit them both won't you? Fine, see if I care, but have the sound on.
I bet you will now visit them both won't you? Fine, see if I care, but have the sound on.
Wednesday, April 06, 2005
Nigerian Scammers
I have $5,000,000,000 resting in an account and all I need is $4,000 to release it. Sound familiar? www.whatsthebloodypoint.com gets their own back. Where else will you find scammers so gullible they believe Rev. Wally Tightnuts is a real person?
Send in the Clones
Star Wars Clone Wars are back for another 10 episodes or so, filling in the gap between Episodes 2 and 3 (seamless storytelling there George). Episodes 1-20 came out last year and were ok, though only the last few showed any real promise and storytelling. Episode 21 on the other hand is excellent, showing Anakin being made a Jedi Knight (not something that should've been in the films, eh George, like the rest of the fracking Clone Wars?) and other character development that Episode 1 sorely lacked and Episode 2 had but was incredibly stilted. The dialogue between Anakin and Padme in this cartoon is far, far, far superior than the sand stuff. Check it out, but obviously mere mortals who aren't lining Lucas's bank balance can only watch the small version of the file.
RIP Boiler (2005-2005)
Somewhere between 7am and 8am on the 6th of April it is believed that the boiler belonging to one Stuart Kerrigan's residence passed away peacefully in its sleep. Acquaintances knew Stuart's boiler well for its famous motorbike impression and for the warm reception it occasionally offered. Sources say the boiler enjoyed a long and happy life, functioning for nearly an entire 2 days with only minor noise pollution. Replacement boiler parts are said to be being elected, but it is not expected these will be ready in a timely fashion. On this matter Stuart held a press statement at 9am saying, "Brrr..." and "Fix my boiler" to the letting agency.
Tuesday, April 05, 2005
Stuart's Definitive Guide to LOTR Movies
Ok - we all know about the Peter Jackson movies. Some even know about the Ralph Bakshi effort, fewer still have seen the Rankin Bass addendum to the Bakshi effort, much less their superior version of The Hobbit* but how many have seen Humphrey Bogart's Lord of the Rings. I would like to point out I was going to post this on my site today anyway but Dr. Sordid beat me to it. Weird.
* which Bradley is going to return of course because he really should not have loaned it to other people without asking me
* which Bradley is going to return of course because he really should not have loaned it to other people without asking me
The Trials of Stuart Kerrigan, Part Three
Well, the boiler is fixed-ish. It sounds like a motorbike revving and I'm told needs a new fan that is on order, but it provides heat. Apparently the faulty fridge of doom is going to be fixed, as is the all-too-close-to-the-bathroom plug point.
Have you ever seen the Evil Dead movies? You know, the ones with Bruce Campbell in them running around a haunted house/medieval times getting clonked by various demon-infested appliances and yelling like a madman in pain...
I investigated the bathroom last night. The shower works, although it was not fitted to the adjuster properly and upon being switched on at the tap fell down the adjuster and clonked me on the head. It also has 2 settings, too cold and scalding, that I discovered the hard way. And it has what I have dubbed the "Exorcist Feature". In addition to falling down when switched on the shower head also has the amazing ability to rotate 360 degrees, spraying water everywhere and generally wetting all your clothes. Fortunately, after making these discoveries I think I have managed to screw it in place.
Have you ever seen the Evil Dead movies? You know, the ones with Bruce Campbell in them running around a haunted house/medieval times getting clonked by various demon-infested appliances and yelling like a madman in pain...
I investigated the bathroom last night. The shower works, although it was not fitted to the adjuster properly and upon being switched on at the tap fell down the adjuster and clonked me on the head. It also has 2 settings, too cold and scalding, that I discovered the hard way. And it has what I have dubbed the "Exorcist Feature". In addition to falling down when switched on the shower head also has the amazing ability to rotate 360 degrees, spraying water everywhere and generally wetting all your clothes. Fortunately, after making these discoveries I think I have managed to screw it in place.
Monday, April 04, 2005
Bad Dreem
"Where all you dreems become bad!"
Anyone remember CITV's Knightmare? The scary 3D blue-screen show where kids donned a helmet and were told what to do by other kids?
Here's a spoof of this show, done with a lot less money (and a paper mache crown). Well worth the watching, this is 10 minutes long and fracking hilarious.
A high resolution version or a low resolution version are available.
PS - I can spell dream Mare!
Anyone remember CITV's Knightmare? The scary 3D blue-screen show where kids donned a helmet and were told what to do by other kids?
Here's a spoof of this show, done with a lot less money (and a paper mache crown). Well worth the watching, this is 10 minutes long and fracking hilarious.
A high resolution version or a low resolution version are available.
PS - I can spell dream Mare!
The Infamous Panties
DISCLAIMER: I am not some weird pervert who likes to upload pictures of women's underwear, but rather this is a pair I found hung up on the bulletin board of the hall of my flat when I moved in. By popular demand, here it is.
Saturday, April 02, 2005
The Trials of Stuart Kerrigan, Part Two
So Sunday morning I had my house guest, the gas man...
The smell is apparently a hybrid of a small gas leak and the vast quantities of paint that were stored in the cupboard. There was a gas leak and it was necessary to get a new meter installed. He also showed me the gas fire in the living room worked. However he couldn't get the boiler to work and told me to call the landlords on Monday.
I started hooking up my PC and unpacking and the flat began to feel like home. Even went so far as to clean the microwave and cook some food last night.
One irate phone call to the letting agency this morning and I am assured it will be all fixed...
The smell is apparently a hybrid of a small gas leak and the vast quantities of paint that were stored in the cupboard. There was a gas leak and it was necessary to get a new meter installed. He also showed me the gas fire in the living room worked. However he couldn't get the boiler to work and told me to call the landlords on Monday.
I started hooking up my PC and unpacking and the flat began to feel like home. Even went so far as to clean the microwave and cook some food last night.
One irate phone call to the letting agency this morning and I am assured it will be all fixed...
The Trials of Stuart Kerrigan, Part One
So today was the big day and already I have a list of problems to take up with the Lettings Co...
1) Try as I might I cannot seem to light the boiler for heating and hot water. The flat is therefore really cold and I have just bought a tiny electric heater (which I didn't have a screwdriver to put together so is really makeshift...)
2) The power closet smells of gas. Not strongly, but not faintly either.
3) No wheelie bin - every other flat has one, but I do not.
4) I have no key for the backdoor. The one left in the lock doesn't seem to work.
5) Most disturbingly - the flat has 2 fridges in the kitchen. The first one worked fine when switched on, the second one fizzed, frazzled and blew smoke throughout the kitchen. Not impressed.
6) The microwave interior puts Hammer Horror films to shame.
7) The phone doesn't work. It's plugged in, but despite there being no power plug it doesnae work.
That's before I upload the photo of the panties on the pin board.
I have to say this weekend has been probably the most bleak point in my move to Leicester. Fortunately the flat is 10 minutes from the centre so when things get too much I go shopping!
1) Try as I might I cannot seem to light the boiler for heating and hot water. The flat is therefore really cold and I have just bought a tiny electric heater (which I didn't have a screwdriver to put together so is really makeshift...)
2) The power closet smells of gas. Not strongly, but not faintly either.
3) No wheelie bin - every other flat has one, but I do not.
4) I have no key for the backdoor. The one left in the lock doesn't seem to work.
5) Most disturbingly - the flat has 2 fridges in the kitchen. The first one worked fine when switched on, the second one fizzed, frazzled and blew smoke throughout the kitchen. Not impressed.
6) The microwave interior puts Hammer Horror films to shame.
7) The phone doesn't work. It's plugged in, but despite there being no power plug it doesnae work.
That's before I upload the photo of the panties on the pin board.
I have to say this weekend has been probably the most bleak point in my move to Leicester. Fortunately the flat is 10 minutes from the centre so when things get too much I go shopping!
Friday, April 01, 2005
BUUUUUUURRRRRRRRNNNNNNN
Nice one Missus Kiddie.
I'm not going to Bradford's Student Nationals this year, but this thread is just so darn amusing. And it embarasses Egor which is always fun.
I'm not going to Bradford's Student Nationals this year, but this thread is just so darn amusing. And it embarasses Egor which is always fun.
Trophy on the Wall
Got paid. Got flat. Started to move in - will choose the room without the obligatory student iron marks on the carpet. Discovered a g-string pinned to noticeboard in flat in hall. Need to do cleaning. Need to buy tweezers.
Thursday, March 31, 2005
Wednesday, March 30, 2005
Herbie Goes Bananas
Found the Bank of Scotland in Leicester today. I only nearly caused a car crash, avoided 2 more and scared a few pedestrians and myself. My flat is now paid up, I need to collect the keys tomorrow.
Yay - I'm not homeless come Friday!
Note to self: Walk to the bank! It's only a mile!
Yay - I'm not homeless come Friday!
Note to self: Walk to the bank! It's only a mile!
Dr Stu on Dr Who
I don't like Doctor Who.
Period.
Ok, I did when I was 5 and it came on TV. Mainly the bit where the smiling face appeared on the screen and the pretty colours came on. I remember a really scary episode involving vampires called the Curse of Fenrus and some weird one where King Arthur came back only to be destroyed in 5 minutes of an episode (or maybe that was another show). But then I realised it was yet another BBC cheap-skate sci-fi series and lost interest. Having said that I watched some Blake's 7 recently and thought it was ok.
I liked the McGann pilot that never got a series, the Gothic Tardis was pretty cool, though the show was American, showing the BBC's inadequacies that it can't make sci-fi without supplementing our license fees with American money and in doing so selling out to the vacuous style of American TV.
Er... rant over... anyway so I decided given the fuss the Beeb was making to watch this as well.
I liked it.
Damn it!
Eccleston is pretty damn cool as the Doctor. He's smug, weird, and generally a good actor anyway. Billy Piper I wasn't so sure of.
In true cheapskate Dr Who tradition rather than choose one of the other infinite possibilities of time and space the Doctor wound up at the centre of the universe, London, England, Earth convienently in the early 21st century. That must have lowered the budget for the first episode, and allowed him to pick up Billy Piper, who it turns out can act.
The episode was really quick - 45 minutes that seemed to involve running everywhere with latex dummies chasing the goodies. The dummies were ok and I understand there is meant to be some big overarcing reason for all this if you've been watching for the past 25 years or so, but there was also some dodgy CGI including a wheely bin. I thought the effects looked like the kind out of Red Dwarf VII, like someone'd been playing with their old Amiga for a couple of months. Additionally there was a totally unconvincing "dummy" replica for Billy's boyfriend which she was completely fooled by despite the fact it looked mega-odd.
Overall good. Not stellar. Not set the world on fire. It's no Babylon 5 or Battlestar Galactica v2.0 but it's watchable. I'll be watching next week I suppose.
Period.
Ok, I did when I was 5 and it came on TV. Mainly the bit where the smiling face appeared on the screen and the pretty colours came on. I remember a really scary episode involving vampires called the Curse of Fenrus and some weird one where King Arthur came back only to be destroyed in 5 minutes of an episode (or maybe that was another show). But then I realised it was yet another BBC cheap-skate sci-fi series and lost interest. Having said that I watched some Blake's 7 recently and thought it was ok.
I liked the McGann pilot that never got a series, the Gothic Tardis was pretty cool, though the show was American, showing the BBC's inadequacies that it can't make sci-fi without supplementing our license fees with American money and in doing so selling out to the vacuous style of American TV.
Er... rant over... anyway so I decided given the fuss the Beeb was making to watch this as well.
I liked it.
Damn it!
Eccleston is pretty damn cool as the Doctor. He's smug, weird, and generally a good actor anyway. Billy Piper I wasn't so sure of.
In true cheapskate Dr Who tradition rather than choose one of the other infinite possibilities of time and space the Doctor wound up at the centre of the universe, London, England, Earth convienently in the early 21st century. That must have lowered the budget for the first episode, and allowed him to pick up Billy Piper, who it turns out can act.
The episode was really quick - 45 minutes that seemed to involve running everywhere with latex dummies chasing the goodies. The dummies were ok and I understand there is meant to be some big overarcing reason for all this if you've been watching for the past 25 years or so, but there was also some dodgy CGI including a wheely bin. I thought the effects looked like the kind out of Red Dwarf VII, like someone'd been playing with their old Amiga for a couple of months. Additionally there was a totally unconvincing "dummy" replica for Billy's boyfriend which she was completely fooled by despite the fact it looked mega-odd.
Overall good. Not stellar. Not set the world on fire. It's no Babylon 5 or Battlestar Galactica v2.0 but it's watchable. I'll be watching next week I suppose.
Return of the Dude
Yet another witty post title...
Good times in Dundee just hanging out and seeing everyone. I actually felt a bit of a mook being up after only 10 days away, but hopefully I should be back up in April to submit the "one true thesis".
Saw lots of some folk and curiously little of others and discovered hell's waiting room while catching a taxi at 3am in Dundee. Just when you think you're almost there it turns out the guy in front has 20 mates that seem to be push in front. But that is the price of a good calzone isn't it.
For those of you not educated in the ways of fine cuisine like myself a calzone is in fact a folded pizza with the delicious pepperoni (or whatever's your poison) topping kept fresh in a layer of hot tomatoy goodness. Who says this blog isn't educational?
It was also good having a TV to watch. Caught the new Doctor Who and a detailed and intelligent commentary will follow since everyone seems to be reviewing it.
Loaded the car up with essentials such as my DVD player, a spare TV and so forth in preparation for the coming move this week. It took me 10 hours to get home but about 1 hour of this was spent frantically trying to find Oadby or the City Centre, neither of which are particularly well sign-posted. Finally unpacked collapsed around 9ish to order some fish and chips.
A little survival tip in England - never ask for a large portion of chips. What I got was HUGE. A meal for 2-3 in itself.
Today's ordeal involves getting to the bank (I don't know where it is so I guess it will take roughly 2-3 hours to find) and paying my deposit on the flat. Try not to mug me today, I'll only be carrying a small fortune in cash.
Good times in Dundee just hanging out and seeing everyone. I actually felt a bit of a mook being up after only 10 days away, but hopefully I should be back up in April to submit the "one true thesis".
Saw lots of some folk and curiously little of others and discovered hell's waiting room while catching a taxi at 3am in Dundee. Just when you think you're almost there it turns out the guy in front has 20 mates that seem to be push in front. But that is the price of a good calzone isn't it.
For those of you not educated in the ways of fine cuisine like myself a calzone is in fact a folded pizza with the delicious pepperoni (or whatever's your poison) topping kept fresh in a layer of hot tomatoy goodness. Who says this blog isn't educational?
It was also good having a TV to watch. Caught the new Doctor Who and a detailed and intelligent commentary will follow since everyone seems to be reviewing it.
Loaded the car up with essentials such as my DVD player, a spare TV and so forth in preparation for the coming move this week. It took me 10 hours to get home but about 1 hour of this was spent frantically trying to find Oadby or the City Centre, neither of which are particularly well sign-posted. Finally unpacked collapsed around 9ish to order some fish and chips.
A little survival tip in England - never ask for a large portion of chips. What I got was HUGE. A meal for 2-3 in itself.
Today's ordeal involves getting to the bank (I don't know where it is so I guess it will take roughly 2-3 hours to find) and paying my deposit on the flat. Try not to mug me today, I'll only be carrying a small fortune in cash.
Thursday, March 24, 2005
By Their Command!
They've release brief summaries of the second season of Battlestar Galactica. Episode 2.2 sounds frackin' ace!
The Scourging of Dundee
A gruelling 9+ hour drive later, with seemingly every truck/car transport/tractor on the single carrigeway of the A1 delaying me, and a stop at Mussleborough service station, the most inhospitable service station at 9pm, saw me return to Dundee.
It seems someone has hidden Tayport and Fife behind a shroud of mist, dug up the Nethergate roundabouts and more annoyingly dumped another set of traffic cones where I usually park in the Blackness estate.
I've come into my office at Dundee. Someone's deactivated my admin access to my PC, locked me out, disabled my storage space and not allowed me access to burn a backup DVD of all my stuff. Bummer! It's going to take me another 30 mins to burn my DVD. At least they found my acetabular cup...
All I need now is for Christopher Lee and Brad Dourif to be behind it all...
It seems someone has hidden Tayport and Fife behind a shroud of mist, dug up the Nethergate roundabouts and more annoyingly dumped another set of traffic cones where I usually park in the Blackness estate.
I've come into my office at Dundee. Someone's deactivated my admin access to my PC, locked me out, disabled my storage space and not allowed me access to burn a backup DVD of all my stuff. Bummer! It's going to take me another 30 mins to burn my DVD. At least they found my acetabular cup...
All I need now is for Christopher Lee and Brad Dourif to be behind it all...
Wednesday, March 23, 2005
So Long Suckas!
Well, in about 25 minutes I will be beginning the long drive to Dundee and the search for a petrol station (not in that order or I won't get there) and my internet access might be a bit patchy unless I bother to dig out the old laptop. Expect excitement, adventure and so forth to resume at some point in the future.
Thanks to the chaps from work for letting me leave early. Wait a minute - they've all buggered off!
Thanks to the chaps from work for letting me leave early. Wait a minute - they've all buggered off!
High Scorer
What, are you a first generation gamer? Did you own the brown box?! Whatever you do in your spare time, gaming seems to be your job. Either you looked up the answers or you're the best of the best, the type that makes other gamers strive to know more. Just don't let the knowledge overwhelm the newbies, it tends to push them from the hobby. We all bow before you. You are the living nat 20, congradulations. I'm going to flee the scene now ;)
From the The Real Gamers use Dice Test written by luminasita on Ok Cupid
My test tracked 1 variable How you compared to other people your age and gender: You scored higher than 93% on dice
From the The Real Gamers use Dice Test written by luminasita on Ok Cupid
Tuesday, March 22, 2005
Paying Yer Dues
Well that felt odd. Despite leaving at 5:10pm I barely caught the Lettings Company before they closed. In fact I reckon I would've been easier walking than driving there, after 2 circuits of Queen's Road I was getting a little worried when the clock said 5:45pm.
Anyway they're always happy to get dosh I suppose so I handed them a suspiciously thick wad of cash, got a classy A4 receipt for my records, went over my form with the chap. What was a little weird was the way he and his assistant both counted the £100 or so in a rather comic-book fashion. At least we know they won't be saying I diddled them any time soon.
So, there goes another chunk of my slush fund. Roll on pay-day...
Anyway they're always happy to get dosh I suppose so I handed them a suspiciously thick wad of cash, got a classy A4 receipt for my records, went over my form with the chap. What was a little weird was the way he and his assistant both counted the £100 or so in a rather comic-book fashion. At least we know they won't be saying I diddled them any time soon.
So, there goes another chunk of my slush fund. Roll on pay-day...
Call of Stuthulu
I went to the student's union again, with some trepadation after the Baywatch incident. As it's holiday time the gangsta rap dude has decided to give his, and my, eardrums a rest and go back to the ghetto that spawned him. In its place is a relatively chilled jazz spilling from the speakers. They've a CD and DVD sale on, being the kind of "5 Films for £9.99" junk that beer and bad movie nights come from, but amongst such great movies I found a copy of Dagon for £4. As I am apparently loaded with cash I've bought this to watch either tonight or when back in Dundee.
A little disturbingly he's wrapped it in a brown paper bag so it does look like I've bought a porn DVD and sat it on my desk. Oh well...
Anyroads I thoroughly expect this to be a bad movie. This adaption of Call of Cthulu looks to be a lot more promising however, and the trailer is well worth a look.
A little disturbingly he's wrapped it in a brown paper bag so it does look like I've bought a porn DVD and sat it on my desk. Oh well...
Anyroads I thoroughly expect this to be a bad movie. This adaption of Call of Cthulu looks to be a lot more promising however, and the trailer is well worth a look.
Could You Turn Right at the Next Junction
I've just filled in a form to be made an invigilator at ECDL (European Computer Driving License) tests. I suspect none of the other demonstrators wanted the job, but if I get my foot in with ECDL it might prove interesting. Failing that teaching word processing and spreadsheets might be a good start to the job rather than teaching, oh, say, advanced C++ data structures with one day's notice.
Given ECDL is going to be lurking around for at least 10 years as it rolls through the NHS with the speed we know and expect this might be interesting.
Given ECDL is going to be lurking around for at least 10 years as it rolls through the NHS with the speed we know and expect this might be interesting.
How Much Cash?
Went to see about getting the flat. Apparently the need a £117.50 referencing fee, £300 deposit and £300 rent. And if I want to move in by April then I need to pay it in cash as cheque won't cash in time. Still it's better than Leicester Halls of Residence who don't take cash, debit card or credit card, only cheque.
Did I mention I left my cheque book at home?
Did I mention I left my cheque book at home?
Monday, March 21, 2005
A Fine Upstanding Citizen
Saw this guy while out walking through Leicester's City Centre at the weekend.
Dumbest Question I've Been Asked All Week
"So had you ever visited England before you came to Leicester?"
'Nuff said really.
'Nuff said really.
Sunday, March 20, 2005
Comments Enabled
I have enabled comments to this blog, in the past it required that you have your own blogger.com account to leave comments. Comment away...
The Long Drive
Being rather bored after being stuck in the flat watching Buck Rogers and Angel I decided around 10:30 to take a drive down to the cheap flat I looked at on Friday to see if the area was in fact a complete dive or filled with junkies on a Saturday night. And to see if I could actually park the car.
Well in one close there was about a half-dozen students all going out for the night, and two wheeler-dealer types having a conversation across the street, but after 5 minutes it quietened down. I didn't park in the street but on the waterfront near the flat. I also noticed all the surrounding flats are not unsurprisingly student flats offering rooms at roughly £45-£60 a week. Quite a few properties were even for sale in the street, which did make wonder slightly, but I got the impression it was ok. I also got the impression people thought I was a policeman or something given I walked up and down the street a couple of times.
What was more disturbing was that thanks to a huge amount of wrong turns and wrong lanes I wound up in Oadby's warehouse district, the centre of Leicester, DeMontfort University campus and didn't arrive back home until midnight. Today I am going to walk down to the waterfront from uni. If nothing else at least its killing time because this weekend has been incredibly boring.
Well in one close there was about a half-dozen students all going out for the night, and two wheeler-dealer types having a conversation across the street, but after 5 minutes it quietened down. I didn't park in the street but on the waterfront near the flat. I also noticed all the surrounding flats are not unsurprisingly student flats offering rooms at roughly £45-£60 a week. Quite a few properties were even for sale in the street, which did make wonder slightly, but I got the impression it was ok. I also got the impression people thought I was a policeman or something given I walked up and down the street a couple of times.
What was more disturbing was that thanks to a huge amount of wrong turns and wrong lanes I wound up in Oadby's warehouse district, the centre of Leicester, DeMontfort University campus and didn't arrive back home until midnight. Today I am going to walk down to the waterfront from uni. If nothing else at least its killing time because this weekend has been incredibly boring.
Saturday, March 19, 2005
Sharptooth Defeated
I have it! In my hands I hold a library card! I am triumphant! No longer can Sharptooth delay the inevitable. No longer will I be forced to ask politely to enter the library, nor stand at the registration desk waiting for Sharptooth to ask me to come back another day when I have some forms/the correct forms/the correct forms processed properly. Now untold volumes of knowledge are at my fingertips.
Do I want to take out any books? Nah - I think I'll go for lunch.
Do I want to take out any books? Nah - I think I'll go for lunch.
Friday, March 18, 2005
Leicester vs Dundee
They say it's the little things when you move that strike you. Well in Leicester University it is certainly not the case - it's the big things.
Leicester Uni on a whole seems to be a lot more strict.
- The CFS (Central Filing System, the campus wide network) all have strict quotas. Apparently students are allowed 20 megs of storage space. If they log off over this quota their account is suspended until, guess what, yours truly or whoever arranges to have this fixed. My le.ac account seems to have a similar quota on it, making it impossible to send me large attachments or for me to send out large attachments. Fortunately gmail has been on hand to deal with this problem but its a pretty serious one IMHO. Poor Mare failed abysmally to send me some photos tonight because I clean forgot about .le.ac.uk's lameness. I will make enquiries as to how to get a proper mail account...
- The CFS do not allow P2P file sharing. Fair enough in this one, but apparently Skipe, MSN, ICQ, AIM etc. also count as P2P and are similarly nixed, though it may only be if you try to send files via these packages. Skipe by default sends audio files so it's totally nixed. For the moment I am continuing to use Trillian while I work in Windows.
- Students at Leicester are not allowed to connect network devices to the MCS (Maths and Computer Science network). In Dundee people connected a variety of laptops, in fact it was encouraged as it helped deal with any shortage of desktop PCs.
- Mobile phones in the lab are banned. Anyone caught using a mobile phone is to be logged by yours truly and reprimanded. First time is a warning, second time is an account suspended for 24 hours and third time is a week or something. A sign on the lab door reads that mobile phones corrupt data over a network. Of course I'm dreading the inevitable day I take my own phone into the lab and it rings.
- Eating and drinking is banned in the labs. While this was officially the case in Dundee no-one enforced it and I used to eat my lunch while coding. I've to treat this similarly to mobile phones.
- Most rooms in the university are swipe card access only. This is fair enough for student labs but our room is permanently locked, accessible only by swipe card or by an electronic switch on the inside. This is to keep students out, we don't seem to run an open door policy given that all marking etc. is to be hidden from the students.
Similarly however the character of the students is very different. Plagiarism and cheating run rife. I'm fairly certain students in past years are mailing their friends and family members code and allowing them to reuse it. There is even tales of students renting programmers online to do their coursework for them, and being dumb enough to post .html files instead of code files, allowing us to trace webpages they've "borrowed" the code from.
Leicester Uni on a whole seems to be a lot more strict.
- The CFS (Central Filing System, the campus wide network) all have strict quotas. Apparently students are allowed 20 megs of storage space. If they log off over this quota their account is suspended until, guess what, yours truly or whoever arranges to have this fixed. My le.ac account seems to have a similar quota on it, making it impossible to send me large attachments or for me to send out large attachments. Fortunately gmail has been on hand to deal with this problem but its a pretty serious one IMHO. Poor Mare failed abysmally to send me some photos tonight because I clean forgot about .le.ac.uk's lameness. I will make enquiries as to how to get a proper mail account...
- The CFS do not allow P2P file sharing. Fair enough in this one, but apparently Skipe, MSN, ICQ, AIM etc. also count as P2P and are similarly nixed, though it may only be if you try to send files via these packages. Skipe by default sends audio files so it's totally nixed. For the moment I am continuing to use Trillian while I work in Windows.
- Students at Leicester are not allowed to connect network devices to the MCS (Maths and Computer Science network). In Dundee people connected a variety of laptops, in fact it was encouraged as it helped deal with any shortage of desktop PCs.
- Mobile phones in the lab are banned. Anyone caught using a mobile phone is to be logged by yours truly and reprimanded. First time is a warning, second time is an account suspended for 24 hours and third time is a week or something. A sign on the lab door reads that mobile phones corrupt data over a network. Of course I'm dreading the inevitable day I take my own phone into the lab and it rings.
- Eating and drinking is banned in the labs. While this was officially the case in Dundee no-one enforced it and I used to eat my lunch while coding. I've to treat this similarly to mobile phones.
- Most rooms in the university are swipe card access only. This is fair enough for student labs but our room is permanently locked, accessible only by swipe card or by an electronic switch on the inside. This is to keep students out, we don't seem to run an open door policy given that all marking etc. is to be hidden from the students.
Similarly however the character of the students is very different. Plagiarism and cheating run rife. I'm fairly certain students in past years are mailing their friends and family members code and allowing them to reuse it. There is even tales of students renting programmers online to do their coursework for them, and being dumb enough to post .html files instead of code files, allowing us to trace webpages they've "borrowed" the code from.
StuWatch
I just had the most surreal experience when going for my afternoon can of Cherry Coke (yes, they sell that in this city). I've long suspected Leicester's Student Union has a weird taste in music. I mean they have some guy who's job it is to sit between two speakers and play gangsta rap at enormous volumes.
So I walked into the shop to hear, blaring over the speakers,
Some people stand in the darkness
Afraid to step into the light
Some people need to help somebody
When the edge of surrender’s in sight..
In case you're not aware that's the apparently popular Baywatch Theme.
I was beginning to feel that in order to buy my cherry coke and twix I should really start running down the aisle of the student's union shop in slow motion, pearly white teeth and six pack gleeming, dragging a life preserver behind me.
Surreal.
So I walked into the shop to hear, blaring over the speakers,
Some people stand in the darkness
Afraid to step into the light
Some people need to help somebody
When the edge of surrender’s in sight..
In case you're not aware that's the apparently popular Baywatch Theme.
I was beginning to feel that in order to buy my cherry coke and twix I should really start running down the aisle of the student's union shop in slow motion, pearly white teeth and six pack gleeming, dragging a life preserver behind me.
Surreal.
A Roof, My Kingdom for a Roof
Apparently the university, in addition to giving me 38 days off (week days, so that's over 7 weeks of holiday) insists I take religious holidays (if they can be called that given it's Easter and Xmas I'm talking about). No-one mentioned this to me previously but I apparently get Thursday-Monday off next week. This is great I suppose in that I can go home, see everyone etc. but it's also a little annoying as the halls I am paying silly amounts of money to stay in will be empty over Easter. It also means I overlooked the fact that every letting agency in Leicester will be shut from Thursday-Monday next week.
With this in mind I trudged up Queen's Road today to try to rent a property. The first, and only, place I visited today had a 4 bedroom flat for £300 a month on offer. Apparently it was meant as a 4 person flat for students but is lying empty so my £300 a month will cover the mortgage. I've also looked into another property but am waiting to hear back from the letting agency. After a drive down to the flat I found I'd spent 1 hour just visiting that letting agency. I sauntered back to work.
So my goal is to find a place before Wednesday next week, go home, take lots of all that dirty laundry my mother is doubtless missing (joke), take some stuff back down (DVD player maybe?) and all will be well...
With this in mind I trudged up Queen's Road today to try to rent a property. The first, and only, place I visited today had a 4 bedroom flat for £300 a month on offer. Apparently it was meant as a 4 person flat for students but is lying empty so my £300 a month will cover the mortgage. I've also looked into another property but am waiting to hear back from the letting agency. After a drive down to the flat I found I'd spent 1 hour just visiting that letting agency. I sauntered back to work.
So my goal is to find a place before Wednesday next week, go home, take lots of all that dirty laundry my mother is doubtless missing (joke), take some stuff back down (DVD player maybe?) and all will be well...
Wednesday, March 16, 2005
Doing it yourself...
Starting to get into a routine with regards to getting the bus in the morning. There's no parking on campus y'see. It seems, barring one chap, most of the other guys stagger in around 10am and leave around 5ish, which is swell as that's been vaguely my routine as a student. For the first couple of days I've been a little lonesome, although the chaps have done everything to put me under their wing. I'm looking into joining some roleplaying up here before I go cuckoo. I also got a list of flats in the area - I am tempted by a £470 a month flat, with a view to getting someone else in the flat and sharing. £235 a month is pretty cheap near the uni!
I even managed to get a copy of my acceptance letter from HR and mollify Sharptooth.
Oh - and I broke the freezer compartment trying to get my ice-cream out of it. Er... d'oh? Well - it's structurally intact apart from the outer part of the freezer box is split in 2. Wasnae me guv!
I even managed to get a copy of my acceptance letter from HR and mollify Sharptooth.
Oh - and I broke the freezer compartment trying to get my ice-cream out of it. Er... d'oh? Well - it's structurally intact apart from the outer part of the freezer box is split in 2. Wasnae me guv!
Monday, March 14, 2005
The First Day
First day at work - well, what can I say. Catching the 8:30 bus for the 3 mile journey to work I was a bit surprised to be hot-footing it to the CS Building at 8:55 for my 9:00 start. I was also a little bit surprised to find my boss saying he'd wished I'd turned up at 9:30 as he was having a manic Monday. Nonetheless after a trip to HR to confirm via birth certificate and NI card I am who I say I am puts me firmly in the "being paid" category at the university. The rest of the morning was spent filling out the oodles of paperwork you need for a staff card, swipe card, campus account, computer science account and library card.
Library card deserves special mention thanks to Sharptooth the Librarian, as I have nicknamed her for her fangs. She was more than a little unwilling to allow me to join the library. She wanted a letter of acceptance as proof. Only problem is said letter is sitting in my room in Dundee, and I'm oddly enough unprepared to go to Dundee just for a letter. Not even a letter from my boss could assuade her otherwise. So two trips to the library and no card to pick up.
By afternoon, just by quitting time in fact, I got my username and password to login. Yay!
Library card deserves special mention thanks to Sharptooth the Librarian, as I have nicknamed her for her fangs. She was more than a little unwilling to allow me to join the library. She wanted a letter of acceptance as proof. Only problem is said letter is sitting in my room in Dundee, and I'm oddly enough unprepared to go to Dundee just for a letter. Not even a letter from my boss could assuade her otherwise. So two trips to the library and no card to pick up.
By afternoon, just by quitting time in fact, I got my username and password to login. Yay!
Sunday, March 13, 2005
The Morning After
Woke up surprisingly rested this morning and spent the morning pottering around the flat, doing odd jobs before finally deciding to go out into the big bad world I'd lost myself in. I drove into Leicester City Centre, thanking the heavens I had a car. Driving by day is surprisingly relaxing given that Leicester centre is full of speed cameras in 30 MPH zones. Apparently this nets the city father's a hefty £750k according to the paper in front of me. In addition there are signs that light up saying Slow Down if you exceed 30 MPH. I triggered one last night - I hope I didn't get caught speeding by the cameras. Mind you I'm convinced I triggered dozens of these things on the journey yesterday!
After visiting the Shires shopping centre, Leicester's answer to the Overgate I bought myself a ton of bachelor-chow (tm) and scuppered back up to the flat. It's so quiet here I am going mad. I even spent my Sunday writing my latest MIUA paper from my thesis, dodging doing any work on the real thing you'll notice.
Bachelor-chow in the form of roast beef tastes very good apparently but I am very bored and sorely lacking any form of company. On the other hand this has left me free to watch Buck Rogers on DVD and contemplate the eternal question - why does Buck feel, whenever he is in casual clothing, the need to show his chest hair. Does Gil Gerard think we are impressed by this? Is the ruined and desolate Earth of the 25th Century so warm that prolonged concealment of the chest could be detrimental to Buck's health?
Thank goodness I'm not going peculiar. ;)
After visiting the Shires shopping centre, Leicester's answer to the Overgate I bought myself a ton of bachelor-chow (tm) and scuppered back up to the flat. It's so quiet here I am going mad. I even spent my Sunday writing my latest MIUA paper from my thesis, dodging doing any work on the real thing you'll notice.
Bachelor-chow in the form of roast beef tastes very good apparently but I am very bored and sorely lacking any form of company. On the other hand this has left me free to watch Buck Rogers on DVD and contemplate the eternal question - why does Buck feel, whenever he is in casual clothing, the need to show his chest hair. Does Gil Gerard think we are impressed by this? Is the ruined and desolate Earth of the 25th Century so warm that prolonged concealment of the chest could be detrimental to Buck's health?
Thank goodness I'm not going peculiar. ;)
Into Exile I Go
I awoke at 8 am, or at least I got up then, feeling utterly exhausted and with a really sore stomach. For obvious reasons I had not slept much, going over routes and so forth in my mind. Dad had decided to write out a third route to Leicester on a bit of paper, and then we loaded the car. Unfortunately I'd decided to take my PC which took up a ton of space in the car, so the back seats had to be popped down to allow more trunk space. Finally with that done and a plate of cereal scarfed down I began my long journey to Leicester in a car which was filled with cardboard boxes and junk. A photo of this will be forthcoming...
The route I eventually elected to take was to take the A1 from the outskirts of Edinburgh and follow it past Berwick and Newcastle until it eventually became the M1. This was quite nice as it allowed me to pass by the Borders, where I was born, though I didn't have enough time to drive to Jedburgh. I stopped at Berwick for a desperately needed break and then about an hour later stopped again. This being my first journey longer than 2 hours, and given my tiredness, by the time I passed Newcastle I was utterly nackered. That and for some insane reason the A1 become a single lane country road for about 80 miles, with signs telling you of the 169 casualties the road has suffered in 3 years. Hard to wonder why?
The problem was that inevitably I ended up stuck behind an ice cream van and a horse van for these single lanes, which I think helped delay me. Eventually I made it to the M1 and after a third break and a caffeine laced Pepsi Max I was able to finally make it to Leicester. Unfortunately my maps of Leicester were woefully inaccurate and I was convinced somehow if I approached from the north I could find Oadby and the halls of residence easily. Unfortunately it was now 6pm and dark, so the intricacies of Liecester's roundabouts and lanes were completely lost on me. However by trial and error I eventually managed to drive past Manor Road and turn up to the halls.
However I'd said by email I would've been up by 4pm, and it was now approaching 7pm. The halls lady had gone home and left a note with her mobile number. The helpful student-assistant at the halls called her up and after a protracted conversation, lengthened by my inability to understand what was going on at this point. About 7:30 she came back and after some profuse apologising on my part took me to the flat.
The flat...
Well, it is smaller than I thought but it is quite cozy. The previous occupant had left the heating on and the place was scorching. Additionally, being a student hall there is always someone who feels they should listen to music at top volume. And tonight was the Hall Ball night 'til about 1am. Add to that excessive heat much carrying of boxes and unpacking and come 9pm I collapsed on my bed only to have mother phone me, wondering if I was wrapped round a tree near Leeds.
And at about 9:30, after hooking up my PC, my stomach reminded me it likes being fed.
Leicester's student digs possess the most dubious honour of being in a residential neighbourhood that seems devoid of any take-aways, supermarkets etc. Given harrowing experiences when I was up for my interview I decided I might just take the car and hunt down some food. Ironically, after asking at the nearby petrol station, where I am beginning to think ignorance of any local geography is a prerequisite (I asked for directions there before and the guy didn't even know where the university was) I decided to get some English cash in my wallet at one of the all too common pay-as-you-use ATMs. About five minutes later with the usual Kerrigan-luck I stumbled upon an Asda and about a million Link cash machines. After buying some breakfast cereal and taking a further 15 mins to find the milk while exhausted I even managed to find an honest to God pizza place in Oadby. So by 10pm I was fed, and even had cereal for the morning. And settled down to watch Buck Rogers on DVD - except my PC DVDR didn't like that disk. So I watched Angel on DVD. Except my DVDR didn't like that disk. So I concluded I need a new DVD drive today... and some food.
So I went to sleep to the sound of the disco going on down the road.
The route I eventually elected to take was to take the A1 from the outskirts of Edinburgh and follow it past Berwick and Newcastle until it eventually became the M1. This was quite nice as it allowed me to pass by the Borders, where I was born, though I didn't have enough time to drive to Jedburgh. I stopped at Berwick for a desperately needed break and then about an hour later stopped again. This being my first journey longer than 2 hours, and given my tiredness, by the time I passed Newcastle I was utterly nackered. That and for some insane reason the A1 become a single lane country road for about 80 miles, with signs telling you of the 169 casualties the road has suffered in 3 years. Hard to wonder why?
The problem was that inevitably I ended up stuck behind an ice cream van and a horse van for these single lanes, which I think helped delay me. Eventually I made it to the M1 and after a third break and a caffeine laced Pepsi Max I was able to finally make it to Leicester. Unfortunately my maps of Leicester were woefully inaccurate and I was convinced somehow if I approached from the north I could find Oadby and the halls of residence easily. Unfortunately it was now 6pm and dark, so the intricacies of Liecester's roundabouts and lanes were completely lost on me. However by trial and error I eventually managed to drive past Manor Road and turn up to the halls.
However I'd said by email I would've been up by 4pm, and it was now approaching 7pm. The halls lady had gone home and left a note with her mobile number. The helpful student-assistant at the halls called her up and after a protracted conversation, lengthened by my inability to understand what was going on at this point. About 7:30 she came back and after some profuse apologising on my part took me to the flat.
The flat...
Well, it is smaller than I thought but it is quite cozy. The previous occupant had left the heating on and the place was scorching. Additionally, being a student hall there is always someone who feels they should listen to music at top volume. And tonight was the Hall Ball night 'til about 1am. Add to that excessive heat much carrying of boxes and unpacking and come 9pm I collapsed on my bed only to have mother phone me, wondering if I was wrapped round a tree near Leeds.
And at about 9:30, after hooking up my PC, my stomach reminded me it likes being fed.
Leicester's student digs possess the most dubious honour of being in a residential neighbourhood that seems devoid of any take-aways, supermarkets etc. Given harrowing experiences when I was up for my interview I decided I might just take the car and hunt down some food. Ironically, after asking at the nearby petrol station, where I am beginning to think ignorance of any local geography is a prerequisite (I asked for directions there before and the guy didn't even know where the university was) I decided to get some English cash in my wallet at one of the all too common pay-as-you-use ATMs. About five minutes later with the usual Kerrigan-luck I stumbled upon an Asda and about a million Link cash machines. After buying some breakfast cereal and taking a further 15 mins to find the milk while exhausted I even managed to find an honest to God pizza place in Oadby. So by 10pm I was fed, and even had cereal for the morning. And settled down to watch Buck Rogers on DVD - except my PC DVDR didn't like that disk. So I watched Angel on DVD. Except my DVDR didn't like that disk. So I concluded I need a new DVD drive today... and some food.
So I went to sleep to the sound of the disco going on down the road.
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