Kung Fu Jesus
Bob the Ball
Saturday, July 31, 2004
Must Buy DVD
Amazon.co.uk: DVD: Shaun of the Dead - best bit - an audio commentary from the Zombies!
Friday, July 30, 2004
BBC - Cult Television - Top Screen Scientist Vote
BBC - Cult Television - Top Screen Scientist Vote - vote for Beaker & Honeydew.
Attack of the Copyright Crusaders
So I'm busy at work tonight when we get a call from the Stage Manager that a video camera has been spotted in the second row of the theatre. Cue half an hour of scrambling around in the darkness try to find this bloody camera. We finally locate what we believe is the camera. The ushers do the usual 'shine the torch' shtick at the offender, who as usual is right in the middle of the row. Despite consistent torch shining, we get ignored by these people. If this person is using a camera, they're violating copyright and we're suppose to stop this somehow. We're told we can't confiscate their tape, we can only insist that they erase it. Which means that if they've been recording this two hour+ show on something like Hi-8, we're going to be there for some time watching them wipe it.
Seeing as this constant torch-waving is beginning to annoy other patrons, the decision is made to get the tape to wipe it at the end of the show. Two PSO's are called up & positioned at either end of the row and we wait for the end of the show.
With the finale finished, the house lights are coming up & we finally get a good look at what the woman is holding. As she lowers....
A monocular....
...and we call the whole thing off.
Now what on earth does a person who is sitting in the second-front row of the theatre need distance viewing equipment for? These after all, are seats where it is often a good idea to bring an umbrella to avoid being showered by the saliva and sweat of the performers. And this person was using something that allows them to see long distances this close? And they weren't using a set of binoculars mind you, they were using an monocular - one lens, one eye-piece...
Thus endeth my exciting night.
Seeing as this constant torch-waving is beginning to annoy other patrons, the decision is made to get the tape to wipe it at the end of the show. Two PSO's are called up & positioned at either end of the row and we wait for the end of the show.
With the finale finished, the house lights are coming up & we finally get a good look at what the woman is holding. As she lowers....
A monocular....
...and we call the whole thing off.
Now what on earth does a person who is sitting in the second-front row of the theatre need distance viewing equipment for? These after all, are seats where it is often a good idea to bring an umbrella to avoid being showered by the saliva and sweat of the performers. And this person was using something that allows them to see long distances this close? And they weren't using a set of binoculars mind you, they were using an monocular - one lens, one eye-piece...
Thus endeth my exciting night.
Thursday, July 29, 2004
Weird Al Poodle Hat Tour
Alas, all of the songs played were published tracks. So no cool unrecorded stuff. There were a couple I didn't recognise, but a check of track listings showed they were just album tracks I didn't know.
However, the videos played during outfit changes were absolutely hilarious (including 'Wheel of Fish'!). The faux interviews were especially good (including ones paying out on Avril Lavigne, Celine Dion, Justin Timberlake & one Marshall Mathers. And yes, the hypocrisy of Mr Mathers does cross into the firing line)
Photos from a different gig on the tour (but with the same set), here.
However, the videos played during outfit changes were absolutely hilarious (including 'Wheel of Fish'!). The faux interviews were especially good (including ones paying out on Avril Lavigne, Celine Dion, Justin Timberlake & one Marshall Mathers. And yes, the hypocrisy of Mr Mathers does cross into the firing line)
Photos from a different gig on the tour (but with the same set), here.
Tuesday, July 27, 2004
JoWood signs Yetisports
JoWood plans to release both PC and console titles based on the popular Yetisports Internet game.
JoWood today announced that it has signed a licensing agreement with the creators of the popular Internet game Yetisports. Developed by Vienna-based Edelweiss Medienwerkstatt, the Yetisports Web site, where visitors play games starring a yeti and a penguin, currently attracts well over 100 million visitors per month.
JoWood today announced that it has signed a licensing agreement with the creators of the popular Internet game Yetisports. Developed by Vienna-based Edelweiss Medienwerkstatt, the Yetisports Web site, where visitors play games starring a yeti and a penguin, currently attracts well over 100 million visitors per month.
Monday, July 26, 2004
UberGoober
Über Goober focuses on the often-misunderstood, sometimes-controversial, and always-kind-of-geeky world of Gamers. Metze examines several different groups including historical miniature gamers, role-players, and those known simply as "LARPers" (Live Action Role Players). The film also explores opposition from religious groups, negative media portrayals ranging from sit-coms to post-Columbine news coverage, and some of the meanest 'man-on-the-street' interviews ever committed to video. Meet the Gamers, learn their exotic language, see their bizarre rituals, gasp at their semi-authentic costumes, and thrill to the painting techniques on their miniatures!
Shot on MiniDV, the film runs 90 minutes and featured interviews include Dungeons and Dragons creator E. Gary Gygax, televangelist Bob Larson, author Mike Stackpole, and cartoonist John Kovalic, along with music by "The Great Luke Ski."
Shot on MiniDV, the film runs 90 minutes and featured interviews include Dungeons and Dragons creator E. Gary Gygax, televangelist Bob Larson, author Mike Stackpole, and cartoonist John Kovalic, along with music by "The Great Luke Ski."
Friday, July 23, 2004
Secret History, Alternate History
Okay, some of you may remember that I was going to do a post on some books when I experienced some technical difficulties. Here goes a second attempt.
I've finished Angels and Demons, by Dan Brown, who also wrote The Da Vinci Code - which is a book I haven't read. And, well, A&D was all right, but I didn't find it particularly amazing.
The basic plot was 'Mysterious murder in CERN leads Hero Guy on a trail to the Vatican where he also runs into the Illuminati'. Okay, fair enough. But it just came out kind of bleh. There were always things that had me kind of wincing and jolting me out of my suspension of disbelief.
First up was the astounding ignorance people seemed to have about CERN, like it was some kind of top-secret organisation. Though perhaps ordinary people aren't geeky and know about massive particle accelerators. Also at CERN, someone (the guy who had just been murdered, in fact) had managed to synthesise large amounts of antimatter. Specifically, as far as I could tell, he'd managed to isolate a huge number of positrons. (I say 'huge', because there were, like, nanograms of these things. They're the antimatter version of electrons - that should give you some idea of just how tiny these particles are). Now, this is a reasonable gimme. But I'm not entirely sure the author knew what he was dealing with.
For one thing, a scientist was proudly complaining that he had 'created matter out of nothing' as he'd created a bunch of particle-antiparticle pairs. Now, while what he actually did is impressive, he didn't create matter out of nothing, he created matter out of soddingly huge amounts of energy from a thirty-kilometre particle accelerator. E=mc^2, and all that.
Later on, another (living) scientist, claimed the antimatter would be 'chemically identical to hydrogen'. In fact, a sea of positrons were being contained in a magnetic field (at least he got the metallic appearance right). This is not hydrogen, or even antihydrogen. Antihydrogen would be characterised by its cheerful disregard of magnetic containment and things going boom around it. Not once was any kind of deal made about the massive positive charge this stuff would have - neutrally charged things would stick to it, even with the magnetic field in the way. Given that a major plot point was that this stuff got hidden in the Vatican and people couldn't find it, that's something of a stuffup.
But that's a relatively minor gripe, for all that it kept annoying me. No, my real gripe was the Illuminati. Now, maybe I've been overinfluenced by Illuminatus! but these Illuminati were piss-poor. Only the Illuminati in the Tomb Raider movie were less impressive. Apparently, they were founded in the 1600s by Galileo, an association of rabid atheists who wanted to bring down the Catholic Church. (In an unrelated gripe, somehow the Catholic Church is responsible for the Bible Belt in the USA. Now there's a conspiracy for ya.)
For fuck's sake, if I want to read about Illuminati, I want to read about the scheming manipulators from before time began who have always pulled the strings. I want to hear about the foul rites the Templars performed before the skull Baphomet, I want to hear about how the Order of Hermes were subsumed giving the Illuminati magical powers, I want to hear about the nameless blasphemies committed in the name of The Being That Picks People Up And Sometimes Puts Them Down Somewhere Else... actually, just hearing about Adam Weishaupt (If I've got the spelling right) and even fucking Bavaria would be nice. Not this namby-pamby stuff where 'Satanist' gets used as a buzzword. (IIRC, dialogue something like "They were Satanists." "Satanists?" "Not exactly.")
So, all up, it was better than Ice Station. But that should be no surprise - my comparisons with Ice Station often include rubbing one's face in red-hot gravel or genital mutilation with rusty cutlery. But my recommendation is, essentially, that it'd pass the time.
On the other hand, I highly recommend Weapons of Choice, by John Birmingham (yes, the He Died With A Felafel In His Hand guy). It's an alternate history - a multinational carrier group is moving in to an Indonesian crisis in 2021. Tagging along is a research vessel one of the group's cruisers had been babysitting and was unable to get another escort. It creates a wormhole, chucking the majority of the group through to 1942.
Most of the transported ships arrive in a clump more-or-less right on top of the US Naval expedition to Midway. While the crews are all unconscious from the Transit shock, one of the 1942 ships happens across a task force member... from the Japanese Self-Defense Forces.
Mayhem ensues, and the Axis aren't left out of the fun. The Japanese get to capture one of the Indonesian navy vessels that was transported, and loot another that appeared halfway into a mountain in New Guinea.
Birmingham does a great job of portraying the culture shock of the eighty-year gap between the travellers and the locals. And it's boggling how far we've come since 1942... as someone points out, they don't even know what DNA is. Not to mention the way non-whites and women are treated in the Allied countries. And then there's the question of the German, Italian, Japanese and even Russian members of the task force.
I'm looking forward to further installments of this series. The concept is nothing new, perhaps, but the execution is sterling. I don't have any moments of disbelief like I did with A&D. Even when HRH Harry Windsor, Captain, SAS, gets involved.
And it is rather amusing the couple of references to 'space lizards invading' that get worked in. The man's read his WWII alternate history as well as his normal stuff, I see.
And for those who have skimmed through this entire thing: Read Weapons of Choice by John Birmingham. Read Angels and Demons by Dan Brown only if bored.
I'm ending this transmission.
I've finished Angels and Demons, by Dan Brown, who also wrote The Da Vinci Code - which is a book I haven't read. And, well, A&D was all right, but I didn't find it particularly amazing.
The basic plot was 'Mysterious murder in CERN leads Hero Guy on a trail to the Vatican where he also runs into the Illuminati'. Okay, fair enough. But it just came out kind of bleh. There were always things that had me kind of wincing and jolting me out of my suspension of disbelief.
First up was the astounding ignorance people seemed to have about CERN, like it was some kind of top-secret organisation. Though perhaps ordinary people aren't geeky and know about massive particle accelerators. Also at CERN, someone (the guy who had just been murdered, in fact) had managed to synthesise large amounts of antimatter. Specifically, as far as I could tell, he'd managed to isolate a huge number of positrons. (I say 'huge', because there were, like, nanograms of these things. They're the antimatter version of electrons - that should give you some idea of just how tiny these particles are). Now, this is a reasonable gimme. But I'm not entirely sure the author knew what he was dealing with.
For one thing, a scientist was proudly complaining that he had 'created matter out of nothing' as he'd created a bunch of particle-antiparticle pairs. Now, while what he actually did is impressive, he didn't create matter out of nothing, he created matter out of soddingly huge amounts of energy from a thirty-kilometre particle accelerator. E=mc^2, and all that.
Later on, another (living) scientist, claimed the antimatter would be 'chemically identical to hydrogen'. In fact, a sea of positrons were being contained in a magnetic field (at least he got the metallic appearance right). This is not hydrogen, or even antihydrogen. Antihydrogen would be characterised by its cheerful disregard of magnetic containment and things going boom around it. Not once was any kind of deal made about the massive positive charge this stuff would have - neutrally charged things would stick to it, even with the magnetic field in the way. Given that a major plot point was that this stuff got hidden in the Vatican and people couldn't find it, that's something of a stuffup.
But that's a relatively minor gripe, for all that it kept annoying me. No, my real gripe was the Illuminati. Now, maybe I've been overinfluenced by Illuminatus! but these Illuminati were piss-poor. Only the Illuminati in the Tomb Raider movie were less impressive. Apparently, they were founded in the 1600s by Galileo, an association of rabid atheists who wanted to bring down the Catholic Church. (In an unrelated gripe, somehow the Catholic Church is responsible for the Bible Belt in the USA. Now there's a conspiracy for ya.)
For fuck's sake, if I want to read about Illuminati, I want to read about the scheming manipulators from before time began who have always pulled the strings. I want to hear about the foul rites the Templars performed before the skull Baphomet, I want to hear about how the Order of Hermes were subsumed giving the Illuminati magical powers, I want to hear about the nameless blasphemies committed in the name of The Being That Picks People Up And Sometimes Puts Them Down Somewhere Else... actually, just hearing about Adam Weishaupt (If I've got the spelling right) and even fucking Bavaria would be nice. Not this namby-pamby stuff where 'Satanist' gets used as a buzzword. (IIRC, dialogue something like "They were Satanists." "Satanists?" "Not exactly.")
So, all up, it was better than Ice Station. But that should be no surprise - my comparisons with Ice Station often include rubbing one's face in red-hot gravel or genital mutilation with rusty cutlery. But my recommendation is, essentially, that it'd pass the time.
On the other hand, I highly recommend Weapons of Choice, by John Birmingham (yes, the He Died With A Felafel In His Hand guy). It's an alternate history - a multinational carrier group is moving in to an Indonesian crisis in 2021. Tagging along is a research vessel one of the group's cruisers had been babysitting and was unable to get another escort. It creates a wormhole, chucking the majority of the group through to 1942.
Most of the transported ships arrive in a clump more-or-less right on top of the US Naval expedition to Midway. While the crews are all unconscious from the Transit shock, one of the 1942 ships happens across a task force member... from the Japanese Self-Defense Forces.
Mayhem ensues, and the Axis aren't left out of the fun. The Japanese get to capture one of the Indonesian navy vessels that was transported, and loot another that appeared halfway into a mountain in New Guinea.
Birmingham does a great job of portraying the culture shock of the eighty-year gap between the travellers and the locals. And it's boggling how far we've come since 1942... as someone points out, they don't even know what DNA is. Not to mention the way non-whites and women are treated in the Allied countries. And then there's the question of the German, Italian, Japanese and even Russian members of the task force.
I'm looking forward to further installments of this series. The concept is nothing new, perhaps, but the execution is sterling. I don't have any moments of disbelief like I did with A&D. Even when HRH Harry Windsor, Captain, SAS, gets involved.
And it is rather amusing the couple of references to 'space lizards invading' that get worked in. The man's read his WWII alternate history as well as his normal stuff, I see.
And for those who have skimmed through this entire thing: Read Weapons of Choice by John Birmingham. Read Angels and Demons by Dan Brown only if bored.
I'm ending this transmission.
Well, here I am. . .
Once again back in the wonderful world of dial-up internet :)
Not much to report yet - I'm here, and pretty much lounging around being a bum (Kristy says "Hi!" and "Don't tell them I'm in the shower."). We're going camping this weekend, and next week I'll probably spend some more time looking for a furnished studio apartment (Kristy's place is a little small for two people).
No James, I haven't bought Penn & Teller yet.
Not much to report yet - I'm here, and pretty much lounging around being a bum (Kristy says "Hi!" and "Don't tell them I'm in the shower."). We're going camping this weekend, and next week I'll probably spend some more time looking for a furnished studio apartment (Kristy's place is a little small for two people).
No James, I haven't bought Penn & Teller yet.
Rubber Ducky, Unbelievable story, Haunted? Possesed? Update
The final, winning, Auction price for the Duck of Doom US$107.50 (Approximately AU$150.28).
Thursday, July 22, 2004
ebay Maddness
Rubber Ducky, Unbelievable story, Haunted? Possesed?
This rubber duck has a tragic / possesed / haunted story. And i cannot believe that it is currently worth US$41.50. Have a look at the ebay auction for the detailed story of the Duck of Doom's story.
This rubber duck has a tragic / possesed / haunted story. And i cannot believe that it is currently worth US$41.50. Have a look at the ebay auction for the detailed story of the Duck of Doom's story.
Wednesday, July 21, 2004
Note to self: Ctrl-W closes Firebird Windows
I was settling in for a good blog rant on a couple of books. I even had visions of a metaphor I was going to use ("It lied to me, left me feeling alone and used and weeping to myself over my broken life" was an overstatement of my feelings, but it was one I was considering using just for the whore imagery.) And then I hit Ctrl-W.
Bugger.
So, short version before I go to bed: Angels and Demons, by Dan Brown - meh.
World War 2.1: Weapons of Choice, by John Birmingham (yes, the He Died With A Felafel In His Hand guy) - impressive. Also unfinished, at this stage, but I'm reading.
I had a more detailed review coming up, but I'd just finished enumerating why I thought Angels and Demons was meh (complete with Derlethian Wendigo reference!) when the dreaded Ctrl-W struck. Gah.
Might blog properly tomorrow. Or might watch the rest of Blake's 7. I'm unpredictable, me, which is what makes me so dangerous.
Bugger.
So, short version before I go to bed: Angels and Demons, by Dan Brown - meh.
World War 2.1: Weapons of Choice, by John Birmingham (yes, the He Died With A Felafel In His Hand guy) - impressive. Also unfinished, at this stage, but I'm reading.
I had a more detailed review coming up, but I'd just finished enumerating why I thought Angels and Demons was meh (complete with Derlethian Wendigo reference!) when the dreaded Ctrl-W struck. Gah.
Might blog properly tomorrow. Or might watch the rest of Blake's 7. I'm unpredictable, me, which is what makes me so dangerous.
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