Constantine

Not to be confused with...

Consonant. A film about a letter of the alphabet torn between 2 worlds, that of the living and that of the dead.

or

Clementine. A film in which Keanu Reeves plays a citrus fruit who kills demons in an attempt of getting the forgiveness from Satan.

or

Continent. A film in which Rachel Weisz stars alongside a large land mass and has a scene with her almost drowning.


The film itself was alright and you could tell it had been adapted from a comic book as there is a good story. Forget the fact the Movie Execs moved it from UK to LA and that Keanu took the place of a blond scouse. The film does seem to lose its way in places but the effects make up for that.

I've become a spammer

When I first came online I signed up with freeserve, one of the main providers in the U.K. who have subsequently been taken over by Wanadoo. I've never actually used the email that comes with the account, prefering hotmail instead. However within a matter of days of joining up I started getting a lot of spam, so I've been keeping the account to see how the spam industry is developing over time. I've seen phishing examples for all the major UK banks posted to this address.

Today I look in the inbox to find it full of "Undeliverable" or "Returned" mail notifications. As if I'd been sending the mail out. The format of the email address you get on joining is john@smith.freeserve.co.uk but you can in theory have anything at the front so that you can have accounts for all the family. What appears to have happened is the spammers have got hold of the bit following the @ and are putting random womens' names in the front bit.

I've reported it to Wanadoo and await their reponse. I doubt there's anything they can do though. It's just as well I don't use this account, I'd never be able to pick my legit mail out from the junk.

Payment cards

Last weekend I went to order a hotel room online (for the Gothenburg trip) to find I couldn't find my mastercard. Panic kicks in and I call up card protection and inadvertantly cancel the visa card. On Sunday I realise what I've done and call up a second time to cancel the right card. They advise me to inform the police. I tell them that I've probably misplaced it at home. I never use the cards as a rule and they're wedged tight in my wallet; there's no way it could be nicked.

Go to the police station who tell me that they're not interested unless I can prove it's been misused. So I call the bank and find out if either card had been used and they hadn't.

Panic over, except for the fact I still haven't ordered my hotel room. New cards have arrived this morning and I will do it this weekend.

Today was a good day...

(respect to Ice Cube for the inspiration in the title)

No, there weren'tt any cops pulling me over as I ran the intersection, and I don't know if anyone was killed in South Central L.A. It was however a glorious day in London, not a cloud in the sky. It was funny to see the local pub put it's tables and chairs out onto the street to attract the punters, it did work but there's a petrol station nearby and the diesel fumes were being blown towards them. We had lunch indoors and I managed to get my food order wrong, somehow a chilli burger became a spicy bean burger; and no I hadn't been drinking.

If it's as nice tomorrow I suspect the vain people will be out in their sunglasses as normally happens in the 1 or 2 days that it's not raining. Of course warmer weather means the women dress down. Nice!

Hostage @ Apollo Piccadilly

Yup, another bloody movie review.

Bruce Willis (and you won't recognise him at first) plays a negotiator who cocks things up and finds himself moved to a quiet town just outside L.A. where a bunch of kids break into an accountant's house and take them hostage. Some bad guys, who want something from the house, then kidnap Bruce's kids to ensure he succeeds in his mission.

Nice tension and some decent acting by Bruce. The weird hostage taker, "Mars" is a pretty good character; totally messed up and twisted. A little far fetched how he is able to deal with the FBI (who act mysteriously like SWAT).

Definitely worth seeing!!

I went with a friend to the new Apollo cinema near Piccadilly, it's not obvious as it's mostly underground. It's a really posh cinema with decent bar, and nice seating areas to shmooze before going in the cinema. Arena seating, super wide arms rests and comfy seating make the cinema standing out above the rest. However it's also the dearest at 12.50 a ticket, and the screens aren't massive. I will go again however. In fact I've agreed with the friend to make it a regular thing and we'll take turns to pick the movie we'll see.

She's jokingly chosen Hitch or Miss Congeniality 2. What have I let myself in for?

Gothenburg Day Trip

The coaster club has been invited to the press event for the new launched coaster at Liseberg. This is a wonderful park close to Gothenburg in Sweden that welcomes the club and just has a superb attitude. A few years ago they got a wooden coaster called "Balder" that quickly jumped to the top of the fan's favourite lists. This year they're opening Kanonen (Cannon), a launched coaster similar to Top Thrill Dragster at Cedar Point but nowhere near as tall, but it looks a lot more fun; it has inversions for a start.

So the invite came and a group of us are flying out at 7 in the morning, spending the day at the park then travelling back at 9 at night. Having never done a day trip to the continent before I'm really excited, especially as it's not France, which is where most people go. The flight is costing me £50 and I can get a hotel room for about the same but split it with someone else who's going. The only other money I need is cab fare to and from the park and that will be around £5 a head.

It's going to be a great day out!

The Streets - Alexandra Palace

My brother works at the venue and was going to try to get myself and a few friends in. However due to computer failure they'd sold too many tickets and there was a chance the event would be cancelled. Not wanting to risk anything, especially my brother's job, we agreed to leave it.

I spent the night catching up on lost sleep from the night before.

I nearly have a new home!

I've been keeping this quiet but after the year wasted trying to find a place I didn't want to pre-empt anything.

I've found a 2 bedroom flat in Hackbridge and this time the purchase has gone through smoothly. I've exchanged and complete just before the Easter Holidays. The flat isn't as nice as the one I spent 8 months trying to buy but I get an extra bedroom and I'll be paying £100 less a month on the mortgage. I have a good opportunity to do the place up (double glazing, central heating and new kitchen) and make more money on it too. In hindsight the other flat was so perfect it didn't need anything and so the potential would have been less.

This time next month I'll be a south-londoner!

Comedy Night

The second, and final, event I'd attended as part of the Diversity week at work. This was a stand up comedy night at Leicester Square (I spend too much time here!) and featured 4 acts; A gay asian, an Australian woman, A cockney and a black, oh, and the compére was Jewish. I can't recall the name of the first guy, but he was very funny, probably the best act of the four. The headline was Junior Simpson who I was supposed to see at the usual comedy haunt I go to but he no-showed. He was quite funny too.

The problem with the show is that there was a sense that some of the acts were holding back, perhaps saving their best material for an audience that pays.

After the comedy, the venue opened its doors to the public and became a nightclub. I hadn't intended on staying too late and I was leaving at around 10.30 when a met a mate, who'd left earlier in the evening to watch Middlesboro lose, but come back. I eventually found myself dancing and drinking until 2. There were a group of Californian girls spending their last night in town and they kept me partying as long as I did.

I stumbled home at 4ish and then called a friend in the states. I should really have gone to bed but it had been a good night and I wanted it to continue.

Fix Up

No! It's not another movie review honest!

This week my big corporate firm has been hosting several events as part of it's "Inclusion and Diversity Week". The aim is to show that they're not biased to any minority group. Why it's only happening for one week, I don't know but if it gives them the tick in the box to say they're a diverse company then so be it.

I went along to this play, written by Kwame Kway-Armah (of Casualty and Fame Academy) telling the story of a black book shop owner facing threat of closure. A small cast but a well written play which covered a number of black issues. After it, 4 of the 5 cast joined us for a Q&A session.

It was an enjoyable evening, made even more so by the vast quantity of free champagne and canapés. Usually the bar runs dry at these things, but not this time. No idea how much I drunk, it's always hard to tell when your glass keeps being topped up.

Ring 2

Had a mate at work manage to get some tickets to an advance showing of this.
I really enjoyed the original Japanese film and didn't like the idea of a Hollywood interpretation as they tend to ruin it (Nikita and The Vanishing to name but two examples).

I wasn't disappointed with the film, I knew it would be shit. If I had to pay to see it I wouldn't have done, but because it was free I went along. There are 2 good sequences; the first when deer attack a car, and the second when the girl is climbing out the well. The former has some very clever CGI, the other looking like it is CGI but according to the production notes we were provided was just a stunt woman who was also a contortionist who could get her feet above her head whilst climbing. The rest of the film is too slow and doesn't build up any tension.

In one scene where the kid is explaining he doesn't sleep, I felt it necessary to comment that if he'd been made to watch this film he'd have found a cure. Putting a "b" and "o" in front of the title is the easiest way to sum it up.

Alls well that ends well. (The best Ring pun I could come up with)

The Boogey Man

Hurrah, a horror movie with no twist, no ghosts, kids who see dead people, no schizophrenic lead actor, and fortunately for a film about monsters in closets, no blue furry beasts with the voice of John Goodman.

This is a straightforward monster movie like the monster movies of the 80s. Sam Raimi produced it but there is so much steadycam camerawork that you would think he was directing it too. A simple enough story about a kid who sees his dad captured by the eponymous bad guy and then finds him returning 15 years on.

A couple of jumpy bits, some good tension build up and a pretty scary bad guy makes this worth seeing, Oh, and it was nice to see the blonde die and not the brunette as usually happens.

There, I've totally spoiled that film for you!

Metal Gear Solid 3

I didn't want to buy this until I'd got 100% on GTA San Andreas. I'm nearly there though, just got to steal some cars, buy some property and deliver some drugs around San Fierro. Well I was out buying a Mother's Day present for "guess who" and picked up a copy along the way.

The game looks solid enough but is a little shorter than I would have liked. Yep, I've already completed it, albeit on "Very Easy" level. Decent boss battles, especially the one-on-one sniper battle with The End. A very odd sub-game with you shooting monkeys is also included in there.

To be honest I'll give this a break until I've done GTA then I'll return to it, and play it properly.

Hide and Seek

Whilst looking for a birthday present for my dad I decided to pop into Leicester Square (to any Americans reading this it's pronounced "lesta" not "lie-sesta") , the only film that looked the slightest bit interesting was this so called "super scary" Hide and Seek.

Starring Robert de Niro and Dakota Fanning (the little girl out of "Man on Fire"), it's a story of a man who's wife is found dead and who decides to retreat to the country with his traumatised daughter to help her. She then makes friends with an "imaginary" friend called Charlie and as their friendship develops sinister things start happening around the house..

It's not a very scary film at all, in fact it's a bit contrived and clichéd. Any film that tries to build up tension by increasing the music and having a cat jump out isn't going to enthrall me. There is a twist, and since Sixth Sense you'd be surprised if there wasn't. However this particular twist has been seen before, and done better. (I won't name the film as it would give it away). You do see the clues but they don't register as such, which I guess is how they're supposed to be; at least they get that right.

In the same week "Saw" came out on DVD, and that's still my favourite film of this genre. See that instead.

Yet another movie review,.....The Life Aquatic

This was a really quirky film but then if you've seen anything else by Wes Anders (Royal Tennenbaums, Rushmore) then you know what you're expecting.

Great characters that break the Hollywood mould by having facets of their characters that have nothing to do with the plot. Other characters that have nothing to do with the plot whatsoever, in this film they include a character who does nothing but sing David Bowie songs in Portuguese.

The story about is about an aquatic film maker, Steve Zizzou (played superbly by Bill Murray) and his quest for a "Jaguar Shark" after it reputedly eats his best friend. Along the way he meets his long lost son played by Owen Wilson, and runs into pirates.

The film is a lot of fun, with some stunning sets (the best being a cross section of the boat) and a great story. Whenever I watch a film that stars Owen Wilson I can't help but wonder what the hell he did to his nose to bend it so badly, but that didn't happen this time round. Either he's had it fixed or the film really is that absorbing.

We have snow!!!

OK, so it doesn't stay around for long but we are getting snow in London and as expected it's totally crippling our public transport. This week I've been getting into work at 10 instead of 9 and getting home at 7 instead of 6. But I have been able to make it in, some of the team haven't; in Kent the snow has been much worse.

Near where I live there's a big church at the top of the hill that attracts the local kids. I guess if we had a 24 hour store, or a cinema they'd hang around that instead. Given the options the church seems not a bad place to congregate. However rather than do anything good with their lives they use the hedges around the church to hide behind whilst throwing eggs at people walking past.

Even with the cold temperatures they're still gathering there, but rather than throw eggs, it's snowballs this week; a preferred option of the two. Give them time and they may even get their aim right, I had 2 fly past my head and smash against the wall beside me tonight on my way home.

Farewell Jack

Picture courtesy of European Coaster Club

Found out today that the oldest member of the coaster club died earlier this week after being diagnosed with cancer. Jack Holmes was well into his 80s and loved travelling to Europe to visit the parks with the club.

He'd emailed us the news himself, earlier in the week, to say he had been given less than a week to live and wasn't downhearted but looking forward to his next big adventure, he was saying his goodbye to us all. That alone showed the strength of his character. I don't believe I could be so bold as to do that, and share that moment with others that weren't in my immediate family.

The subsequent outpouring of emotion, thankyous and farewells from the other members of the club showed me that this is much more than a group of people who share an interest in coasters; it's way beyond that. I'm proud to be around such great people.

Jack was from New York and had some great stories about the Coney Island Cyclone, his favourite coaster and one that he had ridden thousands of times in his lifetime. I think those that were honoured to know him will be sure to remember him whenever they ride it. I for one will think of that ride as Jack's Coaster.

Goodbye Jack, and here's to you enjoying your latest ride, one greater than any built to date, and one we'll one day get to join you on.

Working overnight tonight

2 cans of redbull down, 4 to go. I've eaten all my fruit and have some chicken for later.

As I only consume redbull when I'm working overnight, I thought I'd bring enough to see me through the night. We have some changes to our website happening tonight so myself and another are in to see it goes in OK. I am going to be knackered tomorrow as I didn't get the lie in I wanted; The postman woke me up at 9 to deliver a promotional leaflet for Mother's Day.

On the way in I thought I'd pop into the record shops on Oxford Street. Came out with the new Mash Up CD from the Ministry of Sound. I'm loving the bootleg mixes from Party Ben amongst others and so felt a bit guilty about buying what is obviously a commercial attempt to cash in on the market. So to keep my conscience clear I also bought the Go Team album which has had rave reviews but not something I'd got round to getting. Both are good CDs, the latter a nice mix of Avalanches and Wee Papa Girl Rappers (whatever happened to them).

Oh, and as I got off the underground I found myself in a small snowstorm. Unfortunately it wasn't settling. If it's going to snow I wish it would do it properly.

Club night...

I was invited to a workmate's birthday bash on Saturday night, taking place at a small club in Central London. The last time I was in a proper club was during the short run of Home at Leicester Square which was a long time ago, and the night was so bad that I vowed never to go to a club again. People kicking their empties down the stairwells and having to avoid raining glass was enough to break this camel's back.

Anyhow, anywho, anywoohaa (got ya all in check) I turned up and found the venue pretty good with the party in full swing. Even though it only had a solitary light and laser projector the night was really good fun and much better than my last clubbing experience. I think it being a private party made it a little better.

I stayed there until 2, when the party started to unwind and people made their way home. On the way to the bus stop I thought I'd go for a piss at the toilets in Leicester Square and was followed in by a very drunk lad who proceeded to drop his trousers and boxers at the urinal. He was out of it. I laughed at the state of him, and quickly left. I think he was trying to speak to me but it made no sense whatsoever and as I made my way out I saw him still speaking at where I was standing, so maybe he was just wrecked.

Anyway, got to close to the bus stop to see my bus departing and there was no way I was going to run to the next stop to catch it. I have a rule that the only train or bus worth running for is the last of the day, something that rarely happens in London where we have round the clock travel, on the buses at least. I eventually got home at 4a.m.

Good night though, and yes I did dance, and no I didn't take anything. I didn't need to!

Petals Around the Rose

Came across this tonight and after a few minutes I eventually figured it out. See how you get on.

Petals Around the Rose

Ocean's 12.

Yet another movie and yet another review. I'm glad I don't do this for a living, although with the amount of rubbish I see, I probably could.

It was alright, but tried to be too smart. I didn't like the idea of having Julia Roberts trying to play herself, Bruce Willis' character wasn't necessary and the twist wasn't clever because the background to it wasn't shown to us until being revealed. It's this latter point that disappointed me most. The first film definitely had a clever twist. I don't think the writers tried this time round. And the film also sets itself up for another sequel with Catherine Zeta Jones joining them. I only hope 13 isn't an unlucky number.

The high point of this particular evening, wasn't the film but the Thai meal that came before it.

Unseen Fatboy Slim Video

It would appear that Fatboy Slim had 2 videos made for his "Slash Dot Com" track. The one you've probably seen is the man and woman with marker pens writing on the walls in the metallic room.

This, however, is the other, slightly more risque video.

The real slash dot com video

AAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGHHHHHHH!!!

I've lost my GTA San Andreas save game. All the effort I put in over Christmas has disappeared. Curse you Sony Memory Card.

So I've started over and am flying through it, it's a lot easier second time around especially as you know the layout of all the roads, which helps.

Parents not well..

Got a call from Dad this morning, saying that mum had spent the night in hospital following some food poisoning. He sounded terrible, and was really cut up. She was discharged after an overnight stay but whilst she was alright, Dad wouldn't keep his eyes off her and wasn't sleeping. I'd never seen him like this, a very sweet gesture but also pretty damaging for him. Even when I insisted he sleep and I'll keep an eye on her, he'd refused. My brother had tried too but to no avail. Eventually we got him to sleep when she went to bed which he did. The next day they were both a whole lot better.

It turns out my mother had taken medicine she'd reacted to in the past, but nowhere near as bad as this. Needless to say that bottle is in the bin. There is no way she's going to be taking that again.

Wet Ride

What am I giving up for Lent?

Well I'm supposed to give up something I love, and the most obvious candidate was...

Pizza!

Wish me luck, it's not going to be easy.

Chilled Weekend

Didn't really do too much this weekend, Saturday was spent wasting the hours replaying Half Life 2. The game is too short so I need to get my money's worth from it. On Sunday I went to see The Umbilical Brothers. It's 2 aussie mimes who incorporate sound effects and just put on a very entertaining show.

They've been on Leno and Letterman so you may have heard of them through that. Definitely worth seeing!

Happy Birthday to me

drunk drunk drunk I am
and it's my birthday too
but I don't care for I am old
and I'll have nowt' to do

thirty three is what I'll be
and that is fairly old
I had some cake and truffles
and then drunk cider all evening

yes I know it doesn't rhyme
but I don't really care
for at the weekend I had my head shaved
and now I have no hair

Closer

I really didn't want to see this film as it contains nothing that interests me. I've never seen a Jude Law movie, and I tend to stay away from adaptations of plays, unless there's explosions and crap like that.

However when I got to the cinema, this was the only film about to start and I didn't want to wait an hour for "Assault on Precinct 13", which would have contained explosions-a-plenty! A friend at work had also really enjoyed the film and recommended it.

So I've now broken my Jude Law duck but to be honest he wasn't that good, and I don't see what the fuss was about. For me Natalie Portman stole this movie, her acting is getting better and better.

The fact she plays a stripper who does the splits whilst wearing a thong has nothing to do with it. Honest!

This film also has the coolest movie poster.

New Haircut

Over the last few years, my hair has been increasingly leaving me, am I really that hard to get along with? Rather than trying to cover it up I've gone with just keeping it short. I'd like to shave it all off but never have the confidence to go that far.

Today I went to a number 1 which is a new record!

Now my head is bloody cold when I go out, time to buy a hat, although if I do that it looks like I'm covering it up.

I can't win!

Lord of Rings Marathon

Well I've had the Lord of the Rings trilogy box sets for a while but hadn't watched them so I decided today to do all 3 back to back.

08:50 Fellowship of the Ring begins.
10:35 Swap to disk 2.
12:07 Fellowship ends and The Two Towers begins.
13:50 Swap to disk 2.
15:40 Enough of the towers, time to watch The Return of the King.
17:45 Swap to disk 2.
19:32 "The End" is displayed. The marathon is over.
19:53 The credits finally end.

So it took me the best part of 11 hours (10 hours and 40 minutes if you exclude the credits) but at least I can say I've done it. The pacing of the trilogy is perfect and the ending, which seemed too long at the cinema, is just right when the trilogy is viewed all at once.

Now, I need to sit through the director commentaries, but that can wait for another day.

: Flip The Switch - Chemical Brothers Remixed

One for the bootleg fans. This is the same thing that happened to The Prodigy album a few months back. Give each track from the album to a different bootlegger and get them to remix it. Then bring them altogether on a single website and release them on the same day as the album's release. Fully endorsed by The Chemicals themselves, enjoy!

: Flip The Switch - Chemical Brothers Remixed :

Burns Night

Well I thought I'd celebrate Burns Night tonight and cook the meal.
So one haggis, and a bowl of mashed neeps and tatties later, I'm bloated. There was no way I could finish it, but then it was a meal for 4 I was attempting to devour.

I'm such a fat pig, but it was a one-off!!

I might be going to Japan!!

Over the weekend I received a bunch of trip invites from the coaster club and I think I'm going to do the whole lot!

In May there's a trip to Holland, just a weekend, but to 3 parks I've never been to.
In July there's another trip to Hungary, Austria and Italy, which again I've never been to.

Finally, there's the biggy! A 2 week tour of Japan. I had been undecided about this trip as Japan is my dream destination and I wasn't sure I wanted to do it just for coasters. But the club have some sight seeing opportunities and it's come in less than I thought it would be, just £2300. I only hope I get picked, if the club gets over subscribed.

With the good news on the flat, assuming it goes ahead, I can afford all 3.

WOOHOOO!!!!!

Good News from the Bank!

I went to see my mortgage advisor today and he found me a new mortgage. The bonus is that I will end up paying £100 a month less than if the last purchase had gone through.

I really was destined not to get that flat.

Elektra

Had nothing to do today so I thought I'd go and see another film today, the third this week. The link to Daredevil is pretty weak and there is no Ben Affleck (hurrah!!). The story is OK, with Elektra, an assassin, sent to kill some people who she then ends up protecting.

The effects are pretty good, especially with the character Tattoo who has animals tattooed on his body coming to life. Good to see Bob Sapp typecast as a muscular strongman, given that he's a 340lb Mixed Martial Arts Fighter I doubt he'd get much else. One lame character though was a guy who's ability seem to being able to balance a large coin on his hand. I'm sure if I read the comics I might have known more about him.

Overall its OK, not outstanding but then doesn't try to be.

Team America

The second film this week was a night out with some team colleagues to see the puppet fest from Parker & Stone. South Park is one of my favourite animated films, the intro with Uncle Fucker just cracked me up and kept me laughing throughout the film.

I was expecting Team America to be more of the same but it didn't hit the mark in quite the same way. The comedy was much more broader than South Park with some clever digs at Jerry Bruckheimer and Hollywood in general.

My favourite piece of dialogue was..
"A car with wings, now I've seen everything"
"Have you ever seen a man eat his own head?"
"No"
"Then you haven't seen everything, and neither have I"

The cruellest joke had to be the one aimed at Matt Damon. I can't wait for him to be introduced as "Maaahhht Daaahhhmon" from now on.

The worst bit of the film had to be the throwing up scene which I couldn't stomach, pun intended. I rarely have to close my eyes but I had to here, and it was just puppets. I have emitophobia (a fear of vomiting) so scenes like that I have to turn away from.

A bit of a scare

Got off the underground and went to get some food only to discover my wallet was missing. I had arranged a team night out and had a fair amount of cash in it, along with the cards. I called the office to see if anyone could see it at my desk and was told "no".

Panic sets in, so I decide to retrace my steps on the off chance that I've dropped it.

I ask the station if anything has been handed in and was told "no".
I spend the entire journey back to work thinking how I could have lost it and conclude that the pikey looking girl next to me on the journey home must have reached under the arm rest and picked my pocket.
I ask the station at the other end if anything has been handed in and was told "no".
I arrive back at work and check with reception and was told "no".

I get back to my office and can't see it anywhere on my desk, so I sit down to start calling around to get my cards cancelled when I realise I've just sat on my wallet which had somehow fallen out of my jacket onto my chair as I left to go home.

So this very happy bunny is pleased to find his wallet but is condemned to go to hell for blaming an innocent party.

Million Dollar Baby

I fancied a week of movie going as there had been a wave of new releases that I'd wanted to see. The first was this one from Clint Eastwood and as I'd been recommended to see Mystic River and blown away by it, I was expecting the same with this.

What I got was something much more complete and better. This had a better mix of comedy and tragedy than his previous effort. Some great acting from Hilary Swank and Morgan Freeman, with some very clever scriptwriting.

Whilst I tend to avoid films that are nominated for Oscars, I'm glad I've seen this and I hope it does well.

Found a new flat

Spent today back down in South London viewing some more flats.
Found a nice one with 2 bedrooms and cheaper than the one that fell through.
Similar flats in the area are going anywhere between 3 and 10 thousand more so I've picked up a bargain, because it's in great condition. The living room is a lot smaller than the other one but bedroom and bathroom are bigger, plus this one has the second bedroom.

This isn't as close to the shops as the last place was, but is much nearer the station, a bonus!

I put in the offer and it was accepted so I'm back in the process again. Here's hoping this one goes through.

Webcam exploit through Google

Apologies if this sounds a bit geeky...

If you search for "inurl:indexFrame.shtml Axis" in Google you're able to access webcams for various buildings around the world. I think you can drop the "Axis" for more results.

A pub
An airport
Tunnel construction

Quite cool for those with voyeuristic tendencies.
I've also found some more searches if you're interested just check out this link.

4 guys and a cheerleader

This is just crazy...
Pump Up The Movie

A trailer for a movie for those who liked "Bring it On"

Scaredy cat?

Ananova - Jet forced to turn back from US

I wonder what this guy had in his shoes?

The flat has gone

Today I gave up on the flat purchase.
The agents called for an update and I told them I couldn't accept the lease in it's current form patched up with insurance policies to fill the gaps. When I came to sell it wouldn't be a good proposition. I also wasn't happy with the lack of response from the landlord and not sure I'd want to have to deal with him again.

The seller came back and knocked off a decent amount to get the lease rewritten but couldn't commit to the landlord being keen to do his bit. So I chose to not to go with it.

So after 2 attempts totalling a year, I'm now back to square 1 over a thousand pound wasted. Roll on 2005!!

At the end of episodes of Inspector Gadget you'd always get some useful advice so that the program could be deemed to be educational. If this posting was an episode of that show then I'd now be telling you to stay away from flats above commercial properties as the leases are often shoddily written because only a single legal party is responsible for their creation.

Trip to the hospital

Got home after a crappy day at work (too much to do, too little time) to get a message from my parents. My brother had been knocked off his motorbike after a car pulled out on him (quite normal for motorcyclists it seems).

He's OK, managing to come away with only a fractured leg. The paramedics expected a 30mph collision to be more serious. He was disappointed that it wasn't broken, as he was hating the fuss he was causing. However he's content that it's fractured, if there was nothing but bruising he would have been quite pissed off.

So his leg is all plastered up but he's OK, which is the main thing. To cheer him up I raided the vending machine and bought him a kit kat. The marketing slogan "have a break" seemed ironically appropriate..

Jerry Springer the Opera

This was shown on BBC2 last night.
For those that haven't heard of it, it's a musical version of the show with some strong imagery and plenty of foul language, done in a pseudo-operatic style. The Christian community have been protesting about it saying it's blasphemy and inappropriate for a public funded station. Many of those protests have come from people who haven't seen the show though, as is usually the case with these protests.

Personally I found it really funny, even with the language which I'm not a huge fan of. I don't think the complaints were justified, it's no different from me, being an atheist, complaining about the channel showing "Songs of Praise" (a church based program for those that don't know).

I think if anyone had a right to complain it would be the Klu Klux Klan who are ridiculed by having them break into a tap dance routine. But then I'm sure the Christians wouldn't protest about that, after all they're not the subject.

I'm sure there will be plenty of press on the complaints in tomorrow's papers.

A new year, a new start

Happy New Year everyone.

I realise that I've not been posting enough on this to make it worthwhile so I've made a resolution to be a bit more active. So expect to see some more posts and I'll even fill in the gaps from the last couple of months with the more important stuff.

Flat nightmare

I had a meeting with the solicitor today and got some bad news with the purchase.
In short I seem to have a knack for finding badly written leases.
The vendor has filled the gaps by offering indemnity and insurance policies but it doesn't put me in a good position should I choose to change mortgage provider or sell on.
So I've asked for the lease to be rewritten, the money to come from knocking the asking price down by the required amount.

However that will take time and because it's been 8 months since this started I need to find out if the market has changed. I may be able to find a better property now, in which case I needn't bother continuing with the current one.

How much of my time do they want?

We had a 3 minute silence for the Tsunami victims today at work, as was happening all over Europe. I chose to leave the office before it started as I didn't feel it was right to be told how I should remember the tragedy. Yep it's bad that it happened but when the media (who is driving this) asks for my time on a selective basis then I oppose that.

I can't deny that what happened has been pretty devastating but it got 3 minutes today and another 2 on New Years Eve. Even our war veterans get less than that (one rememberance event I have no problem with). I think when Ken Bigley was killed there were 2 minutes there as well (and he's just a fool who ignored Government warnings in light of some quick cash). 9/11 got also got 2 minutes. In what is appearing to be an increasing trend, it won't be long before we're staying quiet for 10 minutes. Asking for all this time demeans the value of it.

The thing with all of these is that in most cases (except Bigley) we can't forget them if we lived through the event when it happened. There are other events such as Rwanda that are just as horrible but because there's no story there for the papers to sell we don't have it pushed in our faces, and feel obliged to remember and pay up.

Christmas Movies

I saw a couple of films over the holidays.

National Treasure


I saw the trailers for this in Florida and thought it looked extremely cheesy, as with any Bruckenheimer film. But it's actually not too bad. The plot is ridiculous (modern day treasure hunt around some American landmarks) but it comes off alright. I was surprised to see it get a PG rating but no one dies so I guess it's justified.

House of Flying Daggers
The follow up to Hero with some great martial arts action, visually stunning but suffers from that awful drumming soundtrack, which I just don't like. The plot in this is a little weaker than Hero, concentrating on a love story rather than an epic tale.

So 2 films that were just OK

Christmas

Once again my family and friends spoiled me.
I got

A digital camera
Various tops
Lord of the Rings DVD (The 3rd bit)
Little Britain DVD
New Boots
Various Toiletries
A cool book on 1000 movies to see before you die (that's quite an undertaking).
A weird diary that sets you a task each day of the year, if I followed it religiously I'd have emigrated to New Zealand (Jan 5th) and pretended to be the Messiah (Jan 2nd). That's just the first week.

I also got some cash that I used to buy some ipod accessories. I'm also thinking of joining the NFT, which will allow me to see some of the earlier movies in that book.

Hooters

Last but by no means least the most frequented eating establishment in all of Orlando, well by us anyway. We went there so many times the staff (mmmmmmmm the staff) recognised us and remembered our orders. The place has a pre-conception of being sleazy but it's unwarranted, there were couples, families and parties being catered for. We read that a rival chain was being taken to court for stealing the concept and the Orlando residents were definitely behind Hooters which says a lot for it.

IAAPA

This is the big convention that takes place every year and where anyone interested with the industry meets for some back slapping and shmoosing. As I'm not interested in that I was a little disappointed with it to be honest. There was only the one ride to go on, called a DiskO which was pretty good but felt a bit odd because you sit facing outwards unlike a frisbee where you can see everyone else riding. In previous years there had been more. You do get to see what rides may be coming up and get the opportunity to collect brochures from the major players. There's also food vendors demonstrating their new ranges that you can sample (some nice slush puppie variants). But all in all, we spent half a day there then never went back.

Skull Kingdom

This is a haunted attraction which we ignored (the guy in there was well creepy), however parked outside it was a new S&S swing which is starting to be bought by parks. Thorpe Park is getting a version of it this year. We got a free ride on it because we'd been at the convention and had our passes (the perks!). The ride itself is alright, swinging above the horizontal scares you a little bit but it is a little short in duration. It'll be a good addition to any park that buys it though.

Wet and Wild

The main water park in Orlando and although I'd been to others, I hadn't been to one with so many different rides. It's a nice escape from the theme parks, just don't go when it's too hot.
Whilst there I managed to try one of the near vertical drops that always look too scary to go on.
It was fine, the only problem I had was at the end the speed causes your shorts to rip shreds out of your arse. I came off quite sore.

There's also a strange ride where you sit back to back with another person and swing using a water cannon that you take turns to open up. This got really scary and because you don't have full control and are quite exposed you really think you're going to fall out, well I did. At a couple of points I had to slow us down because I really thought I was going to fall out. Afterwards I think I realised why, the harness hadn't been checked by the ride operator and was way too loose.

Kissimee Old Town

This was an evening jaunt away from Orlando. The area has a couple of thrill rides and is just a place to hang out. When we got there it was biker night with the main road inundated with some stunning looking Harleys and Superbikes. A little odd to see both types there, I didn't think the crowds mixed.

Skycoaster
I've ridden one of these things before but not on the scale of this. You get dropped from 300 feet and come throught he swing at 70 miles an hour. I ended up doing it on my own (one had done it before and the other didn't even want to try). When you're hanging at the top its deathly quiet and pretty scary but once you've done a full swing you relax and it becomes better.
I was too scared to even scream.

G Force Dragster Race
This was a new concept of ride which is basically a shot tower dropped on it's side that launches dragster cars along a racetrack. This is officially the fastest non-coaster ride in the world and the acceleration is immense. Its also fun because they've put 2 side by side and you start the car when the start lights tell you. We spoke to the designers of the ride (who got us on for free!) and they were telling us that the footprint is stopping parks from buying it which is a shame because it's a great ride.

Windstormer
At the end of the main street was this ropey little coaster which cost way too much to ride.
Needless to say we only did it the once.

Busch Gardens

So it was out to Tampa to get to this park which turned out to have the best coaster in Florida.
They're in the process of building a new one which is going to be a definite reason to go back out there, but this year I had to make do with the great coasters it already has.

Montu
This was the best coaster of the holiday. It's an inverter like Nemesis but on a much bigger scale and because they'd turned some of the trim brakes off made it more intense than it should have been. I'd also heard bad things about the ride operations at this park but saw no problem. We were allowed to stay on the ride if there was no queue, and for most of the morning, there wasn't.

Scorpion
This was an old Schwarzkopf coaster (Old German guy who designed some great rides). Not bad but not great, especially as there were other better coasters in the park. This probably explained why there was no queue on this ride whatsoever.

Cheetah Chase
This was their new coaster for the year, actually it was taken from another park. It's just one of those mouse coasters which wasn't themed and saw had nothing to do with Cheetah's whatsoever.

Kumba
This is another Floorless coaster, like Kraken at Seaworld. This however is much older and as a result, rougher. However I did have a few more goes on it but I was finding myself riding Montu a lot more.

Python
An old arrow coaster, like the Corkscrew at Alton. It was also very very short and climbing the lift hill took longer than the rest of the ride. One to ride just the once.

Haunted Lighthouse
This was their 4D movie which I found to be a bit long in length but was alright. I think it's finding it's way to Thorpe Park in 2005. You do get wet more often than normal.

Gwazi
Another disappointment of the holiday. How can you have a duelling coaster if you only run one side of it? The track was a little rough and you came off a little jarred. I didn't mind that too much though, there are rougher coasters out there.

Rhino Rapids
Part Safari Tour part boat ride, however the surprise is given away by the map which shows a jeep on the water. It's quite good, and being the only one of it kind makes it worth seeing.

Disney Magic Kingdom

This was by far the busiest park of the holiday but it should have been expected after all it is Disney.

Space Mountain
I absolutely hated the version of this ride in Paris. My head came more bashed than a Tyson opponent (when he was in his heyday). This however, even though it was 20 years older, was great - really simple and enjoyable with some nice flybys as you pass the opposing train.
Coming off the ride you travel on what feels like a sponge travelator, very odd indeed.

Big Thunder Railroad
When we got to this ride, it had just been reopened following a "technical problem" and when we finally got on it found all the lights on which to some enthusiasts would be a dream come true, but to me just showed how bad some of the effects really are. Having ridden it a second time, with the lights off, found it to be a pretty good ride although the Paris version is much better, albeit newer.

Splash Mountain
Although I don't know the Briar Rabbit tale on which this is based, the ride is still ok with some good drops which pleasingly didn't get me as wet as the cali one did (given that there were 4 of us in excess of 14 stones each on that occasion, it's no surprise we got soaked)

Stitch's Great Escape
This was the new attraction for this year and I was fortunate enough to get a preview showing of it. A nice touch that on its official opening day they'd themed the park to the extent of having the main castle covered in toilet paper. The attraction was pretty good with some great animatronics and the grossest smell effect I think I've ever endured.

Philarmagica
Now I almost walked past this and I'm so glad I didn't because it was the best attraction on the holiday by a long long way. Take the 4D concept and let the disney imagineers work their magic and you have the best 4D attraction ever. I was really blown away by this attraction and unlike Spiderman was just as good on subsequent viewings. This is the one attraction I will recommend as a must see.

Pirates of the Caribbean
This was the 3rd version of the attraction I'd seen having ridden the ones in Cali and Paris.
This version was the weakest and ended very abruptly. It's only saving grace that it had a great looking girl in its gift shop. Hi Jessica (like she'll ever read this).

Haunted Mansion
This is one of their older rides, and has dated a bit but it's one of those attractions that has to be done. There's a clever animated gravestone in the queue that people often overlooked, which I've not seen before. The rest of the ride is much the same as in the other parks.

Buzz Lightyear
Similar to Men in Black in that you shoot targets through the ride. Unlike that ride, the guns were bolted down, making shooting tricky. But it's designed for the kids, not the shooting purists, so does the trick.

Tiki Rooms
This used to be an atrocious ride which had clearly dated, I think it first opened in the 60s.
It's had a bit of a spruce, introducing some animals from more recent Disney shows. It's actually alright and makes fun of the fact it used to be so bad, which again is different for Disney.

Disney Animal Kingdom

At the centre of the park is a huge tree with over 350 animals carved into it. This alone is absolutely stunning and when you're queueing for rides you're often walking amongst the roots and trying to spot all the creatures. At one end of the park they're building Everest which I think opens in 2005. This looks massive and should be a good addition to the park, when it opens. It's nothing but a tease in its current state.

Dinosaur
This is apparently the same ride as Indiana Jones in Cali but themed around a time traveling journey. The ride itself is OK but Indiana is a lot more enjoyable. I didn't want to see the dinosaurs more than once but would instantly run back into Indiana Jones having ridden that.

Primeval Whirl
This does not look right in a park synonymous with great theming. It's supposed to be themed around a tacky version of the dinosaur ride and looks just like it. Also disappointing to find that half the ride wasn't working on the day we were there. I didn't think Disney was that bad.

Safari Tour
This was actually quite impressive once I'd got through the 40 minute queue having a woman bash her pushchair into my ankles repeatedly. Better than the walkthrough tour where most of the animals were asleep, at least here they were up milling around.

Rapids
They were closed due to "technical difficulties". Disney doing their best Six Flags impression there....

It's a Bug's Life
Another 4D show and the same as the one in California, some really annoying music in the waiting area (think kazoos) leads to what was my favourite show with stinkbugs, an army of ants and a ton of great effects. However it's now second best to the newer Disney one.

Disney Movie Studios

The first of the Disney Parks that we went to and the one we spent less time in.
Most of this park is tailored at the little kids.

Aerosmith Rock n Roller Coaster
This was nicely themed and having ridden the version in Paris I found this ride to be much much better although I preferred the lighting at the European Park. The cars are themed as stretch limos taking you across California to get to an awards ceremony. Going through the O of the hollywood sign (I can't remember which o) was pretty cool. The only coaster in the park

Tower of Terror
This was the biggest disappointment of the holiday. I was expecting an amazing shot drop tower but instead got something that just went up and down, the acceleration wasn't that great.
There was also quite a lot of queuing for the ride which put me off especially considering the short queues at the Universal Parks. You can't knock the theming of the building though.

Muppet 4D
Another 4D show which was identical to the one in Cali.
It's alright but Shrek was a lot better and this is now showing it's age a bit.

EPCOT

The technology park in the Disney World, there aren't any coasters here but there are some pretty decent attractions. We also walked the world fair which was a little cheesy but for the beer drinkers amongst you the only place to get a proper pint, although you have to spend a small fortune for the privilige.

Mission Space
This is their new ride, a centrifugal G-Force ride that simulates a flight to Mars. The one thing you notice about queueing up is the amount of warnings you get about not riding if you suffer from....
Definitely not Disney at all, they've even added sick bags to the cabins When the ride starts up you soon realise why, the forces are pretty intense and sustained, which is probably what does people in. At a couple of points you have to press a couple of buttons which adds a minimal level of interactivity (they don't actually do anything).

Test Track
This is quite an old ride but still pretty cool. You sit inside a car and a taken through a few temperature rooms, practice skidding and then go out to reach speeds of 100km/h on the main part of the ride. We rode it a few times and I like the noise it makes from a distance, like a small Superman @ Magic Mountain.

Turtle Talk
This opened on our second visit, the same day as Stitch so we didn't really know what we were letting ourselves into. After a short wait we were ushered in and sat down in front of a small screen showing what appeared to be an aquarium. Kids were invited to sit down in front and then Crush from Finding Nemo swam in. So we thought it was just a small movie, but we should have realised that Disney would take it a bit further. When the turtle described a person in the audience we realised that what we were getting was a fully interactive experience with the turtle answering questions fielded by the audience. Another genuine surprise of the holiday as I knew nothing of it.

Seaworld

This was the "local park" as it was only 5 minutes away from the apartment.
Its starting to attract the theme park crowds installing some fairly decent attractions
The star of the park however is Shamu which packs the crowds and is worth seeing (once!)

Kraken
A massive B&M floorless coaster (that makes me sound like such a geek). It's eerily quiet though as to stop the locals complaining about the noise they filled it with sand (that makes me sound like a bigger geek). I think this was my favourite coaster in Orlando, especially when ridden in the front. It was also well run with very little waiting time.

Journey to Atlantis
The other big attraction in the park, is this very well themed boat ride. The only problem I had with this is that the big huge drop didn't get me wet but a 1ft drop onto the lift hill got me soaked. A nice attraction for the park though.

Penguin Enclosure
A big travelator takes you along the penguin enclosure which is quite impressive. You're then taken along a second where they explain that puffins are the northern hemisphere equivalent and have them on display. So hearing Americans say "look at the funny penguins" clearly indicates that they don't they read the signs?

Shamu Show
The big killer whale leaps out of the water and makes a big splash and the dolphins do tricks with the trainers.

Shamu Rocks America
The big killer whale leaps out of the water and makes a big splash and the dolphins do tricks with the trainers, all to rock music.

Citywalk

Not a park as such but the downtown area that joins the 2 Universal Parks together.
It's here that you can enjoy nightlife or go to restaurants for meals.

Orlando Beer Festival
Whilst we were there Orlando had it's Beer Festival which was just an excuse for Americans to get pissed on weak lager and Europeans to drink whilst watching the locals get drunk.
Being on holiday I decided to try some of the beer on offer and wasn't surprised to find them as nasty as the stuff back home. A Jamaican Honey Beer was particularly nasty and quickly found it's way into a plantpot. The best drinks turned out to be the vodka variants with crowds queueing to try the drinks on offer. I'm sure it had absolutely nothing to do with the hot looking women serving them.

Margaritas
I wasn't sure about this place. It's something to do with a guy called Jimmy who sings lots of songs about drinking Margaritas. I guess he's a local celeb because lots of people were singing along to his music. The restaurant has a volcano within it that you have to pray to, when you do it erupts and margarita flows from it into a large glass. Yep, as weird as it sounded.

Cinnabun
This place makes really really nice hot cinnamon rolls and being a cinnamon fan was a good enough reason for me to go. However I was even more surprised by their slush puppies which unlike the ones here, don't lose their colour when you drink them.

Universal Studios

The sister park to Islands with some great attractions but I came away thinking that the park in Hollywood was a little better in places. This however is the best place for a milkshake. Try the diner. It was so thick that it didn't spill over but continued holding it's shape like thick icecream.
Just don't try drinking it through a straw.

Revenge of the Mummy
This was the new ride for the park in 2004. I had intended this ride to be a complete surprise and so intentionally ignored any press articles or reviews of it (not easy to do in the internet era I tell thee). The ride itself is alright with some a nice mix of effects, coaster ride and animatronics. However the first time I came off the ride I expected more. The second time I rode it, I got more because all of the effects were working. I guess they were still having teething troubles with the ride.

Twister
A nice simulation of a twister which can be quite wet if you're in the wrong place (I'm not going to tell you where the wet areas are). There is a nice transition where they move the twister from screen to stage which I thought was cool. The high point for me was the cow though. I promise to explain why on a later post.

Men In Black
A pretty fun shooting attraction. I was rubbish at it but still wanted to reride it. I'd heard rumours that if you scored high enough you got to experience a 2nd level but I don't see how this could be and suspect it's a rumour.

Shrek 4D
This was the other new attraction for the park this year, along with the Mummy.
This is one of those 4D cinemas where you watch a 3D movie and get wet and thrown around.
I found this quite enjoyable with some good use of 3D however the hydraulics in the seats were very loud and detracted from the experience.

Jimmy Neutron
Another motion simulator ride, similar to Shrek but not 3D. However I enjoyed this much more than Shrek for the dancing sequence at the end of the film. The only downside to this attraction was that I wasn't familiar with all the Nickelodeon shows in it. I know who Spongebob is but I don't think I've ever seen it.

T2
A smaller arena than the Californian one but still a good show. Apparently it caught fire the day after we saw it, that would have been much more exciting.

Earthquake
One of the older attractions but still quite good. I'm sure everyone has seen this. There is some weird crowd interaction as it's pre-show which didn't really go with the rest of the attraction.

Jaws
Universal's version of Disney's Jungle Cruise attraction. Some nice effects and I preferred this to the California version (which is a small part of the backlot tour).

Back to the Future
They need to send this back to the rubbish bin because it's so dated now.

Islands of Adventure

Probably the best park in Orlando (sorry Carlsberg) which we visited pretty much every day.
Some great theming, amazing food and just a great place to kill the day!

Hulk
The first coaster of the trip. Very large, very green and like the character it's based on has 2 sides to it. It starts out great with a superb launch and first few elements, complete with water splash. However the second half is a bit rough and I got beat up on it, so although I rerode it, there were better coasters out there. As with Spiderman (see next) skipping the pre-show means you won't know what the hell is going on. The throughput on this was superb with I think the longest queue being 10 minutes, for the front row.

Spiderman
I never understood from people's reviews how this actually worked so was quite looking forward to it. Needless to say I wasn't disappointed, it has a great mix of 4D cinema and motion ride with some great interaction between what is on the screens and the scenery you move through. However it didn't seem to have a huge re-ride factor and I wasn't as amazed after the 15th ride. Also a down side to having small queues is that you miss the pre-show and so don't really get what's going on if you walk straight on.

Duelling Dragons
Probably the best queue line I've ever seen as you're taken deeper and deeper into the castle and it's dungeons. I really like the animated stain glass windows which I blindly ignored for the first few weeks before realising they told a story. Of the two coasters I preferred the fire dragon, just for the airtime hill which I don't remember seeing on any other coaster. Ice is alright but not as good however both coasters have to be ridden in the front row to get the best scare of any coaster. Throughput on this ride was poor compared to Hulk because they were only running a single car on each side.

Popeye Rapids
One word sums this ride up - WET!! We got soaked on the first turn and the ride did not relent.
By far the best rapid attraction I've ever come across, even the lift hill that returns you into the station (or does it??) has more water cannons on it than you're likely to see anywhere else.

Dudley Doright Flume
Another great themed water ride which although it doesn't get you as wet as the rapids is still wetter than most rides. I particularly liked the "inappropriate theming" sign which offers a view of the back end of the park which you're not supposed to see. I was however confused by the side by side drop which only allows one to be used at any one time. The final water cannons are particularly brutal too (especially number 5).

Jurassic Park
The third water ride in the park and very disappointing having ridden the one in California.
The biggest difference is that the T-Rex has no water curtain to burst through and you can see it coming from a distance. Also the dinosaur that knocks you off course failed to emerge from the water, a broken effect I guess. Finally there was a huge rat floating dead in the water which clearly wasn't part of the theming.

Flying Unicorn
This was the park's kiddy coaster which unlike the pteranodon fliers, we were allowed to ride on. It was OK but not great. The staff member at Skull Kingdom rates this as his favourite coaster in the park (we knew he was a bit weird, this confirmed it).

Dr Doom's Freefall.
This is their drop tower ride, which is similar to anyother tower attraction.
One nice touch is that having been assimilated (the theme) as you leave the ride, it plays the sound of a marching army.

Poseidon's Fury
This is one of their walk through shows which isn't too bad. The main attraction is a room that suddenly turns into Poseidon's palace. However due to a mistiming in the effects we got to see how it worked. The ride is excellently themed outside though.

Florida is over!

Well I'm back from my trip to Florida and I had a blast. It was my first time out there and a place I'd been wanting to go to for a while. I was blown away by the scale of Disney. I knew it was big but didn't realise they had their own freeway and a huge amount of land to still build on.

Universal impressed me with it's range of rides, including some very hi-tech ones. There was also an amusement park and attraction convention there that we visited.

Here's my report which I've kept brief because I don't like writing at length and doubt anyone will actually read this. I'll break it down by into bite-sized chunks..

Hero

I finally got around to seeing this last night. Whilst it's a visually stunning film the soundtrack was sending me to sleep so I've come away thinking it was just "ok". It's the same fault I had with Crouching Tiger although being a fan of Ninjas as a kid, I tolerated the soundtrack.
The follow up comes out in December, I know they won't replace the drumming with some angst filled synth rock, which is what you'd get in an American equivalent, but I can wait in hope!

Saw is still my favourite film this year..

Flat is tidy!

Got one of those phone calls that I dread getting.

"hello, it's the estate agents. is it OK to pop around tomorrow as someone would like to view the flat"

For those that don't know, I'm trying to buy a new place and my current landlord is selling the place I'm in currently. This means I have people coming around looking at my stuff. A couple of weeks ago an old couple wanted to view the flat and I said that the place wasn't presentable and could they do tomorrow. However they were indignant so I backed down. They then went on to comment about the state of the flat and made some pretty shitty comments about me indirectly. So now I don't let the agents come around unless I've been given 24 hours notice. That way I can get the place decent for them to see, and I won't get annoyed by more crappy comments.

I'm not a slob, nowhere near it but I don't like criticism like that.

So, the flat has been tidied this evening and the agent can do what he wants tomorrow.

B-Boy Championships are over...

...and what a superb weekend it was.

Saturday was the singles battles and featured a B-Boy battle and for the first time a Popping battle. For me the latter was the better contest, and the final came down to French guys; Salah and Sally Sly. I'd seen Salah before and knew he was really good but here he was in his element and he totally blew all the opposition away, to say he was in another league would be an understatement. However for reasons that no-one can figure out, the judges gave it to Sly. The crowd went mad when the announcement was made. Sly left and Salah stayed and gave another performance. You can tell that this guy has a background in mime and he brings that to his popping. I can't find any footage to show you how good he is, if I do I'll post it. Oh and in the b-boy battle it ended up with two Koreans in the final; Hong 10 and Physics. This final was really close but Physics won it with 8 spins on his elbow, some shit that blew away Crazy Legs, so it must have been good.

Sunday was the team battle and this ended up with a Korean / American final - Project Seoul vs Massive Monkeys. This was really close, both teams having some great routines. I personally thought the Americans had it but the judges gave it to the Koreans. The team battles for me are what the whole weekend are about, and the crowd was well up for seeing these. The move of the night involved a french kid running into 2 team mates and then being launched backwards up into the air towards the rest of the crew who'd built a tower to catch him. Crazy!!!!

The only downside to the weekend was a live act called Breakestra. If there was a musical equivalent to dying on stage then they did it. Unfortunately they played a continual set so had no opportunity to stop and gauge the audience reaction. It got so bad that people just started doing their own battles in the crowd for entertainment.

Not me though, I just watched...

Roll on next year which I hope will be something special given it's the 10th anniversary.

The Machine

Whilst at the B-Boy championships, Afrika Islam (who was hosting with Crazy Legs) made reference to his new band, called the Machine. When you see the line up you should see that this is something special.

Chuck D (Public Enemy)
Melle Mel (Furious Five)
Afrika Bambaataa (Zulu Nation)
Afrika Islam (Zulu Nation)
Ice T (Body Count)
Ernie C (Body Count)
Chad (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
Flea (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
Trent Reznor (Nine Inch Nails)
Axel Hilgenstoehler (Thumb) **OK, I don't know this one either**

Pretty good huh? I thought this was made up as Islam does say a lot of shit on stage. However it does appear to be true, apparently they played their first gig in Germany a few days prior to the battles. The link to a review of that is here .

(If you can't read German it basically says they sound very heavy - rap with industrial overtones and that Ice T never showed up which is a bit bad for a premiere, although he did appear via video link)

Def Jam Vendetta - Fight for New York

The new Def Jam game came out today and I bought a copy on the way home, a complete impulse purchase. For whatever reason I also bought the Star Wars boxset but that's another story!

Anyway, the game is pretty good, nice solid graphics with some sick moves, especially those that involve the crowd. The moves appear a bit limited but that could be because my character hasn't developed yet. It also has Henry Rollins in it, which is enough reason to get it I think. Unfortunately I've not unlocked him yet.

In terms of fighting hip hop celebrities, I've so far destroyed Ice T, O.E. and Sean Paul (Took much delight in the last one). I wish there were more games where you can beat seven shades of crap out of celebrities.

Saw

This is a film that came out today and which I caught after work. It's probably the best film I've seen this year, although to be honest there hasn't been much stand out stuff (Big Fish springs to mind though).

Anyway, if you liked Se7en, with it's dark visuals and non-hollywood ending, then this is more of the same, but much more sadistic. The guy that wrote this needs to be looked at closely as there is a very evil streak in his personality. Instead of having a serial killer, this goes one better by having the baddie put his captors in situations where they end up killing themselves. Much more inventive.

Just about every horror movie, that has come out in the last couple of years, have been marketed as being "the scariest thing since...... and the vast majority of them have been very disappointing and not scary at all. This however really lives up to any hype (and there hasn't been much) that has been thrown at it. Women were screaming in the cinema, and blokes were doing that styled out laughing they do when they don't want to be seen screaming.

Anyway I really like this film. I'm thinking on going to go and see it again, if only to spot the clues to the ending which I'm not going to give away here.

This week's support

I've been on second line this week which means that someone else fields the calls and I'm their back up. So far I've had absolutely no calls this week.

which is nice!

B-Boy Championships

This weekend sees me at the 9th B-Boy Championships for a weekend of hip hop, spinning, MCing, more spinning, Scratching and more spinning.

Saturday is the single battles and they have popping for the first time this year. I'm looking forward to the latter more than the breakdancing.

Sunday is the team battles which are the highpoint as long as the rules aren't too strict.
The battles in 2002 featured skateboards, chairs, costumes amongst other things. Last year there was none of that which didn't make it all that entertaining.

If I don't seem the sort of person to spend all weekend at an event like this then I'm glad I'm surprised you. I've not missed an event in the 8 years it's been running so far, and don't intend to anytime soon.

the official site

Burnout 3 update

Well I've completed what I thought was the final grand prix only to be offered a 4 race series with formula 1 cars. This is proving to be too tricky for me. I'm only able to get points in one of the races. If you crash then that's pretty much it as the other cars leave you for dust.

I'll keep at it though.

The other site...

...is almost complete. I'm exactly 200/268ths of the way through and should hopefully have it finished in the next day or two. Now if I could just stop allowing distractions to get in the way.

Dentist's Again

Round 2 with the Dentist today - fillings and cleaning

The fillings were not too bad at all, the drilling was OK, the only problem was the nurse was a crap aim with the sucker thing and ended up attempting to vaccuum my tongue on more than one occasion.

It was the cleaning that was painful though. Some sort of ultrasonic brush which when put close to my gum line was more painful than any of the tattoos I've had done. I've been told that the new ultrasonic brushes you can buy are nothing like this. I'm glad of that, but will not be buying one anytime soon. I'm not that masochistic.

And the cost of all this enjoyment? £165 if you please.

I have one more round to go, in 2 weeks time.

Working elsewhere

I've not put much stuff on the site over the weekend because I've been working on another site, listing the coasters I've ridden.

I'll link it to this upon completion.

New Michel Gondry Video

Michel Gondry is one of my favourite music directors. He's the guy that did the Chemical Brother's video with the scenery passing the train window in time to the music. He has also done a couple of movies, the most recent of which was "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind".

Occasionally he dips back to music videos, the one below is for a track called "Behind" by a French act called "Lacquer". Whilst the track isn't all that great, the concept of the video is superb - a time lapse recording of a road trip from L.A. to New York.

Enjoy!

Behind video

Party Ben Sixx Mixx

This chap Ben has a radio show in San Fransisco and plays some superb mixed sets. Whereas most mixes are clubbing tune based, these are a mix of Indy, 80s & rap. So if want to hear Franz Ferdinand mixed with Faithless mixed with The Beasties then try here.

SixxMixx

Force and Styles

Listening to "All over the UK" tonight and reminiscing. How good were Force and Styles back in the day? Why on earth did they go and hand over the rights to all their tracks to Flip and Fill (who've only gone and ruined everything they ever did).

Back From Belgium

Another great weekend, no beer, but plenty of chocolate and waffles.
Bobbejaanland and Six Flags Belgium are both great theme parks, the latter will be better when they lose the Six Flags label.

Like the green aliens in Futurama, Corporate firms can really suck the life out of a park.

Away for the weekend

This weekend I'm off with the ECC to Belgium for a weekend of roller coasters, chocolate and alcohol.

Having never been to Belgium before, it'll be another place I can say I've been to.

Bootleg Music

Currently my favourite music download site is http://boomselection.info/ . If you like bootlegs and mash ups then this is probably the best place to go (that I've found so far).

Remember the old days of hip hop when rappers would battle rivals on their tracks. Well it looks like it's the turn of the ladies. The site has a Lady Sovereign track for downloading where she's absolutely ripping into Jenita, who I've never heard of.

The site also has some full length mixes for downloading, which take forever to download on my ickle ol' dial up connection. So why don't I upgrade to broadband? Two reasons.

1) I am hoping to move soon into my new home, if the stupid freeholder pulls his finger out and stops stalling the process (I'll moan about this in another post).
2) If I had broadband I'd not go out at all, and I'm supposed to be going to the gym more often.

So for now I'm persevering with what I have.

New Orange Commerical

Telecommunications company Orange are sponsoring cinema in the UK and every month or so they show a vignette before the film starts. In it a well known movie star is trying to pitch a new movie idea to a bunch of Orange Executives who take their concept and twist them to suit their mobile phone products.

To date we've had..

Roy Scheider
"The Columbian Connection", a piece shot as "Film Noir", is changed to "Film Oránge".

Carrie Fisher
19th Century period drama where 2 characters write to each other via letter is moved to the 21st century and they communicate via text messages.

Spike Lee
"Black and Blue", a movie based on the Boston basketball team and about colour is moved to Orange County and the team is changed to the Giants, who play in Orange.

Alan Cumming
Guy lost in Vietnam is rescued after sending text messages for help.

Sean Astin
Concept for a film set in New York becomes the fourth film in the trilogy, "Lord of the Ringtones - Return of the text message".

The latest one features Verne Troyer trying to sell a film about a man who has to overcome challenges in his life and includes references to "frickin'" and "1 million pounds" complete with little-finger-in-mouth pose. I think this has been the funniest one yet.

One reason why I think these ads work is that they don't outstay their shelf life, unlike most of the adverts shown in cinemas (the twenty year old thieving snake springs to mind). They're kept fresh.

Unfortunately I can't find any transcripts or downloads for those who can't get to a British cinema. Maybe in time Orange will correct this.

Supersize Me

Whilst I was down in Camden I thought I'd get out of the rain and go and see "Supersize Me". I'm sure there's no need to explain the film; every media outlet is currently reporting on it at the moment.

The film puts together a strong case for not believing everything McDs tell you about how good their food is, and is extremely educational and insightful. If I was Health Minister I'd ensure this documentary was shown to every school kid in the country. In fact I'd do my utmost to have it shown on prime time TV.

Whereas Fahrenheit 411 was excessively schmaltzy and a questionable view of it's clearly biased director, this was much more factual and there was a smaller argument for saying that the report was manipulated and one-sided. I mean how much clearer can you get than showing how much the size of the portions have changed over time than putting the cups alongside each other (a normal cup a few years ago is now a kid's size etc.). The only bit which I think is open to question is the experiment with the kids recognising pictures of famous people, naming Ronald McDonald but not Jesus. If you edit the footage to only show the "don't know" responses you can easily add weight to your argument.

Another interesting thing to note is that McDonalds have paid to show a commerical before the film which advertises a website saying what aspects of the film they agree and disagree. Given the impact this film had in the States, where they no longer sell super size portions, I doubt many people will be interested in seeing their argument. They've already lost!

For the record, I ceased eating McDonalds 3 years ago after reading "Fast Food Nation", although a few weeks ago I did have a Quorn Burger, but only because I was drunk and hungry at 2 in the morning following the Comedy Club on Thursday night. Yes, I agree I must have been drunk to have ordered the Quorn Burger of all things.

Halloween Mission - The Boiler Suit

I have an invite to a Halloween Party that my best friend is organising for next month, and as she's insisting on it being a fancy dress affair, I've started looking for my costume.

The plan is to go as Jason Voorhees, the ice-hockey masked killer from the Friday 13th movies. The costume itself should be pretty straightforward; a blue boiler suit, big boots, the aforementioned mask and a machete. I have some ideas for extra effects to make the costume a bit better but that can come later.

So, today was supposed to be the first attempt at getting the costume. I have the boots already, and I thought I'd go for the boiler suit today whilst down at Camden Market.

Now for those who don't know about Camden Market, it's the biggest alternative market in the UK and it takes place every Saturday and Sunday. I think a few hundred thousand people visit it each weekend, it's that big. It's as diverse as you'll get in London, with a mixture of Goths, Skaters, Punks and toursits (lots of those). You can buy pretty much everything, except as it turns out all-in-one navy boiler suits. I couldn't find one anywhere, in fact, I couldn't find anything close. Some old all in one ski suits was the nearest I could find.

I did however see some Guantanamo convict outfits, well the shirts at least. If I don't have much success on the Jason outfit then I'll consider that as a back up plan, although I'd have to figure out a way to dance in shackles.

Burnout 3

This game came out in the UK on Friday and I picked up a copy on the way home. Now it's been taking over most of my weekend. It's a great game and is insanely fast. It's very easy to play it for so long that you just fall into a "zone" and before you know it hours have passed.

An amazing game that is sure to gain major accolades.

The only downside? I'm now left with a copy of Burnout 2 that I'm unlikely to ever play. One for the charity shop I think.

Bar 242 Comedy Night

OK, my first plug for something.

Once a month a local bar, near where I work, has a comedy night. It has had them in place for a number of months now (they used to be twice a week) but the attendance of the public has been pretty shocking. The place does advertise but people don't come.

Last night, the evening was headlined by Tim Vine who was throwing jokes out faster than you could keep up with, something he's well known for doing. There were 3 others before him, who varied from pretty diabolical to pretty funny. From an audience point of view I think there were around 20 people there and its a shame as the event deserves more.

So, if you're at a loose end on the first Thursday of each month get yourself to Bar 242 on the SE corner of Blackfriar's Road and Southwark Street.

Best Joke.
(paraphrased). "I went up to Scotland with Easy Jet" and was going to fly back with BA but he didn't want to fly with me. Kept going on, "I aint flyin' on no plane, crazy fool".

Best Heckle (Tied)
"I apologise, I said you look Jewish and you're not"
"You look funny but you're not".

"Anyone got any questions" (He was dying at this point)
"Do you know any jokes?"

Something else that tends to happen at these nights, is that I always seem to end up quite pissed; I suspect something to do with the amount of wine our group gets through. On this particular occasion, I staggered home at 3 a.m. having just missed the hourly night bus that takes me home. The downside is that it takes me forever to get home on the night bus as I live at the final stop, the good side is that I can fall asleep and be woken up by the driver when he gets there.

New Hollywood Action Hero

This footage has been sneaked out of a movie agents in the states, I suspect to build up some hype for his impending debut.

One to watch out for perhaps!

Audition

Things you may have missed at Legoland

These kiddy parks may not be as innocent as first seems.

SignOnSanDiego.com > News > North County -- Mature images Legoland builder's inside joke

Bouncy Castle Tricks

I discovered the following at this weekend's trip to Southport.

Post to Post
Person A leans against the left hand post facing the post opposite.
Persons B & C then run at full speed from the left hand side of the castle to the right and throw all their weight into the wall.

Result - Person A is launched across the entrance way of the castle face first into the post opposite.


Through the wall
Person A leans against the right hand wall.
Persons B & C then run at full speed from outside the bouncy castle into the side of it.

Result - Person A is launched unexpectedly across the castle into the opposite wall.

The European Coaster Club

A few years ago, I decided that I got fed up with beach holidaying and wanted to do something different. I've always liked theme parks and would visit Alton Towers every year, so I decided to see if there were any holiday companies that specialised in theme park holidays.

Other than Virgin holidays to Florida I couldn't find anything but I did come across a couple of Coaster Clubs which arranged trips abroad. Bingo! So they'd do all the work and I'd pay and go along.

There are 2 main clubs in the UK, the Roller Coaster Club of Great Britain and the European Coaster Club. I wrote to the first and got no reply, not the best start. Then I saw the chairman of that club on a documentary and to put it bluntly he played up to the camera and looked like a dick. He's the guy who wears a suit with a coaster design and has a "coaster-handshake". So I was turned off this club.

Coincidentally, the other club was touring Scandinavia as I was looking to join and I was reading the reports which were being posted daily to their website and I decided that this looked like the better club to join up to.

This was 3 years ago. Since joining I've been to France, Germany, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Spain and all over the American West Coast. I've also been to most of the parks in the UK.

Along the way I've made some great friends too!

Anyway the point of this post is to say that I'll be away this weekend to Southport to visit a couple of parks up there that I've not been to before.

The European Coaster Club

Work today

Not the best day today. Spent the afternoon with the client and discovered that they were wanting to put some changes in for the weekend without running them past the team first.

They wouldn't have worked, so I had to remain in the office to rewrite the pages to help them out.

I won't be in the office tomorrow to see the work through (see next post for reasons why) so someone else is going to have to pick it up.

Now this wasn't an interesting post to read really, was it?

Dentists

A workmate had brought some chocolates back from Florida for us all to eat. I bit into one and heard a crunch, it turned out I'd broken my tooth. So a quick call, and I was off to the dentists to get it patched up.

100 pounds later, it's fixed and not surprisingly there is more work to do in my mouth, so I need 2 more visits.

Fortunately, the dentist wanted to do some root canal work which would have set me back another 300 pounds, however he couldn't find the nerve to work on as it had retreated. Hurrah for my natural defences. I saved myself a small fortune there.