The Sprog Blog

I'm moving.

2011-01-17T17:52:00.002Z

So yeah. To here.

http://the-mind-dump.blogspot.com/

Gone is the sprog stuff. Gone is random crap, annoyingness, and general pointless posts. I'm basically consolidating all my online stuff into one, useful google account. It won't be serious, but it won't be plain stupid either.

New Update

2010-04-24T16:29:00.007+01:00

Holy shit. An update. This is a rare occurance.

Oddly, there's not much for me to post really. I've done all my final exams and am waiting for results to come through (should be next week), if I pass, voila, qualified veterinary nurse. Then just got to get registered with the RCVS.

As I've done all my exams I've finished on placement, which is a bit lame. Started my new job which has slightly insane hours but I'll get used to it eventually. 24/31/48 hour shifts and the like. Gonna be... interesting!

That's it really. Means I'll have less free time and stuff but hey, it's a job for now.

If you have a free couple of minutes, watch this... It's really cool and trippy.

I really ought to update this more often....

2010-04-24T00:41:00.001+01:00

Maybe I'll do it tomorrow when I have time.

I swear this is a real song

2010-03-04T23:54:00.001Z

LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL.... LOL!

For the full thing, go Here

Some rambling thoughts on Tilikum, SeaWorld, and Orcas in captivity

2010-02-26T00:16:00.002Z

I've been reading up on this since it happened, thanks to Josh for sending me a link about it otherwise I would have probably missed it last night. The Orlando Sentinel has written up an interesting article about it all, which you can view here

It's an interesting story, perhaps overplayed slightly with hysterical headlines and exaggerated eye-witness reports (because of course, the whale is going to JUMP out the tank, grab her and drag her in!), but I think it highlights some major points with regards to keeping Orcas in captivity and human interaction with them.

The fact Orcas are kept in captivity is a debate, in itself, far too large for me to even attempt to cover in a few paragraphs. But I'm going to try it anyway, even if it's far too complex. There are definate Pros and Cons to each side of the argument, but I will openly admit I don't take either side, sitting on the fence inbetween. Having been to SeaWorld a few times, I can see they do the damn well best they can for their Orcas. The Orcas have a lot of stimulation and interaction, and a much larger tank than you would perhaps expect, and appear in good health. Compared to somewhere like Miami Seaquarium, where Lolita is kept in a tank roughly 1.5 times her size and spends all day circling, vocalising for her pod, SeaWorld is effectively captive Orca heaven.
However, there are questions with regards to SeaWorld that this incident has raised, some of which have always been in my mind since the last time I visited (I was 16 at the time), a few coming from spending a good 45 minutes walking up and down alongside the window on the tank and having Tilikum follow me back and forth, before then just sitting and watching him for a while.

Something I've always wondered is why SeaWorld continue to house Tilikum and use him in shows.
Captured off the coast of Iceland in 1983, he is roughly 30 years old now and has been in captivity for most of his life. He literally dwarfs the other Orcas, coming in at over 22ft long and 5.5 tonnes, and is the largest Orca in captivity. His history includes no human interaction at the first park he was kept at, resulting in him accidentally drowning a trainer when she fell in his tank. You cannot condemn him for this, as he had no knowledge that humans don't survive underwater for prolonged periods of time and that they also don't particuarly take well to being held on to by an Orca. It's not because he is violent or a killer, as if he had been attacking it would have been a much more violent event, it is most likely because of his lack of interaction and his brief early life in the wild.
It is also not the reason he was moved to SeaWorld, this was due to the fact that the 2 females he was kept with began acting aggressively towards him.

So, when a non-SeaWorld employee decided to sneak into his tank one night, the same thing occured, Tilikum wanted to play. Whether this happened again or this was infact some kind of territorial/aggressive thing cannot really be said at this stage, however the fact he pulled on the trainer's hair and again wasn't particuarly violent suggests that it was more playing. Or at least I hope it was, but the fact SeaWorld now keep him separate from other Orcas due to his "aggressive nature" towards them is troubling. He appears to be allowed frequent but short interaction with the pod, rather than being totally banned from them.
Perhaps this could be seen as cruel, unfair and perhaps inhumane. However, the fact is, (in my opinion) he is better off being kept on his own in captivity. If kept in the pod, he could cause serious injuries to the others, and any attempt to release him into the wild would probably be seriously flawed and detrimental. This is an animal that has been kept in captivity for most of it's life and more than likely lacks the skills, both socially and as a hunter, to survive in the wild. The case to look at here would be that of Keiko, the Orca who was used in the Free Willy films. After much rehabilitation and teaching, he was lost on a supervised swim in the open ocean, preparing him for a return to a pod. But he still had no real skills to hunt or look after himself, resulting in pneumonia and eventually death, and perhaps this shows that even after years of extensive work to rehabilitate Orcas to the wild, it may simply not be possible for it to ever work.
The fact Tilikum is also aggressive towards other Orcas could also potentially be a bad thing, but (throwing ideas around here), perhaps this is a dominance or territorial thing, it may change in a pod in the open ocean. I really have no idea, hence why I generally end up with no real conclusions on the situation (and in which case, if you're hoping for one, you really ought to stop reading now).

However, the fact he was taken from the wild again raises more questions - should this have ever been done in the first place, was it really necessary, and what does it say about us?
I have no real problem with SeaWorld housing Orcas born in captivity, because they don't have any notion of the wild and have constant human interaction. With Orcas like Tilikum, taking them from the wild and dumping them in a tank will surely have psychological effects, and incidents are bound to occur due to a lack of understanding from both the Orca and the trainers.
It can be argued that without taking them from the wild, there would be no Orcas born into captivity, and therefore maybe it was necessary. But then is it necessary to keep them in a tank and entertain people? Necessary to make a profit, perhaps, but not necessary for the animal or, indeed, the customers. There is also a slight argument about research into the species and behaviour, but surely this is flawed as studying them in the wild would provide much better and realistic results?

The 45 minutes of him following me threw up various questions with regards to why he was doing it. I would suspect boredom would be part of it, being kept on your own in a tank can't be much fun. Was he playing? Part of me thinks so. The fact he constantly tracked me along the windows was enjoyable, but made me wonder, was this also enjoyable for him? Surely it must have been for him to continue to do so. I will always look back on that moment in time with awe and amazement, as I only found the viewing area by going "what's down this path?" and dragging my parents and brother down it. For 30 minutes or so, we were the only people there and it was simply amazing to have this Orca follow me back and forth along a giant pane of glass

I'm not sure where I'm going with this any more, as I'm simply trying to show the two sides to the story and the ideas behind them. I've probably asked more questions than I have answered. Maybe I ought to tie this up.

I will admit, I find Orcas fucking awesome, they are brilliant, intelligent, majestic creatures. If I ever had the opportunity to work or interact with them, I would do it instantly. But, these things are killing machines, and as such there is an inherent risk. The staff at SeaWorld understand this, and perhaps that is the most important point: The trainer knew there was a risk, but she did the job because she loved it. And as such, it is neither her fault, that of SeaWorld, or, realistically, that of the Orca. It was simply an accident. If you think badly of SeaWorld or their staff, I highly suggest you do some research into their conservation efforts and compare the care of their Orcas with those kept in other parks.

On a side note, there is also an interesting quote in the Guardian from the head of Animal Training at SeaWorld, about Tilikum's training and the general actions of staff, which you can read here

Tech Support Helpline

2010-01-12T22:38:00.010Z

You know what? I promise never to get angry with tech support people due to the fact they're treating me like an idiot. I now see the world from their perspective, here's the transcript of a conversation I had tonight....

jarrad says (21:19):

hey, my mum has forgoten her password and we cant remove it cuz you need a password. is they anyway of gettiing round that i have tryed safe mode ?

Ash says (21:19):

you need to log on as a system administrator and then change it via user settings on the control panel

jarrad says (21:19):

she is an adminstertor

lucky shes got a finger print on it so thats how shes singed in but the finger print has fucked up befor

Ash says (21:20):

a what?

well if she's signed in

jarrad says (21:20)

finger print thing you can sign in by finger print

Ash says (21:20):

go start > control panel > users

Ash says (21:21):

"Change your password"

jarrad says (21:21):

yer we have done that but when we try to remove the passwoprd you need your old password

she dosent know it

Ash says (21:21):

right hang on

jarrad says (21:22):

thnaks shes haveing a right stress

Ash says (21:22):

right

are you on vista?

jarrad says (21:23):

yer

Ash says (21:25):

start > run > cmd

This SHOULD work

jarrad says (21:27):

yer doint you have to type you user name

Ash says (21:27):

then type "net users"

it will list all users on the system

Ash says (21:28):

find your mum's account name

type in "net users [NAME] *"

if the name has a space in it, you need to put it in quote marks

like.... net users "debbie southern" *

jarrad says (21:29):

Ash says (21:29):

type in the new password CAREFULLY

cmd won't show it

then hit enter

then retype it

and it should, theoretically, change it

i'd advise changing it to something simple and memorable

like her birthday, or whatever

jarrad says (21:29):

ok trhanks

brb

jarrad says (21:36):

ok i got it with me

jarrad says (21:37):

do i put "net users"(deb)

or "net users deb"

Ash says (21:38):

you put "net users deb * "

jarrad says (21:39):

it says its not an recongised comand

jarrad says (21:41):

ok it says C;/users/deb>

Ash says (21:42):

Right, have you got the command line interface open?

jarrad says (21:42):

if you on about the thing with the black backgorund and white writting yes

Ash says (21:43):

just type

"net users"

and hit enter

without the "

jarrad says (21:43):

Ash says (21:43):

like this

jarrad says (21:43):

now hat

Ash says (21:43):

it will show you the users

yes?

jarrad says (21:43):

yer

with admistor on the top

Ash says (21:43):

yep

You want the name of your mum's account

Ash says (21:44):

which is...

jarrad says (21:44):

deb

Ash says (21:44):

now type "net users deb *"

without the " again

jarrad says (21:44):

Ash says (21:44):

asks for new password

jarrad says (21:44):

yes loads of stuuf has come up now i do the password ?

Ash says (21:45):

it will say

"Type a password for the user:"

right?

type in something easy, like 1234

hit enter

it'll ask you to retype, do it again

hit enter

bada bing bada boom

password changed.

jarrad says (21:46):

it says loads oof stuff about what the password used to be

well when it was changed

what what it use to be

like password set

password exspirs

jarrad says (21:47):

then when i typed new password it said jjbjjb is not rconsied

jjb bing the password

Ash says (21:49):

well i have no idea what is going on then

I just did it fine on here

jarrad says (21:49):

ok what i do

net user

jarrad says (21:50):

net user deb

then it says nothing about changeing password

Ash says (21:51):

did you put the * afterwards?

jarrad says (21:51):

when do i put that

Ash says (21:51):

afterwards

you put net user deb *

I did say....

jarrad says (21:52):

oh i thoughtit was by acident

jarrad says (21:53):

ok thenn it says user name

password then user name 3 time underneth each orther

Ash says (21:54):

what?

it should just say "Type a password for the user:"

jarrad says (21:55):

so for acount nmae i out

net users de *

and thats the only time i put the star

Ash says (21:55):

yes

right close cmd

then re-run it

just type "net users"

then type "net users deb *"

then, type your new password

that's all you have to do

jarrad says (21:57):

dam i follow all that stuff egsactly but it always says

jarrad says (21:59):

NET user

[username [some stuff

username some stuff

user name some stuff

c;/users/deb>

Ash says (21:59):

what is the some stuff

send me a screen shot

jarrad says (22:00):

i will have to log in to msn on mums laptop i am on mine brb i will swap

jarrad says (22:02):

is screen shot ctr f12?

Ash says (22:02):

it's "prt scrn"

jarrad says (22:03):

oh yer soz

jarrad says (22:06):
thats frist part
then i

jarrad says (22:04):

just print scrren

or crt?

and printscree

Ash says (22:05):

just the button

jarrad says (22:07):

do you want them bigger

Ash says (22:09):

no thats fine

jarrad says (22:10):

Ash says (22:10):

so now type into that section

net users

jarrad says (22:10):

do i dlo that from my last stage /

cuz i have

Ash says (22:12):

yes

http://photos-f.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc3/hs142.snc3/16972_404179295091_884665091_10704194_1287500_n.jpg follow that

except change "Ash" to "deb"

once you've typed net users deb *

send me a screenshot

jarrad says (22:13):

ok so what do i do with your link

Ash says (22:14):

CLICK IT!

jarrad says (22:14):

yer i know but after that its just a screen shit

Ash says (22:15):

Yes it is.

it shows you what it should look like

jarrad says (22:14):

yer i never get there

jarrad says (22:15):

oh right i get it

oh dw about tht one

Ash says (22:17):

about WHAT one?

jarrad says (22:17):

oh did it not come i thought i did dw

ok this is what keeps happeng

Ash says (22:18):

you keep sending the same screenshot...

jarrad says (22:22):

ok well it says comand complet

but no password settings

Ash says (22:23):

did you press enter after net users deb * ?

jarrad says (22:23):

yer

Ash says (22:23):

and it just says "command complete" ?

jarrad says (22:23):

yer

jarrad sends:

paint dw.jpg

Ash says (22:24):

same shot

jarrad says (22:24):

thats what it dose

no it ant

Ash says (22:25):

Yes it is...

jarrad says (22:25):

mine never dose what yours dose

Microsoft Windows [Version 6.0.6001]

C:\Users\deb>net users

User accounts for \\DEBBIE

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Administrator deb debbie2

Guest

The command completed successfully.

C:\Users\deb>net users deb*

The syntax of this command is:

NET

jarrad says (22:26):

thats what minesays

Ash says (22:26):

YOU NEED A FUCKING SPACE!

NET USERS DEB [SPACE] *

jarrad says (22:27):

omg i am such a dumb ass <- HIT THE NAIL RIGHT ON THE HEAD.

Ash says (22:27):

type this EXACTLY

Net Users Deb *

NOW.

type the new password.

jarrad says (22:27):

yes its come up

Ash says (22:27):

now type the new password...

jarrad says (22:28):

ok it wont let me type ?

it flashes but nothing comes up

Ash says (22:29):

no it wont come up

as it's a password

so it wont show you

jarrad says (22:30):

so the flashing line stays in one place ?

Ash says (22:30):

I TOLD YOU... Ash says (21:29):

type in the new password CAREFULLY

cmd won't show it

yes. exactly.

Whatever you've just typed is the new password

So. Close the window. and start again.

jarrad says (22:31):

yer i have

Ash says (22:31):

changed?

jarrad says (22:32):

will i say acsess denied

i type in jumping

2 times

then it gose acsess denied

jarrad says (22:34):

system error 5 has ucoreid

Ash says (22:34):

well you're clearly not logged in as the admin then.

RIGHT.

jarrad says (22:34):

it says she is on users

Ash says (22:34):

Windows > all programs > accesssories > COMMAND PROMPT

Right click it

select "run as admin"

hit ok when the box comes up

then redo all this

jarrad says (22:35):

doneeee it

my mum says she loves you lol

just going to check it

jarrad says (22:36):

i got sony vagus 9 asswell

Ash says (22:37):

good.

jarrad says (22:37):

cuple of weeks ago its alsome i am makeing and intro at mo

i know how to animate it so its going to look cool

jarrad Signed out. (22:37)

jarrad is online. (22:40)

jarrad says (22:40):

ok it worked

now i am going to bed

bye

jarrad Signed out. (22:41)

Ash (22:41):

You're welcome...

Now here's something that made me laugh, it's like a harsher version of You've been framed

The muppets just keep getting better and better...

2009-12-28T19:13:00.001Z

Remakes, Rehashes, and... something else beginning with R.

2009-12-16T00:05:00.002Z

I really do hate mainstream Hollywood. I HATE IT. In the past 10 years, Hollywood cinema, in my opinion, has become bloated, lazy and tiresome. Everything is just a retread of something else, everything is bounced off the back of something else's success, and it's annoying.

But something has REALLY pissed me off recently, and that is the insistence of Studios remaking foreign-language films. Does it need to be done? No. People can read subtitles!
I guess it really took off with the success of The Ring, the remake of the film Ringu. It was alright, but not a patch on the original. And BAM, Studios worked out that remakes of unknown foreign horrors make money. Why? Because mainstream studio audiences haven't heard of them! So in recent years, there has been a steady stream of shoddily made, poor-quality "remakes" of foreign films.

I don't have a problem with companies remaking films, per se, but some of the best films I've seen in recent times have been foreign language movies, especially The Orphanage and Let The Right One In. Both are currently in production for remakes, and I just don't get why rather than snapping up distribution rights and shoving them out there for audiences to see, companies instead insist on remaking them. Surely it would be better for mainsteam audiences to experience foreign-language films, and perhaps gain an interest in wider cinema.
Another one that stands out to me is when they remade [•REC] into Quarantine. I've watched both, and they're pretty much the same damn movie, dialogue and shot-wise. What is the point in spending all that money remaking it, when they could just buy the distribution rights, release it and make an even bigger profit. Both the audience and the companies lose out!

Pretty much what I am saying is there is no need to remake foreign-language films into English. Just sub them, or at worst, dub them across. Studios should give audiences the opportunity to experience foreign-language film and enjoy it how it is meant to be seen, in its original form.

I think the Director of The Orphanage summed it up pretty well when asked about them remaking his film... "The Americans have all the money in the world but can't do anything, while we can do whatever we want but don't have the money... The American industry doesn't take chances, that's why they make remakes of movies that were already big hits"

An additional point on dubbing films - As much as I hate it, it gets the film across in pretty much it's original form to the audience, which is good. However, I still will not pay to see it because quite frankly, dubs are generally pretty bad (Even the John Lasseter Directed ones on Studio Ghibli films), and I much prefer the original audio with subtitles.

For the angry people

2009-12-14T13:41:00.003Z

I did write a huge long blog about consumerism and market saturation and various other things that annoy me. Then I noticed everyone else's blogs are very similar, ranting about stuff.

So instead, here's a video that will make you smile. If you don't smile, you are a cold, ugly, horrible person. Or, as Russell Howard says, a paedophile.

The Twilight Saga: New Moon

2009-12-02T00:11:00.001Z

For those of you after a quick-fire review, here it is:

New Moon is the most boring, monotonous and stupid film I have seen this year. And I've seen transformers 2.

Fro those of you looking for something with a bit more body and depth, here's the full review:

http://www.facebook.com/notes/ash-moors/film-review-the-twilight-saga-new-moon/191751359405

A Christmas Carol 3D

2009-11-23T00:57:00.003Z

Robert Zemeckis has a slightly worrying performance-capture fetish. He hasn't made any live-action films since 2000's Castaway and What Lies Beneath, and it doesn't look like he's going to be making another one any time soon. His remake of The Beatles' Yellow Submarine is set to be a 3D motion-capture adventure, and Rodger Rabbit 2 is leaning heavily in that direction too, the current idea doing the round that it'll be drawn toons interacting with performance capture "humans". But anyway, I'll shove my disappointment that the guy who made Back to the Fucking Future and Forrest Gump is no longer making live-action films to one side for a moment.

There's no point in me really attempting to cover the plotline of the film, because it's been done 18 times before with Muppets, Mickey, and Albert Finney (Rhyming was amusingly unintentional). If you haven't seen some adaption of it you've clearly never turned on your TV over Christmas. Well, maybe I should cover it, just so this doesn't end up looking like I'm jerking off over 3D and performance capture, and just incase you don't own a TV.

The plot is the same as always, Scrooge is a mean old git who hates christmas and the world in general, and as such is visited by the ghost of his dead associate, Jacob Marley, who warns Scrooge that he is living his life wrongly, and if he does not change his ways Scrooge shall end up like him (A ghost covered in chains, formed from all the bad things he had done). So Scrooge is visited by 3 spirits who show him his past, his present, and his future, and thereby demonstrate how he has changed, what he is missing out on, and the possibilities of his future (that aren't that great). As such, Scrooge shits himself, and then changes his ways. It's a long, old tale of redemption, pretty much.

And that's the main downside of the film, it's been done so many times and as such there's really nothing new here other than the flexibility that performance capture allows and the possibilities that 3D allows. That's not to say it's a bad film, it's rather enjoyable and doesn't seem to drag at all, it's just ground that's been covered so many times by so many different people.
Zemeckis' reason for making the film was that it was his "favourite time-travel story", something that confused me, because let's be honest, there's really not that much time-travel in it (Infact there's none, as it's all just visions and "shadows", it's not like Scrooge actually gets thrown back or forward through time) and therefore it seems a bit of a shit reason to make the film.

HOWEVER, what Zemeckis has managed to create is something fun and lively, a nice adaption that doesn't drag. I'd say that's mainly down to Jim Carrey's performance as Scrooge, who through the use of performance capture not only takes on Carrey's voice but his mannerisms and looks as well (even if they are skewed in a cartoonish, over-the-top way). He manages to create wildly different characters in the forms of the various ghosts of christmas, as well as the different variations of Scrooge that are shown by the ghosts. The majority of the rest of the cast, including Bob Hoskins and Gary Oldman, also take on a number of roles. This allows a large number of characters to be portrayed by a much smaller number of actors, something that doesn't detract from the film as the actors clearly had fun creating various voices and behaviours for each character, something that comes across well on screen as you're not always aware it's the same actor (infact looking on imdb i'm impressed that Gary Oldman was not only Bob Crachit and Jacob Marley, but also Tiny Tim, something I didn't notice at all in the film).

There's also the fact Zemeckis has perhaps learnt from mistakes with previous CG and motion-capture ventures that attempt to portray humans (Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, Polar Express, Beowulf), all of which stumbled into the uncanny valley, and aimed for a less realistic look for his characters, hovering at a point where they are clearly human but could quite easily drop into a shrek or pixar film and not look out of place. I guess the easiest way to explain the Uncanny Valley is that section in the appearance of things where they stop being a cartoon or parody or rough portrayal of human, but do not quite reach the level of what we accept and perceive to be human. Things in the Uncanny Valley lack the subtleties of human beings. All this add up to something that we reject, as we cannot accept it as it does not fall into either category of 100% human or 100% not-human. Thankfully, Christmas Carol does not enter this area, resulting in it being more easy-going on the eye and perhaps all the more believable to the audience.

Like all animated 3D films I've seen this year, the 3D was nicely used, subtle in places but more obvious in others (flying through the streets of london and over fields was impressive), with only the occassional 3D "pop-out" event, but nothing that was part of the "let's make that pop out simply because we can" school of film making that marred Final Destination 4.
My only fault with it (and this was probably due to the fact the projector blew up at the start and was displaying wildly out-of sync images complete with a nice red area on one side the screen) was that there was a hell of a lot of ghosting going on in some scenes, which is where you get a vague, translucent image of one of the viewpoints, about a cm or so off to one side, in this case the Left eye as far as I could tell. Happens a lot with anaglyph displays, it's something I've not seen before with Polarised Light. It was especially evident on scenes with a lot of depth or things largely out of focus in the foreground, such as snowfall or fixed shots of long streets with lots of characters on them, and really detracted from the scenes. But like I said, I'm going to blame it on the projector as before it blew up, the 3D trailers for How To Train Your Dragon and Avatar were perfect with no ghosting or anything else, so it clearly wasn't the fact I was using the Real-D 3D glasses I got when I went and saw Final Destination at uni, rather than using the re-recyclable, dirty, scratched ones Tower Park give to people and then collect back in at the end.

Scrooge and Tiny Tim: The more cartoon-like appearance of characters in A Christmas Carol

6/10 - All-in-all, Bob Zemeckis has managed to make a good film out of something that has been done-to-death. The various technology creates a living, breathing, cartoonish world that is enjoyable to watch and immerse yourself in, even if sometimes it feels a little repetitive because you've seen most of it before but with a little talking frog with someone's hand up his ass. In some ways it's a nice show-reel for 3D and performance capture, and a good introduction to both for people who are perhaps weary of 3D and not quite accustomed to seeing real-life actors rebuilt inside a computer... But I have a feeling that the stuff on show here will be blown out of the water come December 17th.

On a side note, Avatar looks totally and utterly insane, I was sold on the most recent 2D trailer but seeing it in 3D blew me away.

Don't give a damn about my bad reputation

2009-11-17T11:29:00.007Z

Oh yes. I went there.

Originals:

Russel Howard's brilliant argument.

2009-11-11T21:00:00.003Z

I saw this on Russel Howard's Good News, where he was talking about games.

They showed a clip from Fox news in which a reporter was shown saying "In Grand Theft Auto your son, or husband or boyfriend, or whoever can hire a prostitute, have sex with her and then beat her to death with a baseball bat"

His response "Doesn't mean it happens in REAL LIFE. I've played Tiger Woods Golf, doesn't mean I've blacked up and won the US open! It's ridiculous isn't it? 'Where's your brother rus? He went looking for some rings dressed as a hedgehog'."

She said "what?" and I told her that I didn't know

2009-11-10T22:44:00.002Z

I don't know what to write.

Ideally I need portfolio done this week, which is looking more and more possible, but still an uphill struggle. I also need to revise more, but I currently have a horrible addiction to a combination of Rock Band drumming, Beautiful Katamari, and facebook chat, and find it hard to tear myself away from them and actually revise. Damn fun games and interesting world.

That's about it. Goodnight.

English Motherfucker. Do You speak it?

2009-10-20T23:18:00.002+01:00

Oddly, I'm not going to go on a massive rant about English again. I just like that line from Pulp Fiction, it always makes me smile.

I have a feeling my blog is going to soon slide into the realms of Brawny's and Az's, that is a rant against the world and just about everything in it, punctuated by light moments of sarcasm and irony. So what's on the cards today? A LOT. So much that it won't all fit into one deck/hand/blog.

The two things bugging me today are University and University. "But that's one thing!" I hear you cry. Not so. My university course is run by 2 separated establishments, the RVC and CAW. Apparently they stand for Royal Veterinary College and College of Animal Welfare. We're going to change that to Rectal Violation Club and Collection of Absolute Wankers.
You may be seeing where I'm going. You might not. Here, have a torch, it might help you.

I've become tired with university. I've become tired with the whole studying and exams and pointless crap that we do. I love being on placement, I learn so much more than at uni and I get on with everyone really well at work. I don't give a shit that I don't get paid, I enjoy it and that's the point. The point is also for me to be competent in some things before I arrive at placement so 1) I don't look like an ass 2) it doesn't waste people's time and money.

For example, with urine samples a lot of the time you do microscopy. Pretty much involves getting some piss, spinning it in a centrifuge so the debris in it separates from the majority of the fluid, then taking that debris, plonking it on a slide, shoving it under a microscope and off you go looking for cells and crystals. All sounds fine and dandy and interesting. At uni, we get given real blood to work with for slides and stuff. But oh no, we don't get urine. We get Apple Juice, with bicarbonate of soda in. Great for learning the vague process, but utterly USELESS for actually learning what to look for on the slide and the different shapes of crystals and things. So on placement the first few times I'm there asking "So what's this" "Can you give me a hand with..." etc. If we got real stuff to work with at uni, that wouldn't have to happen, and wouldn't waste people and time on placement. Part of it is down to the fact my self confidence with such things isn't exactly great, but the other part is due to lack of useful resources on uni's part. They can build this fantasmical LIVE centre and yes, it is damn good with a lot of useful bits in it, but other stuff in it is... well, useless to a point.

Yeah, there's certain stuff you only learn on placement (like... radiography, for example, you can work the theory at uni but practically it's kinda hard to do what with ionising radiation and needing live animals to work on), but when your university campus also happens to be home to one of the largest animal hospitals in the UK, you're really left wondering HOW FUCKING HARD IS IT TO LET US HAVE THE LEFT OVER URINE SAMPLES. It's not like they'll be losing money.

So that's the RVC out the way. Now for CAW.

I got a nice letter from CAW last Monday. Telling me my portfolio had to be in 100% by last Wednesday. Helpful of them. I sent them an email "We've been having problems with the post, they were sent out weeks ago!". Yeah, postage problems? Surely common sense therefore says for useful and important things with deadlines.... FUCK THE SNAIL MAIL AND EMAIL ME INSTEAD. It will arrive in a matter of seconds, not weeks. The people at CAW aren't not massively supportive and generally completely up their own asses. The only person who has really been helpful is the IV that comes and visits me. The rest are rude, obnoxious, have a very much holier-than-though attitude. Maybe that's just my experience with them, but it really puts me off ever contacting them because it's usually just "Talk to your assessor" "I HAVE".

Another problem is the obvious lack of communication between CAW and RVC, half the time neither have any idea what the other is doing, CAW seem to have no clue when I am on placement and RVC seem to enjoy changing dates for exams and other shit as much as they change their underwear. Which I hope is daily.

It's just annoying, stressful, and frankly I can't even start to think about exams in December when I still need to shift portfolio out the way first. At least good times at placement keep me going, I wouldn't change that for the world.

Going to war with Illiteracy

2009-09-19T19:14:00.005+01:00

I haven't posted a proper blog in a while. It's mainly all film reviews. So here's a kind-of almost real blog.
You know what's getting at me at the moment. Illiteracy. The inability to correctly formulate a basic english sentence. I don't understand how people can go through 13 years of schooling and come out the other end still writing like a retard. Of course some people have dyslexia and aspergers and other similar things, and for that they can be forgiven, but a lot of the time it's not people like that. The majority of people I know with such conditions try their hardest to write properly and do not use it as an excuse to write in poor english.

For an example of what's getting to me, see how many errors you can spot in the following sentences:

well this will be a good day live band's. dancing. stall's. beer tent's. bock's.
bmx. skate's and lot's more it's 11 till 4 albert road portsmouth sorry have no link so have to look up i met the guy that run's the event and he want's us 2 do a bit of a display for them so let's give them a good year but sorry i was on unicycle but when i said to him about us he loved it.

Number of required apostrophes? ONE. Number used? NINE. Nine fucking apostrophes where they aren't needed. That's like me deciding to sit down. And then choosing to start... writing sentence's; With as much pointles's, needles's punctuation as is humanly possible!!!

Number of commas required? AT LEAST SEVEN. Number used? ZERO. Instead, there's overuse of full stops in a list, and then none for the paragraph.

Capital letters required? TEN. Number used? ZERO.

Also, 11 TILL 4? A Till is something you put money in. So it's 11 lots of Till number 4? IT'S UNTIL, or if you really need to shorten that and look even more like an idiot, 'til. NOT TILL.

had a grate day wiv peple!! but woz nakared bi da end of da day!!!

So you grated something during the day with peples? What's a peple? And then you were a naked bisexual at the end of the day?

y r deleviry servasiz so FUKING SLOH! they r loosing me monie hear!

Yeah Deleviry Servasiz, They're sloh. WHAT?!
And they're loosing monie hear. Loosening what from hearing what?

Sum-how gotta bild up somat similer in bournmoth/pool ara nxt yere-not shure howe -answers ona postkard plese pepole. Well yes I kinda fink ansor is havin a coar to go out un just be reguelery out an havein fun, and ,evan if ownlee fleatinglee ,sum1 lik blue hoo keyps da websight livly and gose wrounding up up pepoles ,startin mets an all-ways been their.

Sum-How? Bild? Somat? Yere? Shure? Pepole? Ansor? Coar? Reguelery? Fleatinglee?! Keyps?! WROUNDING?!
And this was written by a 47-year old who claims to hold 2 university degrees.

I'm not sure if people are just lazy, or plain stupid. Typing stuff isn't hard, and you don't need to make short cuts. Infact, Bi, Grate, Sloh, Monie and Hear aren't even short cuts, they're just obvious examples of incompetent spelling.

Seriously, what the fuck. PEOPLE, GO TO TESCO, AND BUY A FUCKING DICTIONARY. OR GO BACK TO SCHOOL AND RE-GAIN YOUR ENGLISH LANGUAGE GCSE, AND MAYBE SOME SELF-RESPECT TOO.
All of the above things are written by people between the ages of NINETEEN (19) and FIFTY (50).

And in a change to the previous shown programme, here's a bit of fun for you, from a stupidly talented man.

District 9

2009-09-18T23:34:00.003+01:00

I don't know what to write about District 9 without filling it with spoilers or words like "AWESOME" "INSANE" and "THE BEST FILM THIS YEAR". I love it, it's brilliant, and proof you don't need a big budget to make a good film. The visual effects are photorealistic, stunning, and never used to wow the audience or go "look at me! over here!". They compliment the film and add a degree of believability to it all, with convincing interaction between the CG aliens and human actors. And all on a budget of $30m. Take your $200m, Transformers 2, and burn it. At the stake.
The level of detail is amazing, this is a fully-formed world, set only a few years in the future, and manages to deal with a multitude of issues, from racism to self-preservation to genetic experimentation.

What makes it even better is that the lead character had no scripted dialoge, everything is improv. How the hell they pulled it off I have no idea, but it makes it even more convincing as a docu-drama, as Sharlto Copley's Wikkus seems even more genuine and unsure of himself infront of a camera.

The only downsides I can think of is that whilst the change from Documentary to actual Drama at around the 40 minute point is very good, towards the end it starts pulling back in the Documentary parts, making a jarring and sudden change from the flow of events. Alongside this, there are a few plot holes that you don't notice at the time but come back to haunt you a few hours later, and the occasional pantomime-style baddies, but they can be forgiven slightly.

10/10 - Fucking awesome, insane, and the best film I have seen this year. Stop whatever you're doing, and go see it. NOW. Further testament - I've paid to see this film TWICE. How often do I pay to see a film ONCE, let alone a second viewing?

Adventureland

2009-09-18T21:29:00.002+01:00

I've never really been into the whole romantic-teen-comedy-life-transition genre mashup movies, bar a few that are genuinely funny and silly like American Pie and the first half of Superbad before it descends into chaos. But I've had adventureland sitting on my hard drive for a while, purely because it has Kristen Stewart in it, and decided to watch it after wrestling for over 3 hours with Windows last night in an attempt to make a DVD copy of it along with District 9 for people at work. I feel slightly bad not paying for a low-budget indie movie, as it's the main genre of cinema I really support, but frankly i've spent so much on dissapointing cinema this year I don't really feel like stumping up the cash anymore. Hollywood can go take one of those big Ls on the side of that famous hill and shove it so far up her ass that only the horizontal section is visible and she ends up looking like she has a tail, especially after the dismal fayre this year with the likes of Wolverine, Final Destination 4, Tranformers 2, and similar popcorn movies made on millions of dollars where the majority seems to have been spent on either overused CG whizz-bang effects or a mountain of crack and weed for the director and his producer chums. Or both, in the case of TF2. But that's enough of a rant against Holly Wood. I mean Hollywood. Apologies if anyone named Holly Wood reads this, please do not sodomise yourself with 50ft-tall letter.

I don't know what it is about Adventureland that appeals to me (other than the fact it has Kristen Stewart, who also happens to be the only reason twilight is good), maybe it's the slight innocence about it all, the way James Brennan (Jesse Eisenberg) is so utterly hopeless with Em Lewin (Kristen Stewart), and the fact it's set in an 80's themepark.

Maybe it's because I see some of myself in James (mainly the innocence and hopeless bits)

Maybe I like the fact Adventureland shows Greg Mottola has grown up and on from Superbad. Thanks to a nice script, gone are the dick-jokes (Bar one, but it's actually vaguely relevant to the scene), gone are the purely joke-based characters, like Seth Rogen and Bill Hader's cops, and gone is the entire purpose of the plotline being about losing your virginity before college that dominated Superbad.
Instead the jokes are a bit wider, more mature, and generally reflect more of the actual scene and the character's feelings, as opposed to simply being the normal male adolescent classroom jokes. Characters feel like they have more depth, they simply aren't there to sprout jokes, all have an effect of the way James grows and changes over his time at Adventureland.

Admittedly Bill Hader is back and mainly there for joke reasons, but he does have some nice screen time and the jokes are less brutal and immature, and the plot is set in the run-up to college, but that's about where the similarities end.
But of course all of that is down to the scriptwriter, but Mottola's direction with it works wonders and takes something that could have been dull and boring and made it interesting, quirky and funny instead.

The focus of the latter half of the plot on attempting to cope with your emotions and teenage angst is great, somehow managing to make you really feel for the characters whilst making it funny, something I found Superbad failed to do (You just end up finding it all stupid or funny, and thinking "Haha. Tosser. You lose." or "Yeah. Whatever." with that film). Maybe I should stop drawing comparisons with Superbad.

So yeah. I don't really know what I like about Adventureland. It's a funny, quirky, and interesting take on life/relationships in general really, the characters are really likable and also, it has Kristen Stewart.

8/10 - I have no clue what to put here as I have no idea why this film appeals to me so much. Other than Kristen Stewart.

Dorian Gray

2009-09-10T00:41:00.003+01:00

The Picture of Dorian Gray is probably the last of the 19th Century gothic horror novels, and has so far avoided a big-budget, big-screen adaption (bar a 1945 adaption by MGM Studios, but that doesn't really count). The only time I can recount Dorian Gray ever appearing on-screen is in the god-awful film that is The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (aka LGX aka The League aka A steaming pile of shit).

Rather than updated for modern times or twisted beyond recognition, Dorian Gray sits neatly in the "period" genre and manages to make itself into an intriguiging and enjoyable film. From what I remember of the book from reading it about 5 years ago, Dorian wishes to remain young like his painting, and this wish is granted by some other force (hinting towards the devil). He then commits a few sins, under the guidance of an older friend, with the painting absorbing these sins and showing what he would really look like. He realises this and off he goes on a life of sin. Yadda yadda yadda, painting grows old and ugly with each sin, Dorian stays young, but you never learn what said sins are. He then realises his mistakes, destroys the painting, and dies after taking his "true form". Painting reverts to him being young. The End.

Rather than focusing on the fact the painting ages rather than Dorian, as the book does, the film gives a slight hint then shoves the painting away in an attic, keeping it hidden from both characters in the film and the viewer. The only suggestions that the painting changes as shots of Dorian's expression looking at it, and the slight hints at the painting absorbing his sins. Replacing all of this suggestion of sin is actual shots of sins. Drug Taking. Excessive Drinking. Nights with Prostitutes. Cheating on his girlfriend. Murder. The list goes on...
It sticks to the book pretty closely I feel, from what I can remember of it.

Some of the visual effects in the film are poor, with some horrendously obvious CG London Shots and Greenscreened pieces, but the low number of them, couple with good acting from the majority of the cast means it has no effect on the actual enjoyment factor. The only major effects shots are where time jumps forward and whilst Dorian has not aged, everyone else has, and these are impressively created through clever prosthetics and make-up.
In keeping with the gothic-horror feel of the book, the film features largely dark and dingey shots of London Alleys and backstreets, displaying 1890's London as a dirty and occasionally dangerous place, and the 1920's version is shown to be no better either, with a short-lived chase sequence through an underground station and partially along the railway lines too, as well as visits to previous locations showing no changes to the general vibe of the areas or their populations.

The only downsides is the ending feels rushed, but it does add more detail to the plot, and a large amount of it is a good and improving addition, adding a nice twist and lengthening an otherwise relatively short story.

One could argue that the shift in focus does reduce a lot of the horror elements. By keeping Dorian's sins secretive, the reader could see their own sins in Dorian, which was a major element of the book. By showing them on screen, a lot of this element is lost, but it does add a great more detail to the film and shows his bad choices in life.
Like the book, the underlying subtones is that every action has repercussions, and the worst actions cause the most damage. Which whilst blindingly obvious, manages to be thought provoking and an interesting moral point.

7/10 - Whilst the levels of horror in the film are lowered significantly from the book, a large volume of time is spent following Dorian on his adventures and the factors which influence his behaviour, which proves to be an interesting and clever choice. By moving the focus from the painting to the actual man, and adding additional plot points, the film manages to be much more engaging than a direct adaption could ever be, as simply seeing a painting age on screen whilst Dorian fucks off would probably be pretty boring.

The Final Destination

2009-09-02T00:31:00.006+01:00

And it sure as damn well better be the final one.

Final Destination was an interesting movie, combining horror, gorefests and thriller into an imaginative and interesting idea.
Final Destination 2 took the first movie, and pretty much made it bigger, bloodier, and better. It is simply brilliant, and tied in nicely with the first film.
Final Destination 3 got a bit silly, but was still enjoyable with some interesting deaths and general humour.
The Final Destination is the point where you know they banged out another for less money with no attention or imagination. The deaths are gory, but boring, the majority having appeared in previous movies (hit by vehicles, things through eyes, nailguns firing into bodies) or other movies. The 3D is the cliche, things popping out, crazyness that dominated cinema in the 80's. It's not cool or interesting, it's just damn annoying.

With a running time of just over 70 minutes, it's also ridiculously short, and obviously made just so they could make a film in 3D. Infact, where it is so short and stupid, it feels more like an experiment by the studio, as if they were playing with 3D and made this in the process, rather than an actual film. The major problem is the lack of ideas, not only is the main plot device recycled, it's over-used, with the lead character now having blindingly obvious premonitions before every death, all in poor CGI with everything in the scene throwing itself out the screen at you.
The ending feels rushed, especially after a mid-way pause of "way, we cheated death, oh shit no we didn't", and the poor-quality effects and overzelous use of 3D, screen-popping events all add up to a horrible, cheap mess. By far the worst film I've seen this year (worse than Wolverine, if that's possible)

3/10 - Overuse of 3D and low-budget CGI, wooden acting, and a lack of imagination lead to a 70 minute movie that drags, making it feel incredibly boring and like a 2hr+ film, and leaving you feeling like you just wasted £7.50. They get 2 stars for Shantel VanSanten wandering around in her underwear for at least 10 minutes of the movie, and 1 star for a vaguely decent score that raises the tension to the level of "As exciting as watching paint dry".

Inglourious Basterds - Quite glorious, actually.

2009-08-26T10:25:00.001+01:00

If ever there was a title that instantly linked to Quentin Tarantino, that's it, as it appears scrawled across the screen in 4-foot high bright yellow handwriting that is distinctively his own. He's always had a bit of a OTT hyped following, ever since resevoir dogs and pulp fiction, which admittedly he probably deserves as the majority of his films are pretty damn awesome. But since Pulp Fiction, nothing has quite reached the same level of downright brilliance... Until now.

Opening with a classic 70's Universal Studios globe, and a basic Weinstein company logo, before launching into one of the most basic title card sequences of recent films (Yellow text on a black background), and then dropping you into France, introducing you to a gruff Frenchman and some Nazis, the first chapter starts off on a roll, and from there-on it just keeps on tumbling along under it's own power.

Oddly for the guy with the highest billing, Brad Pitt certainly doesn't have the most screentime, not appearing until the second chapter and again completely vanishing for chapter 3 and only being a minor character in chapter 4. The same applies for the rest of the Basterds too, which leads to the question "How do they get the movie named after them when they're only in half of it and don't appear until 25 mins in?".

The fact is though, it doesn't matter. The chapters without them are possibly some of the best, introducing some great characters and really fleshing out the entire world the movie is set in. Two of the best turns in the film are Mike Myers as General Ed Fenech, ordering the deaths of the third reich, and Christoph Waltz as Standartenführer Hans Landa, the "Jew Hunter", both clearly relishing their roles and playing them with brilliant gusto and slight sarcasm.Along with them are Til Schweiger as Hugo Stiglitz and Mélanie Laurent as Shosanna Dreyfus, both giving brilliant performances, one with very little lines as a German Nazi-Killer, and the other as a vengeful Jewish Girl whose family was killed by Landa. These characters, backed up by storming performances from the cast of Basterds, who manage to pull off being completely and utterly serious, heartless, violent killers, focused entirely on their jobs, whilst mixing in some hilarious set-pieces and lines (Brad Pitt's Tennessee-accented Aldo Raine attempting to pull off an ee-talian accent is pure genious, whilst Eli Roth's Donnie Donnowitz is frankly slightly psychotic, leaping around like an 8-year old and using a baseball bat to beat in the heads of Nazis in one of the most graphically violent scenes this year), result in the whole film gelling together and never losing pace, constantly flicking between various character groups until all their arcs converge on the final set-piece.

What with the film being heavily placed in France, with both French and German characters, there are many sections of the film where the cast of characters on screen is entirely French or German. Rather than rely on English accompanied by stupendous accents, Tarantino goes all the way and puts full conversations on screen in foreign-language, accompanied by subtitles. In sections where the focus is on a French character who doesn't understand German, all German conversation has no subtitles, leaving the audience in the dark as much as the character is. This results in some nice tight spots, accompanied by a roaring soundtrack which really racks the tension up to breaking point, before either blasting it all away or letting it drop slowly.

I don't really want to go too much into the plot and spoil it, as it all jogs along at a good speed, never slowing down or working up too much of a pace and managing holding your interest throughout, but the final barnstorming set piece involving mis-construed plans, explosions, crazed Machine-gun weilding basterds, and a hilarious section involving Lando interviewing Aldo and another basterd brings together everything Tarantino is well-known for, and improves on it. Clearly he's learnt his lesson from Kill Bill 2 and Death Proof, and it certainly shows in this film.

All in all, it's nice to sit in a cinema, and watch a full-scale (almost 3-hour) romp, without having your nervous system assaulted by a barrage of computer generated mess (See Transformers 2, Harry Potter, GI Joe, Wolverine, etc, etc).So what if it's historically inaccurate, instead what you get is an epic, hilarious, brutally violent, interesting, partially foreign-language, occasionally minimalist, and downright enjoyable film, which is what cinema has seriously lacked for a few years.The Closing line of the movie is "This might just be my masterpiece", and you know what? It probably is. Bravo QT, Bravo.

5/5- Tarantino is back on form with his best film in years. A rip-roaring adventure through Nazi-Occupied France, the film flicks constantly between characters, locations and mood, resulting in a continually shifting movie that never loses pace

Where The Wild Things Are Full Trailer

2009-08-12T13:41:00.001+01:00

IT. LOOKS. AWESOME. I'll post a full blog later.

Harry Potter and the epic failure of a movie

2009-07-22T00:30:00.004+01:00

WARNING: HERE BE SPOILERS

I'm going at assume if you're reading this, you've read Harry Potter. All 7 of them. Or up to 6 at least. I mean, c'mon, 90% of the population of the UK must have, what with those special "Adult versions" so people can read them on the train without looking like a weirdo reading a kid's book.

I'm amazed at the hack job Steve Kloves has done on Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. His adaptions for Books 1-4 were pretty much brilliant, although he did cram a little too much in to each. Sadly, the same doesn't apply for book 6 (He didn't adapt book 5), instead he appears to have taken the opposite approach and included FUCK ALL from the book whilst dreaming up his own scenes (which whilst quite cool, don't really add much and also destroyed the plot for films 7 and 8).
A lot of the film focused on the teenage relationships, which whilst amusing, were drawn out too long and clearly aimed at people who are completely retarded and never had a relationship in their life. For example, the way the script was written probably looked like this:

OBVIOUS GINNY LIKES HARRY SHOT
OBVIOUS HARRY LIKES GINNY SHOT
GINNY LIKES HARRY
HARRY LIKES GINNY
GOT IT YET? NOPE, OK.
GINNY. YEAH. HER. RON'S SISTER. SHE LIKES HARRY. YES, HARRY POTTER!
HARRY. YES. THE TWIT WITH THE LIGHTNING SCAR. HE LIKES GINNY. YES, RON'S SISTER.
GINNY. LIKES. HARRY.
HARRY. LIKES. GINNY.
GOOD. GOT IT? YES? OK.

Now repeat that with Ron/Hermione. Yeah, the entire film is like that. It gets incredibly annoying after a while, being treated like you have the emotional range of a teaspoon (Ah! You see what I did there?).
So, that rant over. What else is wrong with it? The distinct removal of about 80% of the main plot from the book. Admittedly yes they have to cut parts, but it's getting beyond ridiculous now. I've always wondered about how they'd cope with bringing Dobby back after him being absent for 4 films, but now they've got a hell of a job on their hands re-introducing old characters and bringing in new ones, as about 75% of the people in the final book are vital to the plot.
Even in this film, Major characters such as Hagrid and Snape had ridiculously lowered screentime. Yes it's called "Harry Potter" for a reason, but at the same time the entire plot doesn't revolve around him. The distinct removal of Bill, Fleur, Scrimgeour, the history of Voldemort, and countless other parts left me severely dissapointed and confused as the plot hurtled along, jumping massive sections of the book and either assuming you'd read the book so knew what was going on, or just didn't give a shit what you were watching. Overall, scenes felt stripped down, confused, and generally rushed, resulting in multiple scenes with NO emotional depth at all. The massive scene in the book of Dumbledore's death is cut short in this, with no following battle or chase through Hogwarts. Whether this was to attempt a sharp, shock ending, I don't know, but it just falls flat as you've had no chance to grasp at what exactly is going on or why. All this leads up to a very short running time (2hrs 14mins - I was expecting close to 3 hours to be honest), leaving an abrupt ending and a bit of a sour taste in the mouth, even with a bag of sweet popcorn and a pint of cider.

6/10 - Probably the poorest film so far when focusing on pure adaption and plotline, sadly lacking the depth and darkness of the book. On the plus side, it's not as odd as film 3, and quidditch makes a welcome return after being absent from film 5. Watchable, but by no means the exciting adventure film portrayed in the trailers, it instead ends up feeling like a bit of a rom-com.

Revenge of the incredibly poor movie tie-in game

2009-06-26T18:14:00.004+01:00

The original Transformers movie game was possibly the first movie game I actually rated as good. Mainly because it had pretty nice graphics, some fun gameplay, and somehow managed to combine driving and beat-em-up gameplay without completely fucking it up. That's not to say it's without flaws, it did have some, like the inability to transform in midair and some nasty camera bugs. Sadly, the same cannot be said for its sequel. Bare in mind I've only played 60% of the autobot campaign and a fair bit of online so far, I've not yet started on the decepticons.

The first major problem with the game is the new control scheme. The first game had the brilliant notion of assigning transforming to a single face button, so you could toggle in and out, and acceleration and braking were assigned to the triggers, as per normal games. Instead, in revenge of the fallen, transformation is applied to the trigger. As well as acceleration. Thus meaning, you can't be in vehicle mode without accelerating. Which is the biggest pain in the ass, as half the trigger needs to be pushed down to transform into the vehicle, then the other half varies speed. A whole 3mm varies your speed. Thus making it impossible to go slow or stop whilst in vehicle mode at all, leaving you speeding along, careening round corners and smashing into any oncoming traffic. The left trigger controls "drifting", so you can drift around bends and pull off 180 handbrake turns, but it doesn't allow you to brake gently or with any form of precision. I'm unsure as to why it is even assigned to a trigger, considering you have to pull the trigger on full to even activate it.
These can be combined with some fiddly other button moves to allow some interesting transformations. Hold R trigger, then X, then release R whilst still holding X and you transform into a flying kick. R + A using the above rules = Crazy transformation jump. R + B = angry stompy move. None of these are particuarly useful though, as the fact your hurtling along at god knows what speed makes actually taking off at the right time and firmly planting your feet into an enemy bot excruciatingly difficult.

The next big problem is the new "War Room", where you can view a holographic globe and pick the mission you want to play, thus avoiding the linear plot of the first game. Whilst this seems like a good idea, it results in you still playing a linear plotline due to the fact only one mission is available, and then completing this unlocks another single mission. The entire game continues in this way, so you are always stuck with only one new mission to play. You can go back and re-do missions to gain more points, but that was in the first game and it's hardly removing the linear aspect.

Combat is neither on par with the first game, where you could pretty much rip anything out of the street and use it to beat your enemies round the head with. Wielding a lampost like a golfclub or a giant donut like a frisbee made the first game a lot more interesting and allowed for a bit of variation in combat. The new game does away with that completely, instead allowing you to either punch your enemies, or whilst in bot mode, hold down L trigger to go into "combat mode", and then use RB to select your weapon (Each character has 2), before using the R trigger to fire. Yes. The R trigger serves just about every purpose in the game apart from jump (That's A).
Each character has their own melee weapon, but for the most part it feels like the same animations are used, simply reskinned to a different character. The only person who feels vaguely different is optimus, because he gets his TWO GIANT ENERGON BLADES to slash the shit out of everything.

For a game coming 2 years later, a graphical improvement is expected. Instead, the graphics are seemingly worse, not helped by the majority of levels being rather dark and murky, making it rather difficult to see anything. Transformations are no way near as interesting as before, although you no longer have to be on the ground to do them, which is a marked improvement. In the original, you couldn't jump off a building, transform on the way down, then land and speed off as a car. Or even jump off and transform into a plane whilst falling. You had to wait to hit the floor. Same for going from vehicle to bot (apart from planes, obviously). In this one, you can transform whenever the hell you like, which makes moving around a bit easier.

Making up for it a bit though, is the online multiplayer, something the initial game was sorely lacking. Whilst it doesn't allow you to play campaign through with a team of 'bots, it does allow a variety of multiplayer battles, ranging from team deathmatches, capture the flag, and base assaults. It's good fun and adds a lot to the game, but still uses the same awful controls. The addition of extra 'bots to play as is nice, and the levels are quite nice, with big open areas, heavily defended areas, and tight corners to fight in.

The game also sadly lacks the fun factor of G1 from the first game, where you could unlock G1 colours for Prime, Jazz and Starscream, as well as full G1 Versions of Prime and Megatron. This allowed for a bit more fun, charging around levels as the original prime and generally causing havock. Like so:

This one instead brings only one G1 colours unlockable, for ironhide, and let's be honest, who wants a bright red GMC pickup? G1 colours for Ratchet or Bee would be better. The rest of the unlockables are G1 episodes, which is nice for original fans, but I suspect the majority of younger fans playing will unlock them and go "What the hell is that?". Rather than G1 episodes, G1 versions of all the characters would have been a lot more rewarding.

Personally, I'd give it 5/10 so far. This score might bump up depending on how the rest of the game goes, but once I've completed both campaigns, i'm trading it in for prototype or Left4Dead.

Revenge of the Explosions

2009-06-21T01:17:00.010+01:00

That is the title Michael Bay should have given his new movie. Transformers: Revenge of the giant fuck-off insane explosions. I think he may have set a world record for the most number of explosions on screen in a single film.

It picks up 2 years after the end of the last movie, with the autobots having set up a goverment team with Captain Lennox and Co, hunting down decepticons across the globe, apart from bumblebee who seems to live in Sam's garage doing bugger all. By picking up 2 years later, the film can happily skip over explaining details of new Autobots and Decepticons, and instead pretty much taking the attitude of "They're here. Deal with it.". Which in some respects works, but also throws up a lot of questions. Namely how did they get there, WTF is NEST, and what the hell happened to John Voigt?

The entire film pretty much hurtles along at breakneck pace after this, hopping across the globe as things explode, things collapse, and robots go on the rampage and beat the shit out of each other.
It pauses about an hour and a half in to explain about Optimus Prime, The Fallen and the other 12 original transformers, but then quickly throws you back into the action again. The problem with the last hour of action is that an explosion occurs about once every 20 seconds. Which is nice and all that, but seriously, there is only so much Bayhem the brain can take before it becomes a pile of quivering mush amd you simply give up caring. After seeing forests explode, paris explode, and then being sent to a desert that, yes, exploded, my brain was ready to explode.
Complimenting the explosions are more explosions, robots exploding, pyramids exploding, vehicles exploding, and yes, people exploding. Exciting stuff. It's hard to tell who gets more screen time, the CG Robots, or the CG Explosions.

On the plus side, the 'bots have a lot more screen time than the previous outing. This provides a lot more interaction and involvement on their part, and gives a bit more of a feeling the film is about the robots, not the humans. It also allows for some nice talky bits by prime, and some more interaction between bumblebee and Sam.

On the downside of this, there are now so many robots that some barely get any screentime before being thrown away/killed/ignored in favour of newer ones (Including fan favourites such as Arcee, Soundwave and Sideswipe, as well as a pretender who is never explained at all - each gets about 2 lines in the film, and no introduction), and flaws in the animation are a lot more obvious as you have more time to notice them (One epically long scene with Optimus and Megatron going all Medieval on each other looks oddly un-natural and too smooth compared to the real shot of sam and the forest they're in. It is as if the film was shot at 24fps, and then somebody at ILM decided to do all the animation in 60fps, and convert the entire movie from 24 to 60fps to fit with the animations, rather than fitting the animation to the film). Also, a lot of the 'bots screentime is taken up by jokes or poor sterotypes. Most annoying are the autobot twins, Mudflap and Skids, who are generic, afro-american wannabe gangsters, complete with generic afro-american "Hoooooo-ey" accents and gold teeth, followed by Wheelie, a decepticon RC Monster Truck, who proceeds to call Megan Fox a "Crazy Bitch", "Warrior Princess", and then later on in the movie gets an overly long and slightly disturbing shot of him dry humping her leg. As much as any guy in the world would like to do that, seeing a 1ft tall robot do it is downright weird. I can only assume this kind of humour and characterisation is to appeal to a larger audience.

Thrown into the mix this time was the Matrix of Leadership, which was a bit odd and completely off kilter with the majority of the franchise. The matrix of leadership is what is in Prime's chest that makes him the LEADER. And what makes Hot Rod become Rodimus Prime and the LEADER. And is generally considered to be what makes a Prime PRIME.
Instead, in this film it's a key to powering some machine that the Fallen wants to use to blow up the sun to make energon (Don't ask why, this is never fully explained other than he wanted to blow it up years ago and still wants to now - despite the billions of other stars in the galaxy). Queue a race across the globe to find it. It's never fully explained why Energon is needed either, but is declared by Starscream in a scene reminiscent of the human farms in the matrix, except with decepticons instead, so I assume it's to do with making baby 'bots.

There are a lot of plot holes in revenge of the ~~explosions~~ fallen, but the film attempts to overcome them by instead throwing so many things on screen at once that it vaguely covers them up, albeit poorly. However, you'll be hurtling along at such a speed, with so many explosions going off in your face that by the end, you won't actually remember much of what is going on, so you really won't care.

6/10 - Whilst visually overwhelming at many points, with more explosions than you can shake a stick at and a plot like a slice of swiss cheese, Revenge of the Fallen somehow manages to make itself watchable by having giant robots beating each other to death with their bare hands, and almost as many shots of Megan Fox as there are of explosions.

Check it out

2009-06-18T20:47:00.001+01:00

New Blog Graphics.
That's all.

A brief summary of the past month

2009-06-15T00:00:00.002+01:00

Considering all I've posted recently are videos, I thought I should properly update this thing. I finally got my portfolio sorted and finished off, cleared out and accepted. I got my certificate last week. Dated 30th April. So they had it for an entire fucking month before posting it out. Twats. I hate university, I really do.

What else have I done? Worked, did the walk for life again this year... Um where's the team photo... here it is

*Click* For shiny bigger version

Work is good at the moment, not sure why but it's just good. Enjoying it, having fun, and getting portfolio done. All wicked.

Went to Wimborne folk festival on Friday night, that was quite good fun. Went with girls from work, so was a laugh, drove though so couldn't drink much. Came out with possibly the most pathetic line in my life, due to some guy attempting to overturn the portaloo Sam was using. Went to say something to him, came out like alexander the meerkat from compare the meerkat being run over by a JCB, and then said "I would have said something to him but he was bigger than me" Like WTF. Why did I even say that. Seriously. It's like saying... Well I can't come up with something equally pathetic, but I deserve to be beaten alive for using such a line. But other than that was good fun.

My PC blew up, so I'm using mum's laptop at the moment. Hopefully will have a new PC built, with a lot of help from Josh, within the month. Hopefully. Luckily everything else still works at the moment. Fixed up my PSP so it no longer freaks out when I press buttons or try to turn it off, and my phone is still in one piece (somehow). Did have to fork out £40 this week for my car though, as 2 of the HT cables snapped, so engine wasn't firing properly. Which resulted in no acceleration, and a smell of rotten eggs. Sorted promptly by Danny though, within 24 hours, which I am very grateful for at it meant I didn't have to catch the sodding bus to work at all.

That's about it really, apart from the fact I'm 20. And I still can't believe I came out with such a pathetic line.

Wild thing...

2009-06-14T20:39:00.003+01:00

OK so the trailer's been out a month or so. Ok so I've viewed it 10 billion times. But I bet you haven't. So here it is, and it's fucking awesome. GO WILD!

----------------
Listening to: Matchbox Twenty - How Far We've Come

Dare To Be Stupid

2009-06-04T17:41:00.002+01:00

As I'm 20 in under a week...

I remembered black skies, the lightning all around me, I remembered each flash, as time began to blur

2009-05-19T20:54:00.005+01:00

If you get that lyric you're on the music ball. Or a transformers fan. Or have just used Google. FUCKING CHEATERS.

Um... Still waiting for portfolio stuff to come through, and then I can properly start on the NVQ3. Really pissing me off.

I went and saw Wolverine whilst at uni, and was rather dissapointed in the lack of screen time given to Wade Wilson (Deadpool) and Bolt. And the laughable visual effects. Other than that it was alright.
I also watched Star Trek on Saturday - Fucking AWESOME. I've never been interested in Trek before, but the trailers convinced me to watch it. And it's insane, very enjoyable, a few plot holes and things but it moves at such a speed that there's hardly any time to even think about them.
Monsters vs. Aliens is also good. Very funny, best thing Dreamworks has done since Antz.

Looking forwards to Where the Wild Things Are, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, A Christmas Carol, and Terminator: Salvation. All look pretty cool, although Terminator seems a bit too transformers-ish (Giant robots everywhere!)

Music wise - Very much liking the fact The Used are releasing a new album this year, hoping for announcements from MCR and Linkin Park as they've both released new BIG material this year (both having done songs for Blockbuster movies).

Watched end of Heroes Season 3. Was a bit lame. Actually, very lame. I'm close to giving up with that show, much like I did with LOST.

Oh yeah, I'm back at work now. Just did 3 weeks of lectures at uni, was interesting but wasn't enough time to cover everything in lectures. Also went to Wales. Working this Saturday too.

That's about it for now.

Who you gonna call?

2009-04-24T18:00:00.004+01:00

Well... Nobody. Just watch this, and proceed to scream like 10 year old fanboy at its extreme awesomeness.

In other news there is probably far too much going on in this blog page now, but fuck it, I like it. It makes it slightly more interesting than those damn bland single-colour blogs with no imagery or other EXCITING features like my live twitter feed over on the right and down a bit, or the POINTLESS xbox live card that is there for the entire purpose that it shows I am on xbox live and nothing else. There also that rather good looking fellow stood just to the right who is infact my xbox live avatar, and will probably change weekly depending on what mood I am in, the length of my hair, and whether or not I have bothered to shave. As you can probably tell I am infact INCREDIBLY bored with very little else to do with my time, hence this unusually long and cynical post that leaves me with little else to say.
Well, other than the fact I am going back to uni tomorrow, which in itself is highly UNEXCITING to the point where dying in my sleep would be slightly more interesting. A distinct lack of Wednesdays off and a RIDICULOUS increase in the number of lectures, combined with the distinct lack of anything interesting ever happening on campus, means I will probably return to Poole in 3 weeks with the IQ of an amoeba and a constant drooling expression akin to any zombie in any zombie film ever produced about FUCKING ZOMBIES. By this point you may have realised I am not actually that impressed with my university to the point that I have come incredibly close to walking out on the course more times that I can count on a single hand in the past few months, which is an incredibly high number for me to contemplate doing something without actually forcing this poorly planned idea into action at the speed that space shuttle was going when it EXPLODED on re-entry into the atmosphere resulting in a FIRERY BALL OF DEATH. Which is generally how most of my plans end up. FIRERY BALLS OF DEATH.
So returning to university with the offer of 1-on-1 portfolio sessions with an IV is not my idea of fun as if I were to partake in the 1-on-1 session with an IV I would most likely end up punching them in the face before wielding a chair like a baseball bat and sending them flying through that giant plate-glass window in G60 that has spent the past 18 months begging me to smash it for no fucking reason AT ALL. Fucking Emo Window.

I apologise for this incredibly long and ranty blog that doesn't really go anywhere but I needed to blow off some steam and my bocks are packed ready for uni and I really can't be bothered to unpack them and then repack them, which would result in tedious minutes wasted when I could infact be blowing people's heads off on Gears of War. As you may have noticed, I have spent far too long without writing a blog, and have spent far too much time today watching ZeroPunctuation reviews and laughing my head off like a 10 year old on 3 million E-numbers who has just seen someone cycle at high speed into a brick wall. Goodnight.

Desert Song.

2009-03-31T21:40:00.002+01:00

We hold in our hearts the sword and the faith...
Swelled up from the rain clouds, move like a wraith...
Well after all we'll lie another day...
And through it all we'll find some other way to carry on through cartilage and fluid...
And did you come to stare or wash away the blood?

Well tonight... Well tonight will it ever come?
Spend the rest of your days rocking out just for the dead...
Well tonight,will it ever come?
I can see you awake anytime in my head...

Did we all fall down?
Did we all fall down?
Did we all fall down?
Did we all fall down?
From the lights to the pavement?
From the van to the floor?
From backstage to the doctor?
From the earth to the morgue?
Morgue.... Morgue.... Morgue...

Well tonight, will it ever come?
Spend the rest of your days rocking out just for the dead...
Well tonight, will it ever come?
I can see you awake anytime in my head...

Yeah, I dunno. Stressful day at work due to portfolio shit and about 12 things happening at once at the end of the day. Could actually quit uni right now, can't see any point in it right now. Driving me up the wall, it's just a load of crap to be honest, the course, about 70% of people on the course, and the majority of portfolio too. Other stuff going on too and i'm just wound up by it all. Might go bock for a while.

Lyrics from Life on the Murder Scene by MCR incase you didn't know.

And if I make it through today will tomorrow be the same, am I just running in place?

2009-03-11T20:25:00.002Z

Lyrics have made a return. So feel free to guess away (or not).

Er, I got my NVQ2 certificate, now just to do the NVQ3.
I passed all my uni exams. Last theory block was ok. Bit boring.
Watchmen Rules. Okay they changed it majorly but it still works... and Rorschach's altered origin makes him all the more angry and unhinged. His behavior is perhaps not shown as extreme as it is in the comics, but it certainly has an air of this guy if fucking nuts and wouldn't think twice about ripping your head off if you told him his mask was stupid. It still has the same messages and themes, conflicts of humanity, external threats, it still flirts with the idea of what would the world be like if superheroes existed and why they do what they do, and rorschach is still by far the hero of the piece. I think you will either love it or hate it. By "hate" I mean you will just fail to understand it, and as such come out of the cinema thinking "that was shit".

That's all I can be assed to write really, i'm tired, fed up and I've got portfolio to do with no actual motivation to do it.

Real-D 3D - The way forward in cinema

2009-02-16T22:58:00.005Z

I went and saw BOLT this evening, the new disney CG movie. The odean up at uni is odeonDIGITAL, which means they can show stuff in Real-D 3D. Plot was quite good, if a little too much like homeward bound with regards to animals trekking across america. But that's not what i'm going to write about.

3D has always been regarded as a bit silly. A thing of a 70s/80s fad, where you had to wear silly cardboard glasses with red/blue acetate in, which merged 2 red and green images into one with some depth in it. Generally it was only used for special effects though, like the shark coming out the screen in jaws 3, or jason slashing around in Friday the 13th part III. It got revived a bit in the early 2000s by Robert Rodriguez with Spy Kids 3, and The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lava Girl (I am proud that I have seen neither, considering I am a massive fan of Rodriguez - El Mariachi trilogy is fantastic, and Sin City kicks ass), but again it was used as an extension of visual effects, and looked cheap and cheesy, especially with the advent of imax and similar.

In recent years, there's been an increase in 3D using polarized light. The kind you get at themeparks and IMAX screens, where they give you a pair of glasses like Joe 90 had, and they're just clear. The video is projected from 2 projectors still, but each uses light polarized slightly differently, and the lenses of the glasses each pick up one stream of light, so each eye sees a different image - resulting in 3Dness. Generally themeparks use it crappily though, with things poking out the screen, or combine it with water and air jets for a "4D" effect. Muppets 3D is the only 3D themepark film that I've liked, as it didn't use the 3D as some crazy gimmick.
Within the past 2 years, disney and a few other studios have taken it a bit further, removing the necessity for 2 projectors. Infact, you don't even need one, the film is shown on a giant digital screen (Hence the D in "Real-D"), and I honestly have no idea how the polarisation works on it. What I do know though, is that it is mindblowing.

Disney have released a few films in Real-D previously, notably Meet The Robinsons, and the 3D Re-release of Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas. At that time, only about 5 cinemas in the UK supported it, now there's a lot more. Most big cinemaplexes in the US also now have at least 1 digital screen.

What I loved about Disney's use of it in BOLT is that it's not a gimmick, not some way of extending visual effects, it's a way of adding more scope to the film and allowing you to see it as a complete environment that the characters interact with. There's only 1 shot right at the end where they fall into the cliched something big and pointy coming out the screen at you.

With Bolt, he's running through fields and they extend miles back towards the horizon, overhead shots of the city extend downwards to give a real feeling of height without the tops of buildings coming out of the screen at you in silly ways, and characters actually are at different distances throughout the screen, giving a feeling of depth and interaction. It actually feels like a real, interactive world that the characters are in. Rather than just feeling like watching a film, this feels as if you're actually THERE in the environment watching the characters. Soaring aerial shots are rich and gorgeous, with trees popping up, the horizon miles away and a distinct feel of yes, this may be a cartoon but it could also be real. I spent most of the film staring around at the environment, mouth open, amazed at the depth and vitality of it all. It was astounding.

I honestly believe this is seriously the way forward in film, it puts you there in the film, it is a much more immersive experience and makes it all the more believable. It just (literally) adds an extra dimension to the film, drawing you in. What also impressed me is all the trailers beforehand were 3D, for Pixar's new movie UP and Dreamworks Animation's Monsters Vs. Aliens. Both again look awesome in 3D, neither using stuff jabbing out the screen and simply adding more depth to the imagery.

The only thing I disliked about Bolt is that it's CG. Whilst the CG was impressive and looked lush and clean, the end credits were done in traditional hand animation and were still 3D. Disney should go back to traditional and leave CG animation to Pixar.

What else can I say? Bring on James Cameron's AVATAR in 3D. This is the way forward in movies.

A small piece of amusement

2009-02-12T23:40:00.002Z

Once again, my blog focuses on Cadbury's, I wonder if this will become a running theme...
Mainly though, the hilarity of a small piece of company information/history I have pulled up from the depths of the internet.

I'm pretty sure 99% of people were completely unaware that in 1969 Cadbury's merged with Schweppes soft drinks to become Cadbury-Schweppes. In 2000 Triarc (Wendy's/Arby's) sold the rights for Snapple, Mistic and Stewart's to the company.
Ok so it's no funny so far, I know, but bear with me. In May 2008, Cadbury-Schweppes demerged, so one could focus on confectionary whilst the other focused on the Soft Drinks market in the US. The resulting companies from the merger?

Cadbury's PLC
And...
The Dr. Pepper Snapple Group Inc.

Whoever came up with that name is a marketing genius.

A little bit of crunch busting

2009-02-11T01:07:00.007Z

Inspired by my own completely unexplainable and accidental actions this week, I have the ultimate way for you to save money during the current economic recession.

Snap your bank card in half. Voila, you have no access to your money, and as such do not have to attempt to save said money as it's not being spent and building up interesty goodness instead. Sorted. Apart from Nationwide have changed their interest policies, so my account no longer earns interest. Bugger.

How did I snap my card? I have no idea, it was in my wallet and somehow it got wedged in a section and must have snapped in my pocket. So the bank are sending me a new one, to uni luckily, although that involved changing my address on their system, so as soon as I get home in 2 weeks I'm going to have to change it back. Damn.

A few other ideas:
See the blogs over there -->

Chocolate Crunch

2009-02-09T01:17:00.002Z

Incase you can't tell, I've abandoned the lyrical titles for now. They will return at some point.

The credit crunch is affecting everything, apparently (yes, I'm jumping on the blogging bandwagon). My main source of evidence? The lowering quality of the "Glass and a half full of joy" adverts from Cadbury. What started off as a fantastic whimsical viral campaign has become.... Cheap, lame and to be honest, downright scary.

The first advert, featuring a gorilla beating out Phil Collin's In The Air Tonight was amazing. Awe inspiring. Completely unrelated to chocolate, but it left you smiling, laughing, and embedded in your mind that, yes, Cadbury's does bring you joy. And kickass adverts.

The second advert, airport trucks racing to Queen's Don't Stop Me Now, was equally bizarre and chocolate-lacking, but again was great. Originally when it aired on Channel 4, I thought it was something for a new motoring programme. The great thing about it? The little truck wins! Again it firmly implanted the idea that Cadbury's was great and fun and by some crazy psychological effect, you wanted chocolate. And more fun adverts.

But, the newest advert (released as the credit crunching monster appeared over the horizon, clouding the skies and sending tabloid newspapers spinning into rages over Banks, Gordon Brown, and how a small child's dissapearance was directly correllated to global economics - Same headlines as usual then) is bizarre in a newer way. The lack of chocolate remains, the cool soundtrack remains, the clever idea remains. Sadly, the idea is implemented in a disturbing, confusing way, and this advert isn't going to cement the idea of Cadbury's and fun into your mind. Instead, it'll cement the idea that Cadbury's leaves you hiding behind the sofa crying like a baby, like you dad when the Daleks first appeared on the TV in 1963 (If your grandparents owned a TV - if not, then we shall change the analogy to crying like a baby due to the lack of TV)
Take a look and see for yourself.

And there you have it, the credit crunch is destroying everything. Including crazy chocolate commercials. Ah, you see what I did there.

Blog. 3rd Feb 2009.

2009-02-03T14:53:00.003Z

Snow. Lots of it. Fields all white. First time snowed since I was 12.
Slowly melting and turning to mush now. Wanted to snow again, clearly not happening.
Made snowpeople last night. Photos on book of face. Also bocked in snow. Photos and video as above.
"Snowed in" resulted in no evening meal. Provided with microwave rice and crisps. Quality of food poor.

Writing up notes in university library. Slow and tedious process.
Will update later in usual format. Apologies for shortness.

Crashing cars in his brain, keep him tied up to a dream, and he says to me "Kill me now, Kill me now, Kill me now"

2009-01-25T21:36:00.002Z

Computers. Who'd have 'em?
Everyone apparently, which makes you wonder why there are so many problems with them. I had a nice one today, my DVD drives disappeared. Just went. Not recognised on the hardware list, missing in explorer, unable to read any discs. Did a bit of a google search, tried a system restore, boot in safe mode at last good config, and a chkdsk on my C:\ drive (thanks Josh for the advice), which took fucking ages. None of those fixed it, in the end I did a search on an error I managed to pull up, which took me to the microsoft site and a guide (By them!) on editing and deleting certain registry keys to get it back. I never thought MS would publish an article online about doing something that extreme. If you don't know what registry is - it stores all the settings for Windows. You delete or edit the wrong thing and your computer won't boot up again.

What CAUSED the problem? iTunes. Don't ask, I have no idea. Now when I boot up iTunes it complains "Warning! the registry settings used by the iTunes drivers for importing and burning CDs and DVDs are missing. This can happen as a result of installing other CD burning software. Please reinstall iTunes." It's not a result of some other program you piece of crap, it's because I DELETED THEM.
I think the problem happened after I burnt some CDs on Monday night it went a bit crazy, which I guess damaged the registry keys and then the drives disappeared *shrugs* CDs worked though, so that's all good.

But enough about that. I have 5 days to FINISH portfolio. Shite. I'm sure I can do it, it's just getting the cases. I should be writing one right now. Oh well, I'll do it right after. I really, really hate porfolio and wish there was some other way of doing it, it's a pain in the ass and really boring... Meh.

Next Saturday is back to uni in the afternoon, then driving on to Becky's in the evening for her 21st. All the way to Coventry. Fun fun fun. Then week after that I'm driving up to Lincoln for the Bocking Gymfest, which will be good. Get to hang out with Matt, Jeeves, Carl, Tim, Rache, and everyone else, and then there's the first UKPBA (That's UK PowerBocking Association) meeting afterwards hopefully, if all goes well - http://www.ukpowerbocking.co.uk/

I've come to realise that most of my blogs start off really cynical and sarcastic, then just trail off into a boring recount of what I've done in the week/am going to do, so I apologise for that, but I can't really think of much to put.

Best get this portfolio done I s'pose...

Ramblings and other notes

2009-01-19T23:40:00.002Z

Breaking from the usual cynical, sarcastic layout that hasn't graced this blog in many months, I present a series of quick-fire thoughts and notes, from various sources, but mainly facebook.

I noted in my facebook status that Edward Cullen is a psychopath for the first half-hour of twilight. It was then commented that being a psychopath makes him more sexy. Being a psychopath does not make you more sexy, it makes you more likely to be ARRESTED.

The reason Bex would be in the back of a police car? Prostitution. You know it's true.

Az is not an alcoholic. He is alcohol dependant, due to the fact he no longer has blood in his veins. It's been replaced by Jack Daniels.

You should watch twilight if you are bored, are female and betweeen the ages of 12 and 22, are drunk, or appreciate good cinematography. I would suggest all 4 for what I assume would be the best viewing experience. I simply chose options 1 and 4.

All pet owners are retarded. FACT.
Bocking is the greatest sport invented. FACT.
Dettol Protects. THATS A FACT.

That's all for today. More randomness next week.

Listen now, you don't understand. That's not the point in christmasland.

2008-12-20T00:18:00.004Z

Guess what. It's christmas. According to the shops anyway. And according to them it has been for almost 2 months now. Halloween goes and BOOM christmas stuff appears. The point? To peel money from the wallets of mankind, to make a load of profit in probably the most ridiculous time of the year for sales. Even in the middle of the current economic crisis, we're still spending craploads apparently. I try not to think about it with my ever increasing debt to the student loans company.

So what have I spent so far? About £55. Which I thought was pretty good as I managed to get stuff all my family members wanted. Now I just need to get Rebecca's, Josh & Co.'s, and I think that's it. Oh, and I need to put petrol in my car. So we'll estimate that as another £35 worth of spending tomorrow (It's about £30 to fill up my car, and i've got a third of a tank left so we'll say it's £20 and then about £15 on Josh & Co. and Rebecca... Josh & Co. sounds like a company.) So about £85 spent overall. Not too bad I feel, but still a dent in my loan, of which I've already spent over this term's amount by having to purchase car insurance and road tax. Ouchies.

In other news, I got a new xbox from Microsoft, shinier, cooler, quieter, and best of all it works. A-Mazing.
Exams are over so I'm now on my christmas holidays, 1 week gone and 2 left, but I rather miss work and would like to be back sooner... But on the other hand I also rather like the late nights and lie-ins.

Driving to uni wasn't too bad other than mum in the car on the way there "It says slow!" "I know, thats why i'm braking" "That sign says we have to turn off up there" "I CAN READ!". Luckily she didn't come on the way home, which was nice. But dad did use up all the windscreen wash on the way up so I didn't have any on the way home, and we determined it would be far too sensible to turn in to a services and get some to top up with. So we just battered on through the dust and dirt, occasionally having to use the wipers to see but otherwise fine.
Also been trusted to drive around on my own now so driven to work to get portfolio, driven around town and been to Josh's a few times in the car (aka iggle piggle). In other car related news, well done to Em on passing her test. First time. With only 3 minors. *shakes fist*.

Er that's it really. Gym session (YES! After about 6 months of not having a gym session we get one!) on Sunday afternoon then off to the sloop in the evening to see people for christmas randomness, and that's about it. So whoever is coming on Sunday, see you there. If I haven't broken my arm(s)/leg(s)/shoulder/knee(s)/pelvis/spine/shoulder/brain/delete as appropriate.

Sometimes I get nervous When I see an open door

2008-11-27T00:14:00.004Z

Well I guess I ought to update this. Maybe. *Shrugs*. Does anybody read it? If so, comment dammit!

Interesting month... Despite not much happening. Finished work placement, but haven't finished portfolio. That's still at work. Reminder to self: Call work ~~tomorrow~~ today. Took my NVQ2 exams yesterday. Will see how they go, I swear about 3-5 questions I have never been taught or told to research, get results in Januaryish. Not 100% confident, some questions were really odd and had to think long and hard about them but meh, we shall see.
What else... Got an assignment in on Monday. Must complete that this week. Practicals at uni next week. VNT3&4 papers at uni week after next.

So that's what's going on in education. Education which costs me £3145 a year. Other than that, same old, same old. Majority of people know I have a car now. If you didn't, there you go. I have a car. It's a blue 2002 Fiat Punto. Great, now that you've caught up with everyone else, here's a photo.

So yeah, that's my car. It's nice. I goes from A to B. It's got a CD player (always a plus). And its fun to drive. So overall winner. And it's better than Phil's first car!

In more mechanical/technology news, my Xbox finally gave up and blew up on the 14th. Started being odd on the 12th, froze midgame and stuff, 13th decided to kick out some nice static and grinding noises, and the on 14th packed up and refused to boot up again. RRoD. That's Red Ring of Death if you didn't know. It looks like this:
What does it mean? "Hardware Failure: Return to microsoft for repairs".

Well, my xbox is about... 21 months old. Warranty only lasts 12 months. BUT Microsoft are nice, and changed their policy this year to say "If your xbox is within 3 years old and you get 3 red lights on the ring of light, indicating hardware failure, we'll fix it for free."
Woohoo. So off I went on a magical journey through time and space with naboo. Well, no. I went on the xbox site, registered my console and booked it in for repairs. I then get told to go to UPS and organise a collection. I then get told to print a delivery label and package up my xbox, taking off everything including faceplates, hard drive, etc etc. So, after a bit of waiting and internettage, my xbox was collected to be shipped off to the repair centre in Germany on the 18th. It arrived on the 21st. Damn fast I thought. So, about 1-2 weeks and I should get it back. OR a replacement. So No worries! We can play rock band and guitar hero at christmas people! (Looks for people who actually read this... Ah well, I'll let people know when I see them next)

Um, what else. That's about it really, picked up some new books in waterstones today in their 2 for 3 offer. Watchmen, Wanted and Batman: Jekyll & Hyde. Had Watchmen on my PC for a while now, but its a pain in the ass reading it off a computer screen and it's nice to have it in book form. Wanted is really good (Movie = Awesome, even if it does ignore physics.... Comic = Movie x100), and I haven't got onto Batman yet. I'll probably pick up Sin City #1, Hellboy #1 and maybe Batman: The Killing Joke next time I go in.

So that's life from the past month. Other than that, I've finished the CB08 videos. They're here:

That's all for now. Bye.

Oh. LYRICS!

Tell Me Doctor, Where are we going this time? - Back in Time - Huey Lewis and the News.
All These Things I Hate Revolve Around Me - All These Things I Hate - Bullet For My Valentine.
Postcard says "Wish you were here", but I rather I was there - The Dirt Whispered - Rise Against
And you're still probably working, at a 9 to 5 pace - Gives You Hell - The All-American Rejects
We are the rust upon your gears, we are the insects in your ears - Education (Through Labour) - Rise Against

We are the rust upon your gears, we are the insects in your ears

2008-10-27T22:37:00.002Z

Nobody answered the previous blog. YOU ALL SUCK!
Anyway, I went for the second, cuz it's solar powered and has a load of geeky functions. Plus it's a sealed plastic unit which means it's less likely to transfer things at work as there's no material for bacteria to ideally live in and I can wash it easy. Or summat like that.

Anyway, pushing on with portfolio, guess I'm on about 83% now. Should be up to at least 90% by the end of the week, ideally finished by the end of next week and posted off. Eep.

My net has been fucking up recently and running real slow, worried I might have gone over my download limit (it's 30Gb though, so I doubt it) and Tiscali are cutting me back... Heroes (360mb) took 6 hours to download this evening. It usually takes 2 at max, the fastest has been 30 mins (for a 45 min program, that's FAST, over 10mb/min).

Other techno news:
Bought Norton IS06 update last weekend, didn't install right, got an error, then refused to install again (either "error cannot connect" or "this code has been used"), so spent HOURS on their tech support chat function waiting to talk to someone (gave up at 3am - still waiting after 5 hours, it's 24/7 service before you ask), so emailed them and they kind told me to sod off. Didn't solve the activation code problem at all or give me a reason why it was occuring, instead they just sent me a copy of Norton IS09 and a code for it! So good and bad customer service lol =D

That's about it! See ya later folks.

And you're still probably working, at a 9 to 5 pace...

2008-10-26T01:27:00.003+01:00

The postcard says "Wish you were here", but I'd rather I was there

2008-10-19T21:45:00.006+01:00

Um, not much going on recently. I kinda walked out on the Jurassic Jumpers for a bit because I'm fed up of all the shit going on in the group and not enough bocking or changes happening. We've lost the gym, members are being really petty (Joe went to Lincoln without inviting or telling anyone), and as it's hitting winter the evening meets have finished. It kinda sucks, but I can still bock on my own which isn't too bad. And when the weather is dry I'll head back over to the field to relearn flips, haven't done any since my argument with the pavement...

Erm, booked in my NVQ2 for 25th November, so gotta get revising for that, and I've also got to have portfolio complete by the 11th. Also got an assignment in for the 1st December but that might be done after/during the NVQ exam, but I've started researching it now. Renal failure in a geriatric dog - causes, management and care of. In 500 words. How the HELL i'll compress that to 500 words I don't know, my past 2 essays have been 1000 words and I've gone over the limit on them.

So yeah, lots to do, eh?
Started doodling again on Friday night in a state of boredom, then remembered why I gave up. My arm killed, and I had real bad cramp in my hand. NO DOGEY JOKES, ALRIGHT!
I might go back to the old one piece a month though, working on it for like 30mins a day.

Other than that, not much going on. Went and saw How To Lose Friends And Alienate People with Rebecca last night. Was better than I expected but still... I wanted to see Eagle Eye, lets put it that way.
WHO WANTS TO SEE EAGLE EYE WITH ME?! The only vaguely-decent (That's Non-Cinema to you) source at the moment is a TS-Cam that is zoomed in on the screen to far and often flicks in and out of focus, with sound out of synch too... I gave up watching after 10 mins...

Also probably going to Wales for the weekend of Children in Need because Jono is going to attempt to break the world record Halfanimal set earlier this year. To see the previous "Record" watch the video below. The bizarre thing is if you contact Guinness, they have no record of it being set or recorded. Which is odd, and calls into question if there is actually a Record for Jono to Smash. Anyway, watch it. Then watch the video below it, that's of Jono. He's 15, and his record for backs is 15. The world record is 19, so he's pretty close to smashing it.

That's all really, so below is my rant on Thorpe Park's new coaster. It's also over on Sprog Review (sprogreview.blogspot.com) if you wanna look at anything there...

Bye =D

In the past 6 years we've seen 3 new larger-sized coasters open at Thorpe. An Intamin 10-looping coaster that took the world record for largest number of inversions, a Bolliger And Mabillard Inverted Coaster that's possibly the most compact design they've done, and a simplistic but none the less fantastic Intamin Accelerator Coaster.

It's pretty obvious to anyone that they've advanced from the smallest, more family-centred of the Tussaud's parks to the mid-size, thrillseeking park for those of us who live below the midlands and don't want to drive 5 hours to get to Alton Towers unless we've got a 2-day pass and are staying nearby.

They've all been pretty good rides, with nice layouts and some good thrills, but the theming has always seemed to be the tricky part at Thorpe. It's a small area (you can walk from one side to the other in under 5 minutes - Alton Towers takes about half an hour), so everything is pretty close to each other. However, they still manage to fit about 5 themed areas into that, so occasionally it looks like a bit of a mishmash of things and doesn't quite fit together smoothly. The theming is good, but it seems to slide around a lot and not be... as sound and clean as that seen at Chessington or Alton.

Colossus is nicely done, it's quite minimalistic but all fits together nicely and doesn't overpower the area or look out of place. It's just an Intamin 10-looping coaster surrounded by vegetation and some temple theming. It works nicely, and suits the idea of the ride.

Nemesis inferno is also themed well but... I have issues with the name. Nothing links it to nemesis other than the fact it's a B&M inverted, so why not just call it "inferno"? The volcano idea is cool, well built and the equally tropical setting is pretty good too. Just a shame you can see the amity island area whilst on it, kind of destroys the idea of it being in a tropical paradise area.

Stealth is again an oddly named ride for what it is, but that's mainly the coaster community's fault for calling it that when it was called "Project: STEALTH" and everyone simply came to know it as "Stealth" so the park decided to keep the name. So maybe more the management's fault. Who knows.
Anyway, stealth is nicely themed too, if a little weird. Amity Speedway? Ok, racing fits with the whole acceleration idea but... It could have been something else. I dunno, a rocket test. A jet. Something that isn't a racing car like every other accelerator coaster in existence. Except Kingda Ka. However, as Stealth is such a drool-worthy ride and completely awesome it just about gets away with it.

Which leads me to the new coaster. A Gerstlauer Custom-Layout Eurofighter. From the below photo you can see it's pretty nice. 97-degree drop into an immelman.

Why custom? Because they come in 3 other pre-designed versions that are a) Cheaper and b) Boring. These are the Euro-Fighter Model 320+, Euro-Fighter Model 500/8, and Euro-Fighter Model 670/8. If you're at all bothered about that.

Eurofighters. Possibly one of the best new-style coasters (along with the Maurer Söhne X-Car Coaster) to hit the market since 2000. The fact we get one in England is wicked.

They've got one at Oakwood in Wales and it's pretty shit. It's not great, it's not at all themed, and it's in the middle of a field on a block of concrete. If you want anymore info on oakwood, this basically covers it: Someone died on their giant flume, there are sheep roaming underneath megaphobia (The largest woody in the UK), and they have a skyswing.

So Saw: The Ride. They've been building this since about... Late August. Before that it was known it would be a eurofighter and it would sit on a new piece of land filled into the lake behind Samurai, off the side of Canada Creek. All looked pretty good, the designs looked really cool and it appears to have a new, bold intersting layout. It looked very similar to mystery mine at dollywood, which was exciting. But now they release that it's saw? (Yes, I've finally got to the point I wanted to make at the start, took a long time didn't it?)
Eurofighter? WOO
Custom layout? WOO
Saw? BOO

Ok, what's my problem with it being saw? I don't see it lending itself to a ride well. Thorpe is still a little bit of a family park. Which means there are going to be adults with kids there. They can't really make it an "18 only" ride, due to the park demograph. So, why pick a series that is gory, bloody and also well past it's sell-by date?

Saw I: Excellent Film
Saw II: Good
Saw III: Meh
Saw VI: WHY MAKE THIS?!
Saw V: Someone at twisted pictures needs to be shot.

I can't see it being scary, gory or anything vaguely like saw. What's the worst they can do? Have jigsaw telling you you're going to die and you must escape by riding this coaster? Ooh scary. It's not like you're going to be seeing people's heads torn off by bear traps or being shot in the face through a door. They could have based it on a new idea, not a slowly-dying franchise. Something similar, but not Saw.
Ok so places like Universal Studios work well because they're based on films and people like the "ride the movies". However, they do the rides WELL because they have so much more money to spend, making them genuinely scary due to the level of production. All "Scary" rides in the UK just seem cheap and tacky, they're not at all scary, simply because they don't have the same level of funding. Apparently this has the largest funding from any Merlin Groups Ride but it's still... Will it work well?

I'm hoping Twisted Pictures and Lionsgate are going to be putting some money towards the ride to theme it and make it as good as it can be, perhaps with a new original storyline, rather than just reaping royalties from it, because otherwise it's just not going to work well. The fact it isn't even in an area that fits with saw also worries me. If it was going to be built somewhere, I'd have picked the towers or the woods at Alton, not somewhere at Thorpe.

The ride may be really good. It's got a wicked layout with some nice inversions and it looks like they've put a lot of though into it.. It's just the fact it's... Saw. Doesn't fit with canada creek. Or any of Thorpe.

Maybe I was just excited over a Mystery Mine style ride in the UK. Maybe it's just because I'm dissapointed with what they did with the saw franchise (It's turning into something like Nightmare on Elm Street or Friday the 13th, it's just getting ridiculous). Maybe it's because I don't think that "Saw" and "Rollercoaster" fit well together.
Whatever it is, I leave you to make your own decision, but mine is that I don't like the look or sound of this and I can't see it working that well.

And on a final note, does this concept artwork say "SAW" to you? To me it says "Mineshaft" or something similar, and fits alongside the loggers leap sawmill idea. It just doesn't Seem... Sawish. If that's a word.

All these things I hate revolve around me

2008-10-08T23:07:00.001+01:00

I'm quitting bocking. Well, not bocking. Just the clubs for a bit. Up until January 2009 most likely.

I've got too much going on uni wise and stuff, and I can't be dealing with all the shit from the JJ's. Everything I seem to do is wrong, any change on the site or forum has to be discussed 10 times before I'm allowed (or disallowed to do it). Apparently I'm trying to run the group. I am NOT. I'm just making the site and forum presentable to the public. That's all.
It seems the only people I get on with are Rich, Colin, Leon and Tom. And Tom quit last month. It's a shame to see him go, as after Locky he was probably my next best friend in Bocking.

Alongside that, I'm just a bit fed up of everything going on at the moment.

I love being at work, it's really good, just portfolio is a pain. It's coming on okish... I think I can have it complete in about 2-3 weeks. At some point I need to scan it all into my PC as a backup. If I manage to complete the course, I shall use the chainsaw in the garden and chop the fucking thing up. Then burn it.

Trampoline broke and I can't afford a new one right now, which means I'm gonna lose all confidence on backflips as I have nothing to practice on before going to bocks.

I guess that's about it bar a few trivial things.

Maybe...

Tell me, doctor, where are we going this time?

2008-09-28T01:06:00.003+01:00

I am still alive!
Little has happened in teh past few weeks, bar capital bocking and multiple visits to Wales. You've probably seen it all on the book of faces.

I guess all I've got to say is "ARGH PORTFOLIO", and that a few blogs have been updated.
http://sprogreview.blogspot.com/ has a few new things on it

And an entirely new interactice experience has been launched at
http://sprogandrai.blogspot.com/

By "interactive" I mean the 1995 sense of the word where you click a link and it takes you somewhere else or loads a picture. Enjoy.

Oh. Previous Lyrics.

So I guess I better kiss goodbye to my ticket outta loserville...
Ticket out of Loserville - Son of dork

I gave you my world, to tear apart, another fool, another broken heart
Anyone - The Feeling

Welcome to the Jungle, we got fun and games
Welcom to the Jungle - Guns N Roses

Welcome to the jungle, we got fun and games

2008-07-15T01:20:00.002+01:00

I am sat at Locky's PC, in Locky's room, whilst Locky is asleep in bed. lol.

I'm still here in Wales and probably will be until Friday, love it up here. Been down the bay twice in 4 days, also done a gym session and a parade/festival thing. Landed front flips on hard ground in the gym, and been trying on grass Saturday and today. Landed 1 today out of 5 attempts! Woo.
Got some nice photos too, they're up on the book of faces and WB site under June and July monthly galleries (www.welshbockers.co.uk). Apparently i'm a welsh bockerer too now, which is cool =D

That's about it really, going down the bay again tomorrow night to bounce around in the basin and by torchwood tower as it's all been shut off due to festivals over the previous weekends.

So catch ya later peeps =)

I gave you my world,to tear apart, Another fool, another broken heart

2008-07-09T23:32:00.001+01:00

Shiny new skin! Because I was getting bored with the shitty MCR emo one.

Er, not much else to put. Wales tomorrow. Other shit still on my mind (Hence the title).
That's this week's blog done.

So I guess I better kiss goodbye to my ticket outta loserville...

2008-07-03T22:15:00.003+01:00

So. Another blog.
Dunno what to write anymore, ideas have escaped me. Work is good, slowly chugging on with portfolio and stuff, and I'm working Monday and Tuesday next week so I can have an extra long weekend for CAPITAL BOCKING.
Aha, there's something talk about. 43 days! XD

So, I went up to Wales weekend before last, that was fun, had a good laugh with Matt and everyone else, going back next Thursday to go to a gym session and stay for at least 5 days. I'll come back when I get bored I guess. Which is unlikely to happen!
Got to finally bock the bay and it's excellent, really nice and loads of different things to do. Due to there being a festival in the main basin we went on some stairs to the side, where we got into an argument with a police community support officer, who went off crying when we essentially told him to fuck off. Welshies also had a go at "Gibbon Slacking" on bocks which I filmed, I'll shove it online at some point. Photos are on the book of faces. So yeah, going back up to try out the whole area around Torchwood HQ, and generally have some fun and get away from here for a few days.

Monday the old gang from PGS went to Phil's for a good ol' night of bang, catan, carcasonne, sabateur and Poker. I didn't partake in poker as I didn't know how to play, but was a good night with much beer consumption as well. I think we drank 40 bottles between us in the end, I only had 3 because of work the next day. Photos, again, are on the book of faces. Not the book of faeces.

That's about it really, some stuff happened at the weekend I'd rather not talk about and that's all. Been bocking a lot and making a new video, will post here once it's done.

LYRICS FROM LAST MONTH:

On my own I'm finally free...
Injection - Rise Against

Burn burn the life that you can't choose, burn burn the hate that gets you through!
Burn Burn - Lost Prophets

You'll never close my eyes and watch me die
This Suffering - Billy Talent

So take what you need until your body's numb
Prostitution Is The World's Oldest Profession (And I, Dear Madame, Am A Professional) - Cobra Starship

RADIO SPROG!

2008-06-23T18:41:00.002+01:00

Yeah, the title isn't a lyric. Tough shit.

Live Videos provided by Ustream.TV

So take what you need until your body's numb

2008-06-14T17:17:00.001+01:00

http://sprogreview.blogspot.com/

Jam-packed full of cynacle reviews. Or not.

You'll never close my eyes and watch me die

2008-06-10T00:02:00.003+01:00

Sadly I only have 1 year left of being a teenager.
So... What have I learnt in 19 years?

Never put a swingball pole through your leg.
Never confuse the words bollards and bollocks.
Never trust anyone called Matt.
Free stuff is never free.
Girls are bitches.
5 Blades are NOT better than 3, no matter how much the advert says so.
Bocking is the greatest sport ever invented. Period.
Az is, and always has been, an alcoholic.
"Cocking" is not a viable replacement for the word "Bocking".
Never date a girl on the same course as you.
Alcohol is the source of all life's problems. It also fixes them too.
Never date a girl on a different course to you.
Transformers is, quite simply, the greatest franchise ever.
Universal's Islands of Adventure is where I want to live.
If it ain't broke, it still needs fixing. Preferably with WD-40 and gaffer tape.
Never believe your art teacher when they say you cannot draw.
Falling over whilst running at 20mph is an interesting experience. And should never be repeated.
Falling out of a tree is the easiest way to gain concussion. Especially if you do it twice in a row.
Computers are from both heaven and hell. At the same time.

Also, a new blog should be launched soon. Reviewing technomalogical shit.

On my own I'm finally free...

2008-06-02T00:01:00.003+01:00

WALK FOR LIFE RAWKED. I may demand sponsorship money off people when I get home.
Here's some photos

TEAM PHOTO
GIBBO STRADDLE

BOCKER'S BAR
SOARIN'
Quite Simply... LOLAGE

My legs are knackered now and so is my brain but I really can't sleep right now. So Instead I write blog. Today was fantastic, had a great laugh, got to see everyone from back home and some old faces, and meet some new ones too. Was more of a social gathering than bocking event I would say, because we walked more than we bocked, and it involved mass trip to pizza hut (150 bill... OUCH) and also the a pub. We did bock about in Leceister Square a lot though. So much fun, I didn't realise how in 2 weeks I've missed bocking in a group so much. It's so much more fun and you learn so much more, plus it's a good laugh too. That's about it, I'm gonna go sleep now I think. Video blog of the day will be up sometime next week.

----------------------

Oh yeah! Answers!

A nuisance, who sent? You sent for me?
Without Me - Eminem

The people around here, they never leave their comfort zone
The Thing In The Bass Amp - The Aquabats

Stick your head in the microwave and get yourself a tan
Dare To Be Stupid - Weird Al Yankovic

There's a monkey in the jungle watching a vapour trail, caught up in the conflict between his brain and his tail
19-2000 - Gorillaz

Well this is how we do it on the murder scene
Give 'Em Hell Kid - My Chemical Romance

Paper wings, Look up to the sky to see wings, and watch them burn
Paper Aeroplanes (Makeshift Wings) - AFI

I get knocked down, but I get up again, you're never gonna keep me down
Tubthumping - Chumbawumba

I'd do anything, just to hold you in my arms
I'd Do anything - Simple Plan

Can't Find My Way Home...
My Way Home is Through You - My Chemical Romance

Time to start guessing this months!

I'd do anything, just to hold you in my arms

2008-05-26T23:39:00.003+01:00

So... uni life... BORING. Not much to do, had a long weekend... yesterday and today were sooooo boring. It rained lots today too so no bocking =( Wish I was back home, weather was apparently ok this afternoon back there! Could have had a bock around bmth!

Still strugging with stuff but I'm doing my best to deal with it, e.g. this. Not sure how I feel really, just confused. Hence title of this blog. Still not ready to attempt to be friends with her though I think, simply because of how I feel and what is going on in my mind...

Not much to say other than that really, Thorpe park was great fun so here's some photos. Full res are on my dA.

Fin.

I get knocked down, but I get up again, you're never gonna keep me down

2008-05-20T23:24:00.003+01:00

Guess I should update as I haven't in a week. Apologies for that, I just haven't had anything to write. OR I've just been a lazy git. Take your pick.

Back at uni... not sure what to put really... because I'm unsure of how I feel. It was awkward to begin with, and I don't think I'm really helping matters, but at the same time I can't instantly stop feeling the way I do. We went to Tesco yesterday and I ended up walking home because I couldn't deal with being with her for that amount of time. At one point she walked next to me and I almost put my arm around her, just because it seemed the natural thing to do. After a while though I was ok.
I struggle with spending a long time around her. 10-20 mins I can manage, anything more and it gets a bit too much, simply because I still like her more than I should. She spoke to me today, albeit breifly just to ask if the others had gone down to dinner, I said i didn't know so we went and looked and they weren't there, causing a slightly awkward silence. I wanted to ask how she was and stuff but I thought I should hold off on that for a while and take things slowly.

All the girls sit together and the way seating is I'm probably going to be sitting on my own a lot. I don't mind too much though as it means I get to detach from the group and I don't have to be near her. But at the same time I then feel a bit isolated, but it's not too bad. I guess I am isolating myself from the group a bit on purpose, but not because I don't want to be part of it any more. They're all good friends but I still can't deal with the being around her for long periods of time, and I don't want to have to get up and leave midway and seem rude. We did some practical thing today and I decided to go in the group just to prove to myself that I could spend time around her and have a laugh with the others... I think I did ok.

Laura has been really helpful and listened to me a lot, as has Roxie. Jess has also helped a lot too by talking to me yesterday or sunday, whichever day it was. So I'm really grateful to them, they've knocked a lot of sense into me and although I sometimes feel a bit alone up here being the only guy and stuff, I'm really glad they're around and they put up with me. Dunno what I would have done by now without them.
I guess to sum it all up, it's getting better, slowly.

Damn. I seem unable to write cynical blogs anymore. I shall try again at a later date.

Paper wings, Look up to the sky to see wings, and watch them burn

2008-05-13T21:29:00.002+01:00

When you go would you even turn to say "I don't love you like I loved you yesterday"?

Ergh. Back at uni on Saturday. Sucks for obvious reasons. BUT taking xbox and we (Myself, Roxie and Laura) are going to Thorpe Park on Saturday 24th. Haven't been in 2 years so will be good =)

Work is boring, my portfolio is currently being marked... More news later =/

There's a monkey in the jungle watching a vapour trail, caught up in the conflict between his brain and his tail

2008-05-09T23:53:00.002+01:00

Haven't really got much to say. My PC appears to hate me and keeps imploding or spontaneously shutting down, and as such I have given up writing cases. That plus the fact I watched Iron Man and have had 3 beers.

I attempted to write about not thinking about stuff anymore but it just made me think about stuff. So kinda defeated the point.

That's about all really, work is same old boring stuff, as is life. But I feel i'm getting there eventually. Will keep you all posted =)

Stick your head in the microwave and get yourself a tan

2008-05-06T00:18:00.001+01:00

I'll do a proper update at some point, I promise.

In the meantime, I swear I'm normal. Honest.

The people around here, they never leave their comfort zone

2008-05-04T20:06:00.002+01:00

Bails
Pain. Humilation. Hilarity.

Enjoy :)

A nuisance, who sent? You sent for me?

2008-05-03T17:17:00.002+01:00

Ok, the song list!
So I'll give you the Lyrics and then the song and artist they are from

So save me from walking off a windowsill or I'll sleep in the rain
Mad as Rabbits - Panic At The Disco

I see a red door and I want it painted black
Paint it, Black - The Rolling Stones

I've been here before And I don't care where I'm going
I'm waiting - The All-American Rejects

We've been pulling out the nails that hold up everything you know
Prayer of the Refugee - Rise Against

A generation always waiting, a revolution past its time
For all these times Son, for all these times - Lostprophets

Do you remember when we were just kids and cardboard boxes would take us miles from what we would miss?
Inevitable - Anberlin

I'm not what you want me to be
The New Transmission - Lostprophets

Leave the past in the past, gonna find the future
When I'm Gone - Simple Plan

Remind your parents we’re tomorrow
Audrey, Start the revolution - Anberlin

That's that done, now you get to guess this months starting with this one. Shouldn't be too hard, and I'll try and use even more varied artists this month.

That's all really, shoulder is healing up nicely, did some work at Lychett Matravers Junior School may fete today, may post some videos later, was a good laugh and we had a bit of fun and pushed bocking to the public again. Currently redoing the JJ site, which is my plan for this weekend!
Gym tomorrow and Monday! =D

Remind your parents we’re tomorrow

2008-04-30T23:12:00.002+01:00

I wrote more stuff. This is about an animal being put to sleep, and the emotions the owner goes through, and the viewpoint of the professionals too.

At the end of the da y

Haven't really got anything else to add really, other than I redid my layout on here. Currently on a bit of a sin-city crazy mode. It does kick ass though.

Hmm It's the end of the month. Maybe I should post the answer list tomorrow!

I'm not what you want me to be

2008-04-28T22:53:00.002+01:00

I wrote a... Thing

You can view it here:
Staring into space

I kinda realised after majorly wiping out on my bocks that I need to get my ass in gear and move on. This is my attempt at dumping all my emotions and walking away, saying "That's it, Done". For major wipeout info, I present you this:
How did this happen? Running along happily, decided to leap over the curb onto the pavement, didnt make it. I landed in the mud by kerb, slid, my hoof hit the kerb, making me hyperextend my left knee (that's the good one, so was quite lucky), everything went upside down, suddenly i'm onto my back and tumbling along! I also managed to graze my hands through my wristguards, have probably sprained my right wrist as I went down hard onto it, Ripped my trousers and I need a new JJ shirt as mine is now in tatters. Like a peasant's clothes.

Staggered home barely able to put weight onto my left leg, completely unaware of the hole in my shoulder, and collapsed onto my bed and didn't move for a while. But I am fine now! Patched myself up with a melonin pad for my shoulder (after falling back down the stairs as my leg refused to work), had a long shower, took some ibuprofen and is mainly painless now.

That's all for today. More updates tomorrow! Along with the promised Sprog Science Experiment!

Do you remember when we were just kids and cardboard boxes would take us miles from what we would miss?

2008-04-27T19:09:00.006+01:00

So finally I have finished the elusive Elric Brothers II picture after 16 days working on it for about 8 hours overall.
Here it is:

So last night was fun, playing random xbox games whilst Phil made cocktails, Rebecca passed out on the sofa, and Az drunk a lot of alcohol (what's new, eh?)
They left about 12.30, so i cleared up and whatnot, and then sat down and drank my way through a fair few beers ending up so I don't remember after that. Apparently I asked Harry about Sam according to my message histories. Luckily I didn't talk to Sam though, so evidently I'm doing okish if I can do that whilst drunk.

Today has been boring, haven't done much, finished that image and did some more work on my other one, went for a bike ride again and spent a while sat up on the heath thinking things over (this wasn't clever, it left me very confused again. Was a nice day though)
So many people appear to have blogs again now, I have found Craig and Rebecca's through Az's, and now Kayleigh has one too. And I thought I jumped onto an empty bandwagon! Big thanks to Kayleigh for helping me sort my head out a lot this week... Now go and bloody ask him ;)

That's about it, work tomorrow.

A generation always waiting, a revolution past its time

2008-04-25T19:50:00.002+01:00

So I am sat here with a cold beer, having consumed a pizza and reflected on my day at work. Little happened. As per usual.
In other news, little has also happened. Charmy seems unable to keep her msn signed in, matt seems to be turning into how I was a few weeks back, and other people seem generally ok and happy. Congrats to you lucky, lucky bastards.

I personally appear to be some form of metaphorical yoyo forever going up and down. Currently my mood alternates about every 4.8947206 minutes, give or take a few seconds depending on what is happening and who is talking. I change between being perfectly fine and getting there, and then going on a massive downward spiral and wanting her back again. But in all honesty I don't think I could go through it again, I still care about her now but not as much as I did a week ago. Last night however, I wanted to go to B&Q over the road and but 2-by-4 and ram it through Matt's head. Today, iTunes appears to hate me and picks depressing tracks at the moment so mainly gets sworn at and such tracks are skipped. Blasting MCR and Rise Against is fun.

Tomorrow, Az, Phil and Rebecca are coming over to play guitar hero 2 and 3. With 2 guitars. Should be good fun. Az is bring rum however, which last time I drank some had some horriffying (yet utterly hillarious) results. Much like taking a lightbulb, placing it in a microwave, melting it and then blending the resulting mess with a few glowsticks and then placing it all in a francium container and submerging it in water.
I Don't remember any of it, but from what I've seen of the consequences it appears to have been a good night. Apart from the mass throwing up like a firehose on full power.

Thats about it, will update again in 2-3 days.

We've been pulling out the nails that hold up everything you know

2008-04-23T20:47:00.002+01:00

Silence! I Kill you!

So um yeah, Monday night I entered total meltdown mode. Much fun was had by all, except those involved. Basically went on a complete and utter nutcase run and decided I wanted Sam back and stuff, then hit Tuesday lunchtime and realised "WTF is wrong with me?". Ladies and Gentlemen, this was me coming to my sanity. It rarely happens so be shocked More shocked! Come on, you can do better than that! That's more like it!
So yes, after repeatedly metaphorically slapping myself around the head with a tuning fork, I realised this would be a horrifically bad idea, so bad that it may tear a hole in the space time continuum, resulting in earth being the only planet left in the universe, and a strange little green man running amock over the world with sticky balls attempting to pick up rubbish to make new planets and stars.

Today also involved continual usage of the metaphorical tuning fork (it's B flat incase you were wondering), mainly this morning when I sent some ranty, rather frank texts about stuff. Mainly how Sam's not worth it anymore, she was but she's not now. I kinda hoped we would at least stay friends after but the fact she hasn't spoken to me means I really can't be bothered to attempt talking to her. Plus it'll probably fuck my head up too.
So leave it I shall, and when we have returned to university shall see how it goes, I will. Not much improvement I see, but care I do not, if honest I am. Question not, why like Yoda, I speak. Onwards, Padawan!

So that's my week, nothing interesting at work really today. Cystotomy cat (did fuck all all day), Vomiting cat (likewise) and a dental cat (again, did fuck all). Yesterday was similar, Monday I had no inpatients at all. So instead I did all the mindless jobs which make your mind wander, this isn't always good so the tuning fork does surface at certain points in time but other times allows for amusing inventions and thoughts whilst blankly staring at a wall cleaning kits.

On another note, Gavin invented me a poem yesterday in the pub, but I don't remember much of it. It was fucking awesome though.

I see a red door and I want it painted black

2008-04-20T21:58:00.003+01:00

Guess the song time again. As none of you lazy gits did it last time! Maybe the last one was too hard?

Nowhere stocks GHII without the guitar, so I don't have it yet. Will order it when it comes into stock on play.com
You may have noticed a new edition has come steaming in on the right like the train from back to the future, known as "Random shite you should look at". This is just a collection of links to midly interesting sites, currently consisting of 2 blogs and a website. More links shall be added as time goes by.

That's about it really, I may go play guitar hero again as Indiana Jones appears unable to distract my mind from thinking stuff I really don't need/want to be thinking right now. Whoever invented girls needs shooting XD

That is all for today! Work tomorrow! :(

Update: Within 1 minute of posting, Az got the song (you sad bastard). rolling stones - paint it black

So save me from walking off a windowsill or I'll sleep in the rain

2008-04-19T22:29:00.005+01:00

And so we return to the old in-joke of song lyrics as blog titles. This has been a long-running gag/game for some time now between myself and friends, and it shall continue here.
Guess the song title and artist, and if you get it right, you get that free prize I was talking about (which, if you remember, actually ends up costing you about £20 in telephone bills, plus postage and packaging, and a donation to the company sending it to you)

The only comment my previous entry recieved included "After reading it I had the urge to slap you round your face repeatedly and tell you to cheer the hell up Dude."
I would like to breifly point out a lot of this blog will be written in a tounge-in-cheek, cynical viewpoint, simply because I find it hillarious fun, and I also hammer stuff down on the keyboard as it comes into my head, so please do not take all of it to heart.
And now we go hurtling back into the real world like Valentino Eossi losing control of his bike at 60mph on the hairpin bend of Suzuka.

Today, I purchased the marvel known as Guitar Hero III. And what a Marvel it is. No, seriously.
I've been playing it for 4 hours straight, it's so damn addictive. It's probably the most efficient way of gaining RSI in a ridiculously short period of time though, as I have discovered as my wrists now refuse to actually work. Perhaps I should change my technique.
So, I have completed it on easy (having never played any game remotely like it I thought this would be a sensible idea - I'm no pansy, throw me a FPS and I'll jump straight in on Medium or Hard depending on how familiar I am with the control system), after which I was forced to play Dragonforce - Through the fire and the flames during the end credits (or listen to it being really messed up), after which I required a break on Beautiful Katamari after my hands threatened to fall off.
I then discovered a random "store" area off the story menu, which lead me to a place I could "buy" tracks, guitars, and other random shite with the "money" I had "earnt" from "touring and performing".

I scroll through the guitars available - meh.
I scroll through the clothes for characters - meh.
I scroll through the other random shite - meh.
I scroll throught the tracks - Something catches my eye.

This something happened to be a track by a band known as "Rise Against". Now, it's only in the past... 4 months... That I have learnt of their existence. I was introduced to them by my ex-girlfriend, and I was mildly impressed with their talent and wide range of styles. Now there's one song (Prayer of the Refugee) that has really become something of a staple song for me, it gets blasted fairly regularly since we split up and generally stops my mind fucking up and whatnot. In short, it's bloody awesome.
It also just happened to be the song on Guitar Hero III. For the past half hour, It's been on continuous play on the game. Blasting out of my TV, with a half assed attempts from me to "rock along" to it (as the game appears to describe it). I can now play it 100% on Medium difficulty. Whilst shouting along to it with a massive grin on my face. The previous 30 minutes have just been the most amount of fun I've had in about 5 weeks. And if you now excuse me, I'm off to blast along to it again, because it's so much damn fun.

Tomorrow... I'm going to buy Guitar Hero II.

And so, the first proper post

2008-04-18T18:10:00.003+01:00

We shall begin with a coversation between myself and an aquaintance of mine who, for sake of argument, we shall call Matt.

Now, within the space of about 5 days, Matt entered a relationship, and I had one come crashing down around me like a... I would use that wrecking ball analogy again but you'll all get very bored of it very quickly. So I'll resort to the old phrase of "like a ton of bricks". Actually we'll make that 1o tons of breeze blocks just to up the stakes a bit and get somewhere closer to the truth (not the actual truth as I can't come up with an analogy for that right now, other than "a fucking lot of bricks")

I will give Matt some credibility here and say yes, he was doing his best to cheer me up. However, he failed miserably, slowly burning up as he re-entered the atmosphere that is the cynical bastard side of me, a side that seems to be appearing more than usual at an increasingly alarming rate... But we shall come back to this at a later date, for the story must continue!

And thus, Matt attempted to explain how, maybe, one day, I will find "that ms. perfect". To which replied something along the lines of "maybe" (I was on a dangerously mind warping mix of caffiene, sugar, ibuprofen and lack of sleep - I don't fully remember it). At which point Matt goes off on some happy-go-lucky loved-up crazy weirdass talk about how "you'll never think they will like you, and they do" and how said person "Will make you feel so happy and special". To which ("Hello!" says cynical bastard me) replied "Yeah it does feel like that... And then it slowly dawns on you you're being fucked about with, they don't actually care, and your entire world collapses in on itself, leaving you in a dark, empty room with nothing but the face-shaped mould on the wall to keep you company on the long cold nights". I don't think he appreciated this, but this is simply the truth. The horiffic, dark, cold-as-steel truth, and although you might not believe it, it'll hit you one day like a slap to the face with a great white shark.

And as another of my good friends, who by some bizarre twist of luck/fate/stupidity (delete as appropriate) is also called Matt, put so well "Bitches Fuck Shit Up". Let this be a lesson to you all.

And so we return from the real world to the not-so-real world after that joyous adventure into my evening. Sadly, there is little happening in the not-so-real world, and such we shall ignore its existence for the time being. Instead, have a work-in-progress picture.
And back to the real world we shall now travel in an exciting tale (or not) of my day.

So what happened today you ask? Well, it involved much random travelling, wandering, and general bizarreness. First I adventured to Poole to buy a new month's bus pass for work, which took an excruciating 20 minutes after the printing machine at the bus station decided to conk out just as I reached the desk after queuing behind about 10 elderly people all wishing to go to London on a coach... Which involved having to tell the person behind the desk about their entire life, their reasons for going to London, and demanding to know why it is cheaper to go than last year (this left me incredibly puzzled).
I then ventured to Halfords to book my bike in for a sevice as it is slowly disintergrating and about to implode, and upon arrival I realised I had none of the paperwork and didn't even know what model my bike was (feel free to laugh at my idioticness). So I return home to pick up the paperwork for my bike and return to Halfords, clutching the paperwork like some form of plan for a nuclear bomb. I then discover the bike technician is not there. And will not be there until Wednesday. Where am I wednesday? Bloody sodding work.
I am then informed by a bespectacled teenager, who is unexplainably clean after emerging from a dirt and oil splattered room where bike services take place, in an equally unexplainably odd voice (think mickey mouse combined with Donald Duck. Yes. Like that.), that bike services are only done on weekdays. I am unable to get there during the opening times, so he gives me a phone number and tells me to phone it on Wednesday and ask if I can have my bike specially done on the following Saturday. He then proceeds to attempt to sell me a new bike, a bike plan, and (bizarrely) a hifi system. I politely refused all of these, and exited the store.

I then headed to the bus station to break in my new pass and took a bus to bournemouth to visit Argos, knowing full-well (having researched it the week before) that this branch of Argos is the only place in the entire fucking United Kingdom that happens to have the Wheeljack Transformers Alternators figure in stock. Evidently other people have noticed this too as when I arrived there was only 1 left in stock. And this is where my day gets even more bizarre.
The woman behind the till took the form thingy off me, punched in the number wrong twice, asked how my day was, swore at the machine, entered it correctly and then asked "That's TRANSFORMERS MUSTANG, yes?" as if announcing some world-famous performer to a screaming crowd of fans. To which I simply replied in a dry voice "yes." She then proceded to ask for the £14.99 it would cost me in an equally showmanship way, and returned my change after muttering about there being far too many 5ps and not enough 20ps. I then collected my new purchase from the collection desk, and exited the store, and caught the next bus back to Poole.
I then wandered home, musing over the bizarre woman in Argos and the equally bizarre bus driver who looked like a cross between Russel Brand and Sylvester Stallone, yet sounded like Jonathan Ross (yes, it was that random), before bumping into a few old school friends, waving Hi and simply continuing on my way

So that concludes my not-so-interesting day, and I shall now adventure to Southampton on a train to visit pubs, get drunk, play video games, and generally do nothing constructive with a few friends at southampton uni. Details of the night shall follow if they are deamed viable to appear on these pages.

Fuck that was a long blog. They won't all be this long, I promise.

So... Here I am again

2008-04-18T12:32:00.000+01:00

Shamelessly jumping back onto the blogging bandwagon after falling off the side of it and being ruthlessly trapped within its wheels some 6 months or so ago. Basically since I started at the hell hole known as university, in the hell hole known as potters bar, in the equally hellish hole known as "Just North of London".

So my blog began back on another site known as "Tabulas". We all blogged there, and what good fun it was. This continued for around 18 months before interest began to wane, blogs became emoish and full of whining, and generally the whole idealistic lifestyle of having a blog network with your friends came crashing down like a block of flats after a wrecking ball has just passed through the entire ground floor at high velocity. Much like everything else in life.

In recent months, friends have begun blogging again. Here. Not Tabulas, Here.
And so, too shall I. Because I follow the crowd and do what they do, and that's why I jump 6ft in the air and run at 20mph, just like everyone else... doesn't.

So voila! I present to you a new sprog blog. With shiny new template. And random shite.
This will probably be a random collection of musings on general life, my job (be prepared for blood, gore, death, and the occasional cute puppy), observations of people I know, and the occasional rant on random things. Probably this week will include all 4 of those, plus maybe some additional free suprise that actually ends up costing you about £20 in telephone bills, plus postage and packaging, and a donation to the company sending it to you.

So yes, sit back, grab yourself a drink, and fucking stay there until I come back and update this. Probably tomorrow or this afternoon. Depending on how long you're willing to sit there.