It seems that we're not spending entire day at my sister's place tomorrow, or staying overnight. Reference was made to something that's on TV "while we're on our way back" tomorrow... Which means that Friday isn't a write-off, and I might be able to get stuff done then.
One small thing I have accomplished today: More rearranging of my display cabinets, including the new one. My two THS Convoys are on display... Though I'm not sure they're displayed to their best advantage on the bottom shelf. Currently, from top to bottom, we have: Masterpiece 01 Convoy & 03 Starscream > Armada Unicron, Dead End & Laserbeak (!) > Primus, Vector Prime, EZ Galaxy Convoy & EZ Master Galvatron > THS 01 & 02, Kos-Mos (Xenosaga) & I-no (Guilty Gears) statues.
In all honesty, those two statues will probably never have a 'real' home... and, chances are, they'll be moving again very soon to accommodate the next reshuffle, which will most likely turn out like this: THS 01 & 02 > Primus, etc > Armada Unicron, etc > Masterpiece 01 & 03... but that may or may not require another reshuffle if (when) I get my hands on Masterpiece 05 Megatron...
Oddly, this will be yet another year - I suspect the third year running - when I have not completely redesigned the look of my website's homepage. This is odd, because I really don't like the way it is... My favourite iteration had groovy rollovers that didn't work on some platforms... But when it did, it looked great. One of these days, I hope to give my site a proper overhaul. Something I'll be happy with for a few years, rather than being not-entirely-happy to let it stagnate, as I have been recently.
Then, of course, there's the matter of sorting out the images... I have 50Mb to play with, and that's almost full. If my collection continues to grow, I should probably investigate the likes of Photobucket.
Many things to consider.
Wednesday, 27 December 2006
It's probably just S.A.D., but...
One of the most annoying aspects of winter - and particularly the Christmas Holiday - is that, while one has ample time for 'getting on with things', either the inclination to do so just ain't there, or the condtions are all wrong.
It is, for example, my tradition to take photos of anything that forms part of my Collection, so that I may post them up on my website or, occasionally, here. I was hoping to photograph my Christmas haul (and possible do some more stereoscopic photography) yesterday, but the sky was overcast, so there wasn't enough light to photograph anything well (and I do so hate flash photography!). The low light also meant that I didn't want to start sketching, and the overall lowering of my mood thanks to this meant that I didn't get any writing done... be it story or emails (some of which I really should have written more than a week ago).
Instead, I pulled out a couple of my recently acquired DVDs - Pom Poko and Whisper of the Heart - with the intention of watching one (or both) to while away some time. Typically, I ended up getting so drowsy, I stopped Pom Poko, put my head down, and soon went to sleep. How crap is that? I couldn't even watch a DVD.
I woke up around 3pm, to the sound of our next door neighbour talking loudly (as she ususally does). I seem to recall that she was given tickets for a trip to Italy sometime around Christmas, so this could mean that she's on her way tonight, or just back today.
The next thing that struck me was, looking out of my window, the sky had cleared and I could see sunshine... Just in time for sunset. Even with a clear sky, there wasn't quite enough light for photography (not without whacking up the gain on the camera, which sometimes causes graininess). Now, about an hour later, the sun is sinking below the horizon (it's still cloudy over there, but things are definitely getting darker). Another day, another missed opportunity.
All of this probably wouldn't be so bad if I could use tomorrow - after all, with the skies clearing today, there's a good chance tomorrow will be clear as well - but I'll be heading off to Swindon with my folks to visit my sister and her husband in their new house. We'll be staying overnight and coming back sometime on Friday, which mean the next likely opportunity I'll have for any photograpy will be Saturday. One way or another, this whole week will have been a write-off for 'getting on with things'.
If I'm sensible, I'll take along my sketch pad and make a start on Look, Monkiez! so the time isn't completely wasted... because I feel quite sure that we'll end up sitting around watching television for the most part.
In other news, I've just taken the plunge and moved over to the new Google Blogger thing... So far, so similar... But I'm aiming to make changes to my template. Watch this space.
It is, for example, my tradition to take photos of anything that forms part of my Collection, so that I may post them up on my website or, occasionally, here. I was hoping to photograph my Christmas haul (and possible do some more stereoscopic photography) yesterday, but the sky was overcast, so there wasn't enough light to photograph anything well (and I do so hate flash photography!). The low light also meant that I didn't want to start sketching, and the overall lowering of my mood thanks to this meant that I didn't get any writing done... be it story or emails (some of which I really should have written more than a week ago).
Instead, I pulled out a couple of my recently acquired DVDs - Pom Poko and Whisper of the Heart - with the intention of watching one (or both) to while away some time. Typically, I ended up getting so drowsy, I stopped Pom Poko, put my head down, and soon went to sleep. How crap is that? I couldn't even watch a DVD.
I woke up around 3pm, to the sound of our next door neighbour talking loudly (as she ususally does). I seem to recall that she was given tickets for a trip to Italy sometime around Christmas, so this could mean that she's on her way tonight, or just back today.
The next thing that struck me was, looking out of my window, the sky had cleared and I could see sunshine... Just in time for sunset. Even with a clear sky, there wasn't quite enough light for photography (not without whacking up the gain on the camera, which sometimes causes graininess). Now, about an hour later, the sun is sinking below the horizon (it's still cloudy over there, but things are definitely getting darker). Another day, another missed opportunity.
All of this probably wouldn't be so bad if I could use tomorrow - after all, with the skies clearing today, there's a good chance tomorrow will be clear as well - but I'll be heading off to Swindon with my folks to visit my sister and her husband in their new house. We'll be staying overnight and coming back sometime on Friday, which mean the next likely opportunity I'll have for any photograpy will be Saturday. One way or another, this whole week will have been a write-off for 'getting on with things'.
If I'm sensible, I'll take along my sketch pad and make a start on Look, Monkiez! so the time isn't completely wasted... because I feel quite sure that we'll end up sitting around watching television for the most part.
In other news, I've just taken the plunge and moved over to the new Google Blogger thing... So far, so similar... But I'm aiming to make changes to my template. Watch this space.
Saturday, 23 December 2006
And It's Boxing Day
Otherwise known as the day of tidying up, putting things away, and asking oneself "Why did I buy those jars of pickles?"
So, my haul: I'd bought TakaraTomy's awesome Masterpiece-05 Starscream and THS-01 Galaxy Convoy myself, and they were given to me as presents by my parents and sister respectively. Starscream is a true work of art. Ignore any and all fanboy whinings that it's not 'Gee-Wun/Show Accurate' or a particularly realistic choice of colour for the jet (OK, it's neither 'sky blue', nor 'metallic', nor 'desert type'... but you could say it's sort of 'open ocean greeny-gray-blue'), and focus on the fact that it is a truly excellent and detailed scale model F-15 Eagle... which transforms into one of the most iconic characters in the many TransFormers series. Not only that, but it has a 'face change' gimmick which lets one show him off with his characteristic smirk. Personally, I'm not so keen on the molding of the smirk face... but it works quite well. THS-01 is a miniature, part die-cast version of Galaxy Force/Cybertron's Galaxy Convoy/Optimus Prime. It's wildly detailed, very poseable - possibly slightly more so than the full-size toy), and comes with a selection of hands to aid in posing. In terms of its alternate mode, while it's obviously not modelled on any real firetrucks, it seems more convincing than that of THS-02... largely because THS-02 was clearly designed with the miniature Masterpiece-style robot in mind, rather than the truck, while this was designed to be a miniature, part-die cast version of the original. Though, obviously 'flight mode' is still completely unbelieveable.
The only 'surprise' (which wasn't, because it was easy to predict) was Terry Pratchett's Wintersmith, the latest in his series of children's books set on Discworld and starring Tiffany Aching. This was from Maternal Grandmother, as usual.
Additional to this, an old friend of mine got me a couple of the 3" Titanium TransFormers - Jazz and Smokescreen - which, while they look better in person than in the average photo, still really look like playing pieces for a board game. One oddity is that Jazz has something akin to his Gen-1 paintjob, but the figure is modelled on Binaltech/Alternators Meister.
He also got me the collected edition of IDW's TransFormers: Infiltration series, written by Simon Furman and drawn by EJ Su. It's not a bad story, overall. Furman's contemporary retelling of the Gen-1 story works quite well, and looks fantastic. Considering I wasn't terribly impressed by the spoiler-filled reviews I'd read, I was very pleasantly surprised. That said, it reads like an introduction, rather than a story in and of itself.
From a friend and colleague, I recieved a very cool mechanical beetle kit by Tamiya ("Obstacle Avoiding Type", meaning it has a horn which swings it out of trouble), a crazy Eeyore pen (which makes Eeyore glow red when one writes) and... A year's membership to the TransFormers Collectors' Club. How cool?
So now I have to figure out how best to reorganise my cabinets (again) to fit the newcomers. This will probably happen over the course of the next few weeks, as I move items from one cabinet to another, from one shelf to another, then look over everything and move things around again until I'm happy. Or need to add something else.
Christmas Day itself was pretty much like any other day when most of the family are over. Discussions of work, eating a massive dinner, watching rubbish TV...
Whenever work comes up, and particularly any talk of my possible advancement within the company, my father is swift with scornful remarks about how "everyone and his uncle is a manager these days". I've never really wanted to be a manager, but I wouldn't mind giving it a try... The thing is, my father never became a manager of anything, so his remarks are more annoying than they are hurtful. Sure, both he and I have had our fair share of shitty managers, but that doesn't mean all of them are shitty, or that I'd be a shitty manager. And when he starts saying that there are too many managers where I work, frankly, I'm inclined to agree. Each magazine's sales team has a manager, then there's a 'Commercial Director' above them. My sister suggested titles like 'team leader' would be more appropriate for the magazine managers and, again, I'm inclined to agree... but these morons like to feel important because they all know that salesmen are ten-a-penny. They get promoted more through brown-nosing than through good work, so we have a situation where the class clown becomes a Commercial Director, even though one of his subordinates is a better salesman, and the manager of another team was a far more sensible choice. On my side of things, the only reason there's more than one manager is that we've inherited one from the company we bought, and he can't be demoted. Certainly not on the money he's earning...
There is a good chance that I'll have a very good opportunity coming my way soon... And, while I'm not happy with the company on the whole, I'd be daft to ignore this opportunity, whether it puts the word 'manager' into my job title or not.
OK, work rant over.
I'd been really looking forward to the Doctor Who Christmas Special and, unfortunately, felt very disappointed by the end. On the plus side, David Tennant's Doctor didn't do much shouting... but that was largely because his temporary companion, Donna, was shouting at him most of the time. The plot was odd, and worked largely by making integral things which were previously unmentioned. The monster, while wonderful to look at in all its animatronic glory, didn't actually do much. On the whole I'd say that, if this is a taste of things to come in the series - which is supposedly to be set mostly on Earth, because those episodes have received the highest viewing figures - it's going to get pretty boring, very quickly... The trailers at the end looked interesting, though.
I managed to avoid the Christmas Special of The Vicar of Dibley... Though it had my sister shrieking with laughter.
She and her husband stayed the night, and have now gone home... Boxing Day is looking very dull and grey. I have a few other things to do so, for now, I shall sign off.
So, my haul: I'd bought TakaraTomy's awesome Masterpiece-05 Starscream and THS-01 Galaxy Convoy myself, and they were given to me as presents by my parents and sister respectively. Starscream is a true work of art. Ignore any and all fanboy whinings that it's not 'Gee-Wun/Show Accurate' or a particularly realistic choice of colour for the jet (OK, it's neither 'sky blue', nor 'metallic', nor 'desert type'... but you could say it's sort of 'open ocean greeny-gray-blue'), and focus on the fact that it is a truly excellent and detailed scale model F-15 Eagle... which transforms into one of the most iconic characters in the many TransFormers series. Not only that, but it has a 'face change' gimmick which lets one show him off with his characteristic smirk. Personally, I'm not so keen on the molding of the smirk face... but it works quite well. THS-01 is a miniature, part die-cast version of Galaxy Force/Cybertron's Galaxy Convoy/Optimus Prime. It's wildly detailed, very poseable - possibly slightly more so than the full-size toy), and comes with a selection of hands to aid in posing. In terms of its alternate mode, while it's obviously not modelled on any real firetrucks, it seems more convincing than that of THS-02... largely because THS-02 was clearly designed with the miniature Masterpiece-style robot in mind, rather than the truck, while this was designed to be a miniature, part-die cast version of the original. Though, obviously 'flight mode' is still completely unbelieveable.
The only 'surprise' (which wasn't, because it was easy to predict) was Terry Pratchett's Wintersmith, the latest in his series of children's books set on Discworld and starring Tiffany Aching. This was from Maternal Grandmother, as usual.
Additional to this, an old friend of mine got me a couple of the 3" Titanium TransFormers - Jazz and Smokescreen - which, while they look better in person than in the average photo, still really look like playing pieces for a board game. One oddity is that Jazz has something akin to his Gen-1 paintjob, but the figure is modelled on Binaltech/Alternators Meister.
He also got me the collected edition of IDW's TransFormers: Infiltration series, written by Simon Furman and drawn by EJ Su. It's not a bad story, overall. Furman's contemporary retelling of the Gen-1 story works quite well, and looks fantastic. Considering I wasn't terribly impressed by the spoiler-filled reviews I'd read, I was very pleasantly surprised. That said, it reads like an introduction, rather than a story in and of itself.
From a friend and colleague, I recieved a very cool mechanical beetle kit by Tamiya ("Obstacle Avoiding Type", meaning it has a horn which swings it out of trouble), a crazy Eeyore pen (which makes Eeyore glow red when one writes) and... A year's membership to the TransFormers Collectors' Club. How cool?
So now I have to figure out how best to reorganise my cabinets (again) to fit the newcomers. This will probably happen over the course of the next few weeks, as I move items from one cabinet to another, from one shelf to another, then look over everything and move things around again until I'm happy. Or need to add something else.
Christmas Day itself was pretty much like any other day when most of the family are over. Discussions of work, eating a massive dinner, watching rubbish TV...
Whenever work comes up, and particularly any talk of my possible advancement within the company, my father is swift with scornful remarks about how "everyone and his uncle is a manager these days". I've never really wanted to be a manager, but I wouldn't mind giving it a try... The thing is, my father never became a manager of anything, so his remarks are more annoying than they are hurtful. Sure, both he and I have had our fair share of shitty managers, but that doesn't mean all of them are shitty, or that I'd be a shitty manager. And when he starts saying that there are too many managers where I work, frankly, I'm inclined to agree. Each magazine's sales team has a manager, then there's a 'Commercial Director' above them. My sister suggested titles like 'team leader' would be more appropriate for the magazine managers and, again, I'm inclined to agree... but these morons like to feel important because they all know that salesmen are ten-a-penny. They get promoted more through brown-nosing than through good work, so we have a situation where the class clown becomes a Commercial Director, even though one of his subordinates is a better salesman, and the manager of another team was a far more sensible choice. On my side of things, the only reason there's more than one manager is that we've inherited one from the company we bought, and he can't be demoted. Certainly not on the money he's earning...
There is a good chance that I'll have a very good opportunity coming my way soon... And, while I'm not happy with the company on the whole, I'd be daft to ignore this opportunity, whether it puts the word 'manager' into my job title or not.
OK, work rant over.
I'd been really looking forward to the Doctor Who Christmas Special and, unfortunately, felt very disappointed by the end. On the plus side, David Tennant's Doctor didn't do much shouting... but that was largely because his temporary companion, Donna, was shouting at him most of the time. The plot was odd, and worked largely by making integral things which were previously unmentioned. The monster, while wonderful to look at in all its animatronic glory, didn't actually do much. On the whole I'd say that, if this is a taste of things to come in the series - which is supposedly to be set mostly on Earth, because those episodes have received the highest viewing figures - it's going to get pretty boring, very quickly... The trailers at the end looked interesting, though.
I managed to avoid the Christmas Special of The Vicar of Dibley... Though it had my sister shrieking with laughter.
She and her husband stayed the night, and have now gone home... Boxing Day is looking very dull and grey. I have a few other things to do so, for now, I shall sign off.
Sunday, 17 December 2006
You know it's Christmas time when... 2
Nuts. And Crisps. All kinds of foods your family would either not buy at all or, at best, buy in moderation. Suddenly, they're everywhere... When the fridge is full, they spill out onto the shelves, and when the shelves are full, they end up on whatever flat surfaces are left: worktops, tables, counters and even floors.
Christmas is coming, and the family is set to be couch potatoes - tube of Pringles in one hand, bottle of Christmas Ale (OK, I bought that, so I'm not completely blameless) in the other. Presents will be opened. TV will be watched.
In other news, this morning/early afternoon, I watched the last six episodes of Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex 2nd Gig - yes, back to back - and I was frankly disappointed to find they copped out and let the Tachikoma 'think tanks' save the day again. And they did so by sacrificing themselves again. Deja vu, anyone? Yes, I'm sure it's wonderful that these artificially intelligent machines developed enough self-awareness to understand that their actions would lead to their demise, but that it served the greater good, and all their (humanoid) friends would be saved... but when they're part of Section 9, the elite cybercrimes unit with largely military backgrounds, you'd kind of expect the humanoids to be able to sort things out by themselves once in a while.
Don't get me wrong - it's been a brilliant series. Perhaps slower and less dramatic than the first (the rather eerie Laughing Man logo replacing people's faces whenever he spoke through them was a wonderful touch to series one), it had plenty of action when it counted. The whole 'Individual Eleven' thing - are they real, or are they a fabricated means to a political end? - was cleverly played, and the subtle delving into the Major's past was a welcome sidetrack.
Here's hoping series 3 doesn't turn into Fuchikomatic Days...
This weekend, we played host to my sister and her husband as they had things to do uptown. They've gone back home to Swindon already, and I barely set eyes on Helen. Didn't see Mark at all and, come to think of it, didn't even hear him. Weird.
Christmas is coming, and the family is set to be couch potatoes - tube of Pringles in one hand, bottle of Christmas Ale (OK, I bought that, so I'm not completely blameless) in the other. Presents will be opened. TV will be watched.
In other news, this morning/early afternoon, I watched the last six episodes of Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex 2nd Gig - yes, back to back - and I was frankly disappointed to find they copped out and let the Tachikoma 'think tanks' save the day again. And they did so by sacrificing themselves again. Deja vu, anyone? Yes, I'm sure it's wonderful that these artificially intelligent machines developed enough self-awareness to understand that their actions would lead to their demise, but that it served the greater good, and all their (humanoid) friends would be saved... but when they're part of Section 9, the elite cybercrimes unit with largely military backgrounds, you'd kind of expect the humanoids to be able to sort things out by themselves once in a while.
Don't get me wrong - it's been a brilliant series. Perhaps slower and less dramatic than the first (the rather eerie Laughing Man logo replacing people's faces whenever he spoke through them was a wonderful touch to series one), it had plenty of action when it counted. The whole 'Individual Eleven' thing - are they real, or are they a fabricated means to a political end? - was cleverly played, and the subtle delving into the Major's past was a welcome sidetrack.
Here's hoping series 3 doesn't turn into Fuchikomatic Days...
This weekend, we played host to my sister and her husband as they had things to do uptown. They've gone back home to Swindon already, and I barely set eyes on Helen. Didn't see Mark at all and, come to think of it, didn't even hear him. Weird.
Saturday, 16 December 2006
Pertinent Questions
Got into one of those discussions yesterday evening. Odd questions that got me thinking... So here they are for the world to ponder.
1. What was the most beautiful sunset you've ever seen?
This would have to be the one I saw on holiday in Florida, from the deck of a schooner. It was an evening out while in Key West, and I was with a group of other holiday makers, and my old mate Paul. On another evening, we'd been near the docks, and seen people crowding to see the sunset. As the sun disappeared below the horizon, those stood watching began to clap. I didn't quite understand why until I saw it from the schooner. It's not just any old sunset.
2. What was the most beautiful sunrise you've ever seen?
Well, this is more difficult. As one who likes to lie in wherever possible, I don't tend to see too many sunrises... in fact, I can't remember seeing any. If I have seen any, they've been from my bedroom window, from a train, or from an office window, and none would really count as 'beautiful'.
3. What is the most beautiful piece of music you've ever heard?
And this one pretty much ended the stream of questions, because I don't listen to music in that way. No piece of music in and of itself has even got me teary-eyed in any sense. When I listen to any music, I tend to start mentally separating out the instruments and analysing how the sounds interact to make the music. As such, describing something as 'beautiful' would be very difficult. That said, I could probably come up with something if I sifted through my entire music collection... so maybe I'll add an answer later.
Work yesterday went remarkably well... Our largest title went out on time, and without any apparent hitches. It's amazing how easy things can be when you have intelligent and diligent staff. For a change.
1. What was the most beautiful sunset you've ever seen?
This would have to be the one I saw on holiday in Florida, from the deck of a schooner. It was an evening out while in Key West, and I was with a group of other holiday makers, and my old mate Paul. On another evening, we'd been near the docks, and seen people crowding to see the sunset. As the sun disappeared below the horizon, those stood watching began to clap. I didn't quite understand why until I saw it from the schooner. It's not just any old sunset.
2. What was the most beautiful sunrise you've ever seen?
Well, this is more difficult. As one who likes to lie in wherever possible, I don't tend to see too many sunrises... in fact, I can't remember seeing any. If I have seen any, they've been from my bedroom window, from a train, or from an office window, and none would really count as 'beautiful'.
3. What is the most beautiful piece of music you've ever heard?
And this one pretty much ended the stream of questions, because I don't listen to music in that way. No piece of music in and of itself has even got me teary-eyed in any sense. When I listen to any music, I tend to start mentally separating out the instruments and analysing how the sounds interact to make the music. As such, describing something as 'beautiful' would be very difficult. That said, I could probably come up with something if I sifted through my entire music collection... so maybe I'll add an answer later.
Work yesterday went remarkably well... Our largest title went out on time, and without any apparent hitches. It's amazing how easy things can be when you have intelligent and diligent staff. For a change.
Sunday, 10 December 2006
Sunday Addendum
Of course, what I forgot to mention about yesterday evening was the unusual number of Goths abroad in the Tottenham Court Road area. Or was it unusual? I'm rarely there after dark, except for gigs, and then I tend to expect to see them. Of course, the only thing on at the Astoria on a Saturday night is G.A.Y. which, last night, played host to - gasp of horror - Katie (Jordan) Price and Peter Andre. When did they become a double act? I understand they even have... an album.
Truly, gentle reader, I shudder as I write.
So, anyway. Lots of Goths, and I know not why... Curious.
On the way back home, there was a trio of 'fashionably' dressed kids... one guy (sporting a charming diamante 'ELVIS' belt buckle) and two entirely non-Goth girls with serious eyeliner dependency issues. At one point, the guy removed his jacket and asked one of the girls to hold it for him while he rearranged his utterly fashionable attire. One declined to help, claiming "I need both hands to hold my shoes."
They were in a bag.
They had a big bottle of lemonade between them, but some of their conversation suggested that it wasn't just lemonade. They were heading to a gig somewhere or other, but got off at Notting Hill Gate... Must have been one of the awful, subterranean clubs they were aiming for.
And here's what I keep forgetting to ramble on about: The stars.
One way or another, these days, in the city and even in the suburbs, it's quite unusual to really see the stars at night. Light pollution is such that the sky takes on a sickly orange hue, and all but the strongest stars are blotted out. A couple of times recently, when I've got home quite late on a clear night, I've looked up and seen quite a few stars. Stand at just the right place between lampposts and, as long as the houses nearby have their curtains closed, or their lights off, there's still and amazing spectacle to behold up there. It saddens me that, in lighting up our planet, we're losing out on the lights out there. And most of us don't even notice. The point is made, oddly enough, in the short anime series Macross Zero. Set mostly on an island, a pilot crash lands, is taken in, and sets about fixing their generator. When it's back up and running, he switches it on, and the islanders have electricity again. While most are overjoyed to have their lights (and TV/Radio) again, one in particular bemoans the loss of starlight. The pilot suggests that the electric lights are like 'terran stars'... but it's not quite the same.
I've been wowed by photos of the world at night, and how much light our cities put out, but then when I stop to think about what that means, in terms of energy consumption and - more obviously - light pollution, it doesn't look as wonderful.
I really like to look up into the night sky and see all those points of light. All those possibilities. Who knows what's out there?
I'd imagine that, soon enough - when we've used up all the oil on the planet - we'll all be able to see the stars again... Much clearer and brighter than they seem now.
Truly, gentle reader, I shudder as I write.
So, anyway. Lots of Goths, and I know not why... Curious.
On the way back home, there was a trio of 'fashionably' dressed kids... one guy (sporting a charming diamante 'ELVIS' belt buckle) and two entirely non-Goth girls with serious eyeliner dependency issues. At one point, the guy removed his jacket and asked one of the girls to hold it for him while he rearranged his utterly fashionable attire. One declined to help, claiming "I need both hands to hold my shoes."
They were in a bag.
They had a big bottle of lemonade between them, but some of their conversation suggested that it wasn't just lemonade. They were heading to a gig somewhere or other, but got off at Notting Hill Gate... Must have been one of the awful, subterranean clubs they were aiming for.
And here's what I keep forgetting to ramble on about: The stars.
One way or another, these days, in the city and even in the suburbs, it's quite unusual to really see the stars at night. Light pollution is such that the sky takes on a sickly orange hue, and all but the strongest stars are blotted out. A couple of times recently, when I've got home quite late on a clear night, I've looked up and seen quite a few stars. Stand at just the right place between lampposts and, as long as the houses nearby have their curtains closed, or their lights off, there's still and amazing spectacle to behold up there. It saddens me that, in lighting up our planet, we're losing out on the lights out there. And most of us don't even notice. The point is made, oddly enough, in the short anime series Macross Zero. Set mostly on an island, a pilot crash lands, is taken in, and sets about fixing their generator. When it's back up and running, he switches it on, and the islanders have electricity again. While most are overjoyed to have their lights (and TV/Radio) again, one in particular bemoans the loss of starlight. The pilot suggests that the electric lights are like 'terran stars'... but it's not quite the same.
I've been wowed by photos of the world at night, and how much light our cities put out, but then when I stop to think about what that means, in terms of energy consumption and - more obviously - light pollution, it doesn't look as wonderful.
I really like to look up into the night sky and see all those points of light. All those possibilities. Who knows what's out there?
I'd imagine that, soon enough - when we've used up all the oil on the planet - we'll all be able to see the stars again... Much clearer and brighter than they seem now.
You know it's Christmas time when...
So... The office Christmas Party.
Not much to say this year. The venue was one well used by the company over the years, and through various changes of ownership (ours more than theirs, I'd imagine). It's a small, dingy hole in the ground (literally - all there is at street level is a door with a bouncer). The first time I went there was a sit-down meal for just my department (and one hanger-on with his assistant) which was OK. The food was sparse, but well-arranged. The second time was a fancy dress thing with a Movies theme, and at which I wore a rather groovy rubber t-shirt (which later gave rise to all sorts of rumours... more on that later) as part of a Matrix-inspired costume. The third time I went there, after which I vowed I'd never go again, was the leaving do for the girl who was PA to the MD at the time. I'd agreed to wear another rubber t-shirt to that and, If I remember correctly, that's probably the last time I ever wore one. It's also the last time I went to that particular bar-with-restaurant/club pretensions.
Until last week, that is.
Thursday - a very silly night for a company Christmas bash - saw everyone getting Jolly in preparation for a hard night's drinking. It saddens me that so many people these days equate 'a good night out' with getting completely rat-arsed/stoned... it also rather disgusts me, and makes me very glad I don't go clubbing anymore. Only one good thing ever happened to me while out clubbing, and that was all too brief.
But I digress.
For one reason or another, I - along with several others - was late getting out of the office and down to the bar. In fact, some of my colleagues had time to come back to the office to tell everyone who was still working that I'd got the biggest cheer of the evening when the Secret Santa gifts (ye Gods, yes, we had another of them!) were handed out, and then get back to the venue for even more drinking before I got out of the office.
But escape I did and, somewhat reluctantly, decended into one of the dingiest pits the area has to offer. It was quite obvious that almost everyone was completely ratted already, which really helped to make me feel comfortable, but I didn't plan on staying long. My original intention was to stay only as long as it took to pick up my Secret Santa gift (yes, mercenary, I know), but I ended up staying for a couple of drinks and - God forbid - chatting with a few people.
The most grating part of it was being hauled off by one of the senior management, with whom I'd had a bit of a dust-up at last year's Christmas do, because he'd been a complete arse. This year, he was all smiles, and jolly talk, shaking my hand and telling me how wonderful I am, and how things just wouldn't go as smoothly without me... He even hugged me. And I tried not to feel dirty. That's going to be making people laugh for a long time to come, I just know it.
My Secret Santa revealed herself (I've always had trouble with that bit - 'secret' surely implies that one's identity should be kept secret, but many Secret Santas delight in revealing themselves), and explained that my gift - a block which is a clock, thermometer, timer and alarm, depending on which way up it stands - was "a multi-function gadget for a multi-function guy", and that her girlfriend had recently got one as a gift for a friend. It really is a neat little thing, and now I need never wonder how cold my bedroom actually is when I get up in the morning. I just pick up the alarm clock, put it on its side (or upside down, or whatever) and it'll tell me.
Lots of fairly pointless chat happened. Loads of salespeople who probably have no idea what I actually do were telling me how great I am, and sounding very much as though they were working from a prepared script on the merits of my department. I did my level best to avoid saying anything confrontational. One of the recent additions to the department asked me if I always have "that look on your face... like 'is this all my life is?'" I'd guess the look on my face at the time was closer to being "I can't believe I'm back in this dive... when can I get out of here?" or "good grief... they've done nothing with the decor in this place... it's exactly the same!", but hey. She doesn't know me very well, so who can blame her for such a simple mistake.
I was very thankful - if a little tetchy - by the time I did leave, but any escape would have been a good escape, and that was the end of the bad part of my evening. My last task was to let one of my colleagues back into the office so he could retrieve his Secret Santa gift (a large collection of weird and wonderful records) to take back to the party and do a bit of DJ-ing. On the way in and out, he revealed another of the strange rumours that has circulated about me in recent times. Spread by a girl with whom I was almost never on good terms, this one is fairly entertaining, and almost contains an element of truth.
It is said that, some years ago, at a leaving do, I got into a conversation with a colleague (not the one who spread the rumour, so that should have started people doubting its veracity straight away... if only they had brains) in which I revealed that I was into the fetish scene (I am not), and owned a rubber catsuit (I do not. I own two rubber t-shirts which now appear to be perishing in a cupboard). Shortly thereafter, it was alleged that I left the party, only to return some time later wearing the rubber catsuit... only I'd forgotten the talc.
That's the funny part. That's the part that was supposed to be utterly humiliating to me, and what got people laughing and whispering and spreading their own rumours behind my back. Thing is, most people who'd never owned any rubber clothing themselves wouldn't know that you coat yourself and the inside of the garments with talcum powder before donning them. You see where this is going?
The girl who spread this rumour was stupid on so many levels. It wouldn't surprise me that the 'forgetting the talc' angle came from her own experience, considering she would cheerfully relate tales of going to an ATM to get money, and then forgetting to take the money when she was finished.
But anyway.
Friday was a fairly quiet day at the office, despite another deadline, because so few people turned up. Predictable, huh? All of my department turned up, though one had been rushed to hospital at the party due to an allergic reaction. Only one - a new recruit - was so hung over she couldn't work and was sent home. The boss told her "I won't shout at you today... but I will shout at you on Monday." One complete sales team was there (it was their deadline day, after all), with a couple of others in and out during the day, and maybe three of the Editorial team.
Not much else to say about Friday. My boss had a dust-up with one of the salesmen over his inappropriate conversation with a member of Production. When he tried to escalate it by calling the MD, he ended up getting his knuckles rapped. The magazine completed quite late because Editorial were a bit slow... That's unlikely to happen next month, though. For many reasons.
On Saturday, I arranged to see Pan's Labyrinth with my old mate Paul. Even though I'd already seen it, it was a good opportunity to hang out with him, and pop into Forbidden Planet. Of course, things didn't go smoothly all the way. The Piccadilly line was out for maintenance this weekend, so we had to go in via the Central line. Not usually a bad option, and often far quicker than the Piccadilly... Sadly, on this occasion, someone had decided to jump under a train, meaning there were long delays into town. When we got to Shepherd's Bush, I suggested taking the bus to Piccadilly, which should have been a viable alternative. Unfortunately, the traffic was awful, there was a long wait for the bus, which then decided to stop halfway through the route. On the next bus, we hit terrible traffic in Oxford Street, and decided to walk the rest of the way.
If anyone has seen that advert where the two guys dress like salmon and run against a load of marathon runners, you'll know what Oxford Street was like. It's not much better at any time of year, but in the run-up to Christmas, it's berzerk.
We got to our destination, the cinema in Haymarket, with only a few minutes to spare - our original intention had been to do about 90 minutes of shopping before the film, but it had taken us almost two hours to get there. Tickets there are extortionate, so I decided to forgo refreshments. Paul and I took our seats and waited for the movie to begin.
Quite early on, I started feeling very dozy and, before Ofelia had even been given her first task by the faun, I'd fallen asleep, only waking up at the point where the faun berates Ofelia for not attempting the second task. The only reason I know I didn't snore is that Paul would have nudged me if I had.
I managed to stay awake for the remainder, and it's still a beautiful film the second time around.
As we left the cinema, it had already got dark, and the temperature was dropping. It was still fairly early, though, so we decided to pop off to Forbidden Planet to browse. It was quite gratifying to see that they'd rearranged their stock again, giving greater priority to Doctor Who merchandise and - even more gratifying - TransFormers. Rather than being stuck round the back, they were in the same block as Doctor Who, Star Wars and Star Trek (and wrestling action figures, but the less said about that, the better). Almost their entire stock of TransFormers Classics was gone, only a single Hot Rod/Rodimus remained (coincidentally the one I almost didn't get at Memorabilia, as one guy was umming and ahhing about him and Starscream, then decided to get Starscream only). There were plenty of 3" Titaniums - awful things, the lot of them - and lots of Cybertron stuff, none of which I didn't already have the Japanese Galaxy Force equivalent of. They had a few Alternators, but nothing very inspiring. Paul picked up a couple of things, then we headed down the the basement for comics, books and DVDs. They had a special on for Studio Ghibli films, so I picked up Porco Rosso, Whisper of the Heart and Pom Poko for a tenner each, and then snagged the remaining three volumes of the incredibly long titled Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex 2nd Gig. Paul also picked up the collected version of the TransFormers: Infiltration series by IDW, as an extra Christmas present for me.
Since we were aiming to return via the Central line, we headed back to Tottenham Court Road, and popped into Orbital Comics along the way. It's another hole in the ground, but it's easily redeemed by being incredibly cool. A smaller stock of comics that FP, to be sure, but they make up for it with the amazing miscellany of toys and stuff in the back. Against my better judgement - and because it's a rather cool car - I picked up TransFormers Kiss Play Hot Rodimus (and Syao Syao), doing my level best to ignore the packaging.
All the while, in the background, a couple of guys were having a heated discussion about the Matrix trilogy, and how the sequels ruined the continuity set up by the first, and how they should have left it all well alone. It was interesting to hear someone with even more extreme views on the films than I have.
Just after I'd paid, one of the staff announced that they were about to close, so Paul and I departed.
Since it was getting late, and I was rather hungry, I suggested to Paul that we either knocked the day on the head and went home, or got some food and carried on shopping (going to one of the music megastores, for example). Paul didn't mind either way, but I figured most of my shopping could be done another time, so I voted for home. In retrospect, I think I should have voted for food, then home...
The Central line was still experiencing 'severe delays', so I suggested jumping off at Hangar Lane and getting the bus, which would drop us both closer to home than the train would. This turned out to be a really bad idea because the 'severe delays' just meant that there was a shuttle service from North Acton, at which point the route would have been plain sailing. I still thought picking up the bus was going to be the better option, though...
...And it wasn't. It really, really wasn't. We stood out in the cold by the Hangar Lane gyratory waiting and waiting and waiting and waiting and waiting... many buses passed, none were the right number. The only one that did come quickly was stopping at Alperton - a very helpful two or three stops down the route - and several buses which shouldn't even have been on that route passed by, all 'Not In Service'.
When the right bus finally arrived, it was already full - no surprise, considering we'd been waiting so long we could have taken the train and walked and still been home long before this bus came along - with a bunch of rowdy kids with rap aspirations occupying the back. They gave the bus an impromptu performance of some ad libbed rubbish (including references to people's mothers, threats of violence, etc) set to the four-note ringtone of a cellphone. When they were gone, I was glad to see the back of them.
By the time I got home, it was much colder, and I had the beginnings of a headache. Ben Affleck was on TV - starring in The Sum of All Fears - so I had my dinner and dodged off to my bedroom.
Today, there was the option of trudging around Richmond Park to take photos for the work website, but my friend and colleague had work to do, and I ended up dozing for most of the day.
We have several concerns at work... not least the snail's pace that one of our number works at. I ended up doing a good chunk of his work last week because he'd got to press day without even proofing any ads pages ("there are just so many!" he'd whined. There had been ten at most). While this is cretinous in the extreme, it's nothing in the face of this coming week... where he'll be producing a magazine with potentially three or four times as many ad pages, in exactly the same timeframe. I don't know what he was up to last week, but this week he'd better bloody do some work. Late is not an option. Nor is getting me to help out, as I'll have plenty to do for my own deadlines.
Roll on Christmas... I need to start feeling some goodwill toward all men...
Not much to say this year. The venue was one well used by the company over the years, and through various changes of ownership (ours more than theirs, I'd imagine). It's a small, dingy hole in the ground (literally - all there is at street level is a door with a bouncer). The first time I went there was a sit-down meal for just my department (and one hanger-on with his assistant) which was OK. The food was sparse, but well-arranged. The second time was a fancy dress thing with a Movies theme, and at which I wore a rather groovy rubber t-shirt (which later gave rise to all sorts of rumours... more on that later) as part of a Matrix-inspired costume. The third time I went there, after which I vowed I'd never go again, was the leaving do for the girl who was PA to the MD at the time. I'd agreed to wear another rubber t-shirt to that and, If I remember correctly, that's probably the last time I ever wore one. It's also the last time I went to that particular bar-with-restaurant/club pretensions.
Until last week, that is.
Thursday - a very silly night for a company Christmas bash - saw everyone getting Jolly in preparation for a hard night's drinking. It saddens me that so many people these days equate 'a good night out' with getting completely rat-arsed/stoned... it also rather disgusts me, and makes me very glad I don't go clubbing anymore. Only one good thing ever happened to me while out clubbing, and that was all too brief.
But I digress.
For one reason or another, I - along with several others - was late getting out of the office and down to the bar. In fact, some of my colleagues had time to come back to the office to tell everyone who was still working that I'd got the biggest cheer of the evening when the Secret Santa gifts (ye Gods, yes, we had another of them!) were handed out, and then get back to the venue for even more drinking before I got out of the office.
But escape I did and, somewhat reluctantly, decended into one of the dingiest pits the area has to offer. It was quite obvious that almost everyone was completely ratted already, which really helped to make me feel comfortable, but I didn't plan on staying long. My original intention was to stay only as long as it took to pick up my Secret Santa gift (yes, mercenary, I know), but I ended up staying for a couple of drinks and - God forbid - chatting with a few people.
The most grating part of it was being hauled off by one of the senior management, with whom I'd had a bit of a dust-up at last year's Christmas do, because he'd been a complete arse. This year, he was all smiles, and jolly talk, shaking my hand and telling me how wonderful I am, and how things just wouldn't go as smoothly without me... He even hugged me. And I tried not to feel dirty. That's going to be making people laugh for a long time to come, I just know it.
My Secret Santa revealed herself (I've always had trouble with that bit - 'secret' surely implies that one's identity should be kept secret, but many Secret Santas delight in revealing themselves), and explained that my gift - a block which is a clock, thermometer, timer and alarm, depending on which way up it stands - was "a multi-function gadget for a multi-function guy", and that her girlfriend had recently got one as a gift for a friend. It really is a neat little thing, and now I need never wonder how cold my bedroom actually is when I get up in the morning. I just pick up the alarm clock, put it on its side (or upside down, or whatever) and it'll tell me.
Lots of fairly pointless chat happened. Loads of salespeople who probably have no idea what I actually do were telling me how great I am, and sounding very much as though they were working from a prepared script on the merits of my department. I did my level best to avoid saying anything confrontational. One of the recent additions to the department asked me if I always have "that look on your face... like 'is this all my life is?'" I'd guess the look on my face at the time was closer to being "I can't believe I'm back in this dive... when can I get out of here?" or "good grief... they've done nothing with the decor in this place... it's exactly the same!", but hey. She doesn't know me very well, so who can blame her for such a simple mistake.
I was very thankful - if a little tetchy - by the time I did leave, but any escape would have been a good escape, and that was the end of the bad part of my evening. My last task was to let one of my colleagues back into the office so he could retrieve his Secret Santa gift (a large collection of weird and wonderful records) to take back to the party and do a bit of DJ-ing. On the way in and out, he revealed another of the strange rumours that has circulated about me in recent times. Spread by a girl with whom I was almost never on good terms, this one is fairly entertaining, and almost contains an element of truth.
It is said that, some years ago, at a leaving do, I got into a conversation with a colleague (not the one who spread the rumour, so that should have started people doubting its veracity straight away... if only they had brains) in which I revealed that I was into the fetish scene (I am not), and owned a rubber catsuit (I do not. I own two rubber t-shirts which now appear to be perishing in a cupboard). Shortly thereafter, it was alleged that I left the party, only to return some time later wearing the rubber catsuit... only I'd forgotten the talc.
That's the funny part. That's the part that was supposed to be utterly humiliating to me, and what got people laughing and whispering and spreading their own rumours behind my back. Thing is, most people who'd never owned any rubber clothing themselves wouldn't know that you coat yourself and the inside of the garments with talcum powder before donning them. You see where this is going?
The girl who spread this rumour was stupid on so many levels. It wouldn't surprise me that the 'forgetting the talc' angle came from her own experience, considering she would cheerfully relate tales of going to an ATM to get money, and then forgetting to take the money when she was finished.
But anyway.
Friday was a fairly quiet day at the office, despite another deadline, because so few people turned up. Predictable, huh? All of my department turned up, though one had been rushed to hospital at the party due to an allergic reaction. Only one - a new recruit - was so hung over she couldn't work and was sent home. The boss told her "I won't shout at you today... but I will shout at you on Monday." One complete sales team was there (it was their deadline day, after all), with a couple of others in and out during the day, and maybe three of the Editorial team.
Not much else to say about Friday. My boss had a dust-up with one of the salesmen over his inappropriate conversation with a member of Production. When he tried to escalate it by calling the MD, he ended up getting his knuckles rapped. The magazine completed quite late because Editorial were a bit slow... That's unlikely to happen next month, though. For many reasons.
On Saturday, I arranged to see Pan's Labyrinth with my old mate Paul. Even though I'd already seen it, it was a good opportunity to hang out with him, and pop into Forbidden Planet. Of course, things didn't go smoothly all the way. The Piccadilly line was out for maintenance this weekend, so we had to go in via the Central line. Not usually a bad option, and often far quicker than the Piccadilly... Sadly, on this occasion, someone had decided to jump under a train, meaning there were long delays into town. When we got to Shepherd's Bush, I suggested taking the bus to Piccadilly, which should have been a viable alternative. Unfortunately, the traffic was awful, there was a long wait for the bus, which then decided to stop halfway through the route. On the next bus, we hit terrible traffic in Oxford Street, and decided to walk the rest of the way.
If anyone has seen that advert where the two guys dress like salmon and run against a load of marathon runners, you'll know what Oxford Street was like. It's not much better at any time of year, but in the run-up to Christmas, it's berzerk.
We got to our destination, the cinema in Haymarket, with only a few minutes to spare - our original intention had been to do about 90 minutes of shopping before the film, but it had taken us almost two hours to get there. Tickets there are extortionate, so I decided to forgo refreshments. Paul and I took our seats and waited for the movie to begin.
Quite early on, I started feeling very dozy and, before Ofelia had even been given her first task by the faun, I'd fallen asleep, only waking up at the point where the faun berates Ofelia for not attempting the second task. The only reason I know I didn't snore is that Paul would have nudged me if I had.
I managed to stay awake for the remainder, and it's still a beautiful film the second time around.
As we left the cinema, it had already got dark, and the temperature was dropping. It was still fairly early, though, so we decided to pop off to Forbidden Planet to browse. It was quite gratifying to see that they'd rearranged their stock again, giving greater priority to Doctor Who merchandise and - even more gratifying - TransFormers. Rather than being stuck round the back, they were in the same block as Doctor Who, Star Wars and Star Trek (and wrestling action figures, but the less said about that, the better). Almost their entire stock of TransFormers Classics was gone, only a single Hot Rod/Rodimus remained (coincidentally the one I almost didn't get at Memorabilia, as one guy was umming and ahhing about him and Starscream, then decided to get Starscream only). There were plenty of 3" Titaniums - awful things, the lot of them - and lots of Cybertron stuff, none of which I didn't already have the Japanese Galaxy Force equivalent of. They had a few Alternators, but nothing very inspiring. Paul picked up a couple of things, then we headed down the the basement for comics, books and DVDs. They had a special on for Studio Ghibli films, so I picked up Porco Rosso, Whisper of the Heart and Pom Poko for a tenner each, and then snagged the remaining three volumes of the incredibly long titled Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex 2nd Gig. Paul also picked up the collected version of the TransFormers: Infiltration series by IDW, as an extra Christmas present for me.
Since we were aiming to return via the Central line, we headed back to Tottenham Court Road, and popped into Orbital Comics along the way. It's another hole in the ground, but it's easily redeemed by being incredibly cool. A smaller stock of comics that FP, to be sure, but they make up for it with the amazing miscellany of toys and stuff in the back. Against my better judgement - and because it's a rather cool car - I picked up TransFormers Kiss Play Hot Rodimus (and Syao Syao), doing my level best to ignore the packaging.
All the while, in the background, a couple of guys were having a heated discussion about the Matrix trilogy, and how the sequels ruined the continuity set up by the first, and how they should have left it all well alone. It was interesting to hear someone with even more extreme views on the films than I have.
Just after I'd paid, one of the staff announced that they were about to close, so Paul and I departed.
Since it was getting late, and I was rather hungry, I suggested to Paul that we either knocked the day on the head and went home, or got some food and carried on shopping (going to one of the music megastores, for example). Paul didn't mind either way, but I figured most of my shopping could be done another time, so I voted for home. In retrospect, I think I should have voted for food, then home...
The Central line was still experiencing 'severe delays', so I suggested jumping off at Hangar Lane and getting the bus, which would drop us both closer to home than the train would. This turned out to be a really bad idea because the 'severe delays' just meant that there was a shuttle service from North Acton, at which point the route would have been plain sailing. I still thought picking up the bus was going to be the better option, though...
...And it wasn't. It really, really wasn't. We stood out in the cold by the Hangar Lane gyratory waiting and waiting and waiting and waiting and waiting... many buses passed, none were the right number. The only one that did come quickly was stopping at Alperton - a very helpful two or three stops down the route - and several buses which shouldn't even have been on that route passed by, all 'Not In Service'.
When the right bus finally arrived, it was already full - no surprise, considering we'd been waiting so long we could have taken the train and walked and still been home long before this bus came along - with a bunch of rowdy kids with rap aspirations occupying the back. They gave the bus an impromptu performance of some ad libbed rubbish (including references to people's mothers, threats of violence, etc) set to the four-note ringtone of a cellphone. When they were gone, I was glad to see the back of them.
By the time I got home, it was much colder, and I had the beginnings of a headache. Ben Affleck was on TV - starring in The Sum of All Fears - so I had my dinner and dodged off to my bedroom.
Today, there was the option of trudging around Richmond Park to take photos for the work website, but my friend and colleague had work to do, and I ended up dozing for most of the day.
We have several concerns at work... not least the snail's pace that one of our number works at. I ended up doing a good chunk of his work last week because he'd got to press day without even proofing any ads pages ("there are just so many!" he'd whined. There had been ten at most). While this is cretinous in the extreme, it's nothing in the face of this coming week... where he'll be producing a magazine with potentially three or four times as many ad pages, in exactly the same timeframe. I don't know what he was up to last week, but this week he'd better bloody do some work. Late is not an option. Nor is getting me to help out, as I'll have plenty to do for my own deadlines.
Roll on Christmas... I need to start feeling some goodwill toward all men...
Sunday, 3 December 2006
Sometimes, Schadenfreude is the only option
Today, thanks to one of my wonderful editors at work, I had the opportunity to see an IMAX preview of Happy Feet, a new kiddies animated movie about dancing penguins. It's an odd little film, but more on that later. First of all, I must relate some events from the journey uptown.
I was getting a lift from a friend/colleague, with whom I was intending to drive around in the afternoon, photographing areas of west London for use in filler ads on the website of one of the magazines (more on this later also). Traffic was roundly awful today, despite being a Sunday, and the poor weather - terrible rain overnight and in the early morning - lead to my friend being rather late in her arrival. We'd agreed to meet up much earlier than necessary, though, as the last time we attended an IMAX preview, the time on the email they sent out was wrong, so we arrived late - just as the film was starting.
On the drive uptown, I observed a comic scene the likes of which are rarely seen outside those TV shows made up of video clips of various misfortunes, interspersed with strained commentaries by leering anchors. It was as follows:
Man rides bike into tree. Man falls off bike.
And it really was - I'm sorry to say - quite funny. Not so much a belly laugh as in inner smirk, to be honest, but there you go. I mean, first of all, the guy was riding on the pavement, on the wrong side of the road (that is, against the flow of traffic on the road he should have been riding on), and clearly wasn't looking where he was going. He just peddled along merrily until he hit the tree, and then fell off his bike.
A woman passing by turned back to help him out when she heard him fall, which was a pleasant surprise to behold, but the whole scene was ridiculous in the true sense of the word. What an idiot...
So. Happy Feet.
Frankly, I was disappointed. It was a curious mish-mash of teenage mating rituals, religious fundamentalism, moralising, buddy movie, and a gross oversimplification of solving the world's troubles. If they'd stuck to dancing penquins all the way through, it might have been fun, but even then, the film was so full of stereotypes it was uncomfortable to watch.
It actually succeeded in annoying me from the very start because of the 'teenage mating rituals' angle... Penguins wandering around, singing their 'inner song' until they happen upon another penguin whose song they like, and who likes their song... it all reminded me far too well of the utterly shallow way most humans forge relationships these days. From this 'courtship' they would move straight on to making eggs and, when the main character hatches, he's shown to be 'different' (as in 'dropped as a baby') from the start, labelling him an outcast. He then fails to 'graduate', and becomes increasingly embarrassing to his father as he becomes increasingly aggravating to the fundamentalist religious leader of the emperor penguins. Curiously, even though he's born with the ability to dance, rather than having an 'inner song' (which, to me, seemed to equate to having no soul, given the religious motif), he finds his true love while still an infant, and the whole thing seems very mapped out. Of course, they reject each other at a crucial moment, only to find each other again later for the express purpose - or so it seemed - of having an awkward misunderstanding before returning to almost the exact point they were at in their relationship before they parted.
These sorts of film invariably have a 'message' but, frankly, I was lost as to what the message in Happy Feet was until the end, where it became clumsily obvious and very poorly handled.
All in all, it was largely cute for cute's sake, and had nothing to offer an adult viewer. Technically, it was very impressive - the animation is flawless (except certain aspects of the snow's behaviour, and all of the splashing water), but even that didn't rescue the film for me. I will say that it's obvious why this film wasn't presented in IMAX 3D - it would have been confusing, if not utterly nauseating, because much of it was so complicated, either in terms of camera movement, or the sheer number of penguins on screen.
Afterward, the plan was to drive out to Kingston to eat (or, more accurately, to visit Shakeaway and then possibly eat) before tripping around west London taking photos of interesting views and landmarks, to add to the 'royalty free' library of London photos at work. Sadly, while the weather held (that is, it was dry... but also windy and bitterly cold), the traffic getting to Kingston was diabolical and, by the time we got there, we had only about an hour of daylight left. While waiting to park, we bumped into one of the Salesmen from work, and his wife, who mentioned that the shopping centre had a German Marketplace operating. He recommended the pancakes but, when we got the post-milkshake nibbles, we headed to the bratwurst stall for some spicy sausage.
Not wishing to gloss over Shakeaway (see? It's a link again!), I should mention for the uninitiated that it is a wonderful shop which sells milkshakes made up of just about anything you can imagine. The website is a little crappy, but if it doesn't start you craving milkshake, there's something very wrong with you. Of course, the fact that the Kingston branch is just over the road from the Kingston branch of The Entertainer is neither here nor there. Especially not today, then The Entertainer was closed.
Although we didn't get to do any photography, I did solve one problem - I picked up a Secret Santa gift for the office party this coming Thursday.
I dozed for a good chunk of the drive home, but got to work on updating my website with pictures of my Memorabilia haul almost as soon as I got in... Right now, it's time for Torchwood again, so I must sign out...
Additional: Torchwood was OK this week... A little rushed, as usual, and with some rather suspect acting, but a decent follow-on from the pilot.
I was getting a lift from a friend/colleague, with whom I was intending to drive around in the afternoon, photographing areas of west London for use in filler ads on the website of one of the magazines (more on this later also). Traffic was roundly awful today, despite being a Sunday, and the poor weather - terrible rain overnight and in the early morning - lead to my friend being rather late in her arrival. We'd agreed to meet up much earlier than necessary, though, as the last time we attended an IMAX preview, the time on the email they sent out was wrong, so we arrived late - just as the film was starting.
On the drive uptown, I observed a comic scene the likes of which are rarely seen outside those TV shows made up of video clips of various misfortunes, interspersed with strained commentaries by leering anchors. It was as follows:
Man rides bike into tree. Man falls off bike.
And it really was - I'm sorry to say - quite funny. Not so much a belly laugh as in inner smirk, to be honest, but there you go. I mean, first of all, the guy was riding on the pavement, on the wrong side of the road (that is, against the flow of traffic on the road he should have been riding on), and clearly wasn't looking where he was going. He just peddled along merrily until he hit the tree, and then fell off his bike.
A woman passing by turned back to help him out when she heard him fall, which was a pleasant surprise to behold, but the whole scene was ridiculous in the true sense of the word. What an idiot...
So. Happy Feet.
Frankly, I was disappointed. It was a curious mish-mash of teenage mating rituals, religious fundamentalism, moralising, buddy movie, and a gross oversimplification of solving the world's troubles. If they'd stuck to dancing penquins all the way through, it might have been fun, but even then, the film was so full of stereotypes it was uncomfortable to watch.
It actually succeeded in annoying me from the very start because of the 'teenage mating rituals' angle... Penguins wandering around, singing their 'inner song' until they happen upon another penguin whose song they like, and who likes their song... it all reminded me far too well of the utterly shallow way most humans forge relationships these days. From this 'courtship' they would move straight on to making eggs and, when the main character hatches, he's shown to be 'different' (as in 'dropped as a baby') from the start, labelling him an outcast. He then fails to 'graduate', and becomes increasingly embarrassing to his father as he becomes increasingly aggravating to the fundamentalist religious leader of the emperor penguins. Curiously, even though he's born with the ability to dance, rather than having an 'inner song' (which, to me, seemed to equate to having no soul, given the religious motif), he finds his true love while still an infant, and the whole thing seems very mapped out. Of course, they reject each other at a crucial moment, only to find each other again later for the express purpose - or so it seemed - of having an awkward misunderstanding before returning to almost the exact point they were at in their relationship before they parted.
These sorts of film invariably have a 'message' but, frankly, I was lost as to what the message in Happy Feet was until the end, where it became clumsily obvious and very poorly handled.
All in all, it was largely cute for cute's sake, and had nothing to offer an adult viewer. Technically, it was very impressive - the animation is flawless (except certain aspects of the snow's behaviour, and all of the splashing water), but even that didn't rescue the film for me. I will say that it's obvious why this film wasn't presented in IMAX 3D - it would have been confusing, if not utterly nauseating, because much of it was so complicated, either in terms of camera movement, or the sheer number of penguins on screen.
Afterward, the plan was to drive out to Kingston to eat (or, more accurately, to visit Shakeaway and then possibly eat) before tripping around west London taking photos of interesting views and landmarks, to add to the 'royalty free' library of London photos at work. Sadly, while the weather held (that is, it was dry... but also windy and bitterly cold), the traffic getting to Kingston was diabolical and, by the time we got there, we had only about an hour of daylight left. While waiting to park, we bumped into one of the Salesmen from work, and his wife, who mentioned that the shopping centre had a German Marketplace operating. He recommended the pancakes but, when we got the post-milkshake nibbles, we headed to the bratwurst stall for some spicy sausage.
Not wishing to gloss over Shakeaway (see? It's a link again!), I should mention for the uninitiated that it is a wonderful shop which sells milkshakes made up of just about anything you can imagine. The website is a little crappy, but if it doesn't start you craving milkshake, there's something very wrong with you. Of course, the fact that the Kingston branch is just over the road from the Kingston branch of The Entertainer is neither here nor there. Especially not today, then The Entertainer was closed.
Although we didn't get to do any photography, I did solve one problem - I picked up a Secret Santa gift for the office party this coming Thursday.
I dozed for a good chunk of the drive home, but got to work on updating my website with pictures of my Memorabilia haul almost as soon as I got in... Right now, it's time for Torchwood again, so I must sign out...
Additional: Torchwood was OK this week... A little rushed, as usual, and with some rather suspect acting, but a decent follow-on from the pilot.
Sunday, 26 November 2006
Keychains and snowstorms...
By which subtle Marc Almond reference, we come to this year's winter Memorabilia show at the Birmingham NEC.
In many ways, this was a much smaller affair than any of the previous shows I've visited. All of these conventions, lately, seem to be getting smaller and smaller... If not in terms of floorspace (as was the case with this Memorabilia) then in terms of good use of that floorspace, and retail opportunities. Strange, as they seem to be consistently popular. That having been said, this show didn't experience the sudden crowding at 11am (standard entry time) that the others had.
Bad weather had been forecast for this weekend, so the initial plan was that my friend and I would be in and out of the show fairly quick, to avoid having to drive back to the hotel in the gale force winds that supposedly threatened. Certainly, the drive up to Birmingham wasn't too pleasant. Now that it's getting dark so early, it was pitch black and raining all the way. I have a nasty habit of sleeping through car journeys, however inclement the weather, but being at the wheel the whole way, my friend had no such luxury and, when the car started to aquaplane at one point, we slowed right down until the weather eased up.
A diversion on the route to the hotel caused some brief worry, too, but things worked out quite nicely, the diversion reconnected with the main road, and we arrived at the hotel at a still reasonable hour, had a snack dinner, then hit the sack.
The drive to the NEC gets easier each time we do it - this was actually our fourth visit to the show, so it should be pretty simple by now! - and the M6 Toll Road cuts travel time dramatically. So few people are willing to stump up the cash (£3.50 for yer average car) that the road is plain sailing all the way. Hum... Perhaps a sailing analogy isn't such a good idea after the aquaplaning incident...
Nevertheless, we got to the NEC, and even managed to negotiate its bizarrely complicated internal road system which always, without fail, manages to force one to park at the opposite end of the grounds to the hall you're heading toward. I'd like to think they don't do it on purpose, but I can't see how else it could happen.
Prepaid car parking and 'early bird' entrance tickets got us in nice and easy, though, and the browsing began with a look around a small art/animation gallery, displaying everything from Disney to Batman and Superman to Danger Mouse and Mr Ben. They were running a prize draw for a canvas to be painted by one of the celebrity guests, which could have been fun. Wasn't too bothered when I left the show later without having entered, though.
In an attempt to be organized, we tend to walk the aisles in a pretty regimented fashion, deviating from the 'up one, down the next' system only when something particularly fascinating catches our eye. For the most part, that didn't happen very often (although every stall carrying anything TransFormers was pointed out to me, and every time something worthwhile cropped up on one of those, I was advised to "buy it NOW, you'll only regret missing it later" - certainly not ironic coming from the one who denied herself the opportunity to own a chittering, snuffling, jumping electronic furry Ice Age 2 prehistoric Squirrel for so long, they...er... became extinct ;)
And, no, there weren't any at Memorabilia either... I'm sure they're out there somewhere, though.
For the most part, while I found one stall which had some of the things I was after, I was really looking for the stall held by 2nd Star, purveyors of TransFormers to the discerning buyer, and was aiming to pass them most of my trade. I recently had to cancel a pre-order I had with them because they were having such trouble with their suppliers (all the more annoying because they got stocks mere days after I picked up what I'd ordered at Toys'R'Us!), so I felt like making it up to them because they're a nice, helpful and friendly bunch. They turned out to be right at the end of the hall, near the stage area, so I would have found them far quicker than I did had I followed my friend when she dashed off to see Babylon 5's Claudia Christian on stage promoting her new TV series, Starhyke.
When I caught up with her later, just in time to see the screen makeup presentation, Zombies! It Could Be YOU!, it turned out that I hadn't missed anything good... the Q&A session had about 10 people in the audience, and the whole thing had been "somewhere between embarassing and humiliating". On a more interesting note, my friend had been in a queue for drinks with Claudia Christian just afterward.
The screen makeup presentation was pretty good but, being presented in real time, took ages to get anywere. It was interesting all along, and the presenter kept things flowing nicely with much joking and self-depreciating banter. We nipped out after the groundwork of foam latex parts had been glued on, and blended in so we could continue browsing, and came back toward the end to see the finished zombie.
Strangely, it looked like Matt Lucas.
After that came the second showing of the Starhyke pilot, and slowly we understood why attendance for the Q&A session after the first showing had been so poor. Starhyke could quite easily be one of the worst TV shows of all time. Hovering indecisively between toilet humour and Carry-On sex farce, it doesn't even play to Claudia Christian's comedy strength (deadpan - Bab5 could be utterly hilarious simply by showing us Ivanova doing nothing more than raising an incredulous eyebrow in the face of bizarre alien occurances, but her few pithy words in some situations were perfectly judged). The opening sequence, and most of the computer generated effects throughout, are stunning. Some of the best outer space CGI since the later Star Trek series and, had it been a little more imaginitive, better even than Bab5 and the new Battlestar Galactica. Aside from one funny visual gag, where the Dreadnought Nemesis bumps a satellite out of its way, it went quickly downhill as soon as the characters started talking.
At first, Claudia Christian might as well be playing Ivanova again but, as soon as the plot kicks off, and the crew of the Nemesis are sent back in time to the present day and turned into morons, slapstick humour and unfunny jokes make one wonder if this thing wasn't written mainly down the pub by a committee of very drunk Red Dwarf fans (who, by and large, must have missed the best jokes in Dwarf) who sat around one evening saying "wouldn't it be funny if...". Someone should have sobered up and pointed out that the answer was often "no". Jeremy Bulloch as the ship's doctor is alternately randy or senile, and the ship's teenage chief engineer manages to have an orgasm over a helping of spotted dick. When Harry Met Sally it was not. Just about everyone in the crew got into gratuitous groping/snogging for no reason other than to illustrate one of the central plot elements for the series.
According to the scant details available at Memorabilia, the entire series was filmed having been funded by a TV station. This unnamed company then pulled out before any of the post-production work could happen, and the crew then saved up to do it themselves so they could present the series as a fait accompli to any TV station.
I can see why whichever company it was pulled out... As Sci-Fi Comedies go, this is light on both, and I'm sorry to say I'm hoping it never gets airtime. My guess is that the BBC were looking for something to follow Red Dwarf in the Sci-Fi Comedy stakes, before they realised what a success the new Doctor Who had become, but then pulled out when they realised Starhyke just wasn't funny. And that Who was excellent. I kinda feel sorry for Claudia Christian, because she deserves far better than Starshite. Sorry, Starhyke.
So, what nice things can I say about Memorabilia? It was a great show, despite the reduced size. Compared to the recent London Expo, this was about 95% retail and 5% display as opposed to the paltry 30/70 (at best) split of the London show. There was a huge range of stuff, from old to new, sci-fi to sports... Just about every kind of geek was represented, but there wasn't much (that I saw) in the way of Cosplay.
My haul from 2nd Star was largely TransFormers from the Classics line - Optimus Prime and Megatron, Starscream, Bumblebee and Hot Rod (sorry, Rodimus), along with the Japanese Beast Wars Reborn (aka 'Reboan' due to a spelling mistake on the CD) 10th Anniversary set, and THS-01 Galaxy Convoy, which is now set to be one of my Christmas presents this year. I was tempted to also pick up TF: Titanium Jetfire and Optimus Prime, but decided against in the end. Elsewhere, I picked up Classics Mirage and Astrotrain, but sadly missed out on Grimlock, who sold out very quickly. Jetfire was noteable by his absence...
Pictures will turn up sooner or later - next weekend at the earliest, because it's getting dark too early to do any photography when I get home after work - so, for the moment, suffice it to say that they're spiffy.
I considered getting a couple of things as Christmas presents for friends and family, but I've already got most of those people's presents sorted. I was counting on finding a new dragon for my mother's collection, but either the usual stalls weren't there, or they weren't selling any dragons that I saw.
The trip came to a rather unhappy end this morning, when it transpired that my friend had been very ill overnight. She'd had a very rich starter for dinner, and followed it up with Lamb as a main course, which lead to a very uncomfortable night for her, and a small delay in leaving the hotel. Even so, we managed to stop off at a little craft centre we've passed by and visited before and, while the excellent delicatessen had shut down (sometime in June, we were told), the other places were still there, and I came away with a selection of ales for my parents, and some jams/preserves for everyone.
In other news, I got a letter recently from a friend in the States, Lydia, who I've not seen online in some time, thanks to her husband's discovery of the internet. She mentioned that she'd read this blog to catch up on what I'd been up to, but misses the two-way communication of chatting via MSN Messenger and suchlike. This got me thinking about a conversation I had with my Memorabilia buddy, when I first got her to try MSN. She said it was awkward because the timing was so different to talking face-to-face, or even over the phone, and didn't quite believe that it would ever feel 'natural'. That changed, of course, and now we chat online quite easily when we're not able to speak face-to-face.
So to you, Lydia, I say this: It's all a matter of timing, and if you can slow yours right down, leaving comments on my blog almost works as well as - albeit far slower than - any 'instant messenger' software. Frustrating, maybe, but easy enough once you find the new rhythm.
Also recently, I got a couple of emails from Cheryl, a girl who first contacted me way back when I was signed up to several internet dating services (more on that some other time... there are plenty of horror stories!). We've never actually met, but we have exchanged a fair bit of email. Neither of us are 'on the market' any more, for one reason or another, but I still hear from her once in a blue moon. The first email she sent was a link to a t-shirt which bears the legend "Haikus are easy/but sometimes they don't make sense/Refrigerator" - a very funny bit of haiku... Though it's not necessarily true that Haiku (I don't tend to pluralise it, personally) are easy to write.
The second was 'the lost Dr Seuss poem' - I Love My Job, which was quite cute... I really must write back to her, and to Lydia...
While I remember, I shall refer to an earlier posting by saying that the magazine for which I drew the '12 Days of Christmas' icons arrived back in the office last week, and they look pretty damned good in print. I still don't like them, as such, but they serve their purpose very well.
And on that note, I shall conclude this posting...
In many ways, this was a much smaller affair than any of the previous shows I've visited. All of these conventions, lately, seem to be getting smaller and smaller... If not in terms of floorspace (as was the case with this Memorabilia) then in terms of good use of that floorspace, and retail opportunities. Strange, as they seem to be consistently popular. That having been said, this show didn't experience the sudden crowding at 11am (standard entry time) that the others had.
Bad weather had been forecast for this weekend, so the initial plan was that my friend and I would be in and out of the show fairly quick, to avoid having to drive back to the hotel in the gale force winds that supposedly threatened. Certainly, the drive up to Birmingham wasn't too pleasant. Now that it's getting dark so early, it was pitch black and raining all the way. I have a nasty habit of sleeping through car journeys, however inclement the weather, but being at the wheel the whole way, my friend had no such luxury and, when the car started to aquaplane at one point, we slowed right down until the weather eased up.
A diversion on the route to the hotel caused some brief worry, too, but things worked out quite nicely, the diversion reconnected with the main road, and we arrived at the hotel at a still reasonable hour, had a snack dinner, then hit the sack.
The drive to the NEC gets easier each time we do it - this was actually our fourth visit to the show, so it should be pretty simple by now! - and the M6 Toll Road cuts travel time dramatically. So few people are willing to stump up the cash (£3.50 for yer average car) that the road is plain sailing all the way. Hum... Perhaps a sailing analogy isn't such a good idea after the aquaplaning incident...
Nevertheless, we got to the NEC, and even managed to negotiate its bizarrely complicated internal road system which always, without fail, manages to force one to park at the opposite end of the grounds to the hall you're heading toward. I'd like to think they don't do it on purpose, but I can't see how else it could happen.
Prepaid car parking and 'early bird' entrance tickets got us in nice and easy, though, and the browsing began with a look around a small art/animation gallery, displaying everything from Disney to Batman and Superman to Danger Mouse and Mr Ben. They were running a prize draw for a canvas to be painted by one of the celebrity guests, which could have been fun. Wasn't too bothered when I left the show later without having entered, though.
In an attempt to be organized, we tend to walk the aisles in a pretty regimented fashion, deviating from the 'up one, down the next' system only when something particularly fascinating catches our eye. For the most part, that didn't happen very often (although every stall carrying anything TransFormers was pointed out to me, and every time something worthwhile cropped up on one of those, I was advised to "buy it NOW, you'll only regret missing it later" - certainly not ironic coming from the one who denied herself the opportunity to own a chittering, snuffling, jumping electronic furry Ice Age 2 prehistoric Squirrel for so long, they...er... became extinct ;)
And, no, there weren't any at Memorabilia either... I'm sure they're out there somewhere, though.
For the most part, while I found one stall which had some of the things I was after, I was really looking for the stall held by 2nd Star, purveyors of TransFormers to the discerning buyer, and was aiming to pass them most of my trade. I recently had to cancel a pre-order I had with them because they were having such trouble with their suppliers (all the more annoying because they got stocks mere days after I picked up what I'd ordered at Toys'R'Us!), so I felt like making it up to them because they're a nice, helpful and friendly bunch. They turned out to be right at the end of the hall, near the stage area, so I would have found them far quicker than I did had I followed my friend when she dashed off to see Babylon 5's Claudia Christian on stage promoting her new TV series, Starhyke.
When I caught up with her later, just in time to see the screen makeup presentation, Zombies! It Could Be YOU!, it turned out that I hadn't missed anything good... the Q&A session had about 10 people in the audience, and the whole thing had been "somewhere between embarassing and humiliating". On a more interesting note, my friend had been in a queue for drinks with Claudia Christian just afterward.
The screen makeup presentation was pretty good but, being presented in real time, took ages to get anywere. It was interesting all along, and the presenter kept things flowing nicely with much joking and self-depreciating banter. We nipped out after the groundwork of foam latex parts had been glued on, and blended in so we could continue browsing, and came back toward the end to see the finished zombie.
Strangely, it looked like Matt Lucas.
After that came the second showing of the Starhyke pilot, and slowly we understood why attendance for the Q&A session after the first showing had been so poor. Starhyke could quite easily be one of the worst TV shows of all time. Hovering indecisively between toilet humour and Carry-On sex farce, it doesn't even play to Claudia Christian's comedy strength (deadpan - Bab5 could be utterly hilarious simply by showing us Ivanova doing nothing more than raising an incredulous eyebrow in the face of bizarre alien occurances, but her few pithy words in some situations were perfectly judged). The opening sequence, and most of the computer generated effects throughout, are stunning. Some of the best outer space CGI since the later Star Trek series and, had it been a little more imaginitive, better even than Bab5 and the new Battlestar Galactica. Aside from one funny visual gag, where the Dreadnought Nemesis bumps a satellite out of its way, it went quickly downhill as soon as the characters started talking.
At first, Claudia Christian might as well be playing Ivanova again but, as soon as the plot kicks off, and the crew of the Nemesis are sent back in time to the present day and turned into morons, slapstick humour and unfunny jokes make one wonder if this thing wasn't written mainly down the pub by a committee of very drunk Red Dwarf fans (who, by and large, must have missed the best jokes in Dwarf) who sat around one evening saying "wouldn't it be funny if...". Someone should have sobered up and pointed out that the answer was often "no". Jeremy Bulloch as the ship's doctor is alternately randy or senile, and the ship's teenage chief engineer manages to have an orgasm over a helping of spotted dick. When Harry Met Sally it was not. Just about everyone in the crew got into gratuitous groping/snogging for no reason other than to illustrate one of the central plot elements for the series.
According to the scant details available at Memorabilia, the entire series was filmed having been funded by a TV station. This unnamed company then pulled out before any of the post-production work could happen, and the crew then saved up to do it themselves so they could present the series as a fait accompli to any TV station.
I can see why whichever company it was pulled out... As Sci-Fi Comedies go, this is light on both, and I'm sorry to say I'm hoping it never gets airtime. My guess is that the BBC were looking for something to follow Red Dwarf in the Sci-Fi Comedy stakes, before they realised what a success the new Doctor Who had become, but then pulled out when they realised Starhyke just wasn't funny. And that Who was excellent. I kinda feel sorry for Claudia Christian, because she deserves far better than Starshite. Sorry, Starhyke.
So, what nice things can I say about Memorabilia? It was a great show, despite the reduced size. Compared to the recent London Expo, this was about 95% retail and 5% display as opposed to the paltry 30/70 (at best) split of the London show. There was a huge range of stuff, from old to new, sci-fi to sports... Just about every kind of geek was represented, but there wasn't much (that I saw) in the way of Cosplay.
My haul from 2nd Star was largely TransFormers from the Classics line - Optimus Prime and Megatron, Starscream, Bumblebee and Hot Rod (sorry, Rodimus), along with the Japanese Beast Wars Reborn (aka 'Reboan' due to a spelling mistake on the CD) 10th Anniversary set, and THS-01 Galaxy Convoy, which is now set to be one of my Christmas presents this year. I was tempted to also pick up TF: Titanium Jetfire and Optimus Prime, but decided against in the end. Elsewhere, I picked up Classics Mirage and Astrotrain, but sadly missed out on Grimlock, who sold out very quickly. Jetfire was noteable by his absence...
Pictures will turn up sooner or later - next weekend at the earliest, because it's getting dark too early to do any photography when I get home after work - so, for the moment, suffice it to say that they're spiffy.
I considered getting a couple of things as Christmas presents for friends and family, but I've already got most of those people's presents sorted. I was counting on finding a new dragon for my mother's collection, but either the usual stalls weren't there, or they weren't selling any dragons that I saw.
The trip came to a rather unhappy end this morning, when it transpired that my friend had been very ill overnight. She'd had a very rich starter for dinner, and followed it up with Lamb as a main course, which lead to a very uncomfortable night for her, and a small delay in leaving the hotel. Even so, we managed to stop off at a little craft centre we've passed by and visited before and, while the excellent delicatessen had shut down (sometime in June, we were told), the other places were still there, and I came away with a selection of ales for my parents, and some jams/preserves for everyone.
In other news, I got a letter recently from a friend in the States, Lydia, who I've not seen online in some time, thanks to her husband's discovery of the internet. She mentioned that she'd read this blog to catch up on what I'd been up to, but misses the two-way communication of chatting via MSN Messenger and suchlike. This got me thinking about a conversation I had with my Memorabilia buddy, when I first got her to try MSN. She said it was awkward because the timing was so different to talking face-to-face, or even over the phone, and didn't quite believe that it would ever feel 'natural'. That changed, of course, and now we chat online quite easily when we're not able to speak face-to-face.
So to you, Lydia, I say this: It's all a matter of timing, and if you can slow yours right down, leaving comments on my blog almost works as well as - albeit far slower than - any 'instant messenger' software. Frustrating, maybe, but easy enough once you find the new rhythm.
Also recently, I got a couple of emails from Cheryl, a girl who first contacted me way back when I was signed up to several internet dating services (more on that some other time... there are plenty of horror stories!). We've never actually met, but we have exchanged a fair bit of email. Neither of us are 'on the market' any more, for one reason or another, but I still hear from her once in a blue moon. The first email she sent was a link to a t-shirt which bears the legend "Haikus are easy/but sometimes they don't make sense/Refrigerator" - a very funny bit of haiku... Though it's not necessarily true that Haiku (I don't tend to pluralise it, personally) are easy to write.
The second was 'the lost Dr Seuss poem' - I Love My Job, which was quite cute... I really must write back to her, and to Lydia...
While I remember, I shall refer to an earlier posting by saying that the magazine for which I drew the '12 Days of Christmas' icons arrived back in the office last week, and they look pretty damned good in print. I still don't like them, as such, but they serve their purpose very well.
And on that note, I shall conclude this posting...
Monday, 13 November 2006
Deadlines
Word came to me today that there's now a 10-day deadline for the first stage of a new project I'm involved in at work. Ten days to get as much as possible done, when parts of the project beyond our control are... shall we say less than complete? The second stage begins on Friday, from which point we'll have ten days to get as much as possible done for that, before the third stage begins, and then the fourth.
All this would be easy if I had nothing else to do.
As it happens, I have one of my usual deadlines on Thursday, then another two next week, and then it all starts getting really busy in the run-up to Christmas. And I'm expected to get involved in conference calls? When I don't even have my own office?
Being drafted into this project seemed like a good thing at the time, but it's being wholly mismanaged, and the folks who have to do the donkey work just aren't being considered. Nor is the extent of the donkey work required. In many ways, it's even up to the folks doing the donkey work to determine that... And the bad news is that, because of the way we operate, there's quite a bit of pissing about.
It does seem these days that, the bigger the business, the more generally inconsiderate they are. It's just a case of "Aha! We can make money by doing this! Let's hire someone to do half the job, then dump the rest on existing staff who clearly don't have enough to do if they usually manange to leave the office before 7.30pm and manage to have a social life. We don't know how we're going to make money out of it, but it bloody well better make us a tidy profit, or people will be sacked."
My problem is that, somewhere along the lines, I became hailed as a hero - entirely unjustly, but it suits the MD to say that one of his team is a key player (I have been told to "eat less humble pie") - and, as one of the few computer literate people in the company, I was a shoe-in for this project. Trouble is, I know how this "Man of the Moment" crap works, and the moment is generally very short. When they're done telling you what a great job you've done, they give you even more shit to shovel. I don't mind shovelling shit, per se... but I do know what my limits are, and I generally know when I've done something praiseworthy.
No, really, I do. I just have really high expectations of myself.
A prime example being the sketching I did this weekend. Really, not up to my own standards, but they were only meant to fulfill a very basic purpose. They are very basic, and really only took as long as they did because it was a boring job.
OK, that's not entirely true. It took as long as it did because I'm having as much trouble focussing on sketching as I am on writing. It's somewhat distressing... I used to be able to draw quite easily, albeit slowly, and put a lot of effort in to speeding myself up. While my average (halfway decent) sketch was still taking several months to complete, I managed to knock out a couple of really good ones in a little over an hour. These days, I can't stand to look at a blank page, however many ideas I have, because the act of sketching (or writing) feels like a chore, rather than a recreational activity, and whatever makes it onto the page seldom matches what I'd imagined... And I'm not convinced that doing sketches for work is doing anything the change that.
All this would be easy if I had nothing else to do.
As it happens, I have one of my usual deadlines on Thursday, then another two next week, and then it all starts getting really busy in the run-up to Christmas. And I'm expected to get involved in conference calls? When I don't even have my own office?
Being drafted into this project seemed like a good thing at the time, but it's being wholly mismanaged, and the folks who have to do the donkey work just aren't being considered. Nor is the extent of the donkey work required. In many ways, it's even up to the folks doing the donkey work to determine that... And the bad news is that, because of the way we operate, there's quite a bit of pissing about.
It does seem these days that, the bigger the business, the more generally inconsiderate they are. It's just a case of "Aha! We can make money by doing this! Let's hire someone to do half the job, then dump the rest on existing staff who clearly don't have enough to do if they usually manange to leave the office before 7.30pm and manage to have a social life. We don't know how we're going to make money out of it, but it bloody well better make us a tidy profit, or people will be sacked."
My problem is that, somewhere along the lines, I became hailed as a hero - entirely unjustly, but it suits the MD to say that one of his team is a key player (I have been told to "eat less humble pie") - and, as one of the few computer literate people in the company, I was a shoe-in for this project. Trouble is, I know how this "Man of the Moment" crap works, and the moment is generally very short. When they're done telling you what a great job you've done, they give you even more shit to shovel. I don't mind shovelling shit, per se... but I do know what my limits are, and I generally know when I've done something praiseworthy.
No, really, I do. I just have really high expectations of myself.
A prime example being the sketching I did this weekend. Really, not up to my own standards, but they were only meant to fulfill a very basic purpose. They are very basic, and really only took as long as they did because it was a boring job.
OK, that's not entirely true. It took as long as it did because I'm having as much trouble focussing on sketching as I am on writing. It's somewhat distressing... I used to be able to draw quite easily, albeit slowly, and put a lot of effort in to speeding myself up. While my average (halfway decent) sketch was still taking several months to complete, I managed to knock out a couple of really good ones in a little over an hour. These days, I can't stand to look at a blank page, however many ideas I have, because the act of sketching (or writing) feels like a chore, rather than a recreational activity, and whatever makes it onto the page seldom matches what I'd imagined... And I'm not convinced that doing sketches for work is doing anything the change that.
Sunday, 12 November 2006
Look, Monkeys!
It all started with this edition of Shortpacked!
It seemed so innocent at the time. "Look, monkeys!" would be the phrase used to distract from all mistakes or difficult questions. It was the ultimate 'Get Out Of Jail Free' card. But then, for no obvious reason, that idea found itself entwined with the concept of Tribute Bands. Specifically, how could one create a tribute band for Gorillaz who, let's face it, don't really exist. Would the tribute band be real people, or would it be cartoon? If it was cartoon, would it ape (sorry!) Jamie Hewlett's style, or would it be radically different? Would it be characters who looked hopelessly different from Murdoc, 2D, Noodle and Russel, but dressed like them? Many questions... The only certainty was the name they'd adopt: Look, Monkiez!
I had grand hopes for this weekend. For starters, I had to finish some sketches for work - icons for a '12 days of Christmas' thing which have been alternately boring me stupid and frustrating the hell out of me for about a month now - but then, I'd be free to have a go at illustrating Look, Monkiez! for the first time. I have a vague idea of their look... each one will be a not-quite-opposite of their counterpart in Gorillaz, and what they lack in talent, they'll make up for in sheer enthusiasm for paying tribute to their inspiration. I figure the Russel analogue would be extremely skinny, but equally nutty behind the drums, and 'Noodle' would be a chubby girl with a dippy anime name that has -chan thrown on the end for no good reason. She may wear cat-girl ears. 2D's counterpart would most likely mimic the original by wearing extremely heavy eyeliner. The Murdoc equivalent would certainly have a ridiculously oversized pudding-basin haircut. Probably a wig.
As it happened, I was too tired yesterday to do anything, and woke up with a headache this morning. I tried to work on the icons in the morning and after lunch, but didn't do too well.
In the afternoon, I went to see The Prestige. Bonkers film. Utterly bonkers. Full of illusions, misdirection, trickery and hints of what's to come, I'm not sure whether to be very impressed or rather disappointed by the denouement. I enjoyed the film - very well-paced, and the twists were clever enough to avoid being entirely predictable - but it was difficult to find enough sympathy for any of the main characters to feel satisfied with the ending. Maybe I should look up the novel... Before setting out to see it, I wasn't aware that David Bowie was in the film - a fact which might well have put me off. That would have been a mistake - his turn as Nikola Tesla was subtle and well-played... I almost wish he'd had more screen time. In many ways, Bowie's bits of this film reminded me of the anime Steamboy - science so advanced, it's indistinguishable from magic... and Scientists seeking to unlock great secrets.
Once back home, I tried to motivate myself to get back to the Christmas icons for work, but my first attempt at 'neat' versions, which I'd intended to colour by hand, were scrapped. Coloured pencils just ain't my thing. In so many ways, pencils in general are not my thing... but coloured pencils never give me the effect I'm after, as I just end up scribbling with them as I do with any other kind. I have a coloured Partridge in a Pear Tree, and that's it. It looks OK, and yet somehow wrong, and that's not solely due to my piss-poor technique.
The Gold Ring also had a complete overhaul. Originally, I'd drawn just a simple ring, then I added some blobs to make it a more ornate ring. It looked crap, though, and I wanted more than just a ring in the picture, so I redrew the whole thing as a simple ring (with added gold sparkle effect) on a cushion. Looks much better. I suspect I'll add some colour to each one in Photoshop, but it won't be too dramatic. Maybe turn them slightly sepia-toned and try to add a dash of colour to certain parts (my French Hen may have Tricolore tailfeathers). We shall see... Largely, it depends on how much time I have at work. At least I did eventually finish all twelve, and they're still clean enough to scan well when I get to the office.
Someone remind me to politely decline next time anyone asks me to draw something for work. I still cannot work to any kind of deadline, and I couldn't give a stuff if I get any extra money out of it.
Tonight's Torchwood was probably the most impressive so far, in terms of developing an interesting storyline well enough to fit it into an hour of television... And yet still they rely on jarring shouty bits and sudden bouts of emoting a little bit too hard. The special effects were particularly good but the end was a little limp. I am starting to wonder if they've really thought through the character of Captain Jack Harkness... Originally, it seemed that he became immortal in the future, thanks to Rose Tyler/Bad Wolf, but Torchwood appears to be suggesting that it wasn't her temporary foray into Godhood that brought him back to life in the future. This would tend to start one wondering how long he's lived... If he was already immortal back before World War I and, when he met Rose and The Doctor back in World War II, he was from the future where humans had spread out across the galaxy, he's had an incredibly long life... But is the Torchwood Jack the one from the future where Rose destroyed the Daleks (in which case, how did he get back to the present day?), or has he not yet met her or The Doctor? Is Russell T Davis messing with our heads?
It seemed so innocent at the time. "Look, monkeys!" would be the phrase used to distract from all mistakes or difficult questions. It was the ultimate 'Get Out Of Jail Free' card. But then, for no obvious reason, that idea found itself entwined with the concept of Tribute Bands. Specifically, how could one create a tribute band for Gorillaz who, let's face it, don't really exist. Would the tribute band be real people, or would it be cartoon? If it was cartoon, would it ape (sorry!) Jamie Hewlett's style, or would it be radically different? Would it be characters who looked hopelessly different from Murdoc, 2D, Noodle and Russel, but dressed like them? Many questions... The only certainty was the name they'd adopt: Look, Monkiez!
I had grand hopes for this weekend. For starters, I had to finish some sketches for work - icons for a '12 days of Christmas' thing which have been alternately boring me stupid and frustrating the hell out of me for about a month now - but then, I'd be free to have a go at illustrating Look, Monkiez! for the first time. I have a vague idea of their look... each one will be a not-quite-opposite of their counterpart in Gorillaz, and what they lack in talent, they'll make up for in sheer enthusiasm for paying tribute to their inspiration. I figure the Russel analogue would be extremely skinny, but equally nutty behind the drums, and 'Noodle' would be a chubby girl with a dippy anime name that has -chan thrown on the end for no good reason. She may wear cat-girl ears. 2D's counterpart would most likely mimic the original by wearing extremely heavy eyeliner. The Murdoc equivalent would certainly have a ridiculously oversized pudding-basin haircut. Probably a wig.
As it happened, I was too tired yesterday to do anything, and woke up with a headache this morning. I tried to work on the icons in the morning and after lunch, but didn't do too well.
In the afternoon, I went to see The Prestige. Bonkers film. Utterly bonkers. Full of illusions, misdirection, trickery and hints of what's to come, I'm not sure whether to be very impressed or rather disappointed by the denouement. I enjoyed the film - very well-paced, and the twists were clever enough to avoid being entirely predictable - but it was difficult to find enough sympathy for any of the main characters to feel satisfied with the ending. Maybe I should look up the novel... Before setting out to see it, I wasn't aware that David Bowie was in the film - a fact which might well have put me off. That would have been a mistake - his turn as Nikola Tesla was subtle and well-played... I almost wish he'd had more screen time. In many ways, Bowie's bits of this film reminded me of the anime Steamboy - science so advanced, it's indistinguishable from magic... and Scientists seeking to unlock great secrets.
Once back home, I tried to motivate myself to get back to the Christmas icons for work, but my first attempt at 'neat' versions, which I'd intended to colour by hand, were scrapped. Coloured pencils just ain't my thing. In so many ways, pencils in general are not my thing... but coloured pencils never give me the effect I'm after, as I just end up scribbling with them as I do with any other kind. I have a coloured Partridge in a Pear Tree, and that's it. It looks OK, and yet somehow wrong, and that's not solely due to my piss-poor technique.
The Gold Ring also had a complete overhaul. Originally, I'd drawn just a simple ring, then I added some blobs to make it a more ornate ring. It looked crap, though, and I wanted more than just a ring in the picture, so I redrew the whole thing as a simple ring (with added gold sparkle effect) on a cushion. Looks much better. I suspect I'll add some colour to each one in Photoshop, but it won't be too dramatic. Maybe turn them slightly sepia-toned and try to add a dash of colour to certain parts (my French Hen may have Tricolore tailfeathers). We shall see... Largely, it depends on how much time I have at work. At least I did eventually finish all twelve, and they're still clean enough to scan well when I get to the office.
Someone remind me to politely decline next time anyone asks me to draw something for work. I still cannot work to any kind of deadline, and I couldn't give a stuff if I get any extra money out of it.
Tonight's Torchwood was probably the most impressive so far, in terms of developing an interesting storyline well enough to fit it into an hour of television... And yet still they rely on jarring shouty bits and sudden bouts of emoting a little bit too hard. The special effects were particularly good but the end was a little limp. I am starting to wonder if they've really thought through the character of Captain Jack Harkness... Originally, it seemed that he became immortal in the future, thanks to Rose Tyler/Bad Wolf, but Torchwood appears to be suggesting that it wasn't her temporary foray into Godhood that brought him back to life in the future. This would tend to start one wondering how long he's lived... If he was already immortal back before World War I and, when he met Rose and The Doctor back in World War II, he was from the future where humans had spread out across the galaxy, he's had an incredibly long life... But is the Torchwood Jack the one from the future where Rose destroyed the Daleks (in which case, how did he get back to the present day?), or has he not yet met her or The Doctor? Is Russell T Davis messing with our heads?
Thursday, 9 November 2006
Work In Progress
The aim of this Blog was to ease me back into writing regularly. A few years ago, I joined up with an internet writing group, and churned out a couple of very well-received stories. For one reason or another, though, it all dried up. I had (have) ideas for plenty more stories, but I just couldn't bring myself to sit down and write... and the story I'd been working on at the time (approaching 30,000 words) ground to a halt.
Part of me still thinks it's a numbers thing. I kept doing wordcounts, and as they crept ever higher, I found it more and more difficult to carry on, because I was only intending to write short stories, and I seemed to be heading towards a novel.
Not that that would be a bad thing...
For the most part, I just started getting very critical of everything I wrote and, while I'd often come up with whole paragraphs that I really liked - invariably whenever I was nowhere near a computer, or anything else I could write with - I never managed to write them out, and ended up forgetting them. I even bought myself a little PDA - a Hewlett Packard Jornada 720 - for just those occasions... and yet I never remembered to keep it with me.
The other problem is that sometimes I find the act of writing such a chore. All that typing or scribbling... it's just dull. I need some way of directly transfering what's in my head into a Word document, or something. That'd be perfect.
To make matters worse, all my writing for the group was initially based around one character, with a few set to be recurring characters. All of a sudden, one day, one of my 'other' characters became a key player in another story with another main character... who quickly became more interesting than my original main character, and with a whole great, sweeping story arc of her own. After coming up with a few ideas to get that rolling, it quickly dried up.
Except that's not quite fair to say... It's all still there, whizzing around in my head, but I just can't focus on writing.
Which, going back to the original point of this post, is the point of this Blog: A focal point, and 'practice', to get back into the habit of writing. The problem I'm having now (aside from time) is that I find myself automatically censoring everything I think about writing, to the point that there's no purpose in writing it. Don't want to say too much about work, because that's got me in trouble in the past (although that was on my website, which many of my colleagues knew about and, as briefly mentioned in my first post, was obsessed over by one of them), and I can't force myself to come up with witty/crazy things to write about, like the 3D photography post... That sort of thing will occur to me at random.
I can only hope that I'll start coming up with things, because I really do want to get back into writing, and I'd rather not resort to raiding my old stuff to bulk up this blog. Of course, when something interesting happens in my life - such as the Expo recently, and the upcoming Memorabilia - I shall endeavour to write about them... but I do have this nagging feeling (damn you, self-doubt) that I'll go for quite long periods without updating this thing.
One fun bit of news today came from an ex-colleague, well known for being connected for all the gossip. It seems that two of my least favourite ex-colleagues have had some recent upsets. One is looking for a new job because her current (rather prestigious) employer won't give her a pay rise (and absolutely not because no-one there likes her, wants to go to lunch with her, or will even refer to her by name). Another recently split from her boyfriend (another ex-colleague!) after being - and here I quote - "a bit naughty". Considering the way her previous relationship broke up, this surprises me not one bit.
One thing I will mention about work today... As previously mentioned, one member of the department was recently let go. Since then, it has occasionally been observed that many of the silly little problems we had, which often resulted in delays, aren't happening as often. Still happening, and I'd never expect them to stop entirely, but the occurences of the sillier problems are statistically more likely to be accidental now... They used to happen far too often.
Part of me still thinks it's a numbers thing. I kept doing wordcounts, and as they crept ever higher, I found it more and more difficult to carry on, because I was only intending to write short stories, and I seemed to be heading towards a novel.
Not that that would be a bad thing...
For the most part, I just started getting very critical of everything I wrote and, while I'd often come up with whole paragraphs that I really liked - invariably whenever I was nowhere near a computer, or anything else I could write with - I never managed to write them out, and ended up forgetting them. I even bought myself a little PDA - a Hewlett Packard Jornada 720 - for just those occasions... and yet I never remembered to keep it with me.
The other problem is that sometimes I find the act of writing such a chore. All that typing or scribbling... it's just dull. I need some way of directly transfering what's in my head into a Word document, or something. That'd be perfect.
To make matters worse, all my writing for the group was initially based around one character, with a few set to be recurring characters. All of a sudden, one day, one of my 'other' characters became a key player in another story with another main character... who quickly became more interesting than my original main character, and with a whole great, sweeping story arc of her own. After coming up with a few ideas to get that rolling, it quickly dried up.
Except that's not quite fair to say... It's all still there, whizzing around in my head, but I just can't focus on writing.
Which, going back to the original point of this post, is the point of this Blog: A focal point, and 'practice', to get back into the habit of writing. The problem I'm having now (aside from time) is that I find myself automatically censoring everything I think about writing, to the point that there's no purpose in writing it. Don't want to say too much about work, because that's got me in trouble in the past (although that was on my website, which many of my colleagues knew about and, as briefly mentioned in my first post, was obsessed over by one of them), and I can't force myself to come up with witty/crazy things to write about, like the 3D photography post... That sort of thing will occur to me at random.
I can only hope that I'll start coming up with things, because I really do want to get back into writing, and I'd rather not resort to raiding my old stuff to bulk up this blog. Of course, when something interesting happens in my life - such as the Expo recently, and the upcoming Memorabilia - I shall endeavour to write about them... but I do have this nagging feeling (damn you, self-doubt) that I'll go for quite long periods without updating this thing.
One fun bit of news today came from an ex-colleague, well known for being connected for all the gossip. It seems that two of my least favourite ex-colleagues have had some recent upsets. One is looking for a new job because her current (rather prestigious) employer won't give her a pay rise (and absolutely not because no-one there likes her, wants to go to lunch with her, or will even refer to her by name). Another recently split from her boyfriend (another ex-colleague!) after being - and here I quote - "a bit naughty". Considering the way her previous relationship broke up, this surprises me not one bit.
One thing I will mention about work today... As previously mentioned, one member of the department was recently let go. Since then, it has occasionally been observed that many of the silly little problems we had, which often resulted in delays, aren't happening as often. Still happening, and I'd never expect them to stop entirely, but the occurences of the sillier problems are statistically more likely to be accidental now... They used to happen far too often.
Wednesday, 1 November 2006
Testing
| You Are: 20% Dog, 80% Cat |
 You are are almost exactly like a cat. You're intelligent, independent, and set on getting your way. And there's no way you're going to fetch a paper for anyone! |
It's true... Oh, yes. Except perhaps the 20% Dog part. Not sure where that came from.
No, I'm not larking about at the office, I'm at home. Taking the morning off, going into work later.
Sunday, 29 October 2006
London Expo Haul part 2
The only Predacon in the pack is Dinobot, using the mold originally used for Armada Hoist, but retooled and/or repainted for Energon and Galaxy Force. While there has been a version released as Cybertron Longrack - referring to a Beast Wars character - this one has the original Armada Hoist head.
Last, but by no means least, my Tachikoma Plushie, picked up from the TokyoToys stand at the Expo:
Last, but by no means least, my Tachikoma Plushie, picked up from the TokyoToys stand at the Expo:
London Expo Haul part 1
Yes, here they are... Photos of the BotCon 2006 'Dawn of Futures Past' Boxed Set, containing the Cybertronian forms of Maximals Rhinox, Rattrap, Optimus Primal and Cheetor, along with Predacon Dinobot. Now, if only someone could explain why they have animalistic names if they're in their pre-Beast Wars forms...
This is the boxed set in all its glory. Note the storytelling comic book at the side. The story is a bit of patchwork, explaining what happened before the first episode of the Beast Wars TV series.
From left to right, Rhinox, Rattrap, Optimus Primal and Cheetor, based on the molds first used for Galaxy Force Guardshell, Gasket, Land Bullet and Skids. For the most part, they're only recoloured, but Optimus Primal and Cheetor sport entirely new head molds.
This is the boxed set in all its glory. Note the storytelling comic book at the side. The story is a bit of patchwork, explaining what happened before the first episode of the Beast Wars TV series.
From left to right, Rhinox, Rattrap, Optimus Primal and Cheetor, based on the molds first used for Galaxy Force Guardshell, Gasket, Land Bullet and Skids. For the most part, they're only recoloured, but Optimus Primal and Cheetor sport entirely new head molds.
Saturday, 28 October 2006
London Expo
So I went to the London Expo today. It's a strange little show... Been to a few now. It happens maybe a couple of times a year, at the ExCeL Centre in London's Docklands, and each one tends to be very different.
The first one I went to with my sister and a friend a couple of years ago. It was hugely disappointing, in that the 'star' guests mostly weren't, and the retail side of things was decidedly spacious. And looked mostly like a jumble sale. None of us were particularly keen on visiting another, despite overhearing quite a few folks saying things like "The winter ones are much better" as we wandered around.
But I have a habit of changing my mind, and eventually decided to give the London Expo another try. The last one I went to was pretty good - it struck just about the right balance between retail and display, and introduced me to a fair few online retailers who've had quite a bit of business from me since ;) It also served as in introduction to the world of British Cosplay, as there was a competition run as part of the show. Even this, however, does not explain the presence of a skinny guy dressed as a bunny girl. What really made it weird was the sellotape used to keep it in place. Surely he could have kept it low-key and used double-sided?
This one... Was kind of back to being a disappointment. Far more by way of display stuff than retail, in particular taken over by a huge number of upcoming videogames, most of them MMORPGs. The sad thing was, while there was a lot to see, there wasn't a lot that interested me. I don't follow videogames as much as I used to (Next Generation consoles started killing games back when the original PlayStation came out), The star guests weren't that fabulous (Matt Frewer might have been interesting), and the displays were often missed opportunities. For example, Hasbro were there, but only to market their tabletop roleplaying games... Why none of the new TransFormers? Why nothing about the movie? Maybe I'm griping because there was so little in the way of TransFormers to buy, but one would think Hasbro would take any and all opportunities to push as many products as possible while they were there.
What retail there was had mostly been crowded down in one corner near the entrance (though there was a little more on the walls furthest from the entrance, and leading up to the main theatre). Gundam Mad were there (and had a Masterpiece Starscream on display) but I managed to not buy anything from them (which must be a first...), and the only purchase I ended up making was from Spacebridge, who had a couple of this year's BotCon boxed sets just calling out to me to be liberated. At £275, it was technically heavily overpriced - the set was sold for about $275 at BotCon, but such price translations are the norm in retail these days, so why should independent retailers be any different at conventions? - but the guy was at BotCon as a panellist and bought them himself, and I've been keen to get one ever since I saw the first images of Optimus Primal in the Land Bullet/Crumplezone mold. Needless to say, that was my only significant purchase in the show.
Tokyotoys (who, for once, were not ALL wearing sexy maid costumes) gave up one of their exceptionally cute plushie Tachikomas for a mere £20, and I'm debating whether I could safely take it to work, or whether it'd end up getting nicked... probably safest not to try, right?
I did manage to convince a friend who attended with me to buy a muppet Angel (as in the David Boreanaz character from the eponymous TV show spin-off from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, specifically from the 'Smile Time' episode) for a friend of hers. There was a certain satisfaction in that.
Cosplay was very much on the menu for this one. It seems to be becoming exponentially more popular over here... but then, so do these conventions. Quite a few exceptionally good ones and, true to the last year's, at least one very disturbing one: There was a guy dressed as a female version of Cloud Strife from Final Fantasy:Advent Children. At first, it just looked like a Cloud costume... but when seen from behind, the stockings and suspenders were all too obvious. Since I occasionally pop over to cosplay websites, it was interesting to see one or two familiar faces.
And speaking of familiar faces, in one of the gaming areas, my friend ran into a friend of her husband's... who asked her to take photos of some of the cosplayers "because they'd slap me if I asked". This is actually probably not true, as most seem flattered if someone wants to take a photo, but who knows? Later there was much debate over the wearer of a pretty good Wonder Woman costume... who may actually have been male. I thought not... but apparently 'she' had a very deep voice for a woman.
When we left the convention finally - having spent quite a bit of time there, considering how little there was to see - we headed off to Brent Cross for more sensible forms of retail. One shop was offering free hand massages, and cards giving a 10% discount for today only... So I've picked up a housewarming gift for my sister's impending move to Swindon.
Back home, I'd received some post: A whole bunch of Megatokyo t-shirts and a plushie Boo, which was destined to become a surprise Christmas gift for the friend I'd been at the convention with... but I had to tell her about it when she mentioned them when telling me that she'd ordered the four Megatokyo books. Oh well.
I'll see about posting pictures of my London Expo haul tomorrow...
The first one I went to with my sister and a friend a couple of years ago. It was hugely disappointing, in that the 'star' guests mostly weren't, and the retail side of things was decidedly spacious. And looked mostly like a jumble sale. None of us were particularly keen on visiting another, despite overhearing quite a few folks saying things like "The winter ones are much better" as we wandered around.
But I have a habit of changing my mind, and eventually decided to give the London Expo another try. The last one I went to was pretty good - it struck just about the right balance between retail and display, and introduced me to a fair few online retailers who've had quite a bit of business from me since ;) It also served as in introduction to the world of British Cosplay, as there was a competition run as part of the show. Even this, however, does not explain the presence of a skinny guy dressed as a bunny girl. What really made it weird was the sellotape used to keep it in place. Surely he could have kept it low-key and used double-sided?
This one... Was kind of back to being a disappointment. Far more by way of display stuff than retail, in particular taken over by a huge number of upcoming videogames, most of them MMORPGs. The sad thing was, while there was a lot to see, there wasn't a lot that interested me. I don't follow videogames as much as I used to (Next Generation consoles started killing games back when the original PlayStation came out), The star guests weren't that fabulous (Matt Frewer might have been interesting), and the displays were often missed opportunities. For example, Hasbro were there, but only to market their tabletop roleplaying games... Why none of the new TransFormers? Why nothing about the movie? Maybe I'm griping because there was so little in the way of TransFormers to buy, but one would think Hasbro would take any and all opportunities to push as many products as possible while they were there.
What retail there was had mostly been crowded down in one corner near the entrance (though there was a little more on the walls furthest from the entrance, and leading up to the main theatre). Gundam Mad were there (and had a Masterpiece Starscream on display) but I managed to not buy anything from them (which must be a first...), and the only purchase I ended up making was from Spacebridge, who had a couple of this year's BotCon boxed sets just calling out to me to be liberated. At £275, it was technically heavily overpriced - the set was sold for about $275 at BotCon, but such price translations are the norm in retail these days, so why should independent retailers be any different at conventions? - but the guy was at BotCon as a panellist and bought them himself, and I've been keen to get one ever since I saw the first images of Optimus Primal in the Land Bullet/Crumplezone mold. Needless to say, that was my only significant purchase in the show.
Tokyotoys (who, for once, were not ALL wearing sexy maid costumes) gave up one of their exceptionally cute plushie Tachikomas for a mere £20, and I'm debating whether I could safely take it to work, or whether it'd end up getting nicked... probably safest not to try, right?
I did manage to convince a friend who attended with me to buy a muppet Angel (as in the David Boreanaz character from the eponymous TV show spin-off from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, specifically from the 'Smile Time' episode) for a friend of hers. There was a certain satisfaction in that.
Cosplay was very much on the menu for this one. It seems to be becoming exponentially more popular over here... but then, so do these conventions. Quite a few exceptionally good ones and, true to the last year's, at least one very disturbing one: There was a guy dressed as a female version of Cloud Strife from Final Fantasy:Advent Children. At first, it just looked like a Cloud costume... but when seen from behind, the stockings and suspenders were all too obvious. Since I occasionally pop over to cosplay websites, it was interesting to see one or two familiar faces.
And speaking of familiar faces, in one of the gaming areas, my friend ran into a friend of her husband's... who asked her to take photos of some of the cosplayers "because they'd slap me if I asked". This is actually probably not true, as most seem flattered if someone wants to take a photo, but who knows? Later there was much debate over the wearer of a pretty good Wonder Woman costume... who may actually have been male. I thought not... but apparently 'she' had a very deep voice for a woman.
When we left the convention finally - having spent quite a bit of time there, considering how little there was to see - we headed off to Brent Cross for more sensible forms of retail. One shop was offering free hand massages, and cards giving a 10% discount for today only... So I've picked up a housewarming gift for my sister's impending move to Swindon.
Back home, I'd received some post: A whole bunch of Megatokyo t-shirts and a plushie Boo, which was destined to become a surprise Christmas gift for the friend I'd been at the convention with... but I had to tell her about it when she mentioned them when telling me that she'd ordered the four Megatokyo books. Oh well.
I'll see about posting pictures of my London Expo haul tomorrow...
Monday, 23 October 2006
Birthday & Christmas Preparation
After work this evening, I met up with my sister for dinner. Also to pick up my mother's birthday present, which my sister has been looking after since Joust earlier in the year.
I'd actually forgotten all about it until she mentioned it in an email recently, suggesting that we meet up so I can take it back. That is, I dimly recalled purchasing a birthday present for my mother, but I couldn't remember what it was, where I'd got it, or where I'd hidden it. Just as well my sister hadn't lost it in her housemoving preparations. Phew.
This evening also served as a reminder that I've already got my sister's Christmas present. Not sure when my memory got this bad, but I guess I've had a lot of other stuff on my mind since the summer.
So anyway. We met up at Leicester Square, although she walked straight past me at first - I do have this awful habit of becoming invisible at all sorts of inopportune times - and we wandered around briefly - in the rain, neither of us with an umbrella between us - trying to find somewhere to eat. Chiquitos is the usual choice, but it was pretty full, with a half hour wait for a table. We were offered the run of the bar, with one of those "the lights flash when your table is ready" doohickies, but I didn't feel like visiting the bar... not least because I'm just getting over my umpteenth cold of the year. Next port of call was Bella Pasta, round the corner, which was also full. Wagamama presented itself, but I didn't fancy that when I got thinking about it... So we ended up traipsing off to the other nearby branch of Bella Pasta.
Aside from collecting the birthday present, it was a good opportunity to catch up on the progress of the move (not much), and whinge about my day at work (crap... Doing other people's work for them because they're lazy or stupid, getting frustrated by colleagues who don't know what they're doing, the usual), and tell her about the leaving do on Friday, and how it went terribly wrong.
The meal was good, even if the conversation was depressing.
Of course, now I have to be on the lookout for presents for the rest of the family to get me, but I'm off to the London Expo this coming weekend, and Memorabilia late next month, so I might pick something up there.
News from work, now I'm home, is that a few more of The Bints are officially leaving... though it's not officially official yet. Likewise unofficial is the impending departure of one of the biggest problems the company has, in terms of fucking up the money side of things. I don't think we've had one sad loss at work this year! That's saying something, considering the turnover of staff.
I'd actually forgotten all about it until she mentioned it in an email recently, suggesting that we meet up so I can take it back. That is, I dimly recalled purchasing a birthday present for my mother, but I couldn't remember what it was, where I'd got it, or where I'd hidden it. Just as well my sister hadn't lost it in her housemoving preparations. Phew.
This evening also served as a reminder that I've already got my sister's Christmas present. Not sure when my memory got this bad, but I guess I've had a lot of other stuff on my mind since the summer.
So anyway. We met up at Leicester Square, although she walked straight past me at first - I do have this awful habit of becoming invisible at all sorts of inopportune times - and we wandered around briefly - in the rain, neither of us with an umbrella between us - trying to find somewhere to eat. Chiquitos is the usual choice, but it was pretty full, with a half hour wait for a table. We were offered the run of the bar, with one of those "the lights flash when your table is ready" doohickies, but I didn't feel like visiting the bar... not least because I'm just getting over my umpteenth cold of the year. Next port of call was Bella Pasta, round the corner, which was also full. Wagamama presented itself, but I didn't fancy that when I got thinking about it... So we ended up traipsing off to the other nearby branch of Bella Pasta.
Aside from collecting the birthday present, it was a good opportunity to catch up on the progress of the move (not much), and whinge about my day at work (crap... Doing other people's work for them because they're lazy or stupid, getting frustrated by colleagues who don't know what they're doing, the usual), and tell her about the leaving do on Friday, and how it went terribly wrong.
The meal was good, even if the conversation was depressing.
Of course, now I have to be on the lookout for presents for the rest of the family to get me, but I'm off to the London Expo this coming weekend, and Memorabilia late next month, so I might pick something up there.
News from work, now I'm home, is that a few more of The Bints are officially leaving... though it's not officially official yet. Likewise unofficial is the impending departure of one of the biggest problems the company has, in terms of fucking up the money side of things. I don't think we've had one sad loss at work this year! That's saying something, considering the turnover of staff.
Torchwood
So, there's a spin-off series to the new Doctor Who.
Of course, it's unfair to describe it that way... It's a new series based around an organisation proposed within the new Doctor Who 'universe'. It features a character from the new Doctor Who 'universe', Captain Jack Harkness. It's set in Cardiff.
The BBC decided to chuck it out at 9pm on a Sunday, on their Digital channel BBC3. You can look at this as either an indication of their lack of confidence in the product (fringe channel, late timeslot, not the best day in the week), or an attempt to get more viewers on their Digital TV channels. At first glance, I'd say it can only be a mixture of both.
Visually, it seems to be trying to ape the orginal, Las Vegas-set CSI. Lots of sweeping fly-by camerawork, over colourfully-lit nighttime Cardiff streets, and the canny storytelling technique of showing something past from a character's perspective, rather than just having them tell about it. But there's something about the presentation that's somehow slower than the glitzy American forensics show... despite obvious efforts to improve the pacing of the show.
The characters work well... Kinda. It's another ensemble of misfits with a mysterious boss and a newbie to ease us into the organisation. The dialogue was generally quite snappy, and had an amusing tendency to take pot-shots at sci-fi and crime drama.
The opening story was interesting, though perhaps rendered a little pointless and improbable by the hasty denouement. The second really tried to be risqué, but fell a little flat. Thankfully they only screened one 'sex scene', but it was so poorly done they should have done without it, were it not such a critical plot point later on.
Overall, it's watchable, just a little two-dimensional. It's not so much a Doctor Who spin-off as 'The Harkness Files'. Far better than the BBC's Robin Hood, though. Don't get me started on THAT
Of course, it's unfair to describe it that way... It's a new series based around an organisation proposed within the new Doctor Who 'universe'. It features a character from the new Doctor Who 'universe', Captain Jack Harkness. It's set in Cardiff.
The BBC decided to chuck it out at 9pm on a Sunday, on their Digital channel BBC3. You can look at this as either an indication of their lack of confidence in the product (fringe channel, late timeslot, not the best day in the week), or an attempt to get more viewers on their Digital TV channels. At first glance, I'd say it can only be a mixture of both.
Visually, it seems to be trying to ape the orginal, Las Vegas-set CSI. Lots of sweeping fly-by camerawork, over colourfully-lit nighttime Cardiff streets, and the canny storytelling technique of showing something past from a character's perspective, rather than just having them tell about it. But there's something about the presentation that's somehow slower than the glitzy American forensics show... despite obvious efforts to improve the pacing of the show.
The characters work well... Kinda. It's another ensemble of misfits with a mysterious boss and a newbie to ease us into the organisation. The dialogue was generally quite snappy, and had an amusing tendency to take pot-shots at sci-fi and crime drama.
The opening story was interesting, though perhaps rendered a little pointless and improbable by the hasty denouement. The second really tried to be risqué, but fell a little flat. Thankfully they only screened one 'sex scene', but it was so poorly done they should have done without it, were it not such a critical plot point later on.
Overall, it's watchable, just a little two-dimensional. It's not so much a Doctor Who spin-off as 'The Harkness Files'. Far better than the BBC's Robin Hood, though. Don't get me started on THAT
Saturday, 21 October 2006
Stereoscopic Photography
One of my recent whims was to create some 3D photographs. This all came about because of something that happened on the way home from work by train one night.
On this train was a mother with two kids - a very young girl and an older boy. The young girl had a colouring book which came with a set of those 'magic' colour-change pens and, bizarrely, a pair of red/blue 3D glasses (as recently made cool by David Tennant's interpretation of Doctor Who). Evidently, the book proclaimed that one could create 3D images with the pens included... but possibly didn't explain how one might accomplish this. The little girl repeatedly drew things out in all the different colours, then put on the glasses to see if the picture was 3D yet. Nothing seemed to work for her. Not even the 'magic' colour-changing pen could turn her drawings into 3D.
So her brother snatched it all away, proclaiming that he knew how to make a 3D drawing. He took the black pen, drew a cube in perspective, then coloured one face red, and another blue. Then he put on the 3D glasses.
It didn't work. I was biting my tongue by this point.
So, Stereoscopic Photography 101:
Human sight relies on two offset eyes to achieve perception of three dimensions. This is the first clue as to how to create a 3 Dimensional image on a flat surface. Each eye is seeing from a slightly different perspective, and the brain combines these two images into one. You can see this by looking at something, then closing one eye at a time.
Consider now the red/blue lenses. The red lens floods one eye, making red effectively imperceptible. Everything is red. Through the red lens, blue appears darker. The blue lens floods the other eye, making blue effectively imperceptible. Everything is blue. Through the blue lens, red appears darker.
Consider how these two concepts relate to each other. Each eye sees something different, and red/blue lenses make red/blue imperceptible respectively and blue/red more obvious respectively.
With me so far?
Take a greyscale photograph. It's flat. There is very little indication of depth. But now take another greyscale photograph of the same thing, from a slightly different horizontal position, and you have the beginnings of 3D.
At this point, you'll need some form of image manipulation software. If you're familiar with the likes of Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro, this is a doddle.
Assign a colour to each eye. These things tend to be Red/Left and Blue/Right but, hey, I cocked up and did it the other way round. It really doesn't matter, so long as you are consistent, and remember which way round you're doing things.
Using the time-honoured method of closing each eye alternately, determine which picture applies to which eye, thereby deciding which colour applies to which picture.
Initially, you'll need to create an RGB image with your 'red' image on the Red channel and the 'blue' image on the blue channel. This will work as it is, but lacks contrast. To regain your contrast and make a nice, monochromatic 3D image, you'll need to utilise the green channel.
The green channel needs to show both images but, once merged, they don't need to be as dark as either the red or blue channels. I tend to Multiply them together at about 50% opacity, varying one or the other to achieve a good balance.
Once your three channels are set up, view the final RGB image, and don your red/blue 3D glasses. If the image you're looking at doesn't look 3D, try wearing the glasses the other way round. Hopefully, you're looking at something like this (and remember that, as previously noted, you'll need Blue/Left and Red/Right to see these properly):
Through a process of fine-tuning, you'll figure out how best to take the photos and how best to combine them into a 3D image. The above images have a very well-defined 'mid-ground', and that is what I used as the point of focus (where the Red/Blue overlaps most perfectly). You can make things more dramatic (Red/Blue overlaps in the background) or deeper (Red/Blue overlaps in the foreground), but you will find that the difference in position when taking the photograph will have to be quite minimal.
Enjoy!
On this train was a mother with two kids - a very young girl and an older boy. The young girl had a colouring book which came with a set of those 'magic' colour-change pens and, bizarrely, a pair of red/blue 3D glasses (as recently made cool by David Tennant's interpretation of Doctor Who). Evidently, the book proclaimed that one could create 3D images with the pens included... but possibly didn't explain how one might accomplish this. The little girl repeatedly drew things out in all the different colours, then put on the glasses to see if the picture was 3D yet. Nothing seemed to work for her. Not even the 'magic' colour-changing pen could turn her drawings into 3D.
So her brother snatched it all away, proclaiming that he knew how to make a 3D drawing. He took the black pen, drew a cube in perspective, then coloured one face red, and another blue. Then he put on the 3D glasses.
It didn't work. I was biting my tongue by this point.
So, Stereoscopic Photography 101:
Human sight relies on two offset eyes to achieve perception of three dimensions. This is the first clue as to how to create a 3 Dimensional image on a flat surface. Each eye is seeing from a slightly different perspective, and the brain combines these two images into one. You can see this by looking at something, then closing one eye at a time.
Consider now the red/blue lenses. The red lens floods one eye, making red effectively imperceptible. Everything is red. Through the red lens, blue appears darker. The blue lens floods the other eye, making blue effectively imperceptible. Everything is blue. Through the blue lens, red appears darker.
Consider how these two concepts relate to each other. Each eye sees something different, and red/blue lenses make red/blue imperceptible respectively and blue/red more obvious respectively.
With me so far?
Take a greyscale photograph. It's flat. There is very little indication of depth. But now take another greyscale photograph of the same thing, from a slightly different horizontal position, and you have the beginnings of 3D.
At this point, you'll need some form of image manipulation software. If you're familiar with the likes of Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro, this is a doddle.
Assign a colour to each eye. These things tend to be Red/Left and Blue/Right but, hey, I cocked up and did it the other way round. It really doesn't matter, so long as you are consistent, and remember which way round you're doing things.
Using the time-honoured method of closing each eye alternately, determine which picture applies to which eye, thereby deciding which colour applies to which picture.
Initially, you'll need to create an RGB image with your 'red' image on the Red channel and the 'blue' image on the blue channel. This will work as it is, but lacks contrast. To regain your contrast and make a nice, monochromatic 3D image, you'll need to utilise the green channel.
The green channel needs to show both images but, once merged, they don't need to be as dark as either the red or blue channels. I tend to Multiply them together at about 50% opacity, varying one or the other to achieve a good balance.
Once your three channels are set up, view the final RGB image, and don your red/blue 3D glasses. If the image you're looking at doesn't look 3D, try wearing the glasses the other way round. Hopefully, you're looking at something like this (and remember that, as previously noted, you'll need Blue/Left and Red/Right to see these properly):
Through a process of fine-tuning, you'll figure out how best to take the photos and how best to combine them into a 3D image. The above images have a very well-defined 'mid-ground', and that is what I used as the point of focus (where the Red/Blue overlaps most perfectly). You can make things more dramatic (Red/Blue overlaps in the background) or deeper (Red/Blue overlaps in the foreground), but you will find that the difference in position when taking the photograph will have to be quite minimal.
Enjoy!
The End, and yet The Beginning
People have been telling me I should start a blog for ages. I used to have one - of sorts - within my website, but that got cut out for one reason or another. Of course, this didn't mean I suddenly had nothing to say, just that I was no longer throwing it up on the internet for any and all to see.
My 'Ramblings' pages were a bone of contention for some. Most thought they were great, tongue-in-cheek, occasionally laugh-out-loud stuff. Some took personal offense at some of my comments. Some said I was too 'open'... Some took to obsessively reading them over and over again, more often than I updated them.
That's one reason I stopped. Particularly since I worked with one such person.
Of course, I also needed more space to display my growing collection of toys, and I hadn't added to the Ramblings in a good couple of years, so it wasn't a great loss...
But now things have changed, and I feel freer to get back into the habit of writing. Of course, with all the crazy things that have been happening over the last few months, I wish I'd done this earlier in the year, but you can't have everything. Some of the more interesting stories may yet appear, depending on how much I actually have to write about, and how much time I have to write it. Whatever. This has been my first post. More follows...
My 'Ramblings' pages were a bone of contention for some. Most thought they were great, tongue-in-cheek, occasionally laugh-out-loud stuff. Some took personal offense at some of my comments. Some said I was too 'open'... Some took to obsessively reading them over and over again, more often than I updated them.
That's one reason I stopped. Particularly since I worked with one such person.
Of course, I also needed more space to display my growing collection of toys, and I hadn't added to the Ramblings in a good couple of years, so it wasn't a great loss...
But now things have changed, and I feel freer to get back into the habit of writing. Of course, with all the crazy things that have been happening over the last few months, I wish I'd done this earlier in the year, but you can't have everything. Some of the more interesting stories may yet appear, depending on how much I actually have to write about, and how much time I have to write it. Whatever. This has been my first post. More follows...
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