Ninja Paxman
Posted under: The video below is doing the rounds at moment, just because Paxman gets lashed out of it for a change. Call me childish but I find it much more amusing that he’s a ninja for the first 3 seconds.
A legend dies
Derek “Crosaire” Crozier died over the weekend. I made sure to get a paper yesterday and was determined to finish it but alas I didn’t quite make it.
No other crossword comes close to the elegance of the Crosaire. But I stopped doing it a couple of years ago. I couldn’t justify paying 1.80 every day when I just went straight to the Crosaire, and often didn’t look at the rest of the paper. Except for some interest in the art page, the rest of that paper just puts me asleep.
It was such a ritual part of my morning, an OCD ritual; I had that fold down to a tee, black bic at hand (had to be black), all answers in upper case, and a diagonal tick over the number of every solved clue. Doing the online version just didn’t do it for me somehow.
Elsewhere:
- Tributes flow as ‘genius’ crossword-setter dies
- O’brien press have a Crosaire book.
- Derek Crozier bio on a Crosaire blog
My attempt from yesterday
Upsy Downy Spinny Roundy
Ever wondered what it would be like to turn part of someone’s face upside down and then spin it round and round? I can’t think why, but you’ve come to the right place. See Upsy Downy Spinny Roundy.
Robot
Test post for posting to WordPress directly from Flickr. Was driving me crazy getting this set up. If you have trouble getting this working this might be the problem:
Go to wordpress Settings page > Writing, then select the checkbox beside “enable XML-RPC”.
Ticketbasturdz stealin’ ma ink!
Maybe I’m just bit of stingey bastard – but coloured ink cartridges ain’t cheap. I buy ink every now and then and it seems to disappear in a blink. So I just go without for a while, and eventually get around to buying some more. And then I try not to use it unless I really need to, rare commodity that it is in these tough times. I doubt I’m alone in that ink buying cycle.
And then ticketbastards come along and steal my last bit of ink. With Ads. FUCKING ADS. They even state that the whole page must be printed – with the ads sandwiched between the two barcodes. I think it’s fucking scandalous. I can’t even remember picking a print-my-own-tickets option. And THEY charge ME €4.20 service charge per page. I should be charging them. They’re not even for me. They’re for a mate with no credit card / computer. I already knew they were bastards but this is really taking the piss.
142,000 search results for the word TICKETBASTARDS. That’s really saying something.
Will code for cake
Got a dose of good and bad Karma one day a couple of weeks ago. The doorbell rang and this mysterious package was delivired in person, with instructions to leave it in the fridge for the day:
So exactly 24 hours later, I unwrapped the package…
Oooh chocolate biscuit cake. Mysterious lady with your mysterious package, you know me so well!
And with that I broke the eject button on the camera and the memory card got stuck. So two weeks later and a I pair of pliars here’s a late post to say thanks a mil to Jo. I really did very little to help with http://friendsofbreastfeeding.blogspot.com/ but it was worth every single bite. Thanks!
Costa Rican Ricky
I was going to do a quick Photo Friday post and had a look through my flickr and came to this one:
But every photo has a story. That’s Ricky on the right, and his apprentice on the left. Ricky is a guide. He brought us through a Costa Rican jungle pointing out different insects, birds and animals. What you can eat, what can eat you, that kind of thing. Our very own Ray Mears. I absolutely loved it. Great day. The highlight of the honeymoon. Here’s some more pics from that day:
And here’s a photo of the treehouse we stayed in. (http://www.costaricatreehouse.com) which was fantastic.
See: Full Honeymoon flickr set for more.
Friday links on Saturday
Was going to post this yesterday but never got to finish it.
Giant Seagull walks behind news anchor
Peter Serafinowicz cracks me up. Whether you use Twitter or not check out http://twitter.com/serafinowicz.
- “My great uncle was so stubborn, when he died, he left a won’t.”
- “Cling-film = Ghost-foil”
- “What part of ‘understand’ don’t you comprehend?”
- These days, Scooby Doo’s pal is known as ‘Saggy’
And I love Anthony Hopkins recalling his favourite moments from The Excorcist
Jon LaJoie has been doing the rounds again recently. Maybe because he was on rudetube last week. His Regular Everyday Normal guy is great:
And finally The drunkest guy ever gets remixed:
The Shining
What a masterpiece. I’m sure when I saw this as a younglet I enjoyed the story, and Kudos to Stephen King for that. Or maybe I just enjoyed the ‘scary movie’. But I’ve seen it many times since and relished in the craftmanship. Nicholson is stunning, that’s a given. But the imagery and soundtrack combine as a total feast for the senses. Utterly compelling. A real work of art. Kubrick deserves to be right up there with Rembrandt if you ask me.
Not surprising that that iconic image is one of the first things I painted years ago. 
Ouch!
Haven’t listened to New Forms in years but took it out recently and remebered that the CD always looks like a cartoon character who just got a kick in the nuts.
Which reminds me, the icon on power buttons, always look like an icon for someone giving the finger.
image borrowed from www.contrast.ie
So remember, next time you go to turn something off, it’s giving you the finger!
The great sugar experiment of 2009
As I’m sure you’ve all long suspected, sachet’s of sugar are not quite what they purport to be; a spoonful of sugar. Here at Braine labs, we took 12 typical specimens and measured them up against the real deal, a spoonful of sugar. Some did better than others but not a single one contained as much sweetness as a proper spoonful. Let’s survey the evidence.
Not quite as obvious spoon by spoon, but add them all up and put them side to side…
Yes my friends. As you suspected, there is only about half A SUGAR in most sachets. They’re trying to trick that sweet sweet tooth of yours, it’s nothing but a ruse!
So the next time you’re in the canteen making a nice brew, and you’ve just poured two sachets into your cuppa… and someone goes “OOH OOH, Two sugars! Ugh. How can you!?”. You can say “Oi! No! That’s ONE sugar! I take it you haven’t heard of the great sugar experiment of 2009 yet? No? Well let me show you, but first allow me to stick this spoon up your judgemental crack and see how sweet you look.“
Nom nom
Anna loves her nom nom. Always asking for it. Her first words were pretty much NOM NOM NOM NOM. Tried to get a better video of it but this’ll do.
Travors minus Travors
So you’ve seen Garfield minus Garfield right? And know that it’s done by travors? And heard the phrase a taste of your own medicine? well here’s Travors minus Travors.
Click for original blog post (left), or bigger version of the photoshopped image (right). Or see the slideshow on Annie’s site.
The great quest
I walked for many miles, with aching bones, creaking below my now lesser mass. Eventually my destination peaked over the horizon and gave me hope. The journey was shorter than it seemed, but it weighed heavy on my weary soul. As I grew closer my legs gave way. I crawled through the entrance and collapsed upon the canvas floor.
For a moment in time, I didn’t stir. The eve before, slumber seemed but just a blink, sleep had merely kissed these pallid cheeks but woke me with the brush of her sweet lips.
And now, the evening after, near the end of my great quest, she embraced me, but no! I couldn’t sleep now. My mission wasn’t over, only midway. I clutched the treasure to my bosom, then placed it within my satchel. At last the child would receive the sacred cloth and be at peace.
I battled many demons on my way back. I had to step over some bodies who didn’t make it. A time later, at the end of my long journey, I reached the queen. And the child. The queen, who could not partake in the massive journey, for she was with child once again, eagerly sought the treasure with her eyes. It was only then that I realised, with a dawning horror that the sacred cloth was missing it’s counterpart, and would not pacify the child.
“BALLSACKS! I forgot the FUCKING wipes! Jesus! Yes I got the nappy! but I left the fucking wipes in the tent. FUCK!”
And so it was, we started the epic journey of aching legs, from the far end of Electric picnic to the campsite. I changed the nappy, got kids ready for bed. Got ready for bed myself.
And she says to me “What d’you think you’re doing!?”
“Climbing into that sleeping bag, before I collapse from sleep deprivation, and way too much walking for an unfit fucker like me!”
“What about Madness? You really wanted to see Madness!”
“There’s no way I’m going back out there! I told you, that was an epic journey for me!”
But I was eventually convinced to put my wellies and my coat back on and traipse back out there.
I trundled on like a zombie, with aching limbs. “Gotta go to Madnesss, gotta go to Madness. gotta go to Madness”.
And THAT is how I managed to miss what by all accounts sounded like, a brilliant extravaganza of musical fun; Chic.
But I had a one track mind. Gotta go to Madness. Gotta go to Madness.
This is the song I walked by at the time.
Yes you read correctly. I could see and hear that but still kept walking, repeating the Madness mantra, and made it to the main stage. And that was that!
Madness were good fun too. But I had to endure 40 minutes of unknown new stuff while waiting for the hits, when I could have been freaking out to Chic!
Incidentally, the highlight of my weekend was the having-the-craic type Galway band The Timber Tramps, and singing along to great covers like Personal Jesus. Maybe I’ll justgo to Galway next year.
Rude boy rock
Speaking of things that look like things, I noticed this rock by a stream in St. Annes park recently.
Breaking news: stuff that looks like normal people!
Reports have started coming in of objects that look like regular people. We don’t yet know if it’s some crazy coincidence or just a whole new way of thinking. Jessie Swinson, of Milwalkee US took a bite of her Kit Kat when she suddenly noticed an image of a man with a beard. “I showed it to Jed and said now if that isn’t the spit of Jake from the post office than I don’t like to suck molasses!” – “And you don’t think it looks like Jesus?” we asked. “No no no, it’s Jake alright. Any it’d just be damned stupid to call every image of a bearded man Jesus.”
And in a similar story, Mary Heath-Vehorn bought this watermelon at the Farmer’s Market in Asheville, North Carolina. It wasn’t until she got it home that she noticed her cousin Joshua right there on the melon. “Other people have suggested that it’s Jesus to me but I don’t know I mean I never met this Jesus guy, but cousin Joshua passed on recently, and I think it’s his way of making up for never visiting me.”
Meanwhile, some morons in Limerick, Ireland are congregating around a tree stump that hardly looks like a woman, never mind ‘Our Lady’. Shopkeeper Séamus Hogan says “People have been coming from Kerry and Clare to see this tree, which we believe shows a clear outline of Our Lady,”.
Jesus wept.
Gran Torrino
Gran Torrino – worst movie title in ages. I avoided like swine flu until I realised it wasn’t starring Vin Diesel jumping rooftops in a fast car.
Watched it last weekendand it’s jam packed with all the racial movie cliches you can think of. Like the all time classic “Racist guy whos’ good guy at heart and not really racist at all” and their was a brieft cameo from “white boy who likes to get down with the homies but is actually a total dork“.
But despite all that I still really enjoyed it, Clint is an especially amusing grumpy old man who had me chuckling away. He breaths some life into a predictable scribe with every cackley rasp.
He still hasn’t bettered Unforgiven by a long mile though. Now THAT is a movie.
Cheeky little fecks
*Knock knock*
Three young wans: D’you wanna to buy a line mister?
Me: Erm, how much?
Fiver
Fiver!? What’s it for?
Erm – it’s for charidee.
Right, no sorry don’t have a fiver.
D’you have 3 euro?
Let’s see – no actually I don’t seem to have any money at the moment.
LIAR!
*SLAM*
Slane, the Facebook verdict
This always makes me laugh. Two consecutive & conlicting items in my Facebook feed:
Friday links
- Biggest fish ever caught with a fishing rod, a 6 gilled shark. WOWZA!
- For some reason, the most amusing photoshop disasters involve race. There was that time the Sun removed a Rasta dude from a boat, this week meet token he’s FUN!
- If you like movies, there’s a great game on the Empire site, very nicely done.
- One “Elizabeth J Becton” no less, goes crazy paranoid after someone calls her Liz in an email. Hi liz!
- I was pondering buying a hamster, now I just have to get one, no ifs no maybes.
- Mike Tyson is in that new Hangover movie. I didn’t add his 3 frames to my previous post, but I did give him some maracas.
3 frames
This is one from the I wish I’d thought of that but it’s still fun to copy category: Take 3 frames from a movie and make an animated gif.
If you’re going to have a go, don’t go looking for your favourite old movies on youtube, it’s harder to do, and doesn’t look half as good, go for the HD Apple trailers.
The Shawshank Redemption
I’ve been to far too few plays in my life. Something I’d love to remedy but time and money can be impeding factors. So I’m not exactly equipped to review plays. However, several things I learned tonight.
- Watching a play at the very back of the Gaiety is like watching a play of people watching a play
- Sitting behind a fat head can ruin a play
- In no way is it a given that a play will be better than the film in the way a book is
- Unless you can afford the good seats, plays are best experienced in small venues
- Keeping your head at a 45 degree angle for two hours can be very sore
I truly wish I was better at enjoying things I really should enjoy rather than letting the little things spoil experiences much more than they should.
Facemask for Swine flu
Waterspray
My other blog’s a lada
Looks like this is promote my own sites week; after a long lull www.beatingrsi – practical tips for beating rsi is now up to a gargantuan total of 20 posts!
- Stop clicking; Use Launchy
- Save your arms with macros and automation
- Evoluent vertical mouse
- Goldtouch split keyboard
- The daily routine
- Pain relief
- Mini keyboard experiment
- Walk the dinosaur
- Powerball
- Arm lifts
- Keyboards
- Wall angels
- Lumbar roll
- Dr Pascarelli’s guide
- Mousetool
- Windows accessibility
- Nodding dog
- Monitor height
- Workrave
- Water
Flickr
Latest Tweets
Recent Posts
- Books of the (last) year
- Pruning your feeds
- Netflix
- That other time I went to the States…
- Quincy M.E. and Cameron Diaz doing the La Bamba
- Different folks, different strokes
- Family cinema design
- Google+
- Seat hogs
- Super Fly Guy
- Doctor Heiter’s Connections
- Chopsticks
- Please don’t say you drive a Morris Minor
- Take me out
- Homeless Negro Adoption
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