So the big question for the weekend is will it be a bit cooler?
It's been very hot this last week, but not only that, it's been very humid and sticky too - especially at night.
I'm not sure if it's quite capped Nice/Monaco yet, but then for one thing this week I've obviously been at work, rather than sat out in the sun. While it's still hot, being sat in the sun is hotter still.
Also, I've the advantage at home of having the air conditioner. So wile it's horribly hot when I get back from work, within an hour or so my air con has cooled it down to something resembling warm. Then by the evening it can be veritably frosty in my bedroom.
I actually did a bit of an experiment the last two nights. Normally I try to keep my bedroom door closed when I use the aircon, in an attempt to make and keep that room as cold as possible. The problem with this seems to be that as soon as the aircon goes off it heats up very quickly.
What I tried was opening the door and also using fans to try to blow the hot kitchen air into the bedroom. My theory was that by cooling the whole place it would mean the bedroom would stay cooler for longer at night - there'd be no rush of hot air in from the kitchen.
I think it worked, though less successfully last night. I dunno, it can be difficult to really tell because you can't really account for the effects of natural variations.
Anyway, I'm hoping for a bit of a respite this weekend at least. A couple of cooler days would go down well. Especially as this weekend is a cleaning weekend, so finger's crossed.
But either way, I'm going to try to get my hair cut. Longer hair is not so good in warm weather.
I've been having a few weird experiences with the old bread maker. I've been trying to diversify away from the white bread and on Wednesday tried a brown loaf. It didn't quite go to plan, shall we say?
The problem was that it didn't really rise as much as I was expecting. The rising agent in bread is yeast, which gives off carbon dioxide as it ferments. Trouble with yeast is it's alive, but the form you buy it in is a kind of inert form.
But it does mean that it can 'die' or also be activated too early by exposure to water. I've been trying to run the bread machine so that it produces a loaf when I get back from work, but that means I obviously couldn't check the progress of this first brown loaf.
I've therefore no idea if I cocked up or if the yeast was knackered or what. But basically the bread came out almost slab like. It wasn't quite like unleavened bread, but it certainly wasn't fluffy and light like all the white loaves I've had so far.
But there is another factor of course - I've no idea how sitting in this natural heat waiting on the timer is affecting the process. What I did do was try a normal white loaf last night, but not using the timer.
It went okay - the loaf is light and fluffy, so I don't think the yeast is too blame. Maybe it was just the heat evaporating the water?
Friday, 3 July 2009
Thursday, 2 July 2009
bb10 is no more
I've mentioned before that on Thursday nights there's currently a ridiculous number of programmes that I want to watch. I also mentioned that two of them weren't very good.
Well, on Monday I summoned up the courage and deleted them from my PVR's recording schedule. At the same time I had a bit of a think and also came to the decision that I'm dumping bb10.
Part of me is missing it, but a bigger part of me is relieved that I've freed up so much viewing time. It's already paying dividends, because I immediately started watching Battlestar Galactica.
I'd heard good things about the new Battlestar, and so far I've seen nothing to make me disagree. If I'm brutally honest, the original miniseries wasn't quite as good as I'd hoped.
I mean it was in no way bad, but I was slightly left wondering why people had said it was so great. However, starting on Series 1 it became very apparent that it was a very good series.
And I think this difference was actually something of a falsity, caused by what they did to the miniseries on DVD. Even though it's a miniseries, it's been edited into one single entity. In other words, they've presented it as a (very nearly) 3 hour film.
To be frank, it's too long - I had to watch it in two halves. But also, because of the way American television has to be written to incorporate advert breaks it generally has a very clear 3 act structure. Because of the perceived button-bashing nature of American viewers, they like to go to the ad break with a big suspense moment that will encourage viewers to watch again after the ads.
So, if an hour-long show has 3 ad breaks, you end up with 2 big "act break" moments that will encourage viewers to come back. Plus, with it being a mini-series, each episode is of course going to end on a cliff-hanger too.
But that means when you edit, say, 4 of them all together you end up with 12 act breaks :/. Now that's fine in one sense, but it kinda makes the thing a bit exhausting to view. When you watch a normal show and marathon a 4 ep DVD you'll get the credits in there, telling you "okay, now you can go pee" or get a drink or whatever, or you're are at least aware that you're watching a new ep and can refocus your attention.
With it all edited together, these climactic act-break moments keep happening, but there's no respite - the thing just keeps rolling. And that makes it a little fatiguing to watch.
In other words, what I'm saying is, oddly, if it was broken up, I think I'd have enjoyed it more. But it was still good.
Well, on Monday I summoned up the courage and deleted them from my PVR's recording schedule. At the same time I had a bit of a think and also came to the decision that I'm dumping bb10.
Part of me is missing it, but a bigger part of me is relieved that I've freed up so much viewing time. It's already paying dividends, because I immediately started watching Battlestar Galactica.
I'd heard good things about the new Battlestar, and so far I've seen nothing to make me disagree. If I'm brutally honest, the original miniseries wasn't quite as good as I'd hoped.
I mean it was in no way bad, but I was slightly left wondering why people had said it was so great. However, starting on Series 1 it became very apparent that it was a very good series.
And I think this difference was actually something of a falsity, caused by what they did to the miniseries on DVD. Even though it's a miniseries, it's been edited into one single entity. In other words, they've presented it as a (very nearly) 3 hour film.
To be frank, it's too long - I had to watch it in two halves. But also, because of the way American television has to be written to incorporate advert breaks it generally has a very clear 3 act structure. Because of the perceived button-bashing nature of American viewers, they like to go to the ad break with a big suspense moment that will encourage viewers to watch again after the ads.
So, if an hour-long show has 3 ad breaks, you end up with 2 big "act break" moments that will encourage viewers to come back. Plus, with it being a mini-series, each episode is of course going to end on a cliff-hanger too.
But that means when you edit, say, 4 of them all together you end up with 12 act breaks :/. Now that's fine in one sense, but it kinda makes the thing a bit exhausting to view. When you watch a normal show and marathon a 4 ep DVD you'll get the credits in there, telling you "okay, now you can go pee" or get a drink or whatever, or you're are at least aware that you're watching a new ep and can refocus your attention.
With it all edited together, these climactic act-break moments keep happening, but there's no respite - the thing just keeps rolling. And that makes it a little fatiguing to watch.
In other words, what I'm saying is, oddly, if it was broken up, I think I'd have enjoyed it more. But it was still good.
Wednesday, 1 July 2009
iron man
doo, doo, doo-do-do, dodee-dodee-dodee-duh-doo-doo-doo.
Er, that's supposed to be a sort of sing-along version of the riff to Sabbath's Iron Man.
Well, anyway, moving right along...
I've never been that big a fan of Iron Man.
I've read the comic a few times, and Marvel are great ones for crossovers, so I've encountered him sometimes in the other books I've read. I dunno - he never really appealed to me, I guess. The thing I liked about the superheroes I tended to follow was that they were more along the lines of greatness-thrust-upon-them.
So I really liked Spiderman - an nerdy kid who has superpowers thrust upon him. He struggles with life just as much - if not more - as he does supervillains. I also really like Wolverine.
Wolverine always had the air that he was dragged into being a superhero because some internal moral compass could never stand to see bad triumph over good and only he could fix it. If he could, he'd happily step back and let others fix it, but when it came down to it, he did what needed to be done.
I also used to like the Punisher. I've not kept up with the newer versions, but the Punisher again was very much like Wolverine. The Punisher tended to deal in real-world crime of course, but there are a lot of similarities again.
One of the problems with Iron Man for me I think was the whole aspect of him being a weapons dealer. It was never clear to me quite how that worked - in the comics he still traded weapons (I think), yet in his spare time he was a vigilante superhero?
Also, the whole rich playboy aspect jarred with what I preferred. Spiderman was a nerdy kid who had to work to pay his bills and struggled with girlfriends, Wolverine I guess had a benefactor in Professor X but was a difficult, surly character who was difficult to love and Punisher could only leave by using the money he got from organised criminals he killed and of course had no love in his life since his family was murdered.
Tony Stark could buy half of the planet and was so damnable handsome, he could have any woman at the click of his fingers. Yeah, great from a power-fantasy point of view, but not my cup of tea.
What they cleverly do in the Iron Man film is iron out all of these issues.
So he's a weapons dealer, but he undergoes a crisis of faith, as it were. He becomes the victim of his own weapons.
He's a shagmonster, sleeping with all and sundry, but then we get to see he's actually probably in love with someone and it's suggested he shags around because he's lonely.
Now to some extent, these ideas are a little familiar, but this is where story telling and execution become of paramount importance. I mean, think about it - how many adaptations of Shakespeare's plays have there been? And, more relevantly, how many works "based on" those stories?
See, the point often isn't necessarily to do something new, but to do it well. And here they really did it well.
The cast is just about perfect - Downey Jr is brilliant as Tony Stark in particular. The effects in particular are spectacular - CGI has so come of age you virtually can't tell it's CGI anymore.
Also, there's a perfect blending between humour and seriousness, just the right amount of action and the right pitch in terms of tone and pathos.
It's not quite as good as Spiderman 2, but this has got to be up there amongst the best Superhero movies I've seen so far.
What's especially interesting is that the deleted scenes are on the disc as extras and I think that every cut they made was right. Sometimes you watch the deleted scenes and think - oh, they should have left that in as it explains better or whatever, but here everything they chopped out made it better.
Er, that's supposed to be a sort of sing-along version of the riff to Sabbath's Iron Man.
Well, anyway, moving right along...
I've never been that big a fan of Iron Man.
I've read the comic a few times, and Marvel are great ones for crossovers, so I've encountered him sometimes in the other books I've read. I dunno - he never really appealed to me, I guess. The thing I liked about the superheroes I tended to follow was that they were more along the lines of greatness-thrust-upon-them.
So I really liked Spiderman - an nerdy kid who has superpowers thrust upon him. He struggles with life just as much - if not more - as he does supervillains. I also really like Wolverine.
Wolverine always had the air that he was dragged into being a superhero because some internal moral compass could never stand to see bad triumph over good and only he could fix it. If he could, he'd happily step back and let others fix it, but when it came down to it, he did what needed to be done.
I also used to like the Punisher. I've not kept up with the newer versions, but the Punisher again was very much like Wolverine. The Punisher tended to deal in real-world crime of course, but there are a lot of similarities again.
One of the problems with Iron Man for me I think was the whole aspect of him being a weapons dealer. It was never clear to me quite how that worked - in the comics he still traded weapons (I think), yet in his spare time he was a vigilante superhero?
Also, the whole rich playboy aspect jarred with what I preferred. Spiderman was a nerdy kid who had to work to pay his bills and struggled with girlfriends, Wolverine I guess had a benefactor in Professor X but was a difficult, surly character who was difficult to love and Punisher could only leave by using the money he got from organised criminals he killed and of course had no love in his life since his family was murdered.
Tony Stark could buy half of the planet and was so damnable handsome, he could have any woman at the click of his fingers. Yeah, great from a power-fantasy point of view, but not my cup of tea.
What they cleverly do in the Iron Man film is iron out all of these issues.
So he's a weapons dealer, but he undergoes a crisis of faith, as it were. He becomes the victim of his own weapons.
He's a shagmonster, sleeping with all and sundry, but then we get to see he's actually probably in love with someone and it's suggested he shags around because he's lonely.
Now to some extent, these ideas are a little familiar, but this is where story telling and execution become of paramount importance. I mean, think about it - how many adaptations of Shakespeare's plays have there been? And, more relevantly, how many works "based on" those stories?
See, the point often isn't necessarily to do something new, but to do it well. And here they really did it well.
The cast is just about perfect - Downey Jr is brilliant as Tony Stark in particular. The effects in particular are spectacular - CGI has so come of age you virtually can't tell it's CGI anymore.
Also, there's a perfect blending between humour and seriousness, just the right amount of action and the right pitch in terms of tone and pathos.
It's not quite as good as Spiderman 2, but this has got to be up there amongst the best Superhero movies I've seen so far.
What's especially interesting is that the deleted scenes are on the disc as extras and I think that every cut they made was right. Sometimes you watch the deleted scenes and think - oh, they should have left that in as it explains better or whatever, but here everything they chopped out made it better.
Tuesday, 30 June 2009
empowered volume 5
When I got back on Friday I was greeted by a pleasant sight - the latest volume of Empowered had turned up.
Empowered is by Adam Warren, who I'm something of a fan of. His drawing style is what's called (or now called - there's something of a plethora of different terms for it) Original English-Language Manga, or OEL.
In other words, he draws in a manga style. It's not an entirely traditional manga style - over the years Warren's style has grown and developed as you'd expect of any artist - but manga-influenced, nonetheless.
Empowered is his latest project - it's been going for a few years now, and this is the fifth volume. Give-or-take, each volume of Emp is better than the last, although my personal opinion was that it dipped a little in volume 4.
Perhaps that's something of a reflection of how much I enjoyed vol3, but I think it was more to do with the extended fight at the end of the volume. It wasn't bad or anything, it just felt a bit 'been there, done that' for some reason - superheroes fighting for huge page counts is in every other book too.
Anyway, the point is that volume 5 is an absolute cracker. It too has a long chapter at the end, which also involves a big old superhero fight, but here Warren does what he's best at in Emp and kinda subverts that. Basically, it all goes tits up and they get wiped out in five minutes and then the rest of the story is about Emp simply trying to survive. Also, we get some true heroism in the form of people sacrificing themselves to save others.
See, there's nothing wrong with Emp using powers to do the superhero thing like in Vol 4, it's just that the book works better when it's subverting (that's really the wrong word, but I can't think of a better one) that idea and showing the other side. The Emp et al being human side.
I mean, in a sense, that's the core theme of the book - if Emp's very fragile suit gets torn up, she looses her powers, yet she still leaps into danger. And also, even when it does get torn up and she looses her powers she still manages to save the day. It's all about the true heroism.
Anyway, enough of the deeper analysis stuff.
What's also great about this volume is that it contains a good balance of "other stuff" too. As the volumes have progressed, the number of characters has greatly increased, as you'd imagine, and quite a few of them are more than just background characters. They're not quite stars of the book, but they're a bit more than supporting characters.
One of my favourites is the caged Demonwolf, a mega-powerful evil entity in the Lovecraftian vein who Emp trapped inside a sort of bondage belt thing. He now basically lives on Emp's coffee table and is essentially just a voice.
But what a voice - he has quite the way of words and is often used by Warren to narrate stories. These take the form of more fanciful/possibly-fictitious accounts through to more realistic narration.
What particularly amused me this volume is that the Demonwolf relates a story and quotes some of the character, but what they say gets processed through Demonwolf speak and becomes very humorous.
There's also a good chunk of Ninjette in the book and a character called Ocelotina recurs too.
This is actually an advantage of the way the book is structured. The book is written as a proper graphic novel, rather than being a collection of individual comic books. This means that chapter length varies, which means a shorter (or longer) chapter featuring a secondary character can be included without needing to batter it into the required page count.
So yeah, check it out.
The last few pages put a lump in my throat and a tear in my eye - if there's any higher recommendation than that, I don't know what it is.
Empowered is by Adam Warren, who I'm something of a fan of. His drawing style is what's called (or now called - there's something of a plethora of different terms for it) Original English-Language Manga, or OEL.
In other words, he draws in a manga style. It's not an entirely traditional manga style - over the years Warren's style has grown and developed as you'd expect of any artist - but manga-influenced, nonetheless.
Empowered is his latest project - it's been going for a few years now, and this is the fifth volume. Give-or-take, each volume of Emp is better than the last, although my personal opinion was that it dipped a little in volume 4.
Perhaps that's something of a reflection of how much I enjoyed vol3, but I think it was more to do with the extended fight at the end of the volume. It wasn't bad or anything, it just felt a bit 'been there, done that' for some reason - superheroes fighting for huge page counts is in every other book too.
Anyway, the point is that volume 5 is an absolute cracker. It too has a long chapter at the end, which also involves a big old superhero fight, but here Warren does what he's best at in Emp and kinda subverts that. Basically, it all goes tits up and they get wiped out in five minutes and then the rest of the story is about Emp simply trying to survive. Also, we get some true heroism in the form of people sacrificing themselves to save others.
See, there's nothing wrong with Emp using powers to do the superhero thing like in Vol 4, it's just that the book works better when it's subverting (that's really the wrong word, but I can't think of a better one) that idea and showing the other side. The Emp et al being human side.
I mean, in a sense, that's the core theme of the book - if Emp's very fragile suit gets torn up, she looses her powers, yet she still leaps into danger. And also, even when it does get torn up and she looses her powers she still manages to save the day. It's all about the true heroism.
Anyway, enough of the deeper analysis stuff.
What's also great about this volume is that it contains a good balance of "other stuff" too. As the volumes have progressed, the number of characters has greatly increased, as you'd imagine, and quite a few of them are more than just background characters. They're not quite stars of the book, but they're a bit more than supporting characters.
One of my favourites is the caged Demonwolf, a mega-powerful evil entity in the Lovecraftian vein who Emp trapped inside a sort of bondage belt thing. He now basically lives on Emp's coffee table and is essentially just a voice.
But what a voice - he has quite the way of words and is often used by Warren to narrate stories. These take the form of more fanciful/possibly-fictitious accounts through to more realistic narration.
What particularly amused me this volume is that the Demonwolf relates a story and quotes some of the character, but what they say gets processed through Demonwolf speak and becomes very humorous.
There's also a good chunk of Ninjette in the book and a character called Ocelotina recurs too.
This is actually an advantage of the way the book is structured. The book is written as a proper graphic novel, rather than being a collection of individual comic books. This means that chapter length varies, which means a shorter (or longer) chapter featuring a secondary character can be included without needing to batter it into the required page count.
So yeah, check it out.
The last few pages put a lump in my throat and a tear in my eye - if there's any higher recommendation than that, I don't know what it is.
Monday, 29 June 2009
phew, what a scorcher
God, it was hot on Saturday.
I managed to get the car washed and polished, but with hindsight, waiting until Sunday would have been the better decision. It was cloudier and a bit cooler on Sunday, so it would have been a more pleasant experience, but not by much, I think.
Saturday spurred me into breaking out the air conditioner on Sunday morning. I think this is going to be a very good thing, as the forecast is for a bit of a heat wave this week.
If this is the case it does mean I made a bit of a tactical error. I was thinking about getting a haircut on Saturday, but in the end was too lazy to bother (I have to get up very early to get to the hairdresser before any sort of queue forms). Whilst I'm not desperate for a haircut, shedding a bit on the top might help if it is going to be scorching.
Sunday I also did a huge amount of scanning and finished all of the magazines. Don't get me wrong, I still have a lot of scanning to do, but it was nice to finish the magazines. I actually put the scanner away as I'm kinda sick of looking at it, but it'll have to come out again soon.
While I scanned I watched some fansubs of course:
I watched some more Hatsukoi Limited. I actually kinda spoiled this for myself a bit by reading the manga online. What happened was I thought I'd see what the manga was like and if it was available in the west, but during my investigations I found it on a scanslation site and also discovered it was only 4 volumes long.
These discoveries kinda meant I ended up reading the whole thing. It was good, but it meant I knew what was coming next in the manga. However, interestingly they've tweaked the anime quite a bit and I actually the think the tweaks are something of an improvement, and definitely flesh things out a bit more.
Oh, and I also discovered it's by the same manga-ka who did Strawberry 100%. The art style is still gorgeous, but it's better than 100% as the plot strands advance in a much more succinct and direct way. There's none of that fannying about and tooing and froing that gets annoying in 100%.
Asura Cryin was kinda rubbish. I mean, it wasn't actively bad, but it was such a generic mish-mash of stuff you've seen before that it was very dull.
There's actually a quote I once heard that went something along the lines of "I'd rather be confused for 10 minutes than bored for 10 seconds" and in a way Asura Cryin tries to follow that principle. It starts off with all sort of weird stuff that you don't really know quite what's going on.
For example, the main character has a female ghost that follows him about. Or another example is a weird girl that turns up and gives him a suitcase. Or the other weird girl that breaks in that night, using magic and threatens him.
But the problem is that all of these surprising elements are basically standard anime elements. I mean, if I'd never seen any anime before ever then maybe it would work, but as it is I was able to guess most of the twists before they happened.
I then watched one episode of something called Jewelpet. This show is definitely not aimed at me - it's aimed at little girls and not only that, but it's raison d'etre is selling toys to young girls. Think Transformers, Pokemon, Beyblade, etc - it's a show aimed at flogging toys.
It was also quite poorly (cheaply) animated and wasn't exactly based on an original concept - there are these magical creatures that look like jewels lost around the earth and you have to go and find them.
However, more in my age group is Sengoku Basara. I have to admit that on some level I was a little disappointed by Sengoku Basara, because it was exactly what I was expecting.
I know that sounds weird, but I think I was secretly hoping for a bit more of a surprise element to it. I mean, what's there is all perfectly good, but if it had whipped out something extra - something a bit more bonkers maybe - I'd have liked it more.
Also, I was a little unsure how serious it was meant to be. There were some thing that were quite comical, but I wasn't sure how much of the rest of the show was supposed to be taken in that vein. For example, there's a really hot ninja who has a sort of 'love-explosion' moment where the background goes pink and she makes an orgasmic face. Which was quite funny, but a lot of the rest of the show was played with straight faces.
But don't get me wrong - I liked it, just probably not as much as I'd hoped.
I managed to get the car washed and polished, but with hindsight, waiting until Sunday would have been the better decision. It was cloudier and a bit cooler on Sunday, so it would have been a more pleasant experience, but not by much, I think.
Saturday spurred me into breaking out the air conditioner on Sunday morning. I think this is going to be a very good thing, as the forecast is for a bit of a heat wave this week.
If this is the case it does mean I made a bit of a tactical error. I was thinking about getting a haircut on Saturday, but in the end was too lazy to bother (I have to get up very early to get to the hairdresser before any sort of queue forms). Whilst I'm not desperate for a haircut, shedding a bit on the top might help if it is going to be scorching.
Sunday I also did a huge amount of scanning and finished all of the magazines. Don't get me wrong, I still have a lot of scanning to do, but it was nice to finish the magazines. I actually put the scanner away as I'm kinda sick of looking at it, but it'll have to come out again soon.
While I scanned I watched some fansubs of course:
I watched some more Hatsukoi Limited. I actually kinda spoiled this for myself a bit by reading the manga online. What happened was I thought I'd see what the manga was like and if it was available in the west, but during my investigations I found it on a scanslation site and also discovered it was only 4 volumes long.
These discoveries kinda meant I ended up reading the whole thing. It was good, but it meant I knew what was coming next in the manga. However, interestingly they've tweaked the anime quite a bit and I actually the think the tweaks are something of an improvement, and definitely flesh things out a bit more.
Oh, and I also discovered it's by the same manga-ka who did Strawberry 100%. The art style is still gorgeous, but it's better than 100% as the plot strands advance in a much more succinct and direct way. There's none of that fannying about and tooing and froing that gets annoying in 100%.
Asura Cryin was kinda rubbish. I mean, it wasn't actively bad, but it was such a generic mish-mash of stuff you've seen before that it was very dull.
There's actually a quote I once heard that went something along the lines of "I'd rather be confused for 10 minutes than bored for 10 seconds" and in a way Asura Cryin tries to follow that principle. It starts off with all sort of weird stuff that you don't really know quite what's going on.
For example, the main character has a female ghost that follows him about. Or another example is a weird girl that turns up and gives him a suitcase. Or the other weird girl that breaks in that night, using magic and threatens him.
But the problem is that all of these surprising elements are basically standard anime elements. I mean, if I'd never seen any anime before ever then maybe it would work, but as it is I was able to guess most of the twists before they happened.
I then watched one episode of something called Jewelpet. This show is definitely not aimed at me - it's aimed at little girls and not only that, but it's raison d'etre is selling toys to young girls. Think Transformers, Pokemon, Beyblade, etc - it's a show aimed at flogging toys.
It was also quite poorly (cheaply) animated and wasn't exactly based on an original concept - there are these magical creatures that look like jewels lost around the earth and you have to go and find them.
However, more in my age group is Sengoku Basara. I have to admit that on some level I was a little disappointed by Sengoku Basara, because it was exactly what I was expecting.
I know that sounds weird, but I think I was secretly hoping for a bit more of a surprise element to it. I mean, what's there is all perfectly good, but if it had whipped out something extra - something a bit more bonkers maybe - I'd have liked it more.
Also, I was a little unsure how serious it was meant to be. There were some thing that were quite comical, but I wasn't sure how much of the rest of the show was supposed to be taken in that vein. For example, there's a really hot ninja who has a sort of 'love-explosion' moment where the background goes pink and she makes an orgasmic face. Which was quite funny, but a lot of the rest of the show was played with straight faces.
But don't get me wrong - I liked it, just probably not as much as I'd hoped.
Friday, 26 June 2009
at the carwash... yeah
My only real plan for this weekend is to thoroughly clean my car - hopefully even to the extent of polishing it!
This is mainly because my landlord has gone on holiday... again. He did this two years ago as well - I think he had 4 separate holidays over the summer period, but then last year I don't think he had one. Not that I'm complaining - more power to him, he should be enjoying his retirement.
Trouble is, it currently looks like the weather is having other ideas - the forecasts are for more rain :/.
I've done a bit more scanning and watched the following:
Cross Game was surprisingly good. On the face of it, it seemed like a baseball sports-drama, and while it is definitely that, it's also quite a bit more too.
If I'm honest, I felt he first episode dragged a bit. I suppose it seemed that everything was a bit too nice and perfect for the man character, Ko. The characters were also quite young and it felt a lot like the show was aimed at that same demographic.
However, towards the end of the first ep there was quite a harsh tragedy (I fair got a lump in me throat) and it kinda hooked me in with that. The next episode skipped ahead 4 years so the characters were now into their teen years at middle school and with it the complexity also seemed to jump.
In other words, there seemed to be some quite complicated interpersonal relationships developing, as well as the whole baseball thing. So yeah, enjoyed it more than I thought I would and would probably watch it if it ever became available, though maybe not buy it.
It's a similar sort of story with Hatsukoi Limited. Well I don't mean story-story - Hatsukoi Limited has nothing to do with baseball - what I mean is that I found it surprisingly good.
It's a little difficult to explain what Hatsukoi is about, mainly because it's not that complicated. I know that sounds weird, but basically it's because it blends together a lot of genres. It's a romantic comedy at heart, but the easiest way I can describe it is to say that it's a lot like Azumanga Diaoh, but with all the girls being total stunners depicted in a more realistic style.
Which is where it gets complicated because I want to start adding in things like it's rather reminiscent of School Rumble too, but I'll stop there. The real thing of note is that I enjoyed it quite a lot and found it to be really quite amusing.
But I guess I should also comment on the big news of the day - Farrah Fawcett died! No wait, I mean Michael Jackson died.
It's all very sudden and shocking. Jackson was kinda ubiquitous when I was growing up - Thriller and Bad were released at the time I was a young kid, and they were all pervasive.
He had some good songs as well, I'll give him that, although clearly he wasn't what anyone would describe as "normal". But then how could he have been? He was a child star and went on to have the biggest selling album ever in thriller - anyone would end up a bit abnormal from all that.
This is mainly because my landlord has gone on holiday... again. He did this two years ago as well - I think he had 4 separate holidays over the summer period, but then last year I don't think he had one. Not that I'm complaining - more power to him, he should be enjoying his retirement.
Trouble is, it currently looks like the weather is having other ideas - the forecasts are for more rain :/.
I've done a bit more scanning and watched the following:
Cross Game was surprisingly good. On the face of it, it seemed like a baseball sports-drama, and while it is definitely that, it's also quite a bit more too.
If I'm honest, I felt he first episode dragged a bit. I suppose it seemed that everything was a bit too nice and perfect for the man character, Ko. The characters were also quite young and it felt a lot like the show was aimed at that same demographic.
However, towards the end of the first ep there was quite a harsh tragedy (I fair got a lump in me throat) and it kinda hooked me in with that. The next episode skipped ahead 4 years so the characters were now into their teen years at middle school and with it the complexity also seemed to jump.
In other words, there seemed to be some quite complicated interpersonal relationships developing, as well as the whole baseball thing. So yeah, enjoyed it more than I thought I would and would probably watch it if it ever became available, though maybe not buy it.
It's a similar sort of story with Hatsukoi Limited. Well I don't mean story-story - Hatsukoi Limited has nothing to do with baseball - what I mean is that I found it surprisingly good.
It's a little difficult to explain what Hatsukoi is about, mainly because it's not that complicated. I know that sounds weird, but basically it's because it blends together a lot of genres. It's a romantic comedy at heart, but the easiest way I can describe it is to say that it's a lot like Azumanga Diaoh, but with all the girls being total stunners depicted in a more realistic style.
Which is where it gets complicated because I want to start adding in things like it's rather reminiscent of School Rumble too, but I'll stop there. The real thing of note is that I enjoyed it quite a lot and found it to be really quite amusing.
But I guess I should also comment on the big news of the day - Farrah Fawcett died! No wait, I mean Michael Jackson died.
It's all very sudden and shocking. Jackson was kinda ubiquitous when I was growing up - Thriller and Bad were released at the time I was a young kid, and they were all pervasive.
He had some good songs as well, I'll give him that, although clearly he wasn't what anyone would describe as "normal". But then how could he have been? He was a child star and went on to have the biggest selling album ever in thriller - anyone would end up a bit abnormal from all that.
Thursday, 25 June 2009
bad science
My birthday was a little odd this year - it fell really close to the whole Monaco trip, so for one thing I couldn't really afford to do anything spectacular, but for another it meant the presents from my family members were much delayed.
What I got from my Dad has been really interesting - he bought me a bread maker and a steamer. With the weather having been so hot recently I can't say I've really had a chance to use the steamer yet, but it looks like a really good model. Hopefully I'll give it a whirl with cooking some rice this weekend, which is a pretty basic thing admittedly, but it'll at least give me the chance to try it out.
The bread maker is really great and I've been having lots of fun making loafs of bread. I've not ventured too far from the traditional white bread, but even with that there are different variations - sandwich or more traditional, different sizes and whether you want light or dark crust.
The least successful side of it for me is the sizes - small loafs work really well and are manageable, but the larger loaves are not so easily used. I mean, they're great, it's just they're difficult to cut up, especially for sandwiches, which is what I mainly use bread for, because of the shape they come out in.
But most recipes appear to have smaller versions, so it's not so much of a problem. My next big venture will be into bread rolls I think - they're slightly more complex in that the bread maker only does half the job and you have to do the last bit.
Anyway, the thing I wanted to mainly mention was what my sister got me. She got me a couple of DVDs, but also a book called "bad science" by Ben Goldacre.
It's an interesting read. It covers quite a few subjects, including CAM ("Conventional and Alternative Medicine") and the MMR hoax. I'd always known CAM was pure bullshit and that the MMR hoax was, at best misplaced good intention and at worst, outright lies, so it wasn't these that's got me thinking the most.
What got me thinking was the section on Nutritionists.
It turns out that nutritionism is little more than extension of the hocus-pocus of CAM. The practitioners (or bullshit peddlers is probably a better phrase) of this pseudo-science are little better than the crystal-healers and homeopathic experts of CAM.
This really surprised me, because where homeopathy seems fairly ignored by the news, nutritionist stuff does seem to be in the main stream. Think of all those "diet doctor" type programs any you'll see what I mean. Plus, even the BBC has news articles when the latest stuff about miracle foods emerges.
But the reality is that most of these are nearly total bullshit. The problem seems to come from the fact that proper science is done, but it's miss-reported and miss-represented. Also, there's lots of really bad science done.
The books well worth reading, although I have to admit to a little bit of a dislike for Goldacre's style. It's kind of an odd one, because the people he talks about are clearly contemptible and the bad science conducted is clearly worthy of some scorn. The problem I'm having is he doesn't pull back on the contempt and scorn in the way he writes.
So while I've no problem with him fundamentally doing that, it can read like a personal attack, rather than an evidence-based dissection, which is what it actually is.
What I got from my Dad has been really interesting - he bought me a bread maker and a steamer. With the weather having been so hot recently I can't say I've really had a chance to use the steamer yet, but it looks like a really good model. Hopefully I'll give it a whirl with cooking some rice this weekend, which is a pretty basic thing admittedly, but it'll at least give me the chance to try it out.
The bread maker is really great and I've been having lots of fun making loafs of bread. I've not ventured too far from the traditional white bread, but even with that there are different variations - sandwich or more traditional, different sizes and whether you want light or dark crust.
The least successful side of it for me is the sizes - small loafs work really well and are manageable, but the larger loaves are not so easily used. I mean, they're great, it's just they're difficult to cut up, especially for sandwiches, which is what I mainly use bread for, because of the shape they come out in.
But most recipes appear to have smaller versions, so it's not so much of a problem. My next big venture will be into bread rolls I think - they're slightly more complex in that the bread maker only does half the job and you have to do the last bit.
Anyway, the thing I wanted to mainly mention was what my sister got me. She got me a couple of DVDs, but also a book called "bad science" by Ben Goldacre.
It's an interesting read. It covers quite a few subjects, including CAM ("Conventional and Alternative Medicine") and the MMR hoax. I'd always known CAM was pure bullshit and that the MMR hoax was, at best misplaced good intention and at worst, outright lies, so it wasn't these that's got me thinking the most.
What got me thinking was the section on Nutritionists.
It turns out that nutritionism is little more than extension of the hocus-pocus of CAM. The practitioners (or bullshit peddlers is probably a better phrase) of this pseudo-science are little better than the crystal-healers and homeopathic experts of CAM.
This really surprised me, because where homeopathy seems fairly ignored by the news, nutritionist stuff does seem to be in the main stream. Think of all those "diet doctor" type programs any you'll see what I mean. Plus, even the BBC has news articles when the latest stuff about miracle foods emerges.
But the reality is that most of these are nearly total bullshit. The problem seems to come from the fact that proper science is done, but it's miss-reported and miss-represented. Also, there's lots of really bad science done.
The books well worth reading, although I have to admit to a little bit of a dislike for Goldacre's style. It's kind of an odd one, because the people he talks about are clearly contemptible and the bad science conducted is clearly worthy of some scorn. The problem I'm having is he doesn't pull back on the contempt and scorn in the way he writes.
So while I've no problem with him fundamentally doing that, it can read like a personal attack, rather than an evidence-based dissection, which is what it actually is.
Wednesday, 24 June 2009
planet terror
Grindhouse was a project undertaken by Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez a few years back now.
The idea was for them to both produce a film that harked back to the b-movies that they'd "grown up on". These would then be shown as a double feature, back-to-back, with a few additional bits and pieces chucked in, like fake trailers. QT's offering was called Death Prof, and Rodriguez's feature was Planet Terror.
Broadly speaking it didn't work and flopped a bit at the box office. What they hadn't really factored in was that people aren't really keen on double features any more. Even though cinema ticket prices are quite expensive nowadays, the extra value offered by a double feature didn't really appeal to people.
Certainly I personally can remember thinking that over 3 hours of cinema sitting wasn't much fun for my bum during the LotR features and don't think I'd have much fancied it for the Grindhouse double feature )this was only done in the states - everywhere else got them separate).
So they've also split them up for DVD and extend them a bit. There's still a super-deluxe original-format Grindhouse version I believe, but for the purposes of recouping costs, separating the DVDs makes sense.
I've not seen death proof yet - they're both on my rental lists, and it seems planet terror has popped out first.
Tbh, I don't really mind too much, as of the two I prefer Rodriguez. If I'm honest I'm not quite as enamoured of QT as most film buffs - not that I think his stuff is bad, I just don't orgasm over it in the same way.
Anyway, the point is to talk about Planet Terror.
Overall, my verdict is that it's okay.
Basically, it's roughly a zombie-apocalypse film, although this is actually one of its problems - it's not quite a zombie apocalypse film and I think it would have been a bit better if it had definitely been that.
What it does to very well is capture the cheesiness of such B-movie fair. The problem with this is it means this film is also cheesy. Admittedly it's cheesy with a few knowing winks, but still cheesy.
Also I think a few more direct references to classic B-movies would have helped. There are a few, but not as many as I'd hoped. Instead, as the (interesting) Rodriguez commentary track explains it's more of a homage in general sense.
So we get Carpenter-esque theme tunes or scenes similar in style to his stuff, but not actually directly referencing his films. This works but only so much. Also it becomes apparent that Rodriguez is definitely a Carpenter fanboy.
This is great in that I'm also a bit of a Carpenter fanboy, but the problem is that it needed a bit more of a wider fanbase. Some more influences would have helped, as it it's like why not just watch a Carpenter film instead?
The only other thing that I found odd was that the films were on one level a homage to B-movies of the seventies and eighties and yet they featured a lot of very modern stuff. It's like, the cars were old and the way people dressed was somewhat of the period, yet people had what looked like blackberrys.
Similarly, the films were processed and all scratched up as if they were proper, abused double feature prints (there was even a 'missing reel') from long ago, and yet the plot refers to Osama Bin Laden - a very modern thing.
It made it a little confusing.
Anyway, overall I liked the film, but perhaps not as much as I'd hoped.
The idea was for them to both produce a film that harked back to the b-movies that they'd "grown up on". These would then be shown as a double feature, back-to-back, with a few additional bits and pieces chucked in, like fake trailers. QT's offering was called Death Prof, and Rodriguez's feature was Planet Terror.
Broadly speaking it didn't work and flopped a bit at the box office. What they hadn't really factored in was that people aren't really keen on double features any more. Even though cinema ticket prices are quite expensive nowadays, the extra value offered by a double feature didn't really appeal to people.
Certainly I personally can remember thinking that over 3 hours of cinema sitting wasn't much fun for my bum during the LotR features and don't think I'd have much fancied it for the Grindhouse double feature )this was only done in the states - everywhere else got them separate).
So they've also split them up for DVD and extend them a bit. There's still a super-deluxe original-format Grindhouse version I believe, but for the purposes of recouping costs, separating the DVDs makes sense.
I've not seen death proof yet - they're both on my rental lists, and it seems planet terror has popped out first.
Tbh, I don't really mind too much, as of the two I prefer Rodriguez. If I'm honest I'm not quite as enamoured of QT as most film buffs - not that I think his stuff is bad, I just don't orgasm over it in the same way.
Anyway, the point is to talk about Planet Terror.
Overall, my verdict is that it's okay.
Basically, it's roughly a zombie-apocalypse film, although this is actually one of its problems - it's not quite a zombie apocalypse film and I think it would have been a bit better if it had definitely been that.
What it does to very well is capture the cheesiness of such B-movie fair. The problem with this is it means this film is also cheesy. Admittedly it's cheesy with a few knowing winks, but still cheesy.
Also I think a few more direct references to classic B-movies would have helped. There are a few, but not as many as I'd hoped. Instead, as the (interesting) Rodriguez commentary track explains it's more of a homage in general sense.
So we get Carpenter-esque theme tunes or scenes similar in style to his stuff, but not actually directly referencing his films. This works but only so much. Also it becomes apparent that Rodriguez is definitely a Carpenter fanboy.
This is great in that I'm also a bit of a Carpenter fanboy, but the problem is that it needed a bit more of a wider fanbase. Some more influences would have helped, as it it's like why not just watch a Carpenter film instead?
The only other thing that I found odd was that the films were on one level a homage to B-movies of the seventies and eighties and yet they featured a lot of very modern stuff. It's like, the cars were old and the way people dressed was somewhat of the period, yet people had what looked like blackberrys.
Similarly, the films were processed and all scratched up as if they were proper, abused double feature prints (there was even a 'missing reel') from long ago, and yet the plot refers to Osama Bin Laden - a very modern thing.
It made it a little confusing.
Anyway, overall I liked the film, but perhaps not as much as I'd hoped.
Tuesday, 23 June 2009
keep on scanning
So I've been scanning away like mad just recently. I didn't get quite as much done over the weekend as I'd hoped, though. I mean I did a fair bit - a newtype, an animage and the posters from a megami - but I'd been hoping to get almost all of it done.
Part of the problem was that there was loads of telly for me to watch.
I noted before that I've been watching Big Brother and that essentially adds the best part of 7-8 hours of telly watching to my schedule per week. Now it's not as bad as that sounds, because it's more like one hour every day, but it means I can't watch other stuff in that hour, obviously.
But the big thing that's currently knackering me up is Thursday nights. For some reason about a third the programs I'm watching are all scheduled on a Thursday night. It's kind of getting a bit silly, tbh and I'm both hoping one or two of them will end and that I'll be brave enough to severe a couple of them, as they're not that good if I'm brutally honest.
Anyway, the anime shows I've been sampling while scanning have been:
Every year there are one or two shows that are 'stand-out' series for me. They're the shows that I desperately hope will get licensed in the west, and if I ever got to the stage of properly controlling my excessive spending, I would still buy these shows.
One of the best way for me to tell a show like this is if I get to the end of my usual 3 episode sample and I feel torn as to whether I should sample the fourth episode too. If I have a really strong desire to just keep going then that means the show is on the stand-out list. Of course if I'm a bit more happy to put it on hold then it can still be a good show I would probably buy (or all the levels below), but it's just not the best of the best.
Eden of The East is the first stand-out show I've found from this season's crop. It's got a really intriguing plot, an interesting idea behind it and deep characters - what more could you want?
Tayutama Kiss on my Deity was distinctly "meh". I actually only bothered watching 2 episodes as it sat neatly into a few holes.
Basically, it's an 'instant girlfriend' harem type show. The plot is about spirits and stuff, and to be frank it was kinda uninspired. Also, there seemed to be a severe lack of fan-service, which is normally a staple of this sort of show, so it didn't even have that going for it - plus the character designs weren't too my taste either.
Part of the problem was that there was loads of telly for me to watch.
I noted before that I've been watching Big Brother and that essentially adds the best part of 7-8 hours of telly watching to my schedule per week. Now it's not as bad as that sounds, because it's more like one hour every day, but it means I can't watch other stuff in that hour, obviously.
But the big thing that's currently knackering me up is Thursday nights. For some reason about a third the programs I'm watching are all scheduled on a Thursday night. It's kind of getting a bit silly, tbh and I'm both hoping one or two of them will end and that I'll be brave enough to severe a couple of them, as they're not that good if I'm brutally honest.
Anyway, the anime shows I've been sampling while scanning have been:
Every year there are one or two shows that are 'stand-out' series for me. They're the shows that I desperately hope will get licensed in the west, and if I ever got to the stage of properly controlling my excessive spending, I would still buy these shows.
One of the best way for me to tell a show like this is if I get to the end of my usual 3 episode sample and I feel torn as to whether I should sample the fourth episode too. If I have a really strong desire to just keep going then that means the show is on the stand-out list. Of course if I'm a bit more happy to put it on hold then it can still be a good show I would probably buy (or all the levels below), but it's just not the best of the best.
Eden of The East is the first stand-out show I've found from this season's crop. It's got a really intriguing plot, an interesting idea behind it and deep characters - what more could you want?
Tayutama Kiss on my Deity was distinctly "meh". I actually only bothered watching 2 episodes as it sat neatly into a few holes.
Basically, it's an 'instant girlfriend' harem type show. The plot is about spirits and stuff, and to be frank it was kinda uninspired. Also, there seemed to be a severe lack of fan-service, which is normally a staple of this sort of show, so it didn't even have that going for it - plus the character designs weren't too my taste either.
Monday, 22 June 2009
silverston's swansong?
On Sunday it was the British Grand Prix at Silverston.
Potentially this could be the last Silverston Grand Prix for a very long time. Bernie Eccleston, the "commercial rights holder" for F1, has signed a 17 year deal with Donnington Park for them to hold the British Grand Prix.
However, there is quite a lot of doubt as to whether Donnington will actually be ready in time for next year. There's been some stuff in the news about some financial struggles they've been having and there's quite a lot of money that needs spending, in order to improve the track and the facilities so that it can hold a GP.
Bernie had made a proclamation that if Donnington wasn't ready next year then there wouldn't be a 2010 British GP as it wasn't coming back to Silverston. This was not good news.
One of the things I like about British GP fans is that they're both passionate and knowledgeable, but they're also magnanimous. If someone drives well and wins - even if it's not what we were hoping for - then we'll congratulate them too. This was amply demonstrated by the big cheer Sebastian Vettel got this year after his truly dominate performance this year, even though all the Brits were clearly hoping Button would win here too.
In other words, Britain is one of the few places on the calendar where F1 (and, indeed, motorsport in general actually) gets a huge reception. The atmosphere is always great and the crowds are always big and vocal.
The same can't be said about a lot of the tracks on the modern roster. Indeed, some of them you're hard pushed to see any spectators in the grandstands, even on Sunday.
Now don't get me wrong, I don't mean that from the point of view of there's no point gong there, but it make it disappointing that Bernie was basically implying there wouldn't be a 2010 British GP.
However, he now appears to have relented, saying that there are now more "commercial people" in the BRDC so he's okay with Silverston having it in 2010 if Donnington isn't ready. The BRDC is the British Racing Driver's Club and they actually 'own' Silverston (I think it's actually held in trust or something) and this comes down to the crux of why Bernie doesn't like Silverston - he hates the BRDC.
From some perspectives you can understand why - the problem with this type of ownership is that it's put a lot of difficult restrictions on raising money to improve the rack, etc.
But here's the thing that makes this an annoying situation - Silverston makes no money from hosting the British Grand Prix, mainly because Bernie charges a fortune for the rights.
When you think about that it's quite an amazing revelation because tickets to the Grand Prix (and the Friday and Saturday supporting days) cost a small fortune. They're way over £100, but if you use that as a basic number, and then think that about 300,000 people attended this year (admittedly a record attendance, but still) then that means £30,000,000 revenue. And Bernie takes so much of it they can't make a profit.
He also keeps all the money generated from TV revenue. He is literally the fat cat that hoovers up most all the cash F1 generates.
Add to that the fact that he and Max Mosley - the head of the FIA - are thick as thieves and you start to understand why the teams have been acting the way they have this year.
Potentially this could be the last Silverston Grand Prix for a very long time. Bernie Eccleston, the "commercial rights holder" for F1, has signed a 17 year deal with Donnington Park for them to hold the British Grand Prix.
However, there is quite a lot of doubt as to whether Donnington will actually be ready in time for next year. There's been some stuff in the news about some financial struggles they've been having and there's quite a lot of money that needs spending, in order to improve the track and the facilities so that it can hold a GP.
Bernie had made a proclamation that if Donnington wasn't ready next year then there wouldn't be a 2010 British GP as it wasn't coming back to Silverston. This was not good news.
One of the things I like about British GP fans is that they're both passionate and knowledgeable, but they're also magnanimous. If someone drives well and wins - even if it's not what we were hoping for - then we'll congratulate them too. This was amply demonstrated by the big cheer Sebastian Vettel got this year after his truly dominate performance this year, even though all the Brits were clearly hoping Button would win here too.
In other words, Britain is one of the few places on the calendar where F1 (and, indeed, motorsport in general actually) gets a huge reception. The atmosphere is always great and the crowds are always big and vocal.
The same can't be said about a lot of the tracks on the modern roster. Indeed, some of them you're hard pushed to see any spectators in the grandstands, even on Sunday.
Now don't get me wrong, I don't mean that from the point of view of there's no point gong there, but it make it disappointing that Bernie was basically implying there wouldn't be a 2010 British GP.
However, he now appears to have relented, saying that there are now more "commercial people" in the BRDC so he's okay with Silverston having it in 2010 if Donnington isn't ready. The BRDC is the British Racing Driver's Club and they actually 'own' Silverston (I think it's actually held in trust or something) and this comes down to the crux of why Bernie doesn't like Silverston - he hates the BRDC.
From some perspectives you can understand why - the problem with this type of ownership is that it's put a lot of difficult restrictions on raising money to improve the rack, etc.
But here's the thing that makes this an annoying situation - Silverston makes no money from hosting the British Grand Prix, mainly because Bernie charges a fortune for the rights.
When you think about that it's quite an amazing revelation because tickets to the Grand Prix (and the Friday and Saturday supporting days) cost a small fortune. They're way over £100, but if you use that as a basic number, and then think that about 300,000 people attended this year (admittedly a record attendance, but still) then that means £30,000,000 revenue. And Bernie takes so much of it they can't make a profit.
He also keeps all the money generated from TV revenue. He is literally the fat cat that hoovers up most all the cash F1 generates.
Add to that the fact that he and Max Mosley - the head of the FIA - are thick as thieves and you start to understand why the teams have been acting the way they have this year.
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