So this Saturday it is, almost unbelievably, exactly four weeks until Christmas.
I think three or four weeks to go is the point where it becomes okay to actively start thinking about this particular holiday. I mean, it's okay to book holiday and stuff, as I generally need to do this some way in advance, but in terms of actively thinking about it as being 'just around the corner', three or four weeks is the time.
I also think this is the point at which Christmas advertising become legitimate. As everyone I get rather annoyed at the steady encroachment of Chrimbo backwards into the year. I genuinely saw my first Chrimbo related shop stuff about a month back and that is way too early.
I'm not the biggest fan of Christmas. It's okay as a point in the year to see your family and friends and I can see the point of celebrating the mid-winter solstice, although the whole Christian side of things does leave an unpleasant taste on my atheistic taste buds. But the whole excess consumption and forced frivolity and joviality doesn't really do anything for me.
Anyway, point is I was thinking about potential gifts this last week. My family has thankfully fully abandoned any sort of ritual f having to guess gifts. We all specifically ask each other for things and it tends to save a lot of hassle, although there's obviously the loss of the magic of the surprise perfect gift.
What I try to do is provide a wide range of options across a broad range of prices. So there'll be a few books on the list, which will only be around a tenner, then there'll be a few DVDs heading up into the £20 bracket, and maybe a couple of games, which are more around £30-£40.
That way the family can get me a combination that suits their particular budget, but also maintains an element of surprise for me as there's more stuff on there than they could sensibly all buy me.
There'll also be some specific gift requests for my Dad, who likes to buy a bigger, more substantial present. Usually this revolves around some particular gadget - my bread maker, for example. But this year I have to confess something of a difference. This year I want clothes.
See, recently I've really noticed that my body is changing.
I know that's a fairly obvious thing to say, given the extent of the weight loss, but it's only really recently that I've been able to actually see changes in my body. And more specifically and important, my trousers are getting to the point of proper looseness.
In particular, there's a pair of jeans that only stay aloft due to a thoroughly tightened belt. Then there's the work trousers, where I have one pair that's slightly looser and I'm in danger of loosing them on occasion. And with my work belt I regularly find myself tightening it to the fifth hole, which was previously unimaginable. Even my elasticised tracksuit bottoms are more reliant on the drawstring than the actual elastic.
This is all really good, but it means I'm going to have to start buying new clothes. Trouble is I know they're only going to be temporary. In however many months (three or four) I'm surely going to need a whole load of new clothes.
Hence I've actually asked my dad for cash. Hopefully I can get some really cheap clothes that I won't mind replacing. Maybe there'll even be some cash left over that I can use to offset the next wave of clothes buying? Or perhaps my birthday present and next year's Christmas presents are also pre-decided!
Friday, 26 November 2010
Thursday, 25 November 2010
edging ever closer
The weekend revealed another step closer to my weight loss goal for the year.
And it was a much more impressive change than last week, as I'd lost 4 pounds. I now need to loose about 11 pounds before the end of the year and if I can have a few weeks where I achieve weight loss like this last weekend I may well reach my goal before Christmas.
I'm not planning on doing that - the goal is still the end of the year, so if I don't get there before Chrimbo I won't be too disappointed. Still, it'd be nice to no longer be morbidly obese before Christmas... and eating and drinking too much and putting some of it back on again :/.
I think I've mentioned this before, but one of the things I've been doing to help me exercise is listen to audiobooks. I'm pretty sure I did mention it, as, in order to get the audiobooks I joined Amazon's audible site and discovered the books have a horrible DRM that it's a pain to get around (you have to burn them to CD via iPlayer (yuck) and then rip them from CD, which takes ages).
The reason I started listening to the books was because I'd been trying to listen to songs and not really enjoying it.
See, I know when people run they tend to put playlists together and listen to them, and I think that might work because you can choose songs all of a roughly similar tempo. You can then run too that tempo. But I have several problems - firstly I don't really like listening to random songs, as I prefer to listen to complete albums and secondly, the faff of putting together a playlist just seems like too much hassle.
But also, and most importantly, I found it difficult to match the tempos. Obviously, when you're listening to an album (well, an album of proper music, not some dance tracks where all the tempos are the same) you're going to get varying tempos, but also when you walk in real life, rather than run on a treadmill your pace varies all over the shop.
You might have to walk uphill for a bit, then downhill, or you might be on a nicely tarmaced pavement before then walking down some pot-holed track. So you can't really maintain the same pace of walking, so I found listening to music slightly unhelpful.
With an audiobook it doesn't matter - people don't talk at a fixed tempo. Also, you can actively listen to what they're saying and obviously enjoy it. And as a bonus it's a good way of reading and therefore doing something "productive" while I do something "unproductive" (the quotes are because yes, I appreciate that technically, doing exercise is a different sort of productive, but in my mind it's dead or wasted time, which, when you analyse it, is probably a big part of how I ended up the way I am).
And it was a much more impressive change than last week, as I'd lost 4 pounds. I now need to loose about 11 pounds before the end of the year and if I can have a few weeks where I achieve weight loss like this last weekend I may well reach my goal before Christmas.
I'm not planning on doing that - the goal is still the end of the year, so if I don't get there before Chrimbo I won't be too disappointed. Still, it'd be nice to no longer be morbidly obese before Christmas... and eating and drinking too much and putting some of it back on again :/.
I think I've mentioned this before, but one of the things I've been doing to help me exercise is listen to audiobooks. I'm pretty sure I did mention it, as, in order to get the audiobooks I joined Amazon's audible site and discovered the books have a horrible DRM that it's a pain to get around (you have to burn them to CD via iPlayer (yuck) and then rip them from CD, which takes ages).
The reason I started listening to the books was because I'd been trying to listen to songs and not really enjoying it.
See, I know when people run they tend to put playlists together and listen to them, and I think that might work because you can choose songs all of a roughly similar tempo. You can then run too that tempo. But I have several problems - firstly I don't really like listening to random songs, as I prefer to listen to complete albums and secondly, the faff of putting together a playlist just seems like too much hassle.
But also, and most importantly, I found it difficult to match the tempos. Obviously, when you're listening to an album (well, an album of proper music, not some dance tracks where all the tempos are the same) you're going to get varying tempos, but also when you walk in real life, rather than run on a treadmill your pace varies all over the shop.
You might have to walk uphill for a bit, then downhill, or you might be on a nicely tarmaced pavement before then walking down some pot-holed track. So you can't really maintain the same pace of walking, so I found listening to music slightly unhelpful.
With an audiobook it doesn't matter - people don't talk at a fixed tempo. Also, you can actively listen to what they're saying and obviously enjoy it. And as a bonus it's a good way of reading and therefore doing something "productive" while I do something "unproductive" (the quotes are because yes, I appreciate that technically, doing exercise is a different sort of productive, but in my mind it's dead or wasted time, which, when you analyse it, is probably a big part of how I ended up the way I am).
Wednesday, 24 November 2010
domino
The domino of the title is one Domino Harvey, who was a bounty hunter.
I say 'was' because she died of a drug overdose shortly before this film based (very loosely) on her life was released. What also makes her interesting was that she was a rather unusual character, being a not unattractive, fairly slight English girl from a decent background in a rather rough job.
Bounty hunting is one of those jobs that has a weird sort of mystique, even though it's actually a fairly simple activity in the main. By that I mean that really they just go around people who've skipped out on court dates and therefore broken the terms of their bail.
In other words, generally, they're suspected criminals who haven't turned up for their court dates. Now given we're really talking about blue collar criminals - thieves, junkies, con men - that sort of level of crime, you can see how it would be very dangerous (the US is one of the only counties where it's a legal job) and also not really all that glamorous.
It's not like Bobba Fett chasing after Han Solo.
Anyway, the point is with Domino, she didn't exactly fit the stereotype, and much of the film plays on that juxtaposition. It also plays quite a bit to the lowest common denominator, but it does so in a broadly knowing way.
The other key element to the film is that it's by Tony Scott, who has a rather distinctive visual style. In fact, if I'm honest it's this visual style that I enjoyed, rather than the story.
See, the problem with the story is it's one of mounting escalation and it eventually reaches a point where it breaks past credulity. For me, this rather popped me out of the film and from then on it was daft.
Up until then it had been hovering around level of silliness, but not going too far. After that point is was just plain silly and that was a little disappointing. It also didn't help that because it was sort of based on a real person and then segwayed into this over-the-top Hollywoodness. It just didn't fit.
The other thing I was struck by on the negative side was that Kera Knighley didn't really seem to fit the role properly. I think it was her accent - she obviously sounded English, being English, but I think she would have been better taking the edge of her cut-glass upper-class accent. If she'd gone for something regional I'm not sure that would have worked, it's just her accent as was jarred a bit too much.
Overall, I enjoyed the film, but only as a visual spectacle and popcorn action movie level.
I say 'was' because she died of a drug overdose shortly before this film based (very loosely) on her life was released. What also makes her interesting was that she was a rather unusual character, being a not unattractive, fairly slight English girl from a decent background in a rather rough job.
Bounty hunting is one of those jobs that has a weird sort of mystique, even though it's actually a fairly simple activity in the main. By that I mean that really they just go around people who've skipped out on court dates and therefore broken the terms of their bail.
In other words, generally, they're suspected criminals who haven't turned up for their court dates. Now given we're really talking about blue collar criminals - thieves, junkies, con men - that sort of level of crime, you can see how it would be very dangerous (the US is one of the only counties where it's a legal job) and also not really all that glamorous.
It's not like Bobba Fett chasing after Han Solo.
Anyway, the point is with Domino, she didn't exactly fit the stereotype, and much of the film plays on that juxtaposition. It also plays quite a bit to the lowest common denominator, but it does so in a broadly knowing way.
The other key element to the film is that it's by Tony Scott, who has a rather distinctive visual style. In fact, if I'm honest it's this visual style that I enjoyed, rather than the story.
See, the problem with the story is it's one of mounting escalation and it eventually reaches a point where it breaks past credulity. For me, this rather popped me out of the film and from then on it was daft.
Up until then it had been hovering around level of silliness, but not going too far. After that point is was just plain silly and that was a little disappointing. It also didn't help that because it was sort of based on a real person and then segwayed into this over-the-top Hollywoodness. It just didn't fit.
The other thing I was struck by on the negative side was that Kera Knighley didn't really seem to fit the role properly. I think it was her accent - she obviously sounded English, being English, but I think she would have been better taking the edge of her cut-glass upper-class accent. If she'd gone for something regional I'm not sure that would have worked, it's just her accent as was jarred a bit too much.
Overall, I enjoyed the film, but only as a visual spectacle and popcorn action movie level.
Tuesday, 23 November 2010
no, I've definitely lost it
I appear to have lost a volume of manga.
The manga in question is called Bakuman. It's a manga about being a manga artist, but that's not really relevant. What's relevant is that I remember it arriving from Amazon. And I remember opening the parcel, flicking through the pages.
I then don't remember what I did with it.
My flat is actually quite small and I've had a really good search around and can't find it. I've even done what I think of as the classic of going back to the same place (in particular, the shelf on which I keep my unread books and manga) and rechecking it "just in case". Just in case what, I wonder? In case I was suffering temporary blindness, maybe? Or in case I was suffering a mental black spot?
I've a horrible feeling that what I've done is put it in the recycling. I keep a big box that I chuck things for recycling in. I then sort this box out every couple of weeks when they come to pick up the recycling and put it in the appropriate bin outside.
However, where I am the collection service is shit, and they're really pissy about what they collect. In particular, paper but not cardboard is the one that really erks me. Especially since when you go down the local community recycling place they've got a single big storage thing that you can out all paper and cardboard in.
So a while back I started saving cardboard up in my big box too and then taking it down there myself. This isn't too much hassle as it's easy to drop off on the way to get my food shop every Saturday. And I don't do it every week - maybe once or twice a month, depending on how much stuff I've got.
The point is that I think I may have put the manga in that box. This isn't as retarded as it sounds, because Amazon sends its stuff in cardboard packaging, so that has to go in the recycling box and I keep that box in my kitchen and usually when I get in I take my mail into the kitchen with me and sort it there - the bits of it I want and need, keep, the rest of it in the recycling box.
Only I've a feeling I got a lot of stuff and maybe rested the manga on the top of the box stuff just to put it somewhere out of the way and then forgot to pick it up again and it got covered with stuff.
The trouble with this theory is it means that when I've then sorted through everything in there to put it in the right bins for collection, or to take it down the recycling centre, I've completely ignored the fact that it's a book of manga and just chucked it away. Even for me that's amazingly dumb.
This post was meant to quickly turn into a quick manga review one, but I've prattled on so much, I'll have to save that for another day. I've read a few new things and dropped some things I was collecting. Plus I started on all the FMA volumes I had saved up, so I've plenty to talk about, just not the desire to keep going at the moment.
The manga in question is called Bakuman. It's a manga about being a manga artist, but that's not really relevant. What's relevant is that I remember it arriving from Amazon. And I remember opening the parcel, flicking through the pages.
I then don't remember what I did with it.
My flat is actually quite small and I've had a really good search around and can't find it. I've even done what I think of as the classic of going back to the same place (in particular, the shelf on which I keep my unread books and manga) and rechecking it "just in case". Just in case what, I wonder? In case I was suffering temporary blindness, maybe? Or in case I was suffering a mental black spot?
I've a horrible feeling that what I've done is put it in the recycling. I keep a big box that I chuck things for recycling in. I then sort this box out every couple of weeks when they come to pick up the recycling and put it in the appropriate bin outside.
However, where I am the collection service is shit, and they're really pissy about what they collect. In particular, paper but not cardboard is the one that really erks me. Especially since when you go down the local community recycling place they've got a single big storage thing that you can out all paper and cardboard in.
So a while back I started saving cardboard up in my big box too and then taking it down there myself. This isn't too much hassle as it's easy to drop off on the way to get my food shop every Saturday. And I don't do it every week - maybe once or twice a month, depending on how much stuff I've got.
The point is that I think I may have put the manga in that box. This isn't as retarded as it sounds, because Amazon sends its stuff in cardboard packaging, so that has to go in the recycling box and I keep that box in my kitchen and usually when I get in I take my mail into the kitchen with me and sort it there - the bits of it I want and need, keep, the rest of it in the recycling box.
Only I've a feeling I got a lot of stuff and maybe rested the manga on the top of the box stuff just to put it somewhere out of the way and then forgot to pick it up again and it got covered with stuff.
The trouble with this theory is it means that when I've then sorted through everything in there to put it in the right bins for collection, or to take it down the recycling centre, I've completely ignored the fact that it's a book of manga and just chucked it away. Even for me that's amazingly dumb.
This post was meant to quickly turn into a quick manga review one, but I've prattled on so much, I'll have to save that for another day. I've read a few new things and dropped some things I was collecting. Plus I started on all the FMA volumes I had saved up, so I've plenty to talk about, just not the desire to keep going at the moment.
Monday, 22 November 2010
return of the quiet weekend
So on Friday I mentioned that there were no plans for the weekend, and that would only be partially true.
Being me, I had prepared my usual list of stuff to do. What I really meant was there was no specifically interesting activity planned. I did have a few things I thought it might be nice to try to achieve, including:
Otherwise, it was a flat-cleaning weekend and I went food shopping and caught up generally on recorded telly programmes, plus I went for my usual weekend walks (pleasingly, I'm keeping up with doing 10,000 steps at the weekend, so the fact the weekday walking has suffered due to daylight and the weather doesn't make me feel too guilty).
Anyway, about the scanning.
As I discussed last week, I've been building a new computer (I may actually have got it fixed and it definitely looking like it's the loose RAM module theory I had - I may even have identified the culprit, which leaves me the real problem of how I get the company to believe me and accept a return :). And that means that I have the problem of hand-down.
See, I've built the new computer exclusively for gaming. What I like to do is keep that computer clean and not install any crap on it, so that games will run smoothly and as quickly as possible. I even try to remove any un-necessary windows components and it gets completely reinstalled on a regular basis.
But that sort of regime is not helpful for more normal stuff. I don't know about you, but I have all sorts of crap on my machines - random programmes that where maybe useful at the time and documents saved in what seemed like sensible places at the time. All that sort of stuff. So I also have a machine for general use.
And that machine is where I do my scanning. Or I would if I wasn't a lazy bugger (just recently I have a myriad of proper reasons I haven't been doing scanning, but before that it was definitely a list of excuses).
Anyway, the point is that I've ended up in the tricky situation of having to re-purpose my machines. What was my old games rig can now become my new desktop, etc. The big problem is that I want to also end up with a machine I can put by my TV that I use to watch blu-rays on (well, and all sorts of other stuff too - but essentially I'll end up with a PC there, rather than a DVD and other players).
I'm getting way off the point, which is that I found my A3 scanner does not have a windows 7 driver. But I've also heard that later versions of Photoshop have a really good photo stitching algorithm. But Photoshop is incredibly expensive (£600!) so I was hoping to get a cracked version of it.
This will allow me to at least test out how good the photo stitching is. If it's good then I can look at buying a new scanner (a regular size one, rather than the A3 one) and possibly getting a legit copy of CS5 (ouch) and then that will allow me to completely upgrade to windows 7.
Except I've given myself another headache, because in my attempts to fix my games rig by throwing money at the problem I've kinda ended up with half another machine, and it's a really powerful one. So do I try to sell this stuff (I've no idea how well it will e-bay, especially as it's without original boxes)? Or do I go the whole hog and get the last few bits to build yet another machine? And what do I do with a fourth PC? I know my dad is frustrated by the age and slowness of the machine he has - perhaps I should donate it to him?
Being me, I had prepared my usual list of stuff to do. What I really meant was there was no specifically interesting activity planned. I did have a few things I thought it might be nice to try to achieve, including:
- Finish Claymore (did this);
- Watch the first few eps of The Big Bang Theory s4, which I'd managed to get all across with in terms of order, having not realised it had started (did this);
- Finish CoD: Black Ops, assuming I was already a good chunk of the way through (did this);
- Play Anno 1404 (did this... a bit too much, which resulted in me not doing the next thing) and
- Scanning stuff (didn't do this, but see below).
Otherwise, it was a flat-cleaning weekend and I went food shopping and caught up generally on recorded telly programmes, plus I went for my usual weekend walks (pleasingly, I'm keeping up with doing 10,000 steps at the weekend, so the fact the weekday walking has suffered due to daylight and the weather doesn't make me feel too guilty).
Anyway, about the scanning.
As I discussed last week, I've been building a new computer (I may actually have got it fixed and it definitely looking like it's the loose RAM module theory I had - I may even have identified the culprit, which leaves me the real problem of how I get the company to believe me and accept a return :). And that means that I have the problem of hand-down.
See, I've built the new computer exclusively for gaming. What I like to do is keep that computer clean and not install any crap on it, so that games will run smoothly and as quickly as possible. I even try to remove any un-necessary windows components and it gets completely reinstalled on a regular basis.
But that sort of regime is not helpful for more normal stuff. I don't know about you, but I have all sorts of crap on my machines - random programmes that where maybe useful at the time and documents saved in what seemed like sensible places at the time. All that sort of stuff. So I also have a machine for general use.
And that machine is where I do my scanning. Or I would if I wasn't a lazy bugger (just recently I have a myriad of proper reasons I haven't been doing scanning, but before that it was definitely a list of excuses).
Anyway, the point is that I've ended up in the tricky situation of having to re-purpose my machines. What was my old games rig can now become my new desktop, etc. The big problem is that I want to also end up with a machine I can put by my TV that I use to watch blu-rays on (well, and all sorts of other stuff too - but essentially I'll end up with a PC there, rather than a DVD and other players).
I'm getting way off the point, which is that I found my A3 scanner does not have a windows 7 driver. But I've also heard that later versions of Photoshop have a really good photo stitching algorithm. But Photoshop is incredibly expensive (£600!) so I was hoping to get a cracked version of it.
This will allow me to at least test out how good the photo stitching is. If it's good then I can look at buying a new scanner (a regular size one, rather than the A3 one) and possibly getting a legit copy of CS5 (ouch) and then that will allow me to completely upgrade to windows 7.
Except I've given myself another headache, because in my attempts to fix my games rig by throwing money at the problem I've kinda ended up with half another machine, and it's a really powerful one. So do I try to sell this stuff (I've no idea how well it will e-bay, especially as it's without original boxes)? Or do I go the whole hog and get the last few bits to build yet another machine? And what do I do with a fourth PC? I know my dad is frustrated by the age and slowness of the machine he has - perhaps I should donate it to him?
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