Surface Computing

I don't think anything I say can do this justice...just watch & read:

Microsoft presents 'Coffee Table' computing

Women...

Seriously, I think Em will be on the phone until dawn. I'm actually keeping a list in notepad, of things she's said to respond to, it's gone on so long...

Reading fun

As in 'Red-ding', not 'Ree-ding'. There really ought to be some kind of easily recognizable distinction between the two, else people might get used when I put Reading as the first word of a blog post title.

Had my Microsoft Intern Open Day today, which was pretty fun. Free lunch, just the usual sandwiches & stuff though. I got to meet the other interns too, they're not all business types after all! And the ones that are aren't so bad it seems, even business students are people it seems.

The day started off (at 1pm, they knew their student audience well), and mostly comprised of some pretty girls showing us Powerpoint slides, and then reading them. There was quite a bizarre 'video' (read, slideshow with lots of panning in and out and fading between pictures) which lasted for 6 minutes, set to Queen, in which we saw lots of photos of this year's interns getting drunk. These photos, and more photos of interns getting drunk were also used later on, I think they're possibly giving out slightly the wrong impression of what a year's work at Microsoft is about.

Still though, it was a good day to be honest, we got plenty of chance to get to know one another, some information on accomodation was provided which probably won't come in useful 'til our induction week, but is probably good to have anyway. Most of the others got to meet their 'Buddy' - a person in their team, generally a recent graduate, who'll help them get settled. Not only do I not have a Buddy, but no-one from my team even bothered to show up, which isn't a great sign. Saw Matt & Stu from the MSP team though, and I think Matt's offered to be my buddy, even though he's in a different team. Will should be able to sort me out with anything I need though, so not too bothered.

After a 'Game' (team miming, not Guitar Hero, as I was dissapointed to find) and a little more talking we were free to go, so I wandered down to meet Will for a chat for a while - I swear he never does any work.

Spent the evening at Emma's (The female MSP), playing bad console games - Simpsons Wrestling wins the 'awful' award hands down. Twin Calibre seems a pretty cool game though, for the PS1, albeit a bit poorly made. She's talking endlessly on the phone now, so I've stolen her laptop, and I'm going to go and use it productively, by browsing Facebook.

Ciao. Xx

I'm blogging that.

I used to look at things and say "Hey, that's cool", and maybe share them with a couple of friends, or post them on one of the forums I frequent. However, I'm finding that my usual response nowadays is simply "I'm blogging that" - which has led to a decline in my forum activity, and in the number of im/irc conversations I start. In case it needed saying, it obviously hasn't done anything to improve my actual real-life sociability too.

On the plus side, this leaves me more free time for Guitar Hero. Anyhow, here's the pic which I said the above to, which got me thinking about all that. It's so ace, I always wondered where the Firefox logo came from.



Also, if someone's bored, find the Firefox bus for me and send a link, that thing was awesome.

Reading Tomorrow

Off to get to know my new intern friends at Microsoft tomorrow - and to have yet another free lunch from MS Reading. It's going to be weird getting used to actually having to buy or bring lunch when I start working there, I'm getting used to having it laid out for me.

Probably stay the night at Emma's too and then I'm promised alcohol to celebrate the end of exams...at Reading University. Still though, alcohol is alcohol regardless - so I'll be back in awhile :)

Ciao

Score Hero

Score Hero

I believe I briefly mentioned this earlier - it's a fansite for Guitar Hero (all versions) where people can upload their scores, compare them to others, and chat on the forums.

With the massive worldwide love of Guitar Hero it's no surprise that this site has gotten hundreds of thousands of users, and as such, their servers have been really struggling under the load. There's been a donation going on, and they'd managed to collect $8000 from the community when they got a lovely donation of $2000 from what I thought was a rather unlikely source - Harmonix.

Because, you see, ScoreHero isn't just a fansite for the game, it's also the central hub for cracking, pirating and modding the game - although the threads on these subjects are given with the caveat that you must find ps2 hacking tools yourself, and they are, to be fair, only really intended to allow you to play user-made songs.

Still though, I suppose anyone who's so fanatical about Guitar Hero they'll go to all the effort of hacking it to get extra songs is pretty much bound to buy any new releases anyway, so it's probably a good move on Harmonix's part...I'll stop rambling now.

Here's my fully completed scores page for PS2 Expert on Guitar Hero II. I'll fill in GH1 when I get around to playing it again :)

Bye Bye Baby

..baby I loooove you. Why don't I have more doo-wop on my computer? I blame the RIAA and the Germans.

Had Lu here for a few days, which is why I've been ignoring you and not posting anything new. I realise this is obviously unacceptable, especially at such a critical time in your lives, when most of you either have exams and need the procrastination, or have finished your exams and need something to do all day.

I'm now in the latter of those two categories and as such I'm not entirely sure what I'm going to get up to in the days I'm not traveling about the country, but I imagine it'll involve lots of Guitar Hero and Mah Jong, and probably some American TV too.

Had a fun time with Lu, got her addicted to House and planned the trip to Paris, and cooked a bunch of fun things for her too (including a steak as big as my face, with home made chips made without a chip pan [or substitute]). She might not be off to the Alps (Bath Uni Canoe Club trip), in which case I'll go visit her in Bath, but if she is then I'll have to wait 'til Paris to see her I guess. Oh well :(

Joys of Birmingham

Had an interesting day out with Lu in the town centre today - we went out shopping, I don't think Bath holds much appeal for a young girl in those terms, lovely and quaint though its shops are.

Pretty much immediately upon arriving in town we got asked to participate in some market research for Philadelphia, which was pretty fun. After allowing them to tick what they wanted for a bunch of leading questions (way to screw up a carefully devised survey girls), I got to stare at lots of pictures of nice looking snacks, and give opinions on my perceptions of them.

The perception part of the survey was actually quite fun - it was based on a model Harvard came up with a few years back (or at least, seemed to be, from what I could see of the scripts they were running on their very unsecured server). A set of four choices (from a stock of 12-15) were presented, with the user being asked to choose their favourite and least favourite. Then, another set of four were presented, and this went on to deduce what features the user kept picking out, and even why - very nice.

Next up we got to sample all the different types of cream cheese and breads, which made for an interesting free lunch, and led me to the discovery that I do actually like cream cheese, so there's one benefit for them already. Got paid £10 for the pleasure too, which wasn't bad for a half hour's work.

Other entertainment included a lovely scene in Greggs, with a guy throwing things about because the elderly female assistant had sworn at him for something he'd said/done to some girls earlier. Personally I'd have sacked her on the spot and had him arrested, but nothing so exciting came about. Next up was a large black lady, wearing platforms, a short skirt and a tight top - all of which was fluorescent yellow - preaching about our Lord Jeebus. I'm guessing she was a hooker by day, and evangelist by night, and just didn't have time to change today.

Oh, and I bought some awesome new tops, and replaced my entire collection (if that's the word) of underwear and socks - thanks Primark.

Wow

480-Pound Woman Dies After Six Years On Couch

Just...wow. Though I did lol at the 'preliminary autopsy' finding the cause of death to be morbid obesity - as though that's going to need verifying.

Also, becoming one with the sofa? There has to be some science there can can be re-used to breed sharks with lasers attached to them, surely.

Exams Over!

Finally, done with exams for another year and a half now - not counting any professional qualifications I decide to go for whilst I'm at Microsoft, which there'll probably be a fair few of, as they're paying for the training and exams.

Software Engineering, my three hour exam for my double module went inordinately well, which I'm taking as proof that if you actually work at a subject during the year, and do some modest revision, you'll get much better grades than if you just do the last minute revision from notes. I was out of the exam after an hour and a quarter, and home drinking tea in time for say "My exam ends in an hour and a half." - pretty leet.

Last minute revision from notes was however, the case for HCI, so that one didn't go too brilliantly, though Bex's lecture notes were a wonderful basis of revision for pretty much the entire class. We didn't get them till fairly late, but fortunately many other Universities provide lecture notes on HCI online and don't secure them, so we revised from theirs.

Why weren't we revising from our own, you might ask? Simple, the module was taught by that a less than favourite lecturer, [name edited out]. As such, the half hour before the exam was spent collecting signatures on a petition to either have the module compensated or scrapped, which I somehow ended holding when [name edited out] himself walked out of the exam room a full metre from me. I didn't quite have the guts to use the silence he'd created by telling us to enter the room to inform latecomers of the petition, but I was damn tempted. Free now, thank God, and as the Final Year is choices, I won't have to deal with him ever again - a pity really, as some of the modules he teaches for final year could be quite interesting..

Another Youtube Video to Madeleine McCann

Those of you who browse YouTube instead of revising (aka, the entire student population) may have noticed a spate of, quite frankly awful videos made by people with some googled images and an oddly chosen backing track, or even worse - a Madeleine Rap.

If you read the comments you'll find that the posters are split into two distinct groups - those 'anti Madeleine' (or rather, anti the media hype around her) and those pro Madeleine. The latter are easily distinguishable from the former, by the fact that they Can Not type, spell, or use decent English in any way shape or form.

Some of the comments in support are quite frankly laughable, here's some of the more choice ones:

"she's so cute, how could anyone do this to her?"
Whereas, if she were ugly, it would be fine.

"it so inappropriate to take a little girl like her"
You silly kidnapper, you've made a social faux-pas! Also, would it have been fine were she a little taller?

"who cud be sooo nasty 2 diz lil cute gurl u horible sick person take ere ome they dnt want u dey want maddie ome plz tak ere ome !"
What?

"The ONLY proof of missing Madeleine is the media, the media can't be trusted. It's all probably fake anyway, so everyone calm down"
The token conspiracy theorist.

"U in my prays, maddie"
..stealin' my Jeebus.

And my personal favourite:
"who iz she? what hapened to her? i havnt been on myspace in ages so i dno"

Anyhow, one of the guys from the wonderful world of Facebook has put together this loving tribute to the sweet little darling, enjoy:

Choices

I've got those two lovely exams tomorrow...so I probably should have played less Guitar Hero today. On the other hand, I did manage to 5* Stop, Trippin' On A Hole and Freya today, and ace my high score for Jessica, so I'm still going to count the day as productive.

Stand Out From The Crowd

Recently had an article published in the UK Student Zine, thought I'd share it with you lot too if you want, the original's to be found on the Mint Source Blog, and in a few thousand inboxes too.

--

Standing Out from the Crowd

By Ian MacGillivray, Microsoft Student Partner

I really feel sorry for employers these days – it seems everyone’s coming out of university with a 2:1 in their field, and when you’re faced with a hundred applicants, all with the same degree, it can’t be an easy job working out which one is best for the company. Sure, applicant AAA spent an hour a week for an entire month helping out a local charity, but what about applicant BBB, who was secretary of their university’s table-tennis society? It can seem a nightmare, until applicant MSP comes along – after that there’s not really much of a choice to be made.


You see, being a Microsoft Student Partner (MSP) isn’t just something to brag about to your friends, or a way to get your hands on the latest goodies first, it’s the sort of thing that will make you stand out above the crowd, wherever you go and whatever you want to do. I’ve been out speaking to these employers, looking for somewhere to work on placement, and by the time I’d finished telling them about everything I’ve done on the MSP programme, it wasn’t them left wondering who to hire, it was me left wondering which of the companies to pick.


While you’re learning a lot of theory at university, the MSP programme will give you practical, hands on experience of the latest technologies actually being used in industry today. Admittedly, the learning is going to be biased towards Microsoft’s own technologies and solutions – but hey, if you’re reading this article, then you already know how cool some of those are. The opportunities and support here are phenomenal; you can literally become expert in .NET, in ASP.NET or even in XNA, with the Microsoft team behind you.


It’s not all about getting your hands dirty at a computer screen though – when you get out of university there’s going to be a roomful of applicants going for that top job, and they’ll all be able to write code. What people really want nowadays is someone with a talent – and with a set of ‘softer’ skills too. The Student Partner scheme is a unique opportunity to develop your presentation, marketing and interaction skills, something you might never do at university. Again, don’t be scared, you’ll have the full weight of the Microsoft team behind you, with years of experience and tons of handy tips. They also lend a hand with actually getting people to your events too, by throwing in some food and swag to hand out to attendees – and naturally, you’ll need to test the quality of the pizza you’re handing out too.


All this is well and good, I hear you saying, but who really wants people skills and technological proficiency? They’re no fun, you can’t invite them to the pub for a drink, or wear them, or play with them in your room. Well, I think you’re being very greedy, but fortunately Microsoft does not seem to agree with me. There’s three or four events hosted during the year for the MSPs, and believe you me they’re good.


The first will be a trip to Microsoft Reading, the second a trip to Microsoft London, and the third a trip to Microsoft Research, Cambridge. They’re all interesting places, and a good day out in themselves. The contacts you can make in these various places are wonderful, and you get treated in great style when you’re a guest at Microsoft. There’s always a fun social evening, with drinks all paid for, and then a nice hotel to stay in. There may, if you’re lucky, even be a fourth purely social trip, just to say thanks for all the hard work you’ve been doing.


You're also privy to all the latest advances before the masses, and get tons of free things thrown at you (I got Windows Vista Ultimate, Microsoft Office 2007 System, various Xbox accessories and a lot more this year, for example).


By now, assuming you haven’t gotten bored by my over-enthusiasm and stopped reading, I hope you’re pretty excited and ready to go off and apply, but before you do that, I want to answer one of the most common questions I get about people who are thinking about joining the scheme – what does a Student Partner actually do?


Well, there’s a big range of suggestions provided for you, but one of the key skills you need for, and develop from the scheme, is that of initiative. This year I’ve run workshops to teach my friends new tech, I’ve organised trips around the UK for my university’s computing society to launch days for Microsoft products – and even presented my own launch day for Vista and Office 2007! From little things, like putting up some posters and sitting down with someone in a pub and telling them about the new tech, to big flashy events, presentations and trips, the programme is what you make of it, and if you’re willing to put in the time and effort, you could end up with one of the best years of your life.


For more information, and to apply to the scheme, visit:
http://www.microsoft.com/uk/academia/students/student-partners/default.mspx
Feel free to contact me with any questions – ian@student-partners.com (yes, you even get a snazzy email address too).


Oh, and, in case it needed saying. It was Microsoft I picked – I’ll be there on placement next year, I hope to see you down there at one of the wonderful MSP events!

In other news...

For those of you who aren't so interested in naked women, here's some boring news about what I've been up to instead.

Exams
Had three of them now, Internet Programming With Java went quite well, and although I still haven't had my coursework back yet (go SEAS go!) I imagine I've done pretty well in that module, certainly over 70% (first).

Operating Systems was entirely exam based, and that turned out to be, to quote someone I heard after the exam, 'a big pile of lol' - pretty easy, should again have over 70% in that by a mile.

Today was Programming Language Concepts, which I'd been thinking was going to be the hardest of the lot, but I was already going in there with 23/25% from my coursework and lab classes - fortunately this one was pretty easy too, I imagine I got about 80% on the exam paper. Sylvia Wong rushed out of the exam hall after me when I left nice and early too, to offer me a placement doing research in the Uni, but I broke her heart and turned her down, like so many girls before.

Two more left now, both on Tuesday, neither of which I'm too worried about. The morning exam is a double module - 3 hours long, Software Engineering, but I can't imagine that one being too evil. The afternoon session is Human Computer Interaction with our beloved [name edited out], and although I don't actually know a single part of that module, there's so many official complaints and petitions flying into the department against that man, his (lack of) teaching skills and his joke of a module, that I could probably not even turn up and still get a decent mark.

Guitar Hero
I've found the wonders of Scorehero, and I'm going through each song on expert, beating my highest score before I upload that to my account - I think that'll replace my scrobbling habits as my avatar on most forums when I get it done. I've got myself some gold stars too now (100% completes), on Heart Shaped Box and Can You Hear Me Knockin', both on expert. Woooo.

Keeping Busy
Got some fun plans to keep myself occupied once this revision (and all associated procrastination) is at an end, because there's only so many weeks I can sit at home playing various musical instruments and computer games before I develop arthritis. Lu's coming to visit on the 23rd, staying 'til Friday or Saturday, and then I'm off to Reading on the 29th for my Microsoft intern open day, to meet all the business studies kids I'll be interning with - seriously, there's barely a techie among them!

Got a jazz gig for a thousand or so people at the Graduation Ball on the 3rd - which we should really get together and practise for at some point, as we're playing for a couple of hours. I'll probably try and get home (Cardiff) at some point in-between that and Paris (13th - 16th), and then there's the final MSP open day in Cambridge, to see some of the guys one last time, collect my rightful prizes as top MSP (hopefully), and some other swag, and check out Microsoft's R&D department. With any luck there'll be a nice social night before that too, with more free beer.

Then it's off on the 1st of July to Reading, to start my new life as a soulless serf! Can't wait :)

You don't want to know what I've been Googling

So, through a series of interconnected clicks resulting from what was honestly a purely innocent search, I've managed to find my way into two of the nearly infinite pools of filth in the internet devoted to that most fabulous of things - naked women. The first set of links are pretty much SFW, unless you've got a very prudish boss.

First, we've got Bubbles 'n' Babes, a nude car washing service in Australia, where you can have four lovely ladies wash your car in bikinis, for a mere AU$45 (£18), or for the princely sum of AU$82 (£34) you can get an X-rated lap dance thrown in too. Naturally, the Aussies were very careful to keep this whole enterprise tasteful and environmentally friendly though, so the car wash is 'screened from the public and [uses] recycled water'.



There's already a vaguely similar facility available in the UK, also inventively named 'Bubbles 'n' Babes', as reported by The Sun - who else? It's a bit pricier here, £25 for four girls in bikinis and an extra £5 for the tops to come off. No comments were made as to the quality of the car washing though, clearly that'll require some investigation. Anyone got a dirty car?

The next set of links are NSFW. No exceptions.

Next up is a wonderful site I found, which reproduces EGM's 10 Naughtiest Games Of All Time - some hilarious reviews of some of the earlier attempts to provide interactive ladies via computers - which many users seem to think is pretty much the primary purpose of the modern computer, though I lost marks on my last exam for stating that...

Among my favourites on this site is Bubble Bath Babes from the NES, featuring the cringeworthy quote; "POP MY BUBBLE NOW I BET I CAN MAKE YOUR'S BURST!" - if that doesn't get you going, I don't know what will. However, the game comes with a caveat from the reviewer - "Surprisingly, games don't benefit as much as you might think from clumsy drawings of tits.". Budding games developers - you have been warned.

Fortunately however, the folks at EGM do know, I can't bring myself to paste any more links or comment further, but believe me when I say every possible sick and twisted perversion was taken into account when the NES and Atari 2600 games designers got together for their annual conferences. Just look through the 'top ten' games, if you have the stomach for it, and need proof.

More Eurovision Fun

So it seems the latest trend is to take videos of me when I'm drunk, as opposed to just pictures - thanks guys. I hear Gib's got a full 20 minute long one, but this is pretty leet, though I don't quite remember it. Thanks Forx.

Fun & Games

Now I may sound like a bit of an idiot here, to those of you who already knew this - but Mahjong isn't just the Japanese version of solitaire. It's actually a 4 player gambling game, which is absolutely ace.

Tim had a set (and a lovely book containing rules and history) so spent the later hours of tonight playing that with him & Julie-oh, and not revising. Naturally, I won, as with all games ever, but only on the 'money' side (though we just played for points) - I never actually got to call for 'Mahjong' - which, incidentally means 'The Game Of The Sparrows', due to the twittering noise made when North & South wind wash the tiles before East wind calls 'Pow'. You can't make this stuff up.

In other 'games I'm great at' news, I've got Guitar Hero II up in my room now, going through my widescreen TV - it actually has a mode which supports widescreen and makes it look nice, which is fun. I've taken to playing it hyperspeed, because I'm getting a hacked game called Guitar Hero Greatest Hits, which is experts-only soon, and I'll need to be used to hyperspeed, as that's the default. Talking of default, I'm apparently on the default scoreboard for GHGH, which is cool. Haven't got the game hooked up to my speakers yet, but I assume I can just run the audio out of the TV into the speakers - I just hope there's no sound/audio lag if I do that.



Off to bed now, exam at 9.30am Saturday, in the notoriously cold Gem sports hall, ouch.

Xx

No Fear

They say that for each action, there must be an equal and opposite reaction. Well, I've just found out what balances the creation of France - this kitten:

Two down

Just had my second exam, which was an absolute joke. I spent ages revising for it, and it was probably the easiest exam I've had since starting Uni. Almost managed to turn up half an hour late for it, which would actually have been fine, as it was 2 hours long and I was done by the first hour. Should be 100% :)

Watching Back To The Future now - the film that showed us skitching is a viable means of transportation. 80's tastic. Gotta love Michael J. Fox.

Microsoft oPhone

Be the ballerina.

Eurovision Party (aka Terry Wogan appreciation night)

Predictably, last night was made from pure unrefined win, thanks in part to the marvelously random entries, and the crazy Finnish presenters, but mostly due to dear Terry. Credits also go out to the subtitles guy who was clearly playing the same drinking game as we were - he could barely type towards the end.

I think we need to print out the drinking rules, having researched the full format of the event next year, because last night was a bit..dynamic. Here's mostly what we drank to though:

• Terry Wogan being sarcastic.


• Terry Wogan mocking the hosts.


• Terry Wogan mocking an entry/entrant.


• Terry Wogan making us laugh.


• For every new nipple seen.


• The word 'love' appearing in a song (in any language we knew it)


• If we didn't know the word for love in a language, we picked a random word from that song to represent love, since subtitles weren't translated this year.


• Extra drinking if the word 'love' wasn't in a song once.


• Every time a song changed language (thanks Romania, though they weren't the worst culprits, as you might have thought. Worst was the entry that just had one word in the native tongue, in the chorus, and was otherwise in English. Something about Maria).

We were unable to use the 'nil point' drinking game this year, as they've stopped doing it like that. I'm not sure if there were any rules for drinking by the scoring part though, I was pretty well gone by then, not surprisingly, given the above drinking rules.

*****************************************************
Edit: Just remembered these two drinking rules:

• Everyone picks a country during the scoring round...
  
  • 1-7 points - one drink
  • 8-10 points - two drinks
  • 12 points - three drinks
  • Your country wins - finish your drink
  • Your country loses - finish your drink
• Every time the subtitle guy made a spelling mistake (this one hurt towards the end)

*****************************************************

I do vaguely remember still being able to beat everyone at Guitar Hero though, and also drinking lager funneled through a traffic cone, whilst lying on the patio. And don't get me started on the TMNT discussion (mainly because I'm not entirely sure what it was we found so enthralling to debate). Good times.

So, here's counting down to next year. I love you Terry.

Addition: Forgot to make a list of things I loved about last night, other than Terry Wogan:

• Homosexual innuendo throughout the UK entry.


• "My bad ass spinning for you", from the Russian girls.


• The Serbian lesbians.


• Timmy Mallet.


• Santa playing chess.


• Most random prop on stage yet...a bus stop.


• 'Talk to the hand' girl.


• The 'Eurovision Fan' who happened to be sitting in the front row and wearing a tiara.


• The entire Georgian army on stage at once.

More memory stick fun

I love Aston's webmail, I really do:

Sorry to bother everyone but I seem to have last my memory stick in the library. I've been looking for it for ages but cant find it.

Please can everyone keep their eyes peeled. it should be easily recognisable as it is fairly unique, because its bright orange and has a life-size donkey attached to it called Donkey the donkey. this is not a joke email, so please take this seriously, as a donkey's life is at stake.

Yours gratefully,
[name]

300 Spartans On A Plane

Seriously, I cried with laughter.

Google humour

I know the folks over at Google are a bit cool, a bit hip, but I had no idea they strayed so far from the notion of a stereotypical geek. Indeed, they seem to be rather athletic, as the following set of directions from Google Maps shows:

Films on the big small screen

Although this post is about films I've watched, in bed, on my unbelievably awesome new TV with my gorgeous 7.1 surround sound, I'll try to just keep it about the films. No promises though, when I first got the thing, I found it hard to form sentences without replacing most of the nouns with 'TV'.

Snakes On A Plane
Awful. Absolutely awful. With a premise like this, it was never going to be good, but I've never seen something as bad. The snakes were obviously CGI, Samuel L. Jackson was just prostituting his otherwise great reputation, as opposed to developing it, and no-one else in the film even knew how to act.
Saying that, I quite liked some of the outro music. A film you have to watch, so that you can then legitimately compare every other awful film to it.

The Illusionist
Particularly enjoyed this film, though I can't quite put my finger on why. The attention to detail in all of the locations around turn of the century Vienna was remarkable, and the acting was superb all around. The plot became a bit predictable towards the end of the film, but by the time you've realised what is going to happen, you're already completely enthralled in the film and watch anyway. Highly recommended.

The Prestige
Another film about magic, and set at the exact same time as The Illusionist, though this time in London. Full of twists and surprises the whole way through, the drama and rivalry between the two magicians is built up brilliantly, and superbly acted. A great performance from Michael Caine too, as the creative genius behind the tricks. I really liked the flavour for the show-biz world of the time, and the (sometimes gruesome) details behind all of their tricks.
Unfortunately, the film rather lets itself down when it overplays the rivalry between Edison and Tesla (played, for no reason I could discern, by David Bowie), and comes up with some fantastical sci-fi that doesn't really fit in. A pity really, as the film overall is great.

Scoop
Hugh Jackman again, this time effortlessly pulling off the role of an upper-class brit, despite, in true Hollywood style, not actually being British. A fun and entertaining film, but unfortunately lacking in substance. The plot is transparent from the word go, and Woody Allen is unfortunately playing..Woody Allen, who I simply can't stand. When he's out of the picture it's a charming and utterly believable film, but overall it was just too hard to airbrush him out in my head.


Thanks to Smigs for the post...format..idea, thing.

Photo Opportunity

I can't think of anything absolutely brilliant at the moment, but there's got to be an epic picture waiting to be taken on May 13th. Let me know if you think of anything good, toy guns available at the Poundstore.

Dear All

Please note that on Sunday 13 May 2007 there will be a full scale live exercise; known as 'Operation Shoeshine' taking place on the Aston Campus.
This will involve a 'simulated incident' in the Students' Guild and is intended to represent a large explosion. The aim of the exercise is to test the multi-agency response to a major incident affecting the city centre.

In order to achieve this it is anticipated that there will be 15 fire appliances, numerous ambulances, police and army. There will also be a military helicopter and possibly air ambulances landing on the campus car park.

Best day ever

Whoever said 'money can't buy you love' (some insect-loving hippy) clearly didn't buy as much cool stuff as me online. I'm currently enjoying psychedelic visuals via R4 on my absolutely massive new TV, with 7.1 surround sound pumping out Astrud Gilberto and Nina Simone, with interludes from The Supremes.

Exam didn't go very well this morning - two of the questions were based on some arbitrary helper classes our tutor wrote for use in lab classes, which I thought was just plain ridiculous. Naturally I answered them very sarcastically, in my own lovely style, but I don't think I did too well overall. And this was meant to be the easy one...ouch.

Oh well, all over soon, then I'm off to Paris (maybe, depending on the [lack of] organisational skills of Bath Canoe Club), off camping with some guys and off to Reading to start work! Exciting stuff.

RabidHamster - R4

Just got myself a new visualiser, and it's absolutely superb. All rendered in OpenGL, which occasionally shows through, but mostly just leaves you incredulous that something so awesome can be made with such a rubbish graphics API.

Highly recommended, along with the extra scene packs - can't wait to try it out on my new TV (arriving tomorrow I hope, so I can play it with it after my exam).

Get your free domain name

What?
First off, for less internet savvy among you, I should explain that a domain name is the sort of thing you type into your navigation bar. For example, tiedyeina.blogspot.com is a domain name, as is google.com. This is your chance to register your own domain name (yourname.co.uk, perhaps) for free.

How?
As part of their Live campaign, Microsoft have released a beta of Microsoft Office Live (you'll have to use Internet Explorer sorry) - a hub intended for small businesses to get themselves an online presence, through a company they already know and use.

If you, however, sign up for the most basic of services, you'll get a free domain name, and 500MB of storage, to keep, all free - no catches. They'll ask for a credit card to prove your identity and address, but you won't be charged unless you spring for any of the more fancy options.

So, go to the site above and get yourself a little bit of space, even if you're not sure right now what you're going to do with it. Thanks to Ben for the tip.

Sophistication

I can't help but think sometimes that I'm not quite living up to the student stereotypes of dossing about, eating supernoodles in front of daytime tv and getting very drunk on cheap beer most nights of the week. Everything's a bit more...middle-aged on an average day to be honest. Today was a pretty fine example of that.

I was up and in work (well, Uni) at 8.45am this morning, sorting out a few last things for our 9am group project presentation, which went down pretty well, despite throwing an exception up at us (ouch). So glad that's finally over, just got my exams left now - hah, 'just' - then I get a month and a half or so before I move to Reading and start work, scary stuff.

Popped home after that to make a lovely pasta bake with salami, home-made cheese sauce, tomatoes, courgette, peppers, tuna...and then a ton of cheese, of course - which should feed me for a couple more days. That was absolutely delicious, though I feel a bit bad about enlisting Julie-oh to help me with the sauce, given that she couldn't eat any of it!

To make up for that, and the fact that she's been known to pop by and cook nice things for me once or twice, cooked for her (and Tim, 'cause he's revising hard) this evening, with something pretty much of my own devising. I had a look at some recipes for stuffed peppers online, but they all looked pretty rubbish, so here's what I came up with.

Stuffed Peppers:
Ingredients:
One pepper and ~50g paella rice per person
Salami/Chorizo
Mozzarella
Extra virgin olive oil

1. Cook enough paella rice per person to fill a pepper - don't rinse it first, you want the rice to be a bit starchy.
2. Take pepper - cut off top, keep it to one side.
3. Remove all the middle junk from the pepper.
3. Coat the inside of the pepper with extra-virgin olive oil.
4. Layer in mozzarella, salami and rice, finishing with a thick layer of cheese that entirely covers the top of the pepper.
5. Brush the outside of the pepper with the oil.
6. Wrap in foil, and bake for 30 minutes.
7. Put the tops back on the peppers, and serve.

In other sophistication-related news from the day, I bought an absolutely ace purple smoking jacket from the rag market (just need a pipe and some port now...), and spent the evening playing Set and Chess with Julie-oh whilst listening to the marvelous Aretha Franklin.

Pretty terrible for a student eh? Never mind, I promise to behave appallingly come Eurovision night.

Xx

Romance

To quote that most wonderful of programs, Peep Show - "I'm the least French person on the planet. My favourite cheeses are Cheddar and Red Leicester". To quote pretty much everyone I know, "I hate the French".

Sometimes however, you have to put such differences aside and get on with things regardless, and to that end, I'm off for a little break in Paris with Lu this June, which should be pretty sweet. Few details to be finalised, but I've found us a nice hotel and got a vague idea of what we'll get up to there (Day 1: Louvre. Day 2: Louvre. Day 3: Louvre...though I suppose that plan's open to editing if Lucie insists).

If anyone's been and can make...well, any recommendations at all, then please do so - else we'll probably just end up doing the most touristy things, not that that's such a bad thing in a city like Paris. Should be a nice break inbetween exams and starting work regardless, and a chance to spend a few days wholly with Lu, not something I get too often nowadays.

This doesn't mean I like the French, or France though.

The Best Video On YouTube

I think I can say that with pretty much no hyperbole here, take a look:



The moustache, the pelvic thrusts, the vocals, the hair....this is going to be on repeat for a long long time.

Bringing the game into disrepute

I've been watching the snooker recently (and no, not just to avoid revision), and although the standard of play is superb at times, and there've been some brilliant hour long tactical frames, I feel something is starting to lack in the sport nowadays.

I'd hope you'd agree with me that snooker, at its best, is a sport for gentlemen, despite the occasional yob you'll find playing it at a bowling complex. If you do agree with me on that though, note that you'll be disagreeing with England's last King, who stated that "A true gentleman shouldn't be able to get a break of above 25" - seems he might not have been too good at the game.

Can you imagine a snooker player turning up to a match in trainers? Or a member of the crowd shouting out anything other than "Jolly good shot" or "Poor luck sir"? No, of course not - the idea is nonsense, but unfortunately the sport is already on a slippery slope. Two of the worst culprits were in the semi-finals this year, starting with:

Mark Selby

He looks a perfectly innocent chap here, haircut maybe a bit too short but other than that, all fine. However, if you've been watching I'm sure you'll note, as I have, some outrageous character traits that should quite frankly cause him to be banned from the game. I have seen him no less than twice slam his cue against the floor in frustration, he's had red streaks put into his hair and he even failed to offer an apologetic smile to Ali Carter after a rather lucky pot. Despicable. However, even this man seems a perfect gentleman when compared to:

Stephen Maguire

This ruffian has strolled into every match at the Crucible this year...Not Wearing A Bow Tie. This unbelievable display of yobbery should surely result in his disqualification from all major snooker events worldwide, but slipping standards have allowed him to get away with it. That's about all I've got on him at the moment but, come on - no bow tie? Unbelievable. Then finally of course, there's this troublemaker:

Michaela Tabb

Now, with women being allowed to speak in public, and even vote, I thought that the feminists would be happy, give up their campaign and go back to the kitchen and start fulfilling their natural roles again. However, this was clearly not to be, and as such, the fine sport of snooker was forced to make a concession, and allow women to be present in a room whilst a game of snooker was underway. Naturally, having women in the audience was a little off-putting to gentlemen, and Sir. Roger Smithson Thompson-Blythe IV quit the game entirely after seeing a young brunette four rows back and missing a tricky safety.

This, I'm sure you'll agree though, is a step far too far - a woman refereeing at major snooker matches - political correctness gone mad. What next? Players allowed to wear unironed waistcoats? Drinks other than sherry and whiskey served at the bar? Spectators whispering to one another whilst a player takes a shot?

Hear me now, it's a slippery slope, and action must be taken before this fine sport becomes yet another tragic piece of fodder for the masses, with all the naked Top Gun towel-flicking that implies.

..also on that note, anyone else notice how Shaun Murphy, in one dressing room shot was giving another man, his 'friend', a very intimate hug, and in another dressing room shot, was covering up the camera with a towel? Mystery and intrigue abound at the Crucible this year.

BaronVille - The new Mayfair

As some of you will be aware, Hasbro are launching a new version of Monopoly, called the Here And Now edition. In a triumph of clever marketing, the locations on the board are now up for grabs, and will be decided by public vote. Public internet vote.

Now as you may also be aware, people on the internet like to have fun. They like to screw with things and become easily obsessed with the silliest of ideas. This is one of those ideas.

BaronVille.

I haven't quite made up my mind on whether or not I believe the stories circulating around that BaronVille is actually a hamlet in Lancashire, made up of nine medieval castles, each ruled by a baron, but it doesn't sound that plausible, especially given the distinct lack of Google results for BaronVille Lancashire. There is, however, a place in France called BaronVille, and much though I hate the French, the opportunity to stage an invasion of this magnitude is just too sweet to pass up.

So, do your bit to ruin a mostly serious campaign, and show the true power of the internet as a force for immaturity and practical jokes. Go vote BaronVille, Lancashire for the new Monopoly board! (Note, you'll have to choose 'Wildcard').

So I bought a new TV and speaker system

That's what I've had on my desktop all day, after buying various posters and t-shirts, and a scanner/printer for Lucie yesterday, instead of revising. For some reason, it didn't work, and I've managed to buy myself 7.1 Surround Sound speakers and a 32" LCD HD TV that I'm going to use as a second monitor. Byebye £400 and hello unbelievable quality.

As such, I've got a spare 19" CRT Dell M990 monitor - if anyone wants it, you can have it for free, but you'll have to come get it yourself from Birmingham.

I think, for those of you with any interest in my finances, now would be a great time to focus on how pretty the transparency of my vista gadgets (except the notebook, which I made opaque so it was easily readable for you) is, instead of how much I just spent.

Bring on Wednesday! Damn you bank holiday.

Sounds like procrastination

So, despite the large note on my Vista sidebar saying "DO NOT BUY ANYTHING ONLINE", once I finished stage 1 of my revision today (adding obscure musical artists to Wikipedia), I felt compelled to go browsing the internet for new speakers.

I'm currently torn between:
1. Buying these.
2. Buying these.
3. Not wasting all my money online instead of revising.

..2's currently in the lead I think.

Till death do us part

With all the marriages breaking up that you hear about every day, I think that the one between man and goat in Sudan really sets an example. Despite the birth of a kid that was almost certainly not related to the husband, these two stuck it out until the very end.

In other amusing news from faraway lands, there's a 737 abandoned in the streets of Mumbai...classic. Thanks to Julie-oh for link.

Books

I keep meaning to write a little review when I finish a book, but I don't often seem to get around to it. As such, decided to just give you a little overview of a bunch of ones I've read recently at once, inspired by Smigs doing the same.

Jeremy Clarkson - The World According To Clarkson Volume 2 - ...and another thing.
The second set of columns written by Clarkson for the Sunday Times.
..what? That's not enough of an incentive to go buy it? A collection of hilarious stories, brilliant ideas and mild, yet amusing racism (mostly directed at France, though the Germans and Americans get a look-in too). Easy to pick up and put down whenever you feel like, can't recommend it enough. Unless of course, you don't like Jeremy Clarkson..

Michael Crichton - Prey
A slightly fantastical thriller from the man who brought velociraptors so, so close to our hearts. A slightly different take on the Rise Of The Machines, this one focuses on the danger caused when distributed networking goes awry, and a set of microscopic robots develop a fascinating hive mentality. A good solid thriller, and an interesting look at the subject, but nothing too spectacular or substantial.

Martin Amis - Yellow Dog
Yet another masterpiece from the man who I'm tempted to name as my favourite author of all time (though Hemingway still, for now, holds that spot). I'd love to be proven wrong, but as far as I'm aware, Amis is the only author currently writing what can be termed Literature, and he does it beautifully. Every paragraph is a delight to read, witty and intelligent language is almost casually thrown about on every page. The story itself would make a decent read with the most basic of writing, but the look Amis takes at moral values really makes you think, and the dark undercurrent of cynicism throughout is truly compelling. Not to be treated like pop music, and read casually with distractions about, this book should be enjoyed on its own, with nothing else, every page read twice.

Bookmarks are dangerous

Acted pretty much like a real person today, for a change. I was up at some stupid hour - 10 o'clock in the...marning? murning? I forget. That silly bit before lunchtime though, you know the one.

Popped out to town to get ingredients for my super-smoothie (peach, carrot and orange), presents Gib and some lovely food for me, and then back to revision.

And there's the problem. You see, revision comes coupled with its best friend, procrastination. Randomly browsing the internet though, is of course, just not on - that would be wasting time. Checking important things, like your regular links, your bookmarks though, that's fine, that's a normal part of the day - even if you are just visiting the exact same webcomic, which you know perfectly well won't be updated for two days.

I've only managed to buy a couple of things from eBay, and some goodies from XKCD so far, but with weeks more revision and exams left, I'm not sure how much money I'll have left.

9 days till Eurovision

Just nine more days.
Just nine more days.
Just nine more days.
Just nine more days.

..I love you Terry.

09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0

Between yesterday afternoon and this morning, I've managed to have a full 24 hours without any work, which was a lovely break, but now I'm right back into it - joy.

Yesterday was pretty fun, spent the morning putting the finishing touches on our, quite frankly gorgeous, group project, which counts towards 17% of this year or so, so it was a relief to get that out of the way. Our submission was pretty good quality even before you add in the mark bump we're likely to get from having a group of 4, instead of the usual group of 6 - but no more comments on that particular situation eh? It's finally over.

That, by the way, wasn't the fun part. Went to Sutton Park with the South Road guys, which is a lot nicer than I was expecting for anything in this part of the world. There was real grass there and everything - it's amazing. A bunch of geeks playing football and frisbee in the wind probably wasn't the epitome of manhood, but it was a good laugh - in amongst the discussions about shadows and other 'light' physics (pun, unfortunately, was intended).

Big Wok - aka all you can eat chinese in the evening, was absolutely superb. Under the official rules of being a man, I also managed to win there, by eating more than anyone else. That unfortunately, doesn't seem to have done much good for the slight illness I had earlier that day - now I feel awful. I'm also blaming the excessive amounts of food (which, I'm unreliably informed, probably contains cat) on the fact that I completely failed at bowling later that evening.

Spent the day revising mostly, wooo. Great fun. Time for series 4 of Peep Show (I've managed to watch the first three series over the past few days, God bless YouTube) and sleep now.

Xx