Example22

It's not the Messiah...

2008-07-29T19:38:09Z

I may be the last person to know about this, but Eric Idle has written an oratorio .

(I just heard an excerpt on NPR Shuffle, which had me giggling for 10 minutes or so. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for a UK tour, or at the very least a CD....)

Web 2.0

2008-07-07T19:47:03Z

While my delegates do their labs, I sit at the front of the class and browse the web. I feel guilty about this, so I try to avoid giggling, unless I can reasonably show them what I'm laughing about (like little Bobby Tables, for instance).

This week, I am mostly talking about web development, but Verity Stob has beaten me to it...

Thomas M Disch, 1940-2008

2008-07-06T21:37:54Z

More bad news. Dammit.

http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/010413.html

Orchestration: tip #1 (of 1)

2008-05-27T19:58:25Z

Some instruments just don't sound threatening enough...

U. Utah Phillips, 1935-2008

2008-05-25T00:53:34Z

Bugger.

It was 20 years ago today...

2008-05-17T20:34:44Z

So, I just got back from an event commemorating the 20th Anniversary of Section 28, which was nowhere near as dreary as it sounds. There was even a raffle -- alas, I didn't win the signed photo of Sue Lawley.

The whole thing was funny (abseiling lesbians! insider tips on crashing the six o'clock news!), thoughtful (how come we lost, when everyone was on our side?), and incidentally also a sobering reminder of what a Conservative government looks like. An eyewitness report from one of the presenters sums it up nicely: "A Conservative [Haringey] councillor spent the whole council meeting flicking sugar cubes at Bernie Grant, chanting 'Die, you diabetic bastard'." Mmm, lovely. Can't wait until they're running the country again.

Sightseeing without sights

2008-05-17T00:23:28Z

Some while ago, when I first started getting interested in the history of London, I came across George Vertue's map of the Civil War defences of London. (Teeny image here.) I live right next to the site of one of the forts, so this map caught my attention.

I've walked around the Roman walls fairly often; it's a pleasant stroll, and there are remnants of the wall to be seen. The Civil War defences are a more substantial walking proposition: from Wapping in the east to Buckingham Palace in the west, from the New River Head in the north to the Imperial War Museum in the south. Not only that, but there's nothing left to see: the defences were torn down almost immediately after the war, and Vertue drew his map nearly a century later.

There are primary sources, of course: Acts of Parliament, for a start, and apparently William Lithgow wrote a contemporary account (although he seems to have been nicknamed "Lying Lithgow", which is hardly encouraging). But who needs primary sources? There are no remains above ground, and I'm not about to start digging, so what difference does it make if I'm a hundred yards out?

At least, that's what I thought. I walked along the defences (ish) last weekend, took photos, and may even upload them eventually -- but now I'm starting to consider buying books about Civil War London. Just to, you know, make sure I was in the right place. This is presumably how OCD starts...

Late-night Linky

2008-05-16T23:57:17Z

The Greenwich and Docklands International Festival is back. It's free, and the last two years have been brilliant; the evening events tend to be particularly good. 19-22 June. Anyone else going?

The Wellcome Collection hasn't been open for very long, but it hasn't put a foot wrong yet. Upstairs is a bonkers anthropological collection, a bit like the Pitt-Rivers Museum but with waaaay more money. Downstairs they've had a succession of ace exhibitions; lately, "Life Before Death" has had all the press (and deservedly so), but "From Atoms to Patterns" is more fascinating. It's about crystallography, art, design and the Festival of Britain... oh, just go and see it if you're passing by, you won't regret it.

Islington also has a new museum, though this is probably of no interest unless you live here. Still, it's a big step up from the previous "museum" (two rooms in the town hall), so yay for the ~~innumeracy tax~~ Heritage Lottery Fund!

Lastly, there is officially no such thing as too many Leonard Cohen covers. MyOldKYHome hosts dozens of cover versions of Hallelujah alone, and there's even a whole article on the subject. Anyway, I now have an album of Hallelujahs: 42 versions of the same song, and they're different enough that I can listen all the way through without getting sick of it. YMMV, I suppose.

Musical Commandments

2008-01-16T15:51:41Z

Thou Shalt Not...

...record a demo tape if you make Florence Foster Jenkins sound like Karen Carpenter (O Nightingale).

...record Maxwell's Silver Hammer under any circumstances, but particularly not if Jessica Mitford is singing it.

...release Christian propaganda in the form of earworms with ridiculous titles (Harry the Hamster sings the 10 Commandments: The Sabbath Song, which I've been humming for the last three days, dammit).

...play anything by Bach using only non-melodic instruments (Bach for Percussion).

(Via aprilwinchell.com, Music for Maniacs and Beware of the Blog.) The Bach percussion appears to be entirely Serious and Artistic, but personally I'd never have guessed it was Bach. Those who know their Bach better than I do (teaparty.net, are you there?), what do you reckon?

In which I am driven into the arms of Steve Jobs

2008-01-10T13:26:59Z

About a week ago, I finally installed a firmware update for my Creative MP3 player. I say "finally", because it's been downloadable for several years, but I thought I'd wait until they'd ironed the bugs out. This was a mistake, and given Creative's reputation for shoddy software I should have known that.

It's now agonisingly slow to sync; loading 40GB of files took over six hours. Not only that, but it claims to be full when it's actually only three-quarters full. There's still 13GB-ish of space left. I suspect that the clowns at Creative have cobbled together their own half-assed filesystem with an unreasonably low limit on the number of files it can store.

I've prised out the hard drive to repartition and reformat it directly. No dice. I've reloaded the firmware. Nope. I've trawled the forums, which are semi-abandoned now that the product is discontinued. Zilch. And you can't downgrade, so there's no going back. Creative are a bunch of fuckwits, and I'm an idiot for trusting their software.

I may soon be in the market for an iPod Classic. Nnngh. Grr. Hate. Hate.

How To Go For A Walk

2008-01-04T14:17:06Z

Some while ago, in a comment, I mentioned to juggzy that I'd written a program that used M*cr*s*ft Live Earth to generate random walks on a real map. It's great for photography practice: "go for this walk, and take five photos as near as you can to each of the stops". In a moment of unwarranted enthusiasm, I even promised to supply the code, but then I looked at the code, and, er, well.

Anyway, I rediscovered the application over Christmas. After I'd thrown it away and started again from scratch, I had a web page that could generate random walks, beer-glass walks and even themed walks (of which pub-crawls would be the canonical example, but you could do church-crawls or even Dixons-crawls if you really wanted to).

The user interface is appalling, and I make no claims for the code, other than "if you think that's bad, you should have seen version one", but it seems to more or less work. Try it out for yourself. Oh, and if it auto-generates you a suicidal walk: say "down the M4, across a minefield and then over a cliff", I disclaim all responsibility.

The Fenton T Armbrewster Restaurant Guide, 2007

2008-01-04T10:39:52Z

In The Tummy Trilogy, the humorist Calvin Trillin complains that whenever he comes to town to give readings, his hosts always take him to the "Casa de la Maison House" for the best French food in <insert Midwestern town here>, but he really wants to go to the place where they went with their buddies when they got back from Vietnam. My motivations for avoiding the Casa de la Maison House are even more compelling: no way would my boss ever sign off on the expense claim.

Anyhow, there's no point in my reviewing posh restaurants -- you don't need me to tell you that the Fat Duck will put a big stupid grin on your face, or that Anthony's in Leeds has fabulous food but less atmosphere than Mars, or that if you're after the platonic ideal of "dinner with friends" then you should leave your cave and proceed directly to Chez Bruce. But what about if you're on a budget? Where can you eat and still plausibly claim the bill on expenses afterwards? Herewith my personal lone-traveller-with-limited-expense-account awards...

Best Restaurant Award: David Bann, in Edinburgh. It is my personal mission to convey the Gospel of Bann to as many people as possible. If I have a week working in Edinburgh, I will eat a sandwich on three nights in order to afford to eat at David Bann on the other two; it is truly that fabulous. It's also vegetarian, and so good that carnivores like me might not even notice, much less care. I've been there four times so far, had three-course meals every time (fewer courses seemed like a false economy under the circumstances), never eaten the same thing twice, and there's still more on the menu that I want to try. The service is charming, too. If I have to nitpick, the bread rolls are teeny ping-pong-ball sized things, suggesting some misguided attempt to accommodate wheat allergies. But I'll be back, two days out of five, the next time I'm in town.

Overworked but Useful Idea Award: The noodle bar. Post-Wagamama, they're everywhere: Ichiban in Glasgow and Tampopo in Manchester and Fuji Hiro (the only one that's not a Wagamama knockoff) in Leeds, and every one of them is reliable and cheap.

Not That Kind of Indian Award: Everywhere has a curry house, and occasionally there's something memorable about it. Sometimes, it's distinguished by mad decor (Darbar in Leeds, I'm looking at you), but more often than you'd expect, it's the food that's surprisingly non-standard. Good examples of the species are Hansa's in Leeds (another veggie place!), Cinnamon in Aberdeen, The Dhabba in Glasgow (overpriced and not as good as it thinks it is, but even so), and Masala Art in Derby.

Home From Home Award (if there's a Chinese cook in your home): The only Chinese food worth eating (that I've found so far, anyway) is in Manchester. Little Yang Sing and Tai Wu are good, but the best of the lot is Red Pepper, a Szechuan resturant which has authentically spicy food but also a lamentable attitude to single diners. If you're on your own, expect to be sat on a rickety card table, wedged between other tables and facing a wall. I'll definitely go back for the food, but not on my own.

Billy No-Mates Award: As a single traveller, you get used to dining alone with a book. Some restaurants treat you thoughtfully (Masala Art in Derby even brought, unasked, a magazine along with the menu -- some sort of "What's On In Nottingham"-type affair, which I took as a tacit admission that nothing at all is On In Derby, but even so a nice gesture), some treat you like an inconvenience. Red Pepper at least has the excuse of being jam-packed, all the time; if it weren't for the card table, you might not get a table at all. But Chaophraya in Leeds, which apparently has a reputation for outstanding service, treated me like a leper even in an almost-empty room, and I've never had a faster two-course meal in my life. So bollocks to them.

Pub Heaven Award: The Three Crowns at Brinkworth (the longest village in England, apparently) is a short drive from Swindon. Good real ale, good pub food, go early or be forced to queue for a table -- because the alternative dining experience is, well, Swindon.

Gastro Desert Award: Sodding Birmingham. Even Aberdeen -- a city in which every establishment assumes that you're on shore leave from an oil rig, and where food is treated
as a substance whose function is to absorb alcohol in order to allow you to drink more alcohol -- even Aberdeen has a couple of decent budget-ish restaurants (the aforementioned Cinnamon, and Foyer, a brightly-lit stripped-pine cafe run by a youth homelessness charity). In Birmingham, there's bugger all occupying the gulf between Nando's and the Michelin-chasers, at least as far as I can tell. Seriously, what gives?

Surprising Breakfast Award: The Premier Travel Inn in Leeds. No, really: not only are the staff cheerful and charming at silly hours of the morning, but they've always got smoked haddock and other yummy cooked-to-order specials on offer (in addition to the usual rubbery croissants and rapidly-congealing trays of full-English horrors).

Wildly Eccentric Breakfast Award: A tie between the shambolic Lydiard Park conference centre in Swindon (where your breakfast might never arrive at all), and Travelodge's long-life cardboard-box-and-shrinkwrap breakfast monstrosity (where it'll arrive --honestly!-- the night before, and you'll wish it hadn't). Resolution for 2008: never again stay in a Travelodge, not even for one night. Particularly not the one in Stoney Cross: it would have been more pleasant to just turn off the road into the New Forest, park the car and go to sleep in the driver's seat.

Got any city-centre recommendations for me to try in 2008? Of course you have! Go on, post a comment...

Another dreary post about the weather

2007-02-07T21:39:33Z

Once again, I'm missing all the fun. I love London in the snow, but I'm currently in Edinburgh (where it is bastard cold, but not a single flake so far). Bah! Feh! Grumble!

I'm loving Edinburgh, though. Haven't been here since I was ten, so it's all new to me. And all the pubs are smoke-free, and it seems like most of them have free wireless access. What's not to like?

Armageddon!

2007-01-27T23:50:53Z

"In retrospect, lighting the match was my big mistake, but I was only trying to retrieve the gerbil..." Puerile-but-fun link: Armageddon It On / The Gaye-Pride Apocalypso.

(PS: From the same album, not nearly so silly, and I absolutely love it: Laid Bamba)

Is the early morning flapjack market lucrative enough to fund a bassoon?

2007-01-26T01:58:33Z

...an imponderable question from this week's London by London. I almost don't dare to read the text; it can't live up to the title.

I missed the weather! I was Up North all week, and never saw a single flake of snow. Bah. On the other hand, I have now seen Ayr (in the dark), Glasgow (in the dark) and Newcastle (in the dark). And I have blithered about SharePoint to literally dozens of people, most of them working for the NHS. For a treat, I'm now going to Stop Bloody Talking for the next few days....

You've come a long way, baby

2007-01-09T23:58:06Z

Lord Tebbit said: "Black is about being. Sexual orientation is about being. And we would not wish to discriminate against people for being black nor on grounds of their sexual orientation."

Norman Tebbit said that. I have apparently wandered into a parallel universe.

(Normal service was swiftly resumed: the old bigot went on to say "The concerns which are being expressed this evening are primarily about sodomy rather than about sexual orientation", and to vote exactly the way you'd expect him to.)

Seven pounds eight ounces of joy

2007-01-02T19:08:26Z

The world is divided into Mozart fans and Wagner fans, and I am definitely a Mozart fan. Even so, I dithered for quite a while in HMV before I had an attack of box-set-ism and bought the complete Mozart. Only fifty quid in the sales, and it's one hundred and seventy CDs. That's a thirty-centimetre stack, weighing 3.4 kilos (and that's in paper envelopes; if they were in jewel cases, you'd have to build an extension to your house).

I'm all partied out (thanks, smallbeasts, for the New Year party, and purpletigron and purplecthulhu for the open house), and I now have the perfect reason to hibernate. 10 down, 160 to go...

Get Yer Christmas Groove On

2006-12-20T20:30:38Z

For your listening pleasure, may I suggest Otis Fodder's Holiday FreakIn, featuring Northern Telecom's "I Want An OC192 For Christmas", a Cantonese version of Hark The Herald Angels, and Quacky the Singing Duck. Not to mention the inimitable stylings of the Inpatient Music Therapy Program at the UMich Children's Psychiatric Hospital.

If that's a bit eccentric for your taste, then DJ Riko's Mixmas 2006 is closer to normal, without actually including anything you've heard before. And there's a new Santastic, though it's not as good as last year's...

Goodbye

2006-12-08T22:36:38Z

The last train to North Woolwich is tomorrow night. And good riddance to it, though I'll miss the romantic middle-of-nowhere feeling of North Woolwich station itself...

A local opera/exhibition/magazine for local people

2006-12-08T21:58:06Z

And While London Burns: it's an opera about climate change. And an audio tour of London. And the most depressing guided walk in history. And (for all I know) a floor wax and a dessert topping. If you're in London, why not download it to your MP3 player and go for a walk? There are some emotionally powerful moments, though I could have done with a bit more story and a bit less preaching. One tiny thing: to completely follow the walk, you'll need to do it during working hours.

Or you could stay indoors where it's warm, and go to London: A Life in Maps, at the British Library. Described by Time Out, correctly, as "guaranteed to get a certain kind of Londoner quivering in anticipation". Plan to spend several hours in there, and to buy the book afterwards, and to go back a week or two later for another look. Top tip: they've hidden the free guide/brochures by the till, rather than putting them at the entrance to the exhibition -- it's worth getting one, because it folds out to an A1-sized reproduction of Newcourt's map from 1658. But you'll be buying the book anyway. Trust me.

On, and there's a new edition of Smoke. Because you can never know too much about London...

Cretification and Incompatible Mousemats

2006-11-10T20:26:46Z

Microsoft have sent me some certificates. Apparently I am now a Technical Specialist in, among other things, SQL Server 2005 and BizTalk Server 2003. Now, I know nothing about the former, and the latter doesn't even exist, so I felt the need to complain. After an exchange of emails, corrected certificates are on their way. In the process, though, I've discovered a new Freudian slip: my mind insists on typing "Microsoft Cretification". Am I trying to tell myself something?

Meanwhile, this week's course was plagued by problems with the mouse behaviour in Virtual PC: the mouse pointer kept jumping round the screen at random. After a while, we tracked it down to the effect of the company's old shiny starburst-design mousemats on the new optical mice. And so I had to go and tell our facilities people that our mousemats were incompatible and needed replacing...

Under Torch Wood

2006-11-06T14:23:42Z

Verity Stob has been channelling Dylan Thomas and Russell T Davies...

Aaargh! Bleaaaah!

2006-09-14T00:11:06Z

olivepixel has been posting some fabulous photos from Tokyo over the last few days. Of course, I'm going to link to one of the least artistic photos he's posted; you can check out the rest for yourself. Anyway, CAMRA members on my flist should avert their eyes from this monstrosity.

Canto-Pop Bonanza!

2006-09-13T23:12:50Z

So, Ping has been clearing out. We now have a big pile of books and CDs to be got rid of, and most of them are in Chinese. The general desirability level is not high, at least if the English parts are anything to go by (Ace of Base? Roxette?). Your advice is sought. This would be a poll, if I knew how to do polls (they may be a paid-member-only feature, I suppose).

Anyhow, tell us what to do. We should:

1. bin the lot
2. give the English-language stuff to Oxfam and bin the rest
3. give it all to Oxfam and let them deal with it

Ping was going for 1; I've got us as far as 2. Anyone who can authoritatively push us to 3, please do. Alternatively, if you yourself want a carrier-bag full, just say the word...

Great Denials of our Time, # 47543

2006-09-13T22:38:41Z

The US State Department would like you to know:

Reverend George Bush did write a book titled Life of Mohammed in 1830. Reverend Bush was NOT the grandfather or a direct ancestor of the current president.

Word searches find no instances of the words "insect, insects, rat, rats, or snake," although in one section Reverend Bush does compare Muslims to locusts...