Broken foot

I have a spiral fracture of the fifth metatarsal on my right foot - nice clean fracture, no displacement. I got it last Tuesday playing football, it'll be a fair few weeks before I play again - old bones heal slower.

So, if you ever turn up to football and you've forgotten your boots or trainers and someone offers you theirs but they're a size too small - go home, and don't play.

This is what it looks like:

Airport Extreme

There's an airport on Ebay for a million pounds - postage is free, of course.

You know what it's like..

.. when you get something new, and what you had before is suddenly revealed to be instantly obsolescent?

My Mighty Mouse came today! Daisy sellotaped the old Pro mouse up the other day as part of one of her installations, not that it was bothered, and James has given it a lot of stick. Let's see how this new fancy-dan thing stands up to it.. in the mean time: right-click! middle-click! amazing scroll ball! mmmm.. thanks to RTB for persuading me.

Update (August): No problems, mouse truly is mighty. Daisy stopped after Sellotape Untitled IV: James hammers it as you might expect, it just keeps working. He did get loads of jam in the scroll wheel but after a few cleaning scrolls it was OK.

Fantasy celebrity sprog

If Bob Geldof had had a son he would surely have called him Gandalf Geldof..

Formally assimilated

I bought a refurb white macbook from Apple today: spent some of the £100 saving over the new core 2 duos on extra memory [not from Apple!] and I get a superdrive out of it, may come in handy one day. Delivery date is on or before Friday..

When I was checking out the purchase from the the Apple store, I realised I have mislaid my VISA card: I remember them all falling out my wallet "somewhere, the other day". I also remembered the security code on the back which I needed to quote to make the purchase which was just as well, as the refurbs go fast.

Fight! Fight!

Armoured suits for cats and mice. Ippon!

Microthinking

I grudgingly admit the possibility of the existence of Microsoft Desktop Search plugins, and I understand that if I am stupid enough not to realise that uninstalling said Desktop Search would scupper said plugins then I could be mildly inconvienced: and yet, when uninstalling the software (>my< system resources, thankyouverymuch!) I was amazed when presented with this: couldn't they at least have removed the security updates from the list?

Another switcher

> From: robinthebear@robinthebear.com
> Subject: Ordered

> iMac, 24-inch, Intel Core 2 Duo
> NVIDIA GeForce 7600 GT 256MB SDRAM
> 2.33GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
> 750GB Serial ATA drive
> 3GB 667 DDR2 SDRAM
> Wireless keyboard (English) & wireless Mighty Mouse + Mac OS X (English)
> SuperDrive 8x (DVD+R DL/DVD+RW/CD-RW)

Chulo!

Losses

The wonderful French radio station FIP has disappeared from the Brighton airwaves, and Porky Whites are no longer available from Asda.

What I want do do though is say goodbye to Kurt Vonnegut who spoke many words directly into my brain. This image, at the time of writing, is the home page default:



Eidt: FIP is gone for good now it looks like, Porkies are back, and Kurt Vonnegut is still dead..

Astroturf

I played football tonight for the first time in years: I have never played on astroturf before and I had no idea how abrasive it is.

I can never stay on my feet when I play in defense: I like to go for the ball and get it no matter what, so I end out doing sliding tackles: astroturf is more like glasspaper than grass, so I have no skin on my right knee or elbow. Other than losing miserably I enjoyed it a lot: it reminded me of the last time I played, back when I lived in my old flat.

I was turning out for an Ericcsons team in their sports and social league as a favour for a guy I worked with (who was a Kiwi and had never played 'soccer' in his life before: I also have a medal for being part of a winning ESSC baseball team) and managed to get a decent grassburn one week: I was cleaning it with peroxide (yes, I was a single man) when I dripped much too much on the graze and kicked upwards involuntarily: I must have had shoes on (I don't remember it hurting my toes) so the Stanley knife I used to keep on my coffee table took up, turned over once lazily in the air, and embedded itself into my leg. I didn't know which to say ouch for, I imagine I swore a bit.

(We did play at Glastonbury a few years ago but that wasn't an organised game: we were on tv though according to legend)

Long sleeves and trackie trousers next week! Shinpads are a bit woofy though, without boots.

Google Desktop/Mac

I've never installed a Google desktop search product on Windows, let alone seen the need for one on the Mac - why would you when you have Spotlight? - but seeing as Mr Pinky asked so nicely I will give this new Google Desktop/Mac a go on old failthful G3 iBook.

My main problem with these multi-search programs is that I always know in advance where I am looking. If I'm looking for a document or file, it's on my local disk. If I'm looking for a web page, it's on the internet, and the two don't really coincide: equally, if I'm looking for an email, I search there, whether that's local or internet (ie Gmail). I can imagine that under some circumstances you would want to look for all info about a topic, whether as emails or files or webpages, even though I can't think of one myself. Perhaps the program will offer that opportunity (if it ever finishes indexing!)

Edit: on reflection, I would probably use this type of search at work (where I don't have a desktop search program anyway, mostly because everything is stored on the network somewhere and/or on an Exchange server)

Administrative entry

Imageshack.us trashed my profile picture, which as a free service is of course entitled to do. So I've had to upload it again, which is why this post is..

If the cap fits..

Firefox has a few problems with Microsoft and certificates - Microsoft insist on self-signing rather than participating in the trust network - but this one made me laugh:

Everything Virgin does is shit.

We get broadband and TV from Virgin, who took it over from NTL. In the course of their first weeks of operation they have fucked up their contract with Sky and lost Sky One, which means the missus can't watch Lost. And now, suddenly and very inconveniently, it's very difficult to get through to torrent sites where episodes of Lost can be downloaded - sites like The Pirate Bay are suddenly unavailable (they can be pinged, but no connections can be made through a browser)

This is intensely annoying - not Sky One, which I am quite glad not to have any more, but I like to be able to go to whatever website I like. I linked to The Pirate Bay once before, to something I found on their "legal" page, which is worth a look, if you're not a Vigin customer that is and you are allowed to access it by your internet provider (there's also a Turkish internet provider which blocks TPB according to it's wikipedia entry)

Unfortunately our house has neither a rooftop aerial nor a BT phoneline so it will be inconvenient and expensive to change away from Virgin to Freeview and ADSL, but I think we'll be doing it.

Everything Virgin does is shit. I phoned up for Beck once to topup her mobile and the voice menu was all "Hey you" and "Great! You've topped up your mobile -- cool". Arseholes.

Edit: I'm not the first to notice.
Edit: Still no access in April.

No kidding..

Gutsy

Watching a TV program about Kamikaze and Bushido during WW2 on channel 203: "Japanese soldiers would strap grenades or mines to themselves and attack tanks".

Neat

All software installations must require some kind of user action these days - I think this is the best example of a graphic installer instruction I have seen. Whether you're a Mac user or not you should be able to tell what you need to do.

Secret gig

Me and Beck went to a 'secret' Jarvis gig at Concorde II yesterday, a warmup for the tour proper which starts next week. The venue isn't really used to your actual proper band (it's Fatboy Slim's home venue) and it shows: the seven strong band are crowded on the stage, the lighting rig fails (they play the first song in darkness then put a static spot on Jarvis and up the stage lighting, the basic blue and red bulbs on the the stage rig) and the monitors weren't particularly well positioned according to JC who claimed they only worked at knee height (and did most of one song at that level to prove it). The bass was a bit jagged maybe but overall it was not too bad a sound for a venue with debatable acoustics (and maybe PA) and at least good and fucking loud (more swearing later) with the bass drum battering the stomach, bass guitar hammering my aching knees, plenty of noisy guitar. What a gig ought to be, especially the first gig of the new millenium.. ahem.

They open with 'Fat Children' from the new album which is released next Monday: superb. Wasted on this audience, I'm sorry to say, who hardly seem to move. This is the first time JC has played live in years, he's nervous and rambly between songs, but he picks up and soon the animated arm-dancing and twitching is back: he picks up a guitar for a song or two, charisma starts sparking: we're at the back, there still doesn't seem to be much dancing going on though: one factor is age, Beck won the "audience average age" game with 32, but also seemingly the Concorde have fucked up again and put a big gap between the performer and his audience. Plus the band play no Pulp and that's what the audience would love to hear.. Jarvis repeatedly apologises for the unfamiliarity of the material, at one point likening it to looking in a fridge for 45 minutes: afterwards you get the feeling that it was bright, but unappealing. At least that's the way I remember what he said.

The new material is actually very good, I will be buying the album when it comes out next week, in the meantime there's jarvspace. After a while the band started to sound a bit 'samey', perhaps they could try to introduce more dynamics into the set, but maybe that wasn't practical in the Concorde II as it's a bit primitive. Of course there are dynamics in in the songs, Mr Cocker's signature is the high quality of his songwriting, and he takes the time to explain what some of the songs refer to: 'Big Julie Rules The World' is a mashup of a book and an early-developing girl from Loughborough (home of Ladybird books, you'll be fascinated to discover). 'Disney Time' was partially inspired by Dumbo's mum.

They play the songs from the Jarvis album, a B side (Jarvis satirically mocks the term B side, prefers 'differently abled song') called One Man Show, and a song he wrote for Lee Someone called Big Stuff. 'From A to I' is superb, it's about evil being everywhere 'from Auschwitz to Ipswitch' and seeing evil when you look inside yourself.

Then they go off, come back on and do 'C*nts are Running The World' which apparently is the hidden song on the album.. fun for when the vicar comes round 30 minutes after you've been listening. Actually, it's a stormer and available from iTunes. Jarvis is conversational, affectionate, grateful: the audience is slightly perhaps withholding of their favours, unamused by the unfamiliarity, but applause is generally warm and generous. The odd chant of "Jar - Vis" goes up, someone shouts for 'Common People', ironically maybe, though introducing Candida Doyle from Pulp for one song heightened the audiences' hopes of hearing a favourite song: you never know, however unlikely you know it to be.

Our thanks to Carl for the tip-off for the tickets, nice to meet his new wife Gretchen too.

Me with hair and a dress

My sister Jane sent me this picture a while ago - it's my maternal grandmother Sarah, Auntie Belle and Uncle Dick taken in 1913 or so.

Edit: Mum sent me a picture of me in a dress! (all the babies wore them then)

Hating Jimmy Carr

We have an rule with no exceptions in our house: any TV program fronted by (or prominently featuring) Jimmy Carr is switched over immediately. Try it, you'll like it..

Having said that, the only thing that's on that I currently like is series 6 of The Sopranos: once this final series is over (next year) I've only got ER left and that's been going downhill a bit maybe, or plateaued perhaps to be polite. Everything else is dead or gone - I won't watch The Simpsons on TV unless I am absolutely guaranteed nothing past series 8 will sully my eyes. I won't watch new ones anymore at all. I wish they had sacked them all when they threatened to strike for more pay (Fox advertised for soundalikes) and not made the later series. It's the worst example of cultural dilution in my lifetime: they took what was human and decent and honest and made it into a self=parodic freakshow. Homer isn't a father now, he's a monster: my own 'Jump The Shark' moment was when he was lying on the kitchen floor smashing beer bottles in an ep called something like '3 gays and a condo': that just wasn't the man i'd seen before who always tried to do the best for his family albeit in his own hopeless way. And I felt this before I had children in case you think that's a factor.

Anyway, Homer never goes to work (they make meta-jokes about it) and Bart and Lisa never go to school (not properly). They haven't written a properly-structured episode for five years or more, just "The Simpsons are Going To Japan/Brazil/Mars/England" or whatever crazy escapade they have this week. Marge doesn't care for Maggie, who never falls over any more, have you noticed?

It's sometimes possible to tell from the opening credits if it's a new ep never seen before (avoid at all costs) or one made years ago which you've seen a thousand times (you will still get something new from it if you watch it closely, and still enjoy it if you don't)

Incidentally, 'Happy Days' was considered part of the counter-culture when it was first shown: 'The Fonz' wore a leather jacket and rode a motorbike, perhaps the definitive images of rebellion to adults when I was an adolescent. Now it looks like the softest of cashmere conformity.

Oh, and I'm going to buy Resident Evil 4 from eBay so I might not be back for a while... never played RE before, sounds like fun. (Edit: too difficult!)