When Batman's busy, WALL-E cleans up

NFH
It's been a battlefield of nerves taking place in our back garden lately. When I mean nerves I mean tits as in 'getting on our' with the neighbours who live behind us winding us up with their public displays of non-affection. We're really regretting cutting down the tree as its just given them the incentive to use their backyard as a mini-Butlins.

The father had a go at me last night for shining a torch at his windows! After the cinema I had to get the clothes in from the washing line and used a headband spotlight to see what I was doing in the backyard. Such a meathead!

BBQ and Beach
Middle-class moan over as we entertained Emma and James who are back from their Australasian adventure with beers, barbie and beach to celebrate. Nice to dust off the Wii tennis to some newbies. Brighton beach was full to busting on Sunday but found a spot near Hove lawn gardens where the annual charity bungy was taking place.

WALL-E wonder
Last night was 2 for 1 night on the town. I'd been sent a Pizza Express voucher and used the Orange cinema deal with the intention of seeing The Dark Knight. As we arrived at the Odeon, it was announced that all Batman tickets were sold out so went for Wall-E. What a classic! The animation was spot on and humour was excellent. Hopefully Americans will take some notice of it for its consumerism, environmental and obesity messages. Doubtful though.

Landlord
At the time of writing I'm very close to renting my mum's house out. The tenants sound great with non-smoking, no pets professionals. They're being a little cheeky with negotiating though with the original rent at £625 trying it on at £575. £600 was my lowest offer but counter-bided at £595. Grrr!

Revels with a cause

The marketing people behind this are genius! The chocolate Russian roulette game of Revels have launched a Big Brother style eviction campaign. If there's a flavour you don't like then vote it out. Go to Revels Eviction website now where you can evict the flavour off in style e.g. rocket, golf club, remote control car off the cliff. Shame there's no baseball bat or sawn-off shotgun option. There's also a Facebook group.

Here's my soapbox moment for voting:-

Revels are lying to you! They say that Caramel is included but its actually her evil twin brother Toffee. That hardened, unloved bully boy bribed Revels, kidnapped his sister and has been getting away for too long robbing and beating up the other flavours for their lunch money and kicking your teeth in. Only Coffee flavour can save the day! Vote off Caramel!!

More FlickR freaks

DSC_0214F
Originally uploaded by Ginger DJ.

Okay, this is getting creepy. This is the second fetish freak I've come across who's been stalking my FlickR photos. The Sock Fetish was just odd (see my previous blog entry). This time, well I'll let you decide if I should do anything to stop this stalking.

FlickR has the function to check the recent activity of your photos i.e. how many views, how many have been made a favourite, comments made etc. Today this photo of me in a helicopter has been made a favourite for another FlickR user. Why? Its not a great shot so could it be the helicopter, the pilot, me??

I follow the link trail to find out who liked it that much to save it as favourite. Someone called Asicsboy who only takes photos of his Asics trainers and one of him in a mask. Another foot fetish freak! But no, the creepiness continues. His profile reads:

"Guy into sneakers, headphones, hearing protectors/ear muffs and face masks...I'm Male and Single. USA"

Its the ear protectors I'm wearing in the photo he likes and all his other favourites are very similar. However, it all the public groups (photo communities with similar interests) he's a member of that really scares me:-

• BDSM Brasil
• Skinny young people
• gagged guys
• Gags: Capturing the moment of insertion
• Tied Men Compromised
• Male Strip Search and Prison Restraints (Nudity/Homoerotic)
  

Perhaps he should be renamed A Sic Boy. Advice please???

The pleasure of spam

Has anyone noticed how creative spam email subject lines are getting now? I don't mean the countless Viagra, Euro casino, French or Canadian drugs, designer watches, 'be a winner in bed', 'enlarge your tool', 'drill her to submission' etc, or the ones that say someone famous has died but these ones I've been receiving lately:-

• Monkeys taught how to handle a gun
• Mike Tyson to Fight Michael Jackson
• Madonnas Former Home destroyed by Jesus
  
• Jesus Christ To Star in Next Series of Batman
• Paris Hilton considered for Mother Teresa role
  
• Polar Bear finds Yoga great for Flexibility but murder on the Balls

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

This is the title of a French film I'd been wanting to see for awhile and was based on a book and true story. Elle magazine editor-in-chief Bauby suffered a stroke which affected everything apart from his mind and one of his eyes, which doctors described as 'locked-in syndrome'. He could only communicate by blinking his left eye, one blink for yes, two for no. If he wanted to say more a translator had to read out a frequency chart of all letters - so, in French it was E S A R I N T U L. It was this system that he used to write his last memoirs i.e. this film.

There were some genuinely funny moments with Bauby's inner monologue and some very sad ones pulling at the heart-strings. The art style and direction were excellent using Bauby's one-eyed view in places (the sewing up of his other eye will make you cringe) throughout conveying what could have been a very dull film.

Sunday was visiting a couple of garden centres for some new trees since we chopped down the Ash. Driving back from Hassocks we decided to take a back road guessing the way back to Brighton but got seriously lost. On the 25 mile round drive that should have been about 6 we saw a horse blind-folded (waiting for the firing squad?) and some strange metal art structure made of old metal bath tubs.

Han Solo show

Thanks to Kerry spotting this show as we'd missed the chance to see this guy about a year ago and we were lucky to get tickets to see the One Man Star Wars at Crawley's The Hawth. Basically its some Canadian comedian playing out the classic Star Wars films (Star Wards, Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi) on his own with just his voice, mime and general prancing about.

We arrived by car and parked next to a couple guys dressed up in mail-order Darth Vader and Obi-Wan Kenobi outfits. It turned out they were the only ones but as we approached the entrance we were accosted by three storm-troopers all dressed and kitted out properly with guns and voice changer. I was particularly amused by the beer gut of the 'trooper dressed in Return of the Jedi gear.

The show itself was fantastic. Although not every scene from the films were acted out, full credit for getting the sound effects, character voices and exact quotations just right in such a funny way. Full respect to anyone who can do the same show for about 5 years without looking bored of doing it. After the third film was acted out, Charlie Ross cam out to tell the story of how the show began. He explained that Lucas Film Ltd were aware of his first 20 minute show and were impressed by it inviting him to a full-on sci-fi convention to do his show. The 4000 fans loved it every minute of it so he extended the show to include the other two films. Expecting to be sued for copyright, Charlie has to pay 25% of gross earnings for every show. His next project is another trilogy - Lord of the Rings which he previewed to us with an impressive impression of Treebeard and Golem - can't wait to see that!

Shooting Stars back for one-off Christmas special

Reeves and Mortimer back on the telly at Xmas - better than a pair of socks anyday!

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New Wii game - Sports Resort

This week is when all the big games manufacturers launch their newest products by press conference. To follow up their Balance Board and the game that inspired grannies to beat up their friends and dads to get virtual tennis elbow (or wrist), Nintendo will be launching a new version of Wii Sports with different games and a remote add-on to make accuracy and reaction speeds even better. See the video below to get a taster. Be warned, the Nintendo execs come across like a bunch of dicks.

Web 2.0 wonders

Ignore this part of the entry if you don't want to hear about my work and skip to the 3rd paragraph.

My job has got a little more interesting over the past few weeks and I'm actually using the skills I've picked up from doing my blog, photos, Facebook and the degree I did. I'm now expected to come up with a web strategy for the organisation I work for (too complicated to explain here) to ultimately increase their web statistics. Last week I attended a seminar hosted at the Channel 4 building near Victoria station in London where some web experts from BBC, C4, ITV and some agencies presented social web media, networking and the buzzword of 2007/8 - Web 2.0. It wasn't that useful as I'd already knew most of what they were saying and even disagreed with some of them. However, it was a day out of the office, free lunch and getting paid to sit in Channel 4's downstairs cinema was quite cool. The massive '4' metal sculpture at the front of the building was an eye-opener as well.

It's been a little quiet on the social front, though after Glastonbury and Wireless we were thankful for the wallet rest. Kerry organised a 'ditch n bitch' session for Viv last Friday which must be quite therapeutic for long-suffering partners. Apparently I came out as top bloke. I even took Kerry out for a spontaneous meal on Saturday night which earned me good husband kudos. Sabai Gastrobar near the Brighton Pavilion had some delicious food. Shame the duck meat was rubbish as everything else was fantastic.

Underworld, balloons and an up for it crowd

Fancy dress costumes

This blog will happily consume your work hours if not careful.

http://www.wtfcostumes.com/complexity/complex/

Wired at Wireless

What a difference a decent weekend makes. I’m now taking advantage of this new optimism and energy and have almost rewritten my job description for the next year with new ideas. So what happened?

I wasn’t expecting too much from Wireless as after seeing a couple of dull sets from Underworld, last year’s crushing crowd but excellent Daft Punk performance and a doubtful weather forecast for rain. Instead, Steve and Sam came along as first time Wireless playmates getting in for about 3:30pm. This year, the entrance had been moved to the other side of the park which meant a longer walk from the tube but the security was relaxed and efficient so whisked in without hassle. The beer tents looked heaving but were one of the best ideas yet with a snake-like queue and security pointing out the next available server just like post offices. With starting drinks sorted we sat down to overhear Har Mar Superstar with Neon Neon on the main stage.

Japanese Popstars
Out of all the relatively new support acts to see I knew the Japanese Popstars were going to go down well and indeed they did, rockin the place like an Ibizan beach invaded by punk yob mob on electro beer! Even the band members were surprised by the reaction but destined for bigger things I think.

We headed towards the Sandisk tent in preparation for Underworld, even though another two acts were on before. Bootsy Collins was about to come on but couldn’t tempt us with his eclectic sounds. In the tent, we watched ‘Does it offend you, yeah?’, who sounded like aural toothpaste, squeezing out a wall of fuzzy guitar-led sound – all a bit of novelty act really but they may have played better tunes before we arrived.

MSTRKRFT
Nipped out to buy a really crap burger and chips realising I should have walked that bit further. MSTRKRFT were next on and seem to pull in an under 16, pill popping crowd. Slightly unnerved at them using Daft Punk samples, the holy grail of robot rock. It seemed that old age had finally arrived. The rest of the set varied from good, stomping stuff to bland, chat to your neighbours type beats. And what nice neighbours they were as Kerry got asked if she was a model, always a good ego boost. A lot of crowd members were Underworld virgins which amazed me. It was also quite significant that these type of gigs are jaded by drug-taking fudging the memory. Nice to see Sandisk sponsoring the stage reminding us to that these memories are special - now remember to buy our memory cards. MSTRKRFT end their set on a nice Justice remix as the tent gets properly rammed ready for, what really should have been the headlining act.

Underworld
Underworld were amazing! As I said earlier after their last gig at Roundhouse, I thought their live sets would never recover but it seems they’ve been taking notice of other acts by remixing their tracks and combing beats and lyrics from different tunes making it an excellent performance. The crowd were loving it as well whipping them up like a crazed tribe ready for a battle with a frenzied bloke climbing the tent’s pillar and thumping the board as if he’s inciting a riot. The crowd settled marking out their territory and I have to dance like a egg-protecting penguin with my backpack between my legs. I’m also teasing Kev by text but he’s not biting! We meet some class people from St. Albans who we all chat, laugh and stomp along raving about previous Underworld gigs.

At 8:20pm and only 10 minutes to go Underworld end their set and the crowd, although slightly surprised at the early end, take it for real and start dispersing to the main stage. We hang around only to see them come back with Karl Hyde beckoning us to come forward for their proper last tune – cheeky gits but we were spoilt at the closer position.

Fatboy
Like a lot of previous festivals, there isn’t another act that can top that so took our time walking and talking back to the main stage for Fatboy Slim. I couldn’t really say I respected Norman’s set as he kept walking around the stage just sitting about or taking photos and didn’t do that much DJing. New best mates for the night hung about and we even found out a shared acquaintance called Beardo. We had a load of other things in common as well plus Candid, the Belgian lady recommended to visit Southwold pier and see this Tim Hunkin exhibition, which sounded too good to ignore.

We all leave the festival together and head over to Mayfair looking for a pub for extended conversations. Along the way we’re amazed at the fanciness of the shops bumping into pirates and randoms looking for drinking opportunities. At closing time we caught a train to Victoria, caught a cab back to Tulse Hill then gatecrashed Kev and Karol’s. All in all, a great festival with some amazing people - I hope my Facebook gets more interesting.

Waiting for Wireless

Just a quickie before I plough into work duties. More music mayhem at tomorrow's Wireless festival at Hyde Park, London. The website has released the full schedule and will try and use Twitter to update on the bands we see with some short reviews.

Cut Copy 15:30 - 16:00
The Japanese Popstars 16:20 - 16:50
Does it offend you, yeah? 17:00 - 17:30
MSTRKRFT 17:45 - 18:45
Underworld 19:00 - 20:30
Fatboy Slim 20:30 - 22:00

With most of these in the tent behind the main stage I hope there's not going to be a repeat of over-crowding such as the year we couldn't see DJ Shadow. I think its a big mistake not putting Underworld on the main stage. The weather forecast's not looking promising at the moment either - will it be wellies or crap trainers - decisions, decisions!?