one of the latest Steve Bells...
The audacity of it all amazes me. and amuses.

How great is newscientist? Thanks Neel!

Nose controlled mouse anyone?

Remember I linked once to pacmanhatten? Trust the singaporeans to take it one step further.... Augmented reality Pacman baby!
yeah

dBass have somehow got themselves into a shortlist of ten bands in some Beat 106/Miller (yuck) beer competition. If you want to vote, which you should, go here and click 'unsigned bands' and read what it says. The prize for us is a gig, for you, its a guitar... great.

Today's record 25 emails, plus any excuse to not do work, means that I am purging my inbox. I bring you this from the Joe Bourdet Post Script Archive:

P.S. referring to and earlier email of yours: the expression is
"Bitch, bitch, bitchin" not "bitchin, bitchin, bitchin" not a big
deal. HOwever, I have recently retired "BItch bitch bitchin" from my
lexicon and replaced it with my new favorite, "Poppin' Fresh."
Example: "Yo dawg, those new bell bottoms are POPPIN' FRESH!" Note:
the following sentence should also be accompanied by wildly
exagerated gesticulations of the hands and forearms. and when one
says "Poppin" the person should jump at least one foot off the
ground, but never more than 3 feet.

to Loch Sloy

a snippet from today's work/study trip to loch sloy dam, just off the road up Loch Lomond.

OK Dougie has just been round, and I feel I should pass on some of his choice web cuts:

Firstly, a cool Yorkesque video from bizarre hiphop tripped out funky warp signed band Subtle. probably requires broadband.

Secondly, a nice experiment/performance in flash.

I'm going to add a link to Livesciences, as, despite being in direct competition with dBass (or because of it), they're darn cool.

c h r o m a s i a / 13 November, 2004 / tide down #3

Annoyingly, David over at Chromasia has been putting up a series of mind-numbingly brilliant pictures of the end of St. Annes pier - something that probably means little to most people but a lot to those of us from St. Annes. I'm most angered that I've never taken the time out to photograph my own home area. Maybe down to the assunmption that there is nothing of interest there - visitors to a place will always find it much more inspiring than those who have lived there a long time I find. He is making me see with new eyes, as it were.

My goodness. A photoblogger from, seemingly, Blackpool. And a bloody good one at that. He's certainly found a beautiful side of Blackppol that has often eluded me. Enjoy.

www.chromasia.com

Its things like this that make me love the MIT media lab.

John Peel, 1939-2004, sorely missed.
[photo from the bbc website]

"Sometimes kids write in and say, 'I was listening to your programme in my bedroom the other night when I was doing my homework, and my mum came in and said, "What are you listening to?" I said, "John Peel," and she said, "Oh, I used to listen to him when I was your age."' It's nice being woven into people's lives in that way."

The Guardian has an article about Wikipedia up.

Greg used to wax lyrical about the virtues of the open source, unedited, unmonitored encyclopaedia, but I've never really given it a try. Obviously its making waves. Its certainly nicely done, and yet another example of the success of the open source movement.

Which all reminds me of made-famous-by-spaced website urbandictionary.com ; a fine resource, with a pinch'o salt.

theSound has been updated with pics from 'Bouncy castle Friday' and some long lost ones from Norway (only a few months old).

Major Ron Thomson is my beloved lecturer in Mechanics of Solids and Structures 5, the most dull subject in the world were it not for his occasional tangential interjections.

Major Ron on golf:

"If I wanted to put a ball this big [holds up finger and thumb 2 inches apart] in a hole this big [increases finger/thumb gap to 3 inches], located half a mile away, I would not use a bent stick to do it."

Major Ron researches ballistics. Undoubtedly more of his witticisms will followin the future...

The rediscovery continues. Little red boat excels once again in text based humour.

In passing is sometimes good too, exhibiting prime chunks of overheard conversations.

LIttleyellowdifferent is only occasionally funny.

Today I actually succeeded in producing a verifiable macaroni cheese.

Precisely one week ago some friends and I went to see Standing Wave, a play about Delia Derbyshire of the Radiophonic Workshop, the electroacoustic experimental lab located at the bottom of the longest corridor in Maida Vale in the 60s. The play was not mind blowing, as Taylor's Dummies , my only other Tron experience, had been. However I enjoyed the unique structure - the whole story of ten years of Delia's life told backwards, like a spliced piece of tape reeled backwards, starting with the 'decay' and ending on a buzz with the 'attack'. There were numerous references to that intoxicating mixture of science art that is sonic synthesis which, of course, appealed to me endlessly. It must be said the acting wasn't half bad wither, both leads (a young and old Delia) being very convincing, the supporting actor less so, tho holding together pretty well in the faceof the task of performing about 6 different roles. If this play comes your way you do a whole lot worse than to go along. (i remain your understatement king)

Hello. 45 metres of patch cable, one very cheap router and one redundant network card later, 0/2 7 Rupert St is now a wired, fully internetted, broadband-in-every-room, er, flat.

So much more loitering between float declarations on the information superhighway. and blogging.

A robotic drum kit

An ingenious bit of scripting, making a dynamic banner that exactly mirrors atmospheric conditions as seen from the top of a house in dorset (click 'panorama information' in the top right).

The author of that blog is another annoyingly good photographer.

I ballsed up royally today by sending an email intended for my brother only to the extended Crishna family mailing list. To quote a certain sketch show: "Oh, bugger".

The guardian has conceived of a way for we unrecognised US affiliates to have a say in the election:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uselections2004/story/0,13918,1326033,00.html
entailing writing to voters in Clark COunty, wherever that may be. Didn't have time to read, but sounds worthwhile, depending how much efoort you put in to the letter i guess.

The Mitchell library in Glasgow is drawing to a close its fabulous Picture This exhibition. selected photos here.

Again, long time no blog. I'm setting up the home network this week so hopefully more intrenet frolicks in the future. Was down in Cumbria the weekend, wandered/scrambled over Helvellyn (sp?) with Gaz and then an afternoon of eating and driving in between meals.

Shocking graphic follows. Now I where could the recent rise in CO2 be coming from?...
.

Thanks to the guardian.

Look, music notation software for on the move. - could it be what i'm looking for? And one less project possibilty...?

http://news.harmony-central.com/Newp/2001/NotePad-11.html

Found again.
kottke.org, the alleged voice of web development. Or the tried and tested easy access nicely designed fun at teh same time web news blog, whichever you prefer.

Call for travel stories from my colleague, Geoff,

who's a nice chap so why not give him a hand..

Geoff says:

I am currently writing a book about travel, not a journal aboutone trip but
more of a psychological appraisal of the travellers worldand I would like to
include different case studies from anyone who has been travelling for a
substantial amount of time and have moved from placeto place. Everyone has
stories from trips they have been on and what Iam offering is the oppurtunity to
have one of your stories published ina book for all to see. You can include your
name, where you are from, whereyou travelled from to etc if you wish or if you
prefer you can remainanonymous, its up to you. If you help me out then I will
provide a copy of thebook for free to the authors of any of the stories that are
included. I amlooking for stories of 1000 words or less that fit roughly under
one of the following headingsTransportParties from around the worldAwakenings to
new cultures, food, languages and religionsFeelings about different countries
and the attitude to touristsAdventures and dangerous situations (give me a
specific story)The big goodbye- how it feels to leave for such a long timeWhy
you decided to go and how you decided on the route you choseI would really
appreciate if you could help me out but even if thisdoes not apply then please
please please could you forward this on to anyoneyou know that you think has a
travel story that they are bursting to tell. Youcan send any stories to me on geoffbland_1@hotmail.com
and I will try and reply to everyone who does. Thanks for taking the time to
read this andhope to hear from you soon. Geoff Bland

I urge Gaz to submit the ol' passport in a safe story..

News from Nepal, as recommended by the G Dawg: http://www.nepalnews.com

RSA Design Directions: same briefs, fancy name

The first call for entries for this year's RSA awards and collaborations is out. Alarmingly, it seems the final deadline is december - I myself am hoping this is just an anomoly due to early publication.
Last year's winners makes very interesting browsing, comprising as it does several Glasgow PDE students' work, and the department in fact winning a special award for 'producing' 3 out of the 4 finalists for Inclusive Design. i say nothing.

Technology that's kinda in-between, I guess

The Intermediate Technology Development Group - interesting 'NGO' (still not used to that abbrev.) working with the conundrum of applying technology in developing worlds. Not that our local world is not developing. It is. Its just developing from bad to worse. I hope at least with the ITDG there will be less bad development to get worse. Based on 'small is beautiful' ideology, of which i know very little about but can guess.

Edward Hopper

OK, a return to more normal blogging. Thankfully.

I was a little annoyed to have missed an exhibition of Edward Hopper at Tate Modern in London. Then I saw the ticket price and was comforted (£9) Especially as it seems you can see a good bit of this great exhibition on the web for nothing: http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/exhibitions/hopper/

If you're anything like me then you'll know his 'Nighthawks' painting and every time you've seen it you've thought of how you must look up more work by whoever the painter was. I never would have known were it not for the fantastic public service of the tate galleries and especially their website. And the guardian of course!

St. Annes, UK

Back in the nest, all downy feathers and lie ins. A morning newspaper, the washing up, rubbish on the box, popping over to Dave's house unexpectedly, cups of tea and nearby piano. creature comforts? essential living, I say. Its been a while, perhaps too long but no time to look back.

4 days in London are always welcome - the houses, the back streets, the squeak of bus breaks, changing tube lines, watchin the people, the unmistakable suburbs. Every visit to londonVillage is different and increasingly good.. could really get used to it. Must be memories of an Ealing babyhood.

What is there left to be proud of? I remember a few years ago discussing the escargot-ish Italian postal service in mocking tones, with the rose tinted image of Postman Pat's stoic 'the post must get through' Royal Mail in the fore of my mind. A sad misconception today obviously as the Royal Mail manages to fall short of all 15 targets!?! Come on guys, at least one? OK, a success rate of precisely 0% can be swallowed if it means the company isn't still running at a mammoth loss (don't know if it does mean that, mind) but it was with a start (and a reference to Murphy's law) that I read that my very own Fylde was the 7th worst performing borough this year! Remind me never to send a letter here, else it may be more likely to write a bestseller than ever be delivered. Guess that'll be no chrsitmas prezzies this year.

My rose-tinted, nay blind, view of the postal service is probably one of those idiosynchracies referred to by lovable lil Bill Bryson at the start of Notes from a Small Island (note that sudden bout of literacy, and I use the term loosely, is due to a recent bank holiday browsing in Waterstones with my BA in English Literature endowed cousin), along with the fact that we islanders have a habit of perceiving the UK as a big place. Something Mr. Bryson, and my sub-continental cousin are only too hasty point out.

They are right though, I now appreciate this after the last two months. Reassuringly, I think the Czechs whom I met were worse for this: although happy in the knowledge that anywhere in the republic is accessible in half a day (it would seem), there was still a tendency to regard the journey there and beyond as a long haul. They don't, of course, have the island mentality that exists, albeit on a huge scale, in Britain. I might add that the fundamental difference between British and continental cultures can be traced directly to this geographical difference, and which also accounts for certain similarities with Norway (An island perhaps not in the geographical sense but certainly in the economic and social).

I end on a recently discovered book review of the afore mentioned book, which certainly 'clears up' a few things with me concerning the shameful state of Blackpool's (and don't you believe it, St' Annes') beaches:

He delightfully intermingles political commentary with travelogue. He visits
Blackpool, for example, where there are long beaches - that officially don't
exist. "I am not making this up. In the late 1980s, when the European Community
issued a directive about the standards of ocean-borne sewage, it turned out that
nearly every British seaside town failed to come anywhere near even the minimum compliance levels. Most of the bigger resorts like Blackpool went right off the
edge of the turdometer, or whatever they measure these things with. This
presented an obvious problem to Mrs. Thatcher's government, which was loath to
spend money on British beaches when there were perfectly good beaches in
Mustique and Barbados, so it drew up an official decree -- this is so bizarre I
can hardly stand it, but I swear it is true -- that Brighton, Blackpool,
Scarborough, and many other leading resorts did not have, strictly speaking,
beaches. Christ knows what it then termed these expanses of sand -- intermediate sewage buffers, I suppose -- but in any case it disposed of the problem without
either solving it or costing the treasury a penny, which is of course the main
thing, or in the case of the present government, the only thing."

OK, one of the many great things about Slovakia (and I suppose some other countries that I've been in) is the internet cafes. Why? Cos here cafe also means bar and thus one can walk into an internet cafe one morning and catch up on emails while sipping some cool Krušovice. Infinitely more developed culture, I'm telling ya. Not that its the morning, but hypothetically...

Another great thing is kofola. It looks pretty much like coke, tastes kinda like pepsi but spicier. The big dissimilarity between the special k (as I've dubbed it, ignoring references to ketamine) and either of those afore mentioned beverage giants is that special k costs approximately a quarter of the price. The same price as soda water, to put it in perspective. And people drink it like water, along with the several kilos of sugar I'm sure are in it which may explain my recently aching teeth. No fear soon I will be in the land of pivo (eg. budvar, pislner urquell) and I'm sure it will replace the k as my drink of choice.

Thridly, I had some kind of revelation concerning photography today. I am aware that my photos tyhis time round are gonna pretty weird, not at all vaguely holiday snappy as my Europe ones two years ago were. This is because I am on my own this time round. And as a result, I'm not really doing anything interesting. I rely on being made to do things I would never do myself to do exciting things: without anyone else this can't happen. So I just go and search out the things that i want to photograph, which are invariably what i have already photographed in the past, thus causing a momentous lack of anything new. Maybe i can change my ways. The only exception to the rule was Dubrovnik, and I didn't really want to be there that much, which will prove my theory if they turn out good.

I wish I had a digicam. These keyboards have a full US layout on the left of each key AND teh Slovak layout printed on the right hand side of the keys: pretty confusing.

Bring on more haikus!

Košice, Slovensk Republik. I think. Friendly, more so than I found Hungary sadly. Getting my feet back after some weariness. Its confuding stuff. Seeing too many places. Why is it that travelling always just leads you on to thinking about other places, other trips? For instace, met a Polish girl on the train, had been trekking in the mountains of Romania. That would be nice, i thought. Why? is it not enough that I'm out here anyway?? gees, i disgust myself. Still, if anyone is up for a walking holiday sometime, I reckon Romania or Croatia or any other relaxed hilly place would be fantaastic. I guess that is directed particularly at any of the family and Gaz, before anyone else gets worried.

Looking back I feel a long way from st. annes, Spain, and Norway come to that, and in fact the last time I did some schoolwork which isnt good for my anxiety. Same old.

Going for a foresty walk. later.

For all your cheap flight needs, skyscanner should do the trick. Awaiting eyesofabluedog update. Speaking of which I read '100 years of solitude' by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Surreal, funny, don't quite know what to make of it yet. Its a sinker inner i guess. Its basically a family history of lots of people with very similar names. And lives in fact. Maybe thats significant. Will get back to you.

Now, bye

Hello. Its been a while.
Budapest. Previously Belgrade - I stayed with my friend Nenad for what turned out to be 5 days. Was only thinking of 3 tops but he had some very friendly friends and a very comfortable flat and cable TV. And pancakes. Whats a guy supposed to do? And it was very good to talk to someone I know and have an extended conversation.
The previous week had been very long, moving from Dubrovnik to Sibenik, finding nowhere to stay there and going on to Rijeka, staying there for two days, making a trip to a film festival in a tiny roman town perched on a hill called Motovun, moving on to Slovenia and Ljubljana, having a lovely 2 days there, hired a bike and got verx lost in the nearby countryside (my pain was eased by the local priest giving me a little wine from Jerusalem), moving on to the less than inspiring Zagreb, save for some cool fire eating, fire poi and fire juggliness. If only I`d had gaz`s diabolo con fuego...

Budapest is lively, enormous, grand, colossal one might say. There is a big music festival on an island in the Danube which I may head along to today, its only a tenner. I wasn`t that keen on eating today anyway..

Until next time,
R

Namaste!

Dubrovnik, Dalmatian Coast, Croatia - even more heat, old walled city, fantastic views, fantastic amount of tourists, decidedly unfantastic touristy vibe. Look I don't deny that I am one, but its just that on this of all trips I'd like to avoid those sorts of places that seem to have no energy or interest for anything but tourists (only due to their sheer number). Its a beautiful, beautiful place, the eateries look brilliant, the sea is mouth watering, the town a gem. I wish this is what I am looking for but I guess it isnt. So I'm planning on moving on to Zadar promptly tomorrow. Have been reading about Ljubliana and Zagreb and they sound promising, hopefully a little cooler too.

Someone in Italy asked me why on earth I would go on holiday on my own, which threw me a little. I felt like saying that I'm not on holiday exactly, and then vaguely tried to fashion an argument around travelling being some kind of work... obviously thats not true - in theory at least I should be out to enjoy myself, though I'm rediscovering the uncomfortable challenges inevitable in lone unplanned travelling. Still theres a marked difference between my idea of my holiday, and say the lonely planet's, and the dubrovnik tourist board, and the guy in Italy. Hopefully I will discover what my idea is before this is all over.

In the meantime I can't complain. Apparently the sea is so clean that swimming is like
flying

Acquaviva delle Fonti - Fabio's home: beautiful, comfort, good food, banter, strong wine, driving in the heat, over to the beach for the evening...
 
Won't beat around the bush: have been having a ball. Pamplona was cool, bizarre, no running for me, just watching (when I could take a break from cringing) - then to Barcelona, hectic but oh so much fun, caught up with Benji of Trondheim, a day in Terragona and torredembarra to see how the other side lived as it were this year, Joan, Chris, Katherine, Lucas, os so much banter (macha (sp gilly??))
 
Perhaps random this post but what the hey. will be here for 5 or 6 days methinks, looks like just chilling in store, then oevr the seas.
 
Gaz's travels have blasted off in style. happy.
R

in the Mitchell

a quick image from this year's degree show. By Kristen Macarthur

Almost a month without posting, but denied that precision..

On being without mobility, that is sans mobile phone:
Some enhancement of lucid thinking perceived.
noticable struggle of some others to cope with the concept. Most manage fine after a short while, but for some it seems thinking outside the contexts of immediate access to anyone is beyond them.
Have been at home a week. Have not displayed any desire for mobile phone. Nevertheless have been offered to borrow, or even the chance to buy myself one (how kind) on no less than 4 occasions. I'm counting. I do not apologise for the curt responses given to such offers.
lack of weight in left pocketses, now free for filling with keys, coins, scraps and sweeties, just like in primary school...

Speaking of which my mum paid a visit to St. Thomas primary school, my ex-school, this morning (on business. Business of being Indian apparently, and thus introducing the little horrors to - god forbid - a culture other than their own that, despite the local paper's best efforts to conceal, is amply represented by the residents of this strange small town. Am pondering just how much parading half my cultural background over a week's events in the school really helps awaken young minds to the reality of multicultural Britain. Obviously celebrating and learning about Indian culture is of massive benefit but part of me, that is the part that experienced this particular primary school for 7 years, part of me calls attention to the point that we used to have these same themed weeks on such untrivial topics as 'the colour red' (in 1st class), egyptians, country dancing,... well thats about it actually. Is this one week extravaganza really a good reflection of what is meant to be a society of intergrated cultures? 51 weeks of straight up white englishness and one week of reality? I guess in an overwhelmingly white english primary school it is.. Maybe my point is not the injustice of my former school but the sickeningly unbalanced population of St. Annes. Or rather, the increasingly diverse, but thus ignored population of St. Annes.)

My penchant for long parantheses continues unabated. Please put me in line.

The amazing world of blogging! I've created one for for future exchange students such as myself to share info. This is what the webs about! oo, I've come over all warm...

norweegies

And relax. Thanks for your responses to the good ol' cap.comp., you excelled yourselves, anonymous and Dave.
And so I return to these sloggish shores, ones I have ignored for so long, tempted away so many times from my computer based work but really with nothing at all to say so silence remained.

And so I come to the end of my 3rd year of university education. and it has been. A fantabulous year. I owe much thanks to Neel and everyone else who told me to come, really. the fruits of my recent labour can be found at the following links, although they are a poor representation of my education this year - they're just presentation documents that might give one some idea of what i did.
the drum kit project
the computer modelling (needs flash 6 and links to some big movie files)

And so to some linking:
climbing up the walls (video, but not radiohead) and how to do it. Reminds me of a certain night in Glasgow involving a monkey man swinging from bridge to tree at Charing X and later on some squeezing into the gaps in the st georges cross bridge, and after that trying to gain entry to a house of fun without using the front door.
Urban free running. street climbing. call it what you will but I'm sure we invented it somehow and that Glasgow would be the perfect venue for it so i expect to see you all at training in september. I was just training my wall-run to limited success - not the right shoes of course..
That paragraph will make little sense unless you watch the video. Btw.

So I completed all my exams and presentations (1 and 2 of respectively). Quite successfully too I think and hope. And now a period of severe relaxation (floating, excessive late night partying of sorts, cabin trip with vaclav, sleeping, walking, guitaring, eating well, wandering aimlessly, boat trip, festival, boredom, scrabble, cycling, did i mention sleeping..) is blending into a period of severe stuff to do and packing before my departure on Friday. I continue to probe possibilites of a work placement in the summer, perhaps in Prague, even better perhaps paid work in Prague, and then further into the future, some kind of project to keep me busy next year. And I mean work project not another sideliner of which I have many lined up. Including:
build climbing wall in flat.
build bunk in room in flat.
redo flat.
get a bar in flat.
invent some musical stuff.
make a flute from a carrot (/that ones quite easy)
improve cookery.
start a street climbing revolution.
improve the working conditions in PDE.
start a social scene for PDE.
clean up the garden.
restart NYK.
get back into dBass.
start band with saxophonist Kenny.
play frisbee.
solve transportation problem.
use trnasportation solution to get down to Troon with the kite and buggy.
use transportation solution to build cabin in the wilds of scotland.
and so on...

As I say I need a project for my final year. Answers on a postcard.

I had so much to say and now its gone.

Caption Competition

(your caption here)

Real life Pacman anyone?

Or maybe just another cool flash site authored by the author of 58hours, the incredible real time Radiohead gigography.

My mum came back from the breakfast buffet a little confused. I do not recall her exact witty words but they must have included "bread in", "toaster", "contraption", "lost forever", "life of its own" "possibly automatically delivered to the table".

It was one of those Reith Hall-esque contraptions - indeed, not so much a toaster as a Bertha-inspired flame thrower. A brief description: A wire conveyor belt transports any unfortunate inputted items through a dark and mysterious toasting chamber, hopefully to be outputted abruptdely through some unknown orafice well out of sight of your hungry eyes. Ah, memories of bleary eyed students looking on nonplussed as their only meal of the working day disintegrates in cruels wisps of smoke, their only crimehaving been being a little too thickly sliced to make it out of said orafice.

I digress. The toaster in question was similar but different. For one thing it was even slower than Reith's.

"You'll be able to control the speed of it though" I said confidently, recalling Reith's toaster's three controls: conveyor speed, top hotness, and bottom hotness (some people like variety i guess. Note that there was no science to mastering the equilibrium of these three controls, indeed, I don't think there was even an art to it..)

My ma looked apologetic. "Umm.. No. There was one dial and that was set to 'toast' or something."
"What was the something?"
"...um... 'Shoes'."

So here you have it folks:

The bizarre love child of a toaster, an electronic shoes dispenser and one designer's sick mind. And perhaps my mother's tenuous grasp of Norwegian..

"But the tree huggers were trying to save trees, Roy, they weren't just hugging them for the sake of it."

This disappointed me slightly. A lot in fact, as I had the previous day surmounted my towering but irrational fear of high voltage to hug an electricity pylon.

Look: In the 70s the hippies hugged trees, in the noughties we hug pylons. Its a beautiful symmetry, a postmodern OK computerish comment on the state of our lives, and particularly the state of the Trondheim suburbs whose secure, homely estates and cul-de-sacs are ruthlessly scythed, divided by the power grid techinician's pen. I told him this.

He pointed out subtly that this was rubbish. He didn't say as much, but I realise now that I do spout a lot of crap. Please tell me, I need to know.

As soon as I think of a reason to save electricity pylons I'll show him..

Sentinels

Although theSlog does not condone the hugging of electricity pylons, it points out that if you get close enough to a pylon to seriously consider doing this, the structure is probably not live so it is probably safe. Probably. No liability accepted.

Too much to do, too little time. All is quiet on the web at the mo, seemingly simultaneous calls to work for all, bean, dawg, socks. Time for some weblogging however.

Radiohead. New site. tales from the cryptic...

a couple of new pics at theSound but nothing too special, other than my lovely sister in law and brother. Expect more photos over the coming days/weeks if anyone cares.

Claim to fame: Franz Ferdinand rehearsed in the same warehouse where I did with dBass last year. I sense their growing popularity from here without knowing that much about them. Not dBass, Franz Ferdinand. dBass are going strong apparently with a gig in QM planned and one in the soundhaus i think. Imiss it. I'm in line to be playing again come August. Anyway, Franz Ferdinand. They recently edited a n edition of G2 with some vaguely interesting commentary on blogging, though I'm not sure if I concur fully with the views expressed in the article.

Back to work. I miss eyes of a blue dog.

Tony has written some kind of pledge to arms in the Observer. Quite well written I think. Composed but scathing in his accusations, overwhelmingly towards the media, particularly the "appallingly one-sided ... Western reporting" and "al-Jazeera, the radical Arab TV station". tut tut tut. We woudn't want that now would we, vicar?

But really, "There is a battle we have to fight, a struggle we have to win and it is happening now in Iraq."? Which movie do you think you're the hero in Tony?

I guess I'm humbled that Mr. Blair has made the effort to come down to our level honouring us with his opinion in the likes of the Observer. Yes thats what I am, humbled.


Vaclav has returned from his Moroccan escapades (czech out his Trondheim pics too).
Particularly typical Vaschek moments: 1 2 and 3 . Sorry I'm not allowed to link to the pics. Anyone fancy a trip to Morocco, the coolest looking place, some time?

I'm back from the enormous trip. It was good. driving, cruises ships, eating, lazing, eating, oohing, aahing, you get the picture. Hence no pictures here.

Snow once again yesterday. We built a snow castle with integrated mini bar for enjoying the Glenfiddich. Thank you Daddy and Mummy and Ayla. Happy Easter Monday one and all.

I'm about to go to Bergen to meet my parents and my sister for a week's Easter touring of, it would seem, all of Norway. I leave you with a link to some of my friend Greg's pictures of our lives here in Trondheim. He also provides explanations if you have time..

God Påske!

R

I've been snowboarding again today. The last time this year probably. But I made quite a bit of progress so I can quite easily see myself surfin the precipitation once again some time.. I went with the crazy Finn in my class, Tapsa. He's nuts. I feel quite surrounded by people who are slightly but very visibly eccentric. Maybe its a Norway thing. There was a guy snowboarding in a suit. He wasn't eccentric, he was just cool of course, but I guess my point is its comforting to feel relatively normal among your friends. There are times when stuff happens here that is so unexplainable and apparently irrational that it makes me for a rare moment take a little pride and appreciation in my English upbringing. Its not that I'm ashamed of little britain, (this is an issue I perhaps have tried and failed to explain to some of you guys before), I'm beginning to refer to my attitude to britain as a country as 'indifferent', but I'm surprised and happy when occurences might suddenly make me think of british attitudes as pretty 'well formed' for want of a better phrase. This is a strange monologue. Anyway, there's a lot of mileage in the opinion that going away makes one, whether one likes it or not, more patriotic and less liberal rather than the expected vice versa. If patriotism is eked out of me, there must be something in that opinion.

Time for a picture.

Turning the Tide is a blog dedicated to publishing various ramblings of Noam Chomsky. Cool. Be warned: Some of the 149 commenters on this site are complete nutters.

I should say I found it because it is top of blogdex's list today. Blogdex is a MIT Media Lab thesis gone haywire: It picks what thousands of blogs in its database have recently linked to thus determining what are the most 'talked about' ideas in the blogging community right now. Its mostly full of news stories unsurprisingly, but a few of the links make pretty interesting reflections. Awful topic for a Phd though...

Checkee the new Customisation interface <--. Of course, theSound wouldn't be theSound without bugs: If you check 'links open windows' then the commenting ceases to work. ah well. It does remember your settings though thanks to the veiled blessing of cookies. Feedback welcomed, especially on the fonts.

Thanks anyway to Elvis Costello. I mean Eric Costello...

Things to do:

Look out for one of these doin the rounds.

Check out some Baghdad blogging.

Try putting some ham, a pineapple ring and some cheese on a slice of bread and toasting it in the oven. Cheap and cheerful.

Get your teeth into 'to kill a mocking bird', Harper Lee, for clear, sensitive, daily moral living. that isn't annoying.

Look after those you love and look out for them. Look once and then look again harder. Use the phone. Tell me to ring back and I will.

Never take advice from me.

Play, sing, hit something, nothing feels better.

Listen to Mark and Lard in the afternoon on Radio 1 before its too late.

When your son tells you how to set the video to record from satellite, write it down.

Ever wondered how to juggle 100 balls? This Java applet could help...

A new little animation I made for NYK..

teeheehee..

its the 'tache that really gets me..

For some real blogging rather than this morning's sorry excuse from me, check out eyes of a blue dog.

OK, a few points to note:

Firstly, Up until yesterday I was loathing the existence of email for its general information overloading properties, even if said information is very welcome and useful, it is frustrating to require so much time to respond to it all adequately. Thiunnking about it this qualmstill exists for me buti it was offset severely this morning by the quality of received emails. It probably says more about my misuse of the information superhighway that I respond to these on a blog, rather than replying immediately to them but this is a working day ticking away right now... (weak justification for blogging...).

First up, another beautifully crafted email from my friend Matt in the US. No points for guessing he was an English major...

>So I was complaining about something to someone the other day (I forget to whom about what but that's immaterial) and they said something that I thought was absolutely brilliant. "Matt," they said, "instead of just complaining about this why don't you do something about it."
So I did.
What follows is a list of things (in no particular order) that annoy me. Admittedly, this probably wasn't what the person meant when they said I should I should do something but it's a start. So without further ado...

-Non-alcoholic beer
-Decaffienated coffee
- The Family Circus
-Genocide
-People who say "unique" when they mean"unusual"
-Computer-based GRE's
-My mom's cat
-Republicans (there are a few exceptions to this one, such as John McCain and Bob Dole, but they are few and far between)
-Wearing wrinkled clothes
-Ironing
-Driving at sunrise or sunset when the sun is low on the horizon and it's blinding you
-Chris Kattan
-Shopping for a toothbrush (seriously, what the fuck? there's toothbrushes with straight bristles, criss-crossed bristles, a mix of straight and criss-crossed bristles, hard bristles, soft bristles, medium bristles, large heads, small heads, flexible necks, straight necks. Toothbrushes that are guaranteed to reduce plaque, prevent gum disease, clean between the teeth, help you lose weight. Then there's electric toothbrushes. Do you get the one that uses batteries or the one with a base that plugs into an outlet and charges the toothbrush? Do you get the one with the round head that moves in a circular motion or the square head that moves back and forth? I can't wait until I get dental insurance again and the dentist just gives me a new one every six months.)
-Being nearly 23 and still unable to grow a proper beard
-Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity, and Rush Limbaugh (I know I already covered these guys under Republicans but they're so annoying they deserve a separate mention)
-Being poor
-Having a job
-The radio stations in my area (there's like 4 classic rock stations, 4 hip-hop stations, and 4 top 40 stations so if you want to listen to something other than Nickleback, Ja Rule, or Rush you're shit outta luck. If it wasn't for NPR I'd go crazy.)
-Pop-up ads

Well that's about all I can think of right now so I guess I'll wrap it up. Bye for now.

-Matty

He sent this email to nigh on 50 people so I have no qualms about reprinting it for public consumption..

Other highlights from my inbox were a long and highly amusing and homesick inducing email from the sister, more longlost emails from lonlost american aquaintances, A topsy turvy email from Jo in Australia - despite her being there for ovre 6 months I have only just come to the realisation that physically she is actually upside down. For yours my subconcsious discounted this as a joke, a young wives tale if you will, but She is Actually Upside Down. (capitals signify the gravity of this point - hohoho).

Also a cryptic email from Glasgow announcing "Fw: Opening hours and power shutdown". Power shutdown? Just what is going on at home? If its not mass staff walkouts its the uitility companies withdrawing the library's supply. Completely!?! I'm pretty sure this never happened last year.. Some dispatches from the frontline of the Glasgow disputes would be greatly appreciated in comments..

Lastly, which should have been firstly, I have to register my disgust at the happenings in Madrid on Thursday. I would have blogged or at least emailed my counterparts in Spain were I not so sickened and world weary. I am currently trying to block out thoughts that this heralds the continuation of a complete nonexistence of morality and rebirth of cruelty in our modern world. A feeling I haven't sensed so intensely since Iraq last year.

As acts like these proliferate there is less and less I feel there is to say.

I don't know why but for some reason recently pictures speak much louder than words...

I can't say I'm normally a great fan of churches architecture wise - unless they're cathedrals - but this one we saw in Kristiansund was darn cool.

Didn't look that much from the outside, just a crazy whitewashed 70s radical kinda building,

but inside was a triumph of light, minimalism, calm and awe...

Its enough to make you want to go regularly, unlike some other churches i can think of..

PS. I now, like Gilly, have a sitemeter (that number under the credits on the left) that tells us all pretty useless information so why don't you provide more interesting info about your whereabouts using theMap on the left there...

theSound is truly up to date again. Honest. There's still a lot of crap on there in fact which if you're clever you may just stumble across. Goodness knows what I'll do when I lose my entitlement to megabytes and megabytes of university hosting. God forbid I may have to start paying *gasps*.

Anyhoo, I promised some updates from eel and Kath's visit and didn't really elaborate. It was great, fun was had, lots of money spent, one memorable boat trip taken and many memorable things uttered. MOSTLY though I'll probably just remember this:

a very big spanner.

Hardware store for very big people in very small Kristiansund

The Guardian have started a digital edition! isn't that cool? How can I read their site every day yet I've only just noticed this month old news? stoopid eyes..

This is a killer app for flash. Very politically aware too.

this is what the key next to return looks like on keyboards here. Cool eh?

Neel and Kath were here and now they are on their way home...

A frog goes into a bank and approaches the teller.
He can see from her nameplate that her name is Patricia Whack.
"Miss Whack, I'd like to get a $30,000 loan to take a holiday."

Patty looks at the frog in disbelief and
asks his name.

The frog says his name is Kermit Jagger,
his dad is Mick Jagger, and that it's okay, he knows the bank
manager.

Patty explains that he will need to secure the loan with some
collateral.

The frog says, "Sure. I have
this," and produces a tiny porcelain
elephant. It's about an inch tall,
bright pink, and perfectly
formed.

Very confused, Patty explains that
she'll have to consult with
the bank manager and disappears into a back
office.

She finds the manager and tells him,
"There's a frog called
Kermit Jagger out there who claims to know you
and wants to borrow
$30,000, and he wants to use this as collateral." She
holds up the tiny pink elephant. "I mean, what in the world is
this?"







The bank manager looks back at her and
says...
"It's a knickknack, Patty Whack.
Give the frog a loan. His old
man's a Rolling Stone."
(You're singing it, aren't you)



Legal Disclaimer
--------------------------
I am not responsible for any loss of friends resulting from the use of this, er, joke. Any complaints should be directed exclusively towards Mark Corrigan, Linlithgow, Scotland, who incidentally is studying law and thus should really be aware of the fine line this story treads between humour and human rights infringement...

Another lovelily designed website from a graphic designer. This one knows a bit aboot Trondheim too. Sorry, slipped into Canadian there..

Oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy...! Wanna go halvers Neel or Gaz?

My uncle recently sent me a link to some hubble pictures. They are incredible and i've lost that link but here's some equally impressive visuals from the satellite which I personally have some kind of spiritual connection with i think, mainly from memories of numerous features on Newsround, possibly of the John Craven variant. Sadly, hubble's mission ends in 2010 and becasue of the grounding of the shuttles it won't be decommissioned as such, it'll just decay until someone brings it down. Kinda sad.

My surfing has taken a cosmic theme these last few days due to another spiritual connection I have, this time with Space hero (aka astronaut) Michael Foale, whom I met in Dcember 1990. He has since flown loads of misions to become the most spaced out american ever. In other words, he has the most space flight time of any American astronaut, not the Russians who avergae about quadruple the time in space of the Americans I think. This is all pretty confusing for me cos I could have sworn he was British... Then again we don't have a space program that I know of so I shouldn't complain. Anyway the point is he's been on the ISS since October and yesterday did a rather special spacewalk.

What did ISS Commander Michael Foale eat for breakfast, lunch, dinner and supper in the last 10 days? I hear you cry.. Seems like there is more choice in space than here in Norway...

Hamburg warehouses

In the interests of consistency here is Greg's pic again:

My friend Greg took this picture in Hamburg just before Christmas. I like it, he`s getting really handy with his digital camera these days. Respect.

Gaz Drummin'

Roughly this time last year...

Even more cool b&ws of Glasgow at Dawg's rapidly evolving site.

Jonathan Percy has an amazing photo on his blog at the mo.

Humphry and Great Aunt Pam

"How did that knitting needle get there?"
"Thats the eighth glass today, where does she put it all?"
"Anyone got the number for AA?"

On the theme of reflections - by Gareth Johnson

Wow! I was just going to remove the link to the photoslog cos I've realised that its crap and slow and I can do the same thing with blogger (see below) And then I noticed the dawg had replied! And with an awesome photo to boot! keep em coming dawg..

Pointy hat

An image from Trondheim. This was a few days ago - most of the snow has gone now sadly, but it will be back no doubt.

I had an idea. I want to share this idea with you but it would be nice if I could retain credit for it. I want you to take this idea and make something new of it, whatever you like, except don't make any money out of it without checking with me first. It would be nice if whatever you created could be shared in the same way as this idea is.

My idea originated as a phrase: "Open source product design". Open source is a phrase relating to the way in which programmers develop software by sharing the source code, changing and improving it iteratively while avoiding the irritations of copyright law so treasured by big business. Product Design is, a) the pursuit of creating real world objects and systems; b) my degree.

Having a love of both phrases I would like to combine them. If programmers can collaborate internationally and create operating systems that out-do all others in functionality and economy, why can't designers do the same with products?

I went on a search to find out how the programmers did it. I ended up at the Creative Commons website. There I found the very license that would allow me to protect my idea in the way that I want. Here it is:





This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.





So why not with products?

Comments and queries welcomed.

Some rights reserved.

25.02.04 - This article has since been transplanted to and augmented at theSound...

One of my favourite pastimes here is eating hobbits. No really.

<-- Look! A picture of Trondheim. Well, of the shopping street anyways. I live several miles away but you get the idea. Its snowing.

Last week I was the happy recipient of two haggises. Since then I have heard rumours that the sending of haggii through the post may be frowned upon by the authorites so perhaps I should keep quiet. I will however say that they were delicious, enjoyed with friends and a halved swede and two minis of Jura which, I would like to add, fall well within the legal importing volume of "1 litre of beverages with more than 22 up to and including 60 % alcohol per volume as well as 1 litre with more than 2.5 up to and including 22 % alcohol per volume or 2 litres with more than 2.5 up to and including 22 % alcohol per volume" and thus cancel out any wrongdoing in importing two haggii.

The norwegian embassy in the UK has a nice site.

Help me!

Stephen Moss in the Guardian.

Can anyone tell me why I agree with this guy yet will be returning to a British university next year? This is by far the most pertinent argument I've heard relating to the fees debate and highlights that even if grinning Tony gets his precious bill, it means nothing unless people are willing to pay through the nose for a low quality education. The people have a choice!

This is just lovely. See if you can find the alien in the top left of the space area, its really worth it!

The creator's website seems pretty cool too - the ideals of pixel art take me right back to Deluxepaint II eh Neel? before the days of all this photoshop rubbish. Nice to see some creativity and thinking outside of the software package box. :)

Googlewhacking update:

grievously thingamajig

A weight off my shoulders I tell you. I now have much more time to do something more productive. Like making my own dominoes. I did that in the workshop yesterday. Cue two days of serious domino playing in the studio. Darn. If its not one thing, its something else...

My quest for a googlewhack continues fruitlessly. Dave Gorman and his whacking friends make it sound so easy! No such luck.

-40 in NY, 30 below in Canada, and, well quite barmy (or balmy?) at times here - nothing on which to fret mother. In tribute to my first ever prolonged experience of snow, I debuted on a ski slope on Friday. Roy was my name, snowboarding was my 'game' but you have to take it seriously if you're gonna be the best. ahem, anyhoo, I feel pretty proud of myself having, after 4 hours, begun to look pretty darn experienced in scooting down the piste, as long as no one notices that I can't turn. I can turn of course, to be let loose on the slope without skill would be criminal, but in snowboarding you should ideally decide on one foot to point down the slope and stick with it, which means to cross the slope left to right, you have to turn your back slightly to the direction you're goin, which my mind didn't have a problem with per se, but my body just wasn't having it. stubborn thing.

In other news a weekend was spent in this cabin and much fun was had in the snow. Perhaps pictures will follow.

Minority Report was seen once again and doubly enjoyed, especially Tom Cruise chasing his eyeballs down a drain. I tried to fault the plot in this film because it seems so potentially flawed but could not. The concept and imagery is simply genius: 'Howard Marks'' (wasn't he someone else in real life?) Georgian housing and lifestyle, the Andertons' seaside home, John's memories on haphazardly labelled glass 'disks', Danny Witwer's braces and his slightly bizarre Irish-borne quirks... Why can't I have a computer interface like John Anderton's? Why can't we all? That's what the world should be like. Perhaps we are getting closer to that day.

That 'computer interface' link came from Chris Rusay's site, which appears to be quite nice.

theSlog's News of the weird, part 1...

Monday January 19, 10:40 AM

Farmer finds diamonds in the rough

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - It's not quite the goose that laid the golden
egg,
but an Indian diamond merchant's prize cow is producing bejewelled
dung.

Dilubhai Rajput had stashed a bag of more than 1,700 small diamonds,
worth
almost $900 (503 pounds), in a pile of hay at his home in Gujarat
state,
famous both for its dairy and diamond-cutting industries, but hadn't
reckoned on the risk of a hungry cow, the Economic Times newspaper
reported on Monday.

Now he's feeding the animal a diet of grass, grain, fruit and
laxatives
and has so far recovered 300 diamonds in three days.

"I am sure within a week I will retrieve all my diamonds,"
the paper
quoted Rajput as saying.

It was unclear why he chose to hide the stones in the hay.


Neel. (theSlog's newest contributor - thank you Neel!)

Alink. Can't kick your addiction to retro electronics? maybe you don't have to.

I'm loving blogs now. Ah weeel, no work for me this year i guess...

Some highlights from the guardian's blog awards or whatever they're called:
Lurking on the London Underground on your way to work you scour the floor for lost photos, possibly pinhole black and whitesof London, the last of which is nice in design but begs the question, as does the slog, "What's it all for?" Why are these bloggers blogging, what do they hope to achieve, superstardom? Why am I writing this? Its a deep desire inside many to publish to the world, speak your mind for all to hear, yet ultimately remain anonymous for fear of humiliation. Sadly everyone here knows me donæt they? darn. Am i right? At least these people snapping photos, finding photos, travelling underground have some purpose, some mission. Me and gilly are just lost i guess. At least we can take inspiration from these blogging pros and perhaps, one day, people will say, "Roy? Isn't he the guy who said something once?"

Hello there.

So the site slowly morphs once again, and should be online soon.
This redesign was brought to you by about 3 months of chin scratching deliberation at various times - on busses, in trains, queuing in the supermarket, and now finally by having pretty much a whole afternoon to devote to the reorgansiation of 3 years of hecticly posted data.

I shall soon be venturing out into the snowiness and skidding my way to another reunion with friends here. Changes in Trondheim? not so much. Noticeably less people in the studio, still the same comfortable atmosphere of very slow work.! Just the typical slow winding up of courses and my deliberation on what to take to do.

Godt nyt år! is how they say it here, and it is indeedy with too dancing gifts from the Dawg:

Numero uno: Coldcut's '70 minutes of madness' CD wihch might not be overrated when referring to itself as ' the best DJ mix album of all time. Sorry, 3 millenia ad infintum, it just aint getting any better than this! hm. It darn good tho

Numero, er, two: Dave Gorman's Googlewhacking adventure. The man is loveable! so imperfect, so cringeworthy at times, so well meaning, so obsessive! Great, cos i like to think his devotion of half a year to the art of getting one hit with a two word search in google will be enough to prevent me doing the same! hopefully. WARNING: googlewhacking can lead to serious time wasting. Reading Dave's book however adds the human dimension which is infinitely more attention worthy.

THANK YOU Gaz! you can be my friend forever.