The first Clerks was genius. After the weeks I’ve just had (busy as anything!) envy Randall’s job so much. Sitting around doing nothing but insulting people and watching movies. I could really do with a day of doing that. Or two.
All posts by Armand
Chad Vader: Day Shift Manager
Discovered this while checking out G4TV’s ‘daily nut’ video podcast (no link love as its really, really terrible, but does point you in the direction of occasional cool web things).
Check out Chad – proper geek humour right here.
The D
I know I’ve been a bit lazy on this blog lately. Life has been busy and will continue to be. But I’ll put up a few bits over the weekend, starting with this:
Every other trailer I’ve seen for this movie makes it look absolutely terrible, which saddens me as I think there are few who can rock as hard as the D. Whilst I still think the movie is going to be bad, this trailer does ROCK.
Today, I…
…asked a ninja. Thought my question was amusing, but the askaninja autoreply made me laugh more…:
The Ninja will read your question carefully and then decide whether or not it’s interesting and funny.
If it is, he’ll answer it and look forward to killing you soon.
If it isn’t, he’ll still kill you, but he won’t enjoy it.
In the mean time, please go to http://askaninja.com and connect with your fellow ninjas and pirates.
So you’ll know where I be if I stop taking calls. I’ll tell you what the question is when I know if he makes the episode or not, which we’ll discover in the next two-three weeks (it’s seasonal, so suspect that he’ll want to run it in the next few weeks or never).
Torch + wood + H + D = Angel + Wales
Thanks to Tom, not only did I get to pretend to be one of the fabulous Lib Dem gliterati (as opposed to the mere Lib Dem sympathiser that I am), but I also got to see a preview screening of the new BBC3 drama Torchwood.
V. exciting. It is basically Angel, in Wales. The leading lady is awesome, and the leading dude, despite his decided Americanness, does have a long coat. And is also called Captain Jack. And whilst he’s no Jack Sparrow, Jack Harkness does like to stand on tall buildings, which, in HD, looks spectacular. Maybe also not in HD, but the HD looked good.
Tom observed that, like Buffy and Angel, Torchwood is a spin-off set in a city to the west of the original**, about a man, who is immortal, with some kind of detective agency. Biggest difference is that they’re fighting Aliens, not demons (though they look similar) and that Torchwood is based out of Cardiff… debatably less glamorous than LA. That said… it looks great!
Anyway, ’twas much of the goodness. Have set my Tivo to record. Would recommend you all to be watching. Very nice!
**…the original being Doctor Who, which the observant of you will notice, is an anagram of Torchwood… and vice versa…
Music deconstruction
Writing a bit more music lately has had me dissembling the music I listen to in my head. I used to be good at this – when I spent a bit more time with my guitars, back in the day, I could isolate a track and work out the chords/bass lines were with some success (for songs of a certain (low) level of complexity). These days, have somewhat lost the knack but thinking in terms of multi-track recording is helping. At any rate, it’s adding a layer of enjoyment to my appreciation of it all.
Although I still don’t listen to the lyrics well enough to sing along, but that is probably a good thing…!
A great couple of days
The last few days have been good. I mean, really good. My long-anticipated birthday celebrations went ahead, a significant number of friends made a significant amount of effort for me and I had a great time. Thanks to all who came along and wished me well; it meant a great deal to me and was appreciated.
Today, in the anti-climactic wake that ensues any great self-involved event, I busied myself with life-admin. Not the most interesting way, perhaps, to spend a day off, but I’ve finally cashed that cheque from the IRS, I’ve filed everything that was piling up on my desk, done the requisite loads of laundry, installed a Wiki in my webspace (purpose tbc) and… and this is a separate point, really, but…
I’ve decided on the main plot/motivations for the novel. I’ve even mapped out a scene-by-scene breakdown for a short story version which I’m going to try to write over the next week or so. If that works, once tested on a couple of unsuspecting friends, I’ll be able to work to expand it into a novel proper and see about sharing some elements of it with the world at large. It’s not quite there in my head yet but I now have a proper structure to flesh out and its very exciting. My whiteboard, needless to say, is currently full!
The only downside to the last few days (other than the fact that they’re over) is the fact that my camera went AWOL on Sat night. If you chance across a Sony DSC-T7 camera with lots of pictures of me and my friends on it I’d really appreciate it returned… do get in touch.
Emo filmwatching
I’m not normally a particularly emotional guy when watching films. I mean, when it gets really sentimental or there’s a really, really sweet ending, I might get that little lump of ‘awwwwwww’ that we all get, but that’s about the size of it. I don’t walk away too upset when a film is bad, and whilst I am touched when a film is very emotional, I can usually walk it off.
Last night I watched a film that was bad for a weird reason: it was too close to real life (also badly written, acted, and generally annoying). I mean, limited narrative, but all the emotional manipulation that you expect from (bad) people, not movies. And there was no other purpose to the film: the whole thing seemed designed to make you feel uncomfortable, sad and depressed. Which it was successful at.
I don’t really want to name the film as I’d kind of like to hear people’s opinions on it unprejudiced by my view, so I’ll keep stumm. But I’m still shaking off the funk (really, disproportionately depressed by it), so if you have any amusing emails or links, I’d probably particularly appreciate them today.
The Melangogost
Sigh. Still a lot of life-admin to do. Some part of me was feeling so positive about this evening that I thought I’d come back and write half a dozen songs for The Public Betas. Needless to say, I haven’t, but rather had a pleasant evening of cooking and online grocery shopping with Monkey Sister. Which has been nice – am resolved to be less anti-social, acknowledge that I’ll never manage to read the whole internet, and spend more time with people. Which, methinks, is a good amibition.
That said, I do have a few things I’d like to blog about, and think I might do a kind of melange blog post. A melangogost, if you will. And even if you won’t. The things are:
New music (to me, anyway): listening to [[Gotan Project]] (thanks Nick), [[The Fratellis]], Athelete and more. Getting into my Indie a little (INDIE), but still looking for new recommendations. Tell me of more of these, how do you call them, bands? Also listening to The Minutes Music, which I do quite like even though they are my friends… ;)
New outlook: the whole turning 26 thing shouldn’t have mattered. But I no longer think of myself as ‘yoof’, really, as the last vestige of that fell away when I ceased to be entitled to a YP travel card. So I’ve made a list of things I want to achieve; big, difficult things that I really, really need to do to make my life more… exciting. Will keep you posted. The list currently stands at:
-
travel (have holidays to Havana and Edinburgh booked, which is something)
write novel (erm, slow progress)
band/music (well, I have a myspace page),
get fit (more on that soon…)
get driving license (have established I’m entitled to swap my Malaysian license for a UK one, I just need to order the form off the non-functional DVLA site)
buy house (nope, no chance)
get famous (erm, stranger things have happened?)
get rich (erm, again?)
New path: I have, for no particular reason, started to be quite interested in Ninja stuff. Well, there is a reason; it’s this website. It’s unbelievably funny. It confirms my belief that little is funnier than ninjas or pirates (Guybrush Threepwood AND Johnny Depp are testament to that truth). Much as I’d like to follow the path of a pirate, I think using my newly purchased sword (oh yes), I can make better use of time by learning the way of (some form of martial art). My sister’s bloke, the Keeper of the Goat, might agree to show me some useful sword forms. He’s an Aikido master and I think has a grade three belt in grass intimidation (ok, not my joke, which you’ll note if you watch the askaninja videos…).
New season: Winter is annoying me. I mean to kick its ass this year.
New puns: ‘oyster moment’… it was touch and go. My Monkey Sister is a genius.
And that’s it for now. I’m going to go practice some sword forms… and then maybe do a little composing for The Public Betas. Wish me luck!
Update: Managed to both learn some sword forms and write some music tonight (although the sword forms need work, and the music sounds a little too much like the Smashing Pumpkins…) — still, a start!
Crivens!
I’m really sorry for having disappeared of late. Recovering from man-flu, saying bye to folks, etc took a great deal of time. And then yesterday I started reading Pratchett’s new book, Wintersmith (which I got myself as a birthday present). Needless to say, I also finished it yesterday. Those Wee Free Men are wiley little rascals, aren’t they? That’s a philosophy on life I envy (they believe that this life is so good that it must be heaven, and therefore that they’re already dead. And therefore don’t fear death).
Tonight I will catch up on my life, and, like egocentric diarists before me, I will tell you all about it. When you walk the path of the ninja, sometimes you walk, sometimes you run, occasionally you perform a stealth kill, and very, very occasionally… you dance. But only when no-one’s watching.