The one-eyed stare of fear...

The one-eyed stare of fear...
Originally uploaded by sp3ccylad.

The view at the point my heart starts racing. Half the time I have nothing but a sketchy idea of a melody and some scratched-out scrawl on a piece of paper. Most times it works, sometimes it doesn't. Then there's the times the harmonies just flow and time flies. I barely remember those times. It's like something's working me. Something I don't pretend to understand. Something I've no desire to understand.

Dress your Ferret

And why not? If it mauls your finger in the style of the late great Richard Whiteley, then all the better - because you probably deserve it.

Painfully funny, and all the better for it being real.

Surely

Verily, the lad's at it again.

Surely

FREE MUSIC!

Surely is the first song in ages that I actually sat down with a guitar and wrote in the popularly understood way - and you can tell. A supernatural tale of domestic invisibility, it sits somewhere Ben Jonson's Volpone and Anthony Minghella's film Truly, Madly, Deeply in lyrical content - and, even though I say so myself, it's poptastic.

Go on: download it before I start actually selling my stuff.

And on that subject: iTunes users can now buy a Sp3ccylad song. No, really. I'm Talking About You has been released as part of a compilation album linked to a radio show out in the Carolinas that I get played on, called The Great American Music Hour, Vol. 2 that is out on Lost Cat Records. If you wish to buy it (or just check out my story!) I've popped in the iTunes music store link above.

Pimp My Snack

Us Brits love our sweeties. I believe we eat more of them than any other nationality, including those lovable cuckoo-clock peddlars the Swiss. So - what could be better than big fat snacks. And when I say, big and fat, I mean BIG. And FAT.

That's the rationale behind Pimp My Snack, a laudable attempt to make colossal versions of all your favourite chocolate bars. It seems to be an ongoing project, so I shall be going back for more.

Choco-tastic.

Battling the tapioca tube - or How We Used To Live

I was fiddling with the Wayback Machine last night (actually looking for a 9-year-old photo of me in Bridlington, of all places) and while I was doing so, a friend in California pointed me in the direction of a fantastic piece of stuff.

Whilst looking at the links off it, I found a page I'd almost forgotten about - The Random Masturbation Synonym Generator. Hit the button and you get a synonym for masturbation (although most of them fit more properly into the category of euphemisms if you want to get picky).

I was playing with it (eep!) and I suddenly realised "Hey! This is how I used to amuse myself when Bill Clinton was President!" Suddenly, it all seems such a long, long time ago...

Not safe for work unless you work in a masturbation synonym factory.

More Pieces Than People

More music from the newly productive House of Sp3ccylad:

More Pieces Than People
FREE MUSIC, DAMMIT!

A bit different for me, this. Mostly acapella, it counterpoints a growing discontent with the shape of things in the wider world with the knowledge that, however good we try to be, events will conspire to make our personal lives appear no better than the events we try to transcend - that trying to do absolute good will always be tempered by somoeone else's personal perspective.

So: do you live vicariously and look good? Or do you do what you need and watch people play wounded (with undoubtable sincerity) while the world wags its collective finger?

And can you stand the pain it causes: even if it is more self-inflicted than the "victim" claims?

The Same Way Too, revisited

Well, I've remade an old song and stripped it back to basics - and here it is:

The Same Way Too
FREE MUSIC!

It catches me in sombre mood, taking the song away from its pop roots and back to the despair I felt when I wrote it. I'd say "enjoy!", but that's not quite right.

Appreciate.

Belgian farting pig cartoon

I can't ask any more from life than this.

This borders on the perfect, I tell ya.

Aw, bless!

When I was young, I had a knitted digestive system, made by my mother. She also made me a heterosexual. Anyway, I never thought I'd see one again - until today. Ladies and gentlemen - a knitted digestive system.*


*The factuality of this post may be at odds with the written content.

Piiiiiiiiigs iiiiiiiin Spaaaaaaaaace!

Well, this is the prototype version. Want to know whether mammals can take extreme G-forces? Well this Flickr photoset shows how the Soviets went about it - and it's simple.

Just get a pig drunk.

Put it in a cannon.

Boom!

Pig comes back on parachute.

That's it. The pig lives.

Look at all the lovely flying pig photos here.

Product Endorsement Hell

While we're hanging at YouTube, here's a bit of an oddity.

The Rolling Stones - they'll do anything for money! Here, the supposed "bad boys of pop" troop into a studio and record a jingle for Kellogg's Rice Krispies.

To be fair, the result isn't all that bad: but really.

And what was the budget for this, pray?

Woah. Rupert Murdoch may well be union-breaking scum, but he knows how to calm me down with magic.

For our transatlantic cousins, a word of explanation. Over here, we have Sky TV. It's our satellite service. Yes. Our only satellite service. We had two, but one was hounded to its premature death by Rupert Murdoch.

Rupe's formula for getting viewers (especially principled scum like me) is simple. Chuck bucketloads of money at it. Either

a) buy the rights to it (anything with a ball or anything cool…)
or
b) give it a budget roughly similar to Switzerland's GNP

This is a bit of both. Sky have the rights to The Simpsons, and to advertise the new season (yeah, like you need to have The Simpsons advertised) they remade the title sequence in live action. It's pretty amazing.

Look for the detail. It's there.

Bad Taste Alert!!!

I don't like Bohemian Rhapsody. A song that takes that long just to tell me "nothing really matters..." can't be good. Oh, no.

On the other hand, a similar song with lyrics by the semilegendary DogHorse called Bulimian Rhapsody is pure genius. It has kazoos, too. Lots of them.

Kazoos are good. You know that. I've told you so.

The lyrics can be accessed here. Read them and sing along. Tell your friends some bloke on the internet said it was OK.

Hey, You! Remember this?

Hey, You! (revisited)
FREE MUSIC!

Yes - Hey, You! is getting its debut radio play later today on WRIR-FM's The Great American Music Hour! Never mind the fact that I'm not a Great American, let's just celebrate the fact that it's being played.

Even if I keep on being called "Special Lad".

Ah, who cares. Be pleased for me! Follow the link, listen to the podcast or even go for the giddy thrill of hearing me being played on the spot. The programme starts at 11pm EST. That's a work-destroying 4am over here. Eep.

You know, I think I'll do the podcast.

UUUHHHGGG-rrrr!

With a title like that, it can only be Chewbacca's blog. I'm not a Star Bores geek, but I wish I'd thought this one up.

It's the sheer persistence of the joke that I love - as anybody subjected to my running jokes will attest.

Thunderbirds! (But not as I knew it)

Ah, Thunderbirds. It scared me as a pre-school tot. Sensitive, y'see. Then I got into it as a junior school kid. Loved it. Later, in my early teens, I watched it with ironic detachment; gleefully counting the number of puppets dashed to matchwood whilst shaking my head and commenting on how violent television had become.

I was an odd child, I suppose.

Anyway, this is the title sequence. Only it's in Spanish. Did my head in a bit, truth be told. Notice Spanish kids have to have an announcer tell them who the cast members are. Jeeze: can't they read English?

Ah. S'pose not.

As an aside, I once very fleetingly (I was 16) went out with a girl (that's not the end of the anecdote, by the way - that kind of thing has happened quite frequently since, he adds slightly too hastily) and her dad was, and still is, a film editor. He told me that he once had the mind-numbing task of slicing the ad-breaks into Thunderbirds. Drove him near barmy finding the right cliff-hanger point in each episode in which to do it (can you even imagine the torture?), but he could do a perfect Scott Tracy head-wobble as a result. And believe me, it was good.

yeahyeahyeahyeahyeahyeah!

New music time, people. And about time too.

So what I have done? It's a big mish-mash of all sorts, this one. And I love it.

Lucky You: 2.8 MB download
FREE MUSIC!!!

Let's let someone I really respect do the talking. Take it away, Boris:

"you realize that is going to be "shivering on the tip of my tongue" for the next three days?
this was just such a knockout smack that it demanded to be listened to again. and seriously, again! very unexpected and very smartly fit.

'what have you done?' well, you've successfully lifted Beatle elements and made them into your own. from the Taxmanish bass line, to the "yeah, yeah, yeah's," this easily puts a walrus in any Beatle fan's pocket without ever saying "i'm trying to be a beatles song."

there's a couple of specifics worth mentioning: your voice is just great here. i love the pacing, clarity, and charm. well presented! the word "girlfriend" is just brilliantly placed.

also, the way the piece moves is very sexy. it's got a swagger about it that exudes unforgiving attitude. it's got a "2bad, 2sad" vibe going on, while still being a quartful of fun.

great song art, as well. is there anything bad i can say about this? well, i'm not a horns fan. i tend to steer away from them (hmm, joke in there? horns, steer, bull?) but they are the charm and lure of the song and work very well in doing their job.

this was just a lot of fun and very well performed! thank you!! the more i play this one, the better it gets! another inspiring piece to chew on like good jerky."

Phew. I think he likes it.

Best. 12". Single. Ever.

Yeah, yeah. Blue Monday. What else? And in an "it had to happen" kinda way, I bring you the Blue Monday Owners Club, where the proud owners of FAC 73 get to show off their gorgeous possessions, courtesy of artist Spencer Graham.

It's a seamlessly pointless affair. I love it.

Garfield isn't funny

We all know that.

Mind you, it is funny if you remove all Garfield's thought bubbles...

Incidentally, this was the 666th post to Abroad At Home. Make of that what you will.

Polish Poster Designers:Mad as a Bag of Badgers

Over at Retrocrush, there's the most wonderful thing.

"While most movie posters in the United States pretty much showcase the standard corporate style imagery to hawk the film, the fine folks in Poland have a brilliant dramatic license when marketing Hollywood's finest in their country, resulting in some of the most brilliantly surreal and amazing pieces of movie artwork ever created. Some of them are obvious, some seem to be crazy nonsequiters that have nothing to do with the original picture, while others seem to change the focus of the movie altogether. Weekend At Bernies now looks more like a horror film, and Polish poster for The Terror of Mechagodzilla looks as if it was animated by the folks that made Yellow Submarine."

Get your Polish movie posters here.

"Spit on the purists. They're there to be trodden on..."

Ooh, what have I here? Welcome to the dark underbelly of my musical life. This is the video for one of my favourite songs.

Quick back-story time. It's 1982, and Soft Cell are on their way to becoming the most successful act in Britain in terms of singles chart weeks. What does a sane person do? Make the most of your main project. On the other hand, what does Marc Almond do? Form another band. Crackers, I know, but the result is gold dust.

Marc & The Mambas were formed around the nucleus of Marc Almond and Annie Hogan (keys) and had an ever-changing band roster that included variously David Ball, Matt "The The" Johnson, Peter Ashworth (as in the photographer immortalised in Mari Wilson's kitsch classic Just What I Always Wanted, and Zeke Manyika from Orange Juice.

Sleaze was originally a Cellmates-only single and it electrified this young lad from Lincolnshire. So much so that I'd never be out of mascara by the end of the year. So much so that I ripped off (sorry, paid homage to) the minor to major electric piano riff in one of my songs.

Don't let the fact that Sleaze was recorded in Heckmondwike (Heck-mond-wike? Uh?) put you off.

Change at Crux For Disco for Lob Horn and Sap Lust

I like the London Underground map. Anagrams are fun, too. So imagine my joy when I saw the two combined.

It's a surrealist's paradise.

A vintage computer; in LEGO, for crying out loud!

How odd is this? Andy Carol has built a Babbage Difference Engine from LEGO.

Imagine, girls - you meet a bloke, go back to his place and you see that. You'd be on the blower for a cab in seconds.

Bless him though - it's quite the feat.

Matthew Parris Talks Utter Sense

The world is fighting a losing battle against dogma.

I'm not a great fan of The Times. I'm more a Guardian man myself; but The Times has one ace up its sleeve in their columns that goes by the name of Matthew Parris - a columnist I have immense respect for. In today's Times, Matthew Parris strikes a blow for self-expression in the face of those who would scare us into silence.

Read his stellar column here.

A Revolutionary Use of New Technology

It seems that iFingers, the founder of Macidol (the lovely site where I keep all my music) has found a project that could take all the hard work out of the creativity required to make great music. And it involves hamsters as a MIDI controller.

Should I? Would the hamsters need a writing credit?

Incidentally - have a look around Macidol. It's a fabulous place. Some truly great music, and all from unsigned types like me.

A podcast...

Welcome to Maggie Osterberg's International Underground - a podcast featuring independent artists in their own words.

Enhanced AAC - MP3
Put this link in your podcast thingy to subscribe

This edition:

"The music, wit and wisdom of Sp3ccylad.

From the wilds of Huddersfield, UK comes avant-pop savant Sp3ccylad ("speccy-lad"), who talks about his approach to making music, living life and being "The Hendrix of The Kazoo."

Don't miss his masterclass on how to record kazoo with GarageBand!"

Who? Oh, just listen. It's good.

Old song? New song!

I went back to one of my old songs today - a song that I have a lot of affection for, but was never pleased with the final outcome. I'm quite chuffed with it now.

Hey, You! (revisited)

It's a funny old song - tips a hat to vintage soul, and in the original had a slight sound of Len Barry's 1-2-3. It now sounds more like Instant Karma!, and it's all the better for it. Enjoy!

STOP PRESS!

Radio play (proper radio, with transmitters and all!) coming up for this song soon! I'll tip a wink as it gets closer.

STOP PRESS! AGAIN!

The reviews are in:

"Time well spent! Nice work!"

"Excellent stuff! This is a fantastic, well-crafted song with a great hook and feeling to it. Especially liked the backing vocals."

"Poptastic sp3ccylad. Very well put together, great layering. I love the horn section, your vocals are most excellent and those girls sure know what to do!"

"I'm just going to go listen to this perfect noughat nugget of pop again."

"sp3ccymania!"

"What a great throwback while simultaneously remaining remarkably "today". I'll just round up what everyone else has said and second it: great hook, great lead vocal, great backing vocals, great arrangement."

Phew.

William Shatner reaches new heights of irony

Where, in a laudable attempt to raise some money for a well-worthwhile cause, he flogs a kidney stone.

It's an odd world.

The real irony is that I'm blogging about a renal disorder while sitting in a bar drinking a pint of Schneider Weisse.

Dirty, dirty Sp3ccylad

Find out how much of a slut I am: here.*


*Not much, actually.

Invisible Chinese Bloke Puzzle

Here's an odd one. Some bloke goes to a police station, tries to get an ID photo... and can't. Read more here. It's like some bizarre comedy sketch. Or he's a vampire. Or something.

What goes around comes around: or "It's like Germaine Greer never happened"

Boys will be boys, I suppose: and if you ever wanted proof this is it: a pair of Rover badges, advertised toplessly by a seller from London.

Needless to say, it ain't safe for work: although it's hardly pornographic. I leave the last word to the seller:

"HAVE MANY OTHER INTERESTING PARTS FOR SALE NOW, SEE MY OTHER ITEMS LISTED."

I bet.

He shall have music whenever he goes....

With this handy iPod dock and toilet roll holder.

Sheesh.

Quick Vibrating Lockpick

Oh, what have I done now? Yes, I've posted a link to an online guide to making a Vibrating Lockpick out of an electric flosser.

Next - Sp3ccylad gets burgled.

An insight into my evenings...

Or, more to the point, my musical evenings. I'm an enthusiatic consumer of live music, as well as a sporadic provider. To this end, you reader(s) may well remember me mentioning The Scaramanga Six. They're an odd bunch, with a performance style once described by this very writer as "like being harangued by a bunch of psychotic English teachers".

That's a genuine compliment, by the way. Sp3ccylad REALLY likes The Scaramanga Six.

So you can surmise that I was dead pleased to read that a blog in Albuqueque, NM carried an interview with one of the Morricone brothers (the one that definitely reminds me of an English teacher).

Ah, Albuquerque. Never been there, but I've been to New Mexico. Biggest bats I've ever seen outside a zoo: which kind of suits The Six, I suppose.

Read the interview with Paul Morricone here.

I hereby doff my cap to The Great Beyond.

How to hypnotise rabbits

Look, don't anyone ever tell you that this blog doesn't give you the odd useful lifestyle tip. So next time you feel the need to entrance a bunny remember who tipped you the wink.

Look, there's a Paypal button on this page! Show some gratitude, dammit!

The Google Images Storyteller

This has done my head in. So, in turn, I submit it to you.

You know how oddly random Google Images can be, yeah? So: imagine putting a story in and having Google Images turn it into an illustrated story. The effect is rather like being trapped in David Byrne's head about 20 years ago, or having a slideshow brought to you by Jenny Holzer.

The odd image it pulls up is Not really all that Safe For Work, but if you can deal with that, the utter aleatory* nature of it all is quite beguiling.

If you have no material to input, it loads with a bit of Lewis Carroll. Recommendation: it adds a whole new level to Charles Dickens.

Take it for a spin...

*Ooh, get me!

I'm that kind.

What Kind of Drunk Are You?

Legalize Polygamy

No thanks mate. My life is complicated enough. Still, if you fancy a giggle, click on the underlined bit.

Shiny, shiny teeth. And stuff.

Firstly there was that... thing involving shenanigans at the White House. You know which one. If you don't, then read on down. But it ain't nice.

Now I bring you this:

"Still stood in stunned silence, the youngest of the four began to realise the stories she had heard were true, WBF girls school really was the hotbed of lesbian tooth brushing activity she'd been told and secretly dreamt about."

Yes: it's a lesbian tooth-brushing fantasy.

Read more here. G'wan. You know you want to.

The hell that is slash fiction

I'll type this quickly, blog it and forget it. Ohgodohgodslashfictioninvolvingdickcheneyanddonaldrumsfeld. There. I said it. Not safe for work. Not safe for anything. EVER.

I'm going to take my brain out and steep it in bleach for a few hours. I feel dirty: and it's not a good dirty.

An unwise experiment for Christmas

Don't mess with Federal Agencies. That's my experience after bizarre shenanigans with the INS caused by a poor, deluded daft sod who sent an anonymous letter alleging all sorts of rabid crap about my supposed drug-fuelled terrorist past to Portland INS from Holland, PA. She also hand-wrote the envelope (du-uh!): a big thank you there to the INS man who interviewed me - and a big hello to the Freedom of Information Act.

On the other hand, should you want to ignore your Uncle Sp3ccylad's advice and get the G-Men on your case (Angus! NO! Your mother's a bad enough influence), Richard M. Smith has the perfect project to make sure you never fly in the US without a thorough shakedown.

For the record, I ALWAYS get a shakedown, and they always check the insides of my shoes before boarding. The fact that I have custom orthotics (long story and, funnily enough, linked to the letter) makes for the odd scary moment, I can tell you. So: why the shakedown? I think they clocked the fact that I attended that hotbed of dangerous radicalism, Finkin Street Methodist Sunday School.

Good god, Margaret Thatcher went there. Isn't that scary enough?

Thanks, dear. It's lovely.

Looking for the perfect belated gift this christmas? Well, you just missed the chance to buy a toadskin handbag. As the blurb said:

"Strange? Yes!
Attractive? Yes!
In the shops? Definitely not!"

You can say that again.

The Mothers of Disinvention

Oh, blimey - the concerned parent is back, and this time it's noise that they're after. They seem to have been going for some time, but (for the most part) I don't think Mothers Against Noise will be coming after Sp3ccylad's music in the near future, for I am an old fogey prone to Dadrock. Allegedly.

What tickled me about the site was the inclusion of The Pink Floyd Of The New Millenium, Radiohead - they are considered as a "gateway band". Damn right they are - they lead to Coldplay.

Incidentally: lucky, lucky Apple Martin. When her dad is asked to sing her to sleep, it must work like a charm. God knows it does for me.

How Motorways Work

The title is a joke in itself. They just don't. There's so many cars on British roads that motorway driving is a white-knuckle journey into hell. So we have here a guide to the sort of irritations that make driving in the UK such an interesting experience (hey! let's play spot the euphemism!), written with the sort of wit that makes one want to hug the author.

Read it and weep - here.

A seasonal game

Here's your scenario. Santa has blundered into a house through the chimney and is trapped inside a train set's tracks. Glasses of booze appear. Drink them for points.

However, what will the booze do? They'll make him more unstable and more difficult to control with the cursor keys. So, if Santa blunders into the train tracks - and this train set will be confiscated by West Yorkshire Trading Standards, I tell thee - he gets electrocuted.

Mince pies will appear. Eat them. They fortify him against the zapping. Fiendish, anarchic fun.

A great game: the link comes courtesy of LeVic, source of a proportion of The Scaramanga Six's income. Play Sober Santa 2 here.

Couple finds stoned owl in Christmas tree

There is nothing I can add that will dress this up...

Football-based tomfoolery

Oh, dearie me.

Me and the missus were watching Manchester City's demolition of Birmingham City last night - whooping triumphantly at the 4-1 drubbing handed out. We liked it so much, we watched it a second time on Match of the Day on BBC1.

During the post-match interview (click here to read the match report and for a link to the interview), Manchester City manager Stuart Pearce spoke glowingly of the rather fantastic youth policy that the club has these days, saying that he was always willing to give youth a chance. He then rather cheekily put out a plea for young players to join City; urging them (slightly tongue-in-cheek) to "write in, if you will". The following conversation ensued:

Mrs Sp3ccylad: I should write in. I could play for City.
Sp3ccylad: You should. Draw a picture as well. I dare you.

Never dare Mrs Sp3ccylad. It always ends in tears.

So, write in she did. The letter and picture are below (clicking ensures massivity). If we get a reply, I will post that too. We possibly have too much time on our hands.

Cripes (or: From an office party hangover to this?)

she's smiling 'cause sp3ccylad's on her ipod

And I'm blushing furiously for the same reason.

Thank you, Blue Gal.

More music?

Oh, yes: and it's quite different to the last one. Not so noisy. More atmosphere. Very much a winter song.

Spun Out

I'm quite proud of this. It's also pretty bloody honest.

Enjoy.

Separated at birth: Sp3ccylad and...who?

Well - what a surreal and upsetting start to my day. After hanging out at the disreputable street corner that is quinparker.com, I took his advice and tried out some face recognition software.

Anyway - I uploaded my photo, waited... Only to be told I was a 70% match for Salvador Dali. Uh? What? Then, delving down the list of close matches, it gave me John Ashcroft. John Ashcroft.

You know, it was like my mac was participating in some bizarre version of Newman and Baddiel's History Today sketch. "You see that Spanish surrealist, the one with the idiotic moustache and the permanently surprised facial expression? That's you, that is. That's you when you go to gigs in Huddersfield."

So there you go. Should you want to try out this frankly puzzling piece of tripe, it's here. You never know - it might work for you. Or it might tell you you look like Pol Pot.

John Ashcroft (mutters death threats).

New Song!

Yup. It's a SONG. I be songing once more. And it ain't all cuddly. Ooh, no.

It's that difficult "second album" thing.

What we have here is a spiky surfpunk/rockabilly doodad. Listen through click-magic.

Everything Has A Price

Origami Boulder Company

"YOU BUY WADDED UP PAPER NOW!!!!":

Here's one for the laydeez...

Oh dear:

"Your period comes every month, but Xmas comes only once a year. So bring that menstrual joy to this holiday season with these tampon tree decorations. From a string of tampon lights to a star at the top of the tree, feminine hygiene has never been so festive!"

I can't help thinking this one's a bit of a niche market. Go see for yourself at Tampon Crafts

Actually, I'm reminded of a bunch of students from my year at Uni. I was at a place famed for its liberal approach towards the arts, and these girls took it further than most. They hung tampons from their living room ceiling, but not before they'd dipped the ends in red gloss paint. It wasn't as if they were making a point - they just thought it was funny.

Think on this: they'll be all responsible now. Some of them may be schoolteachers. I shouldn't name names...

Mad egg game

And oh, boy: is it certifiable. I'd say sectionable, but it doesn't seem harmful. Basically, you have a dozen eggs and you have to jump them vertically from eggcup to eggcup. Some of them move, some of them don't. Drop an egg, lose a life. A dozen eggs dropped equals Game Over.

It's well addictive. Play it here.

Don't blame me if your spouse (or significant other) leaves you.

I'm not entirely sure what to say about this

You Are Cupid

A total romantic, you're always crushing on a new reindeer. Why You're Naughty: You've caused so much drama, all the reindeers aren't speaking to each other. Why You're Nice: You have a knack for playing matchmaker. You even hooked Rudolph up!

Which of Santa's Reindeer Are You?

So I'll stay mute on the subject.

Stats and beats - the ultimate MusicGeek confluence

Oh, Music Thing, I love you. One of their readers who is way geekier than me has adapted Excel to work as a drum machine.

Where I can see the whole thing going horribly wrong is with the usage the guy wants to put it to. Apparently, he wants audience members to play it with a wireless xBox pad that he hacked to work on USB. The ex-drama student in me is clapping wildly at the thought of audience participation. The music bit of me (notice I avoided calling myself a musician) is wincing horribly. Most people think Meg White is a good drummer.

God, I hope it quantizes on the fly. I suspect, however, that it doesn't. Ouch.

Portrait of the Reader as a Young Dork

A challenge from Gizmodo:

"Here's what we want: one scanned photo of you looking like the biggest dork in the world at age 10-18. We want too-tight shorts. We want long hair and walking sticks. We want inappropriate trench coats and Battlestar Galactica-themed hairstyles - Wiki Wiki Wiki!"

Scary, eh?

More details here.

Floating Logos Project

Eep! Imagine a world without very tall poles. That's the Floating Logos Project. It's a bit crackers, and I heartily endorse it.

Help!

I need somebody!

Quickly, mind.

Because it's arbitrary, that's why

I like pointless projects. Doing things for the hell of it and having other people join in is one of the things the internet is good at. That's why I love t'interweb. And one of those venerable futilities is the Degree Confluence Project.

The whole point of it is to take photographs of every integer confluence of latitude and longitude on the planet. Yes, it really is that gloriously futile. To show my utter approval of the project, I'm illustrating the entry with the only confluence point I can say I've definitely been to - 45°N 123°W, literally on Interstate 5, near Salem, OR.

Woo for confluences!

Should I be jubilant?

Dodging Bullets: neither funny nor clever

Well, unless it's this rather spiffing little reflex-tester of a game. Simply click the mouse on the B of the Bang to dodge the bullet. I tend to get around 10,000 points before I die, and I'm not claiming to be any good.

It's got to be better than writing lyrics. Hasn't it?

Prince questioned on Diana death

Imagine my confusion when I saw this headline on the BBC News site this morning. But then I realised that in 1997 his name was The Artist Formerly Known As Prince. So that's OK.

Having said that: triple album or not, Crystal Ball wasn't much of an alibi.

I'd really rather not, if it's all the same to you...

Simple link - a menu where things got a bit lost in translation. Hilarious? Puerile? Dammit; with me, isn't one so often the the other anyway?

Battle of the toys!

Never mind Transformers: what do you get if you face off Lego against Rubik's Cube? Well, apart from a bunch of brightly coloured geometric shapes, you get CubeSolver: a Lego robot that actually solves the Cube. Which makes it cleverer than me; had I not already co-opted the excuse of not really being bothered.

An admirable use of technology, I'm sure you'll agree. Next week, I hope to bring you a tsunami early warning system made entirely out of Stickle Bricks.

Run, Jesus! Run!

A daft game. Hit the X and C keys to make Jesus run. You'll play it a few times and get well sick of it. Click here to get it out of your system.

Text-Pong

Yes! Text-Based Pong! And this time: it keeps score! Wow!

The 371-day iPod

My iPod died today.

It started to do odd things yesterday (it was really struggling to find songs) and today I decided to wipe the drive and start again. It wouldn't play ball and the resulting HD probs were playing havoc with my mac - I saw way too many beachballs this morning. So in the end I gave it up for dying, if not dead. Imagine how I felt about that. I was distraught. No: screw distraught - I was bereft.

So - I did some mental 'rith and reasoned that it was probably about two weeks out of guarantee. Never mind, thought I. There's probably something I've missed. And anyway - I could probably fit a new HD with one of those kits I believe you can buy. But it wouldn't do any harm to take it to one of those Apple Geniuses I hear so much about - and as the 2nd Apple Store in Europe is but a train ride away (and a bit), I may as well. If you want a death certificate, you can't write it yourself, can you?

So I did. With iPod in hand (note beginning of sentence avoiding a lower case letter) I made my way to Manchester.

Took it to a guy in the Trafford Centre Apple Store called Julien. Francophone, but I wouldn't insult him by assuming his nationality. He tested it and... he shrugged. Like Francophones do. Then he went to have a word with his manager. It turned out it was 6 days out of warranty - and he replaced it anyway. I couldn't say much. I wanted to do cartwheels all over the shop, but I thought it might look smug. So I just sat at the genius bar, all smitten with my genius. Wow.

What a guy, what a company. I've just fallen in love with Apple all over again.

Tragedy for toy people

Car crashes. They ain't funny and they ain't clever - escept when they're lovingly reproduced at 1:43 scale using bonsai trees. CrashBonsai is one of those sites I wish I'd thought of. Actually, I'd have to take that back because the thought of actually having to do it clashes rather violently with my incipient laziness.

No, you're welcome to the idea. But it's a bloody good one.

I'm at it again

Yup, the music is back, and while I get back into singing mode again here's an instrumental to get you in the mood. A bangin' electronic piece to dance around the living room to.

Get the glowsticks out and enjoy.

You're Still Gullible

I love eclectech. But I'm not a stalker. Honest.

No, a while back I championed Doghorse's version of "You're Gullible", a wicked parody of James Bl(o)unt's nasty little pondslime of a song. I should stop mincing my words. It'll be good for me.

Anyway, eclectech - animal masher to the stars - has put together a flash animation of the song with added tomato-throwing interactivity that borders on the cathartic. Watch this work of near-genius and sing/throw along by clicking on these differently coloured words. There. That's how the internet works. Educative and informative. What more do you want? Casual sex?

Pimp My Coffin

Americans. Always going too far in the death thing. Here we have a company that specialises in wildly bespoke coffins and caskets so you can go out in style. The're called the The Original Oxford Coffins Company, and they've got an 0800 number which means... (gulps hard) they aren't American at all, but British. Oh, Christ on a unicycle: what is this country coming to?

To answer the question in the scariest way possible, click here and wince.

The country's going to the dogs, I tell you.

I've been to paradise, but I've never been to me. Or Portsmouth, for that matter.

I've visited the counties in yellow. Which counties have you visited? made by marnanel map reproduced from Ordnance Survey map data by permission of the Ordnance Survey. © Crown copyright 2001.

United States Patent: 6,960,975

I'm sorry but I don't get this. Do they not check patents anymore? Well, if they do, the guy who checks them was having a off day when United States Patent: 6,960,975 came through.

Where's Michael J Fox when you need him? "Flux modulation controllers" indeed.

Life Inside a Water Bottle

I like the internet. No, I do. Honest. Why? It's full of people less lazy than me; which is, in a way, the purpose of this blog. People do interesting stuff that I can't be arsed to do, and I bring them to your attention, because you can't be arsed to find them. So; when will you marry me?

Sorry. I got confused. Bear with me here.

Right. Where was I? Yes. Thomas Mottl. He's a photographer. And like me, he's wondered what it was like to see life from the inside of a water bottle. Unlike me, he didn't think this at work. I did once. I asked a random colleague about what it must be like in there, got looked at oddly and I shuffled back to my desk feeling a bit stoopid. See what my life is like?

Also unlike me, Thomas did something about it (get the feeling I'm trying to tell myself something here?) and produced a marvellous 360º panorama. It's a bit crazy, and mighty wondrous. I've linked to the intro page. Read how he did it there to whet your appetite and then click the link on the page to view it.

Wow.

Personalized Punk Rock Doggy Hoodies! Whew!

I kid you not:

"Sweatshirt or Fleece Dog Hoodies. Your dog doesn't look stupid wearing them."

I beg to differ. Go on - see for yourself.

A neat piece of common sense from Penn Jillette

I like Penn Jillette. I seem to remember liking his daughter's name some time ago. So imagine my delight when he said this on NPR today:

"You can't prove that there isn't an elephant inside the trunk of my car. You sure? How about now? Maybe he was just hiding before. Check again. Did I mention that my personal heartfelt definition of the word 'elephant' includes mystery, order, goodness, love and a spare tire?"

A nice start to a very thoughtful essay.

Catch the bit on forgiveness. I wish I could do that all the time. Still, I get the bit about getting it right first time. It's really important to me.

Read it here.

A game to make you late for work

Simple game - 9 boxes, numbered 1-9. Throw 2 dice, and close any boxes that will add up to the scores on the dice. The game ends when you're stuck and you can't make the boxes add up any more. Play Shut the Box here.

Well, DUH!

You scored as atheism. You are... an atheist, though you probably already knew this. Also, you probably have several people praying daily for your soul. Instead of simply being "nonreligious," atheists strongly believe in the lack of existence of a higher being, or God.

Hey: like this came as a surprise to me. Click the slightly over-literal graphic to take the test for yourself.

There's some funny people out there, pt 326

A big "yoo-hoo!" to iwouldshagher.tk, a list of the girls the webmaster would shag.

Er, that's it.

She's causing trouble again!

Oh, heck. Middle sister's causing trouble. Actually, scrub that, she's performing a necessary service. I shan't explain Whirl-Mart, as a good explanation of what she's up to is available here, and it reads as good as anything I could write on the subject.

Once you've read that, take a look at a Whirl-Mart action she put together in Helsinki.

What fun. Or what a bunch of loons, depending on your standpoint.

Me? I'm proud to be her brother. You do right, Ange.

Donnez la boule à l'homme chauve!

Hello, football types. Ever had a kickaround and imagined you're playing with the world's best? You know, like Brian Glover in Kes? Well, sometimes dreams come true - as they did for this bunch of blokes who found themselves having a kickaround with Gallic pre-penalty vomiter and all-round balding genius Zinedine Zidane. Actually, for the guys in the other side, it's a complete nightmare. Poor lambs. Watch and giggle (or wince) as Zizou makes a complete arse of a bunch of Sunday League players here.

Now you know the meaning of "in a different class".

"You're gullible..."

Not too keen on James Bl(o)unt, me. Never was. I find him anodyne in the extreme compared with a talent like David Ford (iTunes store link). So imagine my joy when I heard Gullible, a spot-on parody of Mr Bl(o)unt's hype-driven nonsense by the highly mischievous Doghorse.

I'm considering playing this live; but I may not survive the night.

I was fooled

Not only is my tinfoil helmet useless against aliens, it is also a possibility that I may be a tool of the US Government. Read on, peasant.

Best. Cover. Version. Ever.

Oh, this is fantastic.

Playmobil - Security Check Point

I offer this post without comment.

Wear Your Cat

There's an interesting prospect. And no, this isn't about to get the animal rights people screaming - for I am bringing to your attention an enterprising little company called VIP Fibers Inc, who make yarn out of your pet's fur. It's an interesting proposition, and far better than the mess my cat leaves on a daily basis. Check them out here.

Now, given the size of my cat how many YEARS would it take to make a decent sweater?

Wrestlers of Mexico City

They RAWK!

Whoa!

Dawn of the Knitted Dead

You know, I like obsessive people. I'm one in a kind of benign, non-compulsive way. And Hannah here is another one. I like her. Now, I'm a bit of a fan of George A Romero. Martin is my favourite film, personally. That's because I'm a bit odd, I suppose. And because I like Soft Cell's take on the film (link to iTunes music store snippet).

Anyhoo, Hannah J Simpson seems to be cut of similar cloth to me. And she's produced her own homage to Dawn Of The Dead. In wool. No, really: she has. And it's really quite spiffing. Take a look.

See? Spiffing.

The Cars from Wacky Races! In Paper! Wow!

Three guesses who might be getting the Pritt Stick out this weekend. For some wonderful person has made a bunch of templates for paper models of the cars from Wacky Races, which was required viewing for me back in the '70s

Take a look here and, hey: leave a comment if you make one.

Paula Orpington. Very odd.

Can anybody explain this ?

Francophones are more than welcome to try.

Gadget city!

It's amazing what you can get for your USB port these days. How's about an air freshener?

I want one. Whatever next: printing from your USB port?

I've just gone off bread

And believe me, you would too if you saw these...

Gay Action Man porn on Flikr

Let's get the NOT SAFE FOR WORK thing out of the way first, shall we? I'm even having trouble thinking of a place where this would be safe, to be honest.

OK. The title gives it away in a nutshell. Gay porn with dolls. They've even oiled the guys.

Look at the photoset here and either wince or say "well done". I did an odd combination of the two.

Scary fun, in a nutshell.

Waxing David Hasselhoff

Yup. A daft game. You get to do exactly what I just advertised.

Go on. You know you want to.

SpoiledrottenDoggies

Oh, and they are.

Hier siehst du ein Baby. Weißt du, wie es auf die welt gekommen ist?

Germans are crazy. No, trust me. They are. I spend a lot of time in the company of Germans, and they're quite barmy. Barmy in a nice way for the most part, but still quite odd.

And this is a example of good German oddness. It's a book. On where babies come from. Only it's a tad too detailed.

See?

It's probably not safe for work, unless you work for a children's book publisher that somewhat oversteps the mark (in which case you probably know the book already).

Bar Signs

You know the thing about talking? It inhibits drunkenness. And drunkenness inhibits shyness, which gets you talking.

Houston, we have a problem.

So why not develop a non-verbal language to get us past that thorny issue? Modern Drunkard magazine has done us proud. Let us salute them. Non-verbally, of course.

Drink, anyone?

Over Three Hundred Proofs of God's Existence

And I don't get any of them. Ho hum.

I'm Ba-a-a-ack!

And good lord it's been hectic. Just moved house, had a few things moving on the music front, got a friend with big mittens... It's all been a bit crackers. I'll drip-feed you as we go along. Read on.

Still, I'm back. Wouldn't you know it, I have a blog entry about poo. Nothing changes, really.

Now - here's a healthy new way to poo - or is it an old way. No matter. Anyway, why not squat to improve your health? You have a proper toilet, I hear you mutter. No matter - try Nature's Platform. It'll take 300 lbs. There you go - even YOU can use one. And you know who you are.

Enjoy!