Similar/Dissimilar Films

We were thinking tonight about two things. In both cases, you have to think of two films where one is a sequel to the other.
1. Which film and its sequel are most similar?
2. Which film and its sequel are most dissimilar?

I have answers but I don't want to influence you so I'll post them in the comments.

BMX shame?

I think I am actually going to be quite ashamed if Team GB wins gold in the BMXing. That's like claiming credit for being best at hopscotch or kiss-catch.

If I had GPS in my legs

On the TV at the moment is a combine harvester that doesn't need a human to drive it - it is all automatic based on GPS readings. Quite clever. I actually start to wonder how people could ever navigate before GPS came along. I guess they did it in the same way that people kept crappy diaries before blogs came along.

I was wondering though whether I could have the same technology (the combine harvester not the blog) installed in my actual legs, to help me when I go running. I'd just input a route and then sit back and let the legs do all the work. My brain would be kept free allowing me to spend time composing poetry or admiring wildlife. What fruits might emerge from such an endeavour!

I figure I could also even simplify the route planning process. Rather than having to trace one out on the internet (and again, I ask, how did people know how far they were running before the web?) I could just type in a target distance and the GPS magic machine would plan a route for me, hopefully avoiding the car GPS pitfalls of being told to drive through rivers or fall into pits.

I might even be able to harvest crops along the way.

So if any scientists are reading, you can have this idea for free, dragonden it if you want (and that is a verb, I won't hear anyone say it isn't), just make it happen. Technologise my legs. I'm willing to spend up to 100 English pounds buying it when it's ready so I could become the $200 dollar man! And who says inflation is ever upwards. Just witness the price of series 4 of Buffy on DVD. When it came out several years ago it was about Seventy Quid. Now it's available for around fifteen. Inflation? Pah. Stick Buffy in your basket.

1997 Comedy = 2008 Reality

It's slightly surreal to watch Brass Eye on DVD and then when it finishes turn straight to Newsnight on actual TV. It's hard to see the join.

2008 Running Update

Up until July this year my running had been a little sporadic and certainly not the regular two or three times a week of the previous two years. Reasons for this included but were not limited to: the shit weather; an injury that may not have existed; laziness; lack of GNR fear.

At the start of July, with three months to go until the big race I had to get my act in gear and become more disciplined. I put a running plan together. I turned down weeknight invitations to the pub if it clashed with my running plan. I entered a state of mental toughness. And slowly, but surely I was able to get going again. I also entered myself into the York Millennium Bridge 5k race, which was today. I did this race for the first time in 2006 during the Run-A-Thon 500 and got a time of 29 mins and 29 seconds.

I've generally felt that I've been slower this year than I was for the last two years so I wasn't sure how much I'd beat the time by. My best practice run for that distance so far had been about 29 mins. But the day before the 2006 race I'd had a fever so may not have been on top form. Race conditions are always different to normal runs. Adrenaline and crowds. I didn't know what would happen.

Come the race, I was a bit nervous, like before an exam. Once we got going I started at a steady pace and soon decided I'd maybe started too fast. But I kept going anyway because I couldn't see my watch to see how long I was taking. And in any case the mile/km markers were confusing me. The rest of the race happened. I nearly fell in a huge puddle in the last 50m but managed to only stumble.

And I clocked my time at 26 mins 26 secs. I was well happy with this. It meant I'd managed not only my best ever 5k time, but also done probably my three fastest ever miles, all at once.

Now I realise it's not Olympic standard (actually, I'm guessing as I have little interest in the Olympics). But it was good for me. So happy I am and I bloomin' deserved the huge takeaway pizzas we had for tea :-)

Next race is the Great North run on 5th October. Longest distance I've done this year is six miles, less than half the full distance. But I'm sticking to my plan and my plan will get me through. Oh yes it will.

Raaaaaaaaa! (That was supposed to be a shout of encouragement/meaning/pain)

Remote Fantasies

It's not exactly a secret that the PSP has struggled a little since launch, in the face of some stiff competition from the DS. It's lacked killer games and has seemed a little unsure exactly what it's for. Is it just a games machine or a full portable multimedia device? I've held off buying one until last week, and the thing that finally pushed me over the edge was the release of Final Fantasy VII: Crisis Core. Being something off an FF nut, it was the final little bit of temptation needed.

First impressions of the machine are very good. It looks good and feels nice. UMD is a bit strange, and it currently lacks internal storage (will be remedied when my 8Gb memory stick arrives in the mail) but overall it's a nice little machine. Even K liked it. It's certainly no iPhone (or iPod Touch even) but it is a nice little bit of kit.

But one thing on it has really, really impressed me because it's really, really cool. It has a feature called Remote Play that lets you link via wi-fi to your PS3. You can then use the PSP to remotely control the PSP. You even see what you'd normally see on the TV screen on the PSP's screen. But the really cool thing is that you can play PS1 games on the PSP over wi-fi. They can be either ones that have been downloaded from the PS store onto the PS3's hard drive or even ones that are actual PS1 games inserted in the PS3's drive.

I tested this today. I stuck the original FFVII in the machine and turned it off. I then got the PSP and used it to remotely turn on the PS3, and then selected the game. I was then able to play FFVII directly on the PSP! It was amazing. I think I'll be able to use this as an excuse to play through the game again! All the streaming video works fine. The game works fine. It's all magic!

And the most amazing part (untested) is that you can also do exactly the same thing over the actual internet!

I haven't worked out a way to change discs over the internet yet though.

Man Baggage

I've succumbed to meterosexual life today and purchased a manbag. Not that I totally need one, but I often don't have enough or big enough pockets. Especially in summer when it's too hot to wear a jacket with its attendant pocketage.

I like my bag. It has lots of pockets, inside and out. It has one that's ideal for my iPod. And one inside for my phone (though I suspect if it went off I wouldn't be able to answer it before it stopped ringing). I could put papers in it if I ever took work home. Or maybe a newspaper.

Actually, I'm not sure what I'm going to use it for. I think I might have bought an expensive, overly large iPod case...

Watching The Bill, Live

It's been all go here this evening, outside at least. I believe that all new property developments in the UK (or possibly some parts of it) are now obliged to designate some of it for Social Housing. This is a relatively sensible policy designed to prevent the formation of sink estates. The majority of people living in such housing are nice enough but it is hard to deny that they include a much higher proportion of drunks, druggies and dreadfuls than would be found elsewhere.

I live quite close to the Social Housing in my development and it's not unusual for the police to be called for one reason or another. I like to think that we just have friendly police round here who like to drop in for a cup of tea every now and then. Or maybe it's where they get their drugs.

Today there's been a lot of noise throughout the day. Mostly shouting and whatnot. Then around seven o'clock three lads were out in the car park shouting and swearing at each other. It was actually getting to the point where I was considering calling the cops myself. But I didn't need to because one of my neighbours had clearly got there first and a police car pulled in. The police got up and had heated discussions with the lads (we were watching through the curtains). The discussions got very heated and ended up with the police using a stun-gun on one of them, at which point the shot man fell to the ground (and was at least a bit quieter). The police then called for back-up.

Within a few minutes, two more cars and three vans had arrived. This made the car park very full and I was glad that I hadn't left the supermarket shopping until then (also it's Sunday so they'd be shut but you get the idea). I couldn't tell how many actual police there were but it must have been at least 12, probably more.

Sadly, I don't think anyone else got shot. I couldn't really tell what was going on as there was a lot of shouting, swearing and overlapping noise. Also I was trying to watch The 4400 on DVD and it was a good one.

After a while everyone left. Some in the front seats of the vans, some probably in the locked up sections of the backs of the vans. Some in cars.

So not a great anecdote, in that I don't have any detail or understanding of what was going on. But I did see a c**k get shot with a stun-gun and that was entertaining.

Wave the children!

It looks like Google's Street View service is going to go ahead in the UK.. Fun!

Whilst visiting my parents last week we spied one of the special cars, the ones with a tree on top, driving around Sheffield. Later on, whilst in the house, it actually came down our street and went in and out of all the little dead ends. I found this quite exciting and made a special effort to wave at it from the living room window, with the hope that I could be immortalised forever (probably with a blurred out face). I also held up one of my nephs (I forget which) to the window so they could be on it too. It's important to give kids new experiences.

Privacy be damned!

The Pop-Singer Fear of FFX2

I finished Final Fantasy X. Good story as always, buy not one of my favourite games in the series. Both levelling up and progressing in general seemed extremely linear, and there often seemed to be far too many uniteruptable cut-scenes.

None of this has stopped me going straight into it's sequel, Final Fantasy X2 though. Not even simple things like how the sun is out, orPortal is unopened on my shelf. First impressions are... er?? Yuna's now not a summoner but a... pop-singer? That's odd. I'm going to need a little more time here.

Luck of the Oirish

I don't normally do well with tips I've had off people but yesterday at the races I had a good feeling. I'd been given tips by a fellow from Ireland and both his first two won their races, netting me close to a hundred squid. After that I pretty much stopped betting.

I was sodding hot though. Same as the day before. Same as today. I think I may have some burn. And running at midday on Friday was total lunacy.

Where's Radovan?

I found out today that The Southern Alps are in New Zealand. I'd initially assumed Italy due to that being where the south end of The Alps is but I was wrong. It's New Zealand. I told a colleague that they were called The Southern Alps because The Alps start in France, go down through Switzerland into Italy and then go straight through the Centre Of The Earth before poking out of New Zealand. It was only when he checked on Wikipedia that he realised I was taking the piss somewhat. I will spare him a name and shame.

We also had an entertaining game of "Where's Radovan Karadzic been hiding". Here he is as now on the BBC. So... Has he been at

1. The Ernest Hemingway convention?
2. In Only Fools & Horses?
3. A Santa Parade?
4. Recording Heavy Metal music?

Or has he been elsewhere? You decide.

Why I Got The Mail

I bought the Mail on Sunday today. Not because I want the paper, it's rubbish. I haven't even opened it. I bought it because they were giving the new McFly album away.

I'm not sure which part of this is wrongest.

Zimbabwian Hyper Inflation

I know that the current situation in Zimbabwe isn't particularly funny but I did find a very funny article in The Guardian on inflation rates there. They are somewhat large. The official rate is currently 2.2m%. It's not often that you get an "m" and a "%" together but they've managed it there. That's pretty bad but the true figure is thought to be as high as 15m%.

My favourite bit is about the limits people can withdraw from banks each day. Normal people are only allowed to withdraw $100 billion a day. One hundred billion. My little finger is at the side of my mouth as I write that.

But normal people are paupers compared to the armed forces. They can withdraw a gob-stopping, mind-mangling $1.5 trillion dollars a day.

And it's worth about five English Pounds.

Please note that all figures quoted here are now out of date.

How to traverse the Scotch Border

So... Edinburgh to York via car. What's the quickest way? A1 is easiest but it seems to take an age. I'm pretty sure that going back towards Glasgow and via the motorways from there could be better. I think today we were over four hours from E to Y on the A1 and that was with pretty clear roads. Can this be improved on?

Plus side is that you get to see some cool sceneries that you don't see off of the train.

Meat! Loaf! Live!

We went to see the mighty Meat Loaf last night at Castle Howard. It was a tortorous route that had been set up to get people there from the A64. Mental. Coming home was a little easier but also darker and wetter.

It rained a lot all evening.



It was fun though. He's perhaps not in his prime form but can still belt them out. And he is a legend after all.

Exterminaten!

We went on my parents' boat at the weekend. They were off on it for two weeks but they wanted some help for the first full day which contained a flight of sixteen locks. They (correctly) figured this could be a bit much for the two of them alone and a couple of extra pairs of hands would speed things up and reduce effort. I didn't mind too much going along to help, but it would have been nice if they'd thought to mention the fact that the second day had a flight of eighteen locks. That just seemed to have slipped their minds. Must be the age.

So on Saturday night I find myself in a canal boat moored in the middle of nowhere, with no TV reception. And the last episode of Dr Who starting soon. Darnit!

We decided to go and find a local pub instead. It wasn't too far but it did involve climbing a fairly long hill. The pub was nice and had a big telly. There were a few people in the room it was in but we chanced our luck and asked if they'd mind putting Doctor Who on it. They said ok!

It started well but soon became apparent that the pub was going to be too noisy or the TV too quiet or both, even when we moved to sit up close. I was able to watch the whole thing easily, on possibly the biggest screen I've ever seen Dr Who on. But I only caught about a quarter of the dialogue. This wasn't ideal and by the end I was quite angry.

My ire was especially aimed at two middle aged fat bald blokes sitting just under the telly who talked through the whole thing, and a family with small children who talked and ran around constantly. C**ts, the lot of them. It's not like it wasn't a big pub with lots of other space they could have gone and sat in for an hour. I'd have happily moved if they'd wanted to watch football or something.

Once home in York on Monday, we watched the episode again off of the recorder and I really enjoyed it, though I'd be lying if I said it was full of surprises at that point. I particularly liked the German Daleks shouting "Exterminaten!". Not sure if that's genuine German but it was genuinely funny.

After that I watched "Remembrance of the Daleks" out of Sylvester McCoy's tenure in the 80s. It was much as I remembered except that in my head it was set in the 80s, not the 60s and I'd forgotten some (most) of the twists. It's actually a pretty decent piece of TV but it was certainly of a much smaller scale than the episode I'd seen prior to it! There's a particularly nice bit when someone who's been only seen from reverse in the first three episodes turns out to not be who you assume it is (ie Davros).

I also remember that seeing a Dalek glide up some stairs was big news and a big twist when initially shown. It doesn't look as impressive now I've seen the buggers fly through space.

And for the record, I don't think Davros is dead. He'll have slipped into an escape pod or something at the last second. Again.

Me and a Dame

I touched Dame Kelly Holmes off of the running yesterday:

Toilet Trouble

We've been having problems at work with someone intentionally blocking the toilets in the evening. I suggested (innocently) that in order to find out who the culprit was we should start monitoring people's movements...

IT Crowd Menus

I've been watching the excellent The IT Crowd (season 1) on DVD and I think it might be a contender for best DVD menus ever. Not because they do anything particularly new but because of the animation on them.

Anyone who grew up in a world of 8-bit home computers will feel instantly at home, from the "loading screen" onwards. There are loveingly crafted pastiches of Head Over Heels and Jet Set Willy that last for ages. You can just sit there watching for ages. I could anyway. And did.

They're probably worth buying the DVD for alone. Think of it as some great animation with six bonus episodes of a geek sitcom thrown in.