Planet Jedimoose

So, despite my lack of sleep I had a relatively good day of writing today.  It was Towers Over The Clyde, the sequel to Living On Reputation.

It was good to get back into it (it always is) and a rough first chapter has finally been finished!

I have some really crazy ideas for the rest of the story, I’m really letting my imagination run riot with this one.

- Alistair

Bloomin’ hell, I’m shattered after being up since 3.30 this morning.  Woke with the worst case of trapped wind ever and had to head out for a long, long walk to shift it.  Got back in and it was 4.30am.  Still no sleep.  Got through my early shift and it’s been a long day.

Aurora is asleep, dinner is soon and an early night is calling methinks…

- Alistair

Fantasy Flight Games, makers of many fine games (including the Call of Cthulhu Card Game and the Arkham Horror boardgame), have been milking their Games Workshop licence in the years since they got it.  And all power to them, their standard of quality across all the games they produce seems to be consistantly high.

Well, they’ve been churning out a number of role-playing games on the licence (Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, Dark Heresy and Rogue Trader) and the next one to join the collection is Deathwatch, where you play a member of the secretive Space Marine chapter of the same name.

I haven’t played any of the other games in the series, although I have been seriously tempted, but the release of this particular game might be the push I need to get a copy and fire up a game.  I’ve been itching to get back into role-playing, time permitting, and I think that this might make a good evenings entertainment.

Bell of Lost Souls have a quick review and a video overview of the book.

And there’s a fancy collectors edition…  Not that I’ll buy it, but just head over to the FFG site to check it out.  It sure is pretty…

- Alistair

I haven’t written anything in ages.  Absolutely ages.  Which is a shame ‘cos I was really getting into it.  Then, as always happens, real life comes hurtling into view.

Whenever I have time (and haven’t I already said I have free evenings next week?) I should knuckle down and dedicate this precious time to the stack of unfinished work which continues to grow.

In saying that, while looking through the archive, I found the first story I attempted for the story-a-day project way back.  It had the working title of ‘Thor’.  It’s only a few hundred words, no more than two scenes, but it was fun to write and given a spruce up it might be worth throwing up on the site.

I’ve been thinking of doing something similar with a few of the shorter standalone pieces.  (but it won’t become another ‘Railman’ or ‘The Bandstand’.  These are on the to-do list to be finished, hopefully, at some point before I shuffle from this mortal coil.)

But as with so many things, we’ll see.

- Alistair

The five man squad of Grey Knights, mentioned here, have been finished only to be replaced with another five.  The Inquisitor and the Chimera have been joined by a Space Marine Sergeant (possibly painted in White Scars colours), a Grey Knight Terminator with Incinerator and a single Plaguebearer of Nurgle.

Oh, and 33 night goblins… 

Still on a look out for a camera that’s decent enough to capture detail.

- Alistair

It’s been a busy wee week for the Bainster.  One of the carers I work with has moved on to another job so I’m in the fortunate position of working with full time hours.  Don’t really know how long that’ll last and I’ve forgotten how tiring a full-time week can be.

A hard life, eh?

As a result, time to do anything other than work and sleep is at a real premium.  (and it doesn’t really help that last weekend I was rather worse for wear.  Bad Al, bad.)

And just getting my shifts for next week in, it looks like another full week, but with the added bonus of only having one evening to do mid-week.  Small mercies at that.

On another point, I’m still enjoying working in care.  It’s different every week and the feeling of freedom is incredible. And it also helps that the staff and management aren’t a shower of…  well, just a shower.

- Alistair

Ruthy and I were discussing this morning the anti-Christ-like ways of the ever watch-able Jeremy Kyle, and the celebrity scandal episode with the wonderfully crazy Brigitte Nielsen.  We thought that she’s a good match for the prince of darkness but another name was invoked who we thought would be a perfect match.

Grace Jones.

According to Ruthy, Grace Jones is “the screaming chaos that awaits us all at the end of time”.

Perfect.  Couldn’t have said it better myself.

- Alistair

Title purely for poetry Last Thursday (19th) Jamie turned one. The last year has been amazing, if somewhat disruptive, what with a new job to contend with too, and the change in direction with church. And now we’re thinking about moving house too. It’s all go…

I just feel very fortunate to have 2 amazing kids, whom I love very much.

Hope to have more posted soon about other interesting subjects. (Promises, promises…)

mrBen

Noelinho's new recent links summary! See what I've been reading recently!

I’m now over 6 months into the adventure of cycle commuting, so I thought it was time to put some reflections online briefly.

1. I actually really enjoy doing it, even in the rain. I’ve covered over 650 miles in the past 7 months, and am on target for my 1000 mile plan for the year. The only days I’ve not cycled to work (3 in total) were because of practical circumstances and not a lack of willingness.
2. I can leave when I want, and my trip time only varies by about 90 seconds each way of 12 minutes. Can’t say the same for car or bike
3. It gives me a nice mental barrier between finishing work and getting home
4. I cycle on the cycle path, rather than the road. I do this for a number of reasons:
   1. The route is actually .2 miles shorter, which is (I gather) unusual for most cycle commutes
   2. Only 2 sets of traffic lights to handle, rather than the 13 by road
   3. My brain is free to wander because I’m not having to concentrate as much on the mass of traffic
   4. The cyclepath is in as good a condition as the road (which isn’t saying much).

   I shall probably return to the road in the winter, as the lighting on the path isn’t up to scratch.

5. After the initial outlay for a few essentials, my free bike hasn’t really cost me much, considering the mileage. A brake cable here and there, but that’s about it, meaning that I’m racking up the ’savings’ – at least until I look to buy a new bike, that is
6. I am getting a bit quicker, which I presume means a bit fitter. I’ve failed completely at getting out on my bike for other, longer, rides in the evenings. Hopefully this won’t always be the case, as I think it’s probably key to actually losing a proper amount of weight and gaining proper fitness, but there is evidence of improvement at least.
7. I’m beginning to look to take my bike on other short journeys too – it _is_ still possible to travel light and not have to worry about clothing, etc for short journeys

Anyway – just wanted to get some thoughts out, so that my dedicated readers (snort!) didn’t think I’d forgotten about the blogosphere completely.

mrBen

Ben, Scott, Chris and part-timer Steve finally bring you a new episode of Classic Yak. Following the aborted episodes 3 and 4, episode 5 of Season 2 will enthrall you with an intense discussion of the British prison system, and excite you with light-hearted banter about atheist internet filtering software. Enjoy!

• Intro [00:22]
• Prison [02:35]
• News [25:41] GodBlock
• Promo [44:11] Scott Sigler’s Ancestor
• Outro [45:14]
• End [46:17]

Send your feedback to show@classicyak.org, tweet us at twitter.com/classicyak, post it to MySpace, join the Facebook group, or leave a plain old voicemail on +44 (0)845 867 6316.

Ben, Scott, Chris and part-timer Steve finally bring you a new episode of Classic Yak. Following the aborted episodes 3 and 4, episode 5 of Season 2 will enthrall you with an intense discussion of the British prison system, and excite you with light-hearted banter about atheist internet filtering software. Enjoy! Intro [00:22] Prison [02:35] News [25:41] GodBlock Promo [44:11] Scott Sigler's Ancestor Outro [45:14] End [46:17] Send your feedback to show@classicyak.org, tweet us at twitter.com/classicyak, post it to MySpace, join the Facebook group, or leave a plain old voicemail on +44 (0)845 867 6316.

Noelinho announces a new Noelinho.org feature, with a few other amazing pieces of mind-blowing information. Allegedly.

The July episode is delayed until next Monday (2nd August). Sorry for the delay.

I had a deadline for Duality 2, a book produced locally, that was today.  The story I was working on didn’t quite work and while I had a good beginning and ending, the middle just didn’t work out.  So no submissions for Duality 2 for this boy.  I’ll wait until Duality 3 and see if I have anything in mind that would work.

Now that’s out of the way I’ve been thinking of working on something a bit longer.  Recently my story lengths have been getting shorter and shorter and after a comment by mrBen I thought that something with a bit more story to tell was on the cards.

So now I’m working on a sequel of sorts to Living on Reputation, something that was submitted recently for Mythaxis.  And, hopefully, it should be a bit more weighty than I’ve been producing.  It has the working title of Towers Over The Clyde.

To give you a hint, think of Glasgow cop-show Taggart but with wizards and a hint of H.P. Lovecraft.  Lovely.

- Alistair

Next week is Read An RPG Book In Public Week.  Make it so.  Dust your favourite role-playing edition off your bookshelf and peruse it proudly in public.

I happen to be off work next week to look after Aurora so I might be doing Read An RPG Book To Your Daughter In Public Week.

All the info is at The Escapist.

- Alistair

Currently I have a five man squad of Grey Knight Space Marines, a Daemonhunter Inquisitor and an Imperial Guard Chimera.  Although it’s slow progress I’m painting faster now than at any time since my teens.  I’ll try and get some pics up but i’ll have to borrow someones digital camera.

Anybody have a decent one I can borrow for a while?

Thing is, as far as gaming is concerned, I have an odd selection of miniatures to choose from.  I’ve only ever bought those I fancied painting at the time with no regard to whether or not it made a coherent army.  Oh, well.

- Alistair

I have until the end of the week to get a story finished.  Talk about leaving it to the last minute.

The added challenge is Ruth had to head up north for family reasons and I have the little Aurora goblin all to myself until she gets back.  Not exactly conducive to a peaceful writing environment but maybe I should get aurora to help me finish it?

Perhaps her critical eye is exactly what is needed…

- Alistair

That would be Warhammer Online then.

First things, first.  It’s nowhere as good as Guild Wars.  Gameplay, graphics, subscription -  Guild Wars wins hands down.

But it works (after a period of uncertainty – transferring the server info from one company to another.  Not a flawless transfer apparently) and it’s good for a casual game.  If you can, get the collectors edition in HMV for 15 quid and a 60-day subscription game card for £13.  Still cheaper than most but not really worth it in the long run I think.  I’ll be making the most of my time on it while I can.

I’ll say that it does a good job of capturing the setting.  Warhammer-related computer games have been getting better at that in recent years.  And soon there comes Warhammer 40,000: Dark Millennium which is a big ol’ MMORPG set in GW’s futuristic setting.  Initial reports are that it looks good.

For Sigmar! For the Emperor!

- Alistair

It’s been a while so I thought I’d post a quick update where I am writing-wise.

The story for Telling of Tales has been submitted.  Haven’t heard anything yet and there’s no movement on the website so I’m not sure Magnus will be going ahead with anything.  That’s a shame, ToT is a good site and a great idea.  Quality voice work form Magnus as well.  Hopefully something will some of th site again if not the story I submitted.

Other than that I have a few short stories for other online and small press outlets.  All offer no financial reward for inclusion but it’s all good practice.

I loving the process at the moment.  I realised the other day when I was talking to Coach (the artist formally known as Edgy) that writing is no longer the hard slog it was before.  Don’t get me wrong, it still takes me a while to produce work of any quality but it’s not the huge weight on my shoulders any more and hasn’t been for a good time.  Part of that, I could guess, is seeing some actual published progress.

- Alistair

Noelinho gets a little bugbear off his chest about the poor use of grammar in today's society.

Oh dear, looks like Noelinho's going a little off-message by the looks of things...

I had got up one Saturday morning with the urge to doodle – and this is what happened…

I photographed my drawing (no scanner), printed on cotton, made a sandwich with some angelina, net, and wadding, stitched round the edge randomly and voila!

Then I thought they would make great t-shirts…

And I painted…

Home and Hunmanby:

Noelinho uses his great powers of prediction to give you the most accurate predictions yet for the World Cup quarter finals.

Stop press! Noelinho has a heart! He's doing something for charity! Frame this moment...the world doesn't get rocked like this too often.

Noelinho looks at the World Cup so far and examines the fortunes of the sides still left in South Africa.

Looking forward to a busy summer, Noelinho pretends to be clever, serious and forward thinking - must be summer missions time.

Noelinho previews this weekend's European Grand Prix from Valencia, looking at the resurgence of Ferrari, the problems at McLaren and the building championship battle.

They’re looking for a novel, at least 80,000 words in length, to be submitted by 31th December 2010.

The theme is Anywhere but here, Anywhere but now.  More details are on the Terry Pratchett website.  I’ll have to put the thinking cap on.

- Alistair

Last week, after a few glasses of wine too many, I ordered the Warhammer Fantasy Battle boxed game, The Battle for Skull Pass, from Dark Sphere.  I had confirmation from Dark Sphere yesterday that it had been dispatched and this morning…

Ah, sweet sweet Warhammer.

I’ve had a shufty through the box and checked out that everything is there.  So far, so good.  When Ruthy is back from work and my late shift is over this evening we’ll have a proper look at what we’ve got.

Let the painting and gaming commence!

- Alistair

Living On Reputation is a wee story of mine that’s been published by Mythaxis Magazine.

Head on over there and give it a read.  Then head back here and let me know what you think. 

I’m really proud of it.

- Alistair

Things a picking up, as they often do when my confidence returns.  Bit of a no-brainer there.

• Currently published stories are running two for two.  Two stories submitted, two stories published.  Okay, that’s a bit on the inaccurate side, the most recent story has been accepted but not published yet.  But it’s almost there.  I’ll let you know when it’s out.
• I’ve sent one, just this week, to Telling of Tales who are doing a season of podcasts with the theme of atrocity.  The story was sent in over the weekend and I’m forever hopeful it will make it.
• There’s another in the works for another local print compilation.  It’s called Duality 2 (the sequel of, unsurprisingly, Duality).  I’ve got the outline and approx. 1000 words written.  Needs a lot of work but has potential I think.  Would be nice to have something else in print.

There are always other projects, but those are the ones that are priority.  I’ll review the others once the Duality story is finished.

- Alistair

I recently recategorised the blog with my gaming stuff falling under ’6 Rolling Freak’.  It’s someone who does well with their dice rolls or is otherwise jammy with their playing, hence ‘you’re a 6 rolling freak’.

Anyway, on with recent fun.

• I was in Games Workshop this afternoon having a look at their preview copy of Warhammer Fantasy Battle 8th edition.  Hmm, very shiny indeed.  The store manager, Steve, ran me through a quick game using the models from the Battle For Skull Pass box.  The book seems to be getting a lot of hate because it’s £15 dearer, from £30 to £45.  Well, it’s almost twice the size of the previous book and in full colour.  And with these things, the cost depends on the amount of use you get out of it.  Yeah, it’s an expensive hobby but with the amount of enjoyment you get out of it, it should pay for itself.
• Ruthy and I never had our full test game of Warhammer 40K.  We had a half game, but we were both shattered and postponed it for the time being.  when my crazy shift pattern settles we’ll crack on.
• PBEM (Play by E-Mail) is good fun.  The current game, run by The Other Big Al, is trundling on and as with so many things depends on how busy the players are.  Hope it continues.
• I recently played another trail account of Eve Online.  I had every intention of signing up for the monthly fee, even with finances being tight at the moment, but Coach found something to hold off for…
• The Warhammer 40K Dark Millennium MMORPG.  Oh, it looks shiny.  There’s a gameplay trailer somewhere online but I’ll hold back until there’s an official site to link to.  But fighting for the God-Emperor might be taking up all my available time.  Heh.
• And with 40K in mind, I have actually been painting through some of my models.  I’ll have to get some decent photos to upload.  Have to source a better camera first methinks.

- Alistair

It has been a while (as usual) so I thought the blog required a bit of a update.

• Work is going well.  Care work seems to suit me.  Some weeks are busier than others but that’s the nature of the game I suppose.  Best job so far though.
• I’m doing an SVQ Level 3 in Health and Social Care.  Only just started it and there’s plenty of work to do.  Confidence is high though.
• With that in mind (heh, heh), the ol’ noggin is clearer.  Mental Health is good at the moment after coming out of a low spell.  Have to make the most of being on dry land, psychologically speaking.
• Aurora and Ruth continue to bloom.  Aurora will be 6 months in a week and a bit and the time has flown by.  Wow.

I’m sure there’s more.  There always is. 

- Alistair

So, the World Cup is finally here! The opening matches were yesterday, when the World Cup hosts, South Africa, drew 1-1 with Mexico in an encounter dominated early on by the Mexicans, but nearly ended up losing at the death. This was then followed by a dire 0-0 draw between France and Uruguay. I’ve seen a few bad games in my time, but that really was an awful game, possibly on a par with the time I saw Watford draw 0-0 with Peterborough United at Vicarage Road. Believe me, that was an awful match.

Anyway, look out for (hopefully) regular postings throughout the World Cup. During the World Cup, you can follow my World Cup Tweets on my separate Twitter account for football, @BritishFootball. Obviously, you can still follow me with my usual @Noelinho account!

Also, not wanting to disappoint, you can go to the specially created World Cup page, which will keep you up to date with my most recent World Cup facts, stats and commentary, and will quite possibly feature a few other things as the competition continues. Don’t say I’m not good to you!

Finally, here are a few statistics from yesterday:

• In the last three #WorldCup tournaments, France have received 32 cautions and 5 early baths.
• France and Uruguay have, between them, been drawn in Group A or Group 1 six times before. Neither have ever progressed from the group stages from there.
• Yesterday’s 0-0 draw meant that France and Uruguay have drawn two consecutive World Cup games 0-0. The other was in 2002. No two teams have ever drawn 0-0 in consecutive World Cup matches before.

Aren’t you glad I told you that? Thought so.

We are approaching half way through the year. You deserve an update on my New Year’s Resolutions. So, here goes:

I will read my Bible every day

Could do better. I’ll nail it one day. It’s hard. Requires setting aside time and ring-fencing it, rather than letting other things encroach upon that time. Rather a case of peaks and troughs at the moment though.

I will vote for [deleted - secret ballot and all that] in the General Election

Done. Obviously, there is no way I could ever tell you who I voted for. Secret ballot, natch.

I will learn a new language

This is on course. I have a Norwegian newspaper. I’m pretty sure I’m settled on that language. Need to brush up on my French, German and Italian too though.

I will read at least 20 books

Hmm. Optimistic. I have started a few now though, and one of them is Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology, which, if you ask me, should count as a few books in itself. There’s no way you could read that twenty times in a year!

I will post on my website more

Getting there. I’ve even redesigned it. Hope you like it. Apologies to IE 6/7 users – blame Microsoft for your poorer user experience. Upgrade to IE 8 for a better one, or use Firefox, Safari or Chrome for the definitive product.

I will set a personal best in a 10k race

I may struggle to find the time to enter a race. I would love to, but I missed a series of three races I had been planning to enter as I had no time. Wait and see.

I will try out a new sport

Tried out for a new American Football team. Had to give up because it was exhausting me as I was so short of time. Still planning on trying curling. On the lookout for other possibilities though!

I will pass my driving test

Really. Must. Enact. Action. URGENTLY.

I will explore new territory on my racing bike

Work in progress. I’ve hit some high speeds too. Just ask the Pastor – 45mph with the brakes on; you should see what I did when he wasn’t following me!

I will be as witty, dark and cutting as ever

A matter of personal taste, but of course I am. Just because you have no sense of humour…

I am beginning to sense a pattern in this year’s races. I make a prediction. The prediction is, on the whole, bang on the money. Then, with about a third of the race left to go, it falls apart. Mark Webber, Sebastian Vettel, I’m looking squarely at you.

If you care to look at my predictions for Turkey, you’ll see I had Webber to win, followed by Vettel. Okay, so I had Alonso third, which didn;t exactly go to plan, but I had the McLarens right behind. Pretty on the money. Except Vettel decided to turn in on Mark Webber, taking himself out of the race and dropping Mark down to third at the same time.

For the record, it was Vettel’s fault. No shadow of a doubt. It completely wrecked my picks. Anyway, we now travel to North America, with a return to the Canadian Grand Prix, one of my personal favourites! In 2008, Kubica won the race, although he was rather helped by Hamilton running in to the back of an obviously red Ferrari.In 2007, Robert Kubica went for a mid-afternoon barrel roll. In 1997, the race ended under a red flag as Olivier Panis smashed both legs in a nasty accident. The Canadian Grand Prix rarely disappoints.

The circuit itself is hard on brakes. The long back straight past the hairpin leads on to the final chicane, Champions’ Wall, which is followed by the home straight and another hard braking area. There are about half a dozen heavy braking areas, so if anyone is marginal on brakes, they can expect to become acquainted with the wall at some stage. The chances of a safety car are high, and there are always high-profile casualties in the race. The pit lane has caused angst on many occasions, with Felipe Massa and Giancarlo Fisichella disqualified in 2007 for driving through a red light in the pit lane.

There are no high speed corners in Montreal, so the Red Bull car may struggle to gain much of an advantage over the other cars. Expect McLaren to be strong. Expect Mercedes to be a little quicker as they make use of their strong engine on the straights. Expect Force India to do the same. Don’t expect much from Ferrari though. Anyway, for what it’s worth, here are my top three for Canada:

1. Lewis Hamilton;
2. Jenson Button;
3. Sebastian Vettel.

I do expect Lewis Hamilton to win. He likes circuits like this. He took his maiden Grand Prix win in Canada. I fully expect him to edge Jenson, who will, I suspect, be fighting to keep Vettel behind him. We’ll see how accurate those predictions are soon…oh, and don’t forget, the action is late afternoon, since it’s coming from North America!

(Or ups and downs and the inevitable return of the Crisis of Confidence.)

I have a habit of becoming hermit-like every so often, even more than normal, and recently has been one of those periods.  It’s annoying (a bloody pain to be honest) but it’s just something that has happened for years, easily since I hit my 20′s.

Now, I know this recent one is not a relapse of the poor mental health that plagued me last year.  Generally I’ve been quite chipper.  Work trundles on, they throw me some shifts if they’re feeling benevolent (joke, joke), Aurora is blossoming and Ruthy is as lovely as ever.  A good and erstwhile chum is back from down south, it’s always good to have him around, and I have no reason to feel like this.

Yet I do.

Of course, the usual reason my mood suffers is due to the pressure I put myself under with my writing.  Same old, same old.  Perhaps I’m just going through the same mood I hit when I had my last whinge.

Ah, bugger.  Prog beckons, I think.  That should break me out of it.

- Alistair

If you’ve read my last couple of posts, you’ll know that I am, overall, extremely happy with my HTC Desire phone. Once HTC/Orange get around to pushing out Android 2.2 I suspect I will be even happier However, I have had a couple of mishaps. My previously mentioned fail with the Sense launcher was mostly harmless, if a little irritating. However, my own impatience with my Mac mounting the phone the other day lead to a worse problem – the microsd card wasn’t mounted/unmounted properly and failed to read either in my phone or on the Mac. The only solution was to format it. This meant I lost everything on it, some of which had been on it from my previous phone. I load a load of photos – nothing spectacular, but quite upsetting.

And so to the problem of syncing…..

There are a number of options available for Android. None of which are as good as iTunes, I suspect… DoubleTwist is an attempt to mimic iTunes-like functionality with an Android phone. However, I’m not overly impressed with it as a piece of software. They’ve just released a client app on the phone too – I guess I might check it out, but I’m not convinced by the reviews I’ve seen so far.

The Missing Sync promise to be a great solution, but it is $40 which grates a little. Plus, it seems to sync _everything_. As I noted in my previous post, I have a load of stuff that _already_ syncs. Contacts, mail and calendar are all sorted. There are only 2 things left I need to sync (that I can think of) – Photos/Videos and the HTC auto-backup file. (Apps is a possibility, but I’m thinking of going with AppBrain on that, as it seems a popular choice)

MyBackup is an online service with an Android app that appears to be highly rated….. but 2GB of space? That seems somewhat paltry for backing up images.

Google, of course, have their own image service – Picasa. Sadly, though, it doesn’t look like the integration with Android is there. And so I think I’m just going to sync photos with my laptop using….. the built in Image Capture programme for syncing with cameras. And I’ll make copies of the autobackup files too.

However, I will play around with DoubleTwist for a while as well, as it’s free , just in case I’ve missed something important.

mrBen

Oh, go on, admit it – you’re secretly jealous. A tiny bit at the very least. For all the ridicule and scorn from people when I said I was going to Eurovision, a surprising number of people then admitted watching the contest, even if the excuse was “I want to see you on telly”. Well, actually, I do believe I was on TV – albeit it Spain and Germany, rather than Britain.

I actually have no idea where to start, to be honest, as there is so much I could say. I will leave general pictures observations about Oslo and Norway (of which I have plenty) for another day and simply stick with Eurovision for now.

Oslo itself was well decked out for the event. Trams, buses and billboards were full of adverts for the event, there was a Eurovision Village and also a Euro Cafe! I managed to befriend a Swedish woman who reeled off Eurovision statistics at a rate of knots that even I was struggling to keep up with. It was also bathed in glorious sunshine for most of the weekend, aside from a little thunder on Saturday morning. Transport to and from the event was fantastic. But anyway, the contest itself…

Firstly, congratulations to Lena, the German entrant, who was both my tip and personal favourite to win. I was sat directly behind a couple of Germans who were going wild as the points flew in. In fact, it was a little too extravagant at one point! At the other end of the scale, the United Kingdom finished bottom. It didn’t dampen too many British spirits on the night, although the next morning was worse, compounded by a bunch of Aussies rubbing it in…

Josh didn’t sound awful in the Telenor Arena, but he certainly didn’t sound great either. I met a British man on the way to the bus back to Oslo who said he’d received a message from someone watching in the UK saying the end of Josh’s song was “worse than Scooch”. I thought that was perhaps a little strong, but having watched the BBC’s TV coverage this evening, it really was terrible. It is easy to see why it came last. In fact, it’s rather more surprising we got ten points for it, although admittedly some did come from Ireland, who are usually quite nice to us anyway.

As you may have seen from the picture above, I managed to get a few shots of the artists as they arrived on the Sunday night. I wedged myself between Dutch, Spanish and German TV. I searched around for British TV, but they were nowhere to be seen. I stuck my head in on a bunch of German fans singing a rendition of Lena’s “Satellite” for a pre-record for German television. We were all waiting for our fellow entries, and Lena, who was definitely the fans’ favourite. Sadly she was rather late arriving, and so I missed her, but those of us who wedged ourselves between the media saw a number of people, including the a couple of the Norwegian Royal Family, the Spanish, French, British, Icelandic and Moldovan entrants, some of whom stopped for a quick chat. A couple even gave away free CDs and even a couple of books, though sadly I didn’t manage to pilfer one for myself. The TV crews were good banter too, although the Germans did ask what I thought of the British entry. Thankfully, they didn’t record the response…

The atmosphere in and around the arena was fantastic. There were plenty of fans from almost every country, including some of the losing semi-finalists, like Sweden. Oh, and like I previously mentioned, some Aussies too! I spotted Canadians and Americans dropping by as well – for whatever reason they wanted to turn up for! The warm-up started about forty-five minutes before the show went live, with a little practice for the interval dance flashmob,which everyone quite enjoyed.*

Last year’s winner, Alexander Rybak, got a fantastic cheer when he came on to perform his song, after which the show really began. I have to say, I did love the entry from Azerbaijan. It started the show off fantastically well. Spain then followed, with a mini pitch invasion. Actually, in the stadium, a lot of people didn’t notice Jimmy Jump invading the stage, and he did fit in rather well – although on TV, it was pretty obvious.

The Norwegian entry sent the crowd wild, as you would expect. In fact, they went pretty wild for Iceland and Denmark too, who both had very good entries as well. The Moldovan entry was good for dancing to, but after that, it died down a little until Ireland came on. Ireland’s entrant, Niamh Kavanagh, has actually won the contest before, and I very much enjoyed her song, but it wasn’t so popular across Europe. Greece were next up. with a catchy track, though they may not be disappointed not to have won considering the country is mortgaged to the rafters and may collapse under the cost of holding the show!

I will ignore the United Kingdom’s dismal entry, and instead mention the French track – also their official World Cup song – which set the room alight. I did love it, although it being French, I could obviously never vote for it! This was followed by a solid piano-assisted effort from Romania. The Russians then came on, and, whilst the track itself was popular, Russia itself bombed, with a sound boo resonating at every mention of the country’s name. The crowd soon forgot, as Lena appeared and the whole place went nuts. Denmark rounded off the twenty-five with a well received song, followed by a repeat of the previously-interrupted Spanish entry, which was, well, weird, wasn’t it?

As voting closed, it seemed the mood of the Norwegians nearby was with Denmark and Germany, though many like Azerbaijan’s entry too. As the votes started to come in, it l0oked like we might have a visit to Copenhagen in store for next year, but as it progressed, Germany became odds-on favourites. They were, if you ask me (and tough if you don’t), worthy winners, though Denmark would have been great winners too! I was rather surprised Norway and Ireland didn’t do better too.

So, who’s coming with me to, most likely, Berlin next year?

*Now you won’t know this, but I have studied the video of the contest carefully, and so I can tell you this is true. At the start of the flashmob dance, you will see Norwegian security pushing a guy aside from the picture. A few seconds later, the professional dancers start, and you can see a member of Norwegian security mistakenly trying to stop one of the dancers. She, in fact, is the person in charge of the dance routine. FACT. Amazing that II know that, huh?

Or, How I Managed to Convince My Wife To Have A Game Of Warhammer 40K…

Actually that’s not strictly true.  She is interested in playing a game and seeing as I’ve had these blasted things on my shelf (still mostly unpainted mind) and not yet played them, I think this is a good move.  And seeing as it’s been years and several editions between my last actual games.  16 years and three editions…

Tonight we set up the wee table, I cobbled together two small armies of futuristic metal (and plastic) soldiers, and we went over some of the rules.  The idea is to spread the learning curve over several days and to use units that are pretty straightforward to play.

Tomorrow, hopefully, brings the game itself!

- Alistair

So I’ve changed browser from Mozilla Firefox to Google Chrome. This is a big deal for me – I’ve been a Mozilla user for years now, and I still think they do great work. However, there are a few big advantages in Chrome for me:

1. It’s quicker.
2. It’s Webkit based, so it helps when working a lot with mobile Webkit stuff
3. My phone runs Webkit
4. The release of 2.2 includes some cool stuff for “cloud-to-device” work, and I suspect a chunk of that will be in Chrome in the near future.
5. The developer stuff is just a bit smoother and neater than firebug

I’m now pretty much a Google boy – I use Google Mail and Calendar, and I have a Google phone, which integrates everything nicely together. Talking of the Desire, I picked up a nasty bug (not sure of the source) which caused the HTC Sense Launcher to repeatedly die, which required a complete wipe of the phone. Luckily, all the magic backup stuff kicked in, and the only stuff I really lost was the connections between my phone, google and facebook contacts, which only took about 30 minutes to restore. (I do really need to sort through my contacts and cut them down – a lot of them are horribly duplicated, and my first phone couldn’t store multiple numbers for a single person, so I have loads of entries for all the different numbers and stuff).

Other than that problem, the Desire is a fantastic phone. I’m enjoying having a “smart phone”, and I suspect that by not having previously had an iPhone is a bit of an advantage. I don’t particularly feel any iPhone envy, and while I appreciate the appeal of an iPhone and the way that Apple handles it, I’m still a big fan of the open nature of Android. While it leads to a proliferation of crap available for the phone, I do believe in the long run it will increase the potential and quality. (Much like the internet). And the price was right.

Oh, and I can’t wait for 2.2 to arrive for my phone – latest news slates it for June 23rd.

mrBen

It is with great regret that I have to announce that we won’t be releasing our scheduled May episode, as it turns out the original recording was completely awful quality, mainly because the Mac decided to record the internal microphone rather than the nicely balanced audio coming from the desk. The quality was sufficiently bad that we’ve made the decision not to release.

I’m truly sorry. We’ll be back with a vengeance in June.

For a while, and for reasons I can’t possibly explain, I’ve been playing D&D Tiny Adventures on Facebook.  And when I say ‘playing’ I mean I log in occasionally and click some buttons to send my character on another quest which, an hour later, will be finished and awaiting my further intervention.

Guild Wars it ain’t.

Initially, it was a fun wee distraction, as is much of Facebook, but role-playing games are better than that generally.  Here’s what I’m playing at the mo.

• Guild Wars – I’ve logged in once in the last month!  Ruthy and I started some new characters ages ago and they sat dormant for months.  I may play again within the next 30 days.  Oh, will the excitement ever stop?
• A Play By E-Mail session – Exactly what it says.  First time I’ve ever done it and it’s fun.  But because it’s intermittent it can be a bit confusing to what’s going on.
• Progress Quest – Better in many ways to D&D Tiny Adventures, after ‘Character Creation’ you have no input at all.  As long as the software runs, your character will quest away to his heart’s content.

I have been reading though the old Red Box edition of Basic D&D, with the idea of running a Pen & Paper session.  It’s been a while since I’ve been involved in a game, either playing or GM-ing, and nothing really beats the experience.  Must try and rustle something up.

Oh, before I forget, try this one out.  It’s the Linear RPG.  Nice bit of fun.

- Alistair

Since I am away in Oslo this weekend, I shall get my Grand Prix preview out of the way nice and early. The season is hotting up nicely, though it is also looking ominous for anyone not driving a Red Bull. So far this season, Red Bull have taken pole position in all six races (three voles each for Vettel and Webber), have taken the fastest lap in three races (two to one in Webber’s favour) and have won three races too (also two to one in Webber’s favour). Although neither driver has taken the hat-trick of pole, fastest lap and race win in the same race, the team have taken the hat-trick twice, including at the last race in Monaco, and Mark Webber has won both the last two races – Spain and Monaco – which happen to represent the most diametrically opposed circuit types on the Formula One circuit. So, if you’re not in a Red Bull, the message is clear – pray it breaks down.

Turkey is a track that will suit the Red Bull car down to the ground. The now-famous turn eight – with four apexes at high speed – is a dream if your happen to have a car loaded with downforce, which the Red Bull certainly is! Barring any problems, I would fully expect the Red Bull car to win again. Behind them, it’s a race between Ferrari and McLaren. Lewis Hamilton relishes a track like Turkey, and Jenson Button won here last year. It will be interesting to see whether McLaren or Ferrari have the upper hand this weekend – I suspect Alonso will edge the McLarens, who will both edge Massa.

All eyes will also be on the Mercedes. Nico Rosberg hasn’t been quite the force he was early on in the last couple of races, but Schumacher has looked much more comfortable. He caught Button napping in Spain and Alonso in Monaco – though cruelly punished – and so will be looking for better finishes from here. However, without some new, serious upgrades, both Rosberg and Schumacher will struggle to break in to the top five.

Amongst the rest of the field, watch out for Adrian Sutil, who was handy in Spain, along with Robert Kubica, who has been fantastic all season so far. Rubens Barrichello is far to discount too, and also keep an eye on Kobayashi – if the BMW-Sauber sets up well, he may, with a slice of luck too, manage to scrape a point. Maybe. He’s more likely to fall just outside though.

So, without further ado, here is my top three for Turkey:

1. Mark Webber;
2. Sebastien Vettel;
3. Fernando Alonso.

You may be surprised by the top two, but Webber beat Vettel in Turkey last year, finishing second. He’s also won the last two races and seems to have a small psychological advantage over his team-mate. He’s also nailed back-to-back victories and is leading the Drivers’ Championship. I doubt it will bother him – he’s having the time of his life right now and is brimming with confidence. I hope he keeps it up!

So, if Webber will win, second place is obvious, assuming Vettel finishes. He’ll have a new chassis, which may help. Finally, Alonso in third. Hamilton and Button will be his nearest rivals, but I think he’ll pull it off.

Last time out: Don’t go there. My picks were a disaster. I got one pick right (Vettel, in the correct position too, actually). My McLaren gamble didn’t really work. C’est la vie.

Forget the General Election. Forget the World Cup, whether it be football, or the monstrosity that is chav cricket. Forget all the other things that can distract you this weekend, for there is only one things that matters. Norway. Oslo. The Telenor Arena. Saturday night… Eurovision. Saturday night is the final of the Eurovision Song Contest 2010, and, ash permitting (it’s looking hopeful), I’ll be there, flag in hand, madly Tweeting away and running up an enormous mobile data bill in the most expensive country in Europe. Hard life, huh?

Now I can hear the scoffers amongst you. No, it’s not sad; yes, it’s a great laugh. You’re just jealous. Enjoy sneakily watching on your TV, wishing you were there. Being in Norway, I may even vote twice – once in Norway, for the United Kingdom, and once in Britain – if I can nab the correct number – for (probably) Germany. I’m certainly not voting for those Eastern Europeans…

So anyway, have fun in my absence. I’m very much doubt that I can resist Tweeting, no matter how much it costs, so don’t forget to follow – @Noelinho.

Don’t Clegg and Cameron look the happy couple? Who would have realised that only weeks ago, these two men were political enemies? It’s enough to make you weep. And swear. And throw things at the screen. But anyway, that’s besides the point. The point is, they have brought with them the “new” politics – and what a load of old codswallop it is.

When David cameron and Nick Clegg talked of the new politics, they talked about reducing the size of the state, of giving power back to people, or creating, in Cameron’s terms, the “Big Society”. So, as I understand it, they were keen to decentralise power away from the state and into other people’s hands.

Err, except they haven’t. All this talk of constitutional reform is garbage. It does nothing to do this. Every measure is actually entrenching power rather than loosening grip. Funny how things change when you win power, isn’t it? So anyway, here are the measures, in brief, with the explanations to follow:

• Instituting a referendum on AV for the House of Commons;
• Appointing peers to the Lords to reflect the vote at the last General Election;
• Changing the law so that a motion to dissolve Parliament needs 55% to win, rather than a simple majority;
• Introducing fixed term Parliaments;
• Changing the rules of the Conservatives’ 1922 Committee so that frontbenchers get a vote;
• Allowing Government parties access to Short money.

So let’s just take a closer look at those…

Referendum on AV

AV stands for Alternative Vote. It’s worth noting that neither the Conservatives nor the Liberal Democrats were in favour of this system during the General Election campaign. It is not a proportional system (not that I care – I don’t believe in PR as a form of effective government, but that’s another matter right now), and so it’s not really what the Liberal Democrats want. In fact, a crude version of AV (ie. not AV+) would produce only a very modest change in the outcome of most elections, but still, that’s what Nick Clegg and David Cameron are going to give us a referendum on. Even better, the Conservative Party will campaign against it! Well, isn’t it good to know that our Prime Minister is going to give us a vote on electoral reform, whilst at the same time telling us to stick it?

Lords Reform

We’ve not really heard much about reform of the House of Lords. It doesn’t seem to be a huge priority on that basis, but what we have been told is that the coalition government plan on appointing a number of Lords so that the make-up of the second chamber is reflective of the proportion of the vote at the General Election just gone. Now, if you remember, Gordon Brown as the outgoing Primer Minister is allowed to appoint a number himself, and Labour already have more Lords than any other party. Thus, the coalition government will have to appoint over a hundred Lords in order to do this. I thought we were wanting to elect them these days (again, I’m not so worried about that, but anyhow…)? Furthermore, appointing the House in this way is actually a clouded attempt at gerrymandering to get legislation through the second chamber. People will only be appointed on the basis that they will support legislation. You may as well just abolish the chamber if you’re going to abuse it like that!

Dissolving Parliament and Fixed Term Parliaments

Clever stuff, this. A vote of no confidence can pass with a simple majority, but a motion to dissolve Parliament would only pass with a vote with a 55% – 45% majority. Why is this important? Oh, it just so happens that this minor change means that the Conservative Party could rule as a minority government, and as long as they all stick together, can’t be booted out by a vote of no confidence, even though the other parties could block every piece of legislation they bring to the House. Oh, and because we have a fixed term Parliament, we’re stuck with a lame duck Government. Great. More gerrymandering.

1922 Committee

The 1922 Committee is a Conservative backbench committee. See that important word? Oh, no, not “committee”, but “backbench”. Currently, those on the frontbench can’t votein the 1922 Committee. David Cameron wants to change the rules so that the frontbench can vote. It just so happens that such a move would increase his power over the committee…

Short Money

The Government always has an advantage over the opposition, since it has almost unlimited resources for research and policy-making through the very fact that it is the Government. When you’re in opposition, it’s much harder to undertake the same reasearch because you have less money and manpower. Short money goes to the opposition to redress the balance somewhat. Only thing is, the Liberal Democrats, despite being in coalition government with the Tories, have decided they should get some. Err, right. That, I believe, is theft. Except they know that, so they want to change the rules so they are allowed to. Hmm.

So anyway, let’s recap how this goes. The Liberal Democrats and the Tories, in their coalition Government, will:

• Give power to the voters! Referendum on AV! Give voters a bigger say – but we’ll campaign against it, because we don’t actually want it!
• Reform the House of Lords! Give the second chamber credibility – by appointing party loyalists who will vote our legislation through! We won’t bother to elect them!
• Give more power to Parliament! Except we’ll remove the power to dissolve Parliament so we can cling on to power like Communists clinging on to the last bricks of the Berlin Wall!
• Take power away from the Prime Minister! No more second-guessing election dates! But it means I can stick it out for five years, whatever happens, however much you hate me!
• Crush the backbenchers! Pesky, noisy twerps!
• Steal money from the opposition! We need it for ourselves!

Is it just me, or was the Old Politics better? No wonder they were laughing so much in the press conference. It’s clearly easier to be a Liberal outside of Government. Now, it’s all about how much power they can cling on to.

Picture: Crown Copyright, taken at the first joint press conference.

Whilst most of the football world focused their attention last weekend on the FA Cup final at Wembley between Portsmouth and Chelsea, the focus north of the border in Scotland was very much on the Active Nation Scottish Cup Final between Ross County and Dundee United – and Noelinho couldn’t resist but go along to Hampden and see the game out.

Ross County had never before got past the last sixteen in the Scottish Cup, let alone made the final or won it. However, en route to the final this year, they put out first Hibernian, and then Celtic. Not bad for a first division team! Dundee United, meanwhile, went into the tie as firm favourites, having beaten Rangers in a replay in the quarter finals, before comfortably putting away Raith Rovers in the semi finals. Everyone knew County were capable of producing an upset, though few really expected it. That said, many neutrals – including myself – were hoping for a Ross County win, and the club sold over 18,000 tickets for the match, although quite how many of them were closet Inverness Caledonian Thistle fans hoping to watch County get pummelled isn’t quite so well known…

It was great to see so many people packed into Hampden Park for the match, especially considering the lack of any Old Firm in the match. In some ways, it added to the anticipation – the Highlanders hugely excited by the occasion, the Dundee United fans anticipating their first Scottish Cup win in sixteen years.

The match, when it finally started after the formalities of introductions and fireworks, was a little cagey. Ross County did look a little unsettled by the occasion and struggled to string many passes together. The crowd were in good voice as they watched Dundee United controlling possession, looking comfortable, but without producing much in the way of end product. A few marginal decisions seemed to go United’s way, but there was no real controversy. As the first half came to a close, United upped the quality, winning a couple of free kicks and corners, but the end product was tame. At half time, both teams would have been please – Ross County, at 0-0, were still in the game, and Dundee United, although not leading, hadn’t been troubled.

The second half started in a similar vein. Dundee United looked comfortable and Ross County looked to be struggling for composure and inspiration. However, around the hour mark, they found more confidence, especially on the counter attack, with a couple of good runs, getting in to the United box. Unfortunately, this also became their undoing, as they were then caught a little on the hop by the Arabs. After a panic from Michael McGovern in the Ross County goal, United’s David Goodwillie ended up with the ball and lobbed it over the head of the stranded goalkeeper and defenders chasing back.

Once United had their noses in front, it was always going to be an uphill battle for the Highlanders. It was always going to be the killer blow. As they desperately tried to find an equaliser, Dundee United punished them in clinical fashion. Craig Conway – who was, in the end, the Man of the Match – had caused the Ross County defence problems all day with his speed, and as the weary County legs faded, he punished them twice, scoring a late brace and making it a 3-0 victory to Dundee United.

In the end, it was a fair enough scoreline. It wasn’t the best game of football you’ll ever see, but it wasn’t bad either.* County certainly didn’t disgrace themselves and their supporters gave them a warm reception at the end of the match. All eyes will be on Ross County next season to see if they can make the jump to the SPL, and if they do, hopefully in a more successful manner than Livingston and Gretna…

* A little comment on the quality of football matches. So many people complain about the poor quality of football matches today! How often have you heard people moaning about a match that was boring, scrappy, or, “the worst I’ve ever seen”? A tip to those people: stop watching teams like Arsenal and Barcelona. You are clearly spoilt by watching those teams, and your expectations from matches are too high. Real football matches are rarely like watching Barcelona and Arsenal, as any fan who stands in the terraces – or, heaven forbid, sits in a poxy little covered seat in the main stand – will testify!

Unfortunately, with the General Election held in the same week as the Spanish Grand Prix, I forgot to preview the Grand Prix. However, with the Monaco Grand Prix this week, you can now sit down to the treat of a dual review and preview.

Firstly, let’s look back to the Spanish Grand Prix. If I had previewed the Grand Prix, I would have picked like this:

1. Vettel;
2. Webber;
3. Hamilton.

And that would have looked great with 10 laps to go! Even with 2 laps to go, it wasn’t too bad. Let’s be honest, Barcelona suits the Red Bull car down to the ground. Turns 3 and 9 are perfectly set up for Adrian Newey’s masterpiece to shine. So, on paper, the race had a Red Bull 1-2 written all over it. At the same time, the McLaren has been good in race trim this year and if Hamilton could show good pace in qualifying, he had definitely shown the race pace required to grab a podium finish.

As the weekend went on, so it turned out. The Red Bull was dictatorially impressive in qualifying, destroying the opposition. Webber shaded Vettel – just – and in doing so asserted that he can be just as quick as his highly rated team-mate.

Come race day, Hamilton made a good start but couldn’t quite jam a move down the inside into turn one. Webber held off Vettel to hold his place at the front, which, in the Spanish Grand Prix, is as good as winning the race, mechanical problems aside. Indeed, the previous nine Spanish Grand Prix had been won by the pole sitter. Still, Vettel was on his tail and could potentially jump him in a pit stop.

Unfortunately for Vettel, his pit stop wasn’t a smooth one and he instead fell back into the clutches of Lewis Hamilton. Hamilton himself had a problem in his pit stop with a wheel nut, but the team reacted quickly as there had been a similar problem with team-mate Jenson Button’s stop, and so they were prepared. I the meantime, Fernando Alonso kept his head down in fourth, and Schumacher – who scared his way past Jenson Button as Button came out of the pits – made his car wider than the M25 to stay ahead of Button in fifth, circling at a speed that at times felt closer to that of the M25 too. From this point on, it looked like the race was over. Webber led Vettel by about fifteen seconds, who was ahead of Hamilton, who was ahead of Alonso. Schumacher then led Button and Massa, neither of whom looked like passing the car in front.

This all changed with just under ten laps to go, braking in to turn ten, Vettel’s car looked fragile, and memories of Australia flooded back. The producer cut to a replay of Vettel bounding across the gravel at turn seven, and you realised something was up. Vettel pitted for new tyres but was quickly told his brakes were about to go. Consequently, he had to coast to the end of the race, hoping he could hang on to fourth ahead of Schumacher and somehow manage to stop his car at every corner. Webber must have allowed himself a wry smile, as must Alonso, who was now in a podium position in his home Grand Prix.

If he had a wry smile then, he must have had an ever bigger smile as he passed through turn three on the penultimate lap. Seconds before, Lewis Hamilton watched in horror as his left front wheel rim popped, sending his wheel nut flying in the air, causing his tyres to de-laminate at 150 miles an hour and sending him straight in to the wall. The second place he had inherited was gone,gladly taken by Alonso, and marked the fourth time in Lewis’ three and a bit year career that a tyre has exploded, causing him to go off track. Vettel, meanwhile, was counting his stars as it meant he could salvage a podium, and fourth for Schumacher gave him his best finish since his return in Bahrain.

So what did Spain tell us? It told us that the Red Bull is still far and away the quickest car in Formula 1 – especially in high speed corners, like turn three at Barcelona. It showed us that the McLaren is the next best, followed by the Ferrari, which has fallen back a little, with the Mercedes still fourth quickest. Michael Schumacher seems much happier with the car now, which is good, but Rosberg had a poor weekend and will be looking to put that right in Monaco, although he doesn’t have a great track record in the Principality. Which leads us nicely on to the Monaco Grand Prix this weekend…

Having seen the utter Red Bull domination in Spain, many people will be despairing, thinking they will wipe the floor again in Monte Carlo. They may, but there are three reasons why I don’t think they will, or there is at least a good chance they won’t:

• The Spanish Grand Prix is held at a track that perfectly shows up the Red Bull’s strengths – Monaco foes not have the high speed corners the Red Bull loves so much;
• McLaren have a very good history at Monte Carlo, winning 15 times – they build cars that run well in Monaco;
• Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button both love Monaco – Hamilton is great on street style tracks, Button is very smooth, tidy and won in Monaco with a convincing drive last year.

This, of course, doesn’t mean McLaren will walk it, but I fully expect them to be up there. So, he is my prediction for Monaco:

1. Lewis Hamilton;
2. Sebastian Vettel;
3. Jenson Button.

I don’t expect the Ferrari to shine, nor the Mercedes. Watch out for Robert Kubica – if he can keep his nose clean, he may be able pick up some more very useful points. But more importantly, think back to the last time there were twenty-four cars on the grid at Monaco? What, you don’t remember? OK, I’ll save you F1 newbies the bother of looking it up, and instead extract the memory from my brain for you. It was 1995. There were, in fact, not twenty-four cars but twenty-six. Indeed, the 1995 Monaco Grand Prix was the last Grand Prix to feature twenty-six cars as the Simtek-Ford team dissolved very soon after. (Pedant alert: technically, only twenty-five cars took the “start” – neither Simtek took the official start)

Anyway, going in to the first corner, Jean Alesi and Gerhard Berger made a Ferrari sandwich out of David Coulthard, bringing out the red flag. It’s not the only time the start has caused problems, and I wonder, will we see it again this year? We shall see…

And before I leave you, I shall leave you with a little trivia, and a video. Want to know why one car didn’t make the restart in 1995? I’ll tell you. Well, see, there was this Italian driver called Domenico Schiattarella (he wasn’t very good – you’ll see if you read on!), who needed his car moving. So, the stewards attached it to a recovery crane and lifted it up in the air. And then they…well, they smashed it to pieces. It fell off. The dropped it. To be honest, if you’d ever seen him race, you could be forgiven for thinking they might have done it on purpose, and thanks to the marvel that it Youtube, I can show you why. Take a look!

See what I mean? His surname almost gave the game away, and if that didn’t, the video really did!

Bizarrely, I’m still working on this.  Haven’t completed a full story since Day 1 but I’ve written anything up to 1000 words for each of them.  I keep telling myself I’ll head back and fill in the gaps once I’ve finished the story for that day, and I might still do that, but I’m a busy boy with new job and baby.  Only so many hours in the day to do any of this…

So, Day 5 to Day 12.  Here’s the breakdown.

Day 5 – A day in the life of Aurora.

Day 6 – A modern day knight.

Day 7 – A work night out gone badly wrong.

Day 8 – A fairy story of a beast who lived in a tree.

Day 9 – similar to Day 8, but with the creature who lived under the stairs.

Day 10 – My attempt at Supernatural Romance.  (I feel dirty just saying that…)

Day 11 – Flash fiction, dialogue only.  Something that wandered without a goal.

Day 12 – A Lovecraftian tale set on the outskirts of Glasgow.

- Alistair

What a smile! My boy is not only sitting, he has moved from tummy crawling to knee crawling and…  on our trip to Birmingham we had pulling himself up to stand.

We went to visit Ben’s sister, who cooked us the most amazing meals and took us to see sharks and otters and other cool fishies.

Ardtalnaig

It dawned on me this morning that this week is election week. Yes, I hadn’t really twigged until now that we are forty-eight hours away from the closing of polls in an election race that, if you read everything that’s been written in the media, is too close to call, the three party election, whatever nonsense they feel like writing (I say this – it’s blatantly obvious the Conservative Party will win, with comfortably the most seats, and with a tiny majority, I predict).

Anyway, the point is, there are the three main parties – Labour, the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats – and the sideshow parties – the SNP, the BNP, UKIP and the Greens. So, as the election draws, who will Noelinho.org endorse? You’re about to find out. So, here is, in brief, a quick run-down of the minor parties:

• SNP: Nationalists. Don’t like that. Alex Salmond / Nicola Sturgeon – don’t like them either. Their education policy in Scotland has been a disaster. Although they do want to get rid of Trident, which I fully agree with. Unless I can have the red button, and then it’s a different story…
• BNP: Err…Nick Griffin? Oh, ok, I’ll give a better opinion. I’m not a Nazi, I don’t deny the Holocaust, I quite like Jewish people and I don’t have much of an issue with black people either. I’m not really sure what their policies are apart from deporting people they don’t like, but I doubt I would fit their idea of an Aryan anyway…
• UKIP: I quite like their policy of getting out of Europe – I can’t stand the European Union. Having said that, it’s about the only thing I agree on, and they’ve not been purer than pure in the Europeam Parliament either…(although did you see the berating of a poor, war-wounded Belgian Prime Minister? That was good!)
• Greens: Statist, authoritarian eco-chumps. No thanks. On yer bike, preferably off the cliff.

Oh well, that’s four parties down, so we’re half way through! So, the major parties, in a little more depth:

• Labour: Leader isn’t wonderful, but probably the best of the three main party leaders. Like him or not, he does carry gravitas, especially in the international community, and he definitely has a better grasp of what he wants to achieve and how to achieve it – whether you agree with that plan or not. On the other side of the coin, he is volatile and comes across as detached from the people. Labour’s team, as a whole, is the most impressive. They have done a lot through the tax credits system to try and redistribute wealth and have invested heavily in the NHS with fantastic results. Yet, at the same time, civil liberties have been slowly eroded, power has seeped to the European Union and equalities legislation has turned almost into creating thought crime.
• Conservatives: Would you trust a front bench of Cameron, Fox, Osbourne and Eric Pickles? Me neither. I wouldn’t trust Pickles with a pie, let alone the country. The party also wants to encourage / reward / bribe people into marriage. Not with my money, thanks. Whatever they like to say, they are authoritarian. They want to renew Trident, wasting more money, and like to tell us at every opportunity that Britain is wrecked / burnt to a crisp / broken / about to be swallowed up into middle Earth unless we vote for Dave and Dave only. I’d rather take the risk. Oh yeah, and “hug a hoodie”?
• Liberal Democrats: Ah, led by the petulant schoolboy. How many Liberal Democrats would have any clue how to govern? Two, perhaps? I’m counting Charles Kennedy and Chris Huhne, if you’re wondering… See, I thought Liberal Democrats were meant to be Liberal in ideology, but apparently they aren’t. They have thrown their own weight behind thought crime legislation too. All rather illiberal. Still, they are against Trident, but they seem to want to spend the budget twice over. They do want to raise the Personal Tax Allowance to £10,000 though, which would be a great move. Aside from this, they have little to offer, other than amusement when their volunteers get arrested for breaking the law, or for when Nick Clegg says he’ll be Primer Minister, or that the Liberal Democrats will hold the balance of power. They won’t.

So, the moment you’ve all been waiting for…who is Noelinho.org endorsing in this election? Well, after much consideration, angst and heated debate amongst the editorial team (with a few others chipping in), we (I) have decided that it is indeed time for change. Radical change. Change that puts a real smile on your face – and there’s only one party than can do that. The Monster Raving Loony William Hill Party. Why? Here are the policies that did it for me:

• It is proposed that The European Union end its discrimination by creating a “Court of Human Lefts” because their present policy is one- sided – that got the left-handed vote!
• Make it illegal for super heroes to use their powers for evil (sensible, no?);
• Ban tractors from driving on roads, they can drive across their fields (why has no-one ever done this?);
• Sell shares in Northen rock, buy shares in Blackpool rock – it must be worth more!
• The Loch Ness Monster should be added to the endangered species list;
• Everyone in England should buy one hundred square meters (or be subsidized to do so) of France. The English would then own France, saving a lot of arguments, and winning us another UN veto… After owning France, It is proposed that we should rent it back to the French.

My support is not total, for there are some less well-thought policies, such as:

• It is proposed that the Isle of Man be renamed to “The Isle of Men, Women, Children and some Animals” as not just men live there (equalities legislation gone too far);
• The Isle of Wight should be changed to: “The Isle of Mixed Races, and Cultures Located off the Coast of Britain” (for the same reason);
• Government Whips will only be used if a politician has been really bad. Minor offences should receive the political slipper (Parliament is already in enough disrepute);
• Cricket will be made more interesting by eliminating the use of padding. (and possibly cricket bats) – err, leave my sport alone!

Still, these minor quibbles aside, Noelinho.org does believe that The Monster Raving Loony William Hill Party does present the best vision for Britain.

Unfortunately, they are only standing in twenty-seven seats, though it could be twenty-eight next time around…

Still working on these guys.

Day 2 had wizards in a tower being assailed by an ancient foe.

Day 3 had a man falling uncontrollably between dying realities.

Day 4 has a real world tale of a man stepping up and putting himself in harms way to protect others.

They’ve all been started and none are finished yet…

- Alistair

Well, I gave it a try, despite my split shift and my incredible desire for sleep and have produced a very silly little story, 951 words of very silly story, and I’m very pleased with it.

It was a joy to write.  It’s about a carer called Thor.

I’ve let Ruth read it, in a pre and untouched first edit I’ll have you know, and I hope she thinks it’s a fun and silly as I do.

It feels odd writing something and finishing it (for the most part) in a single day.

With no real plan what each day will bring, I’m interested what I’ll write tomorrow.

(For more info about what I’m doing, go here.)

- Alistair

Despite the “spitting the dummy out” moment I had recently, I have taken the mindbogglingly foolish step of signing up for the StoryADay.org website.

The plan, according to the mentalists over there, is to write (finish) a story every day in May.  The word count of these can be from 50 to 5000 words.

I’m promising nothing. 

- Alistair

Ben, Scott, James and new-boy Chris are proud to present Episode 2 of Classic Yak. This month the guys tackle the heavy subject of Politics, and whether or not we can trust policitians or even the whole political structure in the UK in the wake of events such as the expenses scandal. We also see the welcome return of the News segment.

• Intro [00:13]
• Politics [01:09]
• News [23:44]
  • Elton John claims Jesus was gay
• Outro [28:39]
• End [31:19]

Promo for Two Blind Squirrels.

Send your feedback to show@classicyak.org, tweet us at twitter.com/classicyak, post it to MySpace, join the Facebook group, or leave a plain old voicemail on +44 (0)845 867 6316.

Ben, Scott, James and new-boy Chris are proud to present Episode 2 of Classic Yak. This month the guys tackle the heavy subject of Politics, and whether or not we can trust policitians or even the whole political structure in the UK in the wake of events such as the expenses scandal. We also see the welcome return of the News segment. Intro [00:13] Politics [01:09] News [23:44] Elton John claims Jesus was gay Outro [28:39] End [31:19] Promo for Two Blind Squirrels. Send your feedback to show@classicyak.org, tweet us at twitter.com/classicyak, post it to MySpace, join the Facebook group, or leave a plain old voicemail on +44 (0)845 867 6316.

No, I’ve not won the lottery. That’s my final score on ‘High Roller Casino’ on my Nokia after numerous successful Texas Hold ‘em tournaments. And it’s the final score because yesterday I took delivery of a new phone, the HTC Desire, which is the latest Google Android powered phone to hit the UK market. I got an amazingly good deal from Orange and it means I finally have a phone that I can use to show off the apps that we create at my work! (without having to sell-out and get an iPhone ) Plus, it’s got SatNav….

mrBen

We have recently had a new content filter system installed on the servers at work. As with all things, you get a few problems early on. Some things are good, like being able to now read the BBC Blogs; other effects aren’t so good, like the system accidentally blocking the whole of the rest of the BBC site. Anyway, once those things are ironed out, it’s fine.

The new system uses active filtering through each page that is loaded and blocks a page if it detects inappropriate content. I’m not sure exactly what counts as inappropriate and I don’t really plan on testing it to the limit (although it is always worth exploring to make sure it is correctly set up). It does, very helpfully, give you an explanation of why a page is blocked when it is blocked. Unfortunately, it looks like this:

I don’t know about you, but don’t you think that’s a little… ironic? The page content is blocked because there is – shock! – a swear word on the page, so when telling you why the page is blocked, it spews out the word in question, but not the rest of the content. Oh yes. Big. Fat. Fail. Although you have to admit, it is pretty funny, even if I did nearly choke on my lunch at the time.

It does beg the question, though – if it detects, shall we say, “raunchier” behaviour, does it do the same? Let’s hope not, eh?

I’ve been having a bit of a struggle recently.

With everything I’ve written so far, even the stuff I think is half reasonable, I always get the feeling that it’s a bit flat.  There’s always that voice at the back of my head telling me that it could have been richer in the detail and, well, just better. And I just don’t know how.  The added concern is that my writing is never going to be more than mediocre.

I’m really scunnered with it to be honest and there’s not a day that goes by where I don’t think of just giving the whole game up.

But I don’t really want to do that.  Or do I?

What I am going to do is take a break.  I’ve tidied away all my notes, all my yWriter files and I’ve put them into on-line storage somewhere.  I’m about to clear them off my pc and take a long time away.  That might be for a week or two, maybe a month.  Maybe longer.  Who knows?

With some time with writing out of sight and mind I might be inspired to pick it up with a greater passion.  Then again, I might not.

I’ll have to see how that goes.

- Alistair

Sounds like it should be a cartoon, doesn’t it? Well, be careful what you wish for – I’ve done exactly that.

As you may know, the UK is currently in an Armageddon-style blackout, with almost all air travel banned, as ash slowly creeps southwards across our Isles. Someone should make a film out of it.

Anyway, there was a certain degree of excitement in the office yesterday as people tracked the moving ash, NATS and the the Met Office department devoted to volcanic ash – bet you didn’t know about that one, eh?

So, after some interesting discussion about whether Steve would catch his flight or not, it all died down and everyone got back to work. And then it happened. Someone mentioned floating volcanoes. No, I’ve no ides where it came from either, but either way, they didn’t live it down for a while, as jokes flew (fittingly ironic, eh?) around about Mount Everest walking to Africa, and BA Cabin Crew striking over UFOs that later turn out to be volcanoes going for a little stretch. I couldn’t resist.

I put it up in the office today, to much raucous. In fact, it was so successful, I could be tempted to make it a more regular slot…you have been warned.