windscreen

MRA (Germany) via Twisted Throttle (USA) via Mr Postman it's home made from a sheet of perspex. not a bad job but a bit short and not too pretty. you can see the size difference. the new one is the touring model which means it's slightly longer than the stock model (which itself is much longer than the home made jobby) and has the upwards flip designed send, wind, rain and bugs up over my head. you can also see it's overdue for a wash by pure chance the rubber edging has a purple tinge to so it looks like it was chosen to match the colour. awesome looks 100% better and has made a huge difference to the amount of wind and noise hitting me on the highway. yay!

weekly heroes torrent report

Right this minute there are 29754 seeders, 19790 downloaders for the biggest torrent on torrentspy. I think it's the season finale.

pete doherty at 15

It's a YouTube video of Pete before he was famous talking to an MTV presenter while queuing to see Oasis. See here.

weekly heroes torrent report (S01E22)

via torrentspy.com. (To find Heroes torrents, go to torrentspy or EZTV and search for Heroes).

Feist, New Buffalo

I just heard of Feist, she seems pretty good.
Feist on Leno, via Stereogum (amazing voice I think) The video for the same song, 1234 which apparently was written by New Buffalo, who I have been a fan since I saw her show in brisbane (with greenapplecat) a few years ago and has a new album out just this week, called somewhere anywhere. Her new video: New Buffalo trivia: her name is Sally Seltman and husband is a member of The Avalanches.

the fake people

Paraphrased from big brother:
J: oh there's so many fake people in this house. oh boy I just can't stand the fake people. you're not fake, you're so genuine, just like me, that why we can hang out together
E: yeah, the other day I was thinking of saying something but I didn't say it, because I just don't feel comfortable being myself with all those fake people
J: yeah I really wish the fake people would like me more but if they don't think I'm good enough for them well I will just sit by myself and not say anything
E: I hate those people who just can't be themselves.
J: me too
etc

My Annual BB rating card

Like: Bodie, Emma, Aleisha, Billy
Whatever: Tony, Joel, TJ, Travis, Demet, Thomas, Susannah, Nick
Can't stand: Kate, Rebecca, Haley, Jamie, Gretel

tv

Last night our TV broke. It just stopped working. I liked that TV. :( It was a widescreen. It was only a few years old. I sent it to the shop but my hunch is that it could be a one way trip. I guess it's time for a new TV. Normally this would be good news but I had this little dream of buying a HD panel with 1080p and an XBox 360 with Gears of War on the same day and hooking them all up together in a little daze of happiness. In my fantasy this can be achieved for under $1500 which means the dream happens far in the future when the 360 and big HD TVs are cheaper. Now my hand is forced. Isn't it great that this is my biggest problem in life? We have three other TVs. So anyway, LCD or plasma? Let me know before tonight preferably.

Kirwan police crime bulletin

This one has some variety. We have the usual Dan Murphy's shop lifters (is that a bottle of Johnny Walker in your pocket or um...), cab fare evaders, purse snatchers. (Though I don't know about that one really - the woman leaves her purse behind at the vale and when she comes back some one has taken it. you could perhaps call that "finding" rather then "stealing"). Also we have a stabbing and a flasher. :( That's not cool.

The Crime Bulletin, Vol 1 Number 11, 9 May 2007.

(Crime Stoppers 1800 333 000).

My house in Google Earth

If you were paying attention to this blog about a year ago you might remember that I was very excited by SketchUp. Well I was in Google Earth and I've noticed that more and more buildings are starting to appear. There is a very dodgey looking Sydney Opera House. The Sydney Harbour bridge looks pretty good, as does the Center Point. Brisbane has a couple of buildings also. The level of detail is excellent compared to when I was last looking at Google Earth buildings. I remember looking at San Francisco. There were buildings there and it was cool but they all looked like various sized beige shoe boxes. Now we have nice looking models and even textures and so on. This inspired me to have another go at putting my house in Google Earth for real this time. I download the latest SketchUp and dug up my .skp file. I fiddled with the rotation, scale and position and submitted to the 3D warehouse. I think someone has to now approve it before it will appear. Will keep you posted. Here's a link. Better yet, here it is embedded:

bunny letter opener

Hackety Hack and _why's new blog

Code poet, writer, artist, insane genius and ruby guru _why has a new project and a new blog. Hackety Hack is coolety cool.

Heroes. Sylar. O... M...... F..... G!

Just saw 19 & 20. Holy crap. Thank you Mr Kring. This is literally the best thing I have ever seen on any screen ever. Ep 20 made me wet my pants. Seriously. Thank you. I will buy the DVDs.

Mordeth13

So I've not really been into video blogs until now. There is this one guy called Mordeth13. He's a Canadian guy who works as a teacher in a city in Taiwan. He mostly blogs with a helmet cam while riding his motorcycle or scooter. Anyway I suggest checking him out if you have the bandwidth. A couple of starters:

• Mordeth13 catches a Hit and Run killer
• M13 cries, scolds an elderly lady, helps a dog, and swears a lot.
• The biker wave (one of his most famous videos)

It's hard to describe why he's interesting but there's something about it. Sorry I'm not being very clear. YMMV. If you like the above then you can get loads more here.

the sorry state of music tv

Just for instance here's what's on right now. Channel V - Ice T's Rap School. MTV - The Hills Marathon. VH1 - Flavor Flav in yet another lame "reality" show. Other highlights, Bam Magera/Hulk Hogan/Various other D- grade "celebs" in yet more lame reality shows. Laguna beach, etc. Some lame Japanese game show with lame overdubbing (thanks Channel V). I also saw girls wrestling in slime also with overdubbing. (Trust me it's worse than it sounds). Etc. It goes on. Well it's no news that MTV makes TV shows, and once they were worth something, eg Beavis and Butthead, Daria, Pimp my Ride I don't mind, Cribs I can watch. Those where the good old days for sure. Now it's turned bad. And worse, other channels are doing their best to follow in the footsteps of MTV but with even harder scrapes of the barrel if that were possible. Eg, they have even found some crappy "reality" show from NZ. Can I get some music on my music TV? Perhaps squeeze a song or two in between the ringtone commercials (which I can do a whole nother rant about if prompted.... (On the other hand I did enjoy some of the video blog show on V). I'm not against reality shows in the broader sense, eg Big Brother. My tip: Billy to win. Aleisha runner up.

heroes torrent

Filename	Heroes.S01E20.HDTV.XviD-LOL.[eztv].torre...
Total Size	349.22 M (366182400 bytes)
Author	death734 - Member Since: 11/7/2005
Submitted	19 hours 16 mins ago
Checked	1 hour 51 mins ago
Health	14378 Seeders / 18741 Downloaders

Look how many people are downloading this one Heroes torrent right now.

(To find Heroes torrents, go to torrentspy or EZTV and search for Heroes).

on beards

Evolutionarily speaking the fact that beards exist means that they increase your chances of a) living longer or b) attracting a mate. Or if you prefer, God (and I don't think He shaves, do you?) created your beard so why are you so determined to remove it? Don't you want to look like God? Do you think you know better than God about how your head should look? Whatever the case I think it's pretty clear that you should grow a beard.

Timbaland is the new King of Pop

The last few Nelly Furtado singles are just ridiculously good, particularly the last two, ("Say it right", "All good things..."), and I don't mean just "good, for a pop song". Plus what about these: the Pussycat dolls song ("Wait a minute"), the one with JT and Nelly, ("Give it to me"), some of the JT stuff, "My love", "Goes around/comes around", (I didn't care for "Sexy Back"). Timbaland dethrones Pharrell, all hail.

In other pop music news, the award for worst (non-)rhyming, "delicious/addictive" goes to Avril. And the coolest pop song of the week goes to Cupid's Chokehold. Did you notice that guy raps almost exactly like Eminem?

i blog my weekend, the sequel

• Friday night, I go to play poker. It's the Australian Poker League. I have to sign up and get my little player id card. Since I don't know where I'm going I got trapped into joining the Brother's Leagues Club. $5.50. I was early, had to sit around for a while. I met this woman who started talking to me. Turns out she knows A. Moll. Alex is there. I talk to a tall bearded guy who works at the hospital. A woman at my table tells about when she went down to a big tournament somewhere. You have to pay your own air fares but it's worth it she says. A guy at my table spills his beer all over the table. Eventually I get knocked out about 10:20pm which is not too bad, I guess I almost made it to the top 50%. Won a few pots but didn't have much luck. I think I will play again.
• After I get home I start watching Big Brother Up Late. So far BB has bored me (first week) but I get sucked in to Emma and what's her name in the bath tub discussing nominations. Later (Sunday night, dinner and BB at K & S's), I shush people when I can't hear. So I guess I'm 100% hooked again. Oh well. :)
• Since I'm tired and feel lazy I sleep in and miss circuit with Viv. Milly goes and says it was great. She has brekky afterwards with the On Fire crew and gets hard poached eggs on her benny. (Side note: Lately this is the bain marie of our lives. To all breakfast chefs: poached eggs are meant to have SOFT yolks. And don't say I should have pacifically arksed for soft. I didn't have to ask you to NOT burn the toast did I? Gah. Well I suppose this is what you have to live with when you live in a regional centre).
• Well the rest of the weekend I mostly just sat around staring at the TV feeling laziness and vague guilt for my idleness. Oh and I watched Hostel. Ew.

i blog my weekend

I had a nice weekend. This is so I can look back some day and remember it.

• I drink a small glass of red at work. Talk to Anne about her dream to start a Montesorri school next year.
• I ride home. Everyone was upstairs on front balcony couch. I drink a beer. T is hammered on about three sips of bubbly. :)
• M was having a sleepover at Grandma's. S and K drop him off and the 5 of us go around to Danny and Louise's. Talk to D about Robert Rodriguez movies. He lends me Hostel and the Mexico trilogy. He shows me his US version of Sin City that comes with the actual book. We eat chilli with rice. Then we play kelly pool, drink beer and listen to their mp3 mix tape. D and L invite us to come fishing the next day. Milly's and T say they're going to Viv's circuit class. I said I was too but no-one believes me. :)
• Get up about 7. Go to circuit class. It was really good but hard. Viv > Sam. Feeling the effects of the beer I flake out two thirds in and have to sit down and try not to vomit. T is a champ.
• We drive to Rowe's bay and recognise D's car by it's Everton sticker. It's nearly 9am. They are on the beach with a bunch of rods setup on rod holders. D has knee high black stinger socks. He's cast-netting for bait. The water is flat and the sun hot. The beach is almost empty. We put on sunscreen. T is afraid of sunburn so she sits wrapped up in towels and umbrellas. D gives me a spare rod and I do a reasonable job of casting right over one of his lines. It's Mum's 60th so I go back to the car and get my mobile to call her in Alice Springs. We joke about motor cycles. There's pretty good signal. While I'm on the phone D catches a baby hammer head shark. He catches little white fish with black stripes and yellow bits and uses some for live bait. Later I get a few bites but catch nothing.
• We go home and meet K, S and M. I wonder how M's sleepover went. He seems a little stressed. We decide to have lunch at Clint Bradley's. We take two cars. Milly and I get to ride together alone which is nice. I order a savoury muffin that came with weird green gherkin relish and coffee and ready yesterday's paper. We talk about how T is going to be an extra in the Baz Luhrman movie. She's organising accomodation in Bowen for 5 weeks next month.
• On the way home we stop at the big Salvos. This used to be our weekly habit but it's been a long time since I've been there since we are now trying get rid of junk instead of collecting it.I bought a travel document holder. $1. We look next door at asics shoes for Milly.
• At home we stare at the telly for a while. I decide to go buy some touch up paint for my bike. I find it at Supercheap auto and also buy some other bits and pieces there including a tyre pressure tester. On the way home I practice slow U-turns in the back of Canon park.
• I consider going to see the Buddy Holly story staring Dave Clay. No-one wants to go with me so I stay home. We eat leftovers for dinner.
• Sunday morning Milly and I leave T sleeping and sneak out for breakfast at Luka Bean. I eat a bacon/egg burger. Noel and B show up. They join us. They buy food and later licorice all-sorts on a plate. We leave in a hurry and forget to pay! I phone Noel from the Willows intersection and he says he will get the bill for us. We wander around the Willows markets for a little bit and meet EJ and kids. We discuss her upcoming movie career also. Victoria and her family appear also. She is incomprehensible. Her baby is very cute. We go to Gloria Jeans and text Chris and Deet. As we wander to the car, past the new rabbit fence, back we stop in a couple of shops and cash converters. I buy a combination luggage lock and a magazine. Milly gets me a wooden thing from the wooden thing shop and trys to buy a porcelain spoon. The shop girl overcharges us $1. We tell her.
• At home I decide that my bike needs oil. I go and buy some and also put air in my tires, they are 10 PSI under inflated. I apply the touch up paint to the scratches. You spray the paint in the cap and apply with a little brush. Milly lets me paint a tiny flower in purple and silver on her green toenail polish. I realise that I don't need oil because I was looking at the indicator with the bike on the side stand. Duh. I wash the bike and also Milly's car then I clean the chain and lube it. My hands and fingernails turn black. I setup my gearsack so it's locked to the bike and also put the luggage lock on the zipper. Now I am late for bowling. I clean my hands and get dressed.
• It's M's "Gotcha" day so we are going bowling. I score a disappointing 97. I take some camera footage of the kids. Jun is very good. Shaun is also good. He scores 132. J is forced to bowl left handed. Milly scores 16. She has to go the airport to get Sacha. Shaun and I have another game quickly before everyone else is finished. I at least get above 100.
• We drive over to J & S's. T takes photos of the house for the party. We eat fish and salad and cake and watch most of Big Brother opening night. Later on after most of the guests have gone home we have a swim. It's cold. I take some underwater photos of Milly and T. J shows us his sexpo showbag. I watch some of Cars on the cinema screen. Still haven't seen all of that movie.
• We go home. Milly and T are wet. I'm not since I already got dressed. At home Milly and I watch a little tv. I read some of my bike magazine in bed and eventually fall asleep.

Youtube Indie Rock Acoustic Guitar Girls

From What Would Jesus Blog via Stereogum.

andrew bird

maybe I should have explained that.. Andrew Bird is a violinist singer/songwriter who I was lucky enough to see live supporting Joanna Newsom. I've been digging him a lot lately. The muppets are from a tv show on the "childrens music channel" or something like that, where Andrew made a guest appearance to sing a song called Dr Stringz. I thought it was nice though those muppets are dreadfully annoying. What is it with childrens' TV? Even the good shows are really bad.

Gmail Paper

call me gullible, I thought it was real :) it seems like a cool product... and actually in some parts of the world this service really exists... see here

my favourite commercial ever

Ps, I have broadband again, hurrah! RIP Rawnet. Pps, the newspaper said you can still get your duty free.

bike update

It's day 3 of being a biker. So far I have done 60 kms. Each day I get a little better, my gear changes are becoming smoother and I feel more like I know what I'm doing. I learnt (the hard way) on day one, that it won't start with the kickstand down, well actually it starts fine in neutral but kills itself when you put it into gear. Which is a good thing. This cause me some grief when I was trying take off after the first tank of petrol when I forgot to put the kickstand up.. Also I've stalled it once or twice which is always fun especially when 50 cars are behind me at the lights. Today I took an alternate route to work including a trip over "the bridge" and took it up to, er, 100kph (very carefully of course). That was fun! Also a friend donated his old gearsack which is awesome I can fit my bag in there so it's not on my back and still have room for a couple of bags of shopping.

andrew bird is dr stringz

life without broadband

my broadband provider (Rawnet) gives used to give me ADSL2+ with 1500kbs throttled to 512kbs when I use my quota. they have free connection, free modem. This is for $25 a month. To compare my previous isp gave me ADSL1 with 512kbs throttled to 64kbps once I use my quota (10G) for $50 a month. Strangely rawnet can't afford to pay their internet bills and are currently "off the air". They've been offline for about a month. Their website says they will be back soon but I am starting to doubt it. I believe their managment board is either in Barbados lighting cigars with money, or catching a taxi from bank to bank trying to convince someone to give him 10 million dollars. I imagine it like this:

Rawnet guy: Okay I need 10 million to keep my business going.
Bank manager: Your business model of selling a service for half what it costs isn't working too well. What are you going to do?
R: We will purchase and install more DSLAMs in all the phone exchanges. We will expand into Cairns and Mackay. We will give out more $800 ADSL2+ modems. We will sponsor more sporting teams. And update our office decor. This way we can increase our customer base.
B: Thanks so much for dropping by.

I will miss you rawnet.

so I started watching...

...the remake of The Producers on Movie Two. It was boring so I flicked over to Movie Extra which was Ferris Buellers's Day Off. Hmm, Matthew Broderick double play I thought. Then I flicked over to Scrubs on Comedy and it was Alan Ruck! Okay I didn't know his name but it's the guy from Ferris Bueller, the one whose Dad has the sports car. Woah. Then I flicked over to... (and this went on and on until eventually... Kevin Bacon). No just kidding about the last sentence. Possibly there were other Ferris Bueller cast members on at the same time on other channels. I just don't know.

if you had to...

...entirely erase the memory of every concert you'd ever been to, except for one, what would it be and why?

Me: Joanna Newsom, Spiegeltent, January 25th 2007. Of course.
Milly: But what about Sigur Ros?
Me: I know. But still.
Milly: Joanna was good. But I choose Sigur Ros, Enmore, 2006. I hallucinated glowing lights.
Me: What?
Milly: I saw a white glow surrounding people in the audience. Especially their hands and fingers.
Me: Did it shoot upwards towards the stage?
Milly: Mmm [thinks]... a little bit.
Me: !!!

my new toy

if you were paying attention last september or whenever it was you would know that I was trying to get my motorcyle license. Well thanks for asking, I did get it and yesterday I picked up.... this! It's a GSX750F 1989 "Slingshot". I think slingshot is something to do with what happens when you drive very fast into something? So I'm not sure if I'm destined to be a biker but what the hell I'm giving it a try.

milly's new toy

Plus:

• Animal Crossing
• Brain Training
• Yoshi's Island
• New Super Mario

Well the last one was for me really. The DS is very cool. Especially the black one. We fondled a pink one briefly but had to go for black. Milly has pimped her's with some bling like tiny little fake rhinestones. I like Brain Training. You hold the DS sideways like a book. Then you write stuff with the stylus so it's even more like a book. It's a very statisfying user experience. Plus it has awesome sudoku just as a bonus game. I think the DS would be quite good as a book reader actually. Also can you get an mp3 player for it? I should google that.

hot right now - "twitter"

i'm thinking of signing up for a twitter account just because it's so hot right now. the link is blog super-star kottke on twitter. hmm. so it's like a cross between IM and blogging.

Bittersweet

So the back bar at the Dalrymple, venue for such world-shaking events as this (spazzys) and this (radiators) is now a Dan Murphys. I want to be upset but oh boy have you seen the sweet range of alcholic beverages and the agreeable down-lighting at the Dan Murhpys? Mmm... booze...

But it seems that others are not taking it so well, for instance these two handgun wielding fans of live music appear to want retribution. "Possibly using an Irish accent"??? On the day after St Patricks day? At Dan Murphys? Why not a leprechaun mask? Tsk, no style at all. And ps, what is the second guy's mask? Is it Petey from fall out boy?

My art project

So I have this idea for an art project. I thought of it many years ago and have described it to several people. Now I will tell it to you.

Imagine a regular small room, roughly cubical in shape, painted white or some neutral colour. The wall furthest from the entry point is a video screen hooked up to a camera which is in the centre of the video screen facing outwards into the room. So effectively the screen behaves like a video mirror. Imagine looking at yourself on your own webcam, only bigger. The image should be mirrored so it actually is like a mirror. Now for the cool part -- there is a time delay on the image. So image is the mirror is of the room some minutes ago. In the room there is a small table with a clock on it positioned so the clock face is visible in the video mirror. There should be no explanation or blurb other than "time machine" or some other less cheesy title.

"Some minutes ago" could be one minute, two minutes, 30 minutes, an hour, 24 hours. This could be tuned to suit the gallery conditions and opening hours. For example a mostly empty gallery would better suit a short time delay. So you see yourself walking into the room before you get too bored and walk out. In a busy gallery you could tune the delay so you will see people who visited the piece an hour ago. The actual time delay chosen doesn't really matter.

This piece interests me because as a viewer of the piece you become, without consent, part of the piece for a future viewer. Also because the "mirror" is effectively a portal allowing you to see into the past. If you don't "get" it at first then your entry, puzzled looks, shrugging gestures and departure, becomes entertainment for a future viewer of the piece. For short time delays it will be fun to make funny faces and do a dance to see what you look like. For long time delays it still might be fun but you will be entertaining not to yourself but to future viewers.

Variation: On the table next to the clock is a flat panel LCD screen which shows the same (delayed) image as the wall. It is positioned so that the screen is visible to the camera. Because the camera records what is on that screen this causes effectively a feedback loop so that the image of the small screen on the big screen becomes another time delay into the past. And if you look closer you should be able to see yet another time delay into the past as the image within that image. Perhaps this is not explained clearly enough but it's like a hall of mirrors effect only each "reflected" mirror is some minutes into the past. This is interesting because it gives us a stepped view into the past, in theory, back to when the power was switched on. In practice of course it will be limited by the resolution of the screen and the camera.

Anyway I am telling you this because I discovered a couple of months ago that someone had my idea (or at least something pretty close to it) back in the 70s! They built something quite similar (which would have been quite tricky with the technology of the times) and I saw it at the MCA at Circular Quay back in the January!!! It was brilliant! I will tell you more about it and another really cool piece from the same exhibition it in my next post.

Ps, If anyone would like to sponsor me to create this piece I will need $4000. :)

happy anniversary scott and miranda!

I thought for a minute it was a green apple cat original! That would be a very nice anniversary gift :) But it's the amazing Daniel Johnston. Scott actually has songs (almost?) as good as this one. Some old ones he put on his new myspace but he did promise to do some more.

well done leslie!

Holy crap, my mate won $100k.

...far and away the best work in this year's Doug Moran...

Sweet!!! And, yeah, it's an awesome painting.

the end of duty free booze???

Is this for real?

...you will have to surrender any liquids, aerosols or gels greater than 100ml that you still have with you, including duty free.

NOOOOO!!!!

Can I get a sack full mini-bar bottles? Damn you terrorists. This time you've gone too far...

Heroes

Milly and I have watched the first 5 eps so far. Three last night, two on Sunday. It was almost impossible to stop watching! Sweet lordy that is a good show. I can't recall TV ever being this good. This may be a new era in television. You should download this show if, a) you ever liked a comic book, b) you enjoy good quality television, c) you have a pulse. My fave parts: Hiro (he rules!), the diner scene, the autopsy, the cliff-hanger ending of eps 4 and 5 (of course).

Science. It Works, Bitches

It's a t-shirt from the xkcd store. I just finished reading The Fabric of the Cosmos so I understand that graph. Well okay I don't understand the graph exactly, but I understand what it means, enough that felt a little personal geek pride knowing that I knew what it means. :) If you're not up on inflationary cosmology, then allow me to enlighten you... Small fluctations in the universe's background radiation are predicted by quantum mechanics equations describing the universe when it was only a few billion sqillionths of a second old. Predicted. Exactly. Hence... cool shirt.

The book is pretty good. I read some Stephen Hawking a while ago but I think Brian Green was more interesting. I learned new stuff like the Higgs ocean, stuff about string theory, curled up dimensions, branes and so on. I give it a 4 p-branes out of 5.

New iTunes is out

The full screen coverflow is nice, but... Did you ever want to be able to mess up your cds in coverflow? Their neat perfectly aligned sliding bugs me. I want to scatter them around. Pile them up. Dig around to find the one I want. Also can I have at least half of them with the wrong disc inside? Then can I play follow-the-trail-of-wrong-discs until I hopefully find the right one? Also can some of the cases be scratched and split with a few with broken hinges. That's what I want.

Plus, get this, iTunes knows what colour your shuffle is... HA! Brilliant.

Ps, please come back rawnet.

To Jimmy Fallon

I saw the movie you did with Drew Barrymore about being a baseball fan. On a plane. Believe me I wouldn't have seen so much of if except that I was on a plane. OMG. Total shit. Also you did a movie about taxis with Queen Latifah. I didn't see that but I'm guessing it wasn't great. Why not come back to SNL? Sure you won't be as rich as you are now. But you will at least be doing something worthwhile. Okay Tina Fey bailed but at least she had a plan other than "take Adam Sandler's part in crap movies".

Ps, to my regular readers, bitorrent "30 Rock" and watch some eps. Tina Fey's new show. It's really good.

"marrdest" mouse

So as you might know already Johnny Marr joined Modest Mouse. I imagine the conversation went like this:

Johnny: Hey I'm Johnny Marr. Can I join your band?
Modest Mouse: Wow. We, er... Actually we have a couple of guitarists already. And you know, the Tarago, it's kinda full right now with the...
Johnny: Did I mention I'm Johnny Marr. Da da da duh duh da dah etc. [Hums guitar part from This Charming Man]
Modest Mouse: Right. Yeah. Okay.. right. When do you want to start?

Ps, if I was going to make some joke about Britney Spears right now it would be something about the carpet matching the drapes, but of course I wouldn't do that as it would be in terribly poor taste.

to daniel johns

Your new song is pretty good. Sounds a bit like Evermore but that's a good thing. Your new look is good. I like it. Are they you're real eyes? But you should possibly rethink the waistcoat-with-no-shirt look. Seriously. Waistcoat in general = born again rocker. Waistcoat with no shirt? Er... Chippendales. Or (worse??), Bono.

Ps, Happy Chinese New Year.

Chinchy tomorrow night

J-Nu part 1

Okay so that was pretty lazy. I apologise. So I should tell you about our trip to sydney to see Joanna Newsom three times. Where to begin...

Thursday night, the four of us have dinner in Surry Hills at a place named after this, was okay, tapas and sangria. We catch a cab to Hyde Park which is about a block to the east of the city. We stop half a block away and walk north wondering where this tent was supposed to be. So we see the tent then quickly go inside because it's right on 7:30pm. Luckily no-one listened to me when I said we didn't need to arrive on time, since she started about 2 minutes later. There was just enough time for a waitress to bring us some beers. We are in a booth which quite close to the front and on the right because we were last in all the chairs are taken. But actually the booths were the best, you get a comfy soft seat and you can lean your elbows on the table and yeah, they will bring you beers. From our spot we are close to side on to the harp. We get a great view of her pedal work and her hands from side on. The tent is quite small, so everyone is close. We were about four meters from the stage probably so we can see clearly the details of her plaidy brown dress her high heels and odd green stockings. The stage is tiny so people in the chairs in the front could have leaned forward and touched the harp. The decor is Moulin Rouge with old fashioned wood panel with inlaid mirrors and wooden windows with coloured glass. In the roof is a tiny trapeze. She begins with a little shy voice "how about this tent" then started Bridges and Balloons, The Book of Right On, Then Ca' The Yowes. It is wonderful. The harp sounded really nice. Her performance voice is a little more mellow and smooth and a little less squeaky. The sound is almost perfect. The tent has some airconditioner noise but you wouldn't want to sit inside a tent sweating with 300 or so people. Ca' the Yowes is Scottish folk tune made from a Robert Burns poem and very sweet and folky. You can watch it here. So where can you go after something as beautiful as that? "The meadowlark and the chim-choo-ree and the sparrow...". Ys. As she began to perform her latest cd the performance moved a notch along some axis not normally accessible to mortals.

...to be continued...

what he said

except shorter. and also this

what sacha baron cohen looks and sounds like in real life

this is his speech at the golden globes: skip over the reece witherspoon

a winged demon said I must post this

click to read. words and art by greenapplecat.

okay

well I was quite caught up in the hype there for a bit. I've calmed down a little since I learned that a. even in the US it's not out until June and b. my guess is Australia will be a long long time after that. But... I predict an iPod only version of that will hit before too long. mmm... touch your music... Go watch the keynote if you like your world-changing gadget announcements.

Ps I have the new shuffle! It's just great for doing chores in your underpants. You can clip it right on your waist band. Washing dishes has never been so much fun. I used to use the old shuffle but it was always dangling round my kneck and threatening to flop into the sink so I'd try to keep it around my back and well that makes it hard to reach the buttons as you can imagine. My new shuffle rating: five steve jobses out of five.

am i dreaming?

oh lordy. sweet jesus.

(minutes later)

can't breathe... go here look at the preciousss.

wii bowling

Don't watch the whole thing (unless you really have nothing better to do) but check out the spare that the pro bowler gets... :) here. (It's a Japanese TV show).

Wii web browser works with Youtube!

Did you ever wish you could sit on your couch and browse YouTube?. Now you can with the Nintendo Wii and the Opera web browser (released today). Check it out:

Wii Weather Channel Hits Australia The World

I updated my system tonight and the weather channel appeared. It includes a Google Earth style globe! I had no idea it was going to be so cool. It looks like this: Actually I started uploading my own video for this post then I noticed someone already put one on YouTube and I cancelled. Damn if I was quicker I could have made the front page of digg... :P.

Wii have a wii

If you asked me a few weeks ago I probably would have guess an xbox 360 would have been first to arrive at my house but my friend John got one on launch day and long story short we picked one up plus Zelda on the Saturday. I think they are just about impossible to get now so I'm glad I didn't wait. Some notes:

• When you first start to "get" the controller it's kind of mind-blowing. Believe the hype, this is an entire new level of gaming.
• A group of people (four is best) playing wii-sports for the first time is quite possibly the most fun you can have with your clothes on.
• Zelda - it's good (well, it is Zelda), definitely better than Windwaker so far, but the graphics will make your Gears of War owning mates laugh at you. This is partly because the game started as a gamecube game that was delayed for release on the wii.
• Tennis - totally cool, you have to try this.
• Baseball - at first I didn't care for it much, mostly because I sucked at it, but it's grown on me, the feeling when you crack one out of the ground is brilliant
• Bowling - it's a crowd favourite. make sure you have a lot of room in your lounge.
• Golf - totally cool, instantly better than any other golf game ever made. You take a few practice swings then step up and, whack. There is a chance this could improve your real golf game.
• Boxing - so far it seems the least cool but it's insanely hilarious a party.
• Miis - you create little cartoon versions of yourself and your friends and these characters are in the sports games. It sounds lame but actually it is super cool.
• Training - you can do little mini-games to improve your skills, three for each sport. Pretty neat.
• Fitness - you do a set course of tests and get a score to show you how good you are. Also pretty neat.
• Wii play - this is a bunch of mini-games you get almost for free when you buy a extra controller. There are a few gems on there that make it definitely worth owning. Try the cow race.
• Overall impressions - the hardware is so small and lovely you just want to pinch it on the cheeks. All the little touches are pure joy, eg the fact that you can put your Miis on your controller and take them to your friends house, the little speaker in the controller that makes tennis racket sounds, the rumble pack feedback when you mouse over buttons. Operating the menus with the pointer is literally fun. Imagine your computer with no mouse. That is every other console except the wii. Only with the wii you can twist your mouse pointer. Why? Because it's fun. The disk slot is the best I have ever seen. The top opens up and you can use your Gamecube controllers and memory cards. Of course it plays all your gamecube games.
• Internet - The wifi worked for me as soon as I entered my wep codes. It spent about 10 minutes upgrading it's operating system as soon as I got online. I was able to browse some retro games, eg Sonic 1 and Mario 64. I downloaded Gunstar Heroes to try it out. I found the wii-mote sideways doesn't work too well but the good news is you can use a gamecube controller or buy one of the retro controllers for only $29. The news and weather channels don't seem to be going yet for Australia. Also I think you can send messages from your wii to someone elses wii. Not sure why you'd want to but it can be done.
• Upcoming prospects - Well I suppose Mario Kart, Mario Galaxy and Metroid are going to be out eventually. Hopefully some surprise hits that utilise the controller but time will tell.
• Injuries? - Well it's easy to see how it could happen. I have observed a few accidental shoulder whacks and near misses of knuckles agains the edge of our glass coffee table. So be careful OK! Here are some freaks who weren't.

Kevin Rose leaks ipod phone details

I like this because I'm a fan of Kevin Rose, he's the guy who bailed out of attack of the show before it completely turned to shit and then founded digg.com. and b. iPod phone! yeah baby!! Via TechCrunch via CrunchGear.

Flow

This is fun little game. It's relaxing and beautiful. I only played for about a minute but I can't want to get deeper. Via Slashdot. Oh they mention giant squid and manta rays so maybe it gets more intense.

King Arthur

This movie happened to be starting on Movie One last night just as we arrived home. Yadda yadda, here's my review:

• Premise: This is the true story of the dudes who's tales were told and exaggerated to become the Tales of King Arthur. Arthur and his knights are under Roman command. They generally don't get on with the natives who refuse Rome's command. The Saxons are coming and the Roman Empire is not as mighty and good as it once was.
• Keira's accent: Why did Keira not have some kind of Woad accent? I don't care what it sounded like just please not her posh tea and scones english voice from Bend It Like Beckham.
• The Saxons: At least you know where you stand. You and your family will be put to death and your village will be burned. But you probably won't be raped. They have standards.
• The cracking ice scene. Seems a bit unlikely. Plus the cracking seemed to go on way too long.
• Keira shooting arrows in blue paint and a leather boob-tube: Thumbs up.
• Clive Owen's range of vocal and facial expression: Thumbs down. Seriously, he is the English David Duchovney.
• Romans: Boo
• Woads: Yay
• Merlin: Yay
• Saxons: Yargh
• Unrealistic lighting of outdoor scenes: Huh? The Saxons had a green spotlight in their camp apparently.
• Lame dialog in romantic scenes: Boo
• That aussie guy from that show with a beard: Yay
• The knights: Cool as shit
• The story: It kept me well interested even though it was on late and I was pretty tired. Thumbs up.
• Enya rating: not enough Enya! The one time you actually want a bit of Enya...
• Magic rating: Actually there is no magic or fairies or anything like that, which is a bit different for a King Arthur movie.

damn now I have to by an xbox 360

It's called Gears of War. Here's some gameplay.

blimey

I thought you might want to see this. It's a dude with an oxygen tank doing a version of a coldplay song. i know that sounds like crap but seriously take a look. via stereogum.

Dear Nora and Kate 'Katy' Davidson

Okay Kate has a blog about her tour/etc. It's here and it's pretty good. On it I found some photos from the gig I was at (not the first one obviously). The blue shirt guy is the bass player. Did I mention I didn't like him much? It may be because he reminded me of me. Except less skilled on bass and with better hair... ;) He played with Dear Nora also. And the drummer was the drummer from The Go-Betweens. For real! Also I found some pics of Bree Van Ryk (scroll down) playing charades I think. Can you guess...?

darren hanlon plays the ukulele

By sheer good luck I was in Sydney the weekend Darren Hanlon was playing at the Metro. Of course I got tickets. Here is a treat for you. A ukulele song. You don't see that every day. It's called Hold On, from Darren's new cd, Fingertips and Mountaintops. The concert was great. I especially like the drummer, her name is Bree Van Ryk. She's a very talented drummer and plays in a sexy way with her head back and mouth open a little. The bass player was pretty crap I thought. Keyboard guy, okay. Darren, brilliant. Also remind me to tell you about Kate from Dear Nora sometime, she was good. And remind me to never speak of Caxton ever again as I try to eliminate all traces of them from my memory.

coolclock now has a google gadget

A guy named Bonstio has created a Google Gadget for my CoolClock. That means you can put CoolClock in your Google Pages page or in your Personalised Google Home Page. That's cool. He also made some Google-ish skins to go with it. The gadget is available here.

polar bears... polar bears with frickin' layzers

Actually no lasers. And the second video isn't actually mine but it was taken just under where I was standing in the first video. I was lucky to see this. The rest of the day the polar bears were mostly hiding in their airconditioned lairs watching Ice Age 2 or something like that. Upon request I may post videos of dolphins jumping.

I got tickets

..for Joanna Newsom. Oh sweet rapture! She's playing in a tent!

A poo poo with one leg and a belly button

Click the link for some art by my talented nephew.

Joanna hates the lamers

It's been way to long since my last post about Joanna Newsom. Via Stereogum:

I think some people perceive me to part of a movement or something that I don't really associate myself with. I think there's a lot of fakery, a lot of monkeying and posturing, a handful of kids who just latched right onto what they saw as a scene, and set themselves industriously to the synthesis of a particular vibe, and I'm pretty insulted when I occasionally get credited in the press for having anything to do with the dissemination of that vibe... I'm not part of some epic, bracelet-clanking, eyes-rolled-back, blasé, nihilistic scenester cult or anything. I've seen some awful displays, let me tell you. I've gone to some shows that have left me feeling heartbroken about the state of music. A soulless, mindless, watered-down, image-obsessed, artless stab at John Fahey or Marc Bolan or Karen Dalton or Donovan or Vashti Bunyan is no less lame than, like, Nickelback or whatnot. There are so many kids who have this energy, you know -- you can tell they were into, like, electroclash five minutes ago, or whatever was big in Williamsburg or Berlin at the time, and now they've grown their beards out and they're doing this thing that they think they understand, but they don't understand at all, and I just find it exhausting to have to consider what they do "music."

Ooo SNAP. I hope she doesn't turn bitter.. :)

Google Docs

The thing that's new is the url and the fact that the documents and the spreadsheets are nestled in together. Also take a look at Zoho (the company bravely competing with google in this area).

steve kilbey's blog

Via a commenter on my post over here I learned that Steve Kilbey has a blog. He writes quite a lot, poems mixed with in a stream-of-conciousness style journal entries. And he sometimes calls himself nevets yeblik. O-kay. Here's a little snippet:

oh i dont know
im backstage at the tivoli
they got wi-fi here
im blogging
gee i cant remember too much about eumundi
i kept my head down n i did my gig
it was good someone said...
we stayed ay a lovely bed n breakfast joint
with a huge sloping garden filled with plants n flowers n birds
spring sunshine n blue skies
i did yog n chi on ye olde verandah

He also does paintings that you can buy on his web site.

Top 5 reasons you know you're a nerd...

Okay I ran out of ideas after 4.

4. You spent the weekend updating your TiddlyWiki plugins to use the new features in version 2.1...

3. You are fluent in both Javascript and Klingon...

2. You spent the weekend updating wikipedia with the technical errors in the World of Warcraft South Park episode...

And the number one reason you know you're a nerd:

[drum roll]
...
...
...
...
...

1. You spent the weekend removing the updates from the nerds who updated wikipedia with the technical errors in the World of Warcraft South Park episode.

See this article for details.

I think I'll be fetching the torrent for that one. Speaking of cool shows, here is David Bowie on Extras.

(not) doing bike license training

So I was filling out the paper work you have to do I was entering the expiry date on my license. Oops. Expired two weeks ago. Sooooo long story short, I have a new license but it's nothing to do with bikes.

I have trouble making a face for ids. They should give you a mirror to practice. I try to smile and it comes out a weird closed mouth smile that makes my lips look puffy. And my eyes are open too wide for fear of looking droopy-lidded. Plus I have a five day growth. Maybe next time I'll shave and try a non-smile photo... IN THE YEAR 2011.

movie reviews

Nacho Libre
Probably would have been better if Jack Black didn't forget his accent now and again. The er, corn scene should have been cut. Despite all that the ending had me in tears of joy. See it if you like Napolean Dynamite. Don't see it if you'd prefer to remain unfamilar with Jack Black's nipples.

Shop Girl
Sounds okay, right? Clare Danes, Jason Schwarzman... Maybe Steve Martin is the next Bill Murray? No. Oh boy that was painful. Then you realise it's probably semi-autobiographical about Steve Martin. That makes it WORSE. Don't see it.

Penny Arcade's take on Zune's so-called WiFi support

See comic here. For more see Tycho's commentary here and the Engadget article here.

Ps, here's a feed for your Google Reader subscriptions.

Pps, I just realised the problem with the new shuffle. You have to carry this when travelling so you can charge.

two words. and a letter

Tenacious. D. January.*





No, I'm probably not going. :(

My third bike lesson

Lesson 2 was zig-zagging and doing figure eights around orange witches in the car park. That was okay but I left feeling like I was progressing too slowly for my liking. Yesterday for the first time I went out on the road. I wore a bright orange vest and followed the instructor around trying to remember what his hand signals are supposed to mean. Basically I was awesome. I got to try third and fourth gear for the first time. Everything seemed much easier than before. We cruised around the back streets of Mundingburra for a while and even went on Ross River Road for a little bit. Rob (not the guy with the Rocket 3, that's Peter, he was away yesterday) said I was ready and I booked for the day long QRIDE course on Friday. So since I'm pretty broke my actual budget to get a bike consists of what I can trade in the scooter for plus what I can raise by selling my clock radios on ebay. But anyway I think this one would be nice. Mmm... yellow.

my retro clock collection

I realised a little while ago that I quite like 70s/80s style bedside clock radios. Perhaps it's the fake wood panel or the funky retro metallic trims. They seem to be better quality that the kind you get now. Anyway here is my collection. The big one was my first. It's a Sanyo RM5300D. It has a totally cool fast/slow setting mechanism. The "lock" button is, get this, mechanical. Unfortunately the alarm on/off slider is a little faulty. You kind of have to grab it with two hands, one on the clock and the other on the switch. So that's why I bought the second one. It's an ALTA A814. The main thing I like about it is the cool metallic cylindrical knobs on the top. And I think the overall shape is a little more appealing than the Sanyo. The little one I just bought today. It's a Radio Shack 63-757. No wood or metallic trim and no radio but I like it's retro space look and it's size leave more room on my bedside table for books, glasses, wallet phone etc. My collection was posed for the photo. I don't have all three running normally (I'm not totally crazy...) The two big ones are going back up on top of my wardrobe. I never listen to the radio and I actually use my phone for an alarm so they are really just for admiring and telling time. I hope you like them too. :)

Ps, you might be able to tell from the photos that my camera has got some kind of internal problems. It's less than 18 months. That's the Casio EX-S500. Next time I will get a Canon or a Lumix.

today's op shop scores

Got a few nice things today. The worlds nicest flanny. A mambo satchel bag (I have a thing for bags. Will tell you about that some other time). A Steve Kilbey looking 80s style shirt. Last week I got a genuine Resident Evil 4 t-shirt the kind you only got if you pre-ordered the PS2 version at EB. Also a shirt that says this:

Got your tickets?
...
<-- For the gun show  -->

If you've seen my arms you will apreciate the irony. Also an beautiful clock for my collection. (See next post).

The new Google Reader

Google reader has been my choosen reader for a while. I had grown accustomed to it's only-a-mother-could-love interface. Today I found it's been fully rewritten and looks totally different. It even has a new logo. My first reaction was "Hey wha happened. It's different. I don't like it". Thirty seconds later I was like "Oh yeah this is brilliant". Bad luck all you hopeful rss reader dot coms. All hail etc.. If I was any kind of quality blogger I'd tell you about the new features and put in some screen shots etc. Instead I will just say it is sweet. And then some.

If you are still reading your favourite blogs and news sites the old fashioned way give the new google reader a try. It's worth it. You can start by subscribing to my blog.

eat this

I realised that this blog has been sorely lacking in recipes and cooking tips. To make up for it here is my guide to making mashed potato.

• Go to Woolworths freezer section
• Buy the Woolworths Select brand frozen mashed potato
• Tip half the bag of frozen potato pellets into a clear glass type microwave dish
• Microwave on high for 5 minutes
• Stir with a fork
• Microwave on high for another 5 minutes
• Eat

Add meat, vegetables, gravy, etc to taste. Serves 2.

But seriously the frozen mashed potato is truly delicious and super convenient.

running, cycling, gmap-pedometer routes

This morning I rode to work. I've done it three times now, starting a few weeks ago. Here is the route. The path along the river is very pretty. This morning I had a detour. I stopped at Sam Bratton's to get a new pedal. Yep, he's still there. He called me sonny, or young fella, something like that. I think his eyesight is going because he asked me to read from the pedal if it was left or right before he attached my new pedals. Anyway Sam Bratton is cool.

Some guys at work are have been going for a daily run. I've joined them a few times. The first time I wasn't sure if I would make it but actually I did okay. The route is this. My best time so far: 16:46.

Read this new blog

This is my friend's brand new blog. Check it out, especially if you like .NET, Lotus Notes or Korean stuff. He's off to a great start. His first ever post? Ppung Ppung ee the cuddly magic farting creature. I've seen this show and yes it is great. Ppung Ppung ee has a home page.

Poderosa

I just found Poderosa. It's a terminal program similar to Putty, TerraTerm etc. I've been using it for close to a day I totally love it. I have been a Putty user for many years and I like it but Poderosa is so much better. Why?

• Tabs. Like firefox tabs you will wonder how you lived without them
• Split screen. tail -f /var/www/logs/error_log in the bottom pane and vim in the top pane. Outstanding.
• A UI from this decade. Ok Putty is a good program but the interface for creating and storing sessions is a little wacky. And suppose you want to change your font? Do it in every stored session.
• Remember passwords and auto login. Maybe putty could do this but I never figured out how.
• Connect to your local cygwin bash shell. Ever try to run cygwin bash in a cmd window? I have and it's HORRIBLE. Now you can use a proper terminal. (Also works with serial port if you need it).
• Extensible with plugins. Well I don't know what you might need but if you need something then you can do it.

Here's a screen shot: The only downside so far is that it's pretty new and there is almost no documentation. But you probably won't need it. Also I guess you still want to keep putty on your thumb drive because of the .NET runtime thing.

To the Poderosa developers, great job, amazing product, arigato gozaimasu. Maybe you should work on the icon though. The logo looks a little weird at icon size.

Update
Well after a few days I've noticed a couple of things:

• It doesn't save passwords for you. I was mistaken because it does remember the last password you used. Actually via the mailing list archives I found you can manually put a password in a "shortcut" (.gts) file but that's probably not a good idea for security reasons. It will negotiate the login prompt automatically though.
• Panes would be much better if there was a keystroke to switch panes. I don't want to reach for the mouse to switch pane. I haven't found that yet.

Funny story about dolphins

At the Institute for Marine Mammal Studies in Mississippi, Kelly the dolphin has built up quite a reputation. All the dolphins at the institute are trained to hold onto any litter that falls into their pools until they see a trainer, when they can trade the litter for fish. In this way, the dolphins help to keep their pools clean.

Kelly has taken this task one step further. When people drop paper into the water she hides it under a rock at the bottom of the pool. The next time a trainer passes, she goes down to the rock and tears off a piece of paper to give to the trainer. After a fish reward, she goes back down, tears off another piece of paper, gets another fish, and so on. This behaviour is interesting because it shows that Kelly has a sense of the future and delays gratification. She has realised that a big piece of paper gets the same reward as a small piece and so delivers only small pieces to keep the extra food coming. She has, in effect, trained the humans.

Her cunning has not stopped there. One day, when a gull flew into her pool, she grabbed it, waited for the trainers and then gave it to them. It was a large bird and so the trainers gave her lots of fish. This seemed to give Kelly a new idea. The next time she was fed, instead of eating the last fish, she took it to the bottom of the pool and hid it under the rock where she had been hiding the paper. When no trainers were present, she brought the fish to the surface and used it to lure the gulls, which she would catch to get even more fish. After mastering this lucrative strategy, she taught her calf, who taught other calves, and so gull-baiting has become a hot game among the dolphins.

Read more...

Maybe you heard this rant of mine before but I am constantly perplexed by the apparent state of denial the exists in science about the intellect of animals. On TV documentaries I constantly hear things like "Humans: unique amongst earth's creatures as the only animal with 'conciousness', or an awareness of itself", or "the octopus used the socket set and wire cutters to dismantle the apparatus and gain access to the food pellets, purely instinctual behaviour that gives the false appearance of some kind of reasoning power", etc etc. I suppose it's rooted in religious ideas about the specialness of humans. And yes I know what anthropomorphising means, but come on! Read the story again. Dolphins are underwater hippies without opposable thumbs. Only smarter. Bah!

The one legged robot

I thought by now I'd have a witty remark about the one legged robot. Maybe something about a butt-kicking contest. But alas, nothing. Here it is, the one legged robot. See also the one balled robot.

Some updates from previous posts in headline format

• LonelyGirl15 (finally) outed as fake
• Regina Spektor not that great especially if you're already sick of Missy Higgins.
• Tiddlyspot now with sexy new logo and over 4000 sign-ups.
• Parker Posey theory challenged by Frankenstein. (though I didn't watch the whole thing so can't say for sure).
• Thom Yorke did some more stunning live stuff from his solo album at the Mercury awards.
• I Killed the Prom Queen okay but needed better PA and (any?) sound engineer. Had profound realisation that I was a sad old dude who should have been at the more age appropriate INXS gig. :)
• Lisa Mitchell is (not so) great (really) but how the heck does Lavina make the bottom three?

Well that will do. Since I'm filling this page up, here's a list of stuff I was going to blog but decided it was too dull. If you want to see/hear any of this then let me know in the comments:

• A video of a 3D rendered flyover of the new motorway they are going to build from the new bridge in Condon to the northern highway.
• Video of kids playing the rainbow perspex water gun powered musical frogs installation at the Thuringowa Riverway opening festival.
• Photos of the lagoon, arts centre, bar etc at Riverway
• Boring store about how I lost my keys
• Video of myself performing "Forever Young" lounge music style on the organ with a bossanova beat and auto bass (actually the video doesn't exist yet but I have been preparing.....)
• A photo of my new door
• More Joanna Newsom lyrics!

Ps, did you know there's such a thing as board game geeks? Look here. Via the blog of my ex comp sci lecturer. John's was my favourite subject. Functional programming with Gopher, or something. I got an HD. Btw, where is Trouble? You have 400 board games and you don't have Trouble???? Tsk.

The new iPod Shuffle

I like that! In other ipod news the nano now looks like the mini and the regular ipod has a brighter screen and more games.

Update:
iTunes 7 is hot. Get it. 'Download missing artwork' is awesome. The cover browser is SWEET.

Update:
Also get it for gap-free playback for your iPod at long last.

all horns and thorns, sprung out fully formed, knock-kneed and upright

From "Ys", the new Joanna Newsom

though my wrists and my waist seemed so easy to break
still, my dear, I would have walked you to the very edge of the water
and they will recognise all the lines of your face
in the face of the daughter of the daughter of my daughter

darling, we will be fine, but what was yours and mine
appears to be a sandcastle that the gibbering wave takes
but if it's all just the same, then will you say my name:
say my name in the morning, so I know when the wave breaks?

I wasn't born of a whistle or milked from a thistle at twilight
no, I was all horns and thorns, sprung out fully formed, knock-kneed and upright
so: enough of this terror
we deserve to know light
and grow evermore lighter and lighter
you would have seen me through
but I could not undo that desire

I wanted to put the whole thing in but thought that might be a bit over the top. ;) Read the rest of the song here if you want to know what she was on about.

But the worst thing about Joanna is I can't really recommend her to you. Her voice is probably going to piss you off. You will probably find it unbearable. Oh well.

The new album is a little different. Ys (pronounced "ees") has five songs averaging 11 minutes each. The material and scope of has gone to a whole nother level of "Joanna-ness" which is a delight for Joanna fans like me but possibly makes the album a little less accessible to new listeners. Then there's the orchestration. It may grow on me but my first thoughts were, 'this would probably sound better without that orchestra'. Sawdust and Diamonds (excerpted above) is my favourite so far and that's the one with solo harp. Anyway, I still give it a double quadruple thumbs up. Have a listen if you can find it and remember to buy it for real in November. Joanna, please back come to Australia, I missed you last time.

Steve Irwin is dead

He was killed in a freak stingray accident while filming a documentary near Cairns. A stingray's tail spine stabbed him in the heart and killed him. OMG!!

Milly was telling me literally last night about how totally awesome he was on the Frank Skinner show when Frank tried to set him up to look stupid over his baby/croc incident. It went a little like this:

Frank: So croc's are quite dangerous unpredictable right? [Shows video of croc eating one of Steve's cameras off a pole]
Steve: Oh absolutely yeah, crikey mate!! Never trust a croc for a second!!!
Frank: So what are you doing here? [Show's baby dangling video]
Steve: Oh yeah jeez, crikey, I got into more trouble than Michael Jackson over that!!!
Crowd: [Huge laugh].
Frank: [Unable to suppress grin].

Frank's not an easy guy to impress but by the end he was totally won over by Steve and they parted with affectionate back slaps, etc. Something like that anyway.

Steve, the world is a little less bright without you in it. Condolances to his wife, children, family and friends.