vs Barry Chuckle (the one on the far left) if he had a beard:
One might also be tempted to compare the long running tv-show of Chucklevision with the state run channel Cubavision.
In other news, the DVD case expose I posted yesterday is currently on the front page of imdb up with the likes of the independent newspaper and entertainment weekly.com . I'm sure it's a catastrophic administrative error that'll be corrected soon, but for now I'm enjoying the moment.
So I was looking for some stationery yesterday, so naturally I went to my local book store. I couldn't get what I was looking for, so I spent a while looking at the DVDs (I'm almost positive that book stores will be the cities of the future; all they need to do is offer lodging, and possibly a pub, and there'll be no reason to leave). While I was there, I noticed a trend appearing on newer DVD boxes.
The formula goes like this: Close up headshot of lead actor either staring at or facing a point 20% from the front + (1 part perplexed expression + 3 parts steely determination) + an explosion somewhere on the case = success.
Here it is in Michael Clayton: And again in Déjà Vu: The Constant Gardener had a fire instead of an explosion, but it's still colourful, hot and dangerous:
Although Die Hard 4 deserves a bit of slack, as nobody ever expected it'd have anything else on it's cover:
And whilst you may think this is a recent phenomenon, I've done some research and it turns out that films have been following this formula for years, it's just that nobody has noticed:
Well we tried this last year, but of the 64 individuals named, a grand total of 64 of them are still alive and well. Few were particularly bad guesses, so the inevitable conclusion is that we are simply fated to do badly. Anyone considering refraining from hypothesising should therefore consider that by taking part, they are quite possibly increasing the likelihood of survival for those that they would have picked.
Before I name my guesses, I think it's apt to remember Luciano Pavarotti, Evel Knievel (who I'd have sworn had been dead for years), Kurt Vonnegut and all the others that did leave us in the last year.
The scoring system is as follows. Each correct guess is worth 10 points plus another point for each year below 90 that they were on death (if they were below 90). A 91 year old individual would be worth 10 points, as would a 110 year old. However a 85 year old would be worth 15 points and a 25 year old, a whole 75 points. So you could pick a lot of more likely, low point people; or a set of high value longshots. Or a mixture of the two. Or whatever you want really.
And now on to the picks:
1. Abe Vigoda (86) - although I've read that his death has been foretold for a while now
4. Amy Winehouse (24) - My only real long-shot pick. I read somewhere or other that she doesn't think she can survive without her husband, who I think is going to prison or something. I don't put as much research into this stuff as my canny foretelling suggests.
6. Roger Moore (80) - It's been 46 years since the first Bond film came out, and unless you count David Niven, they're all still alive. Moore is the oldest, so I'm picking him as the first one down.
7. Ray Wilson (73) - Same as with Moore, I have no desire for this to happen but I figure that it's about the right time for another of the England '66 team to go.
8. Ariel Sharon (79) - This was a toss-up between Sharon and Castro. According to the great, but unreliable source of information that is Wikipedia, Castro is on the mend, so that sorted this choice.
10. Olivia de Havilland (91) - Even though she's the oldest one on this list, for some reason I don't think this will be her year. I'm just putting her down for the benefit of gender equality.
Hopefully somewhere in Israel, a particular journalist is being forced to write "I will not use Babelfish for contacting foreign diplomats" a few thousand times.
The increasing reliance on 'summary justice' from the UK government and police is far from a good thing. The job of the police is to detect and prevent crime, not to punish it. The result is that many people who would have had their cases dismissed by a court of law end up paying unnecessary fines. It's only in patently absurd cases such as this one that people stop and take notice.
Why do we give children pets? More importantly, why give children adorable and lovable pets that have a lifespan that practically guarantees that the animal will be dead before the child is grown up. I mean; rabbits average about 5 years, mice and other rodents last about 2, and even the ever-popular cats and dogs each have an average life-expectancy of 12 years or so.
What's needed is a rise in support for alternative pets. The advertising campaign pretty much writes itself. "[insert animal name] - the pet that won't let you down".
With inflation taken into account, I predict that horses will become the new dogs in the next decade or so. So at least when it does kick the bucket, the average life-span of 20 years means that its owner will be emotionally equipped for the loss. And since the general populace will now be able to afford horses, the rich and famous will need a new animal. Since I'd expect them to want in on the new long lasting animal phenomenon, they'll all probably go with dolphins (20 years) or elephants (40 years), depending on whether or not they already have a swimming pool. The super-rich will naturally get polar-bears (20 years), and then later turn them into carpets, handbags or shoes. Or people could just keep it simple and go with the friendly tortoise. But then again, it isn't quite as cuddly. Perhaps cuddly furry shells are what's needed.
Dear film-makers of the world, I regret to inform you that your services will no longer be needed. Yes film-making as an industry is now obsolete. You see there is this new film out. Its name is not important but all you need to know is that it concerns robots that are in disguise. Yes I do realise that it was directed by Michael Bay. He may have made some mistakes in the past which may have included the butchering of historical events or the repeated casting of Ben Affleck. However this time he has hit the mark and with such unerring accuracy that his hand can only have been guided by divine powers.
Now I realise that many of you may believe that you can top this cinematic masterpiece. Some may even try. However it will surely be a waste of the public's and your time, so why burden yourself with trying to compete with this majestic film.
Now you may feel a bit slighted at the closure of an entire industry due to a single film, but all hope is not lost. There will be staff required for the inevitable legion of Transformers sequels which will surely be appearing in short order.
I hope that you can find acceptance that this is the natural order of things. With best regards Dave
P.S. I was going to post this as one of those review things, but for some inexplicable reason, they only go up to 5 stars.
I stopped at a cash machine outside a Halifax on the way home on Monday. Well I was on the way to the pub that was on the way home (pretty much the same thing). I put my bank card in and waited. And waited. And waited until I was pretty sure that absolutely nothing was going to happen and that the machine had just swallowed my card. Profanity ensued. I managed to borrow a bit of money from friendds, assuming that I could simply pay them back the next day after I got my card back. Foolishness on my part to expect a bank to act rationally or reasonably.
So the next day I go down to the Halifax. General Unremarkable Typical Bank Woman comes to the counter. "Excuse me, last night one of your cash machines outside malfunctioned and swallowed my bank card" I say politely. "Yes. They do that sometimes. Was it a Halifax bank card" GUTBW replies. "Ummm...no" I say, knocked slightly off-balance. "If it isn't a Halifax card, then you'll have to order a new one from your bank" "So there's no way for me to get my card back here?" "I'm afraid not". At no point does her customer service smile slip in the slightest, even though she's essentially telling me that they screwed up, but can't (or won't, I've no way of knowing if this is a policy for the branch, the bank, or the practice in general) rectify it because the account wasn't with them, even though I was practically up to my eyeballs in ID, bank correspondance and the like (considerably more than it would have taken to get a loan).
I then spoke to my bank. I can expect a new card in 7-10 working days. Which means I have anything up to 2 weeks where I can only pay by cheque. Fantastic.
Out of curiosity, does anyone know of/can anyone think of a rationale for a policy like this?
The Pope is on the front page of Wikipedia once again. This guy is the most important Christian on the planet, but he just looks really evil. I mean REALLY evil. He looks evil, he has a sinister voice and if at all possible I think he has an evil walk. And it probably isn't helped by the frankly uncanny resemblance to the Evil Emperor from Star Wars:
But giving credit where due, in this image obsessed society it's hard to remember that a lot of these perfect looking celebrities look distinctly average and normal if you take away their armies of make-up people. Some however, do not look normal. See if you can figure out which of these two pictures is Fergie from the Black Eyed Peas.
Here is the newest advert used in the UK to discourage people from getting counterfeit DVDs. Personally I think it's a load of bollocks.
It seems that the Anti-Piracy commission has given up on trying to get people to fear prosecution, and is now just trying to associate the practice with scorn. I'd imagine that the logic that if you buy knock off DVDs, you must be a cheap git like this guy, is probably not going to win over many people.
This is almost certainly a step down from the 'piracy is stealing thus it is a crime' advertising that preceded this. Associating the practice with theft in people's minds seemed like a fairly decent strategy. On the other hand, it's still better than the 'if you buy counterfeit DVDs, you're funding terrorism' line that was picked up after 9/11 (Call me naive but I'd expect that the vast majority of sales are just to people looking to make a few extra quid using a fast internet connection).
To be honest, I think it's my sense of logic that is most offended. I dislike the implication that someone is both A and B and therefore all A's are B's where A is a purveyor of counterfeit films and B is a bastard.
Of course I could be wrong about the Commission's aims. They might actually be unveiling their new policy of sending people round to sing derisively at offenders.
I could go into a lengthy rant about this week. But why bother when there's a cartoon that'll say it all for you
I increasingly wonder about the value of most of the things that people are tested on. A few years ago, a lot of it could be said to have value but now we're in the digital age where almost any piece of information can be brought up in a matter of seconds, it seems that a lot of what is getting taught in schools is only useful for pub quizzes (case in point, my mind just blanked on the plural of quiz, a ten second google query and I have the answer).
I would suggest that for subjects like law, history and most of the other essay writing subjects; a better method of examination would be using computers connected to the internet , giving candidates access to all the resources they would in a real life scenario. Results would be less dependant on memory and more on capability to find, analyse and interpret information, which I think is more akin to reality.
This is an e-mail forward that I came across. It claims to be from the Washington Post Mensa Invitational for 2006 (or 2005 in some versions). A quick internet search seems to suggest that no such competition exists, but it was still fairly entertaining. There was a small handful of versions on offer so I went with one of the more complete ones, although several of them seem to have been added later on. I particularly like 1, 2, 11 and most of the neologisms.
New Words: 1. Cashtration (n.): The act of buying a house, which renders the subject financially impotent for an indefinite period of time
2. Intaxication (n.): Euphoria at getting a tax refund, which lasts until you realize it was your money to start with
3. Reintarnation (n.): Coming back to life as a hillbilly
4. Bozone (n.): The substance surrounding stupid people that stops bright ideas from penetrating. The bozone layer, unfortunately, shows little sign of breaking down in the near future.
5. Foreploy (n.): Any misrepresentation about yourself for the purpose of getting laid
6. Giraffiti (n.): Vandalism spray-painted very, very high
7. Sarchasm (n.): The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it
8. Inoculatte (v.): To take coffee intravenously when you are running late
9. Hipatitis (n.): Terminal coolness
10. Karmageddon (n.): It's when everybody is sending off all these really bad vibes, and then the Earth explodes and it's a serious bummer
11. Decafalon (n.): The grueling event of getting through the day consuming only things that are good for you
12. Glibido (n.): All talk and no action
13. Dopeler effect: (n.) The tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when they come at you rapidly
14. Arachnoleptic fit (n.): The frantic dance performed just after you've accidentally walked through a spider web
15. Beelzebug (n.): Satan in the form of a mosquito, that gets into your bedroom at three in the morning and cannot be cast out
16. Caterpallor (n.): The color you turn after finding half a worm in the fruit you're eating
New Neologisms: 1. Coffee (n.) the person upon whom one coughs.
2. Flabbergasted (adj.) appalled over how much weight you have gained.
3. Abdicate (v.) to give up all hope of ever having a flat stomach.
4. Esplanade (v.) to attempt an explanation while drunk.
5. Willy-nilly (adj.) impotent.
6. Negligent (adj.) describes a condition in which you absent-mindedly answer the door in your night gown.
7. Lymph (v.) to walk with a lisp.
8. Gargoyle (n.) olive-flavored mouthwash.
9. Flatulence (n.) emergency vehicle that picks you up after you are run over by a steamroller.
10. Balderdash (n.) a rapidly receding hairline.
11. Testicle (n.) a humorous question on an exam.
12. Rectitude (n.) the formal, dignified bearing adopted by proctologists.
13. Pokemon (n) a Rastafarian proctologist.
14. Oyster (n.) a person who sprinkles his conversation with Yiddishisms.
15. Frisbeetarianism (n.) (back by popular demand): The belief that, when you die, your Soul flies up onto the roof and gets stuck there.
16. Circumvent (n.) an opening in the front of boxer shorts worn by Jewish men.
(Apologies if someone's already posted this. I used the search and found nothing but that's about as relevant as saying that I looked out the window and didn't see it)
Book stores are dangerous places for me. Especially the new kind of book stores, the kind that are more akin to miniature cities. Yesterday I wandered into one, looking for a particular CD (a peculiar logic at best). I just get immersed. I look at the special offers, to see if there's anything that looks vaguely readable. I look at the big new hardback books, the critically acclaimed stuff, the works by my favourite authors (not that I won't have already read all their books, it's mostly just so I can be sure that they haven't tried to sneak something out without my noticing. Repeat this process for CD's. And DVD's.
Worse still is when I see something that engages my interest. Yesterday it was Bigger Deal, the sequel to it's predecessor, which was named (would you believe) Big Deal.
Now I do play poker, albeit without any particular skill, but I would never consider buying a book about it. In my opinion it's half common sense, betting with good cards and not betting with bad ones, and half a mental game, which is something that I doubt a book could ever teach you. But what really piqued my interest in this book was the size. This thing was big. I'm talking dictionary big. I'm always amazed when someone is able to write a book as big as a fair-sized desk draw about a subject as mundane as a card game. Odder still is that the author has written two of them.
So I'm flicking through this book, thinking that it's so generic that if other poker books are like this then you could probably make a composite book out of pages from other assorted poker texts and few people would notice, when I take a glance at my watch. With barely a few weeks until end of year exams, I've just wasted well over half an hour in a book store.
That's why book stores are hazardous to me. Without being careful I can quite easily lose hours in there. But my long winded question is thus. What makes you lose track of time?
Also, to commemorate the release of the new spiderman film today, I have borrowed this new theme from the Multiply Customised Themes group. There's some decent stuff there, but it suggests strongly that far too much of Multiply is heavily into My Chemical Romance. I actually quite like the colour scheme for this theme and might keep it after I find a better picture to replace the spiderman banner, any suggestions?
