Sniffing Oxygen

Yeah, I've not been posting as much as I should...

Thu, 17 Sep 2009 14:26:51 GMT

Busy, busy... Often with non-interesting things, it has to be said, but busy, nonetheless.
Anyway, there's a petition you really ought to sign- it's about Peter Mandelson's attempts to people who share files banned from the internet. Three accusations of downloading- without any kind of trial system- and your ISP would be forced to boot you off the net. Which isn't very nice, is it?
Tell your friends. Tell your enemies. Repost it on your LJ/Myspace/etc.
Found via Boing Boing

Well, now that we've solved global warming...

Fri, 28 Aug 2009 12:20:27 GMT

and poverty, and cured cancer and got rid of telemarketing companies, we can start to worry about the important things in life. Like 'pornographic' sweetie wrappers.
Who knows what damage might be wrought upon young minds if this sort of thing is allowed to continue? Ten years from now, we might have a generate of perverts dressed in anthropomorphic lime costumes, inflicting indecencies upon each other with lurid fruit-flavoured genitalia!
Unsurprisingly, this is from the daily mail, found via boing boing.

Food Fight.

Tue, 25 Aug 2009 09:58:24 GMT

A history of American Foreign Policy, as represented by a war between various national dishes.

Neil Gaiman

Sun, 16 Aug 2009 15:51:33 GMT

So, I'm going to the Edinburgh Book Festival on Wednesday to see Neil Gaiman, and I can't think of anything to say to him, should the opportunity arise. Well, technically I can, it's just I really don't think "So what's Amanda Palmer like in bed, then?" will go down too well. Does anybody have any suggestions? I'm tempted to ask him about Duran Duran, given that he wrote a book on them, but I doubt that would go down too well either...
Oh, and I don't think I'll be able to meet any of the Edinburgh people when I'm there, as other plans have been made, unfortunately. Apologies...

Babes of the BNP

Thu, 23 Jul 2009 13:24:38 GMT

Vice magazine interviews three young, female BNP members, with hysterical results. Might be a little NSFW, there's some softcore/vaguely erotic modeling shots there, but not boobies or muff-shots. Be sure to read the follow-up interview as well.

So, Michael Jackson, then.

Fri, 26 Jun 2009 08:58:46 GMT

Assuming you haven't heard yet, which is pretty unlikely, he died last night, presumably of a heart attack. It's one of those 'where were you when you heard the news' moments. I was watching BBC News 24 with my mum. The newsreader said "And some breaking news about Michael Jackson", and I thought, "Oh God, what's he gone and done now..." Then they said he was on his way to hospital and I felt rather guilty. I wandered off for a bit and then got a text from Flea saying he was dead.
I was actually a huge fan of Michael Jackson as a kid; Bad was the first album I ever owned- something that's probably true for a lot of people my age. It's easy to forget in all the paedo-gubbins and plastic surgery and baby-dangling that a lot of his songs were really rather brilliant. I remember my then-best friend, who was a HUGE fan, saying "...and there's this little kid who hangs around with him all the time..."
"Wow! Wouldn't it be sooo cool to be that kid!"
Um, yeah, not so much, in retrospect.
The conspiracy theories are out in force already. My boss said he reckoned he faked his death, got a body double and ran off to South America. So I googled for "Michael Jackson Assassination" and there are already claims that the Iranians did it- to distract world attention from the protests and whatnot. Someone else suggested Barack Obama did it. No argument or evidence given, just a knee-jerk wingnut urge to blame Obama for everything. There's also the suggestion that Michael Jackson was replaced with an Imposter twenty years ago, and that's who's dead.
I shudder to think what the funeral's going to be like...
Still, behind all the madness, the circus and the scandal, there was a guy who wrote some amazing songs, and who had an enormous influence on music. Rest in Peace.

Hey, Edinburgh People!

Wed, 17 Jun 2009 22:17:38 GMT

I'm coming through to Edinburgh on Friday for an exam, and it'd be supremely Awesome to meet up with y'all. Plans are tentative at best, but probably involve being in the Auld Hoose from late afternoon onwards. Twould be cool if you could make it...

What did you do at work today?

Tue, 16 Jun 2009 09:46:47 GMT

I ran a Denial of Service attack on the Iranian Government. Read about it here. It's... remarkably straightforward. Just go here and click start.

Well, this is an awesome.

Tue, 09 Jun 2009 08:31:11 GMT

Hat tip to the Journal for Wonderful-Things Lovers.

Did you see the Ashes to Ashes?

Mon, 08 Jun 2009 22:42:44 GMT

Oh my fucking god. What an ending... That's all I'm saying...
There's going to be another series though. One last series.

The Journal of Abnormal Psychology

Wed, 03 Jun 2009 13:17:52 GMT

Today, I am reminded me of the tale of one of the great mathematicians of the 19th Century- I believe it was Ada Lovelace, who heard the tale of the death of an ancient Greek Mathematician, whose name, to my infinite regret, I cannot recall. He was so deep in contemplation of a particular theorem that he didn't hear a soldier telling him to move, or even register that the soldier was about to kill him. Ada was so struck by the idea that something could be so fascinating as to render the matter of his immediate death so trivial, that she too chose to become a mathematician. That is almost how I feel watching this.
Yes, it's a woman flipping out over a Twilight trailer. But it makes for compelling viewing; an insight into a world I will never understand, and in truth, am somewhat envious of. Is there anything that could make me experience such transcendent rapture, or am I always too encumbered by thought and cynicism? I mean, even if I got to touch Cory Doctorow's cape or something...

Fucking Hell...

Mon, 11 May 2009 10:30:17 GMT

Brit MP saw undercover cops egging crowd to riot at G20

Happy Swine Flu Leaflet Day!

Tue, 05 May 2009 12:43:11 GMT

Gosh, I'm so excited! Today's the day we get our Government Swine Flu Leaflets! I can't wait to read the section on correct handkerchief technique! It's such a special day! I can't wait for the Swine Flu Leaflet Day special edition of Top of the Pops, or the traditional SFL Day meal (scrambled eggs on toast, served with a piping hot mug of Lemsip*). And the presents- I can't wait to see the faces of my nearest and dearest as I give them their monogrammed handkerchiefs!
Anyway, I'm off to decorate giant plastic models of a Orthomyxoviruses and roll them down a hill for reasons that have yet to be adequately established!
Seasons greetings to you all!
*Or vodka and lemsip for the grown-ups.

Requiem for a hat.

Mon, 27 Apr 2009 12:22:51 GMT

Those who know me well will know that, over the past 11 years or so, I'm rarely to be seen without my red and black striped hat, Stripesy. However, on Wednesday, Stripesy went missing- I got off the bus on Thursday and realised he wasn't in my pocket. I revisted everywhere I went since I last remembered having him asking everywhere, and... nothing.
Needless to say, I was gutted. I've had him since 1998, when I got him on a particularly muddy, rainy cold day at T in the Park. He's been with me through thick and thin, through failed relationships, to gigs, through my entire time at Uni... It's really quite difficult to express how much that hat meant to me.

Fuck. JG Ballard's died.

Sun, 19 Apr 2009 21:46:09 GMT

The author of Empire of the Sun, Crash, Cocaine Nights, and The Atrocity Exhibition, amongst others. According to legend, when he tried to get one of his novels- Crash or the Atrocity Exhibition- published, he was simply told to 'seek psychiatric help'. Damn.

This?Is awesome.

Fri, 10 Apr 2009 08:32:35 GMT

It kinda reminds me of Sarah Silverman (a good thing).

Erm, fuck.

Wed, 01 Apr 2009 12:38:30 GMT

Angel Star Andy Hallett dies aged 33.

On Jackie Smith

Wed, 01 Apr 2009 08:48:18 GMT

Well, the furore over our beloved Home Secretary, Jackie Smith keeps getting better and better. According to recent reports, the items she claimed expenses on include:
A bath-plug.
A marble fireplace
Two pornographic movies
A "Rumpole of the Bailey" DVD boxed set*
7 Louis Voitton jackets- presumably one for each day of the week
Monogrammed toilet paper
Five tickets to the Chelsea Flower Show
Details of the porno flicks she and her husband watched have also emerged, apparently sourced to a friend at his squash club. One was called 'Anal Avengers'- an erotic revamp of the classic sixties spy series, the other was called 'through the peephole' a collection of (presumably faked) voyeur shots of people caught having sex on hidden cameras.
Now, is it me, or is it somewhat alarming that our home secretary- the one who's obsessed with sticking up CCTV cameras everywhere, who's so paranoid about accountability that she's even passed a law against photographing the police- has a fetish for spying on people?
Once more, the seamy psychosexual underbelly of our political culture has been exposed, and the implications have been entirely ignored by the mainstream media.
Pah, I say. Pah.

* apparently this counts as 'research' as one episode contained a legal argument relevant to her work.

Holy shit...

Mon, 09 Mar 2009 22:26:33 GMT

Does this mean the end of rickrolling?
I'm also faintly concerned that the people concerned don't really understand what the words 'world' and 'wide' in "world wide web" actually mean... I mean, yeah, it's common enough to get a message saying "this video isn't available in your region" though I suspect that if there isn't already a way around that, there will be very very soon.

Oh, Internets, how I love you...

Fri, 06 Mar 2009 10:25:20 GMT

You keep giving me awesomes!
I'll be seeing Watchmen on Sunday, and yes, I expect it to be the bestest thing ever, up there with blowjobs and ice-cream. This is because I have learnt nothing. Come back on Monday for inevitable bitter disappointment...

I love chinks- and who doesn't???

Sat, 21 Feb 2009 12:27:32 GMT

So... I've been cited for Jury Duty. I'm really not sure how I feel about this. On the one hand I hate being coerced by the state into doing anything, but on the other I do actually believe people should take the time to serve their community. I just think that it should be done voluntarily. Then there's the question of sampling error: if all the intelligent, freedom-loving types throw their letter in the bin and pretend it got lost in the post, then that'll just leave the dim, authoritarian people to make up the jury. And given that the whole 'trial by a jury of your peers' is one of the few defenses we have against the state, I really ought to support that...
One other element of the whole thing that pisses me off is that they only compensate you for lost wages. This means that two jurors, doing exactly the same work for exactly the same hours, can be paid wildly different amounts on the basis on what they do outside the court. The whole 'jury of your peers' concept is fundamentally premised on the idea that all citizens are equal. So surely they should all get the same amount of money for their time?
And don't get me started on jury nullification...
If you're wondering about the subject line, read this first for context.

On Jealousy

Tue, 10 Feb 2009 09:35:10 GMT

So, as some of you might know, my girlfriend, Flea, is doing a Ph.D in molecular physiology. This is largely because she's awesome-smart. But as part of this she's going to a seminar today on 'Communicating Science to Non-scientists'... presented by DOCTOR BUNHEAD, of Brainiac fame.
I know it's irrational, but I can't help it- I'm jealous. I keep having visions of them walking through the park, admiring the fractal mathematical structures implicit in the petals of a rose; or contemplating the glorious range of frequencies in a sunset as it diffuses through a layer of cirro-stratus. And as the jealous rage builds up inside me, all I want to do is storm over to that park, to that sunlit hillside with the cirrostratus, tear them apart and shout "Doctor Bunhead is mine!"

Donnie Darko sequel??!!??

Mon, 09 Feb 2009 15:46:55 GMT

On the one hand, a tiny little part of myself goes "Ooooh, shiny" but the majority just thinks it'll be shit. "Shock Treatment" shit. "2010" shit. After Darko, I figured [the director] Richard Kelly was on his way to becoming one of the great directors... then I saw Southland Tales.
On a related no-way-it-can-live-up-to-the-hype theme, Dollhouse starts on Friday. I've got bittorrent all warmed up ready...

A random hotch-potch of randomyness

Mon, 09 Feb 2009 14:14:18 GMT

Surfer chap discovers Grand Unified Theory of Physics?" Well, it certainly leaves me feeling like an underachiever.
On friday I went to see the Circus of Horrors- good stuff, heartily recommended, part freak show, part circus, part musical. Sort of like Rocky Horror bit with self mutilation.
In the morning I went through to Edinburgh to meet my girfriend's parents- she came too, naturally. They seemed pretty pleasant, but very little to say about them. I managed to get through the lunch without making any comments about people who masturbate into glove puppets mouths, so that was one worry off my mind.
After a wee spot of shopping- I bought a short story by Neil Gaiman about Cthullu-worshipping English villagers- and met people down the pub. Fun was had, and a hearty, Tarvu-esque "HEBBO!" to all who came.

Heads up, Edinburgh people!

Wed, 04 Feb 2009 11:57:49 GMT

So, my girlfriend and I are planning on going through to Edinburgh for the day on Saturday. We were out driving on Saturday and we suddenly went into a 360 degree spin. If there had been any oncoming traffic we could have been seriously hurt. Anyway, even though it might just have been black ice, we're coming through so she can take it to a garage- she drives a mini and wants to take it to some mini-specialists- and that means we're going to be through for the afternoon and evening. So... anybody want to meet up? No real plans as of yet, I'm tentatively thinking Auld Hoose, around tea-time. Details TBA, but if you could let me know you want to come, I'll text you further details and try and work something out, at least...