The July episode is delayed until next Monday (2nd August). Sorry for the delay.
The July episode is delayed until next Monday (2nd August). Sorry for the delay.
I had a deadline for Duality 2, a book produced locally, that was today. The story I was working on didn’t quite work and while I had a good beginning and ending, the middle just didn’t work out. So no submissions for Duality 2 for this boy. I’ll wait until Duality 3 and see if I have anything in mind that would work.
Now that’s out of the way I’ve been thinking of working on something a bit longer. Recently my story lengths have been getting shorter and shorter and after a comment by mrBen I thought that something with a bit more story to tell was on the cards.
So now I’m working on a sequel of sorts to Living on Reputation, something that was submitted recently for Mythaxis. And, hopefully, it should be a bit more weighty than I’ve been producing. It has the working title of Towers Over The Clyde.
To give you a hint, think of Glasgow cop-show Taggart but with wizards and a hint of H.P. Lovecraft. Lovely.
- Alistair
Next week is Read An RPG Book In Public Week. Make it so. Dust your favourite role-playing edition off your bookshelf and peruse it proudly in public.
I happen to be off work next week to look after Aurora so I might be doing Read An RPG Book To Your Daughter In Public Week.
All the info is at The Escapist.
- Alistair
Currently I have a five man squad of Grey Knight Space Marines, a Daemonhunter Inquisitor and an Imperial Guard Chimera. Although it’s slow progress I’m painting faster now than at any time since my teens. I’ll try and get some pics up but i’ll have to borrow someones digital camera.
Anybody have a decent one I can borrow for a while?
Thing is, as far as gaming is concerned, I have an odd selection of miniatures to choose from. I’ve only ever bought those I fancied painting at the time with no regard to whether or not it made a coherent army. Oh, well.
- Alistair
I have until the end of the week to get a story finished. Talk about leaving it to the last minute.
The added challenge is Ruth had to head up north for family reasons and I have the little Aurora goblin all to myself until she gets back. Not exactly conducive to a peaceful writing environment but maybe I should get aurora to help me finish it?
Perhaps her critical eye is exactly what is needed…
- Alistair
That would be Warhammer Online then.
First things, first. It’s nowhere as good as Guild Wars. Gameplay, graphics, subscription - Guild Wars wins hands down.
But it works (after a period of uncertainty – transferring the server info from one company to another. Not a flawless transfer apparently) and it’s good for a casual game. If you can, get the collectors edition in HMV for 15 quid and a 60-day subscription game card for £13. Still cheaper than most but not really worth it in the long run I think. I’ll be making the most of my time on it while I can.
I’ll say that it does a good job of capturing the setting. Warhammer-related computer games have been getting better at that in recent years. And soon there comes Warhammer 40,000: Dark Millennium which is a big ol’ MMORPG set in GW’s futuristic setting. Initial reports are that it looks good.
For Sigmar! For the Emperor!
- Alistair
It’s been a while so I thought I’d post a quick update where I am writing-wise.
The story for Telling of Tales has been submitted. Haven’t heard anything yet and there’s no movement on the website so I’m not sure Magnus will be going ahead with anything. That’s a shame, ToT is a good site and a great idea. Quality voice work form Magnus as well. Hopefully something will some of th site again if not the story I submitted.
Other than that I have a few short stories for other online and small press outlets. All offer no financial reward for inclusion but it’s all good practice.
I loving the process at the moment. I realised the other day when I was talking to Coach (the artist formally known as Edgy) that writing is no longer the hard slog it was before. Don’t get me wrong, it still takes me a while to produce work of any quality but it’s not the huge weight on my shoulders any more and hasn’t been for a good time. Part of that, I could guess, is seeing some actual published progress.
- Alistair
I had got up one Saturday morning with the urge to doodle – and this is what happened…
I photographed my drawing (no scanner), printed on cotton, made a sandwich with some angelina, net, and wadding, stitched round the edge randomly and voila!
Then I thought they would make great t-shirts…
And I painted…
Home and Hunmanby:
They’re looking for a novel, at least 80,000 words in length, to be submitted by 31th December 2010.
The theme is Anywhere but here, Anywhere but now. More details are on the Terry Pratchett website. I’ll have to put the thinking cap on.
- Alistair
Last week, after a few glasses of wine too many, I ordered the Warhammer Fantasy Battle boxed game, The Battle for Skull Pass, from Dark Sphere. I had confirmation from Dark Sphere yesterday that it had been dispatched and this morning…
Ah, sweet sweet Warhammer.
I’ve had a shufty through the box and checked out that everything is there. So far, so good. When Ruthy is back from work and my late shift is over this evening we’ll have a proper look at what we’ve got.
Let the painting and gaming commence!
- Alistair
Living On Reputation is a wee story of mine that’s been published by Mythaxis Magazine.
Head on over there and give it a read. Then head back here and let me know what you think. 
I’m really proud of it.
- Alistair
Things a picking up, as they often do when my confidence returns. Bit of a no-brainer there.
There are always other projects, but those are the ones that are priority. I’ll review the others once the Duality story is finished.
- Alistair
I recently recategorised the blog with my gaming stuff falling under ’6 Rolling Freak’. It’s someone who does well with their dice rolls or is otherwise jammy with their playing, hence ‘you’re a 6 rolling freak’.
Anyway, on with recent fun.
- Alistair
It has been a while (as usual) so I thought the blog required a bit of a update.
I’m sure there’s more. There always is.
- Alistair
So, the World Cup is finally here! The opening matches were yesterday, when the World Cup hosts, South Africa, drew 1-1 with Mexico in an encounter dominated early on by the Mexicans, but nearly ended up losing at the death. This was then followed by a dire 0-0 draw between France and Uruguay. I’ve seen a few bad games in my time, but that really was an awful game, possibly on a par with the time I saw Watford draw 0-0 with Peterborough United at Vicarage Road. Believe me, that was an awful match.
Anyway, look out for (hopefully) regular postings throughout the World Cup. During the World Cup, you can follow my World Cup Tweets on my separate Twitter account for football, @BritishFootball. Obviously, you can still follow me with my usual @Noelinho account!
Also, not wanting to disappoint, you can go to the specially created World Cup page, which will keep you up to date with my most recent World Cup facts, stats and commentary, and will quite possibly feature a few other things as the competition continues. Don’t say I’m not good to you!
Finally, here are a few statistics from yesterday:
Aren’t you glad I told you that? Thought so.
We are approaching half way through the year. You deserve an update on my New Year’s Resolutions. So, here goes:
I will read my Bible every day
Could do better. I’ll nail it one day. It’s hard. Requires setting aside time and ring-fencing it, rather than letting other things encroach upon that time. Rather a case of peaks and troughs at the moment though.
I will vote for [deleted - secret ballot and all that] in the General Election
Done. Obviously, there is no way I could ever tell you who I voted for. Secret ballot, natch.
I will learn a new language
This is on course. I have a Norwegian newspaper. I’m pretty sure I’m settled on that language. Need to brush up on my French, German and Italian too though.
I will read at least 20 books
Hmm. Optimistic. I have started a few now though, and one of them is Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology, which, if you ask me, should count as a few books in itself. There’s no way you could read that twenty times in a year!
I will post on my website more
Getting there. I’ve even redesigned it. Hope you like it. Apologies to IE 6/7 users – blame Microsoft for your poorer user experience. Upgrade to IE 8 for a better one, or use Firefox, Safari or Chrome for the definitive product.
I will set a personal best in a 10k race
I may struggle to find the time to enter a race. I would love to, but I missed a series of three races I had been planning to enter as I had no time. Wait and see.
I will try out a new sport
Tried out for a new American Football team. Had to give up because it was exhausting me as I was so short of time. Still planning on trying curling. On the lookout for other possibilities though!
I will pass my driving test
Really. Must. Enact. Action. URGENTLY.
I will explore new territory on my racing bike
Work in progress. I’ve hit some high speeds too. Just ask the Pastor – 45mph with the brakes on; you should see what I did when he wasn’t following me!
I will be as witty, dark and cutting as ever
A matter of personal taste, but of course I am. Just because you have no sense of humour…
I am beginning to sense a pattern in this year’s races. I make a prediction. The prediction is, on the whole, bang on the money. Then, with about a third of the race left to go, it falls apart. Mark Webber, Sebastian Vettel, I’m looking squarely at you.
If you care to look at my predictions for Turkey, you’ll see I had Webber to win, followed by Vettel. Okay, so I had Alonso third, which didn;t exactly go to plan, but I had the McLarens right behind. Pretty on the money. Except Vettel decided to turn in on Mark Webber, taking himself out of the race and dropping Mark down to third at the same time.
For the record, it was Vettel’s fault. No shadow of a doubt. It completely wrecked my picks. Anyway, we now travel to North America, with a return to the Canadian Grand Prix, one of my personal favourites! In 2008, Kubica won the race, although he was rather helped by Hamilton running in to the back of an obviously red Ferrari.In 2007, Robert Kubica went for a mid-afternoon barrel roll. In 1997, the race ended under a red flag as Olivier Panis smashed both legs in a nasty accident. The Canadian Grand Prix rarely disappoints.
The circuit itself is hard on brakes. The long back straight past the hairpin leads on to the final chicane, Champions’ Wall, which is followed by the home straight and another hard braking area. There are about half a dozen heavy braking areas, so if anyone is marginal on brakes, they can expect to become acquainted with the wall at some stage. The chances of a safety car are high, and there are always high-profile casualties in the race. The pit lane has caused angst on many occasions, with Felipe Massa and Giancarlo Fisichella disqualified in 2007 for driving through a red light in the pit lane.
There are no high speed corners in Montreal, so the Red Bull car may struggle to gain much of an advantage over the other cars. Expect McLaren to be strong. Expect Mercedes to be a little quicker as they make use of their strong engine on the straights. Expect Force India to do the same. Don’t expect much from Ferrari though. Anyway, for what it’s worth, here are my top three for Canada:
I do expect Lewis Hamilton to win. He likes circuits like this. He took his maiden Grand Prix win in Canada. I fully expect him to edge Jenson, who will, I suspect, be fighting to keep Vettel behind him. We’ll see how accurate those predictions are soon…oh, and don’t forget, the action is late afternoon, since it’s coming from North America!
(Or ups and downs and the inevitable return of the Crisis of Confidence.)
I have a habit of becoming hermit-like every so often, even more than normal, and recently has been one of those periods. It’s annoying (a bloody pain to be honest) but it’s just something that has happened for years, easily since I hit my 20′s.
Now, I know this recent one is not a relapse of the poor mental health that plagued me last year. Generally I’ve been quite chipper. Work trundles on, they throw me some shifts if they’re feeling benevolent (joke, joke), Aurora is blossoming and Ruthy is as lovely as ever. A good and erstwhile chum is back from down south, it’s always good to have him around, and I have no reason to feel like this.
Yet I do.
Of course, the usual reason my mood suffers is due to the pressure I put myself under with my writing. Same old, same old. Perhaps I’m just going through the same mood I hit when I had my last whinge.
Ah, bugger. Prog beckons, I think. That should break me out of it.
- Alistair
If you’ve read my last couple of posts, you’ll know that I am, overall, extremely happy with my HTC Desire phone. Once HTC/Orange get around to pushing out Android 2.2 I suspect I will be even happier 
However, I have had a couple of mishaps. My previously mentioned fail with the Sense launcher was mostly harmless, if a little irritating. However, my own impatience with my Mac mounting the phone the other day lead to a worse problem – the microsd card wasn’t mounted/unmounted properly and failed to read either in my phone or on the Mac. The only solution was to format it. This meant I lost everything on it, some of which had been on it from my previous phone. I load a load of photos – nothing spectacular, but quite upsetting.
And so to the problem of syncing…..
There are a number of options available for Android. None of which are as good as iTunes, I suspect… DoubleTwist is an attempt to mimic iTunes-like functionality with an Android phone. However, I’m not overly impressed with it as a piece of software. They’ve just released a client app on the phone too – I guess I might check it out, but I’m not convinced by the reviews I’ve seen so far.
The Missing Sync promise to be a great solution, but it is $40 which grates a little. Plus, it seems to sync _everything_. As I noted in my previous post, I have a load of stuff that _already_ syncs. Contacts, mail and calendar are all sorted. There are only 2 things left I need to sync (that I can think of) – Photos/Videos and the HTC auto-backup file. (Apps is a possibility, but I’m thinking of going with AppBrain on that, as it seems a popular choice)
MyBackup is an online service with an Android app that appears to be highly rated….. but 2GB of space? That seems somewhat paltry for backing up images.
Google, of course, have their own image service – Picasa. Sadly, though, it doesn’t look like the integration with Android is there. And so I think I’m just going to sync photos with my laptop using….. the built in Image Capture programme for syncing with cameras. And I’ll make copies of the autobackup files too.
However, I will play around with DoubleTwist for a while as well, as it’s free , just in case I’ve missed something important.
mrBen
Oh, go on, admit it – you’re secretly jealous. A tiny bit at the very least. For all the ridicule and scorn from people when I said I was going to Eurovision, a surprising number of people then admitted watching the contest, even if the excuse was “I want to see you on telly”. Well, actually, I do believe I was on TV – albeit it Spain and Germany, rather than Britain.
I actually have no idea where to start, to be honest, as there is so much I could say. I will leave general pictures observations about Oslo and Norway (of which I have plenty) for another day and simply stick with Eurovision for now.
Oslo itself was well decked out for the event. Trams, buses and billboards were full of adverts for the event, there was a Eurovision Village and also a Euro Cafe! I managed to befriend a Swedish woman who reeled off Eurovision statistics at a rate of knots that even I was struggling to keep up with. It was also bathed in glorious sunshine for most of the weekend, aside from a little thunder on Saturday morning. Transport to and from the event was fantastic. But anyway, the contest itself…
Firstly, congratulations to Lena, the German entrant, who was both my tip and personal favourite to win. I was sat directly behind a couple of Germans who were going wild as the points flew in. In fact, it was a little too extravagant at one point! At the other end of the scale, the United Kingdom finished bottom. It didn’t dampen too many British spirits on the night, although the next morning was worse, compounded by a bunch of Aussies rubbing it in…
Josh didn’t sound awful in the Telenor Arena, but he certainly didn’t sound great either. I met a British man on the way to the bus back to Oslo who said he’d received a message from someone watching in the UK saying the end of Josh’s song was “worse than Scooch”. I thought that was perhaps a little strong, but having watched the BBC’s TV coverage this evening, it really was terrible. It is easy to see why it came last. In fact, it’s rather more surprising we got ten points for it, although admittedly some did come from Ireland, who are usually quite nice to us anyway.
As you may have seen from the picture above, I managed to get a few shots of the artists as they arrived on the Sunday night. I wedged myself between Dutch, Spanish and German TV. I searched around for British TV, but they were nowhere to be seen. I stuck my head in on a bunch of German fans singing a rendition of Lena’s “Satellite” for a pre-record for German television. We were all waiting for our fellow entries, and Lena, who was definitely the fans’ favourite. Sadly she was rather late arriving, and so I missed her, but those of us who wedged ourselves between the media saw a number of people, including the a couple of the Norwegian Royal Family, the Spanish, French, British, Icelandic and Moldovan entrants, some of whom stopped for a quick chat. A couple even gave away free CDs and even a couple of books, though sadly I didn’t manage to pilfer one for myself. The TV crews were good banter too, although the Germans did ask what I thought of the British entry. Thankfully, they didn’t record the response…
The atmosphere in and around the arena was fantastic. There were plenty of fans from almost every country, including some of the losing semi-finalists, like Sweden. Oh, and like I previously mentioned, some Aussies too! I spotted Canadians and Americans dropping by as well – for whatever reason they wanted to turn up for! The warm-up started about forty-five minutes before the show went live, with a little practice for the interval dance flashmob,which everyone quite enjoyed.*
Last year’s winner, Alexander Rybak, got a fantastic cheer when he came on to perform his song, after which the show really began. I have to say, I did love the entry from Azerbaijan. It started the show off fantastically well. Spain then followed, with a mini pitch invasion. Actually, in the stadium, a lot of people didn’t notice Jimmy Jump invading the stage, and he did fit in rather well – although on TV, it was pretty obvious.
The Norwegian entry sent the crowd wild, as you would expect. In fact, they went pretty wild for Iceland and Denmark too, who both had very good entries as well. The Moldovan entry was good for dancing to, but after that, it died down a little until Ireland came on. Ireland’s entrant, Niamh Kavanagh, has actually won the contest before, and I very much enjoyed her song, but it wasn’t so popular across Europe. Greece were next up. with a catchy track, though they may not be disappointed not to have won considering the country is mortgaged to the rafters and may collapse under the cost of holding the show!
I will ignore the United Kingdom’s dismal entry, and instead mention the French track – also their official World Cup song – which set the room alight. I did love it, although it being French, I could obviously never vote for it! This was followed by a solid piano-assisted effort from Romania. The Russians then came on, and, whilst the track itself was popular, Russia itself bombed, with a sound boo resonating at every mention of the country’s name. The crowd soon forgot, as Lena appeared and the whole place went nuts. Denmark rounded off the twenty-five with a well received song, followed by a repeat of the previously-interrupted Spanish entry, which was, well, weird, wasn’t it?
As voting closed, it seemed the mood of the Norwegians nearby was with Denmark and Germany, though many like Azerbaijan’s entry too. As the votes started to come in, it l0oked like we might have a visit to Copenhagen in store for next year, but as it progressed, Germany became odds-on favourites. They were, if you ask me (and tough if you don’t), worthy winners, though Denmark would have been great winners too! I was rather surprised Norway and Ireland didn’t do better too.
So, who’s coming with me to, most likely, Berlin next year?
*Now you won’t know this, but I have studied the video of the contest carefully, and so I can tell you this is true. At the start of the flashmob dance, you will see Norwegian security pushing a guy aside from the picture. A few seconds later, the professional dancers start, and you can see a member of Norwegian security mistakenly trying to stop one of the dancers. She, in fact, is the person in charge of the dance routine. FACT. Amazing that II know that, huh?
Or, How I Managed to Convince My Wife To Have A Game Of Warhammer 40K…
Actually that’s not strictly true. She is interested in playing a game and seeing as I’ve had these blasted things on my shelf (still mostly unpainted mind) and not yet played them, I think this is a good move. And seeing as it’s been years and several editions between my last actual games. 16 years and three editions…
Tonight we set up the wee table, I cobbled together two small armies of futuristic metal (and plastic) soldiers, and we went over some of the rules. The idea is to spread the learning curve over several days and to use units that are pretty straightforward to play.
Tomorrow, hopefully, brings the game itself!
- Alistair
So I’ve changed browser from Mozilla Firefox to Google Chrome. This is a big deal for me – I’ve been a Mozilla user for years now, and I still think they do great work. However, there are a few big advantages in Chrome for me:
1. It’s quicker.
2. It’s Webkit based, so it helps when working a lot with mobile Webkit stuff
3. My phone runs Webkit
4. The release of 2.2 includes some cool stuff for “cloud-to-device” work, and I suspect a chunk of that will be in Chrome in the near future.
5. The developer stuff is just a bit smoother and neater than firebug
I’m now pretty much a Google boy – I use Google Mail and Calendar, and I have a Google phone, which integrates everything nicely together. Talking of the Desire, I picked up a nasty bug (not sure of the source) which caused the HTC Sense Launcher to repeatedly die, which required a complete wipe of the phone. Luckily, all the magic backup stuff kicked in, and the only stuff I really lost was the connections between my phone, google and facebook contacts, which only took about 30 minutes to restore. (I do really need to sort through my contacts and cut them down – a lot of them are horribly duplicated, and my first phone couldn’t store multiple numbers for a single person, so I have loads of entries for all the different numbers and stuff).
Other than that problem, the Desire is a fantastic phone. I’m enjoying having a “smart phone”, and I suspect that by not having previously had an iPhone is a bit of an advantage. I don’t particularly feel any iPhone envy, and while I appreciate the appeal of an iPhone and the way that Apple handles it, I’m still a big fan of the open nature of Android. While it leads to a proliferation of crap available for the phone, I do believe in the long run it will increase the potential and quality. (Much like the internet). And the price was right.
Oh, and I can’t wait for 2.2 to arrive for my phone – latest news slates it for June 23rd.
mrBen
It is with great regret that I have to announce that we won’t be releasing our scheduled May episode, as it turns out the original recording was completely awful quality, mainly because the Mac decided to record the internal microphone rather than the nicely balanced audio coming from the desk. The quality was sufficiently bad that we’ve made the decision not to release.
I’m truly sorry. We’ll be back with a vengeance in June.
For a while, and for reasons I can’t possibly explain, I’ve been playing D&D Tiny Adventures on Facebook. And when I say ‘playing’ I mean I log in occasionally and click some buttons to send my character on another quest which, an hour later, will be finished and awaiting my further intervention.
Guild Wars it ain’t.
Initially, it was a fun wee distraction, as is much of Facebook, but role-playing games are better than that generally. Here’s what I’m playing at the mo.
I have been reading though the old Red Box edition of Basic D&D, with the idea of running a Pen & Paper session. It’s been a while since I’ve been involved in a game, either playing or GM-ing, and nothing really beats the experience. Must try and rustle something up.
Oh, before I forget, try this one out. It’s the Linear RPG. Nice bit of fun.
- Alistair
Since I am away in Oslo this weekend, I shall get my Grand Prix preview out of the way nice and early. The season is hotting up nicely, though it is also looking ominous for anyone not driving a Red Bull. So far this season, Red Bull have taken pole position in all six races (three voles each for Vettel and Webber), have taken the fastest lap in three races (two to one in Webber’s favour) and have won three races too (also two to one in Webber’s favour). Although neither driver has taken the hat-trick of pole, fastest lap and race win in the same race, the team have taken the hat-trick twice, including at the last race in Monaco, and Mark Webber has won both the last two races – Spain and Monaco – which happen to represent the most diametrically opposed circuit types on the Formula One circuit. So, if you’re not in a Red Bull, the message is clear – pray it breaks down.
Turkey is a track that will suit the Red Bull car down to the ground. The now-famous turn eight – with four apexes at high speed – is a dream if your happen to have a car loaded with downforce, which the Red Bull certainly is! Barring any problems, I would fully expect the Red Bull car to win again. Behind them, it’s a race between Ferrari and McLaren. Lewis Hamilton relishes a track like Turkey, and Jenson Button won here last year. It will be interesting to see whether McLaren or Ferrari have the upper hand this weekend – I suspect Alonso will edge the McLarens, who will both edge Massa.
All eyes will also be on the Mercedes. Nico Rosberg hasn’t been quite the force he was early on in the last couple of races, but Schumacher has looked much more comfortable. He caught Button napping in Spain and Alonso in Monaco – though cruelly punished – and so will be looking for better finishes from here. However, without some new, serious upgrades, both Rosberg and Schumacher will struggle to break in to the top five.
Amongst the rest of the field, watch out for Adrian Sutil, who was handy in Spain, along with Robert Kubica, who has been fantastic all season so far. Rubens Barrichello is far to discount too, and also keep an eye on Kobayashi – if the BMW-Sauber sets up well, he may, with a slice of luck too, manage to scrape a point. Maybe. He’s more likely to fall just outside though.
So, without further ado, here is my top three for Turkey:
You may be surprised by the top two, but Webber beat Vettel in Turkey last year, finishing second. He’s also won the last two races and seems to have a small psychological advantage over his team-mate. He’s also nailed back-to-back victories and is leading the Drivers’ Championship. I doubt it will bother him – he’s having the time of his life right now and is brimming with confidence. I hope he keeps it up!
So, if Webber will win, second place is obvious, assuming Vettel finishes. He’ll have a new chassis, which may help. Finally, Alonso in third. Hamilton and Button will be his nearest rivals, but I think he’ll pull it off.
Last time out: Don’t go there. My picks were a disaster. I got one pick right (Vettel, in the correct position too, actually). My McLaren gamble didn’t really work. C’est la vie.
Forget the General Election. Forget the World Cup, whether it be football, or the monstrosity that is chav cricket. Forget all the other things that can distract you this weekend, for there is only one things that matters. Norway. Oslo. The Telenor Arena. Saturday night… Eurovision. Saturday night is the final of the Eurovision Song Contest 2010, and, ash permitting (it’s looking hopeful), I’ll be there, flag in hand, madly Tweeting away and running up an enormous mobile data bill in the most expensive country in Europe. Hard life, huh?
Now I can hear the scoffers amongst you. No, it’s not sad; yes, it’s a great laugh. You’re just jealous. Enjoy sneakily watching on your TV, wishing you were there. Being in Norway, I may even vote twice – once in Norway, for the United Kingdom, and once in Britain – if I can nab the correct number – for (probably) Germany. I’m certainly not voting for those Eastern Europeans…
So anyway, have fun in my absence. I’m very much doubt that I can resist Tweeting, no matter how much it costs, so don’t forget to follow – @Noelinho.
Don’t Clegg and Cameron look the happy couple? Who would have realised that only weeks ago, these two men were political enemies? It’s enough to make you weep. And swear. And throw things at the screen. But anyway, that’s besides the point. The point is, they have brought with them the “new” politics – and what a load of old codswallop it is.
When David cameron and Nick Clegg talked of the new politics, they talked about reducing the size of the state, of giving power back to people, or creating, in Cameron’s terms, the “Big Society”. So, as I understand it, they were keen to decentralise power away from the state and into other people’s hands.
Err, except they haven’t. All this talk of constitutional reform is garbage. It does nothing to do this. Every measure is actually entrenching power rather than loosening grip. Funny how things change when you win power, isn’t it? So anyway, here are the measures, in brief, with the explanations to follow:
So let’s just take a closer look at those…
AV stands for Alternative Vote. It’s worth noting that neither the Conservatives nor the Liberal Democrats were in favour of this system during the General Election campaign. It is not a proportional system (not that I care – I don’t believe in PR as a form of effective government, but that’s another matter right now), and so it’s not really what the Liberal Democrats want. In fact, a crude version of AV (ie. not AV+) would produce only a very modest change in the outcome of most elections, but still, that’s what Nick Clegg and David Cameron are going to give us a referendum on. Even better, the Conservative Party will campaign against it! Well, isn’t it good to know that our Prime Minister is going to give us a vote on electoral reform, whilst at the same time telling us to stick it?
We’ve not really heard much about reform of the House of Lords. It doesn’t seem to be a huge priority on that basis, but what we have been told is that the coalition government plan on appointing a number of Lords so that the make-up of the second chamber is reflective of the proportion of the vote at the General Election just gone. Now, if you remember, Gordon Brown as the outgoing Primer Minister is allowed to appoint a number himself, and Labour already have more Lords than any other party. Thus, the coalition government will have to appoint over a hundred Lords in order to do this. I thought we were wanting to elect them these days (again, I’m not so worried about that, but anyhow…)? Furthermore, appointing the House in this way is actually a clouded attempt at gerrymandering to get legislation through the second chamber. People will only be appointed on the basis that they will support legislation. You may as well just abolish the chamber if you’re going to abuse it like that!
Clever stuff, this. A vote of no confidence can pass with a simple majority, but a motion to dissolve Parliament would only pass with a vote with a 55% – 45% majority. Why is this important? Oh, it just so happens that this minor change means that the Conservative Party could rule as a minority government, and as long as they all stick together, can’t be booted out by a vote of no confidence, even though the other parties could block every piece of legislation they bring to the House. Oh, and because we have a fixed term Parliament, we’re stuck with a lame duck Government. Great. More gerrymandering.
The 1922 Committee is a Conservative backbench committee. See that important word? Oh, no, not “committee”, but “backbench”. Currently, those on the frontbench can’t votein the 1922 Committee. David Cameron wants to change the rules so that the frontbench can vote. It just so happens that such a move would increase his power over the committee…
The Government always has an advantage over the opposition, since it has almost unlimited resources for research and policy-making through the very fact that it is the Government. When you’re in opposition, it’s much harder to undertake the same reasearch because you have less money and manpower. Short money goes to the opposition to redress the balance somewhat. Only thing is, the Liberal Democrats, despite being in coalition government with the Tories, have decided they should get some. Err, right. That, I believe, is theft. Except they know that, so they want to change the rules so they are allowed to. Hmm.
So anyway, let’s recap how this goes. The Liberal Democrats and the Tories, in their coalition Government, will:
Is it just me, or was the Old Politics better? No wonder they were laughing so much in the press conference. It’s clearly easier to be a Liberal outside of Government. Now, it’s all about how much power they can cling on to.
Picture: Crown Copyright, taken at the first joint press conference.
Whilst most of the football world focused their attention last weekend on the FA Cup final at Wembley between Portsmouth and Chelsea, the focus north of the border in Scotland was very much on the Active Nation Scottish Cup Final between Ross County and Dundee United – and Noelinho couldn’t resist but go along to Hampden and see the game out.
Ross County had never before got past the last sixteen in the Scottish Cup, let alone made the final or won it. However, en route to the final this year, they put out first Hibernian, and then Celtic. Not bad for a first division team! Dundee United, meanwhile, went into the tie as firm favourites, having beaten Rangers in a replay in the quarter finals, before comfortably putting away Raith Rovers in the semi finals. Everyone knew County were capable of producing an upset, though few really expected it. That said, many neutrals – including myself – were hoping for a Ross County win, and the club sold over 18,000 tickets for the match, although quite how many of them were closet Inverness Caledonian Thistle fans hoping to watch County get pummelled isn’t quite so well known…
It was great to see so many people packed into Hampden Park for the match, especially considering the lack of any Old Firm in the match. In some ways, it added to the anticipation – the Highlanders hugely excited by the occasion, the Dundee United fans anticipating their first Scottish Cup win in sixteen years.
The match, when it finally started after the formalities of introductions and fireworks, was a little cagey. Ross County did look a little unsettled by the occasion and struggled to string many passes together. The crowd were in good voice as they watched Dundee United controlling possession, looking comfortable, but without producing much in the way of end product. A few marginal decisions seemed to go United’s way, but there was no real controversy. As the first half came to a close, United upped the quality, winning a couple of free kicks and corners, but the end product was tame. At half time, both teams would have been please – Ross County, at 0-0, were still in the game, and Dundee United, although not leading, hadn’t been troubled.
The second half started in a similar vein. Dundee United looked comfortable and Ross County looked to be struggling for composure and inspiration. However, around the hour mark, they found more confidence, especially on the counter attack, with a couple of good runs, getting in to the United box. Unfortunately, this also became their undoing, as they were then caught a little on the hop by the Arabs. After a panic from Michael McGovern in the Ross County goal, United’s David Goodwillie ended up with the ball and lobbed it over the head of the stranded goalkeeper and defenders chasing back.
Once United had their noses in front, it was always going to be an uphill battle for the Highlanders. It was always going to be the killer blow. As they desperately tried to find an equaliser, Dundee United punished them in clinical fashion. Craig Conway – who was, in the end, the Man of the Match – had caused the Ross County defence problems all day with his speed, and as the weary County legs faded, he punished them twice, scoring a late brace and making it a 3-0 victory to Dundee United.
In the end, it was a fair enough scoreline. It wasn’t the best game of football you’ll ever see, but it wasn’t bad either.* County certainly didn’t disgrace themselves and their supporters gave them a warm reception at the end of the match. All eyes will be on Ross County next season to see if they can make the jump to the SPL, and if they do, hopefully in a more successful manner than Livingston and Gretna…
* A little comment on the quality of football matches. So many people complain about the poor quality of football matches today! How often have you heard people moaning about a match that was boring, scrappy, or, “the worst I’ve ever seen”? A tip to those people: stop watching teams like Arsenal and Barcelona. You are clearly spoilt by watching those teams, and your expectations from matches are too high. Real football matches are rarely like watching Barcelona and Arsenal, as any fan who stands in the terraces – or, heaven forbid, sits in a poxy little covered seat in the main stand – will testify!
Unfortunately, with the General Election held in the same week as the Spanish Grand Prix, I forgot to preview the Grand Prix. However, with the Monaco Grand Prix this week, you can now sit down to the treat of a dual review and preview.
Firstly, let’s look back to the Spanish Grand Prix. If I had previewed the Grand Prix, I would have picked like this:
And that would have looked great with 10 laps to go! Even with 2 laps to go, it wasn’t too bad. Let’s be honest, Barcelona suits the Red Bull car down to the ground. Turns 3 and 9 are perfectly set up for Adrian Newey’s masterpiece to shine. So, on paper, the race had a Red Bull 1-2 written all over it. At the same time, the McLaren has been good in race trim this year and if Hamilton could show good pace in qualifying, he had definitely shown the race pace required to grab a podium finish.
As the weekend went on, so it turned out. The Red Bull was dictatorially impressive in qualifying, destroying the opposition. Webber shaded Vettel – just – and in doing so asserted that he can be just as quick as his highly rated team-mate.
Come race day, Hamilton made a good start but couldn’t quite jam a move down the inside into turn one. Webber held off Vettel to hold his place at the front, which, in the Spanish Grand Prix, is as good as winning the race, mechanical problems aside. Indeed, the previous nine Spanish Grand Prix had been won by the pole sitter. Still, Vettel was on his tail and could potentially jump him in a pit stop.
Unfortunately for Vettel, his pit stop wasn’t a smooth one and he instead fell back into the clutches of Lewis Hamilton. Hamilton himself had a problem in his pit stop with a wheel nut, but the team reacted quickly as there had been a similar problem with team-mate Jenson Button’s stop, and so they were prepared. I the meantime, Fernando Alonso kept his head down in fourth, and Schumacher – who scared his way past Jenson Button as Button came out of the pits – made his car wider than the M25 to stay ahead of Button in fifth, circling at a speed that at times felt closer to that of the M25 too. From this point on, it looked like the race was over. Webber led Vettel by about fifteen seconds, who was ahead of Hamilton, who was ahead of Alonso. Schumacher then led Button and Massa, neither of whom looked like passing the car in front.
This all changed with just under ten laps to go, braking in to turn ten, Vettel’s car looked fragile, and memories of Australia flooded back. The producer cut to a replay of Vettel bounding across the gravel at turn seven, and you realised something was up. Vettel pitted for new tyres but was quickly told his brakes were about to go. Consequently, he had to coast to the end of the race, hoping he could hang on to fourth ahead of Schumacher and somehow manage to stop his car at every corner. Webber must have allowed himself a wry smile, as must Alonso, who was now in a podium position in his home Grand Prix.
If he had a wry smile then, he must have had an ever bigger smile as he passed through turn three on the penultimate lap. Seconds before, Lewis Hamilton watched in horror as his left front wheel rim popped, sending his wheel nut flying in the air, causing his tyres to de-laminate at 150 miles an hour and sending him straight in to the wall. The second place he had inherited was gone,gladly taken by Alonso, and marked the fourth time in Lewis’ three and a bit year career that a tyre has exploded, causing him to go off track. Vettel, meanwhile, was counting his stars as it meant he could salvage a podium, and fourth for Schumacher gave him his best finish since his return in Bahrain.
So what did Spain tell us? It told us that the Red Bull is still far and away the quickest car in Formula 1 – especially in high speed corners, like turn three at Barcelona. It showed us that the McLaren is the next best, followed by the Ferrari, which has fallen back a little, with the Mercedes still fourth quickest. Michael Schumacher seems much happier with the car now, which is good, but Rosberg had a poor weekend and will be looking to put that right in Monaco, although he doesn’t have a great track record in the Principality. Which leads us nicely on to the Monaco Grand Prix this weekend…
Having seen the utter Red Bull domination in Spain, many people will be despairing, thinking they will wipe the floor again in Monte Carlo. They may, but there are three reasons why I don’t think they will, or there is at least a good chance they won’t:
This, of course, doesn’t mean McLaren will walk it, but I fully expect them to be up there. So, he is my prediction for Monaco:
I don’t expect the Ferrari to shine, nor the Mercedes. Watch out for Robert Kubica – if he can keep his nose clean, he may be able pick up some more very useful points. But more importantly, think back to the last time there were twenty-four cars on the grid at Monaco? What, you don’t remember? OK, I’ll save you F1 newbies the bother of looking it up, and instead extract the memory from my brain for you. It was 1995. There were, in fact, not twenty-four cars but twenty-six. Indeed, the 1995 Monaco Grand Prix was the last Grand Prix to feature twenty-six cars as the Simtek-Ford team dissolved very soon after. (Pedant alert: technically, only twenty-five cars took the “start” – neither Simtek took the official start)
Anyway, going in to the first corner, Jean Alesi and Gerhard Berger made a Ferrari sandwich out of David Coulthard, bringing out the red flag. It’s not the only time the start has caused problems, and I wonder, will we see it again this year? We shall see…
And before I leave you, I shall leave you with a little trivia, and a video. Want to know why one car didn’t make the restart in 1995? I’ll tell you. Well, see, there was this Italian driver called Domenico Schiattarella (he wasn’t very good – you’ll see if you read on!), who needed his car moving. So, the stewards attached it to a recovery crane and lifted it up in the air. And then they…well, they smashed it to pieces. It fell off. The dropped it. To be honest, if you’d ever seen him race, you could be forgiven for thinking they might have done it on purpose, and thanks to the marvel that it Youtube, I can show you why. Take a look!
See what I mean? His surname almost gave the game away, and if that didn’t, the video really did!
Bizarrely, I’m still working on this. Haven’t completed a full story since Day 1 but I’ve written anything up to 1000 words for each of them. I keep telling myself I’ll head back and fill in the gaps once I’ve finished the story for that day, and I might still do that, but I’m a busy boy with new job and baby. Only so many hours in the day to do any of this…
So, Day 5 to Day 12. Here’s the breakdown.
Day 5 – A day in the life of Aurora.
Day 6 – A modern day knight.
Day 7 – A work night out gone badly wrong.
Day 8 – A fairy story of a beast who lived in a tree.
Day 9 – similar to Day 8, but with the creature who lived under the stairs.
Day 10 – My attempt at Supernatural Romance. (I feel dirty just saying that…)
Day 11 – Flash fiction, dialogue only. Something that wandered without a goal.
Day 12 – A Lovecraftian tale set on the outskirts of Glasgow.
- Alistair
What a smile! My boy is not only sitting, he has moved from tummy crawling to knee crawling and… on our trip to Birmingham we had pulling himself up to stand.
We went to visit Ben’s sister, who cooked us the most amazing meals and took us to see sharks and otters and other cool fishies.
Ardtalnaig
It dawned on me this morning that this week is election week. Yes, I hadn’t really twigged until now that we are forty-eight hours away from the closing of polls in an election race that, if you read everything that’s been written in the media, is too close to call, the three party election, whatever nonsense they feel like writing (I say this – it’s blatantly obvious the Conservative Party will win, with comfortably the most seats, and with a tiny majority, I predict).
Anyway, the point is, there are the three main parties – Labour, the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats – and the sideshow parties – the SNP, the BNP, UKIP and the Greens. So, as the election draws, who will Noelinho.org endorse? You’re about to find out. So, here is, in brief, a quick run-down of the minor parties:
Oh well, that’s four parties down, so we’re half way through! So, the major parties, in a little more depth:
So, the moment you’ve all been waiting for…who is Noelinho.org endorsing in this election? Well, after much consideration, angst and heated debate amongst the editorial team (with a few others chipping in), we (I) have decided that it is indeed time for change. Radical change. Change that puts a real smile on your face – and there’s only one party than can do that. The Monster Raving Loony William Hill Party. Why? Here are the policies that did it for me:
My support is not total, for there are some less well-thought policies, such as:
Still, these minor quibbles aside, Noelinho.org does believe that The Monster Raving Loony William Hill Party does present the best vision for Britain.
Unfortunately, they are only standing in twenty-seven seats, though it could be twenty-eight next time around…
Still working on these guys.
Day 2 had wizards in a tower being assailed by an ancient foe.
Day 3 had a man falling uncontrollably between dying realities.
Day 4 has a real world tale of a man stepping up and putting himself in harms way to protect others.
They’ve all been started and none are finished yet…
- Alistair
Well, I gave it a try, despite my split shift and my incredible desire for sleep and have produced a very silly little story, 951 words of very silly story, and I’m very pleased with it.
It was a joy to write. It’s about a carer called Thor.
I’ve let Ruth read it, in a pre and untouched first edit I’ll have you know, and I hope she thinks it’s a fun and silly as I do.
It feels odd writing something and finishing it (for the most part) in a single day.
With no real plan what each day will bring, I’m interested what I’ll write tomorrow.
(For more info about what I’m doing, go here.)
- Alistair
Despite the “spitting the dummy out” moment I had recently, I have taken the mindbogglingly foolish step of signing up for the StoryADay.org website.
The plan, according to the mentalists over there, is to write (finish) a story every day in May. The word count of these can be from 50 to 5000 words.
I’m promising nothing.
- Alistair
Ben, Scott, James and new-boy Chris are proud to present Episode 2 of Classic Yak. This month the guys tackle the heavy subject of Politics, and whether or not we can trust policitians or even the whole political structure in the UK in the wake of events such as the expenses scandal. We also see the welcome return of the News segment.
Promo for Two Blind Squirrels.
Send your feedback to show@classicyak.org, tweet us at twitter.com/classicyak, post it to MySpace, join the Facebook group, or leave a plain old voicemail on +44 (0)845 867 6316.
Ben, Scott, James and new-boy Chris are proud to present Episode 2 of Classic Yak. This month the guys tackle the heavy subject of Politics, and whether or not we can trust policitians or even the whole political structure in the UK in the wake of events such as the expenses scandal. We also see the welcome return of the News segment. Intro [00:13] Politics [01:09] News [23:44] Elton John claims Jesus was gay Outro [28:39] End [31:19] Promo for Two Blind Squirrels. Send your feedback to show@classicyak.org, tweet us at twitter.com/classicyak, post it to MySpace, join the Facebook group, or leave a plain old voicemail on +44 (0)845 867 6316.
No, I’ve not won the lottery. That’s my final score on ‘High Roller Casino’ on my Nokia after numerous successful Texas Hold ‘em tournaments. And it’s the final score because yesterday I took delivery of a new phone, the HTC Desire, which is the latest Google Android powered phone to hit the UK market. I got an amazingly good deal from Orange and it means I finally have a phone that I can use to show off the apps that we create at my work! (without having to sell-out and get an iPhone ) Plus, it’s got SatNav….
mrBen
We have recently had a new content filter system installed on the servers at work. As with all things, you get a few problems early on. Some things are good, like being able to now read the BBC Blogs; other effects aren’t so good, like the system accidentally blocking the whole of the rest of the BBC site. Anyway, once those things are ironed out, it’s fine.
The new system uses active filtering through each page that is loaded and blocks a page if it detects inappropriate content. I’m not sure exactly what counts as inappropriate and I don’t really plan on testing it to the limit (although it is always worth exploring to make sure it is correctly set up). It does, very helpfully, give you an explanation of why a page is blocked when it is blocked. Unfortunately, it looks like this:
I don’t know about you, but don’t you think that’s a little… ironic? The page content is blocked because there is – shock! – a swear word on the page, so when telling you why the page is blocked, it spews out the word in question, but not the rest of the content. Oh yes. Big. Fat. Fail. Although you have to admit, it is pretty funny, even if I did nearly choke on my lunch at the time.
It does beg the question, though – if it detects, shall we say, “raunchier” behaviour, does it do the same? Let’s hope not, eh?
I’ve been having a bit of a struggle recently.
With everything I’ve written so far, even the stuff I think is half reasonable, I always get the feeling that it’s a bit flat. There’s always that voice at the back of my head telling me that it could have been richer in the detail and, well, just better. And I just don’t know how. The added concern is that my writing is never going to be more than mediocre.
I’m really scunnered with it to be honest and there’s not a day that goes by where I don’t think of just giving the whole game up.
But I don’t really want to do that. Or do I?
What I am going to do is take a break. I’ve tidied away all my notes, all my yWriter files and I’ve put them into on-line storage somewhere. I’m about to clear them off my pc and take a long time away. That might be for a week or two, maybe a month. Maybe longer. Who knows?
With some time with writing out of sight and mind I might be inspired to pick it up with a greater passion. Then again, I might not.
I’ll have to see how that goes.
- Alistair
Sounds like it should be a cartoon, doesn’t it? Well, be careful what you wish for – I’ve done exactly that.
As you may know, the UK is currently in an Armageddon-style blackout, with almost all air travel banned, as ash slowly creeps southwards across our Isles. Someone should make a film out of it.
Anyway, there was a certain degree of excitement in the office yesterday as people tracked the moving ash, NATS and the the Met Office department devoted to volcanic ash – bet you didn’t know about that one, eh?
So, after some interesting discussion about whether Steve would catch his flight or not, it all died down and everyone got back to work. And then it happened. Someone mentioned floating volcanoes. No, I’ve no ides where it came from either, but either way, they didn’t live it down for a while, as jokes flew (fittingly ironic, eh?) around about Mount Everest walking to Africa, and BA Cabin Crew striking over UFOs that later turn out to be volcanoes going for a little stretch. I couldn’t resist.
I put it up in the office today, to much raucous. In fact, it was so successful, I could be tempted to make it a more regular slot…you have been warned.
The Formula 1 circus hits China this weekend, for the fourth round of the 2010 F1 season. So far, we’ve had three winners, but that doesn’t tell the story of the season. Indeed, we have had three different teams win, but again, that is not an accurate reflection of the way things will pan out over the course of the season.
Quite frankly, Sebastien Vettel should have won all three races. He led all three. Had mechanical trouble not afflicted him, he would have likely won them all. In Bahrain, an exhaust problem slowed him down. In Australia, something broke – I’m not sure if they ever agreed exactly what broke. However, in Malaysia all went to plan, and he won. Comfortably. Mark Webber was no match for Vettel.
There is little reason to suggest things will be different in China, where Vettel won last year. He is a driver of incredible speed, and has great maturity for his age. He is much more level-headed than Lewis Hamilton. Psychologically, he has few chinks in his armour. Put together with the fastest car on the grid, he has to be favourite at just about every Grand Prix this season. Ferrari and McLaren are both fast – as is Mercedes – but they aren’t quite fast enough. Kubica and Sutil have been the two fastest drivers outside of the top 4 teams so far this year, followed by Barrichello, so there is an interesting battle brewing between Renault, Force India and Williams. So, here are my top three for China:
I struggle to see, all things going to plan, that the top three could be any different. Let’s see what happens…
A while ago mrBen became aware that a number of sites on the shared hosting we had were hacked due to a bad plugin on one of the sites. Nothing major but annoying enough to be a pest. The site maybe down or have theme / plugin issues for the next while as I sort it out.
Also, slightly unrelated, Railman is on indefinite hiatus while I work ahead on that story and others. My quality of work isn’t high enough for publishing at the moment and I’m not happy releasing the stuff into the wild until i feel it’s ready. And recently my confidence has taken a knock which hasn’t helped anything.
Normal service should be resumed at some point…
- Alistair
Hi guys,
Your normally scheduled episode of Railman has been delayed.
Part nine (and parts of ten and eleven) just aren’t up to standard, so rather than send them out anyway I’m going to hold them back for a while. The Railman story is something that is lasting longer than I thought it would. It was just meant to be an exercise in keeping my hand in and coming up with a few odd scenes here and there to help the creative wheels turn. It may be something else now, i’m not sure where it’s going.
The uncertainty, the ‘just letting it wander’, has been fun – it still is - but that’s no excuse to let the quality slip. I know that eventually I’ll repost it as one complete work on it’s own page, and let it have a gentle edit where mistakes have slipped though and where scenes need to be longer.
I’ll post more when it’s available.
- Alistair
Mira is now three!
Jamie
After the thrills and spills of Australia last weekend, it’s Malaysia – and Sepang – this weekend. Going in to the weekend, it seems hard not to pick the Red Bulls to be the pace setters, though many are wondering if they will manage to finish the race. Eyes will also be on Michael Schumacher as he looks to beat his team-mate at the third attempt, though Nico Rosberg, who has impressed so far this season, will have other ideas.
It is, however, Ferrari and McLaren that will provide the most interesting battles up front. Alonso was by far the faster Ferrari in Australia, although Melbourne is hardly Massa’s favourite track. Bahrain was Massa’s first race back after his head injury, and so Malaysia will likely give us our first real look at the Alonso up against Massa. If Alonso beats Massa this weekend in the manner he did in Australia, then Massa is in for a long season. If Massa can give Alonso a run for his money this weekend, then maybe we will see a better scrap at Ferrari this year than it looked like last weekend. At McLaren, meanwhile, Lewis Hamilton will be determined to prove a point this weekend after a disaster in Australia, with poor team strategy and a tap from Mark Webber meaning he ended up watching his team-mate Jenson Button win a race he will feel he had a decent shout of taking the chequered flag in himself.
Further down the field – or not, as the case may be – some will be watching Robert Kubica to see if he is able to put in another strong performance after a second place finish in Australia. Nico Hulkenberg will be looking to put in a stronger performance against his experienced, but not lightening fast, team-mate Rubens Barrichello. BMW-Sauber will just be hoping the front wing stays glued to their cars. And so, without further ado, here is my top three for Malaysia:
I’m just hoping I have a little more success than in Bahrain!
The Bahrain Grand Prix wasn’t the most exciting race ever seen, and many felt that, given the rule changes, the Australian Grand Prix needed to produce some good racing. True to form, it did. It produced the usual Melbourne crashes, some changeable conditions throwing things wide open, and people on different pit strategies, resulting in a Grand Prix that even by Melbourne’s standards will be remembered for a while.
Vettel started from pole position and led from the start, with Webber following in second. Alonso got a poor start, placing him behind team-mate Felipe Massa. The race started in wet conditions, but the track quickly dried, and Jenson Button took a dive into the pits after an early safety car, swapping his intermediate tyres for dry tyres. It instantly looked like a mistake, as he went straight on at turn four, but soon was setting fastest sectors and in an instant, the rest of the pack – apart from the Red Bulls – came in and swapped their tyres for dry ones too. The Red Bull cars stopped slightly later, with Mark Webber losing out, but Vettel retained his lead, with Button behind him in second place – a significant gain over his sixth place before the stops. Vettel slowly started to pull away, and looked to have the race in the bag, a bit like in Bahrain. But then, like in Bahrain, trouble befell him, and his car ended up in the gravel trap, due to causes seemingly unknown. Brake failure was blamed, but Brembo, Red Bull’s brake suppliers, denied they were to blame. Anyhow, Vettel was out of the race, and somehow, Jenson Button was leading a race it looked like he had thrown away.
From there, Button didn’t look back. Later in the race, Webber and Hamilton both pitted again for fresh tyres and were comfortably faster, but were both too far back to do anything about Button. Along the way, Webber and Hamilton had a nice scrap, until Hamilton tried to pull a move on Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso, who hung him out to dry on the outside and then scooted off into the distance as Mark Webber forgot to brake and went straight into the back of Hamilton.
My personal highlight of the race, however, was when Kobayashi lost his front wing on the first lap, spearing towards the inside of the track and t-boning a Toro Rosso out of the way and into the gravel trap – causing the day’s only safety car. Top quality crash, even by his standards.
So what did Australia tell us? For a start, it reminded us that some tracks always produce good races – and reminded us that some don’t. Bahrain is definitely in the latter category. It also told us that it will be much better for drivers to one-stop than two-stop this year, as track position proved very important. And what does that mean? It means that drivers who look after their tyres better will, if everyone stops once, be in a much better position at the end of the race.
The race also showed us that Red Bull are definitely the fastest car, that, depending upon reliability, Vettel will be quite something to stop this year, that Alonso looks to be smashing Massa into the ground at Ferrari, that Button’s career isn’t finished at McLaren – and that Hamilton is still lacking the maturity that he needs to be the most complete racing driver in Formula 1. Roll on Malaysia…
People who know me well know that I have a passion for Rwanda. It is said to be a beautiful country, full of fertile plains and hills. The people are said to be a remarkable people. The history of Rwanda is a history of great intrigue, sadness and violence. It certainly isn’t a comfortable read, yet there is something incredibly intriguing about the country, and there has, over the past couple of years, been a growth in the number of Third Sector organisations working in the country, which has been very good to see.
I myself have been looking at finding a way of doing some work in the country for some time. As a technically minded person, I have always seen my skills as a good avenue for finding work in the country. A few months ago (before Christmas) I sent a chance email to a bureaucrat in the Rwandan Government, having looked at their website (it’s not much to look at, is it?). This being Africa, there are plenty of them. Anyway, I waited a few weeks and heard nothing in return. This didn’t surprise me. I forgot about it.
Anyway, in mid-February I finally received a reply. Over an exchange of emails, I took them through Sassenach CMS, a content management system I have been working on for a while and am currently re-writing when I get a moment. Anyway, the upshot of it, after a little to- and fro- of emails, the government have officially invited me to join their Internet Infrastructure team, which is their way of talking about their government websites and incorporates their drive to make more information available to people in Rwanda through the Internet, which will, hopefully, revolutionise communication and education in Rwanda once technology and Internet are more widely available in the country (which is, admittedly, a large and expensive job). The contract is for one year initially, with an option of extending the contract for another year after that, subject to final confirmation of a visa. I will also have to learn Kinyarwanda, the official language of the country. There is also a French graphic designer and coder who has been recruited to help with this project, and who will also help with translation into French. We are both expecting to start this, and move out to Rwanda, by around late July / early August as long as everything goes smoothly.
There is more information about this exciting new project on the Rwandan Government website (English version).
Finally! The book launch was on Friday just there and muggins here picked up two copies. I had already received my personal copy but my mother was over last week and my first ever copy of a book with a story of my very own found it’s way into her hands.
Oh well.
But I have another copy for myself and one for a friend of the family.
A bit of Info about the book can be found here on the Whiteinch Centre website.
If you want a copy please contact them through their website or down the blower (0141 950 4434).
It will be available soon to buy through Amazon and possibly in bricks and mortar stores, but I’m not sure about that.
Happy reading.
- Alistair
After a hiatus of 12 months, the Classic Yak crew returns with the beginning of season two. This episode includes an extended welcome back, and a discussion of where we find good male role models in current society.
Additional Audio Credits
Send your feedback to show@classicyak.org, post it on the forums or Bebo, or MySpace, join the Facebook group, or leave a plain old voicemail on +44 (0)845 867 6316.
*new* You can now also grab us on Twitter – twitter.com/classicyak
After a hiatus of 12 months, the Classic Yak crew returns with the beginning of season two. This episode includes an extended welcome back, and a discussion of where we find good male role models in current society. Introduction and Welcome Back [00:15] Male Role Models [10:37] Outro [31:18] Pilgrims Progress Promo [33:28] End [35:31] Additional Audio Credits Steady B by Trafic de Blues on the album Fin de Cavale Time to Funk by Trafic de Blues on the album Fin de Cavale Promo for Pilgrims Progress by Spirit Blade Productions Send your feedback to show@classicyak.org, post it on the forums or Bebo, or MySpace, join the Facebook group, or leave a plain old voicemail on +44 (0)845 867 6316. *new* You can now also grab us on Twitter - twitter.com/classicyakYet another episode. Hope you like.
- Alistair
Braddock stood on the balcony outside the docker’s office and, leaning on the rail, looked out at the incredible scene unfolding before him. It was mid-morning by his reckoning and the docks were busier than they had been in years. Transports, flat-beds and hoppers were picking up and dropping off on every rail.
He thought of Alice way up in the crane’s cab. Poor lass, he thought. Nothing had prepared her for this. He should have swapped her out for a more seasoned worker but he needed them all on the platforms. And Braddock realised that he should have been out there in the thick of it but Peru hadn’t turned up this morning – he was sure her illness was getting worse – so he had to manage the office and the resulting paperwork. He kicked himself for not spending the time training up someone else instead of taking on the work but who could have known it would be so busy again?
He stood straight and stretched, years of hard work keeping the muscles in his shoulders and back tight, and watched as Gregor slid down the ladder from the third highest rail, named Ringlet, and jumped the last couple of feet to the floor of the docks. Braddock winced at how dangerous his beloved docks had become this morning. Gregor, of course, landed with ease and raced over to the office.
The docks office was above a small storeroom and wooden stairs, with a small landing halfway, led to the first level and to Braddock.
‘Good man, that Gregor,’ he said with his gravelled voice. He gestured through to the office behind him. ‘One copy goes in the tray, both get stamped. You know the drill.’ Gregor saluted sharply, which Braddock returned with a curt nod and a smile, and dashed inside.
Gregor found the stamp, spat on the dry pad, and banged the stamp hard there and again on the forms where he had been shown. He threw one copy down in the tray and ran back outside to return the copy to the driver.
He never noticed a solitary light blinking steadily on the console in the corner of the office. It blinked into life and a single line of text ran across the in-laid screen.
- Repositioning complete -, it said.
On the balcony Braddock watched Gregor race back along the dock and up the ladder to the Ringlet rail. He laughed to himself. The boy’ll sleep well tonight, he thought.
The light on the console blinked faster and faster then changed from amber to a steady red.
- System Error -
Braddock looked up at the Ringlet line. That hopper was on its way now and he saw a flat-bed waiting at the edge of the dome to come in. Gregor knew the drill, all the boys did. There was no reason to spend all his morning by the office. Working a sly flat-bed or two couldn’t hurt.
- Rebuilding Engine -
Braddock walked back into the office to retrieve his gauntlets from where he kept them. The screen in the corner was blank.
I saw today that the Labour Party have given their website a new look. On the same day, the party launched their pledge card for the next election. I can’t help but feel that both the website and the pledge card are rough around the edges, lacking an attention to detail sorely missing since the acclaimed “New Labour” days. There are a few things that have slipped under the radar, and Labour’s message suffers for that.
Let’s start with the website. To be honest, the Labour Party always seem to be updating their website, but it never seems to get very much better. With the latest refresh, they have at least got their message and logo right at the top, with a Labour logo and the “future fair for all” banner, along with a logo to go with it. There are two problems with the “future fair for all” banner though. Firstly, the “future fair for all” logo looks, in some versions, like a railway bridge. On the main website, it looks like a setting sun. You know, as in, a sunset. OK, so some people may say it’s meant to be a sunrise, but still, did no-one in the Labour Party see the massive own goal they’re letting themselves in for there?
Three more things on the website. Firstly, the actual slogan, “a future fair for all”. I don’t like it, and I’ll tell you why. It’s not directional. It’s ideational. It’s not practical. It’s ideological – to an extent – but it doesn’t go beyond saying “wouldn’t it be nice if the world was fairer”. It would carry more impact with a subtle change to something like “building a fairer future for all”, as that carries the idea that it is something that requires action to achieve. It gives an impression of purpose and direction. It’s more promising and positive, rather than wishful, which is more how “a future fair for all” comes across.
Secondly, there is a section entitled “Back the Ban”. For most Labour-minded people, backing the ban on fox hunting with hounds is like having a shower when you get up. Decent people do it. Personally, I couldn’t care less about a pesky fox that tears apart farmers’ chickens, and would gladly carry out the equivalent of a Canadian seal hunt given the chance. Still, that’s for another day. The point is, on the website – the Labour Party website – it says, “the next parliament may see legislation introduced which specifically allows foxes to be ripped apart at the teeth of hounds. Will you join us in fighting this barbarity?”. Now I should say, the statement is correct. My response is “no”. But the point is this: Labour are basically saying, on their website, “we might lose”. It is a negative statement, instigated from a negative mindset. It contributes to a mindset that says Labour will lose, best to operate an opposition mindset. This is not the right way of doing things. Instead, Labour, as the governing party, should use that initiative. Turn it on the Tories. It should say, “The Tories want to legislate to allow hounds to rip foxes apart. Help us to fight this barbarity”. This asserts power in a way an opposition mindset isn’t able to do.
Thirdly, why on earth is there a big blue bar going across the website, which, when selected, turns all the words yellow? #FAIL! I see blue, I think of Tories. I see yellow, I think of Lib Dems. I see a bolder yellow, I think of the SNP. The blue shouldn’t be blue, it should be red. And the yellow – well, it’s not so much an issue then, actually. But you don’t go scoring own goals like that. Whoever is in charge of the web team at Labour HQ needs to raise their game and think of brand image a little more.
That said, whoever was in charge of the pledge card should be in even more trouble. have you seen it?
What, at first look, does that look like? OK, forget whether it’s a sunrise or a sunset, what does it look like past that? Does it remind you of old Corn Flakes adverts? or Muesli boxes? I half-expect to see a rooster with a bowl of breakfast cereal, with skimmed milk pouring down the screen – and then there’s the logo on the right, at the top. See what I mean about the railway bridge? It looks strange, adding nothing to the message. Some people will also say that the writing is hard to read, which it is on a screen, but in print, it won’t pose a problem.
There are two main problems with the background image. Firstly, it’s not a great image. It is full of glare and looks like it was taken by an amateur. It is doubtless a stock photo from a website specialising in those kinds of photos, but there is no vibrancy to the colour, no clarity. It looks a little washed out, tired even. It seems to symbolise the ageing days of a condemned administration – not the kind of image you want to give off when you stand accused of being just that! Secondly, the image adds nothing to the message. It is a wasted image. The picture is what people will see first – before the writing – and so it needs to draw people in. It doesn’t. It would be much better to use an image that can back up one of the pledges. Here’s something I knocked up:
Now before I get slated for a sloppy effort, I should say I spent no more than half an hour on this, and it only took that long because I was working in GIMP, which is an image editor and little more. It isn’t designed for content creation, which is what I was really doing here. I would normally use CorelDraw for this sort of effort, but I don’t have it at home, sadly. Anyway, The Labour logo is now in red – corporate colours (and by the way, Labour Party people, your available logos for people to use in publicity through your website is absolutely abysmal and had got progressively worse over the last few years) – with a very simple mask to make it easy to see amongst the background.
On the right are the pledges – slightly modified, if you look closely. For example, “securing the recovery” has always sounded very awkward, why not refer to “strong economic recovery”? It sums up the aim in a much more positive light. Why only raise family living standards? I am a single man, and I’ve just been alienated there. Talk of general living standards, and of families within that.
The last pledge did say “strengthen fairness in communities”. Now I know Gordon Brown is a fan of this fairness, but actually, if you strengthen communities, they should be fairer too. And besides, how do you define “fairness”? It’s a throwaway term. Useless. For every one way you show fairness to have improved, you’ll find then people to show you where it got worse, but it is easy to show that you have strengthened communities, as long as you have.
Now look at the background. I’ll grant you, it’s not the best, but I’ve actually nicked it from other Labour Party material. It’s the best I could find in limited time. It’s a man, and he’s working. Thus, it links in with economic recovery, but also, potentially, with the high tech economy. It would be great to see a pledge card engaging with the high tech economy pledge. I have, as you can see, taken out the “future fair for all” logo. It had no value.
So there you go, a (not so quick) run-down of Labour’s pledge cards and new website. Verdict: must do better. Labour Party HQ, please feel free to contact me to discuss further. And would you believe it, just before I go to publish, a Labour Pledge spoof website has been launched! Have fun!
Think I’m the only one thinking this? Check out Beau Bo D’Or, who has it right on the money!
It is less than two weeks since the opening of the 2010 F1 season, but I struggle to remember anything memorable from it. It was the dullest race in recent memory, with only the USGP from 2005 competing. It was, perhaps, inevitable given the hype before the season started – but all the same, it was abysmal. According to the Guardian, even Lewis Hamilton’s mum was bored. It must have been bad.
Still, we now travel to the more interesting surroundings of the usual season opener in Melbourne. This is a much different track to Bahrain. It is hard on break wear and is more akin to a street track, with imposing barriers and many challenging corners. Cars need good traction at Melbourne, along with a strong engine and good brakes.
The race in Australia usually produces good racing, action and crashes. In 1999, Alex Zanardi spectacularly crashed over the kerb on the exit of turn 4, and last year. Vettel and Kubica came together with only two laps left. David Coulthard managed to lose a rear wing in qualifying one year, and Heinz-Harold Frentzen’s Williams debut in 1998 ended with brake failure whilst the two McLarens used their extra 3rd pedal to win in one of the most dominating performances in living memory. In 1996, Jacques Villeneuve was winning until suffering an oil leak in the closing stages, whilst Michael Schumacher crashed out in 2006, took a storming drive to 12th place in 1999 and watched his brother Ralf take off like Concorde over the back of Rubens Barrichello in 2002. Talking of taking off, Jacques Villeneuve flew straight on at turn 3 in 2001, a flying wheel striking and killing a marshall, Martin Brundle went for a few barrel rolls in 1995, Coulthard crashed into the pit entry in 2005, Damon Hill failed to make the start in his first race in defence of his F1 title in 1997 and David Coulthard, in another moment of madness, almost decapitated Alexander Wurz in 2007 in a move Takuma Sato and Nazuki Najajima would think twice about. And to think, we’ve only been coming to Melbourne for 15 years!
The Australian Grand Prix is never a disappointment. If the race is dull this weekend, F1 will have serious image problems this year. We need a good race. The Red Bull came out of nowhere in Bahrain to demonstrates a huge one-lap superiority over everyone else, whilst the McLaren seemed a little off the pace. Ferrari will be confident of adding another victory to their 1-2 in Bahrain. Michael Schumacher will be looking to show Nico Rosberg that he is still King after being beaten in every session for only the second time in 249 races in Bahrain, and Jenson Button will be hoping to answer his critics for dismissing his chances as he lines up against Lewis Hamilton, who had the upper hand first time out. So anyway, without further ado, here is my prediction for the podium in Australia:
I correctly picked Alonso as the winner last time out, and also picked Hamilton on the podium, though he finished in 3rd rather than 2nd. I am confident of another Ferrari win, but Felipe Massa doesn’t have a fantastic track record at Melbourne. To be honest, I’m hedging my bets. Massa may spoil my podium party, but I’m saying he’ll come in fourth. Time will tell…
Last updated:
July 30, 2010 09:00 AM
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