The Into Geek Carnival!

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It’s finally time for the Into Geek Carnival! The premise is simple- I create a theme and then you go and write a post about it!  Once you’ve published a post add it to the linky below and if you can I’d be grateful if you could use the code above to put the event logo on your post too!
This year’s theme is:
 TECHNOLOGY.
Here’s a few suggestions to what you could write about:

• A piece of technology you have bought recently
• Five gadgets you love/want/hope will be made
• A look into the future, either accurately or completely made up
• An idea for a piece of technology
• A poem/piece of artwork/comic on this theme
• Websites you love

The theme is as free as you want it to be and you can interpret it in any way you like. I shall make my post tomorrow and you have a week to add yours to the linky below. Please check out other people’s posts too! There's more info on the Carnival page!

Science Fiction or Science Fact?

This post is part of the Into Geek Carnival which you can join in with here.

As the theme is technology, I am going to look at various things that sci-fi tells us will happen and decided whether they ever will.

The Thing: Flying Cars (possibly which drive themselves)

Going to happen?: Unlikely, in the proper sci-fi form anyway. The possible methods to cause flight would all require the vehicle to be much bigger than a typical road car. However there are a number of legal road vehicles that do actually have the ability to fly. Here’s a few examples:

As you can see, none of those really look like normal cars. And as for the driving themselves? Well that’s quite likely. Planes have used autopilot systems for years. For most of a flight on a commercial plane it is not being flown manually. Cars have been produced which can drive by themselves on the road but aren’t widely available yet. However, many high-end cars now park themselves so the technology is already being used.

The Thing: Everything in the home being run by a single computer

Going to happen?: Probably! If you think about it most of the appliances in your home have some sort of computer to work them and so connecting them all is certainly possible. Microsoft’s house of the future has demonstrated the possibilities of such a thing. From a main screen you could turn all the lights on and off and control lots of other things in the house. Most things were connected using cloud technology. Here’s a few incredible images:

For more about this house I recommend this website.

The Thing: Hoverboards

Going to happen?: Maybe. At the moment the only real way of even attempting to do this is using a leafblower but these home-made creations are hardly like the ones in Back to the Future. However, an invention called the Mag Surf does a better job.

Built by researchers in France, the Mag Surf uses superconducter magnetic levitation. Super-cold liquid nitrogen turns a special metal material on the bottom of the board into a superconductor, which powerfully repels the magnetic field in the track and pins the board to the edge of the field. The effect is like an invisible rail. It’s not exactly powerful though and requires their to be metal under the track. It only hovers 3cm above the ground and has a maximum weight limit of around 100kg. But it’s a start. Here’s a video because I know you want to see this in action!

The Thing: Time Machine

Going to happen?: Probably not. Scientists are in debate whether it’s even possible. The only way you might be able to travel in time is by going through a wormhole but this isn’t certain. Humans haven't even ever discovered one yet so they might not even exist. Even if they did humans would have to travel for an incredibly long time to get there. But this is probably a good thing as messing with time could have all sorts of negative effects on the universe.

The Thing: Teleportation

Going to happen?: Maybe. Scientists have successfully teleported some atoms, though the way of doing it is complicated. They technically didn’t transport the atoms but transferred their properties to other atoms, essentially making these atoms the same as the original atom. However, doing it with anything more than a few atoms is a long way off. For one thing it would be incredibly complex to ensure that the original was completely changed and to keep the person alive. There’s also the memory issue. Someone worked out it would take 10⁴⁵ bits to perfectly recreate an average adult down to the quantum level of a computer. Today a terrabyte can store up to 10¹² bits. Therefore you would need an enormous computer, with more memory than has ever been created, just to recreate one person!

Well I hope you enjoyed that, it certainly got my mind thinking. Please go and join in with the Into Geek Carnival, it would make my day. Over and out!

Chart Chasers #4

Hello and welcome once again to Chart Chasers, where I check out the five highest new entries in the UK chart. What rubbish will I have to endure this week? Will there be anything good? Well it’s time to find out!

Our first song today is number 40 in the charts and is by Nadia Ali (whoooo?). The track is called Rapture. Please tell me singers aren’t predicting the end of the world too!

I’m sure this is a cover isn’t it, I recognise the tune? Maybe someone can confirm my suspicions. Either way, it’s clear Nadia has to no talent as they have resorted to using autotune fairly obviously. I can’t really think of anything good to say about this one. It doesn’t annoy me so I guess that’s a plus but it's not exactly a pleasure to listen to… 1/5

Next up are Jay Z and Kanye West at number 37 with a song called Ni**as Paris. Sounds charming. I’m not really a fan of rapping though both of these two have done some OK stuff over the years. Apparently if you’re epileptic you shouldn’t watch this and if you want to avoid explicit language I suggest the same.

Woah, that had lots of flashing lights, I feel like I might have an epileptic fit. As expected I didn’t really like this but I’ve heard worse. At least it has a tune and Jay Z is the master of rapping. I shall give it 2/5

In at number 35 is Jason Deruloooooooooo with a track called Breathing. I quite like Mr. Derulooooooooo’s work and go completely mad for it when I’ve consumed alcohol (that’s what I’ve been told anyway). I wonder whether this will have the same effect:

I rather like that and imagine that in some point in the future I shall be “singing” this very loudly when it plays in a club somewhere. I think it’s my fave Derulo track for quite a while too. Great pop song! 4/5

Way up at 30 are Coldplay with Charlie Brown. I have the album this track is on so know it fairly well but here it is for those that want a listen:

This is a very Coldplay song and this means you will probably either love it or hate it. It’s a fantastic track and I really can’t say a bad thing about it. 5/5.

Our final song of the day, and the highest new entry this week at number 9, is Ass Back Home by Gym Class Heroes with some help from Neon Hitch. The quality of Gym Class Heroes songs seems to vary greatly so I wonder what this one will be like.

Well Neon, at least I assume that’s the woman’s name, has a great voice. It’s no Stereo Hearts but this is a good effort from Mr. McCoy and friends. 3/5.

 

That’s it for this week! I feel slightly confused as normally by this point I have got fully enraged by some of the songs. None have done that this week and in fact the standard is fairly high. Perhaps the British public is finally learning what good music sounds like. Ha, like that’ll ever happen!

King of the Castle

First of all I would like to say a warm welcome to all my new followers, it’s great to have you on board! I’ve had quite an influx lately which is really nice. Remember guys that I love hearing from you so comment away on this or any other post! And secondly I’m sure you’ve noticed by striking new header. I felt that some elements of the old one didn't work too well so I’ve made this new one with me (in the form of a Mii) sitting in the middle of some of my favourite characters. Anyway, I hope you like it.

Last night my bizarre dreams of late continued. In this one my friend Stefan and I blew up a bank. Except it looked like Stefan but wasn’t quite Stefan, like it was his doppelganger or something. Quite why we blew up the bank rather than rob it is beyond me and I do wonder where the hell we got the explosives from. Immediately after we blew up the bank we went to the pub. People from Winchester may know said pub, which is called Alfie’s. Somehow no-one had any idea who blew the bank up but the police set up a huge investigation where they interviewed everyone who was in the area at the time. We kept hiding round corners from then every time they came to find us and other people in the pub said we had looked suspicious. I was living my life in fear, knowing eventually I would probably be imprisoned for that one mad moment where I decided to go a bit crazy with explosives. By the time I woke up though I still hadn’t been arrested. It took me a while to realise the events were a dream though and that I hadn’t in fact blown up any buildings!

Today I went on a little trip to a place called Portchester, which is a small town on the coast not too far from the city of Portsmouth. This wasn’t just a whim, I went there as a trial run of the commute I have to do when I start my placement in school, as that is where the school I’m in is. I arrived in a very small station, which doesn’t even have ticket machines. If I’m sly and a little bit naughty this might save me a few pounds! The school was easy to find and is also tiny, which will be a bit weird. Now it would have been a bit of a waste of a trip had I then come straight back home so I decided to visit the local castle. To get there I had to walk through most of the town, which is pretty nice. That might be though because it was a really lovely sunny day and I think anywhere would have looked nice.

Eventually I arrived at the castle. It’s mostly ruins but the keep is mostly intact and is quite impressive.

There are walls around the castle and a big grassy area which are Roman and built as a fort by them. The keep you see above was built by the Normans shortly after their successful invasion of Britain in 1066. Being on the coast meant it was quite important strategically.

The bits below, which are mostly ruins now, were designed for King Richard II, who lived there fairly regularly. It would have been extremely grand fit for a king with huge windows and lots of space.

After the Hundred Years war the castle became less important for war and became a place King Richard liked to live. He had a grand hall where feasts would have been held. After him it was largely pretty empty for a few hundred years and was just used for storage, mostly of wine. Then in the Eighteenth century it became a prison of war camp for prisoners of the Napoleonic wars. Around 3000 prisoners were squashed into what is a relatively small keep and it would have been an extremely unpleasant experience. It wasn’t all bad though as they spend lots of time gambling with dice and dominoes and made a wide range of items which they were allowed to sell to the public. In fact they were so good at making one item the locals complained that they were undercutting their prices!

This information came from an audio tour, which was done by a “French” prisoner and one of his guards. I use speech marks here as it was clearly an English person doing an over the top French accent. But that just made it more entertaining which was good as sometimes these guides can be a bit dull. It was very good considering it was completely free. You could climb right to the top of the keep and as it was such a lovely day the view was really something.

In the first of those pictures you can see the Roman walls and across the harbour the city of Portsmouth. You can just about make out the famous Spinnaker Tower if you look closely. I’m really glad that I decided to visit the castle in the end as it was a great experience. I love castles!

I couldn’t help but notice Portchester had a very obvious way of naming it’s streets. Although in most towns you might get the odd town named after a building that sits there like “Church Road”,Portchester seemed to have loads of obvious names. There was Station Road, Castle Street and White Hart Lane, named after a pub which bizarrely has been converted into a supermarket. Quite why the supermarket chain thought “I know, let’s buy that old pub and make it a supermarket” is unknown. They have even put a little sign for their supermarket in the pub sign. It seems a lovely town, though with some not so lovely people around. The area around Portsmouth has the most horrible people in on the South coast, perhaps even the entire country. That doesn’t mean that everyone who lives there is scum, it just means that a lot of scum live there! But still,I think it will probably be a nice place to do my school placement in and the school itself seems pretty awesome too. I can’t wait!

Muppet of a Man

Hello there. You join me at a weird time of my life. Pretty much everyone else around me is stressing out or at the very least working pretty hard to get their assignments done. But I am not one of those people, as I finished mine on Wednesday. It was way ahead of the schedule I had in my mind but I got into writing and knocked out 1,400 words in a couple of hours. So unlike everyone else I’ve got over a week to sit around and do very little before I start my placement in school. In some way this is good but actually it’s bad in a lot of ways too. No-one else really has any free time whereas I have bucket-loads. It looks like I shall have to entertain myself for a while.

It’s also a weird time because I’ve been having some pretty weird dreams. The other night was one which confused me a little, but I can’t go into the details here. It’s just weird when you realise what your subconscious actually wants and have to consider properly whether such a thing would be achievable. But then I’ve also been having a recurring one which is really very unpleasant. The setting changes a fair bit. It’s most commonly set on a cruise ship but sometimes in a massive industrial unit with offices in or somewhere else. It’s always a large building though but with no way of escape. In the dreams I am chased by a never-ending series of assassins. Fortunately, being the action hero I am (clearly my subconscious has a high opinion of the normal conscious), I am always able to take out these assassins. I’ve not once been killed in these dreams like you might expect. But the dream-me knows that eventually I will tire but the assassins will keep coming and eventually they will succeed. And I’m trapped and have to wait for the inevitable to happen. It’s that which is the disconcerting bit. What all this means, I dread to think. Maybe there’s some dream-analysist out there who could tell me. Anyone have any theories?

The highlight of my week was finally going to see The Muppets at the cinema yesterday. I am a massive Muppets fan and have been waiting for this movie for ages. It came out in the US in November but only came out here in the UK on the 10th February. But yesterday I did finally get to see it. It was awesome. It definitely lived up to my expectations. Firstly because it’s the usual craziness and sillyness that is a Muppets film. Secondly because the storyline worked very well, with the Muppets putting on a new show in an attempt to save their studios. The moment a new version of the famous titles came up was magical. Thirdly, because it avoided the frustration of other films where they only used a few of the massive Muppet gang. Almost all of the gang made a decent appearance. Apart from Rizzo. There was a brief appearance of several Muppet rats but I’m not really sure if one of them was him. Fourthly, because there were lots of little nods to the Muppet history. Various mentions of stars and acts in the original show as well as the odd nod to previous movies. Fifthly, because the human characters worked well but not as brilliantly as the new Muppet Walter, the ultimate Muppets fan. I could relate to him so well being a big Muppet fan myself. And finally, though as you may have realised, I could go on for ever: the songs. Every single one was brilliant but I particularly loved “'Life’s a Happy Song”, which is this one:

Oh and I didn’t mention the cameos. They were brilliant too. Suffice to say I shall be buying this movie on DVD the second it comes out. There’ll be a full review of this in the next Friday Review, though I think you can guess that the star rating is going to be pretty high…

The trip to the cinema was pretty cheap to. My mate Stefan drove us so I didn’t have to pay for the train. And we got a good deal on the parking. We were there longer than we paid for but no-one noticed and we saved 20p because Stefan put in 20p too little by mistake and the parking warden just wrote a note on the ticket and didn’t make us pay. A nice parking warden is something I didn’t think I’d ever see but it is apparent they do exist. Because were at an early afternoon screening it was really quiet in the cinema, just us and a family. This meant we got to sit in the luxury seats (which are leather with loads of leg room) despite the fact we hadn’t paid for them. But don’t tell anyone! My Mum and Dad thought I was especially sad seeing this film. Maybe I am but there’s something about the Muppets that make them appeal to adults much more than other films. There were plenty of jokes that kids wouldn’t have got, and these weren’t because they were sex jokes like most family films throw in secretly, it’s just because they required an adult to understand them. It was the perfect way to spend a Thursday afternoon. Maybe I should do the same next Thursday afternoon and every Thursday afternoon after that. I really could!

It’s been another crazy week of being a primary education student. Sometimes I forget I’m doing a degree and think I’ve been sent back to primary school. In our English seminar I got to read “We’re Going on a Bear Hunt” and in the maths seminar after it we made 3D shapes out of straws and plastacine. My triangular prism was pretty accurate. And today in our science seminar, amongst other things, we had to make a flower out of plastacine. Ours was really good if I say myself. As you would expect, I took a picture on my phone:

Check that bad boy out, it’s got a stigma and some stamen and everything. (Note to self, never use the phrase “bad boy” again, especially not when describing plastacine flowers. It doesn’t suit you. )

I have become addicted to ebay over the last few days. As addictions go it’s better than drugs or smoking but probably not much better than gambling. I’ve been bidding on things all over the place and doing by best to win various items, mostly Doctor Who related. At least because I’m poor unless I really want something the maximum bid I put on is a measly £3. So far I’ve lost five things and won a Doctor Who DVD of “The Three Doctors”. I’m currently winning ten other auctions and I really hope I don’t win them all actually because it will cost me loads. It’s fortunate really the most any of them will cost me in total at the moment is £6. I’m thinking ebay will be a good way to get stuff I want cheap, but I should be careful about bidding on everything.

Well I think that’s all from me for now. I’m trying to write more of this kind of post, about my life, as they tend to be better ones. It just means I actually have to do interesting things so I can talk about them! If all goes to plan I shall be going on a little adventure tomorrow so I should be able to talk about that a little. So I shall be back within the next couple of days for more fun things!

The Last 13 Things I…

 

A different kind of post today as I’m participating in a cool link-up thing. For today only the task is to write about the last 13 things you did which is quite good as it gives an interesting insight into people’s lives. So let’s do it!

1: Ate- That was a typical student dinner in the form of chicken nuggets and potato wedges. I don’t really like chips so I always have wedges instead. And it was with BBQ sauce, a particularly nice one I might add which is “lightly spiced”. Who needs fine dining when a meal like this is satisfactory?

2: Listened to- That would be this track from the new Muppets movie. Which I finally got to saw today. There will be much, much, much more about this tomorrow. I might end up raving quite a lot!

3: Watched- That would be a repeat of Russell Howard’s Good News on Dave. On the show Russell Howard makes fun of the weeks news. Dave is basically a repeats channel so this was an old one, which means it’s not really news anymore. Still funny though!

4: Purchased- This depends on whether you count bidding on ebay. Until today I have never bidded on anything on ebay and then started bidding on all sorts of things. I’m winning various items at the moment, mostly Doctor Who related. But if you don’t count bidding it would be the ticket to watch the Muppets, which was pretty reasonable I must say.

5: Tweeted- I have adapted this to mean “tweeted that wasn’t a link to my blog or saying I’m listening to that song I mentioned a minute ago”. In that case, it is this:

Have BBC News on waiting for something decent to start and they start making jokes about a place called "Flash". Glad I witnessed that...

— Dan(@zotwot) February 23, 2012

My Twitter is basically just random stuff like that. You should follow me!

6: Drank: Plain old tap water I’m afraid, everything else costs money which is in short supply at the moment. My friends who have come from a fair distance away hate the water here as it is particularly ‘hard’. Having been brought up on it I’m used to it and can’t really imagine anything else. It’s odd that there’s such a difference though.

7: Wished For: More food! I’m hungry and I have nothing in the house to eat!

8: Text I Sent: This says “Yes, I’ll be on then”. That is in reference to a conversation on Skype with my father. It was a decent conversation, if short.

9: Person I saw: Unless you count my dad on Skype that would be housemate Jaz. He was putting washing on the line in the hope it will dry over night. In the UK, in February. He is a crazy fool.

10: Person I spoke to on the phone: Well kind of my dad again, though that was Skype so not really the phone. On the actual phone was my friend Louise as we were trying to organise going to the cinema but in the end I ended up going with my other friend Stefan. He drove us, which was awesome.

11: Thing I hand-wrote: I had to do some ticking on a form, does that count? If not it is probably lecture notes, though I hardly write notes these days. I just print off the PowerPoint slides and keep them. It’s very rare that the lecture will give out any information that isn’t on the slides and in those cases I write things down.

12: Thing I smelled: Soap when I washed my hands. Or possibly food, which made me even more hungry.

13: Game I played: Myself and Stefan indulged in some Mario Kart Wii online today. I was putting in a poor performance compared to normal. It would appear the Spanish are particularly good at it as there were a lot of them doing very well.

And there you have it, the last thirteen things I did. Clicking on the image at the top will take you one of the hosts of this event. And I am hosting an exciting event of my own on February 29th! Visit the “Carnival” page for more info!

Geekgasm #3

Hurrah, it’s time for another Geekgasm. I think my favourite thing about this feature so far is that it’s been quite different every week. I never know exactly what I’m going to put here so you will have even less of a clue!

TV

This is the section where I talk about TV shows which are generally considered “cult” TV shows. Contains spoilers.

Being Human: “The Graveyard Shift”

In three episodes this show has gone from being something I might like to one of my fave shows ever. I am definitely going to have watch the first three series at some point. In this episode Hal starts working at a Greasy Spoon with Tom and a load of vampires show up to kill Tom. Apparently Hal used to be a vampire leader, one of the “old ones”. He’s changed now which is good. Meanwhile, Annie meets Regus, the vampire recorder, and amongst other things creates a hilarious “sex” scene. Basically Regus is a dirty old man vampire and tries to witness sex through Annie’s memory. But as it is her memory it happens like he was Annie and is basically kissed and had things done to by a guy. It was one of the funniest things I’ve seen in months, if not years.

The Walking Dead: “Trigger Finger”

Despite being an action filled episode, this one did seem a bit pointless. It sort of just rounds of the cliffhangers from the last episode and ends. Rick, Glen and Hershel escape from more survivors and a hoard, not before saving a man who has got his leg caught through a spiked fence by ripping it off said fence. Lori has to deal with a few walkers herself but then is found by Shane and is fine. Everyone else goes a bit mental, especially Darryl who is not a happy chap at the moment. It was a decent episode but in terms of plot building it didn’t really do a lot. Also, when a zombie bit of a mans nose my housemate Dannie declared she was hungry. Should I shoot her now or wait until she’s fully turned?

News From the Whoniverse

Finally the 7th series of Doctor Who has started filming and we’ve got a bit of news, mostly about casting. Here’s the first promo shot of The Doctor and the Ponds:

And the following people have been announced as guest-stars, all three of which are exciting:

• Mark Williams who you know as Arthur Weasley in the Harry Potter films. He’s also been playing Regus in Being Human at the moment.

• David Bradley who you know as Mr. Filch in Harry Potter.

• Rupert Graves who plays Lestrade in Moffat’s other show Sherlock (desperately hopes he says “Not my division” in Who as well!)

I am very excited for all of these, they should be awesome!

Pintresting Things of the Week

This week I have got an account of Pintrest, where you pin pictures to virtual pinboards. I have made a geeky board and it makes sense to share with you the best things from that board each week! So here we go!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Control, Alt, Delete Cushions

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Mushroom Kingdom Style

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Star Wars- Where’s Wally- with guests.

 

 

I hope you enjoyed this week’s Geekgasm and there’ll be more stuff like this next Wednesday!

The Usual Antics

Hello. I believe it is long overdue for me to write a post about the recent things I’ve been up to. These posts should probably come around more often but things get hectic.

Let me take you all the way back to Friday night. It was a Pokémon themed night at our student union so I joined my housemates on a night out there. They are supposed to be fancy dress really but I never really do. In fact this is the second time I’ve been to the student union this academic year so it really was a rarity. I did attempt to print off a sheet which would have been a Pokedex and was planning to go round marking off when I’d spotted certain Pokémon. I gave up on that idea that in the end though, mainly because it probably looked a bit too sad. The rest of my housemates all dyed their hair, mostly because they could, and despite the fact that I was dressed normally I felt like the one who was out of place.

It was a good night in the end though and as you might expect I got very drunk. It doesn’t take a lot these days though because I go out so little. In terms of amusing stories I’m not sure there are that many. The people that were with me could probably tell you a few but my memory of the night is not so good. My mate Stefan realised no picture of us together actually exist so the moment he saw me we headed straight for the photographer who capture a decent one of us. Stefan also reappeared later on in the night where he pretty much jumped on me. Inevitably I fell over but apparently I was laughing lots about it. Eventually we left and went home, though I ended up stopping at the chip shop on the way home. This photo of me on the walk back probably summarises the night:

As was also expected, I was a bit sick the next morning. It was at this point that the chips seemed like a bad idea. I could go on to tell you exactly why but you really don’t want to know. Let’s just say it wasn’t pleasant. Still, as hangovers go it wasn’t too bad and by some miracle that afternoon I was in the library doing work with a friend. I did several hours work which is surprising enough on a Saturday, let alone on one where I was hungover. I feel very proud of myself.

On that morning I was excited to receive a package in the post. It contained my scarf which my parents had sent back to me after I left it at home. I love that scarf and missed it greatly. It’s called Mr. Scarf. Also in the package was a mysterious CD with no markings on. Completely unsure what to expect,I put in my laptop and listened to it. It turned out to be a CD of happy songs and comedy sketches like “Always Look on the Bright Side of Life”. This was because I had been feeling down and sounded really sad on the phone. Combine this with a father who apparently has nothing better to do and you get that bizarre CD. It did however put a smile on my face though so I guess it served it’s purpose.

Yesterday was another of those time my teaching course puts me in a fun situation. We went on a visit to Intech, which is an interactive science centre. It basically has lots of exhibits which you can interact with and is great fun. Especially if you are a kid. I couldn’t help but feel totally out of place because everyone else was either a young kid or a young kid’s parent so being there without a child felt weird. One exhibit essentially told me I am both taller and stronger than most visitors and most visitors that are 19 and male like me. I think this means that I am physically better than the average human. I’m pretty much Superman I think.

And today there was another visit, this time to the industrial unit where the local museums store the artefacts which aren’t on display. It’s quite a place there and reminded me of that room at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark only considerably smaller. I doubt the Ark of the Covenant was there either, it was mostly bones and pottery. We looked at some artefacts and learnt how we could use them in schools. It was all quite interesting and probably worth the half an hour walk there. Anything longer than twenty minutes is a long walk in my books. It’s ok if you are purposely going out for a walk but not good when you have to walk to somewhere. It’s fortunate I guess that everywhere within Winchester is reachable within half an hour’s walk from my house. Thank goodness for the good location!

At the moment however my time is largely being spent doing an assignment about science. In groups of four we wrote a plan for a series of lessons and for the actual assignment we have to talk about how we’d teach them with regards to elicitation techniques, dealing with misconceptions, assessing and justify why we put the lessons in the order we did. Wow, it almost sounds like I know what I’m talking about. So far I’ve written just over 600 words out of 2000 but in my 500-word a day system I should finish by the weekend. The moment you finish an assignment is always especially good and this one will probably be even more so because I think it’s going to get a good mark. I just know what I am doing for once!

Today was also pancake and now that I can cook I decided this year so make them properly and make the mix myself. I made six, all of which I ate, and which gradually got better as I went along. I even tossed them, though no-one saw the three that I tossed brilliantly. Dannie just saw two that didn’t quite land properly and the edge fell out the pan. Still, I did a good job and am proud at my ever increasing cooking skills, even if they are still pretty basic!

My latest online distraction is Pintrest. It’s kind of fun but I need to follow more people on it as it doesn’t get update very much. Basically you pin pictures you like to different virtual pin boards. I have quite a few already with titles like “Funny”, “Randoms”, “Movies and “Space”. You can follow me on Pintrest here but you might prefer to just follow this blog on Pintrest. I’ll “pin” every new post to this board for you all.

And I should end on a bit of admin. Google being Google have decided to get rid of the Friend Connect Service from the 1st of March. This means that if you follow my blog that way and want to carry on following my blog (and why wouldn't you?) you'll have to do so some other way. I've tried to make this as easy as possible for you by providing various different services to do so, which you can see on the right. It would mean a lot to me if you would follow me on of those ways and not stop reading with the change. For other bloggers going through this I fully recommend setting up a Bloglovin account. It’s a very similar service to Google Friend Connect but a little better if anything. If I am one of your readers though rest assured, I’ve set up a new way to follow you, via Bloglovin if possible but in other ways if not. So I’d be appreciative if you could go off now and “Like” me or “Follow” me on another site so you can keep reading. It would make my day. Over and out.

Chart Chasers #3

It’s that time again where I take a look at the newest songs in the UK chart and in most cases decide modern music is complete rubbish! Hurrah!

In at number 20 in the chart is Whitney Houston. Oh, this is awkward. As usual it would seem a popstar’s death has done wonders for their career. If only she was around to see it! This one is I Wanna Dance With Somebody.

It’s kind of a classic song so I’m finding it weird that I’m writing as if it were new. It’s a decent pop song with average verses but a pretty decent chorus. 4/5.

New at 16 is Nicki Minaj with a song called Starship. I detest her work so I doubt this is going to be any good, although it has a vaguely sci-fi sounding title which has raised my first impression…

No video yet it seems. This song has annoyed me within five seconds with the “rapping” bit. The singing is an improvement but only a tiny bit. Personally I think Minaj should be launched into space in a starship where she can perform her “music” forever without annoying anyone but passing aliens (she’d fit in well I reckon). 1/5

At 14 is once again Whitney Houston with her classic I Will Always Love You.

Everyone knows this song don’t they? I never really liked Houston’s music and the news of her death didn’t really cause me to have any reaction. People die, yes it’s sad but get over it unless you know them personally. Still, the two songs that appear here are pretty decent and no-one can argue that she didn’t have one hell of a voice. Which is quite possibly appropriate considering where she is now. Too soon? 4/5.

And the final two today are actual new songs like they should be really. Straight in at number two is Emeli Sande with a song called Next To Me. I don’t think I know this one but from her previous work I am optimistic about it’s quality.

Emeli has an amazing voice but this song is a bit bland. I just got bored. I suspect the fact it’s only 59p on iTunes rather than 99p has a lot to do with why it is so high in the chart. 2/5.

There’s a brand new number one this week by DJ Fresh, with a credit to Rita Ora too. This song has been around for literally forever so I’m surprised to discover it’s only just been released. Here is Hot Right Now:

I’ve loved this track for ages and am pleased to see the British public agree with me. It’s an awesome track and might I add that Rita Ora is pretty hot right now. 5/5

As always, let me know if you agree or disagree with my thoughts on any of these songs. Does anyone really like Nicki Minaj? Does anyone not love DJ Fresh? Also feel free to complain about that tasteless joke! Just click below to add a comment.

Little Notes

Something a little different for you today! I’ve seen this idea on a couple of other blogs and thought I’d have a go myself. In it I shall write a few short letters to various people. Some will be funny, some touching but all of them should be worth reading.

Dear Ex-Pizza Hut Waitress,

You used to work in the Pizza Hut in Winchester and every so often I would see you there. I can’t say I knew you very well but you seem lovely. You are actually a very good waitress and somewhere as cheap as Pizza Hut is beneath you. What’s more you are really very beautiful. I would have liked to get to know you better but alas, I will probably never see you again. Pizza Hut closed and you have moved on. Maybe you have moved to another restaurant and one day I shall have the good fortune to be served by you again. I hope wherever you are working now is as lovely as you are, but I’m not sure that’s even possible.

 

Dear Couples,

I hate you. Most of you anyway. Yes, it’s partly because I am am destined to be forever alone. Seeing you write soppy things to each other on Facebook or public displaying your affection is uncalled for though. Get a room and stay in it, preferably forever. And do you realise how much space you take up on the footpath when holding hands? It’s difficult enough to walk along a busy street without you getting in the way!

 

Dear Pukka Pies,

Your pies have changed my life. I only wish you could have started making them soon. They are the best things ever. That is all.

 

Dear [name blanked out],

I wish an opportunity would come along where I could tell you how I feel. Try as I might I can never seem to get you alone. I don’t know how you feel about me but there must be something there. It’s clear at the very least you care about me which is more than most people. Maybe you’ve worked out my feelings for you. Maybe not. The last thing I want to do is scare you or make you feel uncomfortable but maybe you could be the one, just maybe. I very much hope something happens between us. It just feels right.

 

Dear BBC News,

Why the hell do you insist on live broadcasts in every bulletin? Most of the time it’s just a cold-looking reporter stood outside an empty building. Everyone’s gone home from most places at 6PM and even more so at 10PM. You must waste thousands and thousands of licence fee payers money every year just shipping reporters and broadcasting equipment around the country. Just stop it!

 

Dear Piers Morgan,

Just go and die will you?

 

Dear lecture friends,

I could have listed all of you but there’s a fair few. You know who you are, the people I sit with in most lectures. You make life so much more fun than it would be otherwise. I’m going to really miss you when we get new groups next year.

 

Dear Russell T Davies,

My condolences on your partner’s ill health but could we have another series of Torchwood soon? And one that is much better than Miracle Day, preferably as good as Children of Earth. And it would be pretty awesome if you would write an episode of Doctor Who for the Eleventh Doctor. You wrote for him brilliantly in The Sarah Jane Adventures and your standalone episodes are often amazing. Thank you.

 

Dear Channel 4,

Please make lots more episodes of Come Dine with Me. Preferably a whole Come Dine with Me channel which just shows the awesome show. A bit like the channel Dave is for Top Gear…

 

Dear Multi-millionaires,

Please give me a load of your money. Thank you.

 

Well that was fun. Let me know if you enjoyed this and I might do another one at some point in the future.

Friday Review #14

Hello and welcome to yet another edition of the Friday Review where I review various things I’ve watched, read and played recently!

Books

Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins

This is a tricky review to write. I so wanted this book to be as good as The Hunger Games but it just isn't. It's not at all a bad book but it doesn't reach the same exceptional standards.
In it Katniss travels around the districts on a victor's tour, trying to prevent rebellion after being threatened by the president. But hopes of an uprising are everywhere. Katniss is then forced to enter the Hunger Games once again, with even stronger opposition.

I feel like this is the bridge between the games and a full revolution that will obviously occur in some form in Mockingjay. That means it's not that great as a standalone novel and is very slow moving. Somehow the games aren't as exciting either, possibly because they team up more.  Still, it was an enjoyable book and I hope Mockingjay finishes the series well. I think my favourite part of this was the ending as it wasn't what I expect at all and it's always good to be surprised! ★★★★☆

 

The Dragon Factory by Jonathan Maberry

After deciding Patient Zero was just about good enough to make the sequel worthy of a read, I delved into this volume and was pleasantly surprised. It's essentially a "what would happen if Nazis had survived" as two evil geniuses prepare to wipe out non-white races using genetically-modified viruses to create a new Aryan race. It's a scary thought and there were points in the history of the organisation where it was difficult to distinguish the fact from the fiction. A lot of the horrible ideas used in this book are beliefs that people once had.

There's a great balance of talking and action too. Joe Ledger has to deal with various genetically-modified creations such as massive dogs with scorpion tales and "berserkers"- men that are stronger and more aggressive than they should be.

All this builds up to create a fantastic tale. My one criticism is that one part of the climax was pretty predictable, but it was still well done. Totally out-living my expectations, I might even put this in my top 10 books I have ever read! ★★★★★

You can read reviews of every single book I read over on Goodreads.

Movies

The Mummy Returns

I have seen The Mummy quite a few times but for some reason have never got round to watching the sequel. This is probably largely because everyone says it is much worse. Everyone is right. It’s not an awful film but it fails at so much the first one did so well at. The pre-title scene is pretty much irrelevant to the story and one line of dialogue could have done the same job. Much of the humour is gone and though there are many things that are meant to be funny, most of the just aren’t. Because the two lead characters have now got married and had a son the brewing romance doesn’t exist. And the Mummy itself isn’t very scary as he spends most of the film in his fully-human form and doesn’t really do much. Plus the big fight at the end with the Rock as a massive scorpion is ridiculous. I know that these films are hardly supposed to be believable but that is taking it too far. And don’t get me started on the predictable resurrection.

It’s the duo’s son Alex that saves this film really. He has all the best elements of both his father and mother so is a neat little package. It’s just a shame his British accent is so rubbish. Despite it’s shortcomings the Mummy Returns is a decent enough film with some good fights and the occasional laugh-out loud moment. ★★★☆☆

Cars

Cars and its sequel were the only two Disney Pixar films I hadn’t seen. With very few exceptions to the rule, Disney Pixar tend to produce brilliant animated movies and this one was no different. Whilst I originally thought the concept was largely about racing, it’s more about a big-headed upcoming star coming down to Earth after spending time in a town along route 66 which has long since been forgotten. I did feel though that this film didn’t really need to use cars as it’s characters in the same way Toy Story and Finding Nemo needed toys and fish respectively. But I guess it makes it more engaging for kids and brings in lots of merchandising opportunities. It’s a fantastic film though and as ever is enjoyable for people of all ages through it's comedy and lovely message. I found the“cow-tipping” scene particularly funny, though quite why I’m not sure. It’s another Disney Pixar classic, simple as that. ★★★★★

Muppets From Space

With the new movie finally out in the UK (which I will hopefully be seeing very soon), this was shown on TV last weekend. It centres around Gonzo, who is being contacted by his family who are aliens. This contact means he is kidnapped by an agency which wants to capture alien life. The Muppet gang go to his rescue. It’s not the greatest Muppets film ever but it was a great way to explore what Gonzo is. The reveal of his family is very funny indeed. The film doesn't quite work perfectly within the Muppet universe though. If the characters are playing themselves, why is Miss Piggy working as a receptionist at a TV station? And the rescue party contains come a bizarre combination of Muppets. Whilst other Muppets films are better, fans of the puppets and everyone else to will still enjoy this. You can’t help but love Gonzo by the end! ★★★★☆

I hope you enjoyed today’s reviews and be sure to let me know your opinions about any of the things talked about here in the comments. There’ll be more reviews in a few weeks!

The Hilarious Hi-jinks

Hiya! A lot of people have been posting lovely things about the lovely Valentine’s Day they had on Tuesday. I would think that my Valentine’s Day was rather different to those and it will be the main focus of today’s post. Plus they’ll be all sorts of other things with which you can read for your entertainment. Hurrah!

So it has been almost exactly a week since the internet went down but happy days, just a few minutes before I started writing this my housemate Alice managed to fix it. For some reason something interfered with the channel so when Alice changed the channel manually we had internet connection again! Hurrah. It’s kind of nice not to have internet for a week here and there, it reminds you what life used to be like. That’s something I can say now that I have access again. It was pretty horrible and saw be trudging to and from the uni library whenever I needed to do anything online. It’s slightly concerning just how much time I spend on the internet. Ah well, it’s not like I have anything better to do!

So after a pretty dull lecture about the Aztecs (although we did get some chocolate so it wasn’t all bad), my Valentine’s Day consisted of larking around with my two best mates and shopping. We all met up in Southampton, which is conveniently situated where I can get to it and so can Chris when he’s at home. Chris is lucky enough to have a half-term holiday this week, like all the school kids in the country. Half-terms are the thing I miss most now I’m in uni. Still, as a teacher these will be the only four years of my life where I won’t have them! Southampton is also handy for Mike, because that’s the city where he happens to live and go to university at. So we all met up for our usual crazy antics.

The first couple of hours were mostly spent clothes shopping. I needed various smart clothes to wear for my upcoming teaching placement. I don’t do “smart” very well. I was quite fortunate to find some reasonably-priced smart trousers, though I had to try them on in the world’s warmest fitting room. It was like an oven in there. I also managed to buy several cardigans which have inbuilt collars. They are way more comfortable than shirts and make me feel more like a teacher somehow. I feel like I undergo a sudden transformation when I put one of them on. I go from the lazy student to the sensible teacher in a similar way to how Clark Kent changes into Superman when he puts on the outfit. Though teacher-me is hardly as impressive as Superman. It was good that Chris was with me for the shopping as he managed to stop me from making any of the usual mistakes I make when shopping alone, like buying things with words on without me even noticing. However, there was an extremely awkward moment when I went to buy a shirt from a shop called H & M. Several people were queued up and, as you would expect, I queued up behind them. I eventually found myself at the front of the queue with another guy behind me when a woman at the other end of the till says “The queue starts over here”. I knew this wasn’t true, having been stood in the queue for several minutes and told her that the queue was where I was. Unfortunately she wasn’t having it and insisted she was right saying that she had queued there earlier. Why was she queuing in the same store twice in one day? Suspicious… I looked at the guy behind me for support, thinking that this annoying woman wouldn’t be able to take down both of us, only to see said guy go and stand behind the woman. Why he couldn’t have just agreed with me, who was right, I don’t know! At least the woman let me go in front of her but it was a pointless debate and left me very annoyed. I was fuming for ages, as Chris will tell you.

Having had a McDonald’s for lunch, Chris and I eventually met Mike and that was when the craziness really began. When I realised the Disney store had Muppet’s things we just had to go in there and I was desperate to own a cushion in the shape of Animal’s head, but it was too expensive. Then we decided to go to Swedish furniture store IKEA. We had some food and drinks in the cafe and then wandered round the huge store. It was more fun than walking around a furniture store probably should be. We sat in the comfy chairs and generally played with everything we could find. There were some lovely rugs there too…

Next up was Toys ‘R’ Us where we had all planned to waste some money. Walking around a massive toy store is always exciting I think and the novelty will never where off. There were so many awesome things we couldn’t believe it! The toys kids have nowadays are properly awesome. Mike and Chris both decided to buy Nerf guns, so they could torment their housemates and family respectively. I was perhaps even more sad as I purchased “Triop World”. Triops are little shrimp things and it’s basically a set similar to those you get with Sea Monkeys. They are about as close to pets as I’m really allowed here! They are all set up and should be hatching any minute now. I shall let you know when they have reached full size. After that we went to McDonald’s, for the second time in a day, which is something I regret now. My poor stomach. Though it sounds silly, I think it was a really good way to spend Valentine’s Day as a single person. If I hadn’t gone out I would have just moped around in my room all day, which would have been awful. Messing around with your two best mates is way more awesome than a date, though a lot less romantic. People who would happily destroy the English language might call it “bromantic”, but I am not one of those people…

I also came home with all sorts of awesome stuff. As well as the clothes for teaching I got a new pillow which is much better than my old one, a hot water bottle with a furry zebra-stripe cover (which is so nice in bed) and three classic Muppet’s DVDs: The Muppet Movie, The Great Muppet Caper and Muppet Treasure Island. They were selling them really cheap because of the new movie, which I will hopefully see at some point this week. I am so excited for that right now!

Yesterday’s seminar reminded me of the my first year at uni, where we pretty much acted as kids and had various lessons demonstrated to us. As we were discussing modern foreign languages and their place in primary schools, we had a French lesson. My French is actually still pretty good and I could understand “The 3 Billy Goats Gruff” in French pretty well. Unfortunately, we mostly did activities based on the body parts, a section of French I never really got. It was quite fun though and we were tasked with making a monster. We would pick a random card with a number on and a random card with a body part on, both in French, and then draw that number of body parts on the monster. Out monster was called Pedro. Voci notre monstre. Il s’apelle Pedro:

He looks fairly normal apart from that random growth on the right hand side which is a third shoulder. Coming off it are nine extra arms, five of which have extra heads with noses on and three of which have extra fingers. Pedro also has seven legs but only one foot, which is massive. The fun we have!

I’ve been working hard today with two long seminars and then a group meeting to do various bits of work. This means however that I am now perfectly ready to start on my science assignment. 2000 words explaining a a five-lesson plan. It’s not going to be the most thrilling thing ever but at least it appears fairly straight forward. I just have to have the motivation to do it! At least I won’t exactly be using my time going and spending money. After all that shopping on Tuesday, mostly on the clothes I wasn’t exactly left with much in my account. Unfortunately before I get my next instalment of student loan I have to pay £100 holding fee for my house, around £200 to get to and from placement, two months worth of rent AND food bills. The placement travel alone was more than I had in my account. So I had to phone my mother and beg for money. At least I’m doing a good job at being a student! Apart from the stuff I’ve talked about here, it’s actually been a pretty rubbish week with minor things going wrong all over the place. At least the return of internet access is an improvement. I was so down last night it was unreal. Normally when I speak to my parents I try and perk myself up a little so they don’t get worried but I came across really down to them which shows that I was properly feeling down! Still, feeling happier now which is the main thing.

Tomorrow I shall be back with a new Friday Review with a very random combination of things on it which will be well worth checking out. Well I would say that wouldn’t I?

Geekgasm #2

It’s time for another edition of Geekgasm! Lots of fun things today. We STILL have no internet access so updating my blog is tricky but I shall do my best to post most days. Now on with the geekiness!

New Twitter

Twitter has a new layout. Once again we have New Twitter or after the number of changes Twitter has gone through “New new new new new new Twitter”. The changes aren’t massive but it makes for a significant change. The sidebar has moved from the left to the right and when you “open” a tweet, it just expands downwards rather than to the right. You can also view your interaction on the navbar at the top of the page. The new addition is the “discover” page which seems to pretty much expand trending topics using the news stories and occasionally videos. I think this change is a bit pointless and I much prefer opening tweets into the sidebar. But apart from that, I think the new look is great. Many people are complaining, but then human beings are hard-wired to dislike change. It’s cleaner and simpler and with a few little changes could be perfect.

Thing I want of the Week

This awesome Tanooki Mario plushie. Just it’s cuteness is enough to want it but I love Super Mario 3D Land. It’s only out in Japan at the moment.

This is the section where I talk about TV shows which are generally considered “cult” TV shows. Contains spoilers.

Being Human: “Being Human 1955”

This purpose of this episode was clearly to set up the new trinity of a vampire, werewolf and ghost living together. Leo, the old werewolf gets a message to go and see Eve, the baby. In the end Leo dies and his ghost friend also travels to the afterlife having discovered her unfinished business is to tell Leo she loves him. This left us with Annie, Tom and the 1955 trinity vampire, Hal. Hal struggled to cope with the loss but when he and Tom nearly kill each other, Annie does a rousing speech and saves them both. Clearly this starts the series of properly. Hal is an awesome character, who clearly has a lot of trouble keeping his vampire instincts to himself. This episode was a bit lighter than the series opener and made me laugh quite a few times. For a show I’ve only watched two episodes of, I am loving Being Human. I look forward to seeing the series progress!

The Walking Dead: “Nebraska”

Finally season two continues. It mostly dealt with the aftermath of Sophia’s death and the shooting of the zombies. Hershel goes a bit depressing saying there is no hope so Rick and Glen go and find him drinking in a local bar. There they meet the generically named survivors “Dave and Tony”, who don’t survive much longer. Rick killing them seemed a bit random but I guess they will probably explore this more in the coming weeks. And Lori grabs a car to go and get Hershel and Rick but hits a zombie and then crashes. It was a throwaway scene which seemed very important. I’ll assume Lori will be fine. They won’t randomly kill her of for no reason. The TV version of Lori is really annoying though so I can’t say I’d be too bothered. Hopefully there’ll be more zombies next week though.

Trailer of the Week

It’s for Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter. Abraham Lincoln, hunting vampires! What’s not to like? Or did I answer my own question?

Comics

In this section I talk about the comics I’ve received and read over the past week.

The Flash #5: The Mob Rule story comes to a sudden end when The Flash sends the clones flying through a time vortex. Handy skill. But it turns out The Flash causes the electricity outage by sending an EMP back in time. This will no doubt have implications for future story lines. I love how The Flash has some much science-y stuff and that makes it even more enjoyable. It’s quite possibly my fave comic at the moment.

Scarlet Spider #2: I decided to try out this series and the first was hugely disappointing as very little happens. In this issue there is a proper fight but I still didn’t enjoy it that much. Kaine Parker is a character I really don’t like. He just moans a lot and doesn’t have the fun humour that Peter Parker does. I shan’t be continuing with this series.

Deadpool #49.1 (Deadpool The Musical): This bizarre issue just recaps a fair chunk of the Deadpool story, in musical form. I think it works better the better you know the songs. It’s good fun though.

Deadpool #50 (Dead Part One): From the 50th issue the “Dead” story begins. Deadpool might have found a way to die, by way of a special dart which destroys mutations. His plan is to use a series of pawns to find the one responsible and ultimately end up dead. The sheer number of cameos in this issue, including the X-Men and Nick Fury, shows how “big” it is. Surely Deadpool won’t actually end up dead? Surely? It’s an epic story and I’m looking forward to the next issue. And it’s weird to see Deadpool in his X-men outfit, though kind of cool.

I can’t end this post without mentioning this advert I saw:

DC heroes and villains chess? The concept kind of works but there’s a couple of big issues. Firstly, it looks more like Batman chess. Even if it does include over DC characters, they are hardly prolific. Surely the British public has a decent idea of DC characters. And if not that’s a huge shame. Also, the price. Though the first issue is cheap, every other issue is £7.99. 32 issues, possibly a couple more for the board, at £8 each. Who has that sort of money to throw around?

Hopefully I’ll be back tomorrow with the usual fun!