Saturday, February 28, 2009

Cyril Highsmith Interview


These are some pages from the sketchbooks of typographer Cyril Highsmith, who's interviewed in the latest MyFonts.com Newsletter, online now here...
Talented guy, interesting thoughts, and some lovely examples of his craft.



Friday, February 27, 2009

Totalitarian Mentalist Of The Week: Jack Straw

(*Jack Straw in his previous role of the Demon Headmaster)


Why would I post this link to an opinion/comment piece by Jack Straw defending his, and his government's stance and record on liberty and civil liberties, when I clearly disagree pretty much 100%?
Good question, and I'm not entirely sure myself. I think it's probably because it's worth reading simply so you can gawp in either admiration at the delusion / mendacity of the man, or feel a hint of sympathy that he is clearly off his rocker and has lost his already feeble grip on reality. Either way, it's a gread read if you're a lover of the Fiction genre...
There's some excellent comments of feedback too - loads of them in fact (hardly surprising given how easy it is to pick apart such awful, patronising bollocks) - though of course, they will doubtless go unanswered.

What with reading that this morning AND all the latest on that other servant of Satan, Sir Fred Goodwin, I'm beginning to wonder if we shouldn't start working ourselves out of this recession by creating lots of jobs for Gallows Builders.

I'll stop now before that full-blown Anger Stroke hits... ;-)



Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Safari 4 Beta Is Out And Awesome


Okay - good news for those of you who enjoy surfing the interweb.
There's so much crud out there (and indeed on this very site) and so many sites to follow and organise and look at... well, in its latest version (the BETA release of Safari 4) Apple has delivered its best browser yet to help enrich your web surfing, and to be honest it pisses on pretty much any other browser I've seen too. (yes, that's basically all of them).
Whilst they'd done a couple of things I'm not so keen on - like shifting the tabs to the very top of the navbar, and changing their behaviour a bit - some of the plusses are utterly brilliant.

People will make certain comparisons to Google's Chrome browser with regard to the most obvious new feature; the "Top Sites" screen - but that won't do it justice. Although its starting point is a collection of your most viewed sites (albeit presented in beautiful 3D Aqua-fied glory) the cleverness comes in being able to completely turn this into a beautiful Favourites / Start page by sticking drawing pins into pages you want to keep in a certain place and organising others around them. It also has a nifty little touch of letting you know if pages have been updated by showing them with the top corner folded down and a star showing up.

There's a whole interface lifting going on with "Cover Flow" (Apple's gorgeous way of shoing items by flipping through them, derived from iTunes where the metaphor was flicking through a bunch of album sleeves) being used across so many functions such as searching your History for previously visited sites, bookmarks in general, and also special bookmarks such as a folder of sites associated with people from your address book.

The final thing to recommend it is its speed. This is fast. Really fast. Overall rendering is great and the performance on pages heavy with things like Javascript is nothing short of blistering.
Combine it with Safari Ad Block and you have very probably got the most exquisite browsing experience available.
There's a Windows version too, so give it a try (though given that it will be authored to exploit the structure and processes of Apple's OSX operating system, it's unlikely you'd feel quite the same boost. But it's still a fab browser and deserves a tryout.)

There's a page covering all the features here...
And you can download the Safari 4 Beta here...
*Just bear in mind it IS a beta version. It won't be perfect.

...Although it's pretty bloody close.



Tuesday, February 24, 2009

2009 Bikesports In iCal


For any of you who may be into motorbike sports (or at least the main world championships in various categories) I've made a bunch of iCals to help keep tabs on all the important dates in 2009. iCal is an application on the Mac, which uses the open .ics calendar format - which means that you can also use these in various Windows and Linux applications such as Microsoft Works (Version 8 or higher), WinDates, Mozilla Calendar, Sunbird and Zimbra.

MotoGP 2009 Calendar
Click here to subscribe in iCal...

CEV Buckler 2009 Calendar
Click here to subscribe in iCal...

SBK: World Superbikes 2009 Calendar
Click here to subscribe in iCal...

BSB: British Superbikes 2009 Calendar
Click here to subscribe in iCal...

World Superstock 1000cc
Click here to subscribe in iCal...


More information about how to use these calendars on Windows PCs here at iCalShare...

Hope they're useful.
Enjoy :-)

gb


Monday, February 23, 2009

Live Performances Of "Music From The Worm Farm"


As the "Music From The Worm Farm" project I did the website for nears its end, I should point out the forthcoming live performance of the project's output.
The performance is at 7 pm on Thursday the 19th of March at the Science Museum's Dana Centre in South Kensington, London. Tickets are free, and a free CD  of work from the residency will be given away.
Click here for full information on the evet...
And click here for the 'Performance" info page on the Worm Music website.
Ongoing notes form composer Keith Johnson can be found here on the Worm Music blog.


Sunday, February 22, 2009

Help ARK To Stop Animal Cruelty In Kerala


Many thanks to Debbie for alerting me to the work of ARK - Animal Rescue Kerala having seen some of my holiday pics online featuring beach dogs at Kovalam.
Animal Rescue Kerala not only look after animals and work on sterilisation and anti-rabies programmes, but also campaign against some appalling and institutionalised cruelty and killing by the Keralan state itself.
You can sign their petition here and also make donations via Paypal, and find out about their current news.

There's also a Facebook Group here...


Friday, February 20, 2009

Ask David Cameron...

(*Above: Man of the people David Cameron and the rest of Spandau Ballet)


Brighton & Sussex newspaper The Argus has made a bit of a foolish internet newbie mistake in asking readers to post up questions for Conservative leader David Cameron. So rather than them being able to do some judicious filtering, the whole list just goes online.
The whole article and list of questions is here but as I'm such a nice bloke, I've picked out all the best ones for you...


What does swan taste like?

Why doesn't he need to shave - is it electrolysis?

Who framed Roger Rabbit?

Should Poundland come to Worthing?

Who would win in a fight between a baboon and a badger?

Where are my pants?

Would he go gay for Johnny Depp?

Does he think that Yoda sounds like Miss Piggy?

Would he agree that if Conservatism is the answer it must have been a bloody stupid question?

Could he deck a horse with one punch?

Will o The Wisp... or Rhubarb and Custard?

What are the 39 steps?



Brighton interwebbers I salute you :-)



Tuesday, February 17, 2009

The Simpsons New Opening Titles For The HD Age



The Simpsons has some new opening titles, firmly rooted in the original titles' DNA but completely updated.
The new opening sequence accompanies the show's transition to High Definition format in Season 20, with the basic outline / storyboard the same but new incidents and characters and references throughout; many referring to previous episodes (for example the items at the supermnarket checkout now include Tomacco and Mister Sparkle...), Marge now actually hits Homer with the car in the driveway sequence, flinging him straight through into the living room - and a key piece of the titles, the TV which carries the main 'created by' credits is now itself a High Definition TV, which closes the entire sequence by falling off the wall.
Watch the clip above and spot all the differences.

There's loads of info about *all* incarnations of the titles including the movie - here on Wikipedia...


Sunday, February 15, 2009

Mar i Terra


Got taken to a really cool little place on Friday night...
It's called Mar i Terra and it's on a tiny backstreet near Southwark tube station.
Amazing tapas and amazing wine - not cheap but very very good value considering how excellent it all is - and in cosy, unpretentious surroundings with dead friendly staff.
Top tips: Patatas bravas, Fabada Asturiana (a stew of white Pote beans, chorizo, morcilla and panceta adobada, scented with pimentón), the silky, sweet Jamón Gran Reserva - and a stunner of a red wine; the Paso a Paso, Tinto De La Mancha, 2006. Dammit, even the "basic" plate of bread and olives is superb!
This is one of those times when it's hard to say quite how good a meal was, as there's little chance of people believing you.
But it absolutely is just *that* good...
Will be going back.
A lot.


Friday, February 13, 2009

Light Fantastic






Apologies for nicking the Guardian's headline - it's not laziness, it's just I couldn't think of anything better to describe this.It *is* fantastic.
Artist Michael Bosanko makes these pictures using coloured torches at night... His digital camera stays on a long exposure, ranging from 10 seconds to one hour to create the images against the backdrop of Cardiff, Newport and the Brecon Beacons in south Wales.
There's a set of 11 shots here on the Guardian website...



Wednesday, February 11, 2009

El Canto Del Loco English Fansite - elcantodelloco.co.uk


More than a couple of times I've used this blog to publish news about Spanish band El Canto Del Loco. Well, I've finally decided that rather than knock out the odd story here (although I'll probably do exactly that anyway...), it would make more sense to actually build a news, info and downloads site about them...
As a result, I've built and launched www.elcantodelloco.co.uk - an El Canto Del Loco fansite in English which aims to spread the word about them to people outside of Spain and to pass on news and info in the English language.
If you or anyone you know likes ECDL or is curious then please do point your browser at the site to keep up with the band and their activities (especially if they ever include activities in the UK, which I desparately hope they will...)

Already the site includes info on all their albums; De personas a personas, Personas, Arriba el telón, Zapatillas, Estados de ánimo, A contracorriente, and El Canto del Loco - plus videoclips, desktop wallpaper, weblinks, news on record sales and info on a cool introductory El Canto Del Loco iMix you can grab from iTunes.

Go see...
Enjoy :-)



Monday, February 9, 2009

Photos From Cape Verde






I've put up a page of holiday snaps from Boa Vista in the Cape Verde Islands here...
A beautiful place, in a barren windswept kind of a way. Vast beaches, volcanic mountains, a desert and mile after mile of scrub and tundra.
It's peaceful and tranquil; really beautiful actually - although the hotel RIU Karamboa turns out to be a huge 750 room monstrosity, soon to be dwarfed by another RIU hotel in the south of the island on the stunning and pristine Santa Monica beach (to be twice the size of the Karamboa apparently, and surely to have a huge impact on the island's landscape, environment and culture).
And although RIU's "News" magazine goes to great lengths (over several pages) to emphasise its environmental commitment, you do have to wonder just a little when they proudly boast, after all the environmental blurb that they built the Karamboa - and I quote this verbatim - "on the very beach where the famous caretta-caretta sea turtles' egg-laying ritual takes place." Ecology rules, eh...?


Scintillation


Not entirely sure what to say about this film - SCINTILLATION - by Xavier Chassaing, except "bloody hell that's cool..."

Watch it, it's beautiful.