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Below are the most recent 25 friends' journal entries.
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| Thursday, May 15th, 2008 |
angriest
|
8:22p |
I am a window.
According to Brendan Nelson's budget reply, which I actually listened to while stuck in gridlock tonight, I am "a window into the humanity of us all".
I being someone who draws a carer's payment from Centrelink for helping out a disabled partner.
So there you go. You wanna see how much humanity you have? Look into my "window". |
seangaffney
|
5:54a |
It's time to meet the Muppets... The Muppet Show: Season 3 is out on DVD next week. We've gotten our first review, and it would seem that the episodes are uncut once more. :D We get some nice extras here. The 1968 documentary Muppets on Puppets, hosted by Jim Henson and Rowlf the Dog. Several modern-day interviews with the puppeteers. Some old ads with Rowlf for Purina Dog Chow. And the following episodes: * Episode 301: Kris Kristofferson & Rita Coolidge * Episode 302: Leo Sayer * Episode 303: Roy Clark * Episode 304: Gilda Radner * Episode 305: Pearl Bailey * Episode 306: Jean Stapleton * Episode 307: Alice Cooper * Episode 308: Loretta Lynn * Episode 309: Liberace * Episode 310: Marisa Berenson * Episode 311: Raquel Welch * Episode 312: James Coco * Episode 313: Helen Reddy * Episode 314: Harry Belafonte * Episode 315: Lesley Ann Warren * Episode 316: Danny Kaye * Episode 317: Spike Milligan * Episode 318: Leslie Uggams * Episode 319: Elke Sommer * Episode 320: Sylvester Stallone * Episode 321: Roger Miller * Episode 322: Roy Rogers & Dale Evans * Episode 323: Lynn Redgrave * Episode 324: Cheryl Ladd My personal favorites of these are Spike (of course), Danny Kaye, Sylvester Stallone (who is hilarious), Harry Belafonte (brilliant final song), and Alice Cooper, trying to sell Muppet souls to the devil. Also, not as bad as season four but still bad, this is where the Muppet obsession with country music guests begins. Hope you like country. Recommended for adults and kids alike. Current Mood:  giddyCurrent Music: Alice Cooper - Welcome to My Nightmare |
catsparx
|
3:35p |
bad kitty! Yesterday I was utterly captivated by pictures of anteater coolness.  When we got home our three little fluffy monsters were lurking on the front porch. I told them they'd better be well behaved or else I was going to trade them in for Tamanduas. So a bit later on I'm sitting at my desk writing. Nemo (aka Mr White) jumps up, treads all over the keyboard (as usual), then jumps onto the other desk and pisses on the G4 keyboard! Fortunately the 'board was protected by eight A4 pages of novel critique (thanks M). Mr White does not normally wee on my stuff. It was jealousy. Pure jealousy -- and I didn't even show him any of the anteater photos! Current Mood:  chipperCurrent Music: The Presets |
qthewetsprocket
|
4:36a |
lost nitpick Q pleased to see this season replicating the 'desmond story > everything else' pattern i loved so much last year |
angriest
|
11:41a |
Fair's fair. Troy Buswell did not, in fact, ever do anything inappropriate to a quokka. |
| Wednesday, May 14th, 2008 |
grumpyyoungman
|
11:13p |
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michaellee
|
9:08p |
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| Thursday, May 15th, 2008 |
irritant01
|
10:32a |
The Good, The Bad and The Cheap I've had a lot of time recently to do all sorts of interesting things, but I have invested a large chunk of it in watching rented DVDs. This is a good thing in some ways, as I've been able to finally see some classic films that I have never seen before, for example Taxi Driver and Deliverance. But it also means that occasionally I make a bad decision at the rental shop and end up with some clangers... |
kateorman
|
8:32a |
Ear worm of total randomness
What th- ? Why the heck is Adam Ant's Mile High Club stuck in my head this morning?! |
| Wednesday, May 14th, 2008 |
jvowles
|
1:11p |
My nephew is funny.... Giggley AlexYes, that's me in the hat, being goofy. |
jvowles
|
11:56a |
Justin Baily Conspiracy (NSFW)
This mildly naughty little video (thanks to Wil Wheaton for the pointer) is pretty funny -- though I suspect it will amuse various friends for quite different reasons....
|
angriest
|
11:38p |
History nerd.
ME: "Hey look! I found a copy of the Domesday Book in a secondhand bookshop!"
SONIA: "Why the hell would you read that? It'd be like reading the phone book."
ME: "Like reading an 11th century phone book!" |
angriest
|
9:48p |
Grant's review of "The Doctor's Daughter".
Oh for fuck's sake. |
robshearman
|
1:05p |
The Sony Award ceremony! With description. And caramelised pear.
Everyone's been terribly nice to me about this Sony award. Which is very kind, and I'm very grateful. Some have emailed asking if they can see pictures of a statuette, others wondering if I gave a speech.
It'd be lovely to pretend it was really as grand as all that, and that I deserve all these compliments. But in the interests of truth and ego restraint, I've decided to put down what actually happened. Oh, and for posterity too - you know, if some great asteroid hits the earth soon and eradicates most human life from the planet, I'd like some future descendants, struggling out of a new neanderthal civilisation, to prise open this Dell computer and extract from it a fair description of what a Sony Award Ceremony really is. (Maybe they could start a new religion around it.)
The black tie invitation was somewhat frustrating. I have lots of smart suits. If I'm not going to a wedding of some sort, I'm finding ways of getting out going to weddings. In this sort of London climate, my posh clothes for best get more outings than my sunglasses. But I've not been to a black tie do since I was at university, and even if I could find the right wardrobe, I doubt I could squeeze into the trousers now. So I had to rent. That was useful, though, that was the first great social divider. I spent half an hour crammed into the BBC toilets, alongside lots of other men buffing their shoes and trying to work out what a cummerbund is for. ...And then, in the corner, there'd be the odd man who *knew*. Who didn't need his bow tie to be a clip on. Who had trousers specially laundered to his exact thigh thickness. They were the *serious* nominees. The ones who had done these awards so often, they'd actually *bought* the suit.
I'd never received a Sony nomination before. I was longlisted once, I gather, for the drama award, for one of my plays - but I'd given up expecting to get any further. The two most contested awards are the ones for Comedy and Drama, and they're also the only two for which I'm ever going to be eligible. I'm unlikely to get the nod for Most Hippest DJ, or Disaster News Reporter of the Year. So when a text came a couple of months ago, telling me I was going to the Sonys, I honestly had no idea what it was talking about. I didn't even recognise the name of the programme - because the title I'd written under was specific for my story, not for the show itself. Last year the chaps at BBC7 had the bright thought of commissioning a writer to devise and script the first instalment of a serialised short story - something odd and intriguing enough that it'd get the audience's creative juices flowing, and they could submit further episodes building upon and twisting the plot, leaving it each week on a cliffhanger. My job was to stimulate discussion of it on the message boards, give the odd encouraging radio interview, and pick up the strands for episode thirteen and conclude it all in a coherent way. (Which I did. Sort of. Although the lesbian lover artificial intelligence plotline introduced in episode seven never really made sense to me, and I left it as a loose thread.)
So it was a game, really. And the category we were nominated for was Best Competition. Over the evening I was asked by a lot of BBC honchos wearing black tie suits, all of which were better fitting than mine, what I was in for. It was a little like what you'd expect in a prison. When I said I was up for Best Competition, they'd smile and pat me on the head and give me a biscuit. I began to understand this wasn't one of the most prestigious categories. I felt a little bit like it would be meeting Al Pacino at the Oscars, and telling him I was hoping for the award for Best Achievement Used in Piano Sound Editing in a Foreign Film.
But the funny thing was, being in the same room, wearing the same clothes, we all *looked* equally important. It was a big event. On the way in, arriving in our respective taxis, we had to pick our way through two levels of security checks, and gaggles of autograph hunters. And the hotel that was booked for the event was massive. To give you a sense of that: all the invited guests were seated at numbered round tables, with a dais in the middle of the room where we would collect our awards. Each table seated about ten people. There were 136 of these tables. I was allocated table 25. I had hoped to meet up with a friend during the ceremony, and get a little sloshed with him - but he was on table 111. Which was about two and a half miles away. Because it was hard to see, high above the seating area were ten huge video screens covering the event. When the ceremony was taking a breather, when we were networking or eating, photographs of all the nominees were projected upon these screens, one by one, in rotation. Oh, look, there's a huge photograph of Jonathan Ross! There's a huge photograph of Chris Moyles! There's a huge photograph of Robert Shearman! (Who the hell's he? I don't know. He's got a very moody looking picture, though.) I'd say that you can get used to seeing your face glaring out of a big screen in artistic pose - but you don't. Every five minutes the rotation would get round to me again, and I always squawked, and pointed, and laughed. The more with each glass of wine, probably. Jonathan Ross didn't do that. Jonathan Ross was cool.
There were 35 awards to be given. That's a lot. Checking the programme we were given, I found out I was up for award number 13. I was told that was a good position to be in - early enough so that the audience aren't too bored and drunk, late enough that no-one actually cares much. We were given first courses of our supper, as Paul Gambaccini warmed up his host act, and the BBC prepared all their hand held cameras so that each award could be beamed into the houses of anyone fool enough to be watching the live webcast. I thought it was a savoury pie. It turned out to be caramelised pears. It still tasted pretty savoury to me.
It was agreed that my producer, my actress, and myself would all be the ones to get up on to the dais should we win. And that the producer would give the speech, whilst I stood behind smiling and looking gracious. I thought was a great idea, and practised my acceptance smile for ages. The first award was the Live Event Coverage Award. I relaxed - I thought it'd be pretty unlikely I'd get a last minute shoo-in for this. I was surprised that they read out not a single winner, but opened with the Bronze Award, then Silver, all the way up to Gold. Only the Gold had to get up and do the speech thing. I was delighted. I told our producer that meant we had three chances od getting a legitimate award! He agreed. He said that if you were one of the nominees who *didn't* get placed, though, that it made it that much more humiliating. I didn't care. I was now hoping we wouldn't get a Gold. Silver or Bronze would mean I'd won a Sony, with all the publicity it suggested, but would mean I wouldn't have to get up from my seat and put down my wine glass. Everybody wins!
Consequently, when award number thirteen rolled around, and some celebrity I didn't recognise got up to read out the winners (they'd used up Joan Collins on one of the cooler awards), I was the only one on the table who shrieked with delight when we got the Bronze. "We got the Bronze!" I said to my producer. "It's brilliant!" "Yes," he said, "it's quite good." "I should say," I agreed, and poured us both more wine. Someone else won the Gold, and gave a speech, and got some plaque in perspex. I don't know who. We moved on to the champagne.
It was now about nine o'clock. I think. There were another 22 awards to be presented. (Including The Promo Award, and The Station Imaging Award.) I ate a little. I didn't drink that much, actually - I sort of wanted to go home now and get into my comfy clothes, but had to wait it out. There was a lot of schmoozing. I lied to a lot of people that I'd really found their work contributed to the overall glow of excellence to which the radio services must strive. At about two in the morning I reassured a lot of drunken BBC producers and editors that not winning an award probably wouldn't be the end of their career, and that they should be happy with their nomination. (They didn't believe me. One woman cried.) I was asked to dance by the producer of the Jonathan Ross Show, but I'd been getting on so well with her that I didn't want to ruin any illusions she might have of me as svelte and smart and declined. And I met Paul Darrow. And didn't tell him he'd been hammy in the Doctor Who story 'Timelash' in 1985. I was proud of myself for that.
So there you go. I'm the winner of a Sony Award! It makes me feel very proud, and it sounds great. But it's not for a particularly *good* award, and it was the Bronze. But that's okay. It was for short story experimentation, and what they said about that makes me very proud. And I got to eat caramelised pear. You can't do that every day. |
kateorman
|
7:49p |
White on White
Redrafted it. Lots of little changes, and one big one, to up the stakes for the POV character. |
angriest
|
2:13p |
Hahahaa!! Troy Buswell claims there is "absolutely no substance" to reports he once did something inappropriate to a quokka. Poll #1187551 Something inappropriate.
Open to: All, results viewable to: AllWhat is he supposed to have done? |
angriest
|
10:15a |
Medieval brains trust question.
It's the late 13th century: an English knight is summoned back to London from Acre. How long would it take him to get back? |
| Tuesday, May 13th, 2008 |
michaellee
|
9:04p |
|
| Wednesday, May 14th, 2008 |
dalekboy
|
11:28a |
Back from outer space? No, not really... Because everyone's doing it and I'm a mindless sheep... ( Which Shakespeare Play am I? ) Current Mood:  tired |
| Tuesday, May 13th, 2008 |
audioboy
|
6:25p |
Kiddens! A co-worker of ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) bex77 took in a local stray who then graced her with seven kittens a few days later. We had a chance to pop by and see them tonight during so-called "visiting hours" and took some camera-phone photos for your viewing pleasure. Current Mood:  heart-melted |
| Wednesday, May 14th, 2008 |
kateorman
|
8:22a |
|
| Tuesday, May 13th, 2008 |
robshearman
|
11:54a |
The aftermath of drinking champagne in a rented tuxedo
Just a quick word, because it's dawning on me as I blink at the sunshine that I won a Sony award last night. That's rather nice, isn't it? It actually justifies my looking like a waiter for the evening. An award, as was explained to me, for my innovative experiments in the short story form. I like that. I'll put it on a T-shirt.
I can't write now, though, because I've got to take all my rented clothes back. I seem to remember avoiding any spillages. And that dancing on the table was certainly nothing to do with me, and any splashes which were occasioned as a result can only be regarded as secondhand splashes, surely, for which I cannot be held accountable.
Hmm. |
flyingsauce
|
11:15a |
2008 books  33) Jim Theis, The Eye of Argon, 1970 I have Dave Given to thank for this extraordinary pleasure – and yes it was a pleasure, quite possibly the worst (or at least the least good) book I will ever read, that is, in the "so bad it's good" post-modern sense. Written when Theis was just sixteen and originally published in a forgotten fanzine, this 7,000 word 'sword and sorcery' epic's rise above complete obscurity has come at the (possibly cruel) efforts of several prominent SF fans and has at last been enshrined in its own paperback edition, complete with the long-lost last few pages and a long introduction by Lee Weinstein. The Eye of Argon's charm is its teenage naïvity while at the same time Theis's writing, undaunted by lack of familiarity with his subject or fear of stereotype, bravely takes on adult themes with a barely adequate vocabulary: there are perhaps a dozen grammatically correct sentences in the whole story that are at least properly structured, or free of typos, or don't use an awkwardly heavy emphasis on the wrong components. It often reminds one of reading badly translated Cantonese (I particularly liked the use of "avantgarde" to mean "advanced guard"). Jim Theis died a few years ago but was generally sporting about his story's unwanted notoriety... does anyone still play "The Eye of Argon" game at conventions? |
| Monday, May 12th, 2008 |
axonite
|
10:27p |
I'm pretty sure this number isn't right |
| Tuesday, May 13th, 2008 |
angriest
|
9:02a |
Currently playing...
All the Swancon shenanigans completely made me lose track of recording my reading and viewing habits, so that plan has gone out the window. Anyway, I am currently playing:
Oblivion: like Morrowind before it, this is a game that I just keep coming back to and explore a little bit more. My one complaint: I want a button I can press when I've gone to open a door and accidentally picked up a household item next to the door that makes me say "I'm terribly sorry. I was aiming for the door and hit your household item. I was not stealing it. Here. Have it back. Please do not call the police."
Mystery Detective: point and click fun on the DS. I am already stuck. Bugger.
Tingle's Balloon Fight: It's Balloon Fight, only with Tingle in it. Everyone loves Tingle. Don't they? Don't they? |
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