elethe asked why people like living in London, and I left this in a comment. I’m reposting it here, because I like it, and would like to be able to find it another time. If you’ve heard me was lyrical about London a lot before, you can probably skip it – there’s only a limited amount of new material in here.
Author: Alasdair
Opinions Sought: Photo Printing
Firstly: has anyone used photobox.co.uk to get prints of digital images in the past? I think I’ve finally turned up somewhere that’ll do photo printing on demand like I want (ie. without requiring me to pay anything up front) but I’d like an idea of their quality before asking anyone to part with cash. If no-one’s tried them, I’ll order a few things myself, but I just thought I’d check first.
Secondly, and more importantly: of the photos I’ve put up to date on electricana, which are your favourites (if you’re not watching electricana, then by all means, take a quick look and tell me if anything leaps out at you)? Are there you would seriously consider buying, if they were a reasonable size/price?
[Webdev] PHP and Windows Login
I’m working on the company intranet at the moment which will have all sorts of different levels of access. We have been asked to come up with a system whereby the website does not have a seperate login system of any kind – a user simply logs on to their machine in the morning, and if they look at the intranet in any browser on their machine, they will only see those things that they have access to.
The intranet is using PHP on IIS.
Is their some cunning way I can get at their windows username and password via their browser, without throwing up any kind of log in?
(I would hope *not*, for y’know, security reasons, but I’m just checking.)
Pretty Like Drugs
And madder than a particualrly lunatic crop of badgers.
Queen Adreena were storming. I might attempt a proprer review tomorrow. electricana watchers will almost certainly get a few photos from the gig over the next few days. Short version: rockier than a very lumpy rock garden, and sexier than the second coming of an extraordinarily sexy messiah.
I think I may have sprained the bit of my brain that does the metaphors.
Home again.
Menlo Park: good. Sound quality: rubbish, so it was a bit of a let down. Support act were a cross between Frankie Goes To Hollywood and The Streets (I quite liked it). I may write it up properly tomorrow. (It’s not Sunday until I’ve gone to bed.)
Stopped in at Slimes for an hour or two on my way home, but wound up remaining entirely sober, in a shocking break with tradition, and opted for an early nightbus after a couple of hours dancing. It’s a sufficiently nice morning that I hopped off the bus in Balham, and walked home from there, just to enjoy the dawn. I’m such a fucking hippy.
Zzzzz….
Who?
Easily the strongest episode yet, I find myself seriously anticipating next week’s. Not coincidentally, also the one that has done what I think is the best job of adapting Doctor Who stories to something more like the modern American 40 minute SF show format.
III
Gosh, that’s a surprise: it’s exactly as bad as the previous two. Actually, that’s not fair. It’s better than II. So is dental surgery.
Still, it’s nerdstalgia, and it was a laugh. I don’t begrudge the time or money. Which is damning with faint praise, but it really doesn’t deserve more. Portman and Christensen were rubbish, which didn’t help, since they were supposed to be the emotional core of that film. Portman did her best with some of the worst lines I’ve ever heard, but Christensen still has no discernably personality, charisma, or indeed, acting talent. (McDiarmid was having a good laugh, though – I haven’t seen sets that thoroughly chewed since Jeremy Irons got at the Dungeons and Dragons ones.)
Oh, and the lads behind Yoda’s CGI did a bloody marvellous job – the little green muppet managed most of the few emotional moments that actually worked.
And now we can all get on with the rest of our lives, and George Lucas can retire in order to work on growing that chin he’s always wanted.
Protected: Flickr – why it’s better than LJ/Photobucket/Fotopic.
Books! Old and new!
cairmen asked, I answer:
1) Total number of books owned?
Dunno. If we allow comics-with-spines as books, 3 full-height bookshelves worth, plus more in storage. Without that, 2 full height bookshelves, plus storage. What’s in storage is probably another full-height and a bit of proper books.
2) Last book I bought:
Like cairmen, Brookmyre’s new one. I don’t think it’s soulless, although it’s a bit Brookmyre by the numbers. Boiling a Frog remains his weakest as far as I’m concerned.
3) Last book I read:
Last one finished was “Rip it Up And Start Again”.
a) With Pictures?
Erm… Flight 2, or possibly Four Letter Words. There’re a few others I’ve bought, but not read – mostly Marvel and DC trades. Very little new that’s a “god, got to rush home and read this…”
b) Non-fiction?
Rip It Up is non-fiction. But for fiction, the last thing I read was re-reading Grant Morrison’s “Lovely Biscuits” and David Conway’s “Metal Sushi” on the tube last Saturday (I took quite a few tube journeys, and read fast). Then I went and fed myself brain-altering chemicals, and in hindsight, should not have been entirely surprised…
4) 5 Books that mean a lot to me:
- 45 – Bill Drummond. Bill Drummond has the most relaxing and accessible way of talking about Art and modern life that I know. More books about Art should be like his. A friend of mine once flattered me outrageously by comparing my writing style/way of looking at the world and Drummond’s. I think he’s mad, but yes, Drummond is certainly an important influence of mine.
- The Complete Sherlock Holmes – Arthur Conan Doyle. My favourite pulp fiction, the light by which I make a basic judgement about almost all Fantasy/SF/Comics work – do I enjoy it as much as Holmes?
- Fear and Loathing On The Campaign Trail ’72 – Hunter S Thompson. My favourite work of journalism, and also my favourite work about politics.
- Winnie The Pooh (and The House at Pooh Corner) – A A Milne. Technically two books, I suppose, but I love them beyond belief. The only “classic” on my list. Brilliant, brilliant children’s fiction, and the standard by which a person’s soul can be measured. If there is no love in you for these stories then, you should be kept away from real people, as you’re obviously some kind of parasite.
- From Hell – Alan Moore and Eddie Campbell. Not, I should add, on here as a token representative of comics, but on here as a thing I genuinely think of as an Important Literary Work. Yes, it still is the bar that I think other comics have yet to beat in terms of all round quality, but more than that, it’s an excellent work of literary/historical fiction, that doesn’t put a foot wrong at any point. A must-read for anyone, regardless of their prejudices about comics.
Unwind
Mmmm, endorphins. Hurrah for healthy exercise.
I appear to have tomorrow night free. I’m sure I was supposed to be doing something, but I can’t remember what.
Menlo Park gig Saturday night. Who actually got tickets in the end? Does anyone fancy meeting up somewhere for a quiet drink beforehand, since it’s on late?