draconid

Torchwood.

Wednesday.

9pm.

I am very happy now!

I wasn't planning on making resolutions this year but I've realised today that I've actually kinda got some, if unspoken, so here they are:

• comment more
• reply to comments more
• update my journal blog and tumblelog more
• organise my files and bookmarks more
• play WoW more
• play other games more
• play the guitar more
• exercise more
• play with the hamsters more
• programme outside work more

and to break with the pattern:

• eat less!

Apologies for the two posts in quick succession but I wanted to keep this post separate.

I've been planning to do a portal for my various websites for a while, drawing in rss feeds from my blog, my tumblelog, my Goodreads account and my new Magnolia account (which I am planning on replacing my delicious account because I prefer Magnolia and my delicious is in the biggest mess ever. I plan to do this in Rails and have done the initial steps in starting it.

Anyway, today, as I did some stuff on the site I wrote for work (which may soon be defunct) I was thinking how proud I was of it and how much of it I could use for other purposes. The category/topic system could be a category/blog post system. The devolved publishing/category system could allow for a multi-blog system where each user has their own separate blog. The REST knowledge that I've developed would help me write a client for it in the future. And the experience of writing a bilingual website means that I could write a proper bilingual site rather than just posting in alternate languages. Suddenly I had an aim for the future. Something to develop when/if I'm no longer developing at work.

And then I recalled how I've always wanted to learn Python, and had been complaining at last weekend's party that I need a project to enable me to do so. Could this be such a project? Of course, the first thing I'd need to do is find out if Dreamhost will run Python, and the first thing that comes up is this post: http://blog.dreamhosters.com/2006/05/24/django-on-dreamhost/. Rails-like framework for Python that will run on Dreamhost. So not only can I learn a new language but I can also use some of the concepts and techniques I've learnt through Rails. And Python is Lush. Not that Ruby isn't Lush. It's just not named Python.

I'm not definite about the framework yet. There may be better/alternate frameworks out there. But it looks like I've got long-term plans for a project. It will probably take me years, but I really want to do this! Although I still do plan to do the Rails portal in the near future.

(well, that's not completely accurate as tea and cheese come above both of those).

Last night I played more KOTOR - having great fun with it. I also discovered that I have Splinter Cell Pandora Tomorrow which I got free with a graphics card absolutely years ago. I assumed it was a demo or something because I wasn't used to graphics cards coming packed with games. So I started playing that last night too. I suck at it. It's fun but I'm crap at working out what to do next - and this is in the tutorial level with hints. But I haven't given up. Oh no, definitely not.

I'm also squeeeing lots over the idea of playing World of Warcraft again soon!

The books bit is even more exciting. Today I received from Amazon: Y Geiriadur Mawr (the big dictionary), The Welsh Learner's Dictionary (fantastic stuff at the front for helping with Welsh grammar), and last but certainly not least, Harri Potter a Maen yr Athronydd - of which I can't even read the first sentence without the help of Y Geiriadur Mawr! I think it's going to be one paragraph at a time.

I've also got no excuses not to write Welsh blog entries.

Other thing that has me squeeeing is the prospect of more rats - Rat had a discussion with zoundz earlier today and since there aren't going to be any rexes any time soon and we've got girlies "on the way", I'll hopefully (much finger crossing), eventually, get a rex buck! Doubly Good!

We found Zelenka dead today. I'd noticed that the water hadn't gone down as much as it normally would so went to their cage to look for them. I disturbed Carson who was asleep in the house but couldn't find Zel. Then I found him under some other bedding and he didn't seem to move. I moved away and Rat checked and found that he was indeed dead. We have no idea why - he was perfectly fine two nights ago - there were no wounds and he looked perfectly peaceful. We've buried him in the garden.

Here are some recent and not so recent pictures of baby Zel - sorry for the lack of cut but I don't want to cut these today.

http://www.firebox.com/product/2032?src_t=wnw

The best thing? Only works with Linux!

Wikiband meme: Go to the Wikipedia home page and click random article. That is your band's name. Click random article again; that is your album name. Click random article 15 more times; those are the tracks on your album.

Band name: Ratlike Hamster

Album: 1885 in Archaeology

And the songs:

1. Free-living Amebic Infection
2. Tony Prito
3. The Way of Cross and Dragon
4. WCLQ
5. Homs Governorate
6. Webserial
7. Scurvy
8. Ad Herbal
9. Seaman (dog)
10. Rock Port High School
11. Wahlrod
12. Ornithohptera Richmondia
13. Seani B
14. Witch-Hunt: The Rites of Samhain
15. Heinie Mueller

The rejects (found on the special edition album) - i.e. names that I couldn't bare to include

1. Edinburgh West (UK Parliament constituency)
2. Juno Awards of 1994

I'm not in a very artistic or inventive mood so I'm not going to comment on the song titles or do lyrics like some people did, but I reckon the group is a weird indie group - maybe a bit like Mr Hudson and the Library or Duke Special.

Absolutely love the band name. ;)

This might be of interest to miss_next in particular - I'd link to the site in question but it doesn't launch until tomorrow so I'm afraid the link is to an article about the site. But yeah, certainly something I'll be looking into.

Wil Wheaton's post today is a classic, although I can't say I've ever experienced the phenomenom of roleplayers not touching each other's dice.

I've been playing more with Exaile and it's not failing to impress.  I put in a CD and unlike Amarok it automatically opens it.  But it doesn't overwrite my existing playlist.  It opens a new tab.  Awesome!  I am, however, having difficulty importing a CD ... I suspect I don't have any software installed for ripping or something.  Sigh.

For anyone who's even vaguely interested and has BBC Radio, Johnny Walker is going to be talking to Pete Townshend during his show between 4:30 and 6:30 today (I'm guessing because The Who are launching their new DVD and website tomorrow).  You can also listen live at http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio2

Yesterday Rat mentioned support so I answered two requests, getting unscreened for one.  These are probably the only requests I've answered in a year or more.  And today I get a virtual gift - a cool flying bat - for helping in support this past month.  So now I feel I have to answer more requests to deserve the gift!

Considering buying tickets to another concert.  Kerrang! 2008 tour.  I've not heard of any of the bands before but the clips on their MySpace profiles sound promising.  It's £15 per ticket and in Cardiff University's SU.  It's been a long long long time since I've been to a concert in the union (well, ten years in fact - I saw Cast in my first couple of months at university - just before or just after Gav and I started dating).  Being surrounded by students, and Kerrang! loving students, would be scary.  But it's live music and I could really eat live music up right now.  I have a couple of days to decide at least.

Stolen from camomiletea:

Number of journal entries: 1765

Number of people on your friends list: 49

Person who introduced you to LJ: claudiag

Still friends with this person: No

How many people have you introduced to LJ: 3

List everyone on your friends list whom you have met in person: ratofthelab, livredor, zoundz, woodsey5, carreg, lefugue (not that he uses it!) - plus the various journals that are me! ;)

TOTAL # OF LJ-ERS MET: 6

5 people on LiveJournal that you have known the longest: ratofthelab, lefugue, macdadg, niltsiar, dek0n (boyfriend, brother and old IRC friends respectively)

Anyone on LJ you can't stand: Yes, but I'm not saying any more than that!

Name one person on your friends list you would most like to meet: One? One? My first thought would be macdadg because I have known him for sooooo long (or any of the old IRC lot to be honest). But I'm actually going to say isabeau because she's someone I know through LJ rather than through other means and I've wanted to meet mac since before I even knew LJ existed!

Ever ban someone from commenting in your journal: Only spammers, but there's a thought ....

Number of comments: Posted: 4,207 - Received: 3,402

Biggest pet peeve about LJ: The fact that if you have a min security but want to post public you have to go back in and edit!

Do you feel close to most of the people on your friends list: No (I'd say about four or five, but they are either old IRC chums or people I know in RL)

How many journals on LiveJournal do you have: 4

Communities I currently own/maintain: dnd3e, filmcritics, dragonlance

FreeRice

Link from alsatia.  It's a vocabularly quiz where they donate rice to stop hunger, via the UN, for every question you get right.

In more of my "must see as many live acts as possible even if I can't afford it" attitude, I bought tickets for a concert in Birmingham next November. Although not a concert I should really admit I've bought tickets for. They're for my mum's birthday and Christmas presents to be fair. I've bought us a pair of tickets to see Cliff Richard. While not my usual type of music I used to love Cliff when I was younger (and had I been alive when Cliff was young I would have been drooling over him constantly - I used to love watching Summer Holiday) and I think I'll enjoy it. And it'll be nice to take my mum to see him since she's crazy about him! I just hope he doesn't decide to play the Christmas songs (I think I'll have to walk out if I hear Mistletoe and Wine!)

And now to more interesting music, and last night's trip the the Millenium Stadium along with 30,000 other fans of The Police. It started with Sting's son's band, Fiction Plane, who I was very impressed with (and boy does he sound like his dad, I never realised voices ran in families quite like that!). Then Mr Hudson and the Libraries which sounded much better on MySpace than live. And finally Sting and co came on themselves (although there was one song by some woman shortly before The Police - not an advertised support act). By the time the band was on the stadium was packed, as I could easily tell by my lofty throne. The throng of people made for a great atmosphere and at times Sting could have saved his voice because the noise from the crowds was just as loud! The concert was great, covering all their greatest hits, and despite being ill for the last week Sting was in good voice. It was also great to be able to sing along to so many songs.

However, yes there has to be an however, there was something about it that left me feeling quite dissatisfied. As Rat pointed out, it felt quite a bit shorter than The Who concert a few months back (although, to be fair, they didn't have a multitude of power cuts). I also felt it a bit impersonal. I know that probably sounds weird, it's a huge stadium with 30,000 people in it, how can it be personal? Sting spoke a little (although the sound system wasn't brilliant so I couldn't make it all out), but the few things he said seemed to be about the singing ability of the Welsh (and just before trying to get us to sing along). There was none of The Who's story telling about certain songs or about last time they were in Cardiff, or anything like that. And maybe it's just because I'm biased (and was miles away from the stage) but I felt that Sting was just there to do his bit then run off, while I'd felt that The Who were truly loving what they were doing when I saw them.

Other things I noticed were exactly how many of The Police songs have "Eeee-oh's" in them. Which was great because there were lots of opportunities for the audience to join in. A lot of the songs seemed to have been filled with guitar solos or weird bits and some songs were sang in quite unfamiliar ways. I'm sure a lot of this is to make it individual and a bit more fun for them to play, and I'm fine with bands changing things when they are singing live (that's what makes live albums so great) but this happened a bit too much and in at least one song I forgot what song they were playing halfway through. I also felt the guitar solos weren't actually that good. They seems like a lot of noise to me. They're fairly typical guitar solos, not the sort you'd expect to hear from a world class band. Give me a good Slash or Sambora guitar solo any day (or, obviously, Townshend, but that goes without saying). I think a lot of the problem with the songs is that they were written in a time when songs were typically short (and The Police lyrics can be fairly repetitive at the best of times), and so they had to fill the two hours with something (rather than just adding more songs!).

The other thing that bothered me in a way was that both at the beginning and the end of the concert Sting "introduced" the band. As Rat and Peter said, it's probably because he wanted to be inclusive, but to me it felt different. Call me a cynic or something. But most concerts where bands are introduced it's the touring band who are introduced, not key members of the band. It would be like James Dean Bradfield introducing the other Manics. Which would just be weird and well, rude. So it gave me the feeling that this is a Sting concert, with his old band mates playing the backing for him, not a "The Police" concert.

But I shouldn't be too critical because it was an excellent concert. It wasn't a patch on watching The Who and I won't be obsessing about their music for the next six months. But I'm glad I went, it was very fun.

I just wish it had really been a Sting concert, because, while I love a lot of Police songs (particularly Roxanne and Don't Stand So Close To Me) I actually prefer Sting as a solo artist.

On Sunday in Top Gear the guys "lit up" some pipes that they had as merchandise (from Porsche I believe, but I could be wrong). My first thought was "isn't that technically illegal now?" but shrugged it off as it's for entertainment value not because they're particularly wanting to smoke (and it was particularly funny).

Of course, someone has complained, which begs the question - if it's illegal to smoke in a studio, how the hell will they film any TV series or film where characters smoke? Are suddenly all the characters of Eastenders or Coronation Street going to only smoke outside all of a sudden? What about historical documentaries where people would have smoked? While I prefer, in general, not to see smoking on screen (I find it almost as unpleasant to watch as to smell), for realism I think it's important to allow. Or are they going to have to CG everything from now on? I can see the soaring licensing fees now!

14-9.

'nuff said.