we are, after all, professionals...

2003-07-11T08:16:00.000Z

Another week...

...has passed without an update. Bad form, in some circles, but it has been a busy week - and sometimes life is like that. Long lulls and troughs punctuated by frenzied peaks that surprise you in the night with yellow eyes and maddening screeches, or thud into the side of your head like a wet sod as you blithely go about your business...

And so much for that. The big news this week? I am, as of 4.40 this morning, an uncle. My younger brother woke me from a deep sleep (and a strange dream involving pubs, burnt out cars and too many people that I haven't thought about in years) to tell me that his wife had given birth to a baby girl. Both are doing well, and I shall be seeing the new Smithlet some time in the next few days. A life begun, and many others changed forever.

Due to severely disturbed recent sleep patterns I am currently knackered, and have a whole shitload of work to do, so this is it for today. Have a good weekend.

2003-07-03T16:21:00.000Z

Happy Birthday, Bro!

My kid brother is a year older today, and The Girl and I will be attending a party this weekend at his place, along with parents, friends, neighbours and, of course, my heavily pregnant sister-in-law. The booze quota may not be up to usual standards, thanks to the impending arrival of child, but it should be a decent gathering, nonetheless. We shouldn't, at the very least, have to deal with cream-clad perverts , waking up naked in the street with no memory of getting there, or finding that our enemies and opponents have joined our cause in a confusing display of solidarity that breeds paranoia and distrust as much as any of the usual adversarial spoutings...

What? That last one? Well, it seems that the Beeb's recent spat with the government over the disgustingly-phrased sexing up of pre-war documents on Iraq. Prune-faced ultra-Tory Nicholas Soames, a former defence minister, "said he had been assured by a senior figure in the intelligence services that it was 'totally and entirely untrue' that the Government had interfered with the flow of secret intelligence" . This comes hot on the heels of the BBC's own astonishing admission that the in formation upon which it is basing this entire shambolic witchhunt may well be a pack of lies. Or not. We don't know, and neither do they - as is now becoming clear.

The BBC is willing to offer the government an olive branch by admitting that the source who claimed that No 10 had "sexed up" intelligence information may not have been entirely correct.
But it will do so only if Downing Street accepts that its story was legitimate in the context of general concern about the government's use of intelligence material.

Holy Jesus, what a mess. And what a disgaceful indication of the level of bias at the once-mighty Beeb, a national broadcaster with a supposed legendary impartiality. "...Legitimate in the context of general concern..."? What the hell does that mean - that inaccuracies and barefaced lies can be masquraded as truth as long as it furthers the writer's own views? My God, we need honest news now more than ever, and this just feels like a smack in the teeth. It's like the fucking Hermano album all over again...

2003-07-01T16:03:00.000Z

What is it with these weird tuesdays...

As the government debates once more the benefits of full-scale medication of the populace through the water supply, and the medical profession toys with the idea of creating babies whose biological mothers were never born, I find that my local shopping centre recently came within a whisker of falling under the curse of a pure-bred, dyed-in-the-wool, shamanistic freak-doctor from the other side of the world. This witchdoctor, who practices naked to show his honesty and expects his 'patients' to do the same, apparently had one foot on the steps of his private jet, as it sat on a baking Kenyan runway, when a last minute decision was made to call off the spellcasting - saving thousands of shoppers in England's northwest from a fate one can only imagine. A plague of rats? Boils? The four horsemen splashing through the elegant marble fountains in a raging display of Revelationary savagery? A visit from the Charles and Camilla? And all this because of a low-grade knick-knack store whose business has gone belly-up in the fallout of the great new century's divorce from ethnic fascination - a weird kind of inverted snobbery that attributed all manner of noble and salutory notions to wooden masks and worry beads.

So? Well, I shall be visiting this particular mall tonight, as my brother's birthday looms, followed closely by my mother's, and I need gifts. I'll give the tribal goods store a miss though, as I wouldn't want to risk a cursing. Still, at least Henman is hanging in there, following his bizarre and mind-bending match against Argentina's David Nalbandian. With six consecutive service break games in the third set it was an outrageous explosion of profanity and violence, at my end at least, but the teeth-gritting Henman blundered through in the fading light. One day, perhaps, but I doubt this'll be the year...

OK, back to real work, but in the meantime go and play this game.

2003-06-25T11:19:00.000Z

Windows Zen...

I've no clue as to where these came from as I received them from a colleague, but I like 'em! If I'm stealing them from anywhere in particular, well... tough. They're public domain now, my friend...

Japanese Error Message Haikus

In Japan, they have replaced the impersonal and unhelpful Microsoft error messages with Haiku poetry messages. Haiku poetry has strict construction rules. Each poem has 17 syllables: 5 syllables in the first line, 7 in the second, 5 in the third. They are used to communicate a timeless message, often achieving a wistful, yearning and powerful insight through extreme brevity.

Your file was so big.
It might be very useful.
But now it is gone.

The Web site you seek
cannot be located, but
countless more exist.

Chaos reigns within.
Reflect, repent, and reboot.
Order shall return.

Program aborting:
close all that you have worked on.
You ask far too much.

Windows NT crashed.
I am the Blue Screen of Death.
No one hears your screams.

Yesterday it worked.
Today it is not working.
Windows is like that.

First snow, then silence.
This thousand-dollar screen dies
so beautifully.

The Tao that is seen
is not the true Tao until
You bring fresh toner.

Stay the patient course.
Of little worth is your ire.
The network is down.

A crash reduces
your expensive computer
to a simple stone.

Three things are certain:
death, taxes and lost data.
Guess which has occurred.

You step in the stream,
but the water has moved on.
This page is not here.

Out of memory.
We wish to hold the whole sky,
but we never will.

Having been erased,
the document you're seeking
must now be retyped.

Serious error.
All shortcuts have disappeared.
Screen. Mind. Both are blank.

2003-06-24T15:46:00.000Z

Blood in the water...

Well, it's only Tuesday and already it's shaping up to be a weird week. Children are whooping it up for the written word, armoured shrimps and giant sea-spiders have been found off the coast of New Zealand, and Wimbledon's current champion and number one seed got his ass handed to him by a stammering Croatian giant playing his first ever grand slam match.

Beneath the oceans, it would seem, lurks a motley collection of freaks the likes of which is matched only by the images I see of life in British politics these days. One newly discovered creature, called the fangtooth, has teeth longer than its head. To avoid piercing its own brain when it shuts its mouth, its teeth fit into opposing sockets. This describes equally well the evil-looking prehistoric beast discovered in the Australasian depths and the unnamed speedfreak that lifted material from a twelve-year-old Phd thesis for use in a government dossier on Iraq and didn't even have the nouse to fully rewrite the damn thing. Jack Straw is currently 'giving evidence' to the Foreign Affairs Select Committee in an attempt to hammer Labour's panels back into shape, and will be followed later by the government's smoothest fixer, Alastair Campbell. This dossier, released at the height of public fear and confusion over the war, carried the infamous 45 minutes allegation, and was apparently 'sexed up' to make it more palatable to the public ear. Well, my friend, sex and politics don't mix - just ask William Jefferson Clinton, or David Mellor - and you only have to look at these people to see that. Just the facts ma'am, that's all we ask. Too much? Sure, this is politics after all, but for Christ's sake, if you are getting a backroom lackey to rustle up a little chum, please check that shit before you throw it in the water. The last thing you need is an official release document written by some idiot who spent so much time cheating at school he developed a permanent crick in his neck.

Which just goes to show; behind every great politician is a greater number of loons, shitheels and winos, who hold the dreams of the great and the good in their sticky palms, yet have all the political ken of old Fangtooth - snapping away in the dark, each opening and closing of the mouth just a millimetre or two away from impaling the prefrontal cortex on a five-inch spike. Then one day - maybe it's age, or wear, or just a little of that bad luck people talk so much about - the mouth closes mid-sentence, a little off-centre, and BLAM! The fear centre of the brain is scrambled, burned away by the incision of a needle-sharp fang. So much for that; who needs Fear - this is politics, and a man without fear is a force to be reckoned with in Westminster, just like in the bullring, or when descending to the sea in a coffin-sized tin box just to take photographs of deep-sea creatures the likes of which the human eye has never seen. Except in the halls of government...

2003-06-18T08:34:00.000Z

Drug children and toe-eaters...

I received a phone call late yesterday afternoon from The Girl, informing me that she had been headbutted by one if the kids in the class she was teaching. There was no direct malice involved, thankfully. It was merely an accident caused by the fact that the child, a fourteen-year-old girl, was high on drugs. Apparently the pupil, known amongst her peers as a non-drugtaker, had been talked into smoking a joint at lunchtime by one of her classmates - unfortunately the girl in question was introduced to cannabis by way of an enormous ingestion of high-grade skunk weed, straight from the coffee shops of Amsterdam, and paid a hefty price. She entered the classroom late, wild-eyed and skittish, and within minutes was screaming at an unseen assailant and clawing at the walls in a fit of crazed paranoia. Her classmates, panicked by the sight of their friend in the throes of a full-on drug-induced freak out, were unable to help and The Girl, attempting to restrain the maniac, received a blow to the face from the pupil's flailing skull. Teachers from nearby classrooms, alarmed by the chaos and screaming, arrived and eventually manhandled the stricken girl into a nearby office where she alternately thrashed and cowered as some imagined horror tore at her flesh and eyes. An ambulance was called, and The Girl went back to teaching the shocked classmates. It was only after the lesson was ended, and the adrenaline levels had subsided, that she was overcome by fear and nerves, and was followed home at the end of the day by a concerned colleague, as her driving could not be entirely trusted whilst in such a state of mind.

She seems okay this morning, though she was pretty shaken last night, and a couple of new bruises have appeared. These have been documented and photographed (you can never be too careful with these things) and she has returned to school to teach again today. A bad scene, for sure, and one hell of an introduction to the world of drug-taking for this one particular pupil. Of course, my main concern is for The Girl, and the thought of her having to cope with this kind of shit is not something I like to dwell on as it only makes me angry. Teachers need to be able to teach, and are not equipped to deal with violent lunatics and drug fiends. But deal with them they must, unfortunately. It could have been worse, of course, in terms of both injury and outcome, and I suppose we should be thankful that the kid wasn't sniffing butane...

2003-06-12T15:53:00.000Z

Gentlemen, start your engines...

Well, it looks like things are about to crank up again here at the Animation Desk. We've just begun prototyping for a new project (as usual, it's all under wraps at this stage - goddamn NDA's...) and are finally getting some real work. Don't get me wrong, we all needed a break after the end of the Wolverine's Revenge project - a car crash of Stress and Fear that threatened to take down both the great and the good and the workshy shitheels - and it was pleasant enough, for a while, to work eight hour days and play around with personal projects and technical experiments whilst surfing the entire internet... However, after a while the brain begins to atrophy and you wonder whether you'll ever be able to produce a worthwhile days work again. So it has been in recent weeks, with mental stagnation setting in and my animation skills draining out into the gutter like greasy rainwater...

Or so I thought. My first stab at animating our New Secret Character TM has been a success; a revelation, in fact, to the point where colleagues who have heard of it (in tales of lore told around campfires, presumably...) keep visiting my room to take a look. There is a new positivity coursing through my bones, despite the trials and tribulations of trying to get my oven fixed (another story, for another time - right now the wounds are still fresh and I can barely formulate a coherent sentence on the subject), and the creative spark that had been all but extinguished by an eternity of inaction is brightening. It feels good to be back in the saddle.

2003-06-06T15:22:00.000Z

Man, it's like Blogger actually hates me, or something...

Well, it has been days since I could access my Blogger account, so apologies for the blank spaces (but hey, it's not like it's the first time, right?) and a huge finger to the evil that is bandwith...

I talked a while back (no link - archives screwed) about resurrecting some of my past creative pursuits, mainly as an attempt to kickstart my ability to generate animation and thereby earn a living. Well, one of the things that has really grabbed me again over recent weeks has been my love of photography. I recently picked up an old Canon EOS 600 for a song and am pretty enamoured with the thing. It is heavy as hell, compared to modern cameras, but it feels more robust than anything else I've used (a good thing, as I tend to be a little rough and ready with cameras - they are usually slung in a bag and dragged around pretty much wherever I go), plus it is beautifully balanced. I fired a couple of films through it, just blasting away at anything and everything, and recently got the first set of black and white prints back from those good people at Ilford. Man, I'd forgotten how much I love seeing a moment captured on film. I've dabbled recently with digital photography, and it is great, but there is something so tactile and analogue about film work. The chemical process and the timeless quality of a black and white print just knocks me out every time - I grabbed some of the best photos I've ever seen of my parents, for instance, just through quick shot-from-the-hip images as I used up a roll of film. If I can get them scanned I might post a couple.

Assuming the weather is fine tomorrow it'll be barbecue time. Red meat and intoxicants, who needs more...

2003-06-02T15:14:00.000Z

Simian Sleep-Deprivation

I'm feeling pretty tired today. The monkeys were noisy last night, and I had to sleep with my windows open due to the heat. The screeching and chattering was so loud I kept leaping out of bed periodically, sweeping my Maglite across the back garden in an attempt to scare the bastards off, or at least catch a glimpse of one of the little fuckers. I've never seen them of course, and the idea of monkeys living in the abandoned paper mill behind my house seemed a little outlandish to me too, at first. I know they are there, though - I can hear them...

And so much for that. The weekend was much as expected - good weather, booze - and was marred only by the necessary-but-unpleasant (in a root-canal sense) bank visits that the Girl and I had to undertake on Saturday morning. Without getting into too much tedious detail, I'll simply say this: three banks, two hours, zero satisfaction. And the promise of more of the same next week. Selah.

Thinngs at the Animation Desk are looking up, if only slightly. As ever, I can't say much about it, but it looks like a lot of my worries of last week were unfounded, and that my position is more secure than I thought. This is A Good Thing, obviously, and has cheered me somewhat. Unfortunately it didn't come soon enough to prevent me from walking around all weekend like a bulldog licking piss off a thistle, but such is life. I shall still be making provisions to provide an escape route for myself (a man needs protection in these parts, at times), at least in terms of being ready to roll, should the call come, but for now things are getting back to whatever the hell it is that we know as reality around these parts.

2003-05-30T12:56:00.000Z

Fucking Blogger...

Goddamn it, I come back to this thing only to find that I can't access my Blogger account for days on end. No wonder Blair and Bob have both recently followed so many others to more reliable e-pastures...

The breakfast thievery continues, and so the gloves are off. I've threatened violence - something I'm usually against, but in this case I feel it is more than justified - and am going to booby-trap a box of cereal by lacing it with a heavy dose of laxative. Even if I don't catch the swine responsible, a hefty bout of The Shits ought to fend them off...

The weather is beautiful today, and promises to remain so for the weekend (meaning the Matrix Reloaded will have to wait, at least until the rain returns. I live in the UK, and can't afford to waste a second of sun...). My plans, therefore, mainly consist of sitting in my back garden drinking wine and wishing I could afford to take a couple of weeks off. Man, this downtime is really killing me, and my mood has not been lightened by recent information (which I cannot repeat here) which makes me worry for my future in a very real way. Ugly thoughts and possibilities fill my head this Friday afternoon, and the next month is going to be an unpleasant round of insecurity and Fear. My showreel is complete, and opportunities do exist elsewhere, but, shit, I like it here and really don't want change. Of course, things could all change for the better just as easily, but thanks to the present climate and my increasing boredom with the current state of play here I can't help but dwell on the missed opportunities, failed manouevres and possible doom-laden ramifications of it all.

I'm going to attempt to forget about it all over this weekend - after all, it's way out of my hands - and relax a little. Have a good one...

2003-05-27T16:06:00.000Z

Quiet Day

Again. This level of lethargy can't be good for a man like me. The company is still waiting to hear about the next project, so we are all currently dividing our time between aimless meanderings and pointless corporate diversions designed to keep us busy and give the impression to visiting digitaries that we are a hive of activity just waiting, nay, bursting, to be utilised. We'll certainly see if it all goes to plan tomorrow, as an important international player -and one who could well hold our futures in his hand - arrives for his first visit. All this is fine and dandy - you've got to accept a certain amount of this behaviour once you move up to the big leagues, and we're certainly standing on the periphery of that at the moment - but it does shit for my creativity.

A sense of waiting, of being poised and ready, can only be maintained for so long before the muscles relax and complacency sets in. Unfortunately I've been held at Battle Ready status for too long, and now the mind is wandering - I knew I should have paid more attention at sniper school... And enough of that, a lazy metaphor that surely can't take us anywhere good, certainly not when I'm of this mind. I need a focus, and for that I need a target (damn, there I go again. All the recent war footage has turned me into a military metaphor machine. And as for the goddamn alliteration...). What I really need to do is spread myself out a little; broaden my experiences. My plan is to engage in a greater variety of creative pursuits, to recall some of my long-forgotten thrills, particularly those that have fallen by the wayside. Hmmm... Rambling again, Smith? Yup. Well, maybe you'll get to see some of the fruits of these labours in forthcoming weeks. Maybe you already have....

2003-05-23T09:51:00.000Z

A quiet day at the Animation Desk.

My limbs feel like broken branches, my eyes are still red and my hearing seems to be shutting down fast. It is all part of my current malaise - a lingering cold that appears intent in turning me into an old man, wheezing my way through the simplest of tasks with blurred vision and a short temper. Things are eerily calm at the moment though, with most people content to hide behind their monitors until further pronouncements are made - probably some time next week - as to what the hell we'll be working on next. Rumours abound, obviously, and some are betting big on one idea or another in an attempt to position themselves ahead of the game when the traps open. As for me, I just want to catch the bastard who stole my breakfast.

As my friends will no doubt attest, I'm not a good man to be around when the food starts to run out. I do not function well without some form of sustenence (I've been known to collapse, lash out, even freak out and start hurling outrageous slurs and morally dubious accusations at colleagues - all due to lack of food), and the first meal of the day can often dictate my mood for hours to come. Therefore I can only assume that the person who has sytematically chowed through my box of cereal in the company kitchen this week does not know me too well, or surely they would know the peril in which they are placing themselves. Half of me wants to lace a box of cornflakes with LSD or cheap speed just to teach the fucker a lesson - especially after I arrived this morning to find that they'd finished the goddamn box. You just don't fuck with a man's breakfast.

But enough of this ugly talk. Such words are too harsh for a Friday, and I'm a little grumpy, I'll admit. Monday is a Bank Holiday, so a three-day weekend beckons - a Good Thing, for sure. Hopefully this lethargic fog will lift by tomorrow night, and I'll get good use from my extra day. Back to the self-medication...

2003-05-22T08:53:00.000Z

And just where the hell have you been young man?

OK, so I'm back. What? It's not like anything important happened whilst I was gone...

Well, Wolverine's Revenge is finished and hs been on release for a while now. It's strange to see something which has ruled your life for two years come to an end - especially something that has wrung the very marrow from your bones and caused near-breakdowns in many a good, strong man. Marriages faltered, friendships disintegrated, sickness and madness were rife, and all for a videogame. Such is life at the sharp end my friend: toughen up or take off, that's the line from the top, and it seems to be industry wide. Man, this country is a graveyard of devco's these days. Over the last two years the UK games industry has been beaten like a gong, and too many talented men and women have drowned in a sea of hacks and hangers-on. Most people blame the publishers. I certainly do, when I'm in that sort of ugly mood, but in my saner moments I know the truth, and the truth is as unpleasant and brutal a thing as always: too many shitheels and not enough heart.

We lost a few along the way, and we gained a couple too. As to who fits which description, well it's not for me to say, but I know this for sure; interesting times lie ahead for all of us. Lessons have been learned and new structures put in place, but I have my doubts as to the efficacy of these manouverings. Politics has overtaken us all, and there are dirty thoughts in the heads of many at the moment - especially those who have empires to build and axes to grind. I'm trying to lay low (the toll of the last project stills weigh heavily on my shoulders, if I'm truly honest, and I need to bolster my reserves before we head out again), although the hubris and downright greed of some is almost too much to resist. I get a certain perverse pleasure from the Machiavellian wranglings that colour a lot of the interactions round these parts, as long as they keep their claws out of my throat, at least. I wouldn't want to have to start snapping fingers...

2003-03-10T13:55:00.000Z

MIA...

2003-03-04T08:41:00.000Z

WTF?

This from Ananova...

Children banned from reading Three Little Pigs

A school has banned under sevens from reading the story of the Three Little Pigs in case it offends Muslims. All other tales about pigs, including Babe, are also off limits for pupils under seven at Park Road Junior Infant and Nursery in Batley, West Yorkshire. The school says any talk of pigs is offensive to Muslims who make up 60% of the 250 pupils. But leading Muslims say there's nothing in their religious rules to stop children reading about pigs. The ban was discovered when a parent saw words relating to pigs had been removed from a homework sheet. Headteacher Barbara Harris said the books had only been removed from classes for under sevens and were still available in the school library, reports The Sun. But Inayat Bunglawala, of the Muslim Council of Britain, said: "This is bizarre. There is nothing to stop children reading about pigs. The ban is simply on the consumption of pork and pig products."

2003-02-21T08:10:00.000Z

A step too far?

Now I like to watch the ritual humiliation of fame-hungry idiots as much as the next man, and therefore have no real problem with the reality TV concept. This, however, is taking things a little too far I think...

Woman 'traumatised by TV show alien prank'

A woman tricked into believing she was being chased by an alien is suing reality TV producers, claiming the experience left her traumatised. According to a lawsuit filed in the Los Angeles County Superior Court, Kara Blanc was admitted to hospital with physical injuries and severe emotional distress caused by the prank. The teacher was told she had won an invitation to an exclusive Hollywood party at a southern California resort, the suit said. But the car taking her to the event stalled along a remote stretch of desert and she was forced to watch her two companions, who were in on the prank, being 'killed' by a costumed alien attacker. The suit said the pair shouted at a terrified Ms Blanc to flee into a dark, desert canyon area in an attempt to save her life. Hidden cameras were recording the prank for Scare Tactics, a new TV show hosted by former Beverly Hills 90210 star Shannen Doherty. It was filmed last March and is due to air on the US Sci-Fi Channel in April. Other episodes include campers who believe they are being attacked by Big Foot, and limousine riders who are chased by bogus government agents when they drive into Area 51, the US military facility believed to be hiding alien secrets.

Ms Blanc, of Los Angeles, claims the stunt led to her being admitted to hospital several times, causing her to miss work and incur medical costs for unspecified physical injuries and psychological trauma. Her lawsuit charges the show's makers with negligence, invasion of privacy, assault, false imprisonment and fraudulent misrepresentation. It also seeks to bar the producers from airing the tape and to stop them from engaging in "the unfair, unlawful and fraudulent business practice of surreptitiously recording the traumatised reactions of any other persons in the future".

Whatever next?

See the reaction on poor Mary Brown's face as her newborn baby, which unbeknownst to her has been swapped for a lifelike dummy, is thrown into a trash compactor and SQUASHED BEFORE HER VERY EYES!!!

Laugh at the emotional torment as we convince a group of elderly nuns that Jesus has returned. TO SEND THEIR SINFUL SOULS TO HELL!!!

For crying out loud...

2003-02-18T08:49:00.000Z

Busy doing nothing...

Valentine's Day went well. All went according to plan, my fears did not materialise - the flowers arrived in time, and were of an excellent quality - and a good time was had by all. I also recieved gifts, including a pair of ultra-cool fully-functional compass cufflinks. Now, should I ever be both well-dressed and lost, I will at least be able to tell which way is north. Despite my generally 'dressed-down' sartorial approach I have a real love (bordering on a fetish, some would say) of cufflinks. There's something about them that completes an outfit, and I have actually bought many more shirts that require cufflinks simply as an excuse to break out those 'links more often. The fact that I usually team them with a pair of combats and some battered Adidas shelltoe is another matter entirely...

Work is weird. As a company, a unit, a team, we are busy. Very busy in fact, as the game is finally nearing completion and the programmers are working all hours to get all the bugs ironed out. I, however, have very little to do. Yesterday I worked for around thirty minutes of the nine-and-a-half hours I spent here at my desk - the rest of the time I spent attempting to find some work to do. Unfortunately I've never been the kind of person to spend all day doing nothing, and I tend to get really bored without real tasks and challenges. In many ways it is worse than the Deadline Madness that periodically haunts my schedules, as it lacks the adrenalising effect and trench-mentality that gets you through crunch time - plus I feel like a bit of a fraud, wasting the day away whilst others are tied to the mast and battered nearly senseless by the Beast. Of course, I've had my day on the mast and should probably take advantage of this downtime while it lasts; my turn will no doubt come round again, and I wonder whether others will be as understanding of my position as I try to be of theirs...

2003-02-13T10:45:00.000Z

Gah!

The creaking servers here at Deadline Towers are making their dissatisfaction known in a big way. At the beginning of the week a shiny new server was installed, ostensibly to take the pressure off the older mouse-on-a-wheel-powered machines. We were confidently assured that the problem days were over, and that we would no longer suffer the frustrations and hair-tearing that has become commonplace in recent months. Of course there were a few teething problems. Of course! This is to be expected, and we bore them with nobility, safe in the knowledge that a successful solution was at hand. Wires were connected, switches were flipped and the new machine blinked into life, ushering in a new age of speedy connections and fast renders. A day later and - you know where I'm heading here, don't you? -the whole thing is down. Again. Gftuiohfulgjaknbuiabfdh!!! (That was the sound of utter frustration, by the way...)

So we've been offline/online for the last few days, hence the lack of posts.

I've also been super-busy trying to sort out arrangements for the Valentine's Day spectacular I have planned for tomorrow. Actually, it's not exactly a spectacular, but the complications involved in the organisation of things makes it seem like it should be. One of the main problems has been the flowers. You wouldn't think it'd be difficult to obtain red roses in the run-up to V's Day, and in many respects it isn't. The difficulty comes in figuring put when and where to buy them/have them delivered etc. You can't buy them too early, as they'll die (or at least deteriorate until they look like something you pick up from a garage forecourt at 5.30 on a Friday), and you can't leave it too late, as the shops will run out. You can order them to be delivered, but none of the companies involved will guarantee any kind of arrival time more specific than "between 8.30am and 5.00pm". Now if you ask me, that's a rather large window. Seeing as myself and The Girl work full-time and have not taken the day off tomorrow this is also completely useless. I could pick them up myself, but I work nowhere near a florist and my working hours means I cannot even get to a florists before they close. Even if I could, where would I keep them? We live in the same house. There is nowhere to hide a large and conspicuous bunch of flowers, and it is far too cold to leave them ouside or in the car.

As you can probably tell, this quandry has occupied far too much of my thinking time this week, and when my perfect plan of ordering the flowers over the internet and having them delivered to my Nan's house, from where I would pick them up on the way home from work, was scuppered by our server issues I got a little close to panicking. What a ridiculous state of affairs. I wouldn't fret so much if it wasn't for the fact that she adores flowers, especially the big-ass Valentines kind. Just buy the flowers, then give them to The Girl. What could be simpler? Sometimes I think the modern world, with all it's multiple payment options and convenient delivery slots is far to complicated for it's own good. Is there such a thing as too much choice?

2003-02-06T08:38:00.000Z

Man, this place is falling to pieces...

Please excuse all current and recent shoddiness - I seem to have a plethora of problems at the moment. Blogger is being its usual temperamental self, with the added issue of being unable to edit my last post, and my image host is down at the moment. Plus there is the ongoing comments battle...

Goddamn technology...

2003-02-06T08:10:00.000Z

Friday night image

Trucky and the Gecko, on a snowbound street, in the wee small hours...

2003-02-05T12:01:00.000Z

Come back comments, all is forgiven!

2003-02-04T21:59:00.000Z

A French mime in Manchester?

Well, we had a great time on Friday - beer was drunk, shit was talked and laughs were laughed. Also, as is usually the case, the Gecko and I argued politics in our drunken state on the night bus home. I'm not sure why this always happens, but we're both pretty forthright in our views I guess, and Trucky almost always ends up attempting to mediate some sort of truce - mainly because he wants to go to sleep. The best thing is, despite our debates often deteriorating into slurred nonsense, we never actually fall out over any of these arguments, and I always look back on them the next day (through the haze of the inevitable hangover) with a wry smile and strange sense of... nostalgia, I suppose. Odd, but strangely enjoyable.

We talked at length about making more time to see each other, and to have more fun - like we used to in our younger, more carefree days - and this time I think we actually will. Snowboarding is the next thing, I hope - though Trucky might take some convincing after last time (he almost passed out with exertion, hehe). The real problem is wrangling everyone's increasingly busy schedules into some form of confluence...

Oh yeah, the mime. We were in a rock club, so outrageous costumes are not exactly unusual (there was the usual mix of white-faced goths, punks with foot-high mohawks and baggy-arsed nu-metal kids), but then in came a guy in some form of Clockwork Orange meets Warriors get-up. The full ensemble was: strange black winkle-picker shoes, black toreador trousers, black t-shirt (very tight), white braces, white gloves, bowler hat. All of this wouldn't have been so damn funny if the guy hadn't had the sort of look on his face that you normally see on a small boy who's been forced to wear his Sunday Best for the arrival of some ancient aunt when he'd rather be out on his bike or throwing mud at the girls up the street. My favourite sight of the evening - and funniest running joke of the night - was Trucky attempting to stop The Mime's progress every time he walked past us with an invisible mime-rope....

2003-01-31T08:21:00.000Z

What to do?

I have a little tooth-related problem, somewhere along the lines of Bob's. A couple of weeks ago, as accompaniment to a fine head-based viral infection that made me feel like I needed to remove my skull and give it a good rinse out under a hot tap, I started to get a little toothache. Of course, when I say a little toothache I mean fucking agony. The problem appeared to be in a particular tooth that I've had a lot of problems with - problems that started with the dentist, ironically enough, and this is the real issue. I don't like dentists. Not in a 'I'm scared of the pain, it's a horrible experience' kind of way (although a trip to the dentist is undoubtedly a horrible experience. If only to my wallet), but in a 'you're a money-hungry quack, I don't trust you, you evil drill-weilding maniac' sense.

My views on dentists are informed by experience, for instance: they wanted to remove all my wisdom teeth, at the same time, during my late teens, at the point where they had started to emerge and were beginning to cause me a little pain (see a little toothache, above). This is a lengthy surgical procedure that leaves the patient with swollen gums and a bruised jaw, not to mention a whole bucket-o'-pain. Very much against the dentist's wishes, and in the face of threats and scare stories (they'll grow into your other teeth; they'll emerge horizontally from the side of your gums; you'll die - that sort of thing) I decided not to have them removed at all. A number of years later and, hey, whaddya know! - a full set of perfectly healthy and fully-functioning wisdom teeth. Chalk one up to the patient...

The current problem also stems from what I would consider an unnecessary procedure. About three years ago I head off to the dentist for my regular check-up, and am informed that I need a large filling, in a tooth that has given me no pain whatsoever. I trust the dentist's judgement, and a filling is installed in my once-healthy tooth (following a hell of a lot of drilling - to my mind, the amount of drilling it might take to drill a large hole in a healthy tooth, perhaps? Grrr.) From this point on, I begin to suffer pain. In my tooth. The one that has just been filled. The one that, prior to the filling, had never previously hurt. Ever. Over the next couple of years I have this filling removed and replaced a number of times. Each time the pain is excrutiating, and it costs me a small fortune - and all for a tooth that had previously been one of the unsung heroes of my mouth; quiet and unassuming, yet efficient and trouble-free.

So now the tooth is hurting again, and the last time I had it filled the dentist told me that if the latest filling didn't solve the problem it would require root canal work. Excellent. More pain (and plenty of it, by all acounts) and another, even larger, bill. I almost wanted to scream that I wouldn't have the problem if it wasn't for her evil, manipulative, money-grabbing ways, but I didn't (I'm English, what do you expect). So now, what to do? The pain subsided with the last of the head-virus, and now only hurts when I have anything particularly hot or cold. Should I put up with it, or should I swallow my anger and distrust and let the evil tooth-butcher fix me up good'n'proper? It's a dilemma, and one I am not in the right frame of mind to deal with right now.

I realised one good thing out of this latest tooth-pain though. Wine makes an excellent soother for all manner of dental aches and pains. More medicine! Sick guy over here! Nurse!

2003-01-29T19:33:00.000Z

If you want something doing right...

I was halfway through writing a lengthy entry about my inability to give up control over my work to people whose standards are not, to my eyes, high enough. Then I realised that it sounded like yet more pale, shallow bleatings from an overworked man, and resolved to make more of an effort to trust some of my colleagues - as well as to delegate more often - and to spend more time enjoying the company of those people who make me feel relaxed and comfortable. Who says a blog can't lead to self-improvement?

And in keeping with this spirit of enjoyment I have arranged a much-delayed night of debauchery with Trucky and the Gecko: a lad's night out, if you will. My brother is unfortunately unable to tag along, due to work commitments, but the rest of us will be heading out to Manchester where, for old time's sake, we're going to the rock club that used to be our home from home. Our ears, and indeed our livers, will wish they had never been born: Friday night, oh yes...

2003-01-27T14:10:00.000Z

Workrate dropping...

Had a good weekend. A very relaxing Saturday ended with a few friends popping round for a quiet drink and a chat. This quiet drink and a chat ended at four in the morning, following the consumption of an outrageous amount of wine (the kitchen floor looked like a bottle bank the next morning) and many increasingly incoherent and exhuberant games of Articulate. One of our neighbours needed..erm.. assistance in getting home. Thankfully he only lives about eight yards away, and with the help of his boyfriend, we managed to carry/drag him back to his house, where we pretty much just threw him into the living room and staggered back home. I even felt relatively human the next day, once I'd eaten a little toast... A good time was had by all, although judging by the state of our guests the next day I can safely say that not everyone escaped untouched by the hand of the hangover demon.

Work is a little weird today. I've not really done anything of great importance, and feel very tired for some strange reason (see above...). Apart from that, there is a serious lack of urgency around these parts, especially considering the close proximity of the Deadline Beast. I'm hoping this is a Good Thing, and caused by the fact that most people have pretty much finished everything. We shall see... One things for sure - it makes me feel pretty lethargic and lazy, although I don't see this as a completely bad thing, and it makes me look like this...

2003-01-24T12:31:00.000Z

Friday.

I'm so glad it is Friday. As we creep ever closer to the end my energy levels seem to be dropping at an alarming rate, along with my ability to concentrate. My mind keeps flitting around, unable to settle on any one task for too long, and my enthusiasm is ebbing away - it's nothing serious, of course, just the strange lethargy that accompanies the climax (though that may be too exciting a word) of any long project. The problem for me is that all the cool, interesting work has been done, and all that is left is the interminable bug-fixing/tweaking period which, although extremely important, is a little tedious at times. Like I said, I'm glad it's Friday...

Now that I've managed to sort out an image host I can start to implement the occasional visual accompaniment to my erratic posts. Who knows, some days might contain solely an image, if I can find one that sums up my mood perfectly, that is.

2003-01-23T16:04:00.000Z

Here's a little image test...

2003-01-22T16:51:00.000Z

Common sense prevails.

An update on this horror story.

Judge Sweet dismisses kids' obesity suit

In a major victory for the fast food industry, an American federal judge has dismissed a widely watched suit in which McDonald's hamburgers and French fries were blamed for children's obesity. U.S. District Judge Robert Sweet said the plaintiffs, including a 14-year-old girl who is 4 ft 10 ins and 12 stone, failed to show McDonald's products presented a danger unknown to consumers. He also cited concerns the case could "spawn thousands of similar 'McLawsuits'" against all types of restaurants.

"This opinion is guided by the principle that legal consequences should not attach to the consumption of hamburgers and other fast food fare unless consumers are unaware of the dangers of eating such food," Sweet said. "If consumers know...the potential ill health effect of eating at McDonald's, they cannot blame McDonald's if they, nonetheless, choose to satiate their appetite with a surfeit of supersized McDonald's products."

Although the judge threw out the suit in it's entirety, he ruled the plaintiffs could refile claims in Manhattan federal court within certain limits. Sweet also said McDonald's had rightfully pointed out that the case was the first of its kind to reach this stage in federal court and could result in thousands of copycat cases.
The suit was brought on behalf of overweight children who ate at two McDonald's restaurants in the Bronx borough of New York City. The plaintiffs sought unspecified damages, blaming McDonald's for health problems that included diabetes, coronary heart disease, high blood pressure and elevated cholesterol.

The suit was one of at least four cases filed against McDonald's and other fast food chains over the obesity issue. At least two cases have been dropped and another is dormant. The judge noted that Americans spend more than $110 billion (68 billion pounds) on fast food each year, and cited studies showing that on any given day in the United States, almost one in four adults visits a fast-food restaurant.

"The potential for lawsuits is even greater given the numbers of persons who eat food prepared at other restaurants in addition to those serving fast food," Sweet said, citing reports that show almost half of the American food dollar is spent on food eaten away from home. He said the court had a duty to "limit the legal consequences of wrongs to a controllable degree and to protect against crushing exposure to liability".

Please let this be an end to such rank stupidity (I'm not holding my breath, though...).

2003-01-17T10:16:00.000Z

This is just plain wrong, not to mention creepy as all hell...

2003-01-17T10:14:00.000Z

Another week closer...

to the end, and an aching lethargy creeps through my limbs. The project will soon be over (we submit for approval in February), and things are simultaneously winding down and cranking up, strangely enough, as the workload becomes a slog of fixes, tweaks and polishing. It's pretty boring, truth be told, and I feel uninspired by my current slew of tasks. However, this is a temporary blip, and inevitable at this stage so I ain't too worried. The silver lining is that my working hours have reduced to a far more manageable ten hours per day, so I'm not quite as wired and irritable as I was in the run-up to Xmas - plus I get to see a little more of my family and friends at last!

And it's Friday! Thank the sweet Lord for delivering this, my weekend, to me... I've got some nice things planned too. My parents are around for dinner tonight, I'm checking out a potential wedding photographer on Saturday (he seems really cool, and is a photographer who does weddings, as opposed to a 'wedding photographer', ie hack. His work is great, and he seems like a decent bloke, although he is expensive. That said, I'd rather pay a little more for the photos and cut back elsewhere, as they are, for me, one of those most important aspects of the whole deal). I'm also out on a 'date' with The Girl tomorrow night, which should be super-cool as we've not been able to spend enough time together recently, expecially considering we now live in the same house. Hmm, I'm going to need to fit in a couple of gym visits too. Busy weekend...

2003-01-14T10:10:00.000Z

Abnormal service is resumed...

Finally, my access to the world is fully restored following the idiocy and unhelpfulness of our service provider. Is it just me, or has the idea of customer service become an ethereal concept, floating around in the double-speak of corporate politics, rather than an actual reality. In terms of balance - the give and take of the commercial realtionship - things seem increasingly to be in favour of the large company. The impersonal nature of call-centres and helpdesks is inevitable I guess, and a by-product of the freedom to deal with companies without the need to visit a local 'branch'. Unfortunately, this has mutated into a depressing level of mistrust on the part of large organisations, especially when they are at fault (a situation that seems increasingly common in my life).

Example. This morning I finally put to bed an ongoing problem with Demon, my old home ISP. I'd had my Demon account for years, never missing a payment, never causing any problems. They took my money, and I used their services - a traditional relationship. Then, for no discernible reason, my payment details broke down and, unbeknownst to me, I was no longer paying for the services I was using. This problem could have been solved very quickly had Demon contacted me (the problem that caused the cessation of payments was at Demon's end, as it turned out - not that this helped me in any way), but they let the situation continue for nearly a year. At that point I was contacted by a credit recovery company working on Demon's behalf and told, in an unpleasant and vaguely threatening phone call, that I was required to settle the bill for the outstanding payments (an amount I could not afford, at least not in the timeframe they were demanding). No warnings, no enquiries, just a final demand for a large lump sum payment and a threat of legal action.

Now, I'm a pretty easy going guy most of the time, but this sort of shit does not sit well with me, especially when it can interfere with credit ratings and the like. Further investigation showed that Demon had fucked up, and that the reason the payments had not been taken was some sort of 'administrative error' on their part. OK, fair enough. It's at this point that I would expect that old customer service to kick in. No such luck. I requested that I repay the missed payments through an increase in my (now fixed) monthly payments. This was 'not possible'. I requested I second set of monthly payments to settle the amount. Again, 'not possible'. I requested a 'period of grace' before the payment needed to be made, so I could save up the money (Demon had originally given me less than a month to settle the bill). {robot voice}NOT POSSIBLE!{/robot voice}

Hmmm. Not good. In the end I told Demon that they would get the money when I had it, and I cancelled my account, at which point they seemed very surprised that I was taking such an extreme reaction. If they had helped me in any way, accepted responsibility for the fuck-up in the first place, or at least shown a shred of sympathy for my postion I may have still been a Demon customer. Instead, they no longer have my money and, although it's a drop in the ocean to huge companies like these, it is the only power that the consumer has, and I find myself increasingly inclined to use it.

The real twist of the knife - and the matter I have finally resolved this morning - is the fact that Demon continued to demand my monthly payment from my bank, despite my having cancelled my account last September. Fuckwits. Coupled with my ongoing battle to pay my gas and electricity bills (won't someone PLEASE take my money?), and the nightmares we had when moving house over last summer, it just seems that any form of transaction with large companies cannot be conducted without a great wailing and gnashing of teeth...

Man, I sound old, but what the fuck is wrong with these people?

2003-01-09T22:40:00.000Z

Hey folks, still not dead!

Just a quick note. I've been unable to update recently as British Telecom decided to cancel our company's internet account over the New Year period (along with about 200 other business customers, apparently) and we are still waiting for the magic internet wizard to reconnect us. It would appear that to reconnect us take five working days, despite the fact that to disconnect us took only a drunken second as some workshy fool returned from an extended pub lunch and wrenched the soothing blanket of the online world from the naked shivering bodies of hundreds of office workers, leaving us twitching and cursing for the next week. Goddam cold turkey...

More soon.

2003-01-02T08:34:00.000Z

Merry Christmas! Happy New Year!

Yeah, yeah, I know I'm a little late with that. And no, there's no need to send out the hounds theatretech, but thanks for the concern :)

Well, how strange it all is. In a last-ditch attempt to rescue my sanity in the pre-Xmas deadline fiasco I appealed to the better nature of my boss and managed to secure a few extra days holiday over the festive period. Essentially, I told them that I would be 'on-call' for the holiday period, and was willing to come into work should I be needed, but that I had completed my entire workload by the 23rd of December and saw no point in travelling 25 miles to work every day just to sit at my desk twiddling my thumbs. As I had plenty of leave saved up that I wanted to take at Xmas anyway my boss told me to 'take whatever days I had left', and was even nice enough to say that it was a 'well-deserved break' after my recent efforts. It's only a small thing, but those kind of comments go along way towards allieving the pain of a big milestone push like this recent one...

So today is my first day back in the office - as I received no phone calls over the holiday period - meaning I had a full nine days off. Luxury. I decided early on to just take a break from everything, including this blog - hence my total lack of festive updates, and attempt to regain my equilibrium. All in all, I had fantastically relaxing holiday. Santa was very kind, bringing me far more than I expected (and probably more than I deserved), and I was able to spend some quality time with family, friends and especially The Girl. Christmas Day itself was great - the first in our new home - and we both enjoyed it immensely. Due to a fairly fractured family, The Girl has always had to spend past Christmases running between different family members and really wanted a day where she could stay in one place and have people visit her. This is what we wanted to ensure this year, and this is what happened. She loved it, and cooked an excellent Christmas dinner for the two of us which, in all honesty, was probably the best Christmas dinner I've ever had.

Wanderers! Wanderers!

I went to the football on Boxing Day with my Dad and my brother, and we saw our local team, Bolton Wanderers, triumph over far more successful opposition in an amazing seven-goal thriller. Final score: Bolton Wanderers 4 - Newcastle United 3. What a result, and a great 'blokes-day-out' to boot - I don't spend a lot of time with my Dad these days, at least not whilst my brother's there as well, so it was mighty cool.

New Year's Eve

Although I'm not particularly excited about New Year's Eve (I'm more of a Xmas person I guess), this one was fun. In a change to the usual New Year celebrations, and partially as a reaction to the hassle of previous New Years' (packed pubs, queues for the bar/toilets/clubs, extortionate taxi prices etc) we celebrated the coming of 2003 at home with friends. The Girl cooked another fantastic meal, and we drank copious amounts of wine and champagne before running into the rainy street at midnight to watch thousands of fireworks going up from the surrounding streets. It all felt pretty magical, though that could have been the sheer amount of alcohol consumed (I spent most of the first morning of the year throwing up in honour of the pervious nights excesses...) and was a fitting end to what has been, in all honesty, a pretty insane - but mostly excellent - year 2002.

2002-12-19T17:57:00.000Z

OK, so it's Thursday already...

and tomorrow is the deadline. Or is it the 24th? Or perhaps the end of the year? Or maybe it is tomorrow. Christ, who can say? The Deadline Beast has added a new trick to his repertoire of pain and despair. He is now a shape-shifter - an amorphous horror slipping greasily along the wires that hold this travelling circus together. I think I preferred him when he was stomping all over us in a foul bile-driven frenzy - at least he was easy to spot...

No, unfortunately for those with their nose on the wheel, the Beast is learning fresh ways to torment us. In the normal scale of things a deadline is imposed upon us, schedules are devised based upon that deadline, and our lives are ruled by a specific date. It's a tyranny of sorts, but like all the best tyrannies it has its advantages. When the rules are absolute, it is easier to plan your revolution - and enough of those thoughts for now, heh heh. One thing is for sure, with a mix of severe self-discipline and outrageous insubordination it is possible to imbalance the schedulers to the point where you are left to define your own path (which is what I've always done anyway - and what I will always attempt to do. No one knows my own abilities - and my own failings - better than myself, so I much prefer to set my own schedules, idiosyncratic as they may be).

Now we have a situation where the deadline is a malleable, shifting entity, and it is here that the problem lies. My own idiosyncracies have been overshadowed by the wider insanities being visited upon us by those who control the purse-strings. The abstract and indefinable mix of chaos and perfect planning is being negated by the almost fractal madness that sees deadlines shifting apparently at random; weekly schedules reorganised on a daily basis; and a bizarre sense of calm permeate an office that, until very recently, was filled with the kind of atmosphere that causes grown men to clutch their heads, walk into the storm and never return.

We've had some good feedback from recent work, and the game is looking far better than it did as recently as last week, but this eye of the hurricane shit is really beginning to freak me out....

2002-12-16T14:25:00.000Z

Adrenaline is no substitute for sleep...

even when you're sucking it straight from a leopard's adrenal gland. And so it continues. The trenches are filling fast - a quagmire, people; a horrible scene - and we're starting to lose coherence. The deadline draws ever nearer and the days just keep on getting longer, with the subsequent effect of burning the synapses and retinas of many a colleague. I spent the last three days of last week in a full-tilt charge through a piece of work that should (at least in any sane world) have taken at least a week and a half. I got it done, and it looks pretty damn good, but by the time I sent it off to be mangled and chewed by the programmers I was in a ridiculously cranked-up state from the sheer velocity of the working day...

I had plans too, for the night; plans that I couldn't get out of - that I didn't want to get out of, truth be told - and the Christmas party that I was due to attend (the Girl's workplace celebration) was an early starter. I sped home at ridiculous speeds, desperate to beat the brutal Friday evening rush hour, and leapt into the shower only minutes before we were due to leave. Still damp, but looking relatively suave, at least by my standards, we headed out with friends for a night of cheap liqour and bad food in premature celebration of the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ (hehe... and so much for that). My over-adrenalised state led to my behaviour being a little wayward for much of the evening, and my alcohol intake was far in excess of what I had planned. Unfortunately I was in that strange state of exhaustion that prevents alcohol from taking its usual effect. This, coupled with the obscenely under-priced bar, led to one holy monster of a hangover on Saturday morning. I deserve no sympathy, of course - at least, not for the hangover - but I wouldn't mind the odd shout of support...

This whole project is snowballing towards some form of explosive endplay. Whether it will be good or otherwise is a little hard to predict, and still has a lot to do with the battered cabal of freaks and masochists who sit around me right now. One thing's for sure: the fat is most definitely in the fire - all that remains is to see just who gets their fingers burnt...

2002-12-11T08:09:00.000Z

To work, perchance to sleep...

The feathers are flying now, my friends, and my throat is dry and cracked... Well, there it is. I'm currently working six days a week, 11-14 hours a day to get this fucking game finished. I'm not the only one of course, but unfortunately I have a reputation as a fast and efficient worker. I pump out finished animations at a rate far in excess of most of my colleagues (not through choice, you understand, nor through any extra effort particularly. I just happen to work at that speed), and this has left me in the unenviable position of point man for most of the 'extras' that get dropped into our laps on a daily basis like so much cheap confetti.

Producer: 'I need extra work doing, but no one has space on their schedule! What will I do'?
Everyone else: 'Give it to Alex, of course. He'll get it done - and nicely too...'

I'm flattered, of course. But flattery isn't sleep, and it's sleep that I need right now - or at least a little rest from the eye-burning screen radiation that has me blinking like a pit pony as I emerge from the building at the end of the day. I honestly haven't seen daylight for two weeks, except for Sundays. My alarm scares me awake at 6am (pitch black), I arrive at work at 7.30am (hint of light on horizon but still dark), and I leave work at around 6.30pm at the earliest (dark again). But hey, this is what I signed up for, right? Right? Erm... well. Ah fuck it, I'm sure things'll calm down again after Xmas (they'll have to, or I'll be ready to hurt someone...). Selah.

Joke.

Doctor: I'm afraid I have some bad news for you. Your condition is definitely fatal.

Patient: Oh, no! Well, how long do I have left?

Doctor: 10

Patient: Ten what? Months? Weeks? Ten what?

Doctor: 9

Heh.

2002-12-06T13:49:00.000Z

Sooooooooo busy...

...but I never get tired of these stories;

KFC worker bungles robbery of own branch

A man who tried to rob the branch of Kentucky Fried Chicken where he was employed, turned up for work as normal three days later. Aaron Bell from West Philadelphia didn't wear a mask or any disguise and nor did he try to hide his face. The 19-year-old cook didn't get any money, apparently not knowing the safe he tried to force his boss to open was time-locked. An unidentified accomplice was with Bell at the time of the robbery. Bell was arrested after he returned to work three days after the robbery attempt in October 2001. "He was acting like nothing had happened," said a Philadelphian Assistant District Attorney.

A jury convicted Bell of robbery and conspiracy. Four of his co-workers, including the manager, testified about what happened in the restaurant and had no trouble identifying Bell. "It's just like you basically have to ask yourself what was he thinking," said the Attorney.

Sentencing is scheduled for January 15, says the Philadelphia Daily News.

2002-12-03T09:42:00.000Z

Ack!

Things are really hotting up around here now, and we're cranking up towards an ugly and brutal endplay. The Deadline Beast is no longer just prowling the perimeter, picking off the occasional straggler or wounded youth; he is now freely roaming the office, and noone is safe. The project is turning into a battlefield of twisted bodies and the burned out shells of good men, whilst those less able to cope with the screaming and the images of blood red skies and blackened husks are starting to turn on their comrades like dogs. And everywhere there is the whispering...

And what about me? Well, I'm a professional, goddamit, and I refuse to go down without a fight. Thankfully I'm strong, mentally at least, and my kit-bag is always by my side, packed and ready to go. I've been reading Sun Tzu for a month in preparation, and I'm locked and loaded. I was born ready for this shit. I have fought the Beast before, and whilst I've never beaten him (I'm not sure whether he can ever be truly beaten), I've certainly bloodied his gaping maw a couple of times. Unfortunately he always returns as strong as ever, whilst we can only ever grow more weary, and his tactics always seem to evolve - but this is the Way of Things when you enter this kind of bloody encounter. So who will survive the night? I can't say for sure, except for myself, but those that do will be stronger for it, and that is just about all you can ask of these things...

2002-11-28T07:59:00.000Z

Christmas is cancelled

Well, that's just great. Our deadline-loving masters have made a decision, and their decision is sorrow and pain for all who must suffer under it's yoke. The latest deadline (tomorrow - pay attention at the back, please) has been semi-scrapped in favour of an extended period of further work and a new deadline of 'the end of the year'. The Friday deadline is still in existence, of course, only it is now of less importance than was previously thought. So what the hell have I been busting my ass all week for, huh? Thanks, fellers...

Here's the rub. The official Christmas holiday schedule was circulated yesterday. Three days off. Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Years Day. All other days are to be treated as normal working days, and the chances of being able to book time off for that period are, it would appear, slim to none. The real twist of the knife comes in the form of our paid leave system. We get a certain number of days, to be used between the first and last days of any particular year, with no facility to carry over any remaining days come New Year. I, like many of my colleagues, have been working my arse off all year on this project, and have been saving up the majority of my leave so I could have a decent break at Christmas (The Girl is a teacher, and as such cannot alter her holidays from the designated school holidays laid down by the education department timetables. This ties us into having time off together at certain times of the year - with Christmas being one of these times). It now looks like I have saved up my holidays only to be told a month before Christmas that I'm probably going to have to work, not have any holidays and lose those holidays to boot. God fucking dammit.

Sometimes I hate the games industry.

2002-11-26T08:24:00.000Z

Deadline Week!

We've got a major deadline at the end of this week - Friday, to be exact - so updates might be a little sparce over the next few days. I thought I was relatively clear, workwise, for this particular milestone, but I was given an animation list longer than all hell yesterday. To be perfectly honest it was completely unrealistic in terms of the timescale so, following discussions with producers and bosses, it has been cut back to a more manageable level. Of course, manageable in this context means that I will be able to sleep every other night, rather than not at all, and that I will only be half-dead by weekend, as opposed to actually dead.

I'll hopefully be able to steam ahead and finish my work by late Wednesday/early Thursday, thus avoiding the brain-squeeze of the last-minute rush job, but we'll have to see how much interference I get over the next couple of days. In the meantime I'll keep you updated as to my mental state as an ongoing process ;)

Wish me luck, people - I'll see you on the other side...

2002-11-22T13:22:00.000Z

Americans. Stop it.
Overweight children are taking McDonald's to court in New York.They claim they did not know a burgers and chips diet would make them fat.
Lawyer Samuel Hirsch, acting on behalf of eight children and their parents, says McDonald's created a national epidemic of fat children and violated consumer fraud laws by failing to adequately disclose the health effects of its menu.It is the first case in the US to be heard by a judge where customers of a hamburger chain are suing because they say the food made them obese and unhealthy.

In a separate case a group of overweight Americans is suing four fast-food companies accusing them of knowingly serving meals that cause obesity and disease.The children include 5ft 6ins Gregory Rhymes, 15, who weighs more than 28 stone and has diabetes after eating McDonald's nearly every day since he was six."I normally order the Big Mac, fries, ice cream or shake - I like to super-size my orders," he said.His mother, Ruth Rhymes, claims she would not have let her son gorge himself on Big Macs if she knew they contained high levels of fat and salt.McDonald's lawyer Brad Lerman told the court: "People don't go to sleep thin and wake up obese. The understanding and comprehension of what hamburgers and french fries do has been with us for a long, long time."

'I like to super-size my orders'. But of course it didn't occur to you or, more specifically, your dumb-as-fuck parents, that doing this every day might just super-size your fat ass? Jesus... You have to stop this shit. If it happens over there it will eventually happen over here, and then I'll have to get very angry again and the voices will come back and the shouting and clawing and... please, stop it.

2002-11-22T12:05:00.000Z

I don't ordinarily like to nick other people's stuff, but this is too good not too spread around. Via Dave at Liloia...

Playwright Jim Sherman wrote this update of an old Abbott and Costello routine today after Hu Jintao was named chief of the Communist Party in China.

HU'S ON FIRST

By James Sherman

(We take you now to the Oval Office.)

George: Condi! Nice to see you. What's happening?

Condi: Sir, I have the report here about the new leader of China.

George: Great. Lay it on me.

Condi: Hu is the new leader of China.

George: That's what I want to know.

Condi: That's what I'm telling you.

George: That's what I'm asking you. Who is the new leader of China?

Condi: Yes.

George: I mean the fellow's name.

Condi: Hu.

George: The guy in China.

Condi: Hu.

George: The new leader of China.

Condi: Hu.

George: The Chinaman!

Condi: Hu is leading China.

George: Now whaddya' asking me for?

Condi: I'm telling you Hu is leading China.

George: Well, I'm asking you. Who is leading China?

Condi: That's the man's name.

George: That's who's name?

Condi: Yes.

George: Will you or will you not tell me the name of the new leader of China?

Condi: Yes, sir.

George: Yassir? Yassir Arafat is in China? I thought he was in the Middle East.

Condi: That's correct.

George: Then who is in China?

Condi: Yes, sir.

George: Yassir is in China?

Condi: No, sir.

George: Then who is?

Condi: Yes, sir.

George: Yassir?

Condi: No, sir.

George: Look, Condi. I need to know the name of the new leader of China. Get me the Secretary General of the U.N. on the phone.

Condi: Kofi?

George: No, thanks.

Condi: You want Kofi?

George: No.

Condi: You don't want Kofi.

George: No. But now that you mention it, I could use a glass of milk. And then get me the U.N.

Condi: Yes, sir.

George: Not Yassir! The guy at the U.N.

Condi: Kofi?

George: Milk! Will you please make the call?

Condi: And call who?

George: Who is the guy at the U.N?

Condi: Hu is the guy in China.

George: Will you stay out of China?!

Condi: Yes, sir.

George: And stay out of the Middle East! Just get me the guy at the U.N.

Condi: Kofi.

George: All right! With cream and two sugars. Now get on the phone.

(Condi picks up the phone.)

Condi: Rice, here.

George: Rice? Good idea. And a couple of egg rolls, too. Maybe we should send some to the guy in China, and the Middle East. Can you get Chinese food in the Middle East?

2002-11-22T11:37:00.000Z

Neglectification

Now there's a word that's just crying out to be said in a Dubya voice...

Man I've been busy. Again. Hey, it doesn't say deadlines up there for nothing, y'know - and good god almighty I've been beaten with the weary stick this week too. I don't know what the cause is, but myself and The Girl have both been unable to drag our carcasses out of bed in the mornings without serious effort. I think the onset of Real Winter (designated by the passing of my birthday - November 8th), and it's attendant darkness and cold, makes the prospect of getting up at six o'clock every morning less and less appealing. Unfortunately it's the only way I can avoid the horrendous traffic that mires Manchester's motorways - I'm already bald, and do not wish to tear any more of my hair out in frustration. Not that you could actually grasp my hair anyway, what with it being shaved away to nothing, or 'to the wood', as my Dad would say...

I'm feeling very tangentential today, as my brain is slowing considerably in preparation for the weekend. It certainly promises to be a quiet one, due to a complete lack of funds brought about by the last few weeks partying and heartying. I do have Mario Sunshine for company though; and what a beautiful thing it is, plus I've got some knucklehead electricians coming tomorrow morning to finally fix my phone point in the bedroom. This means I'll be able to fix up my wheezing old PC for internet access, thus opening a whole world of weekend browsing, posting and babble - without the need for The Girl's laptop (a device so frustrating to use that I would rather go to an internet cafe and pay through the nose to go online than risk my sanity before it's unviewable screen. Not that I actually do that, you understand. I just stay offline and drink. Gin, too, without soda. With turpentine.).

Enough of this shit, it makes no sense. Have a good weekend, and if you can't be with the one you love, love the...live the...erm...life of the one you...live and... ah, fuck it.

2002-11-19T15:37:00.000Z

I'm a troll, fold-i-roll...

One of the most pleasing aspects of the blog scene is the sense of camaraderie and community that can be found amongst apparently disparate people. The freedom of communication that the internet provides, and the democracy of thought and expression that comes along with it, was once the great hope of our generation, and there's still a part of me that believes in it - despite the fact that it is now little more than a commonplace tool.

It was during my youth that computers made the jump from sci-fi to home appliance, and I've never really lost the sense of wonder that my ten-year-old self felt as he powered up his Sinclair Spectrum on Christmas morning in 1983. To live through the last twenty years, to see the technological advances and the introduction of the internet, the progression of CGI and the mass proliferation of 'home computing', as it was once known, gives us a sense of perspective that younger people, particularly those under eighteen, simply don't possess. They have known no other age than the information age, and I always get the feeling that they take it somewhat for granted in a way which I never could.

Sure, I use computers all day, every day. As an animator I create work that would have amazed the majority of people only a couple of generations ago, yet I see it as the norm. I email people thousands of miles away and feel miffed if such communications are anything other than instantaneous. And I sure as hell mutter in frustration as a 25meg download slows to a relative crawl at midday, despite the fact that I'm sucking down more data than I could have dreamed of only a few years ago. But I still, from time to time, am struck by the sheer scale of todays technology, and these moments of clarity are more often than not prompted by the most human of experiences - encounters and interactions with people I've never met, who live on other continents - which makes them all the more poignant.

This is why I find it so difficult to understand the mentality of those who use the internet, and more specifically the anonymity that the internet provides, as a conduit for low-grade malevolence and spite. Those who send insulting email, or leave nasty remarks on peoples blog comments and messageboards. They who, hiding behind a pseudonym, deflect the hatred they feel for themselves and their unremarkable existences onto others who, it would appear, taunt them with their happiness, success or level-headedness. I've noticed an increasing number of these trolls appearing in the comments of many of my favourite blogs and, whilst I rarely bother replying to their dribbling fuckwittery, I have noticed that they seem to target the most popular bloggers - those who appear to be (whether in terms of site traffic or 'real life'), successful. I often wonder whether these people are as intrinsically mean offline, or whether they are, as I suspect, whiny little fuckers who mutter under their breath but wouldn't dare to question anyone face to face. There seems to be a real powerlessness about them, as if the only way they can exert a little control over some aspect of their lives is by insulting someone they don't actually know from the safety of their hidden identity.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised. We encounter fools in most other walks of life, so why would the internet be foolproof. This is, after all, a democracy...

2002-11-19T13:18:00.000Z

Shannon is ill.

As her honorary manservant I feel honour-bound to lend assistance in her hour of need, but being separated by the Atlantic means that my manservantry is not quite as hands-on as it could be, and I am unable to tend to her needs directly. As a substitute for my bedside manner, and the healing ministrations of my soothing voice, please head on over there and place your healing hands on Miss Okey's tiara.

2002-11-15T08:10:00.000Z

700-year-old picture of 'Mickey Mouse' found in Austrian church

2002-11-14T12:29:00.000Z

'Why don't we do it in the road..'

Last night's drive home involved a lot of stop/start low speed traffic jams which, and I'm sure I'm not alone here, I absolutely loathe. The worst thing about these kind of situations is their absolute and unrelenting monotony, especially on a route you take twice a day and along which you've seen every possible area of interest countless times before. Along one particular stretch - four lanes wide - the traffic was moving about five yards at a time, then stopping for thirty or forty seconds before edging along another five or six yards or so. And so on, and so on. I was crawling along in the second lane when, about eight or nine cars ahead in the third lane, I saw a door open on the passenger side of some beat-up old Toyota. At first I thought someone had been rear-ended, or had a flat tyre or something, until I saw the guy unzip his fly and unleash the biggest torrent of piss I've ever seen - right there in the middle of the motorway.

Now bear in mind that all around him were hundreds of occupied vehicles, some stationary, some edging along slowly, and the whole place was floodlit by the huge motorway lights. This was not the most private place to take a leak. Did the guy make any attempt to retain a little dignity? To shield his genitalia from the passing citizenry? Hell, no. He stood at the side of the car, one hand holding the hose and the other on his hip, and leant into it, arching his back in the manner of someone taking a much-needed, but private, piss in the comfort of his own home! He didn't even have the decency to turn away from the passing motorists on his side of the vehicle who, due to being sat in their cars, were now crawling past at exactly cock-height. I was one of these unfortunates. As I passed the steam rose beside my window like someone emptying a mop bucket out the back of a pub on a frosty February morning, and this guy just carried on til his bladder was purged, by which point his lane was free for about half a mile ahead and cars were streaming around him in a bid to benefit from this bizarre hold up.

Laugh? Man, I thought I'd never stop...

2002-11-13T07:57:00.000Z

Who says the internet doesn't bring fame?

I am now the sixth search result on Yahoo for the immortal phrase chinese girl fuck animal. I'm so proud. And the best thing is, whoever carried out that search actually checked my blog, just in case there was, y'know, Chinese girls. And animals. And....well...fucking, I guess.

I feel dirty...

2002-11-11T18:16:00.000Z

Birthday Weekend Report

Well, first off, I'm glad to report that a good time was had by all - particularly me. Following an horrendous two-hour commute home on Friday evening during which my bladder was so full that I half expected it to spectacularly explode, sending my car careering off the motorway (...paramedics arrived at the scene within minutes, bystanders said, only to find the crashed vehicle completely empty. The only sign of human involvement appeared to be a strong smell of urine which, it is believed, coated the entire interior of the vehicle. In other news...), I arrived home for a quiet and relaxing meal with my mum, my nan and my future mother-in-law, all expertly prepared by The Girl. I was pretty beat, as predicted, and the journey home had finished me off, so it was cool to have such a low-maintenence evening to calm me down. I swear I could feel the waves of stress flowing away from me as the evening continued.

Saturday was spent in a relaxed yet productive manner, doing a little DIY, a little housework (the mindlessness of cleaning is a great way to unwind...) and a little couch-potatoing, all in readiness for the evening. The plan was for myself and assorted friends to go out for dinner at a quality Chinese restaurant that is situated, against all reason, down a dingy backstreet in the small village that is now my home. Me and The Girl have eaten there before, and it compares favourably - in quisine, decor and atmosphere - with any of the large restaurants in Manchester's Chinatown, so we figured everyone needed to experience this backstreet wonder. Our group totalled nine, including my brother and his wife, Chunky and his wife the Doctor, and the Gecko. The food was fantastic (again) and wine was consumed in frightening quantities.

Following the meal, everyone headed back to our place in a convoy of cabs, and we were joined by a couple of neighbours for further drinking and general fun. At this point it was only around 11:30 and, thankfully, we had purchased what we thought to be far more alcohol than would be required. Needless to say it was almost all finished by the time the last folk left, which turned out to be 4:30AM. This surprised us immensely, seeing as everyone thought it was about 1:30, but then I was long past the point of being able to distinguish big hand from small, thanks to the enormous amount of Martini I'd consumed (yeah, yeah, I know - but it seemed like a Martini kind of occasion...).

The aftermath of Sunday was ugly for some, less so for others. I was one of the lucky ones. In fact, I was incredibly fortunate not to be visited with the mother of all hangovers - at this stage I'm investigating the possible existence of some sort of birthday-related boozze-amnesty that rescued me from the hell others suffered like some sort of cosmic get-out-of-jail-free card. Maybe karma's paying off at last. The Girl didn't fair as well, unfortunately. She was visited by the mother of all hangovers, who preceeded to kick her ass all around the house for the entire day. Both she and the female half of our overnight guest couple welcomed the Sabbath by shouting obscenities into the toilet - at one point I think they were taking it in turns - whilst the male guest and myself sat drinking hot Vimto and watching crap television. Later, after our guests had dragged their aching bodies homeward, The Girl hit the sack for a large part of the day, leaving me planty of time to watch the super-cool Tron DVD that was my present from the Gecko. It still looks great, I'm happy to say, and by the time Jeff Bridges had been returned to the real world my mini-hangover was well on it's way.

I can honestly say that I had a total blast. I got to see all of my friends from different spheres of my life get together and have fun (many of whom hadn't met before), and all in my own new home. It wouldn't be over-egging the pudding to say it was the best birthday of my adult life, and for that I am truly thankful.

Amen to that.

2002-11-07T14:10:00.000Z

England is a dangerous place: from Ananova.

Vicious squirrel shot dead

A squirrel which attacked six people in Knutsford has been shot dead by the grandfather of one of the victims. It had been known to jump on to passers-by and scratch at them with its teeth and claws. But Geoff Horth has now hunted it down to a copse near to where the two-year-old was attacked and shot it with an air rifle.
The final straw came when the animal attacked two-year-old Kelsi Morley as she took a walk with her mother. The girl stopped to admire the squirrel before it pounced on her face and sank its teeth into her forehead. Kelsi's mother, Karen Morley, had to pin the girl to the floor and pull the animal off her face. The youngster was left bleeding heavily from a deep gash.

People of Knutsford, Cheshire, were reported to be living in fear following numerous unprovoked attacks by the grey squirrel.

Its other victims included a man who was attacked as he mowed the lawn and a woman who was bitten on the ankle as she walked along the street. Kelsi's grandfather Geoff Horth was so incensed by the latest attack that he hunted down the animal to a nearby copse and shot it dead with an air rifle. Mr Horth's wife today said: "When Geoff saw what had happened, he just wanted to put a stop to it. He said if it had bitten a child's face this time, what would it do next? He didn't want any more children getting hurt."

2002-11-07T13:49:00.000Z

Well, I've had a thoroughly infuriating couple of days...

The Deadline Beast is upon us again, spreading his distasteful bile amongst the troops. I guess it's just the steadily increasing stress levels, but the atmosphere in the office at these times veers wildly between trench-humoured camaraderie and barely concealed loathing. There is a thin veneer of civility beneath which lies a broiling vat of frustration and fear, all of which evaporates as soon as the deadline has passed. It's a slightly odd situation to work in, but the adrenaline is usually sufficient to get most people through the harder days and the majority of us manage to remain friends - I guess the joint triumphs over the common adversities gives us a sort of beleaguered commonality that ensures we don't find ourselves at each other's throats (at least not all the time).

Unfortunately our servers and network systems seem to feel none of this team spirit, and have spent the last two days on a 'go slow' as if protesting against the unreasonably harsh working conditions under which they are currently suffering. I'm half expecting to come into work to find the office entrance blocked by a picket-line of PCs, marshalled by a particularly gruff and hardline union representative in the form of our ancient and creaking main server, a machine that is the computer equivalent of Douglas Bader.

Things do seem a little better today, but are still slow, which has the effect of severely restricting my workflow - when small things that should take fifteen seconds suddenly start to take upwards of two minutes it really alters the progress of your day.

On a brighter note, it's my birthday tomorrow! My mum and nan, along with The Girl's mum, are coming around for dinner in the evening - which should be nice and relaxed - and then Saturday night will be a large night out with some friends and my brother and his wife. An excellent Chinese feast awaits, followed of course by many alcoholic beverages, and after this week I can hardly wait...

2002-11-05T21:15:00.000Z

Just helped my neighbour to change the battery in his car. I had all the right tools, and the job was done in minutes. He felt very grateful, I felt very helpful. What a beautiful thing.

That is all, please go about your business, nothing to see here...

2002-11-04T15:22:00.000Z

What the fuck??? Something is amiss in the world of Blogger, methinks... pages seem to be taking a hell of a long time to load up and, most worryingly, appear to be a dead page whilst doing it. I could warn you good people right here, of course, to be patient and eventually receive the bounteous gift that is my blather, but in order for that to work you would already have to be here.... Hmmm, the dilemma continues.
I have, however, regained my archives (long since missing presumed dead), so for those of you that care and haven't seen them already, snap 'em up quick before they disappear again (my archives appear to be the blogworld equivalent of a comet - they have an enormous eliptical orbit that means they pass by this blog every 163 years or so, stick around for a few days, then head out into the ether once more trailing debris and space dust behind them...)

2002-11-04T15:09:00.000Z

This from Ananova...

A skydiver has survived a 1,600-foot fall when both his emergency and main parachutes failed - after landing on the roof of an aircraft hangar.

Forty-year-old Dragan Curcic from the south Serbian town of Nis says he "saw death rushing up to meet him" during a jump over his hometown.

Mr Curcic sustained only light injuries.

He has told Serbian daily newspaper Glas Javnosti: "I tried to open the small emergency parachute but then the big one started to open too and all the ropes got mixed up. I was literally falling without a parachute.

"I wrapped myself up in the parachutes and I think it was this that saved me, it cushioned my fall and the roof took the rest of the impact."

Jesus, talk about presence of mind! I don't think I'd have had chance to think about wrapping myself in my parachutes, what with the screaming and the falling to my death...

2002-11-03T22:05:00.000Z

Well helloooo there...

Blogging on a Sunday? Well, now I've finally got my home internet access sorted out I figured I'd make use of it, although I'm currently a little hamstrung by having to use The Girl's laptop. My own wheezing behemoth of a PC is sitting on my desk, temporarily offline, as the phone socket in the bedroom has turned out to be no more than a dead plastic box, thanks once again to the quality work carried out by the knuckleheads who built our house. Speaking of which, the house is almost finished, with only a few little DIY tasks remaining.

I'm currently keeping a beady eye on a bracketless shelf that I erected earlier today as, due to the slightly dodgy nature of our plasterwork - and a few previous minor mishaps, I'm half-expecting the thing to crash to the floor, scattering the phone and phone books all over the place and showering everything with a light dusting of plaster. I think I'll probably suspect it of imminent disaster even if it remains firmly attached for the next five years...

I've got one hell of a week coming up - my workload is huge and I've got a frighteningly long list of things to do by Friday. Friday, incidentally, is my birthday! I'll be 29, so it'll be my turn to buy cakes for the office. It's a rather strange tradition - on your birthday, you are obliged to provide the entire office with tasty pastries and confectionary - but one that always results in the kind of feeding frenzy normally associated with sharks and bloody water. Recently, there has been a tendency for people to try to outdo previous celebrators in the scale and quality of cake-purchasing. I must admit, I'm temped to play along and, shall we say, raise the bar a little. I'll have to wait and see exactly how generous I'm feeling on Friday...

2002-10-31T17:55:00.000Z

Deadlines and an animation list as long as my arm (and I've got arms like a monkey, believe me...) is keeping my blogging pretty low key at the moment, but this has to get a mention.

Although I'm a full-on rock guy these days, and have been for many years now, my pre- and early teens were filled with hip hop, with Run DMC being every bit the legends they are made out to be. My first gig, a life-altering experience that truly convinced me of the incredible power of music, was Run DMC at the Manchester Apollo supported by Public Enemy. I was 14.

Pour your forty on the kerb, and remember the good times...

2002-10-28T10:08:00.000Z

Interesting piece in the Guardian on the age of contempt. Certainly it would seem that a sizeable section of the media, and this is a worldwide phenomena I think, are unable to do anything other than cynically needle at the open wounds of those in public, and particularly political, life. Whilst this is not in itself a serious problem, the absence of any other form of analysis, examination or scrutiny; the ignorance of facts and opinions; the lack of balance in a great deal of political journalism is an increasingly worrying phenomenon - and one which has the undesirable effect, particularly at this moment in history, of turning many people away from the political process.

2002-10-28T08:33:00.000Z

Hi Honey, I'm home!

Well, I'm back from my week off and I must say it was pretty damned good - I don't think I knew exactly how much I needed a break until I took one, and even then it wasn't until mid-week that I really started to relax. I'm happy to report that I didn't spend the entire time sat on my arse watching Magnum and Murder She Wrote reruns (only once or twice), but instead used my time wisely and productively. Many annoyingly small and unfinished DIY jobs are now complete, my lawn no longer resembles an untouched English meadow, and my liver has taken a beating at the hands of numerous entertaining nights out. All in all then, a perfect break!

The only thing I didn't manage to get round to, until last night anyway, is to finally fix up my home PC and get my internet access sorted - hence the total lack of posting last week. The situation has now been rectified however, and I will be able to keep myself informed from both work and home. I feel like a complete person again...

My favourite thing during my week off is this story, regarding a guy charged with stealing 40,000 hotel coat hangers. Here's an excerpt from the trial -

Counsel: What is your name?

Chrysler: Chrysler. Arnold Chrysler.

Counsel: Is that your own name?

Chrysler: Whose name do you think it is?

Counsel: I am just asking if it is your name.

Chrysler: And I have just told you it is. Why do you doubt it?

Counsel: It is not unknown for people to give a false name in court.

Chrysler: Which court?

Counsel: This court.

Chrysler: What is the name of this court?

Counsel: This is No 5 Court.

Chrysler: No, that is the number of this court. What is the name of this court?

Counsel: It is quite immaterial what the name of this court is!

Chrysler: Then perhaps it is immaterial if Chrysler is really my name.

Counsel: No, not really, you see because...

Judge: Mr Lovelace?

Counsel: Yes, m'lud?

Judge: I think Mr Chrysler is running rings round you already. I would try a new line of attack if I were you.

Counsel: Thank you, m'lud.

Chrysler: And thank you from ME, m'lud. It's nice to be appreciated.

Judge: Shut up, witness.

It gets better too, and there's more here.

2002-10-18T08:07:00.000Z

The deadline has come and gone...

and I feel strangely empty. Things are all a little up in the air at the moment, as people start coming to terms with the aftermath of a crazy month. A number of my colleagues have worked upwards of 30 hours at a time in the last few days, and we are all pretty much burned out right now. Post-deadline is always a strange period - a kind of regrouping has to take effect before work can really pick up again - and the peaks and troughs are a weird phenomena to get used to at first. It is part and parcel of the games industry though, and after a while you become accustomed to the ebb and flow, the build and release of a development schedule - it starts to feel like a natural extension of the cyclical nature of life; the shifting of seasons and weekly routines. Or maybe that's just how we deal with it...

Anyway, I'm taking a week off next week for a well-deserved (if I do say so myself...) rest. I've still got a lot of niggling tasks to complete at home - a little decorating, a touch of DIY - and I'd like to spend some time with The Girl as we've seen little of each other over the last few weeks, despite living under the same roof. This means that, unless I can finally get my home internet connection fixed (another of my week-off tasks), my posting will be light, if not non-existant, until a week on Monday. C'est la vie - I'm sure you can all live without me, but I know I'll miss my daily blogbrowsing. At least I'll have plenty to read upon my return to cyberspace...

Have a good weekend!

2002-10-16T16:08:00.000Z

Democracy is a wonderful thing...

Saddam Wins! Despot garners 100% of vote! Opposition candidates thought to have lost votes due to lack of existence!

2002-10-16T15:03:00.000Z

Aah, it's good to be back!

Following a power cut that shut down every electrical item in the office on deadline day (oh, now there's fun...) we've been without internet access since Monday. The power surge fried the router, leaving us adrift and alone until a helpful BT fellow arrived today to fix things. It's only at times like these that I realise exactly how much I utilise the internet, and I'm amazed at how long it is taking to read up on all the things I missed in the last couple of days. Just getting around my daily read list of blogs is a lengthy enough procedure, and then there's forums, news sites, message boards - the list is huge...

Over at Bitter Girl, Shannon has a link to the National Novel Writing Month, whereby folk are encouraged to start a novel on November 1st and complete it (in no less than 50,000 words) by the end of the month. Call me crazy, but I think I might have a crack at it - although at this stage I have absolutely no idea what I'd write. Christ, I don't even know what kind of novel it'd be, but I think that in order to get anywhere near the required wordcount some sort of stream of consciousness, gonzo/beat kind of thing is probably my best bet (and, handily enough, suits my writing style anyway). I'll need to give it a little thought prior to starting it, but it might be fun to just run headlong at the thing and attempt to wrestle it into some sort of novel-esque form on the fly. I might even post some of it up here, should I start to produce something that makes any kind of sense.

2002-10-11T13:44:00.000Z

NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!

I'm not a father, but I can't imagine there's anything worse. Having said that, there is obviously some form of karmic balancing taking place here....

2002-10-11T13:27:00.000Z

If the people at Microsoft ever wondered why people don't see the XBox as particularly cool, this godawful flash animation - which (allegedly) pokes fun Nintendo's hugely successful plumber - ought to be a sickeningly humourless wake-up call. Taxi for Mr. Blackley....

2002-10-11T13:21:00.000Z

Ever wondered who would win...

...in a fight? Well now you can find out, with Googlefights. Just enter the two combatants and, be they animal, vegetable, mineral or hypothetical, a winner (of sorts) is declared! Especially useful for deciding whether my Dad is harder than your Dad, for instance, without the need for any actual fatherly fisticuffs...

2002-10-11T13:15:00.000Z

we are, after all, professionals... is a wastepaper basket that makes you invisible and crushes ice.

Why yes, I believe that's an accurate description of my meaningless babble....

For a description of your own product, go here and enter your own details.

2002-10-11T11:17:00.000Z

Two teenage schoolboys who issued repeated death threats to a teacher have been reinstated at the same school by an independent appeals body. Not surprisingly, teachers at the school are refusing to teach the little bastards, and education secretary Estelle Morris has essentially overruled their decision, saying they should be found places elsewhere. Now, the mother of one of the boys is complaining, saying;

"I haven't gone through five months of hell with my family to now accept that my son will go to a referral unit."

Maybe if your son wasn't an arrogant, violent little shit who felt he was above all punishment you wouldn't have been through your five months of hell...

2002-10-09T08:34:00.000Z

Even if this were real, somebody would still attempt to deny all responsibility for their own choices...

2002-10-09T07:54:00.000Z

Rabbit continues to write the kind of thing that strengthens my faith in the blogosphere. Go see, and se the light...

2002-10-09T07:44:00.000Z

Shannon over at Bitter Girl could use a little help, so if you're an engineer of some sort head on over there and see if you can lend a hand. She's a girl with big (but secret) ideas...

2002-10-08T17:36:00.000Z

Apologies for the light posting at the moment.

I know I keep reitterating this point, but Christ, I'm busy!!! This forthcoming weekend sees the final and definite, set-in-stone, never-to-change arrival of the Deadline Beast, and we must ensure our sacrifices are ready. This, unfortunately, leaves very little time in the day for anything other than work, work, work, and renders this blog a weedy and emaciated version of its former glorious self (not that any newcomers can verify this claim, since Blogger has eaten my archives and does not appear willing to return them).

All will be well soon enough, trust me. I'm a professional (see above).

Oh yeah, these comments aren't gonna make themselves y'know! Give up the goods already!

2002-10-07T14:26:00.000Z

Did somebody break the internet?

Can't seem to get a damn thing to work at the moment, although it could be due to the increasing flakiness of our company network. I don't profess to know much about these things, but when a network starts to die two or three times a day I'm guessing it's a bad sign...

Had a decent weekend, despite being on call to assist those poor folks at work on Saturday and Sunday (I felt like some sort of doctor, administering advice over the Animation Helpline...). Me and The Girl hit the town on Saturday, along with a few friends, for the first time in many a month. I was worried that my recent lack of drinking would render me thoroughly pissed by about 10.30, but I'm proud to say I was still going strong well into the wee small hours of the morning and, despite the enormous quantity of alcohol we consumed, I felt remarkably OK the next morning. I did, however, have that strange aching of the limbs that tends to accompany the morning after. I've no idea what causes this bizarre sensation (I'm no dancer, so it sure as hell ain't over-exercise...) but it's a fairly regular occurence for me. Come to think of it, I've never heard anyone else mention it. Christ, please tell me it doesn't just happen to me....

One of the nice things about the night was the fact that, since moving in to our new house (the painful memories of that process are slowly fading) we are able to offer a bed for friends who live outside the immediate area. I'd never realised, as it's something completely new to me, but being able to have people stay over following a night on the lash is a real joy, allowing the night to wind down in comfort (a little food, a Wild Turkey nightcap, a gentle drifting off to bed) rather than run full pelt into the solid wall of silence that accompanies arriving home alone - there's only the tinnitus to keep you company.

Our guests rose at a reasonable time; we shared a jovial, if subdued, breakfast with newspapers and (quiet) television, before bidding them farewell some time late morning, allowing myself and The Girl a relaxing day of recovery and relatives (a visit to both mother-in-law-to-be and father-in-law-to-be). A quality weekend, all told, and one that should set me up well for the week of Serious-Ass Work to come.

2002-10-04T10:42:00.000Z

So so busy...

But not too busy for this! Yes , I know it's kind of old (in internet terms) but there's a whole bunch-o'-fun to be had, thanks to some quality British scientific research to find the World's Funniest Joke.

Here it is:

A couple of New Jersey hunters are out in the woods when one of them falls to the ground. He doesn't seem to be breathing, his eyes are rolled back in his head. The other guy whips out his cell phone and calls the emergency services. He gasps to the operator: “My friend is dead! What can I do?” The operator, in a calm soothing voice says: “Just take it easy. I can help. First, let's make sure he's dead.” There is a silence, then a shot is heard. The guy's voice comes back on the line. He says: “OK, now what?"

Kind of a damp squib, I think, but then I preferred the 2nd placed joke:

Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson go on a camping trip. After a good dinner and a bottle of wine, they retire for the night, and go to sleep.
Some hours later, Holmes wakes up and nudges his faithful friend. "Watson, look up at the sky and tell me what you see."
"I see millions and millions of stars, Holmes" replies Watson.
"And what do you deduce from that?"
Watson ponders for a minute.
"Well, astronomically, it tells me that there are millions of galaxies and potentially billions of planets. Astrologically, I observe that Saturn is in Leo. Horologically, I deduce that the time is approximately a quarter past three. Meteorologically, I suspect that we will have a beautiful day tomorrow. Theologically, I can see that God is all powerful, and that we are a small and insignificant part of the universe. What does it tell you, Holmes?"
Holmes is silent for a moment. "Watson, you idiot!" he says. "Someone has stolen our tent!"

Heh!

2002-10-02T15:36:00.000Z

'AOL boss admits to 'lack of leadership' says the Guardian. According to AOL Time Warner chairman Steve Case (who, judging by the photo used in this feature, has the world's biggest face) believes "online advertising, once the principal engine of AOL's profits and growth, would become less important than other sources of revenue, including subscriptions, fees for additional premium services and selling goods and services to members online."

What should be more important to AOL is providing a quality service. Having said that, I really don't think that people are going to be willing to pay any reasonable amount for 'online services'. For one thing, the quality is not there in most cases, and the majority of web users have got used to free content.

Personally I tend to feel somewhat aggrieved when a site or service starts to charge for things that were once free. Whilst I understand the reasons (running costs mainly, and maybe wages for companies that have employees) I just feel that income should come from other sources - such as advertising. I'm already paying ISP subscription fees and phone company call costs, and any further charges seem like a step too far. At that point the internet becomes an expense in excess of its worth. I don't think I'm the only person to hold this view either; as only porn sites really seem to make any kind of profit from exclusive content and premium services - just ask the folks at Salon...

2002-10-02T07:27:00.000Z

Tim Blair offers an insight into the potential positives of the recent Blogger problems many of us seem to be experiencing. Could it be that Blogger has finally evolved into a sentient entity? God help us all...

2002-10-01T14:37:00.000Z

Over at Random Oddness, things keep getting better and better. Just one thing though -

In Ireland, a 10:10am bus means it leaves on average at 10:10. In reality it will leave +/- 20 minutes from the posted time.

Believe me mate, it's not just Ireland that enjoys such idiosyncratic public services, it's a UK-wide phenomena, and one of which we are justifiably proud!

2002-10-01T13:29:00.000Z

I'm a sucker for anything astronautical, so this sounds mighty cool.

2002-10-01T07:54:00.000Z

I'll bet his mother is so proud...

2002-09-30T13:05:00.000Z

Well, another typical Monday morning...

In so much as I'm slow and lacking in inspiration, at least. Some Mondays, I'm fine. Some Mondays I hit the ground running - my fingers translating the movements I see in my head directly into a perfect animated replicant, flowing and twisting with a realism that surprises even myself. Some Mndays however - Mondays like this one - I couldn't animate my way out of a paper bag.
Lunchtime has been and gone, and my output so far has been minimal to say the least, with only a couple of tweaks and alterations completed. The only fresh animation I've started (and I've started it three or four times thus far) has been an unmitigated disaster, with the character flopping around the screen like a broken Jacob's Ladder...

Ah well... I'm pretty sure things'll pick up; I just need to ease myself into the work. Unfortunately this is easier said than done when you're under the Deadline Cosh - such creative work practices are one of the luxuries that fall from the edges of your desk and roll out of sight amongst the writhing mass of cables beneath whenever The Beast comes calling.

Enough of this babble! Go here, and marvel at the unknown wonders of the universe. Or at another scientific triumph of hope over experience....

2002-09-27T09:05:00.000Z

Forget everything I said.

Seriously, forget it. In an rather Machiavellian eleventh hour move, we've been given a further two-week extension to The Deadline. This is, again, both a Good Thing and a Bad Thing. Here's the rub:

More time = more work can be done to a higher standard and with smaller degree of stress.
More time = stress, although of smaller degree, extended over longer period.

There is also the issue of Feature Creep. For those that don't know, this is the phenomenon of extra features being added outside of the original specifications (usually because they're cool), and is often found draped across the carcasses of failed projects and broken men. We have, however, been assured that Feature Creep will be kept to a minimum during the next two weeks, and that any extras requested will be absolutely necessary. This is good. I am happy with this. This is as it should be.
Whether it actually happens remains to be seen.

Aaaanywho, the upshot of it all is an extension of both the agony and the ecstacy. It should mean an end to working weekends (for me at least - some poor bastards may as well bring in their sleeping bags...) which should make The Girl happier, and allows me the time to recharge my batteries that I sorely need at weekends. Some people seem able to work fifteen hour days continuously for weeks on end; I can't. I know when I'm too tired to work effectively, and at that point I go home, as I don't see the point of remaining at my desk til midnight if all I'm going to do is stare blankly at the screen and rub my temples in an attempt to shift the banging headache I've had since 7.30.
There comes a point when you become unproductive, and in a creative industry this is counterproductive. The little work you squeeze from your dry, dusty brain is invariably substandard, hacked together shite that you end up revisiting and repairing the next day, and the macho "I was here til 4.30 this morning" bullshit that goes with it is just plain stupid. Especially when you don't return to work til lunchtime the next day.

Well, there it is, and here we are. Having re-read the last couple of paragraphs I realise I sound a little negative, but that's just the tiredness speaking. I'm actually pretty positive about this latest development, and my position in it (I've become increasingly integral to the project in recent months, and I enjoy the responsibility - despite my initial fears and misgivings). Good things are to come, I think, as long as everyone keeps their head up and their noses to that old grindstone...

2002-09-26T08:37:00.000Z

Content will be light today, I'm afraid.

Tomorrow is the day of the Big Deadline (though it may, God forbid, be extended to Sunday, thus ensuring a weekend of work and pain...), and I will therefore be out of communication range, buried deep beneath a pile of last minute animations and fixes. I have worked nearly forty hours in three days so far this week, and today is only Thursday, so I can safely predict that, by the weekend, my brain will be mush, my eyes hard, black pebbles and my soul a dry empty husk. Once this is over I shall return to my shining jovial self, I promise; I will emerge from the gloom, eyes blinking, like a pit pony set free.
Apologies for all the recent carping - normal service will be resumed shortly...

2002-09-26T08:11:00.000Z

Well, whaddya know...

Obviously intimidated and offended by the successful arrival of the new Haloscan comments, the BlogOut comments have seen fit to grace us with their return. I'm unsure how to proceed. I think I may just leave both of them there for the time being - maybe they'll fight it out for commentary supremacy, or something...

Two men enter, one man leave!
Two men enter, one man leave!
Two men enter, one man leave!
Two men enter, one man leave!

2002-09-26T08:01:00.000Z

Now where the hell did I put that blanket?

Which Peanuts Character Are You Quiz

2002-09-25T10:18:00.000Z

Lileks once again explores the options with frightening clarity and an eye for the realities of the world.

2002-09-25T10:14:00.000Z

OK, I've installed a new comments system, courtesy of the lovely folks over at HaloScan, and this one appears to be working. I've also left the existing comments code in there, just to see if it comes back. If, by any chance, anyone can see two comments links, please let me know (in both versions, as I can only see one!) Cheers!

Who'd have thought maintaining a blog could be so much work....

2002-09-25T09:37:00.000Z

Well, it seems that my comments system is well and truly screwed. I've tried everything, but Blogger is really giving me grief at the moment, what with disappearing archives, comments not showing up, pages not loading, errors on pages.... bah! The comments code is still in there, but I see nothing on the actual page. The irony is, people have just started actually using the comments, and now my little nuggets of happiness and joy have been hidden from view by the evil and temperamental entity that is Blogger.

I'm tempted to remove the code entirely and try replacing it with a different comments system, but I actually like the one I've got - when it works...

2002-09-24T15:18:00.000Z

If you've got too much time on your hands, this ought to relieve you of those pesky minutes.

By the way, can anyone beat that thing...?

2002-09-24T11:39:00.000Z

Holy smokes, I be tired...

Worked a 14 hour day yesterday, due to one thing or another (mainly the rampant idiocy of our Ultimate Bosses, who faxed a couple of pages of extra work at 5.30PM, to be done before the end of the day!), and now my eyes feel like piss-holes in the snow...

Still got a whole pan-full of work to get through today though, and I can honestly say that I feel like shit. Hopefully I'm going to wake up a little soon because, at the moment, I feel like I'm wrestling with consciousness - just typing this is proving to be far more complicated and tiresome than it should. Still, only a week of this madness, then things should settle down post-deadline. I'm trying to just take it all one day at a time and one task at a time, as this seems to retain my focus and prevent the onset of complete mental overload.

Send me your kind thoughts, you good, good people - I need some positive vibes...

2002-09-23T15:05:00.000Z

The NY Times has an interesting little article on pro-journos running blogs and, occasionally, running into trouble.

2002-09-23T10:52:00.000Z

Rock group Bon Jovi is offering fans an incentive to buy its latest CD rather than obtain a pirated copy from the internet.

Seems like a whole bunch of effort and expense to prevent something that was pretty unlikely to happen anyway...

2002-09-23T10:25:00.000Z

What the hell is going on here? This is Britain, ferchrissakes! The whole reason we're as obsessed with weather as we are is because we don't get any, or at least nothing of any real consequence. The last thing we need is real honest-to-goodness extremes of weather...

"Morning Elsie"
"Morning Beryl, did you see the lava flow last night? Up to my windows it was!"
"Mine too! I don't think my petunias will last the week at this rate..."
"Ooh, I know..."

That said, most of the people I spoke to today interpreted the violent shaking and rattling of their entire house as a possible burglary in progress, bizarrely enough. Men across the country were dispatched to the ground floor in their bathrobes, armed with an array of walking sticks, cricket bats and bedside lamps, as wives and girlfriends sat clutching their duvets to their chins. What they expected to find, I don't know. A gang of vibrating thieves struggling to keep hold of their loot? The legendary Burglar Giant, violently rattling the house fifteen feet above the ground in an attempt to shake out all the family's belongings?

Wife: "Can you see anything Bernard?"
Husband: "No dear, there's noone down here, everything's fine... well, except for the crevasse..."

2002-09-23T08:56:00.000Z

What a weekend!

I did nothing! And it was fantastic!
After the relentless activity of the last few weeks, and in anticipation of the horrendous deadline-focussed week that is to come, it was decided in a unilateral conference Friday night (consisting of me and The Girl lying on the sofa watching TV) that no further unnecessary energy was to be expended during the course of the weekend. All plans to paint the bathroom, erect shelves in the living room and mow the lawn (currently resembling an unkempt English meadow) were postponed in order to achieve the new primary objective of the weekend. Namely, reading the papers, playing videogames and watching crap television.

Following a two day period during which we neither left the house nor completed any arduous tasks, I am pleased to inform you that we accomplished our mission with complete success. I hit the hay last night feeling more relaxed and rested than I have in many months and this morning I feel like a million dollars, having risen at 5.30am to a beautiful golden dawn.

Stay tuned this week to see my energy and zestful mood mercilessly worn down by the Deadline Beast in an orgy of death, destruction and Extra Work!!

2002-09-23T08:09:00.000Z

The truth, godammit!

We all need to hear a little truth now and again, and this nugget fills me with hope for the American psyche. We need a backlash against blame-culture before it overruns us all and every day becomes a whirlwind of finger-pointing and fear, and it needs to begin in the country that spawned the whole sorry state of affairs in the first place...

2002-09-20T16:34:00.000Z

The weekend calls.

It's Friday evening, and I'm just about set to leave work and head for home, where a glass of chilled white wine awaits my parched soul. After a couple of days of solid slog I've whittled down my workload to the point where, hussah!, I don't need to work this weekend, so I can relax and take a rest before next week's Big Push. Oh the agonies that await... I'm trying really hard not to think about it, but I've got a horrible feeling that the boss has lined up some extra work for me to squeeze in before next Friday. Whilst it's nice to be known as a reliable, can do kinda guy, it does sometimes mean you get hammered for all the 'surplus' tasks, and I just know that I won't be seeing much of the Girl next week. A surefire way to make me popular at home, indeed!

Unfortunately, due to the recent car purchase, money is, as someone once said, too tight to mention, so the weekend promises to be a home-based one. This doesn't actually worry me too much, as we've a plentiful supply of booze in-house, and I was planning on spending a sizeable period of the weekend sub-duvet anyway. Next weekend, however, the good ship Pay Day will be in town. May God bless her, and all that sail in her...

Take it easy, and may your weekend bring you rest and reward...

2002-09-20T08:49:00.000Z

Greece.

Will the madness never end?

2002-09-20T08:23:00.000Z

To see yourself as others see you...

is, I think, one of life's great joys. Over at random oddness there are observations about this fair isle's quirks which remind me why I like it.

2002-09-19T08:02:00.000Z

So I got my new car at the weekend...

Of course, when I say new I don't actually mean new, I just mean new to me. Buying an actually new car seems like the most ridiculous purchasing error you could make.

"Say, pal, here's an offer! You wanna buy this item, correct? Well, it's brand new (hot off the production line, doncha know) so I'm afraid there's a little mark-up on it. How much? Oh, only around 1000%. Hey don't worry buddy, you're getting a brand new item here, right? Right!
Ok, now, one other thing. As soon as you take posession of said item I will instantly remove at least a third of its value. How about that!
What? Why? Well, once you buy it it's no longer brand new is it! What's that? I sleep just fine thanks!
Hey, c'mon pal, don't be like that! I'll throw in a free testicular leech treatment too, if you like!"

So my new-to-me car is great, and actually is young enough to feel pretty damned new anyway, at least compared to my previous jalopies. The last one (which died underneath me like an old cowboy's horse), suffered a slow undignified demise, gradually getting more and more decrepit as the months passed. It was ancient and knackered when I bought it, and did me great service in the two years I owned it so, despite its inherent crapness, I have fond memories and mourn its inevitable passing.

Of course, the loss is eased considerably everytime I cruise to work in my new machine, luxuriating in the fully functional wash/wipe function (I can see! I'm less likely to torpedo into someones rear-end!) and the airtight driver's door (I no longer arrive at work with a strange fixed sneer on the right side of my face from the draught). Christ, it even smells nice inside (and not of wet dog)! The joys of modern motoring are here at last...

2002-09-18T17:18:00.000Z

Mr Lileks, I love you.

2002-09-18T16:50:00.000Z

Samizdata has created a pretty-god-damned-smart Blog Glossary (Bloglossary?). Go see! Quickly! Then come back...

2002-09-18T13:23:00.000Z

I WAS A GIFTED CHILD
i had my niche.
intelligent. creative. or artistic.
what kind of child were you?
(brought you by april)

I didn't have a ponytail though...
And I painted only happy faces (and fast cars that left flames on the road).

2002-09-18T08:13:00.000Z

The Deadline Beast is a contrary creature...

He likes to hover close to your ear, whispering his odes to stress and strain, to late nights and tired eyes and headaches. He allows your Fear to build to a crescendo, the pressure to swell in your brain like a bloated corpse dredged from the lakebed. His shadow lengthens over your desk as feeding time approaches, his Maw inches from the nape of your neck, ravenous drool dripping onto your collar... Then he says "Hey guys, you've got another week!"

Bastard.

I don't know whether this is good or bad. Yeah, it means we've got more time to reach the deadline - and we can get more stuff in the game, plus do a little glossing - but it also extends the agony and means that the 'Final Push' of long hours and intense work is stretched into a punishing regime that threatens to wear you down. I can feel my immune system creaking under the strain, but at least the work I'm doing is exciting enough to offer some form of compensation - I pity some of the poor sods doing more mundane tasks. Still, we are but cogs in a machine of greater importance and all must play their part. Mine is calling as we speak, so I shall return to it with vim and vigour (and Vimto). We go over the top in a week, and I need to polish my bayonet...