You know how you don’t feel like going back to work after a holiday? That’s kind of how I feel about blogging after my week off.

I know, I know, that’s hardly the kind of attitude that’s going to get me out of the Blogging equivalent of the Vauxhall Conference, but it’s true. Sometimes, I feel like blogging’s an obligation rather than something to do because I want to, although in fairness I do enjoy writing most of the time; it’s only those odd days when inspiration is absent that I feel like I’m hammering out an entry because I’ve got a one-per-day schedule to stick to.

But stick to the schedule I must, which is why I rattle off the occasional “empty” blog post. You can spot these quite easily; they meander around a little, touch on a few subjects, perhaps contain a nice turn of phrase or two, but at the end you’re not really any the wiser about anything, save perhaps a few details of my childhood. The cynically-minded may claim that I use childhood reminiscences in an attempt to invoke the warm glow of nostalgic recognition which will hopefully blind you to the fact that the post itself doesn’t have any real content (call it the Peter Kay Effect, if you like), but I couldn’t possibly comment.

I tend to think of these posts as the blogging equivalent of fast food; they’re easy to prepare and fill you up, but you wouldn’t want them all the time. I could go all Morgan Spurlock and try spending a month writing nothing but fast food posts but, in the same way that Spurlock gained an unhealthy amount of weight, I’d lose an unhealthy number of readers. Whereas Spurlock was able to lose that weight again, I’m not sure I’d be able to regain the readers; so, if it’s all the same to you, I’m going to give that experiment a miss.

Still, having said little of any consequence in the last few paragraphs, I think it’s fair to assume that this was a fast food post; I’d better do some exercise and come up with at least one topic to write about tomorrow, otherwise I’ll be metaphorically ballooning in weight quicker than you can say “Supershrink my audience”…

Thanks for visiting the tossr drive-thru. Have a nice day.

My memory’s getting worse and worse these days; I’ll forget social arrangements, birthdays, you name it. I was starting to wonder whether it was just the onset of old age but then I saw that Gary Shewan has pretty much hits the nail on the head:

I’m back working on my Rails project today. Much better using Radrails as well. But trying to remember where I left off and what Rails code I need and where to put it is a struggle seeing as I last really had a run at it before last Christmas.

I’ve decided that all this knowledge has been stored in a RAM part of my brain that slowly empties itself over time, with sleep, beer and gets written over with other handy and important information.

What I can’t understand is why the ROM part of my brain (the bit that doesn’t degrade or get overwritten) only contains useless and inane shite, drivel and most definitely not important and handy information?

I think my memory is pretty much the same but with one added problem; at least half of my RAM is super-volatile memory, which gradually loses information throughout the day and is wiped entirely overnight. I suspect that knowing my luck, the rest is probably flash memory so although it retains everything after powering down, it’s only good for a limited number of writes and they’re probably being used up pretty rapidly due to the amount of stuff I have to keep re-writing to it.

In fact, I could be due a meltdown any day now, which is why tossr is taking a mini-break; I won’t be making any “proper” posts until next Sunday night while my RAM is being upraded.

Well, that’s not strictly true; in fact I’ve got some stuff that needs doing round the house, a job application to write and a bunch of social engagements so tossr has been pushed down the list of priorities for the moment. Still, it’ll be fun to check back next weekend and see how many spam posts have amassed; the way things have been going recently I’m guessing 20 at least. That may be small beer to those above me in the blogerarchy but for us W-listers down here (I forget which list I’ve made it to, but I’ll say W-list for convenience; I hope you don’t think I’m getting too big for my boots!) it’s a nice indication of how popular we’re getting.

It’s certainly one I’m going to start applying to real life; therefore, the fact that I get loads of junk mail offering me credit cards and loans is because I’m popular, and not at all because I’ve got the kind of credit history that suggests I might be in need of a credit card or loan.

Wow, I’m feeling better about myself already!

Engadget has picked up on a couple of recent news items; namely, that certain British drivers apparently place more trust in their GPS units than they do their own road knowledge.

Now, I like to think I’m a reasonably good driver but my route knowledge is awful. Truly awful. I couldn’t give you directions to my office even though I drive there every day because I take little notice of various points of reference I could use and would therefore tie myself in knots trying to think which road you’re supposed to take (”Take the third right… no, wait, the fourth right… I think?”). Don’t even get me started on road names; I can remember the the names of barely a handful of the local roads, and I’ve lived here for over five years. It’s a wonder I don’t get lost on my daily commute; I reckon it must be some sort of muscle memory. I’m set in my ways, though, and even if I could cut my travel time in half by taking a different route I’d think twice before trying it; I certainly wouldn’t try it without a roadmap, my GPS and an atlas, just in case.

All this means I have every sympathy with these drivers who are taking ridiculously roundabout routes via tiny little villages just because their GPS told them it’s the best route; I would probably do the same, even if there were big flashing neon signs telling me that another route was the quickest, most direct one, and I had someone sitting in my car giving me precise directions, and I was following a convoy of locals who know the area like the back of their hands. Seriously, GPS would win every time.

However, I can’t remember the last time I went anywhere with my GPS; I scared myself one time, as I had a 10-hour drive which I did more-or-less in one go and by the end I was treating it like some kind of Mario Kart-esque display, wondering why the other cars weren’t showing up on it (and, more importantly, when one of the bastards was going to get me with a blue shell). Once I’d reached my destination and realised how foolish I was being (I was never in the lead so the blue shell wouldn’t touch me), I vowed not to use the GPS again until I could be trusted not to use it to weave between other cars.

The fact that I haven’t set it up since speaks volumes, I think.

(Via Snackspot)

You know the hoary old cliché about how Wagon Wheels used to be bigger when you were a kid? Well, how about a really big Wagon Wheel, courtesy of the fine folks at Pimp My Snack?

If the idea of giant-sized versions of confectionary floats your boat then prepare to drown in gallons of your own drool, as assorted biscuits and chocolate bars receive the PMS treatment and end up bigger and phatter in every way. Of course, that also means a hefty increase in the calorie content; I swear my waistline just expanded a couple of inches while I was browsing the site.

Be sure to check out the awe-inspiring majesty of the King Rolo; if those were commerically available I’d snap them up in a heartbeat…

(Via Whiggles.com)

As HD-DVD is launched in the US, the news from the Blu-Ray camp is not good; it appears that Sony are willing to block titles of which they don’t approve from getting a Blu-Ray release. Don May Jr., head of sci-fi/horror label Synapse Films, had this to say over at the Mobius Home Video Forum:

When we met with Sony to discuss titles and told them about THRILLER and THE IMAGE and that we wanted to do BLU-RAY discs of those two titles, they pretty much told us they WOULDN’T do them because of their extreme adult content! They were like “umm… well… we don’t know if we can do that sort of thing.” That attitude may just outright kill the BLU-RAY format. People want adult films… it’s a hundreds of millions of dollars a year business… and HD-DVD will have them. It’s funny how, when I bring this up (about the adult films), that people say that “they didn’t think of that” when discussing which format will prevail.

It’ll be interesting to see whether Sony are willing to allow Blu-Ray releases of films such as The Brown Bunny and 9 Songs, both of which feature uncut, unsimulated sex acts (a blowjob in The Brown Bunny and full-on rutting in 9 Songs) and which have previously been given the nod by Sony: The Brown Bunny was released by Sony as a Superbit title while 9 Songs is available on Sony’s ailing UMD format, although one wonders exactly who would buy the film in a portable format; the bus-travelling art-film fanatic who doesn’t care about a cloud of schoolboys gathering behind him and peering over his shoulder, or is it more likely to be the kind of person who’s happy to take their PSP to the toilet for a bit of “light relief”?

Still, if only other branches of Sony were willing to exercise control over which titles were released in their respective fields; I’m sure I’m not the only bitter Dreamcast fanboy who’s unable to take the PS2 seriously while the likes of Virtua Fighter 4 vie for shelf space alongside torrents of shitty licensed games and EA’s endless sports tedium simulators…

Am I the only person sick to the back teeth of Peter Kay? Call me a miserable old sod if you like but virtually everything he’s done after the second series of Phoenix Nights (including that sodding Amarillo thing) has been utter toss (in my opinion, of course). Never before has anyone gone down in my estimation as rapidly as Kay; his Live at the Top of the Tower stand-up video is one of the funniest I’ve seen (I originally got it on VHS, then bought the DVD version when it came out a couple of years later), but his Live at the Bolton Albert Halls one just doesn’t make me laugh in the same way — in fact, it barely makes me laugh full stop. Eddie Izzard might be shit these days but at least he doesn’t seem to be shamelessly whoring himself in the same way as Kay, whose official site is merely a web-shop selling countless items with slogans printed on them (and pretty much any pairing of words he’s said more than once has found its way onto his merchandising).

The problem for me is that I’m basically saying “He was funnier before he was famous”, which instantly opens me up to accusations of snobbery but it’s honestly how I feel; every so often I’ll watch Top of the Tower just to remind myself how funny he was, and then I’ll catch him on TV peddling the banal observational comedy that’s now his stock-in-trade and wonder what happened.

Garlic bread? Grrrr.

Regular tossr readers will know that I don’t usually post over the weekend, and as it’s Easter I’m afraid the weekend has come a little earlier and will end a little later, meaning there probably won’t be another post here until Monday night.

Until then, I’ve got another video for you to enjoy. But first, a bit of background:
Continue Reading »
Flushed down the drain like so much excess ectoplasm

In honour of the new series of Doctor Who starting this Saturday:

Could this just be one of the best pop songs ever? It works in virtually every conceivable way; the glam rock beat (lifted from The Sweet’s Blockbuster) meshes really well with the Doctor Who theme (a pretty faithful cover version as far as I can tell, rather than a sample of one of the actual themes), the ring-modulated Dalek voice screaming “Bosh bosh bosh, loadsamoney!” and joining in with the call-and-response “You wot?” puts a grin on my face every time, and for me the only weak point is the use of a portion of Gary Glitter’s Rock and Roll (part 2) (namely, the “Doctor Whooo / The Tardis” chant) due to Mr Glitter’s pederast tendencies, and the embarassment felt that listening to this song on a hot summer’s day with the windows down might earn you a few dirty looks if you drive past a school (as I do on my way to and from work).

Still, it could be worse. The Gary Joins the JAMMs version turns the track into a tribute to the now-disgraced glam rocker, with the vocals provided by Glitter himself; the intro features Gary asking the listener “Did ya miss me? Do ya love me? Do ya wanna touch me?” (which may or may not be part of his seduction technique), and it’s more than a little disturbing to hear…

Anyway, enjoy the video, and props to JohnnyThunderz for uploading it in the first place!

Nearly three weeks on and my cold is still hanging around. I don’t usually get ill so to have two relatively bad colds in the space of a few months is a little worrying; I’ve started feeling distinctly uncomfortable if someone so much as clears their throat, lest I catch yet another cold and end up ill again. I’m going to end up a Howard Hughes-esque recluse at this rate, I tell you.

Of course, the sterotypical male response on catching a sniffle is to loudly proclaim that it’s the ‘flu, not a cold, although of course if it was the ‘flu one would be barely able to proclaim anything, loudly or otherwise. Not being one to rely on such clichés, I am happy to admit that it’s just a bad cold, and — despite my whinging — I’ll be over it in another week or so. It’s only a cold. It’s nothing more serious than that. Just a cold.

Still, that avian influenza, eh?

Further to my previous post about coffee, when I was in the city centre yesterday I decided to stick with the known devil and headed to Costa for my traditional Saturday afternoon medium skinny Fairtrade mocha and spicy meatball panini (yeah, life’s a 24/7 party for me).

As I was queuing, I noticed a banner behind the counter with details of their latest offer; namely, a free extra shot of espresso in your coffee if you want one. Well, that’s me sold; because of that, I’m unlikely to stray from Costa for the duration of the promotion (it runs until the end of the month, I think) and that means I’ve effectively been bought for 35p. Never mind Judas and his thirty pieces of silver, I’m yours for just four (more if you don’t have the correct change).

Yet again, The Man gets one over on me, just like he did when he slashed the price of Branston baked beans as an introductory offer. I consumed tin after tin, decided that they were alright but in future I’d go back to Heinz if they were on offer, and then found that when Heinz did put their beans on offer, I didn’t like them as much as the Branston ones. In fact, I’ve got seven tins of Heinz beans (the remnants of that “buy four get four free” offer) sitting in my kitchen cupboard, lonely and unloved while their Branston counterparts are being bought and eaten on a weekly basis.

So, the score is now Man 2, Stu 0.

Bastard.