Late night surfing

I love the internet.

I've loved it way before I even knew how it worked, or what it did. Back in the old days of living in Baghdad, we had no internet. We knew there was an internet explorer with windows, and we knew the internet was a great place. PC heaven. But what did it look like and how did it work?

I was to find out in June 2000, the year I left Iraq. My first time so to speak was at an internet café in Jordan, when a friend of mine type www.hotmail.com in a browser, and from then on I was hooked.

It's not just the info, but the other main reason I love the web is communications. Thanks to the net I'm in touch with loads of friends all around the globe, some just emailing now and then, some chatting randomly, and others regularly voice/video conferencing and playing games.

And now, I'm laid on my bed, browsing the web for random tidbits at 2:30 in the morning on my laptop, and I'm enjoying it so much that I thought I'd blog it. Come to think of it, today was a good geeky day, cos my gaming buddy Dan came round and we played the Serious Sam 2 demo, and then played ALOT of Mortal Kombat : Shaolin Monks (Ko-op mode). Essentially golden axe but in the mk universe, the ko-op mode is so much button-bashing fun and arguing about screen-stealing and item allocation that it just takes you back to the good old 2D co-op games of yesteryear (double dragon anyone?). Great game. Great day. Great internet.

69 Love Songs

I don't know why I haven't mentioned this earlier. I've been bugging poor old anarki13 about this every other time I post on his blog.
69 Love Songs is a triple CD album by the not-so-known The Magnetic Fields. Why would a blog about computer games, medicine, and jarredom mention such a soppy album? Well, cos not only is it one of the best hidden nuggets of music around, but it's also got nearly nothing to do with lovey-dovey love, but more about betrayal, lust, passion, sadness, happiness, adultry, and anything else that no one else would sing about other than incomprehensible metal bands.

The 69 songs on the album cover a wide range of genres also, from folk rock, to electronic, to pop and even experimental, it's just a brilliant experience all together.

The main man behind the music is a Stephen Merritt, a genius at lyric writing and composing at the same time. With a dull, monotonous haunting voice like moby, he adds more meaning to his music by singing the majority himself (with a few other vocalists sometimes).

With song titles like The Cactus Where You're Heart Should Be, It's a Crime (To Fall in Love), and Let's Pretend We're Bunny Rabbits, you know that this is a special album that deserves recognition.

Worth mentioning is "I Don't Wanna Get Over You", a song about giving up on trying to forget, and about living in blue. Sung with Merritt's trademark dull and dark voice (that you wouldn't expect to be so sentimental and sad), to a bouncy sing-a-long tune that again contradicts the sad and sentimental lyrics, which are about living in blue forever, it's a great example of the genius behind this album.

My personal favourites have got to be:

Absolutely Cookoo:

don't fall in love with me yet

we only recently met

true i'm in love with you

but you might decide i'm a nut

All My Little Words:

you are a splendid butterfly

it is your wings that make you beautiful

and I could make you fly away

but I could never make you stay

Reno Dakota:

reno dakota I'm reaching my quota of tears for the year

alas and alak you just don't call me back

you have just disappered

it makes me drink beer

I Don't Wanna Get Over You:

I don't wanna get over you

I guess I could take a sleeping pill

and sleep at will

and not have to go through what I go throuh

I guess I should take Prozac, right

and just smile all night

at somebody new

The Luckiest Guy On The Lower East Side:

Andy would bicycle across town

in the rain to bring you candy

and John would buy the gown

for you to wear to the prom, with Tom

the astronomer who'd name star for you

but I'm the luckiest guy on the lower east side

cos I've got wheels and you wanna go for a ride

It's A Crime (To Fall In Love):

my mother said gently

syou can buy her a bently

but my son she'll only drive it away

I didn't listen

cos my brain was missing

and I only found it today

Yeah! Oh, Yeah!:

Are you out of love with me

are you longing to be free

do I drive you up the tree?

Yeah! Oh, Yeah!

though I need you more than air

is it true you just don't care?

are you having an affair?

Yeah! Oh, Yeah!

Revolution!

Not the Jarre album or track (both great), but Nintendo Revolution!
Tokyo Game Show started today in the Empire of the Sun, and Satoru Iwata (ninty boss for those on the wrong blog :p) did what the whole world was waiting for, he revealed the nintendo revolution controller!
On first impressions you'd be excused to think that you're staring at a TV remote control. Ditching the very thing nintendo invented 20 years ago, ie the 2-handed control method, the revolution controller is a one-handed simplistic affair with a few basic buttons, and the now trademark big A button in the middle. What's so revolutionary about that?
The revolution comes in with the sensors on the console and the controller itself. Using bluetooth, the controller can sense any kind of movement. Not just gimicky twist and turn, but full rotation and 3D spatial awareness! It's a something you've got to see to fully understand, but imagine a fully 3D mouse and you're nearly there!
Also, the controller can have wired attachments, the one displayed is basically an analogue stick, used for FPS games.
Confusing right? dwell on the pictures below but more importantly, get yourselves browsing here for Revo-Europe's story on the revealing, here for a brilliant trailer of the controller in action, and here for the full 60 minute webcast of Iwata's keynote. Watch the trailer to understand what I'm going on about!
My mind has been made up, Revolution all the way! I was initally on that opinion but thought I'd wait for the controller to materialise before making my mind up. I'm not sure how much the western markets will warm to this idea, but all nintendo needs is Japan, and knowing them they're gonna lap this up big time.
A very excited SoB signing out for now!

XBOX 360 Overload

Bizzare Creations (them of Metropolis Street Racer and Project Gotham Racing fame) are trying to Burn Out (Pun intended - Criterion's racer rules!) an Xbox 360 by putting 35,000 spectators polygon rendered spectators on a corner of a track from their next-gen racer!
The new game boasts realistic fans and crowds that react and take pictures etc, but Bizzare promise thousands (which is still alot) rather than 35,000 in the real game!
Check the pic, and count the heads if you don't believe it.
PS: No results yet whether the box has burned. Keep an eye out here.

Friends

I'm gonna be out of action for a week or so. Reason? My good from Zzz is coming over from Dubai for a week! We last met when I went there back in xmas 2003 and this time he's coming here for something called PLASA at London's Earl's Court. It's something his company boss and him are coming to attend. I'll be going to London today to see him (he arrives today), and will be spending the week over there. Wanna take him to all the great places, Oxford Street, TCR, Trocadero and Leicester Square, Westminster and Waterloo, Imax, Madam Tussaud's, and ofcourse Thorpe Park!!

SoB out for the week or so. Will be online from powerbook but don't think I'll blog.

They invented Tetris...

...and now Russia's biggest design agency has come up with what must be the coolest invention since Alexey Pajitnov's masterpiece.
Cue the Optimus Keyboard - where each key is actually a mini LED screen on it's own! A brilliantly cool idea, with endless possibilities. Push one button and your keyboard changes from English to any other language in the world. Pissed off at all those keyboard shortcuts you can't remember in photoshop? Optimus' keys will show you an icon of what each key is.
BUT, the main thing this keyboard gets a mention here? check this out:

The Da Vinci Code

I've just finished reading The Da Vinci Code, by Dan Brown.
I used to read loads of books as a kid, especially all the Roald Dahl novels - that man wasa genius!
But, recently, thanks to the internet and laziness, I've lost my passion for books. Having being persuaded by a friend to read The Da Vinci Code, I bought a copy and found myself transfixed! It's an amazing story that capitalises on the myth of the Holy Grail and secret societies, with enough riddles and twists to keep it more than interesting. It's also full of historically correct facts and serves up not just a brilliant thriller, but a lesson in history, art and geography of Paris and England.
The book is becoming a motion picture next year (with Tom Hanks), so now's your chance at reading the story. A brilliant book to say the least.

I've also finished reading The House Of God by Samuel Shem. A book about junior physicians, very true and very funny! Don't think I can recommend it to someone who isn't in the medical profession though....

Next Stop: Bill Bryson - A Short History Of Nearly Everything. I've had this book for ages and I've forgotten where I've reached. I'll start again.

No Comment

Virtua.Tennis.EUR.MULTI5.PSP-WAR3X

I have a feeling of deja vu
I think it was 5 years ago, the dreamcast was dying, and I was waiting for the excellent virtua tennis 2 to "be released". I found out it was out at some unholy midnight hour, and it took me about 4 hours to get the damn game and succesfully burn it (my toshiba combodrive sucked then, and dc games weren't easy to burn).
Fast-forward to today, and again I just found out (albeit too late) that Virtua Tennis for PSP is out. As it's now possible to play isos from the memory stick (been enjoying too much Hot Shots Golf recently thanks to that), I'm now downloading the damn thing and now all too well that I won't sleep till 5am. SIGH.
And, if you can, get a PSP for 3 reasons: Lumines, Mercury, and Virtua Tennis

SoB (Jarre fan) out.
PS: need to post about Space of Freedom soon

The.Happiest.Man.On.Earth

I can't believe what just happened!

I wasn't really looking forward to this fan meeting business. Everyone was a stranger and being alone was putting me off even more. But still, I thought I might as well get out of the hotel and go find out what's going on in the city. The fans had all met up by some famous fountain, so I got there and decided to join them.
I headed for a guy I recognised from the flight but hadn't spoken to. His name was Mike and he was a military aeroplane geek as well as a jarre fan, all rolled into one big, red-headed, chain-smoking nice guy! After a while of small-talk, everyone wandered off around town, while me and Mike decided to go to the concert place (the shipyard) to see the place and perhaps listen to the rehearsals.
Picking up a few drinks and the polish version of a doner kebab, we eventually got there, and were happy sitting outside with the loads of people just listening to the rehearsals. It was difficult to see what was going on though.
After a while, we noticed that one of the gates openned and people started pouring in, with some brown tickets on them! Turns out that today was a preview day only for workers of the shipyard and their families! The concert was to start at 9. While me and Mike were trying to get in one way or another, a very nice polish couple offered to sell us tickets for 20 zlotis, about 4 pounds! We bought them straight away and went in (with our cameras!) and managed to watch the whole of the concert a day earlier!!!! Every single thing (with a few hitches, it was a rehearsal), complete with fireworks, laser harps, light effects, projections and all!
Man, being there is just something else!
I could talk on and on about today, but the proper concert is tomorrow. With 120,000 people attending, I just can't wait! Best thing is that I took loads of pictures and movies, so I don't need to worry about the camera tomorrow and just enjoy the show.

SoB - Needs to shower/sleep/eat/jarre

Gdansk

Right.
We reached Gdansk at 11:10 (local time). By we I mean me and the plane :)
Got in a cab (guy called Richard. Seems nice, I'm sure he's overcharging), and checked in to this huge hotel, with a big room. to my delight the room had wireless broadband! Problem is, the signal is shitty, and my room is the only one without an ethernet socket! They've offered me to move to another room, but I can't be bothered and the signal seems to be OK now.
Just gonna go down to town to attend that Jarre fan meeting near some Neptune Fountain. Problem is, there will be NO CAMERAS AT THE SHOW!! Bastards!
Oh, and here's something Jarre said, to wet your (and my!) appetites:

"I am going to cross all boundaries with this concert. It is going to be better than you expect. You all are going to be the participants of my spectacle. I just have to say this to you - do not plan any holidays at that moment, stay in Gdansk because it will be well worth it. This concert is going to be the best concert in my entire career!"

The useless drag of another day

Anyone heard (Hear Is No Why) by The Smashing Pumpkins? A great song, from the even greater (Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness). It starts with the title of this blog, and carries on to tell you about how you'll forever stay in your sad machines. Classic.

Anyhow, 3 things I need to mention here:
I\ I leave for London today later this evening (still gotta go to the damn gym first. I hate gyms!). My plane to Gdansk leaves Luton airport at 08:10am, so need to be there at around 07:00 or so. Luckily, my brother lives about 15 minutes away from Luton, so that's a relief. I'm starting to worry about this trip. It's the first time I go away all alone (as in, with no one there to meet me that I know), and ofcourse my tummy is in knots cos of the small teenie weenie fact that I'm seeing Jarre play live! weather.com says that there'll be showers in gdansk on friday, but as the man himself said in London (Frogs like rain!).
The hotel I'm staying in boasts of internet access in each room. Wether it's wireless broadband or over-priced dialup is yet to be known, but I'll try to post something from the east.

II\ ICONOCLAST. This year's Assembley demo party was won by Iconoclast. A state-of-the-art demo for PC. It is an amazing product, with some brilliant middle eastern music, great gfx, and a tribute to one of the other best PC demos ever made! Old timers that'll watch it will immediately recognise the scene (and music) from the older demo. The last demo to really (blow me away) was VIP2 (Very Important Party 2) by Popy Team, although it had commercial music and some very obvious Poser models in it, it was still great to watch. This one is totally original though. Grab the demo from here.

III\ This one is for all those Amiga-lovers out there, and especially to a certain (anonymous) poster on good-delicious that I'm sure will love this to bits. Courtesy of Nile Warp who gave me this link today, check out this great web emulation of many classic Amiga demos, all coded in pure html (with a bit of java here and there). It's a beautiful tribute to the great 16bit machine. Unfortunately for mac users, it needs a fairly new version of IE. I tried it on Safari/Camino/Firefox/Omniweb/Mac IE and it doesn't function right :(
Everyone get your browsers over here and remember your spotty teenage years.

SoB OUT

Count down

I can't be bothered to go to the gym today.
For, erm, other reasons, my legs are hurting me this morning and I feel like I've had a good work out as it is :)
This Thursday I fly to Gdansk, can't wait! Jarre plays live on Friday at 20:00 (gates open at 16:00, gotta go early!). There's a fan meeting on the Thursday (organised by www.jarreuk.com), so I guess I won't be that lonely! Man this is going to be SO GOOD! I really can't wait, I'm dying from anticipation!
The concert will be broadcast live on the web (in dolby 5.1 surround nontheless) at http://www.itvp.pl/ so hope you guys will enjoy watching it. Can someone save the stream? it'd be so cool.
Gonna take my powerbook with me, and the hotel I'm in has web access, so I'll blog from there. I also bought a 1gig memory card for my camera, so I can shoot tons of pictures. Drool. Man if I actually meet the guy or get a picture with him then my life is complete.

MUM PWNZ JU

Can't help laughing at this one!
A young boy who was sneakily playing WoW at 3:30 in the morning was caught and grounded by his mum after he posted a thread in a forum she read, as she was a player of the game as well!
Other than the poor boy being caught, how cool is that?! Geek women rule!
Read the story and see the thread here.

Link courtesy of Wolf - Cheers mate!

Up Up And Away In My Beautiful My Beautiful

The 15th of August this year marked my mum's 50th Birthday. Being the nice son that I am I decided that this time I'll treat her to something different. So I got her a big-ass birthday card, and took here to a Chinese restaurant appropriately called Palm Trees (don't ask me why!). See, how nice am I!
But, before the restaurant, we drove half the way around the rural country side to get to some crafts show in a place called Braintree. There, in the middle of the field, lay this MASSIVE balloon in all it's glory!

Man the thing really was big, and very colourful, and also very dead! After everyone had gotten ready (it takes 16 passengers), the pilot told us all about what to expect, how to get on, and how to panic if something happened 2000feet above the ground!

Then him and some henchman came out with some kick-ass industrial fans and started inflating the balloon with "cold" air, with the help ofcourse of some passengers (it's all part of the fun you see!) Half way through it inflating, they both went inside to do something or another (perhaps make sure it blows up evenly, don't know) but it was cool seeing to adult men in there and the balloon just dominating all over them!


Soon afterwards, the balloon was nearing full size, and it was time for the captain to turn on the big burners. But, before he could do that, all the passengers had to get in, otherwise it'd fly off all by itself. Easier said than done! To get in, the basket is tilted on it's side and you have to climb in, sit down, and hold on for dear life with both hands!

Once everyone is in, the burners start (And they are HOT! it did say on the website to wear a hat or cap, but being arab we decided to ignore any official warning and just brave it. After all, who wore a cap in Iraq eh?)

Soon after, the balloon straightened itself and was tugging ferociously at the rope keeping it at bay (tied nontheless to a Range Rover Defender), the rope soon gave way and we started flying! Higher and higher, it was a scary feeling at first, cos there was no comfort in the fact that you're flying in a wicker basket with some flimsy balloon keeping you afloat!

Higher and higher, until we reached about 2000feet (so he said), and then it all became very surreal. When the burners are off you hardly feel or hear a thing, and all you do is just float in the middle of nothing! Houses and cars look like toys, the landscape patched beautifully with the colours of summer, the greens and the yellows and browns. The weather was helping as well, for that day it was actually sunshine in Britain!

As it was the flying season, we were soon joined by other balloons (I counted 4), and it was fun to watch them hover around and nearly follow the same path as we did

Surprisingly, it's not windier nor colder up in the skies as one would imagine. The sun started to set and I risked life and limb to take a picture of the beautiful sunset without showing any part of the balloon nor the passengers!

Then we started to descend. The captain explained that they could never pick where to land, and hence we'll end up in some random farmer's land any distance from where we started. Luckily, the Defender was connected by GPS and walkie talkie to us and it was following us around, to take us all back to the original flight field (and where our cars were!).
The landing itself was a bumpy affair (again you have to sit down and hold on to dear life!), but it went as smoothly as possible. We landed in some harvested wheat, and spent another 20 minutes packing the balloon into a tiny bag!

And that was the end of a great flight. All hungry and thristy, we went to that palm tree thing thinking it was a pub, only to be greeted by Mr and Mrs No Cum Too and their All-you-can-eat menu. Great stuff!

We Are Siamese If You Please

Once upon a time in China, lived two Chinamen.
One named I cum and the other one named No cum.
No cum marry pletty Chinese girl named No cum tu.
For velly obvious leason No cum and No cum tu not have any children.
One day, No cum went out of town on business.
I cum came over and spent the night with No cum tu.
That night I cum came and No cum tu came too.
This make both vely happy. However about 7 or 8 months later, No cum see he
about to become father but he not know how come,
so when baby come, he named it, How cum u cum.
Of course, I cum and No cum tu know How cum u cum came but to this day No
cum not know how come How cum u cum came!!

Google Bombing

I think I'm risking alot creating an entry with "bomb" in it, being all arab and muslim and all that, AND in the UK :o)
Everyone uses google. Even the word "google" is now in the New Oxford English Dictionary, and that's a statement to the new culture of ipods, blogs, and google. But what exactly is google bombing? Google uses a once-unique way to rank it's search results. Pages that had more external pages linking to them got ranked higher. A great idea, but with a big flaw: some pages will show up as results to keywords that don't even exist on the page! Let me explain: if alot of pages link to good-delicious with (the worst blog in the world link), then eventually searching google for "the worst blog in the world" will bring good-delicious up as first result!
Google bombing capitalises on just this by getting page masters (and now bloggers!) to link to something using specific keywords. The motive? humour, or most likely political. Why do I mention all this, then. Well, try googling "Miserable Failure" and see what you come up with!
Anyone remember ages ago searching for "Weapons of Mass Destruction" in google and ending up on that spoof IE error page? well that was also a google bomb intended as a joke!
Make sure you check out Miserable Failure, and go here for a great Wiki article about the Google Bomb

Doukutsu

The best 1.5mbyte download you'll do in your life.
Created by a very talented (and generous) Japanese coder called Pixel, Doukutsu (or Cave Story) places you in the role of an amnesiac soldier that's trying to figure out what's going on. A great platform game which shamelessly borrows from all the golden "classics" like metroid, zelda, mario, knightmare, and all those wonderful 8bit platformers-come-action adventures. With a good plot, excellent controls, and 2D platforming and exploring at it's best, this game is a true gem that shouldn't be missed by any self-respecting gamer.
Luckily, romhack have translated it to english, so there's no excuse not to play the game!
Grab your windows version here, and your mac version here

First Encounter Assault Recon

F.E.A.R.
The new game from Monolith (and if you don't recognise them, you're on the wrong blog)
So what's the big deal? the SP demo is out and man oh man oh man!
This game is SCARY. No that's not the word, it's more than scary, it messes with your head, screws you around and leaves gagging for more.
The demo is a small (and not that easy) sample of things to come, basically an FPS that looks just as good as the new batch, but leaves them all in the dust when it comes to sheer psycho thrills. Graphically it looks more half life 2 than doom 3 (which, quite controversially, i like alot more than half life 2, cos it's just pretty damn amazing), with pretty neat bullet-time (slow-mo) effects. But that's not why you'll play it. You'll play it just to prove to yourself that you ARE a man, and that games WON'T scare you, cos they're just games.... or so I thought.
Now, everyone hold hands and get your arses over to gamershell and download the 650mbyte demo. Out in October - I'm scared already...
SoB = Scared of Bad little girls in games

I'm back and I'm on the rag and ovulating

Broadband is here! it's been here since yesterday (although officially the turn-on date was today), but was too busy yesterday to blog...
Few things: some of you might've gotten this by email but I got my ticket for JEAN-MICHEL JARRE live in Gdansk Poland 26/08/05 and I JUST CAN'T WAIT! One of those things that I've always wanted to do in my life, is watch Jarre live. This is my chance and I sure as hell am looking forward to it. Time is just too slow these days...

Listen to Tenacious D's self titled album. Jack Black and some other guy (Kyle I think) have made one of the funniest rock albums I've heard in ages. With songs like "fuck her gently" and "cock pushups" you can tell you're in for a treat. And the single Tribute is a great song in itself.

I'm lounging around quite lazily these days, doing nothing much other than going to the gym and playing games (well at last, I'm catching up on alot of games I've missed out on)... currently finishing of Metroid Prime 2 - Echoes and still playing Guild Wars online. And I've finished Resident Evil 4 - Drool. On that note we've got a ps2 here as well now, but it's not modded yet, once I've sorted that out I'll play R-TYPE FINAL!

I'm sure there were alot more things I could talk about, I've just forgotten..... I go off now and if I remember I'll blog again. Salam