The Kriptonomicon
| www.flickr.com |
Links
These are a few of my favourite links.
Flavours
There's more than one way to view this weblog; try these flavours on
for size.
The Kriptonomicon, Dont read everything you believe
John's contact details:
blog@kript.net
Subscribe
Subscribe(RSS) to a syndicated feed of my weblog,
brought to you by the wonders of RSS.
or by
Atom..
Wed, 31 Dec 2008
Best of 208 - Books
Ok,so it has to be
'War and Peace',
,
but otherwise runners up would be;
The Yiddish Policemen's Union
The Graveyard Book
The Name of The Wind
Little Brother.
How about you?
Posted at: [] permanent link
Best of 2008 - Music
Normally I agonize over this, but this year its pretty easy;
Portico Quartet - "Knee Deep in the North Sea".
The album was launched at the beginning of the year, and they were nominated for a Mercury prize for it. Saw them twice, and looking forward to their new album in 2009!
Marseille Figs - "The Dirty Cannon" - great dirty bluegrass album, very original stuff
Gun'n'Roses - "Chinese Democracy" - only listened to this once so far, but far more complex musically then their previous albums.
Note that I don't include classical music in this - thats a separate post!
Posted at: [] permanent link
Sat, 20 Dec 2008
Bluetooth on Fedora Core 10
f you're having trouble with Bluetooth support on FC10 - the gnome applet not listing the adaptor, not promping for a pairing PIN etc, then search fedoraforum.org for similar issues - I wasted about three hours trying to get my BB Bold to act as a 3G modem with a FC10 laptop (working fine under FC9), until I found a post stating that it was a buggy bluez package, and enabled the testing repository and pulled down the latest package - fixed all the issues.
On the bright side, FC10 fixes the problem with OpenVPN where it couldn't set a default route on ppp connections, which made 3G dongles and BB modems no use for remote use for work. Might be a Fedora only problem, though - didn't try on Ubuntu..
Posted at: [/work] permanent link
Territory
By Emma Bull
Oh, this was just wonderfull. Bull writes the book like a perfect novelisation of Deadlands, but with wit and characters beyond your average RPG.
I enjoyed this so much I ended up browsing wikipedia's articles on Tombstone and Wyatt Earp just to see how much was real and how much she'd made up!
I wasn't sure what to expect, and was wondering if I should have paid the hardback price, when I did a book run from The Book Depository last month, but like everything else I've read of hers, it takes a genre and twists it imaginatively, in a similar, but different, way to Gaiman. A pleasure to read, and I just wish she'd written more books. I'll have to hunt out her back catalog also, which appears to be criminalls hard to get hold of. Well, post Xmas, I know what books I'll be adding to my shopping cart!
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Fri, 19 Dec 2008
Hammered
By Elizabeth Bear
I've started the process of reading the entire Bear back catalog, and Hammered was the first I could find. I didn' realise until later that its the first in a trilogy, and this only became apparent as the book went on, and there was too much plot left to resolve!
Its recognisably her style, and good cyberpunk, but lacks some of the subtelty and craft that marks her later works. Its still about redemption, though, a theme that runs through all of Bear's works I read.
I wouldn't have read more based on this book, but I will read the rest of the series and keep reading her back catalog, but I might interleave this with the later works she's releasing.
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Sun, 07 Dec 2008
Amazon.co.uk mp3 store
So my first experience with this wasn't positive, as my card company decided that buying books from Amazon was OK, but MP3's was just madness, and therefore must be fraud, and locked my card. Bless them. Unfortunately, Amazon's systems took a dim view of this and cancelled the order, including the entire basket..
So I had to go through whole process again a day later, adding all the songs again. You'd have thought that in this circumstance they'd have moved the items to the 'saved for later' section of the basket - they have a section for this after all!
Anyway, downloaded using the 'Amazon MP3 Downloader', which made the process of downloading addding to iTunes pleasantly seamless, and I'm now listening to a KT Tunstall EP on my rather good entry level 'Ultimate Ears' iPhone headphones via the iBook. MP3's are 320Kbps with album art, all in all a well done implementation. The downloader creates its own folder in the ~/Music folder. I'd been looking at 7digital.co.uk but I suspect they have serious competition now. The only question will be catalog. I've already found some stuff on Amazon that isn't on iTunes (KT Tunstall EP's and a Sophie Solomon track I was unaware of previously). Being that the labels seriously want to move out of Mr Jobs influence, I expect this will increase..
Posted at: [/music] permanent link
Sat, 06 Dec 2008
Fedora Core 10
So, I run FC 9 on my HP 2510p at work, and a week after FC10 came out I thought I'd try upgrading. I used the preinstall method, and then the DVD install, but neither worked. The first method complained about a partiton (one it had created in memory!) being too small, and the latter about not being able to mount the /home partition. To be fair, I had encrypted the entire disk of the HP, to try out the functionality, and the interaction between the installer and that probably caused it..
The encryption worked well, BTW, from a protect all the laptop content angle, but as I was aiming at protecting the content should the US's DHS require me to turn it on, and copy it, this would have been of little use, since you have to input the password at boot.
Anyway, I'm borrowing a Lenovo Thinkpad X200, and installing from scratch. So far, everything is detected out of the box, with the only exception, from the limited time I had to test, was the built in EVDO modem (but I might need to activate this on Vodafone via Windows, not looked into it as I don't intend to use it), and the webcam, which Cheese hung on trying to get the picture, although the light showing the camera was on did light up.
I'll do a follow-up post with the packages I add after installation, for interest..
Posted at: [/work] permanent link
Portico Quartett, Redux
A and I went to see them live last weekend. Last time they had been part of another programme, but this time it was just them. In addition to some of the tracks from their current Album,'Knee Deep in the North Sea', they also played some new tracks. The great thing was,as this is jazz, even the tracks we knew were fresh, with different improvisations. They also revealed that they have a new album coming out around March (I think), so looking forward to that!
Posted at: [/live] permanent link
Sun, 23 Nov 2008
Acer Aspire One
I have a new toy. I've been lusting after one of the so called 'netbooks' for a while, but as I couldn't justify it, I've been holding off, knowing that the price will drop of the older models and drawing up a selection criteria.
When the supermarkets started stocking them I knew I'd be able to get a good deal, and this thursday, as we did our weekly shop at ASDA, they were selling the Acer Aspire One for £215. This was the one I had my eye on too, with a 120GB hard disk. The only thing it doesn't have is bluetooth, and I only use that for Blackberry connectivity these days, and have a usb adaptor or two hanging around. Plus there's this cute almost-flush usb adaptor doing the rounds for £15 or so, so why pay more for a Lenovo or Asus 'top of the line' netbook for just that?
I never thought I would, but I succumbed to walking around ASDA, shopping, with my iPhone checking out the
excellent Ubuntu documentation (yes, I'm switching from Debian to Ubuntu. Don't hate me. I'll still run vanilla Deb on a server..) to make sure I could get it working, before purchasing it. At least it wasn't the Blackberry. Of course, a busy week at work means I didn't get to play with it properly until the weekend.
The Linux it comes with is OK, but I can see how people might be underwhelmed. Rather than learn another *nix variant, I used the USBstick method of live booting Ubuntu 8.10 to install it. A hint for those trying - the Ubuntu 8.10 program appears to be slightly b0rked - it created the image on the 4GB Kingston Data Traveller stick I had, but it wouldn't boot, with a 'invalid boot partition' image. This is apparently a reported bug on Launchpad, and the workaround is to use a different tool - the distro agnostic
unetbootin. Interestingly, everyone reporting it had a Kingston 4GB stick..
Ubuntu then installed fine, no wireless. As the docs said, I did a full update and installed the backports Atheros driver. No joy. Much rebooting and checking of /var/log/messages and dmesg and swearing. Then I tried turning it on with the soft switch. Success! Ahem.. Rebooted after some other changes and... no wireless. More swearing, more pressing switches. Eventually discovered via Ubuntu forums that problems with the WPA authentication being fixed by shutting down and leaving it for a few mins prompted me to try that, and success! No idea what that's about, but so far (touch wood) its worked fine. Oh, and the 120GB hard disk? 160GB in mine. Splendid!
I'm documenting what I install for a followup 'what to add after installing Ubuntu' meme thats doing the rounds on the Ubuntu Planet blog aggregator.
I've used the word Ubuntu a lot, but this experience, and that of my MacBook has really shown me how far the distro is ahead of the others in terms of documentation and thinking about what people want to do with it. Very impressed so far.
Of course, Fedora Core 10 ('Cambridge' heh.) is out on Tuesday, so I'll be trialling that at work. It may win me over, you never now.
It looks like I'm not the only one buying one of these. And blogging about it..
Posted at: [/gadgets] permanent link
Twittering.
People seem to, and I don't seem to get to my blog as much as I'd like (unlike this weekend, perhaps). Do you? Should I?
Posted at: [/blogstuff] permanent link
Survivors
on BBC tonight. Didn't suck. Colour me surprised!
Posted at: [/tv] permanent link
Patterson Joseph for Doctor Who!
I thus declare my allegiance. He would be great, in my opinion.
BBC news article, if you don't know what I'm talking about
Posted at: [/tv] permanent link
Sat, 22 Nov 2008
Blackberry Bold
This was finally released by T-Mobile, so of course I got one to 'evaluate' for work. The first (working) 3G Blackberry from RIM definitely bears investigation..
Actually, I'm quite impressed. The 3G modem works easily under Linux using WVDial (you can figure it out, but a good set of instructions are
here.
I'm also impressed how open it is - the internet memory and the microSD card show up as drives under Linux, and both Ubuntu 8.10 and Fedora Core 9 appear to charge the device just fine from the USB port. With the
latest (1.4) version of Banshee
the drives show up as mass storage devices so you can copy music files to and fro (no support for Ogg that I'm aware). Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to support playlist sync, but I might look into
syncropated to provide playlist sync. If it supported smart playlist sync and remembering the position of files so marked, I'd be able to switch away from my iPhone. Alas, it doesn't seem to, but I might look to see if there are music players for the BB that do..
Almost forgot - its apparently possible to set-up two way syncing using Multisync with Evolution, so I could sync diary and address book, if I wanted.
Battery life is pretty good. I use
BlueProximity
at work to lock and unlock my screen when I walk away and back to my laptop, and the downside is that I haven't hit the sweet spot between pinging the bluetooth often enough to be responsive and draining the battery, so its hard on the phone. My old BB Pearl lasted just over a day, but it looks like the Bold will last two easy.
The downsides? Well, the web browsing experience is pretty crummy still - I installed Opera but that didn't help much, its still nowhere as nice as the iPhone.
I guess my next best hope is the T-Mobile Android G1. I can't get it via work, as its not on the business tariff, and it has enough issues (3.5 headphone adaptor? Hello?) that I don't intend getting one for me just yet, but its very promising. Interestingly, the Banshee 1.4 release brings native G1 support - smart playlists, everything. It is very tempting..
Perhaps I'll wait for some other phones to come out with the Android OS on (or an iPhone port! :-).
Posted at: [/gadgets] permanent link
Portico Quartet
Are coming back to the Junction on the 30th. We've booked tickets, anyone fancy joining us?
Posted at: [/live] permanent link
OMG WTF?
There's no pine or mutt in the Ubuntu repositories!!
Posted at: [] permanent link
The Graveyard Book
By Neil Gaiman
This being his latest young adult book, featuring Nobody 'Bod' Owens, and growing up in a graveyard, after his parents were murdered by a serial killer, this is in no way a morbid book!
Capsule Review: Wow.
Probably his best book to date - wonderfully written, incorporating all kinds of legends and fantasies and real world facts that combine beautifully. I bought it in hardback as part of a recent book splurge (I was getting low, OK?), and I'm very glad I did. Looking forward to rereading it!
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Thu, 13 Nov 2008
Arabesk
By Jon Courtenay Grimwood
A three volume book made up of Pashazade, Effendi and Felaheen.
Madhatter loaned me this. Combining the three books into one makes for a joined up narrative, but I suspect I'd have enjoyed it more if I had read it as three separate books. Nothing to stop me doing that, but once I've started...
The books were very evocative of the Arab world I've holidayed in - Grimwood has done a good job of bringing the culture and experience to life, as far as I can tell, anyway. This would be a great series to read while in Tunisia, or Marrakech, or even one of the Gulf states. The story weaves near future sci-fi believably, with genetic technology being an underlying theme, as well, as the use and abuse of power and how people adapt to the future. The protagonist is a little *too* competent for me - genetically engineered or not, he was just a little too capable. Grimwood did a good job of making him believably, but there were still points in the book where the only reason he failed was to further the narrative. He did a good job of weaving most of the threads together, however.
I think I've figured out the ending, but I'm not sure!
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Thu, 06 Nov 2008
Ubuntu on my Macbook
So a few weeks previous, running low on space on the 120GB drive I'd got with my core 2 duo black macbook, I bought a larger hard disk for it (first from Dabs, which was a mistake, because apparently there are two types of 2.5" disk, one larger than the other.
and the Macbook takes the smaller, naturally. I then went to macupgrades.co.uk, and got a 320GB drive for not much more, which fitted perfectly.
Restore was easy with
Superduper!. A week or so later, I was reading about the Ubuntu 8.10 release, and came across the
Ubuntu Community page for installing on Macbooks.
It showed that using BootCamp, I could partition my drive without losing data, and install Ubuntu. So I did. The page also covered the setup for the hardware, which, apart from the iSight, worked out of the box. I even got multi touch button clicking working, which is needed on the Macbooks, and damn cool!
I can't honestly say what I did to get the iSight working, but the instructions were most of it. I think the issue is that you need to power cycle, not just reboot, after copying over the firmware, otherwise it doesn't detect the camera properly. Took me til 2am sat night to discover that, though.. The things I'll do to get
Cheese
working..
I'm impressed with the hardware detection - the Ubuntu article is pretty comprehensive, but I could have used 90% of the kit out of the box.
I liked the fact that it mounted the HFS+ partition (albeit read-only) so I could copy files over.
In fact, with the aid of the
iTunes and Rhythmbox Ratings script and site, I was able to import all the items in my iTunes library into RhythmBox, and then import all the ratings. As I've spent hours rating most of my library, and have playlists that select on ratings, last played etc, all of which I can replicate in RhythmBox, being able to import all of this was very helpful and rather cool. A tip for anyone else trying this, as mentioned in the comments on the site, you need to make sure that the songs have a rating first before running the script, or it can't adjust the ratings correctly. I simply marked all my songs as 1 star, then reran the script.
Power saving works flawlessly, not something I've had good experiences with on Linux.
On the downside, I've noticed the laptop runs hotter, although I suspect I can adjust the fan speeds until I get the coolness I'm used to. Also, Network Manager, while being fine and all that, does still lose its mind from time to time and not connect the wireless networks I use.
I'm very tempted to move over. I've ported my RSS feeds from NetNewsWire to Google Reader, and bought an app for the iPhone that syncs with it. Google reader, using Gears, can be used offline, so I've not lost any functionality, and have found it faster than NNW, although not quite as much of a pleasure to use.
The iPhone. Therein lies the sticking point. I can reformat my iPod to FAT32 and use it with RhythmBox - I can even install RocketBox and play Ogg files, but the iPhone itself I may not be abe to manage or sync. I've jailbroken it, and I know people have got it working, but its flaky.
Will I keep booting into MacosX to sync the iPhone, or will I change it to another device? I'm not sure. Podcast syncing and tethering are 'just around the corner' for the iPhone, which would greatly reduce the need to sync it, as that's what I listen to the most. Also, what alternatives are there? The N95/6 is a great phone, Symbian etc, but reportedly hard to get to work with Linux. I had high hopes for the Android phone, but I don't like the hardware - at least I can change the headphones on the iPhone!
Posted at: [/gadgets] permanent link
Sun, 19 Oct 2008
The Doubtful Guest
I've a picture of the stage before they started (and before I saw the sign saying photography forbidden, oh well) up on flikr - check the sidebar.
A. saw this and bought tickets for us. Its an adaption of the Edward Gorey book of the same name. As surreal and weird as the original book, this was some of the best theatre I've seen, and pretty much defies description. I think the show has ended now, but if it hasn't, head along to the Cambridge Arts Theatre and see it. You may even get a Q&A with the cast, as we did.
Posted at: [/live] permanent link
Some nifty command line stuff
So after reading in the Halloween countdown pages at the
Redecorating Middle-Earth in Early Lovecraft blog that Mary Shelley's book 'The Last Man' was available as a free audiobook, I thought I'd download it and listen to it as a series of podcasts (thanks to
podcastamatic)
but when I got to the page, the low quality mp3's were mixed in with the high quality ones. I've addressed the multiple mp3 download issue
before, but this time I thought I could come up with something that got what I wanted. One last night command line sesson, and lo;
for i in `~/perl/mp3grep.pl thelastman.html | grep -v _64k` ; do filename=`echo $i | cut -d '/' -f 6 `;curl -C - -L -o $filename $i; done
A neat script that downloads the files, and renames them to something sensible. I'm sure you could replace the initial curl of the 'thelastman.html' file with another shell script to extract the info, but that I'll leave as an exercise.The things you'll do when you realise MacOSX only has curl, not wget (indeed, I understand why now, curl being much more powerful), and you determine to proceed anyway..
Posted at: [/code] permanent link
Fri, 10 Oct 2008
Japanese Banking Crisis
We have learned from reliable sources that the Japanese banking crisis
shows no signs of improvement. If anything, it is worsening.
Following last week's announcement that Origami Bank had folded, we have
received more breaking news ... According to our sources, Sumo Bank has
gone belly up and Bonsai Bank is preparing to cut back some of its
branches.
Karaoke Bank is up for sale and is going for a song! Furthermore, shares
in Kamikaze Bank have taken a nose-dive and 500 back-office staff at
Karate Bank got the chop.
Analysts report there is something fishy going on at Sushi Bank and
staff there fear they may be in for a raw deal.
Stay tuned ...
Sorry, sorry, email circular and I couldn't resist..
Posted at: [] permanent link
Sat, 04 Oct 2008
Chariots Of Fire 2008
I trained for months for this, up to three times a week, and managed in a very respectable 11:24. Similar to previous times, I found after I checked this blog, which was disappointing, but much better than the times I was getting running the test route near work (12:45 often). Our team came 87th, maintaining similar position we had last year - not bad considering over 450 teams! Of course, one of my (younger!) students ran it in 10:something..
As I ran with my new GPS, I have Tracklogs of
test run
and the
the race itself
or if you have google earth, you can use these for
test run
and
race itself
Posted at: [] permanent link
Cambs County Council and the Geospatial web!
I'm looking for new halls for my Tai Chi (and hopefully Kickboxing!) classes, due to issues with my previous one, which is turning out to be fairly tricky to find. On a whim, I phoned the council, and asked the receptionist if they had a list of halls for hire, expecting to get passed onto another department. "Oh, yes" she said, "would you like me to email you the link?". Sure enough, a few mins later, I was looking at
this. Browsing it, I realised what I wanted was it overlaid onto a map, so I could see where would be appropriate. Looking at the source, it was in nested HTML tables, and inconsistent formats, so I gave up the idea of writing a web scraper, and mailed the site admins on a handy link, asking if they had the info in a CSV that I could use in a google maps overlay.
A day later the reply came back; "Oh, we've
done it! put "Halls for Hire" in the Search For box (including the double quote marks)
and put the village/town you are thinking of moving to in the Location box
leave the Show Results on a Map box ticked
then click on the Search Cambs.net button.
Live Earth rather than Google maps, and in a tiny window, but otherwise superb - great job Cambridge County Council, and completely unexpectedly competent and on the button!
Posted at: [/martialarts] permanent link
Just upgraded my Macbook's hard disk
Remarkably painless. The most difficult part was ordering the right hard drive (not all 2.5" drives are the same size, apparently. Yes, I know.). So poor marks to Dabs, which took a week to ship my order ("usually ships in 24 hours!"), and only decided to when I complained, and full marks to
macupgrades.co.uk, which, for 30 more than I was going to pay at dabs for a smaller disk, sold me the right sized disk - and one thats 320GB!
You'll need a Phillips #0 Screwdriver and a Torx T8 Screwdriver - which was the hardest for me, I ended up using one at work, so must buy some v. small torx.
Using SuperDuper! I made a bootable clone of my current 120GB disk (which as its part of my normal backup routine, took 15 mins to update the image), swapped out the drive in its caddy, booted into disk utility from an OSX install CD, formatted the disk, and selected restore from the USB disk. Took about 3 hours, all told. Now I can start creating and using the assorted Virtual machines I need!
Now to buy a USB caddy for the old disk, and partition the huge USB dsk into Time Machine and 320GB clone for my new disk!
Posted at: [/gadgets] permanent link
Sun, 21 Sep 2008
How To Make The Perfect Cup Of Coffee
I was pointed to
this podcast
by Cory Doctorow on BoingBoing. Its very well presented, and very engaging - recommended for anyone who likes thier coffee. Maybe I'll get the expresso machine down from the loft, and buy that French Press after all! I already ground my own beans, but Dr Mark Miodownik's talk shows me how much more I could do to make the perfect cup of coffee.
Update Resonance FM have a hard to navigate site, but I did find
this intro to the podcast;
What elements are involved in the making of a simple beverage. The Director of the Materials Library and Head of the Materials Research Group at King’s College London provides an audibly practical demonstration of the answer.
Visit http://www.materialslibrary.org.uk
Posted at: [/cooking] permanent link
Mon, 08 Sep 2008
The Kings Gold
By Arturo Perez-Reverte
The latest in the Captain Alatriste series. This one started slow, and I found my attention wandering. I persevered, and it really cranks up the pace in the last third. While I enjoyed it, I got the feeling he wasn't really making an effort. Inigo, on the other hand, continues to develop, while Alatriste become slight more cardboard, or a caricature of himself.
Talking to a spanish salesman at work, I was gratified to find that dropping the authors name got me some respect and a decent car conversation as I dropped him off at his hotel.
Books, what can't they do..
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Sun, 24 Aug 2008
The Edge Of Reason
By Melinda Snodgrass
Bought in hardback, amoung much fanfare by the likes of Walter Jon Williams and Tor books, in time to go on holiday, I read this on the last day and on the plane back. Frankly, a bit nonplussed. Many people have said that this will poke the atheist and diest alike. Well, maybe, if they're easily offended and stupid. The plot is basic, and the characters only just two dimensional. The ideas floated in the book are simply nonsense, and wouldn't offend any person of faith with more than two brain cells, IMHO.
A moderm world with magic book, it has has the cental concept that Magic is the tool of the Old ones, and reason, the tool of those fighting them. All well and good so far, interesting start with the police officer and the sorceress, but fails to carry it off. Every time I read something like this, it reminds me how well Jim Butcher does the same genre.
Snodgrass (you'd change your name, surely? I mean..) is part of the same writing circle as Williams, which I fear, has something to explain moth books medoicre impact on me.
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
The Yiddish Policemen's Union
By Michael Chabon
Now this is Literature, with a capital L! By far the best book I read on holiday, the use of language is just wonderful - up there with Tolstoy, Susanna Clarke and Gibson in the ranks of authors who use language so cleverly it delights, amazes and amuses. The book is in turns witty, poignant, insightful and suspenseful - I didn't see several of the plot twists coming.
Thw world that Chabon has created is believable and enthralling, as are his characters - not one rings anything but true, and one of them especially, Zimbalist, the boundary maven, is something that Gibson could have created - a character, and role, so believable and yet fantastic that it could only exist in fiction. As Gibson said, 'the street finds its own uses for things'. Although, I have a suspicion that the role may actually exist - I may have to ask my Jewish friends..
Simply fantastic. I'm looking forward to reading more of his work. If not for Tolstoy, by Book Of The Year so far.
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Sat, 23 Aug 2008
Implied Spaces
By Walter Jon Williams
Billed by the author, as a follow on, in spirit to 'Voice Of The Whirlwind', I was hugely looking forward to this. It didn't live up to my expectations, but I think thats as much my expectations as the author's writing. I was expecting a martial arts book, and yes, it features one, but, in no way is this reflected in the plot or affects the actions of the protagonist.
Williams has loads of good ideas - wormhole worlds created as live action rpg's, as fuel sources, as places to put spare populations, massive benign AI's, one of which accompanies the protagonist in avatar form as a cat, a wormhole sword, biomimetic plagues, and so on, it all goes rather space opera towards the end, and blows what little suspension of belief I had..
The author is part of a writing circle, and while the work has no glaring complaints, its not standing out in anyway. Williams fails to being to life the main protagonist, who is damn near immortal, has some funky superpowers, and responsible in part, for the creation of the world as they know it. Frankly, Williams did elements of this better in his 'Aristoi', and Zelany did MUCH better in 'Lord Of Light'.
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
New Amsterdam
By Elizabeth Bear
The second of the lady's works I've read, not counting her short stories, and another worthy title. More polished than 'Dust', I was initiall distracted by the format, finding it a little disjointed, as its a series of stories. Its only when A read it and remarked how authentic it was to the style of the period - think the novellettes of Conan Doyle, that I realised how well it had been put together.
A lot more to be bought by Eizabeth Bear, I think.
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Google Maps Hacks
By Rich Gibson & Schuyler Erle
I actually bought this by mistake, hurredly, before the start of our holiday, thinking it was 'Mapping Hacks', intending to get more to grips with the Garmin eTrex I'd been bought. It was an interesting set of read anyway, although my lack of knowledge of Javascript means I'll get less use our of it than I might otherwise.. I'll be revisiting bits, hopefully soon to integrate the photot's I took with the GPS track I was recording at the same time. You never know, I may have a location based travelogue up at some point!
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
The Last Days of Old Beijing
By Michael Meyer
I bought this because, for some reason, it came up n the new books list on
the book depository, and I remembered his name from the TV tour of China that Paul Merton did..
The book is a documentation of the author's time spent living in the old neighborhoods of Beijing, before they were razed for the Olympics. Its part travel guide, part urban and rural planning, part cultural treatise, part history, part exposition on modern living.
Meyer definitely has an agenda, but you can't fault him - he's lived in the area for years, in the communities, speaking and living the culture. A very interesting read. I bought it as an 'intelligent' even worthy, book to read on holiday, but it never felt like I was slogging through, and it never seemed repetitive - there's always the danger that the description of the third hutong will be the same as the second, but Meyer does a good job avoiding this, and discussion how the communities provide social communities, and showing the benefits without shying away from the detractions. Thought provoking stuff.
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Sun, 03 Aug 2008
The Blade Itself
By Joe Abercrombie
Another recommendation from Whatever's 'Big Idea', this is non-heroic fantasy, quite the antidote to the optimistic highjinks of 'The Name Of The Wind'. Its a nasty, cynical book full of anti-heroes. The main characters are a vain dandy, a psychopath and a torturer. Well written - its 515 pages, but cracks along. I found myself really getting under the skin of the protagonists, and just when you are getting used to how shallow, or amoral they are, the author develops them, and changes your view slightly.
Obviously part of a series, I'm looking forward to the sequels. Some great understated magic, and some potentially fine villains - a ruthless power mad norse style king, a mad wizard who is teaching his followers to eat human flesh to gain magical power, and others. Is the First Of The Magi as benevolent as he appears? Who is The Maker, and why did the Magi have to destroy him?
The second book, "Before They are Hanged : Book Two of the First Law" is already out in paperback, and the third is coming out soon. I'll have to interleave them with other books, because the cynicism and bloodshed can be a little wearing, but some good reading set for the future, I feel!
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
My Name Is Legend - the film
A and I saw this last night on DVD. Its a better retelling than 'The Omega Man', but hollywood couldn't leave it alone - semi happy ending, and what's with all this 'god told me' rubbish? Quite offensive to the spirit of the book, I felt, which was all rationalism. Some good acting by Will Smith, though. Some plot holes you could drive a bus through, but no more so than in the original novel.
Posted at: [] permanent link
The Winters Tale
Another live outdoor shakespeare performance. This time, it rather broke the mold as the weather was lovely. As it was in Kings, it was fairly well attended - perhaps 50 people all told? Still not a great audience for the price and experience but more respectable than others we've seen.
The performance was OK - nothing outstanding, but for me it had a lot of nostalgia value, as I studied 'The Winters Tale' at A Level, the closest I've come to proper lit. crit. analysis. There were a few masterfully understated moments, though - at the end, when the faithful widow who has kep the king on the straight and narrow until his wife can be returned to him, is rewarded by the hand in marriage of the faithful assistant, the played this as kind of 'er. great. Thanks, King. I think. Who are you again?' rather than the 'all's well that ends well, with all injuries redressed, as is normal in the comedies.
Posted at: [/live] permanent link
Sat, 26 Jul 2008
Richard III
The Yates, A and I went to see this in Downing College Gardens last week. I'll have photo's of the grounds to upload when I pay my Flikr subscription.. A superb performance as always, with the usually irremediably evil Richard played with sardonic humour and evil leers to the audience beautifully by (goodness, I don't remember his name, and none of the actors appear on the website - how odd!). Still irremediably evil, of course, but... Having seen this many, many years ago at the Arts Theatre, I was expecting a worthy play, not an enjoyable one but I was forgetting that;
A) Shakespeare's quite good actually..
B) The Shakespeare festival always manage to delight
So I really enjoyed it. Not sure I'd go and see it twice in one year, as we did (slightly by mistake) with Macbeth (the scottish play? ;-) last year..
oh, and for Madhatter and anyone else interested, I looked up the play when we got home, and the famous line (no, the other one, about the nail), is just a line, and the entire verse about the kingdom being lost wasn't in the play. Damned where I heard it though...
Anyway, if you haven't been to any, please go and support them. We're turning up without booking tickets these days, with no problem - this performance had more audience than actors, but not by even 100%, which given the performance standard, is a crying shame.
Posted at: [/live] permanent link
The Name of The Wind
by Patrick Rotherfus
Hmm. This is the third time I've tried to write this before the Mac has wiped it in creative ways - seems like it doesn't want this review written. Well, the truth must be told!
The Truth is that this is one of the best fantasy books I've read in a long while. Patrick has a plot, characters, and a believable world. The magic system is constructed along sympathetic magic and scientific lines, and the only niggle I'd have is that the hero, Kvothe, is just TOO damn good at everything, and that for a kid, he's pretty bloody precocious and worldly wise. The author works this into the plot, and does a good job, but it does stretch credibility at times. The way he most does this is by reminding the reader that he, Kvothe, knows nothing about women, but let me tell you, I was never that smooth at 15. Hormonal, yes, smooth, not so much.
Another slight niggle is that with the scientific understanding they seem to have, along with the interworking of magic, would imply to me that they'd have a greater technological basis than they do. There may be reasons for this revealed later, and its not enough of a niggle to interrupt the verisimilitude.
Patrick has some genuine laugh out loud conversations in the book, and generally writes dialogue well. Its a big book, and at times I felt it could have been trimmed, but never enough that I felt it suffered overmuch from it.
I'll definitely be buying the next volume when it comes out - had it been possible, I'd have bought it right now, but it looks like I have to wait a few months.
If memory serves, I found this in Waterstones, on one of those pleasurable browsing sessions that turn up a load of books you'd like to read - increasingly rare in the mainstream bookshops, I'm finding.
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Digital Music from Play.com
I bought Bellowhead's first album from Play.com following the their toe tapping performance on the folk Proms last Sunday (I'm not jealous that several of them can play the Violin while jumping up and down in time, no not at all..), and it was a thoroughly pleasant experience. Cheaper than iTunes, and in 320kps mp3, my only complaint would be that album art wasn't included, not was a digital booklet of the album slip cover, and that the track number wasn't encoded into each file, so I had to add it manually. iTunes added the cover art fine, as will Banshee on my Linux box, I expect, so no worries there. I'll be using them more!
Posted at: [/music] permanent link
Thu, 24 Jul 2008
Ode To Joy
Ode Indeed...
Posted at: [/music] permanent link
Sat, 19 Jul 2008
Defender of The Favicon
Is your blog's Favicon a little boring? Why not
have it run a game instead
Amazing what can be done in such a small space..
Posted at: [] permanent link
Unbreakable Fighting Umbrella - for the very British Mrtial Artist..
Saw this on
BoingBoing, redirected to Wired.
Can't find a place to buy it, and am not sure I'd want to spend ~£100 on a umbrella, but I do so want one.. How can anyone resist the chosen weapon of the Philipino Secret Service!
Wait, no, you can buy it at this
rather scary shop..
Still, £100..
Posted at: [/gadgets] permanent link
Mon, 14 Jul 2008
Neal Stephenson talk, redux.
Apparently it was video'd;
Posted at: [/live] permanent link
Sun, 13 Jul 2008
Dust
By Elizabeth Bear
A. bought this, via an amazon wishlist she'd had success with in the past, unaware that I'd been considering picking up some of her work after reading
Shadow Unit, the collaborative (and excellent x-files like short fiction, nto to mention the two wonderful short stories by her read out on Escape Pod and (I think) Starship Sofa. "And the deep blue sea" is one of my all-time favorite short fiction podcasts..
Dust is a hard science fiction novel, in that it takes binary stars, colony ships, nanotechnology, genetic (and social) engineering, and extrapolates a 'what if'. I'm not usually a fan of such fiction - the last one I read (Blindsight by Peter Watts), was technically good but had no soul or decent characterisation. Dust doesn't have this problem - its definately character driven, with mostly-believable protagonists. Some of the sexual politics in the book were just odd - Bear doesn't seem to have made up her mind how she wants to portray certain characters - or perhaps thats her way of conveying the confusion within them. I liked the way that the background and such of the world were not laid out, but enough hinted that you could work some out, and wonder about others. It carries, like all of her work, an underlying theme of redemption (English Lit essay; all of Bear's work address redemption in some form or other, discuss.). Overall, it wasn't as engrossing as some of her other work - A thinks its an earlier work, and later work (Like "New Amsterdam", which I'm keen on getting) would be more polished. Well, it was published first in 2007, so maybe - she certainly seems a more prolific author than I thought.
I'll be purchasing more of her work, for certain.
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Mon, 07 Jul 2008
The Website is down
Warning, requires flash.
I'd like to think this doesn't conjure up a sense of familarity, but...
the website is down
Posted at: [/work] permanent link
Sat, 05 Jul 2008
I Am Legend
by Richard Matheson
The book that inspired both 'The Omega Man' and the film of the same name, but don't hold that against it. Matheson is allegedly an early influence on Stephen King and it shows. The book is a gripping post apocalyptic tale about...well, I'll leave you to read it and find out. I've not seen the Will Smith film, but I can assure you the book's nothing like the Charlton Heston flick.
The book shows its sixties roots, but not in a bad way. A combination of Horror and Sci-Fi, its good plot, characterisation and a cracking pace. I read it in one day. I'll have to check out more work by him. But I might leave it a bit. I might also leave the light on. Is that movement outside..?
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Riddle Of The Seven Realms
By Lyndon Hardy
I finally found a copy of the last of Hardy's books in the Amnesty International bookshop on mill road. I probably could have bought it via the internet before hand, if I'd tried, but had never really thought to look.
Hardy's style is applying psuedo-scientific principles and method to fantasy magic. His characters are never particular developed, and the plot revolves around the macguffin, but they're intriguing takes on the fantasy magic angle.
Not the best of his works - the 'Master Of The Five Magics' is by the far his best book, as the style is new to the reader, and there is a semblance of charcterisation.
I enjoyed it somewhat anyway, good nostalgia for the fantasy & sci-fi of my youth, when all the books I read came from second hand stores!
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Tue, 01 Jul 2008
Dr Horrible's Sing-along blog
What hath the Writers Strike of America wraught?
this
Teaser from Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog on Vimeo.
Posted at: [/tv] permanent link
An Utterly Impartial History of Britain
By John O'Farrel
I borrowed this from A - I'm not much of a history buff, but the Temeraire books and 'In Our Time' program have whetted my interest somewhat, so I thought he'd be an entertaining narrator. As indeed he is! Its a thick book - 551 pages, but I read it fairly quickly and feel I've retained some. its got O'Farrel's trademark laconic wit, which makes what could be dry reading quite enjoyable. the middle ages gets a little slow going, but then, its not the dark ages for nothing, I guess..
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
The Intruders
By Michael Marshal
I bought this cheap in Asda - I thought it was the next in his horror/thriller series, but in truth its more of a blend of the more outre of the thriller, and the weirder of his speculative fantasy. I found it a little too immersed in conspiracy theory and so forth - more the ramblings of an internet nutter as a backdrop, but Marshal does take that and weave it into a story. Not sure about the ending though - he hints at it throughout the book, true, but it still feels wrong as it happens. Anyway, I'll be looking to get his next book in paperback when its out for sure.
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Sun, 15 Jun 2008
D&D 4th Ed
I gave in (failed my saving throw you might say), and bought the latest edition of Dungeons and Dragons recently. Almost all my thoughts - including why I bought the slipcase edition of all three major books from Amazon, desipte having an FLGS in relatively close proximity (St Ives - well, close to work, anyway) that could probably do with the business, are better summed up by
John Kavolik in his post on the same subject. For those interested in what 4e is like, the comments also do a good job of summing up the thinking. I'm worried by the 'video agme'-iness of it, seemingly, but then, if I'd have wanted Ars Magica, I'd have got that out wouldn't I..
Posted at: [] permanent link
Using your Blackberry as a Bluetooth modem under MACOSX
I'm running ther latest version, if that matters (10.5.3)..
I found some excelent instructions at
Posted at: [/gadgets] permanent link
Sat, 14 Jun 2008
Empire Of Ivory
By Naomi Novik
The fourth book in the Temeraire series, I thought this was one of her best yet - the plot cracks along, and there are several developments I didn't foresee. Novik handles the slave trade rather well, I thought, highlighting the effect (and the prevailing British attitudes of the time) well, without bludging you over the head with the moral message (like, say, Pratchet would do), but achieving a more thoughtful effect.
I genuinely don't know where the books will go after this one - several developments are left hanging in best cliffhanger style. Bravo, madam!
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Wed, 11 Jun 2008
Call me naive, but I'd not put two and two together, and realised you could do stuff like this..
Call me old, but he's also responsible for the sound that I liked in New Model Army's 'Impurity' album..
Ah, the internet. Is there anything from your youth you *can't* dig up?
Posted at: [/music] permanent link
Sat, 31 May 2008
Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull
A. and I saw this last weekend. I enjoyed it, but found it rather long. We both agreed that little was done with the potential of all the good actors they'd got. The recreations of 50's america etc were good, as were the special effects. The plot was a little silly, and not very well developed, but it was pulp, after all.
Was it a good follow-up? Probably not - I'll watch the Indy films again, but won't be quite so keen to do this one. Film makers, let me say this clearly - special effects are NOT THE MOVIE. That is all. Thank you.
Posted at: [] permanent link
Sun, 25 May 2008
Little Brother
By Cory Doctorow
Being firmly embedded into Doctorows promotional stream via BoingBoing and his podcasts, I'd been anticipating this for a while, and got it via
I enjoyed the book - its probably his best work (although I still say "After The Siege" is his best, at least in my memory), as it ties together his interests, activism and even has an ending that doesn't feel like an afterthought! The word on the street is that he's writing a sequel - "Big Brother", but it probably won't be released until 2010.
The books been on my mind for a bit, which shows that its got under my skin more than his other works (again "After the Siege" not withstanding). I can't decide if its a
In that vein, the book did inspire me to check out assorted things. I'm tempted, yet again, to get equipment to play with RFID tags via the excellent
As with all of Doctorow's work, its available from his website;
here.
Also, since he's made it available, the widget for buying the mp3 version of the book below.
Warning! the link to buy the book appears to be http, which if I'm right is a pretty bloody stupid slipup given the books focus on privacy! When I was thinking of buying it, I hunted around for an https link to enter card details, but couldn't find it. Just as well - its $20 - more than the hardback. I know that audiobooks cost more, but even so.. I guess I've been spoiled by all the high quality fiction podcasts I've been downloading for free (yes, legally), via Doctorow's podcast, Escape Pod, Starship Sofa, Podcastle and so on..
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Sun, 18 May 2008
The Ladybird Book of The Policeman
Ah, I remember
these
from my youth. Well, maybe not exactly like these...
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Mon, 05 May 2008
Camrider @ Cambourne
Camrider came to Camboure recently, and offered 10 min 'taster' sessions to anyone interested. Several of my friends are keen bikers, so I thought I'd give it a try (some pictures in my Flikr Feed). While I enjoyed it, it did highlight I'm not a natural biker - too risk averse! Just as well, I don't need another expensive hobby, and statistically people who start biking at my age (*cough* mid-life crisis *cough*) are more likely to die in road accidents than those who started when they were younger - the 'late' bikers tend to try and do what the other bikers do and don't have the reflexes any longer...
Posted at: [] permanent link
Besquillo Strings
This was the second half of the show that Portico Quartet fronted. Pity - they might have been OK on their own, but on comparison they really suffered. Quite a lot of what Jazz is sent up for - clashing, arythmic, disconnected performers, was all in evidence here. When they stopped being pretentious and played slightly more melodic pieces, they were very nice, and after the first 30 mins my ear got slightly more attuned, so they sounded better, but I wouldn't be going to see them again. A shame, especially as they're 'my people' when it comes to instruments - three Violins, two Double Base, and a percussionist (who looked like he was bored out of his mind).
Posted at: [/live] permanent link
Portico Quartet
I bought their debut album after reading a review in the BBC Classics magazine (bought along with Gramophone) for my Jan trip to Seattle to see if Id be interesting in subscribing. I wasn't, although I'd probably choose the BBC one - just more proof of me not being part of the eltist Classic Music scene, I guess.
I'm not much of a Jazz fan, although I've got recordings by Charles Mingus, Django Reinhardt & Stéphane Grappelli, Jools Holland but not counting other styles of Jazz like Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong, Billie Holiday and the wonderful Amy Winehouse, and even The Hot Club of Cowtown, or the local band 'Cambridge Blue' (Django's castle, if you must know). iTunes tells me I have 35 albums classified as Jazz, but if that sounds a lot, its nothing in comparison to the nearly 500 albums I have..
Anyway, I'm beginning to appreciate Jazz a little more as I learn more about what musical skill is needed to actually create the music. Portico Quartet are a laid back group using Gamalans (sp?) for a very distinct sound. A. and I went to see them last night at the Junction 'Shed' - just the right venue for them. They were a very tight group, with a lot of energy. They didn't spend much time in dialog with the audience but that didn't make any difference. Really glad we saw them and we'll keep an eye for when they come back - apparently two of the band are from cambridge, so hopefully they'll tour here more often.
Posted at: [/live] permanent link
Black Powder War
By Niomi Novak
Madhatter gave me this and the follow on (the latest book? I think there may be another in hardback). I confess that when I started it, I wasn't quite in the mood, and it took me some time to get into it. However, the book builds the plot, and by the end I was making time to read it as fast as I could. Novak has a good alternative history going, and describes the (partly set in the desert) environment evocatively. She continues to develop the characters, and introduces one that I suspect will be a major player in the future. What I found interesting was that the book was partly set in the timeframe of the first half of 'War and Peace', and seeing the war from the French and Prussian angle, as well as interspersed with Dragons and thier effects on battle strategy helped my understanding of that book - or should I say they both fed into the other!
Novak is developing more of the draconic world, and how they interact, and using this an an excellent way of addressing some of the areas in the first two you might have thought 'but what about..'. She also continues her excellent treatment of the fight scenes - descriptive, but short, yet evocative.
The more I think about it, the more I enjoy her work, and I'm looking forward to the next one, which Madhatter also bought me. I'm pacing myself first, though - I expect the new Walter John Williams book "Implied Spaces" to be released any day soon, and its kind of a follow on, at least in spirit, to "Voice Of The Whirlwind", one of my favorite books. Also, Cory Doctorow's YA book "Little Brother" has been released, and is on order from The Book Depository - my new replacement for Amazon after their appalling screw up of the 'Small Favor' pre-order, so I'm looking forward to starting that. I'm trying to resist buying the audiobook version (released on drm free MP3, of course), as not only is it really expensive ($20! the print book is cheaper than that!). We'll see - it all depends if the book arrives before I run out of podcasts... In the meantime, I'm working my way through the 'to read' section of my bookshelf..
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Pesudpolis
A. and I went to see this over the bank holiday weekend, at the Picturehouse Cinema. A thoughtfull and sensitive portrayal of growing up in Iran - from the deposing of the Shah all the way to (I think) the 80's. Its an engaging animating that seems to have resonated with A more so than myself, although I certianly enjoyed it.
Posted at: [] permanent link
Sat, 26 Apr 2008
The Chinese Lake Murders
By Robert Van Gulik
Once again the Judge is on the case - this time, hints of the supernatural - both spirits and the possibility of the Dreaded White Lotus Cult! Will the Judge fail his imperial masters? Is the spirit of the drowned girl really going to take her vengeance? Find out here!
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Sun, 13 Apr 2008
Small Favour
By Jim Butcher
The next in the Dresden Files series. I'm revising my assessment of Butcher as a guilty pleasure - after having ready some execrable stuff recently, I really appreciated this. It cracks along, with plot, characterisation and action. His writing skills have definitely improved, as I'm fully involved with the characters and on the edge of my seat as I read. I will have to go back and re-read fairly soon, as I just gulped this down, and as a result probably missed something. If you haven't read any of his series before, don't start here, but its definitely with continuing with.
Now I have to wait a year for the next one!
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Tue, 08 Apr 2008
KT Tunstall
Live at the Corn Exchange on Sunday! I was dead chuffed to get tickets as its not often that 'big' acts come our way, and their inevitably booked out when they do.
The warm up act was awful, as he had no sense of irony, and very whiney songs. Pity as he could actually sing.
KT (as I can now call her, I assume ;-) was superb, however. I was glad that a headlining act that I'd paid good money to see was as good as their albums. Not always the case (and not even a problem if they're a studio band), so a relief.
No new material, but a good selection from her two albums. She had a group of talented musicians - most played several instruments, apart from one who played - that I saw - keyboards, drums, a washboard tie (really! I want one!), trumpet, and vocals. He also had the best 'Rolf the piano player' hair for the more rocking numbers. KT proved that she's got real stage presence by playing a couple of numbers solo, or with only her backing singers. Amusingly, she appeared to have a different guitar for each song - do guitars get tuned diferently or something?
Posted at: [/live] permanent link
The Privilege Of The Sword
By Ellen Kushner
I was recommended this, if memory serves, from Scalzi's 'Big Idea' Blog posts featuring Kushner. I bought this hoping for more Dumas style swashblucking in the mode of Perez-Reverte's Captain Alatriste. Unfortunately, Kushner is no Perez Reverte. I was expecting something of a feminist book, co-opting the usualy masculine tradition of the swashbuckler, and she makes a stab (ah ha. see what I did there?) at this, along with a stab at being edgy (yes, the predictable way - everyone's bisexual), and a stab at a plot. The plot does OK, up to a point, and that point is the ending - it got the feeling of the author reaching her word count and simply deciding to use her last thousand words to wrap up. One of the least dramatic endings, with little internal consistency I've read in a while.
Still, Jim Butcher's 'Small Favor' arrived to day, no thanks to Amazon, so I have something to look forward to.
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Sun, 30 Mar 2008
Bad Luck and Trouble
By Lee Child
The next installment (paperback) of the Reacher franchise. In this Reacher meets up with his old unit to avenge a comrade's death. Unlike the previous Reacher book, Child is back to good solid thriller fare, and the book is an enjoyable testosterone romp. The twists are enough that I didn't guess them - in fact my basic premise of whodunnit was wrong all the way through. I nearly gave up on Lee Child after the last book, and a cheap offer at WSmiths persuaded me to give him a try - glad I did!
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Sat, 29 Mar 2008
Odd and the Frost Giants
By Neil Gaiman
Gaiman's entry for
World Book Day.
I bought it with a £1 voucher I had left over from Christmas -it felt appropriate and read it this morning. Its about Odd, who runs away from his Viking village, and why the winter hasn't ended, and its just perfect.
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Sun, 23 Mar 2008
Murder In Canton
By Robert Van Gulik
In this edition; what hapened to Ma-Jong once he married the twins, Is Tao Gan as much of a misogenist as has been let on, and does he have reason? Will the Judge find the missing Censor in time to sort ot the problems in the capital, of which he is now Chief Justice?
The world of Judge Dee will never be the same again!
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Blood Engines
By T.A. Pratt
I think I bought this from an Amazon 'people who bought also bought' recommendation. If thats the case, other people are morons. This was terrible. I mean, really, really, bad - so bad I couldn't even get half way through. Having done NaNoWriMo a couple of years ago, I know I could write as well or better than than - and I've only written the one thing and never gone back and revised it!
Cardboard characterisations, wish fulfillment characters, pitiable morality and bad plot. Euurgh.
Bloody Tolstoy, ruining my enjoyment of trash.
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Lars and the Real Girl
A and I saw this on a whim on Friday at the Arts Cinema. Funny and clever - exactly what you might expect, but also so much more depth and characterisation.
Posted at: [] permanent link
Throne Of Jade
By Naomi Novak
A. bought this after reading my copy of Temeraire, and I read it as soon as she'd finished. I've been reading fairly intermittently recently - a few pages here, a few pages there, and I think this deserved slightly more concentration, as I found it a little disjointed. More my problem than the authors, I feel.
In tis book, the problem of Temeraire being a effectively royal chinese dragon is addressed, as the Chinese want him back. She's obviously done her research, and its written from the western perspective, which left me hungry for more chinese detail but again, thats just me.
Not as strong as her first novel, but I think she's done a good job moving the book into a series, and adding more subplots while simultaneously fleshing out more detail.
One of her strengths in the first book was the way she handled the fights, and I found the fight scenes longer here, but perhaps that was just perception. All in all, a good installment in what looks to be a multi book series (at least four that I know of right now).
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Mon, 17 Mar 2008
BSFA Best Short Story of 2007
I'm currently working my way through the entries for the British Science Fiction Association's short story awards for 2007, via the
Starship Sofa
podcast, which I came to via
Escapepod.
I've been completely blown away by
Ted Chiang's story
'The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate'.
Its an excellent fantasy/science fiction story written in the style of 'A thousand and one nights' and similar Arabic fantasies, performed superbly by
James Campanella. I have no idea if Campanella is Arabic, but he sounded just like I would imagine an Arabic storyteller would sound - having seen (but not understood!) them in the square at Marrakech.
This has all the elements of sci-fi at its best, for all that its fantasy - it takes a scientific idea (limited time travel through fixed point wormholes), and explores it with believable characters and plots that interweave and complement.
Ted Chiang. A man to watch, you mark my words.
Interestingly, he has a book of short stories out (and a hardback limited edition of this story, currently going for nearly sixty quid), and the Synopsis of the book does a very good job of describing the short story I just heard - it sounds like all his stories are like this!
Here are eight astonishing science-fiction stories that explore the boundaries between science and religion, between determinism and our ability to choose, between words and the entities they describe.
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Thu, 06 Mar 2008
Fitzwilliam Museum Recitals
I came to these a little late, only finding out about them when my Violin teacher, who is also a Soprano, gave a room filling (in both senses!) performance last sunday. Its the last performance in the series this 'term' at the weekend;
Sunday Promenade Series, Gallery 3 at 1:15pm
Lyn Carter, Piano
Micheal Wigram, Cello
playing Brahms & Beethoven
I don't know what they'll be like, but we're going. Anyone else interested?
Posted at: [/live] permanent link
Letter to my MP
Dear David Howarth,
I am writing to ask you to attend the Commons on 7 March and stand up
and object to a Private Member’s Bill proposed by Pete Wishart
regarding copyright extension (Sound Recordings (Copyright Term
Extension) Bill 2007-08).
It is my belief that all the economic evidence points against term
extension;
* Every other UK citizen is expected to contribute to their pension out
of income earned in their working life.
* Retrospectively extending copyright term won’t encourage Elvis
Presley (for example!) to record any more new tracks.
* If governments continue to draft intellectual property legislation on
behalf of special interest groups, it will only further erode the
respect that ordinary citizens have for the letter of the law.
* An independent review (the Gowers Review) commissioned and endorsed
by the UK government says it should remain at 50 years.
You should find the ORG briefing pack on copyright term extension
informative, should you wish more information;
http://www.openrightsgroup.org/uploads/releasethemusic_aug07.pdf
Yours sincerely,
Posted at: [] permanent link
Wed, 05 Mar 2008
The Curse-d database
This database comes with a curse:
I just wasted an hour or worse
On LimerickDb,
Now all that I see
I read as if written in verse.
Posted at: [] permanent link
RIP Gary Gygax
RIP Gary Gygax
dead at 69
My first introduction to role playing games, like almost everyone was Dungeons and Dragons.
Gygaxs's prose style was tortured and slightly overpompus ('antithesis of the weal'?), but it set the foundation for a lot of other things; an entire hobby you might say.
Seeing Penny Arcade's cartoon, I just had to link to it..
Posted at: [] permanent link
Mon, 25 Feb 2008
Hasta La Vista
I've been using Vista at work for about nine months and
recent developments
meant I'd had enough, a week or so shy of SP1 coming out. Given that I'd crammed 3GB of RAM into the X60 I was using, and it was still sluggish, I'm concerned for the future direction; we'd have to replace or substantially upgrade most of the computers in the company if we made the switch, especially with the OEM's being forbidden to ship anything but Vista by MS in the next couple of months. Its work around-able, of course, but is this the right direction?
Having spent a fair amount of time with Vista, I decided to do the same with Linux. First up, RHEL4 on an IBM T61. First impressions were good, but alas the screen resolution wasn't as good as you could get with windows, nor did the sound, bluetooth or wireless work. Using Codeweavers, I'm able to use Office 2003 (and most importantly Outlook), and its fairly usable. It requires quite alot of work before I could give it to anyone outside of IT, though.
What has been noticeable is the increase in performance using Linux rather than Vista. Granted, I was on a machine with more grunt, but less memory. Vista had taken away the ability to map drives like we do with Group Policy, so I was used to the manual connections. When I setup a symlink to the autofs mounted areas, it became even easier. Likewise, I couldn't manage windows servers with Vista, so I was used to remote desktop; also available under Linux (anyone know a rdesktop client with tabs?). OpenVPN works flawlessly, of course, I just need to get the wireless and Vodafone USB GPRS modem working..
Next we're trying RHEL5 and a VMWare XP session - this should support more hardware and give me more flexibility. I have to use RHEL, alas, as Fedora would probably work even better (I can't use Debian, either, alas, and a test boot with Ubuntu wouldn't get past the loading screen)..
Posted at: [/work] permanent link
UKUUG - Files and Backup
Work paid for me to attend
this conference
, at the Imperial hotel in London last week; tues and wed. A fun journey; when I got there, they'd decided to close the entrance to the underground (no explanation why), and I had to navigate by iPhone to the hotel. I also discovered that
a) the Vodafone 3G USB data modem works great all the way from cambs to Kings Cross, even on Vista
and
b) a recent Vista update had broken OpenVPN (2.1_rc7), which refused to set the default route or assign an ip address.
The conference was very interesting; I think I was the least qualified person to be there - everyone else appears to be a kernel developer of some kind (I sat next to one of the AFS developers on the first day), or distro maintainer. It made me feel rather inadequate, but reminded me of how much I like tinkering around with Linux. This has IMPLICATIONS, as you will see from the next post (or at least some of them. I'm not sure what they others are yet). I did pick up enough from the conference to keep my up to date with some cutting edge linux developments, and some recommendations to go back to the team with.
The talks were varied; the high availability talks were nothing new, and not very well delivered - not that I could have done better! The acamadicians who presenter were much better; clearly more used to doing this kind of thing. Highlights were the Bacula talk, given by the inventor and lead developer and the AFS talk.
Now I have to persuade the boss that its worth me (or someone from the team) attending the Spring Conference..
UKUUG have several conferences coming up. I'm tempted by the OpenTech one-day event on 5th July. Anyone interested?
p.s. - I don't need one, but after seeing the 'must have toy' of the Conference, I so want one..Posted at: [/work] permanent link
Sun, 24 Feb 2008
The Hippopotamus
By Steven Fry
I asked for one of his fiction books for Xmas, after my overwhelmingly positive encounter with his classical music guide. Unfortunately, I didn't get on with it - competently written, but none of the characters appealed to me, or even spoke to me. I don't think he writes straight men well (or didn't here), and while the plot redeemed itself at the end, it wasn't something I'll be looking to repeat. As always, though, glad I read it.
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Don Giovanni
I saw
this
on the upcoming schedule at the
West Road Concert Hall
and thought it might be worth a try, so I persuaded a group of friends and along we went.
Not sure what to expect (I've seen Porgi and Bess and La Traviata, neither of which were great), when we turned up and it was in modern costume and translated into english, I did wonder what I'd signed us up for..
Best summed up by a quote from A. at half time; "I thought it was going to be a bit pants, but its brilliant!".
It was a really good modern adaption - humorous use and translation (I'm pretty sure Mozart never used the word "tosser"), and the scene with the 'serenading' by IM was inspired.
I have it on good authority that the budget was a massive (for them) 10k - the largest they've had, possibly. On the downside, the latter half lacked punch compared to the first half, especially the climatic scene, where the Ghost just didn't compare to Don Giovanni in terms of presence. A difficult part, I know, but it wasn't helped by the rather anticlimatic ending with him being dragged off to hell - I expected more lights and fanfare - some blokes in dark suites walking him backward of the stage didn't cut it.
Apart from that, it was great - I'll echo A's comments; best Opera I've seen. I'll have to get a copy of Don Giovanni now..
Posted at: [/live] permanent link
Thu, 14 Feb 2008
Mine is no where near as expensive
...but I sympathise with this musician who
needs to have his Stradivarius repaired after he fell on it..
Posted at: [] permanent link
Day Watch
The Movie, that is.
We missed this as it had an apparently short run at the Arts Cinema (and nowhere else) in Cambridge at the end of last year. Started off very well, even from the position that the last film ended of having diverged from the books. However, it didn't sustain the momentum. Looking back, it works very well self contained, so I'm probably being over harsh, especially when the characters were so true to form (not unsurprising, when Lukyanenko was the script writer, I guess). A good watch, overall, but unlike its predecessor, I won't be re-watching it on a semi-annual basis.
Posted at: [] permanent link
Poets and Murder
By Robert Van Gulik
Another Judge Dee adventure. In this, lesbians (again?), fox spirits, a new strand of buddhism. This time the venerable Judge has to manage without his trusty retinue as the Prefect summons him for a meeting with his 'little brother' Lo.
Great stuff.
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Tue, 12 Feb 2008
Women and Art
A. pointed me at this amazing piece of stop motion animation and blending..
If you don't allow embedded flash, the URL is
here
Also, I identified the music by ear - so my clasical education is obviously coming along!
Posted at: [] permanent link
War and Peace
Br Tolstoy
Yes, that War and Peace.. I asked for this for Xmas as one of my 'self improvement' reads, as a new translation had just been released that generated much favorable comment in the press and spawned an episode of 'In Our Time' on Radio 4, if I remember correctly. I started it in the new year and yesterday, I finished it, all 1200+ pages of it.
The word masterpiece is bandied around a lot these days, but Tolstoy shows what it means. This book has everything; action, noble characters, flawed characters, love, family, intrigue, philosophy, and not unsurprisingly, war and peace. The use of language is superb - its a real delight to read. Unlike some of Neal Stephenson's magnum opus's, I only found the book dragging in the last few pages of the Epilogue, where Tolstoy expounds his philosophy on Historical Literary and motivational analysis of so-called great leaders (my summary, he's not nearly so concise.. ;-).
The blurb on the front of the gorgeous hardback has some worthy person I didn't recognise saying that he didn't beleive this translation could be bettered. Given that I've not read any other translation, I'd have to agree, simply because it was such a joy to read - the highest compliment a translator can get, in my opinion, especially for as mammoth a work as this. There are pages of footnotes and annotations at the the end to explain the historical and personal references Tolstoy makes, without which it would have been a great deal more impenetrable.
So, I'm very glad I read it, but would I read it again? Probably not, at least not for many years, but I might go back and read some sections again. I read in the essay at the end by Tolstoy written after the work was released, that the book had been released originally in five parts, and I'd have to say this would make the consumption of it even more palatable, but the presentation of the copy I had certainly added to my enjoyment of the read - it was a lovely hardback. It has given me an appreciation of Russian literature that I didn't have before, and a greater interest in consuming some of the other great works of Literature.
Posted at: [/books] permanent link
Fri, 11 Jan 2008
The (in)Complete and Utter History of Classical Music
By Steven Fry
I asked for this book for Christmas as I wanted to start getting my head round classical music, what with the violin practice and all, and this looked like a non-threatening introduction to the subject.
In addition, if I'm honest, the BBC Reith lectures from 2007 by the musician and conductor Daniel Barenboim was also a motivator - while he may be a controversial figure (he re-introduced Wagner into Israel, and ran performances of orchestras made up of mixed Israeli and Palestinian performers), he was a powerful and thought provoking speaker.
One of the things that has always put me off classical music is the whole range of it - I mean, what people call 'classical' is about four hundred years of composers! I didn't understand the time periods that the composers were in, why one's music was different from another, and how they relate. Also, what is with with 'Symphony in G Major', followed with 'Symphony in A minor'? What's difference (yes, apart from the key, smart arse)? When you add to the fact that I hadn't consciously listened to much classical music (but its amazing how much you know, without being able to identify it to a composer), and the fact that the term 'classical' also extends to Opera, there so much to choose from.
I started to try and get my head round it last year, by tuning into as many performances of the Proms as I could. I've found that classical music is much more appealing when you've seen it performed live - especially if you're actually in the audience, and was hoping that the TV would help provide a little of that immersive experience. While it did, somewhat, I didn't get any further understanding of the composers, and the music's place within that, hence this book. Its all very well if you're education (as 'better' schools and indeed, it turns out from conversations with colleagues, Eastern European education systems, do) or upbringing exposed you to the music, so you get a sense of the shape of it, as it were, but mine didn't.
The book is very entertaining and whimsical, as you might expect from Steven Fry, but its also packed with detail and anecdotes, along with mentions of pieces that stand out by that composer. Its a short book, but it still took me several days of holiday reading to finish it, as I was constantly making notes of recordings I intended to get and listen to. Does it introduce classical music? Absolutely? Does it provide references where you can go further and explore it? Unfortunately not. Does it have an index? Unfortunately not (I mean, for heavens sake - why not!) Also, my god, but that man's smart. The book is based on a series of conversations that Steven Fry had with Tim Lihoreau on Classical Fm, and I got the impression that not only was this booked 'knocked out' after that, but it was to sell to the kind of people who might already have an idea of what they might like and might not, which is strange, given the subject matter..
So, armed with a miniscule knowledge of the composers and a list of one or two pieces by each that I thought sounded interesting, I've set myself to buying a couple of the best recordings a month and listening to them. The idea is that by the time I've finished, I'd have an idea of what I like and can start listening around that composer or era. The idea of buying the best recordings is a mixed one, though. I'm taking the advice of Heffers Music (or madhatter, when I remember to ask - or even Ed (for those of you who know him)!), as apparently the recordings differ, even of the same composer. I can't hear it myself yet, but I'm hoping my ear will attune more (as it has in orders of magnitude after a couple of years of Violin), and I'll start to see what people see in this. I'm hoping it doesn't turn out to be like the audiophiles desire for £10,000 cables to connect their stereos, and mere mortals like me won't notice the difference or, indeed, that the emperor does indeed not have new clothes, as the better recording are slightly more expensive.. As the very helpful person in the shop said, some recent studios (if thats the right word) are releasing recordings much cheaper these days, which is driving others to compete and lower their prices as well, so you can get very good performances now for about a tenner, whereas before they might be three times that. I've heard this from other sources, so he wasn't just stringing me along. I have to say, that despite the reputation, the staff at Heffers Music have been unfailingly helpful and useful, and not at all elitist and 'stuck up' as is so often the reputation. So I try and patronise their shop, despite the fact that I could get the recordings cheaper online. Not much cheaper, though, and I'd have to buy and understand a copy of the 'bible' of classical recordings - "The Penguin Guide to Recorded Classical Music 2008". Which, actually, as I read the Amazon write up that I checked in order to get the title right, I might just do anyway - its a lot cheaper than I had presumed..So, to start, Handel's Water Music performed by 'The English Concert' and conducted by Trevor Pinnock, and "Six Concertos for the Margrave of Brandenburg" (often shortened to "The Brandenburgh Concertos"), composed by Bach, performed by the 'European Brandenburg Ensemble" and conducted, again, by Trevor Pinnock. Wish me luck! If there is demand, I might blog my thoughts on these, and other recordings as I buy them..
Interestingly, in researching Pinnock on Wikipedia, I found out that;
"Trevor Pinnock and Maxim Vengerov toured together in 2000, with Vengerov taking up the baroque violin for the first time and Pinnock taking up the modern grand piano. These concerts consisted of a first half of harpsichord and baroque violin, followed by a 2nd half of piano and modern violin."
Why is that intersting, you may ask? Well, Vengorov is the artist I have a recording of performing Ysaye's Sonata No 2, which I bought after witnessing Charlie Siem's virtuoso performance of it - its a staggeringly demanding piece of solo Violin work, and it turns out there are only a couple of performances recorded of it that Heffers could find, and the one I have is the reccommended version ("Vengerov Plays Bach, Schedrin and Ysaye", EMI Classics), hence my interest in his work. No recordings of this, I can find though.Posted at: [/books] permanent link