cakeyvoice

Frank

2011-02-13T21:30:00.003Z

Hello! I have a baby. Having a baby takes ages, which is where I have been.

The baby is 5 months old today. He likes the words 'woof' and 'zip' and his favourite song is Skip to My Lou. He enjoys scratching things and wiggling around on the floor while I play the recorder.

I could go on, but I am really tired. Someone should have warned me about this.

football schmootball

2010-05-04T21:52:00.006+01:00

I've got WORLD CUP FEVER! Not really, silly. Football is reaaaallllly boring and I shan't be watching any, not ever. But I knitted these footballers anyway:

And now they are on the telly! In this advert, right here. Woohoo! If Bruce Willis ever dies, Hollywood totally has me on standby to knit a replacement Die Hard.

ow me gums

2009-11-10T00:01:00.020Z

I went to the dentist today. Upon entering the treatment room I discovered that my nice lady dentist had been mysteriously replaced by a hulking great Russian who promptly set about my mouth with a pick-headed axe before vigorously sanding down my teeth and gums with an orange flavoured paste of ground glass and hot gravel.

As I staggered to my feet to leave, blinking grit from my watering eyes, he turned to me and bellowed in a stern, monotone Russian accent:

"DON'T FORGET TO FLOSS"

Suddenly, the penny dropped. I looked directly into his glowing red eyes and nodded solemnly, communicating my acknowledgment of the grave responsibility that had been bestowed upon me. The room fell silent, save for the gentle creaking of his battered leather jacket. I left without a backwards glance.

My dentist is an unstoppable humanoid cyborg sent back through time to ensure my teeth remain intact at all costs. In the future, I will be required to eat something extremely important in order to save all humanity.

I hope it's cake.

knit one, purl FUN (not my words, the words of Simply Knitting magazine)

2009-10-20T02:02:00.006+01:00

Get a load of this! I am in Simply Knitting magazine. The back page, no less. That's the magazine equivalent of the back seat of the bus, where the driver can't see you messing about and stuff.

Thanks Simply Knitting Magazine! You have almost inspired me to make something new. Considering I haven't actually finished a single thing this year, that can only be a good thing.

10 wonderful knitted movie characters (not my words, the words of totalfilm.com)

2009-08-12T19:02:00.005+01:00

OK, I'm sorry for not bragging about this earlier, but TADA!

10 Wonderful Knitted Movie Characters.

Thanks Total Film! You're way better than Empire magazine.

It took me 15 minutes to log into my blog, as I had forgotten both my username and password. Then I had to guess the unfathomable nonsense anti-spam verification word about 40 times (granhanks? crobnatch?). You're lucky I'm here at all.

While you're here, feast your eyes on just a fraction of my windowbox produce this year. I am currently cultivating a glut of peppers, which may make their way into some hot pepper sauce, if I don't eat them all first.

a fake Polaroid of some tomatoes growing on my windowledge, yesterday

2009-04-29T00:39:00.005+01:00

i have made soap and this is it here

2009-03-18T01:58:00.002Z

I had to make labels for it, because otherwise it just looks like cheese. Hey, maybe I should make cheese? I went to a cheese factory once, there was a man behind a big window who made cheese while you watched, which is a bit weird really when you think about it. I think he was stirring it with a spade, I can't remember. It really smelled like cheese in there though, let me tell you.

But take my word for it, this is good old-fashioned cold process soap. You make it by melting solid fats & oils and mixing them with a solution of sodium hydroxide and water. Then you stir it up until it starts to get thick, add essential oils and pour into a mould. I used a shallow cardboard box lined with waxed paper. It takes 12 or so hours to set, during which time it heats up alarmingly - it burned off a lot of the essential oils during this process, leaving it with a fairly subtle scent. Then you hack it into chunks and leave it to cure for a few weeks.

I don't know what I was expecting, but I was really surprised when it actually worked. I mean, it lathers up like real soap and everything! Wowsers.

zombies do not want to eat your brains

2009-02-03T20:11:00.000Z

Let's get something straight. Zombies do not want to eat your brains. 'What?' you say, 'but zombies LOVE brains, whenever I pretend to be a zombie, I'm always like "ughghghhhhhh braaaaaiiins", that's what zombies do'. Wrong. Zombies do not talk, for a start. Except for that one that says 'Hello Aunt Alicia' - we'll let that one slide. Also, they do not crave brains. Perpetuating this myth makes a mockery of the genre that I simply cannot allow to continue. So, I have swallowed the facts. Then I digested them, and this is what came out of the other end.

OK, so zombies do sometimes eat brains. I know I just said they didn't, but I am trying to make a point, for heaven's sake. Anyway, zombies do sometimes eat brains. They also sometimes eat feet, fingers, guts and anything else they can get their grubby undead hands on. The point is, a zombie would pretty much only eat your brain if your head had already been conveniently smashed in. A zombie won't take the time to bash your head in like a 4 minute egg when there's a nice bit of fresh neck on offer. That's because:

Zombies do not use tools. Except for that one that shot some guy. Don't try to pick holes in my argument, zombies aren't real, you idiot. Anyway, they don't use tools. Except for that one that smashed a window with a crowbar. Look, whatever. Imagine how hard it would be to gnaw through someone's skull. Why would you bother with that when you can just rip out their soft gizzards? Exactly.

Zombies reproduce by biting, which infects the victim with zombie germs. If the victim manages to get away, the resulting infection will eventually kill them, whereupon they become a zombie themselves. However, if said victim were overpowered by zombies and unable to escape, they would only be eaten until they became a zombie. There's no time for eating brains! We're talking lights out to re-animation in a matter of minutes. It's a cold, hard fact that zombies do not eat each other. If they did, you wouldn't have to worry about them so much. Note that I said 'you' wouldn't have to worry about them. Me? I'm not worried.

The myth that zombies crave brains above all other human meat arises from just one film - Return of the Living Dead. There are at least 307 zombie films in existence, meaning Return of the Living Dead makes up approximately 0.325% of zombie movie history. By allowing this fleeting side-step in the evolution of the zombie to perpetuate, we are grossly inflating the cinematic importance of this comedic shambles of a film.

In a nutshell - if you destroy the brain, you destroy the zombie. Therefore, if zombies went round eating people's brains, they would cease to be the exponentially reproductive threat that we all know they are. And that just doesn't make sense. So stop it.

http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2008/02/20/

new year's resolution: never leave the house again

2008-12-30T15:05:00.005Z

Praise the lord! I am back in my own house. The problem with visiting parents is that a) their food is always much more expensive & luxurious, not to mention abundant, and b) their houses are so much cleaner. Now I am back here, everything seems to be coated in a thick layer of dust and cobwebs and there's nothing but old potatoes and toffee pennies to eat.

This is the first time I've been on the internet in 4 days. 4 LONG DAYS. My feed reader has collapsed under the weight of all the backed up information. Unfortunately, in the absence of the internet, I have become addicted to Fallout 3. Now all I can think about is getting back out into the irradiated wastelands to club some bloated mole rats upside the head with a baseball bat. So there's no time for grocery shopping really. I'll just live off the fat reserves I have built up from eating sherry trifle every day for a week, until hunger finally drives me out of the house.

knitted han solo

2008-12-02T12:53:00.001Z

Let's play Star Wars! I'll be Han Solo because my name is Han and also because I am a sassy nerf-herding rogue who will eventually come good and set up the entire rebel alliance for a colossal win. You can be Jabba, or that stormtrooper that runs into a door.

5, 6, better something something...

2008-11-17T20:19:00.007Z

"One, two freddys coming for you 3, 4 better lock the door 5, 6 better something something 7,8 dont stay up late 9, 10 lets sing it again i dont know something like that..."

That's a direct quote from a response to a Yahoo! Answers question, asking how the Freddy rhyme goes. I actually think it's more terrifying than the original - the omission of such crucially relevant information makes for a tense read.

Do you see where I am going with this? I do. I have knitted Freddy Krueger and here he is:

Freddy Krueger ceases to be scary when you realise that he could easily be thwarted by tricking him into plunging his knife hand into a large butternut squash. Since he is constantly blunting those knives by scraping them along pipes for effect, it would take several minutes for him to free himself. This would give you more than enough time to knock his hat off and run away.

Fearsome he is not. But I like his jumper and there's no denying that he's an icon of modern horror. As such, he has earned his place in the minion hall of fame. Come to daddy!

let's put a smile on that face

2008-11-16T23:52:00.006Z

The Joker is such an indisputable badass. Like many before him, he skipped his way right up to the top of my list, overtaking the diorama I keep meaning to make of Siegfried and Roy being attacked by tigers. That's still on the cards, by the way.

Oh, and NEWSFLASH! it's all go in the shop... get over there for your chance to own knitted ash and this shambling resident evil zombie.

More to come! I told you I'd been busy. It's knitting season.

christmas is what you make it

2008-11-13T00:22:00.006Z

Although Christmas doesn't really start until I pop open a bottle of sherry, we all know it is already Christmas because it says on the TV and also in Tesco. Christmas is great. If you don't enjoy it then you are doing it wrong and are probably suffering from sherry deficiency. Get it down you.

Ahhh, poor neglected blog, I am at a loose end for the first time in yonks. The craft fair is over. Sleep was lost, favours were called in, frantic setting up was done, old ladies were confused and children delighted. It was quite a day. Oxford Town Hall is an awesome place to hang out and I managed to restrain myself from rushing the stage to have a go on that colossal organ.

But enough of that, ladies and gentlemen, I have written a book. A very slim book. A very slim, small book. A pamphlet, if you will. But don't be fooled by its diminutive stature, it contains no fewer than 10 of my top secret ideas for making awesome Christmas presents. Even better, because it's so small, there's no room for any of my nonsensical & rambling prose. Although I do reveal the greatest Xmas album of all time, which is worth the money alone.

This was a real labour of love, with pages cut from scrap fabric, titles punched from real dymo label and text typed up on a proper old school typewriter. I then scanned the whole thing, sent it to the printers, assembled the pages into a book & stitched them up real good on my sewing machine. Why? Because I want you to make my ginger whisky. It really is THAT good.

knitted ash from the evil dead

2008-10-31T17:26:00.005Z

hail to the king, baby

i love the smell of a looming deadline in the morning

2008-09-25T01:18:00.007+01:00

Hello world. A veritable tsunami of hits, due to my deluxe hot chai recipe making an appearance on the CRAFT: blog, has shamed me into throwing my blog a fricken bone.

Excitingly/worryingly, it's only a matter of weeks until I take part in my first ever craft fair. This means I actually have to finish the many, many unfinished and barely started projects that I have lying around my flat. Which was the whole point of this when I decided to sign up in the first place. Last night I had my first performance anxiety related dream, in which I turned up with NOTHING TO SELL. Nggghh.

Anyway, all being well I'll be cooking up some truly spectacular multimedia items, finishing up some long overdue knitted figures and debuting an exciting new knitting pattern I've been working on. I'll also be churning out a few homemade soy wax cinnamon candles and some radical Xmas tree decorations (electronics, anyone?). I've got even more on my list, but writing it all down is making me feel funny. Come along & see what I done at handm@de, Oxford Town Hall on Sunday 9 November.

Today I bought another pair of truly awesome vintage curtains, bringing the total number of pairs I own to 6. This might not seem excessive, until you consider that I don't even have curtains up in the house, only blinds. I buy them because I love the fabric, thinking I'm going to cut them up and use them for something, and then I just can't bear to take the scissors to them. These are really cool - I reckon they're from the 1960s, beautiful quality barkcloth, how could I not? They are going in my cupboard forever, I tell you.

monthly round up

2008-06-30T23:36:00.010+01:00

CLEAR!

I have just got back from holiday. It was fun. I drank a lot of rum and generally loafed about. The sea was bloody freezing and a swarm of jellyfish washed up on the beach the day after we arrived, but we went swimming anyway because we are so very British.
You know when you get back off holiday and everything seems really weird and you can't remember what you used to do before you went on holiday? I feel like that now. I suppose I'll just quietly get to work on regenerating my liver.

CLEAR!

Trying to take a decent photo with my camera at the moment feels a bit like I am one of those monkeys trying to thrash out the works of Shakespeare on a typewriter. This is partly because I am too stubborn to not have it on a manual setting and partly because I have gone from never even so much as holding an SLR camera to attempting complicated HDR techniques which are clearly beyond the realms of my capability. After much windswept, amateurish fumbling, I finally managed to cobble one together, so here it is for posterity. You will, of course, overlook the fact that not a single part of this entire scene is properly in focus.

CLEAR!

Doctor Who, eh? Doctor WTF, more like. I totally didn't see that coming. What's going to happen now, then? WHO IS WHO?

-FLATLINE-

life on mars. knitted.

2008-04-14T00:46:00.008+01:00

I'd never seen Life on Mars before I received a request to make these guys. So I watched the first episode. Then the second one. Then suddenly it was 16 hours later and I'd watched the whole lot. Not really. (But NEARLY.)

You either love Gene Hunt, or you've never seen him in action. He's The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, and if I had a car I would totally drive like him.

DCI Gene Hunt & DI Sam Tyler are off to Japan next week, which is sad (for me).

But the good news is that IT IS MY BIRTHDAY today, and also my Mum's. Happy birthday Mum! Thanks for teaching me to knit - without you, there would be no wooly Gene Hunt out there smashing up nonces with a bin lid, so this post is dedicated to you.

tea at monty's

2008-03-30T00:53:00.006Z

Our Matt (my brother) recently made a pilgrimage to the now woefully dilapidated Sleddale Hall in Cumbria, better known as Uncle Monty's country retreat from Withnail & I. It looks as if it's been empty since the film was made - a rotting memorial to what was surely both the best and most mistaken holiday destination of all time. Check out his pictures here.

'country man about town' camera case

2008-03-13T02:38:00.007Z

Hey everyone - sewing is the new knitting! Not really, of course, sewing is still just the old sewing. Had you there for a minute though, didn't I? It's annoying when people say things like that, I know. Sorry. I couldn't help myself - I have been at the wine.

I made this for Rob for his birthday. It's not an original idea, being rather inspired by a number of similar camera cases I've seen kicking around Etsy. I based it loosely on the Diana. It features real suede patches, and a proper lining and everything:

Goodness me, sewing is fast compared to knitting! I couldn't believe I'd finished it so soon. Sewing through suede is hard, and I totally ravaged my thumb making this. But it is also fun, even though the process is actually 80% cutting & pressing, 20% sewing. What a massive swizz.

Coming up next in sewing news: I attempt an extremely challenging bag, not at all recommended for beginners. All will be revealed in several months time. Until then, I've got a lot of knitting to do. Good day.

HE'S GOT AN ARM OFF

2008-02-19T18:45:00.007Z

Zombies, eh? I can't let it lie. I am giving George Romero ONE MORE CHANCE to redeem himself after Land of the Dead. Has anyone seen Diary of the Dead? Please tell me it isn't shit. I really, really want it to be good, even though I know it won't be. And let's not even mention the upcoming remake of Day of the Dead, in case my brain explodes.

Anyway, look! I've knitted a new zombie:

It feels good to be knitting zombies again. Like I've come home. And, no joke of a lie, this is my favourite of all the ones I've made so far. He only appears on screen for a few brief moments in Shaun of the Dead, meaning that I had to watch the same scene loads of times to pick up on the details of his outfit.

I wish I could find a link to it on YouTube, because no matter how many times I see it, Ed's reaction to this guy shambling into their front room cracks me up EVERY SINGLE TIME.

This zombie is for sale. Click here to check out the listing in my shop. Who KNOWS what I might knit next! You would, if you were on my mailing list. (It's down there on the right.)

picture box

2008-02-11T18:14:00.001Z

I bought this last week for £3.99 from a charity shop, after picking it up and putting it down about a hundred times. Then I suddenly imagined somebody else coming in and buying it, and there I was, sprinting towards the till with it clutched in a white-knuckle grip. It might have been my imagination, but the old lady behind the counter seemed overly happy to see it go. I think it might be haunted.

I'm glad I bought it though, because even though I've never actually seen one of these in real life, I remember it well from my childhood. It's PICTURE BOX, from the children's educational TV show of the same name. And now I own it.

Picture Box featured the weirdest theme tune known to man, guaranteed to make you feel as if you were gently riding a fairground horse on a one-way trip into another dimension. It's called 'Manege' and it featured on this (1968?) album (which I have yet to find down the chazza, but I live in hope):

Francois Baschet was a sculptor who, along with his brother Bernard, invented and built loads of crazy experimental instruments. Jacques Lasry was a modernist composer. Together with Baschet's wife Yvonne, they were 'Structures Sonores Lasry Baschet'.

But I digress. Because while looking for the title sequence for Picture Box on YouTube, I discovered that it is EVEN WEIRDER than I remember. I don't even know what to say about it, except that when Alan Rothwell pipes up with his jovial

"Hello! Do you remember that scene from the film last week?"

you can be sure that somewhere in the depths of time, a hundred thousand mentally damaged schoolchildren are silently screaming

"YES ALAN! FOR IT IS BURNED INTO MY MEMORY FOR ALL TIME AND HAUNTS MY EVERY WAKING MOMENT."

Watch it here, but don't say I didn't warn you.

zonino!

2008-02-08T02:32:00.000Z

I discovered a new word! It happened by accident when I tried to type in 'Woohoo!' using predictive text on my phone. The word is 'Zonino!' and I shall be using it liberally from now on.

I fixed the margin error on my template! It took many gruelling hours, and I'm still not quite sure how it happened. Zonino!

I dremeled a miniature cricket bat! There was a tremendous amount of dust flying everywhere. I probably shouldn't have done it in the living room, but Jeremy Kyle was on & I didn't want to miss the lie detector results. The cricket bat is to accompany the Shaun of the Dead figure that is going into the shop tomorrow. Zonino!

deluxe hot chai mix

2008-02-05T00:52:00.000Z

This is an unbelievably delicious recipe for instant spiced chai. I made two big batches of it for Christmas presents this year, and everyone who tried it absolutely LOVED it. Forget the supermarket and get yourself down the nearest Asian grocer, unless you like paying through the nose for those silly little jars of Schwartz spices.

This was my deluxe version of the recipe. For everyday consumption, I would probably reduce the sugar by half a cup or more, and maybe substitute half of the coffee whitener for more milk powder. Here we go.

You will need:

2 cups caster sugar (vanilla sugar is best)
1 cup Typhoo QT instant white tea
1 cup coffee whitener
1 cup dried skimmed milk powder
1 cup Coffee Mate 'Latte Creations', original or vanilla
4 teaspoons ground ginger
4 teaspoons ground cinnamon
2 teaspoons ground cloves
2 teaspoons ground cardamom
2 teaspoons ground allspice
1 teaspoon white pepper

Mix all the ingredients in a large bowl. Process the mixture in a blender or food processor, 1 cup at a time, and store in airtight jars.

To serve, put 2 tablespoons in a mug, top up with boiling water and wait a few minutes before drinking to allow the spices to settle at the bottom. Now drink up! Your life will never be the same again.

bing bang boing

2008-01-31T23:18:00.000Z

I don't know why I'm so excited about this, but I am. I had no idea this game existed until this morning, but right now I can think of NOTHING I would rather do than wang a ball bearing down the Bingle Flinger, across the Humdrums, up the Banglevator, through the Flickerticker and into the Boingle Bucket, all accompanied by the musical stylings of Jean-Jacques Perrey. I'm talking "Bing Bang Boing" by Ideal Games, from 1972.

Bring it back! I want one so bad! Click here to check it out at the start of this reel of old 70s toy adverts. Seriously, I can't stop watching it. The sight of all those ball bearings hopping off into the distance fairly brings tears of yearning to my eyes every time.

And if that's not enough Moog for you, have a look at this video of Jean-Jacques Perrey in action, playing the very music from this ad - "Chicken on the Rocks". Just the sort of thing you should listen to on your iPod while you are walking around your local neighbourhood. I'm telling you, you really should.

i has a graphics tablet

2008-01-24T01:45:00.000Z

WOWEEEE! The slacker got a graphics tablet for Christmas and it has finally spurred me on to make a proper banner. Look how professional it is! I bet you thought I'd had the graphic designers in, didn't you? That's my ACTUAL HANDWRITING up there. Don't act like you're not impressed.

Also, get a load of the fancy new layout - I've always wanted a three column template and have even considered moving to Typepad in the past (£££). Turns out there's no need! I got the code tweaks from Tips for New Bloggers, in case you're interested. It took me three hours to get it how I wanted. That's one hour per column. I'm never changing it again. Even though the left margin is still bigger than the right margin.....I'm fine about it though...ngggghhhhhhhh

My computer is fixed - its treacherous faulty hard drive has been ripped out and impaled on a stick on my desk as a warning to the rest of the hardware. The computer doctor tried to thwart me by inexplicably adding an administrative password and then not telling the slacker what it was when he went to collect it. But alas he had met his match, and I cracked his puny, ill conceived password like the rotten nut it was with a mere 5 minutes of guessing. Pah!

I now have NOTHING in my iTunes. It's really liberating.

Stay tuned and I might just show you the BEST CHAIR IN THE WORLD that I bought yesterday. No really, it is.

the emergency laptop

2008-01-07T03:37:00.000Z

By the power of Greyskull!!! My computer has gone for a Burton. The technical diagnosis is that its most crucial registry files have been sucked into another dimension. I knew this would happen again eventually, because my house is built on an ancient Indian burial ground. Almost.

Tomorrow I am taking it to the computer hospital to be purged of ghosts, since my last home exorcism was nothing short of a miserable failure. This time, however, I shall be forced to admit to them that I punched a gaping hole in my firewall during my vain attempts to host networked games of Settlers of Catan. Ahhhhh, but mock ye not, for tis surely by my fearless nature that I shall one day earn my rightful place in Valhalla.

This post is therefore brought to you courtesy of the emergency laptop that I borrowed off Rob. The emergency laptop is my new (slow) best friend. When I plugged it in and everything (slowly) worked, I could have kissed its (slow) little LCD face. Then I remembered that it used to belong to James, who was probably sick on it at least once, so I restrained myself. Instead, to celebrate my ongoing internet connectivity, I ate a mince pie and looked at my Christmas tree, but the magic was well and truly gone and I felt strangely empty. Welcome to 2008.

the day i traded art with Mike Mignola

2007-12-29T19:08:00.000Z

Remember knitted Hellboy? Well, shortly after being featured on Drawn, I received an email from Christine Mignola, asking if I would make another for their collection - the original having sold within 8 hours of making its internet debut.

I could hardly believe my luck when she agreed to get Mike to do a sketch as a trade. The slacker was FREAKING OUT. So I duly set about making another, trying to recreate the original as faithfully as possible from my illegible notebook scrawlings. The pressure was really on, but I did it. And it was even better than the first one, even though I say so myself. You'll have to take my word for that, as I didn't take any pictures. Ooops.

I sent it out & thankfully they loved it - even the cat was trying to get in on the action, meaning that knitted Hellboy now resides upon a high shelf in the Mignola household. True to their word, the sketch arrived a few days before Christmas, whereupon I wrapped it carefully to give to the slacker on Xmas day, thus earning me a billion girlfriend points.

Yes, Mike Mignola and I traded art. I surely got the better end of the deal, and it was the BEST CHRISTMAS EVER. God bless us, every one.

stick a fork in me, someone...

2007-12-21T18:07:00.000Z

... I'm done. Homemade Xmas presents for EVERYONE! I can't believe I pulled it off. Of course, I can't reveal what any of them are, as it will spoil the surprise. Suffice to say that I have an awesome recipe to share, as well as something ULTRA MEGA EXCITING. Seriously. It's the best thing ever. I'll reveal all on Boxing Day.

fetch me my tools...

2007-12-03T01:30:00.000Z

Save your breath! You will never convince me that building something as wholly magnificent as THIS:

is not the BEST IDEA EVER. Read the story of its creator and see more pictures of this absolute marvel of the modern age here. To think that it nearly ended up in a charity shop! The thought of stumbling across something like this one day is the reason I walk so fast everywhere. Obviously, any delay might cause a knock on effect that would ultimately result in me arriving at the chazza just in time to see some smug bastard waltzing out of the shop with it. It could happen. It musn't happen.

So if you wanted to know what I want for Christmas this year, there you go. I also wouldn't say no to a Junior Carpenter Tool Set and a short trip back in time so that I can pay better attention in my electronics classes. Thanks Santa xx

It's HALLOWEEN!

2007-11-05T01:31:00.000Z

Halloween may be over for you, but here at Cake Towers, every day is Halloween. Sort of. Well, OK, it's not at all. Nor is my house really called 'Cake Towers'. But let's all pretend that it's true for a minute, because I've just finished knitting Michael Myers:

I haven't seen Rob Zombie's remake of Halloween yet, but if it's only half as good as the original, it will be worth a watch. Of course it could never trump John Carpenter's version because a) John Carpenter didn't write the score and b) Donald Pleasance isn't in it.

Michael Myers simply will not die. I like to imagine that 30 years from now, Hollywood will still be cranking out sequels - I won't be watching them (they'll be rubbish, of course) but I'll be glad that they're there. Because Halloween is the greatest slasher movie ever. The End.

I'm taking a break from the knitted minions - they are literally sucking the life out of me. I'm just finishing up the ones I've been working on, and then I'll be moving on. *Insert theme from The Littlest Hobo here*

Oh, and yeah - both Sadako and Michael Myers are up for sale in my Etsy shop. I need the money to buy a soldering iron. And on that bombshell, I shall bid you adieu.

knitted sadako

2007-10-31T20:09:00.000Z

Wooo! Yeah, it's Halloween and, for the first time in about 7 years, I have NO costume. That's right, I'm playing it cool. I'm gonna do it on the night. I'm off round to the pub in half an hour, where I shall pull something together out of a combination of special effects makeup and lost property (not really! ew! I'm going to raid the ever-useful FANCY DRESS box). If it's any good, I might even post a picture, but don't worry - it definitely won't be.

Anyway, never mind all that, because I'm about to unleash the most terrifying knitted item ever seen on Earth. She's so creepy, I keep expecting to see her sneaking up on me out of the corner of my eye. Don't watch that video! It's SADAKO!

The Japanese version of Ring is, hands down, the scariest film of all time. If you think otherwise, you should be forced to watch a VHS copy of it, on your own, at night, in the dark, down a well. Then you'd see what I mean.

More scary knitted stuff coming up in a day or two! OOOOOooooooOOOOoooO!

bird brain

2007-10-12T00:41:00.000+01:00

Brazenly half-inched from I like, this is an interesting test which supposedly determines whether you are predominantly right or left brained. Look at the dancer to see whether she is rotating clockwise or anticlockwise. Or both, if you're super skill.

Try as I might, I can only see her turning clockwise, which does little to explain my affinity with robots, but perhaps casts some light on why I have all those tattoos and am so very rubbish at chess.

I'm also interested to know what yous guys can see. Anyone see her going both ways? Anyone surprised at the result? I wasn't surprised, just a bit disappointed that I can't be good at absolutely everything, which is pretty much the story of my life.

UPDATE: I can see it going anti-clockwise! Turns out I am great at everything after all. Chess, anyone?

back to the crunch

2007-10-08T03:22:00.000+01:00

Hello! Today I am mostly drunk on rum. But that doesn't matter, because rum or no rum, I have stumbled upon yet another invention that fills my heart with joy and hope for the future of all mankind. A timely & welcome reminder that I am not alone in the world.

Make no mistake, I love da crunch. If there was some way to make things crunchier than they were to start with, I'd do it, but it still wouldn't be crunchy enough for me. When I eat cereal, I have 90% cereal, 10% milk, and I eat it inhumanly fast. But now I can have crunchy cereal EVERY DAY, AT A LEISURELY PACE, so very crunchy, for the rest of my life. I am so happy.

Buy yours here at eatmecrunchy.com. I'm off to buy mine right now, even though I drank all that rum & should probably not be shopping on the internet at 3 in the morning. BUT 60% of the time, I do what I want ALL THE TIME, and I can no longer live without the eatmecrunchy cereal bowl, especially at £3.95 with free delivery THANK YOU WORLD, THIS IS ALL I EVER WANTED, APART FROM ALL THAT RUM WHAT I DRUNK EARLIER. Adios!

don't tase me, bro

2007-10-01T02:40:00.000+01:00

Hello! Today I am mostly excited about.....ELECTRONICS. First it was this - the SwoofTronic Pi light controlled sound module:

I stumbled across this on Etsy earlier and boy, was I excited. It's a handheld audio device that you 'play' by controlling the amount of light that reaches the little sensors in the top. The left hand module controls the pitch, and the right hand one controls the note length. If you could amplify the sound of the electrons in your brain while you were having a good, hard think about something really confusing, this is what it would sound like. Have a look for yourself at this video of it in action.

The SwoofTronic Pi is on the market for $55, from my new favourite Etsian, rarebeasts.etsy.com, whose other creations include such audiovisual wonders as the 'Orb of Sound':

But just when I thought I'd reached my daily pinnacle of sonic enthusiasm, I discovered that the MAKE: Weekend Project Podcast is all about how to make your own WALKMAN MELLOTRON - surely the best idea anyone has ever had, ever:

What are you waiting for? You must go there, go there now and make a Walkman Mellotron - don't come back until you've finished. Apparently the Walkman mellotron was based on Mike Walter's homemade Mellotron - the Melloman - an instrument of such exquisite beauty that when I clapped eyes on it, a chorus of angels serenaded me from the heavens, and everything in the world that was not Mike Walter's Melloman ceased to exist forever. MEDIC!

motocykes

2007-09-26T18:25:00.000+01:00

As we all know, I have a vintage Raleigh Commando sitting in my hallway on flat tyres - I'm ashamed to admit I haven't ridden it since I bought it, almost a year ago. My cycling mojo, it would seem, was stolen along with my Grifter. But it's coming back, oh yes it is.

Last night I had a dream that my brother got his hands on a brand new Raleigh Vektar, and I was unbelievably, furiously jealous. (This dream was probably due in part to the fact that our Matt recently picked up a signed John Piper print in a charity shop for £25, which turned out to be worth close to £2000, the JAMMY GET.)

When I woke up, I was compelled to check out the Vektar situation on th'internet, just in case the dream was a sign and I found one that was new old stock or mint in box for a fiver or something. I didn't. But I did find something else. Hang onto your hats bike fans, it's the ROADMASTER MOTOCYKE:

Wowsers. I'd never seen one of these before, although by all accounts they were pretty popular in America in the 1990s, clocking up more sales than any other 20" bike in US history.

But there's more to this 1993 dreambike than meets the eye. For with a flick of a switch, the lucky owner could activate the MotoBlaster™ engine sound, enabling them to annoy the neighbours to their heart's content. I'm serious. You can watch this video here if you don't believe me.

Of course, underneath those moulded plastic fairings was a crummy old steel framed BMX style bike, which probably weighed a ton and certainly wasn't much to look at (see here for evidence).

Would I ride this bike? No*. Do I love it wrong, like Pepé Le Pew loves that cat? Yes. And that's about the long and short of it.

Incidentally, there's one for sale over at Re-Buy-Cycle, which just so happens to be the best bike shop in the world. If you decide to buy it, don't forget to ride it past my house so I can have a good laugh at you. Now go on! Get outta here!

*unless nobody was watching

knitted hellboy

2007-09-05T18:45:00.001+01:00

Hellboy is pretty cool. The son of a demon and a witch, his fate on Earth was sealed from the moment he tasted his first 'pamcake'. But mostly I just like him because he once went to Yorkshire - I'm patriotic like that. Plus, the right hand of doom would be very useful for smashing up wasps.

Knitted Hellboy is dedicated to the good natured slacker, who has served as my creative consultant throughout. He even drew up the original schematic, because he's clever like that <3

Hellboy is ~~for sale in my Etsy shop~~ SOLD, but don't worry - you can still get your hands on my knitted zombie photo notecard sets here, plugplugplug.)

I see more knitted superheroes in the future, but before that I have a couple of other things to finish. Until then, more pics of knitted Hellboy can be found here and here. BOOM!

DO NOT WANT

2007-08-06T01:11:00.000+01:00

Wasps, it seems, are breaking all the rules. Seriously - when did wasps start coming out at night? They never taught me this at school. It's simply not supposed to happen.

It all started a couple of weeks ago. I am up late, as usual, when I'm alerted to the amplified buzzing of a wasp battering itself senseless inside the shade of the floor lamp. Normally in the case of such an invasion, I would simply give in and go to bed. But I am in the middle of a network game of Settlers of Catan and there's no way I'm flaking, because I really am that much of a geek when it comes to my stats.

So between turns, I find myself standing in my living room waving the lamp out of the window in the vain hope that the wasp will notice that it's actually night time and go back to its nest to get some sleep so it will be refreshed & sprightly in the morning, ready for a long hard day of stinging people.

But the wasp is not having any of it, and promptly flies straight back in WITH TWO OF ITS MATES. My lamp-waving, it seems, has merely served as a welcoming beacon for all the wasps in the neighbourhood, of which there suddenly seem to be rather a lot.

I look at the window and there are five more wasps crawling around on the outside. Peering into the darkness, I see a cloudy, seething mass of wasps swarming around the nearby streetlight. It's around this time that I start to panic. To prevent the situation from escalating I have no choice but to close the window, effectively trapping myself in the room with three angry, stingy wasps.

But my game of Settlers is only halfway through, and so I carry on in what is to become the least fun game of anything I have ever played in my life; for 20 minutes I am ducking and flapping and desperately hoping that someone, anyone, will just WIN THE GAME for crying out loud, so I can get out of the room. And all the time I can hear the incessant tap tap tap of more wasps smashing themselves against the window - the only way they could be more eager to get in would be if I were smothered in jam and having fifty picnics all at once.

Finally, mercifully, the game comes to an end and I retreat with great urgency to the bedroom where I wake up the good natured slacker and tell him that THERE ARE WASPS EVERYWHERE, A ZILLION WASPS ARE TRYING TO KILL ME. But the slacker is no slacker when it comes to pandering to my unreasonable requests to rid the house of insects at all hours of the day and night, and he duly crawls out of bed and hurls each and every one of their sorry asses back out of the window, while I shriek helpful encouragements from behind the door, such as "GET IT!!!!" and "DON'T LET IT COME BACK IN!!!!!"

Ever since then the wasps have been out in force every night - faintly tapping, tapping at my chamber door.

I was fully prepared for a zombie invasion, but this? As I sit imprisoned in my living room with all the windows tightly shut on the hottest night of the year so far... I can do without it, I tell you.

car boot bargain de l'année

2007-07-11T14:17:00.001+01:00

If you want to go car-booting properly you have to go up North. Or at the very least, out of Oxford. Because Oxford may be many things, but boot sale central it 'aint. The nearest car boot to me doesn't even START until 10.30am, the time by which all decent booters are packing up and going home to get the Sunday dinner on.

I love a good car boot. The only person I know who loves them more is my bro, who would willingly get up at 3am on a Sunday morning and throw himself out of a moving vehicle just for a sniff of a box of vintage vinyl. I'm with him. There's nothing better than having a good old nose at what people are getting rid of, and if you've got your eye in, there's some super bargains to be had. Take for example the fruits of my most recent booting expedition - the Super Speak & Spell:

Now I know I said I wasn't going to buy any more of this stuff, but in all fairness I never actually said that out loud, and anyway I didn't actually mean it. But you have to understand that, from the moment we met, the Super Speak & Spell and I had a connection. It SPOKE to me. It also made some crazy bleeping noises. I knew I had to have it. AND IT WAS ONLY 50p! Stop looking at me like that.

More obsessive barminess abound, as I planned my entire coach trip home just so I could go to the Sing Fat Chinese supermarket in Birmingham to pick up more Ginbis Party Animal biscuits. The trip proved to be a triumphant success, although I had to check myself before I loaded my basket with 6 boxes of them after I discovered that the entire stock had been relegated to bargain corner and was selling for 45p a box. After much internal wrangling, I reluctantly limited myself to 3 boxes, because I needed to save some room in my bag for these awesome Doraemon crackers:

Doraemon rules. He's a time-travelling robot cat from the future. If you're wondering why he doesn't have any ears, it's because they were gnawed off by a robotic mouse in the 22nd century. It doesn't seem to bother him none. Look how happy he is.

In vegetable (green) and cheese (yellow) flavours, they are almost too good to eat. But I shall eat them anyway in case they give me the ability to travel through time, in which case I would hot-foot it back to about a year ago, when I passed up the chance to buy a Speak & Maths in a charity shop, just because I was down to my last fiver & needed it to buy some food. What was I thinking?! I can barely live with the regret. If you happen to have one that you don't want, please send it to me so that I can get on with my life.

oh dear

2007-07-10T01:52:00.000+01:00

my dad is better than your dad

2007-07-05T23:42:00.000+01:00

Tuesday was a pretty intense day. As my Mum and I kept ourselves busy by taking a long walk around the village, 20 miles away in the Northern General Hospital, a surgeon cut open my Dad's chest and stopped his heart.

My Dad is cool. No offence, but your Dad would have to try really hard to be anywhere near as cool as my Dad. Computer wizard, webmaster, photographer, artist, amateur astronomer & meteorologist, Shostakovich enthusiast, cactus/orchid/bonsai aficionado, film buff and tropical fish keeper - I could go on. My Dad has a Hi-Fi setup with the potential to burst a man's eyeballs at 50 paces if he cranked it right up. He also has a much bigger TV than your Dad. There's not a gizmo or gadget invented that he can't master. He even has an iPod. I bet your Dad doesn't have an iPod.
My point here is that there's simply too much wonder in the world, too many technological advancements and future episodes of Doctor Who to watch for him to be shuffling off at the tender age of 62.

Back to Tuesday morning, and several fraught hours of waiting brought the news that my Dad had pulled through his heart bypass operation with all the vigour and resilience of a true Yorkshireman. A mere 6 hours after his operation, he was guzzling tea and demanding morphine and crisps. He still has a way to go, but the worst is most definitely over.

And so, because no post is really complete without a picture, I would like to take the opportunity to showcase one of my Dad's finest creations; I'm talking, of course, about ME. Because what better pastime is there than rooting through old photographs at your parents' house between hospital visits?

cakes and cakes...and a wedding

2007-06-05T02:02:00.001+01:00

The good natured slacker and I iced these buns up real nice in about 4 hours on Saturday night for Rob & Rhyannon's wedding reception. We stayed up very late indeed and I ate rather a lot of jelly beans to keep me going, but it was worth every sugary minute. I was so pleased with how they turned out, it was all I could do not to weep at the sight of SO MANY CAKES. Go Team Cake! How we will ever top this, I have no idea.

Of course, this post would not be complete without a picture of the the lovely bride & groom. Congratulations guys! May your life together be filled with exciting adventures & delicious cakes.

emperor akihito pops round

2007-05-28T19:07:00.000+01:00

Today I saw His Imperial Majesty Emperor Akihito out of my bedroom window. Apart from that, not much has happened really.

knitted kraftwerk

2007-05-01T18:11:00.000+01:00

Blimey, I've finished something. Here we have the 1975-1981 lineup of one of my favourite bands of all time, Kraftwerk, featuring Florian Schneider, Ralf Hütter, Wolfgang Flür & Karl Bartos.

~~Knitted Kraftwerk are for sale in my Etsy shop~~ SOLD, despite the fact that they look so supremely awesome on my mantelpiece. Click here to see the listing. More soon! Maybe.

forgotten music of the flumps

2007-04-30T22:14:00.000+01:00

The Flumps, along with Fingerbobs and Bagpuss, was one of those programmes that made me feel a bit peculiar when I was a kid. Of course I now realise that was probably because they were designed to induce an unnatural state of soporific tranquility in children, like a dose of kiddie Valium. If you've ever watched The Joy of Painting you'll know what I'm talking about.

The music from the Flumps was written by Paul Reade, who is, incidentally, the composer of the theme to that other British classic, the Antiques Roadshow. Gay Soper, the programme's narrator, sings the songs in her lovely posh BBC voice. It was all very civilised, but with just a hint of melancholy.

I searched all over the internets to see if I could find any of these gems for sharing, but alas, there were none. So, by the power of Greyskull, I bring you the forgotten music of the Flumps. Wheels Turning Round, with its whimsical oboe stylings, is my favourite, but I have to give props to The Moon Alone for being perhaps the most pensive song ever to grace a children's television show. Enjoy. And then feel a bit weird.

Wheels Turning Round

The Moon Alone

mr dangly brings sexy back

2007-04-21T00:16:00.000+01:00

If you ever needed an incentive to clone mr dangly, then surely this is it. This brilliant incarnation of the dangly one is the work of Grace Schnebly, who blogs at Kathryn Ivy. When I first clapped eyes on this picture, I literally laughed out loud. Have you ever seen a monkey look more seductive?

Grace was also kind enough to amend the mistakes in my pattern (because I am too lazy). You can check out more pics and the amended pattern here. I am almost tempted to make another one for myself, except right now I must invest all of my free time into a ambitious conceptual cake making contest that is taking place tomorrow, the thought of which is making my braaiin hurrrtt... watch for updates soon.

guitar hero cake

2007-03-25T23:51:00.001+01:00

Mmmmmmmmm...Guitar Hero Cake. Devoured moments after this photo was taken by hungry revellers, in celebration of Matt's Birthday. I made it for Matt because he is better at Guitar Hero than I am, and I wanted him to ~~think~~ know that I am cool with that, and that there are no hard feelings and it doesn't bother me at all. I'm glad, in fact. Gladgladglad.

Guitar Hero cake was inspired by an old book called 'Cake Magic' that I found in a charity shop a while ago. It contains a mind boggling assortment of vigorously buttercreamed cakes - including shoe cake (a cakey shoe?) a space station, a piano and a guitar, which I used as the basis for my cake. I like this variation on the classic 'face cake'...

...and this awesome typewriter cake.

The typewriter is my favourite. It's really only a matter of time before somebody makes a Speak n Spell cake. I don't want to think about that at the moment though. I have eaten a lot of cake in the last 48 hours and I need to go and lie down for a bit.

dalek egg

2007-03-14T15:51:00.000Z

Eggs, eh? They're funny aren't they? Well I think they are. Not actual eggs, you understand, just the word egg. Egg egg egg.

This post is partially inspired by my good friend JC and his bitterly disappointing experience upon discovering that his large Cadbury's Creme Egg Easter egg was in fact hollow, and not crammed full of delicious fondant. I think we've all been there. In fact, listen up, eggmongers - we're not gonna take your lame hollow eggs any more! What's the point? Oooooh, a chocolate egg WITH NOTHING INSIDE! It's not good enough!

I went into Marks & Spencers the other day, right, to gaze wistfully at the cakes - it's a hobby of mine. Anyway, imagine my tremendous excitement when I happened upon a Dalek shaped box amongst the Easter eggs. Bloody hell, I thought, A CHOCOLATE DALEK! How good is that! Now I know you're all getting excited about this, but seriously, don't bother. Because, on closer inspection, it wasn't a chocolate Dalek at all - it was another shitting hollow egg in a Dalek shaped box. WTF is that all about? I mean what is that even supposed to be? A Dalek Egg?

Shove it up yer arse, Marks & Spencers. There's gonna be a lot of disappointed children this Easter.

rob hubbard - master of magic

2007-03-09T14:56:00.000Z

Rob Hubbard is from Hull. He used to write music for computer games back in the 1980s. He also used to have a moustache. This self-taught musical maverick of the games industry is my newest hero.

The Commodore 64, when it was released in 1982, boasted a pretty sophisticated synthesiser chip. With an 8 octave range, its 3 voices were independently programmable, enabling you to cook up pretty much any sound imaginable - from harpsichords and flutes to barking dogs & explosions.

But as a compositional platform, it was by no means without limitations. Its 3 voice output meant that only 3 notes could be played at the same time. Even more importantly, composing music on the C64 the way Rob Hubbard worked involved writing reams & reams of code. Each note had to have numerical value assigned to it for pitch, waveform, volume, length, etc. For example, here's the code required to make a shooting sound:

10 V=54296 : W=54276 : A=54277 : H=54273 : L=54272
20 FOR X = 15 TO 0 STEP -1 : POKE V,X : POKE W,129:
POKE A,15 : POKE H,40 : POKE L,200 : NEXT
30 POKE W,0 : POKE A,0

This snippet of code produces just ONE note, played once. Imagine writing enough of this stuff to make a 10 minute, polyphonic, rhythmically complex piece of music. That's how Rob Hubbard rolled. His mad skills forged new ground in gaming audio - his compositions sometimes frantic, sometimes progressively epic & compelling - perfect video game music.

But don't be all rushing out to HMV and trying to buy the latest Rob Hubbard CD. The internets being what it is, these crunchy golden nuggets are only a click away.

Hark at the medieval mystery of The Master of Magic, the Jean Michel Jarre inspired One Man and his Droid, and the classic 'chase' theme from Monty On the Run. Then, if you still haven't had enough, here's the theme from Commando, and the full 10 minutes of International Karate. I love this stuff. But it gets better! Because, working with fellow composer Jeroen Tel & the Netherlands-based Ricciotti ensemble, Rob Hubbard recently scored some of these pieces for what was to become the C64 Orchestra. (Click the link & scroll down for recordings of the orchestral versions, plus a really interesting video of the rehearsals, featuring both composers talking about their early game music.) I find this kind of thing really exciting. I'm not just talking about any old cover version - it has to break new ground in genre-spanning for me to be interested. In fact, I haven't been so excited since I heard The Leland Stanford Junior University Marching Band do that version of 'Roundabout'.

Loads more Rob Hubbard tracks are available at The High Voltage SID collection. You'll need to go here to download sidplay2/w - don't be scared, it's a tiny bit of software that will enable you to play SID files. Then follow this link for the Rob Hubbard archive at HVSC. It seems like a bit of an effort, but I assure you it's worth it for such aural delights as 'Zoids', 'Sanxion' and my personal favourite, 'Shockway Rider', which I listened to for a full 45 minutes before realising it was on a loop.

So there you go. The music of Rob Hubbard, ladies & gentlemen. You can't dance to it, and it wouldn't go down well if you put it on in the pub. But there's nothing quite like it and, in all likelihood, there never will be again. Hats off, everyone.

glove dog

2007-02-15T23:59:00.000Z

Glove dog was a Xmas present from Matt, who made him for me as a surprise. BEST PRESENT EVER. Look at him! He's a dog! And he's made out of a pair of gloves! I bet his insides are warm.

knitted slash

2007-02-13T18:25:00.000Z

Finishing Slash has made me sad and happy at the same time. Happy, because he has taken me SO BLOODY LONG, and now, finally, I can get on and make something else. Sad, because now he's finished, I don't really want him to go...

Tomorrow is HOT FUZZ day! At last, I get to feast my eyes on what was surely destined to be an absolute classic from the very moment of its conception. I am peeing my pants with excitement, although probably not as much as schmemma was last week, when she got to see it A FULL WEEK before everybody else! And she got to meet Edgar & Simon! GAHHHHHHH!!!

magic hat

2007-01-26T15:46:00.000Z

If you are feeling old, you could do a lot worse than to pull on a wooly hat and pay a visit to the new Co-op on Cowley Road in Oxford, where, for the price of a bottle of Cava, you can confuse the youth behind the counter into thinking that you are under 18, eliciting a flat refusal to serve you without any ID.

Then even after you have explained your real age, a figure so alarmingly high that nobody in their right mind would believe that you could be making it up, the realisation will slowly dawn on you that there's a very good chance you will be leaving the shop empty handed.

Of course, if you actually want to drink the booze, you must ensure that you take along some friends who are, like, 7 years younger than you and still actually have to carry ID around, so they can buy it for you. (Note to youth behind counter - if you sell alcohol to someone (my friend V) who intends to supply it to a minor (me), you are still technically breaking the law.) Otherwise, it goes from being hilariously funny to being some kind of nightmarish scenario in which one can no longer just go into a shop and buy whatever one wants from off the shelves AT THE AGE OF 32.

Coming up next: Read about how I wear my magic wooly hat and attempt to get on the bus for half price! The hat is not for sale, sorry.

stop the clock

2007-01-13T17:12:00.000Z

Computer programmer & all-round gaming wizard Brian Green has come up with the goods - he reached number one on The Biz, and has sent me the screenshots to prove it. Here he is at no.1 with 'Restless' by Psychokids:

Even more excitingly, here is the winning screen which features a secret code to send off to Virgin Games in order to claim your prize. I have blurred out the code a little bit, so none of you can steal the glory which rightly belongs to Brian:

With his achievement coming 23 years after the game was first published, Brian was not convinced that the competition would still be open. I, on the other hand, simply cannot let this lie.

Having been unable to unearth any previous winner during my research into the game, I believe there is every chance that the prize was never claimed. And so, with Brian's permission, I shall be writing to Virgin Games on his behalf to see if we can't claim his prize. Watch this space.

welcome to the future

2007-01-04T13:19:00.000Z

This year I shall be wearing only silver clothes and eating food in pellet form, dispensed from a slot in the wall.

this game is the biz

2006-12-19T02:19:00.000Z

I love simulation games. I also have something of a soft spot for the ZX Spectrum. So imagine how late I stayed up when I discovered 'The Biz - The ultimate game for the frustrated or budding rock star'. Let's just say I stayed up extremely late, and leave it at that.

The game was written in 1984 by musician Chris Sievey, (whose alter-ego just so happens to be Frank Sidebottom) frontman of 80's band 'The Freshies'. Personally, I'd never heard of them, but with songs like "If you really love me, buy me a shirt" and "I'm in love with the girl on the Virgin Manchester Megastore checkout desk" I'm pretty sure they can't be all that bad.

Your goal, obviously, is to become the greatest band in the UK, and make it to the top of the charts. You will notice the cassette inlay above says that the first person to do so will win the chance to 'record and appear on stage with Chris Sievey'. I desperately want to be that person.

So away I go. After careful consideration, I decide to name my band 'Meanderpede'. We are on the dole, living in a Leeds squat. Our musical direction is 'screamo'. I phone my agent and he offers me a gig at the local disco, for which we will get paid £14. This doesn't seem like a bad offer, so I accept. He offers us another gig, but it's at a scout hut in Swindon, so we turn it down in favour of a much needed rehearsal. And so it goes on for the next few (virtual) weeks as we desperately try to earn enough money to get into the recording studio. It's a rocky road. The lead guitarist gets sacked, we crash our van and the band regularly spend hefty chunks of our hard-earned cash on haircuts. But eventually we are getting somewhere. We hire a manager and the money starts trickling in.

Off to the studio we go, where we record our first single - an electro version of the theme from 'Crimewatch'. I am absolutely confident that this will take us straight to the top. A few weeks later we optimistically have 10,000 copies pressed. Our manager gets us a spot on a local radio station, and we put a few posters up around town. The single storms into the charts at number 186. Three weeks later our manager gets us a spot on Razmatazz on Tyne Tees, but it's too little, too late. The very same week, our single 'stiffs' and we are left with 8838 unsold copies. Our manager is clearly a useless bastard, so we pay a lawyer £4000 to absolve us of our contractual obligations.

It's around this time that I realise there's no way of saving the game, and I'm not about to abandon it now, not after I've just spent £1400 on clothes and a dry ice machine to increase our stage presence, no way. So I settle down for the long haul.

To cut a long story short, we never made it to number one. The best I managed was number 34 with the single 'Peggy Babcock', which even had a video to go with it. We were on standby for Top of the Pops, appeared on the cover of 'The Face', recorded a Peel Session and even made an appearance on Cheggers plays Pop - surely the highlight of our career. But then, alas, I made the mistake of accepting drugs off a groupie, which inevitably led to a heroin addiction that saw the band spiral into obscurity - we were dropped by our label and some of the band became suicidal. So I went to bed, and that was the end of Meanderpede.

I haven't been able to find out whether anybody actually claimed the no.1 prize. But I did read in an interview that even Chris Sievey himself never made it into the top 10, and he wrote the game. Surprisingly, this hasn't put me off in the slightest. I declare this the greatest Spectrum game since Skool Daze, and that's really saying something.

But don't just take my word for it! Get on over to World of Spectrum where you can play an online JavaScript emulation to your heart's content. Be warned though, it's rather addictive. And if you get on Top of the Pops, do let me know.

UPDATE: On New Year's Eve I was gleefully informed by Monsieur Axl Schmaxl that he had managed to storm his way up the chart to the lofty heights of number four. NUMBER 4!

Of course, I didn't believe him at first, but he'd anticipated my envious doubting by taking a photo to prove it. So feast your eyes on HUMAN SHIELD and their number 4 hit 'nascardeath'. As you can see, he had to be quick taking the photo because Darth Vader was sneaking up on him from behind.

inspiration round up

2006-12-08T01:59:00.000Z

Exciting toy news! Those genius Japanese minimalists Muji have expanded their range of soft toys with these winsome knitted dogs (and a cat):

Must...make.........animals.......... problem is, I have so many projects on the go at the moment, I'm already wondering whether I'm ever actually going to get anything finished ever again. Even so, I am sorely tempted to hack up an old woolly jumper and sew myself a saggy new pet.

The idea of sewing some toys out of old clothes has been on my mind ever since I got my hands on a copy of Japanese craft book Dog? or Zoo? (ISBN 4767801354). All the animals in this book started out as items of clothing or household objects. There's a mule made out of an old hat, dogs made out of jeans & gloves & mopheads, a lion made from a scarf, and a rabbit made from a woolly pompom hat, plus loads more.

I particularly like the idea of making gloves into dogs. I'm thinking that I'd like to spend the winter collecting up lost gloves that have been stuck on railings, and making them into stray dogs to be put back in their place. In fact, I am liking this idea so much that I am probably definitely going to do it. Probably.

the following post contains mild sarcasm

2006-12-01T13:32:00.000Z

I was at work, trying to find out if there are any sex scenes in 'Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas' (it's my JOB, I tell you), when I suddenly remembered the marvellously entertaining website kids-in-mind. This is a parental resource site that analyses film content, essentially boiling it down to ONLY the sex, nudity, violence, gore and profanity - each instance of which is expanded upon in great detail. Are you with me so far? These reviews cut out everything except the GOOD bits, and it makes for hilarious reading.

Thinking of settling your kids in front of the TV to watch 'Barney's Great Adventure'? You may change your mind after you discover the hidden horrors of the narrative:

"Barney and the kids ... are trying to recover a mysterious egg which is in danger of getting cracked numerous times. A runaway chariot runs into a clown. Reckless driving and property damage."

Now, a runaway chariot running over a clown does sound appealing, but the egg thing? That would just be too much for me. I'll be steering clear of this one.

Wondering whether to let your kids watch 'Superman Returns'? Only if you want to warp their tiny little minds with outright FILTH:

"A woman says, "I've done Superman" not meaning sexually but people listening misunderstand ... It is suggested that a man and a woman have had a sexual relationship in the past ... A man burps."

CALL THE POLICE!! A man and a woman may have had a sexual relationship in the past! Scrub my eyes, someone! SCRUB MY EYES!

Things really start to hot up when we try to decide whether 'Shaun of the Dead' is suitable toddler fodder, only to discover that during the course of the movie:

"Many zombies crowd toward several people ... A man flatulates several times ... A man is hit in the forehead with a crumpled beer can ... A man lunges at a man and yells at him. A man and a woman argue, and a man yells at a man."

Is many zombies crowding toward several people worse than a few zombies crowding toward not many people? I can't process this information. My brain is melting. 'A man yells at a man'?? does that really matter after we have witnessed a man and a man beating two zombies to death with a spade and a cricket bat? Does any of that stuff matter? I DON'T THINK IT DOES, DOES IT?

The slackers amongst you might find it heartening to know that the 'moral' of Shaun of the Dead is that 'Taking charge of extreme situations with nonchalance may help you get the girl in the end.' Oh yeah.

I've saved the best until last here, because 'The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie' scores 4/10 for violence & gore, and 3/10 for sex & nudity. I don't really know how to describe the synopsis that follows. I mean, really. Imagine someone turning up to a meeting and pitching this as a storyline:

"A starfish has a crush on a mermaid and tells her that she's 'hot.' A starfish wears fishnet thigh-high stockings and black boots and a sponge stands beneath his legs singing. A starfish asks a mermaid if she wants to see his underwear... A sponge brushes a squid's back in a shower. A starfish puts something in his pants that causes a large protrusion in the back. A sponge pulls a starfish's pants down (we see bare buttocks). A starfish with no pants carries a flag with the stick between his bare buttocks. We see a starfish with no pants (bare buttocks are exposed). The back of a sponge's pants falls open revealing his bare buttocks .... We see a sponge in his underpants."

Hang on a minute - we see a SPONGE IN HIS UNDERPANTS? Shouldn't there be some kind of warning on the box? But wait! Before you deny your offspring the opportunity to witness a sponge slapping a crab, or a henchman pulling the lips off of two fish, consider the message this movie has to offer. Namely:

"Even without possessing any hint of intelligence or any talent, you can still succeed if you try."

It just warms my heart.

commando a gogo

2006-11-23T13:39:00.000Z

Foolish cycle thieves! Strike me down, and I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine! That's right everyone, danger has a NEW name and that name is RALEIGH COMMANDO.

The Raleigh Commando was launched in 1973, along with the 'Commando Star', a single speed camouflaged version with a Grifter seat. The Commando features 3 speed twist-grip gear change, sissy bar, chopper seat, and chrome mud/chain guards. Originally available only in jet black, I believe it was later produced in orange & pink, although they may have had smaller frames.

Here is a picture of the actual bike that arrived in the post today, finally giving my postman a justifiable reason to ring the doorbell:

It's not quite ready to hit the streets just yet - being rather in need of some new tyres, a good rub down to remove the surface rusting, and an all-round oily tune up. Overall though, it's in good condition considering its age - the only thing missing is the rear reflector.

Unbelievably, this bike cost a paltry £20.51. Like many of these classic Raleigh models like the Wildcat, Vektar, Bomber etc. it doesn't appear to be particularly collectable. In fact, I saw a Grifter in better condition than mine sell for £26 the other day, so there's a fairly good chance I'll be getting another one in the future - that bike holds a special place in my heart.

So there we go. Once again, my bike is better than yours. In your face, everybody.

long gone lonesome blues

2006-11-07T03:21:00.000Z

It is with a heavy heart that I must announce that my beloved Raleigh Grifter and I have parted company, after it was stolen from my house on Saturday. You may or may not know that I was rather attached to that bike - some might say more than a normal amount. But screw them! Because if loving that bike was wrong, then I don't want to be right, and I feel that under the circumstances it is only appropriate that I should send my trusty two-wheeled compadre off into the world with a befitting eulogy.

Dear Bike

For 2 years and 5 months you have been my faithful companion, up and down roads and hills, across fields, over and under bridges, through parks and red lights and puddles, and on pavements. There was never a day when I wasn't delighted to see you, with your scratched up old red frame and your bitchin' yellow BMX tyres. You had no rear mudguard, but even when you sprayed muddy water up my back all those times, I could never stay mad at you for long.

Do you remember that time when a policeman on a mountain bike pulled up alongside us at a junction & told me that my bike was illegally cool? Oh how we laughed...particularly because he had actually said no such thing...more along the lines of how it was a nice bike and where did I get it from etc. but we both knew that's what he meant to say.

Sometimes I would park you outside shopping centres and then forget where I left you. My heart would skip a beat as I frantically scanned the rows of bike racks & lamp posts, panicking at the thought that you wouldn't be there. But you were always there, you big kidder, and we'd share a hearty joke about what a durbrain I am, before saddling up and riding home for a cup of tea (for me) and a vigorous rub-down with an old sock (for you).

But now you are really gone, and I can only hope that wherever you end up, someone will love you as much as I did. You are as ancient and battered as Old B.O.B - your brakes don't work, you have bent spokes and you sometimes make a screeching noise at high speeds. I hope you won't be left out in the rain.

Bike, in my heart there is a glimmer of hope that someday we shall be re-united - misty visions in my mind of us running towards each other in slow motion, me gathering your bony steel frame into my arms and spinning you around and around, planting happy kisses on your rubbery yellow tyres. I will never stop looking for you, bike.

And so with great sadness, I must say goodbye, old-timer. It wasn't supposed to end like this, but damn, we had some good times didn't we? Yeah we did, and I wouldn't have missed it for the world.

Your friend,

Han

evil postman

2006-10-03T14:52:00.000+01:00

For some reason, the postman refuses to put things in my outside mailbox. In fact, he has taken to buzzing the intercom to announce the arrival of even the smallest of packages. It goes like this:

(8.37 am) BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ!!!!!!!!!!

Me: (shambleshambleshamble) "Hello?"

Evil Postman: "Hello........Hannah Simpson?"

Me: "Yep"

Evil Postman: "Yeah, I've got a small packet for you. It'll fit through the letterbox though."

Me: (in my mind) "Well if it will fit through the bloody letterbox, then why don't you just put it in my MAILBOX and stop waking me up in what is, technically, still the MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT you freakin IDIOT? Jesus."

Me: (out loud) "Ok then - thanks" (shuffles off back to bed)

Thanks? THANKS FOR WHAT? Dammit! The evil postman knows that he has the upper hand in this situation, because under NO CIRCUMSTANCES must you make the postman cross, otherwise he will unceremoniously fling your post into a river. He knows it, and I know it, and I know that he knows that I know it. The evil postman could parade through my bedroom every morning with a marching band in tow, and I would still thank him on his way out. He is playing me like a tambourine, and I am powerless to stop him. I mean, what's going to be next? This?:

(8.37 am) BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ!!!!!!!!!!

Me: (shambleshambleshamble) "Hello?"

Evil Postman: "Hello........Hannah Simpson?"

Me: "Yep"

Evil Postman: "Yeah, I haven't got anything for you today"

Me: "Ok then, thanks"

Evil Postman: "See you tomorrow"

girlie test - part II

2006-09-14T03:08:00.000+01:00

I have trapped a huge spider under a mug. It took me 10 seconds of deep breathing to summon the courage to lunge forth and deposit the mug on top. Then I did that dance, where you hop from foot to foot, limply flapping your hands at chest level. I did the very same dance the time I trod on a dead blue tit that the cat had brought in, in my bare feet.

There's no way I'm going near it again, so it will have to stay there until morning. It's a glass mug. I watched it going mental in there for a bit, but it now it's just sitting there. Or standing, I can't tell. It looks mad. I think it might be plotting something. I have to keep looking at it every 30 seconds to make sure it hasn't lifted the mug up with its razor sharp mandibles. There was a bit of tea left in the mug, so at least it's got something to drink. Do spiders drink tea?

This is no good. I'm going to have to go to bed, where I shall lie awake and worry about spiders going in my ears while I'm asleep, and controlling my mind like those ear-worms in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. Then I shall eventually drift off into a restless and uneasy sleep until a MAN can come along & save the day. Result: FAIL.

girlie test

2006-08-26T22:45:00.000+01:00

Every now and again, when nobody's looking, I like to watch a 'chick flick' to keep myself on my toes. The idea behind such a test is that if I find myself enjoying it then I have at last become a true 'girl' and must immediately start wearing a bonnet & giggling flirtatiously.

Tonight's test was 'Little Voice'. 35 minutes of this nauseating rags to riches pile of shit was enough to make me grow a beard & throw my TV out of the window. Then I shotgunned a beer and battered my wife. Result: PASS.

no commercial potential

2006-08-24T03:36:00.000+01:00

The entire Frank Zappa catalogue has vanished inexplicably from iTunes. It was there a few weeks ago, and now POOF! Nothing. Do you hear me? NOTHING!! Not even Hot Rats!! I don't get it. 48 albums, all gone, just like that. I can't begin to tell you how disappointed I am.

One of the reasons that people find Zappa's music so inaccessible is that there is so much of it - it's practically impossible to know where to start. It makes me laugh whenever I see a 'Best Of' compilation, because there's really no such thing. You have to find your own way through the Zappa universe - a daunting task when you're standing in a record shop staring at 20 albums you've never even heard of.

The availability of practically all of his work on iTunes blew the doors to the world of FZ wide open. At last it was possible to have a real good poke around in there - comparing the many different versions of his songs and permutations of his band. For me, it was one of iTunes' greatest resources, and I can't think for the life of me why they would delete it.

You wanna know what makes this even worse? 'The Real Frank Zappa Book' contains a 'proposal for a system to replace phonograph record merchandising', written in 1983, in which he makes the following statement:

We propose to acquire the rights to digitally duplicate and store THE BEST of every record company's difficult-to-move Quality Catalogue Items [Q.C.I], store them in a central processing location, and have them accessible by phone or cable TV, directly patchable into the user's home taping appliances, with the option of direct digital-to-digital transfer...

...All accounting for royalty payments, billing to the customer, etc. would be automatic, built into the initial software for the system.

Do you see where I'm going with this? FRANK ZAPPA INVENTED iTUNES!!! WITH HIS MIND!! And now, according to their database, one of the most visionary & prolific musical artists of our time DOESN'T EVEN EXIST!!

Zappa would probably have been delightfully amused at this ironic twist of fate, but I'm not. So SCREW YOU iTunes, you'll never get another penny out of me for as long as I live. May there be SNAKES ON YOUR PLANE.

at last...

2006-08-21T13:08:00.000+01:00

...my six-month knitting hiatus is over. Whew! For a while there, I was worried I'd lost me mojo.

Somebody out there knows who this is, and has been waiting patiently for news of his construction. So here you go. He has already made a friend.

I am busting to get him finished, because I have had the BEST IDEA EVER for what's next. You'll just have to wait and see though...

charity bargain du jour

2006-08-18T01:47:00.000+01:00

Behold! As featured on one of my all-time favourite websites, miniorgan, I bring you The Incredible Voice Changer, from Tomy. I picked this up today for an astonishing £1.79.

Still in its box, after 18 years. I could hardly believe my eyes. I mean, who would keep something for that long and then chuck it away?

Someone who could no longer endure the fiendish sounds that this thing produces, that's who. You see, this unit has not aged gracefully. The only visible signs of deterioration are a corroded battery contact, but lord alone knows what's happened inside. I don't know what it's supposed to sound like but frankly I don't care. The deranged & mental sounds of good electronics gone bad was, quite literally, music to my ears. It produces the kind of noise that would make Aphex Twin run home crying to his mummy.

Somebody up there likes me.

freestyle breakfast biscuits

2006-07-27T12:59:00.000+01:00

Wuzzup y'all! Many hours have I laboured in the research kitchen, perfecting the formula for what is surely the culinary equivalent of the holy grail - biscuits you can justifiably eat for breakfast.

Large quantities of oats were harmed in the making of this recipe, but, as Bill McNeal would say, the final cut has got the mad flavour that takes any situation to the next level, so tighten up your flow with this recipe for the biscuit that'll keep you ugly all night long. DAMN!!!

FREESTYLE BREAKFAST BISCUITS (aka WAKE 'N BAKE BARS)

1 cup porridge oats
1/2 cup plain wholemeal flour
1/2 cup raisins
1 tablespoon soft brown sugar
3 tablespoons tahini paste OR smooth peanut butter
2 tablespoons runny honey
2 teaspoons ginger
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

ANY or ALL of the following (You're freestyling! Rock the microphone!):

1/4 cup sesame seeds
1/4 cup pumpkin seeds
1/4 cup sunflower seeds
1/4 cup rye flakes
1/4 cup chopped nuts (almonds or cashews are best, IMO)
1/4 cup chopped dried fruit (dates, crystallised ginger, apricots, cherries, blah blah blah)

Stick the oven on at about 180C, Gas Mark 4.

Mix all the dry ingredients up in a big bowl. Measure out the wet ingredients into the bowl, and give it a stir. Sprinkle over a couple of tablespoons of hot water, and get brutal with a spoon - give it a good old mash-up.

It's gonna look like spaz at this stage, but don't be disheartened. Just get in there with your hands and work it. You're aiming for something that will hold together without being too sticky. Do whatever it takes! You can add a bit more flour if you feel like it. Use The Force, if needs be - it's the energy field that binds the galaxy together, after all.

Now you'll need a baking tray - I always use non-stick baking parchment to line baking trays, because it totally rules, but greasing it would probably work OK. Probably.
No messing about, dump the whole pile onto the tray, and flatten it out with your hands or a rolling pin. If you wanted to, you could roll it out on a floured surface and cut it into shapes. Because I am pretty lazy, I like to just cut it up into squares right there on the sheet.

Stick the tray in the oven for about 15 minutes, or longer, or shorter, whatever. Serve with chocolate milk or orange juice, and you're done.

I eat these all the time, and they are GOOOOD, kind of like flapjack, only without all the butter & sugar. They only take 10 minutes to make, and they're super cheap. Miraculously, they seem to last for weeks, even if you leave them lying around on the side, like I do. You could probably use one to wedge a door open, or as a rustic paperweight. Or perhaps carry one around in your top pocket, to throw into the face of a potential assailant. They're pretty versatile like that.

refreshment round up - ramune

2006-07-21T18:13:00.000+01:00

Phew! Another ill-advised trip out into the blazing afternoon sunshine saw my dwindling moisture reserves sweated off in no time at all. The bottle of water in my bag was HOT. Only after a trip to Tescos to frantically stock up on orange squash (to make ice lollies), juice, & fizzy water did I remember the icy cold bottle of Ramune sitting at home in my fridge.

I had never heard of Ramune (ra-moo-nay) until yesterday, when I happened upon it in the Chinese supermarket. I was immediately struck by the unusual shape of the bottle - sort of like an alien elephant-bishop wearing a gas mask. There were no clues on the label as to what flavour it was, but a short amount of research at home revealed that it was a Japanese 'lemonade style' fizzy drink.

But that's not all I discovered. You see, there's a reason for the crazy shape. Ramune bottles are sealed with a glass marble, held in place by the pressure of the CO2. To open it, you have to push the marble back down into the bottle (with a loud POP), where it will then remain for all eternity, rattling around. Awesome! I even found instructions. Oh, how I love instructions...

If I'd known how much fun it was going to be, I'd have bought more. Cold pop sprayed out all over the place, leaving me no choice but to hang out of the window until it subsided. What an amateur. But check it out! There's the marble! Woooooo!

Original flavour Ramune doesn't taste like lemonade at all. It's more like bubblegum, only less sweet, and very refreshing. The indentations in the bottle neck hold the marble in place while you drink - it's genius.

You'd be forgiven for thinking that this was some kind of futuristic contraption. In actual fact these bottles have been around for over 100 years, invented by an English cork-manufacturer named Hiram Codd. Old 'Codd-neck' bottles are worth loads of money because of naughty children smashing them to get at the marbles. I'm keeping mine.

this heat is makin me CRAZY

2006-07-18T12:37:00.000+01:00

Damn, it's hot!

Trying to maintain this blog has lately started to feel like carrying the burden of the one ring to Mordor. It is a rabid, slavering St. Bernard, circling my hot car. It is a black Peterbilt tanker truck, chasing me through the desert. It's a bomb on my bus, an alien gestating in my stomach, a vengeful psychopath clinging on to the underside of my car. Get away from me, blog! WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME????!!!

Over the course of the next few weeks, I intend to beat it into submission with some truly arbitrary old-school drivel, just like the good old days. It will be a light beating, as I don't want to over-exert myself in this heat. Damn!

Anyway, last week I went camping and a fox stole my sausages from outside my tent while I was sleeping off some strong local cider. It was pretty hot then, too. Damn!

Then last night I saw a fox out of my kitchen window, legging it off into the hospice vegetable patch. It all happened so fast, I didn't get chance to take a picture. Here's one I took 5 minutes ago instead, to help you imagine. You'll have to imagine the fox, too, because it's too damn hot to Photoshop one in. Damn!

Look how HOT it is out there! Hot damn!

I am taking a break from knitting stuff, because the thought of handling wool in this weather makes me want to hurl myself into a vat of liquid nitrogen.

windowbox poppies

2006-06-30T11:00:00.000+01:00

confessions of an compulsive hoarder

2006-06-15T15:11:00.001+01:00

I have a large collection of musical instruments in my house, including an almost embarrassing number of keyboards. These include a Casio MT-100, salvaged from a skip outside my house, a Cavendish model 1500 easy play organ from the junk shop down the road, my trusty Casio VL-1 (VL-Tone) 'synthesiser' that I got for Christmas when I was 7, the bulky Yamaha Portatone PSR-4500 that got me through my A-Level music, and a toy grand piano which I bought in a moment of madness off eBay.
But there's more! I have 3 descant recorders, 1 tenor recorder, a miniature accordion, a collection of crazy 'folk' instruments made out of gourds & bamboo, pan-pipes, ocarinas, a jews harp, glockenspiel, bongos, a guitar, a turkish 'saz' and, of course, the Rosedale Electric Chord Organ in case I feel like busting out a few sea shanties, which is more often than I'd care to admit. Oh, and a collection of those animal noise canisters that you tip upside down - I have them in cat, cow, sheep & bird. That's percussion, right?
I clearly have a problem, and there's no cure in sight. I am constantly on the look out for more. I NEED a thumb piano, melodica, stylophone, fender rhodes, sopranino recorder, set of hand bells, vibraphone, theremin, tubular bells, a bikelophone, a tibetan singing bowl and a massive gong (for dinner time). I'm not sure how much longer I can live without these essentials.
And now, via Music Thing, my obsession turns to these ToyQuest instruments, produced in conjunction with Blue Man Group:

What is it about toy instruments that makes them so appealing? These look AWESOME! Them there tubes are motion sensor devices (like a theremin?), and that little green drawer slides out to reveal a freakin' iPod dock, for jamming along to Emerson Lake & Palmer. Swoon!

antique look toys to enchant you

2006-05-31T16:27:00.000+01:00

How great is this? A huge collection of photos of battered, threadbare, sorry-looking old stuffed toys, from the Mad Mad Crafter on Flickr. (Via WAWAYA).

These are just a few of my favourites.

I have a particular fondness for toys that look deranged and/or angry. I actually own the world's angriest looking stuffed toy, Humphrey, a motheaten squashed up hippopotamus that my brother & I used to fight over. I'll post a picture of him one day, in all his furious glory. Or should that be glorious fury?

what noise do giraffes make? can you cry underwater? is chubb fat? do flies sleep? am I gay? what creature has an eye bigger than its brain?

2006-05-19T14:12:00.000+01:00

It's a little known fact that I graduated from university with a degree in music, mainly because I have never done anything with it. That ungrateful qualification cost me upwards of five grand and hasn't earned me a single penny in as many years. Until today.
I have got the best job ever. Should I be talking about my job on here?? ...mech... I am working for a text-messaging service that can answer any question you have within minutes. Any question! About anything! It's pretty impressive, even if I do say so myself.
So far I have fielded nearly 700 questions, from "Will you be my friend?" and "Watchoo talkin' about Willis?" to "What monkeys can swim, and for how far?" and "Which is superior - bacon or ham? Give reasons". It's soooo much fun.
The best part about it, as if it wasn't good enough already, is that I can work whenever I want. From home. At any hour of the day or night. I don't even have to get dressed. It really is the BEST JOB EVER.
The final cherry on this creamy cake of self-satisfaction came this afternoon, when I logged on to see that someone wanted to know what key the theme from Bergerac was in, and could we please transcribe the chords from the bridge section?
If you can think of any better way for me to spend my time than pounding out the theme from Bergerac on a Casio VL-tone with a pencil in my mouth, then I'd like to hear it. THIS is what my whole life has been leading up to. I have made it.

HE IS HUNTING FOR YOU

2006-04-19T02:50:00.000+01:00

As far as I'm concerned, the 1980's was truly the golden age of home computing. No need to worry about your computer getting in with the wrong crowd and going off the rails, or hooking up with other computers behind your back and conspiring to fuck you over. No! You merely brainwashed that bad boy into submission with a few minutes of whiny tape-recorded noise, and (eventually, if you were lucky) you were away.
In the first few months following our family's procurement of a Sinclair ZX81, we hammered out game after silent game of Tower Of Hanoi, Racetrack and Chase, blissfully unaware of what lay in wait. Because the emergence of a 16K RAM pack brought with it an advancement in 3D gaming technology that would chill me to the very core. Oh yeah. I'm talking about 3D Monster Maze.

Nothing in my previous gaming experience had even remotely prepared me for the overwhelming fear this game instilled in me. It went like this; as you roamed the maze in search of escape, Rex would hunt you down, his status indicated on screen with ominous shouty caps messages. HE HAS SEEN YOU. RUN! HE IS BEHIND YOU! Oh Jesus, no!
By the time you clapped eyes on him it was too late, as he smashed through the TV screen, bursting your skull like a ripe melon with his powerful jaws and ripping your face to bloody shreds in a final, merciful act of sweet relief from the unbearable suspense.
All of which leads me to a confession. Having received a copy of Resident Evil 4 for my birthday last week, the disc has yet to make it into the machine. I am too scared to put it on. Having soldiered my way through the first three (I skipped Code: Veronica) I am more than qualified to kick this game's ass. But instead it has struck the first blow with its powerful, insurmountable hurdle of dread. And so the game is already afoot. Now that's what I call value for money.

like a sandwich of fun on ecstasy bread

2006-04-17T17:25:00.000+01:00

I implore you, for the love of all that is good and right in the world, to get on over to Working Title Films and check out the Hot Fuzz video diaries. I was rabidly excited when I discovered these last night, and you should be too. This film is going to rule!

better. stronger. faster.

2006-04-13T15:31:00.000+01:00

My computer is working. WORKING I tell you! Not only that, but it has been augmented with cybernetic parts, giving it superhuman strength and speed. Together my computer and I shall fight injustice wherever it is found.

I am back, people.

some facts about Tom Savini

2006-03-18T13:20:00.000Z

Eagle-eyed fans of DOTD were right to enquire about the omission of Tom Savini's character from my knitted set of Dawn of the Dead figures. What was I thinking!
When a fan of the movie contacted me a few months ago to tell me he had printed out some pictures of my knitted characters to show to the cast at a convention, I started to panic. He later informed me that he had seen Tom at the convention, but not spoken to him. He had, however, shown the pictures to Gaylen Ross and a few other cast members. These things get around, you know, and I convinced myself that Savini had noted my glaring oversight and would be coming after me to chop me in the head with a machete, like I deserved.
But, so far, he has yet to drive his motorcycle through my front door... so without further ado, I present to you my knitted tribute to Tom Savini.

Tom Savini is surely one of the coolest guys ever to grace the movie industry. As well as executing his own kick-ass stunts, he can whip up a bloodbath of special effects at a moment's notice, makes up a mean zombie, holds his own as an actor, and even directed a decent re-make of 'Night of the Living Dead' in 1990.
The time I was unfortunate enough to find myself watching 'Children of the Living Dead', I switched it off in disgust as soon as Deputy Hughs croaked. Not because this was The Worst Film I Have Ever Seen, but because the bottom line is this - Tom Savini may kill you, but you may not kill Tom Savini. He's THE MAN, plain and simple. If you don't believe me, check out the facts:

Tom Savini can deflect a roundhouse kick from Chuck Norris with the glare from his machete.
When Tom Savini chops an onion (with his machete), the onion cries.
There is no chin behind Tom Savini's beard. Only another fist. Holding a machete.
Tom Savini can fold a piece of paper in half infinity times.
Tom Savini sleeps with a pillow under his machete.
Tom Savini can derive Euclid's fifth postulate from the other four, merely by threatening them with his machete.
When programming a computer, Tom Savini does not need to write a C++ string to slice off a target value by the size of the base type - he uses a machete.
Tom Savini broke the mountain's back in 'Brokeback Mountain'. With his machete.
Tom Savini eats little pieces of shit* like you for breakfast. Or something.

*Tom Savini definitely does not eat little pieces of shit. Ever.

good fortune happy lucky big time for you and family

2006-01-31T15:44:00.000Z

That lucky cat seems to be working out pretty well for me. This afternoon I returned home to find a brand new iPod nano had arrived in the post - a present from my brother. The ironic thing is that it's actually his birthday today and I have neglected to send him a card, on account of the fact that I don't know where he lives at the moment. I do know for a fact that he's out today planting the Simpson flag on top of Mt. Snowdon, so HAPPY BIRTHDAY BRO.
In other exciting acquisition news, I finally managed to get my hands on one of Ping's amazing dolls - WAWA #17.

I am such a big fan of WAWAYA - everything Ping makes is just so full of character. Check out more of her work here. If you think they're cute in the photos, you really should see one in real life. Extraordinary!

I start my new job tomorrow, managing a pub I don't like. I haven't worked full time for nearly a year, and I'm so skint. Luckily, I'm on a temporary contract until the end of July - though at the moment it feels like I'm about to embark on a 6 month prison sentence, only with more booze.

the darkest day of horror the world has ever knit

2006-01-24T15:53:00.000Z

Hot on the heels of Dawn of the Dead comes a vastly under-rated, seriously 80's, special effects extravaganza. Gone are those fresh faced vivid blue zombies - in their place are some truly rotten, decaying specimens capable of ripping a man's legs clean off.
The star of the underground military action has to be Dr 'Frankenstein' Logan's prize undead specimen, Bub, in whom we see the beginning stages of the zombie evolution that will eventually lead 'Big Daddy' to Fiddler's Green. Say hello to your Aunt Alicia! It's DAY OF THE DEAD!

more pics here

These guys sold before I had chance to finish writing this post and, as always, I'll be sorry to see them go. BUT! I am waiting for a very exciting package from Tokyo which should be here in a few days. All will be revealed when it arrives..

lumpy

2006-01-23T14:50:00.001Z

Lumpy is an ex-donkey, now transported from the realms of our collective unconscious to the lofty heights of Unicorndom, thanks to the addition of a magical horn.

Here Lumpy can be seen gaily frolicking on some knitted baubles that I made for my Christmas tree (even though I was too lazy to actually put the tree up this year).
NEXT UP: more zombies!! The obsession continues!

lucky day

2006-01-16T18:11:00.000Z

I found this Japanese lucky cat - maneki neko - in a charity shop for 99p!

harry whittier frees

2006-01-08T23:25:00.000Z

It was while I was doing my Xmas shopping that I stumbled across this book featuring the photography of Harry W Frees.

There seems to have been something of a resurgence of dressing animals in clothes lately, for example here and here and here and here (although I'm not sure if that last one really counts).
Harry Frees' pioneered the art - his career in animal photography took off at the turn of the 20th century when his pictures first appeared on novelty postcards and calendars. Often using his own cats, Rags and Fluff, as well as the pets (dogs, pigs, rabbits & birds) of his friends and neighbours, he spent many painstaking hours setting up and photographing the scenes.

Frees utilised specially designed outfits, sewn by his mother, to hold the animals in standing poses, and as time went on, his props and scenarios became more and more elaborate. His work was made into story books for children, some of which he wrote himself. These books continued to be published after his death in 1953, with some of his pictures being colourized for the modern market.

There's something incredibly woeful and dark about these portraits, which to my mind makes them all the more fascinating, because I imagine that the intention of the artist was quite the opposite. That something created to bring joy to children could eventually become so amusingly unacceptable and mildly disturbing is surely one of the more interesting aspects of how the evolution of social convention can alter the way we perceive an image.

party animals

2006-01-05T23:45:00.000Z

Happy New Year! The party season may be all but over, but that hasn't stopped me. I'm keeping it going with these delicious Japanese butter flavoured Ginbis Party Animal Biscuits, which I got for Christmas.

Now your standard box of Cadbury's animal biscuits contains merely five types of animal - lion, tiger, monkey, hippo and elephant. Ginbis, on the other hand, cram an impressive 45 different species into their range, including rat, peafowl, tortoise, pigeon, horn-owl and polar bear - the names are printed onto the biscuits for ease of identification.

While we're on an animal tip, I'll throw you a sneak preview of my first sewing project:

He should be finished tomorrow, so completed pics will be up very soon. Sewing toys is so much fun. It's really exciting to turn them inside out (or should that be the right way out?) and see what you've made.

BTW, my website is up and running! Woohoo!

when the round round robin goes bob bob bobbing

2005-12-23T19:25:00.000Z

My July dreams of home-made presents for everyone in the family have gently drifted away into the ether. The final nail in the coffin came on Wednesday, when I spent the entire 5 hour coach journey to my Mum & Dad's house sleeping, instead of making my brother a last minute hat as planned. Sorry, dude.
There will be no home made presents for anyone this year. Oh, and no cards either. Sorry everyone. Instead everybody will be enjoying the contemporary Christmas experience, i.e. receiving the hastily chosen, ill-conceived fruits of last minute shopping trips. The lucky recipient of this years most perfunctory gift will be Matt, whose present was chosen earlier today in a record breaking 10 minutes. It's a good job it's not the thought that counts. Oh no, wait.......
Luckily Mum & Dad have got the tree up, the booze in and the entertainment laid on. This includes the world's biggest TV, a mammoth collection of DVD's, 2 working computers and (my favourite) an abundance of those generic letters that people enclose in their Christmas cards so that everyone can share in their annual misfortune.
I'm not sure if my parents' friends are just extremely unlucky or what, but the catalogue of tragedies that have befallen them this year includes, but is not limited to: benign ganglions, bruised faces, failed exams, strokes, relapses resulting in hospitalisation, fights with drunken Scousers, Glandular fever, shattered legs, skin grafts, black eyes and death.
Now correct me if I'm wrong, but I was under the impression that Christmas was supposed to be a time of JOY. 'Ahh' you might be saying, 'A problem shared is a problem halved'. No, actually, a problem shared is a problem all spread around, forcing misery on unwitting card-opening joy-seekers. So herein follows my generic Christmas message to all.

Having a shit time? Keep it to your bloody selves, you doom-mongers! Then I won't have to feel so guilty about having a good old laugh at your expense. Hey, someone's got to enjoy themselves, right?

it's my blog, and I'll cry if I want to

2005-12-17T16:31:00.000Z

Last night I dreamed I beat Vince Noir on an arcade dance machine. He was so mad, he bet me £100 that he could make me cry. I don't recall his methods, but what happened next was that everybody else in the place started crying, yet I remained stolidly composed. Pay up, Vince.
Note to self: Next time you see a copy of Can's Ege Bamyasi on vinyl for £4.99 in Oxfam, you should just buy it straight away instead of hiding it in the 'soundtracks' section and nipping home to look up how much it's worth. Because you'll soon discover it's worth £25-30, and when you go back to get it 10 minutes later it won't be there! ARRRRGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!!!!

the knitted white stripes

2005-12-12T19:03:00.003Z

I just spent the last seventeen minutes having palpitations because I thought that I had broken my blog. This is because of my propensity for tampering with things to the point of destruction - a quality I inherited from my Dad. Have I learned my lesson from this hair-raising episode? Time will tell. Or I can just save you the wait, and tell you that no, I definitely haven't.

I have been taking a break from zombies, but the little folk, they just keep on coming. Last month, after seeing the White Stripes in concert for the first time, I decided that they would make perfect little knitted characters.

Don't worry, there are plenty more zombies to come, as well as some other stuff which I am keeping under wraps for now...
It has been another exciting week for me. Even though I killed most of my remaining brain cells partying hard at ATP's Nightmare Before Christmas*, I recovered enough to drag myself out of bed early on Tuesday morning to take delivery of a shiny new sewing machine! Hooray for Christmas! I must have been good this year! I have promised my Dad I won't use it before Christmas, so for now I must resign myself to just gazing at it wistfully. I can't wait, though!

* I had the best time ever at ATP, but I'm trying to pretend it wasn't that good so that Emma doesn't get too upset that she missed out on the best music festival I have ever been to, ever. EVER. I had such a good time that only 1 out of my 130 photographs turned out good, and not very good at that. If you're interested, it's here.

shaun of the knitted dead

2005-11-29T16:35:00.000Z

It was bound to happen, wasn't it?
Shaun of the Dead is one of the best films ever. EVER. I can't tell you how excited I was when I heard they were making this movie, and the world is a better place because of it. I love you, Edgar and Simon.
This film is like Spaced the Movie, only with ZOMBIES and if you can think of a better combo than that, I would like to hear about it. You can't think of one, can you? That's because there isn't one. Look - if you don't like Shaun of the Dead, there's no way we would ever get along. That's all there is to it.

Click here for the full flickr slideshow. ~~These will be up for sale very shortly.~~ These are up for auction right now! It's a 7 day listing, so there's plenty of time for them to reach you for Christmas. Click here for the auction.

introducing the third monkey in my house to be unimaginatively entitled 'monkey'

2005-11-18T02:47:00.001Z

It's freakin' freezin' around these parts lately, but luckily for monkey I have buckled down and made him a swanky Tam O' Shanter.

Poor monkey has been hatless since August, when he was already overdue for July's MOS project. He also doesn't have a name. I was hoping that maybe one would be forthcoming by the time I finished his hat, but not much is coming to mind. I don't know if that's writers block or all the super-strong Weston's 'Old Rosie' I have imbibed this evening.
Just a short while ago, Rob and I enjoyed a rousing bout of 'Gateaux Gladiators' - a game in which competitors, armed with a spoon, must cram as much cake into one's mouth whilst simultaneously smashing cake off one's opponent's spoon and attempting to scoop it out of their mouth in order that one might eat THE MOST cake and thus become the winner. Things took a turn for the worse however, as both of us inhaled some rather large clumps, and nigh on choked to death whilst not enjoying what was actually quite a delicious chocolate gateaux. Rob nearly died the most though, so I definitely won. Alright!

in which I don't mention the z word, because it's ridiculous

2005-11-07T17:03:00.000Z

As if there weren't enough toys in my house already, what with the growing collection of electronic children's toys I am hoarding for some future circuit bending project (including an original 1978 speak & spell and a talking space explorer), I find myself irresistibly drawn towards this recycled yarn elephant from muji:

So great. He also comes in Cow, Giraffe and Pig. I am a big fan of muji, and have often admired their range of cotton twill dogs, like this guy:

and this guy:

I am definitely seeing some sewing projects in my near future - part of what I enjoy about making toys is seeing things come together into a coherent whole out of their component parts, and sewing is potentially much quicker than knitting, only less portable.
Having said that, last night a security guard at the Hammersmith Apollo told me that my knitting needles were an 'offensive weapon', and pulled me to one side to call over all his colleagues.
"This is exactly the kind of thing I was talking about" he tells them loudly. Everyone looks upon my knitting with grave expressions. A tiny arm dangles forlornly from one needle. Nobody asks what I am making.
"Keep these inside your bag at all times" he says eventually "We don't want them to fall into the wrong hands".
"Damn right" I think to myself, "someone could end up knitting a poncho or something." Ack.

escaped from distant convent

2005-11-02T19:50:00.000Z

The zombies are not exactly multiplying exponentially, but I am still busting 'em out. My latest addition to the DOTD cast is below, photographed just before being boxed up and sent on over to sewingstars.

To those of you who have been wondering, I will have some up for sale very soon. As well as the 'secret' set I am currently working on, I am also re-doing some of the original DOTD zombies. Drop me a line if you would like me to e-mail you when they are ready.
(Oh yeah, and Tom Savini? If you are reading this I have not forgotten you, dude. Please accept my apologies for brazenly omitting you from the original set.)

zombiemania!

2005-10-28T12:48:00.000+01:00

Holy Crap, what a week it has been. Having bust out of my flickr bandwidth, had my photostream viewed 28,000 times, received more quips than you could shake a stick at, been interviewed over the phone for a US news channel, clocked up over 10,000 hits on my blog in a week, been buried under a ton of e-mail and had one of my pictures on the front of a magazine (if you're in or around Portsmouth NH, pick yourself up a free copy of the Wire), I can only conclude that what the world really, really needed in these troubled times was just some good old-fashioned knitted zombies. Thankyou world. How heartening.

But I'm afraid it doesn't stop there, world, oh no. I am already 60% of the way through the sequel, like some kind of unstoppable moron. I'm not going to give too much away until it's finished, but here's a sneak preview:

No pics on flickr yet, I am over the limit. ~~Anyone wanna sponsor me? First taker gets a knitted minion of their choice.~~ UPDATE: Many thanks to sewingstars for the subscription, it is very gratefully received. Your knitted minion will be on its way to you shortly. :)

dawn of the knitted dead

2005-10-15T00:31:00.001+01:00

My absolute favourite film of all time is Romero's 1978 classic Dawn of the Dead. I must have seen it at least 50 times, and I own 4 copies, as well as the soundtrack, the script, the novel, the board game, the comics and the t-shirt (really).
I bore people with endless facts while they are trying to watch it. I point out mistakes and continuity errors and cuts and say things like "Oooh, this is a good bit" and "Look! Look! There's George Romero" and "Look! There's George Romero's wife!" and I tell them about the time I shook Ken Foree's giant hand at a nerd convention.
Hell, I should probably marry this movie. I love everything about it - the characters, the library music/Italian prog rock soundtrack, the setting, the story and (of course!) the zombies. I love it because underneath all that cheesy comic-book action, gore and slapstick humour lies an insightful and thought provoking subtext of class war, conformity and consumerism.
Zombies, eh? They're us, and we're them. When the worst comes to the worst what we should really fear is ourselves, and each other. I think that's what Jerry Springer was really trying to say.
All of which serves as a very lengthy introduction to my latest completed project. A knitted homage to Dawn of the Dead.

Slideshow of all the pics here

Whew! And now, if you'll excuse me, I'm off to resume my much-neglected life.

logizomechanophobia

2005-10-10T15:11:00.000+01:00

My bloody computer is broken AGAIN. I'm thinking of going back to using a ZX81. Can you get on the internet with one of those things?
Of course it doesn't help that I have developed a fear of actually turning my computer on, because I have started to take all of those blue screen fatal error messages personally. Does my computer not understand? I CAN'T BE BOTHERED TO FIX IT.
Fixing my computer is NOT MY HOBBY AT THE MOMENT. If fixing computers is your current hobby, then feel free to come to my house and I will make you a cake, or some Japanese food, or knit you something, or maybe I will play you a song, or take a photo of you fixing my computer, and then we can get drunk and listen to some music and watch Trisha and go on a bike ride to some charity shops and look at other people's pets or something because those actually ARE my hobbies and I don't have vacancies right now for any new ones.
Now I'm only saying this because I'm not actually on MY computer at the moment, and I know that my computer will probably never find out because in all likelihood I'm going to smash it up in a fit of rage in the near future, but I am starting to hate my computer. We had a deal. I would buy it and give it a table to sit on, and in return it would work perfectly and unconditionally for ever and ever, and biscuits would come out of the CD-ROM drive. Why can't things just work the way you want them to?

catwatch

2005-09-30T13:04:00.000+01:00

Spotted yesterday on my way home through the churchyard:

Spotted last night in my living room (he is staying for the weekend):

bargain of the week

2005-09-23T12:32:00.000+01:00

Still no knitting to show, although I am cooking up something rather exciting - I can't show it yet because it's for a swap on craftster and I don't want to spoil the surprise. It's already a week overdue, and there's a fair bit left to do. Yet here I am procrastinating away...lalalala....
Loads of really cool stuff has happened to me lately - the force must be with me or something. First, I got my casio vl-tone back. Then Rob found me a toy train that makes 7 different animal sounds (the duck is broken, but hey) and 3 train noises including some particularly good honking and clacking. Then on Saturday, Al very generously gave me a super-old wooden horse marionette puppet that I fully intend to showcase just as soon as I fix him up a bit. As if that wasn't excitement enough, on Monday I went to Alton Towers, which, as we all know, is pretty much the most fun you can possibly have. And there's even more - check it out:

That, my friends, is the Rosedale Electric Chord Organ. It set me back £15 from a charity shop in Headington - a fairly expensive charity purchase, but worth it for the following reasons:

It comes in a shade of avocado green plastic previously unseen outside of a 70's bathroom.
DAVID freakin BOWIE played one of these bad boys on Space Oddity (although I don't know which tracks - I'll have to give it a careful listen).
It has no volume control. I like that.
You can only choose from 12 chords. Remember - less is more, people.

The sound is powered by a big fan that powers up noisily when you switch it on. It sounds like a mixture of accordion, melodica and harmonica - which comes as no surprise since it employs practically the same mechanism.
The very first keyboard I ever owned was one of these - a two-tone brown Bontempi, back in 1980 or something. I mostly used it to repeatedly pound out the mysterious "In A Wigwam" song from John W. Schaum's Piano Course The Green Book, which also included such classics as "Bone Sweet Bone", "Mr Frog is Full of Hope", "Power Shovel" and "Donkey Party". I'm not even making it up.

now hold on there, bald eagle

2005-09-12T19:22:00.000+01:00

I never was much of a girly girl. That's why as a kid, enamoured of the cool cowboy in the adverts, there was a time when all I wanted in the world was to bite through the chocolate on a TEXAN bar, and "chew, real slow".
When I finally managed to persuade my Mum to buy me one I was unprepared for the possibility that my undeveloped jaw muscles would, in fact, be no match for the mighty chew. I was literally too feeble to eat it, and the task of polishing it off duly passed to my brother, who was obviously more of a cowboy than I was - a realisation which I did not find particularly pleasing at the time.
Legend has it that the miner's strikes of 1984 somehow brought about the demise of the Texan bar - a weak attempt by Nestlé to blame a poor marketing decision on Thatcher's Britain, if you ask me. But anyway, the mighty TEXAN bit the dust, leaving generations of children clueless as to how to outwit a bunch of Native Americans using only confectionery.
Until now. Turns out, due to popular demand, the Texan bar has been re-released for six weeks only. I found this out when I unwittingly stumbled upon one while buying Lucozade for my Sunday morning hangover.

I won't beat around the bush. I think Nestlé are taking the piss here. For a start, the re-released Texan bar is no larger than a Milky Way. WRONG! Texan bars were way bigger. Don't try to fob me off with the old 'you had smaller hands back then' hooey either. Nothing truly Texan could possibly be so small because we all know that everything in Texas is MASSIVE.
The re-released Texan bar costs 40p. WRONG! Texan bars are only 6p, and they don't come with free 'retro ringtones' either, because ringtones haven't been invented yet, dammit. Finally, insultingly, the re-released Texan bar is no chewier than a Curly fucking Wurly. COME OFF IT Nestlé - if I wanted a Chomp, I'd have bought a Chomp. In fact, I could have bought 4 for the price of one of your so-called Texans. Pah.
The bottom line is this. If it's not chewy enough to thwart a young girl's dreams of becoming a cowboy, it's not a real TEXAN. And that's all I have to say on the matter.

in which fortune does not favour the bold

2005-08-12T21:33:00.000+01:00

I am writing this from work. I have killed my computer. A spot of late night computer surgery ground to a savage halt when I slipped up, jamming a jagged stream of mis-placed commands deep into its brain. The results of my imprudent meddlings were instantaneous. A startling array of error messages rose to the surface like bubbles from a sinking ship accompanied by an disturbing, psychotic display of repeated and futile attempts to boot itself up OVER and OVER and OVER again before finally, mercifully, coming to rest on the Blue Screen Of Death. At this point, water began to leak from my eyes like Data off of Star Trek - the malfunction of an electronic device actually squeezing genuine emotion from my cold, cold heart.
This morning, I carried its lifeless corpse to the computer hospital.
"Hello, I've broken my computer" I say. The receptionist gives me a quizzical look.
"Yes, I've deleted some very important files from the registry" I continue blithely "and now it's broken".
A technician from in the back, roused by my bold declarations of stupidity, comes to my assistance. I explain to him what I have done.
"Have you tried overwriting your operating system?" He asks.
"Ummmm, no" I admit "I daren't".
This statement suddenly seems absurd in light of the fact that I have just told this man about how I brazenly deleted my CONFIG.SYS file. Yes, that's what I did. There. I've said it.
"You could try overwriting your operating system then" he says, and I am suddenly, dangerously, filled with a new, exuberant hope - the very same emotion that got me into this fine mess in the first place. I leave, taking the corpse with me. On the way home, I imagine what I will do with the big fat amount of money I have saved myself by fixing my own shoddy handiwork.
I arrive home optimistic and eager to fix my electronic buddy once and for all, just FIX it so that everything will be back to normal, so I can just check my e-mails every 5 minutes and everything will be alright again. The renewed vigour with which I set about formatting my hard drive lasts about 8 minutes - just long enough to get the whole process underway, and have it unceremoniously crash, like so many hopes and dreams.
So goodbye treehouse. The needs of my poor trusty robotic brain mean that you are destined to be purchased by someone less of an idiot than I. (Sniff).

add to my favourite searches and Email me daily whenever there are new items for the following period: INFINITY

2005-08-03T11:28:00.000+01:00

My Month Of Softies sock monkey is overdue. I seem to be incapable of furnishing him with a suitable hat. After two failed attempts, I refuse to admit defeat and he will remain under wraps until the hat is finished. I am behind schedule, and the projects are piling up.
This chapeau emergency has not prevented me from spending hours goggling at miniorgan.com with my mouth hanging open. Here is a site so exciting that my tea went cold and had to be reheated in the microwave. TWICE. Why am I wasting money on food and rent, and wasting precious time sleeping and working, when I should be travelling around the world in search of the Mego Muson Synthesizer?

Strangest sounds in the galaxy, please! And while I'm at it I'll be cuttin' my own wax on the Tomy VoiceCorder. More and more and more things that have been added to my increasingly long list of 'things that I must have, or I might die'. Dammit, my tea has gone cold.

cheese is my life, that's what I like best

2005-07-27T10:24:00.000+01:00

Art produced by kids is in a league of its own. It has a genuine spontaneity and unself-conscious expression that most adult artists struggle to attain, without any of the pretentiousness that permeates much of our modern art.
When visitors come round my house I invariably end up playing them a track I discovered on the 365 Days Project site, called "I Like Cheese" by The Cheese Band. I love this song, I never get tired of listening to it.
So I was positively GIDDY with excitement when I discovered a whole demo by the Cheese Band online at Comfort Stand. This is the best thing that has happened to me this week since I got those new tyres on my bike. While listening to it this morning it occured to me how I would absolutely LOVE to hear someone do cover versions of these songs, like the musical equivalent of Dave Devries's Monster Engine. Heck, maybe I'll even do it myself.

Zip file containing the complete release (Cheese, I Like Cheese, Cheese is Life (piano) and Football Practice) available for download here. I'm off to make myself a Cheese Band T-shirt.

The cheese band duh nuh nuh nuh
You hear those nice farts duh nuh nuh nuh
You like my song so far duh nuh nuh nuh
I like M & M's duh nuh nuh nuh

everybody spark another owl

2005-07-19T01:41:00.000+01:00

I am digging this crocheted owl by GourmetAmigurumi on Etsy almost as much as Etsy itself. This home grown eBay will surely revolutionise the crafting world. I am watching its progress with great anticipation.

Unfortunately I can't really justify spending $32 on this little fella at the moment, much as I would love him. Instead I hereby vow to spend tomorrow learning to crochet, so I can make one of my own. I just can't put it off any longer.
I don't know whether it's just me, but I've been seeing owls all over the place just lately. You can't get out of a charity shop without clocking at least two. It would seem that we are in the midst of an owl epidemic. Maybe Russ was right to run over that owl in his car. He obviously knew something we didn't.
An owl once swooped alarmingly at my brother Matt's head while he was standing outside our parents' house smoking a fag. He said he'd been making mouse noises but I find it hard to believe that he tricked an owl into thinking he was a mouse, because everyone knows that owls have supremely good eyesight, and my brother is very tall. A more likely explanation is that the owl, in its wisdom, was teaching him a stern lesson about taking the piss.

ms. dangly

2005-07-13T11:56:00.000+01:00

Well, would you get a load of this. The talented Jess Hutch has gone and cloned Mr Dangly into something classier than I ever imagined. Meet Ms. Dangly. She's so fancy! Look at those pearls! If Mr Dangly was here, there would surely be a tiny arrow piercing his wooly heart.

pop quiz, mofos

2005-07-13T01:51:00.000+01:00

Who could it be?

The scraggly beard may have gone, but....blonde hair? Childlike ears? Full of beans? Surely it can't be....no WAY.....it's:

The inimitable Simon Pegg, in Land of the Dead. He scrubs up pretty menacing alright. While we're at it, here's Edgar Wright doing his best 'cross' face. My research has led me to believe I won't be able to see this film until SEPTEMBER, for crying out loud. Lucky I'm so calm and patient and not at all prone to bouts of irrational anger otherwise I'D BE FREAKING OUT!!! BUT I'M NOT!! I'M ABSOLUTELY FINE!! HAHAHA!!