At this time of festivity and celebration, in these days of Yuletide happiness and giving, I invite you all to spare a thought for those people on the planet who didn’t get an XBOX 360 with Gears of War for Christmas, such as myself.
My wife does not read this blog, nor I guess does anyone else’s wife... or husband or perhaps even ...relative. So this dilemma and confession remains between just myself and the idealized reader of this blog.
This is the situation.
I have been shopping online for my wife’s Christmas presents, she has done well. I started off at high end virtual couturier's and ended up, via a fairly noncircuitous route, on Ebay. I bought her many presents, spent allot of time thinking and planning and watching. This wasn’t an "its her birthday on Tuesday, it is time for ebay" kind of an ebay gift buying session.
So... I pay for the presents with Paypal. Cut and shuffled. Done and dusted. Its all good, daaaaawg. Then something strange dawned on me. And this strangeness lead to a 30 second investigation and the fruits of this investigation had seeds that planted ripe melons of mistake. Namely, that at some at some point recently my wife has set up her own credit card as the default payment method. So, when I pay with Paypal, I pay with her credit card.
So what do I do?
No, I did none of these. As I was writing this post she was milling around and I thought I might as well let her read this post. Its 100% exactly the same as Bono from U2 composing “Sweetest Thing” for his wife, by way of an apology (for having sex with a German shepherd (A sheep specialist from Stuttgart, rather than a dog)).
This blog is not art, nor science, nor literature, nor tech. It is growing ever more into a platform for me to show what a duplicitous turncoat I am. Examples:
In February 2006 I posted this review of the Gillette Mach 3 Power Nitro.
And in it I derided the potential for further development in the shaving domain. Then, as I posted I found out about a new Gillette, the Mach 5 Mega Laser Razor. I can’t actually remember the proper name, but that’s not important. So, the new razor was out before I had posted the blog post about the last new razor.
That’s the thought provoking intro over with…
Roll back three weeks. I needed some new blades for my 8 month old Gillette. I went to Ebay. I brought some. They were the wrong kind, these were for the new Gillette that I assured myself I would never get. But now I was trapped. I had inadvertently signed a pact with the close-shave devil, and thus was forced to buy the actual razo.
Yes, I was hoodwinked into this turncoatery but, my dear reader, I am sure you agree it would be wrong for me not to review the aforementioned hateful implement. I may have done my self in the razor ‘rongun, but you guys deserve this self-sodomised review.
If I die today the revelations of this post will be my Magum Opus. This new blade hasn’t only taken me closer, its taken me deeper…. into a very important aspect of my life.
Before we continue…
Ladies, I love you all, but this post is strictly for men. Do not read this if you are easily offended by distilled masculine conversation or references to male grooming. I just found this website, http://www.damegames.com/, so go play some girly games there until the shoe-shops open and leave the rest of this post for the dudes.
The Review (Men Only)
Gillette have skipped the 4 blades and made that evolutionary step into The Fifth Blade. Five blades, aligned so close together - and so sharp - that you can almost feel the cells gracefully part between the metal. It vibrates, as did the previous Model. The vibration feels good but I am still an outsider on if the vibe is actually good for the shave’s effectiveness. It’s a moot notion that will no doubt perplex razologists for aeons.
On the back of the razor head is a sixth blade. The sixth blade, much like the sense equivalent, is very handy if you have it but you wouldn’t expect to need it. It is angled perfectly to get that bit where your nose joins your top lip (Phew! Good job there are no women reading this bit, they would be sooooo lost) and it just does the job.
The blade feels good, looks that weird Alienware spooky but is ultimately a nice objet d’consumption.
I have been using it for three weeks – the shave has stayed nano close and though it irks me to admit it, its great. It really is a bigger jump between this and the last one than the last one and the penultimate
Post review Deconstruction of the previous review’s core premise.
I don’t feel as turncoat in this sense because I like the new blade(s), or because I showed blogbased exasperation at my first encounter with it. The reason for the anisotropy of my opinion is that I am forced now to embrace the endeavor to perfect the razor.
Millions… billions is spent on the evolution of the razor. I have been one of the no doubt millions of people who have seen 3 blades, or 4 or 5 and winced at the ridiculousness of it. And yet, the fact remains that new stages in razor development are self-experimentally better than the last.
And you would expect this, all this investment would not work if the results were not a discernible improvement. I remember when I first had a shave in a mach III and I know many friends and family members - including my wife ;) - who swear by the thing.
This fact is incontrovertible. I wont be there in 40 years with my grandson saying “Son, in my day shaves were closer…”
Millions may be dying of famine and disease. We are rubbing Carbon salt into the planet’s wounds. Even more people, every day, experience their WiFi drop out. These issues are not exclusive. They don’t mean we cant waste at least a few billion squid and scientists brain cells on the perfection of the razor.
The Future Of Humanity
As a baseline for technological evolution I propose the razor, being a device or method for the removal of body hair. The litmus test for the relentless march of the tech. To measure progress by numbers is to overlook progress’s intimate effects on culture.
Shaving is so very human. It is functionally pointless but important. It effects how others see us, how we see ourselves and importantly how we feel ourselves. To shave is to live.
Keep an eye on the shelf and a finger on your cheek
Perfection of the Razor
A task so meaningless it is significant.
The smoothness of a strangers face.
The muddy roots of the lotus.
The glide. The cut.
The lines that grow until we die.
Shatter shell and Cutthroat angles.
One blade, two blade, three blade,
Five.
I haven't been much of a one for Blogging about other websites, but this is just really freaky. I have no idea where they got those clothes from or who dressed them but I think its pretty fair to say that they are all in need of a makeover BIG STYLE.
Since the collapse of comunism there has been much in the way of fashion-schism, but I never ever thought it could get this bad.
When will they learn that you can NEVER mix NYLONS.
God save us.
http://englishrussia.com/?p=251
The last time a game made my heart really race, my wife was a Teutonic dominatrix and I had the blueprints to "die speziellen lesbischen headquaters". That was until today, when I started re-playing Quake.
Quake is one of the best computer games ever made; it might not be quite as exciting as licking your way out of the Saphist Coliditz, but in terms of game-play and challenge and excitement, Quake is hard to beat. What is especially exciting about my recent foray into Quake is that it all took place on the little-portable-open-source GP2X, powered by two AA batteries.
It doesn’t stop there. Not only does the GP2X (Powered by 2 AA batteries) play Quake, it does much more, and that, my dear reader, is what this post is about.
What is it?
Its a handheld gaming device weighing 161 grams and made in a place called
It runs a version of Linux and has two 200MHZ processors and its own Video processor so it can do things that no other device on the planet, powered by two AA batteries, can do.
Where you get it?
You can get it from these people, http://gp2x.co.uk/, who are the global distributors and are based in
What does it do?
In order of importance:
1) Fractals!!!
OMG have you seen these things! They are patterns that are made mathematically out of component parts of the same patterns, and it gets better.... they go on for ever. Ot at least that’s what the manufacturers claim. I don’t know if that’s true but without doubt they go on for 6 sets of AA batteries. You can just zoom in and in and in and in. It never stops.
Unfortunately the Korean version 2's didn’t put this in the GP2X so you need to download it and install it on the GP2X.
Download it here: http://archive.gp2x.de/cgi-bin/cfiles.cgi?0,0,0,0,8,1088
2) Drum Machine
Most people who buy this in the early days will be pretty geeky. Using Shoemaker's G-F translation it is pretty clear to see that geekyness is inversely proportionate to funkiness. However, to compensate for this you can install a drum machine on the GP2X and, through practice, actually increase your funk without decreasing your geek. This is the best of both worlds and IS NOT available on the Sony PSP or Nintendo DS Lite.
Download it here: http://archive.gp2x.de/cgi-bin/cfiles.cgi?0,0,0,0,8,1088
3 The Graphical User Interface
The GP2X comes with its own "graphical user interface". This consists of small pictures ( or "icons") that represent the various aspects of the device. For example, the part of the graphical user interface that runs games has a "joystick" picture to guide you. If you get lost the pictures also have descriptive names associated such as "Games", "Music" and "Settings".
I found this graphical user interface very easy to use and navigate but some people may find it easier to actually go to a DVD store or an amusement arcade.
Because everything is open source there are other graphical user interfaces that can be put onto the GP2X to replace the one put on it by the Korea Version 2.0 team. I haven’t tried these others because the default one is just fine, thank you.
One other point of note is that the graphical user interface complies to the NORTFM. This means that though there is a manual you don’t need to read it, instead press a few buttons and you will pick it up, pronto.
4 Video Player
Once you have blown your stash of AA's cruising deep into the Mandelbrot set you might need a break from that math’s rollercoaster.
I suggest a good sojourn from such an excursion is to watch a movie. There are many movies available from an online video store called Bittorent, which has a great rental policy and the GP2X will play most of these (allegedly etc etc) and it will play them really well.
I like things that make you go "wow". Like when you go camping out of the city and look up to see the milky way. Or you walk in on your mother in the kitchen and she is juggling three apples and you have never seen her juggle before. Not even two.
The video quality of the GP2X has this wow. Maybe not as much as the Milky Way but at least 3 times more than Andromeda (the Galaxy not the TV Show and with the naked eye, not Hubble). Its clear and bright and with good contrast. The playback is smooth... so smooth (because of the hardware video) and all powered by two AAs.
You can push the output to the TV and its just as good as a desktop with TV out or Freecome Media Player display. I can imagine being around at a friends house and the chat has got a bit dull. They are talking about "friends of friends" and the beer is warm and its still so early. So what do you do? Get out the crack pipe or say this:
You: "Hi, I have my media player on me, how about we watch Zoolander 2?”
Them: “How?”
You: “I can plug it right in to your telly."
Them:"Really?"
You:"Yes….. but have you got two AA batteries?"
As a final parting a very neat feature that could be in any video player but isnt, is that it remembers your position in a movie. So, I was watching a film in bed last night and when I was sleepy turned the device off. Tonight I'll continue watching it some more right from where I left off (assuming I don’t play Quake or "Frauline was is das in der leiderhossen!!!").
If you just want a portable movie player with TV out then that’s enough reason to get the GP2X.
5 Music and Podcasts
Some people find it enjoyable to listen to sounds aranged with a certain order or sequence and the GP2X has more than enough OOOOPH to satisfy these people.
It does MP3 and WMA and OGG, but lets be honest, we can forget the last two. The MP3 player is simple and effective. It doesn’t support play lists, in-song bookmarking or lyrics but it has all you really need for most cases. I wish it would have bookmarks like the movie player does but it doesn’t. It does have real smooooooooth in track navigation, so you can zip anywhere in a 50 meg podcast in seconds.
I’d like to make a special mention of the sound quality. I have had a zillion MP3 players over the years- stand alone, in Palm , PPC, phones etc and this, to my ears, is the best I have heard. It is clear and loud and a nice range and just ...good. It doesn’t have Dobly.
6 Games
This part of the review is only here so I don’t get accused of being nonquakeaphobic. I’ve seen the youtube.com vidos of people playing many games at full speed. Ultima 7, Sonic, Duke Nukem’ etc etc etc.
Other Applciations
This baby runs Linux at the back end and has two meaty processors doing the work. In theory it could run Open Office, or Gimp (Like Photoshop) or contacts/calendar applications... really anything that can be done without internet on a desktop.
What I think will make or brake the trajectory of this side of the GP2X is peripheral support. It has a USB port so can it take a keyboard? Or a mouse? Can it cable via this to a mobile phone’s port to go online?
Because of the open source nature of this system and the fact it has port access the sky really could be the limit if a significant surge of developers get behind it. (We are going to try this at work, I think)
Any Downers?
There is a moment as a child when you realise that adults are not perfect. Maybe its when you ask one a question and they don’t answer right away. Maybe it’s when Uncle Derek looses the key to the tool shed and you both have to spend the night inside it and its cold. So cold.
For the GP2X this moment, the reaslisation that gadgets, like adults, are not perfect, comes when you try to change the batteries. The GP2X build is good, apart from the flimsy little metal tongue that pushes the negative into the positive. Its a spring that doesnt seep to ahve much spring about it. I am guessing that most of the send-backs for the GP2X will be because of this. It will break. I can that little thing now and it is saying... "I am the weakness."
There are other gripes......
Power Outage
In the middle of a game of Quake and suddenly the effects became awesome... better than an Xbox game. It was as if a white light nuke went off and I was starring at ground zero, my world imploding and melting at the same time.
In fact what had happened was the batteries died on me and that was the LCD's Swan Song. Being a life long battery fetishist I know that rechargeables live fast and die young; often without any warning. But this white out seemed really dramatic. I don’t ask for much... but 30 seconds of warning that the GP2X needs a change would be a start.
The Worst Accessory Ever
I got the official GP2x carry case and it is pants. It really is the worst designed case I have seen for any device, and I have seen many many.
This is the worst case ever made for anything. If you can imagine taking the spongy excrement of a camel and smearing the GP2X in that excrement you will not be into the land of metaphor, but reality.
Conclusion: The Future
The review is coming to and end. I have been working on it for two days and I feel we need a dramatic conclusion to keep you happy. The GP2X review equivalent of blowing up the Death Star or (come out) Kevin Spacey loosing his limp. Where should I go? Try to be funny and zany? Or serious and resolute?
I think all good reviews of portable gaming and media devices should end with a quote that encapsulates what has gone before. And so I will end with a quote that achieves just that. And yet achieves even more.... spreading not just the scope and flexibility of the GP2X but also its community and potential.
I will end with a quote from a Korean (Version 1.0) Shin-Jok play that translates as follows:
"In the cusp of your fingers you may hold the many worlds and many things until power fails and all is dark".
out of 5
Ahhh the joys of Google Video.
Rob Newman may hold the Guinness World Record for the biggest comedy show ever, he and David Badiel filed Wembly Arena. I never really liked him when he was in his early carear. He seemed smug and way to Oxbridge. I always liked his comedic buddy, Badiel - whose brother I have met twice, oh yes, in those kind of circles.
So Rob Newman, who might be my new hero of the moment, hasn't been in the limelight for a long while. It looks like he has been looking at the world through smart, cynical and very open eyes.
If you have 45 mins to spare then watch this video in your browser:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7374585792978336967
It will educate and anger and maybe even make you wet yourself with laughter. There are not many 45 minutes I know like that. The last one I remember was in Mexico City in 1992 and involved a a badger/chupacabra hybrid. Zona Rosa anyone?
I'm sitting with my laptop on my Lap, still running Ubuntu Linux, and I have noticed something just now. My thighs are not on fire! With XP the laptop used to get soooo hot. But now its almost chilled. In fact I may need to boot into XP for a bit just to warm me up.
Googles new tool, Google Trends, has revealed a strange consonance in the cosmos of web searches that, frankly, makes all the hubba bubba and mystery about the Da Vinci Code + The Nazca Lines + Lord Lucan + American Democracy dwindle into insignificance.
anal 
analysis
The Anal Anlaysys Iconograhy of DOOM- realtime
| 1. | Peru | | |||
| 2. | Brazil | | |||
| 3. | Argentina | | |||
| 4. | Chile | | |||
| 5. | Turkey | | |||
| 6. | Portugal | | |||
| 7. | Colombia | | |||
| 8. | Mexico | | |||
| 9. | Switzerland | | |||
| 10. | Australia | |
As you can see from this enigmatic pictogram and associated histogram there are correlations and inversions which nothing can explain and less surprisingly people from
As a whole, the world is much more interested in "anal" than "analysis".
Sorry, this post started off as a more serious announcement about the new Google Trends but I got carried away. Its interesting to play with for like, 30 seconds.
Other trends of note:
That’s exactly how I feel right now. I just got phished by a Mr, or Mrs CHUKWUDI, to a not-insubstantial amount.
Now we all know phising goes on, but what makes this so bad is that I fell for it. I cant believe it! The transaction was stopped early and the cash is safe… but my ego is in tatters.
Even In this Blog I have come close to mocking the scare mongery, associated with such deceptions:
http://www.salted.net/2006/02/email-correspondence-with-chris-dixon.html
http://www.salted.net/2006/02/non-user-review-siteadvisor.html
But now I am a victim.
So… I got the email from my bank, claiming that:
My Bank always look forward for the high security of our clients. Some customers have been receiving an email claiming to be from My Bank advising them to follow a link to what appear to be a My Bank s web site, where they are prompted to enter their personal Online Banking details. My Bank is in no way involved with this email and the web site does not belong to us…. Bla blab la…
Genius! I clicked the link and did as they said. OK, I was stupid, I was jet lagged, I didn’t think it could happen to me.
Dealing with Bank
I didn’t think about the mail as related to the Phising… it just didn’t occur.
I was thinking what to tell the bank. I felt confident that I had all the answers. "MY Details are protected by AES 256 Encryption using Open Source software that my company designed… there is no way… never stored on disk… blab la bla"…."
"..., have you had any emails concerning our bank account recently?"
"Doh!"
Id like to end this post with a quote from a very dumb man:
"… phishing and fraud and identity theft … all of these threats are threats overcome not by comparing checksums but by not being stupid. If you really do think your long lost uncle Borris wants your paypal details so he can pay for some "lovely vases, very pricey" then I am not sure you should be online."
Quoted from the Salted Solution, Feb 04, reproduced with permission.
I have spent the last 15 years trying to stay up with modern music. Chasing stuff that excited me in the same way as when I was 12 and first heard the Doors or 18 when I first heard KLF. Things have come close to the mark, some have passed it: primal scream, prodigy?
But so rare. Now extinct, to me.
If modern music is so bad what am I missing?
The obvious answer is that I am getting old.
I can handle that. My body is a nest for disease.
Questions
What excites today's 18 year old?
Is it what excited me?
What excites the new young rebels?
Can I get it on MP3?
It seems the entire world of Islam is about to boycott Danish goods. What with muslims not being big consumers of pork based products, or beer, I think the Dansih economy will survive.
Google on censoring Chinese search results.
Was it good to do or bad? Are they evil or secret saints whose mission will emerge from the mire of post-communist decay? Can I really stop using Google when they have all my mails for the last few months on there evil servers?
I dunno, but here are the key points:
These are all fascinating avenues for discussion. However, what it seems people have been over looking is that Google is also censoring the search results it provides for us – about many things CHINESE.
That is correct, Google is censoring both ways.
There are many secrets to the Chinese world, cuisine, history, culture and geography that Google is not allowed to tell us about... but the Discovery channel can and does:
How do you make 1,000 year old eggs in just an hour? What really is Tofu and why doesn't it taste like it should? What is underneath that big hill with the terracotta army standing guard? (Discovery channel was only partially certain on this one (rivers of mecrucry, yada yada)). How can a guy who is older than my dad, and looks like my gran, lift me off the ground with his forearm? (ibid. on the Discovery). How do you make trainers that cost as much in my supermarket as a bag of apples? (Not on the Discovery channel in any sense)
6 Years ago in a super market in Guatemala I brought a Gillette Mach 3 razor. And since then have been a convert. Converted in a way that is unusual - the adverts really do live up to he product.
Ask any man who has moved to the GM3 (As its called in high-tech barbershops the world over) and if they tell you:
"Using the Mach 3 was not a paradigm shifting experience that redefined my own understanding of the term "close shave" and I will never use one again"
Then, they are a liar.
It is that good. Men the world over know that. Its so good that the blade are the most stolen items in supermarkets and RFID tags are being used on these first. Sales pitch over, the GM3 is the big dogs kahunas.
In our Bigger Faster Better consumer culture it wasn't going to be long before the GM3 was usurped, either by Gillette or Wilkinson Sword or maybe Superdrug own brand (hmmmm..). And so... in a fanfare of TV ads, the Gillette Mach 3 Power Nitro was released. I waited over a year before I got one.
Notwithstanding my conviction in the GM3, the 'Nitro just seemed, a con.
"Just 'coz it vibrates, it don't make it better" Is an adage my old scoutmaster used to say. I thought he was right about 'Nitro.
Today I got one in the post. It looked like an alien sex machine. Even with my scepticism about its performance, looks-wise, this baby cruised in the outer lane of the facial hair highway. I had a shave. I wont go into to much detailed or prose, even with the gentle buzzing, it was after all, just a shave.
ANd you know, It was the closest shave I have had. It was so close that I look 3 weeks younger and feel more confident around women.
As I write this coda to a blog post somewhere in cyberspace, I should feel happy. Glad that I was not conned. Content that I have one of the smoothest faces in the room (for at least the next 2 hours until the hair grows or the Avon lady calls). Satisfied that product and placement can become well acquainted. But I don't really. I feel as if I am on a plateau.
That even when they bring out the "'Nitro Nano Mach 3 Plus" in 5 years all achievements made will be facile. Yes, its closer. "Whateva".
Now its closer than it was. And before was close enough. Stop telling me I need a smoother face. I don't need closer. I need cheaper. I want blades that don't have an 800% markup. I want blades that don't cost more than an MP3 player on Ebay.
Ohhh it is nice though.....
DO NOT PURCHASE FOR ADULT USE
This is perhaps the most awe inspiring Travel Cot ever made. It combines supreme design elegance with that compact fold away methodology that real world class travel cots should have. If there was a magazine all about TravelCots this little marvel would be on the front cover EVERY MONTH!!!!
But don't take our word for it,read the facts:
We all use the smiley :)
It is a symbol that not only evokes a smile, but also elemnds of happyiness. But WHat of the history
The origins of the Smiley can be traced back as far as the origins of humanity. The earliest recorded use of the smiley pictogram is in the 14, 000 year old cave paintings at Scredda, in the south of England.
Here we find one, admittedly rough, representation of the face. It appears to be placed in the sky, almost sun-like, and shedding its radiance over a herd of bull or cattle.
Thanks to Professor Canesten for permission to use this image
This is the only use of the Smiley until the Roman times, although both Linear C and Fang Dynasty writings have smileoid characters. During this time it was used to represent the deity Bacchus, even becoming an adornment of the High Priests and Priestesses of Bacchus. This symbolic relationship lasted until the prohibition of Bacchanalian worship by the Roman Senate, in BC186.
Following this prohibition the Smiley disappeared from history until the middle ages when it became the symbol, "heureux le visage", used by quality French mistresses. Even Molière, in l'École des Femmes (1662), has the protagonist ask:
"Quel visage heureux brille de son coeur et la musique la peint-elle des mots?"
From the 17th century onwards the Smiley makes an appearance in a variety of art and literature, from Cervantez to bawdy Great War ballads. But it is not until the 1960s that the Smiley has its first wide-culture resurgence since the Roman period.
In the 1960's the popularity of a group of drug using degenerates changed the world for a decade. These 'Longhairs' or 'Hippies' believed in Free Love, Free Drugs, Freedom and Peace. What represented Peace to them was the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) and the symbol of the CND movement was nothing other than the Smiley.
Some Hippies or 'Longhairs' in what appears to be a rug shop.
The cold war ended at the end of the 1980s. Global multi-lateral nuclear disarmament finally occurred in 1990 and CND was disbanded a year later. These changes in the cultural landscape left the Smiley a bastard symbol in a world becoming ever more populated by the New Icons of Commerce. The Nike swoosh, the Coke-Cola double swirl and the Irn-Bru slash became the dominant, if unholy, trinity. Smiley was left out in the cold.
Out in the cold but not for long. 1991 saw the birth of a new phenomenon which soon swept the globe. A youth movement unlike anything seen before; illegal parties, clashes with the police, protest and rebellion. All of this to a soundtrack of heavy proto-dance music that forgave the few and rewarded the brave. The future would never be the same; Grunge was here.
The Grunge Movement was an explosion that began in London but engulfed the planet. If Grunge had a flagship then it was the band Nirvana and if that ship had a flag then on that flag was the Smiley. Still fighting, only now for Grunge and all that she stood for. Even though Grunge lasted only 2 long months its followers refused to let go of the style and motifs that had made it so popular... apart from, that is, the Smiley.
In its 14, 000 year life the Smiley has had ups and downs, reverence and rejection, but what of the future? What will the next 14, 000 years hold for this, perhaps the greatest of all pictograms?
This is a 5 min clip from an episode of South Park that is definatly funny.
Which reminds me...
"A Gay Icon Called Tom"
If Tom Cruise is not Gay, then which famous Toms might be?
Here are the contenders so far....
 | Tom Selleck, the darling of the Hawaii set. A prime example of Homo Erectus. |
 | This Tom has the smile and the accent, a real god of Welsh gyration. He is smart, but is he kind? |
 | He was "Glad to Be Gay", then he was not gay and now, guess who wants to be a Gay icon again? Mr Robinson, can you be trusted? |
Who will win the title "A Gay Icon Called Tom"?
Will Tom Selleck become champion of the bout? Will he be battered around the ring by Tom Robinson? Will Tom Jones deploy his infamous Sex Bomb? Will outside forces play their hand by combating Tom Hanks and Tom Beringer against the victor?
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