SpareParts

Huge fire

Looking out across London there is a HUGE fire apparently at, at waterden road, straford, just where they are goig to do the olympics.

The london fire brigade latest news said "Incident - Waterden Road
Eight fire engines and around 40 firefighters are currently attending an incident on Waterden Road, East London. The Brigade was called at 1206."

Diamond in the rough

Possibley the best show with the least credit, Boston Legal (imdb) (tv.com), possibley in the uk at least because its on living tv a tv channel aimed at women and also on sky and cable only.

Starring William Shatner and James Spader (amoung others), its a series about a law firm, its an intelegent darkly comedic series winning golden globes and emmy's.

Web 2.0 Zeitgeist

Its a list of lists, the top items from things such as fark, deli.cio.us, furl, flickr, et...

popurls.com | popular urls to the latest web buzz

Dirty spam-bags

Spammers Media logistics uk, have just been ruled against by a uk court, found guilty of being Spammers. All I can say is, serves them right, and I wonder if I've had any spam off them and can sue them?

Reported on the BBC News site, the company was charged £270 and £30 costs. I wonder if someone is going to write a howto guide about how to nail the spammers.

BBC Tv in "not so bad after all" Shocker

In the last 10 years I've been quite disillusioned, disenfranchised and all round disappointed with the Television output from the TV, specifically in the entertainment part of the BBC's holy trinity statement of "Inform, Entertain ad Educate". I mean BBC always keeps up the quality of production, but dull and repetetive just doesn't cover it. But just recently things are getting better...

Yes, they've continued to do wonderful news and education programs, but I've been less than impressed with output of the kind of TV I can just sit down and enjoy. I mean, fly on the wall crap, pop idol, celebrity garden makeover challenge, makeover shows, house makeovers, car boot sales (!!, I mean the next step on that one it teleshopping), soap operas, hospital dramas. I mean if I wanted that kind of entertainment I could have just caught flu for a week.

But recently it seems to be turning a corner. Now, I can't say whether I am just finding the better programming from decently interactive TV guides and well displayed meta data therein, or whether its improved as a whole (or maybe its just turning 30 ?!). Clearly though the return of shows like Doctor Who have improved things. I mean I liked Doctor Who before, not so much in the sylvester mcoy years, personally, I think that choice of Doctor made it much easier to kill off the show before. It had become too cult, rather than popular, its had fed fans more than viewers (and a lot of fans would have said not even that.

The new Doctor Who is something I have great hopes for, lets hope they can continue what they started. Doctor Who is on at prime time Christmas day, something its not done for 40 years (I read the other day, William Hartnell's Doctor apparently).

Anyways, I've been finding more things that I am interested in on the BBC recently, I think things are getting better, maybe its competition, but whatever it is its good. But then you look at the competition, and you wonder where it is coming from? Sky One Christmas day? I don't think so:

10:00 - Futurama
10:30 - Malcolm in the Middle
11:00 - WWE: Experience
12:00 - Stargate SG-1
13:00 - Best of Brainiac: Science Abuse
14:00 - Brainiac: Science Abuse
15:00 - Moby Dick
17:00 - The Simpsons
17:30 - The Simpsons
18:00 - The Simpsons
18:30 - The Simpsons
19:00 - The Simpsons
19:30 - The Simpsons
20:00 - The Simpsons
20:30 - The Simpsons

The only 'Christmas day worthy' programme there I would say is Moby Dick. Compare with BBC1 :

10:00 - Stranger in the Manger?
11:00 - Songs of Praise
12:20 - BBC News and Weather
12:30 - The Santa Clause
14:00 - Top of the Pops Christmas Special
15:00 - The Queen
15:10 - Shrek
16:30 - Toy Story 2
18:00 - My Family Christmas Special
18:50 - BBC News; Weather
19:00 - Doctor Who
20:00 - The Green Green Grass

And you've got the wide appeal that BBC needs to provide, mixed with a few gems.

Indiana Jones, so great!

I must just say, watching Temple of Doom on a Saturday afternoon (even if it only happens on Christmas eve), where did this type of film go? High excitement, a total rollercoaster of a film; Gadgets, mysticism, leather whips, and a proper hero.

Actually on that point a hero that encourages education, and if anyone didn't spot it, he is a historian. That's one thing that's missing, no decent role models. Looking at this weeks UK top 10:

1. King Kong

- angry monkey

2. The Chronicles Of Narnia

- naughty kids

3. Harry Potter And The Goblet Of Fire

- naughty kids, but at least this time well meaning kids

4. Flightplan

- pass

5. The Family Stone

- pass

6. Lassie

- a hero at least, but the kind that makes kids want to be dogs, and says that humans are all round stupid enough to need rescuing by a dog (oh no, timmy fell down the well)

7. March Of The Penguins

- no comment

8. The Polar Express

- more naughty kids

9. Bluffmaster!

- con artist, etc, just great

10. The Constant Gardener

- bit whingey, not a hero really

Strike update

You may remember yesterday I went through the picket line and was pleased with the professional nature of my colleagues. Well it wasn't so relaxed an friendly on going to lunch. In order to get to the canteen we have to leave the front door of our building and enter the side door of the other. and on the side door of the other they had people that were seemingly slightly more vociferous with their requests not to cross the line, opinions and questioning. I knew I shouldn't have worn a shirt and should have dressed down, I think they thought I was someone who could make a change and picked me out of my colleagues. Anyway after a couple of questions and a bit of personal space issue (for me) I got though to building.

Then as I left there was a few mumblings of 'scab', which I would have expected from elsewhere than the BBC, but I suppose some people just have to descend to name calling. Pity, sent my levels of support though the floor. Some people just have no talent for sociology, I'm no professed expert, but I know what'd piss me off. Suppose it depends on what you're trying to do in a strike, get buy in and further support for your views or upset people to the extent they feel they can't come to work. I'd expected the former from BBC staff, but I guess the BBC isn't all good apples.

Crossing the line

Crossed my first picket line today, oooh... The BBC unions are having a strike over plans to make almost 4,000 people redundant.

I approached the main entrance from the front, a feeling of forboding, having not crosed a line before. Thoughts of what to expect a mixture of the miners strikes of the 80's and Carry on at your conveinience. The approach was relatively low of pedestrians, I figure people decided they didn't want to come in and cross the line. The line seen ahead being a few friendly looking people handing out flyers and chatting, oh scarey.

Proceeded round to the entrance to my building, noting the side entrance (the canteen entrance, damn, no canteen lunch for me) was similarly covered. I saw the line I had to cross, personally I'd wanted to stay home and work from there, but 'they' wouldn't let me. I saw faces I knew, does that make it easier or harder, I'm still undecided, but it kinda took away the "La, la, la, i can't see or hear you" option, in favour of a nod and pleasant smile and taking a flyer.

So, I made to to my desk, with no bruises, bad feeling or guilt about crossing the line, and I read all the way through the leaflet and agreed with most of it. Then I took the camera and took some shots of the line I'd been through (above) and the deserted BBC 'street', which is normally pretty busy by now.

What can I say in conclusion? It was a well mannered picket line, that gave me nothing to rant about, Damn! :-) Weirldly (?) the kind of picket line that makes you proud to be part of the BBC, standing up for what it believes, but not being offensive about it.

Pay less tax

Info from The Motley Fool UK, how to pay less tax. i know i want to. I think its amazingly rude of them to tax my savings, never mind twice (once normal bank deductions, again at self assessment time). And all the time with a smile on their face saying, you should save your money. Yeah! good idea for them! and don't even get me started on death duty and inheritance tax. Talk about unfair ! You save all your life, try to provide for your kids, and then the government come and take a whoping great slice, and for what, it not like your going to get any more servive out of them now your dead (if you ever did).

And stamp duty too!! what's their excuse for that? and then if you move into a house and move out in under 2 years, I'm told you get capital gains tax on the money, even if you are trying to buy a house with the money from the sale. Talk about a corrupt system.

Quite depressing...

When you hit get mail on your mail cllient, it tells you that you have 67 new mails, you go to find them and it turns out they all got filtered into your spam folder (and they are spam), and you've nothing new left to look at

8-(

Tories admit defeat

Tory expert denies defeat warning. Err am I being odd here or do we, the voting public, get a say in who wins the election?

Sure I don't really want the conservatives to win, but I deffinately don't want 'new' Labour to get back in with their lies and deceit (personal opinion), lack of 'giving a shit' about anyone but the rich and love of smooching up to a certain american president.

Most unpopular 2nd Presidential term since Richard Nixon

You know, I'm sure democracy is not 'supposed' to work like this... BBC NEWS | In Pictures | In pictures: Bush inauguration - 21m spent on makiing sure nobody shot bush, Holding back protestors with Water canons, polls slipping below 50% approval (see title) and now even Blair looks like his unilateral support for his bosom buddy is waning calling for a 'more consensual' approach. I mean you have to be getting pretty bad for even Blair to start saying you've gone to far.

So no Iraq mentioned in the the inauguration speech, thats probably because it looks like he's going to attack Iran next.

Yes Iran looks like getting nuclear weapons, but why shouldn't they, I'd want to if I was being pushed around / prodded by a foreign dictator with more weapons than sense, and button pushing fingers than IQ points. And what would Bush say if someone told him he couldn't have nuclear weapons? Probably "Oh I better use them up, on your country, in that case"

Personally I'm split between, "its only another 4 years and then it'll get better" and "we're all screwed, the world is run by a mad dictator"

Big Brother - Patronising Wankers

Can't believe it, tonight I caught a glimpse of John Maccririck (spelling?), the C4 racing bloke, talking to Bez, ex Happy Mondays. They subtitled everything Bez said in the scene... Sure he's a Manc, and he's got a fair bit of an accent, but come on... I expect better from Channel 4

Justice is blind

Thatcher fined over 'coup plot' - Saw a cartoon in the Metro this morning. Judge says to the baliff "Bring me the laws for the rich".
4 years suspended sentence and a £265k fine, and he claimed he thought he was paying for a helicopter as an air ambulance. Dunno about you but if I give someone a stack load of money I like to see what I get for the money, and I think I would recognise an ambulance helicopter...

Prince Harry the Nazi

BBC NEWS | UK | Harry urged to say sorry publicly. Ok there's a side of me that wants to say, "What's the Big Fucking deal" if you cling to the past your whole life you'll never move on; but obviously the Nazi's were, well, genocidal, so Royal's as a public statement shouldn't really dress up as them. Then again I'm told The Producers by Mel Brooks is amusing, and they all dressed up as nazis in that and that's mostly acceptable these days. One question for our Harry might be, "why??"

Better be careful what I say

So lost of other people have blogged this so I figure I probably will also, BBC NEWS | Scotland | Worker sacked over blog comments.

I always wonder how far I should go on my blog, I mean before someone takes serious objection. I mean one phrase of "Bush is a Twat" and you end up on the CIA's computers as a flag even before the right wing nutters from the southern states of the USA start sending you parcel bombs in the mail. But I think I am going to start a category on 'how our government fuck everyone over' anyways.

Pretty laughable, America has 'freedom of speech', that one always amuses me; the only reason Michael Moore hasn't been assasinated is because the public know his name now and Bush and his paymasters dont want him becoming a martyr.

Chavs all about

Very uk socially relavant piss taking based on bohemian rhapsody tune, WWW.CHAVS.CO.UK

more X-prizes

So, they've flown into space privately, and all for $10m, so now What's next for the X-Prize. I say there should deffinately be more of these, and you can suggest one on the x-prize site. If its going to take financial incentives to get people there, then lets just get on with it.

How to fold a T-Shirt

Wow, its How to Fold a Shirt. You thought it was so hard, but no!!

This is so cool, you have to see....

Aldwych drama part 2

So yesterday we were not so much alerted, but kinda whispered to on the grapevine that we were locked in our building as there was a suspect package on a bus outside our office. In the end it was only a bag left behind or something, but it does highlight for me two issues.

1. Terrorist bombs, well its very expensive, and potentially lethal to the carrier, to plant bombs in London. Also if you get caught you will get sent to prison for quite a while (and if the american's get their hand on you probably abused for fun).

But, considering the chaos caused by suspect packages, tubes closing at rush hour (for 4 hours or so), bus and traffic routes being closed off, people being stopped going back in their offices after lunch to do more work (yay!), and the cost incurred by these in terms of hours lost / cash lost to buinesses and london / uk as a whole;

Why don't the terrorists stop meddling with all these dangerous chemicals, rockets and viruses and just plant cheese sandwich laden spiderman lunchboxes all round the city, and watch it grind to a halt.

Obviously, I amd very far from condoning terrorist action or an cheese sandwich abuse of any sort. But you think, by now, the police / bomb squad would have some way of detecting whether a package really is dangerous or not, before causing major gridlock of whatever variety. Its obviously good to be vigilant in telling people if you see a suspect package, it scares me some times how easy it would be to get on a bus at willsden green, stick a parcel under the seat at the back of the bus, or even that lugage shelf near the front, and have it delived to the centre of London for you.

Oh and the second point is; Police, they seem happy to cordon off roads and allow people to panic / think the worst, why don't they just put up a sign saying what the problem is and let people decide whether to rubberneck or run away.

Drama outside our office

Just now, firemen, policemen, and blokes is hasmat suits. outside the waldorf hotel on aldwych.

update: - 12:36
another pic
hmm... they are just letting people walk around some police cordons though, and someone said its possibley just the chlorine lines burst for the swimming pool under it.
update: - 12:59
well they've moved to the middle of the street now.
another pic
update: - 13:11
"I'm going out now, I may be some time". I'm going to get a subway from next to all the shennaigans... If I don't come back, well I'm sure you'll not miss me.
update: - 13:33
I made it back... so I talked to a police man down there and he said "oh, someone just spilt something and they are just taking precautions", he seemed bery calm about it all. Very extensive / expensive precautions for something so simple it would seem, with all the firemen and police. Subway has been closed, and the pavement down that side of aldwych. But they are letting traffic through now. One couple of people I saw were celebrating cause they couldn't get to their office cos the pavement was closed.
pic from the north side of aldwych
zoomed in pic from the central reservation
update: - 13:33
Apparently the story is that someone mixed the wrong chemicals in the swimming pool. Crikey I'm glad I don't go to LA fitness any more *if they are trying to give people chemical burns or whatever. Apparently the police told our building security after it was all over.

*the "if" obviously to escape libel cases, "I said 'if', not therefore implying that they had done so"