Word Crimes by Weird Al Yankovic. It's a parody set to the tune of Blurred Lines that is, well, a spelling and grammar lesson. Hee. :D

Also, the fact that Al is still going makes me happy in general.

I'm currently very disappointed. I've been scouting round for a new laptop and I found what I thought was the perfect one at John Lewis. It was on the expensive side, but doable, so I bought it. Got it home, the battery installed, and all plugged in to charge. Went to actually boot it up and let All The Updates run, and discovered two things: a) it did not have the anti glare matte finish screen as per the specs; and b) the uber shiny screen it did have had a dot of dead pixels.

So it goes back tomorrow. The thing is, I need a matte screen. I have a lot of trouble with the standard screens, even moreso nowadays with how shiny they have gotten - I could seriously do my makeup using this one as a mirror. When I booted it up to check that the dead spot really was a dead spot, and got to the screen with all the licensing agreements, it hurt to read.

I was so excited to have found this one (it's an HP Envy TouchSmart) that had an anti glare screen, and turns out, not so much. :-(

Doing some more googling, it looks like actually, the only laptops being produced anymore with anti glare screens are for serious gamers, e.g., Alienware. That really isn't what I wanted - I really don't *need* all that power. But I may end up with something like that purely for a screen that doesn't give me headaches and eye strain. *sigh*


(x-posted to DW)

Is where I will be heading in a few minutes. Back home. Exhausted, and everything is a mess, but. Home.

Just an FYI that I will be offline at home for about ten days whilst we get the Internet etc. all connected up at the new place. I will undoubtedly take my tablet for a few spins of free wi-fi somewhere, but my mobile will be the only reliable way to get hold of me if need be. :-)

Kevin Bacon's grand entrance onto the Tonight Show. I can't believe Footloose came out thirty years ago! He looks fantastic. I actually watched the movie not too long ago, as there were a couple of 80s DVDs available secondhand so we got one with that and Flashdance on it, and one with The Goonies, Gremlins, and Police Academy on it. Good times for under a tenner total. *g*

When Jack and I were in Cardiff over Halloween, I bought some 'nom nom Proper Welsh Chocolate'. The flavour is Toffee Waffle, which it says contains 44% Venezuelan milk chocolate, Tregroes waffle pieces, cinnamon, and salted caramel. It's exactly as yummy as that sounds!

The back of the wrapping makes me laugh, though. It's got some chatty bits about the company; the ingredients list; a 'Demolish By' date; a note to contact your local stockists if cravings persist; a warning to keep it cool, dry, and away from potential kidnappers; and then there's the Nutritional Info: "Never eat more chocolate than you can lift".

I think that sounds reasonable. *g*

(x-posted to DW)

Yesterday - Thursday - the windchill dipped to around -30C. Then in late evening, it started to snow. Today was blizzard conditions. Still cold, though not quite like that! Seriously, between the snow falling from the sky and being blown around in gales, we couldn't see the house across the street.

I had been glumly anticipating spending the weekend doing shifts of shovelling out the driveway from its two feet of snow, seeing as I am the only person in the house capable of shovelling, but I am well out of practice at both the activity and being in this weather/temperature, but Dad decided to ring the landscaping company that cuts the grass in the summer to see if they do snow removal. (Many do; year-round income that way.) They do, and agreed to dig us out, saying it would probably be tomorrow. The owner's brother lives round the corner from us, though, and has just had shoulder surgery so obviously isn't able to do his own driveway. I thought I heard scraping outside about 10:00 pm and sure enough, it's all been cleared away! Fabulous *g*. They did put quite a pile at one side of the bottom of the driveway that looks like it's more on the street, which will probably end up spread across the driveway if the snowplow goes through again, but I can manage that easily.

I'm keeping warm in fuzzy pyjamas, fuzzy socks, Snoozies, polar fleece house coat, and blanket. And coffee or tea. I'm drinking more coffee than I would normally because making coffee has been one of my dad's jobs around the house so it's helpful for him to keep doing it and feel useful. We are coping.

Offline for a few days, folks - the flatmate and I decided to go spend Halloween somewhere with a castle. *g* I shall be contactable by mobile should anyone need me. (How funny to think that once upon a time, I had to call tech support to get them to unlock my phone because I hadn't used it in so long, I'd forgotten the voicemail password. Now it's in close range at all times... and it's not even a smartphone!!)

Apparently they did a record together. Upon reading the interview, it makes a bit more sense - the album is Foreverly, a cover of an Everly Brothers record which was itself a cover album. And, of course, the part that made me laugh was Billie talking about wanting to do this project with a woman, and arriving at Norah Jones because, well, Adie said to. LOL. ♥

Went to see it tonight, in IMAX 3D. I love IMAX. 3D, not so much - aside from the general headache the experience tends to give me, wearing the damn glasses over top of my own glasses is particularly heinous. It leaves me with sore eyelids from blinking against my lenses because the 3D glasses force mine too close to my face, and a sore nose from the extra weight and awkward positioning of the 3D glasses. So I really just don't do 3D very often.

Nonetheless! I enjoyed it. The film is effectively a concert with some extra special effects interspersed with a tangential story following a young roadie/assistant named Trip. The story itself is interesting and has a definite horror bent to it (hi Kirk's influence!) - it is genuinely creepy as fuck in some spots. And Trip is well-named, because he is having one hell of a weird/bad night. The segues between the stage footage and the Trip footage are very well done and it's clear that the story was carefully built around the music.

The concert bits were fantastic. This is one of the few times I've ever felt that the 3D was actually enhancing my viewing rather than getting in the way (OotP Ministry of Magic fight, I am looking at you). It really captured the Metallica concert experience - except with a lot more close-ups than I'm accustomed to getting.

That accuracy is actually where the film kind of fell down for me, because I kept wanting to follow whichever part of the narrative was currently showing. I wanted a complete horror story, OR a complete concert immersion, and I kept getting dragged back and forth between the two. Now, I'm aware that this is quite specific to me; I have kind of a running joke that I am not ADD enough for the modern world. Most people will shift back and forth happily, and as I said, the transitions were great. But it meant that overall, it left me a bit dissatisfied with the film, instead of in the blissful post-concert state. Which the little mindfuck part at the very end didn't help!

However. My main recurring thought? Maaan, I just wanna lick James Hetfield... :D




(LJ is refusing to show me my damn icons so I can't change from the default, grr. Just imagine this one instead.)

Ahem. *g* I have not been this excited to watch something on TV since the season three premiere for Roswell (I only started watching in season two, so I would have been excited for that premiere, had I known about it...). I shall need icons. I love Agent Coulson.

I'm able to watch the NorthAm premiere because I'm visiting the parents - I actually got here on the ninth, and will leave on the 30th, which is less than a week away now :-( My grandmother was here for the first week, so I wasn't online much. Then last week, the mother and I went to PEI for a few days for some of the Fall Flavours goings-on through September, and man, it was awesome. Apparently the island has landed on the top ten list of foodie places in the world and I believe it! It is a beautiful, beautiful place, too. I'll post some pics once I pull them off the camera and organise. Having an actual vacation in the midst of my visit home was very much needed.

Oh yeah! Criminal Minds premieres tomorrow night! *more glee* I am behind on watching the previous seasons but I will watch that anyway.

In case you don't look at GDA/follow them anywhere, they posted that BBC3 will be streaming GD's performance from the Reading Festival tonight at 9 pm GMT. My understanding is that you do not have to be in the UK to be able to stream it from the website (obviously, I can't test that!). For those of us in the UK with TV licences, apparently this means we can 'red button it' and watch it on the telly. Since I have used said red button precisely once, for a Doctor Who trailer, and it took a good fifteen minutes to figure out exactly wtf you DO to access the red button, I expect I will be swearing at the TV and then settling in to watch mah band. *g*

This video is of the first two songs at the Guildhall on Monday. There are others popping up now, and some from London on Tuesday (which was also excellent), but the person who filmed the linked vid appears to have been standing three or four people to my right and maybe a couple forward, because that is damn near my view of the stage. Heh.

My sciatic leg is still twinging some but eh, worth it! It didn't help that I went to another standing-only gig on 8 April - Matthew Good, acoustic. Just him singing and playing guitar. (Well, plus his guitar/sound tech cum bartender, lol.) That was at Hoxton Square Kitchen and Bar in the Shoreditch area of east London, which has a massive bar and seating area that must be gorgeous in daylight with all the windows, and then a totally enclosed, totally black back room with a stage and a square old wooden bar, that holds 450 people. It was glorious, at least once I managed to find the damn venue - the relevant Tube station is Old Street, which happens to be located underneath the centre of a roundabout with bits of the same streets running off in all directions. I eventually texted Jack and said I am between these two intersections, which way do I go? LOL.

Matt did a show at a different London bar the following night, and posted this video afterwards. I wasn't anywhere near that close - I stayed by the bar at the back of the room for this one, as it was stiflingly hot in there and there was a bit of cool air coming in from the exit doors. And he didn't come down into the audience like this at the Hoxton show, perhaps because the disco ball was inoperable, which he did express disappointment about, lol. But the feel of my gig was very similar to what's in the video. Also, I actually saw Matt very close up, as, being a back room, there was no backstage and he had to both enter and exit via the main doors by which I was standing! So that was cool. It was also cool that not a person blocked or bothered him when he left. Great crowd.

Tonight was MB20 gig number one. Local venue. 1800 capacity. There were about ten people (and a railing/bit of space) between where I stood, and Paul Doucette's side of the stage.

Rob was in black jeans, black tee, black waistcoat. Levi's should seriously consider paying him to model. That is how a pair of jeans should look on a man, mmm.

It was 'An Evening With...' as they didn't have an opening band - no support act for the whole UK tour, for whatever reason. So they took the stage about 20.20 and played for about two hours.

Departures from the usual setlist included Waiting for the Train, the bonus track off UK iTunes version of 'North', and Rob doing Downfall as a solo acoustic track (OMG amazing like that!). The rest was a mix of stuff from all four albums, and a cover of INXS's Don't Change.

Live, Sleeping at the Wheel has awesome power. And even though I've watched all the live versions of English Town I could find, hearing it live was just stunning. (It's my favourite track off 'North'.)

Excellent gig, despite the sciatic pain from standing so long! Even dancing in place only does so much, alas.

Fortunately, tomorrow night I have seats. ;-D

x-posted to JF

Prett much everywhere north of London got a snow dump yesterday; from London southward, torrential rain. (Although there were very light flurries this morning here.) Poor Cumbria had some really freak weather, with high sudden winds and all that created 14-foot drifts in minutes. The article I read had some weather person commenting that it was more like something you'd see somewhere like Canada. No, not especially. Nor'easters can definitely be brutal, and I know my parents were digging out again last week, but they don't really do the snow equivalent of a flash flood very often.

My timing being what it is, I am off to spend a couple days at the beach. LOL. I bought a Groupon voucher around Christmastime that was good until the end of March. My original thought had been to go away the weekend of my birthday, but I forgot that was Mothering Sunday this year. (Cannot get used to that being in March. I have a few stray cards round the house because I keep buying them in March and then not knowing wtf I've done with them by the time late April rolls around and it's time to mail them!)

So it'll be freeeeezing, but is supposed to just be cold and overcast so no big, really. I can certainly cope with cold! And the hotel has an indoor pool and jacuzzi so if it's really blustery and I don't feel like making the 20-minute walk into town, I can just hang indoors and lounge. Not planning anything except to chill out and get away for a couple of days.

Didn't even check if there's wifi, free or not, as I'm intending to unplug and am taking actual books instead.

I seem to have survived my thirties. Technically it won't be my birthday until 08.10 Eastern but it's after midnight where I am so I'm counting it. :P I took tomorrow off. I intend to sleep in, to help make up for today having been such a giant clusterfuck. I am more bothered than I expected to be by turning 40. Not because of the particular age so much as passing another milestone without seeming to have accomplished much of anything.

Also, happy International Women's Day to you all. I have no idea how 2013 is well into March already...

When I left the house this morning, there was a weird sense of waiting calm in the air. It was overcast but pale, pearly grey and bright-ish.

A little after noon, it started raining. By the time I left work for home, the streets were full of puddles and the wind was blowing sheets of rain sideways. I saw a few people struggling with umbrellas but most, like me, turned up their jacket collar and put their hood up if they had one, and carried on.

I was decidedly glad for my thick, warm black leggings, though, because with those kind of gusts, my minidress did not exactly stay down, LOL.

Tomorrow, I expect to see umbrellas littered round, with broken spokes and snapped spines. They seem to be the biggest casualty of a rainstorm round here.

Which I stumbled upon by doing that thing I rarely do, aka reading the comments. *snerk*

adumbrate

1. To foreshadow vaguely.
2. To give a vague outline.
3. To obscure or overshadow.

(Etymology: Latin adumbrātus "represented in outline", from adumbrāre "cast a shadow on", from umbra "shadow".)

New vocabulary pleases me. *g*

A good centimetre already and the flurries seem to have settled in, so I thnk we might end up with more than the predicted 2cm.

And whilst part of me was Very Amused at all the omg!incoming! warnings and disaster planning that was going on yesterday, for two centimetres of snow, I've lived through enough winter weather here to know that southern England isn't really designed for snow. So the people who do need to drive, etc., may genuinely be better off trying to work from home or taking a personal day or whatever.

Since I walk, and I can go the longer route which is all flat, I'm fine. I still have my Canuck winter coat so I'll just dust that off and lace up my Docs.

Snow! *g*

*hugs everyone*

25 Funniest Autocorrects of 2012. I just... man, Damn You Autocorrect makes me laugh so I cry and cannot breathe. I suppose because it's language-based and all that, it kind of hits me where I live. *g*

How it is that I am generally perceived as a responsible adult.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Dear Self,

Please to be stopping the procrastination queen act. You are making yourself far more anxious than is reasonable and wasting money to boot.

Love, Me
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

No, it's nothing that's going to get me in genuine deep shit, just... yeah. *sigh* One of the things I despise most about having a wobble is that I do procrastinate out the wazoo, in part because I cannot maintain an awareness of time. This post by scott_lynch describes the general phenomenon better than I have the brain for at the moment, with what he calls 'black dog time'.

What I find so incredibly irritating, though, is that this particular aspect is the one that persists at a constant low level. On some level, I am always avoiding *something*. And yes, I know, that is how procrastination works, but ever since the first time I climbed out of a major depressive episode, some twelve years ago now, this has remained a vicious little circle of behaviour that I can't seem to get a handle on, no matter how well everything else might be going.

Which is how I find myself having a nice not-quite-anxiety-attack at ten o'clock on a Thursday night because I'm having a new mattress delivered tomorrow and my bedroom is in serious need of a clean-&-tidy, and it's now too late to vacuum. So I am tidying and dusting as best I can tonight, and I shall be up at the crack o'dawn tomorrow so that I can hoover as soon as it's reasonable (that would be 8:00 am here). But none of this should be necessary, because I have actually had all this week off. Jack had surgery last week, so I collected him from hospital on Saturday and have been making sure he doesn't do anything strenuous. So I've had all this time, and I booked the damn delivery at the beginning of the month so I've known exactly what needed to be done and to what deadline and here I am, effectively 'cramming'. Bah. Hate.

[A few days ago] Rona Ambrose, the Minister for the Status of Women voted in favour of a bill that could strip Canadian women of their right to security of person and the right to a safe and legal abortion.

Please consider going here: https://www.change.org/petitions/canadian-women-deserve-better#share and signing the petition calling for the resignation of Rona Ambrose.

So, there's actually been stuff happening that I haven't been posting about. *gasp* No real reason why, other than me being busy getting ready for my trip to Canada and then being on said trip! But in the wake of the deaths of a family friend, my cat, and my employee in early summer, I took some actions - work-related and personal life-related.

( More about all that...Collapse )