Driving home for xmas, sort of..

Forsinkede fly, stuck på gardermoen, heldigvis har jeg tilgang til inet så det går an å drepe noen timer.. Er på vei til sørlandet til familie, gamle venner, mat og gaver - blir sikkert bra! God Jul!

Karl Pilkington

Erik tipset meg om et ganske ferskt intervju med Karl Pilkington fra BBC2's Culture Show:

Foruten å lese boken hans (han er sansynligvis den første som har skrevet en bok uten å ha lest en først selv..) er jeg godt i gang med prosjektet å høre gjennom alle 90+ showene fra XFM som, uten musikkpausene, varer ca 1 time hver. Å høre fødselen av Rockbusters, første gang Tattoo Stan, Worlds 50 Top Freaks og Autie Nora bli omtalt er priceless..

Now playing: Cat Stevens - Tea for the Tillerman

#150

Wow, 150 poster på bloggen, hvem ville trodd det?
Det har vært ganske stille her i det siste, jeg jobber ganske mye for tiden (kanskje litt for mye i det siste) og det er ting & tang å ordne med leiligheten etc. Jeg prøver også å pleie diverse vennskap, noe jeg ikke har vært særlig flink til på enkelte fronter i høst(beklager!), men mest av alt så prøver jeg å tilbringe så mye tid som mulig med kjæresten min Marianne - noe som kan være vanskelig med nattevakter, overtid, møter etc som skal passe.. Bortsett fra stress og mangel på tid er livet ganske topp for tiden, hvis det forblir slik er jeg en happy-camper :-D

Har endelig oppdaget Tom Waits' musikk og det var hyggelig å oppdage at han har røtter i jazzen (se debutalbumet The Heart of Saturday Night), kanskje mer om det seinere..
Siri har dratt til Kenya for å gjøre ett eller annet ingen av oss er helt sikre på hva er, men som sikkert blir en fin merit på hennes knappe 7-års utdannelse ;-) Hørte hun traff mesteparten av familien min igår, verden er for liten..

Marianne drar til danmark neste uke, vi får forhåpentligvis et par dager sammen før jeg vender nesa ned mot sør for å tilbringe noen juledager med familien og gamle venner.

American Splendor

Her er et aldri så lite legendarisk klipp fra David Letterman Show med siste gjesteopptreden (før 90-tallet ihvertfall) av Harvey Pekar. Sansynligvis sier dette deg lite, men sjekk ut filmen American Splendor så får du bakgrunnen om en ganske spesiell karakter i amerikansk popkultur. Paul Giamatti, som spiller rollen som Harvey, er forrøvrig en av mine favorittskuespillere for tiden hvor en perle er Sideways.

Intervju med Karl Pilkington

Her er et intressant intervju med min store helt Karl Pilkington i forbindelse med den nye boken hans (som Erik var så snill å oppdrive i Oslo til meg!).

Ellers så vi Borat-filmen på fredag, herlig-herlig! Jagshemash!

Sam & Max

Jippi, gjengen er tilbake :D:D Første episode klar for nedlasting 1. november.

Yazz-flute

Jeg og Christian har utviklet en usunn fascinasjon for 70-talls progrock som tangerer mot det hinnsidige, med jazz-flute, dementert joddling, sopp i alle bauger og kanter, tekster som umulig kan ha blitt skrevet i nykter tilstand osv.

Utforsker tidlig Jethro Tull for tiden, her er et bra eksempel (hopp til ca 3:00 for å få essensen):


Her er det hår så langt øyet kan se, aggressiv fløyteføring for ikke å nevne bekledning bestående av gule skøytedrakter, uidentifiserte objekter forran skrittet, alt akkompagnert av en Arthur Dent-isk morgenkåpe og fine pixie-sko..

Ellers er Focus nærmest et referanseband å regne i denne sjangeren, ord blir knappe når de skal beskrives, ta en titt.


Her er eksempel på noen av tekstene til Focus - Happy Nightmare (Mescaline) (Mescaline er naturligvis en ganske offroad sopp populær på 60-tallet):

There's a man with three heads,
There's a girl with three beds,
See they're both running fast after me,
(Gonna catch you, gonna fill you full of love).

Have your head filled to the top with big pearls,
(Feel the softness of a wild mountain silk),
Then you hear someone's dead in the world,
(Sink your body in a cold bath of milk.
You can bet your sweet life
That they fought with a knife,
See they're all running fast after me,
(Wanna kiss you, run their fingers through your hair).

Oppdatering: Kunne ikke la være å legge ved det klassiske klippet fra filmen Anchorman:

Finsk disco på norsk

http://www.start.no/filter/embed_click.html?link_id=1794

Dette er en gammel slager som er morsom nok i seg selv (sjekk DE dance-movene da!), men her har noen satt seg ned og tekstet det som blir sagt som om det skulle være norsk :-D

Husker du La Linea

..eller Streken som han het i norge? Husker mamma pleide å rope til oss guttene "kom fort, Streken er på tv!" så løp vi opp trappene som galninger.
Herlig gjensyn!
La Linea 01

La Linea 02

La Linea 03

La Linea 04

Så kan du finne resten selv..

Ninjateknikk II

Nå som jeg midlertidig er uten internett hjemme kan jeg kanskje starte på en ny bok..?

Family Planning Advice

Fikk denne fra Jan:

Some Thoughts by Karl Pilkington

Homeowner

Etter 1 mnd med visninger, tøffe budrunder og slit har jeg endelig kjøpt meg en leilighet her i Bodø! Det var i lengste strekket prismessig, men både jeg og pappa falt pladask for den da vi så den, pappa kallte den Penthouse-leiligheten pga. plassering og innbo, så den måtte jeg bare ha! Er ganske fucking overlykkelig nå, tankene svirrer fra det rent praktiske som flytting, kontrakter etc, til farge på gardiner og hvor stor tv jeg trenger..

Leiligheten ble tatt av annonsering for en uke siden, derfor har jeg ingen bilder eller linker, men kort fortalt er det en 3-roms, 61 m^2, sinnsykt sweet kjøkken/gulv/bad etc, masse bodplass, stort kryploft, balkong kanskje med plass til en liten sofa og noen pledd for seine sommerkvelder, bygget seint 2004. Den ligger på toppen av bygget, helt på hjørnet og er med ganske liten tvil den fineste i bygget, med utsikt over det meste av byen som er verd å se ;-) Ellers er det heis, integrerte hvitevarer, parkeringsplass til 1,5 BMW++ i oppvarmet garage, porttelefon med video, 200 m fra jobb og masse jeg ikke kommer på nå.

Virtuell champagne til alle!

Oppdatering: Strøkent kjøleskap og komfyr fra 2005 selges ;-)

Campingtryner

Liv er verdensmester på campingtryner, sjekk selv hos John T.

Skjeivind

Var på trening med Christian på mandag og pga. dårlig tid var vi litt gjerrige med oppvarmingen. Etter et par løft sa det pang og jeg fikk sinnsykt vondt i nakken. Idag satt jeg på jobb med en 45 graders vinkel i nakken og kunne nesten ikke bevege meg så jeg gikk til en kiropraktor som sykmeldte meg ut uka mens de skal gå til verks på styggdommen. Suger.

Kom over denne artikkelen om folk som tydligvis hevner seg på piggrokker etter at Steve Irwin ble drept av en. Galskap!

Singstar Norsk på Norsk

Karaokespillene Singstar til PlayStation 2 har solgt utrolige 300 000
eksemplarer i Norge.
Dette er faktisk er 7 % av det totale antallet solgte
Singstar-spill i verden, og hvis man måler dette i forhold til folketall, er det
nesten litt underlig hvor glade nordmenn har blitt i å synge og få poeng i
forhold til hvor bra de synger.
Så da Sony skulle lage fire nye europeiske
fullokaliserte versjoner, falt valget på England, Tyskland, Spania og Norge.

Les mer her.

Gleder meg til å høre Jaran synge "Rompa mi", denne gangen ikke bare umotivert på hyttetur ;-D

Herligherligheihei

Her er en sak som jeg har koset meg med i sommer men som jeg fullstendig har glemt å legge ut en link til - Sveinar og Tormod har laget en muntermangsom og innsnavlende podcast de kaller Herligherligheihei, (Trykk på free, skriv inn koden som dukker opp etter ca 80 sekunder og lagre fila.) der de tar for seg en noe mer spesiell nisje av populærmusikken. Olga Marie Michaelsen var kanskje en av de mer kjente norske eksponentene for denne formen, men det finnes så mye mer der ute. Bare introen med Shooby Taylor som kjører offroad med agressiv scatting lagt over Johnny Cash's Folsom Prison gjør dette til en forlystende halvtime (håper Shooby kommer med på enten Singstar Frijazz eller Singstar Offroad). Venter i spenning på neste episode, kanskje denne gang med Bluesøsken, dementert jodling og utagerende "jazz flute"-soloer med Focus..?
Oppdatering: Har fikset linken til podcasten ;-)

Ricky Gervais Show Season 3

Våknet opp til fantastiske nyheter idag, ikke bare var det en ny gratis video podcast fra Ricky, Stephen og Karl, som kan sees her:

men de fortalte at 22. august starter sesong 3 med 6 nye 30 min episoder!! Har hørt hørt gjennom de gamle tusenvis av ganger, så dette var virkelig gode nyheter!

Takk til Erik for tips!

Singstar Anthems

Selv om jeg ifølge denne anmeldelsen tydeligvis ikke kan være mye mann gleder jeg meg kjempe mye til dette! Setlisten på Singstar Rocks var en stor sviktelse, men jeg tror dette kan hjelpe å veie delvis opp.

Jeg syns forresten det var intressant å lese hvor konsekvent journalisten er helt til han kommer til dette:

20 forferdelige låter (OK, 18 da - Queen og Scissor Sisters er helt
greie)

De nevnte to bandene må vel være rimelig godt definert skeive og ikke-maskuline?

Oppdatering: Enda en, denne gangen Singstar Legends. Ser veldig bra ut! Men det ser desverre ut som vi må vente enda litt til på Singstar Frijazz, for ikke å snakke om Singstar Offroad.. :-(

Hva skjedde (med dagbladet)?

Selv ikke treigt nyhetsbilde og agurknytt forsvarer dette her:
http://www.dagbladet.no/nyheter/2006/08/06/473140.html

Ting & Tang

Kommer med div. ferieanektoter etterhvert, tenkte bare jeg skulle slenge inn noen linker jeg satt og så på idag. Den første er en gammel kjenning som jeg tror jeg først kom over for noen år siden, FOUND Magazine.com. Fantastisk side. Siden sist jeg var der har også Dirty FOUND dukket opp. Så denne tilfeldige Find of the Day, og lurte på om det var noen som samlet penger med beskjeder på. Kom fort over denne siden som var et tilfredsstillende svar, her spesialiserer de seg på sedler med stempler (sjekk linkene på bunnen også, masse herligheter der), men den virkelige godbiten var linken videre til WheresGeorge, hvor man kan følge sedlers reiser over kontinentene, eksempel og top 10. Fikk fryktelig lyst til å lage en norsk variant, men har jo ferie og gidder knapt kle på meg om dagene ;-)

30 sekunder

Er på reisefot for tiden, men måtte bare legge ut denne som jeg fikk fra Liv: http://www.angryalien.com/#this

Fikk hjerteinfarkt - ble «jamaicansk»

Fantastisk historie, ser for meg gamla på sykehjemmet med dreads, lue og tvilsomt tjukk rullings: "One love man, chill out!"
http://www.vg.no/pub/vgart.hbs?artid=122034
Jeg skulle ønske bestemora mi begynte å snakke jamaicansk!

Litt stille her for tiden, har et par ting på vei..

The Elephant Man

Fikk endelig sett The Elephant Man igår. Har hatt planer om å se den i årevis, men har hatt litt problemer med å få tak i den. Ingen butikker har den, det virker som den er ute av produksjon eller noe (prøvde å bestille den på play.no). Først av alt så er det ikke en tradisjonell David Lynch film - du sitter ikke igjen med mentale arr slik som med Mulholland Drive, Lost Highway etc., men det er en utrolig trist film! Anbefaler lommetørkle hvis du er svak for slikt.

Anthony Hopkins spiller en veldig overbevisende rolle, som alltid, når han som legen Dr. Frederick Treves prøver å hjelpe Joseph Merrick som er sterkt misdannet, men etterhvert begynner å spørre seg selv om han egentlig er noe bedre enn freak-sirkusdirektøren som tjente penger på å stille ham ut.

Jeg var ikke klar over at Joseph Carey Merrick var en ekte person som levde mellom 1862 og 1890. Michael Jackson ryktes å ha bydd 1 million dollar for skjellettet hans i 1980. Mer på wikipedia.

Fant et klipp fra filmen Freaks fra 1932 på YouTube. Her er enda et. Her finner man en samling bilder og historier om folk som de kallte freaks. Karl Pilkington er veldig fascinert over bla. "The Human Pillow" som verken hadde armer eller bein men kunne både barbere seg selv og rulle røyk bare med munnen. Fant også "Three Legged Juggler" som Karl ofte omtaler.

En søndag etter en ganske voldsom fyll mens jeg studerte våknet jeg opp og var temmelig daff og ikke i det beste humøret. Det klødde i begge ørene så jeg pillte meg i begge ørene samtidig da jeg oppdaget at jeg kom mye lengre inn på høyre side. Da oppdaget jeg til min store overraskelse at høyre lillefinger er mye tynnere enn den venstre! (skal se om jeg får lagt ut et bilde) I 22 år hadde jeg gått rundt uten å merke det! Molefunken som jeg var tenkte jeg "jaja, nå kommer de sikkert til å selge meg til neste sirkus som kommer forbi.. :(". Etter å ha lest om disse folkene forstår jeg jo at det er menneskeskjebner som har hatt større utfordringer..

Futurama lever!

http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/home-entertainment/futurama-returns-183043.php
Genialt! Fatter ikke hvorfor de tok det av i det hele tatt.

Sin City

Når det er møkkavær som nå må jeg si jeg savner sommerene på sørlandet, det er derimot ting jeg ikke savner. Det er klart at ikke alle er sånn, men det var virkelig befriende å flytte til et sted hvor man slipper det konstant tilstedeværende underliggende religiøse formynderiet.

Fikk denne lille saken fra christian om Metallica - "satans fred" *tihihi*

Rapex

Kom over denne i min daglige blog-runde: Rapex. Les for mer info.

Så mange spørsmål.. Hvordan og når er det meningen at en dame skal installere denne;
- Før hun går ut om kvelden? Ville tatt det ganske personlig hvis jeg fant ut at mange tok på seg en sånn før de kom på mine vorspiel ihvertfall.
- Når man hører skumle fotskritt bak seg på vei hjem fra byen? Med mindre man er rask i håndvendingene ser jeg for meg at man bare gjør jobben lettere for en potensiell *tihi* voldtektsmann.

Hva skjer hvis man glemmer at den er i? Må menn ta med seg lommelykt og ta en ekstra sjekk for å være på den trygge siden fra nå av?

Hvordan får dama den ut? Ser for meg legevakten; 3 personer har satt fast pekefingrene på en kinesisk fingerfelle, 4 damer har fingrene fast i denne..

Tone, den innbitte markedsføreren som hun her kom opp med det naturlige navnet for denne saken i norge: "Musefella" :D

Og for å fortsette med Tones store tanker: "En ting jeg lurer på er hvor det skal selges. På apoteket sammen med prevensjon, på jernvareforretningen sammen med musefellene *knis tjihi*, på kondomeriet sammen med pisk og håndjern eller hos Securitas sammen med hjemmealarm og brannslukningsapparat?"

Amerikanerene har benyttet dette konseptet i mange år, men der på parkeringsplasser slik at man bare kan kjøre én vei (hvis man er glad i dekkene sine). Men er det ikke på mørke parkeringsplasser mange voldtekter skjer?

Så vidt jeg har forstått er den ihvertfall forsinket 1 år fra å gå ut på markedet pga. manglende mannfolk som har meldt seg til å teste den...

Smerte!

Livstegn

Hei, lenge siden sist. Har jobbet noe sinnsykt i det siste, samt var borte en uke. Ganske sliten for tiden, men positive er at jeg har begynt å trene sammen med christian. Satser på 3 ganger i uken, får se hvor lenge det holder. Ellers var det godt å få siri hjem, imorgen blir det fest :D

Fikk ikke med meg Deep Purple igår, men leste en fin kommetar fra en 80 år gammel nabo til konsertstedet "jeg bare tar av meg høreapperatene. jeg syns det er bare bra at ungdommen får more seg". "Ungdommen" i dette tilfellet ligger på et aldersnitt på 40-50 år..

Fikk Hitman: Blood Money forrige helg og har brukt så mye tid på det som mulig - lever fullstendig opp til forventingene og litt til. Mer om det seinere.

Ellers så følte jeg meg skikkelig kar her om dagen; skrudde og styrte på bilen. Dvs, bortsett fra å fylle på olje (måtte spørre en ung jente på bensinstasjonen om hvilken type jeg måtte ha) gikk det mest i å skru og løsne på bolter og lokk, for så å skru de tilbake igjen. Panseret åpent, nappe litt i gassen (tråttelen), røyke litt, sparke i dekkene etc. Bra ettermiddag.

Så var det denne middagen da..

Mer Kaizers!

Min blodsbror Jørgen informerte meg for en stund siden om Føling på Fyllinga - Kaizers Orchestra skal ha en unik konsert i min hjemby Arendal i sommer på en søppelfylling! Det er ikke så ille som det høres ut som, det er mer en svær samling bildekk, gamle maskiner, sammenpressede biler osv. Gleder meg sinnsykt!
Ellers ble DVD-oppfølgeren til live albumet Live at Vega, Viva La Vega, releaset i norsk versjon denne uken. Jeg fikk endelig kommet meg fra jobb og løp for å kjøpe det, ble et lite stikk i gleden da jeg oppdaget at jeg hadde fått den engelske versjonen som har vært ute lenge.. Ikke så fryktelig farlig egentlig, men litt surt når jeg først ventet så lenge. :-S

Har lagt ved et bilde fra da vi så de i bodø i høst. Kjempebra konsert og masse feststemte venner! (trykk for å se større)

Så de også på en privat fest i regi av Microsoft men finner ikke bildene fra det..

Beer Holster

Har alltid syns det er passe geeky å gå rundt med enten et mobilhylster eller Leathermanholder i beltet - ser man noen gå med begge deler er det åpenbart at personen har 5 år eller mere ingeniørutdannelse.

Fant denne dog, som kanskje vil endre oppfattningen min..

Ellers har det vært litt stille her i det siste, har jobbet som et helvete i det siste for å rekke diverse deadlines. Blir jobb i helga også, og det spøker for helligdagen mandag(noen som vet hva slags helligdag det er??). Neste uke er jeg i Bergen på et seminar arrangert av jobben. 400-ish mennesker, Madrugada er leid inn. Tar en ekstra dag der i helga med Christian og noen flere for å få litt bedre tid til å drikke øl^h^h oppleve byen.

Jo, forresten, har fått en samling med alle Mannen med den nakne pistol filmene, samt tv-serien fra 80-tallet, Police Squad, som filmene er basert på. Bedre og billigere humor får man ikke :D

Cigarette? Yes...It is!

Hayley: äldre än sin mormor

Ikveld (mandag 29.05) kl 22:35 viser svensk TV4 dokumentaren om Hayley som lider av progeria, en sykdom som gjør at hun eldres veldig fort og derfor har bursdag 8 ganger i året. Hun har en hjemmeside der du kan lese om henne og se bilder fra diverse progeriatreff.
På et spesielt treff i tyskland for et par år siden fikk de male på en bil som jeg antar skulle auksjoneres bort. De burde nok valgt en kabriolet siden ingen av ungene blir mer enn 13 år og derfor ikke rekker stort høyere enn til under vinduene.

Er det noe 80-tallet har lært oss så er det at en sang kan redde alt. Legg merke til dreven headsettføring på naboen! Fant et bilde der hun og søstera kjører i limo til en fotballkamp - slo meg som litt rart å sette frem champagne og resten av baren til henne, men hun er jo tilsvarende ca 80 år så en liten dram kan vel ikke skade?

24 sesong 5 over!

Så nettopp siste dobbelt-episode av sesong 5 av spenningsserien 24. Jeg er nesten stum! De klarte det igjen - enda en sesong som totalt overgår de foregående, på alle måter. Skal prøve å ikke avsløre noe for de som følger med på tv, men jeg kan vel få si at vi har en spennende oppfølger i vente?!
Dette betyr ikke så mye for de som ikke har sett filmen To End All Wars, men jeg har et sterkt håp om å få se Jack Bauer tusle rundt i kinahatten og skulderveska :D:D

Men nå er det 6 mnd til neste runde :(

Bildet: Jack Bauer spiser folk som Chuck Norris til frokost!

Sing like nobody's listening

Her er et lite sitat fra Mark Twain som jeg likte:

"Dance like nobody's watching; love like you've never been hurt. Sing like nobody's listening; live like it's heaven on earth."

Den delen med synginga tror jeg at jeg lever opp til ;D Vet ikke helt med den siste delen, folk sier jo at du bør leve hver dag som om den var din siste; hadde folk faktisk gjort det hadde jo sykehusene vært stappfulle - jeg hadde ihvertfall løpt til legen, jeg er jo tydeligvis dødssyk!

Ricky Gervais kom med et par fine uttrykk som jeg gjerne vil reprodusere her:

"Den som hugger opp veden varmer seg to ganger."

og

"En kamel er en hest designet av komité."

Finn-ut-av-spill del 1

Jeg er oppvokst med adventure-spillene (vi kallte det "finn-ut-av-spill", fordi man måtte ..finne ut av ting) til bla. Lucas Arts og Sierra.

For en stund siden lasta jeg de opp igjen, først ut var Curse of Monkey Island. Dette er absolutt bland de mest underholdende spillene jeg noen sinne har spillt! Da det kom ut revolusjonerte det, sammen med D.O.T.T, grafikken for adventurespill, det fantes ingen rette streker, ingen 90 graders vinkler og alle proporsjoner var .. helt ut av proporsjoner. Den absurde humoren var i kjent Lucas Arts spill, minner kanskje litt om Monty Pyton eller Simpsons, men det var likevel noe eget.

Gode minner fra spillet er bla. når man må prøve å få mannskapet sitt, en Barbershop Quartet bestående av ex-pirater til å slutte å synge hele tiden og heller manne skipet, ved å prøve å hive inn linjer i sangene dems som de ikke klarer å finne noe rime på (kan høres her) - vet du noe som rimer på "orange"? I samme del av spillet må du prøve å slå andre pirater i "Insult duelling" hvor man fekter, og for hvert slag må finne et svar på en fornedrigelse som både må rime og fornærme :)

Bortsett fra grafikken tror jeg musikken var det jeg likte best; det var ikke tracket musikk, men ordentlig spillt inn med band og det hele og lå i en funky caribbean jazz/raggae-stil som kan få voksne menn til å gråte ;) Du kan hente ned all musikken fra http://soundtracks.mixnmojo.com/ se under "Curse of Monkey Island".

Gode eksempler er:
Mocking the Voodoo Lady & Voodoo Jazz
In the belly of the snake (fantastisk del av spillet!)
Using the row boat
Monkeys of the sea cucumer

Sporene er ganske korte fordi når de spilles i ulike scener av spillet så har de en intro, en mellomdel som spilles i loop, og en avsluttning som spilles når man forlater scenen. I spillet er derfor sangene evigvarende så lenge man er i samme scene.

Har ikke kommet gjennom hele spillet på nytt nå, mest fordi musikken mot siste del ikke er så bra IMHO.

Tenkte å fortsette denne lille serien med noen flere "trips down memory lane" som Letterman kaller det.

Guybrush Threepwood møter Murry for første gang. (Guybrush fikk fornavnet sitt da artisten ikke visste hva karakteren skulle hete og lagret bildet som filen "guy" med filnavnendelsen ".brush" fra tegneprogrammet Paintbrush på Amiga).

Pinball Nostalgi

Har hatt en nostalgi-trip om spill vi spillte på Amiga, Commodore 64 og PC da vi var mindre og har funnet frem litt av hvert. Først ut er Pinball-spillene:

Et kjært minne fra Amiga-tiden er Pinball Dreams, Pinball Fantasies og til en viss grad Pinball Illusions. De var utviklet av svenske Digital Illusions, som nå heter DICE og er aktive med bla. Battlefield-franchisen.

Jeg fant en DOS-emulator(DOS Box) som kan spille PC-porten av spillene som du finner her:
Pinball Fantasies
Pinball Dreams
Pinball Illusions

Fantasies var min favoritt, og jeg tror det kuleste med hele greia var musikken. Musikken var slik at den utviklet seg jo lengre man kom og jeg husker jeg ofte prøvde å holde ballen igang så lenge som mulig bare for å høre musikken :D

PS: Jeg husker jeg trodde spillet var laget av Fairlight fordi de hadde lagt på en intro når spillet startet *hihi*. (Fairlight var en cracke/warez-gruppe som hadde spredt spillet ulovlig).

Urge: MTV & Microsoft's iTunes Music Store killer?

I morgen (rettelse, en leak er tilgjenglig pr. tirsdag ettermiddag) blir Urge tilgjenglig. Urge er MTV (Viacom) og Microsofts samlede tiltak for å prøve å ta en del av digitalmusikkmarkedet(hater norsk orddeling..) Apple's iTunes Music Store dominerer. Personlig kjøper jeg ganske mye musikk fra iTunes (jeg gidder ikke gjenta Music Store hele tiden, eventuelle kverulanter), men det er fordi det er veldig få aktuelle alternativer. Jeg klarer ikke sette ord på hvor mye jeg hater både iTunes klienten (som man er låst til å bruke) og mange aspekter av selve tjenesten. Topp 2: hvorfor kan man ikke enkelt hente ned musikk kjøpt fra en annen - autorisert - pc? Det er fullt mulig å kopiere over de beskyttede filene og legge de inn på den andre pc'n, men det er jo stress. Nr 2 er at man trenger en iPod for å spille av musikken på farta. Jeg har en SE Walkman jeg bruker som mp3-spiller, men må brenne ut og rippe tilbake all musikken fra iTunes hvis jeg skal høre på de der. Hat.

Det som kanskje irriterer meg mest er hvordan Microsoft får masse pes om å drive monopol når Apple er så mye værre. Forskjellen er at Microsoft er så mye mer vellykket og derfor merkes mer. Hadde MS låst all digital musikk til Windows Media Player og én type mp3-spiller skal jeg love det hadde blitt baluba, er det ikke dette Apple gjør?

*telle til 10*

Ok, uansett, jeg håper Urge kan være med og skape alternativer til iTunes, kanskje jeg nå bare trenger bruke én media player :D

Les mer:
Artikkel på gizmodo.com

urge.com

Flere blogger

Vil ønske velkommen til Martes blog og Eriks blog (var ikke klar over at du hadde en).

Oppdatering: faen, bomma på linken til Erik, nå skal det være bra!
Oppdatering 2: Erik har flyttet hit.

The Edge spiller med New Orleans Preservation Hall Jazz Band

Stilig sak for oss som både liker jazz og U2.

Loppemarked

For tiden saumfarer jeg aviser o.l. etter loppemarkeder, her om dagen fikk jeg så sinnsykt lyst til å dra på et stort loppemarked med masse forskjellig skrot! Liv og jeg sporet opp et slags loppemarked, men det viste seg å være en liten privat antik handel som var oppe en dag i uken. Liv endte opp med et gammelt fuglebur til Georg og en LP-sigle av Harry Belafonte (en av de fra USA for Africa). Hvis noen i Bodø-området vet om noe tar jeg gjerne imot tips!

@#%¤"&!!

Christian fortalte om en bok av Douglas Adams (Meaning of Liff?) der han tar for seg rare navn på byer og tettsteder og resirkulerer de til å beskrive følelser som ikke har noe navn. Eksempel er følelsen man får når man setter middagsrester som man vet man aldri kommer til å spise opp inn i kjøleskapet, for å slippe dårlig samvittighet. Husker ikke navnet på byen.

Jeg etterlyser et navn på den følelsen man får når man har tatt oppvasken, er god og fornøyd for en alt for langt utsatt jobb, hører lyden av at det siste av oppvaskvannet renner ut av kummen og oppdager stabelen med skitne sorterte tallerkener som man hadde satt like ut av synsvidde... Foreløpig kaller jeg det "@#%¤"&!!"

(jeg elsker Donald-banning *hihi*!)

Kaizers Orchestra

Jeg er fryktelig glad i Kaizers, siste året på høgskolen hadde vi til og med vårt eget lille (vel, vi var vel 8 stk) Kaizers coverband, selv om mange vil si at det bare var en unnskyldning for å drikke midt i uka.

Fant en torrent på The Piratebay på ca 1 GB som inneholder masse bootlegs, demoer og masse annet rart fra gutta fra Bryne. Selv om bootleggene er temmelig crappy i kvalitet fant jeg en demoinnspilling av Ompa til Du Dør som er verd sin vekt i gull. Skikkelig gutterominnspilling! Ellers er Live at Vega noe av det bedre jeg har hørt - Kaizers er et live band og ikke lett å replikere på plate, dette er et veldig godt forsøk. Lurer på om jeg skal dra og se de på Bukta Festivalen..

Lazy engineers..

Halvveis norsk ihvertfall..

Sirimor minnet meg på i en kommentar i jarans blog at jeg ikke har skrevet så mye i det siste, noe som jo er sant. God blanding av at det er mye som skjer for tiden og at jeg er for slapp til å skrive. Faktisk er jeg så slapp at isteden for å forklare meg vil jeg heller henvise til jarans unnskyldning, bare bytt ut med mitt navn der det passer..

Et annet problem er at jeg kommer på ting jeg har lyst til å skrive om, men innen jeg finner en pc/har tid til å skrive så har jeg glemt det. Skal prøve med en huskelapp.

Language/Språk

Was talking with Marianne about this the other day - why do I write my blog in english. When I first started off I had this big decision to make; my main reason for choosing english was that I have come over so many links to blogs with things I'd like to read that have turned out to be french, spanish and such that I can't read. Annoying!

On a more general thought, as the world is getting smaller, people are travelling, mixing and blending I can't see that languages serve any other purpose than a hinderance to this. So I guess I'm not very nationalistic..

Anywho, I realized that I only care about real friends reading this blog, not internet friends, and most, if not all of the former speak norwegian and that those are the ones I write for. Not as if there is much of national value in my ramblings, let alone international.

Any thoughts? Jaran?

So - we are going norwegian!

Hallo ;-)

Home, ill

I got a cold at the end of last week and it hit me hard this weekend. Initially you think that it's not that bad, you get time to play computer, watch tv/movies etc.. how wrong was I! Just about the only form of entertainment occupying me the passed 4-5 days have been counting the tiles in my bedroom celing (which is 21). Thankfully I got a lot of sympathy from friends and all my extra-moms, and Tone even came by with Tom & Jerry-biscuits, coke and cartoons :-D

Fever is gone so I'll have a go at work tomorrow and see how it goes.

Local Celebrity Part III

Had almost forgot about this, but as promised here and here, here is finally my interview in electronic form! Actually it was my boss who found the electronic version today, but he's a good sport and actually posted it on our local news portal at work ;-)

Traded a paper clip for a house

http://www.dagbladet.no/nyheter/2006/04/17/463724.html (norwegian, you can google his name and find an english article, I'm too lazy)
Heard about this guy a while back, good to hear he (sort of) made it!

Karl the distinguished

We might be seeing Karl's little mank head on video from now on, check out the teaser on iTunes!
Wanna hear Karl laugh? This is pretty exclusive and it might ruin your experience of him - you have been warned!

The human ball

Was working overtime late at night on tuesday and needed some food, so I went to the nearest gasstation to get a burger. Went to the teller, looked to my left and saw an old cupple. They both looked 75-ish, the lady had a nice little head, normal body, evenly porpotioned legs and all. The guy though; he was pretty small most all over, you know, like old people that have shrunk a bit, although his jacket was huge! Not only was it huge, it looked really round in every direction. It was such that he could shoplift one of those big plastic balls you can jump around on, and noone would notice! What made me look twice was his head - it was just unbelievely small! And because his jacket was so big his neck was just an inch too small for his head to stick out of it! He loocked like one of the characters from "Kalle Klovn", the deliveryguy if I remember correctly, just with no neck.

I had to wait with my order because I was on the werge of bursting - afterwards I damned myself for being too polite to take a picture of them for your viewing pleasure.. Gonna stick around there to see if he shows up again!

Zzzz..

Apparently I snore. I'we heard it before but I guess I have dismissed it on a subconcious level or something. Nothing compared to my father tho, he snores so loudly the whole house trembles. Maybe it's that compared to him I don't really make much noise.
My father doesn't sneeze a lot, but when he does it says in the paper the next day!

Read about a armwatch that gives you a small shock whenever you snore. Seems cruel to me, can't imagine who would wear it freely. And it doesn't even show the time.

Summertime

Tonight we loose one hour of sleep, remember to set your watch one hour forward. I have never really understood this concept - seems like a design flaw to me.. I may not be as confused as Karl Pilkington tho, he has on several occations given pretty interesting theories on what should be done with the whole concept of time when, if, we move to another planet, as he thinks the elderly would become pretty grumpy if we adjust it to suit the planet's orbital movements.

Morning pill

Hi, I'm not dead, just been a busy week. Doing some work to reach deadline monday, we'll see how it goes.. Planning on watching Smokey and the Bandit tonight, too tired to go out. I got all 3 movies a while back, toghether with Cannonball Run that me and Liv watched two weeks ago, good times!

But that's not why you called.. Check out this alarm clock - it has got to be the coolest one I'we ever seen! Reminds me of a 3D demo we made for a multimedia project at school.

Skiing in Sweden

Going skiing for the first time in years in Sweden this weekend, I’m gonna try snowboard for the first time. If you don’t hear anything from me in a while, call the ambulance :-S

Busted product photo contest

Busted product photo contest

Video game music

Check out this compilation of different remakes of theme music from our favorite video games (Written in Norwegian, the music speaks for itself). I love this stuff, the first Mario video was really good, aswell as the Monkey Island bit. Oh the memories.. I actually still have and old hand-made poster from when Press Play on Tape played at The Gathering in 2000 or so :-)

Update: Found this Mario-thingie too.

Local Celebrity Part II

Annette found this small teaser in the paper this morning:


I especially like how then almost got my name right, and how it looks like a cat scratched my chin in the print ;-)

Bread crumbs

In my kitchen I have like a closet/shelve where I keep my bread. I can not remember the last time I ate a whole bread, usually more than half og it goes to waste (I don’t eat breakfast). So when it gets hard or even when it sometimes grows molds I throw it out. The other day as I was cleaning I noticed that a lot of bread crumbs (damn you english seperation of words!) had gathered in the closet – I can’t have cleaned it out more than a handfull of times ever. It got me thinking, if a big piece of bread can grow mold, and crumbs aparently not, what’s the minimum size it can be and still get moldy – or to put it the other way; can you make really small bread that is mold-resistant? Just buy a bunch of them and never worry?

More Ricky Gervais Show

As Erik pointed out a clip of Ricky’s apperance on David Letterman Show can be found here. Another Karl Pilkington fan site has this feature:

Blast from the past, Scientology, cones and more..

What I like about the internet is all the weird stuff that’s out there and all the crazy people who can ramble on uncensured. You just have to dig a bit. Or just stay here. I remember reading about a crazy maths professor, Alexander Abian, many years ago who, among other things, claimed all bad things on this planet were caused by the moon and that if we could just blow it up everything would be nice and dandy.

This got picked up by Kibo (James Parry) who besides writing loads of nonsense formed his own religion, as I remember it, as a parody on the Church of Scientology (you know, the thing with Tom Cruise, Katie Holmes and John Travolta where they brainwash you and steal all your money and other nice things). Kibo eats Chuck Norris facts for breakfast. He sparked my facination for cones, and can be blamed for why I keep stealing cones when I’m drunk.

Both Kibo and Scientology are days worth of entertaining reading if you have a taste for the weird. Also the Rotten Library is good reading, for instance the “origin” of many of Karl’s stories about intelligent monkeys. I wouldn’t step out of the library tho.. See how similar Karl’s head is to this supposed picture of Ollie?!

Ricky Gervais on Letterman

My two favorite comedians at the moment were gathered this Friday 3rd of March on a issue of Late Show with David Letterman. It aired in the US the same night, and I’ll be shure to download it or catch it on Norwegian TV (on monday I guess?). Dave knows who Karl is, how cool is that!

Doctors

Went to the doctors today before lunch. I had just changed doctor so I didn’t know who I was visiting except for a name. Found the name on a map downstairs at the clinic and went to the 4th floor and had a seat. I all seemed strange, there were patients coming in and out, but there were no doctors running around and there was nobody at the reception and in one end of the hall I could see lots of weights and exercise bikes. 20 minutes after my appointment should have started I finally asked an old man sitting beside me what was going on. It turned out this floor was for physical training and such, I guess people recovering from car crashes and that and I was in the wrong floor. When I got to the right floor I was too late to have my appointment and there would be no openings untill next friday. I asked about the sign downstairs and they said they hadn’t got around to update it. What’s the point in having signs and maps if they are out of date?

Bored?

Here is an old piece that has been floating around the internet for a while, but I think its so funny I have to repost it. I think I read this is a swedish delegate in the European Parlament or something. This guy is soo bored, it’s probably friday after lunch, he’s going to a party later that night and he just can’t wait to leave. I really sympathize with him, I must have done just as stupid things when boredom has been at it’s worst..

The forklift

We were eating lunch at work the other day, there was a big panorama window and I spotted a forklift pottering passed at no more than 10 km/h with at least 6-7 cars following it just waiting to pass. I collapsed laughing, everyone else looking bewildered at me. I guess my weird sense of humour origin to when we lived in Kent, England. I must have been between 3 and 5 when, and this is one of my first memories at all, dad took me out to see The Jungle Book, the old Disney cartoon classic. We got in the wrong room and saw Ghost Busters I. My dad was loving it, for 12 years and up it was a comedy, I was hugging my chair in terror wondering what the hell a comedy was!?

The Mortality Sequence

Albeight my short 25-or-so-years of age, I have smelled the inevitable stench of death a few times, none of them as comical and possibly less serious as about half a year ago; I was at the office, my coffee was running empty and cold, so I thought I'd go and have a refill. On my way I passed the toilets and thought I might do the old two-in-one. So I drank the last of the coffee and went into the closest stalls - what met me was just the worst toilet-hell o' stench you can imagine, so I instinctively closed my nose that was my only source of oxygene, as my mouth was full of half-warm office-grade coffee.. As reason had left and instinct had kicked in my mind could not decide which was worse - take in stinking ass-air through my nose, having to smell it; or smallow the worst thinkable collection of coffee before getting the life-precious O? I woke up at the floor of the toilet floor with a bump in my head.

The title is a reference to Pink Floyd, an early instrumental version of Great Gig in the Sky.

Guinness World Records

When I was younger the cooles think I knew was the Guinness World Book of Records, there was so many facinating facts and pictures there. Now, 10 - 15 years later I suddenly remembered it and got it ordered a few weeks ago. Oh man, I read in it almost every day, I go through all the weird and unprobable facts and not the least I tell everybody I meet about it!

I think what I like best about it now is not the actual numbers and records, it's more the people behind, their lives, their sacrifices and their motivations. A few examples:

I think my favorite is the guy who eats metal. He has eaten 15 shopping carts, 18 bikes (like 10 would'nt be impressive enought). 7 TV's, 2 beds, a computer and a Cessna small aeroplane. The first thought that struck me was that I would never invite him home! Just imagine coming back to the livingroom with coffee: "Heeeeey, where is the sofa!?" *burp*.

One of my newest facts is the guy who was been struck by lightning 7 times! The best thing is that they say he died in 1994 by a broken heart.. Sounds really romantic and all, but think; who would date a guy who keeps getting struck my lightning!? You should never go on pickninc with him by a tree on a large plain field, the only safe date would be on a drive-in cinema, or maybe on a tandem bike.

I kinda also bought the book to see what the old classics where up to; the tallest lady, the two fat twins who rode really small motorcycles and of course the guy with the longest fingernails. He must have really dedicated his life to this, spending so many years of his life just to have the longest fingernails in the world. And I can understand why someone would dedicate their selves to be the fastest swimmer, the one to collect the most buttons etc, but this guy didn't really do anything, he is in the book because he didn't bother to cut his fingernails for a while! As Stephen points out, why sacrifice so much? Imagine his mates calling him up: "Wanna go bowling, Jeff?" "No, I can't.. I have this thing going on..". Is he married? What kind of intimate life can he have, for god's sake, can he even go to the toilet unassisted?

All for now, there is so much cool stuff in this book, I'll be shure to keep posting when I find more!

Stavanger for Africa

I love music DVD's and in my collection I think my overall favorite has to be Live Aid from 1985, just for the sheer volume of great musical history. There is so much great stuff there: Queen and Freddie Mercury's unparalleled performance, later attempted copied by Robbie Williams in 2005's Live 8; of course "Do they know it's christmas" and "We are the world"; Duran Duran who choose to play none of their best tunes; Madonna; Sting; Dire Straits; Nik Kershaw I could go on and on..

Now, there is a real gem for our Norwegian listeners hidden there if you have the patience to look - on CD 4, Extras there is a track called "Overseas Contributors" that contains various parallel conserts from all over the world, Western-Germany, Russia and so on. It is all in one track, so you can't skip, but if you keep going for a while you hit something that I like to call "Stavanger for Africa". It's just beautiful! Filmed in Stavanger, with lots of local B-lists. Per-Inge Torkelsen does a hilarious apperance with his big old glasses, Mia Gundersen is there (I always thought she looked like the female version of the sidekick from Airwolf Ernest Borgnine), and many others. Just the thought of Stavanger really pulling toghether to save Africa makes the hairs in my neck stand..

Why this piece of Norwegian musical goodness has been forgotten is beyond me!

Skidskolan

Skal på en liten alpintur til sverige snart og sjekket http://www.hemavan.nu/ for å se på mulighetene for å ta et snowboardkurs etc. Fikk litt kalde føtter da vi så navnene på de forskjellige nivåene/kurse :

• Fjällbusar, 3->
• Smygare, 4-9 år
• Glidare, 4-9 år
• Svängare, 5-12 år
• Grupplektioner

også en liten frekkas til slutt:

• Fräsare, 5-12 år

Her er det bare å la fantasien løpe fritt!

Plastick bag for that?

Was at the shop earlier tonight. I only bought a roll of large garbage bags. When I had payed the girl behind the teller asked me: "Do you need a bag for that?"

Beat for Beat

Just a quick note that the Norwegian adoptation of “The Lyrics Board”, “Beat for Beat” is back on the screen this friday, March 3rd at 19:55! Been a long pause now, over 3 months, but I am really looking forward to seeing it again on a weekly basis! Too bad I can’t join the old gang at Luftslottet.

Big day tomorrow, I’ll keep you posted!

Shampoo

Just got reminded of once when I was studying. There is a shampoo brand in Norway called “Fruktis”, which in it self is a pretty weird name for a hair product. I picked up a new bottle of this and used it during the week. At the end of the week i noticed how greasy my hair was, eventhough I had washed it thoroughly. The weird thing was though, it was surprisingly shiny. I looked at the bottle and it turned out they have several different products in pretty similar bottles – I had been cleaning my hair with conditioner!

Dub Side of the Moon

Sveinar mentioned a raggae/dub cover of Pink Floyds classic Dark Side of the Moon, and the other day I got hold of it. I love DSotM, I love raggae and I love good covers, what more could I ask for!?

So fire up your pipe, check out Dub Side of the Moon for some samples and maybe you can find the album in a specialist music store, order it online or have a look at a BitTorrent-site. The

Great Gig in the Sky is my favorite from the original album and there is no difference here. Their next project is said to be a cover of OK Computer - hey, wait a sec, isn't that the name of my other blog? :D

Update: found some live stuff here.

Ya, man! Peace and love.

The Ricky Gervais Show

..has sold out! New episodes of RGW is no longer free download, as of tuesday all new episodes are avaiable for purchase. Ok, so not surprising, and to be honest I'm willing to pay a small fee to be able to listen to it, I think this is the best comedy I have heard since the glory days of The Simpsons. What annoys me tho is how it is distributed.

Option 1) Audible.com This is confusing, I have a bachelor's degree in computer science but I spent a while figuring how to actually start listening to it if I don't have an iPod. After about 15 click, advice from equally confused mates I found out you have to define some "device" or other just to get on to the downloading part. You can choose to listen streaming, this requires that you download a 500 KB codec (spyware-alert rising) to play it with Windows Media Player. Ok, well if I have to pay for this I would at least like to have the stuff downloaded on my machine. Option 2, download it; this requires you to download and install Audible's own proprietary "Music Manager". For starters, why would I want to have another media player, in addition to the 100 I already have to use just to be able to listen to the stuff I want to? I can barely stand having to use iTunes, which I think is the biggest piece of crap-software ever written on the face of the planet (I don't know what kind of software they make beneath earth, so therefore the precaution), let alone have to switch between Windows Media Player and Winamp for different formats. And now I need this shit? I downloaded it, went thru green-hell as I installed it, and loaded it up only to find the episode was not yet available.

2) iTunes: I thought I'd try this today, just to get a message "Purchase of this item is not currently available" eventhough the show is aledgebly "number one in the UK iTunes download chart"..

So they have some issues, that's not my greatest concern - I listen to RGS almost everyday as I walk to work, the shop etc on my phone. There is no legal way I can do this with any of the solutions available, eventhough I have payed for it! If I use iTunes I will have to manually copy the files with me to be able to listen to it on any of the 3 computers I use on a daily basis.

On a more general note it is interesting how the old drug-marketing strategy has been successfull here - the show would never been remotely as successfull if it had been a pay and DRM'd option only from the start, good on them!

'Synthesizer Medley' from the 1985 Grammy awards and other gems

"Synthesizer Medley" was done by Thomas Dolby, Herbie Hancock, Howard Jones, and Stevie Wonder in Los Angeles(1985). It doesn’t get any better than this! Story here.

More weird tidbits here.

Thanks to MusicThing.

Discovered genetic defect creates devolution into ape-like people

An editor of a noted scientific journal says he has discovered a genetic defect that seems to set back the clock on human evolution by more than a million years.

Looks like bullshit to me, I guess you find all sorts of weird instances of genetic defects that might fit some crazy theory.

Update 2: Norwegian newspaper VG has picked up on the story.

Story here, clip here. Update: Erik wrote this great piece of how this story would be translated and retold by our favorite global village-idiot Karl:

There's this fella right, goes to Turkey or something on a holiday. I don't remember exactly. He travels, like, all through the desert and through all this barren land. In the evening, right, he comes to this village where he takes in at a hotel or somethin'.

He goes to sleep and wakes up the next morning and out of his window he sees this great looking farm, right in the middle of the desert. He's thinkin' what great farmes these people must be. Being a famer himself he is astonished by this great lookin' farm. He goes down to the receptionist and says: "Who runs that farm? It's great!"

He answers: "Nah, you don't wanna bother with those people, right. We don't ask questions and they give the village food and stuff."" But they gotta be great farmers, I got to hav' a look, and maybe hav' a chat with these people."But the guy in the hotel says: "No, no! Please just leave. We don't want any hassle, y'hear!"

This guy says says "Right, I have to be on me way anyway." and thinks like "I'll just pop in a bit on me way out of the villige." He goes up to the farm, right. He comes into the yard he is absolutlely blown away about this farm. It's the greatest farm he has ever seen. Much more clever than in any of the farms he had seen at home.

He wanders around a bit. Into the back. He sees this little fella chuckin' hay around, right? He goes up to him to talk with him. There he sees a large group of small fellas. All covered in hair. MONKEYS!

That's where that sayin' comes from, right. "Monkey makes the world go around."

Testing BlogJet

Testing out BlogJet, seems alright for posting with a bit more powerful client than the web interface, I hate web interfaces..

Local Celebrity part I

On monday I got a phonecall in the middle of the day, it was a journalist who wantet to know if I was "Idol-Eivind" and if he could do an interview of me... Went there today, nervous as shit, but it turned out to be a nice experience. The guy was nice, the questions were not that intimidating and we had a nice chat. The only thing that put me a bit off was that the photostudio was in the basement - The Vault! A bit of background info: The newspaper has its offices in an old bank, the basement used to be the vault holding gold, diamonds and whatever banks hold. I guess it's mostly paper nowadays.. Last time I was there we were at a farewell-party for a friend and me and Siri got lost in all the corridors and ended up in the vault and in a small hole under the stairs in the basement. We had a bottle of wine so it was ok.

When we were finished I of course remembered a million things I wanted to say, but I don't think the piece will be that long anyway.

It turned out some ppl from work had found out where I was going and had sent an email to the journalist with lots of stories about me, the kind of you don't want your mom to know :-S I hope they won't use them..

It will probably be printed Saturday 4. of March, if I approve of it I might scan it and put it up here.

Liv; you are gonna pay for this! :-D

My Bike's Amazing Adventures

Realized today that my bike was missing, I usually park it outside my apartement unlocked and today it was not there. 'Damn' I though, I have no idea if I have any insurance that would cover it, I don't know the serial number and it was not locked. Went passed the shop a bit later on my way back to work, there it was! I had probably forgot it there a week ago :-S It was not locked or anything so I guess I live in a nice neighborhood.

More Karl

Found another clip of Karl Pilkington, this time at work. Just look at that head...
Think I posted it before but I am too lazy to have a look: "Meet Karl Pilkington" is a really nice introduction to what the phenomena, the cult, of Karl is all about.

Was watching through season 1 and 2 of The Office earlier on, found this clip of a great moment - Gareth sings allmost like me!!

Boybands

What happened to boybands? I don't think I have seen a new boyband song in years, I don't think you count Justin Timberlake as boyband longer since he somehow got Snoop onboard.. But I have that old "too good to be true"-feeling, so I'll hold my celebrations.

Got a really weird phonecall today, more on that maybe later this week.

BellyBongo

My good friend Sveinar, known to dig up the weirdest bits of music and other oddities, showed me a fun site. BellyBongo is aparently a swede who has been collecting weird pieces of music for many years, and he has an archive where you can see and listen to a great deal of it. I honestly don't know what to say, if you like this kind of stuff you are in for a treat! I haven't gotten over it all yet, but I recomend DEB HYER - ONE MAN BAND, TINO CONTRERAS Y SU GRUPO - JAZZ TROPICAL, THE BILL BEAU TRIO - LIVE AT THE BLUE PORT LOUNGE, GARY SCHNEIDER - JUST FOR FUN JUST FOR FRIENDS... Party at his place tomorrow, always a blast!

Another cool spot is the blog PCL Linkdump.

Pleo the dinobot

How cool is this! It's an automaton with 38 sensors, 14 servos and running a specifically designed operatingsystem that can run several personalities. Estimated avalilability Q3, price $200. Video here. We wants us one of these :D

Update: Here's a more detailed link.

Winter Olympics time!!

..so I have ordered a shitload of DVD's!
I have never had the faintest interest for winter- or summer olympics, and it would not even cross my mind if it was not for how the events take TV as hostage for a few weeks. How long does it last, maybe I should order more films just in case?? Another thing about it that annoys me, is how it's "ok" to spend much time at work to keep updated, not to mention all the additional talks around the watercooler.

Thankfully I have (mostly) carefully selected my friends of people that aren't sporting-geeks. Ok, maybe half of them..

Ordered Guinness Book of Records today, really looking forward to getting it.

Chess keyboard

http://us.gizmodo.com/gadgets/peripherals/chess-keyboard-151768.php

Love to play chess on your keyboard? Well, while the OWL-KB108WB from Owltech
looks like you might be able to get your pawn on, looks can be deceiving. There
are 2 versions, black and white, and are compatible
with Macs and PCs and
includes a USB adapter. No product information on the
site yet but surely coming
soon. Price is about $23.

I would be quite surprised if there was only one version, what would they do with the left-over white keys..?

Early morning

Was up pretty early this morning, too tired to make any fuzz so I just had a quick shower and got out. A few meters down the street I started feeling a bit cold and "loose" downstairs - I had forgot to put my underpants on!

Steam powered RC toys

http://www.crabfu.com/steamtoys/

How cool is this!

Birthday Party

I'm having my birthday party tonight and among the different preperations I have to do is to let my neighbor know. The last couple of parties I'we had have kinda gotten a bit out of hand, there is a general rule of no loud music after 23-00 at night, so screaming out your lungs with Singstar on really loud at 02:00 is not that popular. I was going to the shop and met my neightbor (they had just come home) and told her about the party tonight, she was really sweet about it and I said she could call me if it went on too long (she has my number from last party she had to call...). We'll, back from the shop 15 min later, they were gone! Lights out and everything.

I just imagine her just after I left going "Ok son, pack your bags, we're out of here!!" ;-)
Landlord is on vacation, so if she does not come back tonight that's pretty good!

Bananas on the ice rink

http://www.dagbladet.no/nyheter/2006/01/25/455846.html

This has got to be the cutest pair of monkeys in a long while :D
Reminds me of Karl Pilkingtons story about the monkey who joined the bobsledge team in a winter olympics..

Siri's Adventures

Siri is going to study in South-Africa for a semester, she put up a blog here. Good luck and keep us updated!

Birthday madness!

I was met in the elevator of the building where my company is by a poster of me saying "25 years!" and "Come on, congratulate me!". Found more of those as I got to the office. Well, I found my desk completely covered in all sorts of (childs)birthday effects - there was a tablecloth with pirates, party hats, homemade birthday crown with pictures and sparkling stuff, balloons, candy all over the desk, flags, cocktail-umbrellas and everything! And a pineapple.

Before lunch I was surprised in a conference room by people from the office singing the birthday song - accompanied on conference phone by Mom!

At lunch they had made a beautiful cake in the shape of Tweety - it was really good! Also there was the candle that played the birthday song that would not stop - even when we put it in a glass of water :-) I got a present from Tone, Stine and Annette with refill for the badge-machine I got for christmas, we had used up all that was left at the party on Saturday so that was brilliant! It came with a sweet card in the form of Mr. Gisse :-D

When I came back from lunch I found a gift from Trygve on my desk; a pair of passifiers (it's an inside-joke, can't really explain)!

Best birthday-surprise so far!
(images following:)

Birthday!

Turning 25 in a few hours! Never really thought it would get this far, so I don't really have any strategy planned out for the next 25 ;-) Anywho.. I am a bit worried if I will get a revenge from the last birthday surprise :-O

Shake It Some More

Been working a bit of overtime this weekend to try to reach a deadline, I stumbled across Tony Sheridan's album "The Beatles with Tony Sheridan", which feature songs Tony played with members of the, the to come, The Beatles as a backing band. Really old school rock&roll, fun to listen to! Ruby Baby, Sweet Georgia Brown (you know, the old jazz tune used for the Harlem Globetrotters theme), Ya Ya are just a few of the nice progressive blues/r&r tracks.

Blue Ball Machine

Found this on Anders Norås' blog, pretty entertaining. Reminds me of the mid 90's game The Incredible Machine. This is kind of what I imagine goes on in Karl Pilkingtons head, when he recieves some piece of information, accompanied by strange music out of a eastern-european cartoon from the 60's, as he thoroughly strips it of facts.
http://blueballfixed.ytmnd.com/

More Monkey News

(norwegian) http://www.vg.no/pub/vgart.hbs?artid=300596
http://chimpcenter.osu.edu/

The Daily WTF

Too lazy to actually write much, take it from Jaran.. www.TheDailyWTF.com

24 and Monkey news!

The first 2 episodes of 24 season 5 (4 hours total) were available this morning!
Episode 7 of Ricky Gervais Show is also out! I found a BT seed of all the episodes from the archives of the show over at XFM (probably something like 35 hours..) and two really long shows from BBC radio and some more stuff - have a look over at mininova.org.

Update: Just came over this: Some animations of Ricky, Stephen and Karl, pretty funny.

Better living thru chemistry..#01

Here is a small list of ppl I would want as friends:

1. Karl Pilkington
2. Amy Sedaris
3. Kiefer Southerland

Rambo: First Blood

They are showing Rambo: First Blood on TV tonight, I love that movie! In my opinion it is not comparable to the two other movies at all - I find this one really intriguing and I think it has a very real, deep and tragic view on what might happen to someone returning from war. I don't think it stops there, it may apply to any situation where you go from one reality to another that you can not cope with alone.

I am planning to watch The Matador sometime soon, as I gather it is based on the same concept. So is season 2 of 24 when I think of it..

Update: Just started thinking: why are the sequels called Rambo: First Blood Part II and III, and not Rambo: Second Blood and so forth..?

The Gone Jackals #2

Anders made a nice write-up of The Gone Jackals that I mentioned earlier. Who would guess they had Parkrangers in their fanbase? :-)

The stove.

Last Wednesday I finally bought myself a stove. For the passed two years I have only had a microwave and a simple make-shift plate to cook my food (for those days I actually make my own food at home). Mom and dad have been trying to convince me to get a proper one for, well, two years, and this christmas my present from them were money for this. As mentioned the plate caught fire in the christmas holiday, so after over a week of micro-food I finally got to the store to get a propper oven. I went there thinking I might get a good one for, say,4-5 000 NOK - was I wrong! A clean 7,500 later I was a proud oven-ovner :-)

Anywho, that's not why you called.. The store ppl said it would be delivered the following day, and I had to be at home from 16:00 till 19:00 as they do all their deliveries in one go. So I hurried home after work and cleared up space and waited. And waited. And waited... At 20:30 I gave up (after trying to get hold of the transport-ppl in any imaginary way) and hungry as I was made a simple micro-prepared meal. Half way through it, at 21:00, guess who showed up?! Man, I was so furrious and prepared a whole hat0r speach to give to the deliveryguys (when I told this to some friends the other day they just laughed as they imagined me giving and angry-speech..). Well, it turned out I knew one of the guys so I kinda left it at that.. ;-)

The end of the story was that it was like 22:00 when I finally had it set up and prepared, I was half-hungry and tired, so I ditched the big nice meal I had planned to prepare and made a pizza..

All in all it is really good, fast and reliable so I guess I have what I need of whiteware for now.

Do bathtubs drain counterclockwise in the Northern Hemisphere?

This write-up blew my mind, I now have the feeling I have to fundamentally go back and re-think every single truth I have accumulated over my (soon) 25 year life. Will have a go at my sink tonight. Give it a read, more from Cecil to come.

Monkey News

(Norwegian only) Vegvesenet sier opp entreprenør

Cameleon on a mirror

If you put a cameleon on a mirror, what color would it become?

Brothers in arms

Just saw Lord of War. I always thought Nicholas Cage's best performance was in Leaving Las Vegas, and I still do, but this was really good!

TV-Party!

I was delighted to see the first new seasons of TV-shows starting this week. On a regular basis I download:

• Prison Break
• The Office US
• Top Gear
• Fifth Gear
• The Daily Show
• The Colbert Report
• Whose Line is it Anyway
• The Green Screen Show
• Joey
• My Name is Earl

On norwegian TV I also watch:

• Late Night with David Letterman
• Myth Busters
• Walkabout
• Beat for Beat (The Lyrics Board)
• (can't remember any more..)

Update: Oh man, a mate reminded me I totally forgot 24! 24 is the best TV-series I have ever seen! I ordered season 1, 2 and 3 a while back but unfortunately I just recieved season 2 this christmas. I saw throught it (it's the one with the A-Bomb, and the war on the middle-East) and I think it's absolutely one of the best 24-seasons as of yet.

8 days and season 5 starts - can't wait!! The 15th they will air a 2 hour episode, followed by another 2 hour episode the following day, then it will return to the usual 1-hour a week scheme.

Update 2: 24 starts January 15th, not 16th.

Workout

I wonder how early man realized that physical training really worked. This caveman was out running for an hour and got really sweatty, tired and exhausted. One day later all his muscles were hurting like hell since it was the first time - remember; running and working out was not yet invented. He could not do much work all day. At what point did he put his finger in the air and go "AHA! This is making me stronger!"?

If you like me don't like working out, doing one first intensive workout, getting over the pain the next day or two does NOT make you feel great! That is bullshit, and just in your head! After a week or two maybe, but not the first time.

After eventually discovering this, did our caveman keep putting his finger in the fire thinking "just one more week and it'll start getting better!"?

Incidently I thought about this while doing my first jogging/workout last night. Just to get some more energy in the cold, dark winter. Hopefully in two weeks it will pay off ;-)

Braille

Idag feirer Google bursdagen til Louis Braille, mannen som oppfant blindeskriften. Jeg har alltid funnet det ironisk at skrift for blinde folk heter Braille-skrift (uttales "brille"...) ;-)

Jim'll Fix It

Remember this guy? I guess not if you didn't grow up in England (I lived there for two years way back). I must say I really enjoyed the show, and I still remember the theme song "Jim'll fix it for you, you, you, yoooooou!" :-D Actually his name is Sir(!) Jimmy Saville and he claims he has raised over £40 million for charity over the passed decades.

Now, I am trying to track down another TV-idol from the late 80's/early 90's - ha was on a TV marketing show from America, he would always wear the same ugly sweater (it reminds me of one Bill Cosby used to wear and was really the ting to use in the early 90's!) and got pretty famous for that. He was always really happy and would do crazy stuff with what he was trying to sell (like stick his hand in a blender to demonstrate it was unharmful) and my best description would be a cross between Chevy Chase and Bob Saget, wearing Bill Cosby's sweater.

Illness

A while back I remember listening to the news where they were saying that the government or whatever wanted to reduce the amount of sickleave. They quoted someone saying that there was a big problem with ppl taking 3 days off after partying in the weekend. WHERE IS THIS PARTY!? WHAT AM I MISSING OUT ON!!?