We were in China Town (to buy a second Wok) and popped into one of those kitchy cutey shops that sell weird stuff in a Hello Kitty style. We were fascinated by this new character who looks like a sad poo and has two smaller poo-style friends who are less poo-ey. Any ideas who or what this thing is? (bear in mind it’s scanned off a pencil…)
Matt (D’Israeli) Brooker’s account of the Hard, Salty Meat episode at Bristol this spring. Sorry for the delay in finding this…
In lieu of my rambling on about the usual guff, might I take this opportunity to remind you of my father’s site with his photography and travel writing. He’s also got the weblog bug. Originally I set up and designed the site for him but then he realised how easy it was and now does it all himself. I’m officially the “Site Consultant” which seems to comprise of occasionally saying “nice pictures” or “like the way you have the site map on the front page at the bottom”. If everyone read Philip and Alex the world wouldn’t need site consultants.
Anyway, the point is, go check his site out. There’s some quite stunning photos on there, and being his son you know I’d be the first to take the piss if there weren’t.
I’ve really been neglecting both the weblogs this week and I feel I should apologise for that. Seems a little odd to be doing so, but I feel obliged!
I downloaded Netscape version 2 tonight to see how BugPowder runs on it, and it was quite a revelation. The front page is completely black as any background colours in tables do not work. And I thought I was doing okay on the Anybrowser front.
More thought in graceful degradation (or whatever it’s called) is thus needed.
Interestingly, Netscape 2 cannot load the Netscape home page…
A few years ago I was suffering from depression, or rather I was going through a period of depression while my life changed, or rather I belatedly grew up rather painfully. I’m still not sure which is right but it all cleared up. The pills did the job and I came out of it a much more rounded and able person. Anyway, I remember reading a newspaper article written by someone who had been seriously depressed and had come through it about how intolerant “happy” people can be to those crushed under their weight of their fucked up minds.
Depressed people are convinced that no-one can understand what they’re going through and normally that’s the case. And on the flipside depressed people can be really annoying with their incapacity to think about anything other than how miserable they are, this being their overriding concern in life. I’m still amazed that I kept my friends during that period - maybe my nocturnal habits helped or the fact that most of them were on medication too. When I emerged from my long dark tunnel I was sure I’d never be intolerant of the depressed, having been one of them. No matter how happy and bouncy I got I’d be aware of what they’re going through.
Having a depressed friend is like having a problem that is screaming to be solved. You like this person and you want them to be happy, to get better. The more your life is working out, the more obvious it seems that all you have to do is get over these silly things in your mind and be happy. But that doesn’t work. It’s never that easy.
It’s funny, but depression doesn’t just incapacitate the person who is depressed - it incapacitates everyone who tries to help them. You can’t help a depressive. Only they can do that themselves and that’s the heart of the problem - they haven’t got a clue where to start. So what’s worse? To try and help by giving advice which normally reduces down to “pull yourself together” or something equally effective, or to say nothing and let them get on with it? The latter seems the more effective but isn’t that like walking past beggars?
I’m rambling now. The point is I know two depressed people and I’m finding their intrusions into my happy and contented life to be a bit annoying. I find myself wishing they’d just get over it and re-join the human race. Despite my dark years of fear and sadness I cannot empathise. And while it means I’m definitely better it’s still kinda scary.
I’ve commented on other sites quite a bit (as is the nature of these things) and picked up things from the mistakes of others but I learned a lesson from my own site this week. Only one person has taken up my offer of free postcards. Admitedly this involves sending me your home address and I wouldn’t give that to any old site, but even people I know haven’t bothered asking for them. 20-40 people a day look at the main BugPowder page and none of them want free stuff. There’s an advert on the tube where you can get free board games from a site. Apart from the fact that these ads patently do not work (I’ve seen it loads of times and can’t even remember the address) I wonder how many games they’ve managed to give away? The saying that web users want everything for free appears to be slightly wrong. People don’t want stuff for free, they just don’t want to pay for stuff they want.
We started our holiday on Friday which was much needed and very well timed. On Friday night I was an emotional wreck and needed to sort out a lot of stuff in my head. None of it was particularly critical but I’d noticed I’d been getting more agressive and nasty to people in recent weeks. So, two weeks of quiet and calm are now here. Their main purpose to have a decent break from the shop before the final run up to Christmas. Three days in and I’m feeling very calm. Admitedly my sleep patterns are screwed again (it’s 3.00am) but that’s normal for me. I’ve been doing some work on the site and generally mooching around. All very nice. Judging by the schedule we’ve got this week for catching up with people I won’t have much time for computer stuff, so if this weblog goes deadish for the next fortnight and I don’t reply to every email then my mind is on other things.
Ah, the internet is a wonderful thing. If you’re not content with the media’s sniggering coverage of The Lords’ debate on lowering the homosexual age of consent, you can plough through Hansard online and read Baroness Young’s repeated use of the term “buggery” for yourself. The fun starts here and continues for pages and pages. “Buggery” is a quite unique looking work and stands out on the screen when in Times Roman. See how many you can spot.
If you don’t normally check out the main page, I’m giving away Top Shelf postcards to anyone with a UK address who emails me while stocks last. Scans here.
Ooh, Steve Bell is very good, isn’t he.
Brains4Zombies.com — Your online home for Brains and Brain-Related Products
Quite inspired, as Amazon parodys go.
I got this from a Guardian piece by trash-fic author Jenny Colgin about authors nervously following their sales ranking on Amazon which is much better than her books appear to be.
She got a £60,000 advance. Even months after the event, you gotta laugh…
Interesting how Amazon are using remaindered stock to give the illusion of generous discounting. They probably only paid a pound a copy for this. 70% off indeed!
Eight hours of public transport later and my stitches are out. It was actually the most painful part of the whole procedure and at one point I felt quite faint and had to lie on the floor. That pesky tear duct again.
Mr Reuser, who refers to me as “my London patient” as all his other victims are elderly West Midlanders, had a nasty limp and all the nurses were asking “oh, Mr Reuser, what have you done?” which, while he is a most decent and nice chap, made me think “now you know how we all feel when you leave us with facial disfigurements”.
I also closed down the old PO Box in Birmingham and while the collection of envelopes was on the whole spectacularly dull (one interesting looking zine turned out to be full of goth poetry - nice cover though) this is a good thing really.
So, apart from Kate’s folks, who are in the Black Country, my Birmingham days are now over. A sense of closure pervades.
Birmingham is kinda weird at the moment. Due to the Bull Ring redevelopment there’s a lot of building going on and other areas have taken this as an excuse to be torn down and start afresh, but unlike other cities where building works are a pain, there’s something optimistic about it all. Perhaps it’s that they’re tearing down all the crappy lumps of concrete so they no longer loom at you in their 60s glory.
After the first five and a half hours of traveling I needed to do something other than sit down in a vehicle so went for a quick drunk with some old chums (Hi Andy, Kim and Dave!), part of the Birmingham Booksellers Gang who haven’t moved to London (Hi Brett, Sarah, Helen, Stuart, Lucy, Lynn, etc…!). I remembered an intention long ago to get Andy Green (who wasn’t there) down to London so he can visit all the trees and make sure they’re okay.
Day off tomorrow, and assuming I can get out of bed I hope to do some serious BugPowder work, starting with discovering where the hell the recent order has gotten to. Parcelforce are sitting on it, I suspect. When it does come through there’ll be lots of nice new Top Shelf and Highwater titles in the Shop
Tomorrow (or today since it’s past midnight) the stitches come out and I no longer have thin pieces of blue plastic tied into my face. This is something of a relief as one of them keeps falling near my tear duct. Annoying more than anything else.
Amusing story I don’t think I’ve told yet. Over the last week or so some of the stitches around my eye have been falling out, probably because there’s not much skin there and as it heals there’s no room for them. The first one came out on the tube in the morning as I was clearing the sleepy gunk from my eyes. I sat there in a half-awake daze with a freshly shaven head and a still rather obvious wound staring at a bright blue stitch coated in yellow goo. The chap next to me got up and moved to another seat, obviously thinking this skinhead was going to pick at his face for the whole journey. I can’t say I blame him.
Kate Buggeln is president of boo.com, an easy target I have stayed away from until now. Last week she did the Q&A in the Guardian’s New Media section. Some selections:
Least useful site/s on web?
People’s personal websites.Most useful site/s?
Any site that is providing you information on what you’re going to buy in addition to giving you the opportunity to purchase.Most irritating thing about the web?
The vastness of it.and finally…
I adore having people around me. I don’t think the web replaces that.
Well, it’s good to see boo has someone in charge who realy understands the market and medium they’re operating in…
Amusing petrol related stuff. The Daily Mail (no web site I can find, which says a lot) had “Police State” on it’s front page today with an outraged report that the blokes in trucks are being photographed and followed by helicopters and will be prevented from entering London.
Whoever thought that the Criminal Justice Act, brought in to deal with ravers and tree protesters, would be used against responsible, working truck drivers? Well, actually many people did say just that. It’s a miracle they got away with it last time. Welcome to the world of political protest (says he who now finds the sound of helicopters really opressive having had one buzzing over him for five hours on Mayday…)
In honour of the Blake Exhibition at Tate Modern I present to you a blast from the past…
I went to get the paper this afternoon and came back half an hour late to find Kate in tears. She’d nearly finished The Amber Spyglass, the final volume in Philip Pullman’s trilogy. This book is sold as suitable for 10 year olds. When was the last time a book had you in floods of tears? I have to read it (once I’ve got through all the other books I have to read…).
Looking at the logs for this page someone is coming here using Netscape 3 on an unknown operating system. Good job they should be able to read it then. I’ve also been told that the main BugPowder page doesn’t work when accessed through an television set because of the black background.
I can download older versions of Netscape and IE but does anyone know where I can get hold of a TV browser that’ll run on a Mac? Or a palmtop computer emulator?
The quest for universal access gets harder. Soon it’ll be fridge emulators…
Presumably because I’m running a few apps and am streaming some audio, I just got a message from the Silver Bullet Comics site that I haven’t got enough memory to run their fancy Java navigation bar, so I guess I won’t be going anywhere else in their site…
Actually, the audio I’m listening to is a neat use of RealPlayer from Jeff Levine who gathers together 16 songs to listen to while your surfing. A nice mix of decent country, The Pogues, bluesy rock, etc. He’s managed to get a perfect ambiance for late night surfing. (click on “Radio”)
Looks like I’ll be up quite late tonight, which is annoying mid week. I don’t want a repeat of last Saturday After getting Kate home and settling her on the sofa I suddenly came over really tired and had a quick lie down waking up three hours later. So it’s midnight and I’m wide awake. Arse…
A train of thought prompted by reading The Cluetrain Manifesto book. To be “managing” something is not necessarily a great thing. Being manager does not really mean you’re doing a good job. If someone asks how you’re doing and you reply “oh, I’m managing” you mean you’re getting by, scraping through, just about getting the job done to a minimum standard. So, semantically speaking, a manager is someone who just about gets the job done, which when the job entails balancing the realities of the real world with the fantasy world of corporate ideologies, is quite a success. I’d rather be the person who runs things rather than the person who manages them. Maybe that’s where I fail.
Over on the main weblog I mentioned a couple of days back that BugPowder and Blogger were screwing up but that Kate was working fine. Today I had to pick up Kate from work due to another fever / thick head thing, her second in as many weeks. I blame the company. Things are so bad in her shop that the prospect of her having tomorow off was greeted with despair by the managers.
I had a call from another branch today, which is always nice. I asked how they were getting on. “We’ve got the managing director here today” came the tired but cheerful reply. (Obviously his first Xmas…). “Give him a kick in the nuts from me then will you?” I asked. Nervous laughter followed.
It’s like a gurrella movement against the instigation of corporate values. They can run as many training sessions and issue as many memos and scare as many managers as they like but it just takes one phone call or one trip down the pub to unravel the whole thing. It’s not malicious or evil - it’s a simple case of telling the truth. If the truth was positive then new staff wouldn’t need to be trained in the companies values. They’d be obvious from the moment they stepped into a branch and talked to the staff. As it is I have to spend a whole five minutes deprograming them (with a little help from the reality of the situation) and quite frankly I could shelve a load of books in that time.
SchNEWS is terrifically biting about the whole Jarrow March farce….:
Without a sense of irony it was announced there would be another Jarrow
march - except unlike the last one in 1936, where starving unemployed
Tyneside workers walked to London to demand jobs, this one will be in
the
form of a four-day convoy of slow-moving lorries. Their demand - a 26
pence
cut in fuel duty, for the right of the motorist
to-drive-anywhere-we-like-for-as-little-as-possible, and bugger the
consequences. And it gets better - the protests will begin on the very
first day of the Climate Change Conference in the Hague! Hello, is
anyone
home?
Well, it could be worse. At least when I come back from work I’m not greated with idiot boy…
This is the personal blog and main internet hub-thing for Pete Ashton. What you'll find here is a seemingly random collection of stuff I want to talk about and share.
My more sensible business blog is ASH-10 where I talk about understanding and engaging with the social internet.
Music what I has Scrobbled
RSS feed
Email
Twitter
Flickr
Facebook
Last.FM
LJ feed
Pete Pipe