:: GussetBLOG ::

:: Saturday, December 20, 2003 ::

The physics of Santa

:: popcorn 20.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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Dancing Robots

:: Dan 19.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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The Beagle has successfully seperated . It's only got to glide 3mil km and land now

:: popcorn 19.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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Carol singers jeer job losses

Want a road legal sofa? Or a furry VW Beetle? Visit Cummfy Banana

:: Dan 19.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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The Guardian’s British Blog of the Year award winners have been announced. There are some great blogs in there as you’d expect. I particularly recommend the photography ones but many of the other are defiantly worth a visit, as long as you don’t stop coming here. Please.

Breakdown of Blogs:

I guess we fall into the incoherent rants category then (admittedly my doing).

Public Houses were originally so named because they were intended to look and feel like the houses the day (except with more beer). However, little has changed since. In order to drag them into the 21st centaury they will need to have more than just comfy arm chairs, like broadband jukeboxes with two million tracks to choose from.

Google Guide presents more Google hacks and takes you through using some of the more obscure features. Worth a quick look. Also, Google Print is now in Beta.

:: Dan 18.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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Practice your getting home skills

:: Dan 17.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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I normally avoid blogging Onion stories but this one is too good miss:
Christmas Brought To Iraq By Force

Wheels Instead Of Hooves. Fri 19.12.03, The Electrowerkz, Torrens St, Angel, London. Wheels Xmas Wingding Videoflier
3 floors of festive madness inc:
Rephlex Records Braindance Grotto feat: AFX & Rephlex Master Controller, D'Arcangelo, Astrobotnia and K-Rock
Planet µ Elves Workshop feat: µ-ZIQ Live, Remarc, Chevron Live, Shitmat Live, Leafcutter John Live + Special Guest
Room Three: Rob Hall (skam), Miles (Baked Goods), Claro Intelecto (Ai Records), Yellotone (Ai Records), Normal (Ai Records), FZV (Ai Records), Michael Manning (Ai Records), Buddy Peace (Lex), DJ Egg Nog + Paxo-Box
Visuals: The GLue Factory, MANKf and Survival Research
+ new project from members of Hi-ReS! (creaters of DONNIEDARKO.com, thethirdplace.com and the LFO website amonst others) - under the banner "T+A"
I'll be there. Expect a review after I've recovered.

:: Dan 17.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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And I saw him two weeks ago in Birmingham , he was cool.

ner ner ner ner ner

:: Dash 17.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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Eddie Izzard @ Cardiff CIA, 16.12.03.

I’ll admit up front that this is not the most unbiased of reviews, as I did fork out 25 quid apiece to see this. Then again, I expect more in return for that.

Eddie was on form, the usual mix of observation and banter, mime, jumping around and sound effects. This provided exactly the sort of show we’ve grown to love him for. Oh yeah, and the skirt and high heels, although I could hear the woman sat behind me complain, “I don’t get transvestites.” At least she was still open minded enough to come along and appreciate the humour, as there still seems to be a lot of resistance out there because of that. This is a shame. I wonder how many people would be at the show if it wasn’t for that. Or would he lose audience too?

This review can only really act as an ad for the “Sexie” DVD (which I haven’t seen) as the tour is now almost over and is long sold out. I would recommend that you watch the show/DVD if you want to find out what happens when Medusa goes to the hairdresser, how to deactivate a shark, what noise flies should make if they want us to welcome them into our homes, or what happens when a transvestite with a Yemen passport tries to get through US customs, “hey, we got a comedian here. So what do you do?”

The material itself was exactly what you would expect if you’ve ever seen Eddie previously, live or on video. It was all new material, although references were dropped to older material to huge cheers. Like the passing reference to Pavlov in a monologue about Doppler’s cat throwing experiments. Despite this there was something familiar about all of the material, all of it is just slight variations on previous work and no real new territory was explored. The classic themes of the Bible and Greek Myth both came up again, like they are easy sources of new laughs every time he drops into them.

Like many established acts, whether they are comedy, music, film, whatever, he has found his safe ground and is walking it again. Few acts have the ability to constantly innovate, Bowie perhaps being the best example of someone who does, but I struggle to think of a comedian who can do it. I’d like to see Eddie take a risk and try to do something new with his live show, something he probably thinks he is doing by performing it in foreign languages, but that is not something that the home crowd can appreciate as new ground.

:: Dan 17.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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Update on the Mario in 11 mins story:
This forum thread claim to have proof it was faked.
Namely, the bloke that did it saying "It's faked. I never meant anyone to think it's someone playing."

I think it's a whole lot more impressive now, as he played it frame by frame, with each frame saved.

He didn't complete it in 11 mins, it took him 2 years

:: popcorn 16.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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Some impressive plank spanking.

In the coming weeks this scene will be reinacted in shopping centres up and down the country.

:: popcorn 16.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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Record companies sue CD Wow! over online music copyright (i.e. for selling stuff too cheap)

Gym members sweat over camera phones

:: Dan 16.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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One of my parents neighbours have sent their Christmas cards out with their usually family newsletter egotistically inserted. This year’s newsletter seems to be even more nauseatingly full of pomp and self-congratulation than ever before. The thing was also crammed to the hilt with grammatically errors, which isn’t something I can normally feel justified in complaining about but on this occasion I felt compelled to correct them all with red pen and anonymously drop it back through their door. Amanda stopped me doing this, so instead here is my draft of the response newsletter they won’t be getting in return:

Dear friends and neighbours
(and some other people but I can’t remember who you are),

So I can’t believe it, here we are again and I’m writing another load of nauseating waffle about how wonderful our lives are and why yours is so meaningless and futile, but hey, that’s enough about you! So, what have we been up to in the last year?

Our travels around Europe in the spring took in the Netherlands and Germany. All of those “fairy tale” castles of Ludvig II we were taken to really were very average. I would expect our sausage scoffing neighbours to have made much more of an effort for us really.

And our travels around the South West over the summer gave us the opportunity to drop by Padstow to give Rick Stein some pointers on his Oysters Charentaise, Dover Sole Meunière and Roast Tronçon of Turbot. He seems to have taken my advice and they are apparently now outselling all of his previously most popular dishes.

Amanda’s work in the retail trade has earned her another promotion (we won’t mention the retail giant she now near as damn runs, no name dropping here thank you very much!) Despite the company’s insistence that she deserved to take a break, perhaps to go travelling, she passed on the opportunity as visiting all of these foreign places is so passé, after everything we’ve already seen this year the idea seemed so tiresome.

Le Gousset completed their gruelling UK tour with a spectacular home coming concert and record ticket sales. This was followed by a two-hour retrospective special on BBC 1 hosted by our lifelong friend and admirer Mr John Peel. Sean has developed a very delicate touch on the Theremin which I have to say brings a tear to the eye.

The American refuge we adopted is now safely back home with his family. Without my mothers unstinting generosity I don’t think he would have made it. He spoke warmly of his time at Smyth Heights as the most peaceful of his life.

Of course, a damp dirty rag was lightly smeared over the year by all of those harrowing pictures of the war in Iraq. I frequently found myself moved to change the channel and watch another episode of Murder She Wrote, much more cheery.

As I write this I wonder what the New Year will hold for us, and what delights you will be looking forward to reading about this time next year,

Yours belittlingly,



Lord Pope

:: Dan 16.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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Bored students' 130m euro spree

'Curry killing' wife jailed

Squarepusher Live In London, 2003 (MP3, 56.8MB)

Spider Man 2 trailer looks good and it’s a bit more than just a teaser if you ask me. DocOc looks fantastic. Should be good.
*note to self* Must not get too over excited, you know you always get let down by these things.

:: Dan 16.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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Check out the Teaser Trailer for Spider-Man 2.

If you like that sort of thing.

:: Spokesy 15.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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So the results are in (were last Saturday in fact) from the Beeb's Big Read debate. Surprise, surprise, the UK's Best-Loved Book is now "officially" Lord "being made into films at time of doing survey" of "can't escape the hype anywhere you go" the "like anything else stood a chance?" Rings. Pride and "my god, a book that's actually over 50 years old" Prejudice takes second place, His Dark "next Harry Potter" Materials third, Douglas "died recently" Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy takes fourth and Harry Potter And The Goblet Of "only this low because no-one could decide which Harry Potter book to vote for" Fire come in fifth.

:: Dan 15.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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This has been linked everywhere so you’ve probably seen it already, but this (in places flawed) Guardian article about the rise of the nerd contains this fascinating quote from Paul Dergarabedian, president of the US box office tracking firm Exhibitor Relations, "Blockbusters have become very sophisticated versions of what were once seen as exploitation movies: martial-arts films, fantasy films, science-fiction films. All of which people loved, but which were decidedly B-movies that were not aimed at mainstream audiences." This statement alone goes a long way to explaining why “the nerd” is so prevalent these days, perhaps to the point that the representation is almost meaningless.

:: Dan 15.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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Slim likes to argue that you can't get better than US sitcom these days. I argue that with the likes of The Office, The League of Gentlemen, Spaced, Jam and Black Books (among others) British Comedy has hit a new high in innovation. It is pushing the boundaries of what is socially acceptable to find funny, no longer trying to make us look at the world from a slightly different perspective but making us look at it how it really is. Will the US be following this trend in the next few years what with their remake of The Office on the way? Or will they fuck it up like everything else they ever remake? 'Sunshine on Putty: The Golden Age of British Comedy from Vic Reeves to The Office' is published in the new year. The Indy has an extract predominantly following the production of the second series of The Office.
Gareth's Homepage
Comments, Slim?

:: Dan 15.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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Tigerbeat6's End of Year Top Tens includes the "Top 10 Things Duran Duran Duran stuck up his butt while on E":

10. more E
9. Fishead's old glowstick
8. Giorgio Marauder's Laptop
7. 7 ravers raving
6. ragga acapella mp3s downloaded from SoulSeek
5. vegan philly cheesesteaks
4. Xanopticon's "Magic: The Gathering" cards
3. the amen breakbeat
2. Donna Summer's masculinity
1. Entire Tresor records back catalog

Didn't see any of this going on when we gigged with him but maybe that's just as well.

The Butterfly Effect. It’s a movie about Chaos Theory.

See Goldfrapp’s performance of Yes Sir (I Can Boogie) and maybe vote for it for T4’s performance of the year if you think it’s worth it.

:: Dan 15.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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So Saddam has been captured, we can all sleep safely now. Blair made a very carefully worded speech about it yesterday afternoon, although there was no mention of the whole objective of the war being achieved (as of course the capture of Saddam was the US’s primary goal) and their was no mention of Weapons of Mass Destruction (the UK’s primary goal, although there is always the “Saddam is a WMD card” to play).
Conversely, US administrator Paul Bremer simply announced “We hot him” to rapturous cheering and applause like something you’d expect to hear at a wrestling match. Let the circus commence...

:: Dan 15.12.03 [Arc]    ::
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