Fun and Games

What's the Movie?

Yet another new category to be added to the ever increasing list! But like I have said the world is a very big place.
This time I invite you to the quiz section, now I have to have a big debt of gratitude to Filmwise for these piccies, and if you really want to test yourself go there and do some of theirs. Also join the forum, as they have fantastic advice and reviews on loads of film related stuff.
So what is different and hard about these pictures? Well Filmwise calls them invisibles, speaks for itself really!

Here are 3 of them to get you in the mood...


Number 1 - Pretty easy one for starters




Number 2 - More Tricky? No even easier



And Finally...



But now name the actors/actresses that are shown in the picture. Your Blog will be added to my Bloglist should you get 100%.


What on earth?

Now until I can get the equipment to do a What's the object using the same arty images previously, here are a couple of everyday items that have been photographed too closely. Just say what you think they are.

An easy one to start




And now a lot more difficult!



So get your thinking caps on and try to work it out!

Finally Quizzicles

Last but by no means least are 5 pretty straight forward questions to test your brain power.

1. What spirit is made from potatoes?

2. From which country did chocolate originate ?

3. Who performed the theme song to "Tomorrow Never Dies" ?

4. What is the full name of the drug LSD ?

5. Whose right ear was cut off by kidnappers in 1973 ?

All answers will be published next Tuesday, along with some more questions.

GOOD LUCK!

Art & Funnies

Something New

Thought I would add yet another category to my ever increasing list of things on the site. Well it is my view of the world after all, and that is a hell of a lot os subject matter.
As you may already know I work for a company specialising in Thermal Imaging, well whilst in India I discovered something pretty Arty, that I haven't previously bothered about (2 years with the company and I hadn't realy noticed it!?!)
have a look at the following.

This picture is taken from our software from the inside of a cement kiln, using our specialist camera.

Original

Now have a look at this picture, which is exactly the same image, but with a different colour palette applied. You may not agree, but I am sure pictures like this go for a bomb in modern art galleries!

Modern Art version

And here is another original,

Original

With it's Arty Counterpart below

I wonder if there is a potential market out there... Answers on a postcard please!

Entertainment

What does the future hold for Computers?

I have touched briefly on this subject before as part of a Weekly Question topic (Weekly Question), but thought I would bring it up again, as listening to 5Live this morning they had a little on 1986, and how we seemed to be better off then than now (or was it the other way around???). One thing is for sure though we didn't have half the entertainment stuff then, that we do today. So lets take a trip down Memory lane...

Computers in 1986

The Atari ST, I Loved It!

The new Apple Mac was introduced, which had an enormous 1 Mb of RAM, and a new style keyboard. This sold in the states for around $2,500. In the same year Compaq introduced the first 386 based PC, Microsoft was listed on the New York Stock Exchange, selling shares at $21 each, and MS-DOS 3.2 was released.
I myself had an Atari 510ST computer with the plug in memory taking it to a whopping great big 1Mb of RAM, and a lightning fast speed of 8mHz.
I was playing games such as Bubble Bobble, Boulder Dash and the graphically fantastic Defender of the Crown.
Meanwhile schools in the UK had, had more than 2 years to get acquainted with the BBC Micro, which had 64K of memory, and the BASIC language at it's heart. You also had to send away your programs as part of a computer course.

THE choice for schools in the UK

But I was one of the odd ones out, whilst I had the ATARI ST in 1986, most of my mates had, Spectrums, or Spectrum plus's, Sir Clive Sinclairs little baby. There were very, very few people who had one of those ludricously expensive PC things, although a few had the Amstrad with the green screen display.

The computers were fantastic as far as I was concerned, and the development of them was going fast, things were been touted in the pipeline, like a new computer to rival the ST from Commodore, as a replacement for the aging, but mega popular Commodore 64. (I later owned an AMIGA 1200, and thought it the best thing since sliced bread!)

The other things that made these computers so popular were the vast software library, all on either cassette, or if you were lucky 4 or 5 floppy discs! The only frustrating part was if your game failed to load in the last 20 secs and you had to rewind the tape and start again. Oh Happy Days.

Donkey Kong, Jump them Fireballs!

As for the Internet and email, what's that then??

Computers in 2006

Well the PC now rules supreme, and the old computers of yester-year have been confined to the annuls of history. I got a lot of my info from here Old Computers so am grateful to them for their information, but the very word museum in the URL title speaks volumes. Indeed the world URL was never conceived in 1986. Where are Commodore, Atari and Sinclair?

I have at home a 1.6Ghz PC with 512mb RAM, and a 40Gb hard drive, with a 2Mb broadband connection to the internet. I also have a DVD writer and a CDROM, I do have a few additional things, but hardly worth a mention here. I have what I consider to be a dated PC.

Most PC's nowadays have at a speed of at least 2Gb, have memory of at least 1Gb, hard drives of 60Gb, NO Floppy Drives, DVD Dual-layer Writers, sound cards that have more memory and power than 5 computers in '86, internet connection available up to 8Mb broadband, and Windows XP as standard.

We take the internet and emailing for granted now, and most business would find it impossible to function without it. BASIC as far as I know is no longer taught in schools, but I have know idea what is (HTML possibly?). Multi-tasking is the key word, and computers can do 7 or 8 jobs at the same time with no discernible change in speed.
Laptops have become the norm for business men, and even the most basic ones would have the nerds of 1986 salivating.
Another development is Bluetooth and wireless, enabling business men to hook up and check their emails from any place that has a Hot Spot. But this development leads to an increase in computer crime and Identity theft, something unheard of in the 80's.
But what is really amazing is the price of these computers, relatively speaking they are oceans cheaper than their predecessors, indeed you can pick up a decent 2nd hand PC AND Monitor for less than £50 these days.

Games too, have come on leaps and bounds, those that used to gasp at the graphics of 'Defender of the Crown' (a masterpiece in it's time), would be close to a coroney at the graphics of some of the games today, but it's not only the graphics, it's the sounds, music, and sheer size of the games that are incredible. Add to that the fact you can play someone thousands of miles away, and the whole gameplay scenario just blows the 80's into dust. It's like comparing alogarithmicm book in the 80's to a Cray supercomputer.

But that is today, and if you tell kids how it was in the past they laugh, yet they all love to play, Pacman, and Donkey Kong (Now in a joystick that you plug into the TV). But they are not the only ones that laugh, we have a chuckle too. So what will the kids of the future be using in 20 years time...?

Fifa 07, Feel the Football

Computers in 2026??

I can foresee in 2026, that all peripherals will be wireless, and the PC will be integrated as part of a Home Centre. The Home CPU, will control all manner of things, from the TV to the Music system. There will be no need for a keyboard as everything will be done through voice recognition, the fluctuations ineveryone'ss voices will enable the computer to know who is wanting to do the work/play, and will adjust aviewablee screen to that user, and because of voice recognition, there will be no chance of piracy or hacking, as even taped voices will not work.
Refridgerators will be linked into the computers main hub, and will register not only the product removed, but how much of it is used, and whether or not it requires replacing. A voice and screen will tell the home owner when stocks are getting low, or when stocks are close to being out of date. The home owner can then command the fridge to order more of what is required, and delivery arranged at amutuallyy agreeable date.

In the work place there will be less people having to go in, as most of the work will be done at home, allowing greater freedom for leisure activities. Emailing, will be available in every corner of the globe, as will internet access, and speeds of 100gB will be common place.
DVD's and CD's will be obsolete, and all data will be stored on Flash Media. In effect there will be no need to have a PC workstation, as the PC of the future will incorporate all other entertainment Media into one box.

95% of the games in 2026 will have some sort of virtual reality element to them, and controls will be done through such devices as gloves, and even helmets. Sounds a bit too much? Well they have a golf game that uses a club, and measures the swing to find out how well you have done. That is now!

So there you have it, looks to be very interesting times ahead of us, and it looks like we will all be having more times for ourselves and our families. That is of course if we don't get carried away with all the technology and allow computers to become too clever.Becausee if we do... well Terminator 3 scenario anyone????

Current Affairs

Blair Going or Not?

I aint going anywhere!

Well Tony has just told his party to stop asking when he will be leaving, and get on with their jobs. Which will only antagonise Gordon Brown that much more, and further alienate him from his own party. Could it be that Tony is far closer to Maggie than he thought?

It is well known that arguably one of the best Prime minister's this country has ever had, was hounded out of office. But like Tony, Margaret Thatcher was getting too big for her boots, she thought that she could do no wrong in the eyes of the public and her party. In short power corrupted, and rusted the Iron Lady.

Tony 'Smiler' Blair, is much the same, he came to power on a wave of favourable public opinion (I just thought he was a smarmy git!), and has led Labour in three election victories. Mind you he didn't have much opposition really, now did he? He was the darling of the Labour party, and was the young, dashing father who was going to set the country to rights, and was on the common mans side.

Humm, OK there may have been some good policies such as the minimum wage, but the rest? Because of government targets that just have to be met, we are no better off in the long term. Borrowing has rocketed, and so has petty crime and urban decay. But perhaps the biggest problem of all has been the number of aledgedly dodgy deals and sleaze that has been undertaken by Tony's government, and indeed the allegations against him personally.

But, still Tony is hanging on to power, why? Because he loves it so much, he loves the holidays at public expense, the travel, the high life, the feeling that he is in control. It is my opinion that Mr. Blair is the most powerful control freak in the country, and that is a dangerous thing. Another opinion is that he only does things that is favourable to the public. If he thinks of a policy, it is leaked and if the public don't like it, the policy is dropped or altered. He has no balls to carry through unpopular policies, why? Because he want to be the darling of the public, he wants to show that he is still great.

I have got a giant Invisible Hambuger in my hands, and I am enjoying eating it!

Take the Gulf war, we only went into Iraq, as his advisors said they may have WMD's. He even told the house that is why they went to Iraq, when they found none, his excuse for going into Iraq was to remove a vicious dictator. Well on that basis half the African countries in the world and a few Middle eastern countries should be preparing for Invasion. That is the thing I hate most about the man, the amount of spin, and misleading quotes and the like.

But now our Tony is in trouble, he has got some opposition to face, just like Margaret Thatcher had, it comes not only from the Tories, but from his own party. David Cameron looks to be a breath of fresh air for the stale and stuffy Conservatives, he is saying things that make a lot of sense much to the disgust of some of the older party members. He is the Conservatives new Blair, hopefully he wont turn out the same as the current one, and is gaining in popularity everyday. But our Tony continues to make himself unpopular with Joe Public, he continues to hold onto his life-blood of power with his every breath.

I am convinced that Tony will not want to relinquish power until he absolutely has to, even if it means defeat for his beloved party. For he like Thatcher before him has become too big for his own boots, he doesn't want to give up his mantle of power, and become just another PM, he likes the limelight too much.

So is Blair going...?

Well, may be next year, but I can't see him going before then, his ego wont let him!

Movie Review

Aliens

Whilst away in India I managed to watch what I think is the best of the four Alien movies, and that is Aliens. Alien, the first movie was pretty good, with plenty of Atmosphere, number 3 was just pants, and 4 (resurrection) was so ridiculous it was hardly worth the money to remake it. Yes indeed Aliens was the best of the lot, and here is why.

Set 57 years after Warrent Officer Ellen Ripley blew the alien that destroyed her entire crew, she is awakened from a hyper-sleep to discover her worst fears, LV-426 the planet where she first discovered the Alien spaceship has been colonised. Worse still she is stripped of her rank, and flying license and sacked from the company. But when all contact is lost from the planet, the company want her back as a consultant to a bunch of space marines, Ripley agrees as long as they are going to wipe the aliens out, but the company has other ideas...

Who will win the battle the Aliens or the Marines? No contest really, especially when the Marines are been led by an inexperienced and inept lieutenant.

Ripley and the Gang

Aliens is the type of film that leaves you hoping for a sequel, and hoping that the sequel will be just as good, but like most films that have more than 2 in their arsenal, the third and 4th films are a total load of crap!

The battle scenes in Aliens are pretty believable and well acted throughout, and Carrie Henn, who plays Newt is a very accomplished young actress. There is also humour in the film, such as my favourite when Hudson says "Hey, Vasquez have you ever been mistaken for a man?", to which she responds "No!, ........Have you?"

There is not all that much blood and guts at all in the film, as it relies on the tension and 'mind games' as the first Alien did. The music sets the tone perfectly, and the dark lighting produces the atmosphere of a foreboding planet, that has yet to be made fully habitable.

Probably the most used image of the film

The special effects in the film, are pretty good too, and although the film was made in 1986, some of the effects are pretty visual, and you're left wondering as to how they could create that image on the screen. Indeed the film won the Oscar for it's visual effects, it also won an Oscar for the sound effects editing.

One of the effects that still has me wondering how it was done is when Bishop, the artificial lifeform has been ripped in two, by the Alien Queen, and is pulled toward the airlock hatch, with pipes and cables spewing out his guts. Truly amazing.

Bishop you have a lot of Guts!

Weeks after the film had finished there were still teenage girls all over the country, saying the immortal line "Get away from her, you BITCH!!", when her friends were in trouble.

It is such a shame that parts 3 and 4 had nothing going for them whatsoever, that very fact has ruined any chance of another Alien film been made, although a prequel may not be a bad idea!

Starring;

Sigourney Weaver, Carrie Henn, Lance Henriksen, Michael Biehn

Certificate; 18