Flame Warriors!

In my travels around the Internet, I've had occasion to see, meet or 'experience' most of the various type of 'Netizen out there.

Fortunately, someone with the whit & wisdom I appreciate has taken it upon himself to capture these quasi-psychotic miscreants, bringers of mayhem and bedlam in ink for everyone to ponder and scrutinize:

You: "Is that me? Hope not. But .. yeah, I know someone who's just like that."

Please adjourn to Flame Warriors for your entertainment and edification...

Oh, by the way, just to get you going, try Bliss Ninny, Bong, Ennui, Tireless Rebutter and my personal favourite, Strumpet...

Thought of the day

"Books won't stay banned. They won't burn. Ideas won't go to jail. In the long run of history, the censor and the inquisitor have always lost. The only weapon against bad ideas is better ideas."
~ Alfred Whitney Griswold, New York Times, 24 February 1959

So what do we think of censorship, then?

Review: Batman Begins

OK, I am a big soft kid and I like my 'no-brainer' action flicks.

But then sometimes, you drop on a film that falls somewhere between the cerebral and the senseless.

That's sort of where Batman Begins lies.

Having 'a mind like fly paper', Sherlock Holmes from the 1970 film, The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes, all manner of trivia sticks in my head with all 'the tedious inevitability of an unloved season', Hugo Drax from the 1979 James Bond film, Moonraker .. by way of an example, or two.

So there you go.

So when we see Bruce Waynes' parents gunned down in a seedy alleyway, I immediately recall that in the Tim Burton original Batman, his parents are killed by non other than the young Jack Napier, later to be known as The Joker.

Needless to say, the guy who kills his parents isn't a younger iteration of The Joker, so my mind is knocked askew and I have to then make room in my head for an altered course of Gotham folklore & history whereby things are slightly different.

Not being the comic nerd of that particular character, I've no idea which is right or wrong. Either way, a little consistency would go a long way.

What can I say of the cast? probably very little that doesn't make use of superlatives and gushing praise.

What with Liam Neeson (Henri Ducard), Morgan Freeman (Lucius Fox), Christian Bale (Bruce Wayne), Michael Caine (Alfred), Gary Oldman (Jim Gordon), Rutger Hauer, Tom Wilkinson .. pause for breath...

While non of them would find themselves overly taxed by either the dialogue or the depth of the plot or any nuanced performance, all made worthy and credited performances, as you would expect.

The overall feel of the film was one of epic proportions, with a little 'e'.

I took my nephew along to see the film and I found myself having to explain some of the plot devices and sequences to him, so I found the classification quite misleading. Surely a 15 rating would have been more appropriate that a 12A?

And with that suitably subtle segue, to the plot we go.

A young Bruce Wayne is left troubled by a subterranean encounter with some bats living in a well on the grounds of Wayne Manor, leaving his suitably vacuous young mind quite troubled.

A trip to the opera triggers a flashback which leads the Wayne clan to decamp from the opera and make an early exit; presumably stage left.

On doing so, his parents are bumped off by an otherwise unknown and worthless, nameless criminal. This sets the stage for the young Bruce to question his goals in life and set a new course; one of vengeance.

Only, things aren't quite as simple as they first seem and thoughts of revenge turn to acts of self-preservation as he realizes that there is much, much more to the untimely death of his parents when he meets the man he believes to be responsible for their deaths; Carmine Falcone (Tom Wilkinson).

At this point, Bruce disappears into the wider world and isn't to be seen for seven years .. seven years in Tibet, no less.

While lost in some Stalin-esque Asian penal colony, he is discovered by Henri Ducard (Liam Neeson) who offers him a chance to follow a different path and to train him accordingly.

And here is where Batman really does begin.

As usual, I won't go into further detail, since there's always a chance of burping out a spoiler or two and I find that when I read the interpretation of one person, I go into a film with one idea and come out with another, typically very uncomplimentary of the first.

In this period of refinement where Henri Ducard hones the young Bruce, it seems that Liam Neeson brought with him some of the couched and cliched dialogue from the various Star Wars prequel films, which would no doubt make George Lucas et al proud, whereas I found most of which to be lumbering and florid.

The shear level of detail is something to behold. The scale of Gotham is akin to that of Mega City One from 2000AD, sumptuous in the seething, thrusting squalid majesty of the buildings and improbable monorail systems slicing across the city from road level to sky high.

On encountering our first 'baddie', The Scarecrow, we are indeed treated to a truly horrific vision of drug-induced hallucinatory fear and paranoia.

Not having taken drugs, I cannot speak from personal experience, but of those that I have spoken to who have, the visual effects people really did do their homework and created a very real, disturbing and shocking image of madness.

Even if I might not like a film for one thing, I might sometimes like the film for something else, so detail is something I prize quite highly. If the final article doesn't float my boat, I might doff my cap in the direction of detail and the thought poured into the production.

Having been furnished with a knowledge of the past and the beginning of The Dark Knight, there is a better sense of the things that motivate him, of which we were given only cursory glimpses of in the various previous films.

There has been a little criticism of the fight sequences, and I would also be critical, but not for the same reasons. I found many of the physical engagements to be too claustrophobic and cluttered, not giving a sense of who was dishing out what to who and when.

All in all, a very dark, sinister and entertaining if slightly circuitous and long film...

Food, infections, high temperatures, low work rates and clear blue skies...

Today is proving to be mercilessly hot.

I'm a bit like a big engine in that I don't respond well to heat.

I much prefer the cold. I start better that way.

That said, going for a jog last night was a major sweat-breaker.

Dad and me are having an out-door barbecue, with lots of dead animal flesh and dead plant matter.

However, there will be no beer for me. On the rare occasions I do get ill, I don't do it by halves.

I have a pretty nasty throat infection common to now extinct prehistoric animals .. or something.

The voracious collective of virii are happily working their merry way around much of my head, which is nice of them.

Not to be beaten, I will continue as usual until my otherwise impressive if at times diesel-like immune system gives them what for...

Wet behind the ears

Now, I'm no big fan of Thomas Cruise Mapother IV.

Personally, I think he's prone to being a bit of a pocket-poser who's managed to garner more interest and accolades than his acting abilities would otherwise demand.

Maybe this is just the roles he plays, but he always comes across as the self-assured, overly confident slick with an answer for everything.

However, in his later years, he's impressed somewhat with roles in films like The Last Samurai and The Minority Report, so I'm a little less dismissive these days.

Anyway, despite all of this and despite all of his weird pseudo-religious malarky and despite the persistent rumours that he's gay, what happened t'other day in London at the premiere for his new film, The War of the Worlds was just as inexplicable as it was embarrassing.

As a measure of the man, I don't think he was all that embarrassed. I'd say he looked more pissed off and angry than anything else. As would I, I might add.

Where the two of us differ is that I would have shown the kind of restraint Russell Crowe would be proud of, in that the 'joker' would be shitting his teeth out the following day.

What embarrasses me is that when all is said and done, Tom Cruise is the consummate professional who always has a smile for his fans, who is always happy to sign an autograph, and who is probably arguably the least pretentious of all movie stars.

So here I am, an Englishman who finds himself severely embarrassed by some half-man, half-whit dolt who thought it would be a bit of a wag to make some guy look like an idiot in front of the world, when in reality, most people wouldn't have found the jape in the least bit funny.

I feel a great need to apologize for the guy with the hose-pipe microphone and to apologize on behalf of everyone else.

But if nothing else, Tom Cruise is a smart enough guy and I'm sure he's very much aware that one man does not a country maketh...

Feel like a man...

Yesterday

There I am, laid on my front as my physiotherapist twangs my left Achilles tendon back into shape.

Then she leans over to rub the kinks out of my right shoulder. Not before she pauses for moment:

Physiotherapist: "You have a really big bruise on your right leg."

She exclaims.

Physiotherapist: "How did you do that? It looks painful."

I twist my head around to look at the back of my calf. The bruise looked a little weird, and then my eyes make sense of the shape.

Me: "That's a bite mark."

I reply automatically. More to myself really, but my physiotherapist heard all the same.

She raises her eyebrows and laughs in astonishment.

Physiotherapist: "Animal or human? Or should I not really ask?"

Me: "Human, actually."

Physiotherapist: "Oh!"

For the life of me, I have no recollection of being bit on the leg, although I was very much aware of being bitten on my arse. The left buttock to be precise.

Who'd have thought dancing in a nightclub might be so treacherous?

So this last week has seen me doing the left buttock shuffle to avoid agitating the huge rasp on my arse, complete with teeth indentations and accompanying bruise the size of saucer.

Still, that's what happens when me and my mate Stan have a few to drink and get going with the ladies.

Thinking about it, the woman who bit me wasn't all that bad looking, although she did have that strange, 'bunny boiler' look about her.

Today



My car is nearing the end of her productive life.

Age has taken hold and the automotive equivalent of organ failure seems inevitable.

Yesterday, the clutch cable popped off .. again. So I just managed to lumber home from the motorway -- on my way back from seeing my physiotherapist -- before the whole thing fell to bits entirely.

So this morning, in combat bottoms and vest, I get in there and fixed the thing myself.

I'm usually a total woman when it comes to cars.

I get in, I drive.

If the car stops working, I call someone to get the thing fixed.

So actually fixing my own car really did the trick.

I have a mental list of things to do, so ticking this one off made the day shorten somewhat.

Tonight

Spoilt for choice, really.

Do I go on a leaving do for someone, or do the usual and go around town with my mates?

The former has a much greater woman-to-man ratio, the later maybe not, but have the potential for much more fun.

Hmm .. choices, choices.

Tomorrow

I'm in London with a certain lady friend.

Should be a bit of a giggle...

Driving me crazy

The government has announced that Leeds is to be the focus of a pilot program for a new 'Pay-as-you-go' toll road scheme.

While the reasons for introducing toll charges on roads seems to make sense:

"The transport secretary said the charges, aimed at cutting congestion, would replace road tax and petrol duty.

Alistair Darling said change was needed if the UK was to avoid the possibility of 'LA-style gridlock' within 20 years."

In reality, both the execution of such a plan and the very idea is, and will no doubt be fundamentally flawed.

For a start, what on Earth has possessed the architects of this scheme to run the pilot in such a large metropolitan city like Leeds?

It's absurd in the extreme.

The amount of disruption is going to be utterly unfathomable.

Let's bare in mind that Leeds has just worked it's way through the painful and vastly disruptive construction of the M1-M62 link road, the M621.

I worked in Leeds during this time and the chaotic traffic congestion was just mind-blowing.

Also, there were plans to re-introduce a trams along the same lines as the Supertram in Sheffield.

In the end, the plan has been set back due to the incredibly high costs of development and construction, as well as the cost to business through general disruption.

So it's pretty clear that Leeds is not a suitable candidate.

Surely, a small town, or a series of small towns distributed over various geo-regional locations within Britain would make much more sense?

In addition, what happens to the people paying these toll fees?

What of those people living in Leeds paying toll fees?

Are we to assume that they don't get any rebate on their road tax to cover their new Guinea Pig status? Which would clearly be the honourable thing to do.

So in addition to the road tax, they're going to have to pay the various toll fees.

It's difficult to imagine a less sensible scheme. Certainly, a scheme so poorly thought through is unlikely to yield the data the government is looking for, which is the whole point of the trial in the first place.

There are other glaring failures in the thinking of the government.

For example, the idea of toll fees is to firstly introduce a more representative use-based fee structure for road usage that does away with the current flat fee.

Also, by introducing such a scheme, the costs of road usage becomes more transparent. The logic being that people will be more conservative with their use of the car.

While all of this sounds sensible enough, the government is going to get this quite wrong.

Why? Because they're going to get greedy and charge a fucking fortune, that's why.

Here's some simple numbers my dad and me knocked together. Not so much back-of-cigarette-packet, more back-of-a-compliment-slip laying around in the kitchen sideboard.

My dad does about 6,000 miles per year, well bellow the national average of at least double that.

He spends about £800 of petrol and his road tax is £160.

Now, the government have been clear that the upper toll fee for major motorways -- like the M1, M6, M25 and so on -- will be £1,34p while lesser A and B roads will be as little as £0.02p. In the middle of those fees is an average of about £0.50p.

So, my dad currently pays £960 per year for his car usage. With this new scheme, he will be paying around £3,000 per year .. and this is without factoring in petrol costs.

And this for a guy who is well below the national average for road usage.

I don’t think you require too much time or help in working out that the fees levied on other road users, such as myself will be substantially greater.

Even with a promised reduction in petrol duty, I certainly can’t see how this is going to help the situation at all.

Believe it or not, things could get worse.

In an attempt to avoid paying high motorway fees, people will use the lesser A and B roads. Which means that while we may see a marginal drop in road usage, much of what's left on the roads will be jammed into the narrower road infrastructure in and around major towns and cities that simply aren’t going to be able to cope with such high volumes of traffic.

So I suppose a sensible solution is needed. Just don't expect one from the government...

Be happy...

I was just thinking about certain people in my life and how unhappy and disillusioned they've become with everything in their lives.

My ex-girlfriend being a good example. I would often say to her: "I wish I had your problems."

I'd have done a straight swap and sorted her life out for her in half a day.

Most of the problems in peoples' lives stem from not having the courage just to say 'no'.

If you can't be happy with all of the wealth that youth brings, then how the hell do you expect to be happy when you get older when youth becomes a distant memory?

Review: Sin City

Not knowing anything about Sin City, other than its comic book background, and all the big cars, racy ladies and fast dialog, I really didn't know what to expect.

But that's how I like it.

Then I saw the trailer. The visual appeal took a hold like a frightened child, so I was curious.

My nephew had a face like someone had taken his pet dogs best chew toy and left a half-smoked cigar, instead.

I guess he was put off by all the yet-another-comic-to-movie-conversion stuff, but that kind of thing appeals to the kid in me.

I'm like that, see.

Set somewhere between some modern-day seething night-time American city and some latter-day seething night-time American city, you're eyes get pulled around like the first time you saw your sisters best friend get undressed while you hid in the closet, spying through a crack in the door.

The only time you see colour is for emphasis and gratuity, like the hair of some hot, well-stacked dame, lipstick, some guys sneakers and the eyes of some sleazy young, back-stabbin' broad.

I was in my element.

OK, that's it .. no more noir-ish commentary. I'll only end up drinking coffee again...

I'm not sure if anyone in the cinema knew what to expect, and I suppose I thought I was going to see something serious yet violent. But there was some out-and-out 'comic' moments which made me laugh out loud while most of the audience in the cinema just didn't pick up on.

The dialog was excellent. So utterly cliched and roundly unspeakable in a modern film. The kind of stuff you'd expect James Cagney, Edward G. Robinson or Humphrey Bogart to hit you with .. each word all bad like a dum-dum bullet and their mouth like a machine gun in the hands of a dead man, shootin' all over the joint.

No .. stop it!

I will resist...

I was impressed by how most of the sketches over-lapped and intertwined. Although, I'd have liked to have seen more of that. But that's just me being fussy.

It's worth pointing out that there's still life in Mickey Rourke, yet.

He had the longest scene, and his turn as Marv was just .. well, marvelous, hilarious, a hint of poignancy and no small amount of pathos.

Also, I'd say he was brave to take on the role of someone who had a disfigured face, given his affection for the surgeons' scalpel of late.

So I've no idea what the readership of Sin City are likely to want from the film. I don't know whether they will be pleased or pissed off. Who knows.

What was most reassuring about this film was that you had the kind of actors & actresses who always turn out a fine performance; Powers Boothe, Bruce Willis, Clive Owen, Brittany Murphy, Benicio Del Toro, Michael Madsen .. the list goes on and on.

Fun, wildly violent and funny. Worth a squint...

When I get older...

And if this should be the song lyric, then hopefully not loosing my hair.

But if hereditary traits are anything to go by, I'll have a full head of hair for many years to come.

So, who do I want to be like when I get older?

I wouldn't mind being like Powers Boothe or Sean Connery.

Of course, all of this is based upon the very idea of me ever growing up. And if my drinking, carousing, outrageous flirting and bacchanalian revelry on Friday and Saturday night are anything to go by .. err, well.

Plenty of time to get all grow'd up when I get olderer...

Thought of the day

"The best way to predict the future is to invent it."
~ Alan Kay, computer scientist

Like I've got nothin' else better to do!

Please be aware this isn't for the want of more enlightening content.

On the contrary, one of our less reputable but no less entertaining number has took it upon herself to nominate me for some meme madness.

So, without further ado...

1. Total volume of music files on PC

A little over 12 gigabytes of pure sonic bliss all wrapped up in the loving arms of iTunes on my G5.

Which equates to 18 genres, 221 artists, 366 albums (bare in mind that iTunes doesn’t distinguish between albums and singles) all of which amounts to 2,667 songs, which if played continuously would take 8.7 days to complete.

So there!

2. Last CD purchased

Actually, I've just bought an album this last couple of hours through iTunes Music Store.

The album is / was Last September by Deepest Blue .. beautiful, melodic, soothing and just all round chilled.

3. Song playing right now

Another Chance [Afterlife Mix] by Roger Sanchez

Soon to be followed by Blackhole by Beck from the album, Mellow Gold.

4. Five songs I listen to a lot or mean a lot to me

Five songs is just not nearly enough.

You're Not Alone by Olive from the album, Extra Virgin.

Poseidon - Supertransonic (Jody Way Out West Mix) from the compilation album, 21st Century Deep Trance.

Papua New Guinea (12 Inch Original) by The Future Sound Of London from the album, Papua New Guinea Translations.

Creep by Radiohead from the album, Pablo Honey.

Very Yeah by Corduroy from the album, High Havoc.

5. Do you have long hair?

No.

Did have, but not now.

Now, according to the rules, I have to nominate three people, but I say bollocks to that idea.

If you're up for it, pick up where I left off...