Category: Favourites

Last nights show by Coldplay at Philips Arena can only be described in one word

AWESOME!

More of that later… After my ingenious plan of using a disposable camera as a decoy to allow me to sneak my digital camera in proved to be pretty must worthless as soon as I entered the arena as security didn’t particularly care about people using cameras (as this shot shows).

Anyways, onto the show… The support act was Rilo Kiley and they were pretty good, a few catchy songs in their set, most noteably a song called “It’s A Hit” which I think I had heard before, but never knew who it was by.

Then there was a huge wait for the main act but once they arrived (complete with countdown on the video screen behind the stage) it was just a great show… Though, I’ve heard them play live before they mixed things up slightly by playing most of the memorable songs like “Politik,” “Yellow” and “Speed of Sound” early in the set. Usually you would expect these to be played later on.

Anyways, Chris Martin was downright bubbly throughout the night, running around the small stage like a man possessed and also taking a moment to run through the capacity crowd to the back of the arena during “In My Place.” He also managed to screw up the start of “The Scientist” which he compared to being voted off American Idol… He was also throwing out special mentions to Atlanta left and right, even managing to work OutKast, Michael Stipe and “Georgia On My Mind” into the lyrics of “Politik” and later on during the encore he brought out a special guest in the shape of Michael Stipe who then went on to sing “Nightswimming” with Martin on the piano to the delight of all there.

The show was a hugely enjoyable spectacle, well worth the wait and extortionately high ticket price… I doubt you’ll find anyone who was there who’d say a bad word about the show, easily one of the best ones I’ve been to…

As a footnote, I’ve been contacted by the Deputy Picture Editor at NME who has expressed an interest in using one of my pictures of Chris Martin and Michael Stipe in next weeks edition… Sweet or what??

Coldplay

Originally uploaded by FLC.

Look very closely at the square marked “A” and the square marked “B” in the image below…

Got it? Good… Now would you believe me if I said they were the same colour?

Because they are.

I’m such a sucker for great optical illusions…

I got an invitation to use WordPress.com today, quite unexpected… It feels all very Charlie and the Chocolate Factory-esque.

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away you entered your email address on http://wordpress.com/ to get a blog.

We’re now inviting small groups to use WordPress.com and your email address was selected today!

While you’re on a string of good luck it might be a good day to buy a lottery ticket.

Cheers,
The WordPress.com Team

Sweet or what? Now I’m getting a sneak preview of the new look backside of WordPress 1.6 (I believe) which is chock full of AJAX (or insert relevant buzzword here) goodness… As it’s a Blogger hosted type service the options are a bit limited, like only 8 themes to choose from (6 new as well as the default and classic) and you can’t customise these themes neither, though I hope that changes in the future.

On with the screenshots I guess…

This is the dashboard area, much like the present one except it has links to new WP.com posts and hot WP.com blogs etc. It also shows the new colour scheme for the admin interface…

The biggest change is in the posting page, the box can be dynamically resized, and it has also been dumbed down, no more entering html by default (though there is an option for that) it’s now like a bog standard text editor, a lot like Microsoft Word for example (probably a bad one), I’m none too fond of it though…

Just a little example of the themes available…

so there you have it, if you want to see my empty space, go to scamcity.wordpress.com, I’m not sure what to put there…

Oh another thing… I have invites for WP.com, so if anyone else wants a wordpress.com blog, drop a comment and I’ll hook you up, assuming the story you provide explainig why you want/need one is good enough…

This is too good to be true…

In what seems destined to become one of the most joked about photos of the month, a well-known Reuters photographer on Wednesday captured President George W. Bush scribbling a note to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice during a session at the United Nations. On the note is a message revolving around the need to take a “bathroom break.”

I think I may need a bathroom break? Is this possible?

No really… It’s true… The President of the United States of America is, in essence, asking Condoleezza Rice for a hall pass during the 2005 World Summit and 60th General Assembly of the United Nations.

I have seriously entered bizarro world today, either that or in the last few months Scotland has managed to develop a good football team without me knowing…

It all began on Saturday, Scotland drew 1-1 with Italy, arguably one of the great footballing nations… Scotland, who have been, shall we say, utter shit for the last 4 years, drew with them, infact they were 15 minutes away from beating them… How bizarre.

Onto today, Scotland actually beat Norway 2-1… Last I heard, Norway were supposed to be a good team.

Of course, this leads to the usual uphill struggle to get 2nd place in the qualifying group (but not impossible) and then somehow overcome a hard as hell playoff against some European superpower who had a bad game and slipped to 2nd in their group…

Is there really anyother way?

To make things even more bizarre… Northern Ireland beat England 1-0, Northern Ireland who, at one point, couldn’t score a goal for years and years, beat the almighty England, I wouldn’t have put any money on that happening in my lifetime…

6 months or so ago a contest was ran for WordPress themes, I entered my old theme in what was really a rushed job and I was never really happy with it, but I was also too busy or unwilling to fix a few bugs and styling errors in it, I spent about an hour last night revisiting it and fixing them and now it’s ready to be released…

It’s nothing special, it’s not perfect either as I used to hack numerous WP core files to make it work like I wanted to and as a theme for everyone I simply can’t do that, so I had to find a few workarounds, especially as WordPress likes to use lists to display sidebar items, not even ordered or unordered lists, it just spews out <li> tags which breaks validation… So it’s now valid (at last) and the CSS validates too, which is always a bonus.

I’m hoping to make a few new themes over the next few weeks, if only to keep me busy.

You can download it here

You can view it here, though this may be changing in a few days as I work on a few other new themes…

Now, a little bit of backstory… When I moved in with Robyn I brought Sally with me, he was given to me by Erika as he was on his last last last last last last chance with them and was most likely to be given back to the place they got him from as he had become a very anti-social cat… He was fine when we lived in Marietta, he wasnt very social, we put that down to him being the last cat but he would hang around with Piggy, but when we moved to the lake he became a whole different cat…

He would completely avoid people, avoid the other cats, fight with Snoopy and worst of all, he would pee in corners of rooms leaving a horrible smell. So when I left, he came with…

Now he is a completely different cat, he’s friendly, happy, and best of all, he plays with Felix and todays highlight was the two of them laying beside each other on the bed while I worked, Sally reached over and grabbed Felix’s head with both front paws and proceeded to clean him. Sally of old would never have done that.

I dunno why he’s changed so dramatically, maybe I was right long ago when I said he liked me for some strange reason, maybe we’re not too dissimilar the two of us…

Except I never pee in the corner of the room…

Felix and Sally

Originally uploaded by FLC.

I’ve had a chance to play with Google Talk now, and I’m mightily impressed…

It has a ton of neat little touches that really sets it apart, plus it’s a tiny, bloat free install, unlike MSN, Yahoo or AIM, which is cool… The first is the actual conversation window, if you have multiple conversations going on, it stacks them like Gmail does with email

So if you have one or more persons on “hold”, it’ll still show you if the other conversations have been updated, which is really nice…You can also minimise everything to prevent people peeking over your shoulder.

Inside the windows is cool, it’s bare minimal, no emoticons (though it does highlight :) :( :P etc.), no themes, no file transfers and it uses Markdown to bold and italicise words, which can be weird at first, but easy to learn…

Like I said, this is a quick review, I really need to get a mic to try and “call” people. That’s the ultimate test…

Finally the big announcement, which some have known about for a while but were sworn to secrecy upon pain of…. Well, just pain.

I’m getting married!

I was waiting til we got the actual ring, as opposed to the fake ring Robyn has been sporting for the last couple of weeks, and we got it today, and it’s a beauty!

To semi-mark this momentous occasion, we persuaded Phillip, a friend off Flickr, to take a few pictures of us on Monday night so we could package a whole bunch of them together, and they turned out perfectly…

We did try to keep it a secret so well done to whoever worked it out, noteably Mark from this comment… The big day is November 5th, and we have our reasons for having it so quickly (no, not an unexpected pregnancy), but most of all we’re very happy.

It’s funny who you meet when you go OTP, Robyn got an email telling her Greg Proops was playing at the aptly named Funny Farm in mysterious Roswell, GA. So we headed up there and were not disappointed…

The man is a funny, funny man, and it makes me feel old to remember him like 10/15 years ago on Who’s Line is it Anyway? on Channel 4 in the UK. So yeah, a funny, funny man and he’ll be in town tomorrow and Saturday night also, and if you’re lucky enough, you must just be able to jump him in the bar afterwards, jam a camera in his face and yell “smile bitch!” like we did.

Fun times…

Robyn, Greg and… Greg

Originally uploaded by FLC.

Who needs a Mighty Mouse when you can get your hands on a freakin’ Danger Mouse!

Actually, this is pretty funny as only a few nights ago Robyn and I went down memory lane looking for the theme for Muppet Babies (don’t ask) and we came across a killer site that have stuff on other kids shows like…. Danger Mouse! And Thundercats too… To make it doubley weird, we were watching the leaked Family Guy straght-to-dvd movie tonight and it has a funny as hell tangent involving Thundercats (seeing is believing, seriously, I couldn’t make it up)

I just find it funny how stuff like this all starts to appear within a few days of each other, now without further adieu…

He’s the greatest! He’s fantastic!
Wherever there is danger, he’ll be there!
He’s the ace! He’s amazing!
He’s the strongest, he’s the quickest, he’s the best!
Danger Mouse!
Danger Mouse!
Danger Mouse!

Love it…

http://apple.com/dangermouse

Originally uploaded by a superhero by night

First of all, a little back story, there was an Atlanta Blogger/Flickr joint meet up a few months ago and I though it went swimmingly, but afterwards there was reports of Blogger and Flickr related gang violence (GTA: ATL), you know, looting and running street battles and all that jazz… So now comes the final showdown*… Blogger vs. Flickr at Whirlyball!

Now the trash talking has been going on for a month or so now, lines were drawn and people were forced (some at gunpoint) to pick a side. Were you Blogger or were you a filthy, greasy Shark Flickr. Friends have turned on each other, families have been ripped apart, I’m living in my own West Side Story scenario at home as Robyn has elected to join the dark side of Flickr… Lousy no good sell out she is!

So as you might have guessed, I’ve chosen to fly the flag of the Blogger side… As much as I love Flickr and the fun I’ve had with it, I’ve been a Blogger for nearly 5 years, you don’t turn your back on that… When your a Blogger, your a Blogger 4 Life!

*throws up gang sign*

So the showdown is this Saturday at Whirlyball in Roswell/Alpharetta, and if you don’t know what Whirlyball is, just think a combination of basketball & hockey, but in bumper cars…

WhirlyBall, dubbed “The worlds only totally mechanized team sport”, is best described as a combination of Basketball, Hockey and Jai-Alai played while riding an electrically powered machine, similar to a bumper car, called a WhirlyBug. Although the WhirlyBug resembles a bumper car, it is a far superior machine. Quicker, stronger and far more maneuverable, the WhirlyBug powers you and your team down court in a five on five game.

WhirlyBall is a team sport and a fun group activity. The playing court is approximately 4,000 sq. ft. and there are 10 WhirlyBugs on the playing court at one time, five red and five yellow. In one hand the player has a Jai-Alai style plastic scoop and in the other hand a steering crank. The ball being tossed around is a softball sized whiffle ball.

At each end of the court there are vertically hung backboards with a 15 inch hole in the center. Behind the hole is a plexiglass swing gate equipped with a buzzer to notify the referee when a score is made. The referee is the person sitting in the elevated booth above the court who will call play by play during the game, keep score and assess any penalties incurred. Before you go out on the court, the referee will go over the rules and give you a brief rundown on how to play WhirlyBall. Participating center rules and safety requirements may vary.

I imagine blood will be shed on the court… Kill or be killed!

* = Might not be so final afterall

Yesterday we spend the majority of the afternoon/evening in Decatur celebrating Slingerdoo’s birthday which was a great time, though the intake of too much alcoholic drink left us taking MARTA home, and well… Less said about that the better I think.

Anyways, after we got home I decided to check who had posted pictures of the event (hey, it’s Flickr, there was a bajillion cameras around) and I came across this one by Anselpixel, and good god, what a wake up call! The back story is my dad has been bald up top for pretty much as long as I remember, and my brother started to go bald as soon as he turned 21, but now that gene has been passed down to me as I’m finally going to admit that I’m going extremely thin on top…

Of course, I had my hair cut not long ago, so it’ll grow back to a decent level, but yeah, I’m finally officially balding and it makes me feel older than I should feel.

Waiting for the Great Cone

Originally uploaded by anselpixel

Remember I said Atlanta was in the grips of a horrificaly hot heatwave? Well, yesterday I decided it would be a good time to take in a game at Turner Field… A day game, in 90°+ temps, at least I wasn’t the only one as 40,000 people took a day off work to see the Braves sweep the Nationals to reclaim the top spot of the National League East Division.

The reason for the recent good run by the Braves?

Atlanta’s very own, Jeff Francoeur!

This guy has been a sensation since he came into the lineup a few weeks back (5 homers in 12 games) and yesterday he knocked two out the park to help the Braves win 5-4 and thus sweeping the series and moving 3 games clear of the Nationals at the top of the extremely close NL East, put it this way, the New York Mets who are in last place have a winning record and are only 6 games behind…

Anyways, great game, lovely day and I met a bunch of nice people in the BudZone, the best way to see a game is there, really, buy a $1 ticket and start a tab at the bar and you’ll have a fun time no matter what happens. Though today I was paying the price of cold beer (x6 at least) and warm weather, next time I’ll be on soda’s. Put it this way, I crashed out when I got home about 7 till about 11, then pottered about for 30 minutes and crashed out again till 8 this morning, so soundly that Robyn had Sally playing on top of me and I didn’t wake up… Yes, soda’s next time…

To cap it all off, here is a panorama from the BudZone… And I’ve lost score of my overall record, it doesn’t even matter anymore.

It was inevitable really, especially in this culture of lawsuits that we live in nowadays, but really, this has more holes in it than a pasta drainer!

A woman upset that she bought the video game “Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas” for her 14-year-old grandson without knowing it contained hidden, sexually explicit scenes sued the manufacturer Wednesday on behalf of consumers nationwide.

Florence Cohen, 85, of New York, said in the lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan that the game’s manufacturer, Rockstar Games, and its parent company, New York-based Take Two Interactive Software Inc., engaged in false, misleading and deceptive practices.

She sought unspecified damages on behalf of herself and all consumers nationwide, saying the company should give up its profits from the game for what amounted to false advertising, consumer deception and unfair business practices.

Let’s see…

A woman upset that she bought the video game “Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas” for her 14-year-old grandson without knowing it contained hidden, sexually explicit scenes.

Huh? You don’t say…

I present Exhibit A.

Oh my, can we see a close up of that warning on the back of the box please?

The defense rests it’s case…