Author: Greg

We got a new member of our motley crew of the damned extended family today in the shape of Linus’ real, real brother… Which we’ve christened “Sally” just to confuse the two of them, seeing as Linus is a girl and Sally a boy. And he’s just an adorable little kitten, the runt of the litter no less. Linus is a little ball of fluff, and Sally is like half her size.

He arrived just over an hour ago, so the rest of the cats are not quite sure how to treat him… Linus is all hissy, Pigpen doesn’t really care and Snoopy cares even less than Pigpen.

Anyways, here he is…

As you know, I recently upgraded to Mozilla Firefox 0.8 and today I finally got round to going to the extensions page after it was down for the best part of 10 days and installed the RSS Reader Panel. This is a handy tool as it (in theory) prevents me going to all the blogs I read to see if their updated…

As I said, it’s in theory, because most of the blogs I read don’t have RSS feeds to draw from which is kinda disappointing. So this is a call to my blogging readers… Get your RSS feed on, if you use blogger it’s so easy to start… It’s handy for people who read lots of blogs on a daily basis as it gives you the blog in bite sized bits and you can quickly see if it’s been updated so you can quickly jump to the post you want to read.

Here’s how mine looks like:

More info on my feeds is here.

Ever since the song “Hey Ya” by Andre 3000 of Outkast came out, everyone is shaking their Polaroid pictures. I have always been told that you should not shake a Polaroid picture, but I’m having a hard time convincing those around me that this is true. What is the answer?

Polaroid say “NO, just lay it down flat OK!”

OK then… But “lay it on a flat surface like a Polaroid picture” doesn’t sound nearly as cool does it?

Now…. You thought this was gonna be a post about that infamously lazy ass band who call themselves Guns N’ Roses and their lawsuit didn’t you?

Jesus readers, give me a bit more credit than that… I’m here to bring you stories that will warm your heart and broaden your horizons while informing you of the latest going’s on in the world as we know it.

So with that said, I’m taking it all back by presenting to you… Back to their near enough original line up! Some said it would NEVER happen! The baddest band in the land! The Ayatollah’s of Rock and Rollah! GUNS N’ ROSES!!!!!…

*Insert sounds of record scratching here*

Woah man… Their, like, kids! It’s like a bad trip… Talk about sending a cold shiver down my spine. But the most disturbing part is in the bio section, the Lil’ Steven Adler is sporting a freakin’ phat blunt! Wassupwitdat??

A funny fact about Pepsi’s iTunes Giveaway. There is a way you can ALWAYS* win

“Hi, I’m Greg, and I currently reside in Atlanta, Georgia and in my spare time I like to defraud leading cola retailers.”

Hey, Atlanta is prime Coca-Cola land, I’m doing my bit for the cause *upraised fist*.

* = Not always proven to win, I’ll do some research at the nearest Publix and get back to you, any codes I find in said Publix will be added to a notepad so I can cash them in as soon as I get home… Brings new meaning to “No Purchase Necessary”.

Wales 4 – 0 Scotland

Another dismal performance by Scotland, after the “dizzy” heights of beating Holland 1-0 in November, it’s back to the same miserable performances. I listened to the first 20 or so minutes of today’s game before turning off in relative disgust. They’ve now conceded 10 goals in 2 games without reply.

So much for progress… They’ve also dropped down two positions in the FIFA Rankings to 53rd. Now teams like Iran, Iraq, Mali, Jordan, Honduras and Algeria are above them… That’s kinda pitiful.

A bonus of living over here is I got to see most of the Holland versus USA match on ESPN2. A good battle between the 4th (Holland) and 11th (USA) ranked teams in the world. Both also sporting hideous Nike kits, all of which are pretty damn ugly again. I thought they’d have learned their lesson after the ugly kits they gave their teams in the 2002 World Cup, but no…

This time via the new(ish) look Copydesk…

A number of BBC staff placed this advert in the Daily Telegraph and much kudos to them… There is also a nice link to Scary Duck’s blog that tells it like it is…

There is nothing in the world, however, like a vengeful Blairite, and Hutton has left the BBC on a knife-edge just two years before charter renewal. The licence fee? Editorial independence? The right to take risks and ask difficult questions? All these, say here today, and dare I say it, gone tomorrow, culture minister Tessa Jowell are beyond discussion – but how many both within and outside the corporation actually believe her? After all, the Kelly affair left both Chairman Gavyn Davies and DG Dyke sacrificed to the government like pawns in a one-sided game of chess.

Governments are sprawling Jekyll and Hyde organisations. They come to power on a tide of promises and goodwill, but eventually the power hungry Hyde surfaces with his broken promises, trampling on those who get in their way. Underneath the officially airbrushed smile is a sharp-toothed monster, spinning for all it’s worth, and is never, ever wrong.

So, who do you trust? A BBC that makes mistakes every now and then, or a rabid print media in the hands of a few millionaire businessmen that can lie and distort on their front pages and never have to take a word back; whilst spoon-feed stories by political spin-doctors?

For 116 quid a year you get eight TV channels, five national radio networks, separate networks for Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, with their own language services. Local radio. The world’s best web site. Your taxes buy the world’s most listened to radio station. I know who I trust, and I’m proud to work for them.

So. Not. Worthy!

Anyways, I’ll leave you with a few images that caught my eye on SuperHeroHype, it’s another Batman cartoon series and too cool NOT to share.

Interesting tidbit found via The Benblog.

The UK Government may want to dismantle the BBC after the fallout from The Hutton Report about the death of Dr. David Kelly. This can only end in tears before bedtime for everyone concerned…

A new scholarship created for whitey only.

A student group at Roger Williams University is offering a new scholarship for which only white students are eligible, a move they say is designed to protest affirmative action.

The application for the $250 award requires an essay on “why you are proud of your white heritage” and a recent picture to “confirm whiteness.”

“Evidence of bleaching will disqualify applicants,” says the application, issued by the university’s College Republicans.

Jason Mattera, 20, who is president of the College Republicans, said the group is parodying minority scholarships.

So am I the only one who doesn’t see the funny side?

I should really stop blogging on a Sunday as there isn’t much to say. It’s been raining like nothing else most of the morning and the three cats are having 12 rounds of throwdown at the bottom of my bed. We’re also back to a 4 people, 6 animal household. Not that having Ben and Lauren here was bad, it was quite good, I just don’t think I could live under those conditions for any significant stretch of time. I’ve lived with 4 other people before and even that was strained at times…

So many are still wondering why I chose to live in Atlanta, so seeing as I’ve got time on my hands (and really nothing better to do) I’ll tell you a little story.

Flashback to 1997

97’s the number, another summer *get down*, sound of the funky drummer…

It was a mediocre year, I was still in college and I recently discovered this fabulous new tool called the internet, “they have the internet on computers now?”, and one of the few things I liked to do in my early days was head on over to the Channel 4 NBA forum. Channel 4 had been showing the NBA in the UK for a year or so now and in the forum was a few funny characters and what fun we’d have trying to wage war with the NFL forum and the Under The Moon forum. Time moved on and after the 97/98 season Channel 4 lost the rights to show NBA and the forum was closed, the league also went into a prolonged lockout taking out just over half of the season.

But alas, a new forum had sprung up and a few core members from Channel 4 had found their way over and for about 3 years we called it home.

Fast forward to 2000

Channel 4 had begun showing WWF programming on terrestrial TV, and a few of us started talking about it on the NBA forum, so much so it caused the owner to make us a special WWF forum and nothing but good times lay ahead as this forum grew and grew and grew over time, as well as moving to and from various free message board providers until March of 2002 when one of the members decided to put one of those YaBB message boards on a server of his and finally we had (and still have) a stable home…

But what’s all this got to do with me being in Atlanta you ask? Well, one of the posters in the Channel 4 forum moved over to the NBA forum and was there for the beginning of the WWF forum and finally hosted the permenent home of the WWF forum is also the same guy who used to live in Croyden but now lives in Atlanta… Am I making any sense here? I guess not cause I’ve pretty much confused myself.

Basically, if I hadn’t went to that Channel 4 NBA forum in the summer of 97, I most likely wouldn’t be sitting here typing this, as the people I live with also host this place. It’s funny how one little action can affect you in many ways, but that’s another “what if??” question for another day.

Now you kinda, sorta know how I ended up in Atlanta… Happy now?

The new Mozilla browser release has been, well, released… Say hello to Mozilla Firefox 0.8 and so far looks a bit better than the old Firebird 0.7 release, but what’s with the name change? Will Thunerbird 0.6 become Thundercats?

I can only hope…

In completely unrelated news, we visited North and South Carolina yesterday, which was a long day, a long long day… But hey, it’s 2 new states on the list. I’m also hoping to add Oregon to that soon as I’m playing with the idea of visiting Tiffany for her birthday in a couple of weeks time.

It’s a gorgeously sunny day outside, so what do I do? Well, breakfast on the back deck is a must… Normally I wouldn’t go outside as it’s only 30°F (but feels like 25°F) which translates to about -1°C in my terms.

Yet in the sun it’s not too bad, quite pleasant really… So with the new laptop Erika bought (and gave to me to use) I’m sitting outside (the joys of wireless internet y’all) but it’s a bit too bright to see the screen… So back inside I go to finish this off.

No plans for this Sunny Sunday, everyone else is slowly waking up so I’ll see what’s going on…

Yes! The Pixies are getting back together!

After 11 years of “will they, won’t they”, The Pixies are havin’ a reunion and hitting the road.

They’re talking, they’re rehearsing, and they’re going to perform together for the first time in more than a decade. The Pixies, acclaimed as the most influential pioneer of the late ’80s alt/rock movement, and who effectively blazed the path for groups like Nirvana, Radiohead and Pearl Jam to rise to superstardom, have officially confirmed their much-anticipated reunion. The original line-up – Frank Black/vocals, guitar; Joey Santiago/guitar; Kim Deal/bass; and David Lovering/drums – are already holed up in a Southern California rehearsal space working together for the first time since they disbanded in 1993.

I can’t wait…