Blink and you'll miss us

Well, my name's Rob. I'm from Andover, locally known as Chav-central, and non-locally known nowhere. And it seems that slowy and surely, we won't even be known locally at all.

Take our high street. Betting shop, cafe, cafe, charity shop, betting shop, cafe, MASSIVE POUNDLAND, bank, charity shop, bank, bank, cafe, betting shop - you get the idea. You can see why it may be considered a chav homeland. In fact I think we're one or two Primarks away from every chav in the world moving in. But hey, we have the large pointless housing estates to home them all! Anyway, it isn't an appealing enough shopping precinct to entice others to spend lots of money to truly support the shops.
Unfortuntately, this leads to the so many "For let" signs. At least it means the 'For-Let-sign-making' businesses will thrive! That's something....I guess.

But so many people don't know of us. I spend lots of time at college, or online my PS3 talking to south englanders. 'Andover' doesn't appear in their geographies.
We do hold some records though. Our Tae Kwon-Do club (of which I'm proudly a member) has received constant admiration at big tornaments. Our Britax child-car-seats are used worldwide. Our radio station 'Andover Sound' has won many worldwide awards.
These aren't amazing things, I will easily admit, and it hasn't really lead to anything either. People online ask me where I'm from and we eventually narrow it down to 'Andover', and all I see is question marks.

I don't know. Our businesses are slowly dying. We're hardly known anyway. Our residents spend so much time complaining, or drunk. Or both. So are we going to survive? Unlikely.
One day Basingstoke will probably just expand and swallow us. I can see our new sign now:
Andover. Twinned with the Moon

Peace out. Come visit us! XD

HitchHiker's Guide to my Heart

[Quick pointer: I haven't posted for a while, so coming up now is a few!]

So, my latest obsession. No longer is it The Dark Knight, LittleBigPlanet, The Sims, WALL-E, Watchmen, Gorillaz, Gary Larson, Fred Basset.....the list is endless.
No no, it is in fact the HitchHiker's Guide to the Galaxy book trilogy...plus 2. A quintolgy? It'll do.

Anyway, last Saturday at work (Oxfam) I was bored and ended up reading the making-of book of the HHGttG film, and then finished and thought "I wonder if they have the actual book"......"Ooh, gotta serve a customer first".
Walked over, found it, took it home, read it. Loved it.

Douglas Adam's writing styles are invigorating, intriguing, grabbing, fascinating and at (repeated) times, bloody hilarious. He manages to use the term "mind-buggering" in one describing paragraph. And he uses it well!
Added to that, the narratives are so wonderfully wacky and creative I love it to bits. And as a result of reading it and watching the films, I'm constantly worried because to "survive in the universe, you gotta know where your your towel is"
[plus the 42 malarkey and Marvin - the manically depressed paranoid android]

Annoyingly, I forgot the storyline is split up into 5 parts/books: The HitchHiker's Guide to the Galaxy, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, Life the Universe and Everything, So Long and Thanks for All the Fish and Mostly Harmless. Yeah, I know. I shockingly forgot!!
So I got to the end of HHGttG, read the last lines and thought "Oh yeah. Bollocks."
And the next day, I trotted off and got parts 2 and 3. [And to match my new collection, Kaysey got me 1]

So there we go. My new fictional love - an insane storyline about our own universe. Puh-erfect :D
So long fellow readers.
And thanks for all the fish.

I'm sorry, but that just isn't needed

I don't know if you've seen the new Aviva advert about life insurance, but I shall tell you now.
I saw it not 20minutes ago. And I hate it. With a passion.

It starts with a family getting ready for a holiday. The son's lost his goggles and running around to find him, the daughter's off to University, the mum's dealing with it all and the Dad is walking around just commenting on it all, as the advert normally goes.
There is a very small hint as to what it's about, but it's something you only realise at the end, after seeing it all.

Anyway, they all arrive downstairs. It goes a bit quiet and the daughter says "It won't be the same without Dad", quietly. The mum brings her close, kisses her forehead and says "I know".
And then there's a zoom out, and the Dad (who was previously standing on the edge of shot) has disappeared. And wasn't really there at all. First reaction: A very let-down "oh". And then just: depression. Doubly so for me. Why?

I have suffered the loss of a paternal figure.It is not in any way good or positive and is not suitable for an advert trying to use it in this way. I think the fact that Aviva is using this sort of situation is absolutely fucking disgraceful. I'm not normally one to turn against parts of society, but the sooner that advert goes, the better.

Sorry everyone. But that's what I feel. My first angry-rant blog.
And Aviva? I've lost all respect for you.

A modern classic

Brought on by a lazy film-watching New Years Day, I'm going to do a film review of the Disney film Wall-E.

Well, it's brilliant really.
The general animation, narrative and voice acting is superb. The idea of two robots falling in love is one of my personal Disney favourites
But I also like this film a lot because of its allegorical ideologies.

I can see the human race doing this.
We get new technologies, new superstores, new everything and we binge. Overuse resources and leave the Earth ruined - in real terms, we're about halfway there. We're not drowning in rubbish - yet.
So, what do we do?

We run away, leaving the responsibility of cleaning up our regretable act to someone - or this case - someTHING else.
And we stay in a spaceship - getting lazier and larger and generally drowning in technology and leaving the Earth a brown, dusty memory.

Disney were just being creative. They saw contemporary issues and put them within a brilliant film - subtly hidden by a mute robot falling in love with a swanky piece of kit.
In today's terms? It's like a PlayStation 1 loving an Ipod.

Anyway - a film with modern and shocking (yet potentially truthful) ideologies.
And it's also the last film in Disney's good run. Besides 'Up', their latest work including 'Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs', 'The Princess and the Frog' and their latest others have not reflected their best work.
And Wall-E was the last great film before they went downhill.

So watch it, enjoy it, laugh and coo over the love between the two opposties.
And secretly think to yourself: So this is what the end of the earth looks like.

Save time, money and.......indigestion tablets

People always complain about putting on weight over the Christmas period. And it's true, we normally go at least one or two pounds in the wrong direction.
But so much like life, there's just one massive coincidence that coincides with facts.
There is a lot of food at Christmas. All on offer in shops, very cheap, easy to get and completely unavoidable every time you go shopping.
Here's our list:
Christmas day: Turkey, potatoes, peas, carrots, broccoli, pigs in blankets, sausages, bacon, bread sauce, cranberry sauce...with many servings and polishings of alcohol.
Now, that not many seem like a lot. But I can create a new hypothesis: Christmas Day is not the main weight-gaining day.
Boxing Day is.
Today was neither full of snacks or occasional helpings. Today was a mixture of a banquet and a buffet. 9 people here, not anywhere near all of it finished: the above meats served cold, plus more turkey, some cold sauces, plus carrot sticks, cucumber, bread sticks, 3 types of baguette, endless hot party foods, over 7 types of crisps, dips.....then dessert - chocolate pie, lemon pie, ice cream, Celebrations, Thornton's selections.....with even more lashings of alcohol, plus teas and coffees.

That is at least double the Christmas Day helpings. I actually cannot move due to overeating. So it's odd when considering the fact that Christmas Day is mostly held as the main 'Food Day'.

Anyway, if you simply want to save money and weight...ignore the endless part food deals at Tesco/ASDA etc, get less food and then you won't drown in leftovers over the next few days...and spend the money you saved on more presents or games etc. It's not the food you want to be happy. It's the fun side you want.
Or I do anyway.

But hey, I got a laptop this year which I'm currently using. So my year was good anyway.

Fond memories or faded habits?

Well we all know the time of the year. And I'm going to share with you all...whoever is reading this about my own Christmas traditions.

Now some people also have their own. Within families it's to put alcohol, a carrot and a mince pie at the bottom of the chimney - which is funny looking back because Santa never finished any of it except the alcohol!
Others include religion guidlelines; I know of some vague one that unwrap their presents on Christmas Eve, others spend all their time praying.
Others drown in a gutter surrounded by bottles. That's all fine.

My own tradition? To this day I cannot remember why I do this every Christmas Eve and I damn wish I could because it is an insane one!
Every Christmas Eve before going to bed, I play the Fracture Hills level of Spyro 2: Gateway to Glimmer and complete it (collect everything and defeat all the enemies and such).
Then I read Charlie the Chimney Sweep and Sooty (I know!)- a simple but delightful Christmas based children's story that is only read once a year - and then I switch off the light and go to sleep.

I have no idea when, why and how I created this procedure, but I did. And I have upheld it for at least 5 years, and I'm pretty sure it's actually longer than that.
So, it's weird. But addicitive.

Goodnight everyone. And a very Merry Christmas 2010 to all :)

Want to turn a country on its head?

Well the simple answer actually comes from a old, favourite song of ours:
"Let it snow, let it snow and snow".
And the funny thing is, I'm just not kidding.

Think about it. When it snows:
Schools shut down. Businesses shut down. Roads become dead. People stay at home and salt truly comes into it element. No more making fish and chips more interesting. No it's actually saving lives.

Anyway, we all love snow. It's pretty, it's fun and it is generally highly anticipated when it comes to winter.
BUT have you noticed that we want snow, right up until we actually get it?
Snow is an amazing phenomenon (oh my god I actually spelt that correctly!).....for a day.
Then we get constantly reminded my grandparents and news channels alike: It will become slush. It will freeze. It will kill people.
Suddenly this frozen icing for buildings is a countrywide deathtrap. Schizophrenic weather? How cool does that sound?!

So lets just sum up shall we?
The first day of snow is bliss. It's untouched and looks amazing. Kids go absolutely mental over it all. And everyone enjoys some time off.
After that, it's a murderous ground covering that makes you bored,  housebound and it buggers up your Christmas plans. (If I receive nothing for Christmas it's not ParcelForce's fault [for once]. It's the elements!)
I think it is the fastest mood change in something, matched only by the switch from good to shite of Northern Rock. In both cases, everybody's opinions on both change overnight.

Still, enjoy it somehow. I always manage too :)
Merry Christmas

Harry Potter 7 pt 1 Review

Well, the clue is in the title so lets get on with it.

On the whole, the film is good. The special effects are brilliant; there is a certain scene featuring seven Daniel Radcliffes (god forbid). The general cast in excellent - Bill Nighy makes a good appearance, Rhys Ifans plays the double-crossing weirdo Xenophilius Lovegood and, for the happiness of many and the annoyance of the rest, Dobby the house-elf returns.

However: those of you who have been following the films and not the books (philistines) you are likely to enjoy this film very much.
The rest of us who read the books first are going to be slightly disappointed. The disappointment isn't nearly as bas as The Order of the Phoenix, but it's there. And I can sum it up with one question:
Why bring it out in 2 2hour parts and still differ from the book. Things are added, things are changed by in 9 times out of 10, things are just dropped and forgotten in a dusty of bin.
So they fill in the first two hours with, and get ready for this........the bloody forest scenes.
They could have used Bill and Fleur's Wedding; Harry, Ron and Hermione's planning; time spent within Grimmauld Palace for gods sake.
But no. The three peep's forest antics were all the rage.
And this unfortunately lead to boredom.

But to be fair, the long times of boredom are rewarded.

1. Ron's hissy fit.
2. Hary and Hermione's little trip to Godric's Hollow.
3. (For the girls)- Radcliffe's underwear moment.

= All these bits were good and interesting to watch (despite some occassional wooden acting), and I'd like to think that this ridiculous 2parter did at least have a logical stopping point.
A more logical stopping point being the END, but hey, that's too easy.

Right, let's sum up. Excellent CGI, good acting (but not in all cases), rather long winded and unnecessary as they cut bits out anyway and.....possible boredom windows.
Now I know I'm a negative writer, so I'll be fair to the directors/actors etc. I still recommend the film, I enjoyed it. Take your family to see it, and ignore what I've put really; it's just easier to pick on bad things in a review/blog.
So, yeah, finish the trilogy. See what happens. And watch George come downstairs with a toothbrush in his ear.
Peace out, Wizards and Witches.

Something just for you...

As it's nearly Christmas and I'm now feeling happier about the whole 'no money' situation becoming essentially sorted, I've decided to share with you bloggers something that makes me happy:
My favourite-est song of all time.
On Melancholy Hill - Gorillaz
:
Up on Melancholy Hill, there's a plastic tree.
Are you here with me?
Just looking out of the day,
Of another dream.
Where you can't get what you want, but you can get me.
So let's set out to sea.
'Coz you are my medicine, when you're close to me.
When you're close to me.

So call in the submarines, round the world we'll go.
Does anybody know?
If we're looking out on the day, of another dream?

If you can't get what you want, then you come with me.
Up on Melancholy Hill.
Sits the manatee.
Just looking out for the day when you're close to me.
When you're close to me.

When you're close to me.
~
I love the title, I love the lyrics, I love the music, I love the music video, I love the words 'Melancholy Hill'.
I love this song. It is a fantastic, brilliant, amazing song and I urge you all to go onto YouTube or whatever and listen to it. It makes me smile everytime.
Enjoy. I always do.

Synergy f**king up

For the record, 'synergy' is a media term to describe one media text promoting another.
For instance, Resident Evil 4 promoting its film tracks CD, and vica versa.

Anyway, this happens a lot with films and computer games.
Many many examples include Star Wars, James Bond, Spongebob Squarepants, Coraline, Wall*E, Batman, Avatar, Transformers, Watchmen - all of these have had a video game released that follows the narrative of the film to make it more interactive and continuous.
And in my experience, they are all shite.

What gaming editors are essentially saying is: "Why not have a more badly pixelated version of the film, with glued on pieces of narrative and occassional cut scenes from the films themselves."
You may as well just hold a PlayStation or X-Box controller in your hand whilst watching the films and just tap the X/A button when Obi-Wan Kenobi jumps. (Double tap for extra-high double jumps, of course)

Resident Evil was the other way round. These new, inovative zombie films came along, scaring the world with pixels as big as a baby's face and voice acting that could make answering-machines blush. But it worked, and therefore they brought out films.Which also worked.
I have experienced these films and enjoyed them muchly. The latest one, film no. 4 brought BigScaryCrazyAxeMan (a personal nickname for him) to life, which I liked.
So, games bringing out films I think I can live with.
Then:
The Increidbles went backwards entirely. We may all remember the vaguely dramatic ending with "The Underminer" bursting through a tarmacked car park and bellowing out plans for world demolition.
Was there a sequel film? No
Was there a sequel game, instead of a film? Yes. Oh christ.
I hope other producers don't copy this little broken gem. But I learnt about 5 or 10seconds into the advert that I cannot live with games becoming part of the actual storyline.
Copying the storyline, that's OK. James Bond PS1 games actually did a good job.
Becoming the storyline. No. I'd rather try and give a hedgehog a mohican than experience that kinda crap.

Anyway, time to give a verdict:
Films becoming games - Fine, but at least make a good job of it
Games becoming films - Yes please. I'd recommend Batman: Arkham Asylum as a starter.
Games sequeling films - Piss off.