lensblog

Well, the last two long weekends have been a pleasant change, albeit chaotic in terms of repercussions when most people get back to the office and face the mountain of work they did not do during the public holidays. For me, it’s been a frustrating time. Making calls, sending mails, trying to get appointments to see houses or flats to share… driving all over Johannesburg…

I was also housesitting for friends of mine while they went away to celebrate a birthday. Which gave me plenty of time to reads my RSS feeds and catch up on some podcasts. One of those was a Dave’s Lounge Podcast I hadn’t gotten around to listening to yet… Dave’s podcast has become something of a regular feature in my music library these days.

In episode 107, he introduced me to a new music project called Sleepthief, featuring some of the vocalists and themes from another music project I enjoy, namely Delerium. The track he played was off “The Dawnseeker” album, called ‘Sublunar’:

Well, the lights are on and I don’t feel safe
By this tainted window
So if you’re looking in, you might see the pain
But I don’t want you to know, so…
Just go on pretending that you don’t know
All I am is empty, an empty world in my heart, In my heart, in my heart, in my heart
Sweet angel sweet angel sweet angel
All my pretty things make you stop and think
I must be a sweet angel
But when the glitter smears and the wires appear
You’ll see I’m horribly mangled, but
Hush hush hush la da da da
Hush hush hush hush hush
Hush hush hush hush hush hush la da da da da, da da

I don’t quite know how to put into words the ethereal quality of Kristy Thirsk’s voice. Reviews online describe the track as “melancholy but heavenly” and “Kristy Thirsk’s crystalline vocals are truly angelic and stunning within the celestial textures of Sublunar.”

Now Dave generally promotes a lot of smaller label artists so I wasn’t too hopeful about finding this on anything other than CDBaby or iTunes but I see Amazon has it as does Take2 so I think I may get this for myself sometime. Once my move, etc is done and I’m settled again.

The other highlight of the weekend was seeing “Iron Man” with some work colleagues. I’m not going to spoil it for those that have not seen it, nor am I going to repeat what several hundred other blogs are bound to say, except that this was a good movie. Specifically, a good comic-related action hero movie. And I think we all know how rare those are these days. It has all the elements of success in it. And as one blog put it, if you could leave your preconceived ideas at the door and sit back and watch it as a technology-fest, the geek in you would love it.

Reading some of the RSS feeds this morning on the topic, the folks at Marvel must be smiling, as Iron Man has taken the box office by storm.

Another page I stumbled upon recently lists all the upcoming movies for the next 3 years with links to their IMDB records. Some awesome titles on the cards, it seems, and some questionable ones too:

Filtered from titles slated for 2009

• A-Team, The (2009)
• Area 51 (2009)
• Astro Boy (2009)
• Barbarella (2009)
• Captain America (2009)
• Castlevania (2009)
• CHiPs (2009)
• Conan the Barbarian (2009)
• Crank 2: High Voltage (2009) – [Didn't he die?]
  
• Dark Avengers (2009)
• Elfstones of Shannara, The (2009)
• Fraggle Rock: The Movie (2009)
• G.I. Joe (2009)
• Ghost Rider 2 (2009)
• Godzilla 3-D (2009)
• Green Hornet, The (2009)
• Halo (2009)
• Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs (2009)
• Jetsons, The (2009)
• Jurassic Park IV (2009) – [Why?]
  
• Justice League: Mortal (2009)
• Kong: King of Skull Island (2009)
• Magnum P.I. (2009)
• Masters of the Universe (2009)
• Metal Gear Solid (2009)
• Neuromancer (2009)
• Night at the Museum 2: Escape from the Smithsonian (2009)
• Prince of Persia: Sands of Time (2009)
• Rambo V (2009) – [What, is Rambo going to go postal on us in the retirement home?]
  
• Sherlock Holmes and the Curse of the Banshee (2009)
• Shinobi (2009)
• Sims: The Movie, The (2009)
• Sin City 3 (2009)
• Smurfs, The (2009)
• Spider-Man 4 (2009)
• Spy Hunter (2009)
• Star Trek (2009)
• Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li (2009)
• Superman: Man of Steel (2009)
• Swiss Family Robinson (2009)
• Teen Titans (2009)
• Tekken (2009)
• Terminator 4 (2009) – [What time paradox excuse will they use this time?]
  
• Thor (2009)
• Three Stooges, The (2009)
• Tintin (2009)
• Transformers 2 (2009)
• Transporter 3 (2009)
• Underworld: Rise of the Lycans (2009)
• Warcraft (2009)
• Wolf Man, The (2009)
• X-Men Origins: Magneto (2009)
• X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009)

Filtered from titles slated for 2010

• 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (2010)
• Alice in Wonderland (2010)
• Ant-Man (2010)
• Bond 23 (2010)
• Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, The (2010)
• Clash of the Titans (2010)
• Cyclops (2010)
• Devil May Cry (2010)
• Dune (2010)
• EverQuest (2010)
• Fahrenheit 451 (2010)
• Fantastic Voyage (2010)
• Fantasy Island (2010)
• Green Lantern (2010)
• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part I (2010)
• Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
• Heavy Metal (2010)
• Hercules (2010)
• Hobbit, The (2010)
• I Am Legend 2 (2010)
• I, Robot 2 (2010)
• Incredible Shrinking Man, The (2010)
• Invisible Woman, The (2010)
• Jason and the Argonauts: The Kingdom of Hades (2010)
• Jonny Quest (2010)
• Jungle Book (2010)
• Knight Rider (2010)
• Lone Ranger, The (2010)
• Mighty Mouse (2010)
• Mortal Kombat (2010)
• National Treasure 3 (2010)
• Navy Seals (2010)
• Nick Fury (2010)
• Puss in Boots (2010)
• Q (2010)
• Rainbow Six (2010)
• Resident Evil 4 (2010)
• Return to Castle Wolfenstein (2010)
• Robotech (2010)
• Sherlock Holmes (2010)
• Short Circuit (2010)
• Shrek Goes Fourth (2010)
• Sin City 2 (2010)
• Spawn 2 (2010)
• Splinter Cell (2010)
• Sub-Mariner (2010)
• Sword of Shannara, The (2010)
• Tarzan (2010)
• Thundercats (2010)
• Toy Story 3 (2010)
• TRON (2010)
• Voltron (2010)

Filtered from titles slated for 2011

• Chronicles of Narnia: The Silver Chair, The (2011)
• Ghost in the Shell (2011)
• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part II (2011)
• Hobbit 2, The (2011)
• Jumper 2 (2011)
• Untitled Third Tintin Film (2011)

I can only hope that they don’t screw them up too badly. Specifically the ones in bold… (please do not let Uwe Boll near any of these movies!). As for the ones in italics… well, one has to wonder…

Let’s see, what has happened in the last two weeks worth writing about.

Ah, yes, the storm and subsequent demise of my ADSL modem and laptop. And MPH.

I’ll start with MPH… I’ve never been to a car show before and certainly never anything like MPH, so thank you Rozz, for a very different and entertaining Christmas present.

Didn’t get to see all that much of the car expo itself, but the ‘theatre’ part of the show was brilliantly executed by the hosts and their accompanying stunt drivers. The banter between Hammond and Clarkson was a welcome familiarity for those that have watched any Top Gear at all, and I think poor Sasha Martinengo didn’t stand much of a chance of stealing any limelight from those two.

There were some stunning driving/stunt sequences, some amusement in the form of the soccer match with cars, the hosts driving their own inventions and the half-a-car race, a rather different take on bull fighting with a very flexible female matador and a bakkie as the bull, mixed in with some of the best looking cars available today. A petrolhead’s dream come true, I think.

The whole thing was marred a bit though, by the travesty they called seating. I think no matter what shape or size you are, those seats are just uncomfortable, especially if you’re a little taller than most and your knees end up crushed against the seat in front of you.

Anyway… it was still a good time though. Good times with good company… it’s all that counts really.

We left MPH, only to be greeted by a magnificent storm and downpour.

The next day wasn’t much better. Though for the most part, it wasn’t stormy. Or so I thought.

There I was, happily sitting on my bed, playing World of Warcraft on my laptop, headset on, chatting to friends, when ZAP! … Everything went dark. Ok, not surprising, considering the mains tripped on the distribution board… flicked the switch and we had power again. Except that somethings didn’t come back up. Things like my brand new Netgear ADSL modem and my laptop. And there was the smell of ozone and electrolytes in the air to confirm my suspicions.

Ah well… It’s meant that I caught up on some of my reading this week, though I have ended up working late to get some research, etc done that I normally would have done from home.

In the meantime though, I’ve put my old Telkom ADSL modem back online and built up a small PC from spare parts. Nothing great, but it’s enough to run XP and Office, browse the ‘Net and listen to MP3′s. I got a new Netgear as a replacement but not in a rush to install it just yet as without the laptop, I don’t really need the wireless just yet. And frankly, my housemates can wait a bit before I put them back online again… maybe this will encourage them to pay me for their usage.

Hopefully I get the laptop back this week coming. Apparently they’ve replaced the motherboard, and I’m hoping I didn’t lose any data of the hard drive.