under cover

It's short duration commuting for me this week, across London to Canary Wharf which means I'm travelling mainly under cover and under ground.

Compared with last week, where I could see the sky almost continuously, this week I'm protected from the elements by various man-made constructions unless I decide to break cover at lunchtime.

movie time?

I've been using one of those Flip Mino HDs for quite some time for conveniently capturing pocket-sized bits of video. It works rather well and is significantly better than the stuff one can capture in most phones - both as picture and also sound.

My guess was that the "HD type technology" of the Flip would appear in a phone, which needs a better lens and sensor, some image stabilisation and a decent way to capture sound in such a small device.

It seems that Apple have had a go in the new and finally announced iPhone and are also adding iMovie support as well as WiFi based video calling.

We all know it is still consumer based video capture, but I've been quite impressed with what can be squeezed out of the Mino format and look forward to see what can be correspondingly achieved in the new phone.

radial anxiety

Back from a short break with plenty of good experiences and a whole extra layer of dust inside and outside of the car.

Despite using bicycles for some of the travelling I have also needed to take the car for a spot of attention. I'm now the proud owner of a new tyre on each corner of the car.

Muicking around

We're heading way down south to Manchester today, thereby saying 'farewell' to the glens and lochs for a while.

The usual accompaniment of pictures and narrative hasn't been so easy this week, what with relaxing and all.

But now it's time to load the car and check around for those last few items, which I suppose had better include this computer.

staccato bursts from the north

We're still crossing rivers and climbing hills as well as a spot of cycling along what would once have been railway tracks. The bird and squirrel bait has worked quite well attracting all manner of livestock to our locale and a few inevitable photo opportunities.

The lack of bandwidth here precludes extensive uploads so these short telegrams from a tranquil place will have to suffice until we are back in better contact.

Of course, that's the original idea behind rashbre north, a place where we can chill without the usual pressures. It may also explain why its three years since we were last here.

Zazie moment

Vezi mai multe video din Film
Still away in the hills.

Here's a short Chelsea interlude for film (and photography) buffs, which has cropped up in our beer-laden conversations and makes a London-ish post, whilst I enjoy the sunshine.

travelling back a month in time

We are away in the Cairngorms at the moment, having woven a path across a decent chunk of England and then over the border to Scotland.

There's almost no mobile phone signal coverage in this area and this current blip of WiFi was unexpected although allows me to upload a few pictures and a short blog entry whilst sipping a bowl of leek, potato and onion soup.

The soup may sound hearty, but I think they'd add a wee dram of whisky if it was really cold. It's certainly a month or so earlier seasonally, with daffodils still in evidence and lambs that are a whole size smaller.

things are looking up

Despite the clear skies, the cars around our way seem to have a layer of brown dust across them at the moment. I can't decide if it has anything to do with Iceland.

In other news, I may be taking a few days holiday at the end of this week.

fresh air reviewing

I'm spending most of today reviewing some work items, which means sitting indoors looking at the mysterious condition known as 'Summer' occurring outside.

But I'll come clean.

I needed to go on a short errand earlier, which gave me the excuse to fill my Camelbak with icy water, stuff a few of the review papers in the same backpack and use the bicycle instead of the car for the journey.

This meant I could take a slightly different route along a few back roads and also pause a while under a leafy tree to continue my reviewing al fresco.

No such chance for the rest of the week, when I'll be office based.

Summer Alert

Sunday seems to have brought a proper summer's day along. Nothing for it but to head for the beach, although that seems to have been many other peoples' plans too, so traffic avoidance was part of the process.

Nonetheless, we found a sandy area looking out towards the Isle of Wight and spent pleasant hours in the sunshine.

dream dna sequence

A few days ago, over dinner, I was briefly describing one of my dreams and the people present were somewhat surprised at what they saw as bizarre content. Readers of this blog will know better.

To be honest, I can't even remember the dream properly now (as is the way) but I expect my more recent ones are equally 'imaginative'.

But instead of describing one, I thought I'd select a few components from the last few days that could easily make an interesting dream sequence or probably at least appear in a few of the newspapers as cartoons.

Which components to select?

1) The UK coalition - Clegg and Cameron - "Claggeron"?
2) The roll-on deodorant shaped mascots for the Olympics.
3) "Synthia", the newly created and self replicating life-form created by re-booting a dormant bacteria using a chemically generated DNA strip.
4) Any other set of recent newsworthy twins - Jedward is a bit old but has the right type of hairstyle

So my dream sequence could be something that creates a new lifeform, which somehow mutates into orange and blue pairs, with identical hairstyles and then takes over the world/economy?

Truth/Fiction/Dream? - You decide...

ashes to ashes finale

I've been quietly enjoying the "Ashes to Ashes" series, which finally ended on Friday night, including some neat wrapping of its interplay with the prior "Life on Mars" series.

I'm not sure whether the plot links would have been considered when the preceding Life on Mars series were made, but it was certainly well done, even if some of it had been retrofitted.

At it simplest level, Ashes to Ashes allowed a modern action police series to be set in the 1980s, be politically incorrect and break many modern day policing regulations. The blend of the surreal moments and the intrusion of cosmic forces added a certain spike to the show alongside some regular moments, such as the boozing in the subterranean Italian bistro. Indeed, even in the complex finale episode, there was also a diamond heist crime story in amongst the main storytelling.

The part I had guessed was that the Police Station was a sort of Underworld staging post and that maybe the new DI Kemp was a Charon figure ferrying souls to his variation of a Hell.

What made it fun, though, was that there was still enough originality in the scripts and ending, so that unless you'd sat down and analysed the show (I expect some did this), then for the average viewer there was a good chance to still be surprised.

As an example, I'd worked out the nemesis role, but hadn't picked up on the three lost souls that would form part of the ending. The moody lighting and cutaways in the final episodes helped to signpost this, but until Episode 7 I'd not really picked up the pointers (I watched the last two episodes together - travel, don't you know?)

I also didn't really figure out the Gene Hunt back story until it was unfolding, and found this to be a satisfying way to see the edges of the reality start to melt away.

I also smiled with the final scene, which even had a door slightly ajar during what was really a reset of the reality.