Comedown.

Like the title says this is the final review we'll do.  All the best bits forgotten from the previous two reviews and a round up of stories of the year.  But first the final crusty remnants.

Meghan Trainers.  All about that ass.

Or indeed bass, you all know what this is about and its a guilty pleasure, like a McDonalds or a crispy Kreme donut. The lyrics are the usual bollocks essentially and she's more homely than full on fat like most Muricans, but there's something about this that keeps me coming back.  Maybe its the audio equivalent of Chinese food.

The Taylors of Harrogate Coffee Ad.

Reading the comments its apparently a version of listen to the mockingbird and possibly scanned in from a crackly old 78, rather than a tape but this is one of the best things of the year.  Just a bit of psychedelia to sell you coffee rather than some old bullshit dreamed up by admen on coke.

A bit more on stems.

Forgot I took this screen grab until I was scrolling through the pictures on my HD. Highlighted is the only thing audible in the entire file.

This weighed in as a 52Meg download from Soundcloud.

You know what is even worse after erasing all deadspace from every file, and creating and saving a project file in Psycle, it still comes to only 46 MB.

                                        F E A T U R E   P R E S E N T A T I O N

Great stuff in YTP.

Well there is a few things that have kept me laughing this year.  First of all is a new Krobo Poop a part two of his Fesh Prince of Blair.  Its around 14 Minutes of fun but keeps you entertained.

Caillou celebrates Ebolaween. from CS188. Why not draw mummy's twins on the Joj lantern this Ebolaween, cos its a damn good return to form.

Noisepuppet stuff.  Possibly  the last one about cheese or the Harbee's training video poop which is very well done.  There are a lot of  Rosen poopers such as Mad Mothz or Root Negative 16 which are entirely worthy of your time, but (and this is a big butt) for me a great new find is the Septic Foundary guys, I'm a sucker for some good sentence mixing.

Yay stuff in general.

Sargon Of Akkad.
Don't normally get involved with feminism in general but, this is a good enough starting point now that the Internet Aristocrat channel is closed.  If you despise Tumblr feminists, mental illness fakers (look up headmates) and social marxists in general this is a good enough antidote to all that.

Ashens.

You should know by now that I love Dr. A's work, ever since I came across him on the now defunct World Of Stuart forum, but his stuff keeps getting better, either the ropey block tech advent calendar, chef Excellence who I'm sure is in the Just Eat ad, or the regular Poundland haul of cheapo toys. True there has been some that are hard to watch, anything involving massively out of date food, but the rest is pure gold.

Fappening.

Just for showing us what Cat Deeley's snatch looked like {NSFW}.  Oh and about a million other things thanks to lax password controls and an absolute faith in cloud security, to protect when the best security is keeping it secret and backed up offline.  I know I should be banging on how terrible this is but for a basement dweller who will never score, this is gold.  Also the best thing to come out of Downtown Abbey is surely Jessica Finlay nude right (along with the one time that the cat stole the chicken).

Nay stuff.

Gamergate.
I know there is a lot of this to take in such as the not your shield hashtag for those non CSI Miami types, all you female gamers out there and all you gaymers who don't identify with the rad feminists who want gaming to end.  I just don't like all the death threats on twitter this generated, and I really abhor the way the anti side tried to say we are dead.  I've read a lot about this over the 6 months it came out and now I can say this please end.  It doesn't affect regular gamers who still have to put up with non i'll informed bullshit about violence, in fact there is a year old piece masquerading as news in the mail today about violence and misogyny in gaming which says how much the mainstream still hates us.

Its not about ethics in journalism either as the whiny anti gg side have latched onto as game journalism is, was and in the future will still be, shit. In fact to me the worst thing about this generation is the built in obsolescence of it all, that console games are now as badly bugged as PC games, and require patches to work, its paying for DLC that is already on disc, its the fact that when the servers are turned off or the Hard drives start to die, that this generation will leave nothing behind unless archived.  Its not some soppy bint with a degree in social studies saying that all games are sexist, though bollocks still isn't as bad as some of the shit pulled by the industry (Ubisoft and EA i'm looking at you).  The best thing about it all is saying full Mcintosh, which is a much nicer way of saying full retard especially if you work with spackers.

Acieed: Silver Boxing Day Review.

We did of course forget something from yesterdays round up review and that was Baggage Battles, which is sort of like a lost luggage based Storage Wars spin off / Rip off but with likeable people. I'll endeavour to do parts 3 and 4 tomorrow and Sunday, though it'll mostly be about video clips of the year and stuff forgotten from both previous posts, I know my limits.

Commercial Stuff of the year. Both Good and Bad.

Katy Perry and some cunt from Three Six Mafia, Dark Horse.

Do you wanna play with madness.
Do you know what you're fighting for.
Do you wanna dare to do this.
Cos I'm coming atcha like I'm HARDCORRRE.

Those of course aren't the words to the semi disappointing song from Katy Perry and Juicy J. Which in my ears at least should sound like the linked version i.e. coasting around 180 BPM.  What you have is something that is neither fish nor fowl and is of course ruined by Juicy J rapping like a twat. If you have to rap so bad on it you've lost

Jeremih and another sub par rapper. Don't Tell Em (Pike)

Rhythm is a dancer I need a companion.

Why are Snap and Corona such heroes to these new school yank EDM groups. Haven't they heard the majesty that is Rozalla or Technotronic.  The soaring peaks of musical perfection that are Los Del Rio and Whigfield.  I'll stop there before my pisstaking gland blows.  Its got a decent enough slow loop that is begging for a massive kick drum to be played behind this but instead gets the usual insipid R+B perc loop it got instead.

Anaconda Nicky Minaj.

Oh fuck no, this is a bad re edit of Sir Mix A Lot classic Baby Got Back.  Its adds asinine lyrics from Nicky and her usual annoying vocal tricks.  Fucking appaling need I say more.

Ten Walls. Walking With Elephants.

This wasn't so bad if it didn't rip off an existing Deep House track and I can't think who its by, now but literally all it adds is the ''brass'' bits, still its awesome as it was the best thing on Kiss by miles and as a consequence, never, ever played.  As a side note the brass bits in this are from a Yamaha DX7 preset, I know this due to messing around with the excellent VST emulation of it called Dexed.  Due to them having all original presets added in, its on the original under Brass.

Shake Me Off Taylor Swift.

Or rather Shake It Off Taylor Swift, she would never of course do that unless there was a song in it for her.
This is included here because well its just so generic, another lost love song, and that there is one line in it and it goes.

When you could be getting down to this,  you could be listening to this sick beat.  Or something. The beat in this is the most milquetoast, white bread, boring, made in five minutes FL Studio junk imaginable.  Its not sick, just eurrgh. You want sick beats listen to Bong Ra.  You want break up songs listen to Taylor Swift.
Incidentally I remember a piece where she was talking in the Metro about being inspired by the music of 1989 and saying how fresh it sounds.  I was foolishly expecting Andreas Gehm, or Steve Poindextder to be producing, for that authentic sound, but no this is who produced it.

Tiesto Wasted.

I liked it better when you're wasted.
I liked it better allllllllll of the time.
When you're passed out on the floor
I can treat you like a whore.
When your wasted.

You used to make excellent techno, see Bleckentrommel from 1997 why do you suck so much ass now.
Just another Avicii or David Guetta, making 3 minute dance that entertains no one.

Neon Jungle Can't Stop The Love.

This is terrible, just terrible, they had a competition on Kiss to remix this and put up 2.5GB  of various stems to load into the DAW of your choice.  I hate stems, would rather wav. samples so you can mix and arrange stuff differently. Even worse you have a 3.10 minute track, and they use a bit of a beat that is only used once so you have to download a 50 Meg file that could easily be just a few k as a sample.  The song is appalling we can all get along sub par nonsense and I remember them saying that they wanted it to go a bit ''Grimey".  Needless to say I have an unfinished gabber remix on my HD and I'm not going to win any competitions with that.

Aphex Twin Syro.

Sad to see such a come down for my favourite ever artist.  I have only listened to this once and the tracks are meandery, electro / freestylish grooves.  Only Aisatsana is the piano track, that could be a Drukqs off cut is any good and the bonus Japanese Issue track.  On the other hand RDJ seems to have come out of hibernation, and added two big interviews with Q magazine and the one I had up on Robots Nunca Visto (sadly pulled along with his soundcloud). Which was sad as it went into great depth.  He buried the remains of his dead DX7 in the back yard at Lanner, and sold presets as Sysex data from it in the back of Audio magazines, are the two bits I can find oh and if anyone has that stuff around and would like to make a patch of them that would be cool.

Non Commercial Stuff  Any My real picks of the Year.

Phonic Boy On Drugs. Part of the nixed AFX soundcloud.  It was some really old stuff on tape made with a Cheetah Drum Machine and stuff, proper mental electro cut from a time before Aphex, don't know if this is archived anywhere, if not I have a download of this ripped from soundcloud.  Oh and the old Caustic Window album mentioned in Trance Europe Express has been released thanks to the efforts of the WATTM crowd and a successful Kickstarter appeal, predictably its now up on youtube as a whole album, but Muttley, Cunt, and Flutey are my favourites from the whole lot.

John Heckle Cactus Jack.

Jaw Dropping acid techno jam, heard it yesterday on the increasingly Memphis Rap orientated Intergalactic FM. It wouldn't be a 303 post special without acid.

Lobster Theremin Label.

This is what I'm sure I heard last time I was at Phonica's uptown, but was too shy to ask what it was.  Monster old school house / acid groove tracks are the order of the day but if it isn't that, then what is the label that looks like an Egyptian god on a white label from a distance.  All of this is so cool so all you old schoolers be sure to snap this up.

Finally Perseus Traxx split.

This is a unlistened Christmas present, and I've literally listened to snips from Clone.NL but this is a evil 4 tracker on Contort Yourself.  Primitve acid tracks from Perseus Traxx, Pankow with a mix from Helena Hauff and a killer opening track from Parrish Smith.  Fiddling with the contents just now to confirm my faulty memory, I've pulled out some typewritten instructions that make no sense at all but seem closely relevant.

Edit listening to this now a few hours later and its the fucking bomb, dark slow mo acid from Parrish and Helena Hauff's remix is really good.  The other side can wait to tomorrow as there's two originals from Pankow.

Oh and to bring this to a halt IFM are counting down the top 100 tracks of the year as voted by IFM listeners. There's a lot of Italo Disco as well as a few surprises.

Merry Christmas Everyone.

You know the drill by now, today we will do the TV and a few other bits and pieces including Youtube stuff and nonsense, and we will give you our ''coveted'' Miranda awards for Televisual Hell for 2014.

Incidentally acid fans tomorrows Boxing day broadcast will be our 303rd so expect some Silver box magic in our round of music, if I don't forget half of it.

OK Best things of the year TV wise is.

Chasing Shadows.

Reece Shearsmith (League of  Gentlemen) is an autistic detective bounced to the Missing Persons Bureau run by River Song from Dr Who (Alex Kingston). His boss is Useless Mickey also from Dr. Who (Noel Clarke, someone I've never actually liked in anything), it drags in places but for a local like me the sheer joy is the implausible nature of some of the places, which is getting a 53 bus to Thamesmead and Woolwich having an open air DLR station.

Remember Me.

Michael Palin is an old guy living alone, haunted by the fact that he is well haunted by his Indian nanny who died in a boat accident when he was young man.   Absolutely atmospheric with some dark touches, that remind me of Hideo Nakatas Dark Water, the rain and the Cowrie shells turning up en mass, an off season Whitby being as bleak as the English Seashore can be off season, and Scarborough Fair played out at odd times.

Channel 4 The Paedo next door.

Genuinely ground breaking work talking to an actual non offending paedo and offering treatment for his disease rather than the kneejerk reactions of hang 'em all (which don't work).  

Further honourable mentions go to, Gotham, Agents of  Shield and Dr Who for the sheer temerity to turn the moon into some sort of Cosmic Duck (wasn't of course), and Harry Hill reprising his TV Burp role in Professor Branestawm (if your remaking books from my childhood next BBC can we have Bangers and Mash they were ace).

Miranda Awards. Has got a rather documentary approach this year.

Barry'd Treasure.

Terrible pun aside this is what happens when you take the only interesting guy out of Storage Wars and give him a half baked show driving round with weirdo's.  It doesn't work, its boring and worse of all Barry Weiss is only cool when he's in Storage Wars, its not the worse thing I've seen this year, that would up next but its still not the best.

America Unearthed.

Had to type in about Vikings in Arizona, to remember the title of this, but fuck me, this is utter speculative garbage of the highest order.  Case in point, the viking episode that they had a rock full of runes up in a cave in the north of Arizona, problem is the rock is missing now and, he literally makes it up as he goes along, speculating like a bastard that the vikings could have been here but really weren't.

Diggers.

You liked Time Team right?.  Would you like it better if  it was presented by shouty hyperactive Americans running around shouting awesome on some no mark Civil War battlefield whilst looking for the relics of General Custard.  Then bingo here's your fucking show. Thirty minutes of  archaeological whooping and hollering, while your intelligence slowly slides into your shins.

Chanel 5. Advert.

That somebody thought that a slow version of You're The One That I Want needed to be made, and added to some hideous little twat with a paedo beard (I'm pretty sure its the cunt from the mentalist) poncing about with his white bread little life.  Successfully parodied with the Arthur Mullard version up on my channel its only marginally better, but still horrible.

Worthy mentions that will not be elaborated on.

Citizen Khan. It looks like someone really wanted to make a sitcom from 1992 but with none of the humour.
Sainsbury's Advert. Because War has never been so much fun.

300

This is just an awful little post celebrating the fact we have reached the milestone of  300 posts, and telling you that our regular year end review is coming on Christmas day in the morning, and boxing day with the usual errors and omissions accepted due to my faulty memory.

That's all.

Unnamed SaGa Game For Vita

Squenix have announced  a new SaGa game, possibly as part of Jump Festa, along with a load of FF15 news but as Final Fantasy is dead to me, I'm focusing on this instead.

So far there is fuck all on display and what they do show leaves a lot to be decided.  At the moment this sadly doesn't look likely to be localised.   Also Minstrel song and its non Pal localization is coming to PSN as well as part of a 25th anniversary edition. Oh and DDS translation are currently putting the finishing touches to the SNES original if you really can't bear the voices in the remake.

Edit, there is a PC offshoot called Imperial SaGa, which looks horribly like Freemium rubbish to my eyes, and I don't think this is going to be localized either.

Playstation 20 Junk Tour.

This is going to be a disappointing junk tour, as like my previous non trip to a MSG event I never found the object of my travels.  This year is the 20th anniversary of the Playstation 1 or next year if you aren't Japanese.  Still have my one bought for £80 with 3 ace games Tekken 3, Resident Evil and Final Fantasy 7 though like all my consoles its not been booted up in ages.  I'm digressing yet again as Sony have set up a little pop up shop in Bethnal Green to celebrate the fact and sell off special edition PS4s for £20 (long, long sold out) along with other merchandise.

With that in mind we decided  to hell with Xmas shopping and lets see what all the fuss is about and if I fail to find it look around the Museum Of Childhood as a consolation.  Well guess what, I settled for the consolation prize.

Decided to look around the Museum first and nothing much has changed since I was last there, they have some hideous mutant, body horror tea party going on in the foyer.

Like old Polish cartoons

Words cannot really describe how rank these dolls were, and took a few shots of them for posterity.  Found  a few things this time that I missed out on last time.  Including their console rack, which consists of an original XBOX and an Amstrad CPC complete with tapes, its weird what they archived there, I could have given them my old C64 if they so cared.

Having had enough there, decided to poke around the town itself to see if I could find the pop up and see if its worth it for a junk tour.  The short answer is no, there is only one charity shop which was selling a strange mix of CDS (still have to check out who Popo Kibuto were, they seemed to be Japanese and Jazz) and strange Postcards (crab on wheels from the White Cliffs Experience in Dover).  Also their Cash Converters were selling Taiko No Tatsujin portable for PSP for a quid, but sadly the mouth breather behind the till couldn't actually find the UMD for this.  Looking around it seems Bethnal Green is an Immigrant town, judging by the amount of ethnic shops and that, one butcher was selling off Halal deer meat, because venison is such a staple of near east cuisine (subs pls check).

Went up town after that as I couldn't top that, and hit the motherlode of CDs in Oxfam off of Drury Lane.
Aphex Twin Come To Daddy Single in a proto Syro sleeve. The Gentle People and a whole lot more.  They had people handing out Mountain Dew which is what piss looks like when radioactive and I'm reliably told that it tastes the same only with miles more sugar.  Gonna get some me Doritos and start reviewing shit!

Found the old magazine shop again which was ace and they had old forum magazines from the 70's and decided to buy one.  It is super boring nothing like what it became, no sex confessions but a few strange articles such as abortion and no adverts whatsoever.  Also didn't realise that there is a manga shop opposite or near enough, its called Adanami Shobo and some of the prices for stuff are staggering, I noticed some stuff were going for £90 or so.  Will have to have a look in to see if they have any Class King Yamazaki Tankobon or Iron Wok Jan.  Apart from picking up some Perseus Traxx tracks from Phonica that was it. Decided to go home.

Gateway 3DS

This is probably the bestest thing evar to hit the 3DS a flash card that if its correct will see off the hated region lock that Nintendo* have lumbered the 3DS with.  There is a big list of questions here as well as a massive thread over at GBAtemp forum.

People are speculating that this is the beginning of piracy on the 3DS and to be honest it will be something I would warrant as I really don't fancy downloading anything from Nintendo's overpriced online Eshop. Especially since certain stuff will never, ever be officially on cart in Europe, Shin Megami Tensei 4 and a few other things that are deemed not commercially viable here.  To be honest this is what I use my PSP for playing back ups of  UMDs and rarely Emulation.  Would be great to see this scene explode on the 3DS, along with the inevitable NES / Spectrum Emulators maybe even get some emulators working.

The DS generation gave us Colours art package, Moonshell, Nitrotracker and a homebrew version of Tetris 3 the grand battle before it was pulled and disappeared into internet oblivion.  The 3DS is much more powerful and would love to see what could be made in the right hands.

*Until Nintendo update firmware that kills it off of course.  >;*)

Pipe to Pipe Bushmen on Channel 4.

Sorry you were supposed to get a much longer version of the Feed / Heal the world including a link to Medecins Sans Frontiers, but ran out of time.  The bottom line with this is, if you truly like Heal the World 30 just steal it from youtube (there are plenty of Youtube downloaders) and bung MSF a couple of quid or do what I do buy stuff from Oxfam shops. It doesn't hurt and it will do some good.

The Chimney Bottler Next Door.

This is a channel 4 documentary I saw in the week, about Paedophilia and issues surrounding it.  I've touched on this before, but this has to be said, isn't an easy watch, even more so if you have children yourself, (i'm a loner so I'm spared this).   It talked to those abused in childhood along with Keyop officials, who kept an eye out for nonces online and for the first time an actual padeo (more later).

First of  all it has to be said that, the victims themselves, a Geordie lady and a guy who had been to public school, had been seriously affected by their experiences.  Mainly a shared history of prostitution and drug issues and problems with relationships, the main message seemed to be this:  If you fuck a child you fuck up a child.

Although there was some hope, the lady was going to be a social worker working with abused children and teenagers, and the guy had found a wife and settled down.

There were a few other facts apart from the one above, 70% of abuse cases are carried out by family members, in the extended family or close friends.  The myth of the bush dodging paedo with hipster beard and thick glasses is just that, a myth.  The other assaults are carried out by people in authority such as teachers, youth leaders, scout masters anyone who it seems comes into day to day contact with kids and can buy there silence.   They had a few talking heads from retired vice officers, and a dutch psychologist but the most interesting was an interview with an English Psychologist, who did the unthinkable and talked to some paedos online.  Apparently no one did this before and its interesting to hear this.

There are apparently around 50000 - 250000 nonces in the UK, as obviously getting exact figures is going to be tough.  On top of that fact is that there are a few that do not offend and would be horrified if they did.  They talked to a guy called Eddie one of the non offending group, wracked with self loathing over who he was.  It was fascinating to hear him talk about his sickness, he fancied women as well, not just children and that the paedo witch hunts didn't work (you shift a problem on its still a problem, just somewhere else, and the non abusers were either "triggered" into abusing or suicide).

There was an awkward face to face interview with the posh bloke who was abused at school, and the hope of a cure or at least psychiatry to reduce the harm and effect a cure before someone starts.  My only gripe with this is that it assumes that all paedophiles are men, where as if its an issue of a broken sexual attraction then there should be female paedophiles as well.  Whatever it is, the programme finishes with this prophecy: if we do nothing to cure the underlying roots of paedophilia we will still be talking about doing something 20 years later when the next generation of offenders come along.

Bad Aids 40

Before I begin  I will point out that popular teletext weasel Mr Biffo has got a brand new Digitiser site up and running (well blog).  I'm quietly confident that Rapping Shoe will make an appearance as well as Mr T and his bins so if the following makes no sense to you click on Brown Trumpet on the sidebar where I've added the lynx maaan.

Band Aid.

Sodding Band Aid, one of the most predictable things at Christmas time is the trotting out of the same old songs. Whether its Slade or Wizzard or Paul McCartney singing about Golden Labradors come down from the sky (he doesn't of course its Wonderful Christmas time) certain songs have to be played in my eyes so that everyone knows its Christmas.   This track used to be about famine relief in Africa but now it isn't, I could point out all the inaccuracies that it holds (one, if nothing ever grows then why is there a big fuck off rainforest belt across the whole central half of Africa) but instead I'll fashionably whale on it because its bastard terrible.

This year its being released to coincide with Ebola relief, a good 9 months after the horrendous outbreak in West Africa and subsequent cases occurring in the western world.  Incidentally its not the first time this digital Ebola has broken out,  they had Dido on the 20th anniversary version and complete with a terrible rap too if memory serves correct.  Also they've changed the lyrics so it isn't thank god its them instead of us anymore.  Now its ten times more patronising.

So who is in this years line up: I'll summarise below if you're too lazy to click the link

1,2,4,6. Bastille. Fucking terrible electro house group, did that rework of Rhythm of the Night / Rhythm is a Dancer song that was all over Kiss FM.

3.  Bloke from Elbow.  Don't really care about Elbow but there you go.

5. Chris Martin from Coldplay.  I suppose it pays the bills now he's split from Gwynneth Paltrow, but I've never liked Coldplay, ever and am not going to start now.

7. Seal.  Fact fans my first record I can remember buying was Adamski Killer on which he did vocals. So  he's a legend.

8. Bob Fecking Geldof.  Who's beginning to resemble Jimmy Saville with his massive grey locks.

9. Karl Hyde From Underworld.  Why in all gods name are you here, you should be re releasing Dark and Long on Junior Boys Own not pissing about on a charity single.

10. Roger Taylor from Queen. Fair enough, Queen were ace shame that Freddie Mercury never made it on the original that would have rocked.

11,12,25. Various Youtube Vermin. They are supposedly big among "the yoot" but hardly household names or singers, nor have I ever seen Google promote them in the sidebar like Shane Fucking Dawson or Pewdiepie. Would have preferred MrSimon, McMangos and Ashens with his Engrish Violin, cos lets face it it could do with some livening up and at least I respect those guys.

14,15 Arse Bandit sorry Clean Bandit. More Electro House, here and another confession I really don't like Rather Be and its convoluted twiddly fiddle bits. You may know from that M+S Ad with the food in.

16-19 One Dimension. Because you really aren't getting enough Jailbait to buy your record as it is. Incidentally, Harry Styles face always looks like they've blow dried a King Charles Spaniel and its stuck.

20. Olly Murs. Heart favourite and Xfactor runner up.  Sad to say but I like Olly, his songs ain't bad at all.

21. Sinead O'Connor. An odd choice, but at least she can sing you may know her from Nothing Compares To U.

22. Ellie Goulding. Another good choice if only because her album Halcyon sounds like an old Orbital single.

23. Jessie Ware.  Not a fucking clue.

24. Ed Sheeran. He did Drunk which is boss and a lot of other stuff that isn't.

26. Angelique Kidjo. Because its all too white and middle class, we need some African stars in there, but mainly because Wombo Lombo (Junior Vasquez Mix) was the bomb.

27. Emeli Sande. Fucking hell although she has at least came out and monstered the song itself, but damn she is everything as is.

28.  Paloma Faith. Left wing Amy Winehouse clone.

29 and 30. Is Midge Ure from Ultravox and That's U2's Bono Vox.
Theres a few more but you get the drift.

Hyper Japan Again

Before I crack into the Winter Market version of  Hyper Japan there is a brief update to the 419 letter I got, apparently Havering Police are warning about a scam letter with nigh on identical wording from a different chinese guy.  As I said before its a scam, there is no inheritance and they will ask you for a substantial fee up front and all you'll get is Jack Shit in return.

Hyper Japan Christmas Market.

I reported on the summer version of this a few months back but this is less game orientated and much more to do with Japanese Culture overall, also its had a move from Earls Court to Olympia.  So you had guests by visual artists like Siro A and Jpop singers as well as all the geeks and fangirls cosplaying.  There were still a lot of food stands and places to grab a sake, including some traditional sweet stalls and a place selling iron teapots of all things.

Gaming this time was represented by Capcom which had a bank of flatscreen TV's playing Ultra Streetfighter 4 and Monster Hunter, as well as some ugly Minecraft style Ken and Ryu stands.

Ryu + Steroids not a pretty sight.

Square Enix didn't have any games at all just a shed load of merchandise set in display cases, you could grab a plush Cactuar and a Chocobo dressed as a white mage.  Or you could spunk your cash on an endless array of FF soundtrack CDs.  They also had stress balls too but they weren't actually that good.

I demand that this be an actual FF release

Upstairs they had a nice arcade area which housed some cool shit, including an American Snes with its horrible boxy outline and purple colour scheme playing Marioworld, or on the other side you had a Megadrive with Streets of Rage. There was no old guy hogging Ikaruga this time as there was no Ikaruga and the games were hogged by tiny kids in Karate Gis!. Persona 4 Ultimax Arena, the beat em up crossover with Arc System Works was on offer a shame that I never got to play on it.  Did however get to play on Final Fight which was cool and saw a mum with cat ears dancing with her young son on DDR.

There was a lot of merchandise for sale upstairs along with wall scrolls and swords were a shed load of toys from various manga and  games.  Was debating getting a Luigi Keyring for my cousin and me but decided to chance it with some Persona 4 the Animation blind bags.  Got the secret rare as well which is Margaret dressed as Marylin Monroe. Cue crap picture.

About life size here.

They also had the queen of British Anime Helen McCarthy which some of you may remember from the Anime Column in long defunct Snes Mag SuperPlay or from the big encyclopaedia of anime she did.  Sadly I didn't get a picture of her but she did look a lot like the chibi version but of course much older now.

Finally they had a lot of people cosplaying including many many gothic lolitas and Mario and Luigi sitting around which was nice. Don't know when the next one is on but will definitely be going.

NSFW Scan of The Week Returns.

Don't have a lot to say this week, here is a NSFW link to a sadly non downloadable vintage pron web archive. Found it while looking for various magazines detailed in the small ads of Cult Magazine an old 70's porn mag from Favcrest LTD (who were apparently South London based, there's a Charlton postcode on some of their addresses and an unknown SW postcode for the rest).  Seems everybody was trying to import red hot Scandinavian filth into the UK around that time, either mags or Super 8 films, whether you got any hardcore for your cash is debatable.  Most of those mags archived on that link were sold through various grey importers back then often at a massive price.

Advert for Private magazines circa mid 70's

My own copy of Cult was bought from a bootsale sans cover and with various graffiti on the photo sets, including a Alvin Stardust style quiff added to one of the male models.  The highlight of the whole mag is a whining letter from the letters page from a man looking for a massage at a massage parlour and being offered sex at every turn. If you can read it please do in a Daily Telegraph reader / Retired Major General voice, its most funny.

Bah a stiffly worded letter to my MP is in order.

Incidentally, I wonder when Private dropped their Welsh interest films (Private 41 clearly says Animal Orgy), my guess is in the late 70's, just like Color Climax did with along with their (skin crawls) kid fiddling flicks.  Both are much more professional companies nowadays and definitely don't have to resort to CP or Beast flicks anymore.

Namco Fun City VS god and that

Yesterday I took a trip up town as it was nice out, and it never fails to surprise me how much strange stuff I find out and about.  For the most of the day I was round by  the Namco Centre now called Namco Fun City but will probably change next time I'm up there. Decided to come out at Southwark and head down that way via The Cut and see what we could find.  First of all there was a shop that sold nothing but sheet music so if you have a piano or guitar (other instruments available) and have a hankering for any music in sheet form then this will be your first port of call, its near Waterloo station if you are interested.  I finally found my way down to the river (its by the London Aquarium near County Hall) and I came across a plaque dedicated to those who lost their lives through VCJD (you may know it as BSE) on the wall opposite Big Ben.

Finally made my way into Namco Fun City or whatever it is now and had a go on a few cabs.  They still have the Temple Run infinite runner cab set up to dispense tickets (nearly everything dispenses tickets) and somehow its gained a Flappy Bird cab as well which to my knowledge is the only hardware left that its not been ported to (there are a ton of 8bit / 16bit ports including Colecovision and possibly Sharp X1).

The only other thing was playing a few games on the slot and understanding how a person could get addicted to them.  I got 2 7s due to activating a feature and was 1 nudge short and for the rest of the day was convinced it was all my fault and if I had one more coin I COULD get the bonus.  Luckily I was only £2 down but damn that was scary.

Walking around Soho some guy stopped me with a random don't kill him and points to the pavement.  There is a tiny rat hopping along, tail outstretched and acting for all the while like a little clockwork toy.  I know vermin aren't cute but damn it was endearing to see it hop about and its just like a cat toy.  Also managed to find a place that sells Jones Soda one of the best Cola's around, they had a panda pops style blue Bubblegum flavour but in a glass bottle and totally ace it was.  You don't see them much but their straight cola is definitely worth it too.

419 Scam Letter

Here is a odd thing we received in the mail during the week, and its probably the first one of these I've seen written rather than as a E Mail.
I'll print it in full here with certain bits amended to protect my privacy, you'll also get an inkling of what type of letter this is and the level of English this guy has.

從桌上的泰徳陳*6

xu4494@yahoo.com

Dear Potential Scammee*.

My name is Heng Xu, I am a** contacting you in relations to the late Kobe Bryant***, I worked for  him as his private investment manager, and in the few years prior to his death invested substantially in various opportunities.

After a few years of profit making, he instruted that all the money be collected together into a single bank account, and I arranged with a specialist bank here in China to secure the money in a single account, shortly after he died* I assumed his relatives has since made claims, only to get a phone call from the bank a few weeks ago that Charles funds remains unclaimed, and the money would go to the Government if nobody claims it.

The bank used international people finders**** to locate any relative of Charles but they failed to locate any, hence I have taken the initiative to make enquires myself, in the process I have been provided your details, I propose that we don't allow this money go to the Government and work together to legally secure this money in full compliance with the laws of China.

Kindly write back to me on the estate of late Mr. Bryant, kindly keep this communication confidential due to its sensitivity***** as we do not want this inheritance to fall into the wrong hands,

Heng Xu.

* Did call me by my real name but I thought this would be much more funnier as I clocked what the bastard was up to.

** I am a contacting. The first grammar slip up.  People who write these sort of letters do not have English as a first language (though judging by the state of peoples English around here neither do we English anymore).  .

*** Not my relatives real name, he was never a basketball star, and he definitely scraped the info off  Facebook as its the only place I've shared this info (a photo my cousin asked for), and the biggest flag for me, as the person in question died in WW2. Reread the letter with that info in mind and it becomes much more obvious he is a spammy cunt of the highest magnitude.

**** International People Finders. Just googled and these sorts of people do exist but surely is this something a legitimate bank would do. Not sure what the laws are in China for tracking down a young guy who died fighting the Hun in WW2, and never ever went to China especially to do business.

***** Yeah like you would keep quiet about this, potential money coming in you would shout from the rooftops, unless you were a total imbecile and they wanted to keep you quiet.  In stark contrast I cashed in an ISA this year and the letter they sent was much more professional, more business
like and actually had a proper address not some random Chinese and a fucking Hotmail account.

****** Don't know if the address is live or not as I'm not going to reply, if anyone wants to send unsolicited pictures of dogs or spam through sock puppet accounts the address is xu4494 at yahoo dot com with dot and at replaced with actual punctuation.  More worrying I never got a hit off the Chinese when I googled it. I did type this in via a combination of sljfaqs. kanji look up site and cojaks hanzi site and posted the result in  Firefox's search bar but never got a single hit that matched them all.

Anyway the short answer is this, if you ever get a letter in the post that sounds too good to be true, it is. If it sounds like any of these letters, its fake..

The river of Poppies.

This is just a short lived thing up town out by the Tower of London, remembering all those that have fallen in battle in world conflicts.  Covering the moat area outside the Tower and various areas including spilling down the wall at one point its a poignant reflection on war and loss.  We were going to write about something else (an update on some old topics) but thought you would like this trip out instead.

First of all the Oyster card I had was plain out refused as it was blocked and didn't realise until I went in to Woolwich, luckily I was only going to use it for one trip before getting a travelcard for the rest of  my journey, which is a bastard but can't be helped. Next up we shared a train with a pop eyed spaniel like a full brown King Charles which was cute and set us up for the rest of the trip as it was full of dogs.  More spaniels down by the river, small schanuzers, big labs, dogs being carried, dogs on boats and a Fred Basset (incidentally I actually laughed at a Fred Basset strip this week, something to do with accidentally tossing the salad leading to much hilarity which is normally alien in his button down mundane world.)

I didn't think much of the river of poppies it was really crowded and there wasn't much space to take photos. A much better idea is taking a photo from a height such as from the park above the main areas, trust me it'll look better and you won't be crushed to death by 6 billion tourists.  The other reason I was down there is that we have a giant wooden hippo moored up at St Katharine's docks.  Its by a dutch artist and is very nice, its called Hipopo Thames and reminds me of the little guy from Liquid Kids or  a massive Kinder Happy Hippo.  Want to know how awesome he looks well check it out here.  Apparently the guy behind it has also made a giant rubber duck which I really must google.

Beach Boys.

A heads up for those of you who like this sort of thing before I start on the main topic, but Q magazine has an 8 page interview with Aphex Twin. Its rather nice and covers an awful lot of ground, it also counters out the fact that the rest of the magazine is utter shite.

Beach Boys for BBC.

Something horrible appeared in the week on BBC and its not Linda's rape to the cat and budgie theme on Eastenders, (Listen here and then listen in the background as Deano comes out of the door its faint but its there) but the horror of a big budget BBC trailer for an old Beach Boys song.

I don't know if you've seen it live on the BBC or just the viral video on Youtube and other places but really is staggeringly awful.  Its a cover of the old Beach Boys song God Only Knows, by a shed load of artists including Pharrell Get Lucky Williams, Lorde as Sephiroth and Brian Wilson himself being menaced by a tiger whilst playing the piano, and One Direction, One Fucking Direction.

For me the pivotal moment, where it all turned to shit came when Emeli Sande started singing, that's when I really decided that this could fuck right off, and it duly increased when Gilles Peterson started to DJ with gold discs (should have got the Scratch Perverts in) and there is Paloma Faith and her leftish mug floating about in a hot air balloon.  And because its the BBC there is no end in sight from this being used in every ad break either in its entirety or in truncated forms, such as Florence from Florence and the Machine poncing about the undergrowth or Sam Sparro singing wistfully in a bedsit.

After all that you'll need something to take the edge off of the whole thing and I suggest you either catch up on IPlayer (or more likely torrent the whole episodes) of the Horizon cat watch 2014 special, a 3 part look at cat behaviour with Liz Bonin.  No really, even though the net is awash with cat clips, this is a full on scientific look complete with moggy cam and a breath taking X ray sequence in which you can see just how agile a cat is when landing on its feet.

Set in Brighton and at a farm location it is a collaboration of 100 cats and their owners detailing their lives and covers, communication, territorial disputes and how behaviours are taught from parent to kitten.  Its a good watch especially if you are a massive cat fan like me.

Another thing that isn't really appreciated here and I've always maintained it, is that certain behaviours scale up, so things that your humble domestic tibbet on your lap does to the massive tiger or lion out on the plains and forests is totally the same. Also it gives me the chance to show odd hunting behaviour like in this clip of Saphie taking on a toy rat, from episode 2, which is the nearest thing to a full on headrush a cat can get.

Green Coke and bad Crisps

Was going to do a whole lot about a few junk tours I did including finally getting to Upminster but it was a total disappointment, the best thing there was Crazy Beat Records which I got a few nice things.  In fact apart from seeing a Kingfisher fly past down at the river today, the most fun I've had is finding that my local corner shop does Coke Life aka green Coke.

I've seen this about including some billboard ads, but never to actually buy in the regular can size.  Its unique selling point is that half of the sugar in it is replaced with Stevia sweetener instead of the aspartame based nonsense that is in Diet Coke.  So in the week we had the chance to get a can as it was available in our local corner shop.

My first impressions is this, its halfway to becoming Coke Zero, there is still some soul in there but something has gone very very wrong.  If you didn't know I absolutely despise Coke Zero or ball less soulless Coke as I call it. Its nowhere near as bad as that but its halfway there.  On my official chart of Coke, I rank it as this.
Vanilla Coke>Coke>Coke Life>Cherry Coke>Diet Coke>Coke Zero.

Walkers are doing their do us a flavour promotions again which is their excuse for unleashing more rancid flavours onto the world, link above if you must vote on something.
So far we have:
Hot dog and Ketchup,
Chip Shop Chicken Curry,
Cheesy Beans On Toast.
Pulled Pork in a sticky BBQ sauce
Ranch Raccoon
Sizzling Steak Fajita
Human Flesh

I've had most except Cheesy Beans as I've never liked Baked Beans in any incarnation let alone in crisp form. At the moment its neck and neck to find the worst of the bunch but so far its Rancid Raccoon by a long, long margin, coupling a strange initial taste that turns into something much, much viler. Its my stand out worst crisp ever.  Hot dog and Ketchup is probably next as it tastes of just ketchup and nothing else.
Bearable are Steak Fajita and Chip Shop Curry, the latter tasting exactly like the McCoys range of crisps but not ridged at all.  Steak Fajita I've had before or at least its flavour in other crisps so its not a shock.
Heads and Shoulders above the lot is Pulled Pork, seemingly named by Beavis and Butthead and is rather good, but then again I'm a sucker for bacon flavoured crisps so that it'll be nice is a no brainer.

I'd like to think that they'll retire these but its not as if they'll promote these to a full time flavour, who remembers the last lot of crisps they did, chances are if your out and about and see them on offer stay the hell away unless its the pulled pork ones.

Edit for completion sake we did have the cheesy beans flavour and they weren't bad a bit tomatoey and slightly cheesy, in fact just what you would expect really.

Banstead Junk Tour.

We are once again testing the edges of just how far a one day travel ticket can get you, and armed with a treat of the MSG mesemb show at the community center there, well I decided to go.

Looking at the map it seemed so easy, just find the right community center and head there except I have a bad track record with South London.  An ill fated interview for a factory job in Summerstown left me walking around endlessly trying to find the place, (on the plus side they had a decent record shop which had Phuture We are Phuture so snapped that up) I think you'll know how this would end up.

True I didn't find the place but thats not my fault, I did the preparation and crucially didn't pick the right community center which remained stubbornly closed.  Even worse, seeing photos on my Facebook wall of it looking ace best is the real kicker.  However it wasn't a total bust, Banstead itself is quite a nice little town halfway between Sutton (which I only briefly stopped off at) and Epsom (home of Chriddof as well as Horse racing).  It reminds me of a smaller Orpington for those who've been, and have about the same amount of Charity shops too.

I didn't get a whole lot but I did see some excellent stuff there.  First of all is a strange CD by Anna Homler, a mix of improvised singing that sounds half African / half Japanese in places and synthesizer.  This is my new favourite thing ever, due to the sheer tribal oddness of it all.

Saw another CD of kids songs with some suspect cover art.

A badger shagging a tortoise.

Just what is the offspring of a Badger and a Tortoise.  I dread to think.

Also the retards at Answers In Genesis have some DVDS featuring the Creation Adventure team.  Its billed as a Jurassic Ark Adventure but as I didn't get this will have to surmise its all about Jesus.

Edit I missed a trick here as they are absolutely hilarious, check this review here.

Finally went up town to see if I could pick up the new Aphex Twin album Syro (yep and still can't think why Bond Street HMV is still in business, its bastard awful).  Cutting through the backstreets and eventually came out in Green Park to see a black lady walking down the street with nothing but some body paint and some strategically placed backpacks to preserve her modesty (you could still see her arse though).

Anita Sarkeesian and the Edgeification of gaming.

You were supposed to see a little bit about Community Pom a super rare PS1 game in my last post but like a doofus forgot all about it.  Some people kinda say it looks like the bastard offspring of Zelda and Secret of Mana but to me its more like the town from Harvest Moon bolted onto SOM as the colours are more muted than Zelda's ever were.

Whatever it is, your character in this is a small girl with her hair in bunches and looks to be armed with a bug net. The sheer joy of writing that, and watching it play out, seems to fly in the face of Anita Sarkeesian and her whole women on the periphery never main character whine shtick and Social Justice Feminism against games and gaming as a whole.

I've been attempting to do a YTP of the whole Feminist Frequency videos kinda like Insector did for Michael Rosen back in the day.  It means I have to listen to a whole bunch of Anita Sarkeesian talk about gaming about tropes vs Women and about advertising and sexism and edit it to say something funny. Even worse trying to keep eye contact (for an autist that's truly painful) and do the whole ironic sexist thing of not staring at her chest!.

Mainly I'll be here to destroy the video Retro Sexism and Uber Ironic Advertising Give it a download and join in if you want.  But first a quick digression into Edgeification.

For those who aren't English we have a games magazine over here (from the bastards at Future Publishing) that seems to do nothing but suck the life out gaming.  Its called Edge and if you want to know why I read Retrogamer and would rather I get my news from sites like Siliconera then this argument sums it up. I used to buy it regular back when it was good around about when the PS2 came out it had a few articles and wasn't afraid to look back and smile (oh and Mr Biffos column helped a lot in this). Then the articles changed, from dull developers to indie gaming, (when they talked to Phil Fish about Fez) they tried to scholarise when it should have just stuck to being entertaining.  I gave up in the end when they got rid of their excellent Nintendo wall planner that was in their Xmas issue, so now I just read it in Smiths.

Anyway review time and our first clip is Mikes Hard Lemonade ,an alcopop named by Beavis And Butthead it has some poolside hotties and a few lame attempts at pick up lines. The Fosters Radlers ads do it so much better and am agreeing with Anita on this only because the guys are douches.

Second clip time, and its Twix, something about some do with a bloke staring at some girls while his wife gets the baby out of the car.  Be honest its a damn sight better than our twix adverts and its left biscuit vs right biscuit bollocks, and anyway if you really want jokey sexism then I'm surprised she didn't flag up the Yorkie ads.

Third ad and its Coors time in the spotlight as a numbskull gets a call from his equally dull friend about venting and convinces his wife to go and see him (its OK its for beer). I guess its portraying women as idiots and the only equivalent that I can currently go is that daft coffee ad from nescafe (you know pretends to go out in the pouring rain for barista style coffee).  I could point out a shed load where men are portrayed as idiots, but the Maltesers advert where the two women make the two sleeping guys cuddle makes me cringe. Put it this way if you can reimagine it from a female standpoint you wouldn't get away with it but if its two guys well hard luck.

Finally some bell end in a camper van is talking bollocks at a hula doll for Carls. Jr burger chain.  The whole advert is painful to listen to, I don't know enough about Hawaiian culture to know if its being patronised or if flicking a hula doll whilst trying to eat a burger is sexist or just bad table manners but, its a shit advert, a life sucking bastard of an ad.
In fact I've saved my best to last to counter this. This is probably the most sexist thing I've seen, some guy getting changed on the beach has his trunks stolen by an old ladies dog so they can ogle his ass for Bertolli margarine and apparently as its women on men its OK.

Finally as I've gone on long enough and as I originally found this in Edge so encapsulates the whole thing, have a link to Napple Tale a platformer where most of the programmers were women.

Edit have at thee with some photos.

This is Old Edge, Old Edge is good.

Ghost Sarkeesian

Nitpicking Chasing Shadows with a busted ankle.

Thanks to me twisting my ankle at work, you'll have two (yes two) posts this weekend.  It happened Monday afternoon as I was walking back to the van I stepped into a hidden ditch that effectively fucked up my ankle and sent me reeling.  Decided to go to our local hospital and get it checked out and being lucky with timing, was seen straight away.  An X ray and a long old wait for the results to come back meant that I had a torn ligament and soft tissue damage.  They gave us a crutch to get around and zero pain relief, the plus side was two days off work and a chance to kill off what remaining brain cells I have left watching the Scots vote on independence and the increasingly dire threats of leaving the union (essentially Armageddon even though no one is quite sure what the union confers in this day and age).

Which is where Chasing Shadows comes into its own.  It stars League of Gentlemen's Reece Shearsmith as a high functioning Autistic cop bumped from homicide and seconded to the Missing Persons Bureau.  He works with Alex Kingston who Dr Who fans will know as River Song, but she really shines in this, as they have to work together to solve cases of missing kids and murder.  There is also more ex Dr Who alumni in Reeces boss played by Noel Clarke, he was Useless Mickey from the Ecclestone era who for those that care about such things, and I really don't like him as he comes across as an arrogant cunt.  I don't really know any of the characters names but Alex Kingston's onscreen mum is played by Lynda Barron and she has a serial killer obsessed son who also seems to be on the spectrum as it were.

There are a lot of Afro-Caribbean actors in this which jarred me for about the first half hour,  until I got to see where Alex's character lived.  Up on Greenwich Hill, that clock tower in the town center is unmistakable. There are a shed load of West Africans in the borough and when I realised it was set locally I sat back and really enjoyed this.  Which leads us into a few problems with geography and stuff.  As its two, two part drama's the end of part one has them raiding a few spots in Woolwich to catch the killer.  First of all, although Woolwich is a shit hole our DLR station is brand new and entirely below ground so that shot where its above ground is wrong (maybe some rail nerds can work out where it was). Secondly most of our housing stock isn't that badly run down so where they apprehended the killer is totally wrong, though on second thoughts it could be either Woolwich Common or Morris Walk, which are rough enough to qualify.

There are a few errors in the current two parter as well.  There's a nice shot of the council offices / Woolwich library and he gets a 53 bus outside to ride it to the end of the line (which you can do and please do its a nice journey via Blackheath and New Cross).  However he ends up near Southmere Park in Thamesmead and as any fule kno, the 53 terminates on Plumstead common and isn't a single decker.

Southmere Park used to have  a cracking bootsale in which I got a sampler for my Amiga back in the day and both Strings Of Life and Tears cheaply.  They also had a guy selling LCD Gundam and Godzilla games once but I digress.

The last episode is next Thursday and is well worth a look despite a nit picking local ripping into it. I think its scheduled for release on DVD but if you can find it on ITV player or for download give it a go.

Holiday. Cornwall 2014

Haven't been to Cornwall in ages, so thats why there was no post last week.  My aunt has a cheap Arnova Tablet and brought it with her, so far not really impressed with small scale surfing, but Android seems nice enough to work with so might get one of these simply to get into mobile gaming.  Wondering if there are rom sites for APK files and a sandbox program to run them :)

On the other hand though Cornwall is nice and for balance have been checking what I wrote 4 years back when we were there last.  We didn't go to Heligan or Eden Project this time just a few towns around the general area.

The place we stayed at is a small campsite called Meadow Lakes and is a mix of farm and fishing spot. We had a charming holiday chalet and a pretty good view of the surrounding landscape and blood red super moon which was cool.  Farm itself confines itself to a children's zoo, with a mix of goats (two a brown pigmy goat and a massive white one) pigs (always entertaining) and free roaming chickens (oh and a big black cock which I've always wanted to write down). There is a really old pony and rabbits too but they weren't the least bit entertaining.  Best of all farm cat, black and not giving a fuck about anything, on our last day there he caught a mouse and proceeded to walk back along the track acting like he was ten feet tall.

Other stuff includes a small shop, a heated pool (outdoor and not too deep) a wifi area / childrens place because of patchy wifi, and a playbarn that had air hockey, darts a cocktail MAME cab (not on) crane toy and a pool table.

Best of all is a skittle lane which reminded me of Hen A Pippa from The Childrens Channel.  It was a mix of cartoon chicken and live action. The only thing I can remember is that she substituted an egg for a skittle ball to hilarious results. Even worse there was a white chicken ranging round who looked just like her.

I also got to see my first live Ice bucket challenge, which looked all for the world like what we used to call a wet tee shirt contest back in the day, sadly didn't have my camera for that. I know its for charity and that but ice water plus black top = win.

Trips out.
We went to a few areas including Fistral Bay in Newquay, Truro and St Austell as well as visiting my dad's cousin in London Apprentice.  Newquay had a nice record shop called Edges which we picked up a K Alexi album, it also doubles as a comic shop and sells DVDs so worth a visit if you are sick of surfing.
It also has some cracking views of the bays from the cliff top.

St Austell is largely all hills, and has a few decent charity shops, including I've heard a soon defunct PDSA and a bookshop too.

Truro is the main city of Cornwall and has all the big shops and that, its got a nice cathedral and a nude statue of a drummer in its main square.

There were also some minor trips to visit my relatives too including a nice pub in Tregony with decent fish and chips (and an old guy and his mum with some wonderful Shelties on a lead).

TV. Because my cousin? brought her two kids over to see our chalet, we had to watch CBEEBIES, which I've always written off as utter cock but there were one or two shows which were worth a look. Grandpa in my Pocket which I'm sure was a comic in the Dandy, is a show set in Southwold, Suffolk.  It stars James Bolam from the Likely Lads, who with his magic hat can shrink down to tiny size and save the day.  A bit tiresome for grown ups but OK for little ones.

Far better is Abney and Teal, a charming old school style cartoon, that genuinely harks back to the stuff they showed in the 1980's. Abney is an odd looking bear thing whereas Teal is a hyper excitable girl, the episode I saw had them making porridge with endearing results.

Also full props for Canimals, an utterly bonkers South Korean show that they showed on CITV. The one I saw had a chameleon stealing froot loops from a scatty rabbit.

On that note, Soulless Peppa Pig will wish you goodbye.

Keston, West end and Ealing.

This is going to be a long post so buckle up. In the first part you will get two brief bits of news before we crack on with the main body. Grab a cup of tea, or other beverage and sit down.

Kyuuyaku Megami Tensei Fan Translation Released.

DDS has been working on this for over 4 years and after a few beta niggles is finally out now.  Its the Snes remake of the two Nes Megami Tensei Games by Namcot (with a T back then remember) collected into one handy anthology.  I can't tell you how or what they play like except that they seem to be some old school dungeon crawlers, but the patch is up on RHDN so go there and download if yer curious, K.

Children's Channel turns up again.

This is an odd one, the Chriddof Archive, Fizzymilk 1989 has added his take on some Telecat audio which I may have talked about at some point. Its here if you want to see. However that's not why I'm here scouting round the sidebar I came across some rare footage from Roustabout.  Shot at the Dorset steam fair and featuring presenter Mick Robertson talking to the show promoter, its yet another piece preserved from the early years.  Now to see if there are any Stories Without Words clips.

Keston (Feature presentation)

Cactus club night was quite an adventure this month, my friend Jim didn't want to go, but I did, so this prompted me to find out what was the quickest way from home to Keston, by bus. Its 3 buses if you're curious.  My dad dropped me off there and after a nice talk about northern Mexico decided to go home.  This is where the fun starts, there's a choice of two buses and they both run hourly at that time in proper country fashion and its a case of miss one miss both.  I had 25 minutes to kill so decided to walk down to Hayes and see what the other choices were.  By the time I reached Hayes station picking my way through the pitch dark lane it had taken 20 minutes and was time for the bus to come, I saw it pass me by but the lady driver was kind enough to wait so a big thanks to her.  Apart from that when it dropped me off in Bromley town there was a trivial wait for the bus to take me to Lewisham and then home.

London Trip.

A few obscure bits and pieces from yesterdays trip to the West end.  I had to change up some cash and decided to walk in.  Part of the way a calico cat decided to follow me along the road and after much stroking and dissuading left her at the roadside before carrying on.

After much poking around the back streets of Soho came across a Retro Magazine store somewhere in the gay area.  After literally laughing my bollocks off at some outrageously sweary cards up on the top floor, decided to look downstairs.  They have a lot of NME's and old Escort porn mags and a few more old society and porn magazines too.  They didn't have any old gaming mags or Fortean Times but they probably did somewhere.

Decided to look around Ealing and when by tube so I didn't get lost this time.  Pro tip: if you wish to know which road to take back to Ealing Broadway tube station look for Nat West bank on the corner and take that road.  You can't miss it its in an old converted church.  Apart from picking up an Indian disco record and checking out Oxfams Japanese culture window display, there wasn't much there.

Zoe Quinn

Hello If you've come here because of the promise of cat island / Tashirojima clips then this one is the best I've seen.  Shot before the Sendai Quake struck, I don't know if they can sense it but they don't much like what is happening and its pretty unnerving to here them call out.  In fact all this caterwaulin' is the best intro for our main topic today.

Zoe Quinn stuff.

This is currently getting my blood boiling, and not in a good way. For those who don't know who she is shes a female game developer who did Depression Quest and is an active Feminist. So far so good, however its stops there.  A good starting place for this will be Internet Aristocrats Youtube channel.  He'll explain it far more than I can ever could {they're called Quinnspiracy Theory if you want to know}. Another good place is this, the Zoepost written by an ex boyfriend and explains all the infidelity on her part.

Its not that a, She cheated on her boyfriend, that gets me worked up. Its not the fact that she slept her way  through whats considered to be the best of Internet Journalism..  (which to say is its a joke, there ain't no Stuart Campbell or Kieron Gillen, as they all do other stuff now). Its this.

She calls herself a feminist and moans that there are no games by women and when someone actually does something about it she shuts them down in favour of her own currently not in production rebelgame jam (non) even.

I play games, true its generally internet shite, emulation stuff and previous gen bits on Handheld, but I actually do like gaming.  I like to see what other groups make of gaming, I'm pretty damned sure if  more women programmed they would come up with something better than the majority of games that were aimed at women and girls.  Especially on DS, every fourth game seems to be about poking a horse / Dog / baby and then dressing it up in clothes and parading it around.

Bratz Diamondz Slightly Corrupted

So if you try to close something that's actually trying to get more people into gaming that makes you a bad person.  I don't care about if you think its sexist or any of your social justice junk, I do care about you trying to hold back someone with good ideas and could actually make a difference.  

To finish up with here is an article about how 4chan (yes 4chan) are the main contributors to the above fundraiser with a video about text adventure legend Roberta Williams, who quite frankly knocks Quinn into a cocked hat.

Bank Holiday Round Up.

Hello and welcome, the more observant of you may have seen a new hero added to the sidebar. It is the Chris Lyons Video Cassette AKA Chriddof who does those Daz 3D animations of stuff.  He's know for deleting stuff wholesale due to ''teh anxiety'' so how long this will be up is anyone's guess so enjoy while it lasts.

Syro. Bonkers.

Its largely all over the net now and really should be up on Robots Nunca Vista my sadly neglected side blog, but there is a new Aphex Twin album coming soon.  Its called Syro and I learned this through a Dark net link via his official Richard David James page on Facebook.

Fucking A

The link itself is a strange one, its apparently gives you a tracklisting if you use TOR and nothing but a rundown of your plugins, processes and location if you use a normal browser.  This can be limited if you use No Scripts but its still pretty worrying.

There is now information up for preordering at bleep.com and a full tracklisting and a massive array of download options and physical media for idiots like myself including an ultra limited edition version of 200 for £250 (*w*) as well as a more sane £9.99 for a CD edition.  Its out on the 22/9/2014 so I will definitely be booking the day. 

Finally do you want to see a Japanese island populated just by cats, its called Tashirojima and is located off the coast of Sendai, which you may remember from 2011's devastating Tohoku quake.  There is a shrine called Nekojinja at its heart which sounds like Neko Ginger in English (a breed of cat). I'll try and dig up some videos tomorrow.

EDIT was going to do something about Ferguson but it just seems to be the London riots of 2011 with bonus racism and disinformation thrown in.

Robin Wiliams R.I.P

Sad to hear about Robin Williams dying, depression can be a right cunt sometimes and we all remember him from better days, either from stand up or the numerous film and TV shows he was in.  My favourite film of his, has to Jumanji, but Mrs Doubtfire and the voice of the genie in Aladdin also get an an honourable nod as his finest hour. R.I.P dude you'll be missed.

Avery Hill.

As part of the Greenwich University campus Avery Hill is a park right at the edge of Eltham comprising of several open spaces, a garden, the winter gardens and a cafe.  Royal Greenwich calls it as such.

This large, open parkland with many splendid trees, is notable for its winter garden (a magnificent hothouse), containing tropical trees and plants from around the world. There is also a rose garden, affording a pleasant place to sit and relax."

I'd been past when they where renovating the winter gardens back in 2012 and hadn't been back since.  Its easy enough to get to from my end a 51 bus to Blackfen and a longish walk down toward Eltham which will get you to the park without much fuss. 

Its true that there are a lot of nice specimen trees and such in the park and they had a Rowan with berries as well as a nice Eucalyptus with scaly bark.  But I'm a cactus man at heart so its off to the winter gardens which were at last open.  This is where it went majorly wrong, for some reason the "magnificent hothouse" had morphed into a tired old place with a few disappointing mislabeled species of cacti and succulents and a few other specimens that were not much better.  They had a guardhouse separating off the statue of Galatea they have there and another ante room with a selection of wildlife photographs and a few other plants in pots including what appeared to be a 10 foot Espostoa in an 8inch pot.

Other stuff was hilariously mislabeled including what looked to be an Echinopsis that they had down as an Aporocactus. A Cephalocereus Senilis that looked a lot like an Oreocereus Celsianus and an Agave Victoria Reginae that I had to relabel there and then, due to it being several feet away on something else.

On the other they did have a few gems including a nice set of Haworthias including Truncata and a big clump of Gasteria Verrucosa which could be all one plant. They had Jersey Lillies and Pokeweed too, and pigeons flying in and out of a massive palm so it wasn't all bad.
After that I decided to go home through the rose garden (nice) and walk into Eltham (not far) to get the bus home.

Pokeweed

This was as good as it got.

Not the nicest Gasteria

Palm. very impressive

EucalyptusBranch