Durham: a reprise

So a couple of weeks ago now I made the long journey (never take a train on Sundays) back up to Durham. Walking through town and getting back to House 3 it was as if I'd never left. Of course, Matt was out so I had to wander around in the rain for a bit but eventually I found him and got the spare key. I wandered into the bar and everything was the same - same bar staff, same students (strangely, there were hardly any 1st years around) so I sat with a couple of 4th years and caught up on what had been happening.



Over the next week I finished off my thesis, printed and bound it (a lot more fidley than it sounds. Nothing is more frustrating than having to reprint 25 pages cos there's a dash missing in the header), had a meeting with a prospective employer, went out to lunch with the girls from my group and of course, the weeks big event: Blondie's viva. He passed and is now Dr Matt Cartwright subject to completing his corrections. This of course meant that a large night out with the chemists was in the offing leading us from the New Inn to the union, Varsity, Jimmy Alan's and finally Klute.



By Friday the effect of living amongst a new generation of freshers and their dirty germs had hit me and my head felt like it was going to implode. That night was the group Christmas meal and I had managed to get myself invited.



We went across to the New Inn at 5 to start the drinking before heading to Bella Italia. Kara ended up sitting opposite Martin who is infamous for ordering lots of wine, only having a glass himself and dishing out the rest to those around him. About 10 minutes in and she was hammered. As it was an evening meal, only 4 of us made it to the pub afterwards and pretty soon we were down to me, Kara and the 4th year Laura who stayed the course until chucking out time. After two months of not drinking, two nights in a row was surprisingly doable. On the way home I chatted to Laura about the group and she told me that the group had been pretty dull until they heard I was coming back at which point they started discussing going out for lunch and to the pub. Maybe I did leave a mark and they didn't just think I was dickhead alcoholic.



Over the weekend I just chilled out with the chemists around Durham and heard about Alan's plan to get a Bengal leopard cat - even when he's settled down, he just can't be normal. Finally on Monday I submitted my thesis and headed home. I didn't have a camera on me, so the only evidence of my thesis is this really bad camera phone shot (I really need a new phone - possibly one of those N73s with 3MP Carl Zeiss lens...).



Most upsettingly I had to give back my laptop. Now this has been pissing me off for a while now. It was taking longer and longer to boot up, it no longer went into standby when you shut the lid, it occasionally couldn't find my wifi network even right next to the aerial and had the occasional issue with Endnote, but it was mine: it even made the trip to Japan with me in May meaning it's more well-travelled than half the group.



Being back in Durham was like a second nature and with all the chemists it felt like nothing had changed. However, Trevs seemed a little bit deserted. I realise that it's the people that make it special. Last year was bad enough with a load of people I didn't know, but now I'm pretty much left knowing only postgrads and 4th years amongst some token 3rd years from my bar days. Next year it could well just be the physicists that I know. It'll be the same with chemists - almost all of my friends are now 3rd years and will leave in September. Time to move on. Ironically, I could spend the next few years in the same area, but more on that later.

Also, being at Trevs but living out of a bag was very weird. For the last three years I've lived full time at Trevs, but I guess my permanent address was still in Bromsgrove along with a load of my stuff. Next year I'm going to have to face the complete move to a new permanent address. Scary.

Pandora's Box

After extolling the virtues of the personalised internet radio station Pandora, I've discovered the next step: Pandora's Box. The main failing for me of Pandora is that you need to keep a separate window or tab open to keep it going and it's al too easy to accidentally close it or find it getting in the way. Pandora's box simply opens a dedicated window that can be minimised to and controlled from the system tray. It works a treat and even better: it's free!

Get it here

Advertisments

Beyond the sight of Christmas trees starting to spring up in October, there is one easy way to feel the approach of the festive season: adverts. Thankfully, for the last 7 years I've been away during this silly season and have hardly watched any television at all, but this year I've seen it all. Last summer I set about the job of copying all our old VCR tapes to DVD and the most enjoyable part of this was seeing all the old adverts from the 80s. They really knew how to make them back then - no celebrities, bad hairstyles and simple premises. I have to say that my family are an advertiser's worst nightmare - my father doesn't understand any of the ads, my mother remembers them, but can't remember what brand they're for and I just mercilessly pick holes in them. Take the modern advert for the Vauxhaul Astra with all the cars flying all over the place - did anyone actually stop and think "this looks absolutely ridiculous!"? There's a bit in it where a chain of CGI Astras perform various choreographed manoeuvre's. Unfortunately it looks about as realistic as a Japanese Elvis. Saab on the, other hand, actually did this in real-life back in the 80s as shown below:



It's almost as if advertisers can't be bothered any more and just give their CGI people a free reign. But of course when it comes to Christmas we get the big promotional adverts. First up is the unfortunate case of Sony's PSP adverts. Sony clearly booked a lot of slots in the belief that they'd be pushing the new PS3 for all it's worth. The PS3 won't be with us for at least 3 months so Sony have had to push their PSP: after all it's being slaughtered by the Nintendo DS both here and abroad. Unfortunately they have come up with the most annoying characters known to man (the dustballs). If you haven't yet seen them (Sony have booked a LOT of slots) then play the video below.



Of course the one thing that never fails to appear ad-infinitum around this time of year are those tossing fragrance adverts - you know the ones: get various celebrities to ponce around and deliver a catchphrase that has nothing to do with the scent at all. To be fair, it must be a challenge to sell something that is entirely based on smell via a medium that's solely interpreted by the visual and aural senses, but why do they keep showing the same ads year on year? That "I see a man; it's chance. Take it!" gets me so angry and the one with the guy running across the bollards in time with the waves has me secretly hoping he falls and gets a large bit of concrete trying to insert itself into his crotch. And to finish, they're still wheeling out that Baz Luhrman/Nicole Kidman Chanel one that cost $45m to make. Apparently in the cinema it still carries credits at the end. What always amazes me is people fall for it. Of course, if people knew that behind the fancy names like Brut, Fabergé and the like were actually companies such as Proctor and Gamble or Unilever and that the scents were designed in massive chemical factories on the New Jersey turnpike they may not be so will to splash out £50 upwards on 50 ml of organic solution.

It's not 100% bad though. I'll finish on a positive (before all those sofa/kitchen sale adverts start next week) with two adverts that I actually like. The first is another Vauxhal advert. It's the ones for the Astra/Corsa with the muppet-like characters that simply say "C'Mon!" At first it bugges the crap out of me, but I and severa others have grown to love them - especially the really gruff one who mutters things under his breath before shouting the obligatory line. Sean Paul actually suits the soundtrack (I never thought I'd say that) so have a glance below.



Secondly is the 2006 Debenhams Christmas advert. The whole theme is a modern take of Father Christmas - instead of being a fat man with a long white beard in the traditional red suit, he's portraid as a young, slim man with a grey goatee and sharp red suit who body pops his way through his "grotto" (read: stylish house) before setting out on Cristmas Eve not on a reindeer pulled sleigh, but a flying snowmobile. It's not on YouTube yet, but if for some reason you haven't seen it you can do so here and the music (a modern version of Santa Baby) can be downloaded from the same page. In a world of dull, uninspired, cynical adverts, it's nice to know at least some companies are coming up with innovative adverts. Oh, and if you're ever left wondering what the music used in adverts was, try this site.

Hair today, gone tomorrow

My last haircut was at the start of August. When it's just been cut it's too short and when it gets longer it gaves wavy and just looks like a mess. In fact when I got back to Durham I was told by at least 3 people how bad it looked.

From this...


to this...


There's always one day when I catch a glance in the mirror and actually think my hair looks good short and then the next day it's back to being bad. The same thing happens when it gets slightly longer.

Bigs cops. Small town. Moderate violence.

I'm not one to advertise upcoming films on here, but I have to mention Hot Fuzz. Brought to us by the team behind Shaun of the Dead, this promises to send up buddy cop films in the same way Shaun... sent up the Zombie genre. The full trailer has just been released and is available to view here. Go now ModemMan!