5th
May
2008
Visited my dad tonight who had just been given a massive pile of old LPs by his brother, who was doing a big clean up. Amongst it all there were a few gems and I managed to grab a heap, some of which you can see in the picture. Mostly it’s 70’s stuff - Bowie, Pink Floyd, Black Sabbath, Iggy Pop, Deep Purple, Led Zep and many others. I also inherited a Yamaha turntable so I can play them - it just needs a new stylus. Was funny showing the boys how we used to listen to music in the ‘olden days’ when I was a kid, before CDs were invented. Strange how the world has changed so much in such a short space of time…
Tags : flickr, LP, photos
Categories : music, photos |
5th
May
2008
I’d prety much forgotten about remote posting via flickr until I notced ob1 doing it the last few days. Nothing like some fresh photos to keep things interesting.
So here begins a series of random photos of my world as I’m around the traps. To start with, the focal point of Rockingham, where I have spent many many days since I was a kid - Rockingham beach.
Tags : flickr, Local, photos
Categories : Australia, Local, Personal, photos |
5th
May
2008
We watched a couple of movies over the weekend, both of which I quite enjoyed, although for different reasons. I’ll just mention them briefly and you can check them out if you want.
Into the Wild was the first one. This is a true story of a young guy named Chris who, upon college graduation, decides to leave his troubled family life behind and disappear, living life as a “supertramp.” 
Ultimately he finishes up living a solitary existence in an abandoned bus in the wilds of Alaska, but on the way we share in his journeys across America and the people and places he encounters. As the story progresses we learn more of the back story of his home life that led to him doing this, and also of the anguish of those he left behind. This is a brilliant movie - one of the best I’ve seen in a long while. Amazing scenery combined with fantastic performances as the odd-ball characters that Chris encounters along the way. It is a classic road movie but with an emotional intensity and depth few road movies can match. Nevertheless it’s added further fuel to my burning desire to get out and travel again, particularly to America - I just can’t wait to get back over there!
The icing on the cake of this already excellent movie is the wonderful soundtrack by Pearl Jam’s Eddie Vedder - a bunch of original acoustic folky songs that fit perfectly with this film. I got this soundtrack (from iTunes ironically) last year before my last trip to Africa and have been looking forward to seeing the movie ever since.
Briefly, the other movie we watched was Run, Fatboy, Run! This is an English take on a romantic comedy formula you’ve probably seen at least half a dozen times before. You know, the one where the slightly screwed up nice guy who goes for regular visits with his child meets the new boyfriend of the child’s mum, who he is still carrying a torch for. The new guy is always “perfect” on paper - wealthy, good looking, great job, apparently good with kids. And then the rest of the movie shows how the dad works at keeping his kid, regaining the love of the mother, and generally proving that he’s at heart a better man than Mr Perfect. Run fatboy, run takes that tested formula and delivers it in the manner of the standard British comedy, set in London with a range of colourful supporting characters. Simon Pegg does a good job as Dennis, the main character, and he’s well supported by a good cast including Hank Azaria who plays the American interloper Mr Perfect (”Whit”). Interestingly, this movie was directed by David Schwimmer (who I assume is the same guy as Ross from Friends?), yet it still retains that British film-making feel. It’s a predictable movie, but still worth watching for a bit of fun.
Tags : into the wild, Movies, run fatboy run
Categories : Movies, music |
5th
May
2008
Doctor Who to boost church popularity - yet another news story about how a church is trying to tap into modern culture to boost flagging attendance among the ‘youth’ - these stories always make the church leaders seem like out of touch old fuddy duddies sitting in a room somewhere.
Interesting choice though - I haven’t seen much of the recent Dr Who (although I used to love it as a kid) but it strikes me as being one of the least spiritual/theistic sci-fi series out there. Apparently (according to the comments) Richard Dawkins will be featuring on the series soon so that says a lot. Better to use Star Wars, or Star Trek, or the new Battlestar Galactica - which is deeply infused with religious elements, and is a brilliantly conceived and produced show.
Tags : battlestar galactica, Church, dr who, sci-fi
Categories : Church, Culture, Television |
5th
May
2008
I know you can do an awful lot of things on the net these days but keeping things cold? Now that’s impressive! :))
Tags : flickr, Local, photos
Categories : Local, photos |
5th
May
2008
Now if you ever need to hire a baby you know who t call.
Saw this the other day 
Tags : flickr, Local, photos
Categories : photos |
5th
May
2008
Heard
an interesting statistic yesterday - apparently only around 1% of those who have the iTunes software installed actually purchase music from he iTunes online store. The inference being that most of the rest of people are filling their iPods with illegally downloaded content. I doubt this is the case. Certainly proportion of people will be using downloaded tracks, ad most probably it is much more than 1%, however I’d still say the vast majority of those 99% of non iTunes store users are not. Rather these people are the millions upon millions of people who have bought or been given an iPod, and simply use iTunes to transfer their CD collection to it. Mums and dads and teens and kids - most iPod owners probably wouldn’t know where to find music on the undernet if they wanted to. As I commented in another post, I rarely buy stuff from the iTunes store, but I do still buy a lot of CDs, which I always immediately rip to MP3 and load into iTunes. I think most people are in the same boat, using iTunes simply as a way of getting their music onto their iPods, rather than as a way of getting new music. It would be interesting to see a statistic of how many people actually use the full capacity of their iPods - my guess is a lot would not.
Interestingly though, even though only 1% of iTunes software users shop through the store, it has still become the number one music retailer in the US, surpassing Wal-Mart. I would imagine we will begin to see that 1% figure start to rise a little bit, in view of that.
Tags : iPod, itunes, mp3
Categories : iPod, music |
