Sunday Roast: I’m going to go crazy and I’m taking you with me

Doesn’t it feel good to be back where we all belong here on BrightMeadow.co.uk? I feel good about it and as I’m moderately hungover, it’s a miracle I can feel good about anything. Before I forget, everyone wish happy (ever so slightly belated) birthday to Neko and Bibby and say hello to fulnic who promised me last night that he would start reading again. He also mentioned being awe of me, but sadly it turns out that awe can’t survive rocking out to Bon Jovi. C’est la vie.

What else is new in the world of Cas? Well, I have short hair again. Properly short. I haven’t taken any pictures yet but when I do, rest assured that I shall share. Why cut it all off? I got bored. The last time I got it bobbed it didn’t work properly and I just got so fed up with it I booked an emergency appointment on Saturday. I probably won’t keep it this short, though it is so ridiculously easy to manage right now, but it is nice not to have to worry about it getting in my eyes and I can legitimately fiddle with it because it’s called “styling”. Felt weird dancing last night though. No hair to head-bang!

It turns out Penguin don’t want me *sniff* I lack the experience they require. It does make you wonder how the frack you are supposed to get the experience in the first place, but hey, I wasn’t expecting this to be easy. The next round of applications are being prepared even now.

Which brings us in our usual circuitous fashion to the roast for this week. Yummy linky goodness.

Got a piece of technology designed for a kid to use? Why not be novel and let the kids review it

Sadly rebooting Bright Meadow has lost me my stats history so I can’t share all the weird and wacky search terms that have brought people to this blog (though Christian Chiropractors does stick in the memory). What are your oddest search terms?

I gave up on my dream of being an astronaut a long time ago (health issues disqualify me if nothing else) but I still secretly cherish the belief that one day I will be in space. Have you got the right stuff, seeing as how there is a shortage of astronauts in the EU.

It has been a little over four months since I sat on my first Razr, necessitating a replacement. At the time, I had only had it a week and I loved it – it was so slim, it fit in my wallet, it had a satisfying cthliunk when you closed it, the keypad was all sci-fi-y. Now I’ve lived with it and I loathe the bloody thing. Yes, it still fits in my wallet and has a satisfying cthliunk, but that sci-fi-y keypad gets up my nose. It has no memory so it is stupidly sluggish to run, when it wants to run at all. It randomly decides to change things (like a whole week where it didn’t let me know when I had a missed call or voicemail – I was wondering why no one seemed to love me that week, till I checked my messages!) and the menu system is just the most unintuitive thing this side of the Fasthosts control panel! But I can’t get rid of the damn thing because there is no phone out there that does all that I want it to (and that I can afford). Not that the Razr does what I want it to either, but it (more or less) lets me make calls and texts. So I totally agree with this article. Completely and wholeheartedly.

I get a bit of schtick at work because I rely on my paper to-do lists at the same time as banning post-it notes and insisting that people email phone messages and jobs to do. I just know that I plan my day better on paper, whilst if people keep giving me things to do on scraps of paper, they get lost. The blend of electronic and paper works for me. Could it work for you too?

I remember the day the CCM brought two of these beauties home. Yes, two! And you could join them with a cable to duel at Tetris! Talking of Tetris, does anyone know if you can get it on the newer Nintendo models? My mum is a Tetris fiend, but she can’t use our old Gameboy (yes, it still works) any more because it is too heavy and big for her RSI.

JK Rowling is wrong – a decent analysis the lawsuit Rowling brought against the print version of the online Potter Lexicon.

Their stupidity at not hiring me withstanding, Penguin are doing some pretty sexy things at the moment playing with the idea of literature on the internet. The last “We Tell Stories” story, ‘The (Former) General’ by Mohsin Hamid is probably my favourite. Not strictly for the story itself, but for the approach. I have this really exciting idea to take the week 1 idea with Google maps, and mash it up with the multi-linearity of week 6, bringing in other multimedia (pictures, video, external websites, etc). Sadly I lack the technical skill or time to do this, but is there anyone out there who might take the challenge up? Please?

If you could get OSX on non-proprietary hardware, would you ditch Windows? Yes. In a heartbeat. I love the look of my PocketCalculator, but it is getting to the end of its life, and I just can’t afford to get a new Mac. I refuse to go back to Windows so I’m in a bit of a fix!

Mac Slocum has hit the nail on the head when he calls for ergonomic design of ebook readers. Note Scoble’s rant at the “flappy paddle thingies” for how irritating bad design can be.

Confused with all the different sorts of ebook formats and readers? I know I frelling am! Here’s a handy guide

The other week I twittered my sheer exasperation that I couldn’t find any good new blogs. I was trying to step outside the 9rules family because I don’t want to the run the risk of getting a blinkered view of what’s out there, but found I was drowning in the sheer amount of crap that is out there.
Steve Lawson jumped right in with some great suggestions including –
David Byrne’s Journal
Where Did It All Go Right? by Andrew Collins
Thanks Steve!

I could bang on for hours for the reasons behind the work I do, but I won’t because this isn’t the time or the place. This article should give you some context though

Just two trailers this time, so Abi, try and ration them 😉
Henry Poole is Here
War Inc

Which brings me to the end of the rag bag of links I have found this week. I am off to drown my hangover in endless cups of tea – you sit back, have a lovely weekend, and why not share fun stuff you’ve found in the comments as well?

9 thoughts on “Sunday Roast: I’m going to go crazy and I’m taking you with me

  1. When I saw that original GameBoy in the museum my initial thought was ‘oh wow look at that’ – but then I thought hang on, something that I thought was a recent memory is an exhibit in a museum – a frickin’ museum! I didn’t think my memories were old enough to start appearing in museums. Oh dear!

  2. When still an impoverished undergrad (as opposed to the impoverised post-grad I am now) I borrowed my gran’s old Hoover. My housemate came home one day in fits of giggles. He had just be to a nearby museum, which had a load of old British gadgets… including the exact same model Hoover we had spent the last week using! Fifty years old and it still worked perfectly.

    The thing I hate about Cas’s Razr is it’s constant need for attention. The beeps it makes if she’s got a text and hasn’t checked it yet are louder the beep it makes to tell her there’s a text in first place. And the bloody thing won’t shut-up until she checks it. That’s why I like my little Nokia. It’s simple and undemanding. It doesn’t yell at me for not checking my messages and only asserts it’s existence when it’s about to die and needs a recharge. It’s there when I need it and unobtrusive when I don’t. And that’s what I expect from my technology. It meets my needs and not the other way around. Probably why I’m still a pen and paper girl too.

  3. Hi, nice to see you back at your own domain. I’ve played Tetris on the Nintendo DS lite, albeit only briefy, but it seemed to work well.

  4. Superawesomegreat to have you back here where you ought to be. It’s sad you didn’t get in with the P. where you ought to be as well, but I suppose the experience issue is an important one. Did they specify which experience (publishing in general, big company, lit…)? Have you considered working with smaller, independent publishers first? Hey, the pay would be lousy, the hours killing and job satisfaction subzero, but it might help…

    As for running Mac OS on anything but a Mac, I wouldn’t do it. One of the strongest arguments still being, I think, that Apple guarantee the full experience only on machines they have full control over, not on some buggy DOS box or whatever that would only have you start swearing about drivers and compatibility troubles from the go again. I can’t afford anything newer than my own aging iBook either, but OSX belongs on a Mac. If I had my shit sorted out just a tad more, I’d just get a loan or something, because with the recent price drops (and if you can get them ex VAT) they’ve really become attainable and still great value for their money…

  5. publicenergy – I know. It’s just plain wrong that something which still works fine should be classed as a museum piece. *grumble about the state of the world today*

    Moose – oh, I’d forgotten about the constant need for attention! That has to be THE most annoying thing about the damn thing!

    Sppoky – thank you. Nice to see you back in the comments. And that’s good to know. I think I know what my mum’s getting for Christmas this year 😉

    Nils – they haven’t specified what experience they were looking for that I haven’t got, but I’ve asked for feedback so let’s wait and see. And yes, I have considered the independents as well – at this stage, I’m looking at everything!

  6. I waited until I had a nice night at home to read the Roast. Last week I missed my train because of it. And the movies? Well, I went and watched a whole bunch of them on the Apple website, including bad ones.

    Ah, yay Roast.

  7. Abi – missed your train? Sorry. Though of course the evil side of me is gloating right now 😉 I watched some very bad ones on the Apple site as well, I just don’t link to them because I still have a smidgeon of self-respect. You would not believe how close I came to including a link to “House Bunny” until Moose just looked at me and shook her head in despair.

  8. No, thank YOU Steve for giving my brain some new content! And welcome to Bright Meadow and the comments 🙂

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