To resolve last night's nailbiting cliffhanger, Alberto phoned me just about the instant I'd stopped writing. Alberto Dell'Isola Rezende Medeiros, is interesting not only for having more names than most people, but also for being at the forefront of Brazil's emerging gang of memory enthusiasts. He's also the person I have to thank for the trip - he persuaded Globo not only to put him on the show and fly him to the world championships next month, but to bring me out there too. As usual with people I've only known through emails, he is in real life absolutely nothing like I'd imagined - I was thinking earnest young student rather than fun mid-twenties maths teacher. It turns out that he likes all the important things in life - cartoons, the Beatles, classic arcade games and so on, and is a really great guy to hang out with.
So, on Tuesday afternoon Globo sent a car again to take us both down to the Village. Verônica, the other person I have to thank for the trip since she made all the arrangements and is also a lot of fun, escorted us to the studio dressing room where my outfit was waiting. Presumably operating on the principle that the less of me is visible, the better I look on TV, they'd got me a big black cloak, complete with hood, to go with the black suit and playing-cards tie. I looked seriously cool. We spent something like three hours hanging around while they recorded another bit of the show (a man won a makeover of his car by conducting an orchestra after minimal training, and I had a really vivid memory of my dad watching a similar show years ago and saying "the orchestra know what they're doing, they don't need to look at him...").
Eventually we went through to the studio where an enthusiastic audience (composed entirely of attractive young women, which surprised me a bit since the show is obviously aimed at all ages and genders) were cheering Luciano and a singer who performed a rather good if Eurovisiony song. Then it was Alberto's turn to go on stage and perform. He did a very cool thing with a gossip magazine he'd memorised, describing what was on any page Luciano, the singer or an audience member asked for. Then he did day-of-the-week calculations rather faster than I can do it as an encore. They had a calendar appear on the screen behind him showing the correct day of the week (or, in a couple of cases, the correct day of the week for a date other than the one he'd been asked, which caused some confusion).
So then it was my turn to come on ominously in cloak and hood (and snazzy headpiece with microphone attached that somehow gave it an even more Star Wars look - Alberto had already been insisting on calling me Master Yoda until I pointed out that Ben Kenobi would be more appropriate and slightly more flattering) and do the card thing. Luciano shuffled the pack, spread it out on the table in front of me and gave me a minute to memorise them (during which he whispered distractingly in Portuguese about what I was doing). I made a complete and total mess of things, so he re-shuffled them and did it again. I messed up in less dramatic fashion that time, but it was still embarrassing. He suggested using that take, but I insisted on doing it again, and luckily got it all right the third time. I think it'll look good on TV - I was trying to be unsmiling, cool and intellectual as the cloak seemed to demand, but I'm not sure I kept that front up the whole time (it's hard not to giggle at moments like this). Still, they're going to send me a tape, and if you're in Brazil you can see the finished product on June 22nd.
Henrique Athayde, a Rio-resident memory guy, had joined us in the dressing room and taken photos (I hadn't brought a camera with me as usual), and the three of us went back to the hotel for dinner before a night out on the town. Alberto had challenged me to a duel at StreetFighter II, but it turned out that the big arcade in Rio didn't have a single Capcom fighting game. Disgraceful. He had to beat me up on Virtua Fighter 2 instead, although I won on Daytona US. Then we went to the bowling alley nearby, played three games and equitably won one apiece. It's fair to say there wasn't a great level of skill on display, although strangely enough the scores got better after we'd started on the tequila.
A certain amount of alcohol later, we hailed a taxi back to the hotel, singing raucously all the way home. Henrique went back home and Alberto and I decided it would be a good idea to end the night by walking along the beach delivering what I think were really quite cool and harmonic renditions of Beatles songs at top volume. As I was still wearing my good black work shoes, I made sure to take them off and put them at a safe distance from the sea before going for a paddle, only for a huge wave to immediately come along and soak them. So now they smell of the sea and are full of sand as well as holes. Twenty degrees celsius at midnight!
Having finally gone to bed at about half past one, I had plenty of time in the morning for a lie-in, although my body didn't seem to agree, waking me up at about five o'clock as it had done all the time I'd been in Brazil. So then it was just a matter of being driven back to the airport (Globo's driver again, at my beck and call all week!) and heading home.
So, in summary, I got a wonderfantabulous three day holiday for free in return for two minutes' work. You've got to admit that makes me pretty damn cool.
Friday, July 14, 2006
Thursday, July 13, 2006
Rio: Phase one, in which Doris gets her oats
I'm writing this the old-fashioned way, with pen and paper in my lovely room on the sixth floor of the Royalty Hotel, Rio de Janeiro. It's 5pm on Monday and just starting to get dark. I'm impressed by the cosmic coincidence that in Derby, where it's four hours later but in the other hemisphere, it will also be just getting dark. Anyway, I'm intending to type this up and stick it on my blog, so if you're reading this now it's safe to assume that that's what I've done. It occurred to me that it might save some time when I get home, because this holiday's going to have a lot to write about and I've got a spare moment now - I'm assuming Alberto's going to call at some point since I told him what room I'm in but somehow neglected to ask him his room number in return. I'm improving my Portuguese in the meantime by watching cartoons - Clifford O Cachorrinho is Clifford's Puppy Days, although I'm pretty sure the title translates literally as Clifford The Puppy, possibly with an extra diminutive suffix on the end. See, I'm multilingual!
Anyway, this was meant to be an account of the holiday so far. Let's start with book reviews. I decided to get two new books for the trip - John Banville's "The Sea", which regular readers will recall me saying ages ago that I was going to buy, and while I was in the bookshop and not being entirely confident in the ability of "The Sea" to keep me going all through the four days away from home (it's not all that long), I decided to see if there was anything by Flann O'Brien that I hadn't read (remembering that the first trip I blogged about, I waxed lyrical over O'Brien's work). The only one they had was "Best of Myles", a compilation of the column he wrote for the Irish Times under the pseudonym Myles na gCopaleen. These columns, by the way, are exactly what I would love this blog to be like, if only I was a halfway competent writer. They're hugely clever, witty, inventive and just plain funny.
Having picked my two books in such a random way, I was rather surprised to see that the writer of one had obviously read and enjoyed the other. Not only is there a character in "The Sea" called Myles, but both books include a pun involving a Primus stove and the Latin phrase "primus inter pares", which CAN'T be a coincidence.
And speaking of The Sea, I can see it from my window - the hotel's right on the beach. The smell of sea air, I only realised today when I smelt it, is something I haven't experienced for a good three years. It's lovely, and the beach here is wonderful. You can't really understand how much I love a nice beach without appreciating where I grew up - in and around Boston, Lincolnshire. Firstly, it's thirty miles in any direction from the nearest hill, which makes me admire inclines whenever I see them (and the mountains around here - wow!), and secondly, the nearest beach, where we always went for holidays and days out, is Skegness. Now, I quite genuinely would recommend Skegness to anyone, it's a great place, but if your idea of the seaside is clean, sparkling white sand and pure blue water topped with shiny white wave, gleaming in the sun... you might be disappointed. Skegness is on the North Sea coast, and the sea water is the colour and texture of thick mud (with, by all accounts, a generous quantity of raw sewage mixed in). So I love a good beach, and even the lack of donkey rides here doesn't put me off.
It's also hot! It got up to about 29 degrees here today. I had the morning free (I got in late last night, just in time to see the penalty shoot-out, and was asleep by half seven), and spent it walking around the beach and the bit of this ginormous city within walking distance of the hotel. Globo, the TV company, have paid for me to have three meals a day at the fancy hotel restaurant, but there's only so much posh food a man can take, so I had lunch at Bob's Burgers next door. Delicious!
Then this afternoon Globo's driver came to take me to the studio, which turns out to be a long journey along some terrible roads - they reminded me of the Old Hammond Beck Road in Boston, although that's not a reference anyone reading this will understand, so I don't know why I'm writing it. Suffice to say that they were full of potholes and bumps, and indeed at one point the whole road had collapsed into a huge chasm, so we had to go over into the wrong lane where it wasn't quite so deep or wide, to get over it. Still, we got to the studio in one piece, and it turns out that 'studio' isn't really the word. 'Village' comes closer, but only if Derby is also a village - it reminds me more than anything of the town built by the Globex Corporation in that Simpsons episode - there are lots of big studios (Globo do all the big Brazilian soap operas and things), exterior sets, offices, buildings all over the place, it's fantastic. I met all the people behind the show we're recording tomorrow. I demonstrated my amazing ability to recall the cards in Portuguese and they looked at each other and said "Maybe you can do it in English, and we'll have a translator." I don't blame them.
I memorised another pack in English for the crew (slowly, and with mistakes, but they were still impressed), then the presenter Luciano came in (he's more Ant and Dec than Noel Edmonds, I've decided) and I memorised another one (perfectly) for his benefit, plus a string of numbers he wrote down. Everyone liked it. He took me to meet Scorpio (okay, he isn't actually called Scorpio, he's Marcel I think, although he does have a beard), the big boss, and I did another pack for him. Not perfectly memorised, mainly because he was saying "Wow!" and "Look at that!" all the time I was memorising, as if the fact of me looking at the cards was in itself somehow amazing, but he still thought it was cool when I could recall most of them. My standards of impressiveness in memorising are much higher than everyone else's, I need to remember that and not worry about getting jeered tomorrow if I take 90 seconds to memorise a pack. Anyway, that's filled an hour and two sides of A4, I'll write more tomorrow but now I should go and find Alberto (who I notice I forgot to write about today although I met him for the first time).
Anyway, this was meant to be an account of the holiday so far. Let's start with book reviews. I decided to get two new books for the trip - John Banville's "The Sea", which regular readers will recall me saying ages ago that I was going to buy, and while I was in the bookshop and not being entirely confident in the ability of "The Sea" to keep me going all through the four days away from home (it's not all that long), I decided to see if there was anything by Flann O'Brien that I hadn't read (remembering that the first trip I blogged about, I waxed lyrical over O'Brien's work). The only one they had was "Best of Myles", a compilation of the column he wrote for the Irish Times under the pseudonym Myles na gCopaleen. These columns, by the way, are exactly what I would love this blog to be like, if only I was a halfway competent writer. They're hugely clever, witty, inventive and just plain funny.
Having picked my two books in such a random way, I was rather surprised to see that the writer of one had obviously read and enjoyed the other. Not only is there a character in "The Sea" called Myles, but both books include a pun involving a Primus stove and the Latin phrase "primus inter pares", which CAN'T be a coincidence.
And speaking of The Sea, I can see it from my window - the hotel's right on the beach. The smell of sea air, I only realised today when I smelt it, is something I haven't experienced for a good three years. It's lovely, and the beach here is wonderful. You can't really understand how much I love a nice beach without appreciating where I grew up - in and around Boston, Lincolnshire. Firstly, it's thirty miles in any direction from the nearest hill, which makes me admire inclines whenever I see them (and the mountains around here - wow!), and secondly, the nearest beach, where we always went for holidays and days out, is Skegness. Now, I quite genuinely would recommend Skegness to anyone, it's a great place, but if your idea of the seaside is clean, sparkling white sand and pure blue water topped with shiny white wave, gleaming in the sun... you might be disappointed. Skegness is on the North Sea coast, and the sea water is the colour and texture of thick mud (with, by all accounts, a generous quantity of raw sewage mixed in). So I love a good beach, and even the lack of donkey rides here doesn't put me off.
It's also hot! It got up to about 29 degrees here today. I had the morning free (I got in late last night, just in time to see the penalty shoot-out, and was asleep by half seven), and spent it walking around the beach and the bit of this ginormous city within walking distance of the hotel. Globo, the TV company, have paid for me to have three meals a day at the fancy hotel restaurant, but there's only so much posh food a man can take, so I had lunch at Bob's Burgers next door. Delicious!
Then this afternoon Globo's driver came to take me to the studio, which turns out to be a long journey along some terrible roads - they reminded me of the Old Hammond Beck Road in Boston, although that's not a reference anyone reading this will understand, so I don't know why I'm writing it. Suffice to say that they were full of potholes and bumps, and indeed at one point the whole road had collapsed into a huge chasm, so we had to go over into the wrong lane where it wasn't quite so deep or wide, to get over it. Still, we got to the studio in one piece, and it turns out that 'studio' isn't really the word. 'Village' comes closer, but only if Derby is also a village - it reminds me more than anything of the town built by the Globex Corporation in that Simpsons episode - there are lots of big studios (Globo do all the big Brazilian soap operas and things), exterior sets, offices, buildings all over the place, it's fantastic. I met all the people behind the show we're recording tomorrow. I demonstrated my amazing ability to recall the cards in Portuguese and they looked at each other and said "Maybe you can do it in English, and we'll have a translator." I don't blame them.
I memorised another pack in English for the crew (slowly, and with mistakes, but they were still impressed), then the presenter Luciano came in (he's more Ant and Dec than Noel Edmonds, I've decided) and I memorised another one (perfectly) for his benefit, plus a string of numbers he wrote down. Everyone liked it. He took me to meet Scorpio (okay, he isn't actually called Scorpio, he's Marcel I think, although he does have a beard), the big boss, and I did another pack for him. Not perfectly memorised, mainly because he was saying "Wow!" and "Look at that!" all the time I was memorising, as if the fact of me looking at the cards was in itself somehow amazing, but he still thought it was cool when I could recall most of them. My standards of impressiveness in memorising are much higher than everyone else's, I need to remember that and not worry about getting jeered tomorrow if I take 90 seconds to memorise a pack. Anyway, that's filled an hour and two sides of A4, I'll write more tomorrow but now I should go and find Alberto (who I notice I forgot to write about today although I met him for the first time).
It's a fact, I'm back, yeah I'm standing on the rooftops shouting out...
Ah, back in non-sunny England. I'm in an internet cafe in London - I should really be on a train home to Derby to get some sleep, not having had more than four hours or so for the last two days, but after the plane journey I'm fed up of sitting down while being moved from A to B, so I decided to have a walk around the big city while I'm here. Lots and lots and LOTS to write about Rio, which I'll do when I get home, today or tomorrow night (got to work tomorrow, need my beauty sleep). This Wish You Were Here special will come in two parts - I wrote part one of the travelogue with pen and paper on Monday afternoon and I just need to type it up. I could have used the internet access at the hotel, but I like to be completely incommunicado when I go away like this. And nobody's emailed me to say that some disaster happened while I was out of touch, so it's fine. Unless the house has burned down or something.
Saturday, July 08, 2006
Well, while I'm here
Coming to you live from Gatwick Airport's internet access! I've been to Gatwick before, but I can't remember when or why, and I don't think I came up to this bit with the shops and restaurants so I was probably in a rush to catch a plane at the time. I'm quite pleased with myself, actually - I worked out that I could get the 3:30 train and arrive here just in time to find a hotel, get a room and sit down to watch Doctor Who, and the whole plan worked perfectly. Great episode too.
So I'm flying out in the early hours of the morning tomorrow, touching down in Rio at around the time the world cup final kicks off. Then on Monday it's planning how the TV show's going to look, Tuesday it's recording it and hopefully having plenty of time for hanging out with Alberto and the rest of the emerging Brazilian memory scene (none of whom I've ever met before) before flying back on Wednesday evening.
It occurred to me on the train that it's winter in Brazil at the moment and I haven't packed a jumper, but I gather it doesn't get too cold there at any time of the year, so I should be okay. So I'm off to practice memorising cards and reciting them in Portuguese before an early night.
So I'm flying out in the early hours of the morning tomorrow, touching down in Rio at around the time the world cup final kicks off. Then on Monday it's planning how the TV show's going to look, Tuesday it's recording it and hopefully having plenty of time for hanging out with Alberto and the rest of the emerging Brazilian memory scene (none of whom I've ever met before) before flying back on Wednesday evening.
It occurred to me on the train that it's winter in Brazil at the moment and I haven't packed a jumper, but I gather it doesn't get too cold there at any time of the year, so I should be okay. So I'm off to practice memorising cards and reciting them in Portuguese before an early night.
Friday, July 07, 2006
Good Omens
I was wondering what to wear on the TV if they didn't specify anything, and I decided to go for something a bit different - black trousers, black shirt and my playing-cards tie. Stylish. And then the TV woman emailed me and asked me to bring some black clothes so they could present me as a kind of man of mystery. Anyway, I'm going down to London tomorrow because the flight's from Gatwick in the early hours of Sunday, so this might be the last bloggery from me for a few days, depending on whether I can get my hands on the internet and whether I can be bothered to use it if I do.
That being the case, you'd think I'd be able to think of something relevant and funny and interesting to talk about, but I really can't. I'm going to go and practice cards a bit more - I'm almost getting to the point where I think I can do it on TV and recite them in Portuguese without it all going wrong. Almost.
That being the case, you'd think I'd be able to think of something relevant and funny and interesting to talk about, but I really can't. I'm going to go and practice cards a bit more - I'm almost getting to the point where I think I can do it on TV and recite them in Portuguese without it all going wrong. Almost.
Thursday, July 06, 2006
"Do you remember that time when Daz..."
I must have heard my dad start a conversation like that dozens of times over the years, but for the life of me I couldn't remember any continuations before the funeral today. Still, it was a good day. "Daz", it seems, was short for Terence Andrew Sadler, and his funeral was suitably eccentric. The hearse especially - it was a motorbike with sidecar big enough to hold a coffin, driven by a man in black leathers and helmet, and with the funeral director (in top hat and suit) riding on the back.
The minister (and this one was a proper minister of some kind, although he was doing the "humanist style" service) delivered his eulogy in a strangely conversational style ("and he was also a fan of that fellow Cat Stevens, the one who became a Muslim, came to Spondon once but I didn't see him...") but he read the poem How Do You Live Your Dash? ("by Linda Ellis, I heard her one time on Radio 3, she's got a nice voice") wonderfully well. The music was "Bridge Over Troubled Water" again - all my dad's gang loved that song.
It absolutely chucked it down during the interment and then cleared up again as soon as we'd moved on to the pub for lunch. Had a good time reminiscing and generally chatting with Daz's daughter Vicky (who I'm told I met several times when we were little, but neither of us remember it) and her friends, plus his Uncle Byron and Aunt Peggy, not to mention it being a good excuse for Grandma (who was essentially a mother to Daz when he was a young man - she's spent her life taking in waifs and strays of one kind or another) to tell parts of her life story, something she can do endlessly and fascinatingly. I seem to come from a family of great storytellers - my brother's the same, and my dad was too, but that gene seems to have skipped my branch of the family tree.
Oh, by the way, if you couldn't see yesterday's entry until a few minutes ago, I do apologise. I did try to upload it last night, but I don't think it worked. And if it did work, sorry to confuse you. I couldn't see it on my computer until I re-uploaded it.
The minister (and this one was a proper minister of some kind, although he was doing the "humanist style" service) delivered his eulogy in a strangely conversational style ("and he was also a fan of that fellow Cat Stevens, the one who became a Muslim, came to Spondon once but I didn't see him...") but he read the poem How Do You Live Your Dash? ("by Linda Ellis, I heard her one time on Radio 3, she's got a nice voice") wonderfully well. The music was "Bridge Over Troubled Water" again - all my dad's gang loved that song.
It absolutely chucked it down during the interment and then cleared up again as soon as we'd moved on to the pub for lunch. Had a good time reminiscing and generally chatting with Daz's daughter Vicky (who I'm told I met several times when we were little, but neither of us remember it) and her friends, plus his Uncle Byron and Aunt Peggy, not to mention it being a good excuse for Grandma (who was essentially a mother to Daz when he was a young man - she's spent her life taking in waifs and strays of one kind or another) to tell parts of her life story, something she can do endlessly and fascinatingly. I seem to come from a family of great storytellers - my brother's the same, and my dad was too, but that gene seems to have skipped my branch of the family tree.
Oh, by the way, if you couldn't see yesterday's entry until a few minutes ago, I do apologise. I did try to upload it last night, but I don't think it worked. And if it did work, sorry to confuse you. I couldn't see it on my computer until I re-uploaded it.
Wednesday, July 05, 2006
Hooray, hooray, it's a holi-holiday
I was meaning to wish all my American readers a happy July 4th yesterday, and remind them it's too late now to come running back and say they want to be a colony again. Hope you all had a good time, anyway, even though I saw fit to devote last night's entry to more whining about my free holiday next week.
Although it would be cool to be American in order to have fireworks in the summer, what wouldn't be cool is the amount of time off work you get over there, from what I've heard. This trip to Brazil next week, New York earlier this year, Germany the other week, then the WMC, MSO and BOC to come have almost completely eaten up the 25 days' annual leave I get. I don't know how I'd cope if I only got a couple of weeks off a year.
One dream of mine is to acquire a biggish chunk of money, £20,000 or so, and take a year off work to do all these things I never get round to doing. I'd join a gym, go to college or university or both and do as many weird courses as I could find (this is what the bulk of the twenty grand would go on), do all the usual memory and other mind-sporty things only with more time to practice, fit in a couple of trips to Las Vegas and general globetrotting, just generally have a good time. Write a book or two, set up websites about weird things. Maybe learn to play snooker well.
I'd also need some kind of brain surgery to stop me feeling guilty about spending all that money on myself rather than giving it to the people who need it, of course.
Oh, and by the way, I'm flattered and fascinated by all the comments I got on that post about my credit cards and things. I thought at the time I wrote it that it was the most boring blog entry I'd ever done, but it seems to have been one of the all-time most popular. I mean, I take the contents of my pocket and write about them in graphic detail, and people read the whole thing? Am I out of touch with what's cool and interesting nowadays? Or am I just such a great writer that I could transcribe the phone book here and everyone would love it?
Although it would be cool to be American in order to have fireworks in the summer, what wouldn't be cool is the amount of time off work you get over there, from what I've heard. This trip to Brazil next week, New York earlier this year, Germany the other week, then the WMC, MSO and BOC to come have almost completely eaten up the 25 days' annual leave I get. I don't know how I'd cope if I only got a couple of weeks off a year.
One dream of mine is to acquire a biggish chunk of money, £20,000 or so, and take a year off work to do all these things I never get round to doing. I'd join a gym, go to college or university or both and do as many weird courses as I could find (this is what the bulk of the twenty grand would go on), do all the usual memory and other mind-sporty things only with more time to practice, fit in a couple of trips to Las Vegas and general globetrotting, just generally have a good time. Write a book or two, set up websites about weird things. Maybe learn to play snooker well.
I'd also need some kind of brain surgery to stop me feeling guilty about spending all that money on myself rather than giving it to the people who need it, of course.
Oh, and by the way, I'm flattered and fascinated by all the comments I got on that post about my credit cards and things. I thought at the time I wrote it that it was the most boring blog entry I'd ever done, but it seems to have been one of the all-time most popular. I mean, I take the contents of my pocket and write about them in graphic detail, and people read the whole thing? Am I out of touch with what's cool and interesting nowadays? Or am I just such a great writer that I could transcribe the phone book here and everyone would love it?
Tuesday, July 04, 2006
What I wouldn't give for an intergalactic omniglot
Sorry I've talked about nothing else for the past week, but the show I'm going to be on is called Caldeirão do Huck. It's got a website, and it doesn't look like the kind of thing that they'd invite foreigners on in order to play cruel jokes on them, but I'm still not sure what it's all about. Or for that matter what a caldeirão do huck. A cauldron of something, possibly. I'll have to ask Alberto for a crash course in what the show's all about - I have a feeling it's a kind of Noel's House Party.
Anyway, I'm still not practicing memorising cards, I notice. I think I have some kind of subconscious desire to fail spectacularly in front of the watching Brazilian millions. How many people watch this programme, anyway? And once again, what happened to my policy of not doing things like this? Sorry, I just get nervous before scary new experiences. Ignore me.
Anyway, I'm still not practicing memorising cards, I notice. I think I have some kind of subconscious desire to fail spectacularly in front of the watching Brazilian millions. How many people watch this programme, anyway? And once again, what happened to my policy of not doing things like this? Sorry, I just get nervous before scary new experiences. Ignore me.
Monday, July 03, 2006
Things I should be doing tonight
1) Learning Portuguese.
2) Working out how I'm going to memorise a pack of cards in a TV-friendly way.
Things I'm actually doing tonight:
Sitting around in my pants watching Popeye cartoons and reading the entire run of Exiles comics.
I don't know. It's disgraceful, really. But it's been so hot today!
In other news, I'm going to a funeral on Thursday. You go your whole life without going to a funeral, and then two come, both at once. Not anyone I knew, an old friend of my parents who used to hang out with them and my uncle Stewart in days of yore. But my mum's swanning about in the south of France and Uncle Stew is a jetsetter who's practically never in the country and Grandma wanted someone to go to the funeral with her, so I volunteered. Although taking the day off work is going to cause me a lot of hassle for the rest of this week, because we're busy at the moment, especially with me flitting off to Brazil next week and everything. Still, RIP Daz, I've heard plenty of anecdotes about your antics over the years and I'm sure you'll be missed.
2) Working out how I'm going to memorise a pack of cards in a TV-friendly way.
Things I'm actually doing tonight:
Sitting around in my pants watching Popeye cartoons and reading the entire run of Exiles comics.
I don't know. It's disgraceful, really. But it's been so hot today!
In other news, I'm going to a funeral on Thursday. You go your whole life without going to a funeral, and then two come, both at once. Not anyone I knew, an old friend of my parents who used to hang out with them and my uncle Stewart in days of yore. But my mum's swanning about in the south of France and Uncle Stew is a jetsetter who's practically never in the country and Grandma wanted someone to go to the funeral with her, so I volunteered. Although taking the day off work is going to cause me a lot of hassle for the rest of this week, because we're busy at the moment, especially with me flitting off to Brazil next week and everything. Still, RIP Daz, I've heard plenty of anecdotes about your antics over the years and I'm sure you'll be missed.
Sunday, July 02, 2006
Dragon's pocket adventures
I haven't got a wallet, but I have got a big stack of credit cards and things that I carry around in my pocket at all times. Today, for the first time in ages, I had a look at the 'and things' and realised how long it's been since I threw the useless things away. It's mostly business cards that people keep giving me at memory championships (half the people there have some kind of memory-related business and use the competition as a good excuse to hand out business cards). So just in case anyone's interested, here's the inventory of what's in my pocket:
Maestro card
Train season ticket
Bank of Scotland preference account debit card (I haven't used the account in years)
Monument Visa card (occasionally use it online when a site won't take Maestro)
National Insurance Numbercard (I've been carrying this around in my pocket since I turned 16. Perhaps I should take it out and put it in a drawer somewhere - I know the number off by heart)
Business card for Samantha Birkinshaw of Michael Page Recruitment (She was the one who got me the job at Parkhouse, I think. I'm pretty sure she stopped working there a couple of years ago).
HSBC Savings Card (cashpoint-only card for an account I don't use any more)
AT&T phone card (only works in the USA, and in fact doesn't even work there any more. I bought it the first time I went there in 2000.)
Ulrich Voigt's business card for Likanas Verlag GmbH (he's a 'mnemonist' from Germany, and a very nice guy in fact despite being so intellectual and disapproving of 'memory sports' as pointless wastes of time. That IS the point! I don't know what his company does, if anything.)
Fiona Samouelle's business card from Michael Page (I think she's left too.)
Lincolnshire County Council library card (surely must have expired by now, I haven't used it in a good ten years or more)
One of my own business cards (I don't know how that got into the pile. I had them printed earlier this year to give to people who give me one. They just say "Ben Pridmore, idiot" and my email address)
Nick Rosen the TV director guy's business card, with an American phone number scribbled on it that might be his or someone else's, I don't remember.
Barclaycard (which I only use when I'm abroad and need to stick something in a machine. Usually for train tickets in Germany.)
A book of first class stamps, seven left.
Business card for someone called Branislav Maricic in some language that I'm guessing is Czech. I think it comes from last year's world memory championships, and he's some kind of journalist, but I might be wrong. On the back are some cryptic notes I've written - "Pack o' cards" "Andy" "375001" "David - person" and "8.30" I have no idea what any of them meant, but I hope I found them useful at some time.
Alina Lord's business card from Nord Anglia PLC. She was one of the former employees at Cheadle who taught me most of what I know about my current job. She was (and presumably still is) Transylvanian and a lot of fun. This card has lots of phone numbers and things scribbled on it - I was using it to record everything important when I first started there.
Lim Teck Hoe's business card from Maximum Recall. He's the Malaysian guy who organised the 2003 WMC and was going to be organising this year's until it all fell through. I've scribbled "445900" on it at some point, for some reason.
Ottakar's book shop Reward Card - get it stamped ten times when you spend £10 or more (before November 2005) and get £15 off future purchases. Woo! It's got one stamp on it.
Mensa membership card. I think this is still valid, I've got a direct debit comes out of my bank account every year, but I didn't tell them my new address when I moved to Derby so I don't get any correspondence.
James Jorasch's business card from Walker Digital Management. The most recent memory guy to give me his card!
Mhairi Fitzpatrick's business card from Michael Page. A hat-trick of Michael Page cards! I think I only spoke to Mhairi once, and she gave me her card anyway.
Midland Bank (yes, Midland, not HSBC, that's how old it is) Pay-In Card. (Came with the British Othello Federation bank stuff when I took over as treasurer. You can only use it to stick in the paying-in machines.)
Burton card, which they gave me the one and only time I've bought anything at Burton's in the last ten years or so (the suit for my dad's funeral. If I ever have occasion to shop there again, I'm sure it'll come in handy.)
I don't think I'll throw anything out, it's kind of fun looking through this stuff and remembering where it came from. I'll keep adding cards to the heap until I can't fit them in a pocket any more.
Maestro card
Train season ticket
Bank of Scotland preference account debit card (I haven't used the account in years)
Monument Visa card (occasionally use it online when a site won't take Maestro)
National Insurance Numbercard (I've been carrying this around in my pocket since I turned 16. Perhaps I should take it out and put it in a drawer somewhere - I know the number off by heart)
Business card for Samantha Birkinshaw of Michael Page Recruitment (She was the one who got me the job at Parkhouse, I think. I'm pretty sure she stopped working there a couple of years ago).
HSBC Savings Card (cashpoint-only card for an account I don't use any more)
AT&T phone card (only works in the USA, and in fact doesn't even work there any more. I bought it the first time I went there in 2000.)
Ulrich Voigt's business card for Likanas Verlag GmbH (he's a 'mnemonist' from Germany, and a very nice guy in fact despite being so intellectual and disapproving of 'memory sports' as pointless wastes of time. That IS the point! I don't know what his company does, if anything.)
Fiona Samouelle's business card from Michael Page (I think she's left too.)
Lincolnshire County Council library card (surely must have expired by now, I haven't used it in a good ten years or more)
One of my own business cards (I don't know how that got into the pile. I had them printed earlier this year to give to people who give me one. They just say "Ben Pridmore, idiot" and my email address)
Nick Rosen the TV director guy's business card, with an American phone number scribbled on it that might be his or someone else's, I don't remember.
Barclaycard (which I only use when I'm abroad and need to stick something in a machine. Usually for train tickets in Germany.)
A book of first class stamps, seven left.
Business card for someone called Branislav Maricic in some language that I'm guessing is Czech. I think it comes from last year's world memory championships, and he's some kind of journalist, but I might be wrong. On the back are some cryptic notes I've written - "Pack o' cards" "Andy" "375001" "David - person" and "8.30" I have no idea what any of them meant, but I hope I found them useful at some time.
Alina Lord's business card from Nord Anglia PLC. She was one of the former employees at Cheadle who taught me most of what I know about my current job. She was (and presumably still is) Transylvanian and a lot of fun. This card has lots of phone numbers and things scribbled on it - I was using it to record everything important when I first started there.
Lim Teck Hoe's business card from Maximum Recall. He's the Malaysian guy who organised the 2003 WMC and was going to be organising this year's until it all fell through. I've scribbled "445900" on it at some point, for some reason.
Ottakar's book shop Reward Card - get it stamped ten times when you spend £10 or more (before November 2005) and get £15 off future purchases. Woo! It's got one stamp on it.
Mensa membership card. I think this is still valid, I've got a direct debit comes out of my bank account every year, but I didn't tell them my new address when I moved to Derby so I don't get any correspondence.
James Jorasch's business card from Walker Digital Management. The most recent memory guy to give me his card!
Mhairi Fitzpatrick's business card from Michael Page. A hat-trick of Michael Page cards! I think I only spoke to Mhairi once, and she gave me her card anyway.
Midland Bank (yes, Midland, not HSBC, that's how old it is) Pay-In Card. (Came with the British Othello Federation bank stuff when I took over as treasurer. You can only use it to stick in the paying-in machines.)
Burton card, which they gave me the one and only time I've bought anything at Burton's in the last ten years or so (the suit for my dad's funeral. If I ever have occasion to shop there again, I'm sure it'll come in handy.)
I don't think I'll throw anything out, it's kind of fun looking through this stuff and remembering where it came from. I'll keep adding cards to the heap until I can't fit them in a pocket any more.
Saturday, July 01, 2006
Oi
So immediately after Portugal knocked us out of the world cup, I start trying to learn Portuguese. Makes me seem like some kind of traitor. It does remind me, though, of a fundamental fact about myself - I hate learning languages. I just find the things so darn difficult to do. Makes me wonder why I devoted a big chunk of my teenage years to languages, but hey, I was weird when I was younger.
Still, did you know they don't use the letters K, W or Y? That means I'm already three twenty-sixths of the way to mastering Brazilian Portuguese! Which is my aim over the next eight days, before I fly out there on the 10th. If there's one thing I hate more than learning languages, it's going to a foreign country and making people talk to me in English.
Remind me again why I agreed to do this TV thing?
Still, did you know they don't use the letters K, W or Y? That means I'm already three twenty-sixths of the way to mastering Brazilian Portuguese! Which is my aim over the next eight days, before I fly out there on the 10th. If there's one thing I hate more than learning languages, it's going to a foreign country and making people talk to me in English.
Remind me again why I agreed to do this TV thing?
Friday, June 30, 2006
Senile dementia
I left the house without my briefcase today, and didn't realise I'd forgotten it until I got to the train station, too late to go back and get it. And then at work while going out to buy a sandwich (the most important function of my briefcase is carrying my packed lunch), I quipped to a colleague "I seem to be getting very short-sighted in my old age. No, not short-sighted. What's the phrase I'm looking for? Means forgetful?" It took me five minutes to remember 'absent-minded'. This isn't a very impressive display of memory from someone who's hoping to win the World Memory Championship in a month and a half.
In my defence, I think forgetting my briefcase in the first place came about because I wasn't wearing my usual office clothes. I decided to go casual on casual day for a change, so that I could wear my Germany shirt. Because having spent quite a lot of money on it, I thought I should try to get as many jokes out of it as possible. It'll be outdated after the World Cup, after all.
In other news, my washing machine just behind me here is making some very loud banging noises. I hope it doesn't blow up or anything. It's a good seven and a half years old by now and it's never completely broken down yet, so I shouldn't complain. Generally speaking, my posessions all stop working much earlier in their lives than that, I seem to have the touch of death with technology.
In my defence, I think forgetting my briefcase in the first place came about because I wasn't wearing my usual office clothes. I decided to go casual on casual day for a change, so that I could wear my Germany shirt. Because having spent quite a lot of money on it, I thought I should try to get as many jokes out of it as possible. It'll be outdated after the World Cup, after all.
In other news, my washing machine just behind me here is making some very loud banging noises. I hope it doesn't blow up or anything. It's a good seven and a half years old by now and it's never completely broken down yet, so I shouldn't complain. Generally speaking, my posessions all stop working much earlier in their lives than that, I seem to have the touch of death with technology.
Thursday, June 29, 2006
P-p-p-pick up
Sainsbury's have a half price offer on 18-packs of penguin biscuits. 89p, which is a pretty good deal really. Interestingly, they haven't got a similar offer on the packs of 9 on the shelves next to them, which are still 98p a pack. I felt like buying a 9-pack just to make some kind of ironic point, but then I realised that that doesn't make the slightest bit of sense, so I didn't.
I'm watching Andy Murray playing tennis at the moment, and his horrible mother's in the crowd. I saw her being interviewed last year when Murray had just won a very impressive game, and rather than saying anything nice about her son, she immediately launched into a list of his deficiencies as a tennis player and observed that they'd have to work on them before he'd be any real good. Although on the other hand, maybe if I'd had a mother like that I'd be practising speed numbers like I said I would right now, instead of wasting my life watching Wimbledon.
I'm watching Andy Murray playing tennis at the moment, and his horrible mother's in the crowd. I saw her being interviewed last year when Murray had just won a very impressive game, and rather than saying anything nice about her son, she immediately launched into a list of his deficiencies as a tennis player and observed that they'd have to work on them before he'd be any real good. Although on the other hand, maybe if I'd had a mother like that I'd be practising speed numbers like I said I would right now, instead of wasting my life watching Wimbledon.
Wednesday, June 28, 2006
Bom-dia, meu nome é Zoomy.
I'm almost certainly going to Brazil in two weeks, touch wood. Which is extremely scary and I don't think I want to do it any more. But I'll get over it.
This is of course another distraction from training for the world championships, and I've had a lot of those lately, what with the football. And general laziness, to be honest. I had a real buzz of motivation earlier in the year, but for the last few months I've been steadily declining back to 2005 levels of don't-feel-like-it-ness. Well, not quite that bad (seeing as for most of 2005 I didn't look at a pack of cards or sheet of numbers that weren't pi at all), but getting there. I did have a go at speed numbers tonight, but considering there wasn't even any football today I should have done a lot more, really.
Never mind, this weekend I've got no plans (although come to think of it I haven't been to see my grandma for aaaaages, so maybe I should do that too), so if I can drum up the willpower to do it, I can do an hour numbers and cards and maybe come up with a definite plan for how much of each to attempt at the worlds.
This is of course another distraction from training for the world championships, and I've had a lot of those lately, what with the football. And general laziness, to be honest. I had a real buzz of motivation earlier in the year, but for the last few months I've been steadily declining back to 2005 levels of don't-feel-like-it-ness. Well, not quite that bad (seeing as for most of 2005 I didn't look at a pack of cards or sheet of numbers that weren't pi at all), but getting there. I did have a go at speed numbers tonight, but considering there wasn't even any football today I should have done a lot more, really.
Never mind, this weekend I've got no plans (although come to think of it I haven't been to see my grandma for aaaaages, so maybe I should do that too), so if I can drum up the willpower to do it, I can do an hour numbers and cards and maybe come up with a definite plan for how much of each to attempt at the worlds.
Tuesday, June 27, 2006
More pretty pictures!
What you can't see here is that the lights on the face really flash and everything.
Just for the purposes of comparison, for the benefit of those poor people who didn't watch Battle of the Planets.
Monday, June 26, 2006
An epic travelogue
So, if memory serves (and remembering something that happened more than five minutes ago isn't my forte, as I think I've demonstrated this weekend), I set off on Thursday night for the first stage of my journey, and the great challenge of finding my hotel. A cursory search of the internet hadn't revealed any of the various hotels actually at Birmingham airport, so I'd booked a room at the Holiday Inn a couple of miles down the road. I decided to walk it, seeing as it was nice weather and I don't like getting taxis. And it was a very pleasant walk - the area around the airport is for some reason absolutely crawling with rabbits, it's like walking on some kind of bunny carpet (I didn't actually tread on any, don't worry). But the number of rabbits I saw on the walk was inversely proportional to the number of Holiday Inns, since it turned out not to be where I thought it was, and after a couple of hours of walking around I found my way back to the airport train station and got a taxi like a normal person would have done in the first place.
After that, I got the plane in the morning without any difficulty. The usual funny look at the passport control because my picture looks like a completely different person, but no trouble. The departure lounge seems to have got more interesting since I was last there, and I had two good books to pass the time with anyway, The Marlows and the Traitor, and Kavalier and Clay. Then I had a day of looking around Düsseldorf (which I didn't think much of) and Essen (really nice!). I bought a Germany football shirt to wear for a laugh at the competition. I know I don't normally buy clothes, generally wearing the same old falling-to-bits ones I've had since I was a teenager, but I'm not above spending huge amounts of money on a single garment every now and then if I think it'll be funny. And I like to think I've got a reputation for wearing interesting T-shirts at memory competitions, so I need to keep that going even now that everyone's seen my entire wardrobe.
I also bought a teddy bear in a Germany football shirt, just on a whim. He's called Ballack, and he seems to be getting along well with Hi-Fi, Tom Jones, Treelo, Iago, Dragon and Shelley, the rest of my stuffed toys who I really should blog about some time soon. I thought about taking him to the competition as a mascot, but decided that two Germany shirts would be overkill, and anyway he wanted to stay at the hotel and watch TV. I found the Essen Holiday Inn without much trouble at all, although negotiating the constantly-shifting roadworks and diversions and working out which direction cars were likely to be coming at you from while crossing the road was a bit of a challenge.
The weather all weekend was absolutely baking hot and sunny, the kind of temperature where it's seriously uncomfortable to be in the direct sunshine. My hat comes in handy for stopping my bald shiny skull getting sunburnt in this kind of situation, but it's horribly hot and sweaty wearing it. Still, the advantages outweigh the disadvantages, and I'm too superstitious to stop wearing it to memory competitions now. Somehow I don't think I could memorise anything without it sitting on the desk (or, if there isn't room, on the floor) in front of me.
Anyway, I found the competition venue without any trouble at all, considering I got off at the wrong one of Hattingen's S-Bahn stations and so the map I'd carefully printed out beforehand was of limited use. As well as the Speed Cards Challenge, the Schulzentrum Hochhausen was host to a speed-stacking competition and other sideshows. This is something that the German competitions do very well, and the British ones do terribly. The WMC is always accompanied by Tony Buzan and his friends and relatives giving lectures on self-optimisation and things to gullible businessmen and charging the kind of prices that make your mind boggle. German competitions are accompanied by the kind of shows and contests that people actually want to come to, and this is probably why lots of people there like 'memory sports' and nobody over here does.
Boris did a fantastic job organising everything, by the way - very much putting my shambolic Cambridge effort to shame! There were only ten competitors in the SCC at the end, which was a bit disappointing. Possibly the clash with Germany's football game in the afternoon had something to do with it. Clemens wasn't there, but there was me, Gunther, Steffen Bütow and Alisa Kellner among the participants. For the first round, I was up against Florian Dellé, and stuck with the strategy I'd come up with in advance - just go for a fast time and then if it goes wrong, go a bit slower in the next two heats (it was best of three, head-to-head, if you remember). Actually, I needn't have worried - as usual in these things, when I'm actually in competition, my recall is much more accurate than when I'm at home. I did 32.03 seconds (a bit better than my existing world record) in the first heat, and something like 34 seconds in the next. So I'd won pretty comfortably, and got to sit out the third heat. Watching Steffen against Alisa was entertaining - there really could be something in this as a spectator sport, you know!
For the second round against Franz-Josef Schumeckers it was the same kind of thing, I had another couple of times in the low 30s, including a 31.03, and won it without any difficulty. Nobody else was doing much under a minute. I was up against Steffen in the third round, and he decided to forfeit it and save his mental energy for the final round after lunch. That annoyed me a bit, to be honest. But I decided to go for a super-fast time rather than doing nothing, and made a complete mess of it twice in a row.
After lunch (which was pizza, and free of charge for competitors, another coolness. I live on pizza and McDonald's when I'm in Germany - there are always people selling cheap slices of pizza in train stations and elsewhere, generally reheated several times, often burnt and always delicious. Haute cuisine!) it was time for the grand final, which was me against Gunther. After those failed attempts at breaking the record, I was concerned that I might make a mess of things, so decided I needed a new strategy. Gunther, I reasoned, would assume I was going for a 30-ish-second kind of time, know he couldn't beat that, so would hope that I made a mistake and take it slowly, and make sure of getting his own recall correct. That would give me leeway to go more slowly, say 1 minute, and be certain of winning. So I did, and I have no idea why - I know from experience that going through the pack twice makes me no more likely to recall it correctly than only going through once. Strange but true. My time was about 1:00.91, I think. To my alarm, it turned out that Gunther had done about 51 seconds. He'd expected me to do the sensible thing! I'm deeply offended. Haven't I spent my whole life not doing the sensible thing? And now that for once I have, it was anticipated by my opponent? Luckily, though, he got the third card in the pack wrong, so it didn't matter. I went back to doing the silly thing for the second heat and got it perfectly right in about 36 seconds, without any trouble.
So I won, and to be perfectly honest, I won without breaking a sweat. It sounds disrespectful to the other competitors, I know, and I really should be keeping my big mouth shut here, but I would have liked to be challenged a lot more than I was.
Anyway, the final ceremony included the finals of the speedstacking - very exciting and one of those things I've been meaning to get into since learning of the sport's existence last August, although I imagine it would be hugely frustrating to keep making mistakes at crucial moments; a blindfold Rubik's cube solver (extremely cool); an attempt by Boris at the two-packs-of-cards memorisation record (much better than my own disastrous attempt in 2004, but still unsuccessful, unfortunately); a magician, and a whole lot of trophies. This, again, is normal for a German memory competition. In Britain we get a speech from Tony Buzan, maybe about how great he or one of his friends is, and a quick presentation of medals.
So, thanks to the generosity of the sponsors (Volksbank Sprockhövel - if you want a bank in Sprockhövel, check them out! Assuming they are a bank, I'm not entirely certain about that) I went away with two trophies (for winning and for the best time), and a solid gold pack of cards (seriously cool!). Of course, once again I hadn't brought a bag big enough to take them home with me as well as Ballack and my clothes and things, but I managed to cram them all into my rucksack without leaving too much behind in the hotel room (my notepad, since there wasn't anything written in it and I can easily buy another one, and my jumper, since I've got about half a dozen more at home and I only wear one at a time).
I skipped the get-together at Boris's house for the football game. Rude of me, I know, but these competitions tire me out tremendously and I just didn't feel up to it. I went back to the hotel and was fast asleep by eight, not even disturbed by the sound of Germans celebrating their victory. Which reminds me, a German interviewer at the competition asked me what I thought the result would be, and I said 2-0 to Germany. Should have put some money on it, really.
Coming home yesterday was fun - the boiling hot weather lasted right until the split second I got on the plane, when it turned into the most amazing thunderstorm, with torrential rain (the plane was sitting in the middle of like a square mile of concrete and it was all under an inch of water by the time the rain stopped), vicious wind and some really great lightning. The pilot assured us that if the plane was struck by lightning it probably wouldn't kill us, but we weren't able to take off for an hour and a half until there was a break in the weather. Luckily, I was still immersed in Kavalier and Clay. It's one of those books that can still utterly absorb you even on re-reading it. And then when we finally did fly back to Birmingham, there weren't any trains from the station because of engineering works. In fact, there are practically never trains from Birmingham International station, and I'm not sure why they still call it a railway station except out of some sense of tradition. But the replacement bus service wasn't as slow or late as they usually are, so I shouldn't complain. Incidentally, in Germany the trains really do all run on time. I was hugely impressed!
After that, I got the plane in the morning without any difficulty. The usual funny look at the passport control because my picture looks like a completely different person, but no trouble. The departure lounge seems to have got more interesting since I was last there, and I had two good books to pass the time with anyway, The Marlows and the Traitor, and Kavalier and Clay. Then I had a day of looking around Düsseldorf (which I didn't think much of) and Essen (really nice!). I bought a Germany football shirt to wear for a laugh at the competition. I know I don't normally buy clothes, generally wearing the same old falling-to-bits ones I've had since I was a teenager, but I'm not above spending huge amounts of money on a single garment every now and then if I think it'll be funny. And I like to think I've got a reputation for wearing interesting T-shirts at memory competitions, so I need to keep that going even now that everyone's seen my entire wardrobe.
I also bought a teddy bear in a Germany football shirt, just on a whim. He's called Ballack, and he seems to be getting along well with Hi-Fi, Tom Jones, Treelo, Iago, Dragon and Shelley, the rest of my stuffed toys who I really should blog about some time soon. I thought about taking him to the competition as a mascot, but decided that two Germany shirts would be overkill, and anyway he wanted to stay at the hotel and watch TV. I found the Essen Holiday Inn without much trouble at all, although negotiating the constantly-shifting roadworks and diversions and working out which direction cars were likely to be coming at you from while crossing the road was a bit of a challenge.
The weather all weekend was absolutely baking hot and sunny, the kind of temperature where it's seriously uncomfortable to be in the direct sunshine. My hat comes in handy for stopping my bald shiny skull getting sunburnt in this kind of situation, but it's horribly hot and sweaty wearing it. Still, the advantages outweigh the disadvantages, and I'm too superstitious to stop wearing it to memory competitions now. Somehow I don't think I could memorise anything without it sitting on the desk (or, if there isn't room, on the floor) in front of me.
Anyway, I found the competition venue without any trouble at all, considering I got off at the wrong one of Hattingen's S-Bahn stations and so the map I'd carefully printed out beforehand was of limited use. As well as the Speed Cards Challenge, the Schulzentrum Hochhausen was host to a speed-stacking competition and other sideshows. This is something that the German competitions do very well, and the British ones do terribly. The WMC is always accompanied by Tony Buzan and his friends and relatives giving lectures on self-optimisation and things to gullible businessmen and charging the kind of prices that make your mind boggle. German competitions are accompanied by the kind of shows and contests that people actually want to come to, and this is probably why lots of people there like 'memory sports' and nobody over here does.
Boris did a fantastic job organising everything, by the way - very much putting my shambolic Cambridge effort to shame! There were only ten competitors in the SCC at the end, which was a bit disappointing. Possibly the clash with Germany's football game in the afternoon had something to do with it. Clemens wasn't there, but there was me, Gunther, Steffen Bütow and Alisa Kellner among the participants. For the first round, I was up against Florian Dellé, and stuck with the strategy I'd come up with in advance - just go for a fast time and then if it goes wrong, go a bit slower in the next two heats (it was best of three, head-to-head, if you remember). Actually, I needn't have worried - as usual in these things, when I'm actually in competition, my recall is much more accurate than when I'm at home. I did 32.03 seconds (a bit better than my existing world record) in the first heat, and something like 34 seconds in the next. So I'd won pretty comfortably, and got to sit out the third heat. Watching Steffen against Alisa was entertaining - there really could be something in this as a spectator sport, you know!
For the second round against Franz-Josef Schumeckers it was the same kind of thing, I had another couple of times in the low 30s, including a 31.03, and won it without any difficulty. Nobody else was doing much under a minute. I was up against Steffen in the third round, and he decided to forfeit it and save his mental energy for the final round after lunch. That annoyed me a bit, to be honest. But I decided to go for a super-fast time rather than doing nothing, and made a complete mess of it twice in a row.
After lunch (which was pizza, and free of charge for competitors, another coolness. I live on pizza and McDonald's when I'm in Germany - there are always people selling cheap slices of pizza in train stations and elsewhere, generally reheated several times, often burnt and always delicious. Haute cuisine!) it was time for the grand final, which was me against Gunther. After those failed attempts at breaking the record, I was concerned that I might make a mess of things, so decided I needed a new strategy. Gunther, I reasoned, would assume I was going for a 30-ish-second kind of time, know he couldn't beat that, so would hope that I made a mistake and take it slowly, and make sure of getting his own recall correct. That would give me leeway to go more slowly, say 1 minute, and be certain of winning. So I did, and I have no idea why - I know from experience that going through the pack twice makes me no more likely to recall it correctly than only going through once. Strange but true. My time was about 1:00.91, I think. To my alarm, it turned out that Gunther had done about 51 seconds. He'd expected me to do the sensible thing! I'm deeply offended. Haven't I spent my whole life not doing the sensible thing? And now that for once I have, it was anticipated by my opponent? Luckily, though, he got the third card in the pack wrong, so it didn't matter. I went back to doing the silly thing for the second heat and got it perfectly right in about 36 seconds, without any trouble.
So I won, and to be perfectly honest, I won without breaking a sweat. It sounds disrespectful to the other competitors, I know, and I really should be keeping my big mouth shut here, but I would have liked to be challenged a lot more than I was.
Anyway, the final ceremony included the finals of the speedstacking - very exciting and one of those things I've been meaning to get into since learning of the sport's existence last August, although I imagine it would be hugely frustrating to keep making mistakes at crucial moments; a blindfold Rubik's cube solver (extremely cool); an attempt by Boris at the two-packs-of-cards memorisation record (much better than my own disastrous attempt in 2004, but still unsuccessful, unfortunately); a magician, and a whole lot of trophies. This, again, is normal for a German memory competition. In Britain we get a speech from Tony Buzan, maybe about how great he or one of his friends is, and a quick presentation of medals.
So, thanks to the generosity of the sponsors (Volksbank Sprockhövel - if you want a bank in Sprockhövel, check them out! Assuming they are a bank, I'm not entirely certain about that) I went away with two trophies (for winning and for the best time), and a solid gold pack of cards (seriously cool!). Of course, once again I hadn't brought a bag big enough to take them home with me as well as Ballack and my clothes and things, but I managed to cram them all into my rucksack without leaving too much behind in the hotel room (my notepad, since there wasn't anything written in it and I can easily buy another one, and my jumper, since I've got about half a dozen more at home and I only wear one at a time).
I skipped the get-together at Boris's house for the football game. Rude of me, I know, but these competitions tire me out tremendously and I just didn't feel up to it. I went back to the hotel and was fast asleep by eight, not even disturbed by the sound of Germans celebrating their victory. Which reminds me, a German interviewer at the competition asked me what I thought the result would be, and I said 2-0 to Germany. Should have put some money on it, really.
Coming home yesterday was fun - the boiling hot weather lasted right until the split second I got on the plane, when it turned into the most amazing thunderstorm, with torrential rain (the plane was sitting in the middle of like a square mile of concrete and it was all under an inch of water by the time the rain stopped), vicious wind and some really great lightning. The pilot assured us that if the plane was struck by lightning it probably wouldn't kill us, but we weren't able to take off for an hour and a half until there was a break in the weather. Luckily, I was still immersed in Kavalier and Clay. It's one of those books that can still utterly absorb you even on re-reading it. And then when we finally did fly back to Birmingham, there weren't any trains from the station because of engineering works. In fact, there are practically never trains from Birmingham International station, and I'm not sure why they still call it a railway station except out of some sense of tradition. But the replacement bus service wasn't as slow or late as they usually are, so I shouldn't complain. Incidentally, in Germany the trains really do all run on time. I was hugely impressed!
Sunday, June 25, 2006
Did I remember to set the video for Doctor Who?
Did I heckers. Now I'll have to wait till they show the whole series again on BBC3 to tape the rest of them. Anyway, lots to write about the weekend, but I'll save it for tomorrow because I've only just got back, later than planned, and I'm going straight to bed. I've got the day off tomorrow, so assuming I wake up at some point (I'm completely exhausted for some reason) I'll be able to blog at length then.
Thursday, June 22, 2006
I don't get it
And by 'it', I mean ticket inspectors on trains. Not as a person, they're all very nice people, but I don't get why they don't conduct on the same trains every day. I take the same train every morning and evening, and it's always someone different inspecting my ticket. It was the same when I was commuting from Boston to Skegness - never the same guy twice. Well, sometimes they're guyesses, but mostly they're guys.
Anyway, I'm off to Hattingen. Gradually. My plane leaves too early in the morning to get a train down there without panicking about missing it, so I'm spending the night in a hotel in Birmingham. Then I'm going to spend tomorrow sight-seeing in Dusseldorf and Essen before finally making my way to Hattingen on Saturday morning. Unless I get lost.
Anyway, I'm off to Hattingen. Gradually. My plane leaves too early in the morning to get a train down there without panicking about missing it, so I'm spending the night in a hotel in Birmingham. Then I'm going to spend tomorrow sight-seeing in Dusseldorf and Essen before finally making my way to Hattingen on Saturday morning. Unless I get lost.
Wednesday, June 21, 2006
Doctor in the house
If you've got fancy cable TV like what I have, you can see each new episode of Doctor Who three times in a week. Which should be plenty for the guy who's taping every episode for future viewing marathons, right? I missed last Saturday's because of the party, and then on Sunday I forgot to turn over to BBC3 until about 30 seconds after the episode started. So I watched it, but decided to tape it on Friday so as not to have the first couple of words missing. It occurred to me yesterday that I'll be in Essen by the time it comes on on Friday, so I'll have to set the video and remember to leave the set top box tuned to the right channel and everything, and I'm pretty hopeless at that. So if you happen to see me over the next day or so, remind me about it, okay? Thanks.
Tuesday, June 20, 2006
Ewww.
Shudder. I'm trying not to look at the TV too much in case they show another replay of Michael Owen hurting himself. I'm horribly squeamish about knee injuries, having had some very nasty ones myself in the past, and that looked sickeningly familiar. Poor guy.
On the other hand, we might get to see Theo Walcott playing now. I'm full of hopes that he can be England's surprise hero and win the cup for us.
On the other hand, we might get to see Theo Walcott playing now. I'm full of hopes that he can be England's surprise hero and win the cup for us.
Although on the other hand...
After saying yesterday that it would probably be a good thing to do a lot of practice for the speed cards challenge, I went and did three packs of cards (for the first time in a few days) and had times of 31.01, 29.51 and 27.34, a new personal best. So I think I might actually leave off training at that point. But then I did have a mistake in recall on the second pack, which is annoying. The SCC is going to be a really different kind of challenge - it's not about getting the best overall score, it's about beating your opponent each time in a knockout kind of competition (Swiss system so everyone's taking part all day, but with four rounds and sixteen competitors you can't win if you lose one heat). So I'm looking forward to the new experience. I'll play it by ear as to whether to go for a fast time or to be certain of remembering it all correctly.
I will admit my decision to go easy on the training is influenced by the fact that there's an England game tonight and I've got a Looney Tunes Special Bumper Collection video to watch (three hours of cartoons, several of which I don't think I've ever seen before, even though they're all from the fifties and therefore the kind that are on TV constantly). I bought it on eBay, only the second thing I've ever bought off there, and since it arrived this morning just before I left for work I gave positive feedback to the seller without so much as checking that the right tapes were in the box. I worry about offending someone by not giving them prompt and glowing feedback. Although the warm fuzzy glow they get from it might be diminished if they knew I could never bring myself to say anything bad about an eBay seller, even if they hacked into my bank account and stole all my money, launched a low-yield nuclear missile at my house and sent me a video with a slight distortion on the soundtrack.
I will admit my decision to go easy on the training is influenced by the fact that there's an England game tonight and I've got a Looney Tunes Special Bumper Collection video to watch (three hours of cartoons, several of which I don't think I've ever seen before, even though they're all from the fifties and therefore the kind that are on TV constantly). I bought it on eBay, only the second thing I've ever bought off there, and since it arrived this morning just before I left for work I gave positive feedback to the seller without so much as checking that the right tapes were in the box. I worry about offending someone by not giving them prompt and glowing feedback. Although the warm fuzzy glow they get from it might be diminished if they knew I could never bring myself to say anything bad about an eBay seller, even if they hacked into my bank account and stole all my money, launched a low-yield nuclear missile at my house and sent me a video with a slight distortion on the soundtrack.
Monday, June 19, 2006
General chit-chat
I met a guy at the party on Saturday night who I got on extremely well with and spent a long time talking to about this and that, until my brother accused us of being 'like a pair of woodpeckers, only talking to each other'. This is either a common expression that's passed me by all these years, or one of those phrases that only he uses.
On Sunday, I bought a fantastic graphic novel - a collection of all Alan Moore's Future Shocks from old 2000ADs. I'd read most of them before, but it's brilliant to see them all at once. And here's another reason to shop at Page 45 in Nottingham rather than Forbidden Planet - the guy on the till asked me what else Alan Moore had written, because the name sounded kind of familiar. I thought he was joking, but it turns out he was entirely ignorant of Moore's work. Now, I suppose I shouldn't expect someone working in a comic shop to have an encyclopaedic knowledge of every comic ever written (although most of them do, because who else but a comic geek wants to work in a comic shop?), but not knowing Alan Moore? If there's a single most famous writer currently producing comics, it would have to be him. Everyone who works in Page 45 can chat with you about any comic you care to name, and recommend good ones. It's the personal touch I appreciate.
I'm undecided about how much to practice speed cards before Saturday. My natural inclination is to do quite a lot, although with most championships I normally leave off training for the week beforehand. With cards, though, you can lose a couple of seconds if you get out of practice for a day or two, and there isn't going to be a huge amount of memorising in Hattingen (12 packs at most, which is nothing, really) so I don't need to worry about not having a fresh journey to use.
One of the presents I got my brother was a Harmidge leathercraft set. Make your own real leather comb case and clothes brush holder! I found it in a charity shop where it had possibly been sitting for a good thirty years - the picture on the packet shows two children with late-sixties/early-seventies hairstyles and clothes looking with delight at the pack's contents - three little pieces of leather that you have to sew together to make the comb case. You also get a comb and clothes brush, needle and thread. Possibly the most exciting birthday present anyone could hope to get.
And a Jem video, which I'm inclined to write about at greater length another time, because I watched it and realised I'd forgotten just how darn good Jem was.
On Sunday, I bought a fantastic graphic novel - a collection of all Alan Moore's Future Shocks from old 2000ADs. I'd read most of them before, but it's brilliant to see them all at once. And here's another reason to shop at Page 45 in Nottingham rather than Forbidden Planet - the guy on the till asked me what else Alan Moore had written, because the name sounded kind of familiar. I thought he was joking, but it turns out he was entirely ignorant of Moore's work. Now, I suppose I shouldn't expect someone working in a comic shop to have an encyclopaedic knowledge of every comic ever written (although most of them do, because who else but a comic geek wants to work in a comic shop?), but not knowing Alan Moore? If there's a single most famous writer currently producing comics, it would have to be him. Everyone who works in Page 45 can chat with you about any comic you care to name, and recommend good ones. It's the personal touch I appreciate.
I'm undecided about how much to practice speed cards before Saturday. My natural inclination is to do quite a lot, although with most championships I normally leave off training for the week beforehand. With cards, though, you can lose a couple of seconds if you get out of practice for a day or two, and there isn't going to be a huge amount of memorising in Hattingen (12 packs at most, which is nothing, really) so I don't need to worry about not having a fresh journey to use.
One of the presents I got my brother was a Harmidge leathercraft set. Make your own real leather comb case and clothes brush holder! I found it in a charity shop where it had possibly been sitting for a good thirty years - the picture on the packet shows two children with late-sixties/early-seventies hairstyles and clothes looking with delight at the pack's contents - three little pieces of leather that you have to sew together to make the comb case. You also get a comb and clothes brush, needle and thread. Possibly the most exciting birthday present anyone could hope to get.
And a Jem video, which I'm inclined to write about at greater length another time, because I watched it and realised I'd forgotten just how darn good Jem was.
Sunday, June 18, 2006
Beans, of the Boston Beans
The mistake was the two of us going to the Boston Bean Company Bar before the party and having four pints of lager each. Not that it stopped the party being great, it just had the effect of making me feel really, horribly unwell today. I actually lost count of how much I had to drink, which isn't like me (I don't have the problem of forgetting things I do when I'm drunk, I suppose it's part of the memory champion thing, but I do have the big problem of remembering what I've done when I'm drunk, which is worse). I was staying off the Stella, so it could have been worse, possibly.
Anyway, great party. My costume, as previously mentioned, was brilliant (photos to come when my brother gets them developed). His Zoltar outfit was really cool too, although I question the decision to base it around a skintight purple leotard that was more figure-hugging than is strictly necessary. We got a few unusual looks from people on the street outside the restaurant (did I mention this fancy dress party was in full view of the public?), which was fun. I'd write more about it, only as I mentioned I'm not well today.
Still, I've got the next five days to recover before Hattingen on Saturday - I've got Friday off work to travel there, and my boss is off for the next two weeks so hopefully work won't be too taxing.
Anyway, great party. My costume, as previously mentioned, was brilliant (photos to come when my brother gets them developed). His Zoltar outfit was really cool too, although I question the decision to base it around a skintight purple leotard that was more figure-hugging than is strictly necessary. We got a few unusual looks from people on the street outside the restaurant (did I mention this fancy dress party was in full view of the public?), which was fun. I'd write more about it, only as I mentioned I'm not well today.
Still, I've got the next five days to recover before Hattingen on Saturday - I've got Friday off work to travel there, and my boss is off for the next two weeks so hopefully work won't be too taxing.
Friday, June 16, 2006
Egad! I am such a genius!
I've made a really amazingly cool 7-Zark-7 mask. If I had a camera I'd post a picture of it here, because I'm extremely proud of my handiwork. I'll try to get someone to take a picture tomorrow, before it gets ruined (this is likely to happen, because of a minor design flaw that means I can't see at all when I'm wearing the thing).
But I've talked more than enough about 7-Zark-7 costumes over the last couple of weeks. I have definite plans for tomorrow, and I'm going to write them down so that I've got no excuse for not doing them. I'm going to get up early, sevenish if I can manage it, realistically more like eightish. Do a 30-minute binary practice starting around 8:30, watch a few cartoons on TV from 10am while wrapping presents, writing card, dealing with a few other things I can do without properly thinking. Circa 11 o'clock go out into town, get some euros for the trip to Germany next weekend, buy some comics and things. Come back, have lunch, read comics and things, practice speed numbers a bit (I'm having mad theories about possibly attempting 468 digits in five minutes and I want to see just how mad they are), then get the train to Nottingham to meet my brother at four. Which would be a busy and productive first half of the day that I could feel entirely proud of. I'll let you know what really happens, but you should probably expect it to mainly involve lying around eating sweets and watching cartoons.
But I've talked more than enough about 7-Zark-7 costumes over the last couple of weeks. I have definite plans for tomorrow, and I'm going to write them down so that I've got no excuse for not doing them. I'm going to get up early, sevenish if I can manage it, realistically more like eightish. Do a 30-minute binary practice starting around 8:30, watch a few cartoons on TV from 10am while wrapping presents, writing card, dealing with a few other things I can do without properly thinking. Circa 11 o'clock go out into town, get some euros for the trip to Germany next weekend, buy some comics and things. Come back, have lunch, read comics and things, practice speed numbers a bit (I'm having mad theories about possibly attempting 468 digits in five minutes and I want to see just how mad they are), then get the train to Nottingham to meet my brother at four. Which would be a busy and productive first half of the day that I could feel entirely proud of. I'll let you know what really happens, but you should probably expect it to mainly involve lying around eating sweets and watching cartoons.
Thursday, June 15, 2006
I need some self-discipline
Too much football-watching, not enough memory training. Not any memory training at all for the last few days, actually. But it's just so hard to turn the TV off right now!
Never mind, there's still plenty of time before the world championship. And I'm still in better shape than I was last year. I think.
Never mind, there's still plenty of time before the world championship. And I'm still in better shape than I was last year. I think.
Wednesday, June 14, 2006
Smack Street
Had a really cool letter in the post today:
Dear Ben,
My name's Owain and I am a Researcher for The Jeremy Kyle show at ITV. I'm writing to you with regard to an article that appeared in The Sun on June 9th 2006 concerning the problems in your area which is now dubbed "Smack Street" and how we may be able to help you with your nuisance neighbours.
I'm extremely interested in hearing your side of the story as I'd love to learn more about the situation as we may be able to help you in some way.
If you could please give me a call on the number below I would be more than happy to explain more.
Thank you for your time and I hope to hear from you soon.
I haven't seen the Sun article, but a bit of research tonight suggests it's based on the same press release as this one from the Telegraph (I don't read a daily newspaper unless you count the Metro, so I miss out on the juicy stories.
I didn't realise until I read that page, incidentally, that the local pensioner refusing to pay her council tax and insisting that she gets a mention in every newspaper is that woman in the picture - I see her around a lot, and she once tried to collar me and make me sign a petition insisting that the council return the boar statue to the Arboretum (long story behind that one - original statue was destroyed during the war, some bright spark had the idea of using Lottery money to make a replacement, local Muslim busybodies objected on the grounds that they find pig statues offensive, local non-Muslim busybodies like Miss Rooney counter-objected on the grounds of tradition, you know the kind of thing. I refused to sign any petitions either way. But the new statue did go up eventually, if you were wondering).
Anyway, back to the main story, this is not a bad neighbourhood! I have lived here for two and a half years now, and it's not just cheap but quiet and friendly! I've never even had a problem with neighbours playing music too loud at nights, let alone selling me drugs as I go about my daily business. Yes, there's a fair amount of drug dealing and use goes on, but not in what I'd call any serious way, and it's not something I notice on a regular basis.
And I don't appreciate my locality being characterised as some kind of hellhole. I could comfortably afford to move to the 'nice' part of town, but I don't want to. I like my little flat, and I like the neighbourhood. So stick that in your crack pipe and smoke it!
Dear Ben,
My name's Owain and I am a Researcher for The Jeremy Kyle show at ITV. I'm writing to you with regard to an article that appeared in The Sun on June 9th 2006 concerning the problems in your area which is now dubbed "Smack Street" and how we may be able to help you with your nuisance neighbours.
I'm extremely interested in hearing your side of the story as I'd love to learn more about the situation as we may be able to help you in some way.
If you could please give me a call on the number below I would be more than happy to explain more.
Thank you for your time and I hope to hear from you soon.
I haven't seen the Sun article, but a bit of research tonight suggests it's based on the same press release as this one from the Telegraph (I don't read a daily newspaper unless you count the Metro, so I miss out on the juicy stories.
I didn't realise until I read that page, incidentally, that the local pensioner refusing to pay her council tax and insisting that she gets a mention in every newspaper is that woman in the picture - I see her around a lot, and she once tried to collar me and make me sign a petition insisting that the council return the boar statue to the Arboretum (long story behind that one - original statue was destroyed during the war, some bright spark had the idea of using Lottery money to make a replacement, local Muslim busybodies objected on the grounds that they find pig statues offensive, local non-Muslim busybodies like Miss Rooney counter-objected on the grounds of tradition, you know the kind of thing. I refused to sign any petitions either way. But the new statue did go up eventually, if you were wondering).
Anyway, back to the main story, this is not a bad neighbourhood! I have lived here for two and a half years now, and it's not just cheap but quiet and friendly! I've never even had a problem with neighbours playing music too loud at nights, let alone selling me drugs as I go about my daily business. Yes, there's a fair amount of drug dealing and use goes on, but not in what I'd call any serious way, and it's not something I notice on a regular basis.
And I don't appreciate my locality being characterised as some kind of hellhole. I could comfortably afford to move to the 'nice' part of town, but I don't want to. I like my little flat, and I like the neighbourhood. So stick that in your crack pipe and smoke it!
Tuesday, June 13, 2006
Money grows on trees
Well, my internet connection's all fixed, and I had a day off to go into Nottingham and waste money on bits and pieces that I don't really want or need. I seem to be spending a lot of money just lately. I don't know why, because I've spent the last several years being quite careful about spending money (I realised that I was routinely spending quite a lot more than I earned every month, and decided that life would be more fun if I did things the other way around), but I've got out of the habit just lately.
And talking about money, I need to decide soon whether to join the company pension scheme. I'm still inclining towards not, because I really doubt whether I'm ever going to be in a position where I'm wanting to retire and needing this money I've put aside. There's just way too much that can happen in the next thirty-odd years and I hate wasting money on something that quite possibly isn't going to happen.
In other news, I've decided to believe that all people who share the same name are in fact the same person. I realised that this was a fun kind of philosophy to adopt when following the football yesterday and thinking it quite impressive that Tim Cahill has the time to play for Australia and Everton as well as writing mediocre cartoons in America. This way, of course, Andi Bell isn't just the three-times world memory champion, he's also a member of two different pop groups. With his name spelt differently.
And talking about money, I need to decide soon whether to join the company pension scheme. I'm still inclining towards not, because I really doubt whether I'm ever going to be in a position where I'm wanting to retire and needing this money I've put aside. There's just way too much that can happen in the next thirty-odd years and I hate wasting money on something that quite possibly isn't going to happen.
In other news, I've decided to believe that all people who share the same name are in fact the same person. I realised that this was a fun kind of philosophy to adopt when following the football yesterday and thinking it quite impressive that Tim Cahill has the time to play for Australia and Everton as well as writing mediocre cartoons in America. This way, of course, Andi Bell isn't just the three-times world memory champion, he's also a member of two different pop groups. With his name spelt differently.
Monday, June 12, 2006
Hanging by a thread
I wasn't planning to do a blog entry tonight, but my broadband's just come back on, so maybe I'll be able to post something quickly before it goes off again (engineer coming tomorrow morning and then with any luck I'll be back hooked up 24/7 again).
Although the thing I really want to blog about is a present I got for my brother's birthday, but I can't write about that yet in case he reads it and it spoils the surprise. So I'll save it for next week. There, that's got his hopes up, now he'll be extra thrilled with his £1 Smiths voucher.
So instead, I'll jinx the most exciting prospect of fame and fortune I've had for ages by mentioning that there's a sporting chance I'll be appearing on Brazilian TV in July or August, with them paying for my plane tickets and hotel and everything! I can't really say no to an offer like that (assuming I get an offer like that - I've currently only got an offer of a possible offer like that), but I do have my worries.
It's an issue that most people can't seem to get their heads around - I'm a memory champion, in the sense that I do well in memory competitions with their exam-style format, but I'm not a performer. I've never done a Memory Man stage show, and that's what they're looking for here. My memory techniques are designed specifically for the memory championships - more than any other competitor's systems, their sole function is to let me memorise the most information in the particular rules of each competition discipline. I struggle to flick through a pack of cards in thirty seconds and then recite it, because that's not what my system is designed for - the two-cards-to-an-image thing works great if you get to recall by sorting an unshuffled pack afterwards, but for verbal recall you probably need to stick to one image per card. So I'm not sure what to do on this live TV show in front of the Brazilian equivalent of Ant and Dec and an audience of millions.
Also, I don't speak a word of Portuguese, and I hate going to a country where I don't speak the language. It's just so rude.
Although the thing I really want to blog about is a present I got for my brother's birthday, but I can't write about that yet in case he reads it and it spoils the surprise. So I'll save it for next week. There, that's got his hopes up, now he'll be extra thrilled with his £1 Smiths voucher.
So instead, I'll jinx the most exciting prospect of fame and fortune I've had for ages by mentioning that there's a sporting chance I'll be appearing on Brazilian TV in July or August, with them paying for my plane tickets and hotel and everything! I can't really say no to an offer like that (assuming I get an offer like that - I've currently only got an offer of a possible offer like that), but I do have my worries.
It's an issue that most people can't seem to get their heads around - I'm a memory champion, in the sense that I do well in memory competitions with their exam-style format, but I'm not a performer. I've never done a Memory Man stage show, and that's what they're looking for here. My memory techniques are designed specifically for the memory championships - more than any other competitor's systems, their sole function is to let me memorise the most information in the particular rules of each competition discipline. I struggle to flick through a pack of cards in thirty seconds and then recite it, because that's not what my system is designed for - the two-cards-to-an-image thing works great if you get to recall by sorting an unshuffled pack afterwards, but for verbal recall you probably need to stick to one image per card. So I'm not sure what to do on this live TV show in front of the Brazilian equivalent of Ant and Dec and an audience of millions.
Also, I don't speak a word of Portuguese, and I hate going to a country where I don't speak the language. It's just so rude.
Sunday, June 11, 2006
Apologies for absence
Sorry I didn't write anything yesterday - my internet connection, which I mentioned recently was playing up, had stopped working altogether. So I have called someone out to look at it after all, and he's coming on Tuesday. So as I could have predicted, it's been more or less okay all day today. Never mind.
I'm annoyed with myself today - I was practicing hour numbers for the first time in much too long, and not concentrating properly a bit less than 30 minutes into it. I memorise numbers in groups of nine, and they're presented in rows of 40, which means that every ninth row the last digit is the last of a group of nine. On the fourth row of the third page I found that that happened, and thought to myself "that's not right, this is row 44, not row 45." I decided to go back and see where I'd gone wrong (which I NEVER do, I have set procedures about how to deal with it when I've made a mistake somewhere, and I should have carried on to the end of the journey then kept an eye out for the problem while reviewing it. But as I said, my mind wasn't properly on it), and couldn't find the problem. This distracted me so much that I couldn't remember any numbers at all, so I gave up. Afterwards I realised that the fourth row on the third page is row 54, not 44, and I hadn't made a mistake at all. This annoys me a lot.
I blame the temperature - it's scorching today. I've been out for the last couple of days in my unflattering shorts and tattiest T-shirt. And I need air conditioning in my flat. Or at least something over my windows to stop the flies getting in - I'm feeling terribly guilty about the number of them I've offed with chemical warfare just lately.
I'm annoyed with myself today - I was practicing hour numbers for the first time in much too long, and not concentrating properly a bit less than 30 minutes into it. I memorise numbers in groups of nine, and they're presented in rows of 40, which means that every ninth row the last digit is the last of a group of nine. On the fourth row of the third page I found that that happened, and thought to myself "that's not right, this is row 44, not row 45." I decided to go back and see where I'd gone wrong (which I NEVER do, I have set procedures about how to deal with it when I've made a mistake somewhere, and I should have carried on to the end of the journey then kept an eye out for the problem while reviewing it. But as I said, my mind wasn't properly on it), and couldn't find the problem. This distracted me so much that I couldn't remember any numbers at all, so I gave up. Afterwards I realised that the fourth row on the third page is row 54, not 44, and I hadn't made a mistake at all. This annoys me a lot.
I blame the temperature - it's scorching today. I've been out for the last couple of days in my unflattering shorts and tattiest T-shirt. And I need air conditioning in my flat. Or at least something over my windows to stop the flies getting in - I'm feeling terribly guilty about the number of them I've offed with chemical warfare just lately.
Friday, June 09, 2006
Vindaloo
Don't worry, I'm not going to go on and on about the World Cup for the next month. I know that quite a large proportion of my small but loyal readership don't like the game. Plus I have readers from the USA, who won't know what the rest of the world is talking about for the next several weeks, so I'd hate to add to their confusion. But just for tonight, football fever hits even this determinedly-different section of the blogosphere. I love the World Cup.
What's more, this is the first World Cup for years and years and years that hasn't been disturbed by having to study for exams! In 2002 I was taking my CIMA accountancy qualification round about now. In 1998 it was the AAT (the inferior accountancy qualification), while in 1994 I was dedicated to not revising for my A Levels. Back in 1990 I was in the third year and just had normal exams that didn't count for anything (I distinctly remember blaming the World Cup for me doing so badly in them), so you have to go back a whole twenty years to those halcyon days of 1986, when I was a few months shy of ten years old, to remember the happy combination of a World Cup and no revision. And it was in Mexico that year and half the games were after my bedtime. I don't remember paying any attention to the 1982 tournament, and back in 1978 I was distracted by my parents having another baby right in the middle of it. I told them at the time that it was a bad idea, but they wouldn't listen.
I'm currently cheering Ecuador on against Poland. You never know, with enough positive vibes coming from me, they might surprise everyone and win!
What's more, this is the first World Cup for years and years and years that hasn't been disturbed by having to study for exams! In 2002 I was taking my CIMA accountancy qualification round about now. In 1998 it was the AAT (the inferior accountancy qualification), while in 1994 I was dedicated to not revising for my A Levels. Back in 1990 I was in the third year and just had normal exams that didn't count for anything (I distinctly remember blaming the World Cup for me doing so badly in them), so you have to go back a whole twenty years to those halcyon days of 1986, when I was a few months shy of ten years old, to remember the happy combination of a World Cup and no revision. And it was in Mexico that year and half the games were after my bedtime. I don't remember paying any attention to the 1982 tournament, and back in 1978 I was distracted by my parents having another baby right in the middle of it. I told them at the time that it was a bad idea, but they wouldn't listen.
I'm currently cheering Ecuador on against Poland. You never know, with enough positive vibes coming from me, they might surprise everyone and win!
Thursday, June 08, 2006
Tight schedule
I’ve noticed that my plans for the weekend involve eight hours of memory training, six full football matches, hunting for a birthday present for my brother and buying the raw materials I need to make a really cool 7-Zark-7 costume. I know I said I was thinking of taking the easy route to this fancy dress party, but I’ve got the idea in my head of being Zark now, with flashing face-lights and deelyboppers and everything. I’m weird like that. So I'm obviously going to have to cut down on non-essentials like sleeping, eating proper meals and talking to people.
And hey, isn’t it hot? Except in our office, where it’s arctic because the air conditioning is working and (as seems to be the case with every office air conditioning system in the world) nobody can get it to keep the place at a comfortable temperature. I worry about getting sunburnt on top of my head on the way to and from work, though. I could wear my hat, but it’s kind of sweaty and uncomfortable in this weather. Or I could get a baseball cap or something, but that might make the hat jealous. Maybe I’ll just wear a knotted hanky.
And hey, isn’t it hot? Except in our office, where it’s arctic because the air conditioning is working and (as seems to be the case with every office air conditioning system in the world) nobody can get it to keep the place at a comfortable temperature. I worry about getting sunburnt on top of my head on the way to and from work, though. I could wear my hat, but it’s kind of sweaty and uncomfortable in this weather. Or I could get a baseball cap or something, but that might make the hat jealous. Maybe I’ll just wear a knotted hanky.
Write it on a pound note pound note
Is it completely illegal and treasonous to draw glasses and a moustache on the Queen on a five-pound note? Because I have a strange urge to do that tonight. I don’t know why, but I just thought it would brighten up a succession of people’s days as the note circulated the country and found its way into different people’s pockets. I think there should be more of that kind of thing, and I’m quite prepared to risk the death penalty over it.
Anyway, on rather more sane matters, you may recall that a couple of weeks ago I mentioned that I’m a big fan of Antonia Forest’s Marlow family books. There’s one of the series that I’ve never read, and have been vaguely looking for for ages and ages – “The Marlows and the Traitor”, the second book in the series. I realised tonight that my ‘looking’ for the last few years hasn’t involved noticing that it’s back in print again, courtesy of ‘Girls Gone By Publishers’, which is a fabulous name for a publishing company by the way.
And when I say I realised, that kind of implies that I did some active detective work, but actually all I had to do was open the mysterious parcel I got in the post today – my mum sent me her newly-acquired copy! So I officially take back 93% of the bad things I’ve said about her on this blog thing. This is unprecedented niceness on my mother’s part, and I’m going to have to think of something nice I can do for her in return. What an inconvenience…
Actually, that’s the second nice surprise I’ve had in the post this week – Jenny sent me a wonderful home-made card just to say hi, which brightened up my day no end. It’s like the old days when I used to get little presents for my brother’s birthday (next Wednesday) so I wouldn’t feel left out. Why don’t people do that any more? I still feel left out, darn it. I’m going to throw a tantrum if you’re not careful.
Anyway, on rather more sane matters, you may recall that a couple of weeks ago I mentioned that I’m a big fan of Antonia Forest’s Marlow family books. There’s one of the series that I’ve never read, and have been vaguely looking for for ages and ages – “The Marlows and the Traitor”, the second book in the series. I realised tonight that my ‘looking’ for the last few years hasn’t involved noticing that it’s back in print again, courtesy of ‘Girls Gone By Publishers’, which is a fabulous name for a publishing company by the way.
And when I say I realised, that kind of implies that I did some active detective work, but actually all I had to do was open the mysterious parcel I got in the post today – my mum sent me her newly-acquired copy! So I officially take back 93% of the bad things I’ve said about her on this blog thing. This is unprecedented niceness on my mother’s part, and I’m going to have to think of something nice I can do for her in return. What an inconvenience…
Actually, that’s the second nice surprise I’ve had in the post this week – Jenny sent me a wonderful home-made card just to say hi, which brightened up my day no end. It’s like the old days when I used to get little presents for my brother’s birthday (next Wednesday) so I wouldn’t feel left out. Why don’t people do that any more? I still feel left out, darn it. I’m going to throw a tantrum if you’re not careful.
Tuesday, June 06, 2006
Ecuador!
The title to be sung in the style of that dance record from a few years ago. I've got Ecuador in the office World Cup sweepstake, which probably isn't a good one to get. Although I'll be all the more pleasantly surprised if they do win, of course. But before the draw I was thinking of spending the winnings on a new pair of work shoes. It struck me today that my foot coverings were strictly decorative - with the holes in the soles and in my socks, my right heel was actually touching the floor. This is the point where even I think about buying some new ones.
Incidentally, if you were wondering why my last blog post didn't show up on the internet until this morning, it's because my broadband connection is continuing to be dodgy and it wasn't working last night. And if you weren't wondering, well, don't let me keep you. You just go back to whatever you were doing that was so much more important than cataloguing every minute detail of my life. I don't mind. Hmmph.
Anyway, from past experience it will sort itself out in the long run whether I call Ntl out or not - it's done this two or three times before, going all intermittent and random on me, and then it fixes itself or gets fixed and it's fine for months on end. It might possibly get fixed quicker if I call them and they send someone out to poke it, or maybe it won't. I don't really remember how conclusive it was the one time they did send a man round. And it does mean taking a day off work to wait for him to turn up.
On the other hand, it does mean taking a day off work to wait for him to turn up. And I have been feeling like I could do with a day off work. Maybe I will call them. And I notice now that the connection's died again. So this might get posted in the morning again. Or next week, or next month. We'll see.
Incidentally, if you were wondering why my last blog post didn't show up on the internet until this morning, it's because my broadband connection is continuing to be dodgy and it wasn't working last night. And if you weren't wondering, well, don't let me keep you. You just go back to whatever you were doing that was so much more important than cataloguing every minute detail of my life. I don't mind. Hmmph.
Anyway, from past experience it will sort itself out in the long run whether I call Ntl out or not - it's done this two or three times before, going all intermittent and random on me, and then it fixes itself or gets fixed and it's fine for months on end. It might possibly get fixed quicker if I call them and they send someone out to poke it, or maybe it won't. I don't really remember how conclusive it was the one time they did send a man round. And it does mean taking a day off work to wait for him to turn up.
On the other hand, it does mean taking a day off work to wait for him to turn up. And I have been feeling like I could do with a day off work. Maybe I will call them. And I notice now that the connection's died again. So this might get posted in the morning again. Or next week, or next month. We'll see.
Soundtrack
Some people have a ‘current music’ bit on their livejournal entry every day. That seems kind of strange to me, since I have the telly on more than half the time while I’m writing my blog. Still, tonight it’s music, and I thought I should record that I’m listening to ‘More Abba Gold’, one of my favourites from my limited CD collection. I like it much more than the original Abba Gold, strangely enough – I’ve got that one too, but I hardly ever listen to it. The ‘Abba songs that aren’t quite good enough for their greatest hits’ album, though, I really adore. So many really beautiful tunes on it. Maybe I’m just weird.
Anyway, I need to sit down and work on memory things. Names and faces, and abstract images, specifically. That is, not the ones I like doing and am quite happy to practice all the time, but the one I have a mental block with and the brand new one that I haven’t worked out a technique for yet. Since they’re insisting on keeping the patterns (which as I mentioned before is colossally stupid), I need to identify how many of them there are, codify them and work out the best way to go about memorising them. Then maybe I can get a big score and persuade the Powers That Be to do a proper images discipline where you actually need to look at the images.
See, I’m still all worked up about this thing. I worry that I’m taking things much too seriously sometimes. But as a bit of light relief, it’s only three weeks to the Speed Cards Challenge! That’s going to be a lot of fun, and I’ve got the flights and hotel booked, I’m in good form with the cards so no need to work hard on the training, I can just enjoy the whole thing and hopefully blow everyone away on the day.
Still need to get a costume for the party in two weeks’ time, though. I’m not sure when I’m going to fit that into my busy schedule, but I’m sure I’ll manage.
Anyway, I need to sit down and work on memory things. Names and faces, and abstract images, specifically. That is, not the ones I like doing and am quite happy to practice all the time, but the one I have a mental block with and the brand new one that I haven’t worked out a technique for yet. Since they’re insisting on keeping the patterns (which as I mentioned before is colossally stupid), I need to identify how many of them there are, codify them and work out the best way to go about memorising them. Then maybe I can get a big score and persuade the Powers That Be to do a proper images discipline where you actually need to look at the images.
See, I’m still all worked up about this thing. I worry that I’m taking things much too seriously sometimes. But as a bit of light relief, it’s only three weeks to the Speed Cards Challenge! That’s going to be a lot of fun, and I’ve got the flights and hotel booked, I’m in good form with the cards so no need to work hard on the training, I can just enjoy the whole thing and hopefully blow everyone away on the day.
Still need to get a costume for the party in two weeks’ time, though. I’m not sure when I’m going to fit that into my busy schedule, but I’m sure I’ll manage.
Sunday, June 04, 2006
A snip at only 299
Because I always fail to notice when the mileometer of this blog clicks over, I think I should celebrate the fact that tonight's entry is number 299. Woohoo! It really is coming up to a year since I started properly writing something here, every night that I haven't got a good excuse not to. You've got to admit that's pretty impressive.
Although I can't really think of anything worth writing about today, so it's a good thing this isn't a real round-numbered post. I'll just have to make sure to say something thrilling and noteworthy tomorrow. I hope something more exciting than a usual Monday at the office happens. Maybe I'll arrange for an aeroplane to crash on the building, or aliens to make contact during my lunch break, or my bag of crisps in my briefcase to come open on the way to work making them all soggy when I come to eat them. You know, something thrilling like that.
Although I can't really think of anything worth writing about today, so it's a good thing this isn't a real round-numbered post. I'll just have to make sure to say something thrilling and noteworthy tomorrow. I hope something more exciting than a usual Monday at the office happens. Maybe I'll arrange for an aeroplane to crash on the building, or aliens to make contact during my lunch break, or my bag of crisps in my briefcase to come open on the way to work making them all soggy when I come to eat them. You know, something thrilling like that.
Saturday, June 03, 2006
London Nights
Just got back from London after a day's othelloing. And on turning on the computer I thought "hey, there's a tournament on kurnik starting in three minutes. I should play in that!" Then I remembered half a minute too late that I'm drunk and tired and this isn't going to do my rating any good. But never mind.
Today was fun - the tournament was (as I think I mentioned yesterday) in the George public house on the Strand. It's one of those pubs that are steeped in tradition and go out of their way to tell you about it, although to be fair if Samuel Johnson once used my place as his postal address, I'd boast about it too. Among the photos and drawings on the walls I noticed one of soldiers drinking with the caption "Let me the canakin clink", so it's obviously a very suitable venue for an Othello tournament. We didn't get let into the building until 11am, and we were due to be kicked out at 6:45, which I thought would cause all kinds of trouble trying to fit in seven rounds (which generally last an hour each) and a lunch break. It turned out not to be any trouble at all, and we were finished by about half past five. Shows what I know.
There was also some actual playing of the game involved in the day too - I didn't play quite as spectacularly badly as at Cambridge (although dead mice have been observed to play better othello than I did at Cambridge, so that's not saying much) and managed to win three out of seven. Iain Barrass won. Other things happened too, probably. I'd make a terrible reporter, wouldn't I? Actually, the most entertaining part was having a drink in the pub afterwards and playing othello-related truth-or-dare.
Today was fun - the tournament was (as I think I mentioned yesterday) in the George public house on the Strand. It's one of those pubs that are steeped in tradition and go out of their way to tell you about it, although to be fair if Samuel Johnson once used my place as his postal address, I'd boast about it too. Among the photos and drawings on the walls I noticed one of soldiers drinking with the caption "Let me the canakin clink", so it's obviously a very suitable venue for an Othello tournament. We didn't get let into the building until 11am, and we were due to be kicked out at 6:45, which I thought would cause all kinds of trouble trying to fit in seven rounds (which generally last an hour each) and a lunch break. It turned out not to be any trouble at all, and we were finished by about half past five. Shows what I know.
There was also some actual playing of the game involved in the day too - I didn't play quite as spectacularly badly as at Cambridge (although dead mice have been observed to play better othello than I did at Cambridge, so that's not saying much) and managed to win three out of seven. Iain Barrass won. Other things happened too, probably. I'd make a terrible reporter, wouldn't I? Actually, the most entertaining part was having a drink in the pub afterwards and playing othello-related truth-or-dare.
Friday, June 02, 2006
Sartorial elegance
I normally defiantly wear a suit and tie on Fridays, even though it's casual day. Two reasons - firstly, I can't think like an accountant unless I'm dressed like one, and secondly I haven't got a lot of clothes that are more or less acceptable for being seen in. I'd hate to go to work in the same T-shirt more than once. Besides, everyone else wears England shirts and I'd stick out like a sore thumb with my Dr Seuss or pocket dragons shirts.
Today, though, I had to go casual, because the finance team were having our fortnightly meeting combined with a team-building pub lunch, and it was my turn to be chairman. Which would have meant everyone in the pub seeing me as the stuffy old boss in his suit and tie hassling his casually-dressed staff with work stuff during lunch. Regular readers will already know my attitude to meetings, team-building and unfavourable public opinion, so I really had no choice but to minimise the annoyance by ditching the accountant costume in favour of jeans and my stylish (ten years ago, possibly) bright green collarless shirt. The one I wore on The Weakest Link, for my TV fans.
Still, it wasn't such a bad day - we got confirmation that we're all getting a 3% pay rise, backdated to the start of April, which will be nice. Although since the big bosses are over the moon about the stockbrokers upgrading our shares from 'hold' to 'buy', you'd think they could have shared the anticipated wealth with the masses in a slightly more extravagant way.
Also, it's the weekend again! Othello in London tomorrow, at the George pub on the Strand where we had the London regional two or three years ago and I did unusually well. That's probably a good omen. 18 players signed up, which would break all recent records for Regional attendance! And not starting till 10:30 due to a last minute change of plans and landlord, so I don't have to get up too spectacularly early. Unless I decide to get up at 5:30 anyway to watch the cartoons on Boomerang, I'll see how I feel.
Today, though, I had to go casual, because the finance team were having our fortnightly meeting combined with a team-building pub lunch, and it was my turn to be chairman. Which would have meant everyone in the pub seeing me as the stuffy old boss in his suit and tie hassling his casually-dressed staff with work stuff during lunch. Regular readers will already know my attitude to meetings, team-building and unfavourable public opinion, so I really had no choice but to minimise the annoyance by ditching the accountant costume in favour of jeans and my stylish (ten years ago, possibly) bright green collarless shirt. The one I wore on The Weakest Link, for my TV fans.
Still, it wasn't such a bad day - we got confirmation that we're all getting a 3% pay rise, backdated to the start of April, which will be nice. Although since the big bosses are over the moon about the stockbrokers upgrading our shares from 'hold' to 'buy', you'd think they could have shared the anticipated wealth with the masses in a slightly more extravagant way.
Also, it's the weekend again! Othello in London tomorrow, at the George pub on the Strand where we had the London regional two or three years ago and I did unusually well. That's probably a good omen. 18 players signed up, which would break all recent records for Regional attendance! And not starting till 10:30 due to a last minute change of plans and landlord, so I don't have to get up too spectacularly early. Unless I decide to get up at 5:30 anyway to watch the cartoons on Boomerang, I'll see how I feel.
Thursday, June 01, 2006
It's Thursday already?
Three-day weeks confuse the heck out of me. Still, it's a good kind of confusion, because there's only one more work day till the weekend. Woohoo!
I'm getting to the point where I can count the number of free weekends I've got left to practice for the WMC, and realise there's not many. Probably about five now at most. Time to come up with a definite plan for how much I'm going to attempt in the hour-long events, because it needs a couple of trials to work it out. And then I always change my mind at the last moment on the day of the competition, so I suppose it doesn't really matter in the end.
What concerns me more is that I really don't like Robbie Williams's latest single. This is unusual for me, I normally secretly love his stuff (but I wouldn't tell anybody in case they laugh at me). They normally take a while to grow on me, I didn't like Advertising Space when it first came out but I'm still singing it now, but this one definitely isn't. Perhaps now I can truthfully go around saying 'ugh, no, not Robbie Williams, turn it off!' and people will think I'm cool.
I'm getting to the point where I can count the number of free weekends I've got left to practice for the WMC, and realise there's not many. Probably about five now at most. Time to come up with a definite plan for how much I'm going to attempt in the hour-long events, because it needs a couple of trials to work it out. And then I always change my mind at the last moment on the day of the competition, so I suppose it doesn't really matter in the end.
What concerns me more is that I really don't like Robbie Williams's latest single. This is unusual for me, I normally secretly love his stuff (but I wouldn't tell anybody in case they laugh at me). They normally take a while to grow on me, I didn't like Advertising Space when it first came out but I'm still singing it now, but this one definitely isn't. Perhaps now I can truthfully go around saying 'ugh, no, not Robbie Williams, turn it off!' and people will think I'm cool.
Wednesday, May 31, 2006
No costume = No admittance
I've just been reminded that I haven't yet done anything about arranging a costume for my brother's birthday party in two and a half weeks. Yes, it's fancy dress. And not just that, it's Battle of the Planets fancy dress, and if I don't at least turn up in stripey flared trousers and numbered T-shirt, preferably full good or bad guy costume complete with helmet and accessories, I will be unceremoniously thrown out on the streets. 28 years of deriding, bullying and occasionally being nice to a guy counts for nothing at one of these shindigs.
I was thinking of making a Spectra guard outfit, but then I saw this super-cool home-made helmet on the internet which puts anything I could possibly come up with to shame. I'll just stick with my original plan of going as Chief Anderson, although that would involve shaving off bits of my beard to just leave the moustache and sideburns. And buying a wig. Or I could cobble together a 7-Zark-7 costume...
I was thinking of making a Spectra guard outfit, but then I saw this super-cool home-made helmet on the internet which puts anything I could possibly come up with to shame. I'll just stick with my original plan of going as Chief Anderson, although that would involve shaving off bits of my beard to just leave the moustache and sideburns. And buying a wig. Or I could cobble together a 7-Zark-7 costume...
Tuesday, May 30, 2006
It's like collecting stamps, only funnier
I've decided to get on with that longtime ambition of mine to collect every Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoon on tape. As I think I've mentioned before, the rules of the game are to get as many as I can through either taping them off the TV or finding obscure video and DVD releases, before resorting to downloading or asking someone else to make me a copy. Not that I have any ethical problem with 'stealing' cartoons like that, I just like the challenge of hunting for them myself. There are quite a lot that practically never get shown on TV, and probably haven't ever come out even on the dodgiest of videos, but some intensive research and cartoon-hunting might still track them down. I think I've got about 100 now, so 900 still to go...
What I'll do when I've got them all, I don't know. I have a mind to start another blog and review one cartoon a day until I've got through the lot of them (which would take about three years). I think it would be fun, anyway.
In other news, I've had the day off work sick today. I'm just feeling completely run down - I've essentially spent the whole last three days in bed. Don't know what it is. I think the cure is to give myself a (strictly metaphorical) kick up the backside, get up early tomorrow and spend a long day at the office whether I feel up to it or not. But I'd appreciate any ahh noises and messages of sympathy if anyone wants to send them...
What I'll do when I've got them all, I don't know. I have a mind to start another blog and review one cartoon a day until I've got through the lot of them (which would take about three years). I think it would be fun, anyway.
In other news, I've had the day off work sick today. I'm just feeling completely run down - I've essentially spent the whole last three days in bed. Don't know what it is. I think the cure is to give myself a (strictly metaphorical) kick up the backside, get up early tomorrow and spend a long day at the office whether I feel up to it or not. But I'd appreciate any ahh noises and messages of sympathy if anyone wants to send them...
Monday, May 29, 2006
Blog roll
I haven't got one of those lists on my minimalist blog here of other people whose blogs and things I read on a regular basis. This makes me feel quite guilty, since several of them have links to me, so here - look at these people, everyone:
Log/Sam
Sleepy/Mike
Crispy/Emma
Jemfo/Jen (you have to be on her friends list, but if you know her I'm sure she'll add you to it. And if you don't, well, you can always ask.)
Jemfy's other blog
Darth Tigger/Jess
Schecki/Jennabean/Jenn
Is that all the VPSers? I bet I've forgotten someone who'll be mortally offended now. They'll never speak to me again, whoever they are, and spread malicious rumours about me behind my back.
Log/Sam
Sleepy/Mike
Crispy/Emma
Jemfo/Jen (you have to be on her friends list, but if you know her I'm sure she'll add you to it. And if you don't, well, you can always ask.)
Jemfy's other blog
Darth Tigger/Jess
Schecki/Jennabean/Jenn
Is that all the VPSers? I bet I've forgotten someone who'll be mortally offended now. They'll never speak to me again, whoever they are, and spread malicious rumours about me behind my back.
Sunday, May 28, 2006
Lazy Sunday Book
If anyone's keenly following my othello progress, I came 11th out of 24 in last night's tournament, which could have been a lot worse, and didn't play all that badly. So who knows, I might not lose all my games on Saturday.
Anyway, I've done nothing at all today. I didn't get out of bed till gone twelve, and I've spent the whole afternoon lounging around lethargically. I think I've got sleeping sickness. Or ME. Or clinical depression. Hmm, I need to get a medical encyclopaedia so I can look up more possible ailments - I'd quite like to be a hypochondriac, it sounds like a fun hobby.
Still, no work tomorrow so I can do things then. This is, of course, the root of my laziness problem - why do anything today when it can be safely put off until the extra Sunday tomorrow?
Hey, I was going to talk about comics last night, wasn't I? I went into Nottingham yesterday for a change, where there's a really cool comic shop called Page 45. They stock a really wide range of comics and comic-related junk, and the people who work there are really nice and friendly too. They charge 60p more for a $2.99 comic than Forbidden Planet just round the corner, so they obviously either need the support or have commendable levels of cheek. I always buy stuff there, anyway - there should be more comic shops like that.
As well as the usual week's supply of superhero action (including She-Hulk #8, that makes me go oo, isn't Dan Slott the best writer in the world, not for the first time) I bought volume 28 of Ranma½, which I would urge anyone who hasn't heard of it before to check out. There are actually 30 volumes out now, I've just got a bit behind with buying them. It's a hilarious martial arts comedy saga from Japan, by Rumiko Takahashi about a young martial artist called Ranma who turns into a girl when he comes into contact with cold water. He has a huge range of friends and enemies, most of whom also turn into something else when exposed to cold water, three fiancées and countless rivals for their affection, and a mother who will force him to commit ritual suicide if she finds out he's a girl part of the time. This volume features a girl who trains sumo wrestling pigs, a cure for Ranma's father's baldness, Ranma's teacher harnessing the battle energy created by fighting fish to make her a better teacher, Kuno being posessed by a tree in such a way that only a date with Ranma will cure him, a fever providing a temporary cure for cold-water-related transformations and a cursed kitchen spatula. I don't think there's another comic series in the world that stays so inventive after such a long time.
Since I've got no money at the moment and that always makes me splash out on things, I also bought Babymouse - Queen Of The World! by Jennifer L Holm and Matthew Holm, which is somehow also a lot of fun. It's the adventures of a young mouse girl who wanders off into pink-coloured fantasy sequences at the slightest provocation. The characters and plot are a string of overused clichés, but in this case it still works. It's funny. You should buy this, too.
Anyway, I've done nothing at all today. I didn't get out of bed till gone twelve, and I've spent the whole afternoon lounging around lethargically. I think I've got sleeping sickness. Or ME. Or clinical depression. Hmm, I need to get a medical encyclopaedia so I can look up more possible ailments - I'd quite like to be a hypochondriac, it sounds like a fun hobby.
Still, no work tomorrow so I can do things then. This is, of course, the root of my laziness problem - why do anything today when it can be safely put off until the extra Sunday tomorrow?
Hey, I was going to talk about comics last night, wasn't I? I went into Nottingham yesterday for a change, where there's a really cool comic shop called Page 45. They stock a really wide range of comics and comic-related junk, and the people who work there are really nice and friendly too. They charge 60p more for a $2.99 comic than Forbidden Planet just round the corner, so they obviously either need the support or have commendable levels of cheek. I always buy stuff there, anyway - there should be more comic shops like that.
As well as the usual week's supply of superhero action (including She-Hulk #8, that makes me go oo, isn't Dan Slott the best writer in the world, not for the first time) I bought volume 28 of Ranma½, which I would urge anyone who hasn't heard of it before to check out. There are actually 30 volumes out now, I've just got a bit behind with buying them. It's a hilarious martial arts comedy saga from Japan, by Rumiko Takahashi about a young martial artist called Ranma who turns into a girl when he comes into contact with cold water. He has a huge range of friends and enemies, most of whom also turn into something else when exposed to cold water, three fiancées and countless rivals for their affection, and a mother who will force him to commit ritual suicide if she finds out he's a girl part of the time. This volume features a girl who trains sumo wrestling pigs, a cure for Ranma's father's baldness, Ranma's teacher harnessing the battle energy created by fighting fish to make her a better teacher, Kuno being posessed by a tree in such a way that only a date with Ranma will cure him, a fever providing a temporary cure for cold-water-related transformations and a cursed kitchen spatula. I don't think there's another comic series in the world that stays so inventive after such a long time.
Since I've got no money at the moment and that always makes me splash out on things, I also bought Babymouse - Queen Of The World! by Jennifer L Holm and Matthew Holm, which is somehow also a lot of fun. It's the adventures of a young mouse girl who wanders off into pink-coloured fantasy sequences at the slightest provocation. The characters and plot are a string of overused clichés, but in this case it still works. It's funny. You should buy this, too.
Saturday, May 27, 2006
Better things to do
I'm in the middle of an othello tournament on kurnik, trying to remember how to play the game before next Saturday's London regional, and I haven't got the time tonight to write what I was planning to (it's about comics, and I know nobody reading this likes those posts anyway, so you're not missing much). So, sorry, this is all you get tonight. No refunds.
Friday, May 26, 2006
Memory gossip
While I've been rambling about Chaucer, Channel 5 and Charlie Fox, it's been quite a busy week for the world of 'memory sports', or at least my little corner of it. It just turned out today that the German Championship has been postponed until some time in the autumn, which is a real annoyance. Also, the World Championship has been confirmed as taking place at Imperial College, London - not very glamorous, but there are worse places it could be - on August 19-21.
What I need, though, is a competition before then to get me properly in memory-championship-winning mood. For the last couple of years that role's been performed by the German championship, and the year before that it was the MSO. This year there's only the Speed Cards Challenge (which is a completely different kind of affair), unless I can engineer something else to fill the gap.
There is a vague possibility, though, from two sources. Firstly, James Jorasch and Chris Harwood have been talking about holding a memory championship in Manhattan some time in August. Just cards and numbers, James speculated, which sounds familiar. I've also spoken this week to one of the six billion TV producers trying to sell a memory documentary to Channel 4, and he's spoken to Andi Bell (quite a feat, these days). Andi, it seems, hasn't been training, doesn't think he'll come to the WMC this year, but is still talking about organising a championship of his own. Like the Memory World Cup in 2004, which was just cards and numbers, and a lot of fun.
There must be a way to get these people together and use their business sense and passion for memory competitions to benefit me in some way. I would love to see another World Cup - it would be great to have that on the regular schedule of competitions every year (that, and Gunther's reaction would keep me amused). July would be better than August, obviously, now that there's a void left by the German Championship. But would anyone come to a World Cup in America? Probably not. Well, Americans would, and I would, but I'd want to get some Germans over there too to make it a proper competition. We'd need to find a big sponsor or eccentric millionaire to throw money at it, but that kind of thing's possible for the likes of Andi or James if they put their minds to it.
I haven't got a phone number for Andi, of course, and I'm not sure I've got a current email address either, but I'm sure I could track him down...
In other news, thanks to the Metro free-on-trains newspaper, I've just discovered the pop group with the coolest name ever: Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly. With full stops in the name and everything. Classic. Their music is pretty good too - check them out.
While I'm talking about the Metro, I should also mention that it has a rather cool comic strip - Nemi. Which according to my research is a popular Norwegian strip that's quite rightly gathering a cult following here in Britain. Although the British translation, given where it appears, is understandably toned down a bit from the Norwegian original - granted that I only speak one word of Norwegian, I'm almost certain Nemi's first word in the third panel of this strip isn't 'sod' like it is in the Metro version...
It's cool that they're still happy to show Nemi smoking and drinking and having casual sex, though. I hate excessive censorship.
What I need, though, is a competition before then to get me properly in memory-championship-winning mood. For the last couple of years that role's been performed by the German championship, and the year before that it was the MSO. This year there's only the Speed Cards Challenge (which is a completely different kind of affair), unless I can engineer something else to fill the gap.
There is a vague possibility, though, from two sources. Firstly, James Jorasch and Chris Harwood have been talking about holding a memory championship in Manhattan some time in August. Just cards and numbers, James speculated, which sounds familiar. I've also spoken this week to one of the six billion TV producers trying to sell a memory documentary to Channel 4, and he's spoken to Andi Bell (quite a feat, these days). Andi, it seems, hasn't been training, doesn't think he'll come to the WMC this year, but is still talking about organising a championship of his own. Like the Memory World Cup in 2004, which was just cards and numbers, and a lot of fun.
There must be a way to get these people together and use their business sense and passion for memory competitions to benefit me in some way. I would love to see another World Cup - it would be great to have that on the regular schedule of competitions every year (that, and Gunther's reaction would keep me amused). July would be better than August, obviously, now that there's a void left by the German Championship. But would anyone come to a World Cup in America? Probably not. Well, Americans would, and I would, but I'd want to get some Germans over there too to make it a proper competition. We'd need to find a big sponsor or eccentric millionaire to throw money at it, but that kind of thing's possible for the likes of Andi or James if they put their minds to it.
I haven't got a phone number for Andi, of course, and I'm not sure I've got a current email address either, but I'm sure I could track him down...
In other news, thanks to the Metro free-on-trains newspaper, I've just discovered the pop group with the coolest name ever: Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly. With full stops in the name and everything. Classic. Their music is pretty good too - check them out.
While I'm talking about the Metro, I should also mention that it has a rather cool comic strip - Nemi. Which according to my research is a popular Norwegian strip that's quite rightly gathering a cult following here in Britain. Although the British translation, given where it appears, is understandably toned down a bit from the Norwegian original - granted that I only speak one word of Norwegian, I'm almost certain Nemi's first word in the third panel of this strip isn't 'sod' like it is in the Metro version...
It's cool that they're still happy to show Nemi smoking and drinking and having casual sex, though. I hate excessive censorship.
Thursday, May 25, 2006
Testing, testing, one two three...
My internet connection is a bit dodgy tonight, so I'm hoping this goes through and doesn't get lost in cyberspace. Because I'm not typing it again, I'll tell you that.
Anyway, a couple of days ago I bought myself a new copy of the complete works of Geoffrey Chaucer. My brother borrowed my old one and lost it, somehow. It's about 1500 pages and the size of a house, so it seems to me you'd have to be pretty creative to lose something like that, but never mind. I also really shouldn't be spending twenty-something quid on a book until I get paid next week, since the Cambridge memory competition seriously drained my bank account, but never mind. I can always rob a bank or something.
Anyway, I've been into Chaucer for a long time, ever since stumbling across the Miller's Tale when I was somewhere in the region of 14 years old. I'm not sure exactly what the appeal is - I don't mind a bit of poetry from time to time, but Chaucer's the only great poet I could do the life and works of on Mastermind. The Middle English is something to do with it, I'm sure - reading his works is like a puzzle, you need to translate it into modern words and still appreciate the poetic effects he manages to achieve with a horribly cumbersome language. There's a reason all the poets before the 14th century wrote in Latin or French, they're much easier to make something beautiful from than the English of Chaucer's time.
Then there's the fun of trying to establish exactly what Chaucer originally wrote, since he came from a time before the printing press was invented and no two manuscripts are quite the same. What I'd really like to do some day is discover a lost 14th/15th century manuscript of one of his more obscure poems and keep it to myself until I've transcribed it and compared it to the other existing ones. That would show all those professor types and book-losing English-literature-PhDs how cool I am!
Anyway, a couple of days ago I bought myself a new copy of the complete works of Geoffrey Chaucer. My brother borrowed my old one and lost it, somehow. It's about 1500 pages and the size of a house, so it seems to me you'd have to be pretty creative to lose something like that, but never mind. I also really shouldn't be spending twenty-something quid on a book until I get paid next week, since the Cambridge memory competition seriously drained my bank account, but never mind. I can always rob a bank or something.
Anyway, I've been into Chaucer for a long time, ever since stumbling across the Miller's Tale when I was somewhere in the region of 14 years old. I'm not sure exactly what the appeal is - I don't mind a bit of poetry from time to time, but Chaucer's the only great poet I could do the life and works of on Mastermind. The Middle English is something to do with it, I'm sure - reading his works is like a puzzle, you need to translate it into modern words and still appreciate the poetic effects he manages to achieve with a horribly cumbersome language. There's a reason all the poets before the 14th century wrote in Latin or French, they're much easier to make something beautiful from than the English of Chaucer's time.
Then there's the fun of trying to establish exactly what Chaucer originally wrote, since he came from a time before the printing press was invented and no two manuscripts are quite the same. What I'd really like to do some day is discover a lost 14th/15th century manuscript of one of his more obscure poems and keep it to myself until I've transcribed it and compared it to the other existing ones. That would show all those professor types and book-losing English-literature-PhDs how cool I am!
Wednesday, May 24, 2006
Pesky copycatting Channel 5
I've just noticed there was a programme on tonight called "The Mystery of the Mary Celeste: Revealed". Now everyone will think that that exciting story I wrote last Tuesday was inspired by flicking through this week's Radio Times (which came out that day) rather than by whatever did inspire it. I can't remember what it was. Still, I won't let it discourage me, I know how much my loyal readers enjoy reading my occasional attempts to be funny rather than writing about something interesting or enlightening (actual quote - "I even liked that thing with Sunderland and the Prime Minister...")
I see there's a programme on Channel 4 later tonight about the Pet Shop Boys. I used to be a big fan of them back in the 80s, and I think it's cool that they're still going strong, even if they can't write good songs any more or persuade anyone to buy the ones they do release. They still seem to be nice guys.
I see there's a programme on Channel 4 later tonight about the Pet Shop Boys. I used to be a big fan of them back in the 80s, and I think it's cool that they're still going strong, even if they can't write good songs any more or persuade anyone to buy the ones they do release. They still seem to be nice guys.
Tuesday, May 23, 2006
Would you, could you, with a fox?
I keep seeing foxes out the window of the train as it's coming into Derby station. Or maybe it's the same fox every time, I'm not sure. But I never used to see them when I was living in rural Lincolnshire, it's only since moving to the big city, which is strange. Admittedly my old boss Andrew and his gang went out shooting foxes back there on a regular basis, but they never seemed to run out of innocent creatures to slaughter so you'd think I would have seen them around a bit more. Maybe Derby's just the fox capital of the world. Or maybe this one fox is following me around with nefarious intent. If I had a wallet, I'd keep a close eye on it.
Monday, May 22, 2006
Auditors, yuck.
Yes, it's the highlight of every accountant's year, having auditors coming around and poking their nose into the accounts to make sure you're not siphoning the company's money into a Swiss bank account and buying Ferraris and helicopters. This lot today weren't too bad, I thought, although other people were saying they were more rigorous than the last bunch. But they were entirely cool with me providing backing information that didn't come close to showing the kind of figures that it should have done for all the little bits and pieces they decided to investigate (due to administrative errors and things that date back to before I started, of course). Secretly, auditors really don't want to find problems with the accounts. Oh sure, they dream of uncovering a multi-billion dollar fraud some time and exposing corruption at the highest levels, but when it comes to bread-and-butter stuff like the little subsidiary company of ours that they were auditing today they just want to be reassured that we more or less know what we're doing, so they can sign it off and get home on time. Still, it keeps a lot of people in unnecessary employment, which is probably good for the world, economically speaking.
Sunday, May 21, 2006
Who let the bunnies out?
It must be at least a few days since I last devoted a blog entry to wittering on about a cartoon rather than anything my devoted readers might be interested in reading about, so let's talk about Loonatics Unleashed, shall we?
It's a futuristic superhero action-comedy series featuring heroes based on the Looney Tunes characters, and it's not as good as that makes it sound. It has its moments, but with that kind of premise it should be really quite cool. It also should be funny occasionally, but it really isn't. It bugs me that the Daffy Duck analogue is used almost entirely for comic relief while the others are the cool, useful heroes. Actually, in today's episode he did pitch in in the big fight scenes and pull his weight, but that's a rarity. The plots are generic superhero stuff, which I'm fine with, but there's no character interaction between the heroes, so you can't really connect with the stories.
And the voice acting could be a lot better, particularly Charlie Schlatter as Ace Bunny. I'd never heard of him before this, although looking him up on IMDB, he's done additional voices on quite a few series I've watched in the past. But he really doesn't get this voice right, and I'm not sure whether that's his fault or the director's - he's not trying to sound like Bugs, but the script has him saying 'oi' instead of 'er' sounds, and that just doesn't go with the accent he delivers every other word in. It sounds really weird. And Jason Marsden, who's really quite a good voice actor, doesn't really impress me as Danger Duck. They should have got Joe Alaskey. Rob Paulsen's as good as usual, though.
I always worry about saying bad things about people on here in case they read it. So nobody show this to the cast or producers of Loonatics, please.
On the other hand, the latest batch of Codename: Kids Next Door episodes is brilliant. When I saw the first couple without Mo Willems credited as writer I thought it had lost its touch, but then they came out with a couple of all-time classics (Caked-Five, Daddy) so I'm not worried. And this weekend's Doctor Who was really cool too, one of the best yet.
It's a futuristic superhero action-comedy series featuring heroes based on the Looney Tunes characters, and it's not as good as that makes it sound. It has its moments, but with that kind of premise it should be really quite cool. It also should be funny occasionally, but it really isn't. It bugs me that the Daffy Duck analogue is used almost entirely for comic relief while the others are the cool, useful heroes. Actually, in today's episode he did pitch in in the big fight scenes and pull his weight, but that's a rarity. The plots are generic superhero stuff, which I'm fine with, but there's no character interaction between the heroes, so you can't really connect with the stories.
And the voice acting could be a lot better, particularly Charlie Schlatter as Ace Bunny. I'd never heard of him before this, although looking him up on IMDB, he's done additional voices on quite a few series I've watched in the past. But he really doesn't get this voice right, and I'm not sure whether that's his fault or the director's - he's not trying to sound like Bugs, but the script has him saying 'oi' instead of 'er' sounds, and that just doesn't go with the accent he delivers every other word in. It sounds really weird. And Jason Marsden, who's really quite a good voice actor, doesn't really impress me as Danger Duck. They should have got Joe Alaskey. Rob Paulsen's as good as usual, though.
I always worry about saying bad things about people on here in case they read it. So nobody show this to the cast or producers of Loonatics, please.
On the other hand, the latest batch of Codename: Kids Next Door episodes is brilliant. When I saw the first couple without Mo Willems credited as writer I thought it had lost its touch, but then they came out with a couple of all-time classics (Caked-Five, Daddy) so I'm not worried. And this weekend's Doctor Who was really cool too, one of the best yet.
Saturday, May 20, 2006
It's terrible
They've changed the Eurovision Song Contest so the representative of each country at the end doesn't read out all ten scores, just the top three. That stops the results taking quite so many hours, but it's still a terrible break with tradition. On the other hand, the coolest song (Finland) are winning for a change, so it's okay.
Yes, there are more interesting things I could write about than the Eurovision Song Contest. I bet the internet is full of blogs talking about it, and this is meant to be a "different" kind of blog. But hey, it's only once a year. I won't do it again. And Britain have scored double figures for the first time in years!
Yes, there are more interesting things I could write about than the Eurovision Song Contest. I bet the internet is full of blogs talking about it, and this is meant to be a "different" kind of blog. But hey, it's only once a year. I won't do it again. And Britain have scored double figures for the first time in years!
Friday, May 19, 2006
Planning it is half the fun
Yes, two posts in one night. I'm as prolific as Enid Blyton, and only 90% as contemptuous of the working classes. But I've just noticed that the MSO schedule is on the website. This is always a highlight of my year. Planning out a timetable that will give me something fun to do all day, every day is a challenge - how much othello should I play? Should I play the last weekend or go to the othello nationals in Crawley? I want to do the mental calculations on Wednesday morning, so what to do in the afternoon? Can I cope with two solid days of Chinese Chess? Why is Chinese Chess before Chess in the alphabetical list? Can I remember how to play stratego? Can I fit azacru into the schedule and still have something to do for the rest of the first weekend?
After nobody came to last year's event, they're really going out of their way to persuade people to come back this time round, so maybe it won't be a complete disaster after all. I'm pretty sure I'll go along this time, anyway.
Who is Sandie Thom sleeping with at Virgin Radio? They're plugging "I Wish I Was A Punk Rocker" like nobody's business at the moment. Okay, it's a very good song, but every DJ is urging us to listen to it, predicting it will be a chart-topper and telling us it will grow on us. In identical words. There's some sinister conspiracy behind it. Really great song, though, so I don't mind.
And while I'm talking about radio, I really should have mentioned tonight that Radio 4 want to do a show about me as part of an all-summer theme of memory. Riveting as usual, Radio 4. But this really sounds like it would be fun, somehow, so I really want to get involved with it. It's only a 15-minute slot and it's on radio, so it seems to me there'd be a bare minimum of people following me around and talking to me, and probably no cameras being pointed in my face.
After nobody came to last year's event, they're really going out of their way to persuade people to come back this time round, so maybe it won't be a complete disaster after all. I'm pretty sure I'll go along this time, anyway.
Who is Sandie Thom sleeping with at Virgin Radio? They're plugging "I Wish I Was A Punk Rocker" like nobody's business at the moment. Okay, it's a very good song, but every DJ is urging us to listen to it, predicting it will be a chart-topper and telling us it will grow on us. In identical words. There's some sinister conspiracy behind it. Really great song, though, so I don't mind.
And while I'm talking about radio, I really should have mentioned tonight that Radio 4 want to do a show about me as part of an all-summer theme of memory. Riveting as usual, Radio 4. But this really sounds like it would be fun, somehow, so I really want to get involved with it. It's only a 15-minute slot and it's on radio, so it seems to me there'd be a bare minimum of people following me around and talking to me, and probably no cameras being pointed in my face.
Oo, gotta get up, gotta get out
Sainsbury's have changed their opening hours without telling me, so that they now close an hour earlier at 7pm. This forces me to go to Spar if I notice I've run out of bread after that time, which generally forces me to buy that horrible "seven days fresh" stuff, because they generally sell out of the edible kinds of bread by that time of night.
Now, I'm not like Delia Smith, who won't eat any bread that she hasn't made from flour she's ground herself and yeast she's cultivated between her own toes, but that seven-days-fresh bread is horrifically nasty. I'm not sure by what definition of 'fresh' they're working, but it looks, feels and tastes past its sell-by date even when it's brand new. And a loaf of normal bread usually lasts me seven days without going off. Who buys this product, and in the name of sanity, why?
In other news, there's a solid gold pack of cards as the prize at the Speed Cards Challenge next month! I'm definitely going to win it. This is the kind of prize that all memory championships should have, rather than stupid trophies that don't fit in your rucksack for the journey home (always catches me out, that does. And I can't bring an empty bag to the competition with me because that would jinx the whole thing). This whole event is going to be fantastic, I can tell. Better by far than my Cambridge thing. Hattingen's limited supply of hotels seem to all be fully booked, but rather than trawl around for B&Bs and phone Germany to ask if they've got a room, I think I'll get a hotel in Essen - it's twenty minutes away on the train and that way I get to look around the big city on the Friday before the competition.
Now, I'm not like Delia Smith, who won't eat any bread that she hasn't made from flour she's ground herself and yeast she's cultivated between her own toes, but that seven-days-fresh bread is horrifically nasty. I'm not sure by what definition of 'fresh' they're working, but it looks, feels and tastes past its sell-by date even when it's brand new. And a loaf of normal bread usually lasts me seven days without going off. Who buys this product, and in the name of sanity, why?
In other news, there's a solid gold pack of cards as the prize at the Speed Cards Challenge next month! I'm definitely going to win it. This is the kind of prize that all memory championships should have, rather than stupid trophies that don't fit in your rucksack for the journey home (always catches me out, that does. And I can't bring an empty bag to the competition with me because that would jinx the whole thing). This whole event is going to be fantastic, I can tell. Better by far than my Cambridge thing. Hattingen's limited supply of hotels seem to all be fully booked, but rather than trawl around for B&Bs and phone Germany to ask if they've got a room, I think I'll get a hotel in Essen - it's twenty minutes away on the train and that way I get to look around the big city on the Friday before the competition.
Thursday, May 18, 2006
Mister Boss
I'm not, as a rule, good at being a boss. I can't tell people to do things because I'm scared they'll say no, and besides, I'd much rather do everything myself than get someone else to do it. But today I noticed that I and my underlings were working really well, getting stuff done and I was all telling them what to do and how to do it and everything. I'm not sure how that happened, but it was fun.
Although in between that, I was getting in an argument with someone non work-related over email, and I was going to blog about that at length tonight, but we sorted it out, more or less, and it was all the result of a misunderstanding, mostly, so I won't go into it here after all. Although I'm still quite annoyed with this person's attitude, so maybe I will if I can't think of anything better to write about tomorrow. It's the kind of thing I should sleep on, I think.
I'm watching the Eurovision Song Contest semi-final at the moment. It's kind of irresistible.
Although in between that, I was getting in an argument with someone non work-related over email, and I was going to blog about that at length tonight, but we sorted it out, more or less, and it was all the result of a misunderstanding, mostly, so I won't go into it here after all. Although I'm still quite annoyed with this person's attitude, so maybe I will if I can't think of anything better to write about tomorrow. It's the kind of thing I should sleep on, I think.
I'm watching the Eurovision Song Contest semi-final at the moment. It's kind of irresistible.
Wednesday, May 17, 2006
Fallen at the last fence
Drat, I was hoping to say tonight that I should have had a bet on Chelsea to win the league, Liverpool the FA Cup and Arsenal the Champions League, as I predicted a while ago, but it didn't quite work out.
Instead, I suppose I should record that I'm thrilled with the World Memory Championship being moved to London and mid-August, meaning that a) I don't have to take time off work in our busiest period of the year (and might even have escaped the newspapers and things before I have to get on with work), and b) I get to play in the othello nationals after all! Now all I have to do is learn how to play the game properly and I have a very slim chance to get a trip to Japan out of it. That's assuming an unprecedented number of flukey wins, better players not wanting to compete in the worlds and people being abducted by aliens at convenient (for me) times.
It's a shame to miss out on visiting Malaysia again, though - I was really looking forward to it. I suppose I could go there anyway some time and not compete in a memory competition, but that would just be silly.
Another TV company emailed me today, adding to the long, long list of people who are trying to develop a documentary about memory for Channel 4. One of these days, I'm sure one of them is going to actually make one, just on the law of averages.
Instead, I suppose I should record that I'm thrilled with the World Memory Championship being moved to London and mid-August, meaning that a) I don't have to take time off work in our busiest period of the year (and might even have escaped the newspapers and things before I have to get on with work), and b) I get to play in the othello nationals after all! Now all I have to do is learn how to play the game properly and I have a very slim chance to get a trip to Japan out of it. That's assuming an unprecedented number of flukey wins, better players not wanting to compete in the worlds and people being abducted by aliens at convenient (for me) times.
It's a shame to miss out on visiting Malaysia again, though - I was really looking forward to it. I suppose I could go there anyway some time and not compete in a memory competition, but that would just be silly.
Another TV company emailed me today, adding to the long, long list of people who are trying to develop a documentary about memory for Channel 4. One of these days, I'm sure one of them is going to actually make one, just on the law of averages.
Tuesday, May 16, 2006
The Bermuda Triangle
"Everybody shut up and pay attention," said Douglas, bursting through the front door with a two-foot-long model ship in his arms. "I've solved the mystery of what happened to the Mary Celeste."
Everyone turned their gaze from Noel Edmonds on the TV to look at Douglas. When he showed no signs of wanting to elaborate on his pronouncement, Davina asked "So what did happen to the Mary Celeste?"
"Technically," said Hortense, "we know what happened to the Mary Celeste. It was the crew whose fates are a mystery. The ship itself was just fine."
"Shut up, Davina," said Douglas, rather unfairly. "I'll be able to tell you what happened to it if you'll let me use your bath. I've only got a shower at my place and that's no use."
Everyone stayed silent this time to see if Douglas would explain what he was talking about without prompting, but he put the model ship down on the table, wandered into the kitchen and made himself a cup of tea. Roger threw a brick at him and narrowly missed, breaking the sugar bowl and two salt cellars. Luckily, the salt fell on the floor in such a way that it seemed to spell the words "What do you mean, Douglas?", so Douglas continued his explanation.
"You see," he said, inaccurately, "I've made a perfect scale model of the Mary Celeste. I just need to set it afloat in your bathtub and watch what happens, and the greatest mystery of the human race will be solved!"
Davina doubtfully interjected, "Douglas, it's a very good scale model, but..."
"I got a better scale model out of a Kinder egg last week!" shouted Spike from the corner.
"...But I'm not sure you can deduce what happened to the original ship by what happens to a model in a bathtub," continued Davina undeterred.
"And it was supposed to be an ostrich, I just put the pieces together the wrong way!" Spike screamed.
"Ah, but I've made scale models of the crew as well, look," said Douglas, as if that put an end to any and all criticism of his theory. "Now come on, let's go to the bathroom.
"I could do a computer simulation of what happened to the crew of the Mary Celeste..." started Hortense, safe in the knowledge that everyone told her to shut up every time she mentioned computers and thus she wouldn't have to reveal that she hadn't the first idea how one would go about creating such a simulation. Roger threw a brick at her head, which missed and shattered a ming vase, three windows and an antique crystal radio set.
So, ignoring Noel Edmonds's increasingly frantic attention-seeking, the gang trooped upstairs. The bathroom door turned out to be locked, so Davina and Spike kicked it down. They discovered an elderly man in the bath.
"For crying out loud, Uncle Herbert," sighed Davina, "I've told you before about breaking into my house to use my bath."
"Yes, but your bath is slightly smaller than mine, so it reduces the risk of drowning," said Uncle Herbert, climbing out. "I'll be off, then."
"No you bleeding well won't!" yelled Spike. "You're staying here to help us solve the mystery of the Mary Celeste!"
"Can I at least put some clothes on first?" asked Uncle Herbert. "I left mine at home, and it's surprisingly cold in here, considering there are six of us standing around a tub of hot water in a six-foot-square bathroom on a hot afternoon in the middle of August."
"There's no time for that kind of nonsense," said Douglas airily. He put the model of the Mary Celeste into the bath and took out his camera to record the goings-on.
Several theories have been advanced as to what happened after that. We will never know for certain, as at that moment the batteries ran out in the security camera in the bathroom. When the man came to read the gas meter three weeks later, he found the scale model of the Mary Celeste still floating in the bath, Noel Edmonds still on the television, but no sign of any of the six former occupants of the house. Some things we are just not meant to understand.
Everyone turned their gaze from Noel Edmonds on the TV to look at Douglas. When he showed no signs of wanting to elaborate on his pronouncement, Davina asked "So what did happen to the Mary Celeste?"
"Technically," said Hortense, "we know what happened to the Mary Celeste. It was the crew whose fates are a mystery. The ship itself was just fine."
"Shut up, Davina," said Douglas, rather unfairly. "I'll be able to tell you what happened to it if you'll let me use your bath. I've only got a shower at my place and that's no use."
Everyone stayed silent this time to see if Douglas would explain what he was talking about without prompting, but he put the model ship down on the table, wandered into the kitchen and made himself a cup of tea. Roger threw a brick at him and narrowly missed, breaking the sugar bowl and two salt cellars. Luckily, the salt fell on the floor in such a way that it seemed to spell the words "What do you mean, Douglas?", so Douglas continued his explanation.
"You see," he said, inaccurately, "I've made a perfect scale model of the Mary Celeste. I just need to set it afloat in your bathtub and watch what happens, and the greatest mystery of the human race will be solved!"
Davina doubtfully interjected, "Douglas, it's a very good scale model, but..."
"I got a better scale model out of a Kinder egg last week!" shouted Spike from the corner.
"...But I'm not sure you can deduce what happened to the original ship by what happens to a model in a bathtub," continued Davina undeterred.
"And it was supposed to be an ostrich, I just put the pieces together the wrong way!" Spike screamed.
"Ah, but I've made scale models of the crew as well, look," said Douglas, as if that put an end to any and all criticism of his theory. "Now come on, let's go to the bathroom.
"I could do a computer simulation of what happened to the crew of the Mary Celeste..." started Hortense, safe in the knowledge that everyone told her to shut up every time she mentioned computers and thus she wouldn't have to reveal that she hadn't the first idea how one would go about creating such a simulation. Roger threw a brick at her head, which missed and shattered a ming vase, three windows and an antique crystal radio set.
So, ignoring Noel Edmonds's increasingly frantic attention-seeking, the gang trooped upstairs. The bathroom door turned out to be locked, so Davina and Spike kicked it down. They discovered an elderly man in the bath.
"For crying out loud, Uncle Herbert," sighed Davina, "I've told you before about breaking into my house to use my bath."
"Yes, but your bath is slightly smaller than mine, so it reduces the risk of drowning," said Uncle Herbert, climbing out. "I'll be off, then."
"No you bleeding well won't!" yelled Spike. "You're staying here to help us solve the mystery of the Mary Celeste!"
"Can I at least put some clothes on first?" asked Uncle Herbert. "I left mine at home, and it's surprisingly cold in here, considering there are six of us standing around a tub of hot water in a six-foot-square bathroom on a hot afternoon in the middle of August."
"There's no time for that kind of nonsense," said Douglas airily. He put the model of the Mary Celeste into the bath and took out his camera to record the goings-on.
Several theories have been advanced as to what happened after that. We will never know for certain, as at that moment the batteries ran out in the security camera in the bathroom. When the man came to read the gas meter three weeks later, he found the scale model of the Mary Celeste still floating in the bath, Noel Edmonds still on the television, but no sign of any of the six former occupants of the house. Some things we are just not meant to understand.
Monday, May 15, 2006
I want a mini-me
It occurs to me that of the newcomers who took part at the Cambridge memory competition, Rich Bowdler is very much in the mould of Ed Cooke, wild-haired life-and-soul-of-the-party Oxford types; Dave Turner is along the same lines as David Thomas, both professional corporate memory trainers as well as the eerily similar names; Guy Griffiths has been taught everything he knows by his fellow student Boris Konrad; and James Paterson at least shares a name and initial with James Ponder, even if I can't think of a good way to keep the analogy going. There was also Philip Peters who joined in for the afternoon, but I didn't get much chance to talk with him and I can't think of anyone to compare him to, so I'm ignoring him for the sake of this argument.
The important thing was that there wasn't anyone there sporting a silly hat, unflattering beard and strategically shaved head, nor emulating my own approach to memory contests. (Unlike in the othello-playing world, where hats are fast becoming the essential fashion accessory). I do have plenty of people who ask my advice and act on it, so I shouldn't complain. But I'm going to anyway, because I'm just in the mood for it tonight. Not that I want to devote my time and energy to training or inspiring people, but if there was a way to have hordes of dedicated fans and protegés without having to actually do anything, I'd take it.
Until I got tired of the attention and ran away, obviously. And if I've offended anyone reading this by characterising them as a mini-me, I'm very sorry.
The important thing was that there wasn't anyone there sporting a silly hat, unflattering beard and strategically shaved head, nor emulating my own approach to memory contests. (Unlike in the othello-playing world, where hats are fast becoming the essential fashion accessory). I do have plenty of people who ask my advice and act on it, so I shouldn't complain. But I'm going to anyway, because I'm just in the mood for it tonight. Not that I want to devote my time and energy to training or inspiring people, but if there was a way to have hordes of dedicated fans and protegés without having to actually do anything, I'd take it.
Until I got tired of the attention and ran away, obviously. And if I've offended anyone reading this by characterising them as a mini-me, I'm very sorry.
Sunday, May 14, 2006
Practice makes you tired
Haven't done as much as I was planning, but I did a 30-minute binary this morning, and 30-minute cards tonight. And I'm toying with the dangerous idea of trying 18 packs in Germany. I did that tonight and think I got 14 right, which would be great, but I didn't get the last three, which kind of suggests that I should just stick with 15. That's the safe option (relatively - there's still a sporting chance that I could mess it up completely), but 18 is the tantalising target that I've felt for years like I should be able to do.
I could always attempt a number of packs that isn't a multiple of three, there's no law against it, but I just prefer to do these things in complete routes (three packs to a route). If I did 16, maybe I'd get them all right. Or maybe I'd just be confused by the whole thing. I really like strategising like this.
I could always attempt a number of packs that isn't a multiple of three, there's no law against it, but I just prefer to do these things in complete routes (three packs to a route). If I did 16, maybe I'd get them all right. Or maybe I'd just be confused by the whole thing. I really like strategising like this.
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