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.

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.

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!

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.

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.

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.

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!

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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...

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...

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.

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.

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.