Monthly Archives: May 2004

Whitsun 2004

So, today is both Memorial Day in the US and the Whitsun bank holiday in the UK. Apparently, Whit Sunday commemorates the coming of the Holy Spirit in the form of flames to the disciples (source). I see the cheese rollers of Gloucestershire have been at it again. That must really rank as one of the oddest of the British customs. Honestly, people roll cheese down a hill in the name of sport.

I am having a quiet bank holiday before returning to work tomorrow.

On this day…

2006: links for 2006-05-31

Troy

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film poster for the movie troySo why did I go and see this film? Perhaps it was for the epic nature of the story or perhaps it was to see the battle scenes in all their cinematic glory. Of course it could have been just to see Orlando Bloom and Brad Pitt buffed up and clad only in armour for a couple of hours on the screen.

The film was a huge let down. The epic, cinematic battles looked old-hat when compared to The Lord of the Rings. The story seemed disjointed and unfulfilling. There was nobody to side with, nobody to support and precious little humour to lighten the feel. It may be based on real-life events but if you are going to take licence you may as well bring some feeling into it.

Trojan champion Prince Hector (Eric Bana) is the most likeable but – while not wanting to spoil anything for you – his fate entirely predictable even if you didn’t know the story. Pitt had all the moves, looks and swagger but was an unsympathetic mercenary and Orlando Bloom came across as a wishy-washy waste of space. Sadly, Achilles’ end (the heel, if you will) is entirely lost despite the best efforts of the film makers.

I’d wait until it’s on television if I were you.

On this day…

2004: Polo Shirts: A Fashion Idea For 2004
2003: Open Secret
2003: Crossroads ‘was all a dream’
2003: Pop Life
2003: Unfortunately There Are Effectively No Funds Available To Pay The Salaries
2003: No Consensus In Support Of Same-Sex Unions
2003: Dr Kildare is a Sissy

Polo Shirts: A Fashion Idea For 2004

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If you don’t try and keep up with boifromtroy you end up with so much to read you keep putting it off. It’s an amazing amount of material. Anyway in case you – like me – have missed out on this season’s fashion tip (hot from New York City) you should click across right now and learn that polo shirts are back. Honest. When I was at University in the early nineties there was a hall warden in the residences who must have worn a polo shirt every day of the four years I was there (I do not believe it was the same one). His collars were always up and, unlike most people’s collars, they never went limp. I don’t know who did his laundry (maybe he did) but it was incredible. Now the fact I can’t remember his name is starting to trouble me.

On this day…

2004: Troy
2003: Open Secret
2003: Crossroads ‘was all a dream’
2003: Pop Life
2003: Unfortunately There Are Effectively No Funds Available To Pay The Salaries
2003: No Consensus In Support Of Same-Sex Unions
2003: Dr Kildare is a Sissy

Here We Go Again

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dermot and davina back for big brother 2005Last night saw the last Friends in the UK (it was Black Friday) and the first of the new series of Big Brother. As we all knew the ending to Friends it seemed like something of a disappointment really. Big Brother on the other hand was a very different beast. Having had a few hours to think about it I am slightly less caught up in it than I thought I would be. It would appear the producers have selected all the people who claimed that they would ‘mix it up’. The house is full of individuals who claimed that they would be outspoken. Last night I thought this was a dangerous tactic. Yes, it will be fun when they first explode at each other (which they surely will) but I think it risks getting dull. Part of the fun of the original series was the fact that the housemates had fun and were, therefore, funny to watch. Car-crash television isn’t that interesting after the initial look. A high quota of lesbian, gay and bisexuals looks like exploitation to me and doesn’t make me think of a happy, diverse home.

UPADTE 2 JUNE. The Big Brother links:

The big brother popularity poll is a neat interactive idea to get you coming back to the site again and again. I do quite like that idea.

On this day…

No other posts on this day.

Memories Of A May Afternoon

twelve months ago listening to jazz in the helsinki sunshineI know y’all won’t care but I’ve said before that the primary reason for the existence of this site is for me and a kind of diary/journal. The fact it is online is probably the incentive that makes me keep it up. The fact that you occasionally comment makes it feel more worthwhile. Ever since I introduced the ‘on this day’ link against relevant entries on the homepage I’ve found a great memory jogger. I end up re-reading entries from this day last year – or the year before. It certainly doesn’t seem like twelve months since I was sitting in Helsinki for the first time and listening to an afternoon, outdoor Jazz concert. It wasn’t what I expected of that city at all. And it looks like we may be doing more business in that part of the world over the rest of the year. I hope so.

On this day…

2004: Internet Domains
2003: Helsinki Jazz

Internet Domains

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A number of site’s are pointing to Tim Berners-Lee’s discussion on new top level domains. I found it a fascinating insight to some of the concepts which were put in place in the early day’s of the internet. What I also see as interesting is that the tree-like structure of the domain system evolved from good technical reasons and was – back then – less about maintaining the concept of a trademark or brand. It’s a shame that it’s moved away from that really.

On this day…

2004: Memories Of A May Afternoon
2003: Helsinki Jazz

New Entries Or Broken Images?

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Just in case you are reading this via a feed/rss reader of some kind – like bloglines – then you might be seeing you reader marking a whole stack of entries new when they are, clearly, not. I’ve made some minor code changes to the site to have the feeds validate with the Feed Validator as well as link to the comments from the feed. Additionally, I’ve added a couple of Movable Type plug-ins that will help me keep the rest of the site validated. Nothing major but it does mean some of the entries have been marked as updated when it’s just the background code that has been amended.

If you happen to use a web-based feed reader or aggregator you may see that images are broken. I’ve prevented images being called if the referrer is not this site because some of the images from the Man of the Moment section were being called by external sites and I don’t want to end up paying for that bandwidth. It’s not intended to stop people reading the site from seeing anything so let me know what reader you use and I will try and open images up to the relevant domains.

On this day…

2004: Junk Mail Is Now 70% Of All Mail

Junk Mail Is Now 70% Of All Mail

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There are a lot of reports around at the moment about the levels of spam. BBC News is saying that junk mail now accounts for nearly 70% of e-mails worldwide. If this is true then I am doing rather better than most people. You may recall that my ISP is Demon who introduced spam filtering earlier this year. This has had a fantastic impact on the levels of spam I receive. Musak is hosted with DreamHost who use razor spam filtering server-side and then I use Mozilla’s junk mail filter at my end of the chain. If one message a day gets through then I am surprised indeed. I’m so used to this level of filtering that I hardly ever look at the spam folder. I just looked at it and while there are lots of pre-filtered messages there none of them were mails I should have had. All-in-all this is working very well indeed.

On this day…

2004: New Entries Or Broken Images?

Missed Todd’s Coming Out

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bruno langley is toddReading the Yahoo group, it seems the story line for Coronation Street got all exciting last night and so I now have to remember to catch the ITV2 repeat. It’s funny but I really do only watch it for the gay story line and fast-forward through the rest of the episode.

For the uninitiated, Coronation Street is a classic British soap that has been on screen screen forever (see the faq). Rumour has it that Adam and Eve watched it back at the beginning of time. Anyway, Todd (engaged to be married, father) had a ‘moment’ with his fiancee’s brother (who, to be honest, is hot). It was the first ever openly gay moment on The Street (which is what it’s known as here and has no link whatsoever to stocks and shares and New York City). So, Todd gradually realises his preference is for men and falls for hunky nurse Karl. This week was the big coming out moment. The storyline is helped by the fact that Bruno Langley is also cute as hell too. So, despite the fact I don’t watch the soaps anymore, I keep watching bits of this storyline (and so, apparently, did lots of other people).

And if my friend Steve is reading this I am expecting a nice long comment about Gail Tilsley and what a joy she has been since her arrival on The Street (a hundred years ago – or so).

On this day…

No other posts on this day.

Palme d’Or

Congratulations to Michael Moore for winning the Palme d’Or at Cannes for Fahrenheit 9/11. Previously I have enjoyed his books and films not just because, personally, I often find myself agreeing with his points but also because I believe it’s important for any democracy to have people who challenge the accepted wisdom. The fact that the film has not been distributed yet suggests says a great deal. I find it amusing/ironic/scary that we will happily criticise countries where government media censorship is quite clear but when censorship happens by the back door we don’t stand up to it. When big business censor media does this really make our democracies any better than when government’s take their scissors?

UPDATE 25 May: Just come across an interesting piece at BBC News today about documentary films: Documentaries turn up cinema heat. I am quite interested in seeing ‘Super Size Me’.

Apparently, there is also a film in the works, Michael Moore Hates America and the makers can’t get an interview with Mr Moore.

On this day…

2005: Danny Baker Shuts Up His Tree House
2003: Amusing Connections in News
2003: Here We Go Again
2003: An identity crisis