new force

'After painstaking behind-the-scenes negotiations the ballot papers will carry the title "Ulster Conservatives and Unionists - New Force".'



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orphaned

Dave is mothering some orphaned guinea pigs. He had one too many lollipop last night (read: one in total) and declared this should be broadcast live. Don't think he's gone the whole hog (aha) and built a site for them yet, but in the meantime here's the UStream...

Stream videos at Ustream

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changing rooms

The hero of our times (and recurring overachiever) that is Micah has just launched the website for an absolutely blinding series of events in Belfast next month called The Changing Room. To quote his blog directly:

'it's an event about ethical fashion and lifestyle as well as fair trade clothes, second hand clothes, food, workshops on urban gardens, fixing clothes and herbs!'

Two words: Be there. The site alone has completely sold it to me, but only cause I'm a sucker for sexy graphics. The events themselves sound not only completely wonderful, but backed by a very important message. Go on, my son.

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art with a purpose

Whilst the title is debatable (as I of course back art for art's sake), much of what new media offers as art often falls flat on its proverbial when it is revealed as not really very purposeful at all. [See deviantART for several years' worth of appalling content for your browsing displeasure, for example. Yes, there is a completely neglected mediatree page.]

However, one extremely important project, of which I am an immense fan and have mentioned before is Frank Warren's PostSecret project, an 'ongoing community art project, where people mail in their secrets anonymously on one side of a homemade postcard.' If you haven't come across it, you must stop reading this now and go browse for a while.

One thing that makes this particularly special is the apparent wonderous selflessness with which Frank administers the project; so it is with little surprise to discover that, upon being awarded $10,000 by Myspace, he's giving the whole lot to the anti-suicide charity Hopeline, run by the Kristen Brooks Hope Center. PostSecret is a deeply moving and personal, yet obviously cathartic experience for thousands of people, and Frank can only be commended for having the foresight to set it up.

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cricket scores

Simultaneously attempting to follow football, cricket and rugby, whilst drafting an application form... it's all go on this spring-like Sunday! However, life has been eased slightly by Cricket Score, and Cricket Score 2, two mac applications which track scorecards straight to your desktop. My only issue is that I have downloaded both versions as the newer, much more useful one is tracking Australia v New Zealand, whilst the original miniscule one is providing the England v Windies score. Still worth a looksie though.

Also, if anyone can work out how to install facepacks, badges etc. to FM2008 for Mac, I would be eternally grateful!

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naturally 7 are amazing

The Flying Pickets they most certainly ain't... New York's sensational Naturally 7 are breathtakingly brilliant. Worth it for the vocal bass line alone. Must. Buy. Everything. Ever. Released.



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chickens, home, roost, etc.

First day against the Windies, and who was the first not to fall flat on his face? KP delivers 97 after Strauss for 7 off 15 and Cook for 4 off 20... this could be a headache of a series for the "new" England setup if, as today would indicate, the prodigal son remains their best player. Time (and the next few weeks) will tell.

don't say that...

Let's be clear: I am in no way anti-semetic, and so what follows is entirely taken out of context compared to how my lovely other half (who is also not anti-semetic) said it; it's a very funny story, worthy of relation, but it's late at night and I can't be bothered.

Suffice to say, I just received an e-mail with the following attachment from Dave with the flattering subject, "You are the ONLY person on the internet ever to have said..."

the bearded wonder

Was literally joking to Dave about TMS, only to open NetNewsWire and find out from the TMS feed that Bill "The Bearded Wonder" Frindell passed away during the week. My open-mouthed admiration for the broadcasting anomaly that is Test Match Special has been alluded to before, and the joy to be gained from listening to a group of people lounging around cricket grounds tossing out stats and commentary willy-nilly on Radio 4 LW is unique in itself. However, Bearders was one of the best; it was a recurring highlight every time he came out with the answer or factoid that no one else could land on, delivered with pitch-perfect timing and wit.

Here's some Bearders gold that TMS have pieced together.

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stuck in a moment you can't get out of

Also, I got stuck in a lift for over an hour yesterday. Ironically, to abate my panicking I settled down to watch the next episode of The Office on my iPod... only to find it was this one!

Only cottoning on that The Office: An American Workplace has some amazing folks directing... the last three episodes I've watched in season three have been directed by Josh Whedon, J.J. Abrams, and Harold Ramis respectively. It must be a great exercise for these guys to do something so completely different (apart from Ramis, obviously), that it does in a twisted way make perfect sense...

Anyway, yes. Stuck in an elevator, suspended between Ground and First. We had a go at the alarm button. "Press 3 for jammed doors. Press 9 for trapped persons." Except the building only has 8 floors, leading to distinct absence of a 9 button. So that took a while to actually get a person to shout at a few times. In between we got enough reception on my mobile to phone upstairs, and thankfully not everyone had gone home for the weekend.

By the time we got out, the maintenance on-call guy still hadn't arrived. A couple of the hospital maintenance technicians had decided to go up and physically worked the mechanism to lift the elevator up to first, and then hauled the door open (this could not be done between floors as a safety device kicks in to - and this is the genius bit - seal the doors closed for the safety of the passengers stuck inside.)

A particular moment of humour occurred when the only way back down to Ground was in the other lift. Decided to use the emergency exit stairs instead.

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water is essential

If you were at T in the Barn last year (one of my favourite days ever) then this is especially for you; if not, pay extra attention. The main charity your money went to that night was the amazing charity: water. Watch the new promo below, and then go to the website to find out more about the priceless, and selfless, work they do.




Also, if you're a twitter enthusiastic (like myself) charity: water are organising a unique bit of fundraising in the form of Twestival, so find out about that too.

further up and further in?

Now for goodness sake, stop aiming it at ignorant toddlers!

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out of africa

Credit goes to Giggy for flagging this one up on facebook: Times favourite son Matthew Parris, writing brilliantly on a topic entitled "As an atheist, I truly believe Africa needs God". Parris is has previously borne no falsehoods on his negativity towards religion as such, but as a quality journalist making honest observations, he's delivered a great piece of comment, worthy of more than five minutes of your time.

'Christianity, post-Reformation and post-Luther, with its teaching of a direct, personal, two-way link between the individual and God, unmediated by the collective, and unsubordinate to any other human being, smashes straight through the philosphical/spiritual framework I've just described. It offers something to hold on to to those anxious to cast off a crushing tribal groupthink. That is why and how it liberates.'

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loss of record

Yikes... there goes the (old) neighbourhood. Hope Ben realises that people have worked out how to get past such new innovations as password protecting computer files.

On the plus side, they're probably at the back of my "office", along with everything else that's missing in the NHS...

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reconfiguring

Dave was on at me today for not having updated in over a week; apparently, this makes his work days longer. Since joining the 9-5 cycle, I have to admit my time management has been nothing short of mad. I've been trying to relish free moments, but they've been few and far between. Embracing this new era, I guess it's probably a good idea to try and work out where to go from here.

1] Mediatree needs an update as a concept, and a facelift as a website. If said update includes sticking with the nomenclature opted for a few years ago, it's about time to get a proper domain and switch this whole bad boy to something that's probably not blogger! Truthfully, I've always been a bit bereft of ideas for any other names, and moreover am still piddled off that mediatree turned out to be so popular with so many other random organisations - as did its predecessor, Room One. (Although room one records remained for gig organising purposes, including the night of joy that was T in the Barn - more on that in a minute.)

2] All the creative stuff. In theory, a no-strings 9-5 should free me up for a lot of time to work on the creative business ideas. This hasn't happened - haven't even managed to catch up on the couple of editing projects I'd promised to fit in for people. Very hard to do.

3] T in the Barn followup. There is an idea. It's very experimental. It would be completely untried and untested, and to my mind, unlike anything that's ever been attempted by anyone I know before. This is very exciting. Even better, it will probably happen in the next six to eight weeks, so if you like good music (and conveniently probably in Belfast this time), watch this space.

I'd write more, but I've a whole lot to do before... going out tonight! Gah. Was in Bristol over the weekend, so here's a nice picture of the Clifton Suspension Bridge to finish...



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new ways to play old songs

Interesting blog post by Krist Novoselic upon encountering his own song in Rock Band 2, and finding himself rendered hopeless trying to play it. I vaguely recall reading Billy Corgan stating something similar, and famously Lars Ulrich is a Guitar Hero nut...

From personal experience, good old Ringo rocks the socks off a real drum kit, but put the time I joined in for Rock Band action, he was a mess... only joking...

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we will be watching the watchman

To a collective sigh of relief, Fox and Warner have kissed, made up, and the world is still due to burn on March 6th. Read the BBC explanation here.

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take me now and end this pain

Props to techcrunch for flagging this up... Can't decide which item makes this more appallingly appalling:

a) They're using Macs in the ad - for an exclusively Windows-based product;
b) These actors have clearly walked in from a self-help class entitled, "So you're rebounding from losing your soul";
c) They're SINGING.

Dave reckons Microsoft must have sued the makers of this advert for something shocking. What distresses me most is that some people actually sat around a room at some point and thought this was a great concept. Even without all the above, it would still suck. Someone was paid an exhorbant amount of moolah for this; and I'm working as a 'file manager'.



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coleraine house of prayer

An amazing project (that has followed on from previous worship efforts in the town) has been the development of the Coleraine House of Prayer - or C-HOP - and last Friday I finally got to join in with Simon and the amazing Psalm Drummers as some of the guys led a drum circle to kick off C-HOP's New Year, and even better, its transition into a daily routine of intercessory worship for the town and communities.

Anyhoo, Andy Rogers was sneaking around behind a camera for much of it and has stuck it up on d'Tube... picture's obviously dark, but the rhythms are somewhat awesome. It's also worth hearing Ian's statistics at the start, amazing stuff.


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primark linked to uk sweatshops

The national chain says it is very concerned about the allegations.

I think they were as shocked as we are to discover that their clothes are fabricated (bong!) by workers paid £3.50 p/h - and not, as previously assumed, outsourced to armies of slave children in the Far East...

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