Once again, I didn't think I'd be WeNiSing this week, mainly due to the fact that the weather was being batshit crazy. One minute it was a gorgeous sunny day and I was lunching in the sun in Regent's Park, the next there was thunder and lightning. I was working late and decided to make an on-the-spot assessment at 7.00 to see how the weather was holding up. Storm clouds were definitely gatherin ...

A while ago, when I was at the younger end of the teenage spectrum, I used to fantasize about a band that would release an album that would be 'cross-genre'. As in, they'd do a rap track, then a heavy metal track, then an easy-listening track, then an opera track, then an instrumental, and so on. I used to think to myself: "If I'm ever in a band, that's what I'd do." Gorillaz isn't that band, a ...

"Hey Dan, great presentation, thanks for that." "Ah, no problem. I got your e-mail on the changes you wanted. I made most of them, but uhm, some of them were a bit, ah, vague?" "Which one?" "Well, I had a bit of trouble with this one here." "What's wrong with that one." "Make it look better?" "Yeah. Y'know, spruce it up a little." "I don't suppose you could be a little more....specific on t ...

Latest NIN single now available as single tracks. Get remixing, kids! ...

[flash] ...one ...two ...three [BOOM] Three seconds. It's not raining. This isn't rain. It's walls of solid water, falling from the sky. It's outdoor swimming with little pockets of air floating around. I don't think there's a part of me that isn't wet. Hmm- my crotch is the only part of me protected by two layers, maybe that's still dry. I roll my hips. Nope, that's wet, too. Lightning forks ...

Kung Fu Hustle is just a joy. I can't remember a single moment in the entire film in which I wasn't grinning like a loon. This is kind of odd for Kung Fu movies. Having watched, oh, I don't know, a hundred-odd Jackie Chan films, the formula seems to be: Fight scene, 20 minutes of "wacky" (Lord, preserve us from wackiness) comedy and some strained plotting, another fight scene, rinse and repeat. ...

It occurs to me that blogging is really good at capturing some emotions, and not quite as good at capturing others. Joy is one of the ones it?s harder to pin down afterwards ? it?s like sticking a pin through a captive butterfly and wondering why it isn?t as beautiful as when it was fluttering crookedly in the sunlight. "It's here!" Paul screamed from the the rise of the hill. "What?" I yelled f ...

The Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy is great. That is to say, the radio play, the novel, and the TV series are great. The film is mediocre. Maybe this opinion is just a product of my own encyclopedic knowledge of Hitch-hiker's (when I was fourteen I read the first four books in one day), and I was simply judging the film from my own preconcieved notions of how the film 'should' be. Certainly ...

...

While there haven't been any memos or discussions about it, the men in my office seems to have come to some kind of collective informal psychic agreement that ties are now optional (I'm assuming this is just for the summer months- presumably a similar psychic agreement will put them all back on when it starts to cool). `twasn't always so. In fact, on my three month review, my boss said I was do ...

About once a year, it seems, I get roped into some form of 'singles evening'. In theory, it's a really good idea. I mean, the bottom line is, it's actually fairly difficult to meet new, attractive, interesting single people in London, particularly when one half of your social circle seems to be dating the other half. So when one of your few single friends says: "Hey, Dan, join me and a room full o ...

The interesting, or I should say one of the many interesting things about Batman is that he is the most re-interpreted, cross-media renditions of a contemporary character. People tend to think of him as a 'comic book character', but that ceased to be true a long time ago. It's true that there are thousands of comics out there, but when you pile on the live-action TV show, the four animated series, ...

So, like, I'm walking through Hampstead Heath on Sunday morning, brilliant, gorgeous day, and, do you ever, like, I thought everybody did this, but apparently it's just me, sometimes I'll sort of absent-mindedly pick some lint out of my pocket and start rolling it into a ball between my thumb and forefinger. So I'm walking along, not really conciously doing this, but doing it nonetheless, when i ...

So, I ordered the new Gorillaz album, because I liked the single. I could have downloaded it and not paid, but I like to financially support artists that do good stuff. So I get the CD yesterday and pop it into my computer. Nothing. Computer doesn't even register that there's a CD in the drive. I chalk it up to the fact that I have a lousy computer at home, but it's mildly annoying. Get to work ...

As you know, some time ago Trent Reznor released the 'source files' for his latest single 'The Hand That Feeds', allowing fans to completely remix the song from the ground up. A rather impressive online community has sort of sprung up around this concept. Talk about clever ways to get your fans to engage with a song! The remix is actually a really interesting interpretation/interaction between aut ...

If there's a lesson to be learned from the last 24 hours, it's that twenty minutes can make all the difference to one's commute. Go home at 5.00: Relatively empty tube, home in 20 minutes. Go home at 5.20: Spend an hour travelling in London's armpits. Blade to work at 8.00: Smooth sailing. Blade to work at 8.20: Pavement covered by hordes of what I believe taxonomists have categorized as "Don't- ...

You know, One of the recurring arguments that occasionally pops up between me and my friends is: "Is Bono a wanker?" I think the answer, as much as it pains me (and, probably, you) to say, is probably yes. I mean, the last time I saw U2 live, thirteen years ago (!), was the ZOOTV tour, which I found to be a much more 'structured' show than the Vertigo tour (and also a more 'polished' show, ...

Yes, it's true, I did see the greatest rock n' roll band in the world this weekend. U2? Hell, no: DIE! DIE! DIE! The Spreadeagle in Shoreditch is a funny old venue for live bands. It's basically a tiny wee pub with a drum riser. The bands weren't so much playing in front of the audience as in and around the audience (which was packed into every nook & cranny). First up was the always-excellent Gr ...

Would a human body bounce if it fell eight stories on to concrete, and if so how high would it bounce? From: AQA [63336] Parts of you would bounce about four feet in the air before arranging themselves over the concrete. ...

...

I dreamt I was in this enormous, gothic, like, larger-than-a-city sized spaceship of some kind, which, like, it was in a battle with...someone....not really clear who....anyway all of a sudden we hear this tremendous noise and the whole place shudders really weirdly, and someone, this woman standing near me says: "It's beginning." and starts running in one direction, and so I start chasing her, an ...

"Hey bro, I need your help with something." "Yeah, sure thing, what's up?" "I'm ah, I'm going to see U2 live in concert on Sunday and I'm ... It's tough to say this ... but I'm ... not very excited about it." "What?" "Yeah, just, like, I'm completely nonplussed. Wait, does that mean, like, what does nonplussed mean?" "Dazed and confused." "Oh. Then I'm not nonplussed. I'm plussed. I'm just ...

I didn't think I'd be WeNiS blogging this week. I got up on Wednesday morning, full of vim and vigour, slapped on my skates, went out the front door, saw it was raining and turned right back around. Wet roads and skates are two great things that don't go well together. Jump forward twelve hours with me and the weather is (of cour ...

...

It's reassuring to know that, after four years in London, I'm still learning new things. For example, in New Zealand*, if a dog runs up to you and starts yapping away, jumping all around you and nipping at your heels and generally disregarding its place in the food chain, it's a perfectly acceptable deterrent to yell: "GET OUT OF IT YA MONGREL!" and clip it sharply on the ear. Kiwi* dog owners w ...

If I hadn't been drinking myself silly in Clapham Common on Saturday, you can bet your babooties that I would have been participating in the Naked Bike Ride across London- not on a bike, of course (scrotum + bike chains = youch!), but on my blades. Although from the looks of this photo taken by my friend as she walked across Waterloo Bridge, not everyone was taking the 'naked' edict as serious ...

I spent most of my weekend in various states of inebriation, thanks largely to Toast New Zealand, a sort of kiwi-themed festival that seems comprised mostly, if not entirely, of tents dedicated to New Zealand wines. There was a terribly annoying monopoly-money system in which you would purchase 'kiwis' (doubly annoying was that, to many people, kiwis means kiwifruit [or, if you grew up pre-1944 ...

Shy geeks of the world, rejoice! Forget speed dating, internet dating, being set-up by your mother, or indeed going up to a girl in a club and awkwardly trying to spark up a conversation; for I have inadvertently stumbled on a sure-fire way to get girls to come up and talk to you. It's three easy steps: 1. Go to Cyberdog and pick up one of those tops that comes with those little scrollable dig ...

...

I read this bad boy on the plane, in one sitting, and considering it's a book that relies heavily on quoting various facts and figures, that is a good reflection on how the author (Eric Schlosser) manages to keep a handle on your attention. The book is comprised of three essays. The first, Reefer Madness, is a history of America's marijuana laws (did you know that the first US law ever pertainin ...

...

No you fucking DIDN'T! I did NOT just open hotmail and have the crazy frog tune start PLAYING through my headphones WITHOUT fucking ASKING! FUCK! This has gone TOO FUCKING FAR! Gaaaaaaaah! ...

...

You know, you can't get a decent Coke anywhere near my office. It's true. Every single single sandwich store, convenience store, off license and snack shop sells this wacky imported brand of Turkish Coca-Cola that tastes utterly foul. Coca-cola, as everyone knows, tastes slightly different from country to country. I first noticed this when I moved to the States- the Coke they have there is much ...

It's Wednesday again, and that means WeNiS! Last night's WeNiS was one of the best I've ever been on. The weather was perfect, the crowd was huge and friendly, I had a lovely picnic in the sun with a few beers beforehand, and some of my fellow skaters looked (gasp ... pant ... breathe) great. I really want to do a photoset called 'The beautiful people of the WeNiS'. As I don't feel particularly ...

"Hey Benj, so, like, check it out, see, there's these three ex-soldiers, right? And whenever they fly, they always fly with BA..." "...Barracus?" "...Dammit!" ...

I just raced the buses to work on my blades. And won. By about ten minutes. You'd think this would be a good thing, but really, it's not. I used to feel so sanctimonious blading to work. Getting up early for starters is something I overly pat myself on the back for, like getting up thirty minutes earlier is some kind of mighty achievement. But then exercising? I'd feel like the sixty-million-doll ...

"When I'm drunk, I find you really, really attractive. When I'm sober, I'm not quite sure what the appeal is." "Are you saying you want to break up?" "God no. I'm just saying I don't think I should be sober around you." ...

-Daniel! Daniel, Daniel, Daniel. Andy. -I've come up with a plan that's gonna make you a millionaire! Brilliant. I need one of those. -Okay, so this blog thing you were telling me about, with the webcam and the couch and you being caught naked and that there? Uhm, yep. -So, if I understand this correctly, it's like a diary, you document what happens to you throughout your day? Er, not real ...

I don't mean to bag to my favourite songstress, but her albums have been going downhill a bit recently. I think what happened was...her songs stopped being about anything. They always were a bit stream of conciousness, but post-Pele this tendency became exaggerated to the point that you couldn't actually pin down any one song and figure out decisively what it was alluding to beyond gigantic zebra ...

Could a monkey clean a window only by holding a cloth with its tail? From: AQA [63336] It would depend on the monkey but most probably could if they felt the urge. The spider monkey has the longest, most powerful tail of all primates. ...

...

The script sucks. That doesn't mean you can't eke some enjoyment out of the film. It just means that not only is the dialogue clunky, the scenes don't flow. The scenes exist purely to teletype (in bold) the plot points, as the story struggles to weave all the pieces together before the end of the film- you can almost audibly hear the 'revelations' clicking into place. "This scene exists to expl ...

As constant readers will know, a few weeks ago I finally, ecstatically stumbled across a question to which AQA did not know the answer! While there isn't actually a competition to do this outside of my own fevered imagination, AQA graciously offered to give me a prize anyway! This makes them: tops. So, ladies & gentlemen, may I present: My AQA T-Shirt! ...

[Disclaimer: This post contains gratuitous nekkid-Dan shots. Viewers of a nervous disposition, or those who wish to remain attached to sanity, are advised not to proceed, for the path you take will lead to certain destruuuuction!] Okay, the story is this: for the past few months, blogging legend and excellent friend Adrian has been using his nifty Sky+ box to tape Star Trek: Enterprise for me. Si ...