I give you all you need to know

I dont really like it when people brag, so feel free to hate me for making this post.

Most days of the year i feel incredibly down and inconsolably hateful. Receiving emails like this are the little things that help me to keep making at least some effort with life, which is always welcome.






Even if it turns out it's just an automated spam mail that sends a similar thing out to everybody, its still a good idea and i think everyone should get things like this in their inbox, for days when the real world is too sick to think about.

Who needs a amp?

Like, just use a tesla coil!


This guy wired his electric guitar upto a tesla coil instead of an amp, so the sound is just coming from the static lightning. Cool, huh?

Problem is that it does sound a little scratchy, which could be down to the coil and/ or the guitar. This guy on the other hand has managed to get pretty clear sound from a plasma arc 'speaker'. too bad he didn't manage to pick a track that wasn't shit!


check out the related videos at the end, theres a few plasma speaker experiments out there- but this video shows the whole set-up.

Just lately, ive found an exciting new obsession to keep me entertained for the next week! and i wanted to share it all with you ^^
Basically. it's just the International space station. which is so cool! it orbits earth from space and people live in it. It's the biggest human habitat off earth and its still under construction. whats not fucking awesome about that??



A couple of years ago, a 'space tourist' anousheh ansari, took a trip up and stayed on the station for 10 days. She recorded the whole experience on a blog, going into detail about all aspects of her journey, from the preparing for the launch to life on the satellite and coping with the earth again. She gives the impression of the space station being a peaceful, otherworldly haven manned lovingly by intelligent, friendly scientists, and frankly ive completely fallen in love with it..

Her blog is thoroughly reccommended by me, you can find it (well the good bits start) here. Annoyingly the first post is on the last page and everything, so you will have to work backwards- just remember to click 'previous' instead of 'next' ^^ Also the mission notes and video footage were added in realtime- not in sync with her entries- but you're all intelligent people, you'll work it out.

Anyway, theres a number of videos i think are really cool. ive tried to pool together the ones i think are good.

Anousheh's launch on the Russian Soyuz. The launch site is in Kazakhstan. During ascent you can hear the crew reporting from onboard in russian, which is being translated to english.

See the little orange thing dangling from the ceiling inside the capsule? One of the astronauts explains it's a toy bear called misha. Misha is being used as a G-Force Sensor.

You can see a tour of the outside station here. For an awesome tour inside, Cheerey flight engineer mike fincke takes you on a 3 part journey around the ship, complete with cheesey 80s music n all! nice one mike! unfortunately embedding is disabled, so i figured just click on mike's pic instead:


For Lazy ass people, episodes 2 and 3 are here.

There were some videos of ansari doing things like washing hair, eating with a spoon, etc, which were quite long and boring but interesting to see. every now and then you'd see a tiny ball of water flying off her hair when she washed it. unfortunately those vids have been removed now.. but if i find them again they will be added.
I just find it fascinating.. like, when you're spinning round, does it feel like you're spinning round, or the room is spinning around you? when you can't feel any up or down, what's realtive to what?

Btw, just in case you were wondering what exactly they do in space, here's a video:

They all seem to make little videos about daily life, like.. how to open a can of honey! wow.

I kinda love this little video, it really seems to convey just how bored and homesick the astronauts must start to get from time to time. basically, they've figured out a way of drinking liquid from an open container much like a cup. Much joy for them! You can tell by the speed of his voice and how many times he repeats 'you can SIP your coffee!! you dont have to SUCK!' just how excited by this they must be. So excited, in fact, that they felt the need to make a little video and tell mission control all about it. And you can see at the end just how much mission control shares their excitement.

presumeably before hand, they drank their tea like this!


And here's the feel good montage of space life!


Re-entry:
This is Ansari's re entry. The soyuz is composed of 3 parts, the descent module, orbital module and equipment module (carrying any waste from the ISS). They get jettisoned and burn up in the atmosphere as they fall with the descent module.




For people as fascinated by space flight as me, here's a full length launch-to-orbit of the Russian Soyuz and launch-to-orbit of the American Space Shuttle:
Soyuz:

Shuttle:

Perfect Strangers

i dont know how old this is, but i only just found it. and i think everyone should see it once in their lives.

One Thousand, Eighty Four Pounds and Forty Three Pence (Plus Two Pound Seventy Five Pence P&P)

I'm not saying it's not worth that much, but you can buy it at Forbidden Planet for £10.

:(

I'm not sure if the hilarity of this is lost on people who didnt spend two years struggling at the hands of 3D Studio Max, with the "Aid" of some less than constructive tutoring, but i think its still a piece of genius. Apparently we graduated this time last year. Uni, i fucking miss you :(

'Wanna know my dieting secret?'

The following blog was inspired by fascinating articles like this.

Hi, It's Issi, I used to hate my body but i've just discovered an amazing new breakthrough dieting product! it's supposed to be a secret, but i just had to tell all my friends because the results are amazing!! I told my friend and she's started using it, now all the hot boys look at her and her phone is full of numbers from sexy dates!!1!! I'm serious, this stuff really works!!!

It's an amazing new tea, called 'Be-You-Tea™'!! This stuff has changed my life completely!!11!1! what's so different, you ask? well this contains a special scientific dieting agent called anti-nutrinos™! they suck any nutrition you have gained in the last 24 hours right out of your body, meaning you can eat as much as you like and still look like the malnourished famine victim you've always dreamed of being!



dont believe me? just check out this photographic evidence. I went from having a curvy, feminine sexy figure to a skinny malnourished rake in just two days! thanks to breakthrough of Be you Tea™!!!



Some people just don't know how to diet. look at Jabba. he tried to cop out with cosmetic surgery instead. he paid for it in the end- now he looks like a healthy human being! if you ask me, those kind of results just aren't good enough! don't be one of these people. the only way to diet is with patented Be You Tea™! GET YOUR FREE SAMPLE TODAY.



And once you've discovered how much you like Be You Tea™, try these other flavours!

Varsi tea™ - an exotic indian herbal tea. instead of anti-nutrition technology, this drains you of anything interesting to say!
Densi tea™ - i cant work out what this one does!
Pu-Ree tea™ - this korean tea erases anything bad in your life. and anything good, too!
Sani tea™ - this african tea reminds you of when the world didnt make sense!
Imhatalla tea™ - a native american tea that promises you won't die after drinking it! about as scientifically sound as any of our other teas!
Sek Zhua Li tea™ - ever heard of expanding your hard drive? with this chinese tea, you can expand your sex drive at the same time!

Note: this product is outlawed by all international health organisations, any actual weight loss without dramatic side affects are purely co-incidental.

With enough stupid sound effects you can get the hang of anything

By the way, what is it with japanese tv needing to put the face of some chick from the audience watching it in the corner? im not complaining or anything, i just think its a weird tradition.

Hidden floor

I was coming back from lunch in the lift yesterday, and even though ive worked at the ordnance survey for 10 months now, for the first time i noticed this:


You probably didn't notice, but see how there's a number missing?


On my way out of the building later that day i took the stairs. i consciously tried to look out for the second floor. i missed it the first time, so i went back. then i realised there was a third floor, and below it was the first floor.. no second floor!

I got out my security pass and i consulted my map:



Its suspicious. i mean its unlikely that one of the oldest, largest and most thorough cartographic organisations in the world would forget to map an entire floor of its own headquarters.. right?


I asked luke earle, man of wisdom, if he knew anything about it. "oh yeh," he explained, "thats where they keep the children to make the maps. they put them in mangles and use the skins to print with. because theyre more durable, i suppose" hm, i dunno.. luke has told me strange things before, and i dont think they were all true. like that time he said the beans in the canteen were nice and when he said its better to be vegetarian. so i think i'm gonna investigate this one myself.

Thoughts of an unemployed man

I just read the blog info on the side there and realised this blog appears to be some kind of profile for the powers that be to monitor my actions. i'm going to get on the case of this, and i'll get back to you when i know more. in the mean time, as a means of decoy i'm going to publish the work of fans. As such, here is a guest rant, posted in by the not so mysterious Lucky No 4:




Walking up the road towards my destination, Obi-Wan utters the immortal phrase “jobcentre plus, you will never find a bigger hive of scum and villainy.....”


ive been unemployed before, after graduating from uni with a degree in computer games design, i was naïve enough to think that i would be able to find a job in the industry. I was urged to get jobseekers allowance by my parents as i had to pay my national insurance stamp or something similar. The day after i signed up for this, my local jobcentre burnt down, so my sign on days were no more than: go into room, hand over book, have it signed, get it back, continue to look for jobs. Im not saying the staff were brimming with enthusiasm this time. When i told them one week that i had 2 interviews, one for a normal office job and the other for the games industry. “ok, sign here” was the reply. I was greeted with an equally enthusiastic response when i told them i had a job.


this time, things are different. The jobcentre hasnt burnt down. And running out of money, with a car to pay for, i had no choice but to sign on again. Now i accept that some people might not be very bright, and are therefore unemployed. They seem to slump into the jobcentre and ignore the staff asking them to “check the job banks while you wait” stinking of alcohol. They then tend to speak VERY LOUDLY into their phones, often asking one of their mates to “lend us a fiver” and generally moaning about their lives and the 6 kids they have to support (heres a thought, stop breeding!)


Now the thing that annoys me the most about this is that i could not be further from this profile, yet get the same treatment as these people, in fact possibly a lower standard of treatment. I am actively looking for work, and spend several hours a week scouring job pages to do so, unlike others who spend the week scouring the pages of the racing post, or just buying special brew. You seem to be seen as some sort of leper by the staff in these places. A leper on trial by the spanish inquisition for heresy. Any time you give an answer to a question you are not sure if you are going to be led into a room and tortured for the truth:


heres a kind of brief overview of my last interrogation, mixed in with my thoughts at the time:


Hello, how can we help? (she sounds nice, you kind of had to be there)


Well lets see.......you could look at me with utter disdain, oh sorry youre doing that already. Ok, well how about muttering everything you say so its really difficult to understand? Oh you do that too!? Wow, ok. How about making me feel like im a piece of sub human scum thats lying about the amount of jobs i have applied for since the last time was in? You do THAT already too! Wow you guys here at the jobcentre plus really did think of everything didnt you?


(vacant stare)


So anyway, i go on to tell the “helpful and friendly” staff member of the 12+ jobs ive applied for in the last week and a half, and how ive just downloaded another 6 from their “job banks” to be greeted with the same vacant, almost zombie like stare. After an awkward couple of seconds debating in my head if i am still supposed to be talking, the helpful staff member turns her monitor to face me. Another awkward few seconds ensue.......am i supposed to be reading whats on the screen? Am i supposed to be looking at the results of the lie detector test theyve secretly used on me to check if i have been looking for work!? Who knows! The silence continues......


the list on the screen is of jobs that are in the area im looking for so i scroll down the list with my eyes, only to realise i have ALL of these jobs printed off and currently in my hand. “yeh, i think ive got the details for all of them”


silence, vacant stare. Then suddenly, movement, the “helpful” member of staff turns the screen to face herself, uses the middle mouse button to scroll down the list, turns it back to face me, revealing THREE WHOLE JOBS that were not on the list before hand, none of which are relevant to me.


Yeh, i think ive applied for all of them.........


silence, vacant stare....................right, thats it, youre done.


Oh well actually i was asked to bring in my P45 from my last employer today as i forgot it last time.


OH MY GOD!!!! what have i done!?!?! ive actually asked them to read something that i have brought in!?!? and DO something useful!?!?!?! the look of vacant disdain changes to a look of vacant disdain with a hint of anger, the P45 is taken from me to a guy i spoke to when i signed up for jobseekers allowance, who was actually helpful.


You gotta keep that bit, we keep this bit.........vacant stare is back as responsibility has been passed to a different member of staff.


Ok then, bye. I leave, my soul consumed and my enthusiasm in tatters, good job jobcentre plus, youve really given me motivation for my job search in the future.


Thanks to: LuckyNo4

GUUUUUUAAPAAAAAAAAA

I'm speechless. tonights conversation with Ron just produced the following:


Ron says (20:01):
i was watching the spanish football round up today and saw something that made me piss myself laughing
Ron says (20:02):
basically they have a feature of the best skills or goals of the week, and this voiceover shouts GUAPA!!!! which means, beautiful football etc, but its the way he says it. i found a vid on youtube 2 secs



My reaction follows like this:


Issi says (20:04):
what
Issi says (20:04):
the
Issi says (20:04):
fuck
Ron says (20:04):
lol
Ron says (20:05):
so now you see?
Issi says (20:05):
so
Issi says (20:05):
basically
Issi says (20:05):
spanish footie commentators are mentally ill?
Ron says (20:06):
possibly
Issi says (20:06):
i cant believe this is happening to me.. thayts just fuckin weird
Issi says (20:06):
i cant even type properly! im so shocked by this
Ron says (20:07):
lol, so is it wrong that im curled over laughing?
Issi says (20:07):
i keep replaying it and its just seems less sense in it everytime
Issi says (20:07):
WHAT THE FUCK?
Issi says (20:08):
its the fact he keeps saying it??
Ron says (20:08):
if it were english i spose they would just be shouting BRILLIANT!!! or something
Issi says (20:09):
yeh, but in english it'd be MORE THAN ONE SPAZZY WORD

James Clark

Congrats to james clark for having possibly the most generic name ever. I just did a search for him on facebook. it retrieved 4 different james clarkes who all seem to share a different mutual friend with me, and none of them was my mate james clarke who i was looking for.


Yeh, i know its also a bit weird that i know 4 different adams, but thats another matter.

Day in the life

well, perhaps you might wonder what i do all day. this won't give you any insight.. but i feel like posting it anyway.


6:30 am was woken by my new phone. hate myself for agreeing to do overtime today. superficially think it might be worth it for the £70. promise myself i can come back on the bus n go straight to sleep again afterwards. go back to sleep.

6:45 am get woken by my old phone. start having a debate with myself about how peter griffin on family guy is not that great a character. this debate seems heated enough to get me out of the bed.

7:20 am finally got dressed, and finish the debate by agreeing that although he is nowhere near as original or popular as stewie or brian, he is still perhaps necessary as an anchor for the show. find riceball test subject #1 in the fridge, wrap it in seaweed.

7:30 am make it out the door and see its tipping with rain. at least its only tipping, i can make it to the bus stop in this. and at least there won't be anyone about so i wont have to feel embarrased about my fashion sense today. anyway, riceball #1 is nice, so its not all bad yet.

7:40 am - occurs to me that there might not be any buses today. a number 10 bus arrives. faced with a dilemna. do i take the number 10 bus and only get half way to work and walk the rest in the rain, or wait around indefinitely just in case theres a number 8? the decision is killing me.. and i miss the number 10 as a result.

7:50 am. electronic timetable screen machine still showing nothing. figures, there will be no number 8. fuck, im walking to work. in the pissing rain. and ive got 10 minutes.

20 minutes in, the rain is turning torrential and i feel miserable as fuck. drenched. definitely no fucking buses. everything is streaky and grey, stupid glasses. tassels on my hat looking droopier than ever, damn right. fucking work, i mean what the fuck? note to self: double time is not worth this. stupid double time. 'ooh 70 quid!' yeh fuck you, and fuck you fucking rain. my shoes are getting heavier. and cold. even my bra is wet. unbelievable.

8:30 am. finally make it to the ordnance survey. glance across the bleak grey sodden carpark to confirm there is no life. across the road.. hoorah! the lights in the spar are on! maybe theres people inside.. and warmth! get inside, buy a box of teacakes. old indian lady serves me. oh indian lady, ive never been so happy to see you!!
walk back over the flooded carpark. get up to the door, which isnt opening. have to call security. he talks over the intercom a bit, couldnt make out a single word he said. the door opened.

8:40 am. 40 minutes late, fuck em. they should be lucky i got here. 'oh, i could've given you a lift!' announces alex. '..oh yeh? so why didnt you!??' Fortunately, the exchanging of teacakes and cookies and various other 'overtime treats' lightens my mood.
sit down, after removing as much clothing as is socially acceptable. put my walkman on, any music will do. As if to prove the universe has a sense of humour, 'head like a hole' comes on.

9:00 am Realise im actually still shaking with freezingness. cant seem to shed anymore clothing without disrupting the peace as it were. cant find any dry objects to wrap around me either. while going to make myself a cup of coffee, i dawn on a solution: i find an empty coffee jar in the kitchen. cleaned it out, filled it with boiling hot water from the boiling hot water dispensing machine on the wall. it warms me, like a hot water bottle.. sigh, oh hot water coffee jar.. how i love you!

10:00 After slowly warming up, work doesnt seem so bad anymore. Kasabian comes on the walkman.. ho shit! i love kasabian.. im happy again! but still cold.. though less so where lovely coffee jar is touching me.

10:30 breaktime, time for riceball test subject #2, which was wrapped in seaweed before going in the fridge. agree that #2 is nicer. today has not passed without an achievement.

11:00 start arranging the teacakes, cookies and muffins in a line on the desk in the order i'd like to eat them in. the line will, of course, be subject to change as the day goes on. probably feeling around 40% warmer.

11:30 fat christian girl next to me has started pointing out stupid things on the aerial photography. fields of sheep, mostly. she sure is hilarious with her stories of sheep. why dont u go find the chalk picture of the dude with the big dick.

12:00 fat christian girl next to me offers to give me a lift back. woopee! i knew being nice to her and ignoring her horribleness would pay off! Alex also offers me a lift.. dunno, isnt going home with a middle aged guy a bit weird? no wait, i have done that before. well, quite, and that WAS weird.. actually no, this wont be the same. ah fuck whatever, he lives closer so why not.

13:00 despite being 40 minutes down, im fuckin outta here. jump in alex's car. feel guilty about the rubbish in my hand so i dont put it down. uncertain if the silence on the way back is a pleasant or awkward one, i choose to go with pleasant. after 10 minutes we're at mine. as he quite rightly points out.. its nicer this way. i knew that.

13:10 take off all my clothes and put the fan heater on. put on NIN and dance around the room, causing some more damage to the springs in the mattress on the way. meh, i was already gonna have to replace it anyway. check through lovefilm dvds, remembering i havent watched any in a week.

13:20 collapse on my bed like i promised myself i could. got a text from a mate which reminds me about this blog. figured i should see if i can get away with writing any old trash.. like this.

13:40 start writing all this blog

15:00 got horny so took a writing break. fell asleep.

17:00 (roundabouts) came back, started finishing this off.

17:47 wrote this very sentence.

huh? ....fuck! ive got a life to live! see ya later folks!

Clickey-click pic:



There's long been debate about whether or not the Americans ever actually made it to the moon. Anyone who's researched the Apollo projects will appreciate that if they did, they made it there in something that is, in the light of today's technology, comparable to a tin can with rockets and the equivalent computer processing power of a cheap mobile phone. That was the 60s, technology was limited, and that was America.. where everything has to be done right here right now, faster and cheaper than anybody else. The whole feat was stunning and so impressive its only understandable that some people feel the need to question it.

China on the other hand has a more time-honouring culture, with a history of huge long term projects for big, lasting goals. They have no direct competitors on this one, and all the time in the world to hone things down to an art.

If, it is true that the Americans never really made it, then ill bet the Chinese definitely will.

...oooooooh, yeh i said that.

Having spent a week filled with love and no one to give it to, i have arrived at this enlightening conclusion: I need a bloke.


Here's a quick list of my preferences:


His appearance should be something like a human equivalent of this:

Musical tastes should include things like this:






He should be able to laugh at things like this:





==Also, i dont really want him to:==

• take me on shopping sprees
• be gay
• hate me
• mind me randomly hugging and kissing him
• mind me jumping around the room when i get excited
• mind me ranting away to myself when i get angry
• mind me getting a sudden and often unexplainable interest in just about anything

==Also, I would quite like him to: ==

• be trent reznor
• be equally awesome if he isn't trent reznor.
  

Well, anything on top of that is a bonus really. If you feel you might fit this description, please dont hesitate to kick yourself for me for not being here last week. Thanks!

subject xs2y-356 speaks:

hello..

well, the plan is, in time this will become kayamana's ranting office- like a little sorting office in which kayamana files her rants. its where kayamana can be a grumpy old man long before she's old or has the sex change that she realised just now she doesn't intend to have.

You should start as you mean to go on, so heres a long whiney list of excuses as to why ive been procrastinating and not getting my first proper blog done.


Bonobos

a friend of mine informed me of a little jungle monkey who's more sexually exciteable than any other animal. impressed that any creature would throw down such a gauntlet, i rushed off to research the little guys immediately. the legends are true. these guys get off on seeing.. anything. all sexualities are welcome and the fun never stops. oh and they're our closest relative! will do more research and get back to you with info on where we went wrong..


sunshine

a good friend recommended to me [and hes generally good on his films, with the horrible exception of mallrats] a film about astronauts who fly to the sun. i know, i know.. the first thing i thought was thats the most dumbest thing i ever did heard. but i like sci fi and the fact the science was all horribly wrong restored my interest in astrophysics. well, for a couple of hours anyway, and ive forgotten most of what i learnt again now.


astrophysics

whatever they were saying, that was a cool


Mallrats

that wasnt. that was shit. what the hell? it woulda been more fun wasting those two hours in an actual mall.


love film

over the last couple of months ive been stockpiling a list of 'must see' films to hit a certain online film rental company (other film rental companies are available!) with. as such i now have a total of 29 films to try and get through in the remaining two weeks. 'as many dvds as you like' is all good n well but you can only physically recieve and watch no more than 3 dvds a week. despite the worrying build up, if you DO have a film to recommend, just drop a post. on here, not on your foot.


public relabelling service

ive already found a bus ticket and a toothbrush packet in need of relabelling. more items will no doubt be added soon, along with the actual relabellings themselves!


zombie phones

fuck dying suns, my phone needs phone CPR everytime i want to send a text. the lights gone, the buttons barely work, and it periodically passes out with only a major session of switch on/ off/ on/ off/ on treatement to ressusitate it. i really should get a new phone but as far as im concerned it DOES send texts, so it ain't broke.


fire fox themes

foxkeh was so cute i physically couldnt stop myself crying when i saw it. i dont cry anymore, but i still smile when he runs. other internet browsers, along with their themes, are available.


And finally:


making a blogger account

what am i f***ing stupid.. it took me 6 attempts to get past the 'create your account' stage. 6 words with no meanings and i couldnt copy a single one of them. well apart from the last one of course..