A letter from Zen in the mail today said that they sincerely regret having wasted their time on such an obvious no-candidate like me.

Or as Shasha might call him, ‘Ray LaLasagne’. I just can’t get enough of this man. Ioannis was kind enough to pilfer his second album “‘Til the sun turns black” and burn it on to a CD for me. The second song is called “Empty” and has really burning lyrics in a beautiful melody.

It includes this amazing paragraph.

Well I looked my demons in the eyes, laid bare my chest, said “Do your best to destroy me.

See I’ve been to hell and back so many times I must admit you kind of bore me”.

There’s a lot of things that can kill a man, there’s a lot of ways to die yes and some already did and walk beside me.

There’s a lot of things I don’t understand why so many people lie, it’s the hurt I hide that fuels the fire inside me.

Will it always feel this way?
So empty and estranged.”

Yesterday’s interview at Zen Internet went well, except for the 60-minute test exam I was given with questions like:-

1. In the slash notation what does /24 mean?
a) 255.0.0.0
b) 255.255.0.0
c) 255.255.198.25
d) 255.255.255.255

and

2. In binary what represent the number 130
a) 10010100
b) 11100000
c) 10101000
d) 010001110

(P.S. Computer geeks needn’t tell me that none of the above is actually 130, I have randomly typed in some 1s and 0s to illustrate my point. Although every attempt is made in this blog to report events accurately, even I’m not anal enough to actually look up/work out what 130 is in binary)

There were only 35 of these questions, and being a choice of four means even an idiot should get approx 25%, so I gave it a go. Then I had to describe, in my very own plain, humble words, what latency means in relation to network connections, as well as work out how long it would take to download 650Mbs at 512kbs, assuming theoretical maximum.

Such, and more, horrors aside, I think I did swimmingly!

No, not the death metal group Death, but real and virtual death.

1. Steve Irwin has died filming off the coast off Queensland. He was stung by a stingray straight through the heart.
Well, you can’t say a sudden death by natural causes wasn’t realistically on the cards for him; as my good friends at despair.com remind me, luck only lasts a lifetime if you die young. Odd though, that it was a stingray that got him, because as far as I know they’re not the deadliest of things swarming about on that continent. Although a six inch poisonous barb through the heart will do it for anyone, I guess.
Gone are the days when David Attenborough reluctantly put himself in front of the camera in order for viewers at home to get an idea of the scale of the animals. To him, the animal was the star and anything that detracted from it was to be avoided. Hence the hushed, reverent tone he used. Cut to modern day presenters Steve Irwin, Austin Stevens, etc. hassling and terrifying a poor animal to get the dynamic shots demanded of them, and you realise this can only end in grief. While they may have good intentions of simply photographing the animal, for all intents and purposes the cornered animal is saying his last prayers and either preparing for a final glorious battle to death, or simply curling up and hoping the end won’t be too painful. I’m not blaming these guys; I rather like them and their shows. I’m simply commenting on the state of affairs.

2. Dubyah Bush is going to be assassinated on Channel Four. Shot by a Syrian assassin.
It has provoked the usual outrage that it must have hoped to provoke, but there is an interesting side to how events might pan out following this. Similarly, Frederick Forsyth had written a novel before the 2nd Gulf War about how the presence of Saddam Hussein was not actually unwanted by the West as a stabilising influence, and that there were fears about who would slide in to fill the power vaccuum after he was eliminated. Better the Devil you know..?

I have an interview with Zen Internet on Monday, based in Rochdale, for the job of a Technical Support Consultant. I will be given an hour-long test: multiple-choice, comprehension, problem-solving, etc. Then a one-to-one interview. So fingers crossed. Or should I say, “Employment, here I come!” ? God knows they need me more than I need them.

A Scanner BORING more like it. I fell asleep halfway through the boring explanations of who was what and why. After five minutes the novelty of watching an entire film that was first shot with actors and then handed it over to pre-school cartoonists to scribble on wears off. That’s like pulling your own cart and buying a horse to sit on it. Keanu Reeves does his usual “What’s going on here I don’t understand” acting (of course he was chosen because of Matrix) which makes the dull barely-human acting even less so. Woody Harrelson and Robert Downing Stupider were only cast because they are known pot- and coke-heads. A couple of funny lines about “Waaay, I’m stoned maaaan” just can’t hold up this movie.
Sci-Fi stories are generally not meant to be shot as films unless you can get it right. Just because you think the story is pushing social boundaries, and you’re pushing cinematic boundaries doesn’t necessarily mean the story and you have an iota in common.
Verdict: Another passable sci-fi story ruined by a nouvelle art director.

Shasha was talking about product sabotage. This is what the BBC says. I watched this programme, it’s called ‘Trust me, I’m an Economist’

Also known as Anne Robinson.
Yesterday there was a young American rock/rapper (eh?) called Chip on, who was also pushing the bible and therefore was nauseatingly chirpy. He couldn’t answer a single question related to anything British, obviously, but the only American question asked him about Connecticut he also got wrong! Only an American would think he stood a chance with such knowledge. Annoyingly, the others were so crap that he got to the final, where he was beaten by a Scottish accountant with the personality of cream-ish wallpaper who managed to answer two of the five questions.
Which goes to show that the show has gone downhill from being a moderately poor quiz show in the beginning by quickly realising that its potential really lies in getting stupid people on so Anne can look smart in comparison. Why they take any stick from her is beyond me!
Insulting television is on the up, isn’t it TrinnyandSusanna?

Ioannis asked about the video membership Shasha has joined.
The shop is in Rusholme, opposite Sangam’s. It’s called 24-Hour Self Video, which I thought meant anybody desperate to video themselves in the wee hours of the morning or during lunch break needn’t wait. No, it’s a self-service, fully automated dvd, vhs and something-else-I-can’t-remember rental shop. You pay at rates of 6 hour, 12 hour or 24 hour, so it works out cheap for people who live above it. Here’s a review of it in Itchy Manchester, which says pretty much what I’ve told you.

Quote of the day from Dr. Cox in Scrubs. He’s got many good ones, but this caught my, ahem, eye.

Sex is like squash; you work hard for half-an-hour, work up a sweat, and try not to get hit in the eye.

Of course, he said ‘racket-ball’, not ‘squash’.

David Attenborough was on all day yesterday with ‘Life in the Undergrowth’. Apparently hermaphrodite Leopard Slugs screw each other in the head while hanging upside-down. Brilliant!
Seen a lot of movies recently, Yesterday saw ‘Bellevue Rendezvous’ at the Cornerhouse with Sha. Sha has a new membership deal with a video shop, which means she MUST watch two films a day, and I’m trying to help 🙂

Another gripe. I have previously mentioned my wonderment at how far companies will go to claim superiority over their competitors. I started shaving with a twin-bladed razor, which was the best a man could get in those days. I was eventually persuaded to add another blade, so I’m on three now. So far David Beckham hasn’t persuaded me to switch to four. But now someone’s got out a FIVE-bladed razor, so clearly the foolishness of this all is only apparent to the general public and not to the big bosses at Gillette! Wilkinson took a while before they caught up with the four-blade-upgrade; I suspected it was more due to their reluctance to appear to be chasing Gillette than any real technical difficulty involved. Will they go to five? I suppose they will, the logic being that stupid people are being convinced that more is better. Hence the similar Finish detergent with three four FIVE active ingredients getting their back bent out of shape in all sorts of odd postitions in order to clean your dishes.
I am reading one of the most fascinating sci-fi books in a looong time (That’s not “looong” with the ‘o’ as in ‘spoon’, but with the ‘o’ as in ‘thong’, only prolooonged). Alastair Reynolds’ ‘Redemption Ark’ won the British Science Fiction award, and I can see why. It’s a massive 650-page tome with size 2 font, and I’m only into page 20 so far, but it’s gripped me by the gonads. Hence the high-pitched typing. Already there’s been wars, and alien invasions, and mind augmentations. I’m looking forward to a bit of human-alien action next, know what I mean?

Might go watch A Scanner Darkly at the Cornerhouse today. 18:25 or 20:40.

Watching an American programme about the “World’s Deadliest Animals” (95% of which were American wildlife because what’s the point in scaring people with something that lives far away) I heard this most incredibly articulate wildlife expert and his well-expressed opinion that:-

“Prevention is the best method of not getting stung by a scorpion”

Which brings up the old argument. As a tool of communication, such language manages to get its message across not by content alone, but (arguably mainly) by context. Therefore it is doing its job used in the medium it was employed, the spoken word. But it just annoys me when people dem doan speak propah.

My sister didn’t make the drum school auditions; so there’s more bad news for the Kazi Siblings. In true KS fashion, she was out celebrating her visit to London by going to the Proms and dining out, trying to push the knowledge of defeat into a box in the dark recesses of her mind where she can then lock it tight so it never resurfaces. It works like a charm for us!
I was expecting some cash today to plough back into my debit account that’s been in the red (and therefore costing me £50 a month in charges) ever since Homo Habilis turned wanderer and left the savannas of Africa following game northwards. Of course, as I log in to my bank account for the umpteenth time (with a pop up specially designed for me by the whiz boys at SH-BC bank that says “What? Back already”) I see that there has been no relieving of my dough-related doldrums.
I have to make a trip to Old Trafford today, hoping that it’s worth the hassle. Had a hell of a time trying to answer questions for a particularly nosey company. “How do I know what I’m good at if I’ve never done anything in my life?” I tell them. I figure honesty must count for something, right?