a lot of stuff and nonsense from eclectech

Someone just posted some spam in the comments of an old post and it was emailed to me.

It reminded me that I had a blog so I popped over to have a look. It is older than I realised.

I will muse, and decide whether to abandon it or try and make use of it again.

I think I will try to keep it going.

Have a shocked and dizzy pom pom while I think about it...

Labels: blether

Happy holidays and all that.

Love e. x

Labels: blether

The Open Rights Group is 3.
This is a good thing.
You can read about what they've been up to here.

UK organisations keep having problems protecting your data.
This is a bad thing*.
You can read about some of them here.

* Yes. Even when it's the BNP. Guilty schadenfreude aside, I can't pick when to apply my principles. If I say it's OK because it's the BNP and I don't like them, I lose the argument when someone who doesn't like me (or what I stand for) does the same. Bah.

Labels: blether, open rights group

... featuring Mushroom the Marmot here, but as it's running a little late I thought I'd spend 10 minutes clearing the rest of my bookmarks out. It's a little bit of a "I'm back online" frenzy from my point of view.

First up, I do rather like the atheist adverts being run on London buses, "There's probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life." A worthy message and a nice change. I also found this photo great. Well, that's not quite right, I can't bear the hatred shown in the demos, but the protest placard is wonderful. Hooray for that.

I've had a big moan in the past about the quality of comments on YouTube. This Firefox plugin was obviously made for me. Fantastic.

This is definitely the best BBC headline in a long time... Military penguin becomes a 'Sir'. Frankly all a bit nuts, but still a great headline. A slightly sadder headline involves my first penguin love. Berke Breathed has said goodbye to Opus. Again. This time for good it seems. It's a bit of an odd one for me. I've not kept up with the recent Opus cartoons, to me he belongs to the eighties when, along with Calvin and Hobbes, he was my cartoon favourite but I've always intended to catch up. There's something sad about knowing he's gone for good. On the plus side Mr Breathed is about to delve further into kids books, and as a new parent this makes me quite happy. I can't express how much I'm looking forward to reading "A wish for wings that work" to the techling this Christmas.

More books... I strongly recommend Ben Goldacre's Bad Science. I've always enjoyed the blog, but I 've just finished the book and it's tops. Well written, entertaining and informative. A great defense against the horror of "well I read in the newspaper that..." He also mentions me. I was quite chuffed about that. Unfortunately it was because that awful poo woman threatened to sue me, but he called me funny too. Rah!

Finally, Scaryduck has rewritten Romeo and Juliet in txt speak.

Jlt: Rmo Rmo WTF art thou Rmo?
Rmo: Here 4 am I art LOL
Jlt: Oh, you is so lush

Read it!

Back tomorrow with Mushroom the musical marmot in action.

Labels: blether, neat links, news links, penguin joy, poo woman

The credit crunch has hit my nappy pixie and it's gone bust. It is a sad day.

I don't like disposable nappies* and have been quite happy to only use them minimally for the techling.

I also don't like doing the washing. Laundry is the worse of domestic chores for me. It's dull, dull, dull and, if dirty nappies are involved, a little too stinky.

I found a solution. We used cloth nappies and once a week the nappy pixie** arrived, took away the stinky nappies and left clean ones. It's been great.

And now they've gone.***

[Sob]

House eclectech is currently taking bets**** on whether my principles can hold their own against the stinky nappies.

*Well, they're marvelous things in their own way, but when you get through so many of them I prefer to reuse.
** might not be an actual pixie
*** my own selfish moaning aside, I'm rather upset for the folk working there too. The people I've dealt with there have been splendidly friendly throughout. Boo.
**** not really, I think I'd need some kind of license for that

Labels: blether

Adding a small child to house eclectech didn't cause quite enough chaos, so we've also moved to the country. It is very lovely, we're surrounded by woods and hills and lochs and birds and squirrels and other such fine things, but also by boxes.

Took a little time off baby things and unpacking to make a silly picture, to make sure I still could.

Have a homster.

Normal service etc.

Labels: blether

It's a boy!

He's very lovely, and is consuming all my time at the moment. It's fun, if slightly tiring.

Normal service will resume in, ooh, 18 years or so probably, but I'm hoping to find an alternate service early in the new year as I find my feet in my new role. In the meantime I hope everyone has a fun festive season and wish you all a very happy 2008.

Love eclectech x

Labels: blether

Apologies for the girl talk, but my job for the day is to put together a play list for my upcoming hospital trip. It turns out to be a rather unusual task; what music do you want to listen to when you're trying to squeeze out a baby? One possibility of course is that when the moment comes I won't care, which makes my job for the day decidedly easier, but on the off-chance I get picky I want the right selection. It's making me listen to music with a very different ear.

I've ruled out masses of music I like (and part of me feels would be highly appropriate) for being too shouty or dancey. If I came away from anything from the physiotherapy antenatal class it's that managing stress and controlling breathing should help; picking music designed to make one shout and jump probably isn't wise. So no California Über Alles or I Can't Decide then.

The problem with quite a lot of my more laid back and mellow music is that they have very emotional lyrics. I keep finding tracks, thinking "that'll be perfect", listening to a little and realising in my current slightly hormonally challenged state it makes me want to weep. Again, maybe best to avoid.

Current list is a strange and unexpected subsection of our music collection. Lots of instrumentals or lyrics I don't understand due to being in another language. Sigur Rós, Buena Vista Social Club, the soundtrack to Amelie, the Penguin Cafe Orchestra... not what I expected to choose but they feel right.

Some old favourites as well of course. Tom Waits is essential, but I've selected older, croonier material rather than the more chaotic, shambolic albums of recent years. Some Nick Drake because he's associated so strongly with days when I was doing little other than relaxing, and Spiritualised for the same reason (to be honest Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space is on the verge of the 'making me cry' category, but is too lovely not to include).

Hmm. Nine albums and a few selected tracks. That should do it. I suspect I won't notice if it starts to loop.

I should probably apologise in advance to the midwife though.

Labels: blether

... is the size of your duck.

Despite the amusement I occasionally experience when I misread a spam subject I've finally decided that I need to move over to a new public eclectech email address as after 7 years online mail@eclectech is getting far too many emails about duck size.

I'll run the old address for a wee while longer, and will set a sensible bounce message to let people know what's happening, but in future please send emails to hello instead of mail at eclectech.co.uk.

Ta.

Labels: blether, silly joke

I've not been online much recently, here or anywhere. Off-line life is rather hectic getting work finished up and things sorted in readiness for the Big Day of babytech arriving. I'm hoping to get a new animation out in the next couple of weeks but it all depends...

We have released an animation with Friends of the Earth since my last post. Available through their new site at www.exxon-files.eu or at YouTube, it looks at the approach of one particular oil company to climate change research.

Hopefully I'll have a little free time before baby arrives and be able to catch up with online friends. In the meantime have a very splendid video that you've probably seen before but is currently making me smile. Christopher Walken rocks.

Labels: blether, flash animation, video

I have been making monsters! Rarrrrrrr! Turns out I'm not very good at drawing monsters as I don't think they're meant to be cute, but heh, the song is called Monster Island so the characters are monsters. That's all there is to it.

Monster Island

And now the news.

House eclectech is very happy. A baby is on the way! Oh my!

According to the BBC I'm part of a trend of women who went to uni and put off babies until their thirties. It's been a while since I've been part of a trend, it's rather reassuring in its own way. I wonder if the rest of my pregnant peers are as keen as I am on these hats, which are almost tempting me to attempt knitting.

Labels: blether, flash animation

Kurt Vonnegut

A great writer, artist, satirist, and humanist.

It's sad that he's gone, but good that he left so much behind.

Boing Boing : Remembering Kurt Vonnegut
BBC Obituary
Guardian Special Report
New York Times article
Wikiquotes

'And if I should ever die, God forbid, I hope you will say, "Kurt is up in heaven now." That's my favorite joke.'

Kurt Vonnegut, A Man Without a Country

Labels: blether, news links

Splendid! Thanks to all sharing your opinions, please keep them coming!

The current results have cartoons firmly in the lead, followed by scenery. Mutants and flowers are tied in third place.

A few nice suggestions, one particularly fine one involving an animation of Humph on a trampoline using "several tall, narrow images side-by-side to capture it. One of Humph going down, one bending the trampoline, and one of him going back up." I'm rather taken by that idea.

Apologies to the person taking offence at my scenic photos only covering Scotland and England. I know there are very nice places in Wales (not to mention elsewhere in the world), it's just I live in Scotland and have many friends and family in England so I tend to be in those places with my camera frequently enough to get a few decent shots. Nothing personal against Wales, honest!

As a partial explanation of my recent absence there are some new photos of the Lake District online as I was down there for a few days. Nice stomping about the hills and one gorgeous sunset.
Life is a little mad at the moment, but hopefully I'll grab a moment to make something fun soon.I have plans for the wee guy up the way to become a drummer. I just need slightly longer days and I'll be sorted......

Labels: blether, photos

The bad pun is, I assume, self evident. This is the responsibility of an email correspondent who has taken to tempting me with things to animate, so blame David H. please.

Is this a UK thing? Ah, yes.

As for the huge Humph, you can see him at the other place, where I'm also asking for opinions on what I should stick into a gallery at Photobloc. Cartoons are currently in the lead. Hooray for Humph!

Stumbled across a lovely gallery of sky photos and some fab drawings that are work a peek, if you've had enough Humph.

Labels: blether, neat links, silly joke

It didn't rain.

It didn't cloud over.

It did get quite cold.

But that didn't matter because it was very lovely. Hooray for the lunar eclipse!

I've been snapping at the zoo too and have some new photos online. I'm quite pleased with a couple of them, the Japanese Macaques and chimpanzees posed nicely. The baboons were fantastic but didn't get close enough for me to do them justice. Next time!

Labels: blether, photos

... believing it to be Wednesday.

I am now confused, but quite pleased as I seem to have gained an entire day.

Probably a good job really, as I have rather a lot to do and wasn't sure when I was going to fit it all in.

But now I have Wednesday.

Hooray!

If you've discovered some free time down the back of the sofa and don't already have stuff to fill it you could always write some ten word reviews or become an exhibitionist about your home.

Oh, and if you're a youngster expecting to get your first passport in the next few months can I recommend you get your skates on and do it in the next month. People applying for their first adult passport from April 2007 will the guinea-pigs for a process the government is calling "Authentication by Interview" (encouragingly described by the Government as an "intrusive interview"). Lovely. You can find more information over at Renew for Freedom.

Labels: blether, neat links, NO2ID

It's never nice when a loved one is in hospital, and if they're a few hundred miles away it feels even worse, so I have been away to get closer.

I am back, things are better and I am getting back to normal.

Back soon with some silly, and I hope to manage it this time.

In the meantime, have an appalling joke about teddy bears on a picnic.

Labels: blether, silly joke

Life is keeping me off-line at the moment.

There should be a few new things in February but in the meantime have a porkupine and a photo of the two new chicks of my adopted penguin. It has been a good year for penguin chicks in Argentina apparently, so hooray for that!

Back soon with some silly.

Labels: animangle, blether, penguin joy, silly joke

Lots going on at the moment so very little time to play online. Busy with work after the holiday, preparing for a terribly grown-up* dinner party this weekend and my only distraction has been the occasional animangle.

I tend to go through different phases with graphics stuff, and a realisation that I hadn't created any new breeds of animal recently led me to make some dog-bird hybrids. I think this wee fellow is my favourite of the bunch.

I call him the doggle. There is a wallpaper version if you'd like to see him in all his glory.

For those interested there are two source images for this, the base hawk image and the cute dog.

For the very interested my next favourite is the pigeon. Mainly because I have a silly fondness for visual puns.

I have also, on my occasional spare moment, been perusing the blog of Mr Yaxlich. I recommend popping over. He has been making me grin.

Have a good weekend all.

* well, maybe not that grown-up

Labels: animangle, blether, desktop wallpaper, neat links

Have a very Happy New Year everyone. Here's hoping 2007 is a good one.

If you'd like to see the new year in with some fireworks without venturing out into the cold feel free to go and waggle your mouse over the dancers on my noisy hogmanay fireworks.

Have a good one and see you all in the New Year.

Love eclectech x

Labels: blether, flash toy, jeremy