Paula Radcliffe

Well no surprises here but Paula Radcliffe has dropped out of the Olympics, Why we keep sending her is the biggest surprise, the highest she's come is 4th and that was 12 years ago in 2000, in 2004 Olympics she failed to finish twice, and in 2008 she didn't even finish the London marathon, there's  people in costumes finishing that remember.
Maybe it time she retired, and maybe it's time we started sending athletes who actually are fit enough to have a proper chance of winning instead of just sending people on name because they won something donkeys years ago..

British Olympic opening ceremony

Well last night was the British Olympic opening ceremony, I wasn't hopeful and I certainly wasn't disappointed.  What a disaster, stupid sets, terrible singing and bad taste, well what do you expect with Danny Boyle running the show.
The doctors and nurses dancing for joy, why? the health service is in crises, they are closing hospitals all over the place because theres no money to pay doctors, not much joy there then.   James Bond in the opening clip with a fake queen, shame the bond films were all American funded and produced.
Then we have the real queen, sheesh! what a miserable old dear, all that done for her and she couldn't force a smile to save her life (mind you not much to smile at) I'm told she was reading while what passes for the British team came out.
Paul McCartney was dug up again, why? he sounded terrible, same as he did last time they grave robbed him, why don't these old rockers pack it in when the get past it.
The only mildy entertaining part was Rowan Atkinson playing the fool, and even he's getting boring now, the one trick pony of Mr Bean is tired and sad, but expected from royal sycophant Atkinson.

Power cables and mobile phones!

Why, oh why, is something as simple as a power cable such a problems?  I mean why cant they be standardised? Why do we need about seven different power cables for our mobile phones, surely some sort of standard could have been reached, I mean camera makers managed with the tripod screw fitting.
And why is it a phone cable is about a a metre and a half long (4.5 foot) or longer and yet a bloody kettle or computer power cable is about half a metre (18 inches) I mean a mobile phone is small enough to go anywhere near a plug, a kettle on the other hand will probably only go in one or two places in a kitchen, and a computer most lightly only one place in a room.  It's like spaghetti junction in my house with bloody wires and extension leads everywhere.
Come on designers get some common sense please!!!!!

John Bishop's Britain

I saw this the other night, and if a stand up comedian needs canned applause there's something missing.... him being funny maybe?  to be honest it was grim, singularly unfunny.

Grumpy

Yep it's official, I'm a grumpy old devil, the last few weeks I haven't been sleeping too well, and it's catching up with me.   I'm having a go at those around me, and they don't deserve it to be fair, so I'm going to try and get more sleep and be less miserable.   Fingers crossed.

US tv shows?

What is it with US TV shows?  All the police series have glamorous detectives solving impossibly complicated crimes (nearly always a serial killer) with clever hi-tech crime busting.  Whereas the reality is a fat cop with an old computer hardly ever solving even the most basic robbery, and even when they do it's because the criminal is even dumber than the cop.

Then there's the "reality" shows, why is the boss always a hard nosed pretend tough guy (American chopper, sons of guns, battle machine bros deadliest catch etc etc etc) In reality an overweight bully with an attitude problem, who's showing off for the cameras.   And why is there always a dumb son or brother?
Do any of these people actually realise how stupid they really look?

Personally I cringe what I see some of the rubbish put out on channels like discovery, take Finding bigfoot (please take it away) every week a bunch of "squach" hunters go crashing through the woods with radios bleeping every 30 seconds, wondering why they cant find bigfoot.  Two reasons people, one because it doesn't exist, and two because even if it did exist the noise you jokers make would scare off anything within a five mile radius.
The way to find it ( if it was there)  would be to move in very quietly, and set up an OP covering the main tracks to any water, staying silent  (we call it hard routine) and wait for it to move around, you'll find bugger all thrashing about in the woods making stupid "squatch calls"  and talking constantly on the radio.

Mumbles

We went to Mumbles today for a break, I really enjoyed spending time with the boys and my dear lady, we should do it more often, we don't get out all together very often at all.
here are a few photos.

Whale wars Viking shores 3

Well what can I say...  In tonight's episode the Sea Shepherd crew actually went out to sea for a change, ok there was a dramatic race to stop a grind but that turned out to be a local boat race not actually a grind at all.

Then when for the first time the SS crew actually saw a pod of live whales, they immediately got on the radio and told everybody listening where and how many there were. Now remember in an earlier episode they said the locals were monitoring their communications, so maybe giving them the information they need to kill the whales wasn't very bright.
That is unless you wonder if there's an ulterior motive, after all they would love to catch the local Faroese people having a grind and film it for publicity for the Sea Shepherd, so maybe there is a hidden agenda here.

Either way I'm sick of the whole thing, the Sea Shepherd crew have behaved very badly, and either are totally incompetent (the covert van with the driver wearing a SS sweatshirt and being met by a film crew, the illegal microlight, giving out the whales location on the radio etc etc)  or are just very naive spoiled rich kids playing eco warriors, to be honest I don't much care, my support for them died during this series, and from what I'm hearing a lot of other people feel the same.
Goodbye whale wars.... And good riddance..

tilt shift

Theres a new feature in Photoshop CS6 it's the new blur options, one of which gives a tilt shift effect, this makes the scene look a bit like a model village.

Lifeguard sacked?

Thomas Lopez a lifeguard near Miami in the USA was sacked from his job after being called by a member of the public to a man drowning, Thomas rescued the drowning man and was sacked for rescuing a person outside the guarded area of the beach.
Most people would be proud of their lifeguards saving lives (the clue is in the job title), only in America where shoe sizes are bigger than IQ's would they sack them for doing it.
Give him his job back and a bloody medal you morons, if I'm ever drowning I really hope Mr Lopez is around to save me.
Good for you Thomas Lopez, you saved a life, I'd give you a job in a heartbeat, personally I can't think of a better recommendation than a guy putting his own life at risk to help others!