By Roy Mathur, on 2024-03-25, at 23:07:05 to 23:51:55 GMT, for Captain Roy's Rusty Rocket Radio Show
Google this for delightful pictures of bears playing with a swan pedalo at Woburn Safari Park.
Although technically not quite the start of spring in England (ahem, global warming), the Hindu spring festival of colours celebrating Vishnu's victory over the demon Hiranyakashipu is upon us.
After last week's experiment trying out my trusty Shure SM58 mic with my new post-production process---the same that I use for the Shure SM7B---I can tell you for sure (sorry) that the SM7B is the smoother of the pair, so I'm back on it.
Being a Doctor Who nut, the TARDIS fascinates me, but I found a Wikipedia, er, fact about the real thing: police boxes were used to, "...hold detainees..."
That can't be right, can it? Let me know as I haven't had an answer on social media.
Imagine dialling 999, while hearing someone struggling inside!
I also asked on social media, "If you could be any character in The Lord of the Rings, who would you be? I'd pick Tom Bombadil. He's only a bit player, but he's so happy." (Paraphrased).
Zero response on Twitter, but Mastodon choices and results were Frodo 0%, Gandalf 22%, Aragorn 11%, Tom Bombadil 67%. After the fact, I realised how annoyingly male-centric the poll was, though I had originally intended Galadriel to be on the list. My opinion may have biased the poll, but being a happy, friendly chap, married to Goldberry, a beautiful water nympth... lucky bugger.
The FX were good, but the acting was fairly average, apart from Iman Vellani who lights up the screen as Ms. Marvel (Kamala Khan). But even her efforts failed to save the 2023 movie. I wonder if the cast were a little lost trying to bring to life the anaemically written story about yet another vengeful, hammer-wielding Kree lunatic.
I was pleased to see Beast in the post-credits.
From the creaky archives of my old blog Boldly Voyaging the Multiverse and posted on 2011-11-29 and (appended).
I've always wanted a church organ. A large, towering, ominous, cathedral sized instrument on which I could endlessly play Bach's Toccato and Fugue in D minor. This would entertain my hench people while they went to work on Mr Bond with lasers in my dungeon. So here's a list of my personal top 10 organ playing villains of all time:
The Nautilus Salon set created for the film was set up in Tomorrowland as a temporary exhibit, but it became so popular that it remained on display for 11 years...the sets were disassembled in 1966, the pipe organ...was set aside for use inside the Haunted Mansion, which would open three years later.---George Savvas, Disneyland PR Director, 2014
The second adaptation of Liu Cixin Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy, this time by GoT's Damon Lindeloft and D.B. Weisse's on Netflix, and starring some familiar GoT faces. Named after the first novel of the trilogy, but distinguished from the China's Tencent's produced series (reviewed in 484) by using the Arabic numeral. There's also an anime that I no little about.
In short the plot follows the aftermath of a vengeful Chinese SETI-type programme physicist inviting alien invaders and the fall out thereof. The sheer scale of the story gives it a mystical bent, but this is refreshingly proper hard science fiction encompassing Fermi's Paradox (given so much space, where are the aliens) and the Dark Forest Hypothesis (there are lots of aliens, but they are probably hiding).
Netflix's first season better explains the story, is better acted, and has better SFX, though it feels shallower in intellectual and emotional depth than Tencent's attempt. The ratings are not spectacular. Given Netflix cancellation-happy track record, that does not bode well for a second season.
Accompanying this is a also a new audio book adaptation by star Rosalind Chao (older Ye Wenjie). There was an older unpopular version that is now unavailable. As I find the plot fascinating, but can't commit to the hefty translated tomes, I might give it a try.
I've been rewatching The Beiderbecke Trilogy, increasingly for Barbara Flynn.
I can't believe the vaguely jazz-centric, mild, comedic, northern subversion of pulp noir came out in 1984.
I spruced up my resume, made ten copies, and went to local a job fair for roughly the fifth time in a decade on Saturday (2024-03-23). Even as I walked there I started to think back to the previous events that turned out fruitless, that is, no interest, few resumes accepted, and no call backs.
This one was no exception. A cyber security firm that caught my eye had no jobs in actual cyber security. No one wanted to accept my resume and just about all the exhibitors told me to scan a QR code to look up vacancies, which begs the question why even bother tuning up in person? Perhaps the point of job fairs is cheap promotion of the companies exhibiting and absolutely nothing to do with finding people work. The final irony was a booth encouraging visitors to sign up to donate blood. A splendid metaphor.
Total distance walked there and back: 10.8 km.
There are better pods and blogs about fountain pens, but they occasionally feature in my podcast: 322 (Diplomat Traveller, Kaweco Sport, Lamy Safari 2020 Special Edition Candy Fountain Pens, Diamine Sapphire Blue, Herbin Rose Cyclamen, Herbin Lierre Sauvage, Blue Parker Quink, Black Parker Quink, Montblanc Mystery Black), 349 (Lamy Z50 Extra Fine Fountain Pen Nib in Black Stainless Steel), and of course tonight's inky thoughts.
Green ink: nutty letters to the editor from irate readers or signed by MI6's C (still?)
Red ink: from a series of my maniacal teachers.
Blurple is my favourite, but Diamine Sapphire is stinky and I draw and scan too, so I usually use cheap black Quink. Though I have used terrible and sticky India ink and have a beautiful shoe bottle full of overpriced Mountblanc Blank Permanent.
Interspersed with sorting through mounds of paperwork and dealing with like in general, I've been aura-ing and migraine-ing on and off. Not so much visions of Ornella Muti's Princess Aura in Flash Gordon (1980), though I wouldn't say no, but I've experienced an amazing psychedelic flashing and pulsating scotoma recently.
Such is the life of le migraineur---I feel quite the bohemian---or "migraineux" according to Monsieur Encre Verte in the Jama Neurology Journal.
Not gun power treason and plot, but that this show has two formats. The main topics are always SFFH, but it comes in two flavours.
This multiple topic type is closest to the original casual geek audio zine counterpart to my old blog started in 2012. It tend to drift off in tangents on this one.
As Yoda says, "There is another..." The second is a single topic revist or review started around 2014. This is more focused if that is your thing.
If you dare, please join my laboratory assistant, Herr Fygor Gestalt, and I for refreshments and relaxed chat at Castle Royenstein.
It always starts with me thinking I don't have enough material for an episode podcast and ends with too much.
Mine is the Mauritian Goodbye of podcasts. If you are a British Mauritian born in the 60 or 70s, you'll know exactly what this means.