New Puppy

We got a new puppy last thursday night. Its an 11 week old female Bichon Frise.
The whole naming of the puppy thing took about 3 days to resolve. The Name changes went as follows

Molly
Snowy
Maggie
Sally
Lady (This one actually stuck for about 12 hours. My 4yr old son wanted this name as he's a big Thomas the Tank engine fan)
Then Finally back to Sally.

So say hello to our new puppy Sally.

Why People Like/Dislike Comic Books

On the BBC newsfeed today:

"Batwoman Hero Returns as Lesbian"

That is all.

Eating Out Ireland

If you have been reading all the other blogs you'll have seen that Ursula has set up a new blog called 'Eating Out Ireland' on which I have been invited to write restaurant reviews.

Well. I'll give it a go. A few people are saying the name is jokey, i didn't get it until Sinéad spelt it out for me:

"
Put yourself back in the mindset of a 15-year-old boy.
Or Jay and Silent Bob.
If you were Eating Out Ireland, you'd be a busy man with a sore jaw and a tired tounge
"

Quite.

No Immunity from Defamation and Libel.

Reading the front page of my free "you’re an IT Professional" ComputerScope. I am told that you can be prosecuted for defaming people on your blog in Ireland. Not being stupid I already new this. Commentators beware, you are also libel for what you write. Now, I think that my blog is satire. Heavy-handed, ill thought-out satire, but satire all the same. Still, to cover my bases, I’d like to clear some things up:

TicketMaster who were cleared by the Irish competition authority, are probably an ethical company, or least have some sort of ethical company policy on their intranet. They engage in normal business practice, and are entitled to do whatever they want within the eyes of the law. Any allusions or quotes that I may have used about them being unethical, greedy, money grabbing bastards were for humorous purposes only, and probably don’t reflect the truth.

Some people who are not complete morons may not get "The Da Vinci Code" movie. They may be taking acid, be drunk or in shock.

Not all psychics are "bead-laden taffeta-clad behemoths and tank-top wearing weeds," and the guy who took my photo was not fat, by some people’s standards.

Sky do not "make news up," I least I think they don’t, I don’t watch Sky news. I presume people would sue them if they did. I am not encouraging people to sue Sky, or watch Sky News. Not that I’d know because I don’t watch Sky News. Not because they make stuff up or anything, it’s just too far down the channel list.

Shannen Doherty is not a "Mad Bitch," she has issued statements to this effect. Go read them.

Ryan Air should not change their name to "Council House Airlines"

God has never issued a statement from heaven (post old-testament), that I am aware of. Plenty of others may say otherwise.

The Harp Bar was not "…a secret eugenic extraction facility to purify the essence of human scum…"

Mariah Carey does not keep a guy in her bedroom to blow cocaine up her ass. Why would she do that? C’mon why? Nor indeed, to my knowledge, does she take any drugs, either orally, nasally or anally.

50 First Dates is not about Adam Sandler on a quest to rape and psychologically abuse Drew Barrymore. It’s actually a light hearted comedy, and oh so funny.

I didn’t enjoy Riverdance. It was actually shit. In my opinion, not in others.

So there you go. Don't sue.

TicketBastards.

Some unsavory news on the net today. Rewritten to suit my own bias:

Three years after Ticketmaster introduced ticketFast, its online print-at-home ticketing service, consumers have so embraced it that the company now sells a half-million home-printed tickets for sporting and entertainment events each month in North America. Where ticketFast is available, 30 percent of tickets sold are now printed at home, said the company, which is by far the nation's largest ticket agency.

But consumers — many of whom have complained for years about climbing ticket prices and Ticketmaster service charges — may be less eager for the next phase of Ticketmaster's Internet evolution.

Late this year the company plans to begin auctioning the best seats to concerts through ticketmaster.com.

With no official price ceiling on such tickets, Ticketmaster will be able to compete with brokers and scalpers for the highest price a market will bear.
"The tickets are worth what they're worth," said a Ticketmaster rep. "If somebody wants to charge €50 for a ticket, but it's actually worth €1,000 on EBay, the ticket's worth €1,000. I think more and more, our clients — the promoters, the clients in the buildings and the bands themselves — are saying to themselves, `Maybe that money should be coming to me instead of Bob the Broker.' If fuckin’ retards are going to pay that price we might as well capitalise on it. Man those monkeys are stupid. This is off the record isn’t it? Ah, print it anyway, I have three Porches. I’m fucking untouchable."

"We exist to fuck the consumer," he continued, "and anyway, why are you getting at us? EBay started it. Good bless their greedy little hides"

EBay has long been a busy marketplace for tickets auctioned by brokers and others. Late last week, for example, it had more than 22,000 listings for ticket sales.
Once the auction service goes live, Ticketmaster will receive flat fees or a percentage of the winning bids, to be decided with the operators of each event, said a Ticketmaster's executive.

Along with home printing, auctions are central to "a new age of avarice and greed," the Ticketmaster rep said, "We swim in cocaine, normal hookers are no longer good enough." In the second quarter of this year, tickets sold online, with or without home printing, represented 51 percent of Ticketmaster's ticket sales. The rest were sold by phone or at walk-up locations.

Many of those customers are skeptical about Ticketmaster's plans to auction the best seats to concerts.

"The band's biggest fans ought to have the best seats, not the band's richest fans," said Tim Nolan, a naïve tool from Carlow, who used Ticketmaster recently to buy tickets for a concert by the rock group Aslan. Ticketmaster would be, in essence, official scalpers, Mr. Nolan said, voicing a sentiment expressed by some other customers.

Industry watchers agree that auctions will affect all concertgoers. Prime seats are undervalued in the marketplace, said John Moloney, a professor at Trinity, who has studied ticket prices. He predicts that once auctions begin revealing a ticket's market value, prices as a whole will climb faster. John Moloney admits part of his job is stating remarkably obvious observations. "It’s fantastic that I paid for saying this shit," he said.

Gary Gary Gray, editor of the concert industry trade magazine, StarSmack, predicted that all ticket prices would become more fluid. Tickermaster say after a promoter assesses initial sales from an auction, remaining ticket prices could be raised or lowered to meet goals. "Lowered!" Gary Gary snorted, "when that happens I’ll stop beating my wife. Does anybody believe a word these cocksuckers say?"

The notion of ticket auctions is annoying, Mr. Gray said, but he is resigned to them. But mostly he doesn’t care because his editor picks up the bill.
"I guess the capitalist inside me would say, `Hey, if that's what they can get for tickets, I guess that's just something I can't afford, like a Yacht, a Learjet or a sex-change.' "

The Last of it. For Today.

Finally added in the in-laws. Makes my lovely poster a little cluttered and far less dynamic.

Also, remember girls and boys that if you are going to do an image search for Shannen Doherty do it at home. Definitely, definitely NSFW. Don't do it. Don't be tempted. Shudder to think what would come up if you did a search on Alyssa Milano.

Anyway, for the maybe final time, here is the new poster:

Da Vinci Code

The Da Vinci Code is getting terrible reviews. What did people expect?
Here is an excerpt from the review on BoxOfficeMojo.com:

"Long-haired Mr. Hanks and French-accented Tatou skedaddle across Europe, eluding gendarmes, escaping to a French chateau and jetting to London, all the while tracking clues and positing theories using their knowledge of history and Catholicism.

Tatou's childhood takes on added significance as the pair come to possess another Da Vinci treasure that implicates the Holy Grail, Da Vinci's The Last Supper and—gasp!—the very foundations of the Catholic Church. Without spoiling the twists, it involves Jesus and, broadly, it secularizes Catholicism.

This will not endear the movie, which counts on basic history knowledge, to the comic book crowd, who will not get it, and, conversely, Mr. Howard would have been branded a blasphemer even had he added hundreds of Vatican gift shop product placements."

Now this is complete gibberish, Everyone who's not a complete moron will get this movie.

Movie audiences can be seperated into two groups:

Those who thought Mission Impossible was complicated and hard to follow and those that didn't.

People in the latter group should stay indoors, away from sharp objects.
People in the former group should probably not watch the Da Vinci code, lest they rot thier brains.

More Plot

Dynasty was already taken...

Definitely a Fargo "based on a true story" is the way to go. I also like the idea of expanding real life events to absurdity.

For example:

Dad decides to give Conor K a fishing rod, but when he opens it finds out it's dynamite. I expect a gag like this needs the setting to moved to Heuston, TX. Bringing home a dolphin and cooking it features somewhere. A culture clash gag would work here, with Dad being a southern patriarch and Conor K being a Yankee.

(To adapt and steal from Neil Gaiman) this might happen:

"I read the various drafts of the script as they came in, pointed out when they were getting too far away from our lives, pointed out when they were moving even further away from our lives, and, finally, enthusiastically agreed with the powers that be when they decided that the movie script had got so far from our lives that it would be best for everyone if the movie's characters weren't called The Murnanes, the film wasn't called Pedigree and we took our toys back and started again..."

Despite this, I am thinking about pitching it as "The Royal Tenenbaums only coarser, faster and funnier."

Definetly not a gross out comedy. Broad yes, Gross no.

More Pedigree

So,

After a couple of folk including me said it, I substituted Mum for Carrie Fisher. The movie now needs a tagline and a plot.

Currently running with Sinéads sublime "When Even The Best Isn't Good Enough"

Plot Guides lines to follow one of the seven plots:

1 - [wo]man vs. nature
2 - [wo]man vs. man
3 - [wo]man vs. the environment
4 - [wo]man vs. machines/technology
5 - [wo]man vs. the supernatural
6 - [wo]man vs. self
7 - [wo]man vs. god/religion

and script to follow:

Initial situation - the beginning. It is the first incident that makes the story move.
Conflict or Problem - goal which the main character of the story has to achieve.
Complication - obstacles which the main character has to overcome.
Climax - highest point of interest of the story.
Suspense - point of tension. It arouses the interest of the readers.
Denouement or Resolution - what happens to the character after overcoming all obstacles/failing to achieve the desired result and reaching/not reaching his goal.
Conclusion - the end of the story.

None of your postmodern structure here, thank you.

Amended poster (still without In-Laws)

Pay Scales for "Pedigree"

After making the below, and my mind refusing to let it go, I started looking at how much we'd need to make our movie.

James Spader as the lead? He did Secretary for $400k + % profits. Not bad, but this doesn't have "arthouse" written all over it. Say $5m James? You’re hardly in demand.

Robin Wright Penn. $2m. Ok.

Dakota Fanning. $3m and rising. Still within budget.

Daniel Craig. Eek. Probably looking for $20m now he’s Bond. Try to negotiate a pre-bond fee of $2m

Billy Zane. $2m apparently. Fair enough.

Jason Lee. $3m. $3 million??? Ok. You are playing me.

Helena Bonham Carter. No idea how much she asks for. Let’s say $3m.

Shirley McLaine. Normally looks for percentage. Let’s say $3m?

Robert Redford. $11m. No way Rob. Maybe you can produce it like A River Runs Through It, and waive your fee. Or percentage? We’ll have to see if Paul Newman is available. He’s the same price? Rutgar Hauer it is so…

Shannen Doherty, Carrie-Anne Moss and Andrew McCarthy. $1 a piece.

So, excluding Rob Redford who were hoping will work for free, the actor wage bill comes to: $23 million. I don’t think I can put this on my credit card. I think we’ll just have to play ourselves, or hire Australians looking for a visa.

B-Movie Life

It started the way all these things start.

Sinéad and I were sitting on the couch watching the end of Pretty in Pink. James Spader plays the bad guy (Steff) and Sinéad says that he could play the role of John in the movie of his life.

Not a bad choice. This lead to the conversation on who would play me in the movie of my brother's life if he was played by James Spader. Obviously with James Spader playing my brother, especially in the title role, all the other actors cannot be A-Listers. It was an interesting twist on the who would play you in the movie of your life. I would have picked George Clooney a lá Syriana, but now that option was gone.

Anyway, Sin and I worked through the cast with much hilarity.
I now give you the cast of the movie of John's life, working title: "Pedigree"

(Apologies Sinead, Brigid and Conor K. I couldn't fit you on the first version of the poster. I will amend though.)



PEDIGREE

An Aaron Spelling Production
Directed by: Ang Lee

John James Spader
Karel Robin Wright Penn
Sarah Dakota Fanning
Dad Robert Redford
Mum Shirley McClane
Susan Helena Bonham Carter
Stephen Daniel Craig
Andrew Billy Zane
Conor Jason Lee

Also starring:

Sinead Shannen Doherty
Brigid Carrie-Anne Moss
Conor K Andrew McCarthy

Amazon Replies

Well what did I expect? What I got I suppose, a polite PFO. Bearing in mind I wasn't confused about shipping, just annoyed about it. In the past I also have in the passed suggestions onto "along to the appropriate department," we all know what that means. I have a friend from Fermanagh though, and he has offered to bring the stuff down for me. Way to beat to the system. Would there be a market to get stuff delivered up North and deliver for half amazon's rates? Maybe. I wonder what the weight of sales are like in the south?

"
Dear Customer,

Thank you for contacting Amazon.co.uk. I'm sorry for any misunderstanding regarding our free Super Saver Delivery option. As stated on our website, this option applies only to UK delivery addresses. You can find our current international delivery rates on our website at the following Help Desk page: http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/tg/browse/-/11072971

We are always working to serve our international customers better. However, as policy, we do not comment on any possible expansion plans. Please know that all our customers, international and at home, are very important to us and I have passed your suggestion along to the appropriate department.We apologise for any disappointment this may cause. Thank you for shopping at Amazon.co.uk.

Warmest regards,
Etc.,
"

I am not a crank

Sent a complaint letter to Amazon:

Hi,

I have used Amazon a lot over the years, but cannot justify it any more due to the high shipping rates to the Republic of Ireland. It is as easy and often cheaper to buy books in the high street. Does Amazon have any plans to offer super saver delivery to the Republic of Ireland. If not, why not?

Regards,
Conor

I feel better now.

Post IT Organisation

I have a lot to do.

I have a lot of tools at my disposal to help me organise my work: Email, Helpdesk, Tasks, Calendar etc.

Seems that all these are now full and contributing to the problem. I talked about this to the powers that be and got given "Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-free Productivity" which I read.

While not a terrible book he advocates lists, which you put everything (work, personal etc.) on to. From there, you work on them in order of importance, everything goes on the list, stuff gets bumped etc. If a task is small you do it immediately. It doesn't even make the list. In my experience if you have many, many things on you list, your list is useless.

I have taken all of this and condensed it into the "PostIT System (TM)."

In this I have a postIT on my desk containing all the items that I am going to do this week. Nothing else goes on the postIT. If I am asked to anything else it goes on my postIT for next week. Best of all, no one (except me) can add to the postIT. I believe that this is called task orientation, and it is how I have decided to do my work. It's either that or go crazy.

I am going to write a book on this when I am done, and give seminars and be rich. Watch this space.

Good Fore it.

Yesterday I noticed a bump on my tire. I do remember slamming into a pothole a few days ago, so I have probably buckled the rim. Darn.

I am off down to Cork for the weekend so I decided to change the tire as Sinead will I have the car and I am a good caring conscientious husband. Easy peasy. You’d think.

Got the tire out from under the car? Check
Loosen nuts? Check
Jacked up car? Check
Took off nuts? Check
Took off tire? Nope. That fucker’s stuck fast.
Yanked at tire? Check
Kicked tire? Check
Yelled at tire? Check
Pulled tire? Check
Kicked tire? Check
Rang Dad? Check

The conversation with Dad was a good one.

"Do you have a sledgehammer?"
"Nope."
"Well, get something heavy and hit the back of the wheel and should pop off. It’s stuck on the rim."

Just then my neighbour Simon passed by.

"Hey Conor"
"Hey Simon. Got a sledgehammer?" I hope that this is the most surreal question that he has been asked today.
"Nope."
"Ask him if you can use his wife," says Dad’s voice in my ear. I don’t ask Simon this, he’s my neighbour. I not sure Dad knows Simon’s wife, she’s very nice. It appears that finding a sledgehammer in suburbia is no easy task. I hang up on Dad.

I go to my shed, to see what I can use to hit the back of my wheel. The previous occupants left a set of golf clubs.

I choose the three iron. A couple of good tee-offs later and the wheel is loose. The three iron can no longer serve its primary function.

No punch line here, except that I hate fucking golf.

I Don't Know Kung Fu.

Super Powers.

For a while I have be going on about everybody having a super power. Your super power doesn't necessarily have to be useful, nor helpful to oneself. In fact, your superpower can just be a localised ability to bend reality in a given situation a little better than anybody else. What may seem a benign and useless power may be invaluable one day if you find yourself in a highly improbable situation.

For example:

Sinéad (my wife) has a superpower that she always loses her luggage on long-haul flights. You may be tempted to say that this is merely bad luck, but you’d be wrong. Her metaphysical power diverts the bag to either a different plane, or to stay on the tarmac at Charles-De-Gaulle. While initially seeming like an irritating and masochistic power, imagine the following scenario:

While on holiday in Thailand we leave our bags in the room. A cleaning lady in the employ of Triads from the Golden Triangle stuff the lining of her suitcase with heroin. When in the airport, the bag gets checked through. We get on the plane. Sin’s special power does its work and the luggage is lost before it’s X-rayed or sniffed. We get home without being sent to the Bangkok Hilton for life. Sinéad’s luggage turns up a week later, and we keep the Horse.

Not too shabby.

Another example:

Jim (my friend, his mother calls him James) has a superpower that he can terrorise Carnaval Folk. His special power is to be able to walk into a carnival and win by throwing hoops over things, throwing balls in basins, hurling frogs onto lily pads or knocking down three old tin cans with a couple of softballs. The Carnies are forced into handing over stuffed toys, confused about how he beat the system. This power has a downside in that Jim cannot get on a carnival ride that goes more then a foot of the ground. It is hard to see what use Jim’s power is now that he is engaged, and he no longer needs to impress girls. Maybe a steady relationship nullifies his power (sex is his Kryptonite?) but we’ll need to go to a funfair to find out.

Me:

Until recently I didn’t know what my special power was, but now I have found out. Nobody wants to sit beside me on the bus. You may not think that this is unusual, but let’s apply Bus Theory.

Bus Theory states:

When entering a bus you will instantly calculate where you want to sit. You will choose your seat in the following order:

1. Empty double seat, near quiet people
2. Empty double seat, near nobody
3. Empty double seat
4. Empty single seat near quiet small lady
5. Empty single seat near quiet small man
6. Empty single seat near quiet normal sized lady
7. Empty single seat near quiet normal sized man
8. Empty single seat near small lady
9. Empty single seat near small man
10. Empty single seat near normal sized lady
11. Empty single seat near normal sized man
12. Empty single seat near quiet fat lady
13. Empty single seat near quiet fat man
14. Empty single seat near fat lady
15. Empty single seat near fat man
16. Empty single seat near noisy small lady
17. Empty single seat near noisy small man
18. Empty single seat near noisy normal sized lady
19. Empty single seat near noisy normal sized man
20. Empty single seat near noisy fat lady
21. Empty single seat near noisy fat man
22. Stand
23. Empty single seat beside crazy/aggressive/unbelievably noisy person

At worst I come in at no.7 on this scale (or no.13 depending on your point of view), that means for people not to sit beside me, they are perceiving me as a no.23. So often as not I get to sit alone or be a “Number 52” (the last person someone sits beside on the bus as most buses have 53 seats). I think you agree that this is not a terrible special power. I do have a secondary aspect to this power in that I can work out the Bus Theory calculation abnormally fast.

Often my enemies defeat me by later taking an iPod out of their pocket as soon as I sit down.

One day I will smite them.