I recently met an Australian who spent a lot of time in the area helping the people of Palestine all he could, taking part in blockades, blocking Israeli bulldozers that are destroying Palestinians homes, in the end however his positive actions were put to an end as he is no longer allowed to go into Israel, and therefore no longer allowed into Gaza or West Bank, what hope do the people there have, none really, only the hope in the rest of the world coming to their aid eventually, just like all the prisoners of the Nazi’s in world war 2, the only hope they had was that the rest of the world would come to their rescue, which they eventually did, this time though its taking a little bit longer, i’d say we are 60 years late.”

On you tube there are many more video’s one posted by both sides, both sides claim they are innocent and are just doing what they have to, yet still there is war and death there, so someone, if not both sides are lying.

A short movie after the link


Reminds you of them videos of all the prisoners in striped clothes being marched to the Nazi death camps doesn’t it.

(Press more to read the story that has really made my week possibly even made my month!)

This whole story starts when I was about 5 years old, and I started playing on my dads spectrum 48k computer, waiting patiently for games to load as the tape player that loads them spits out computer noise, I waited patiently and the noise sank in without a thought. When the game starts my little child mind lit up with beautiful fantasy worlds, built up from simple 8 colour graphics and odd bleepy sounds. It was the start of a beautiful relationship.

More games came along, in fact so many games came along, there seemed to be an unending supply of games, I was never waiting for a new game to come out there just seemed to be so many of them. And to this day I can remember, im pretty sure, almost all of the games I played on this beautiful little computer. You can even get an emulator and download the games for free now, which I have done many times over the years, whenever i fancy a blast of nostalgia.

So what im getting at with this recollection of the past is that I was a massive fan of the spectrum and many of its games, totally loved loads of them. So lets skip forward to….

1998! By this time my old Spectrum was pretty much obsolete, id been through the Amiga years as well (which despite feeding my gaming addiction massively don’t take part in this story, well other than feeding my gaming addiction), through the Super Nintendo years (no relevance again), and onto my N64 years, and to a game called Wetrix, which was made by a company called…….ZED TWO! (the story unfolds). This game totally blew my mind, it was kind of a Tetris clone, but involving water and fireballs, the idea is build walls on a 3d landscape with random falling tetris blocks, then water starts coming down, fill up the landscape and use extra blocks to stop the water leaking off (which is how your game ends) then fireballs come along and you evaporate the water for points. It was such an amazing concept, beautiful graphics, beautiful music and perfect sounds. I got totally hooked, one game for me would last easily over an hour and sometimes 2 or more hours, it got to the point where I would have to put some serious time aside to play it, that and get myself into a serious state of mind. Very quick thinking was needed and tactics were constantly changing and new ones evolving. It was such an amazing game, such depth, beautiful really.

And then, zoom forward tooo…

2001 (dum dum duuum!) The Fab Cafe in Manchester, Me and my mate Jay were supping beers there like we were doing a lot them days, and a bunch of guys sat near us were also supping beers, we all were having a nice time. The group of guys sat near us said hello, asked us how we are. We got chatting and they explained that they had all just finished work and were enjoying the friday night drinking beers. I asked them their job and they told me they made computer games!! I asked them what games and they said that I wouldn’t have heard of them, so I asked them the name of some of their games. They told me they were called Zed Two! And they made a game called Wetrix! They were blew away that I was a massive fan of this game, having spent many hours perfecting evaporating them little lakes, cultivating duck ponds for multipliers. We talked more and more and got on to their first games, again they said I wouldn’t have heard of these games for sure, the first game they mentioned…..Zub! (picture of it up there), i described in detail the game to them, they were amazed! It was a joyous occasion for all of us. They reeled off a list of loads of Spectrum games, pretty much all of them id played and loved, (glider rider was a massive favorite of me and my friends, so was Feud, Matt! these guys totally made Feud!). They then showed me a Gameboy Advance that they had just received from Nintendo, it had just come out in Japan so it was amazing it see it so early. It was a great night for all of us. All the spectrum games i put pictures of further up this post, these guys made them games!

I met a couple of these guys a few years later in a computer game writers meeting in a pub in manchester, i know i don’t write computer games, but i went along anyway and met some of them guys there.

Skip forward to 3 days ago, when i saw the name Zed Two again, i searched for their website but it had gone. But after a little searching I found their new website. They are still making games under the name Zee 3 check out their site (the Zee 3 is a clickable link for loads of stories and artwork from their back catalog of games, really interesting if like me, you played their games (I love the little story about the Zub character animation, how he drew in an animation that showed him flipping gun hand when he turned around, otherwise people would see that the character facing left and right was just a mirror image). Their names are Ste and John Pickford, they are brothers from Stockport! I emailed them and asked them if they remembered me from the fab cafe, Ste got back in touch and he totally remembered me! Said he remembered me well! And that has totally made my month for sure! Ste also has a flickr account with loads of beautiful doodles and comics, check these out for sure here

They are still making games, their most popular game to date is called Naked War, I downloaded it and I fancy playing it, I think all of you out there who know me and played games with me when we were young, we should get this Naked War game going on, as its a turn based 2 player war game that we email turns too, the graphics look very bold and beautiful. Keep an eye on the guys website as well, more games coming out and since I have loved quite a few of their games in the past im sure they are capable of greatness again. If Ste or John are reading this! Hello! Leave a comment why don’t you!

Here’s some stuff from their site

I don’t ever recall England arming its kids in such a way, I even recall stories of sending kids away at war time, but over there in the middle east they don’t seem to give a shit! They’re all doomed, at least until that generation of kids is dead. I say put them in the battlefield now, get it out of the way, looks like they want it, their parents want it, and they are ready for it!

A thought has just occurred to me that this is evolution in action, survival of the fittest. The stupid kill themselves off, I have always seen religion to be pretty stupid, so here it is in action, people killing each other of magical make believe entities, stupid and leading to death, its absolutely beautiful, evolution in action! It does make sense doesn’t it!

“Battle not with monsters lest ye become a monster and if you gaze into the abyss the abyss gazes into you.” — Friedrich Nietzsche

*Update* its doing it again, its also doing the same thing with another computer in this house, and my friend in Portugal.

me

Click on more to see a list of my favorite pictures from the internet from 2008, some are pretty strange ones indeed, so be sure to have a look.(theres a lot of them!) And be sure to click on em! The full size versions show a lot more than the thumbnails most times.

Run for your lives!

Before we had horses

WWF

Millions of eyes wasted every year.

The Earth likes a smoke now and then.

An old woodcarving.

unexplainable

Excellent Idea

Its true.

Its beautiful!

Click on it too see before and after.

Occams razor is a thinking method.

The moon!

All we see of the moon (click it!)

:D

(same place as previous picture)

Naughty boy!

Kowloon, a real city in Hong Kong, if you ever played Shenmue 2 (Dreamcast) you will know it.

How to pose

Human Timeline (Very looooon picture)

Don't cross the streams!

He deserved it.

Fire up the BBQ!

Aint nothing to fear but fear itself, and here he is.

Goat in Coat

Fire up the BBQ!

Sharp

Ah hahaha! Brilliant!

Amazing!

Battle Mode Flipper, YES!!

He don't like it, ok?

Hmmmm...(Thats the President of Iran and his wife by the way)

Comin to git ya!

Sorry

Beauty and the Beast

Never forget that this day reminds us of 9/11 and American misfortune.

More effective than normal ice lollies

2009 will tell

Hope you enjoyed them as much as I did, which was loads!

How does this video/message make you feel? and how do you feel about Channel 4 showing it?

I think that while there are things in life that no person should see, this isn’t one of them, and since its quite relevant to all our lives, then its shown and watched.

The British government has created some fictitious offense by saying it will cause offence.

“The biblical narrative of Jesus’ birth gives no date for the event, though it more likely occurred in spring than in winter. Saint Luke tells us that Manger scene shepherds were “abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flocks by night” — shepherds guarded their flocks day and night only at lambing time, in the spring; in winter, the animals were kept in corrals, unwatched.

It is important to note that for two centuries after Christ’s birth, no one knew, and few people cared, exactly when he was born. Birthdays were unimportant; death days counted. Besides, Christ was divine and his natural birth was deliberately played down. In fact, the Church even announced at one point that it was sinful to contemplate observing Christ’s birthday “as though He were a King Pharoah.”

The idea of celebrating the Nativity on December 25 was first suggested early in the fourth century CE, a clever move on the part of Church fathers who wished to eclipse the December 25 festivities of a rival pagan religion,
Mithraism, which threatened the existence of Christianity.

On December 25 (the date of the winter solstice) pagan Romans, still in the majority, celebrated Natalis Solis Invincti, “Birthday of the Invincible Sun God,” Mithras. The Mithras cult originated in Persia and rooted itself in the Roman world in the first century BCE, but by the early 300s CE the rising religion of Christianity was posing a formidable challenge to the sun worshipers, especially after the Edict of Milan issued by the Roman emperor Constantine I in 313 CE allowed Christians to practice their faith in the Roman Empire.

In those tenuous early days of Christianity, however, Church fathers debated strategies for supplanting the Mithras cult with their own religion. Since it was well known that Roman patricians and plebians alike enjoyed festivals of a protracted nature, Christians recognized that they needed an alternative to the December celebration of Natalis Solis Invincti. They needed a celebration in which all participants — Mithraists, Christians, and those in between — could take part with pride. Accordingly, the Church officially recognized Christ’s birth, and to offer head-on competition to the sun worshipers’ popular feast, the Church located the Nativity on December 25. The mode of observance would be characteristically prayerful: a Mass. In fact, Christs’ Mass. As one theologian wrote around 320 CE:
We hold this day holy, not like the pagans because of the birth of the sun, but because of him who made it.
Although centuries later, social scientists would write of the psychological power of group celebrations — the unification of ranks, the solidification of collective identity, the reinforcement of common objectives — the principle had long been intuitively obvious. Christianity took permanent hold in the Western world in 337 CE when Constantine I was baptized on his deathbed, uniting for the first time the Crown and the Church.”

Hmmm, it seems we have all already forgotten what Christmas is all about, its not actually about Christmas at all!!!

The corn will still grow in the fields and the rivers will still continue to flow. The poor and starving in the world remain poor and starving. The rich will become less rich and some may even become poor, however I have no doubt that they will not starve, nor will they suffer any amount in comparison to the real suffering in the world. The exchanges taking place on the stock markets are exchanges in a virtual world, nothing real is actually changing hands, how this affects the whole world I really do not know, my knowledge of the stock market is not so good, my first impression is that its completely bollocks and uneeded, I could be very wrong, I welcome explanations that will make me believe it is needed.

Here is a song and a video that seems very apt at this moment in time, Jarvis Cocker, you are beautiful.

Yes thats right, one my teeth at the front is smaller than it should be, when i was a little boy i had it built up with classic british shoddy dentistry, and before to long it crumbled and i was left again with a small tooth. So i am going to get it fixed here in Chiang Mai, i have talked to many people that have been to the dentist’s here and they all agree that the work is exceptional, and cheap. So i have an appointment for 3pm tommorow. There is a picture below of the offending small tooth.

As you can see by the diagram the tooth is smaller than it should be, i will be posting a picture of the brand new full sized tooth when i get it. Im also having a cavity filled in and a general clean. Its gonna cost me about £100 for the lot, if anyone can do it cheaper get in touch, bearing in mind that the new tooth is going to be a ceramic one, none of this plastic resin piss.

He has been engaged in left wing political activism all his life. If you listen to some of his lectures you get where the guys coming from, he really does say it like it is. He spends most of his time studying, studying events and the events leading to them events, he studys the politics of his country and other countries, and with available literature he has seen the way the world works, this knowledge is available to us all, and he has compiled it all for us! his thirst for knowledge far exceeds his thirst for fame or time in the spotlight (if he has them desires anyway). He is a voice of utter truth in a world of bent media, im saying all this as i think more people need to hear this guy. So heres some videos of him, which will do more than me trying to get across what he’s about. Notice his dull deamenor, unlike other showboating lefties (and i guess all the showboating righties, well pretty much all politicians) this guy simply states facts, his lectures however are always sell out, he generates good viewing numbers, however he is rarely given airtime on TV or radio, and if he is its pretty much always pre-recorded, for the simple fact that his views, are counter productive to the views of the Government, because of this i have taken it upon myself to air his views. (click more to get to his videos)

BBC interview part 1 (9min26sec)

BBC interview part 2 (8min27sec)

America is not a Demorcracy (7min4sec)

Santa Fe in January 2005 (46min37sec)

911 conspiracy part 1 (3min14sec)

911 conspiracy part 2 (4min44sec)

Personal Motivation (4min56sec)

Human destiny (2min21sec)

If these have interested you, then check out Youtube and do a search of Noam Chomsky, there are many more videos by the guy, if you still thirst for more, go read some of his books.

Evil murdering fuck

Steve with his forte

See all that thread the caterpillars are making? well they normally make a small amount of it, but because they have been eating bones, they can make so much more thread! crazy eh!!

How, you ask do caterpillars kill a human, well i dont claim to have the answers to that, but imagine if you will, your sleeping, you wake to a “cush cush” noise, you open your eyes through sleeping crust, YOUR COVERED IN THEM! IN YOUR MOUTH, IN YOUR EARS! you gasp swallowing loads of the little non-vertebrates, hoovering too large an amount into your lungs, this is what i think happened.

Ive noticed more and more butterflies in England lately, and i know for a FACT that all this hot weather has increased the reproduction of lots of insects, could we be the next north west European town? If so why not head over to my recipe page for a great recipe to take advantage of this!