I'm off roleplaying today; as is usual for a Saturday.
Anyway, there are some strange, but interesting buildings around the world and the Unusual Architecture blog is dedicated to collecting together all the most unusual, strange, weird and crazy buildings of the world into a big and easy to use list.
Village of Joy is a website that collates the amazing, interesting, wonderful, weird, odd and funny things about our world. Two pages of interest are the 50 Strange Buildings of the World and 50 Strange Buildings of the World (Part II).
Maps-of-War was created in September 2006 to help people understand current events, as seen on TV and in our newspaper headlines
All of the maps are created using Macromedia Flash 8.0. Many different sources have been referenced for the maps, including National Geographic Atlas of the World, Atlas of World History, DK World History Atlas, Wikipedia and New York Times Publications.
The First Lady of Star Trek, Majel Barrett Roddenberry, wife of late "Star Trek" creator Gene Roddenberry, has died at the age of 76. She died at her Bel-Air, Los Angeles home, after battling leukemia.
She is the only actress to appear in all five "Star Trek" series. She most recently provided the voice, once again, of the USS Enterprise computer in the upcoming J.J. Abrams' "Star Trek" film.
She is survived by a son, Eugene "Rod" Roddenberry Jr.
I happily managed to get all my Christmas shopping done in one go today; and managed to grab a couple of bargains into the mix. However, that won't be the end of the shopping. I will probably have to do some last minute shopping next week for my Dad. He always leaves things to the last minute.
Valve's Left 4 Dead is set in the immediate aftermath of a zombie apocalypse, At it's basic level it's an all-action, first-person, zombie survival shoot-em-up. The nice feature is that you have 3 companions that are also trying to survive the horror. I've only played the first level so far but it's pretty damned good. One word of advice; for added atmosphere, play it with the lights off. Oh, and it's available for the PC and XBox 360.
Just finished roleplaying but I now need to go and do a wee bit of late night shopping. Whilst I've been doing some errands for Geoff and Chrissy today both Michael and Catherine have been out to get some shopping. However, neither of them got any dog food and Petra has had the last tin that we had in the house. Thankfully, the local(ish) Tesco is 24 hour.
I've recently come across a site full of small, distracting puzzles and quizzes. Please check out Sporcle.com.
Star Wars: A Musical Journey is a new 2 hour stage show planned to launch on April 10th at the O2 in London before going on a European tour.
The show will see the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra play a new, rewritten live score as excerpts from the six films are shown on a cinema screen. A statement said thar John Williams has "painstakingly rewritten" the music he wrote for the movies. The show has been put together by Williams and George Lucas' Lucasfilm.
An accompanying exhibition will feature original models, props, costumes and production artwork.
Tickets, costing between £30 and £100, will go on sale on this coming Monday; 15th December 2008.
I watched the Manchester United vs Aalborg European Champions League game last night. United scored within the first 5 minutes and were totally dominant for the vast majority of the first half. With the number of chances United had within the first 10 to 15 minutes it seemed that they were about to hand out a serious drubbing. However, Aalborg equalised about mid-way through the half and then stunned the 74,000 watching in the stadium by taking the lead just before half-time. United got back on level terms within 10 minutes of the restart but, despite continued pressure, failed to add a third. United qualify for the next stage as group winners. The draw will be made next Friday, the 19th.
It was Chrissy's daughter's Christmas Play last night, and she was playing the title role of the Sleepy Shepherd. It was a lot of fun and for five year olds it was a very credible performance. Highlight was undoubtedly the dance routine of the three kings. Like I said, lots of fun.
That little white, or perhaps black/blue/pink, pointing device that is sat on your desk is 40 years old today. Dr Douglas Engelbart, of the Stanford Research Institute in California, first demonstrated using a mouse at the Fall Joint Computer Conference (FJCC) on 9th December 1968.
Whilst the name of Oliver Postgate might not be well known, his creations certainly are. Mr Postgate, who created Ivor The Engine, The Clangers, Noggin The Nog and Bagpuss along with Pingwings, The Pogles and Pogles' Wood, has died at the age of 83. Bagpuss, of which only 13 episodes were ever made, was voted best children's programme ever in a 1998 poll and was voted the best TV animal of all time earlier this year. Apparently, plans are afoot, via a company called Coolbai, for a Bagpuss revival.
The BBC News website is reporting that the journal Nature Genetics has found that the workings of our internal body clock appear to be directly connected to our risk of diabetes.
The research apparently found faults in a key 'clock gene' were linked to blood sugar levels and type II diabetes. Some scientists already believe that our circadian rhythms (body clock) have a role to play in the condition, which affects millions worldwide.
But one expert said more evidence was needed, before a link was proved.
I have recently upgraded MT to the latest version and have also taken the opportunity to finally enable Comment Registration. Previously, you had to have either an existing Movable Type account or else use an OpenID, LiveJournal, Vox or TypeKey account to comment. If you didn't have one of those accounts then you couldn't log in and comment. However, you can now also register here on the blog itself to comment.
