The Story of Jimmy Carr’s Massive Head

Every now and then you see something weird in a place it doesn’t belong and think “how did that get there?”. If you are going to Wickerman festival this year one of these things will be a bar. No normal bar. This bar is housed inside a massive model of Jimmy Carrs head. Now first off you are thinking “Nah, its just something someone has made and it looks like Jimmy Carr”. No, you are wrong, it IS Jimmy Carr.

Ok, so the origins of this thing. In 2011 Walkers Crisps had a competition between The Pub Land Lord All Murray, National Treasure Steven Fry, Gary “Big Ears” Linker and Soon-to-be Tax dodging comedian Jimmy Carr. Each were to make a type of crisps and you would buy them and when you did Comic Relief got a tenth of a penny or something like that. So as part of the advertising for this Walker commissioned a massive copy of Jimmy Carrs head. This coming complete with a door in the back and a moving mouth. All in all costing £70,000 (hopefully paid by Walkers and no Comic Relief). Here it is in action.

Really wants to make me eat crisps……..or punch comedians. Anyway, “what happened next?” you ask. Well after this memorable advertising  campaign it was bought by a salvage yard looking to make a quick buck out of its novelty appeal. After advertising for a year for the bargain price of £18,000 no one wanted it. Even putting it on eBay it didn’t hit revised reserves of 2 grand. So it sat for a year until the good people at Wickerman decided to buy it and turn the gaping hole of Jimmy Carrs massive mouth into a novelty bar at their festival.

God speed Giant Jimmy head, God speed.

 

Till next time,

Fall

 

I melted for a bit, sorry…..

Its been well over a week since I updated this page. It has been really warm up here in Edinburgh for the last week and with a mixture of hay-fever and trying (and failing) to sleep in a room that’s over 2 degrees C, I have been left shattered and unwilling to type. Also as mentioned in my last post I was at a weekend long stag do when the best men managed to successfully organise a piss up in a brewery?

We went to the Allanwater brewhouse (http://www.bridgeofallan.co.uk/) Which is a belting little brewery. Its essentially a little bar at the back of a hotel with a one room (a small one at that) with a couple of cylinders full of young beer. To be honest I have seen bigger chemistry sets for sale in toy stores. Not that it matters when they make really tasty beers and for the first time in my experience, a drinkable chilli beer. In fact a really good chilli beer. We got a tour, a load of tasters, a pint of our choice and a soup/sandwich plater. Really nice late afternoon in a really nice wee town. We even got a wee carry out and a chippy and went for a dip in the river. I was bloody freezing! The whole experience left a lasting impression and inspired me to make beer. To do this I will need to get a house with a garage and start the old home brewing! In time, in time.

So, in prep for my own version of Brewdogesk supper micro brewery which is bound to come from making my own beer….. I need to think of some names for beers. So, any related to my name would be great or to do with the area I live? Maybe make a fruity beer and call it Polworth Punch or a 9% beer called the Fountianbridge Fracka. I’m sure there are better ones out there. Any input would be great! If I get a few will make a poll!

 

Till next time,

Fall

SPIDER SPIDER SPIDER SPIDER SPIDER

We I’m off on a Stag do for a couple of days so there will be no posts till Sunday (also the name of my favourite Beasties Boy song). So to tide you over I have posted 40 of the greatest minutes of your life. If you have never seen Italian Spiderman then sit back and enjoy the roller-coaster ride that it is. If you have seen the “Best of”, do yourself a favour and watch the whole thing!

Its bellow, enjoy…

Till probably Sunday,

Fall

Top 5 Street Fighter Memes

Seen a few belting Street Fighter videos and memes recently and after buying Marvel Vs Capcom I thought I would look at the best Street Fighter memes going.

so….

5. Real Life Bonus round!

4. The inner workings of Zangiefs mind.

3. Cats

2. Some Guile Acapella

1. And lastly Blanka being a total dick

Short and sweet. Still none of them stand up to Van Damme.

And on that note,

till next time,

Fall

Body Art

Morning all. When looking around the interwebs this morning I came across something a little bit different. There is a scientific glass company in the US called Farlow Scientific Glassblowing INC who have found a new use for their glass shaping skills. They have started to make glass models of human insides to use as a teaching aid in classrooms. These things are stunning. I mean the brain is amazing look at it! its like there —> How amazing is it that someone could even think, “tell you what, I tired of making valves and test tubes. You think I could make a human brain from glass?”. Just look at the detail, I mean I’m brain surgeon but if I was training to be one surely this would be an amazing tool. The full website is here http://www.farlowsci.com/aboutus.html. Check out the below.

Sinus Model:

Full body:

Also there is models of Aneurysm’s to be used for medical training.

On the same note I found this website http://iheartguts.com/shop/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=8 . Basically loads of different plus body insides for sale. Think the smiling eyeball is my favourite!

 

Till next time

Fall

The Dangers of Grass

So apparently grass is now the most deadly factor in sport, ever. Everyone that has ever tried to play a sport on grass will know the risks of physical activity on the stuff. You can take your concrete basketball courts or ice rinks, no danger there. Real fear is playing a non contact sport on slightly damp grass, laid on soft ground.

Right that sound stupid I know but watching the BBC’s coverage of Wimbledon you would be mistaken for thinking the players were going out and playing in the kind of pearl you could only create by replacing the ball with a grenade (On a side note, did anyone ever play Sensible Soccer on WWII mode where the ball was a grenade? Was brilliant, used Cannon fonder animation as well. Ace, but I digress). The story is that 7 players have been injured today at the tennis festival and has left about three players in the tournament.  Surprisingly, the main issue is apparently the grass being  possessed somehow? One of the players even blamed it on dead grass. That right, zombie grass. In its eternal moaning for roots its been tripping the players.

Its not like the beeb to blow a British sporting even all out of context (the Olympics, Any England football match). They get really defensive as if these players and sullying the good name of Britain while at the same time trying not to piss off the same players that are moaning. Its like a dog chasing its tail watching them talk about it. The only words of sense I have heard are from Hewitt, a man who the commentators slagged every two second in his last game for being Australian, who basically said “its the same as every year, deal with it” (I’m paraphrasing here) and “Mad as a Hatter” Boris Beaker who said “its grass, it sometimes gets slippy. You are pro’s, deal with it” (again paraphrasing).

So the only why to sort this out is to play week two on ice so tennis players will work out what slippery actually mean (and it would be bloody hilarious) . I’m sure all of injuries are genuine and its sad for them to be out of a big part of their lives but it’s probably from playing a sport where a match can last four hours, on rock hard surfaces that have caused these complications and not that the courts are sponsored by Tefal this year.

Anyway, man up tennis.

Fall

Pure Daft

Every time you walk into shop or turn on the radio this summer it has been wall to wall “Get Lucky” by Daft Punk. It’s by no means a terrible song and the video having Peter Serafinowicz in it means I have probably watched/hear the song more than I would have.

Anyway, there have been two versions hammering around the internet lately which I think are pretty good.  First up it a remixed version which goes through every era of music from the 20’s. Pretty interesting and a quick fire blast through musical history for any kid out there.

 

Next up is the old US President Barack giving it a bit of the karaoke treatment during press conferences and public addresses. He should probably stick to issues but this is the kinda thing that makes him pretty cool.

Still my favourite bit of Obamary is when he became a ninja for a day. Enjoy.

Till next time

Fall

BACK! FASTER! SMALLER! PROBABLY LESS FUN!

So in one last attempt to keep the site ticking over I’m going to change ethos a little. So I am going to attempt more short post with mini insights and hopefully at least one every day. Maybe. So smaller, better, faster, harder, smoother, eh….., rounder?…. that will do.

So making post smaller shouldn’t make things worse (hopefully!). I mean twitter can do it in like 4 1/2 characters so surely I can do something in a couple of hundred.

Talking of this, check out this mini fiction page on Twitter. Very Short Story is a page where you can read tip-top fiction in the standard 140 character stylee of everyone’s favourite “I’m watching telly” alert system. Do something decent and read this stuff on the bus. It’s really pretty good for its size!  Follow using this linkage @VeryShortStory

 

Until next time,

Fall

 

 

Dr Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog

The magic of Netflix is that every now and then you are flicking through all the crap that is presented side by side and you come across something pretty interesting. One such example is when I came across Dr Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog. So first off you see the cover, Neil Patrick Harris (Barney from HIMYM) in a white over coat and massive goggles. Good start. Also it is 40 mins long so not too much time to invest. Right, its got my interest,  little bit more persuasion needed through. I scroll down the info and see “Directed by – Joss Wheaten”. HOLD THE PHONE. This was made in 2008 and I missed it how? (The reason being it was distributed on-line only) So this is a one-off special by the great Geek Messiah and I was not aware of its existence.  OK I’m on board now, but wait there is more, “staring – Nathan Fillion”. Capitan Reynolds is a main character. Sweet baby Jesus!  Nothing, and I mean NOTHING can put me off watching this. “This musical adventure”……wait, it’s a musical, really? Eh….ok well lets give it a try.

So the basic premise is that we have Dr Horrible (Patrick Harris) who is an aspiring evil genius looking to break his way into the bad guy elite club known as the “Evil League of Evil” who is headed by the mysterious “Bad Horse”. So Dr Horrible video blogs (as any self-respecting wannabe tyrant would) and lets slip about “her”. This being his long-term “I stalk you in the laundromat when I’m not being evil” crush Penny (Felicia Day). So the dream is to change society,  rule the world and get the girl. A straight forward and entertaining storyline mainly expressed through the media of song. The only thing standing in Dr Horrible’s way is the dashing superhero Caption Hammer (Fillion) who is Dr Horrible’s arch-enemy . So Dr H develops a gun to freeze time so that he can put Penny in suspended animation giving him the opportunity tell her how he feels without falling over his awkward words (who said romance was dead). But just as things are coming together a spanner is thrown into the works as “Bad Horse” summons his singing cowboy messengers (oh yes) to inform Dr H that he has a chance to impress the League and gain entry.  So what will he do? How will it all pan out? I’m not going to tell you! You will need to watch it.

In all honesty this is one of the best 40 of TV I have seen in a long time. I will be perfectly honest and say that musicals are definitely not my thing. When a musical number crops up in something like HIMYM then I tend to cringe and feel there is no point to them other than to make me uncomfortable. Put it this way, even short adds for Glee make me want to end it all, as that 20 seconds of guff makes me lose hope for humanity. BUT…. the songs in this are excellent, more a vehicle to get the inner thoughts of the characters across than big showy musical tunes for entertainments sake, personally how I think musical numbers should be used. I am reminded of another Wheaton creation, “Buffy” and their OTT musical vampire slaying special “Once More, With Feeling” which must have been a good 10 years ago? (after research 2001, so 12 years ago!)

The story itself has a bit of the anti-superhero vibe that The Boys series has, portraying superhero’s as obnoxious bullies and fairly air headed where as the villains of the piece are introduced as people who will go all out to try to change the way things are, to battle against their bullying adversaries. There is a fairly massive unmistakable undertone of the high school “Jock vs Nerd” conflict but making the Nerd (i.e. the apparently weaker of the two) the stereotypical bad guys make the average Wheaton fan, who is your quintessential nerd/geek, warm to Dr H. It makes him an anti-hero you really get behind and route for. This is summed up in a montage song by Capitan Hammer where he toys with Dr H as he gives him a wedgy and poses for tourists while battering the daylights out of his Nemesis. Also making Fillion the air headed jock is a stroke of genius. Anyone who has seen Firefly will have a massive soft spot from him and during this story you start to route against his character but I found that I still really like the character simply because it was Fillion. I think this made the story more enjoyable.

To be honest this show was made to be entertaining. Its got a great story with loads going on. Almost like the second season of Dollhouse where a smorgasbord of ideas were crammed in where perhaps a quarter of them would have sufficed. Despite this Dr Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog is never confusing, it never really has a lull either. The story is simple but has many layers and undertones which make it so much more than just a collection of songs about love and revenge on the world. This is well worth a watch and any fan of Joss Wheaten will not be disappointed, even if you hate Glee as much as I do.

Until next time

Fall

That was 2012

So new year has passed and all hail 2013 as we hurdle into its third week. Im pretty glad 2012 is over. Not that it was a terrible year, really it was a bit meh. Movies this year have been pretty good but I honestly only remember coming out of 2 or 3 thinking  “I would really like to see that again”. Fern Cotton also deemed this a glorious year for music on Christmas day Top of the Pops. Total pish. Music this year has been pretty poor. The Killers and Muse had new albums which failed to reach the bands past heights and as far as new music goes there was not much to write home about. Thankfully, due largely to Netflix  this year has been ace for TV shows. I have been able to catch up on shows I had never seen for one thing. Like about 80% of the people I know with Netflixs I started watching Breaking Bad for the first time and Dexter. This year also saw new sitcoms “New Girl” and “Don’t trust the Bitch in Apartment 23” which were excellent and the not to excellent but “It has its moments” How to be a Gentleman (staring Johnny  Drama/Kevin Dillon).

Ok, so now I will give my _____ of 2012. These might not have been made in 2012 but hey, this is my blog and these made my year!

Film of 2012

This was a really easy one in the end but I will quickly go through notes of intrest. Way back in January
The Gray came out. A film where basically Liam Neeson kicks the crap out of wolves (See here). Really enjoyed this film and thought it one of the better this year. There were alot of disappointing films at the start of the year to compensate. “Haywire” was a utterly underwhelming offering, “This Means War” was just terrible and the “Dictator” did nothing for Sacha Baron Cohen’s reputation.On the upside there was “The Muppets” and “21 Jump Street” to keep things ticking along until SUPERHERO SUMMER where my number one sits. So it was a time for heroes and we got them in abundance, The Avengers Movie was nothing short of amazing. Great story, Great action, an all round amazing film but not my #1. “So its Batman?” you say. Nope. Another brilliant film but I had my issues with it (especially the ending) so is not top of the pile. “John Carter? The Expendables? Surely Ted doesn’t count?” Your right it does not, My number one film of 2012 is……. Dredd.

I loved everything about Dredd. It looked cool, its plot was really simple, the pacing of the dialogue to action was perfect. Essentially Judge Dredd and partner are lock in at the bottom of a massive tower block and need to get to the top to get out. Only problem is that everyone in the building wants them dead. There is more to it than that but not much more. Another plus point is that it is one of the only 3D films I have seen that was made better by the technology. My #1 hands down.

TV show of 2012

There have been alot of great shows this year. As said above I have watched a host of excellent dramas but this year has been brilliant for sitcoms. I was losing faith in sitcoms, with the wealth of British offerings drying up due to the “give over rated comedian his own show” sponge. But this year i have see some great comedy. It has helped as old favourites  such as “30 Rock” and “Its Always Sunny in Philadelphia” have been bang on form and the new arrivals mentioned in the intro have added something fresh. Even hidden gems like “The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret” and the unmissable “The League”  have brought a smile to my face. This year also marked the end of Limmys Show. It is a poor decision by the BBC to keep giving Russell Howard so much money than he knows what to do with it and pulls Limmys brand of off the wall comedy. Anyway to my #1 for TV is another series which has ended this year. Armando Iannucci stunning “The Thick off It”. I can only assume you have all watched this and if you haven’t, come on, sort it out. The satire is brilliantly clever and is perfectly mirrored by the eloquent strings of profanity from Malcolm Tucker. I personally love Armando’s work and if you haven’t see “The Armando Iannucci Shows” or “Time Trumpet” then give them a try.

Music of 2012 

Ah. Well. This could be tricky. Music this year has been disappointing to say the least. If its not Dub step or songs about Equestrian Eventing (I assume from the actions?) then theres not been alot of noise made about anything. Music has been quiet this year. That said The Hives were on Jools Holland at new year so at least it ended well! I suppose my album of the year was actually relased late 2011 but I never got hold of till last year. It is Los Campesinos! – Hello Sadness. Great album, will add a track below and for more on them head here.

Oh and I suppose my Song of the Year is this below from Bloc Party.

Internet Thing of 2012

Butterfield. Last year you stole my heart. www.peterserafinowicz.com/brian-butterfield/

Well that will do. Like 2012 this is not the best, maybe slightly rushed but hey! Lets get on with 2013.

Till next time

Fall