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The drunkards roll with epic afros

Travel, Drinking, 506 days ago

People who drink are normally labelled as social pariahs – but only because people sad enough not to drink alcohol like to label things.

After a day of ‘bread earning’ I met up with two friends who had spent the day in York. After a fabulous meal at the Royal Oak at lunchtime, I left them to look around York while I finished my afternoon at work.

Two young men left in one of the most historic, cultured cities in the world, naturally took much delight in the arts and architecture of this wonderful city. Nah, I’m only shitting ya’, they spent the afternoon in the pub – or rather, pubs.

Dees naughty boys wot smoke

By the time I had met up with them, they were beyond pissed, being as they were talking to a strange old man in a Samuel Smiths pub.

After coaxing them to the train station (which had included taking their pints out of the pub and onto the street) we waited around for the train – and this is when the cameras came out.

Largent waiting for a coffee, sorry 'latte'

Despite Largent (the taller one, without the hat) calling Ash (the shorter, hatted one) a ‘pussy’, he was the first one to buy a coffee – nay, ‘latte’ – but not just any latte – a latte with a caramel shot. Flash bastard.

Ash and Largent - United in coffee

Ash, not to be outdone, went with the American theory, of bigger is better, and ended up with a coffee bigger than his head and his hat hair.

Ash don't care for no one - especially baristas

When we did finally get on the train, we saw something of such immense amazingness that I believe that it defied physics: It was, in essence, a fucking epic afro.

Largent poses with what can only be described as a *fucking epic* afro

Julian Dyer

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Sheesh, 31 days

Travel, Geekylicious, 545 days ago

Is it really that long since I did one? So much for keeping it up. I guess its just my hectic, cosmopolitan lifestyle getting the better of me once more…

I’ve been spicing up my days by getting a different variety of trains to work. Having become sick of Virgin Rail’s shit stinkers, I’ve been getting a combination of sexy Class 321 electric to Leeds and the Trans Pennine express Class 185 to York. Sexy Beasts.

Me *hearts* the Class 321

I’m glad to report that neither of these trains stink of shit. And are more comfortable. And quieter. And arn’t in a constant state of disrepair.

In a (marginally less) geekylicious development, I stumped up enough cash from my immense financial warchest of literally tens of pounds and bought an iPhone. Apple seem to have a canny ability to just take a pure idea, and actually produce it, or at least produce it to a point.

My iPhone - in all its glowing, fingerprinted sexyness.

It’s a great piece of kit at every level, but as with every Apple product it does have limitations. Typing can be a bit tricky at times, and there is sometimes lag when reading the contacts list. But apart from that, it makes every other phone look like something from Star Trek in the 60s. Something which I take an immense amount of smugness from. In your face, peasants.

I recently came across a website called Jamendo which showcases music which is free and legal under the Creative Commons license system. I found an artist called Ruth Theodore, and ordered that a CD be sent post-haste to my dwelling.

Go. Buy. This. Now. You'll. Enjoy. Much.

Her album Worm Food is absolutely fantastic – it’s a whirlwind of politics, emotions and frenzied acoustic guitar work. I find it a great releif that there is actually some tallent out there, not like the wank constantly pumped out on the radio.

How bands as dreary, uninspiring and ultimately bollocks such as Elbow can win any awards for anything other from being dreary uninspiring and ultimately bollocks is beyond me. What vile excuses for human beings think a these kind of bands are good? I’ve heard farts more tuneful than them. And they wern’t even good farts.

Alas, time has beaten me for probably another million weeks. Well maybe not actually, no doubt I’ll be as bored as fuck this weekend too. Tatty bye bye avid readers (aka Craig Burgess) for now.

Julian Dyer

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Moocard-a-riffic

Geekylicious, News, 576 days ago

New moo cards! Woot! Lookie yonder:

A selection of my new moo cards... well, all of them actually

This time, i just decided to do some random shite, simply with the aim of making some interesting cards. Thoughts?

Julian Dyer

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Birthday-a-roo

News, Geekylicious, 589 days ago

Yesterday was my birthday. Another day to reflect on the things which have or haven’t happened over the past year. It is also a time in which to consume too much of Samuel Smiths finest, and to almost win the pub quiz.

Mercifully, I had both today and yesterday off work to celebrate/rehabilitate the occasion. As is required, I received a rather geekylicious gift. I got the Robert’s Robi DAB radio for my iPod.

Robi DAB radio for the ipod. Radio 4 cometh.

No doubt this will save me from the tedium of BBC Radio 6 at work, which seems to play literally the same songs all of the time. I don’t know why we don’t just record it one day, and play it back the next. It would be exactly the same experience as listening to it live. (Have I said this before? I’m sure I probably have)

The best thing about having a day off work, is the ability to do absolutely nothing of value whatsoever. I took to this well, although I did have to vigorously defend my lunch from Timmy the cat, who showed a little too much interest in my sandwich.

Timmy the cat, eyeing up my birthday sandwich.

Naturally, the pub was the place to go in the evening, and of course, that pub was the Wheel Inn. I received an amazing card from my friends Ash & Whitney, of a group of old ladies squatting. Hot.

Some old ladies squatting - on a card!

There seemed to be literally a hundred people on our quiz team, and after 2 hours of trivia we still only came second. But the other team probably did have a combined age greater than our own, despite there being 4 of them and about 10 of us. Boo hiss boo.

All in all, a great day; sun, friends and beer. And now, recovery.

Julian Dyer

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Job of journey work

Rant, Travel, 595 days ago

I know, I’ve talked about the train journey to work before, but as it feels as though it takes up 90% of the day, I think I’m entitled to bitch about it again.

In this lovely hot summer weather, its rare to shiver while coming home on any form of transport, but somehow the Virgin Voyager trains manage it. Air conditioning is usually up as high as it will go, only making the step off the train into the heat of the diesel engines even more unbearable.

Its all I have to show, at these prices

Today, it was so sunny that I became blinded on the train; a girl sat opposite was texting on her phone (god knows why, there’s never any reception) an as the light caught the face of the phone, it managed to shine accross and blind me.

But what could I do? I can’t exactly say “turn the phone away a few degrees, as you’re making my pupils scream”. I’d have looked like a Mark Corrigan-esque figure, and rightly so.

And another thing that annoys me is that the trains are far too small. Who really wants wall sockets and a radio system on a train? I’d much prefer they bought some more carriages, rather than little LCD screens (which never work) and the radio (which never works either. I’d rather have a seat than any of that crap.

Julian Dyer

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What a pie

Review, Work, 613 days ago

The steak and ale pie at the Royal Oak, York

Some pies are good. Some pies are merely ok. And sometimes, a pie is born which is legendary. The steak an ale pie at the Royal Oak is one such pie. Go now, and devour.

Julian Dyer

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The hat wot I got at work

Work, News, 618 days ago

The hat wot I got at work, from my boss

Rather inappropriate for this time of year, but much appreciated anyway. Cheers, Jon.

Julian Dyer

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iRacing: This ain't Gran Turismo

Geekylicious, Review, 619 days ago

IRacing is the latest in a succession of racing simulators created by David Kaemmer, which was preceeded by Nascar Racing 2003, Grand Prix Legends and Indycar Racing 2.

The sim has been in development for over 4 years, and has now entered a titillating and somewhat frustratingly drawn out release phase. To drive it at the moment you have to be invited into the ‘inner circle’, in a similar way to the Gmail release. Luckily, I was one of the ones invited.

How much??

This is the first sim racing title to use a subscription – around a $156 (exhale breath in a “how much?” kind of fashion) of American green. For this amount, you get around 6 tracks and 2 cars, and additional tracks and cars can be purchased.

This sounds like a lot – until you see the production levels the team has gone to. Each track is laser scanned (freaky lasers!) to model literally every bump in the road. An undertaking costing around $600,000 – per track. In addition to this, each car has been extensively modeled to be a virtual copy of the real machine – and you can feel this quality on track.

Like feeling dizzy?

The cars in the sim are in general of the ‘Amurkin’ variety, including only 1 European car, the terrifying fast Radical SR8. There are 2 types of car, being of course oval cars (for people who like driving in circles) and road racers (for people who like exercising their arms).

Put down by the virtual ‘man’

A full regulation system is also in place. Go off the road, and you receive a penalty. Make contact with another car, and the same applies. This all goes towards a ‘safety rating’ which must be built up to advance to other cars.

The Skip Barber through the corkscrew at Laguna Seca

In practice, this system puts you under immense pressure not to make a mistake – but I feel that this cuts both ways. Fear of being penalized for putting 2 wheels on the grass removes the desire to ‘push’, often meaning you’ll let others pass a little too easy.

Boogidy boogidy boogidy

Out on track the cars feel very convincing. The feedback of the track through the force feedback is unparalleled with any other racing title to date, and even surpasses NetKar Pro in some instances.

Sluggish Solstice at Lime Rock Park

With this comes great difficulty. After racing the rather pathetic excuse for a racing car, the Pontiac Solstice, I often felt frustrated that this wallowy, soft car was all that you could drive in the early stages. Even when I had figured out the car a little better I couldn’t help feeling that it was limiting my enjoyment somewhat.

As you can only race against people online, and only through sessions which occur every 2 hours, actually getting on track can take some time. And once there, the quality of racing was a little lack luster. Unmatched grids with people of vastly different pace did not make for entertaining racing.

Driving in circles is actually quite fun…

The small Legends 34’ Coupe car is one of the few things in America which is actually quite small. I was surprised to find the finesse needed to race around an oval, and the amount of work needed on the wheel to keep the car in check.

The Legends Coupe - fun and frisky

However, I still have reservations about he points system – it would not take much of a mistake to rack up some incident points around an oval. Again, the points system saps some of the fun out of the simulation.

Worth getting?

Although the sim is not technically out yet, it does show signs of being one of the greatest ever. However, an overly harsh system of points stops the sim from becoming addictive quite so quickly. Clean racing does not mean mistake free racing.

Having to wait large amounts of time for races does not help either, and inconsistent competition matching has not yet provided memorable races. But these are early days. This is certainly the future of all gaming, not simply simulations.

Julian Dyer

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These F***ing doors

Rant, Travel, 625 days ago

I literally find nothing more annoying about my journey to work every day more than these:

These f***ing doors are the bane of my life

Virgin Trains aren’t punctual. They are far too short. It is always packed between Wakefield (glorious Wakefield) and Leeds. The bit with the toilet in really smells of poo. And piss. But above all, the fucking doors send me insane.

They will stay open just long enough for you to get 50% of the way through them, before crushing you to death. The constant shrieks of “I’m trapped!”, usually coming from college girls with suitcases big enough to fit another student in becomes rather tiresome every single day.

And if you do get through it, someone has decided to leave one of these for you to be bum-punctured with a point armrest.

Prepare to be reamed

Why are they there? Does anyone need an arm rest? If you lucky, you might still have some to rest on them having navigated through the doors.

Julian Dyer

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