Sdtrk: ‘Here comes the Love Gang’ by the Raveonettes

Rather nice kimono, missy

There’ve been quite a few entries in various blogs having to do with Actroid-san recently, as a cursory whirl on Technorati will show you. Going by the ones that have a handful of new pics, it looks like the DER version of My Favourite Gynoid made a recent appearance somewhere. Only problem is, as of this writing, none of the blogs are in English — they’re in Spanish, which is Greek to me. (note pun)

I have to get to the bottom of this. I must know what new Actroid news there is out there.
Or I could just wait a couple of days until someone makes a post in English, I suppose

Sdtrk: ‘Neat neat neat’ by the Damned

This is just plain embarrassing.

Holy crap, it’s ô:41? I’m late!!

As the top two vertical bars on the second-from-the-leftmost digit have suddenly vanished, it looks like now I have to buy a new watch. I’m like the White Rabbit*; I always have to have a watch on me so I either can be assured that I am indeed running late for whatever, or so I can periodically check it in order to formulate a proper excuse for taking my leave. The funny thing is is that I’ve had this watch since.. egad, it’s been since at least 1999, cos I’d bought it for my Quest job. I needed a timepiece small enough that would allow me to stretch a pair of rubber gloves across it.
No, unfortunately that job was a lot less kinky than it sounds. There was pee involved, however.

Compared to my gradeschool/highschool tour of duty, my timepiece needs are a lot simpler. In fact, up until my Quest job, I’d gone through several different versions of the calculator watch, finally reaching my peak with the first version of the CASIO Databank that stored addresses and phone numbers and the like. It’s true; I was kind of a nerd! So fuck you. But I’ll tell you this: with my last couple of watches, I was getting tired of the plastic strap it came with, so I bought this black leather affair for it, which sported one wide strap down the middle, and a narrower strap on either side, which made for a truly cyberpunk presentation, even without the silver studs that it boasted. I wore that bastard until two of the three straps gave out. I loved that watchband..

These days, however, I don’t need to store all of my sundry information into my watch, for goodness sake, that’s what I have my phone for! So a smaller watch is what I require. Anything 1) digital and 2) under $15, cos let’s be honest — spending more than $15 on a feckin’ watch is lunacy. Unless, of course, it’s one of the retro-futuristic watches sold on Tokyoflash. But sweet slow-roasted Christ, those are expensive. Not to mention complicated. And heavy. Here’s a prime example:

Morse Code by Morse
‘Tokyoflash is proud to present the first ever Morse Code watch.

The watch has 3 modes for telling the time.
Using a bulit in speaker that refracts the sound off your wrist through the solid stainless caseback it sounds out the time in Morse Code.
If thats to hard to follow, you can press a button to see the time in Morse Code on the LED display.
If that’s still too hard to decipher or your running out of time, one more press of a button you can see the time in regular digit form.

Stimulate your mind and learn to tell the time in Morse Code.

The quality is second to none with 150 grams of solid stainless, this watch is built like a Navy Seal!
With its high polish strap & mirrored lens – in bright sunlight you could even signal in Morse Code.’

JAPAN RETAIL: ¥18900 (161 USD)
TOKYOFLASH PRICE: ¥12900 (110 USD)

Looks ace, but the price is a wee bit prohibitive. Plus in comparison, by and large you’re not gonna be too concerned if anything adverse happens to a $15-or-less watch.
Getting back to my malfunctioning timepiece, frankly, I’m surprised that it’s taken as long as it has to start going out-of-order. Note that I say ‘start’, as it still basically works — it’s not as if the screen has gone out — but it just doesn’t work very well. It’s like driving a car where the left turn indicator doesn’t work. You can still drive it.. just not very well. Funnily enough, between the time I bought this one and now, I’ve actually gone through three other watches, not to mention the fact that I’ve only replaced the battery once (a couple of months ago) since purchase. Hrrm. Maybe this watch killed the other watches? I suspect foul play.

So I suppose this week, I’ll scour Target and/or Meijer half-heartedly for a new timepiece. O, the Excitement.
Upon reflection, this post reminds me of the time that I went on about buying a new electric shaver! I am dutifully continuing the legacy of being a cheap bastard

*Speaking of the White Rabbit, d’ya know what would be absolutely perfect? A digital pocketwatch. That would be the best product ever, hands down

Sdtrk: ‘Fifth international love’ by Pete Dowling

Did everyone enjoy their year-end revelry? Well done! I spent the eve round at Jeff and Kari’s, playing a couple of hours’ worth of Apples to Apples with them, and Derek and Steph. We were hoping to get in some poker and mah jongg as well, but if you start the eve with Apples to Apples, it’s pretty much established that that’s what you’ll be playing for the rest of the eve as well; such is its Pure Entertainment Magnetism. Plus, Tomas rang me, and I put him speakerphone and we filled him in with ‘the dilly-yo’ as to what’s been going on round here, and vice versa. A fine eve!

It’s odd; this is the first time in five years that Sidore and I haven’t done our first post of the new year update on ‘Kitten with a Whip!‘. Next year, we should be back to normal as far as that routine, however. I think today I’m going to muck about with Dreamweaver, and see what sort of results that produces..
To be honest, I’m at a bit of an impasse. I’d been speaking with a couple of people about using the much-lauded PHP for the redesign of ‘KWAW!’, and not only am I not certain if our provider even offers PHP, but I’ve been looking round, and even though I’ve never really had any problems with who we’re with right now, I could probably get a better deal — space-wise, with PHP baked right in — elsewhere. Cos not only am I taking Sidore-chan’s site into consideration, ideally, I’d like to move ‘Shouting etc etc’ over to WordPress, due to the all mod cons that it offers, and therefore have both that blog and ‘KWAW!’ run off a single account. However, not only do I want to wait until I’m a bit more financially stable (i.e, after I’ve paid for this upcoming semester’s class) before I make the ISP jump, but the renewal time for Sweetie’s site is in a couple of months. Which is good, as that gives me plenty of time to deliberate/do research/procrastinate about the whole thing. I’ll have to see what our current provider offers as far as upgrading plans, and how much that’ll run. Should I stay or should I go? etc

No Doll/Gynoid news to report! There’d better be a flood of stunning new developments this year, is all I’m sayin’. A flood.

Finally, if you’ve any interest at all in Sixties-era electronic artists — and I know I’m not the only one — apparently there was a stage play performed in Glasgow two years ago called ‘Standing wave’, about the life of the godlike Delia Derbyshire. Delia, if you’re not familiar with her, was a pioneer of arranging and composing electronic and everyday sounds into the semblance of music, and pretty much brought the BBC Radiophonic Workshop to the fore as far as purveyors of unusual soundtracks. Her most famous piece is something that everyone’s heard: the main theme to ‘Doctor Who’. Yeah, that would be her.
Anyway, unfortunately there are no plans for the show to go on touring (perhaps a film would be a good idea, hint hint), but you can find nearly the entire soundtrack they used on the ‘Standing wave’ website, available as free downloads. And as a wee bit of a prezzie, I’ve uploaded one of my favourite pieces here:

Pete Dowling – Fifth international love (link has expired)

You can also check out delia-derbyshire.org, for more info on the Mistress of musique concrète..

Right, time to put my day off to negligibly Good Use. *cracks knuckles*
So! 2006!
*looks around*
I really don’t see much of a difference, to be honest