The World’s End

The World’s End is the third film from the guys who brought you (and me), Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz. Two superb movies I can watch repeatedly. And have done. I live in North London and wonder if the idea came from two pubs in the area both called ‘The World’s End’ and both in areas that I know the stars and writers frequently hang around. (Camden and Finsbury Park.) Or maybe, also like me, they are obsessed with the apocalypse.

The World’s End is going to be great, I can feel it.

If you like Skyrim or want to see the 3D yourself, you can try this NOW. AT HOME JUST USING YOUR EYES!Maybe you have already seen this before. Quite frankly, it may be the last thing you see because I am sure it messes up your eyes. But watch this clip and go cross eyed. Honestly. If you get it right you will see Skyrim in 3D and that’s surely another bucket list ticked.

Finally, here is a gamer/geek’s first impressions:

I will be buying one of these. Or if an Oculus Rift publicity man reads this, then send me one and I will publicize the hell out of it.

To be fair they are quite similar.. They both involve people with a fair amount of time on their hands doing silly things on camera recreating something a bit nerdy. The first one was called Hadouken. It originated from a move in Street Fighter. Happily I remember Street Fighter 2 and all the moves from a teenage life spent in games arcades in Hong Kong in the late 1980s. (A youth well spent  by the way.) Here are a couple of examples:

Hadouken!

More Hadouken!

Cool isn’t it? Before this was ‘Pottering’ but that was awful. Exhibit A:

But now… there is Vadering.

Remember when that pillock in the Death Star in Star Wars: A New Hope mocks Darth Vader? (The first one back in the 70s.) He calls the Force an ancient religion even though it was one of the most powerful and respected things about 20 years before and had been for literally thousands of years. Vader rightly chokes the moron. Then, in Empire Strikes Back (the best of the Star Wars films – fact) he starts chucking shit about with his mind, like a demented Uri Geller that isn’t a fraud. Well that combo (used in the games) is the new thing to utterly waste your time posing for. ‘Vadering’.

Time well spent quite frankly. Vadering is cool. If we had the internet and weren’t so naively obsessed with sex and drink and drugs back in the early 90s, I would have spent all my time doing this sort of thing. I give you… Vadering…

Vadering!

Girls Vadering!

Vader Vadering!

I know Thailand incredibly well. I even used to write for a well known travel website on the country. For some reason however, I had never been to Railay beach even though I had always wanted to. It is a stunningly beautiful part of the world and I highly encourage you to go.

The main problem you are likely to face is where to stay. The entire peninsula is basically a load of interlinked resorts, which is a bit of a shame. On the West side, there is the main gorgeous beach, lined with posh resorts. They seem nice enough, but the food we had was ok and a bit overpriced. Another option however, is to head for the East side, (which is a bit swampy) and enjoy the cheaper nosh there. A third option is to do what we did: stay in Ao Nang (which is ok but has good food) and just take longtail boats everywhere.

If you are in Thailand and haven’t visited, you should. It’s gorgeous. If you don’t believe me, here is a photo:

Here’s a panorama. Because I can. Unfortunately my wife’s arm moved and now she looks like a mutant. The beach is nice though.

Railay Beach

Anyway, here it is:

traintimes.org.uk/map/tube/

I bought a cheap smartphone in Hong Kong which I then took to Thailand. Phones in this part of the world are unlocked as they are fully aware of how stupid and pointless it is to lock an easily unlockable device. With a Thai 3G sim card and internet tethering I now have the web at my fingers wherever I am.

I just bought Anthony Beevor’s superb Stalingrad on my kindle while eating a spicy bowl of Kaotom pla (boiled rice and fish with spices). I then spent the last 4 hours lying in a hammock in the tropics with a belly full of superb spicy Thai breakfast while reading about the slaughter and carnage of Hitler’s attempt to invade Russia. Good times.

I then wondered if I could write a website entry from my supine position on my tethered Galaxy Note 2 mobile phone. If you are reading this, then I can. If that’s the case, I may be here a while…

Here is a picture of said hammock, kindle and sea. Plus my feet. I apologise if it is cold where you are.

I hate moving

I left my flat of 4 years and had to pack everything in storage. As anyone who has ever moved apartment will know, this was a massive stressful ball-ache. Not just the lifting but calling half of Britain to cancel direct debits. Just try calling Camden council and you will see that the stress induced is reason enough for my not having time to write.

Not enough?

I am in the final stage of my degree and am now entering the ‘Massive Bastard Essays’ stage. I have two huge fiction essays to write and accompanying essays of several 1000s of words. This is all while moving. I probably shouldn’t be writing this in fact.

More?

As well as being technically homeless, I am now technically unemployed as well. I probably shouldn’t say this but both of those facts are brilliant and I love being in this state of limbo. Consequently though, I am now constantly scouring the job pages to persuade someone, anyone, to hire me. To do anything. I work in TV, write fiction, am a journalist, and can teach, so please send me an offer at thewordofward@gmail.com. This leads on to the next time consuming point.

Final excuse:

This photo could well be in colour.

I also left Britain. Quite frankly, it was cold and the natives were grumpy. Maybe these points are connected. I flew to my old home and place of birth – Hong Kong. I bloody love it there and in the 5 days we stayed we drank, met people, and generally revelled in the futuristic awesomeness that is Hong Kong. Superb place. I also applied for some jobs while there in addition to looking at property and writing the aforementioned essays. Busy but brilliant times.

Hong Kong is from the future

The next stop was the current one. Bangkok! Again, a place where I have lived and loved and lagered. I spent a couple of years as a journalist here and that is another option on the cards. I have spent the last week looking up old contacts and going out with friends. A lot. Oh yeah, and the essays.

Bangkok!

So there you go. I’ve been a busy boy so cut me some slack. If you are rich and live in Hong Kong/ Bangkok/ Singapore and want to hire someone to write some stuff or work in a TV studio you own, give me shout. Then I can write more here as well and everyone’s happy.

In case you feel a twinge of pity, there really is no need. I am headed to this beach in a couple of days. Bye for now.

Railay Beach

Tomb Raider

When the Playstation 1 came out I played certain games on the console and others on a PC. The console was great for driving games and third person adventure games (such as the pixelated bosom-filled actioner Tomb Raider), while the PC was better for First Person Shooters and Real Time Strategies. It all worked together perfectly. Soon after the PS2 arrived however, I found myself getting increasingly frustrated with PC games that either didn’t work or took hours to install. I have yet to gain the patience that apparently comes with age. I want to play now! This trend just seemed to get worse with the PS3. Consoles were great multimedia gaming devices and my PC was for toil or writing superb website entries.

Recently however, this seems to be changing and it is a change that will be permanent and the end of consoles. In my opinion, these will probably be the last consoles of their type. Something similar may be along to replace them, but as they are now they just can’t keep up with PCs. Why? I hear you ask, you poor ignorant fool. (Unless you’re a tech type and have already stopped reading as you know this already.)

The answer is Moore’s Law. This states that ‘the number of transistors on integrated circuits doubles every two years’. Essentially, computers double in speed every two years. This law was written about in 1965 and still holds true, so huge kudos to Mr Moore you clever tyke. Here’s a graph:

Moore’s Law

As you can see, it’s pretty damn close to the prediction. It should be noted that this rise is exponential. Which means that the speeds will continue to rise at ever quicker rates. This means that when someone makes a console, no matter how quickly they make it, that console’s processor will be a year or two behind what a PC can do. If a console is around for 4 or more years, it will look like an ZX Spectrum compared to a PC by the end. (Possible exaggeration.) This will just get worse.

Unless you can 3D print a new console every 6 months, the gap will become ridiculous. And as a gamer, unacceptable. The new consoles are basically PCs anyway. Couple this with the fact that it is getting so stupidly easy to build your own gaming PC and update it with new cards that even I could do it, and you can see where all this is headed. There are some cool games coming out, which you can see here, but they will look better on a computer. Personally, I see myself writing on an ultrabook and gaming on something like this:

Gaming PC with glowing things in it!

How cool does that look? I’m sure many will disagree with me on this one and feel free to do so. (You are wrong though.) In the future, enjoy your silly moving controllers as you leap around your living room. I will be here:

This is my future home.

http://youtu.be/oyCFiONCpbk

A painting about death

The exhibition comprises over 300 pieces of art, sculpture, anthropological pieces, and more. I’m no expert but I thought it was brilliantly curated. Great lighting, well presented, and er, other curatorial goodness. The first room is full of art relating to death with lots of ‘Memento Mori’ – which is Latin for ‘Remember your mortality’ or ‘Remember your going to die’ (I did 5 years of Latin at school and it just paid off). Then things diverse into skulls, masks, models, pictures, and even cool things like a bone candelabra. It’s downright fascinating.

I would have liked a bit more anthropology however. There were some really cool masks and statues but they were so interesting I wanted a few more. It is a minor quibble though.

Here are some photos to give you an idea of just quite how much Death is on display:

This was particularly gruesome

Death: A self-portrait is on at the Wellcome collection until the 24th of February. It is well worth a visit and like all exhibitions at the superb Wellcome collection, it is free. So if you’re in London, check it out.

Here is a video about it:

The Wellcome collection is at 183 Euston Road, London (opposite the main entrance to Euston).

For more info, click this link. Death: A self portrait.

The Firefly concept

This fanciful dreaming has been inspired by the science-fiction-sounding Deep Space Industries. To increase this scifi feeling the exploratory modules are called Firefly. I don’t know if they are fans of the show but I suspect space scientists/engineers probably are, as all intelligent people like science fiction (that’s a fact). The Firefly modules will act like scouts and will be out there by 2015. Probably. This new space expansion is unlikely to really get going until the 2020s at the earliest. I’ll be almost 50 in 2020 which is why I need the longevity drugs. There are a lot of ifs in my mental scenarios but I’m an optimist.

A Fuel Harvester

In addition to these modules Deep Space Industries have all sorts of incredible vessels planned. Harvesters and miners and processors and habitats. And it’s all real!!! Well, soon will be. Probably.

I really hope DSI makes this happen. I’m fed up with being disappointed by humanity when it comes to space exploration. Whenever anyone says something like ‘we should spend all the money on hospitals or something’ it makes me want to cry. Sure that would make things a bit better right now but it’s so short sighted. If we keep everyone healthy, old, but stuck on this planet you are essentially dooming future generations to overcrowding, disease, and mass starvation. You are essentially thinking purely of yourself. Prick.

Anyway. As I said this will hopefully be about to change. This time it looks more hopeful than ever. Call me cynical but this time there is a factor that might help us reach for the stars: mankind’s innate greed. There’s a shitload of gold and valuable goodies out there, locked away in asteroids. I read somewhere that some asteroids near us contain enough gold to change the price of gold on our planet permanently. It may now be financially viable to get our grubby paws on the stuff.

Here are two brilliant pictures straight from a movie. These are followed by a clip that could be directed by Paul Verhoeven but isn’t. It even has scifi writing fonts and everything.

More space harvester action

Space habitat. I soooo want to live here.

I want to work for this company. Even if it is in the video making department.

For more info see their site. I got all the pictures from there and there are more. Go Deep Space Industries! If you read this can I have a job? http://deepspaceindustries.com/

The International Space Station

I found this video clip fascinating and I want to go into space so badly it almost hurts. Although probably not for a couple of months. A long weekend will do. It looks a bit cramped.

I meant to flick through this tour of the space station to the exciting parts but it actually kept me clued to my laptop. Just don’t go on a random youtube journey afterwards and waste hours of your life looking at proof of aliens videos and government hushup crap. People on youtube frequently depress me.  Clips like this then cheer me up. Enjoy.

This website started as a blog/review site and has morphed into a place where I talk vaguely about things I think are cool or interesting like science or exploration. As well as doing reviews. Well rest assured it shall continue thus. At the risk of just blogging about myself you should know that things afoot. This is the year I will make a change and write more stuff! This is not a New Year thing, it is a realisation that I want to work a bit less in TV. Just a bit. The reason I am telling you this will be made clear.

One thing I did last year was read the superb 59 Seconds by Professor Richard Wiseman. It is a self-help book based on science. I hate self-help books, but am quite interested in psychology (you’d think the two would be more connected but they really aren’t). In the book they do crazy things like take a look at self-help stuff and actually test to see if it works rather than blather on about unsubstantiated vague old bollocks. For example, picturing yourself in a wonderful perfect place and trying to work out how to get there doesn’t help you achieve goals. It does the opposite. When you see all you need to do to achieve a major goal it can be overwhelming and disheartening. If you think about writing a book it seems huge but a 1000 words a day and you’ll be there in 3 or 4 months. Just set little targets and you’ll be in your own Playboy mansion/Skywalker ranch hybrid in no time (or whatever your ideal house is).

Smiling makes you happy

In 59 Seconds Wiseman tries to study things that actually do work and attempts to explain why. Some of it is just bizarre. Lots of studies for example, have shown that just the act of smiling can make you happier. Also, if you are a relatively happy optimist then better things happen to you. You are more open to opportunities. So don’t be a miserable whinger – it makes your life shit and you are boring to listen to.

Another thing that has been discovered is that if you tell a lot of people that you are going to do something, you are more likely to do it. Which I could probably have predicted, but didn’t know for certain.

So bollocks to New Year resolutions, just tell lots of people and let shame do the rest. I will write 1000 words a day. Lots of them will be here. Do stuff people! And have a great year.