Tuesday, November 30, 2004
5 star reviews, across the board...Wow, Amazon really does stock just about everything. They've got Marijuana for sale now, including some 'used' stock from the low low price of $8.95. The most entertaining bit of this page though, is the comments... [via boingboing] # | Monday, November 15, 2004
International Librarian of MysteryBizgirl's take on the evening is pretty much how it went down. I was at work, Natalie's gmail pinged me, I checked, and was pretty much instantly left in no doubt as to the fact I'd won the thing. A phone-call to Rachel - the hired-gun who'd come in to help organise the event - confirmed it for me. She showed no signs, from what I could tell, of being overly surprised that I turned out to be who I was. After taking a mere second to digest the information, she got on with the job, and booked me on the next plane to Auckland so I could get to the awards before the presentation.It was pretty much all go from that point. I spent a frantic twenty minutes trying to get hold of my wife to let her know what was going on, to no avail. For only perhaps the second time in my life, I cursed our mutual dislike of mobile phones. The time came when I had to make the call as to whether I was staying or going, and I thought, well, how often does this sort of madness come along, so I left a message at reception to pass onto my wife when she arrived to pick me, jumped in a taxi and went to the airport. An hour later I was in Auckland, and caught another cab to the event, where Rachel - who was helping Netguide out with the awards and associated media - met me and got me to take a quick squizz at the media release the were preparing. Prefabricated quotes are a scary thing... "Er, do you think I could maintain some level of anonymity?" "No." "Um, yes, suspected as much. Ah, well, ummmm, how about this, can I change 'It's been a fun ride while it lasted' to read 'It's been an interesting exercise in creativity?" "Yes." A small victory, at least. I was given a glass of champagne (finally, a cold drink), and was shown to a seat in the auditorium where I'd missed the best part of the evening (inside fireworks!) and the worst (Ralph Norris's speech), catching up with things as they ceremony moved into the actual awards presentation of the evening. I was up third-to-last (which makes it, what, equivalent to Best Actor?), so had some time to work on drying my palms as best as possible for when I needed to shake Ralph Norris's hand. The announcement came, I went up on stage, retrieved the plaque, and descended back to the floor to a mixture of applause and laughter. A memorable moment, for sure. Anyway, it was the post-awards carry-on that was interesting. When Rachel caught up with me again, she led me away to be introduced to a couple of people high up in the ACP chain - the people behind the Netguide magazine. We chatted about the blog for a bit, a chat that was to become the archetype for a conversation that I've had numerous times since. Why? Why indeed. I also managed to catch up with Damian Christie, who I had organised to accept the award on Natalie's behalf. This was when I got to thinking about the media. Now, if Damian had had to get up to accept the award, would there have been a 'sorry, Ms. Biz is unable to be here to accept the award' announcement from the MC Jaquie Brown, or would he have been the butt of the joke? There were no speeches, so no chance for DC to set things right. I mean, other than the goofy grin on my face, how did anyone know I wasn't just Natalie's mate accepting the award on her behalf? Anyway, I wasn't staring a gift-horse in the mouth. If ACP and their hired PR guns wanted to use me as a pawn to get a bit of air-time for the Netguide Awards, I was hardly going to stand in their way. Turns out it got some coverage on TV3 later that night, and, this was the real kicker, it made the front page Wellington's Dominion Post the next day (online text is a much shorter version of the print edition, and doesn't contain my anonymous photo of me which you can see at the top of this page, or the sexy librarian image that the Dom wrongly jumped to the conclusion of assuming was 'Natalie'). There was also a decent story in the other big daily - the Auckland Herald, written by Alan Perrott before Friday, and which is thus doesn't mention me by name. (Sorry Alan, I didn't see Friday unfolding quite like it did). Man, it must have been a slow day at the Dom. The other front-page stories were the enrolment of a fifth set of twins at St Teresa's primary school, a 59 year-old grandma expecting twins (I expect they'll go to St Teresa's), and the non-revelatory headline story that Telecom and Vodafone are running a mobile phone duopoly in NZ, and charging far higher than the average OECD rates. Good company then. And they managed to mangle my one quote... It's been fun exercising creativity, but I have to say it's nice to be recognised."It's been fun exercising creativity..."? What sort of statement is that? And they described me as... ...a man in a suit...Honestly. I hardly ever wear a suit, and I wasn't wearing one that night. (Update: I've been informed that the article was pretty much lifted from NZPA, so the blame for any errors lies with them, not the Dom. Not that the mistakes are biggies, but, really, a suit...) It was all pretty obvious in hindsight - the Personal Blog category was the one award that really had a bit of a story to it, whether or not it was Natalie winning the award, or me. Trademe winning the Site of the Year award is all fine and dandy, but it's not really going to make a splash beyond the IT pages. Ms Biz was a story in the making, and my introduction to the plot just just added an even better twist. I wonder now, if Rachel, the person behind getting me to the awards was actually aware before she rang me or not. She seemed a pretty sharp lady - I wouldn't have been surprised. So, yes, an interesting blip in the development of Ms. Biz, who has been my faithful sidekick for nearly six years now. Her first foray into the world of the web came as the manager of my band Debris, and there's still some quotes lurking about online from an interview she did with an American newspaper - the New Haven Advocate - on the development of mp3 back when mp3 was a new thing back in 1999. She's been doing the news for noizyland.com pretty much from the word go, and has had various other jobs thrust at her over the years, most of which she's handled with aplomb. Where to now for Ms. Biz? Only she can say... # | Thursday, November 11, 2004
Very big numbersI was amazed to see the odds of a golfer scoring two hole-in-ones in one round was calculated at 67,000,000-to-1 by America's Golf Digest. Some self-confessed hacker from Spokane, Washington, USA did it at Liberty Golf Course earlier in the week. Says the article... Varallo, who has never broken 90, called his two aces "the two best shots I'll ever hit." At 31, he said, he's reached the pinnacle of his athletic career.Honestly, you'd have to set your heights higher, surely? Three in a round man! A golfing hat-trick! It reminded me of Julian Barnes final chapter in his History of the World in 10½ Chapters, in which a man, dead and gone to heaven, spends several hundred years (perhaps longer) of his eternal afterlife getting his golf game down to a perfect and consistent 18 strokes. Anyway, what really interested me was that 67 million figure. If that really is the odds, I imagine this sort of thing is happening all the time. There must be tens of millions of golfers in the USA alone. Hundreds of millions around the world. Almost certainly there would also be hundreds of millions of rounds of golf being played every week. Hole-in-one doubles must be virtually common-place. I was reading about the 'Law of Truly Large Numbers' (aka Littlewood's Law) the other day, and had been pretty much won around to the view that million-to-one 'miracles' not only can, but also statistically should, happen pretty regularly to everyone. So, roll on my golfing hat-trick! [golf story via Insta Marv] # | Wednesday, November 10, 2004
Put your fists in the ... air! Air, people!A totally unconfirmed rumour is doing the interweb rounds that Concord Dawn have licensed some of their music to be used in a German hardcore porn film, under the condition that the lads might get to use some of the (presumably less R18) footage for a future video.All very well if the film in question features fine-boned blonde-haired aryan goddesses, as the duo were no doubt expecting, but, upon arrival of the video, it turns out to be an all-male anal fisting video. Ouch, you might say. [via ms. behaviour via twisted] # | Wednesday, November 03, 2004
Radio Active 89FM NZ Music Show Playlist02 November, 2004Ahaha. As predicted earlier, I ended up being part of Miles Buckingham's un-chart-ed doco that airs during the very NZ Music show I host every once in a while. Miles gave me have the last word, usually reserved for some 'humourous' anecdote or soundbite from whoever he's interviewed that week, which, in this case, was me. I seem to recall it had something to do with the awards, me being there on a media pass, and the fact I had only turned up with an HB pencil. A blunt one, at that. Anyway, here's the playlist... Confucious - Selectaversion guy fawkes dedication: Double Happys - Big Fat Elvis apra scroll loser! Pony Club - Days of Wine .. and wine Nouveau Riche - Autumn Girl Mahinarangi Tocker - When I Grow Up Trinity Roots - Call To You apra scroll loser! Labcoats - Dugout Sleepers Union - Psilocybin Boy Datsuns - Peter Heater Nimbus - Weather King part 1 Marineville - Children of the UFO un-chart-ed: Silver Scrolls Special Scribe - Not Many apra scroll winner! Hinemoana Baker - Blue Sky Shaft - Ginger's Losses SJD - Four Door Hot Swiss Mistress - The Method of Being a Happy Man Bing Turkby Ensemble - Boganspeak/Grease Gun Prince Tui Teka - Mum Fly My Pretties - Singing in My Soul Goodshirt - Buck it Up apra scroll loser! Ju and I came up with an ad-libbed 'sting' (as they call it in the trade, so I'd believe) where I'd do a radio-jock 'APRA SCROLL LOSER!' after each track written by one of the losers from the previous event, and Ju would do a fake digital delay: "active active active..." Needless to say we pulled it off faultlessly. # | |
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