Woolgathering Weekends
Friday December 21, 2007
A few weekends ago I had the pleasure of watching the magic hands of Mr. Scruff scratch the decks at Camden’s Koko. Tea, beer, and funktacular melodies filled the night, leaving myself to the whimsy of his sagely DJ-ing.
Anyone who goes to such a gig will not fail to notice the awesome projections, clever visuals, and Scruff-style musings with a comical edge. “Colin’s pie shop” is forever embedded in my head, Rhubarb & Tent Peg being my unconditional favourite, and I’ll never again forget to “Wobble those legs!”.
I’ve concluded resolutely that university groupwork is universally crap. I’m glad to be done working in groups of students that do jack all and pretend to care (this isn’t always the case, but there’s usually one person among a collective spoiling the fun).
Group assignments shouldn’t be geared to jeapordize people who want the grades in the finals. You can only learn two things from badly constructed exercises – the “Do it yourself” philosophy; winging it at 4 o’clock in the morning, or how to spend time climbing on the backs of other people until they do what you want. You could probably do more if you were in a group with the fish in the departmental aquarium. At least from the outset you’d know you were on your own for the project write-up since it’s unlikely aquatic life will be able to print anything off underwater.
Christmas isn’t so annoying this year. I’ve had few moments wanting to explode from festive overload, not as bad as living in town, which is one saving grace of campus.
Random interesting experiment – Everyone’s had that “danger moment” when you cross the road, timing it just right to walk behind an oncoming car. Try the same at an actual pedestrian crossing. The car will likely slow down to let you pass. I’ve no idea what causes this, whether it’s common British courtesy or the manifestation of some psychological phenomena. Theories on a postcard or in the comment box.
Came across a sexy Hex Editor for Eclipse. Pretty useful these last few weeks…
On the music front, I’ve been doing advert music again, although attempting to identify in reverse. I’ve got the songs, I’d like to know what adverts they’re from… There’s a specific one I can see in my head, and I know this was the tune, but I can’t remember the product:
Neat tune even if I don’t buy what it’s advertising.
On a final note, the Kahvi christmas releases have been awesome. Get an earful of Xurba, track 2.