This site ponders along not really doing much and there’s about three people actually look at it. I don’t mind that. I’m not making any money from this and it serves more as a repository of films and bands I’ve seen than anything useful for anyone else. What I’m saying is that I expect no real traffic on this site so I was somewhat surprised a few days ago when I got a massive spike in viewership.
Potential Hacking Attempt
For some context the maximum views value is 5000. I shouldn’t be anywhere near that. Around this time I also got an email saying my website was under attack, mostly from the USA.
“we’re sending this notice to make you aware that there is a higher volume of the attacks than usual”
This website was hacked about ten years ago and it took me a while to fix it. I was actually impressed with how the attack worked but it was rather annoying. So, as I write this I will download another backup of this site!
I’m considering adding a permanent page to this site where I write stupid little things that I think of during the week. I’ve had this page before and it was called “This Week” and that was a generation of this site from the early 2000s. I don’t want to join Twitter or a different social media site I’ll just end up following the usual people I’ve followed in the past and when they aren’t friends – journalists and politicians etc – it negatively affects my mental health. So, there might soon be a page linked from the home page with stupid things that I notice during the week.
I took a trip to the cinema at Strood. I had booked my tickets earlier in the day not really sure if I was going to make it to the film as I had a shitty migraine. The plan was to pick up a delivery that had gone to a collection point and then head to the cinema IF I felt able to. In the early afternoon I was running at 75% no-go and I used the app to see if I could cancel my ticket but I think it was too late to do that. I didn’t want to get a “black mark” from the cinema so I decided I would go. I went to the parcel collection point, it was closed, and headed to the cinema. The tide was high-ish. It was more high than not. There was a little mudbank still showing, I wasn’t sure if the tide was rising or not.
I rated this film on IMDb after watching it. My migraine had not gone but it dissipated for a while and I was able to watch the film although I did spend time adjusting my sitting position, I couldn’t get comfy. To be honest it was a miserable day which has continued to today. Anyway, I gave this film 6/10. Please read this communication to understand the scoring system.
This film was a pretty standard post-apocalyptic movie. I think I’d rather watch 28 days later, it’s a better movie. The thing that possibly saved this particular film was the scenery – it was pretty amazing. Colorado looks such a pretty state. What I don’t understand is the title of the film. It doesn’t make sense. The dog doesn’t really star. There is a star named after the dog but not plural. There is an actual Dog Star but that wasn’t mentioned. There was one dog in the movie. I’m not sure. I will say the movie looked great. It was directed by Steven Spielberg and when you think about great directors putting out mediocre films you have to realise that they probably do the best they can with the script and money that they’ve got.
I’ve had two racing wheel stands that have both had a single point of weakness. The stands were around GBP60 but the angle of dangle was kept secure by a single bolt going through a flange on an axle. Both of these wheel stands failed where the flange met the axle. The design just wasn’t good enough to cope with the torque involved. So, I looked up another stand using Google. I initially searched Amazon but I didn’t want my money passing through that company so the plan was to get an idea of cost and then buy direct from a manufacturers website. Using this method I found GT Omega. I decided to buy one of their stands. It was sent via DHL but I wasn’t in the house so I had it delivered to a pick-up centre. You might imagine I could get the package sent to the DHL centre I can see from my house but that wasn’t an option and I had to go to Sittingbourne instead.
I picked this box up on a really humid day. It was awfully humid. I was grumpy all day and I didn’t enjoy the weather, much like I found the weather this whole summer to be awful. I’m currently looking into buying an air conditioning unit for my house. It’s a small house and I reckon I could make it very pleasant during the heat waves that we are going to keep getting. If you aren’t filled with an existential threat about humanity and the climate then I think you probably just aren’t a thinking human being.
This steering wheel stand is constructed very well. It’s solid. I can’t see any points of failure and it holds my wheel, gear stick and pedals perfectly. I love how Logitech have made their products with securing bolts built in so they can be fixed to third party devices. The HOTAS system I have works in a very similar way.
As you can see the whole frame is pretty solid. I reckon I could stand on the wheel block and it would easily hold my weight. The pedals are screwed in position and now there’s no movement and I don’t have to use my feet to adjust the pedal position while driving. The gearstick is in a more “simulator” position and I try to use this when I drive a car that doesn’t have “flappy paddles”. Overall this is a decent addition to the setup. It even folds up so can save a little bit of space when needed.
The above picture shows my view. Nice big, bright TV. 7.2 surround sound. Telemetry box on top of the wheel showing tire temps and other information. All in all the driving experience got a lot better with this new stand.
I’ve been spending some time in the world of Skyrim. Someone at work mentioned it and I saw it going cheap on the PlayStation store so I think I bought it. I wasn’t sure what to expect, especially as the game is fifteen years old. Then, one day earlier in the summer, I pretty much spent twelve hours playing the game and I decided I would delete it so that at least I have some sense of achievement of real things during August. After I returned from Wales I decided I would start playing again and it was around then I noticed the moon in the game!
I went to see a film at Rochester cinema. The tide was absolute tip top high as I drove along the road by the river Medway. I wasn’t sure how long the film was but I was curious to see the change that would happen when heading home. I rated this film on IMDb after watching it and I gave it a 6/10. There’s a whole list of rules for the scoring system so you should read this communication.
I quite enjoyed this film. I’m not really into superhero movies, I find them remarkably childish and immature – he who has the biggest fists wins. This film had some humanity in it. I liked the fact that Peter Parker had bruises and was hurt. I think we need to talk about physics and all that at some point but overall this was good fun. I definitely wasn’t expecting Jean Grey to turn up!
Another day another film to be watched now that the kids season has ended at the local cinema. The tide was low, which makes sense – I went to see this film around the same time as yesterday’s and the tide was low then. I will admit that the views over the river were great when I left the cinema as it was golden hour and the sun reflecting off the houses on the east bank looked pretty special. I rated this film on IMDb and it’s score was 6/10, there are RULES about the scoring system so you should read this communication.
I enjoyed this film. It was good fun. The action was sensible, although I’m not sure about the giant snake thing, but then the film never made claims to be an accurate representation of dinosaurs or similar. Honestly the most incredible thing in this film was the size of the house that the Platts lived in. We don’t have any clues as to what types of jobs the adults do but to make ends meet the father is delivering pizzas after losing his main job. The house is, fucking massive. I reckon they had to set this film in the early 1980s just to justify the size of the house and the type of neighbourhood.
I was somewhat surprised about three quarters of the way through the film with an incident involving a main character but this was resolved by the end of the movie – I’m not sure if I’m happy with that – it creates many paradoxes. To be fair, this film copes with the whole time travel thing quite well. I probably need to stop thinking about time as linear and consider other ideas.
I have just been looking up giant snake things as I didn’t particularly like that aspect of the film. I was bothered by the size of the snake. So, I found a page listing all the dinosaurs in the movie and then had a look at the Titanoboa.
I went to the cinema at Rochester. Finally there are some films on that aren’t just for kids. A few weeks ago I even went to see The Odyssey again, partly to enjoy the film and partly to be somewhere cooler than the oven that was “outside”. Even the second time that film was great, I loved it. This time I went to see a Statham film. You know what you are going to get with a Statham film, it delivered. On the way to the cinema I noted that the tide was quite low, mud banks visible aplenty. After the film I rated it on IMDb. This film scored 6/10 in my opinion, it is important that you understand the scoring system which is explained here.
This was a Statham film. It delivered. That’s my review.
There was quite a bit of murder in this film. A fair amount of shooting people in the head because it’s cool. A little bit of Americans to the rescue. Silly plot lines. And killing of all people involved in a human trafficking scheme rather than investigating and finding out who the customers were. It was a Statham film. You know what you are getting.
I’ve been to Wales, again. It was lovely. I stayed in Penmaenpool near the toll bridge, this is a village(?) close to Dolgellau. I saw many things. There were dolphins, seals, metal birds, trains, boats, canoes, aqueducts, sheep, cows, herons, lakes, rivers, tiny well maintained roads, mountains, and power stations. I even had a guided tour of Rheidol Power Station which was very cool, we saw the generator room and the turbine room. During the tour the guide suggested we visit the dams as one of them could be driven over and they were an important part of the generation system. So, we went there before returning home.
We drove through Gonigan, Pontarfynach [Devil’s Bridge], somewhere called Cymystwyth and then many miles of single track mountain road through the Elan Valley. When I say many miles, it was a loooong way. No phone signal. Just an assuredness that we would somehow get out at the other end. I didn’t know if we would see the dams and reservoirs or even if we were on the correct road. It turns out that the Elan Valley is a “dark skies” park. This makes sense. We definitely felt as though we were in the middle of nowwhere!
Elan Valley and Reservoirs
On the map look at the yellow road with the green dots. That’s the road we followed hoping to find the dams. We did find the correct dams and drove over the first one!
Craig Goch Dam
There was a car park on the east side of the dam. We stopped for a short while and took some pictures. I really liked the texture of the dam and the design of it. Considering it was made in the 1960s it looked a lot older and I liked that. After seeing this we drove home, there was plenty of mountain road left to traverse and then A roads before we got into England and motorways!
Craig Goch Dam Reservoir and Dam
The whole energy generation system was pretty impressive including how they built in a large drop for the water before Rheidol power station meaning that more energy could be extracted from the water. The power station wasn’t generating while we were there but there was a controller room which oversees all the water system. I was impressed.
I recently returned from some time in Mid-Wales and it was great being there. The temperatures was nice, ~20C, and there was even rain! We managed to see plenty of aircraft and heard many more. One day while near Llyn Tegid we saw some Texan IIs and Typhoons. I don’t have any pictures of those. It appears that they use this valley as an entrance to the Mach Loop. A little later while at our holiday cottage I saw this beast fly by:
A400M – Atlas – Mawddach Valley
On the day we actually chose to go to the Mach Loop we didn’t actually see anything when we were up high but we did see the US Air Force doing some stuff:
MC130J – Mach Loop
Then while walking up to a vantage point we had a couple of F35s pop by:
F35 – Lightning II – Mach Loop
We could often hear Hawk T2s flying around but I don’t think we saw one. They were often messing around at around 20,000ft so the noise was clear but the images weren’t. Shame really, would have been nice to see them, they were the only “regular” we didn’t see.
