It gets us all / Roy Keane

"This is purely for all the background and images related to my Sonic Fanfiction works, so I can shrink my Bio there."

That's the first thing I said to someone who commented on my DA.

Now I'm doing gift art, participating in contests and doing pictures completely unrelated to my fanfiction.

The spirit of community within DA gets to everyone even when they aren't really all that bothered.

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This week Captain of Man Utd and all round legend Roy Keane has said he will probably leave Man Utd at the end of this season. All I can say is...... Good luck, we'll miss you.

Yes it would be great if he stayed but he is getting on a bit now. In a few years he will probably retire and move into coaching. In the meantime he should do what he wants to end his playing career, and if that means playing in a different league (he said he's not going to move to another English Club) then so be it.

No-one is going to question his loyalty. The spirit of the Red Devils has always flown through his veins, Passionate, Proud and professional. Playing in a different league is also bound to help him understand them better, which would work well if he decides to coach and manage (Hopefully Man utd).

If anything I would like him to stay at least another season and devote his remaining time to teaching Alan Smith (who seems to be his replacement now) all he knows.

He will always be remembered as a Man United legend.

Update 9

Chapter 5 of Two Tribes is up now. Working it's way to the conclusion, possibly one or two more chapters left.

I also started a small website for my gaming cafe idea. There you will find a short description of my aims and an account of what I've done do far.

The Address is Extralife.homestead.com/files/home.html

(I haven't made a front page so without the files/home.html you will get an error message)

Sky one, king of the TV

Normally I would say TV sucks but Sky One have been excellent recently.

They show New Simpsons
They still show Futurama and Malcolm in the Middle
They did show Family Guy (not sure if they still do)
They started Time Gentlemen Please

And more recently gave us

The 4400, can't wait for next season to start
The Match, The game's pretty good even if the show itself is crap
Funny documentaries that get the facts wrong (i.e. Chavs)
And a brilliant show called Hex

It's going to get labelled as the british buffy, but it's darker, sexier, less camp, funny and well written. The twist that happened at the end of tonights episode was so unexpected (2nd episode of 2nd season). I cannot wait until sunday 9pm so I can see how it moves on.

Bravo Sky One

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Update: New pic of Joz, SA shaded.

See I told ya / News

Football got pretty unpredictable and exciting and it's only a week later.

Chelsea let in a goal (still won but at least they've conceeded)
Man Utd LOSE to Blackburn (WTF? We're screwed)
Everton could be bottom of the table when they reached 4th last season
Liverpool and Arsenal held to draws

You'd be crazy to still say football is boring and predictable

......

So I finished my work experience placement (More or less, I have 4 sick days that I'll be claiming next week). Now it's back to my gaming cafe idea which I'm thinking of making a website for.

It was alright just not what I wanted to do.

It feels strange having all these problems after finishing my degree. I never thought I'd be in this situation. Though I'm happy to see that I'm not the only one. Some of my friends are stuck in Workington as well now. Though the more I think about it the more I feel I'm destined to start my own business:

- No girlfriend, few friends here, no work = plenty of freetime
- Unemployment led to me finding out about Inbiz who help people try out businesses risk free. I was always put off by the risk
- No-one seems to want to offer me an interview let alone a job. It feels as if a higher force is preventing me from finding work
- Friends scattered across country = easy to branch out if sucessful
- Friends mother working at one of the big schools = easy (hopefully) to do Market research through the school
- Cornered a market yet to exist
- Big new Shopping centre almost finished here which might free up some of the existing buildings

I'll finish by saying the name I have in my head right now is "Extra Life". Any comments would be very much appreciated

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ART Update:

A couple more sketch collections and a pic of Virtual On character Apharmd sonicified are up on my DA.

I feel like crap right now so I won't be writing tonight. Now that my course is finished I should return to the old routine.

The Premiership is boring?

All I've been reading lately (in the sport section of course) is how boring the premiership is and how chelsea have won it already. Are the watching a different league?

Yes matches today have been more about tactics and playing safe, but it's been quite interesting. They all seem to forget that it's only be 6 matches out of 38, with some with games in hand.

We've also seen our national team humilated in a season with world cup qualifiers right at the start.

It is early on, players are regaining their form, football isn't going to stay this way people.

Chelsea are not going to have such as easy ride. Ok already 4 points clear of nearest rival (who would still need to win their game in hand) is not looking good for other clubs, but Chelsea still have to play Man Utd twice, Liverpool twice and Arsenal once. Their form hasn't been their best and they have been lucky so far.

Those that think the premiership is boring and predictible should wake up and realise that is never the case. It's early in the season, things will pick up. STOP BEING SO GODDAMN PESSIMISTIC!

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Update:

The 3 Shadows other main characters have a profile collection, and there's two Virtual On sonifications of Fei-yen and Raiden all on my DA.

Can't remember last update, if I said it already ignore me but Chap 2 of Deep Pressure is up on ff.net

TGS 2005, the highlights so far

I haven't really being paying that much attention, though there has been two new things that have caught my attention.

1. THE REVOLUTION CONTROLLER

It's a remote, it's a sex toy, It's shit....

Wait hold on a minute. Have you actually read about it's features. It's more of a make your own pad with that remote as the central part. It can connect to a separate part with an analogue stick and more buttons. It can slide into a more traditional pad. The more I read the more I like.

This will allow more freedom in what you can develop and what peripherals can exist. See those bongo's on the GCN. See how they don't have a wireless version. well connect them to the remote and there you have wireless bongo's.

A risky move as just looking at the pictures doesn't give you the full story.

2. NEXT GEN SONIC

OMG! A new Sonic game. Not a new Shadow game. Not a new Skatboarding game. Not a DS game. A flew blown 3D adventure...

oh no it's 3D. Why bother? Sonic doesn't work in 3D...

Adventure 2...

Ok you've sold me.

Putting the traditional 2D/3D arguement aside which quite frankly is bollocks, This game looks amazing. Gameplay doesn't seem to deviate much from the racing sections of Sonic 2. Real time environments sound nice and knowing ST they'll be planning something to do with night and day.

Watch the videos on IGN and start drooling.

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Update: Chap 2 of Deep Pressure is up on ff.net. Pic of Demonic Joz is up on DA and if I didn't say last time there's also another sketch collection for Joz

How could they make Sonic any worse...?

By firing the Voice actors and replacing them by the Sonic X ones. The voices weren't perfect, many feel they were annoying. But compared to the Sonic X ones they were gold.

So I urge you, for all that is good and holy sign this petition

http://www.petitiononline.com/a4kvaisg/petition.html

Ok so it's a petitiononline petition, but you have to try something.

And don't assume this is a North America only thing. It'll run to Europe too.

Sonic with guns, Sonic on Boards...Now this. Are we ever going to see a classic Sonic title again.

AS FOR ART:

A few demon sketches have been added to my scraps.

Update 8

Lots to tell you about.

Art:

A little Devil lineart
Rouge in Joz's Gear wallpaper (two sizes)
Sapphire pen sketch
We Won't Follow ~The 3 Shadows main theme~ (Classed as poetry)

Fic:

Chapter 4 of Two Tribes
Chapter 1 of 3 Shad ep 8 Deep Pressure

Games collection:

Pokemon Box
Devil May Cry
Destroy All Humans!

OH and if you're a member of the SONIC-CLUB at DeviantART, vote for my entry in the classic contest. I'd like to get at least one vote. It's number 45 in the big guy category, my SA0 cover.

Speaking of Sonic, yet another game has been announced, more on that some other time. Though a great triumph for the blue blur happened recently. He beat the teenage wank material that is Tifa in the GameFAQS character contest. Which is strange due to the amount of Square fanboys that vote. Square/Nintendo characters usually win. She was probably his biggest threat although Megaman won't be a pushover. VOTE SONIC!!

Taking Advantage of the ignorant.

If there's one thing I really can't stand it's companies like Jamster and Ringtoneking. Yes I know slating them's been done to death but I felt like commenting after hearing yet another Jamster ad.

Now it wouldn't be so bad if their ads weren't on every channel, 3 or 4 times every ad break.

I don't want your rip off service for things I can get off the net for free. You can't just get one thing, no you have to join a club. Spend £3 a day on crap (if you want it, you get charged either way) unless you text them back.

Well it's the perfect business isn't it. You send people some MIDI/MP3/GIF/JPEG files to an ignorant person and make them join a subscription service. All you need is a server and you're off. You barely need employees.

The thing is you can get all this stuff with a WAP phone for free if you know what you're looking for. Considering WAP phones have been a standard since well as long as I remember I can't see why people don't know this.

For a colour wallpaper pop the URL of an image file in your wap browser and save the file. Easy as pie.

For example this is my wallpaper. I scanned and cropped it from my Sonic Heroes triple threat CD. Popped it on my webspace (or use imageshack). Now right click the image. Choose the option "Properties". You should see a web address. Pop that in your WAP browser and that wallpaper is yours.

For polyphonic ringtones do the same for MIDI files
For Reals it's MP3 I think

Easy isn't it? And to think people spend lots of money on this. Low costs + plenty of sales = lots of profits. Lots of profits = more money spent on advertising = Crazy frog 3 or 4 times every ad break.

So please whoever you are, don't buy Jamster/Ringtoneking/etc products and do it yourself.

Katrina shows how different we are

May I first start by saying it's a tradegy that sadly happens from time to time. The infamous Tsunami is Indonesia and more closer to home, the Carlisle floods, They're all tradegy's and I wish the people of New Orleans all the best.

But at the back of my mind their's a nagging thought. Hurricane Katrina has shown how different the UK is from the US. When a disaster strikes UK, say the terrorist attacks in London or the Carlisle floods we all stand together. We roar back and our sense of community sees us shake off the disaster as if it was nothing. This isn't anything new, the same thing happened during The Blitz.

But the US. Within seconds of a disaster looting and killings are taking place. It's every person for themselves and their own president comes under fire for trying to restore order before he sends aid. We applauded Blair for his dedication to making sure London was safe after the bombings.

It's a shame that sense of community and helpfulness that occurs when the going gets tough hasn't travelled across the pond.

Also notice how after the creators of Independance Day made their movie a famous building was completely unexpectedly destroyed. Now after they created "The Day after Tomorrow" one of America's great cities was hit by a natural weather based disaster. Lets hope they don't make any more disaster movies 0.o

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Update:

I'll get back to fic writing this weekend. I got my new Creative Zen Touch on Friday and I spent most of last weekend filling that up. I did however manage to finish a set of Acid the Hedgehog pics for Spinny's contest, a penciled cover for 3 Shad ep 2 and a few scraps. Oh and If I didn't say before, Old Miles was completed soon after I got back from Tenerife.

I also have my Sonic 15th Project all planned out. Doesn't my dedication shine through that I'm planning a birthday project for June the previous September.

Do I have crap tastes or have the standard for things gone down?

My folks still had a week in tenerife so I had the house of myself the past week. With the TV free I found myself watching the ocassional movie, including 3 I hadn't seen before but I always wanted to.

Kill Bill Vol 1

For some reason I avoided this. I now see I was right to do so. This is nothing more than Over the Top Gore and Violence. This is the plot. The main Character is beaten up and her unborn child killed on her wedding day. When she recovers from her near death she remembers everything and goes on a rampage killing the five responsible for that incident. She kills two in the movie.

That's it, oh there's a back story for the main enemy but the rest is pure OTT violence.

So I ask why is this great? Enjoyable yes but so OTT. I fail to see why it gets the praise it does. A bit like GTA, a great game but the success and praise it gets is much more than it deserves, and you get the feeling that's because of the Violence.

Lost in Translation

To be honest it may be unfair to judge this after missing the start, and if there's important gold stuff at the start that justifies it's praise I'll take back what I'm about to say.

It's just that nothing seems to happen. Good looking 20 something woman meets up with a 40 something man. Both seem lost in their new location, Japan, but entertain themselves by hanging out with each other. A friendship develops but they eventually separate when the man leaves.

How did they make that a movie? Scenes of silence. So many scenes where nothing actually happens besides the character staring into emptiness.

There are some notable funny moments but that's it.

How is this critically acclaimed? It's just on the better side of Average.

Scooby Doo 2

The best of the three films as for once I didn't have high expectations. A movie you can enjoy no matter what age you are and is overall a lot of fun. Captures the Spirit of Scooby Doo perfectly.

Now about a year ago I had seen 21 Grams. A really rubbish movie that was critically acclaimed. It was full of pointless scenes, Graditous nudity and confusing plot (If she wanted the person responsible to pay why didn't she press charges earlier on). Randomised for a arty effect, it served no purpose. Compare to Memento where the twist is in the middle thus the random scene order had a purpose.

So the point of this post. 21 Grams, Lost in Translation and Kill Bill Vol 1 are all very overrated IMO. Am I wrong? Is there some genius I'm missing to justify the praise they got? Or has the Quality standard dropped considerably?

It's not just movies. Music these days seems to blend together and bands no longer stand out. TV's most high profile new comedy "Little Britain" turned out to be so shit it completely removes my faith in the British Public. I had to see Futurama die out yet this shit exists on terrestial prime time?

And why hasn't the Reality TV bubble burst yet? Why is TV consumed with Reality TV, Soaps and Documentaries when we're crying out for a comedy to rival the brilliance of Only Fools, Father Ted and Red Dwarf.

I throw down the Gauntlet. I want to see more TV, Movies and Music that are actually good and for critics to appreciate them more.