Mark's Blog

I admit like many on the left I was rather disappointed by the previous labour administration on many fronts, I didn’t find there agenda to be very radical and it amounted to little more than more of the same. After nearly 20 years of tory rule we had a labour government that came in and didn’t at first make a big splash. However I think to truly judge how much the previous labour government actually delivered we only have to look around us. We live in a country that has undergone massive regeneration during the last labour administration. New hospitals, schools and serious improvements in the delivery of essential public services such as the NHS. I remember vividly during the tory years local news reports of some poor soul who had been in extreme pain for years on some occasions before being seen by a doctor. However labour made some serious mistakes there was a general erosion of civil liberties and being dragged into a war in Iraq and Afghanistan which might have been justified but the planning and general execution of both campaigns seems to have been rather poor. Its a real shame that it has taken a tory led government to abolish the ID card scheme an expensive waste of precious government money.

I was really disappointed that the previous labour administration weren’t more radically left wing. No freeing up of the draconian anti union laws drawn up. No real talk of renationalising the utility companies or public transport system, which have gotten worse and a lot more expensive in private ownership, in spite of all the tory double talk about efficiency savings and competition driving service levels up and prices down.

Now after all this you probably have a good idea that I am firmly of the left, which I unashamedly am. I see the links between everyone in society and know that its in the best interests of us all when we have a government and services which meet the needs of everyone especially those who are most disadvantaged. This is why I was so unhappy that we have now been con demned by the liberal democrats who seem to have spat in the faces of all those that supported the manifesto that the liberal democrats were elected to bring forward. I see the coalition agreement seems to broadly follow the tory manifesto but seems a long way away from what the people that voted liberal democrat actually voted for. It seems we truly are back to the hack and slash and screw the poor and disadvantaged of the Thatcher years, admittedly with better PR and a veneer of respectability bought in by the liberal democrat sell outs.

Whilst Dianne Abbot is the labour leadership candidate I would naturally support the most, it has to be about more than me it has to be about getting rid of the current condem coalition, and for that we need labour to win. For that we need a party that appeals to a broad range of people, and for me that means supporting David Miliband. Whilst he is not not radically left wing enough for me, he would never get elected if he was and its far better to get some of what you want a fairer government for all than to stick with the left and whinge about how the tories are wrecking our essential public services.

Well I rejoined this week If you want a say in who will lead the opposition to tory cuts for the rich, then join the only major national party that opposes tory cuts!

For many years I have really been looking for a great email program. Outlook is bloated, buggy, a security hazard and offers little additional functionality in a home setting. Outlook express and later windows live mail were ugly lacked features and their IMAP support has always left something to be desired. Earlier versions of Thunderbird were similarly uninspired and ugly. There is of course the bat but I really don’t want to pay for it as I don’t think its that good.

Finally though I have to admit I have found an email program I love and its the latest version of Mozilla Thunderbird. Its fast, light and has all the features I would expect, the only slight fly in the ointment is I really do not like the default tabbed view for email. I much much much prefer each email in a separate window as I am far too used to killing the window to close an email, whereas with tabbed view I kill the whole email program. However its very simple to move back to the original window per mail view.

If you are longing for a mail client that does exactly what it says on the tin with a minimum of fuss and hassle then I can recommend Thunderbird. Now if Mozilla could only reinvent Firefox which has become bloated and sluggish in much the same way that IE 6 was.

I first bought this game for the PC about a year ago when it was newly released, I tried it out briefly and my first impression was that it was ugly and given how ugly it was the performance was really poor given that I had a pretty good specification PC. It points to the game being a very bad console port like the original halo for the PC was. It too was ugly and very intensive in terms of load on CPU and graphics card.

I never really played this game on the Xbox but from what l am told by others that have its a direct port the actual game is exactly the same in terms of looks and playability except that on the PC you can get a far greater resolution. Now back to what I said earlier this game especially the earlier stages is very ugly I thought even the original Xbox could have produced something that looked better. For graphics I really would have to give this game a 3/10 it doesn’t even look like they even bothered trying.

Playability wasn’t too bad but the game felt very static and repetitive. Wave after wave only a few more each wave isn’t very adventurous or new. The levels were for the most part very unimaginative especially when compared to the original halo which had some great looking and thought out levels and this game basically feels like it was rushed to get it out whilst the hype of the original game could drive the sales up.  For playability I would have to say if I am being honest a 5 or 6 out of 10.

One real plus for me like the original halo was the music soundtrack the music is gorgeous and truly epic I think many game designers could get some real tips from Bungie on the musical score for their games.

Overall I’d give this game a 6/10. If you can get past the ugly and dated graphics especially in the first half of the game its actually fairly fun if very repetitive at times. But obviously their are newer and better games already out there.

I have recently started watching Lorraine Kelly’s Big Fat Challenge. It’s just one of those random shows I found on Sky Anytime when I was bored one day. As I am no fan of the x factor the first I saw of the Chawner family was seeing the outrage at some of the comments they made during an ill advised interview with one of the newspapers. Now I think anyone who has ever been on benefits knows it’s not an easy life and it leaves little money for any extras so it’s no wonder they were saying they were close to the bread line as that’s what life is like on benefits.

These poor people and I mean this in both senses of the word have been pubically humiliated and bullied because there youngest daughter had the audacity to turn up to an x-factor audition and try to get something better out of life. Granted from the clips I saw she really should give up on the idea of being a professional singer maybe if Lorraine can actually help them to lose weight she will sound better.

What I cannot believe is the intimidation, threats and general nastiness towards these poor suffering people. Being obese isn’t easy and maybe it is self inflicted but these people are suffering because of their condition.  The daily abuse these people have to suffer is appalling and no doubt contributes to their condition. What these people need is the help and support of people around them rather than this unacceptable abuse they currently get. I just hope they get the help and support they really need from the TV program and aren’t just used to provide cheap entertainment and then discarded and stigmatized even more if they fail.

I really don’t understand why we feel we can bully, intimidate and abuse people who cause us no harm just because they are different to us. Why is it acceptable to judge other people and decide oh that person shouldn’t get any help because I don’t agree with their lifestyle choices. Should the public help fund and treat people who die because of other dangerous activities. Should motor cyclists, rock climbers, sailors or anyone who does any form of sport be told you can’t be treated because your problems are “self-inflicted”. This of course precludes any possibility that being obese is due to mental disease or genetics, when there is emerging evidence that this is true in many cases. I mean we could discuss the currently advised “healthy” diet and its part in obesity, heart disease, diabetes and many other conditions but that is another subject for another day.

I just want to say be nice to other people. What right do you have to judge them? Would you like them to judge you and treat you in a negative way only because they are different to you?

After spotting Highlander’s new poster over at his blog I decided to make one of my own! Let me know what you think

My DC poster!

I was reading the BBC news earlier today when I saw Have your say was debating “food policy” in response to this story.  I have to admit I had a real “chuckle” at some of the suggestions! Although they seem to be have slightly more sense than the government and the “opposition”(I use the quotes as we all know it doesn’t matter who you vote for you get the same old crap anyway).

Now let me put to you my views on food, waste, global warming and the environment. I think wherever possible food should be sourced with 100 miles of where its eaten, I remember not so long ago buying some onions from the small convenience store around the corner. Now these two facts might not seem to have anything to do with each other but consider that I live in Cheshire and 2 miles down the road in every direction there are farms that actually still produce food, and also bear in mind that onions can be grown in most places including in pretty much any arable land anywhere in England during the time of year I saw the aforementioned onions. Now hope you are still with me here as I am finally getting to the point I know you will all be glad to hear!  They were produced in New Zealand! How on earth can it be cheaper to grow onions in New Zealand and ship them all the way here? And what about all those other places that are closer(and lets be honest there aren’t many places further away from the UK than New Zealand. Now I know there are those of you that will lay the blame with the capitalist economics that the world runs on, and well in this case I would have to agree with you, what sort of sick system would get to the point its cheaper to ship it from the other side of the world? I mean given the low cost of farm produce it must have cost more to ship them here than to produce in the first place. Another example of the madness was a report that I saw in the news a few years ago now, I cant remember the exact figures but in this example they are irrelevant to the point that I hope will be startlingly obvious to you as well at it was to me and indeed the news presenter at the time. In the year previous Germany had imported the same weight of potatoes as it had exported to the UK. Now please explain to me the sheer lunacy at work here please as I don’t get it ?  I know that there are different varieties of potatoes that are good for different things but given that the climate of Germany and the UK are very similar is there any good reason why the exports and imports of these crops between the UK and Germany are overall in nett weight neutral? How can this be good for the environment and how can it be cheaper? I point to these two examples not because I have any problems with either the Germans or the New Zealanders but because of the idiocy and waste of transporting goods where there is no logical need other than “the good of the market”. Obviously there are things which can’t be grown in the country especially during the winter and we then need to import what we need from abroad but in my eyes it should be from the closest possible source wherever practical.

I think another problem is with the European Common Agricultural Policy this insane market protectionist measure paid for by the consumers of the EU is used to artificially prop up the prices of certain agricultural products. This results in farmers in Europe paid to keep their fields empty or used for other purposes than growing food, it also results in some foods bought from farmers and wasted, although it has to be said this is now slowly starting to change. We then need to look at the waste that happens when food is rejected for being the wrong shape or size or slightly sub optimal colour where these factors have no bearing on the safety and taste of the food in question. From there its onto the food packaging, transport and retail supply chain where there is yet more waste. I don’t have any figures on what percentage of food that is grown actually reaches our homes but I suspect it is probably a far smaller fraction than most of us would dare imagine, and when you factor in how many needless miles food is crossing to get to your homes and fridges its truly scary the environmental impact of all of this.

Finally and I don’t say in any way least you have the waste in the home, food that’s thrown away cooked or uncooked, and obviously as usual this is the small fraction that is being targeting which proposals to ban buy one get one free. Now I know that to those that can’t afford to eat well this would be the final nail in the coffin of their already overstretched budgets but to those that don’t worry about the cost of food it will make little difference. This will adversely impact the poor in society, the low income families, those on benefits and pensioners. The very people who are least likely to waste food in the first place.  I know in my own home the biggest waste for me living on my own is its hard to get food in single portions so I end up buying two or even more times the amount of food I need due to lack of choice and the need to eat a balanced healthy but also semi interesting diet as well. I’ve got to admit I loved the suggestion by someone on the Have your say “debate” that food in single portions should be banned, so for those who live on there own they get to waste even more what a great idea! Another favourite of mine was to ban McDonald’s and other similar junk food I don’t disagree that there might be other justifications behind such a ban it has nothing at all to do with food waste. Whilst unhealthy and probably lacking in the things it needs and having too much of the stuff you dont how often do you see much McDonald’s food going into the bin?

Now I ask you is there anything particularly hard about any of this? Is any of it rocket science? Well I don’t think so but its obviously beyond our “elected”(when they are all the same you have no choice and hence can they really be elected? ) leaders.

Now I know this game is now a few years old but I finally got around to actually playing it right the way through after it having been sat on the shelf since it was released. I have to say not only does this game look fantastic the story is great and very imaginative.

A 1950’s city built under the sea where all manner of morally dubious experiments has destroyed the city which is now roamed by the genetically modified original inhabitants. The story twists and turns and is never really predictable or totally obvious. I just hope more games take note of the strong story element of this game and try to imitate it.

The look of this game is fantastic in full directx 10 glory. I hope this is the shape of games to come as visually it was spectacular, I recently played crysis and whilst this too looked good I actually thought bioshock looked better and the frame rate was rock steady on my pc(Core 2 quad E6600 @ 2.4GHz, GeForce 275 GTX, 6 GB of RAM, Sound blaster x-fi audibly(with SB Environmental Audio switched on), it never slowed down and was a seamless gaming experience.

I did experience some issues with loading screen freezes but patching the game upto the latest version 1.1 available here, and removing the tablet services from vista(don’t have a tablet anyway on my gaming pc) as detailed here fixed my issues.

I really can’t recommend this game enough, visually and audibly its nothing short of stunning, but the strong storyline and role playing element make this game nothing short of totally compelling and a must play for any gamer. If I had to give this a score its got to 9.5/10, main reason I only say 9.5 is the issues without the patch and also its too damn short! I know I definitely plan on playing bioshock 2 when it arrives, probably again on the PC. I know that bioshock and bioshock 2 is/will be available for the PlayStation 3 and the XBOX 360 and as much as I love the idea of kicking it back and playing on the big screen(well 32″ widescreen) from the comfort of the sofa is hugely appealing I much prefer to play shooters with a keyboard and mouse. Whilst I have and enjoy gaming on both the XBOX 360 and the PlayStation 3 I am at heart a PC gamer as I have always gamed on computers with a keyboard and mouse rather a console.

Being a huge fan of the hitch hiker’s guide to the galaxy series of books, TV programs and radio shows(lets forget the film was called hitch hikers as apart from that it was pretty good) I really wanted to hate this book. I regarded it as little more than a cheap cash in on the works of the late and great Douglas Adams, the problem is it wasn’t completely awful, infact it wasn’t that bad at all.

The style isnt quite the same as Adams’s but its close enough that it feels comfortable compared to the earlier works in this series. Eoin keeps a good pace throughout the book; and doesn’t branch off from the story too often, or go too indepth about sub-plots and assorted facts as many writers have a tendency to do.

If you like the previous books in the series and are ready to put aside your preconceptions and enjoy the book for what it is, this is a highly enjoyable read if a little lacking in bulk at 340 pages. The humour doesn’t feel quite the same as Adams’s but is similar only maybe not quite so dry and deadpan. If however you just see it as a cheap commercial tie in on the popularity of the Hitch Hiker’s series then you probably already hate it. I would just like to say give it a go put aside your preconceptions and try it out, its rather hypocritical to deride something before you have even experienced it.

I don’t want to go into detail about the plot of the book as that would spoil it for others who have yet to read it but there is plenty more information on the book’s website 6of3.

Happy new year all, a new year and another attempt at blogging! How long will it last this time ?