That'll be the fat lady singing then...

Well then. Miracles do happen. The sweetest one yet, perhaps? So many highlights tonight, hard to pick one out, perhaps seeing Gordon walking about the pitch afterwards with a cup of tea in his hand. Roll on season 2008/09 and more opportunities to show Re-Arrangers how football should be played.

Big Jock Knew alright...

"There is not a prouder man on God's Earth than me at this moment. Winning was important, aye, but it was the way that we have won that has filled me with satisfaction. We did it by playing football. Pure, beautiful, inventive football. There was not a negative thought in our heads. Inter played right into our hands; it's so sad to see such gifted players shackled by a system that restricts their freedom to think and to act. Our fans would never accept that sort of sterile approach. Our objective is always to try to win with style." (Jock Stein, 1967)

So that's it completed then

So. Almost, but not quite a year since my last post I got round to completing Halo 3 on Legendary. Its not taken all that time, as I sat on the Halo 3 disc until the OCD in me finished with Halo 2. It just seemed proper. Anyhoo, not sure if the 'real' reviews concur but to my mind, it felt shorter than the two previous single player experiences. A good bit shorter. Its not taken huge chunks of gaming time really, maybe a dozen sittings, if that. Felt sad it was over, ok the story was a load of old toot - and most of the time I couldn't grasp the foggiest of who was doing what to whom or why, but it passed the time. I very much enjoyed shooting things, throwing grenades at things, flying and then falling out of flying things. Oh, and jumping off stuff. Highly recommended. Fingers crossed Bungie do another FPS next, if not necessary another Halo title. In the meantime, I suppose there's time for some new online maps until GTA4 comes out...

Halo shambles

Talk about a complete cock-up. So way back when I heard about the Halo 3 Multiplayer Beta invites in Crackdown I went out and bought a 360. Then I heard about the actual launch date of the Beta I went out with Graham and damn near bought a 40" HD telly. I provisionally took the day off too. Ok, so its been delayed, maybe by a day or so - but talk about a PR disaster. Its bad enough some of the websites are already dropping big hints that it won't live up to expectations and now this. Oh yeah, don't forget the beta is only up for three weeks too. Shaby. I get the distinct impression our chains are being tugged here. Poor.

Both sides of a C90

So apparently the cassette tape is dead (good old Currys, whenever you need a bit of press rather than do something with your prices, just kill something off - bards). Back when I was doing my O'Levels, like most kids I used to tape tunes off John Peel and worked to a 6:1 ratio. That is, he played one decent chill-out Orb or hardcore techno tune for every six African guitar, thrash Extreme Noise Terror or unlistenable The Fall track. Anyhoo, I used to "mix" these compilation cassettes with Dads two tape decks through an old Radio Shack mixer (incidentally, whatever happened to Tandy?) and back onto my old Sony ghetto blaster (with very cool 'detachable' speakers). Ok, there was no speed altering beat mixing as such, but it was good fun at the time. One night when my Nanna was over staying (Christmas I think), I was up in my room playing with tapes and she came in, and proceeded to grab an old second-hand Shure mic I had. She then sang some first world war ballad old school pub singer stylee over the top of the mix I was making. I was killing myself laughing at the time, but the mash-up actually worked well, her singing this old Irish lament over the top of my ambient techno instrumental nonsense. Years later when she died, I remembered about the tape and went through the box in my dads garage which had all my old stuff. Couldn't find it. Went up the loft and went through boxes of my old 2000 AD comics, Shoot and Zzap64, but no tape of my Nanna singing over the top of The Orb. I broke my heart up there, and to this day I would give away my whole music collection just to hear it one more time.

One tenth of UK consumers...

become victim of Internet fraud. According to recent news reports anyway. Well, in four years I've bought a pair of Nikes from Singapore - which unsurprisingly disappeared en route - a bit like the seller once he had my money. This morning, my old P900 was hijacked on Ebay by three fake bidders - pushing the price up to a grand at one point. First I knew was when Ebay emailed me about 20 minutes before the end of the auction a "Notice: Administrative Bid Cancellation". Now if that message told me I could block bids, I might have stood a chance of averting disaster. Unsurprisingly, Ebay still bill you the Final Value Fee - and you have to put in a claim which takes at least seven days etc etc. So with the clock ticking down in 24 stylee as quickly as I could block their fakey bids - new id's appeared (with zero rating) putting in more scam bids. It was quite thrilling at the time, and seems to be all the rage according to some of the Ebay forums. Something about this should be done. [shakes fist angrily]

£6m is a lot of money

A couple of months ago I wrote about how I eventually managed to get my incorrect parking ticket overturned. Turns out this enterprise is indeed a nice little earner for Glasgow City Council. An article in todays Evening Times confirms that last year wardens issued 193,850 fixed penalty notices in the City, generating six million pounds. There's plenty of meat in this subject, not least because as I accepted a 'Conditional Fixed Penalty Notice' from two of Strathclydes finest a fortnight ago. I wanted to fight it but going to Court against the Procurator Fiscals Office is an entirely different kettle of fish. Sadly, you can expect another blog post about FPN's in due course.

This stopped me in my tracks

I don't usually blog about internet stuff, but I came across a link to this video yesterday and it completely shook me. Its not telling you anything you don't already know, but it puts its point about perception and reality across really well. The cynical spoiled dark side of my heart thinks that its a neat marketing angle. Dove going after the ugly dollar (to paraphrase Bill Hicks). Maybe they are being genuine - but I doubt it. Just like Innocent, the squishy drinks company, its name sounds like some really careful consideration went into it... which makes me suspicious when I probably shouldn't be.