Fifty People, One Question

A friend of mine posted a link to a video on Facebook the other day, I really liked it, and so I’ve decided to share it with readers of my blog too.

The concept is remarkably simple – “Go to a place. Ask fifty people the same question. Film their responses”.

I’m not going to spoil it…please click on the links marked London/Brooklyn to view the  films and you’ll soon see the question that they asked:

LONDON: http://fiftypeopleonequestion.com/locations/4-london-uk

BROOKLYN:  http://fiftypeopleonequestion.com/locations/3-brooklyn-ny

“What might happen when we venture far from home now? Will we find that London light around the corner? Will the rain hide all the dreamers out of sight? They might not want to play our little game this time – or we could look away and miss our chance. Or maybe just a bit of something out there will remind us why we take the time to ask.

It’s a simple question and the answers can lead us anywhere. So go ahead, ask yourself…”

I thought that the London fim especially was a beautifully crafted short film, and the music of Chaz Knapp has really added so much to it!

(There is a free download available of Chaz Knapp’s album,”Vie Comme un Parasite Faisant la Féte”, which contains music used in this piece available from THIS website (it is his management’s website – you want PHCH003). Chaz Knapp also has a MySpace page.

Such an uplifting piece of media – really well done to the creators and participants, it really did manage to touch me. I found it especially relevant as I usually have a love/hate relationship with London, though it made me realise that I wouldn’t exchange London for anything at the moment.

That said, if I really could choose just only one place to wake up,  I think that it would be in an large modern apartment in New York, big full height glass windows on two sides, I’d be high above a bustling street below, it’d have to be in one of NY’s taller buildings or else slightly out of central Manhatten. I’d open my eyes, roll over and see such a magnificent skyline framed by my apartment, and I wouldn’t have to go anywhere, I could just lie there and look out for miles and miles…

It’s somewhat strange viewing the Brooklyn video and seeing people say that they dream of waking up in London instead of NY. I can’t fathom why someone would pick London over NY, and I think that this really does hit home the sentiment that perhaps it’s not just the person in NY who isn’t appreciating the fantastic city on their doorstep… perhaps they would think that I am just as strange!

World’s Best Complaint Letter

Just happened across the below link to a reproduction of a customer complaint letter, which was published in the Daily Telegraph earlier…

Link to the Letter to Virgin boss Richard Branson

I have honestly not laughed so much in recent memory!!!!

Enjoy!

The Noisettes – Don’t Upset The Rhythm/ Mazda 2 advert

I first came across the song  “Don’t Upset The Rhythm (Go Baby, Go Baby, GO)” by hearing it on the advert for the new Mazda 2 (in itself a very nice and well produced advert!):

I really love the colour of the car too – bold and different whilst remaining very pleasant on the eye! I have no idea on handling / technical specifications, however just for getting the style of the car itself, I wish I could drive hehe!

The song comes from The Noisettes forthcoming album “Wild Young Hearts” and is called ‘Don’t Upset The Rhythm (Go Baby Go Baby GO)’ and if you’re anything like me, you will not be able to stop singing this song! I am going to go out on a limb and say that I think that this is my favourite song of 2009 (yes, I know that it’s only three weeks in, and that there will be other cracking songs out this year). This song is just so fun and playful and as a group they seem to have bags of attitude and style! I have yet to hear it and not dance along to it hehe! Really keen on discovering other Noisettes songs and getting into their sound further.

Buckets of style!

The song will be on their “Wild Young Hearts” album which is due for release on 30th March 2009 (not sure if I can wait until then!!).

A background to The Noisettes can be found on their Wikipedia page.

Until March, the below YouTube clip of the full song as posted by the band will have to do I guess hehe!  (NB – if the clip won’t play, double click within the black box to be taken to the YouTube page for the clip – opens in a new ‘tab’)

Weeeeeellll – you know you make me want to SHOUT!

The other evening, I had half an eye on Celebrity Big Brother whilst we were making our tea, and happened to notice an ‘exclusive’ advert broadcast on Channel 4 during the eviction show:

I absolutely love this advert!! Well done T-Mobile!

I know some people are moaning that this is somewhat contrived, and that around 85% of people in this advert are paid dancers, however I don’t see how that spoils my enjoyment of this advert in any way at all -I think that folk  should take it for what it is, and it is a really uplifting advert in my opinion!

‘Flashmobbing’ can be quite good if done properly, as this advert demonstrates – much more fun than organised ‘random’ pillow fights and whatnot that people used to always try and get you to go to around 3/4 years ago hehe! That said, there are a few good such clips on YouTube such as the below (not linked to T-Mobile/the above advert):

(oh, and the guy in the purple top is rather yummy too hehe!)

Note to T-Mobile – More of the same next Monday at London Waterloo so that I can join in please!!! hehe.

Queer As Folk (UK)

I’ve been staying in and re-watching Queer as Folk recently in a bid to beat the credit crunch hype that the media are whipping up at the moment.

I really had forgotten how amazing this series is!

Basically, Queer as Folk is a British television series that chronicles the lives of three gay men (Stuart, Vince and Nathan) living in Manchester’s gay village around Canal Street.

Back in 1999, I was a little too young to have seen this on my televisual radar (I was only 14!), however I was quick to get it on DVD a couple of years later.

It’s really strange for me, as for once I really can take a lot from it. Yes, some of it is very OTT and at times not all that an accurate a portrayal of gay-life; however an awful lot of it is inherrent within gay life – and so whilst some bits don’t factor into my life, they certainly will factor into someone elses. That said, I don’t think that my story differs all too much from the themes explored in this programme at all, and that makes it absolutely fascinating to watch really!

I come from Manchester originally and, when I first moved into the City Centre, my boyfriend at the time of starting Uni was exactly like Stuart Jones is in this show! It’s uncanny! Not to mention that I was exactly like Nathan when I first came out! This seems especially true when looking back at my attitude, and the kind of scrapes I got into and my levels of maturity when I first hit the Gay Village around the age of 16. It’s scary, because even now, ten years on from the creation of this show,  and several years after first seeing it, I still find myself relating to the story of Stuart, Vince and Nathan, each time from a seemingly different perspective.

Russell T Davies (who went on to bring back Doctor Who) really has managed to create a fantastic series with Queer as Folk – seen as a breakthrough at the time, as the only other gays on TV at the time were Tony and Simon in Eastenders, and they weren’t exactly having the best time of it!

I must stress at this point that we gays do not do as much running around as they do in this programme heh! Russell T Davies is obsessed with quirky movement (in Doctor Who, characters frequently travel up/down as oppossed to left/right, in QAF, they run every-chuffing-where!).

I must confess something of a ‘thing’ for Charlie Hunnam (Nathan), which Mister Greg has been very tollerant to put up with whilst we’ve been re-watching the series hehe!!!

Denise Black (Hazel) is definitely my favourite character of the series, followed shortly by Anthony Cotton as Alexander (both now in Corrie!).

I never really got into Queer as Folk USA to be honest, I think that the UK series was the original and the best! I know that I will be watching this and continuing to identify with it for many years to come – truly spiffing telly!!

twitter

I just realised that I don’t think that I’ve made a post on twitter before – which strikes me as odd – especially as I’ve been using it for a year or more now!

For those people who are unaware, twitter styles itself as a ‘micro-blogging’ service  – the aim being that you can use twitter to promote yourself/websites/opinions/pictures etc (basically anything you want!) in 140 characters or less.

It’s like the Facebook status update… however a twitter feed is much more robust, and can be added to websites (such as this one!) as well as be updated via several different platforms. When you update your feed, twitter can also update your Facebok status using the same message too (you need to add the application on Facebook), and so it really is very useful!

twitter (it’s spelt with a small ‘t’) is very very addictive I must say, but a great way to let  people know what you’re up to and what you’re thinking.

You can subscribe to another user’s twitter feed, and they can subscribe to yours. You can make comments to others either publically or privately. I find it especially useful in utilising it to keep up with other friends and their news by receiving updates via their twitter feed.

Several well known personalities make use of twitter to update their websites and keep in touch with fans. Such well known people using twitter include Stephen Fry; Jonathan Ross; Peter Kay (as Geraldine McQueen); Alan Carr and John Cleese (all genuine).

Barack Obama’s presidential campaign in 2008 made use of twitter updates to keep supporters up to date with news (and they are thinking of utilising this method throughout his term in office). In fact – Hillary Clinton and John McCain both utilised it in their campaigns too, as did the Lib Dem candidates in the 2008 London Mayoral elections. The website of Number 10 Downing Street is also updated via twitter too. The BBC also put out news headlines via twitter.

In fact, most organisations are starting to wake up to the power of twitter!

Recently, twitter has come to prominence in the mainstream media – partly due to the grumblings of several UK newspapers (notably The Daily Hate – I mean Daily Mail…!), but also in light of the New York plane ditch in the Hudson the other week. The first picture of this was sent by a chap using twitter! He uploaded a picture and put a brief status update along with it – and BAM! – the news was instantly picked up worldwide!

Due to it’s increasing prominence, especially in instances such as this, I think that we will see lots of other companies and organisations (especially media companies) utilising twitter a whole lot more! I am expecting some very exciting developments  now that twitter’s been catapulted into the public eye – including a much increased take-up of the service.

Go on, give twitter a try! I’m sure that you’ll be tweeting away in no time whatsoever! As linked to above, there are plenty of different applications that you can use to update your twitter feed, and scores of ‘how to’ guides online, so it really couldn’t be easier to get started!

Feel free to follow me and my strange ramblings if you so wish to do so

Fun with Debitas

A good friend of mine just forwarded me a link to MoneySavingExpert.com and to a forum page that documented a series of phone calls that some chap has had with Debitas  (a debt collection agency working on behalf of Capital One).

The ‘debt’ was actually fraudulent activity on his card and thus is not the fella’s fault, and so he decided to start winding these people up as in reality it seems that they were being overly persistent and a bit of a pain.

I have not laughed so much in years! ENJOY!

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=741653&page=1

“Running From Camera”

I’ve just been going through some of my bookmarks and came across the one for the “Running From Camera” blog hosted on eBlogger.

http://runningfromcamera.blogspot.com/

Well worth a look if you get a moment…. perhaps not quite as amazingly fab as the different man who dances everywhere (below) but certainly a very nice twist to add to those usually rather sterile photos that people take whilst visiting other places!

Well done that man!!

Ben Adams

* NB – for a copy of the May 2009 Attitude Cover, click HERE *

********************************************************************************************************************************

I don’t really watch Big Brother / Celebrity Big Brother… however Ben Adams to win!!

Now, if only we could get the other three yummy A1 boys back into popular media too…!! hehe!

Ben Adams (albeit looking rather jaundiced!)

The photo below was from their infamous ‘Naked’ shoot in Attitude magazine back in January 2001.

Mark, Ben Adams, Paul and Christian : A1, January 2001

Finally, a few early posts of images from the CBB House… P

Statistical Information

Some more financial funnies which managed to snake their way into my inbox…