Speaking From a Bungee Jump

As you may know (but perhaps not care) I'm doing some gadget reviews for a my friend Rory Blyth who is an all round top bloke and also works for Microsoft. He is doing a podcast thing which will have interviews with the Microsoft great and good, and inserts from yours truly.

I've not been in front of a microphone for some time (I used to do radio work but I kind of gave it up when real life got in the way) and I was rather disturbed to find that my voice technique seemed to have collapsed. I sent some bits and bobs off to Rory and he politely suggested that there might be something wrong somewhere. I sounded like I was moving towards and away from the microphone at great speed, as if I was talking whilst doing a bungee jump, with the microphone at the bottom of the ravine. I took a listen and was highly disturbed to find that he was very right. I seemed to get very quiet and then suddenly, and for no reason get very loud.

It sounded awful. One of the hardest things to do when recording voice is keep yourself around the same distance from the microphone. I usually do this by putting my elbows on the desk, but this did not seem to work. I still have the voice of an express train whizzing past. So, after two hours of trying to record a three minute piece I'm going to bed rather unhappy, and wondering how to train my vocal chords to behave themselves.

Where would you think?

I've spent a big chunk of today working on our new admissions portal thingy. We used it last year and the people that visited quite liked it. We put the site up on www.wherewouldyouthink.com and had a fair few visitors over the year. Then it broke. The hard drive head decided it wanted to find out what rubbing itself against the disk surface felt like (answer, it hurts a lot and also breaks everything) so I've just finished rebuilding the site on a new server, using new technology. With pictures. There is a bit of content to add, but the overall structure is in place and I think it is spiffy (but then I would think that).

If you want to take a look, have a go at the puzzles, marvel at the pictures, and let me know what you think, I'd love to hear from you. With the coming of the new site we do of course have new T shirts, which will be going off to be printed next week. We got through loads last year, I think we will have a few extra made this year. The most surprising thing is that I see first year students, in my lectures, still proudly wearing their shirts. I'll see if I can get a few snaps. Next year we are going to give a prize to every new first year who turns up in their shirt....

Petrol Obsession

The new car (which isn't mine, but is new) has a rather clever trip meter thing which gives you live fuel consumption figures as you bowl along. For someone like me this is like mana from heaven. Something else to become obsessed with whilst driving. I have become fixated with keeping the MPG (Miles Per Gallon) figure above 40 as much as possible. To achieve this zen like state around town you have to never stop and never speed up. Once you reach that magic point on the bar chart you have to hold it there by fair means or foul. This means that driving now has a new level of excitement as I career over level crossings dodging trains and fail to stop at traffic lights (only kidding folks).

I'm not sure if this will improve my fuel consumption much, I wasn't much of a lead foot driver in the first place, but it is fun for the moment.

I'm reminded of one of the great advertising blunders of all time, which came out a few years ago. BMW were very proud of their new fuel system, which completely shut off the petrol to the engine when the car was coasting. This was quite an advance, and must have been quite hard to design. Pity that they gave it to an idiot to advertise. The picture showed a car going down a mountain side, and in large letters over the top was the strap line "120 miles per hour, 0 miles per gallon". I reckon the driver was drinking the stuff.....

And there weren't any monks

Went to York today. It rained. And rained. And rained. For lunch we went out to Monks Cross, a shopping centre on the outskirts of the city. Number one daughter (who we went to visit) had need of some commestibles and an ironing board from ASDA. I figured that it would be quieter and more pleasant than York.

I could not have been more wrong if I was from Planet Wrong in the Wrong part of the Wrong end of the universe where I had a first class degree in being wrong for all the wrong reasons wrongly.

It was horrible. Wet, hard to park, very busy. People in cars were driving around being selfish and stupid (I of course stopped doing this as soon as I got out of my car). There were no paths. At one point we got stranded in the middle of the road, surrounded by whizzing idiots in 4x4s. The only satisfaction that I could gain from the situation was the fact that I was in a position to choose to never go there again. Ever.

In short, I did not like the place much. But in the end we got what we wanted, and escaped with our lives and most of our sanity. And an ironing board.

Speaking in Tongues

I've spent the evening trying to turn "The Little Brown Ikea Pencil of Doom" into a podcast. This is the first time I've ever tried doing audio drama, and it is a bit hard. Doing all the voices is very difficult. I come up with an accent for Sergeant Wilkins and then, when he speaks again it is with a totally different one. And everyone ends up sounding like they are from the West Country.

I'm starting to regard the trade of acting as slightly more difficult than I thought, and holding actors in slightly more esteem. But only slightly.