Blog: Kenneth Trax

Blu-tack was originally invented as an aphrodisiac. Cows can drink any other farmyard animal under the table, no problem. Even if you can fit that in there, you'll never get it out again. I enjoy long walks in the park, long baths, long lunches, long johns, Josie Long, Longleat Safari Park, longboats and Long Island iced tea. Owls have such keen eyesight and sharp wits that they would make much better drivers than humans, but they can't reach the pedals. Original post blogged [...]

Think about that tension you get when opening a page linked from another page you were just reading. You still have an attachment to that first page. The new page seems only temporary. If you're not careful you'll end up with too many pages open, and you'll run out of steam. And then you don't want to close the pages because you're not really done with them yet. At some point they become irrelevant to new enquiries. But many of them, you remember, suggested avenues that remain unexplored. Some of those avenues still whisper to you when you glance at [...]

Clive ran past Ken like he was on fire, yelling at the top of his lungs a single, shrill word: "deadlines". Ken rocked back on his heels and sucked in the air. It was going to be a long day. Ken had responded to Clive's texts the way any friend should. Sending up the rallying cry was a move Clive only made in the most desperate of times, and Ken knew better than to press for details when Clive needed him, so he had made his way straight to the scene. Clive's rooms had become buried in a [...]

District 9 Now-school sci-fi thriller abundant with interesting themes including body transformation horror, refugee life, slavery, alien social structures, international politics, the arms trade, conspiracy, third-world aid and the duelling threads of interwoven personal motivations all backed up with awesome special effects and fashionable camera technique. In The Loop Hilarious and insightful film about the bumbled politics of war-making from the stables of hilarious and insightful TV series The Thick of It, both essential viewing. A Serious Man [...]

First preview of Shape Sequencer version 2 which I am developing in C++ using openFrameworks Original post blogged on b2evolution .

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v =7gioP_kxFSU& http://www.guardian.co.uk/medi a/2009/jun/26/michael-jackson- tnt-show A new category of error, as Channel 4 pulls a sketch about Michael Jackson just as the news comes in about his death, leading to several minutes of the Channel 4 ident being played silently instead of the segment. This also highlights how much easier it has become to capture and re-publicise live-broadcast television errors, which I'm hoping will lead to greater archiving of these kinds of errors. Original post blogged on [...]

My eyes were feeling a bit tired today so I installed the Stylish extension and an excellent style called " NightShift - eye care " that changes all colours and even dims images. Another reason to stick with Firefox. I also installed this Zenburn Windows XP Theme (zip) based on one by Jason McBrayer . Zenburn is a low contrast colour scheme originally for Vim. Now it's like my eyes are resting in a pool of cooling grey. Original [...]

I continue to be addicted to Firefox largely because of the following extensions: Adblock Plus - development of the original adblock stalled a long time ago. I have barely seen a banner since 2001, and wonder how others cope. FireGestures - Once you learn gestures, everything else is too slow. I've been through several other gesture extensions, and this one is the current favourite, although I do have to switch off a lot of options. British English Dictionary - [...]

In photography class, I was taught that a properly executed black and white print should contain a perfect black and a perfect white, however minute. The full range of tones in between were then available to the image. This serves as a metaphor for a statement about film-making I would like to assert for discussion: that no film can be called great if it doesn't contain a moment of humour. It may not be a joke, it may not be an element of comedy, or a deliberate insertion agreed upon by the whole chain in the film-making process, from writer [...]

This year we: - got well into spinning around on bikes - going to Brighton, Box Hill, Brasted, between Seville and Cordoba, 47.5 mph down Titsey Hill and through London at night (occasionally without lights or a full complement of contact lens - neither recommended) - got sonically sliced and reassembled by a blistering Autechre and .snd gig in Hearn street car park. Had to leave early, but could still hear the beats a good five minutes walk away - started a dangerous habit of European city breaks, and had a series of glorious meals [...]

If I was being brutally honest, the five best eating experiences this year have probably all been ice-cream based, eaten after midnight having consumed a few beers. But that would be a very boring list, and the photos of me dribbling down myself should probably never find their way onto the internet. (5) Birthday Fishcakes Great because they're almost a meal on their own, and they neatly combine the comfort aspect you get from fried food, but with the health kick of eating fish. Bonus. [...]

The King of Kong (Seth Gordon) imdb amazon Personal, amazing and often amusing look into the trials of obsessively competitive classic arcade video-game players. There Will Be Blood (Paul Thomas Anderson) imdb amazon Epic parable of ambition and family, selfishness and power, driven by the incredible performance of Daniel Day-Lewis as the ruthless and charismatic Daniel Plainview and a vivid rendering of early twentieth century America. [...]

The King of Kong (Seth Gordon) imdb amazon Personal, amazing and often amusing look into the trials of obsessively competitive classic arcade video-game players. There Will Be Blood (Paul Thomas Anderson) imdb amazon Epic parable of ambition and family, selfishness and power, driven by the incredible performance of Daniel Day-Lewis as the ruthless and charismatic Daniel Plainview and a vivid rendering of early twentieth century America. [...]

Google Chrome has arrived. They've used many of the best user interface features from Firefox 3 (for example the amazing address bar auto-completion) and combined it with an already highly impressive speed and finesse for a first beta, to rival that of Opera Here's the five features I instantly miss from Firefox 2 adblock plus noscript / keyboard shortcut for quick find the ability [...]

As seen at the Dalby Forest Visitor Centre and Shop , on the southern slopes of the North York Moors National Park, UK. This giant silver androgynous head features solar panels, flowers made of broken CDs, levers to make the eyes move and mouth open, lights powered by winding a handle close to the ground and most baffling of all, "spinning fruits" dotted about it's head. By way of explanation, the following plaque is attached: The lights and fruits are set off by a large red [...]

Original post blogged on b2evolution .

Original post blogged on b2evolution .

I have just installed Ubuntu 8.04 Hardy Heron Alpha 6 on my Dell Inspiron 2600 (Intel 830M graphics, 256mb ram) I used the alternate install disc due to lack of RAM and concerns that my graphics chipset would not be recognised. It turned out that the graphics were still not recognised, and after some playing with the exciting new recovery mode and a lot of googling I found out that I needed to downgrade the bios to version A08 I2600A08 due to the way the chipset was initialised. I [...]

I have just installed Ubuntu 8.04 Hardy Heron Alpha 6 on my Dell Inspiron 2600 (Intel 830M graphics, 256mb ram) I used the alternate install disc due to lack of RAM and concerns that my graphics chipset would not be recognised. It turned out that the graphics were still not recognised, and after some playing with the exciting new recovery mode and a lot of googling I found out that I needed to downgrade the bios to version A08 I2600A08 due to the way the chipset was initialised. I [...]