The Deadly Star Wars Secrets!

Scientists are a vulnerable lot aren't they? Particularly scientists that are working on goverment defence projects. There's a tendency for them to commit suicide when ever they've just made some major breakthrough. It doesn't make sense does it? If any of you reading this have shown an interest in the often sordid underhand dealings of officials running shady operations such as Area 51 and The Philadelphia Project, then you'll already know that whistle-blowers and people who've seen too much, have a tendency to commit suicide or have a nasty accident. It's part and parcel of the job, even though most of them were probably pressured into the role in the first place.

Where am I going with this? Well, a few days ago, I came across this article online, which makes very interesting reading. It seems that, 22 British computer scientists involved in work relating to the American Star Wars defence project, killed themselves in the 80's. What makes this article all the more interesting is that they were British and it all mainly happened here in Britain, yet I've never heard about this before and I'm sure most Brits haven't either. What's truly disturbing is how at the inquests into each death, on almost every occasion, the police reported that the victim was suffering from depression or stress, when the victim's families reported the exact opposite to be true.

Now, the finger can be pointed in probably any of 3 directions here, assuming they were not suicides;

• The US secret service wanted to keep elements of the research, secret to such a degree that they had the scientists who knew too much knocked off.
• The Soviets were having the scientists assassinated so as to hinder the progrees of the project.
• The British Secret Service may have found out that scientists were selling top secret information, to the Soviets or elsewhere, and plugged up the leaks effciently.

I think that the British Secret Service had to be involved. How else could the police be persuaded to give false testimonies at the inquests. I'm fairly certain that this type of "silencing" goes on all the time, the case of Dr. Kelly, the former UN Weapons Inspector who was made a scapegoat by Tony Blair, being an obvious more recent example. People who slash their wrists tend to bleed a bit, but when Dr. Kelly's body was found on Harrowdown Hill, there was no blood. Plainly, he had died elsewhere, and probably not by his own hands.

I Got Me Some Bargains!

I picked up a couple bargains this morning, when the wife and I went on our bi-weekly grocery shopping trip to Elgin. I always look at the book section in Asda's because quite often they have some decent novels for £3.50 ish. Harking back to my Italian holiday in July, if you were keeping up, then you would remember that I read "The Tower" by Valerio Massimo Manfredi while I was there, and that I promised myself to buy his other books once back home in Scotland. Well I did have a look on ebay, but then the focus went elsewhere and I forgot all about it. Anyway, there I was this morning, looking at the books in Asda's when I saw "Spartan" by Manfredi for £1. Woah... bargain book buy or what? So, I snapped that up and "Wolf Of the Plains" by Conn Iggulden for £3.50. That's a novel about the life of Genghis Khan. Yep, you're starting to see just what type of novel I go for, aren't you?

Following that coup, we had to go and try and get some music book for my daughter, for flute, which of course wasn't in stock. They never are! My wife decided to look in some clothes shop and waved me off to Ottakers book-shop, although I wasn't really intersted, but then I found the best buy of the lot, despite costing me £10 this time. I looked under education, you know, just on the off chance that I might see something worthwhile buying, when I spotted a book called "The Trainee Teachers Survival Guide" by Hazel Bennett. After 2 or 3 minutes flicking through it, I relaised that this book might just save my life. Not only has it a wealth of pointers on all aspects of Teacher Training within the Uni, but it also has lots of helpful tips for what to expect and to do while on school experience. I should have had this book a few months back, but better late than never, as they say!

Brace Yourself For Drama!

I'm going to miss a day of Uni today, because I have to take my son into Aberdeen to see the orthodontist. Bascially he needs a brace, and the only place he can get seen to is in Aberdeen or Glasgow. Did I mention that it took 2 years to get an appointment? That's why I'm having to miss a day of Uni, even though it's probably crucial that I don't miss any classes this early on. Such are the joys of having kids though, they always come first.

Added another little feature to the blog today... ClustrMaps. Unbeknowest to you perhaps, I can already see where all my blog visitors come from; Country, City sometimes, length of visit, what content they viewed etc. I guess the only benefit of ClustrMaps is that it allows the blog visitor to see where other blog visitors came from. Is that really worthwhile? I'm not so sure, but I'll let it do it's work and see how it goes.

My daughter is currently going through a Hilary Duff adoration phase. She's collecting all her movies, all her albums, posters, the works. Worse still, she's constantly watching the movies and listening to the albums. She says she wants to be just like her, and why can't we move to Edinburgh right now so that she can enrol in drama school? She's 10! I refer back to my previous statement regarding having kids!

Jumping Through Hoops!

This is me yesterday and this morning... jumping through hoops! Idiotially, I volunteered to be the head person for our tutor group this week and only afterwards realised I had no idea what the task was. When I eventually found the details of the task to complete, it became apparent that I would have to access a research paper for the information required to complete the task. So, simple I thought, just use the online library service for the Uni, it cost them £55 million, so it's bound to be simple enough.

I logged into the library, searched for author... nothing, searched for journal... nothing, searched everything... still nothing. So, I logged into Athens... just a huge list of material, but not what I was looking for. Enough time wasted, so I E-mailed the tutor asking how the hell I could find this paper.

I got the reply this morning. Via the Uni library website, into Athens... select some seemingly arbitrary item off the list there.Travel to another website, serach there, check some box, click another arbitrary link, download the .pdf. How simple, I wonder why I never figured that out for myself. Then cheekily, at the end of the E-mail, my tutor suggests I see the librarian about a getting a tutorial. Well, I've already had the tutorial, and contrary to expectations, it never taught me how to jump through hoops!

Meet the Skate Meat!

Ckeck out this trailer for EA Skate Meat. My son and I had a great laugh together when we saw this. He's played all of the Tony Hawks' games, where the bails are hardly realistic. This game apparentlly uses ragdoll physics, I nearly typed "ragtime" there, that would have made it an entirely different game. Anyhow, you have to see this video, realistic bails, slams and the stereotypical rail-slide gone wrong. Check it out!

Gorillas In the Milk (Chocolate)!

What's going on here then? Yes, it's a gorilla pretending to be Phil Collins. No frills, just for laughs. There doesn't really seem to be any Dairy Milk connection apart from through the medium of Purple. Apparently, their next advert is going to be even funnier. I'll make sure and keep an eye out for you!

An Airbag Saved My Life!

Yes, I know I missed yesterday's post, but I was late getting back from Uni, I had a migraine and couldn't be arsed really! But, I'm going to make it up to you today. First off, check out the video above of the 2006 Pride of Arizona Radiohead Part1 and 2 (UW Game). Why don't we ever have stuff like that in the UK? I'll tell you why, it's because we have no vision. Yes, the Americans have guns and a genocidal president, but at least they get to do cool stuff.

You want to know what's in the video before you watch it? Well, it's a marching band playing Radiohead songs right before some big American Football match. What struck me was the choice of songs that they selected; Airbag, Paranoid Android, Optimistic and The National Anthem. Now while I prefer the 2 more obscure tracks from those 4, I imagine the crowd at the game were largely ignorant of Radiohead. But, why? OK Computer is largely hailed as the Best Album Ever and certainly the Best Album of the 90's. Radiohead's headline act at Glastonbury 97 has also been voted the Best Concert ever. You get the picture? If you haven't heard the albums then what are you waiting for?

I'm going to post a couple more interesting videos today. Just stuff that has come to my attention for one resaon or another. Let's face it, you could sit watching videos all day, if you had the time!

A Snapshot Of the Future!

I'm toying with the idea of buying a digital camera. I know, hard to believe that I still don't actually have one. Well, there were a couple reasons for that; firstly, I had my camcorder, which had a camera facitlity, albeit woefully inadequate, and secondly digital cameras were fairly expensive for a long time, while not being very good at all. Now, I believe that the cameras are of a suitable standard for me to make a purchase. Although the cost of "extras" concerns me a bit, I must admit.

There are several good reasons for my acquiring a camera;

• I need to take more family photos
• I can use my own photos for blogging purposes
• It's handy to have a camera sometimes, when you see something unexpected

I'm rapidly coming to the realisation that I may be living and breathing teaching over the next year or so, and possibly the following year, and even forever maybe. Don't get disheartened when I spout heaps of legislation and teaching standards etc. It will only be because I've been brain-washed. I don't mind, this is the path I've chosen. I will try and retain my personality as far as possible, but it may be difficult to do so.

I've met a good few of my prospective fellow teachers now and I'm certain that I'm as capable as any of them, of being a good teacher. When it comes down to it though, only the School Experience will offer a true test of potential. That's where we'll either be broken or be all conquering. Say, in about 5 weeks time!

3-D TV!

So scientists have taken the first step on the road to developing 3-dimensional television, except no they haven't really. The image in the photo is created using a mirror spinning at what is probably a dangerous speed. Notice also, how the lines at the extremities are slightly blurred while those in the centre are sharper. It seems that white light is the only type workable at this point as well.

Clealry, there's a long way to go until we see television akin to that demonstrated in 2000AD, back in the early 80's, with their Halo Jones series. That's where I first saw the concept, and it made me stop and think at the time, "Will this ever be possible?" As I've said before, so many ideas demonstrated in 2000AD have come to be, and in some instances I suspect it was former 2000AD readers that brought them to fruition.

I was trawling through Digg this morning, when I spotted a link to an Asimov short story and thought "I'll have a qucik squizz at that then!" See the Sci-Fi connection coming through again, nothing wrong with a bit of Sci-Fi, especially 50's-60's, when anything was thought possible. Quite a nice little short story, it reminded me of the time when I had to take a book out of the school library for 'O' Grade English. I just sort of randomly selected a short stories compilation, which was mainly rubbish. The one exception was a Ray Bradbury short, which if I recall correctly had some time travellers travel back to the time of the dinosaurs, where they had several dramatic encounters. The twist in the tale being that, on returning to their own time, they found that everything was slightly different, back to front in fact. And, it was all because one of them had crushed a bug. Very thought provoking, especially when you're 13!

Gradually Graduating Towards Graduation!

Hard on the heels of my degree certificate, came the information pack and guest tickets for my graduation in about 6 weeks time. Early indicators suggest I might be wearing a kilt to the ceremony, we'll have to wait and see though. My wife and I had a, should I say, "heated discussion" about why there were only 2 guest tickets in the pack, when I had asked for 3. I explained that there was only meant to be 2, that it had said I would only get 2, and that it also said there was great demand. Of course, that wasn't sufficent, I would have to phone and demand an additional ticket. The whole "discussion" became a moot point really when she picked up the tickets and discovered there were 2 stuck together. That was my fault too. As a husband and father, I find that being to blame is just part of the job.

I'm beginning to get the sense that this could be an incredibly hard year. There are high expectations on me, from everyone including myself it seems. I envision that some of the things I'll have to do in the coming months will test me like never before. Not that I doubt I can do it, and I certainly want to do it. It's just this external pressure that's beginning to build even after a week. What will it be like later on if it continues to build? You just don't realise what it takes to become a teacher, it feels like I'm climbing Everest, and that when I get to the top, I'll find it's just the first mountain in a chain of peaks.

So far, the lecturers and tutors have been amazing. I just can't believe how good these people are at talking, and with such confidence and exuberance. Perhaps that's where a lot of the pressure is coming from. They're setting the bar so high for us, that the task seems enormous, but I've met teachers before, and they're not all geniuses, far from it in fact, some of them haven't met up to my expectations of what a teacher should be at all. Perhaps I'm merely realising just how prestigious a Uni I'm in, and seeing first-hand why it's so damn prestigious.