I'm sure anyone else who has seen this re-make will agree that it is complete crap. I would classify it is as mediocre schlock-horror, but it was more the heralded Gold Class experience which I was interested in.
Greater Union Cinemas have had a Gold Class section for, I guess, around three years & this was my first opportunity to go. Unlike a normal cinema, it only holds about thirty people in groups of two & the seating is allocated. Meals & alcohol is served during the film at a time pre-determined when you order, which means a flurry of waitresses coming in & out at regular intervals.
I'm yet to work out what sort of clientele is being chased, but I'm probably not it. Eating during a film annoys me greatly, especially rattly bags or the smell of a greasy burger. Seeing plates of food with cutlery being delivered is a novelty & I was warned about the dinging of knifes & forks. However, the exact opposite was the case. It has to be the quietest movie environment I've ever sat through. Everyone is extremely cautious about making noise, because it's so easy to spot who it was! Thinking about it, I can't remember anyone talking or laughing at inappropriate moments etc, which is half the fun of being at a cinema. You have to at least get a couple of snorts thrown in when someone laughs at every film!
The jury is still out on the fancy chairs with electronic recliner abilities. Everyone in the cinema sat down & immediately reclined to a position with their feet almost held above their head. I tried it for a few minutes until I could feel my legs losing consciousness & by the end of the film, everyone else was also upright again. They are comfortable, but no more than a normal cinema.
Thankfully, we got in for half price, which made it about the same cost of a regular ticket. Considering food is on top of the cost of the regular Gold Class ticket, it makes it a damn expensive night out, especially when there is no atmosphere of 300 people all gasping at the same moment during a scary bit of the film.
As you can probably tell, I was able to analyse my surroundings quite comprehensively throughout the duration of the film. Yes folks, it really is that bad!!
I cast my pointless vote yesterday in the state election. Normally, I believe in things such as democracy, but with no one of any substance to vote for, the conclusion was, well, conclusive, regardless of how the politicians wanted us to believe how close it was supposed to be.
However, it's not the election I was interested when I went to vote. Normally, I go to the local high school, where I spent five years to get edumacated! The ballot boxes line the walls of the school's theatre, which is painted completely black & it takes a few minutes for your eyes to adjust before you can find a booth & a few minutes more to read what's actually on the ballot paper.
Since the queues are notoriously long, I ventured down to the Primary school where I spent the best part of seven years to get learnered! It was the first time I had entered the school grounds in approximately eighteen years.
Nothing much has changed, but I knew that because I've driven past many times over the years. Getting up close & personal with the facilities showed me how much I had forgotten. The gymnasium held the ballot boxes & was half the size I remembered it to be, even though it hasn't changed. I remember being amongst all the students for school assemblies & being up the back, struggling to see the front of the hall. I played two gigs as part of a band in the gym, once using a cardboard cutout of a saxophone & the other with a tennis racquet for a guitar. Let me just say, we weren't very good or believable!
Student artwork still hangs from the walls all the way up to the windows near the ceiling. I once had my own version of the Australian flag adorning the building in a similar manner & I was so proud to have it there. It was made up of lots of swords (I thought they were cool) & not surprisingly, didn't win any awards.
After voting, I left through the other end of the gym & ventured past the transportable classrooms where a familiar named was stuck to the door. "Year 7 - Mr. Beaton" was the sign. A guy with his young family who were just arriving to vote made the comment "I bet he gets a hard time from the kids, you know, getting called Mr. Beat-off all the time!". Geez, no kid attending the school would have any idea they could even play with their bits, let alone make fun of a teacher over it!
Om my way back to the car park, I passed the storage room for all the sports equipment. I was responsible for handing out equipment with a few school mates one time & managed to get smashed in the face with a hockey stick. Ah, such memories.
At this point, a big four-wheel drive clambered through the car park, over the curbs & chomping into the garden area before finding a place to park. The woman driver was completely oblivious to the carnage she'd just caused.
Back when I was in Primary school, four-wheel drives only existed on farms, miles from civilization. They certainly weren't used to regularly maim children the way they are now.
Times have changed, but it was really worthwhile exploring an old stomping ground. As stupid as it sounds, it made the election a somewhat enjoyable experience!
(Spellings used for educated & learned in the above text, are purely for creative purposes only & do not reflect the actual intelligence of the author!)
Found the following photo in my camera from a few weeks ago. It's the morning feeding frenzy which occurs every day before 8am.
The bird feeder has been hanging for a couple of years now, but it has really become the place to be seen, for the little spoggies to come & munch. About thirty or so fly in from a big tree over the neighbours back fence. When you go to fill the container with seed, they all look on in anticipation, then swarm in as soon as you leave the area.
The feeder had to be modified with some plastic grill to stop the pigeons spoiling the fun. It's a scary sight seeing two pigeons stuffed inside & not letting the little birds have a go.
Unfortunately, you can clearly see all the poo which is a nasty side effect of being kind to the birds!!
After way to much effort for the eventual results, I've finally managed to upload a template. I'm content with the ideas I had in mind, but I'm still not quite sure about the implementation.
What I was trying to achieve was a format which doesn't make you squint when you view it on an LCD monitor. The old stripe template was causing me eye strain, but to be honest, I haven't seen a site which really doesn't.
I'll keep working on it, but my thoughts were as follows;
I wanted to get rid of the stripe. It's done it's time & served it well!
I'm finally letting those who stick with 800x600 the flick. Most people are using a higher resolution, & it allows bigger photos to be posted which is a plus.
I wanted a big banner! I actually had a dream about how I wanted it to look one morning (that's so very sad, isn't it!). It was to be just an outline but I couldn't find the correct font. In the end, I went with something that isn't easy to see, but holds your attention as it becomes clearer. It stands out more from an angle on an LCD!
Since there is so much crap in the html code, I may need to start the next template from scratch! Have a look at the source code & you'll see what I mean. It ain't pretty!
"So where the bloody hell are you?" is the new catch cry which is presenting the country to the world. It's based on extensive research which has all proven positive.
After all the controversy of having the swear word "bloody" used, I think it's clever & since we all ride kangaroos to work & call one another mate, it's quite appropriate!
However, the phrase has one, large, fundamental flaw. If we're going to be all ocker in the way we present ourselves, there is no way in hell we would say it like it sounds.
The final word, "you", would never be pronounced in it's natural way, but presented as "ya", in which case the slogan would be - "So, where the bloody hell are ya!"
It's not a question, it's a statement. We really don't want to know where you are, we want you to get your arse over here spending you're money on dinky koala souvenirs & taking photos of the coathanger & the big rock!
That said, if the slogan was produced in it's most purest form, it would actually be slightly longer -
Just an update to my birthday from last week, which is very unlike me to reminisce on such a horrible event!
The tradition of taking a cake to work on your birthday is not something new, but I was planning to venture out during the day to pick one up rather than struggle lugging one into the office. However, during the day, the chefs discovered I was a year older & did the work for me!
This was taken some way into the event of muffin eating. Just for the record, the flavours of said muffins were; banana, chocolate & raspberry, butterscotch & macadamia & one which I just can't remember, but apparently it was also pretty good!
I'm not sure how many people had a full muffin each, but at one point a knife appeared & people were taking a slice of each flavour, hence the mess in the photo!
If anyone would like to come around & scratch me, that would be great, because I sure haven't had the time to do it myself!
Work has been insane!
The computer system we use was designed for one single purpose & no other, which is exactly why I am expected to make it do other things never intended in it's design. Archaic is a word that is thrown around rather liberally, but the alternate update to the system costs upward of a cool half million! Hence the reason the powers that be aren't too interested!
Since the day the system was implemented (around 8 years ago), it has been locked without any changes. If something was to be changed in the way it operates, nothing attached to it would work. For example, doing the accounting function requires all information to be exported from the system into excel files. All of the files use massive macros & link across other spreadsheets which, if a change is made, nothing reads through. To explain it simply, if you walked out to your car in the morning & the one of the little caps on a tyres air valve was missing, you would subsequently find that the car won't start & your place of work had mysteriously changed addresses!
Anyway, mid last year a change took place which required some renovations to the system to be made. This required intense effort in working though each & every document to make sure all the macros, pivot tables, linked reports, etc, behaved themselves correctly. It was a major undertaking & once performed cannot be reversed!
That was six or so months ago & everything has been ticketyboo since..... until last week! The owner of the company has decided that the current arrangement & format of the reports is fine, but that for comparison purposes, the old one's are also necessary.
Lesson one of employers, is they never never mean what they thought they did. If they're going out, five minutes means an hour, a couple of hours means all afternoon. If they want something, five minutes means now & a couple of hours means... now! Hence, the permanent change to the reports was always going to be a temporary thing & thankfully I realised that at the time & did a bit of extra work adapting the system to perform both formats!
That extra bit of work paid off & probably saved a month or so effort.
Moral of the story? Do exactly what your boss asks & whilst you're at it, do the exact opposite of everything your boss tells you because that's eventually what they'll want!
