My copy of Firewater’s latest album, International Orange, sadly lacked the fun liner notes which are the only reason to ever buy physical over digital. As a result, it lacked the lyrics, and the internet’s been uncharacteristically crap at remedying this, so I typed them up myself.
Not pretending to own this, may have mistakes which are all my fault, all lyrics (c) Tod A/Firewater etc. Buy the album, it’s not bad.
I’m going through my old Tumblr posts, rooting out those few that are worth saving (including a trip to Cornwall) and posting them here, tagged and backdated.
I feel this one was worth bringing back to the front page.
Reasons for changing site fall under the heading of “stuff I’d like written down for posterity”, which these days realise is by far the strongest reason I put anything online, but blogging about blogging is always the most reprehensible and tiresome self-absorbed crap, so I’ll make this brief.
I didn’t get tired of Livejournal so much as tired of blogging, because consequences conspired to rob me of the time, energy and Stuff Going On to for serious long-form posts. (I haven’t done one in six months, good lord.) But having broken the social ties which had kept me on the gradually more outdated and irritating-to-use LJ, at the end of last year I switched to Tumblr. This was a mistake, as Tumblr is not only a system inimical to writing anything of substance, but a really awful place in general; it’s basically Twitter, and while it lacks the character limits it’s even worse in terms of the poisonous outrage-fandom userbase or the general crushing inconsequentiality of “microblogging”. (They say a tweet is a novel when you’re being shot at. True, but unfortunately nobody’s shooting at you.)
But I want to carry this on, because my memory of the past is garbage and it’s fun to write. So, new site, new start, old posts backed up from LJ (most posts from uni are good enough for me not to wince with embarrassment, at least), maybe I’ll be better at it this time.
Also, testing the crosspost abilities.
Positive: You can jimmy the little plastic colour-coding rings off replacement toothbrush heads, so although none of the replacement packs in this house have blue rings, I can still be blue. Score!
Negative: Changing the head hasn’t stopped weird grey shit appearing, so it’s either coming from my toothbrush or from my teeth.
[11:55:48 PM] Parsley: anyway i’m actually about to go to bed, i need to get up early-ish tomorrow to go to france
[11:56:10 PM] Brosencrantz: before you do
[11:56:15 PM] Brosencrantz: http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_maozc249aX1qigaa4o1_1280.jpg look at the man front right
[11:56:25 PM] Brosencrantz: think about him in your dreams.
[11:56:34 PM] Parsley: i’m aroused
[11:56:47 PM] Brosencrantz: I have hundreds like him.
[11:57:02 PM] Parsley: ooohh second lieutenant oooohhhhh
[11:57:12 PM] Brosencrantz: hello parsley
[11:57:18 PM] Brosencrantz: I have just returned to base
[11:57:27 PM] Brosencrantz: and I am looking so moustachioed
[11:57:42 PM] Brosencrantz: and my giant hairy fur coat thing opened?
[11:57:51 PM] Brosencrantz: let’s do it
[11:57:59 PM] Brosencrantz: and I will leave my thigh length woolly boots on
[11:58:14 PM] Parsley: meanwhile in a 20 mile radius of this event
[11:58:42 PM] Brosencrantz: ammo randomly cooking off
[11:58:48 PM] Brosencrantz: russians getting chills
[11:58:56 PM] Parsley: it was amazing
[11:59:02 PM] Brosencrantz: the end.
Thank you very much to everyone who wished me luck. Enormously appreciated.
The assessment day went well (ish)! I wrote up a long blog posty blow-by-blow report on how the whole thing went, but I imagine the firm would rather I didn’t share the details of their interview process to the whole wide world – so if you want to see it and I’m reasonably confident you’re not going to post it all over the rollonfriday forums, drop me a line.
The odds against me are actually far less awful than I was expecting, but still not favourable. Fingers crossed – I’ll hear back on the 18th…
Doing research work at the National Archives; the field (British military assistance in Africa in the 70s & 80s) isn’t one I know much about, but the old sarcastic officer wit is extremely familiar.
MO, SD. My dear good friends,
I’ve studied both the scenes;
The former formulates the ends ,
The other finds the means.
But Maggie (Allah bless her name)
Is tough on cash restrictions.
And men need more, to fight a war,
Or stake a claim in a new Great Game,
Than the courage of convictions.
Policy and money hand in hand
Can spot the gaps and span ‘em
– But you can’t outplay old Ivan’s hand
On three per cent per annum.
[11:10:21 PM] Brosencrantz: good hoax story went round tumblr today
[11:10:36 PM] Brosencrantz: involving samsung paying apple with 20 billion nickels
[11:22:50 PM] Hovercraft: 20 billion nickels would weigh 100 million kilograms
[11:23:21 PM] Hovercraft: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20081130131743AAFuroy
[11:23:23 PM] Brosencrantz: the hoax did involve a fleet of trucks
[11:23:35 PM] Hovercraft: “You can research this information easily by yourself on the Internet.”
[11:23:45 PM] Brosencrantz: that’s what he’s doing :D
[11:23:52 PM] Hovercraft: I googled “weight of a nickel” and got that page, yes
[11:23:55 PM] Hovercraft: what a fuckass
[11:24:46 PM] Hovercraft: how much do you think a truck can carry?
[11:25:06 PM] Hovercraft: http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_pounds_of_freight_can_a_semi_truck_carry righto
[11:25:27 PM] Hovercraft: https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=how+much+can+a+truck+carry&sugexp=chrome,mod=13&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#hl=en&safe=off&sclient=psy-ab&q=75000+pounds+in+kilograms&oq=75000+pounds+in+kilograms&gs_l=serp.3…1369.8338.0.8453.25.23.0.2.2.1.138.1767.20j3.23.0…0.0…1c.bFaCccByV2c&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_qf.&fp=e66a99fc09647756&biw=1858&bih=1019 okay
[11:25:43 PM] Brosencrantz: 34 tonnes!
[11:25:45 PM] Brosencrantz: not bad
[11:25:50 PM] Hovercraft: so about 3000 trucks would be needed
[11:26:02 PM] Brosencrantz: or a hundred journeys by 30 trucks
[11:26:15 PM] Brosencrantz: the logistics is not the biggest plothole here
[11:26:27 PM] Brosencrantz: the biggest plothole is why samsung has a billion dollars in 5c pieces
[11:26:50 PM] Hovercraft: do 20 billion nickels even exist?
[11:27:02 PM] Brosencrantz: I… dunno
[11:27:04 PM] Brosencrantz: probably
[11:27:23 PM] Brosencrantz: fucking coppers accumulate everywhere
[11:27:43 PM] Hovercraft: nickels are silver
[11:28:08 PM] Hovercraft: http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_coins_exist_in_the_world FUCK
[11:28:08 PM] Brosencrantz: shit, so they are
[11:28:18 PM] Brosencrantz: probably not then
[11:32:12 PM] Hovercraft: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Mint_coin_production hmm
[11:32:35 PM] Brosencrantz: are you a bad enough dude to copy that into a spreadsheet?
[11:32:58 PM] Brosencrantz: nickels have been minted since the civil war
[11:32:59 PM] Hovercraft: so they produce about 1 billion nickels per year, but don’t know how long they stay in circulation for
[11:33:05 PM] Hovercraft: probably several decades though
[11:33:18 PM] Brosencrantz: the hell happened in 2009?
[11:34:08 PM] Hovercraft: dunno, there didn’t need to be much of a top-up?
[11:34:28 PM] Hovercraft: so it’s feasible that 20 billion exist
[11:34:34 PM] Hovercraft: but getting that many in one place is absurd
[11:35:19 PM] Hovercraft: …why would I want to copy that into a spreadsheet?
[11:35:36 PM] Brosencrantz: I looked up a graph of the price of copper
[11:35:52 PM] Hovercraft: did it spike?
[11:36:05 PM] Brosencrantz: ish, it was at rock bottom early 2008 and climbed steeply, but carried on climbing
[11:36:11 PM] Brosencrantz: peaked mid 2010
[11:36:23 PM] Brosencrantz: looking at nickel now
[11:37:01 PM] Brosencrantz: nope, same story, very low through 08 then rising steadily
[11:37:38 PM] Brosencrantz: and nickel’s prices were highest in mid 06
[11:37:49 PM] Brosencrantz: when production was a billion and a half
[11:38:06 PM] Hovercraft: needs must
[11:38:25 PM] Brosencrantz: americans suck at seigniorage
[11:39:16 PM] Brosencrantz: I love that we can actually research this sort of shit effortlessly
[11:39:21 PM] Brosencrantz: for no better reason than because we’re BORED
[11:39:25 PM] Hovercraft: o/\o
[11:39:45 PM] Hovercraft: and to give us a sense of smug superiority over tumblr halfwits who swallow anything they’re told
[11:39:55 PM] Brosencrantz: like, in a shitty thriller twenty years ago researching this sort of information would involve an attractive harvard grad and a romance subplot
underneath the open sky 
