Overheard #44

An impromptu sports day, possibly on the South Coast:

"Come on fatty, hurry up and start jumping!"

Dandy Racquetball

"Scoring is bourgeouis." But watch this anyway:

Robert Newman's History of Oil

It may be 45'23" but blimey...

Overheard #43

OK, so this was 'overheard' off The Apprentice (S4:E9), but it was just too good:

"It's quite an emotive piece, which you can't replicate when you're in a people carrier."

Square Arrow Triangle Dance*

So I stumbled across the AMVI theory via Neatorama and it seemed like an interesting idea:

AMVI: Associative Musical Visual Intelligence
"Associative Musical Visual Intelligence is a type of intelligence that's difficult enough to define, let alone test. Many creative people can associate across sensory domains: they "hear" hints of shapes and can "taste" the essense of colors. At its most extreme this phenomenon is called syntesthesia. However, I believe that creative people subconsciously employ elements of syntesthesia every day when attempting to think of things in new ways. This test attempts to measure one's ability to associate musical phrases with abstract shapes and symbols."

So I take the test (disclosure: I do have A level music and Grade 8 flute but at the time of the test I had also sunk a couple of fairly large gins) and get 95% (19 out of 20) which is :



Maybe I'm wasted in investment banking. At the very least, I should pick up the saxophone again :)

* this will mean nothing unless you take the test - in fact, I'd be interested in your scores -> comments please!

Skinny Latte Anyone?

The perfectly pleasant Michael, who runs the Costa stand next to Citypoint, has suddenly got a lot to live up to:

Sexpresso

(Insert your own gags about lightly steamed milk; I've got Eurovision to watch...)

Ding Dang Dung

Yikes.

It seems to be time for the 2008 Eurovision Song Contest already. Since the success of the magnificently inappropriate Lordi in 2006 and bespectacled radical Flump Marija Serifovic in 2007, I have absolutely no idea who might win. To be fair, neither do I give a flying muskrat. What I do know is that they will be hard pushed to scale the dizzying heights of Teach-in from the Netherlands in 1975. Now I'm pretty sure they weren't miming, coz that ain't allowed, so the sync on the video must be terrible. Anyway, enjoy:



Despite the fact that the start of the middle eight is a dead ringer for the Grandstand theme, get a load of the pianist's trouser/boot combo as well as the fact that the guitarist on the right is clearly about 8'3" and wouldn't have been out of place in the aforementioned Lordi. Genius. Altogether now:

"Ding-a-dong every hour,
When you pick a flower,
Even when your lover is gone gone gone..."

Awesome. Especially the face on the xylophonist* at the end.

* I imagine it might be some sort of vibraphone but 'xylophonist' was too good to resist. How many times a year do you get to put that in a blog post, eh?

Overheard #42

The summer weather brings all sorts of other issues:

Turns out the trouble was that I was nippling my iPhone.

Overheard #41

Part of a heated discussion regarding the re-branding of equity research templates:

The fundamental problem we have is that you're not allowed to tamper with the cat's arse.

Obviously.

Radio Four Was Invented In 1783 By A Greek Ornithologist Called Trevor

I just passed a very enjoyable half hour catching up with this David Mitchell-hosted comedy quiz,

Radio 4: The Unbelievable Truth

in which Lucy Porter was excellent on the gay mating habits of giraffes. Next week promises Adam Buxton, Ed Byrne, Lee Mack and Tim Vine; I shall prepare the needle and thread for my sides...

Dubstep Allstars In Their Eyes

I remember last year flagging up Fairtilizer after stumbling across it chasing some Klaxons shit or other. Anyway, they very kindly emailed me this dubstep playlist which is very much of the bomb, in my humblest of opinions:



The Rusko and Benga tracks are particularly, er, vibrant :)