SpaCeMonKeY UK

Oddly excited about Lego Rock Band - very cute. But is it rock? Maybe not if it's child friendly... Guess it has to be a lower age rating. In other gaming news I gave in and I've been playing Sims 3 a bit. My Sim is called Cassie Starr and she's going to be a rock star. Woo!

Had a pretty good weekend - went to Creswell Crags and (whilst doing boring housework) particularly enjoyed the second Formula 2 race of the weekend.

We went to Creswell Crags because they were opening the new visitors' centre. We saw David Attenborough (who was opening it) but mainly we went because Rob's dad was doing flint knapping there. Not only that, but he made the knife that David Attenborough cut the ribbon with! The new centre was good, the exhibition was nicely done. I particuarly liked the interactive touch screen thingummy that showed you all the cave art. The crags themselves are always a little disappointing since there's little interpretation there and the caves have grilles over the openings to stop you going inside. I'm not complaining about that, but it's hard to understand why they're so exciting!

The 2nd Formula 2 race from Spa was particularly memorable because it was Alex Brundle's best finish of the season so far - 5th. It might be fun to go and watch the races at Donington in August. :)

Apart from that, not really looking forward to the predicted heatwave this week. I hate hot weather...

Took some more photos last night - one my my pics is now on the front page of Open Plaques! Can't find some though, annoyingly - so far I know 2 have been removed, so they're not around, and I can't find the East Gate plaque, the Unemployed March one that's supposed to be at the Corn Exchange or the Conduit plaque. I've now taken photos of 17 plaques, which you can see in my Flickr set and there are apparently 37 (well, 35 with the two that definitely aren't there at the moment) in total. So I have 18 to find. There are still some easy ones to take pics of, but I think it will only get harder...

Today's headlines: looks like F1 is safe, there was a big article about Dan Black in the Metro and I took 7 (or 8) pictures of plaques in Leicester for the Open Plaques project. Hooray!

It didn't seem that Max Moseley really won many of the points he'd been arguing about (he says they reached a 'compromise') but at least it's all sorted. Was looking a bit serious for a while there.

Dan Black? He was the frontman in 'The Servant', who I really liked (but few had heard of). I've pre-ordered his solo album, out soon, and it sounds really good. It's good to see him getting some press coverage.

And plaques, well, I took pictures of 7 blue plaques and 1 other plaque (did take some other pics of buildings, too, which may get onto my Flickr/Google Earth thing at some point). The plaques are on my Flickr account and mapped here, if you're interested! If I've done it right they'll also be integrated into the Open Plaques site before too long.

If the weather brightens up maybe I'll take some more pics later. :)

Another hot and sunny day - brought my camera with me, hopefully the sun will still be shining when I leave work (though not too hot!). Will either take pics of buildings in the city centre, plaques, or both (the plaques project is a new thing, will say more if and when I manage to take some photos).

We had a church meeting in rooms at the Church of the Nativity in Aylestone last night - two of our homegroups met up together. Our church's homegroups meet during the week in people's homes, usually, but this was a 'special occasion'. It was ok but I felt a bit ill when I went and by the end I felt awful. I've been headachey lately (think it's hayfever related) and sitting in a hot fairly noisy room that smelt of paint didn't really help. The meeting itself was ok though I don't really like large groups of people so (as usual) I didn't talk to anyone unless they made an effort to talk to me (I'm rubbish, I know). Ah well.

Oh, and before I forget, there is absolutely NO WAY that Michael Schumacher is The Stig! Shame on you, Big British Castle, for taking advantage of the gullible in this way. This is not the behaviour we expect from you! Why on earth would the man who's possibly still the best racing driver on the planet be driving for a British TV series? And how (and why?) would the BBC get a world class superstar to take the place of Perry McCarthy (who, let's face it, wasn't exactly famous) when there are plenty of British racing drivers who are quick and could do with the job? Honestly...

The British GP wasn't exactly the most exciting race in the world, though it was a class performance from Sebastian Vettel and the Force India/Renault/McLaren battles were fairly exciting. Really, the racing didn't seem important what with everything else going on. After seeing Max Moseley's interview with the BBC you have to wonder what he's thinking. You'd think he wanted to get rid of the teams causing him problems rather than sorting things out - bit silly to call them loonies! I hope they do sort it out, but if they don't, well, I'm with the FOTA Championship...

In other news, we went to see Rob's parents' new kittens yesterday. They are small and like to attack things. :)

Has it really come to this? Will it really happen? Will there be a breakaway F1 championship next year? I can't believe the FIA are so unwilling to negotiate with the big teams. FOTA's statement seems entirely reasonable, the FIA's is argumentative and blames the teams for everything. In recent years there seem to have been so many arguments and so many silly rule changes to 'make the sport more exciting'. F1 is the pinnacle of motorsport! For crying out loud. If I have the choice between a championship with Williams, Force India and a bunch of random teams or a championship with everyone else, I know who'd I'd rather be watching...

In other news, we had a BBQ with Danny and Megan last night. It wasn't very hot, but it didn't rain. Rob cooked way too much food and we all had a nice time. :)

"Rodent Josh with Pilau Mice" - headline of the day has to go to the Metro for that one! (In reference to a mouse being found in a jar of Asda curry sauce... yum!)

Had this afternoon off work, did loads of exciting stuff like buy a bath plug and do extensive hoovering that meant I had to get down on my hands and knees (stupid black sock fluff on the bedroom carpet!). Oh well, I feel better when I look at the tidiness. :)

I can't think of many amazing things that have happened since I last blogged. Well, since I last blogged properly, I don't think the Monkey Island blog counted really! Rob played the sax at our church (King's Church Leicester), we've done quite a bit of gardening (marrows, beans and peas are all growing away down the bottom of the garden now)... Hmm... I counted birds in the garden for the RSPB Making Your Nature Count survey (in my hour I saw 2 wood pigeons, 3 swifts and a blackbird). I must have done some more exciting things at some point, mustn't I? Maybe not...

I've enjoyed watching the swifts lately. Apparently there aren't so many of them around these days. There are loads here, I don't know where they're nesting. I learnt some facts about swifts, such as they can't really walk because they have tiny legs (they cling to vertical surfaces) and they spend almost their entire life flying. They even sleep in the air! In the mornings and evenings I watch them up there, swirling around in the sky, catching insects. Apparently they fly an average of 500 miles in a day! That's amazing!!

Anyway, I can't think of much else to blog about. A bit of Warhammer 40K painting has been happening round here, mainly Rob painting his Sisters of Battle, though I was having a go at painting some Black Legion Chaos Space Marines. I'm gradually becoming less stressed whilst painting, though I was so stressed to begin with it isn't hard to be less stressed now. Hehe.

I'm looking forward to the British GP, but concerned about all the arguing. Will F1 still exist next year, or will it be an odd sort of F1 without all the best teams?

I have to go and test my bath plug now. Bye!

Oooh, new Monkey Island!

Southend was fun, didn't go to the airshow as such but saw some aeroplanes from Mum and Dad's house. Went for a walk over the fields near Sutton, saw some pillboxes - it was very hot! It's been surprisingly hot for a while now, though today's cloudy and cool so perhaps the hot weather's finished for now (was a bit hot for walking, so I suppose I should be happy). Watched the Grand Prix on Sunday 24th (woo Jenson!). Rob played the saxophone at Mum and Dad's church (I played the bass but that's not so surprising - Rob hasn't really played in public much before).

What else did we do over the bank holiday weekend... well, Monday we watched the new Star Trek film! It didn't disappoint, though a couple of bits did seem a bit too silly. (Mainly bits with Simon Pegg, who I like a lot, but he was the only part of the film I wasn't sure about. I wondered if Paul McGillion from Stargate Atlantis, who had a couple of lines as a barracks officer, would have been a better comedy Scotsman...) We took my mum to see it. I don't think she'd been to the cinema for 30 years or so. Rob was excited taking her since he thought she'd find it totally awesome. She didn't really say much about it, but I think she enjoyed it. (I was just shocked that the Odeon in Southend cost £7.20!)

Not much else has happened recently. I was a bit excited at the prospect of the first Formula Two racing in 25 years. I watched it on Eurosport and it was some of the worst coverage I've ever seen. The racing itself might have been good but the commentators didn't really commentate on the action, and when they did they didn't know who anyone was or how to pronounce people's names - they could have done some preparation beforehand! I'd like to get into it more, I hope the coverage gets better...

Better do some work now. Bye!