Books by Covers

If you're reading this at LJ, head over to http://gotmockery.blogspot.com/ for the images!

So that's me at my graduation. Yay! More pictures at my facebook/flickr if you know where those are, if you don't, comment and I'll link :3

I'm kinda contemplating starting an image posting blog called "Books by Covers" or something, based around bad cover art for good films/books (especially films).

It would probably include these two which I found in HMV recently:

No wonder these are selling for so little. The quality of the characters on the box art isn't even as good as the film was, let alone the layout! Why do people feel that after cell shading an entire film, they have to make the characters on the cover 'realistically' shaded.

Oh god Ferngully no, not you too! :(

These films are great and there are kids who won't see them because of their naff covers :(

I'm pretty sure Treasure Planet wasn't much better either.
Yep there it is.

Now they're not necessarily terrible in their own rights, but when you know the films and the content and how much better the work is in the film, it makes it look horrible.

What I find most irritating about these box arts is that, at least in the case of Titan AE, it has not been the first incarnation of box art for the particular film, and otherwise there have been much much better artworks created for posters and the suchlike.

Such as these:

(This first one is I think the cover that was on the dvd of Titan AE I have in Cardiff somewhere)

Graduation and Grant

I had my Graduation ceremony on Friday and I'll get some pictures up from that as soon as I can get them from Ceri :)

So yesterday Ceri and I ended up dancing in front of Hugh Grant, something I wouldn't have been able to predict in a million years.

After a flying visit to the Westfield Centre in Shepards Bush (which is completely stunning architecture, I want to go back and gawp at it all for a whole day some time) went to see Salad Days at the Riverside Studios in London where amusingly we were given graduation scrolls as we sat down, I had not been given one on stage the previous day, for some reason we were just doing the handshake thing. The musical was fantastic and I completely recommend anyone who can to go see it before it goes, it is totally uplifting and lovely.

Part way through I noticed that Hugh Grant was sitting in the audience; he seems to always have a slightly sheepish look on his face, bless. I think he'd tried to sit on the end of the row out of the way but the actors ended up using his particular corner several times, still Ceri and Caroline didn't notice him until I pointed him out.

Later during the musical, the actors were dancing and encouraging others to come and join them 'on stage' (the stage was floor level with seating rising up on both sides). So Ceri and I ended up being pulled out to dance, which was hilarious but I'm sure I was terrible. Explaining does somewhat ruin the magic of the concept but I still find myself smiling at the silly thought.

Jobs and such

So awesomesauce, I got the Caffé Nero job :)

I had my three training days Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday of this week and I've got to do a couple of full shifts over the weekend which I'm slightly intimidated with but I'm hoping I can manage.

I quite enjoy the work, the only thing I'm having trouble with is remembering all the orders and being fast enough at the same time as being accurate. But I think it will probably develop over time.

In other news, I've been under 85kg for a couple of weeks now. I can't really see any difference at all, but I do feel like it's easier to walk it's just less effort.

This is a rather general heads up that I might be around rather less than I should like. I'll still update twitter and facebook statuses but probably rather little else with any kind of frequency.

Still hoping to work on my webcomic though.

Café Nero

Got a call this morning regarding a Café Nero interview at 3:30pm, was really excited because they had seemed enthusiastic when I was handing my CV in.

When I got there, the manager was confused as to whether to call me Poppy or Helen, I soon found out why. My CV had been photocopied/scanned on top of someone else's, so that my name and contact details were on top of someone else's CV. I quickly said that the CV wasn't mine and that I had a copy of mine with me. Thankfully the interview still went ahead and apart from the rather major flaw of the wrong CV, I though it went really well.

Now that I think about it, when she phoned me she seemed to think I already knew about an interview and that it was just the location change she was calling about.

I really hope they don't just really want this Poppy person. I could really do with a break (and a job!)

Ni Hao

I'm trying to learn Mandarin. It's something to do really.

I'd be spending my time drawing if I didn't have ridiculous art block, which I might be slowly getting over but it's too slowly for my liking!

That whole back pain thing was sorted by the way. I eventually did loads of stretching exercises and it worked it's way out.

I really hate not having a job. I feel so bloody useless all the time. Somebody hire me damnit!

Le Sigh.

One more thing about healtcare

I've seen a couple of arguments from Americans living in the UK who still think that the American system is better. Saying that they got better treatment, more comprehensive tests done generally rather than when you need them etc and would rather pay for better treatment.

My response? Pay for better treatment!

You can always go private, we do have the option to do so.

With BUPA you can pay for a comprehensive health check including tests for all sorts of things which I'm sure is as good as those done on American healthcare.

I watched a documentary a while back about those who cannot afford health insurance in America, it was appalling.

I'm going to stop going on about this now honest

Gay Healthcare

I freely admit I use the word far too much as a derogatory term, I really really need to stop that.

I suppose it's no different from spastic, retarded in the way that they were proper terms that became insults due to people using them as such. I didn't know they were technically politically correct until I was older.

However that's not what this post is about.

It's sort of started by this brilliant deviation and a couple of the stupid comments made on it.

Firstly, Boo American Healthcare. Stop saying how bad ours is. People in this so called highly developed country die because they can't afford health insurance.

See also this great article about an American's experience of both healthcare systems. I don't think I'm biased because my dad works for the NHS but I maybe appreciate it more because of it and how very hard he works.

Additionally because we don't have health insurance tied to jobs and so on, I think it is not quite so difficult to deal with losing or changing jobs.

Also, and I have to say I'm taking this from ER so it might not be particularly accurate, but having to pay for when someone dies in a hospital? Really?

Secondly, in regards to a comment on the deviation.

Being able to reproduce has nothing to do with whether or not people should be allowed to marry. Being able to reproduce naturally even less so. I'm sure it wouldn't cross their minds to criticise someone for having IVF or a sperm donor or a surrogate mother because they are infertile or have low fertility. Those people are still allowed to marry.

There are studies stating that the Y chromosome will die out in about five million years anyway resulting in men and women possibly becoming separate species as they would not be able to reproduce with each other so we're all going to be gay then.

Dinosaurs!

Decided to spend some savings on seeing dinosaurs, so Ceri and I are seeing them next Sunday :)

Feel about 200% smilier now :3

No Dinosaurs For Me

Okay so today I was meant to be seeing Walking with Dinosaurs with Ceri and Jack as organised by Jack.

I spent a lot of time yesterday, last night and this morning trying to contact Jack to ask when and where we were going to meet. I heard nothing for a long time until just a sudden apology for a cancelation, that he was busy covering someone's shift in Newbury and then had to go back to Oxford later.

I mean fair enough that he was busy but he could have told me yesterday. He could have given us the tickets so we could still go, it's not like he can get a refund on them or anything.

I've been looking forward to this for months and it's completely ruined my mood and most of my day.

I'm going to see if I can try somehow to see it still but Ceri's taken a day off for this and he only has nine more until next April and we can't really afford it.

Boo :<

Back from the Gower

My Dad, uncharacteristically being silly when faced with sand-tides.

Was a nice holiday in as much as they can be with one's family what with all the arguments and cramped eating around tables.

Trying to work on story ideas still. No real plot as such yet, mostly characters.

Haven't drawn in ages. Feel like I might lose the ability to D:

Have been talking to Stu (Yeah shush Ceri) (husband of Jackie who is a graphic designer in the same office as Ceri) who works in films and concept design about it all and he's given me a couple of training videos. I doubt I'll go into it all though as I'm not really good at all that stuff. He's currently working on the next Harry Potter film (HP7 part one) and also Avatar (but not the one based on the animated film) and has previously worked on Hellboy II.

Inspiration, come back to me plz.

Donor Carer

I've got my interview tomorrow for the Donor Carer for Blood Donation position, I'm worried but also quietly confident that I can only do my best at this. I'd love to get the job as it has long term prospects including nice pension plans and so on, but if I don't get it, there's also the possibility of a job in Barclays. Fingers crossed for getting a job soon!

I drove Ceri to Latitude Festival up in Suffolk today, which was about a seven and a half hour round trip. I like driving, but not quite that much and I'm going to have to do all that and more on Monday when I drive to Suffolk, back to Oxford and then on to Horton in the Gower covering much of the breadth of Britain in the mean time it would seem. Ceri said it would be nice if we could do festival work together, and I agreed, but it would require someone to look after the girls and is likely to be complicated to orchestrate, would have been nice if I could have gone with him though, I miss him a lot when he's away.

Oh. I did get my toaster in the end, hilariously I was on hold with the people asking where my toaster was when Ceri answered the door to the man delivering it.

Here, have some cats. Pinstripe, Paisley & Ronnie (who lives with my parents and is huge)

(pictures don't work on LJ export :/)

Alright Awesome

After trying various ways, I've managed to make my Blogger post to my livejournal, as I generally can't be arsed to post to LJ any more and I'm trying to update the GotMockery blog more often.

So if you're reading this at Livejournal, it's coming from GotMockery.blogspot.com :3

If you're wondering how to do this, I did it via http://www.lexislounge.net/2007/09/publish-your-blogger-blog-to.html.

Hurrah.

Need to do some decent layout for this now, not just this one I've thieved from somewhere.

I Want My Toaster

I ordered this toaster on Monday.

On Tuesday, Ceri and I went to Milton Keynes to poke the shops and we saw the same kind of toaster in John Lewis and pondered when it would arrive. When we got back, there was a sticker on the door saying they'd tried to deliver and we were out. Fair enough, I wasn't expecting it to be delivered that soon as it was free delivery and within five days. Scheduled a redelivery for today.

At 18:00 Ceri phoned to ask them where it was, the conversation went thus:

"We haven't received our delivery."

"Says here they couldn't deliver due to the access being restricted."

"What?"

"They couldn't get past the security door."

"...We've been here all day waiting for it, no one rang the bell."

"...Oh..."

"Can we have it redelivered please." :|

Were they expecting us to wait on the doorstep all day?

What kind of a delivery man sees a door with a doorbell and decides it's an unpenetrable shield with no method of crossing.

On top of which, my phone number was taken for the redelivery in case there were any problems, did anyone ring me?

No. Couldn't be fucked.

I just want my toaster :<

Chuck

Since I saw V for Vendetta when it was in the cinema in 2005 I have wanted to try recipe and I made eggy in the basket just now and it was brilliantly delicious. I don't think I have mastered the making of it yet, it was rather messy.

Recently I have discovered two shows with central characters named Chuck, in the order in which I discovered them they are Chuck and Pushing Daisies.

Chuck is a great show and I am completely addicted to it, I fully appreciate it in all its geeky referencing glory. It features a guy called Chuck Bartowski who after being sent encrypted pictures by a secret agent has a brain full of highly confidential information triggered by things he sees or hears requiring him to be protected by two more agents undercover.

Thankfully there are few hole-diggingly painful episodes, which is always a plus. Also something that amuses me no end is Adam Baldwin, having only previously known him from Firefly I always think of him as The Man They Call Jayne.

Pushing Daisies is something I tried to watch in the past but couldn't obtain, after seeing it today I was completely hooked from the first episode. It follows Ned, a guy with the ability to bring people back from the dead with a touch (with consequences ) who helps a private investigator solve murders. It's completely charming and so colourfull!

One other thing I would recommend for watching would be Wild Child, as a whole it's a fairly predictable affair, but I would watch it if only for Nick Frost as a hairdresser in a small part of it which was brilliant.

Hypochondria and Farmer's Markets

So today I finally managed to get myself to the Headington Farmer's Market for the first time since I moved here last August. Nearly a year ago now! It's quite small and quaint, I might see if I can have half a table there to sell greetings cards, there or the Oxford Castle Market (which I for some reason keep referring to as the Oxford Cardiff Market).

I bought some gorgeous Apple and Cinnamon juice, a roll of Cookie Dough and a Danish Pastry for later :)

Whilst I was there I developed a horrible pain in my hip that seems to nearly only be there when I walk. If I limp it doesn't hurt so much. I have no idea what it's from but like the weird headaches I keep having, it makes me worry that I have some hideous disease. But then I generally assume that I'm just making stuff up, like when I had appendicitis and I was sure for quite some time that it was just bad period pains, before I had to be taken to hospital because I couldn't walk.

I dunno! I'm probably just paranoid.

Gah stupid headache again.

Speaking of Paranoid and illnesses. Pinnie has thrown up after eating twice in the past three days, I'm pretty sure she's just eating it too quickly as it looks the same as it did when I put it on her plate. Silly girlie.

Feel rather sorry for the Farmer's Market people now, it's started tipping it down.

Tutu

I know pretty much no one reads this, so sometimes it seems pointless in my updating it, but whatever.

So I've got my 2:2 which I am incredibly pleased with. But now it is on to trying to get a job and I can't help feeling that my BA (Hons) Illustration is completely useless to me in this regard. Everywhere I look wants either work experience of essentially the same job (or they don't but they end up hiring someone with more experience anyway which is basically the same thing) or NVQs and GNVQs which Ceri awesomely refers to as 'Not Very Qualified' and 'Generally Not Very Qualified'. I know I'm not the same person in this position, which makes me feel more sad and annoyed that there are so many people out of work.

I really need to get back in to drawing again, for some reason I can't even find the will to put pencil to paper much these days which makes me a very sad panda indeed.

I'm working on ideas for a webcomic which I hope to have at least a couple of pages of up by next March so I can attend the London Comix Thing as an exhibitor rather than a visitor.

I can't really think of much else to say so I'll scoot out and leave behind this gorgeous picture I took of my girls. Paisley is currently trying to eat my hair and Pinstripe is attacking a hairbobble.

Ugh again!?

That fucking creep called me in the middle of the night, I didn't recognise the number so I set it to busy and turned my phone off. 

This morning I turn my phone on and there's a text:

I wana fuck u just for your voice wow x

Need to call vodafone and get them to block the number :|