BBC iPlayer Beta

Got a chance to play with a new ‘toy’ today, as I’ve signed up to try the Beta of the new BBC iPlayer, it lets you watch TV from the last 7 days of the BBC output on your PC, although not all of it, so far I’ve noticed it doesn’t have the Bill’s Food episode I missed last weekend or Heroes (although I have seen that already). However you can watch lots of Doctor Who if you so desire due to it being repeated ad infinitum on BBC3, so it crops up alot on the iPlayer to. So far have downloaded an episode of In the Night Garden which Girl Lacer absolutely loved, despite being able to watch it every night on CBeebies anyway. She’s a right techno tot, I feel sorry for which ever poor so and so is going to teach her IT when she goes to school as she’s pretty competent already and she knows it. The only thing holding her back at the moment is that she can’t read what’s on the screen but even that doesn’t stop her really as she’s learnt to recognise the various symbols and common words on screen like play, close, print. She had a great time with the iPlayer and was changing the size of the screen and pausing and playing it without me having to tell her a thing.

Looking forward to finding more things to play on the iPlayer, quite looking forward to being able to watch TV in bed again, although I was already doing that with Newsnight online, but at least I’ve got more choice now!

N is for New York and 9/11

I was in New York on 9/11 as a tourist. We’d be staying in a pretty grotty hostel on the Harlem side of Central Park, the bunk beds squeaked loudly and dangerously with every move so that combined with jet lag meant me and Mr. Lacer were up with the birds each morning. That day we had planned to visit the Natural History museum which is on the edge of Central Park but it was hours before it was due to open, so we spent that morning like we normally did, wandering through Central Park. At one point we sat down on a bench for a rest, sitting near us was someone who looked like a business man. What looked like a bum came wandering up to the business man, completely ignoring us, the obvious tourists, the bum said to the business man “A plane has just crashed into one of the World Trade Centre towers”, the business man looked at the bum like he was crazy, like he went round every morning telling random people that planes had crashed into the World Trade Centre and that’s what I put it down to as well when I overheard the bum’s remark. We wandered a bit further, nearer to the roads that ran through the park, as we sat down on another bench, suddenly it seemed like every fire engine in New York city was running, sirens blaring through the park, firemen clung to the outside like they couldn’t fit enough men onto the engines and I remember one in particular was flying a large United States flag behind it, fluttering in the breeze. I saw the stream of fire engines and I began to wonder whether there was something in the bum’s comment. We progressed to the museum, deciding to wait outside for the last few minutes before it opened, it never did that day, a security guard came out and explained what had happened. Mr. Lacer thought it best we find an internet cafe somewhere to contact his parents who’d worry (I correctly guessed that my dad would think I was still in bed), the metro wasn’t running and neither did it turn out were the internet cafes, the phones were unrealiable to. I remember clearly to this day standing in Time Square, every inch of the Square jammed with people standing transfixed looking upwards at the giant TV screens playing news footage of the planes hitting the towers, it was a start of a new era. For a long time afterwards, even when back home, if I saw a fire engine running through the streets, siren blaring, I’d say a silent prayer for the guys on that engine and think back to the firemen I saw that day in Central Park as they rushed past, I hope they made it.

M is for Music on my MP3 player

Pretty much the only chance I get to properly listen to music is on my MP3 player, when I go out running or get to escape to the shops on my own. My taste is pretty variable, I have a Napster to Go subscription and I love having so much music to choose from. Currently on my MP3 player;

• The most listened to album has to be Black Eyed Peas Monkey Business , there isn’t a dud track on this one.
• Also popular on my playlist is anything by Jack Johnson , not as well known, at least not in the UK, he plays lovely mellow guitar songs. Listening to him, you kind of imagine that when he’s not strumming his guitar, he’s of surfing some beach somewhere.
• I find Kanye West great to run to.

Also on my MP3 player are the following singles:

• Dance Tonight by Paul McCartney , I love this track, it just makes me want to dance. I half heard an interview with McCartney (I wasn’t really paying attention) where he was talking about this track and I think he said something along the lines that he knew it was good when he saw a 3 year old dancing to it, my 3 year old dances to this one to, however she also really really likes Crazy Frog, so I’m not sure that rule always holds!
• Bring me to Life by Evanescene , this track has the distinction of being the only piece of music (so far) that has ever inspired me to write something (I normally get my inspiration elsewhere). It wasn’t a very long lived project as I only managed two chapters but everytime I hear this song I think I should go back to it.
• Get Ur Freak On by Missy Elliott , my all time favourite track, I love how she mixes Indian influences with this one.
• Die Another Day by Madonna , I really don’t get why people didn’t like this one as the opening track for the Bond movie of the same name, I thought it fitted the opening sequence beautifully.
• Numb/Encore by Linkin Park featuring Jay Z , I love this one to, in fact the whole Collision Course album is excellent.

And finally (although I do have a lot more tracks than that on my MP3 player, I’ve recently upgraded to a 4GB Creative Zen V+ which is an absolutely gorgeous little thing and I’ve only managed to fill up half of it so far), one album which is about to make it onto my MP3 player which is a little different from the rest.

• Chant Meditation , it’s gregorian chants which despite me being completely non-religious, have always appealed to me, it took me a while to find it on Napster though, funnily enough typing ‘gregorian chant’ into Napster’s search box doesn’t really get you anywhere. When Mr. Lacer heard me listening to this he’d thought I’d gone funny. It is very relaxing but I suspect would be more relaxing and more appropriate in quieter and calmer surroundings than my flat.