Speed Of Superman

I have been thinking about these 4 hour flights from UK to Australia. Usually takes 21 hours. Well London to LAX (Los Angeles) is 11 hours, while London to Houston is 10 hours. Does this mean we could be in California or Texas in about half an hour? That would truly be a revolutionary step forward in travel, and one could argue even bigger than a certain Neil Armstrongs stroll on the moon. A truly bite sized world which would change a whole heap of things from work to visiting family/friends in distand lands.
Be great for sporting events too! You could be anywhere in the world by early afternoon, hell you could even have dinner at home before setting off! And be back for supper. The more I think about it, the more exciting it sounds. Super quick travel is the logical next step because it needs to keep up with our almost immediate communications. This is not the age of the snail, it is the age of speed and bouncing across the globe like a pinball with barely time to catch a breath. Everything needs to be done YESTERDAY from messaging to meeting.

Dibnah Fear, Pet

You dont get many men like Fred Dibnah these days thats as damn sure as Strongbow. A proper working man from Bolton who sadly passed away aged only 66 (from cancer) in 2004. He was the type of man who was seemingly born with gifted hands because whatever the popular steeplejack did it looked like he did with ease. (And of course being a mechanical engineer helped.)
Watch the video (above) and you can easily see that Fred was a million miles from the type of vacuous, attention hungry celebrity on todays television screens. He was down to earth, humble and could talk at length on almost any given subject. None of those things could be applied to the reality dimwits in 2012.

1979 BBC documentary Fred Dibnah: Steeplejack.
Directed by Don Haworth
1980 BAFTA Best Documentary Programme winner

Resistance: Fall Of Man

Fight them on the beaches!

The Chimera are aliens who have not come in peace. Nor are they looking to phone home. All the fanged terrors want is to invade earth and eradicate all human life. Bugger. Oh and they have deadly automatic pulse rifles and other highly advanced weaponry to aid them in their dastardly mission. Double buggery.
The first game in the series, Resistance: Fall of Man (2006) takes us back to 1951 Britain as Sgt. Nathan Hale and troops attempt to stomp Chimera ass and send them packing. Afterall humans and 9ft tall murderous aliens are never going to make it work. And thus begins a spiffing trilogy (so far*) of First Person Shooters (FPS) games for Playstation 3. Ashamed to say im late to this party and have only recently got around to buying the first two games but better late than never and on the plus side I did manage to snag both for a bargainous £2.80! (When PS3 first arrived on the scene I was busy playing third person action stuff.) Ive always had a weird relationship with FPS games in that Ive never been their biggest fan but in spite of this been hammering them since Alien Trilogy and Medal Of Honour on the original Playstation donkeys years ago. Also if you were to look at one of my game shelves and see the amount of FPS titles I have in my collection, you would think I was the biggest fan. Weirdz huh?
Im not a total Resistance virgin, I played the demos and from those I knew I would be taking the longterm fight to Chimera sooner or later in the full games because lets not mince words here: these games f**king rock! Who the hell wants to be plugging terrorists in Call Of Duty when you can be lobbing Hedgehog Grenades into the angry faces of lizard extra-terrestrials? Sign me up for some of that shit quick as you like!
In fact thats one of the things which attracts me to Resistance so much. I really like the humans v alien scenario, pitting our primitive 50s weapons against superior alien technology. In the early part of the campaign before you get your hands on the baddies stuff, gunfights often feel like you'd be better off using a peashooter or catapult against Chimera. And you know what? Its awesome! David versus Goliath but always Mankind has spirit on our side.


*Following the release of Resistance 3, Insomniac left the series with studio head Ted Price stressing that they felt Resistance had "reached its logical conclusion in terms of the story that we wanted to tell".


School sweetheart

The Death Of Popstars

Opening sentence to an artice in this mornings Mail Online:
The population of Britain will rocket to nearly 80 million by 2050 — an increase of a third — according to an authoritative new projection by the Population Reference Bureau.

Apologies in advance if I deperess you with this post but I shudder to think how miserable and miserable life will be in 2050 and happy I am that I shall be long dead. (Sure theres a chance i'll be alive, I will be 73 in 2050 but those chances are slim at best.) Some people believe the future has a magical time in store for us where enlightened beings have conqured the planets woes and that humanity will have found sobriety after thousands of years of inebriation by our barbarian forefathers. In short they believe human beings will evolve into near God~like perfection.
Oh how television (the T Monster again) have warped their poor minds for certainly there will be no futuristic utopia where cars fly and cancer is defeated. In fact there will be a much worse cancer spreading as it already is. Blame youth obssessed with celebrity, or social media turning folk into near hermits through lack of integration, blame what you will, but it was as inevitable as a rainy summer in Britain. There is only so far a world can go before reaching flatline, and someone, somewhere will invent the 'trigger' that caused it.

We All Float Down Here

Possibly the creepiest thing BratNews has ever seen *shiver* How such a creation ever shrugged off this John Wayne Gacy nightmare we'll never know. Drop the cheeseburger and step away from the child molester.



And to further ruin your day, heres the first ad. "I know all the boys and girls." Yes we bet you do Ronald, we bet you do. Do they float?

My Eve

Holy G strings, if Eve (the one who knocked about with Adam in Eden) looked anything like this, then yowsers, Adam was one lucky son of a bitch.

Lost Volumes

"Rare Books" Section at the House of Wisdom

The rarest of the rare books from the East and West hemispheres housed in the Grand Library of Baghdad. The largest library in the world, and contained some of the oldest books ever written from all over the world. It's where the Persians kept the wisdom and successes from their history, including discoveries in science, medicine, astronomy and technology.

This place held books about numerous subjects we know nothing about, but possibly subjects we could never know about, such as extinct animals or plant-life (the Romans discovered a plant that worked so well as birth control they farmed it to extinction.
Baghdad was once the capital of the world for science and mathematics, who knows what greatness they had, stuff we;ll never know.

Damned shame the Mongols chucked every book into he Tigris river.

How To....Make Title a Link

So you have created your own blog or website and want to show it off on forums. How do you go about making the title of the blog into a 'clickable' link? 'Tis easy my friends!

[url=YOURWEBSITEHERE]Other words here[*/Url]

Ah whats that? You want to be all swanky and turn a picture into a clicky clicky link? S'no problemo.

[url=YOURWEBSITEHERE]Link to picture here usually has [img]code with a picture format at the end of it. png[*/img][*/url]
With out the *

Heres two I made earlier:

[url=http://daijakes.blogspot.com/]Click for Dai Jakes[/url]

[url=http://executionwales.blogspot.com/]Click For My Executions in Wales[/url]

Happy linking!

Behan

Drunk and chatty

Brendan saw that it paid to be drunk; the public wanted the witty, iconoclastic, genial "broth of a boy," and he gave that to them in abundance, exclaiming: "There's no bad publicity except an obituary." His health suffered terribly, with diabetic comas and seizures occurring regularly.
Behan had married Beatrice Salkeld (the daughter of painter Cecil Salkeld) in 1955. A daughter, Blanaid, was born in 1963. Love, however, wasn't enough to bring Behan back from his alcoholic abyss. By early March 1964, the end was in sight. Collapsing at the Harbour Lights bar, he was transferred to the Meath Hospital in central Dublin, where he died, aged 41.

Where exactly was the "Harbour Lights" bar that Brendan Behan took his final drink?
Since he was taken to Meath hospital, this was somewhere in the "Dublin 8" area?

Thanks to the internet I have discovered the Harbour Lights was in Echlin street, which is just off St James Street, near the Guinness Brewery. I don't think there is a bar there anymore though. He underwent an emergency surgery for a tracheotomy at the Meath Hospital. He died on March 20th from sclerosis of the liver aged 41 and was buried on March 22nd at Glasnevin Cemetery in North Dublin.

On Rolled the Mad Ball

We all knew a kid at school who could be counted on to do daft stunts for attention. The permenant classroom jester, ready to perform whenever he (it was usually always a boy) fancied a bit of ego massaging. Jump in a river fully clothed? Sure thing! Dance on the headmasters car? Can do! Hell if there was a guaranteed large audience, this 'crazy funster' could even be persuaded to eat live earthworms. How do I know? Because I was this boy! Usually the type of kid to be found sitting under a tree reading a book, or painting heavy metal bands logos on my books, if ever I felt the need for the cheers from my classmates, I would do anything. Well almost anything.
Fastforward twenty five years and with the advent of the internet, and more importantly Youtube, the stakes have been raised way higher than jolly japes in the classroom. And it isn't only attention hungry teenagers who are risking all (even their lives) for high ratings on their Youtube channel. Its going end in tears one day, thats if it already hasn't in cases we dont know of.
With so many video hosting websites, everyone can be a reality television 'star' today and by and large its a good thing. Travel videos saved for eternity online, the ability to share videos for far away relatives and friends to enjoy. I love it. But as with anything to do with the internet, it has a dark side. Especially when it comes to loungeroom legends (legends in their own mind) and disciples of MTV's Jackass.

** VIEWER DISCRETION ADVISED **

Republican Space Rangers

Devolution of Man

From Leigh to Pee


Where are the femme fatales today? Ladies like Grace Kelly, Audrey Hepburn, Vivien Leigh, Lauren Bacall and Carole Bouquet. These women could hold their liquor and make your heart beat without being vulgar. Such class and elegance.
How different we are today! A car wreck where its all about looking like a slut or tramp. Just Google 'drunk actress' and you'll see what I mean. Heck compare the photgraphs I have posted here if you're in a rush.
And its not about the alcohol, they had boozers in the 1950s too but at least they were stylish and oozed class. And didn't dress like Poundland hookers waiting for a fix. They reek of cheap, like the human form of syphalis. If they could act it would be one thing but these are actresses only to themselves and foolish directors who insist on filling the screen with fluff.
The classic femme fatale is dead and this makes me sad. We are left with pizza faced, grim bodied witches with the seemingly only honest ambition to get as wasted as possible.
Ive said it before but I truly believe we are witnessing the devolution of man. Its not just Hollywood, the decline has spread everywhere from that ghastly 'text speak' where people are too lazy to write a few letters, to the supposedly responsible broadsheets advising an affair to put fun back into marriages.
We are slowly (or quickly depending on how one looks at it) turning ourselves back to apes. We crawled, we stood, we conquered and now that we have seemingly achieved all, we are turning around and racing for ape life once more. (Text speak is no more than banging sticks and stones together anyway.) Im not some mad blogger, alone in believing this either. There is a part in "Return to Sodom and Gomorrah" by archeologist Charles Pellegrino where he talks to Professor Stephen Hawking, and Hawking says this: "Whatever we were arriving at in this planets history, we have already arrived at it." Indeed, and where to now?

The Mundanes

Anyway I thought id post something current with the Assange thing. Sometimes I think im too much in my own merry cocoon, writing about death, booze, retro, pipkins, food and videogames, so occasionaly I make attempts to join in the trends. And generally end up scurrying back into my own mad yet pretty world :)

Let the Fire Leave Hearts

I do recall reading about children not being able to compete in certain schools because it may affect their self esteem. What a load of codswallop. You know who these types are. To steal from the new Batman film, there IS a storm coming, you WILL see a horrible bumch of failures in this country (possibly worldwide). Crime and zombies (not the flesh eaters) will be rife. All over the place. And the namy pamby crew will have created it.

Kerouac

On October 20, 1969, around 11 in the morning, Kerouac was sitting in his favorite chair, drinking whiskey and malt liquor, trying to scribble notes for a book about his father's print shop in Lowell, Mass. He suddenly felt sick to his stomach, which was nothing unusual, and headed for the bathroom. He began to throw up large amounts of blood, and yelled to his wife, "Stella, I'm bleeding." Eventually he was persuaded to go to the hospital and was taken by ambulance to St. Anthony's in St. Petersburg. Blood continued to pour from his mouth and he underwent several transfusions. That evening he underwent surgery in an attempt to tie off all the burst blood vessels, but his damaged liver prevented his blood from clotting. Kerouac died at 5:15 the following morning, October 21, 1969, never having regained consciousness after the operation.

Bond Games 2012

And, if we thrive, promise them such rewards
As victors wear at the Olympian games:
This may plant courage in their quailing breasts.

William Shakespeare

Fixing THAT Pesky Error

Its annoying and frustrating but below is an effective way to solve Error (80029780) Playstation Error (80029780)
Make sure you have 1 space on for your account to activate before following the Step by Step process.

Step 1: Create a new email (live, google, etc)

Step 2: Go on your playstation console.

Step 3: Sign in, go under Account management.

Step 4: Change your email to the new one created.

Step 5: Within a few minutes or 24 hours, you can re-activate your console successfully.

Federer Rogers Murray

New Wimbledon tents available at all good camping stores soon!

Andy Murray is the first Briton in 74 years to reach a Wimbledon final and Britain expected much of him. He didn't disappoint either even if ultimately losing. He started the game with racket blazing, winning the first set despite all the naysayers pointing out he'd never won a set in his three other Grand Slam appearances. Balls to them then. Such was his play that I thought he was going to walk it, even against the supremely talented Roger Federer.
For once it looked good for British sport and the audience in center court were buzzing (including the obligatory celebrities like David Beckham but never his wife of course).
Federer won the second set with some magnificent shots but the rain interupted set three and the roof was pulled over the court making it look like a giant hermit crab. By this time Murray was probably happy for the break, anythig to stop the Swiss tennis maestro getting into his stride. When a champion loses the first set, its best go up a gear to prove who the real champion is and Federer showed touches of genius throughout this match.
We all knew in our heads that Murray would more than likely lose but it was exciting to follow the heart for a while. The Fed Machine went into overdrive in set four and the cake was his for the eating. There is no shame in losing to a master of the sport. Andy Murray can and should be proud of today, he'll win a Slam one day judging on this performance. Well done Andy, well done Roger.

** By the way the BBC have fine tennis champions on the commentary team with Boris Becker and John McEnroe so why they go and spoil it by including the weedy Tim Henman is a mystery to me. He's won nothing of any real significance and stands out like a banana amongst a box of cucumbers.

Apocalypse Us

Pays to be prepared

The zombie apocalypse IS coming. Soon there will be nothing but blood and zeroes, as shuffling, rotting herds of the undead do their death thing and eat your brains (or what used to be called brains until television turned them into mulch). Be advised that 'Resident Evil' and 'The Walking Dead' were not simple pieces of entertainment but clever survivalist programmes created by our governments to prepare the masses for the coming apocalypse. We are all in terrible DANGER and the slow drip drip revelations of people tearing strips of flesh from sleeping tramps are an attempt to desensitise us, less we go insane when the full story is revealed.
Have you not noticed the more edgy the world has become recently? The stories about global economic crisis, Obamacare, Italy kicking Germany out of Euro 2012 and legal highs turning men into ravenous vagrant/dog munching monsters are just the beginning. In the near future, the gates of hell will be opened and football and money will be the last things on peoples minds, and when the zombies, vampires and werewolves stalk the land we shall find no salvation in soap operas or reality television.
As the Immortal Bard, Shakepeare wrote:

"This is abhominable,--which he
would call abbominable: it insinuateth me of
insanie: anne intelligis, domine?"

Bark from trees will weep blood, the seas will boil from the septic waste and be filled with razor eyed eels and armoured sharks, lands will be infested with nothing but the relics of the dead. We are doomed to live out the final years of earth as desperate savages, devoid of love and compassion. All hope will be gone, as dead as the miserable scourge upon us and victory over the fanged creatures feasting on our scabbed frames will not be coming, as far away like a lullaby on the planet Mars. Only the mechanics of Death will remain, forcing humankind to try and survive a relentless enemy while hunting each other for a scrap of comfort.
Our minds will warp beyond recognition takig with it the pockets of treasured memories, turning us into little more than murderous sacks of meat, zombies without actual brain death.
No Superman or Batman, or priest or even God will save us. I can almost hear the wild groans and serpent hissing of monsters as I type. Can almost feel the mildew teeth of the undead sink into my tattooed shoulder, ripping me away from the screen and I will admit, a curious chill rings down my spine. The end of everything: fish & chips, books, tea, videogames, music, holidays, trips to the seaside, lazy sundays. All as we know it will be crushed in the clenched talon of the evil dead. Humanity will be ripped from life's water like fish on titanium hooks, to die gasping for breath beside the heel of mutant, beautiful savages.


A zombie squirrel yesterday

Dic Penderyn

No Panty Day!

Lose them! Ive lost mine.

Vintage InterWebz

Fried Tarantula

I have a mad fear of spiders but I like the look of these fried tatantulas. When in Rome and all that. In fact my biggest hurdle would be holding them, eating them would be easy.

Pelican Scoffs Pigeon

Never seen anything like this!

And then this...

The Con Supreme

James Bond has been named as the greatest film series of all time. How many have there been? Ive seen 4 in all, and two of them were the recent ones. Never liked Sean Connery so ive not seen those ones. Its like Michael Caine (who I also detest), if I dont like the 'actor' I dont watch the films. Im of the opinion most say they like them because everyone else does and I shan't be swayed im afraid. Its like those ghastly Beatles and Queen. Folk only like them because others do. Its mass hypnotics, a supreme con.


Hi, I love dogs

Old 'Health' Warning Video

Good grief, its little wonder there are so many people with skewered attitudes to gays if this was the sort of pish that was rammed down their throats (non sexually of course). We can all laugh at this now but its frightening to see how backward thinking we were then.

Cameron's New Horse?

This was doing the rounds yesterday on Twitter when PM David 'Dai' Cameron was giving evidence at the Leveson Inquiry. Raised a few chuckles too *Grins*

Im With Stoopid

Fish & Chips

All hail Fish & Chips!

McDonald's, KFC and Chinese and Indian takeaways might be popular in Britain but BratNews is happy to hear the news that 250 million Fish & Chip suppers are still sold every year in the UK. Why? Because nothing can touch Fish & Chips, the dish ought to be one of the wonders of the world its so good. And it definately has a touch of the Holy about it.
I love cheeseburgers, hot dogs, Vindaloo etc because im a fastfood fan, (the faster the better) but if I had a choice of only eating one takeaway meal for the rest of my life, Fish & Chips would be my choice. I could have all the money in the world and eat at the most expensive places but nothing could put a mark on this British classic. Ive even penned a little ode to it.

"Fish & Chips"

Tonight my mouth awards the stomach glory
because its fish and chips for dinner.
Juicy fish encased in golden, crisp batter
and to hell with getting thinner...

@ Steven Francis poems 2012

Ozombie: Bin Laden Returns!

This looks just the movie for a 'pop the beers' night! Zombie Taliban? It could be better than the zombie Nazis in Sno.

Chat Up Line

Tyson Knockouts

Whatever the man behind the punches, you cannot deny brute, animalist force combined with footwork like a heavy metal ballad. Mike Tyson was awesome in his prime.

Hypnotising Chooks

Panzram

Not a nice man

I first heard of Carl Panzram when I read 'Belly Of The Beast', a book by some convict or other that I picked randomly in the library. There was also a great movie made (starring James Woods as Panzram) which was based on a diary the killer wrote in prison. Chilling story and even more shocking are the things he said.

Carl Panzram quotes:

"I hate all the f*cking human race. I get a kick out of murdering people."

"In my lifetime I have murdered 21 human beings, I have committed thousands of burglaries, robberies, larcenies, arsons, and, last but not least, I have committed sodomy on more than 1,000 male human beings. For all these things I am not in the least bit sorry."

"I have no desire whatever to reform myself. My only desire is to reform people who try to reform me, and I believe the only way to reform people is to kill 'em. My motto is: Rob 'em all, rape 'em all, and kill 'em all."

"I sat down to think things over a bit. While I was sitting there, a little kid about eleven or twelve years old came bumming around. He was looking for something. He found it, too. I took him out to a gravel pit about one quarter miles away. I left him there, but first committed sodomy on him and then killed him. His brains were coming out of his ears when I left him, and he will never be any deader."

Check out the trailer for the film below and I recommend you Netflix the whole movie because you won't be disappointed. It never glamourizes the brutal thug (how on earth could they?) and pulls no punches.

Unofficial Queen Mary

70s porn icon



Playtime anyone?

Mary Millington was a pornographic star described as one of the hottest British sex film stars of the1970s. Sadly her time was short and she comitted suicide when she was just 33 years old. A very beautiful woman and to me there was something more to her than what she was famous for. She had 'soul', I can see it in her eyes.

R.I.P 'Queen' Mary ~ 30 November 1945 ~ 19 August 1979

E3 2012: Trailers

The third installation of survival horror game Dead Space is looking good to me. Now I must get around to actually completing the original game (a case of too many titles, too little time im afraid).

Beyond: Two Souls is also looking great by Quantic Dream (who made Heavy Rain of course).



Stunning footage of Metal Gear Solid: Revengeance.



Ubisoft have delivered some of the best trailers in E3 2012 with Assassins Creed III and footage of breathtaking Naval battles featuring canons, huge wave swells, storms and pirates.

Vertigo Has Russians

Been watching Assassin's Creed

Ive done many many stoopid things but those crazy Russians have me beat with these antics. I'll be honest, no amount of money would even get me to stand on the tower in these videos, let alone attempt exercise routines. I get high blood pressure and vertigo just watching them. Brave or stupid? You decide.


Fancy a go?

Hellraisers

Welcome to BratNews

Cheers everyone!

Jabba The Snack

Jabba~licious!

I don't know what it is but whenever I see Jabba The Hutt I get hungry. Sure he's not the prettiest of fellas but look at all that blubber! He must taste f**king great, especially if his fat tastes anything like steak fat. Thats my favourite part of the meat. Hell I would even give Salacious Crumb a few hours in the oven. He looks a bit 'chickeny' and im betting its the dark meat he tastes like.
Ah if only these creatures were real! BratNews might well have started something special here. *Sigh*

Mississippi Execution

The crime: Convicted of killing four young nieces & nephews aged 2 ~ 5 in a 1990 stabbing rampage.

Today Henry "Curtis" Jackson Jr. died by lethal injection at the Mississippi State Prison. When asked if he wanted a few last words, Jackson replied "no I don't". He flaked at 6:13 p.m and never even looked in the direction of his family as he was strapped down waiting for the jab.


He's no more.

Sid Is Not Having Fun

Some quotes by Sid:

"I just cash in on the fact that I'm good looking, and I've got a nice figure and girls like me".

"I was the only guy with any bit of anarchy left".

"I'll die before I'm 25, and when I do I'll have lived the way I wanted to".

Sid Vicious ~ 10 May 1957 ~ 2 February 1979

Fuming Rose

Axl Rose is fuming. He had £200,000 worth of jewelry nicked at a private party after a show in Paris. Maybe this will teach you not to ponce around in jewelry lad, thats a womans game. Women look sexy in expensive trinkets, blokes just look sissyish.
Oh well whatever, hope the Ginger One gets his stuff back. And here's Guns n' Roses when they were hungry, dangerous and f**king classic!