Music Is The Weapon

Okay okay, yeah I lose points for even daring to quote that, but I needed something at least a little bit catchy and dramatic.

I’m a musical person, always have been. There’s nothing like a sweeping symphony or a crackling electric guitar solo to inspire a man. I did GCSE music back in high school, played the violin to grade 6 standard, tried my hand at a variety of different instruments too, from flute, to saxophone, to guitar to piano. I was never brilliant at any of them. I was never gonna be the next Vanessa Mae or anything. But I enjoyed performing, and still regret that I hadn’t put more effort into learning the more difficult instruments – namely guitar and piano – though I know there is still time.

I don’t look back on my GCSE with fondness, unfortunately, because of what it did to me. Basically, I realised quite near the start of my final year of school – second year of GCSE music – that I was outgrowing my violin. I’d already got the full size one – largest you can get – but it just wasn’t big enough. My arms were too long, and I was finding that I had to twist my wrist in an odd way to hit the notes properly. It began to hurt when I play for too long, and my violin tutor noted that I should probably change instruments to the slightly larger viola, or to something even bigger like the cello.

In retrospect, I was an idiot. I didn’t want to do viola or cello because I’d have had to learn new clefs, and it had taken me long enough to get treble clef sorted. Also, if I had to give up violin now, it would completely screw up my final year of GCSE. I wasn’t really any good at the flute – grade 2 standard at most – and thus couldn’t switch to that and hope to get a serious GCSE result. I didn’t actually want to DO anything with music back then by the way. I just liked the class and wanted to do well in it.

I got a C, in the end. By the time the final practical exam came round, the muscle at the base of my left thumb, and my wrist itself, was so screwed up by repetitive strain injury, that I was never going to get the B or higher that I wanted. I’ll probably not be able to play a stringed instrument again, sadly, though I still do want to at least give guitar a try.

Until I can earn enough money to get myself a cheapo guitar and some lessons, I’ve been sating my music-playing desires and building up the muscles in my left wrist again, by playing Guitar Hero on the 360. And yes, I know I know it’s not a REAL guitar and it doesn’t require the same skills and motions etc, but for someone with a knackered wrist not even used to holding an instrument at that angle before, it at least helps me get some mobility back into my sore tendons.

Now, I’m a big fan of rhythm games. Ever since Spence first introduced me to the Dance Dance Revoltion series of arcade machines down in Torquay, I’ve always picked up the odd game for whatever console I have handy. Now, I’m a big man, so I don’t use the dance mats. There’s NO WAY I’m jumping around in my study trying to hit notes – I have size 12/13 feet and the chances of me being precise enough to hit the pitifully small squares on the mats are low. So I’ve always used the normal controller for these types of games. And because I AM musically-minded, and have a good sense of rhythm (apparently!) I tend to do very well at this type of game. I can kick ass on most DDR games on the PS2, usually on the Hard difficulty while my friends compete on Easy or Medium. Which is fine. It’s all about having fun after all! I just like a challenge.

I first tried the Guitar Hero games round at Dave’s house, and I will admit to being sold on it. It was a lot of fun, and while it seemed to be pretty darned difficult on Medium mode (where you have to hit FOUR frets rather than the first three on Easy mode) the mini plastic guitar controller and a great selection of tunes including Guns n Roses’ “Sweet Child of Mine” and Warrant’s “Cherry Pie” inspired me to get it. Was just a pity about the rather expensive price.

Fast forwards twelve months and a fair bit of supply teaching work later, and I found a second-hand copy of Guitar Hero III with controller for £50 in Gamestation. I snapped it up on a whim, and have been making steady progress. I can now kick ass on medium mode, and play the odd song on Hard, which forces you to use all 5 of the fret buttons. I have to be careful though, it seems. Yeah I’m musically minded, good sense of rhythm, know how the songs go... But I can’t overcome the RSI in my wrist just yet. Try and play more than a couple of songs on Hard and it REALLY begins to hurt. Not as much as my back hurts on bad days mind you, but enough. Sometimes I push through the pain, hoping that it’s just the muscles protesting at the exercise. Other times I’m sensible and take a break. But either way it’s good stimulation for my poor knackered hand, and it feels good to get it moving again. So much so that I splashed out on Guitar Hero II as well, which is the version I played back at Dave’s last year. I may never be able to complete either game on Hard or Expert, but I enjoy at least giving it a go, and as Rick tells me – with these games, practise is just as important as it is on a real instrument.

Can’t believe I quoted that as the title though.... >.>

THE MRI EXPERIENCE

Magnetic resonance imaging is a medical imaging technique used to visualise the structure and function of the body (paraphrased from Wiki! Let it do the work, so You don’t have to!)

Due to me having a k-nackered back, and the physio and Orthopaedic specialist not being 100% sure of what’s actually wrong with it, I got to have my first ever MRI last week. I wasn’t looking forwards to it.

I’ve seen MRIs done on TV before, most noticeably on HOUSE MD., my favourite medical drama. They’re basically a big magnetic tube that they slide you into on a table, make you hold still for fifteen minutes or so, and then tell you all sorts of wonderful things about your internal makeup.

However, you know what they say about TV? That everything looks a little bigger?

The MRI machine was not big. After I kitted up in my incredibly flattering surgical gown, I walked into the room and did some basic maths. I’m quite wide-shouldered, and obviously pretty tall. The MRI machine didn’t look like I would fit in fully either way. I was right. I had to be shunted up halfway through the procedure, and I spent the entire 15 or so minutes I was in there with my shoulders compressed slightly together ‘cos I wouldn’t have fit in otherwise! Yay for modern medicine.

Now I don’t know how many people know this, but as well as being afraid of heights, spiders, and having vertigo and hayfever, I’m also claustrophobic. Not VERY claustrophobic, but enough. Only in REALLY cramped spaces, when I imagine most people would get a little edgy. I have real issues with sleeping bags (I know I know, laugh all you like ><) and have to leave the zips undone so I can stretch. I got very little sleep the night before the MRI, because it’s a big enclosed tube, like a big plastic and metal sleeping bag. But, I told myself, it can’t be TOO bad. They look big enough on TV.

But as I’ve already mentioned, they’re smaller in real life. The top of the tube was about four inches from my nose. I felt like I was in a coffin, and if it wasn’t for the cool breeze drifting over me, I’ve had probably had some kind of panic attack and completely freaked out. In fact, I almost did  It was utterly terrifying. I hated every moment of being in there, but I made sure I barely moved, because I knew that if I did I’d have to go through the whole process again.

As well as being afraid, I was also in a lot of pain. Some days my back is almost okay. Other days its hideously painful. The MRI day it was fine, until they got me laid on the table. They propped my legs up on a cushion about 4 inches thick, and this — unhelpfully — left almost all of the weight on exactly the spot on my back that hurts. I was in UTTER agony for the first ten minutes, until my body started freaking out from everything and went almost completely numb.

Now, when my back spasms in pain, I twitch. Twitching isn’t good for MRIs. So I had to fight that, as well as my claustrophobia.

Add all this up and I think you have a pretty good impression of my MRI experience. I hope, I PRAY, that *something* shows up after this, because I would gladly never go through that whole thing again!!!!

Even if I DID look pretty good in the surgical gown...:P

Data Disaster

I had this blog all planned. It was going to be a happy, shining blog, reminiscing about the evolution of television from the mid-90s. This would have perhaps shown my age, and how I’ve dated as badly as a mobile phone in a music video, but I wouldn’t have cared. Mid-90s TV formed the foundation of who I am today!

But alas this is not to be, as other stuff happened before I got to write it. Let me explain.

I’m sure any of you that use computers as much as I do run out of space eventually. Hard disks can only store so much data, and they start to slow down — or “chug” — the closer to capacity they come. Now while TV show release dates ARE changing so that the UK is getting new series closer to their US releases, I still prefer to watch the shows I like straight away. So I download them. I also tend to watch them when they finally do air on British TV. I also tend to buy the box sets (the collector’s 5-series DVD set of Andromeda is sat right behind me, for example. Yes, I plan on watching it in a marathon of poor special FX and Kevin Sorbo-ness.) This is my thinly veiled defence against “zomg he is pirate! Yarrr!” or something.

Some of these TV shows I like to store to watch again and again until the DVDs are released. Things like the Dresden Files pilot episode, which — at approx 2 hours long — was very cool, but not out on DVD and only available in the US on Sci-Fi. I watch it now and again to remind myself what it is about the series (and the books) that I love so much. But it’s over 1gig worth of file. These all add up. So I store all this kind of stuff on an external HD to save myself from a chugging computer fate.

All was going fine with this plan, but now DISASTER has struck.

I have a very simple, 250gig external HD, which I’ve used to back up pretty much everything from the last 7 years or so. In fact, when my sister was moving out, and I was having the big overhaul/tidyup, I actually went through many of my old backup CDs and tried to consolidate the data I have onto the external HD. And now, via an application of Sod’s Law, the external HD has decided to screw up. Connecting it in Windows makes explorer hang. Trying to access anything on it makes explorer hang. Interacting with it in any way (except one, more on this in a moment)...you guessed it... makes explorer hang.

There is 232 gig worth of data on this drive. Granted more than a bit of it is TV programmes that I haven’t deleted yet (I’ve got the DVDs now). Some of it is Anime. Some of it is Doctor Who. I think some of it may have been the Sarah Connor Chronicles actually. Either way, a huge chunk of it is TV and I would in no way miss any of this stuff – well, apart from House S4, but that’s out on DVD this month so that’s fine.

What I will miss, if I can’t retrieve it, is photos, work, silly things that — retrospectively — I should have backed up elsewhere instead. I never even thought about it. That annoying “What if the external HD fucks up?” question. I certainly didn’t expect to have any problems with it only 6 months after I bought it, but considering my run of luck with external storage devices, I should have known better. The sad fact is that, while I have plenty of copies of a lot of the older stuff knocking around on CD — I didn’t throw ALL of them away in the clear out — there’s a lot of stuff that I simply don’t have backed up elsewhere. This IS my backup device, after all. It was a purchase designed to ensure I didn’t have to spend hours backing stuff up onto DVD.

But now it seems I may pay for that error of judgement with the loss of a considerable number of irreplaceable items. This makes me a very sad panda.

This is not to say all hope is lost, however. I currently have a programme scanning every single sector of the drive in the hopes of retrieving as much of my data as possible. I started this scan at 6:05am on 9th August 2008, and at 2:22pm on the 10th August 2008 as I write this very sentence, the scan is 39% done. It’s a slow one, and I live in fear of a powercut, or the cable to fall out, or something that will cause me to have to start the whole process all over again.

I’ve pondered if it’s worth it. How much of the crap on that drive do I ever actually look at?! But that isn’t the point, really, is it. Because I know that as soon as I give up on attempting to retrieve this data, then I’ll need some of it. This, really, is the problem with the digital era. Nothing exists “for real” until you make it real. Photos are a collection of pixels until you print them out.

A big chunk of the backed up stuff — probably 5% or so — is PSD files. My artwork, in the many stages of work-in-progress. I save all of those just in case I want to go back and change things, or steal elements for another painting, or use portions of them for something in web design. There’s several gigs worth of these, as PSD files are pretty damned hefty, that I don’t have backed up elsewhere. I COULD have burned them to DVD, but I didn’t. I relied on one device.

Never again! It seems I will have to add even further to the clutter that is my workspace by adding a second external backup drive to the mix. A smaller, more robust one, for critical backups of stuff. I may also need to add a third HD into my PC itself. All to ensure that, if I have critical data, if I do manage to recover the stuff that is important to me from this buggered HD, then I’ll have multiple copies of it just in case another Data Disaster happens again.

Let this be a lesson to me, and to you too!

August 2008

Ladies and Gents, loyal readers, August is upon us already! To say this year is going fast is an understatement. I put the speed down to me measuring time as intervals between appointments with various NHS-related people trying to "fix" my back.

So what have I been up to recently? Well, a variety of things really.

1) I've had some fits of guilt and nostalgia and have taken it upon myself to try and get in touch with friends from years gone by, see how everyone is, and get up-to-date contact info for everyone on the off chance that they want me to visit. Some of these people I haven't heard from since I left college 10 years ago, so its really good to know that some of them are doing well, and I must confess to taking a guilty pleasure in knowing that some of them are as undecided about their futures at 27 as I am.

2) I've been reading books. Mainly re-reading Jim Butcher's Dresden Files books, in completely the wrong order. I've also been dipping into the world of Graphic Novels, working my way the the Watchmen in preparation for the movie release, as well as catching up on Slaíne.

3) I've been continuing to work on a particular painting. I've kinda got into a bit of a rut with it. Turns out it was a bit TOO ambitious for my current skills (and attention span), but it IS progressing slowly.

4) I've also done some writing, albeit not a lot. I'm currently working on a big fight scene towards the end of the novel and, unfortunately, its not going well. I'm finding it difficult to visualise the scene. I blame this on the painkillers which I'm currently taking too many of to block out the big spikes of pain that are happening (fortunately) infrequently.

5) I've been playing too much FFXI. As you might have gathered if you actually check my main site, a lot of the blogs/updates recently have been FFXI-related and thus not written about on this here Life Blog. Toddle over to the FFXI blog for updates on that.

That's about it for now. Not the most exciting of updates, but I did feel I was bending my new year's resolution a bit by counting the FFXI blogs as part of my "one blog per week" thing. Updates to this blog, and my website, will continue. Have a gander at the updated art gallery if nothing else. Some newish pieces in there from this year that most people haven't seen. ^_^

~Jon