A win from England would secure the Grand Slam, a win from Wales would upset England’s applecart, and a good win from Wales would take England’s applecart, puree it, and use it to season the hog roast of the Millenium stadium.

The game was, unfortunately, the last of these options. The first half was a fairly tight affair, and though Wales pulled ahead 3-9, there wasn’t much in it. A moment or two could have turned the tables – the second half, though, was an entirely different affair. It was a rout, Wales had soaked up any pressure that England had applied, and then came back strong, making several good runs of play as the scoreline built. A penalty from Leigh Halfpenny at about ten minutes in the second half was followed five minutes later by a try when England lost the ball at the breakdown and Alex Cuthbert ran it in for a try in the corner. The next ten minutes saw a couple of missed kicks, and then a drop goal from Dan Biggar saw the score reach 20-3 with 15 minutes on the clock. 17 points with 15 minutes left is a big ask… and the situation was made more dire almost immediately made worse for England when Cuthbert scores again. A conversion saw Wales 27-3 up.

The penalty with ten minutes left was the final nail in the coffin of England’s grand slam hopes.

It was a thoroughly deserved win for Wales.

The other games of the day saw France avoid the wooden spoon by beating Scotland 23-16, and a good show from Italy as they beat Ireland, 23-15. With Ireland and France in 5th and 6th respectively, we’ve a real mixed results table.

(Note: Unsportsmanlike comments will likely be deleted)

Please do visit the original post to comment. | Original : Six Nations 2013 – Week 5 | © Murky, 2013. |
Post tags: Rugby Union, Six nations, Six Nations 2013

Regardless of the result against Italy today, next week is crunch-time.

Should Italy win today, the Grand Slam dream is over, but a win against Wales will see England raise the cup on the 16th. Gloom is over this week, and a win sees happy faces…. however, by the same token, Wales could get it.

Should England win today against Italy, Wales need to beat England by a margin (yet to be determined) in order to raise the trophy. Should they beat England by a lesser margin, the trophy will be English, but the English will no doubt feel disappointed. Should England beat the welsh, it will be a grand slam.

What do I think will happen?

1. I expect England to have a tough time against Italy, winning the game, but giving a scare in the process
2. For the Wales game, I expect this to be a real challenge, no surprises there, and can imagine Wales coming out strong, gaining an early lead, and for England to be under the kosh at the start of the game. I’m hoping for an English win, but I fear that Wales may pip them. If life were a storybook, I’d expect a Welsh win in the game, but an English win in the championship – and thus gloomy faces all round!

Please do visit the original post to comment. | Original : Six Nations – Week 4 | © Murky, 2013. |
Post tags: Rugby Union, Six nations, Six Nations 2013

Wasps have a game in hand (playing today away at London Irish) having put in some good performances of late, winning away at Quins, and again at home against Gloucester). A losing bonus (losing by 7 or less) would put us in fourth place, a win with a bonus would see us in third. It’s been the first time in a few years that we’ve been in contention for a place in the final four, and the knockout stages of the premiership, and top top it off, we’re sitting in a Heineken Cup place for next season.

Rugby has a playoff system to account for the fact that many clubs lose players for the six nations – and it also adds some buzz to the final stages of the competition. The premiership is such that there’s something to play for all the way down. At the bottom, there’s avoiding relegation (assuming that the league 1 side isn’t kept out of the premiership on a technicality, as almost happened with Welsh), in the middle, there’s playing for Heineken Cup slots (which go by rights to teams one through six, and occasionally team seven), then there’s the top four places for the playoffs, and within those top four, there’s seeding for the playoffs.

We just need to keep on form, we need to beat Irish today. Wasps should be able to, but Irish need the win to avoid relegation, and they’ve home advantage – so it’s not a walk in the park.

I won’t be able to watch it live, I’ll catch it a few hours later on ‘premiership rugby TV‘ – I hope to be able to remain unspoiled….

Please do visit the original post to comment. | Original : Aviva Premiership 2012-13 – Irish vs Wasps | © Murky, 2013. |
Post tags: Aviva Premiership 2013, Rugby Union

Then it was on to the real business of the weekend, England vs. France. After losing their first two games, France came from the hiatus with a determination to do well, as I thought they might. There was a great effort for a French try from Fofana, shaking off several England players, and the French went into half time a point up on England, 9-10.

The second half was scrappy, at one point I thought that England were ‘flocking’ a little bit, though they held onto the ball at this point. Tuilagi got across the line, that was nerve-wracking, as the camera shot made it look as if he’d be caught.

With time to spare, there was a try in hand, and another penalty took England 10 points ahead at 23-13. Phew!

The shots in the locker-room of a dejected France told the whole tail, three losses from three in the six nations…. though I can’t help thinking that the locker-room cam is a little… pervy. I hope it’s obvious to them, and they can easily disable it!

Next up for England is Italy. This one should be more straightforward – and England vs. Wales should decide the grand slam. It’s Scotland vs Ireland tomorrow.

Update: The Ireland/Scotland game was a close run affair, with Scotland up against it for much of the game, but nonetheless, they ground out a 12-8 win, somehow.

Please do visit the original post to comment. | Original : Six Nations 2013 – End of Week 3 | © Murky, 2013. |
Post tags: Rugby Union, Six nations, Six Nations 2013

It’s been an exciting six nations so far, the first weekend was something special with highlights being England smashing Scotland, 38-18 – and then the Italy-France game was great (for Italy) with a 23-18 win. France were not up to scratch, but there was a possibility they might snatch it back at the end.

In the second week, Scotland beat Italy and Wales beat France – with Ireland vs. England being a low scoring, but tense match in the slippery wet.

Today we have Italy vs Wales – I expect Wales to win, though I’ll be hoping for an Italian win, as a strong Italy makes for a better competition, I tend to will Italy on whoever they play (except England, and will do so until they’re contesting for the top slots, when I’ll reassess).

Then, it’s England vs. France. On current French form, I’m expecting an England win – but France will have had two weeks to build up a head of steam, and will come out strong hoping to avoid a whitewash. With that in mind, I have a nasty suspicion it’ll be a lot closer than one might suspect. As long as England don’t let it slip, a close game will be just the slap in the face needed to ensure that the Grand Slam is not taken for granted.

Tomorrow, it’ll be Scotland vs. Ireland. I think Ireland will nab it here.

Right now, the table looks like this.

By the end of tomorrow, I expect England to be on top, followed by Wales/Ireland (probably that order), then Scotland, then Italy with France in the wooden spoon slot.

I *hope* to see Italy move up in the rankings though. I *fear* that England might let it slip today and a determined France, eager to save face will nab the win.

I shall be on the edge of my seat!

Kick off today is 2:30pm for Italy/Wales, and the England/France game is 5pm.

In the women’s six nations, the women have suffered their first defeat since 2009 (a 25-0 loss against Ireland), and they’re currently third in the table behind Ireland and Italy. Coverage for England Women against France will be on the red button with kickoff at 7:20pm. It is at Twickenham, immediately after the Men’s game if you’re near Twickenham, the game is free to watch, the gates are open to all.

Please do visit the original post to comment. | Original : Six Nations 2013 – Week 3 | © Murky, 2013. |
Post tags: rugby, Six nations, Six Nations 2013

The 3D itself didn’t give me eyestrain in the way that 3D usually does, so that’s the high frame rate’s benefit right there. That said, I’m still not sold on the virtues of 3D, it can look like a series of cutouts overlaid on each other. A few times I closed one eye to remove the 3D effect, and the picture looked a lot more ‘integrated’ (though some of the effects noted below did not vanish).

The film itself is well put together, and I enjoyed the opening a lot, it was lovely to see Bilbo, Frodo and The Shire. Gandalf’s opening scene was really nice, as one might expect.

Plotwise, I was somewhat concerned when the dwarfs broke into song – in The Lord of the Rings they cut out all the songs (and still had to jettison some plotpoints, such as the scouring of the shire) – with the Hobbit I thought ‘Three films? They’re keeping it ALL!, Oh no….’

This didn’t feel like the same universe as Lord of the Rings – I know that is true to an extent with the books having different characters, but with the production team knowing before they started that these were all connected, a luxury Tolkien didn’t have, I hoped this wouldn’t be an issue – but it was. It felt foreign to the films already in existence, it had the same sets, many similar actors, but yet, it felt different, and not in a good way.

The look and feel of the film is best described as ‘patchy’. It felt like a ‘made for TV’ movie, albeit with a big budget. There were scenes of spectacular scenery, intermingled with quite poor CGI (by modern standards) of the type an XBox might generate.The poor CGI would have stood up to scrutiny a few years back, but by today’s standards the characters often felt animated rather than real (trolls, white orc etc).

Then there were shots which looked like they were filmed on a soundstage with very sharp, directional lighting. I know that many shots were on a soundstage, but the point is that it should not feel like that. This left me with an impression of a BBC play of the 60s or 70s – examples include when the company was leaving Rivendell and were clambering along mountain pathways, or going into the mountain cave. The mix of visual tones tended to throw me out of the film.

The film suffered somewhat from sticking too closely to the raw material, and so things could feel like non-sequiturs at times, for instance, the battle of the mountain trolls came from nowhere – in the book it works reasonably well, a gap can be bridged more smoothly, a few seconds of real time can take much longer to read – but in film the reverse is true, and it jarred.

Later on, the whole escape from the misty mountains sequence felt massively over-done to me, it was a case of ‘more is less’ (as I felt for some of the ‘Return of the King’) – and a part of me looked at those ricketty bridges and thought ‘totally unstable, not practical even for Orcs’). It was too much to be believable. The falls were massively overdone (huge falls kill the bad guys, but not the good guys). I know it’s fantasy, but if you’re going to have falls like that (as you must), soften the impact somehow!

I’m also sorry to say that James Nesbitt keeped giving me jolts back to reality, I thought he was going to suggest looking up a taxi cab in the yellow pages – his voice is too distinctive in my head for him to be a dwarf.

What worked well? Even in spite of the problems (which were mostly technical, but spread through the film), I did enjoy the film. Martin Freeman as Bilbo was well cast and utterly believable. The sequence with the riddles (he said euphemistically for anyone not familiar with the story) was absolutely superb. If I was to watch this film again, I’d go for the straight 2D version – though I don’t think the issues with ‘obvious studio work’ relate to HFR, I don’t think the 3D helped.

Honestly, though – having seen the film, I think I should have waited for it to be on TV (although that would have felt like I was missing out).

Please do visit the original post to comment. | Original : The Hobbit | © Murky, 2012. |
Post tags: Cinema, Film

In iTunes you can create a playlist based on rules. I.e. Show me all songs with ‘Bowie’ in the artist, released before 1984, that haven’t been listened to in the last 2 weeks. This is useful as it allows iPods to have ever changing playlists.

in iTunes 9, you could have ‘nested conditionals’. This means you could do complex things like:

• Released before 1985
• AND
• Artist=Bowie
• OR
• Artist=Rolling Stones

In iTunes 10, the button to nest rules together seemed to disappear. This caused me annoyance, but I found out where it went, and thought I’d tell record this information (on the principle that if it’s been annoying me, chanced are I’m not alone).

It has been merged with the ‘new rule’ button, I think this is a retrograde step in the user interface personally, it should be an option, off by default as it’s not easily discoverable.

So, to create a smart playlist, type spag, option, N. Alternatively, use the drop down menu. Once you have your smart playlist make your rules. When you want a new rule, click the little ‘plus’ button. If you want to nest rules, hold the option button, the ‘plus’ changes to ‘…’.

Job done. What you do with your rules is down to your ingenuity. Don’t forget to rename your playlist to something sensible, and when you sync, tell iTunes that you want this new playlist to be copied to your iPod.

Please do visit the original post to comment. | Original : iTunes and nested conditionals | © Murky, 2012. |
Post tags: Conditional, itunes, Rules

1. There are teams
2. Cycling closely behind someone at speed means you expend less energy. This is important for top athletes who are evenly matched, it’s a total hazard for the lower speed commuter and so isn’t advised in this situation!
3. The above leads to strategy with some teams working for yellow, some for green, some for the team competition and some simply to get their sponsors as much screentime as possible by breaking away.
4. There are several competitions. The big one is the yellow jersey. This is for the person who gets the smallest total time. The British hope here is Bradley Wiggins in Team Sky (Olympics allowing)
5. The green jersey is the points jersey. Points are awarded for various feats, such as crossing the line first on a stage, or reaching an intermediate sprint. It is difficult to do this from day to day, so green jersey contenders pick their moments and tend to come in late on stages when they’re not in contention. The British hope here is Mark Cavendish in Team Sky (Olympics allowing)
6. The polka dot jersey is awarded to the person who gets most points for climbs
7. There are jerseys for young riders, and for ‘most combative’ (awarded by judges) as well as a team competition.
8. The big bunch of riders is called the pelaton. French is used a lot for cycling terms.
9. If there is a good effort, you will often hear the commentator (especially on Eurosport) say ‘Chapeau’, i.e. a tip of the hat. The ‘Lanterne Rouge’ for example is the rider with the longest overall time (in a group ride, they’d be carrying the red light to alert cars).
10. Sometimes riders will escape the peloton. They do this for screentime. Occasionally, they stay away and get a stage win, but this is tough as the pelaton can ride more efficiently. If a breakaway contains a rider who is in contention for a jersey, the breakaway is more likely to be hunted down by the peloton.
11. A team will have riders who do different jobs, e.g. act as ‘lead out’ man, i.e. a movable wind-break for the sprinter, who will then arrive a few hundred metres from the line relatively fresh – or a ‘domestique’ whose job it is to fall back to the team car and deliver water to the team at the front, and then repeat – this exertion usually means they aren’t in contention for the stage.
12. There is some etiquette, such as “Don’t start to attack when your main contender has a mechanical issue”(although, if already attacking, it’s a different issue) and “If the peloton is stopping for a ‘comfort break’, just roll along until everyone has had a chance to pee”
13. Finally, you hear a lot about ‘doping’. This did used to be a big issue, but cycling these days is very clean – there are ‘biological passports’ in place – and when you do hear of something, it’s actually a good thing as it’s somebody being caught and the sport doing its utmost to police itself.

If you watch the tour live, you need to watch it with a decent commentator (I like the Eurosport coverage, they do live tweeting and interact with the audience) – there’s a lot of ‘rolling along’ and so they do explain things for newbies (without overdoing it for those who don’t need explanations).

A grand tour is really is like a game of mobile chess, especially on big mountain stages where riders will try to break their rivals by attacking and pushing them over the edge.

When watching live I tend to have it as ‘background noise’ and pick up when something interesting happens, but it really kicks off (usually) in the last 50km, and this is what you’ll get on a highlights package (ITV4 or Eurosport usually).

Do give it a try, it really can be compelling stuff.

I’ve put the course for 2012 below – in 2013 it will be in Corsica.

Please do visit the original post to comment. | Original : Le Tour 2012 | © Murky, 2012. |
Post tags: Cycling, Le Tour, Tour de France

With Manchester, there were only half as many seats, but as it wasn’t an Olympic test event, they were much easier to get (annoyingly, though I’m a member of British Cycling, I didn’t notice they had an advance booking period until 30 minutes after it closed – so I could only get tickets for Thursday). The ‘Olympic fever’ has attracted a lot of folks who don’t usually follow the sport – this has both it’s good and bad side.

Arriving at Stratford tube, I had expected the route to the Olympic park to be clear, it really wasn’t. There were no big obvious signs, or clearly marked walkway – instead we had some guys with foam fingers. Being human, from time to time they forgot to point the foam fingers in the appropriate direction. Arriving at the park, we had to cross a big road. Admittedly, there was not much traffic on it, but it did strike me as bad planning for it not to be pedestrianised.

The queue was huge – though reasonably fast moving – though this was for one venue, I dread to think what the queue will be like when it’s all running. The marshalls were all very polite, but a little bit jobsworthy (‘keep walking’ was a constant refrain, even when we already were walking – or unable to walk as they were checking tickets).

Once in, transfers were by bus, which seemed to take the most long winded way around the park. I hope that the buses will be optional when the Olympics themselves are on. Honestly, we could have walked that journey twice in less time by taking a more direct route.

The velodrome as a whole is impressive. It looks wider than Manchester – and there are good views all around. (There is something about the geometry of Manchester that I prefer, though – but London has the better building).

There are two big screens (they should put small screens on the back of the big screens, so that those queuing for refreshments can still see what is happening). The refreshments are pretty good actually, I had feared that as a sponsor, MacDonalds would be the only option. The food wasn’t *great*, but it could have been a lot worse. They’re not as cheap as they could be, but they’re not massively overpriced by London standards either. There were good sandwiches, porridge(!), wine, beer etc. That said, the food isn’t ‘cheap’, nor is it diverse – the beer wasn’t a particularly good one, and it was of the brand ‘take it or leave it’.

The velodrome is kept warm as it makes the air thinner (hence the track faster) – it is supposed to be cooler for the spectators. That’s as may be, but it was still like being in a swimming pool (without the chlorine smell). If visiting, I strongly recommend that you are able to remove layers. I do hope that the upper levels were not hotter.

We were watching the Team Pursuit heats. It’s not my favourite discipline – I prefer the Sprint, Keirin and Points races – but I like the spectacle of the close riding. Individual pursuit and time trials don’t, as a rule, do it for me – though I do like Australian pursuit. When Team GB rode, the atmosphere was electric, especially when the men’s team saw the lap times tumble. Some of my favourites, are sadly not Olympic disciplines any more, e.g. the Madison – that doesn’t work well on TV for me, though – much easier to follow live.

Both the men and the women are in the team pursuit finals for a gold/silver medal.

Coming out of the velodrome, we had to queue for buses again – this was mostly orderly, though it took ages. At one point they asked people to come forward and we had three queues side by side, so the orderly queue turned into a bit of a scrum when the bus arrived. This was entirely created by the marshalls, and it all would have been more orderly if they’d have left it as a queue!

Simply getting from the velodrome onto the tube took over an hour, again, I dread to think what the congestion will be like in the summer. Hopefully, if it’s walkable, then it shouldn’t be a problem. I also hope that the finish times for different events are staggered so that the demand on the transport links can be spread out.

Though it was my top priority, there was no way to express that on the Olympic ticket application (nor was there priority for members of the relevant organisations) – and so I’ll be watching the track cycling at home in the summer. I’ll be relying on auntie Beeb. Dear BBC, don’t cut the shots so that the viewer can’t keep an overview – especially on points races – you need to get a sense of the whole track!

Adding to my summary of events:

• Track Cycling.
  <Positives>: Great Atmosphere from the crowd. Guy on PA was excellent.
  <Negatives>: A bit too warm for punters (I don’t see a fix for this, but they organisers should forewarn people). If sent for a drink, can’t see action, so put small screens on back of big screen. Loos were non obvious, and inadequate (even for men!). The ergonomics of them were poor as you had to walk across the entrance to dry hands (and it’s a small space). The flooring in the loos shows up every drip when people shake their hands, which doesn’t look good. Access times – it took far to long to get to and from the tube station.

Please do visit the original post to comment. | Original : London Prepares: Track World Cup -London – Day 1 | © Murky, 2012. |
Post tags: Cycling, London, London Olympics, London Prepares, london2012, Olympics, Track Cycling

Yes, the plot is thin – but as it’s a silent film, what do you really expect, Shakespeare?

The film is about the emergence of the ‘talkie’ and the often career-ending effect this had upon the silent stars. Essentially it’s ‘Singin’ in the Rain’ without the Singin’.

The style of the film, as you’ll know by now, is that it, itself, is a silent movie. Yes, that’s a conceit and one which has caused some people to shun the film unseen. A mistake. ‘Black and White’ and ‘Silent’ may not be common these days, but they’re not synonymous with ‘Bad’. If you deny yourself films with either of these tags, then you deny yourself some true greats. I’ve been talking this film up to anyone who’d listen, but have mostly got back "silent film?" – it’s great to be able to point to some awards!

Due to the lack of dialogue, the audience has to concentrate on the screen, and just watch – this is engrossing – when I saw the film, a pin could have been heard to drop, it was quite eery.

The introduction to the film is very clever, it introduces people into the world of the film very quickly – and soon one forgets the style of the film and becomes immersed, to the extent that the sequence where Jean DuJardin sits in front of his mirror and drinks a whiskey is absolutely shocking in its simplicity.

When I came out, I had a great big grin on my face, and I honestly don’t think I’ve ever seen a comparable film at the cinema. I’ve seen many great films, but nothing quite like this.

It’s fantastic that it’s got lots of awards, and this’ll prompt more people to see it at the Cinema. This really is a film which I don’t think would translate well to the small screen – so do try to make the best of the extension of screenings that the awards have earned it, and get along.

… and yes, the dog is as good as you’ve heard.

Please do visit the original post to comment. | Original : The Artist | © Murky, 2012. |
Post tags: Cinema, Film, The Artist