It's a funny thing - I find English being misspoken with a thick Indian accent rather frustrating, but the closely-related phenomenon of English being 'misspoken' in print, in a way that smacks of computer translation from an East Asian language, oddly endearing sometimes.
Take, for example, the text on the chopstick packet from the noodle bar Sam and I went to in Littlehampton, on one of the days out from Root Hill last week:
"Welcome to Chinese Restaurant.
Please try your Nice Chinese Food With Chopsticks
the traditional and typical of Chinese glorious history.
and culture
BAMBOO CHOPSTICKS
PRODUCT OF CHINA"
I think the text says it all. If you appreciate the Engrish, then you appreciate it; if you don't, then no amount of explanation on my part is going to make you get it.
One other thing - it wasn't even a Chinese noodle bar. It was Thai.
- The Colclough
Showing posts with label Food. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Food. Show all posts
Friday, 6 September 2013
Tuesday, 17 January 2012
Excuses: A Luxury Assortment Pack
Pick an excuse; any excuse. I've got loads for why I've lost "First 12 for '12" so badly, and you can take your pick as to which (if any) you feel like accepting. What follows is a list of other stuff I've been doing instead of winning my own blog race...
Drawing big geometric doodles with Sharpie pens - as mentioned earlier. Iteration 4 is now in progress. No Sharpie yet, but I've plotted out the basic forms in pencil, and so far it looks more like a grapefruit than anything else. Might show you a WIP photo eventually, but not yet.
Trying to design aliens - part of an ongoing (if intermittent) effort to work out what the major races of Universe XGT look like, in collaboration with Tim. The designs range from ones sprung entirely from my own imagination, via some intermediate co-designed ones, to a few species where Tim has said what they look like and I've taken it upon myself to interpret that in pencil. I've got one or two species presenting headaches at the moment, but once they're sorted out I might do a post featuring a selection of the drawings. Maybe. Watch this space.
Occasional cooking lessons - I haven't set fire to the kitchen yet, but I've had a go once or twice. This afternoon's masterclass was in the preparation of pasta bolognaise, which turned out more or less edible. However, I can't say I did it all myself, and I've got my doubts over whether it'd have been anywhere near as non-poisonous if I had.
Developing a bit of a musical superiority complex - I was given two CDs for Christmas, little sister got one too, and I have to say I think I got the better end of the deal, not just quantitatively but also qualitatively. She had something by some chap called Michael W. Smith - whose parents, I can't help thinking, were rather clumsy to have missed out the 'H.' that everyone knows should come between the 'W.' and the 'Smith', but that's another story. I had Jurassic Park OST by John Williams, and Karl Jenkins' Requiem. From what I've heard of MW(H)S, he sounds like just-another-pop-singer sort of thing, and I can't say I'm especially impressed.
Jurassic Park, on the other hand, is John Williams at his finest. If you let me count a whole film series (e.g. all six Star Wars episodes) as a single musical opus, then I'd probably say JP is outclassed by SW, and maybe also Indiana Jones, but in terms of musical achievement within a single film, I think I'd vote JP as Williams' masterpiece.
Requiem, meanwhile, is a bit of an odd album, but quite a fascinating one. It actually comprises two unrelated suites of music, setting three separate text cycles in a total of four languages (Latin, Japanese, Welsh and English, in order of appearance). The first, and by far the longer, of the two suites is the eponymous Requiem, and I've found it fascinating listening: considering that a Requiem, by definition, is a funerary work, a mass for the souls of the dead, it's a lot less sombre than you might expect. Elegaic in places, yes, but in the end it's actually rather uplifting.
Keeping up with Sherlock and stuff - I've seen episodes 1.1 and 1.2 twice each, and 1.3, 2.1 and 2.2 once each, plus read the script for 1.2, so my do-list for the rest of this week includes catching up on 2.3 before it goes off iPlayer on Sunday evening. Between Moffat and Gattiss writing at their best, and the brilliant casting and acting of Cumberbatch and Freeman, I've found all five episodes so far to be very good. Much looking forward to the next one. Before you ask, I can't make any comparison to the recent feature films, as I haven't seen those. But I can compare Sherlock to Doctor Who, and I'd say the latest series of S (so far) has been much more rewarding viewing than the latest series of DW.
Completing the Root Hill DVD 2011! - yes, at long last. The discs are in the post (well, most of them; I ran out of disc labels so the last few copies will be sent in a few days)... after four-and-a-half months in the planning and execution 8p
Writing the pilot script for a new animated series which might be the successor to Arbitrary Stopframe - when I laid AS Series 1 to rest back in December, I don't think I'd even come up with this idea. It grew out of the production of Smells Interesting a couple of weeks later if I remember right. The general concept is that it will feature three characters (new ones created specifically for the show), paper-cutout animation, and dialogue, with less emphasis on technical virtuosity relative to AS, and more emphasis on strange, random humour. Maybe as much as 2 or 3 minutes per episode. No idea how many episodes (if any) will end up getting made. We shall have to wait and see.
Statistics:
- The Colclough
Drawing big geometric doodles with Sharpie pens - as mentioned earlier. Iteration 4 is now in progress. No Sharpie yet, but I've plotted out the basic forms in pencil, and so far it looks more like a grapefruit than anything else. Might show you a WIP photo eventually, but not yet.
Trying to design aliens - part of an ongoing (if intermittent) effort to work out what the major races of Universe XGT look like, in collaboration with Tim. The designs range from ones sprung entirely from my own imagination, via some intermediate co-designed ones, to a few species where Tim has said what they look like and I've taken it upon myself to interpret that in pencil. I've got one or two species presenting headaches at the moment, but once they're sorted out I might do a post featuring a selection of the drawings. Maybe. Watch this space.
Occasional cooking lessons - I haven't set fire to the kitchen yet, but I've had a go once or twice. This afternoon's masterclass was in the preparation of pasta bolognaise, which turned out more or less edible. However, I can't say I did it all myself, and I've got my doubts over whether it'd have been anywhere near as non-poisonous if I had.
Developing a bit of a musical superiority complex - I was given two CDs for Christmas, little sister got one too, and I have to say I think I got the better end of the deal, not just quantitatively but also qualitatively. She had something by some chap called Michael W. Smith - whose parents, I can't help thinking, were rather clumsy to have missed out the 'H.' that everyone knows should come between the 'W.' and the 'Smith', but that's another story. I had Jurassic Park OST by John Williams, and Karl Jenkins' Requiem. From what I've heard of MW(H)S, he sounds like just-another-pop-singer sort of thing, and I can't say I'm especially impressed.
Jurassic Park, on the other hand, is John Williams at his finest. If you let me count a whole film series (e.g. all six Star Wars episodes) as a single musical opus, then I'd probably say JP is outclassed by SW, and maybe also Indiana Jones, but in terms of musical achievement within a single film, I think I'd vote JP as Williams' masterpiece.
Requiem, meanwhile, is a bit of an odd album, but quite a fascinating one. It actually comprises two unrelated suites of music, setting three separate text cycles in a total of four languages (Latin, Japanese, Welsh and English, in order of appearance). The first, and by far the longer, of the two suites is the eponymous Requiem, and I've found it fascinating listening: considering that a Requiem, by definition, is a funerary work, a mass for the souls of the dead, it's a lot less sombre than you might expect. Elegaic in places, yes, but in the end it's actually rather uplifting.
Keeping up with Sherlock and stuff - I've seen episodes 1.1 and 1.2 twice each, and 1.3, 2.1 and 2.2 once each, plus read the script for 1.2, so my do-list for the rest of this week includes catching up on 2.3 before it goes off iPlayer on Sunday evening. Between Moffat and Gattiss writing at their best, and the brilliant casting and acting of Cumberbatch and Freeman, I've found all five episodes so far to be very good. Much looking forward to the next one. Before you ask, I can't make any comparison to the recent feature films, as I haven't seen those. But I can compare Sherlock to Doctor Who, and I'd say the latest series of S (so far) has been much more rewarding viewing than the latest series of DW.
Completing the Root Hill DVD 2011! - yes, at long last. The discs are in the post (well, most of them; I ran out of disc labels so the last few copies will be sent in a few days)... after four-and-a-half months in the planning and execution 8p
Writing the pilot script for a new animated series which might be the successor to Arbitrary Stopframe - when I laid AS Series 1 to rest back in December, I don't think I'd even come up with this idea. It grew out of the production of Smells Interesting a couple of weeks later if I remember right. The general concept is that it will feature three characters (new ones created specifically for the show), paper-cutout animation, and dialogue, with less emphasis on technical virtuosity relative to AS, and more emphasis on strange, random humour. Maybe as much as 2 or 3 minutes per episode. No idea how many episodes (if any) will end up getting made. We shall have to wait and see.
Statistics:
- First 12 for '12 status: 9 down, 3 to go - I've lost. Oh well.
- Latest book read: the end of 2 Samuel from the KJV
- Latest film/TV watched: Middlemarch (1994 BBC version), part 6 of 6
- Latest music listened to: Requiem by Karl Jenkins
- Latest edible item eaten: that spag bol
- Predominant colour of clothes: shabby blue-greys again
- Programs and web pages currently running: Microsoft Office Outlook and Word 2007, Firefox (tabs: MatNav 6.1; Blogspot Dashboard; Blogspot Create Post), Skype
- Webcomics posted today: Fort Paradox Backstage
- The Colclough
Saturday, 13 August 2011
On Vegetation
Sarah and Tim are walking the dog, and I'm once again seizing the opportunity to blog.
As of the small hours of this morning, Hannah and I are both half-way to completing the Twenty Questions blogging challenge, and I've decided to mark the occasion with a brief recap of the question list. Answered questions are denoted in grey like this, while the unanswered questions are denoted in italics like so:
My questions for H:
...and her questions for me:
To kick off the second half, I will answer Question 14: "Do you like broccoli when it isn’t named Albert?"
I do like broccoli, and so long as it isn't either gone off, or a particular pixelated sprig called Albert, then I'll eat it with no fuss and bother at all. I've been accused of not liking anything green, but that's not a fair claim. I'll eat lettuce, cabbage, broccoli, asparagus, and peas (among others) quite happily. And I like plenty of vegetables in other colours. It's just that the ones I don't like all happen to be green ones: cucumber, courgette, marrow, and most variants on the theme of green beans.
I digress. Most of the times I've had this particular vegetable, it's been washed and lightly microwaved so it no longer counts as raw, but still pretty close to its in-the-field state, with all the nutrimental goodnesses still intact, and then served up in a little pile of its own on one side of the plate.
Some of you may be wondering why Hannah made that cryptic reference to a broccoli called Albert - since when does anyone name broccoli Albert? For the benefit of those who don't know, she's making a reference to my webcomic, Cylinder and Miserable, in which Cylinder has an artificially-sentient vegetable called Albert S. Broccoli (the S. stands for Sentient) as his butler/chauffeur/manager/accomplice/whatever. He was named after the former James Bond film producer Albert R. Broccoli, as a joke, and now it's stuck.
Some fresh, juicy stats for you to chew on:
- The Colclough
As of the small hours of this morning, Hannah and I are both half-way to completing the Twenty Questions blogging challenge, and I've decided to mark the occasion with a brief recap of the question list. Answered questions are denoted in grey like this, while the unanswered questions are denoted in italics like so:
My questions for H:
- Where did the sheep obsession come from?
- If you ruled the universe, what’s the first law you would pass?
- What’s wrong with Doritos, anyway?
- Who is your anti-role model?
- How big are your feet?
- Do you like mornings?
- Beethoven or Bieber?
- Ink or acrylics?
- What’s the most overrated book out there?
- Would you prefer an alien invasion or a zombie apocalypse?
- What’s the strangest activity/project/group you’ve been involved with?
- If you had to choose between your eyes and your ears…?
- If you wrote a comic strip, what would it be about?
- What’s your most recently formed life ambition?
- So… what to do when life gives you lemons?
- Which is the best chocolate bar, and why?
- What would your dream house be like?
- Has Steven Moffat dropped the ball?
- Why is your car called that?
- Is this the last question?
...and her questions for me:
- We’ve reached the end of the Harry Potter era. Thoughts?
- If you were an animal, how on earth did you become an animal?
- How would you describe your taste in music?
- If you were a character in Doctor Who, who would you be?
- Do you have a favourite medium to use when doing artwork?
- How tall are you?
- If you were a shape, what shape would you be?
- What is your favourite character that you’ve created so far?
- Do you have a favourite novel?
- You now have a type 40 TARDIS. Where and when would your top destinations be?
- What is your earliest memory?
- What is your suitcase packing method?
- Please can I have your bank details?
- Do you like broccoli when it isn’t named Albert?
- Sheep or cows?
- Zombies or unicorns?
- What is your favourite smell?
- Would you ever go bungee jumping?
- If you were prime minister, what would you do differently?
- If the answer is 42, what is the question?
To kick off the second half, I will answer Question 14: "Do you like broccoli when it isn’t named Albert?"
I do like broccoli, and so long as it isn't either gone off, or a particular pixelated sprig called Albert, then I'll eat it with no fuss and bother at all. I've been accused of not liking anything green, but that's not a fair claim. I'll eat lettuce, cabbage, broccoli, asparagus, and peas (among others) quite happily. And I like plenty of vegetables in other colours. It's just that the ones I don't like all happen to be green ones: cucumber, courgette, marrow, and most variants on the theme of green beans.
I digress. Most of the times I've had this particular vegetable, it's been washed and lightly microwaved so it no longer counts as raw, but still pretty close to its in-the-field state, with all the nutrimental goodnesses still intact, and then served up in a little pile of its own on one side of the plate.
Some of you may be wondering why Hannah made that cryptic reference to a broccoli called Albert - since when does anyone name broccoli Albert? For the benefit of those who don't know, she's making a reference to my webcomic, Cylinder and Miserable, in which Cylinder has an artificially-sentient vegetable called Albert S. Broccoli (the S. stands for Sentient) as his butler/chauffeur/manager/accomplice/whatever. He was named after the former James Bond film producer Albert R. Broccoli, as a joke, and now it's stuck.
Some fresh, juicy stats for you to chew on:
- Twenty Questions status: 11 down, 9 to go
- Days until Root Hill: 7
- Latest book read: don't remember anything since Dianetics
- Latest film/TV watched: Monsters vs Aliens
- Latest music listened to: Cylinder and Miserable Official Webcomic Soundtrack: Series 1 Suite
- Latest edible item eaten: some sort of cranberry breakfast cereal
- Predominant colour of clothes: grey
- Programs and web pages currently running: Incredimail, Firefox (tabs: Hannah's blog; Blogspot Dashboard; A White Horizon; Blogspot Create Post; Webs)
- Webcomics posted today: Cylinder and Miserable #1335
- The Colclough
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