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Posts tagged ‘jersey’

15
Jun
pizza

Diet Diary: Starting all over again

I’ve got a bet with my wife – she doesn’t think I’ll be able to lose two stone by our anniversary at the end of August and I’m adamant I can.

When I was at school I was always a bit chubby, then when I left school and started working I lost weight bery quickly, possibly too much at one point – but then when I moved to Jersey and got married it piled on. Read moreRead more

17
Nov

Setting goals for the approach to 30

I’m 28 and 4 months, by February that will be 28 and a half.

I won’t say I’m NOT doing well, I’m married with three children, have a lovely house and a job I enjoy – but everyone needs goals.

So, instead of setting normal goals for my age of career, family, home… I’ve decided to play on my geeky obsessive tendencies and round off my guitar skills.

I can already play guitar, acoustic, electric, whatever – as long as it has six strings I can find my way around it.

I won’t go as far as to say I’m any kind of guitar master – but I could hold my own in a band.

But that’s mainly on the rhythm side – I’m a drummer at heart – but with a tab in front of me and a couple of hours to practice – I could learn the lead part to a song or two.

But I’m not talking about rounding off my six string guitar playing skills – nope I want to add other guitar shaped instruments to my repertoire.

So between now and 25 July 2011 I want to have learnt to play the ukulele, the bass guitar and the banjo to a level where I could comfortably perform a middle level song on the radio.

As I can already play the guitar, these instruments shouldn’t be TOO bigger stretch for my limited mind and capacity to learn.

So I’m starting with the ukulele (thank whatever you believe in for spell check on that one), and already have enough chords down to play a couple of VERY simple songs.

The Janet & John of the ukulele songbook if you will.

I’ll keep you posted with my progress and if you live in Jersey, have a proficiency in any of the instruments I’ve mentioned and don’t mind a difficult student – I’m looking to record this as a series for radio – so need another voice.

In fact – my first public performance on the ukulele – an instrument I picked up for the first time yesterday evening – will be on Children in Need Day at the Jersey Arts Centre as part of the ‘Do Something Different’ mentality.

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23
Sep

The 13 film review challenge

The second Branchage film festival kicks off next weekend from 01-04 October and there are dozens of films and events happening over the four days.

From the opening night gala at the Opera House – Werner Hertzog’s Encounters at the End of the World on Thursday night, through films in unusual places like castles, schools, barns and courts to the closing night gala – Moon on Sunday also at the Opera House.

Over the weekend I will be running from one place to another watching a total of 13 films (well 12 films plus a demonstration of model making) where most will have music and some a Q&A.

Part of the charm of Branchage is that the films are being shown in unusual venues, places where you wouldn’t normally expect to see a film.

So when you take the fact that the film is in an unsual venue, the Q&A and the musical element into account – you’re moving into event territory.

With that in mind I’ve decided to set myself a challenge – write a review of every event I go to – so the review will have to look at the venue, the film, the Q&A and/or the music.

I also want each review to be able to exist as an article on its own and I’m basing this on the basic article structure of a BBC Local page – which is four paragraphs and a minimum of about 300 words.

Actually the minimum is 100 words but that’s far too easy and wouldn’t give me scope to tell the story properly – so I’m setting a goal of 300 to make it a challenge (this article is 375 words to give you an idea of the legnth I’m aiming at).

These are the films I’m seeing and will link each one to the review as it is published.

THURSDAY

Encounters at the End of the World

FRIDAY

Animagica Night (more)
Short Films: London Short Film Festival presents Music & Video
Burma VJ
The First Day Of The Rest Of Your Life

SATURDAY

Shaun The Sheep + Q&A (not a film but live demo of making models for the show)
Across The Pond
Documentary Double-Bill: A World Without Women
The End of the Line
The Yes Men Fix the World

SUNDAY

Unrelated
Sounds Like Teen Spirit
British Sea Power perform live to Man Of Aran
Closing Night Gala: Moon

3
Aug

iPlayer Pick: Man on Wire

When coming up with my iPlayer picks I would normally ignore anything in the top five simply on the grounds that most people will have seen it already – but I’ll make an exception for Man on Wire.

The film tells the true tale of how Philippe Petit managed to achieve his amazing high wire walk between the Twin Towers in New York back in the 70s – it’s funny, poinant, irritating and slightly scary all at the same time.

It’s a British film with a French sensability and Philippe Petit has such an over archingly exuberant personality that he brings the whole film alive – mixed with black and white footage and a selection of equally ‘interesting’ head 2 head interviews with his ‘crew’ of the time.

Watch it and enjoy.

Embed code generated using the Up Your Ego PIP tool.

I first saw Man on Wire at the first Branchage film festival in Jersey, an event I’m more closely involved in this year through the Sheer Talent/BBC Jersey Introducing gig.

Branchage pulls together films in alternative places – in locations you might not expect to see a film like The Wicker Man at the twelth century Gorey Castle.

It also mixes live music with that venue selection as well – from live scores to silent films to a heavy metal guitar solo before the screening of Heavy Metal in Baghdad.

If you can be in Jersey between 1st and 4th of October – you’ll find SOMETHING to do and probably discover a few new ‘favourite’ films in the mix.

Speaking of mix and music see if you can spot me in this months Gallery Magazine.

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28
Jul

A full on summer

I’ve been working in Jersey for about nine years now and seven of those have been spent at the BBC doing everything from live blogging elections (first one was seven years ago) to photographing a street carnival in the form of the Battle of Flowers.

There is also the Jersey International Air Display – one of the largest free air displays in Europe.

In the last few years a number of new, cool events have started up in the island – some with a message like the Human Rights Film festival and OxJam – others cool, fun and funky.

First there was the Jersey Live festival, now in its sixth year and featuring some of the hottest musical acts in the world. This year headliners include Basement Jaxx, The Kooks, Doves, Dizzee Rascal, 2ManyDJs and Passion Pit.

More on Jersey Live (I’ll write a whole post on the festival later): Official | Twitter | Facebook | My Podcast

Then last year two new events joined the funky fold in the form of Grassroots, a more acoustic, green festival taking place the first Sunday in August and featuring mainly Aussie singer songwriters – this years headliner is Newton Faulkner.

More on Grassroots: Official site | Twitter | Facebook

And the Branchage Jersey International Film Festival – a cross arts festival that puts films on in places you wouldn’t normally expect to see them – like The Wicker Man at the 12th Century Mont Orgeuil Castle in Gorey.

Anyway – here is the promo video for this years festival:

Last year I reviewed four films over the three day weekend and went to see about six. Although because of BBC rules the reviews had to be more features than reviews.

This year I’m hoping to do at least as many reviews and will also be co-hosting a live music event tied to the BBC Introducing brand – not done anything ‘live’ in front of actual people before – so it could be fun or it could be horrible.

I know I’m talking to a few thousand people when I present my show – I’ve seen the stats – but it just isn’t the same, sitting locked away in a stuffy soundproofed studio talking to a microphone isn’t really the same as standing up, amplified voice in front of a few hundred!

More on Branchage: Branchage Site | Branchage Facebook | Branchage Twitter

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16
Jul

Harry Potter and the cool effect

On Wednesday I got up early, took the children to school, went to work and then walked on down to the St Helier waterfront to the Cineworld cinema – in time for a film that started at 10:15.

Now this is nothing unusual for me, I’ve been to the cinema that time of the morning many times before, in fact I almost ALWAYS go to the cinema in time for the first screening.

The reason for that? There is usually nobody there – I mean why do people go to the cinema in large groups, eat noisy foods and THEN talk to each other in whispers throughout the film? I CAN STILL HEAR YOU!!!!

So by going to the first screening of the day I normally get a cinema to myself, even for the bigger films. No noise from people sitting near me, no noise from people thinking you can’t hear them – I get to be my anti-social self and enjoy a film at the same time.

But on Wednesday I went to see Harry Potter and I went to see not only the first screening of the day but also the first screening in Jersey (or at least ‘official screening’ anyway).

Image by xcaballe via Flickr

I was in a screen with at least 200 other people – it was ever so slightly insane. OK so it is the start/middle of the tourist season but Jersey doesn’t exactly have a ‘massive’ tourist market anymore – so it was a little mad to be in a half full large cinema screen at 10 in the morning.

Anyway to the point – Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince – the review.

I was a bit of a late-comer to the whole Harry Potter thing, getting into it around the time book four was released but I quickly caught up and was waiting impatiently in line at midnight like everyone else for books five to seven.

I heard them all in audio form as read by Stephen Fry, have watched all the movies in the cinema and have them on DVD as well. Not that I like them much.

So you now know I went into this film as a little bit of a Harry Potter fan boy, unlike other films I’ve been in to where my default position is ‘come on then, impress me’.

I was impressed by Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. In fact so impressed that I am slightly scared that Director David Yates had been looking around inside my head as he made the film.

The whole thing looked and felt almost EXACTLY as I imagined it in my head while reading the book – the different scenes panned out how I imagined they would, the conversations happened as I expected – with a couple of minor exceptions.

The first involved the Snape and Dumbledore thing – in my mind that happened on the grass outside and not in a clock tower but it was more effective this way.

The other was those things in the water in the locket scene – in my mind it was a sort of Munch inspired hands coming out of swirling water thing without seeing the rest of the body.

Instead the film had creates that sat somewhere between Dobby the House Elf and Gollum but a bit more grabby.

The relationships between the characters continued the increasingly intense and growing mutual respect and sense of dread that the last couple had started to set up.

My only concern was that the whole thing felt a little bit ‘glossy’, maybe I need to see it for a second time but the dispair didn’t really come through as intensly as I expected it to.

And when I say glossy I don’t mean it as a critisism of the look of the film – that was spectacular, it felt completely immersive, water was intense, the breaking up of the wobbly bridge out of this world and god I love the Quidditch scenes.

But I felt that maybe, just a tiny little maybe, the ability to look stunning over took some of the simpler intense scenes that could have been created between a couple of good actors on a plain set.

Overall though I would still give it a high four out of five.

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22
Mar

Resisting the world

You know when you have a dream that is so vivid, when you wake up you have to do a double take and for a split second wonder if it was actually real or not?

Well I had one of those last night and it was a wierd one. One day I’ll try and write the whole thing into a short story but for now here is the summary.


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A new element is discovered in Jersey – this is something incredibly rare and 1mg of it has the power to both destroy a planet and power a whole country forever – assuming it’s mixed properly.

But it turns out after much searching, debate, discussion and bartering that Jersey is the only place in our solar system it can be found.

So France who believe they have a medieval claim to the island, China who need the power, England who believe they own the island through the Crown and Imperial Stormtroopers (told you it was weird) decided to invade.

This then turns the tiny island that’s just 9 miles by 5 into an international battle ground.

In my dream I was leader a resistance movement of people that were living in the island before the element was discovered, I work with a team to convert the Puddle Ducks (google Puddle Duck Jersey) into escape ships that can take hundreds to mainland UK to escape the fighting in Jersey.

All the while dodging the Stormtroopers, Chineese forces and French soldiers eating cheese (don’t ask).

One scene saw me walking down towards Victoria Avenue as a squadron of Stormtroopers marched along the Avenue – I avoided them by joining a marching band who – for some reason where in fancy dress and hiding between them.

All the while I have an irritating buzzing feeling in my left shoulder.

That’s when I woke up to find my 14 month old baby poking me in the shoulder.

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6
Jan

Mapping down to your house

An idea was posted on the BBC Backstage Idea Store asking whether it was possible to search for stories that happened around the posters house – basically to get as local as possible.

It was posted by www.richardsprojects.co.uk and basically said:

Sometimes I would like to find news that is happening in a certain area. This area might be quite small and I might be less interested in how recent the news is.

I may for example want to find all news that happened near my house in the last year.

The original author suggested a few solutions to the problem – these including providing a location based search, making sure location data is available within the news feeds and metadata and creating an algorithm to search through the content on pages to look for place names and adding location data where necessary.

Manx triskelion.
Image via Wikipedia

But there may be a solution in the offering from the BBC in the not to distant future – and it will come in the form of an enhance (albeit original video free) BBC Local.

As BBC Local moves into the News & Sport CPS and towards the new look service I think you’ll be able to do something along these lines from within your BBC Local site.

Mapping will probably play a fairly big part of these sites as they develop (without original video) over the next year or two.

Expect to see an interactive map of the region the site covers (so for example Bristol) with wide reaching stories created by the Bristol team (as well as TV/radio teams for the area).

Then as you zoom further in you’ll be able to see more locally relevant stories – eventually down as far as your own street – although I doubt they’ll be many at that level from the BBC.

Obviously I don’t know for certain this is what will happen – it is what I’d like to see happen but I’m also not convinced BBC Local content gets local enough to make it worthwhile.

I mean its ok for Jersey, Guernsey and the Isle of Man – local is island wide here and there – but for someone like BBC Three Counties – local is an interesting issue.

Looking across Castle Park in central Bristol,...
Image via Wikipedia

Ideally local would go down to the street level – in fact it would go down to house level – but life isn’t ideal and the BBC Local content is a long way from being THAT local.

You might get the odd story you can tie to the odd street – but if you looked at a full detailed map of Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire – the number of pins would still be pretty sparse – even after nearly a decade of being am active site.

Maybe if a partnership agreement could be struck between the BBC and local newspapers you’d get the level of localness you’re looking for.

The BBC has the big regional stuff, local newspapers cover a town and then if you pulled in parish newsletters (giving them a blog or a way of publishing online and encouraged residents associations to blog as well – you could create a fully detailed map with a mass of truly local content.

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31
Dec

Happy New Year!

Well 2008 is finally coming to a close and I’m ending it in a house with no central heating, insulation or warmth in any shape or form.

But you’re not interested in that – only to know I’m sitting here wea3130693854_9ff4fa95a9_bring five layers and tight gloves while typing this blog post – so apologies in advance for any typos.

So what will the new year bring? Well I’ve already outlined some of the things I expect to see happen in the media world in 2009 – and some of the things that did/didn’t happen in 2008.

For me personally my show is going to increase from 45 minutes to an hour, will see the addition of live session recordings and hopefully the odd gig as well.

The BBC Jersey website will get a new look around March and with it I’ll be doing a lot more in the way of people features and leaving the office to go out and about.

And as for this blog – I’m hoping to organise the categories a little bit better – split things up along much more generic lines than I’ve previously used.

In the past I’ve been of the opinion that it is better to split things into a specific a groupings as possible – but as time has gone on I’ve come to the conclusion that categories are a bit of an irrelevance.

I would much rather have some very generic top level categories like Media, Technology, News and Thoughts then use tags to find things beyond that – than the current mess I’ve got at the moment.

I may also further tweak the look and feel of the homepage and sub-pages as well – oh and more video clips for the top right hand side as well as a new audio podcast.

Whatever happens – see you in 2009.

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