Nature. Oops.

I just screengrabbed this:

http://www.zotz.demon.co.uk/oops.nature.jpg

It's from Nature's website, of course (but may be finished by the time you read this). Now, the big question is :

Should I send it to NTK?

Trip, ex-Hobotalk, MC.

The trip back up from was crowded, possibly because of half-term. The woman next to me was going from Reading to Dundee, which sounds like a nightmare journey if ever there was one, and the much younger woman opposite was reading a book on inflation and covering sheets of paper with densely-scribed physics equations. I was reading Last exit to Brooklyn, which has finally bubbled to the top of my to-read pile. It's very very good.

improb is also very good.

karmicnull to note : Marc Pilley of Hobotalk has a band called Brother Grapevine. Presumably this means Hobotalk are an ex-Hobotalk.

Today I am in possession of a new cartridge. It's an Ortofon, and it's very nice, which at that money it bloody well ought to be.

All my records sound fantastic. The ones I've listened to, anyway. I'm scared to go back to the ones I've stopped liking or never liked much, in case they sound fantastic too.

Weekend, MC15, Rollei.

So while in London (yes, I'm doing this the wrong way round) I went to B-Movie with Fiona. It was very good, as usual, but more crowded than I've seen it for a while. Too many friends were there and I didn't really manage to talk to any of them as much as I'd have wanted, and I didn't talk to some friends at all. Fiona unfortunately got zapped by the cigarette smoke and had a nasty relapse of her cold, wiping her out for all of Saturday most effectively. On Sunday she felt much better, and we went to see Shaun of the Dead somewhere in the wastes of the Docklands. It's very good. In fact, I'd say that this is the zombie film (Romantic comedy, with zombies. Rom-Zom-Com) for people who don't like zombie films (although my friends who do like them tell me that it's a damn good zombie film for those who do like them too. And one of these is Andrew Wilson, with whom you may take up the argument if you wish).

I should probably mention at this point that the reason I went down this weekend rather than any other is that it's my last weekend with a free monday off. I'm re-entering the world of paid employment on monday coming. I'll be working for the University again, out at KB (Daniel Rutherford building, for thse it makes any difference to), minding a pair of confocal microscopes, the associated computers and any other imaging equipment the teams in the building need. Now, it has to be said that about microscopes I know fuck nothing, or close to. That's OK, though. They're happy to teach me about these things. All I know is that confocals are impressive beasties.

Anyway, this was also the reason why I decided to finally go for the new cartridge. It's an MC15 (as if anyone cares), so I've entered the scary world of the low-output moving-coil. And do you know something? Things sound nice out here. Only one Morphine album got a vinyl release . . . and it sounds stunning. It was Hugo Largo and Pixies on the turntable earlier. I should do this kind of thing more often.

I went to the shop (Hifi corner, to of Leith Walk) last Thursday and spoke to the blokes there about cartridges. They recommended the Ortofon, which was one of the ones I'd been vaguely considering but hadn't been sure about - it might be wasted on the deck and arm, I thought. Today I took the deck in expecting to leave it with them, but they offered to do it while I was there. It didn't take very long either, as the suspension was perfectly set up already (done by my flatmate James a few years ago just before he sold it to me - Thanks J) so they didn't charge me for the fitting either. And while one was on the phone, the other got a can of pledge out and gave it a rub-down. All part of the service, apparently.

After setting it up, Springsteen's album "Tunnel of Love" went on for the duration of the first song. It sounded very clear, but I don't know it at all so I couldn't judge. I said as much, and the guy who'd done the setup said that he only knew it because it was a good test disk - he'd never listen to it otherwise. A bit harsh?

Also, the little Rollei is fixable, but only at a cost slightly over half what it would cost to replace. Well, I suppose if I will go wearing out the controls, I'll have to pay. And after all, it's a much nicer camera to use than most. Actually, maybe that's why I did use it so much. Maybe getting it fixed is self-defeating.

At some point I have to finish off the weekend before, and the one before that. Ho hum.