Joss Whedon’s latest venture is Dr Horrible’s Sing-along Blog. He’s releasing it for free viewing this week on the web at http://www.drhorrible.com until the 20th of July.

Act 1 went up last night, with Act 2 due on Thursday and Act 3 on Saturday before it vanishes on Sunday.

Its well worth a look. I just watched Act 1 and its a great laugh

So, I remember talking to some friends yesterday during the day regarding my fears for the UEFA Cup Final in Manchester.

I knew that Rangers fans were descending en masse, and most of who had been drinking since the Tuesday.   I pointed out that I hoped things went smoothly, as the scope for things to kick off was quite high.

So I was really sorry to see the news today that things had infact, gone sour and Rangers fans had spent the night trashing as much of Manchester as they could get their hands on

For the record, I’m no football fan.   Partly because I’m a geek by trade, so me and sports have never mixed well.   But also because of my upbringing in Glasgow.  The biggotry and general unpleasantness that goes alongside football in this city is hard to avoid, and its put me off the game almost completely.

Still, it always made me happy when I saw Scottish fans at international matches, having a great time, and being well-liked by the locals.

Last night however was a disgrace.   Watching the news, with the mobs chasing down police officers has made me ashamed to be associated with these people, by virtue of where I’m from.    There’s no doubt in my mind that what they did has damaged Glagow, Scottish Football, and Scotland itself.

(As a side note, I should clarify by saying that I’m not trying to tar all Rangers fans with the same brush. I’m aware that the people instigating this were probably wearing a Rangers top for the first time in their lives, and many fans were there and had a great time without rioting. However there’s no doubt as to how this looked for the Rangers fans).

So this morning, there was only one Sun vendor, operating from a booth/box thing standing outside the tube station.

Who says bitching online doesn’t accomplish anything

Time to break out the “rant” tag

This time its about newspapers on our public transport. I grab a Metro everyday, but other companies have started to decide they want a piece of that circulation. And my main rant is the disruption its causing when you’re trying to actually use the public transport. I’m pretty blinkered when its 5 o’clock and I want to get home, in that I just want to get into the station, and onto a train (tube or otherwise). However its starting to become a fine art.

The number of people the Sun have got flogging their papers at the tube stations is absurd. Hillhead tube station’s currently got three of them. Its a small station, and its a quiet time of day, there’s just no need for that many people there thrusting newspapers in your face. Apparently its the same at Cesnock station.

And yesterday one guy helpfully positioned himself right in front of the barriers to try and flog the paper to people, meaning you practically had to shove past him to get to the tube.

And at lunch I noticed an Evening Times seller setting up right at the entrance to the Bunchanan Street escalators.

This is going to get soooo much worse if its not nipped in the bud.

Its already a pain in the neck dodging past the people with free Records at the station doors when you’re trying to catch your train at night. At least the Records are free but do they really need to position themselves right by the main entrance to cause maximum disruption? Especially given how busy the main entrances to the stations can get.

Honestly, the Metro have by far the best system. They just set up bins in each station, and you can go over and grab a paper, or ignore them and get on with your day. Heck of a lot better.

Well, Friday night was the latest Riechoes gig.

This time they were playing Nice ‘N’ Sleazy in Glasgow, and the place was packed. Despite being the first band up, the downstairs was standing room only (and not much of that), with a great atmosphere as they played through their set. Some great new tracks as well.

Another cracking gig. Looking forward to the next one, and hopefully this time I’ll be able to drag some people out with me

Mitch Benn has released the video to his re-release of “Happy Birthday War”, a song he originally created for the Now Show. He mentioned in his podcast that its going to be available via iTunes, so I’ll need to check that out tonight.

Happy Birthday War by Mitch Benn

I’ve been meaning to write about this for a while but kept getting distracted.

The other weekend I ended up in Dunkeld for a walk with a friend. We’d been up once before, and I instantly became a big fan of the place, so was keen to go again. It really is beautiful up there And I encourage anyone to head up there when they want to get away from it all and enjoy a nice small town and some beautiful scenery.

I only stopped to take a couple of pictures, but I thought I’d put them on the blog for others to enjoy.  We were fortunate that it was such a nice day, but we enjoyed a nice walk along the River Tay.

Well, its a rare non-Knight Rider post from me tonight

I was out catching new Glasgow band playing at Barfly tonight. It was the first Glasgow gig for The Riechoes, my brother’s new band.

It was an excellent gig, and they’ve got some excellent numbers. Personal bias aside, I definitely recommend any readers check them out live at their next gig.

You can hear some of their stuff, and follow their news at their myspace page:

http://www.myspace.com/theriechoes

Long Way Round was something I’d always meant to see, and earlier last year, I was gifted the DVD, which I sat, watched and thoroughly enjoyed.

I then got the book for Christmas this year (along with the DVD and book of Long Way Down) which I’ve been working my way through.

Its truely fascinating stuff, following Ewan and Charley’s trip of a lifetime around the world. Even just watching it on TV, its amazing to get those glimpses into other cultures, so the affect it must have had on those involved in the trip must’ve been truely profound.

The book also provides a good counter-point to the TV series. While the TV series did a good job of balancing the trials and joys of the journey, the book provides a slightly starker look at how challenging the trip could be.

Certainly by halfway through the book, I was left wondering why these two would go through it all again for Long Way Down, as both actors are very upfront about having to confront their own demons, with Charley accepting that his constant worrying about things is leading to clashes, and both actors battling the poor moods that the constant travelling through poor conditions can cause. However, as the book goes on, and they start travelling through Mongolia, Ewan especially starts to find the trip that he dreamed of, camping out in the Wilderness and meeting warm-hearted strangers to whom he is just a passing traveller and not just “Obi Wan Kenobi on a bike”.

Its a heart-warming read how these encounters clearly touched both actors quite profoundly and you can’t help but revel in their triumph as they finally reach Manhatten.

Now I’ve just got to get cracking on the Long Way Down book

Just for anyone that was wondering if I was still going to “re-spin” my Dr Who video

I definitely am, but annoyingly the Nero project file had become corrupted. Originally I’d figured that I could fix a few of the pacing issues by re-juggling the existing clips, but with the project file dead, it meant I’m going to have to rebuild the whole thing from scratch.

Something that hasn’t been helped by Nero deciding to become very unstable on my home PC, and crashing constantly.

As a result, I’m taking the advantage to look into getting a proper movie editing package. I’m on a budget, but I’m currently looking at Ulead Video Studio 11, and I’ve downloaded the trial to see if it’ll be worth getting.