Yes, as the title of this post proclaims, the plague that is Hello Kitty has now also spread to wedding dresses. I’m guessing they were thinking: “hey if Disney can do it, why can’t we?”

The most expensive of the bunch goes for about $4000 and is pink, pink and… well, pink:

The rest are not as exuberant as that, but also not what you’d typically think as a wedding dress. This next one has big heart stuck on your bosom, with more hearts surrounding the hem of the dress:

Even without the little Hello Kitty logo, I’d be hard-pressed to wear this dress. The fur is just too much (or not enough, I can easily imagine winter dresses with fur, but then it’s actually practical), it’s the “I want to be a cuddly toy!” dress: 

Hmm. As a “fancy dress” dress this would be fine, but a wedding dress?

From all the dresses in the bunch, I like this one the most. The Hello Kitty is almost unnoticeable and it doesn’t feel to costume-y. Still it doesn’t look like your typical wedding dress.  

[Via Wedding Bells Blog]

Here’s the first photo of our trip to Liverpool last weekend. It’s a statue of Captain FJ Walker (nicknamed Johnnie Walker like the whiskey).

Looking at this photo, you’d think there is a completely different story behind the statue. A man waiting for a long lost lover, always keeping watch in the hope her ship will sail in. Binoculars and red rose in hand.

Episode 93: “I don’t think the dead care about vengeance”

Not too long ago I posted a trailer mash-up of Toy Story and The Dark Knight (see post). Here’s a similar trailer, but now for The Incredibles and Quantum of Solace:

[Watch the video on YouTube]

Besides BarCampBerlin last year, I’ve actually only been to BarCamps in London and Brighton. Most of the time it’s just too much of a hassle to make it to unconferences in other cities, cause it’s so expensive (wishing the train ticket prices here were like in Netherland; then again, the distances here are much further) and too difficult to get there. Thanks to some of the sponsors though at this Liverpool BarCamp, Cristiano and I got offered to get our travel expenses covered (being BarCamp veterans has it’s perks). Besides that, Alistair and Caz were so great to let us stay at the apartment they were renting. So last Friday, we caught the train up to Liverpool, visiting another part of the UK we hadn’t been to before.

This barCamp was held at the Novas Contemporary Urban Centre, a great venue with loads of rooms and space. It also had it’s own bar down stairs, so later on in the evening we all moved there for the “party”. The food wasn’t exactly fantastic (again cold pizza), but for once there were other drinks besides only fizzy stuff. 

Here are a couple of the most interesting talks that I went to: 

Geocaching

This talk from Alistair was a great introduction to everything Geocaching. Although I’ve already gotten the Geocaching bug and have found some caches myself, there were still quite some stuff I didn’t know about. For instance, I kind of knew what travel bugs and geocoins were, but hadn’t seen or dealt with any of them before. Besides that I’m hunting caches down with pen, paper and a printed out Google map, while the “proper” way is to actually use a GPS device; it was great finding out a bit more about that too. Later that afternoon we skipped two of the sessions to go geocaching in Liverpool.

Game Design – Player Motivations

This talk was about the different player archetypes within video games. There are 4 types: 1. the Achiever, who want to collect, unlock everything (totally me!), 2. the Explorer, who wants to understand the map and discover new and hidden features, 3. the Socialiser, who plays with friends and to make new friends, and 4. the Killer, who screws other people over. Basically most video games are designed while targeting one or two of these archetypes. We had to figure out from 5 games which archetypes they were targeting (Gears of War, Geometry Wars, Mirror’s Edge, Left 4 Dead, Word of Warcraft).

Quiz Spectacular!

Because I went geocaching, I missed the first round of this game, but was still able to join Cristiano’s team, the Awkward Silences. The second round was about guessing the keyword that connected 4 other words, each word appearing after a couple of seconds. I scored some points by guessing the keyword that connects “The Lion King”, “Bernard and the Genie”, and “Love Actually” (I won’t give it away, can you figure it out?). The third round was pretty similar, but here you had to guess the 4th keyword in a sequence (I liked the George, Timothy, Pierce one). The fourth round were Google search questions and I scored some points again with the name of the wife of the 14th president of the US. Finally there was a showdown between the two highest scoring teams, one of which was our team! The team nominated me to go up and play the game, which was basically guessing a list of words based on the descriptions by my team mates (kicking myself that I didn’t get William Shatner, because I thought Cristiano said “Actress in Star Trek”). 

Bitchin’ Pitches

The last session on the Saturday was a one minute pitch session. I wasn’t really planning on presenting anything; I mean, I don’t have a startup or anything actually developed, but right at the end of the session, I thought I’d go ahead and pitch the idea that’s been spinning in my head for ages (a book reading habits website). Much to my surprise, I got chosen to do a 5-minute pitch later that evening at the party, in front of a panel of judges. Eek! My presentation didn’t go that great (but then I hadn’t really thought it through yet), but a lot of people were interested in my idea. Plus I won a Bluetooth marketing dongle (I still have to figure out what this exactly does, but I think this means I can spam people) and a £50 Amazon voucher (yay!).

There were also more great sessions on the Sunday, but to be honest I was still feeling fairly hungover at the time so wasn’t participating as much as I wanted to. Again, thanks to everyone who made this trip possible; I had a fantastic time!

Last Tuesday i played around with taking some portraits of myself through the mirror. The sun was just so pretty and I knew I had to at least try to experiment a bit with it. At a certain stage though, the sun shifted in such a way that the dirt and spots on the mirror were highlighted and I had to stop. Next goal: learning how to use the remote and taking pictures of myself that way.

This photo reminds me a bit of a book cover, like it could be called The Blogger’s Gambit or The Adorable Geek 🙂

The second in this series. Not my most elegant expression, but I like the contrast of the light and dark halves.

Here’s the third (and for now, I think, final) photo of my mirror session. Again it’s not completely showing my face, and I love the way my right eye is only partly in it. I should learn to make some more ‘intense’ expressions.

Ever since A Life Less Ordinary, I’ve been intrigued by its director: Danny Boyle. Each movie he makes seems so different compared to the others, but I always feel he has an interesting story to tell. And I have to say this is one intriguing little movie.

Slumdog Millionaire opens with our main character Jamal being interrogated by the Mumbai police, who think he has cheated on India’s version of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? Jamal is only one step away from winning the main prize of 20 million rupees, and the police don’t believe he could have known all the answers. As the inspector says, if even doctors and lawyers can’t reach that final question, how could Jamal, a slumdog from the poorest parts of Mumbai, know them? Desperate to prove his innocence, Jamal tells the tale of his life and how each answer to the questions in the games show is interwoven in a chapter of his life.

Some people will tell you this film is amazing and that it should win Best Picture at the Academy Awards next year. And they may very well be right; Slumdog Millionaire does feel like the type of fair Oscar voters will gladly bite into and from whatever other films that might be nominated (you know I’m not the Oscar loving type) I’d like to be rooting for this one.

I think the best way to describe the movie is this: Take City of God. Change the setting from Rio De Janeiro to Mumbai. Add more hope and positivity, and a touch of love. And you’ve got Slumdog Millionaire. Like City of God, this movie gives a realistic view of the slums in Mumbai and it can be grim and depressing at times. You really have a feeling as if you’re seeing a side of Mumbai which is normally not seen. Unlike City of God though, there remains a ray of cheeriness and optimism throughout the entire movie. 

I don’t want to say this movie is amazing. Cause to be honest, I didn’t find it a-m-a-z-i-n-g. The plot feels a bit too coincidental (the way every question ties in with part of his past), while it could have been done slightly more subtle. On the other side though it’s gotten really stuck in my head and I keep thinking about it. At it’s heart Slumdog Millionaire is like a fairy tale and you just can’t help liking it.

That being said, Slumdog Millionaire is definitely a film you should watch in the cinema. It’s got more heart and charm than other movies you’ll find currently there and I won’t be surprised if it indeed manages to grab that Best Picture Oscar!

UK Release Date: 9 January 2009
US Release Date: 12 November 2008
Runtime: 120 min

Interesting links for November 30th through December 4th:

• Resampled Space – Amazing "photos" of a Belgium photographer who "combines photographs of parts of buildings into new, fictional, architectonic structures". He's created some cool looking, but slightly impossible structures.
• Vintage Ads: Oldies But Goodies – Wow, vintage ads! Get a fridge to match your style and decor… Love the French Provincial one.
• 50 Strange Buildings of the World – Great list of cool buildings.
• 50 Reasons – Did you catch last week's How I Met Your Mother? Here's Lily's complete list of 50 reasons to have sex.

As a kid, I loved The Secret Garden. Not the story though, but the idea, the concept of something beautiful hidden away. This photo reminds me of that; you can’t see what the end of the path is leading to… could it be a secret garden?

I’ve been asked a couple of times to blog about the events that I’m organizing for the London Geek Dinners. So here’s a quick repeat of three of our upcoming December events:

Mini-GeekDinner: The Death of Reading

The days are getting shorter, the air is getting colder and the fleeting strains of Christmas songs are right around the corner. One last mini GeekDinner before the end of the year! 

This time our guest will be Adrian Hon, Chief Creative Officer at Six to Start. He is one of the main designers and producers behind Perplex City, the world’s first commercially successful ARG (Alternate Reality Game) and has since then been at the forefront of ARG development. This time though Adrian will give us a talk on “The Death of Reading”. 

Again the venue will be our regular Hummus Bros in Holborn at 18:30, with the talk starting between 19:30-20:00. Food will be on a get your own basis, so no need to pay online. If you’re running late and can’t find us at the Holborn place anymore, we’ve probably moved on to the pub down the street.

When: Wednesday, December 10th 2008 18:30
Where: Hummus Bros in Holborn
Speaker: Adrian Hon from Six to Start
Topic: The Death of Reading
Cost: Food and drinks on buy your own basis

Please RSVP on our signup site if you are coming, there is only limited seating.

BBC Backstage Christmas Bash

BBC Backstage is teaming up with most London and Manchester communities to hold two Christmas parties. We will be drinking, having fun, and probably make a fool of ourselves on the dance floor. Will you join us?

Tickets have been really popular and they’ve now run out of standard tickets. But don’t worry! Ticket holders have priority and a guaranteed entry, but basically if by 8pm the venue isn’t full (there’s always a certain number of people who register and can’t make it or just stay for one drink), they’re allowing people to turn up at the door.

For more information, check out the event page.

London Geek Meet 3: Cold War Modern

Again another London Geek Meet! And again something a bit different. This time we’ll be going to the Victoria & Albert Museum for their special Cold War Modern exhibition. Here’s the description about the exhibition from their site:

This period from the end of the Second World War to the mid 1970s was a period of great political tension and exceptional creativity which touched all aspects of life, from everyday products to the highest arenas of human achievement in science and culture. Art and design were not peripheral symptoms of politics during the Cold War: they played a central role in representing and sometimes challenging the dominant political and social ideas of the age.

I’ve heard a lot of good things about this exhibition, including the fun and mysterious promotion of it through The 7th Syndikate. And thanks to the guys at 1000heads we’ve gotten 10 free tickets to share with you all!

To make it fair though, we won’t be giving these tickets away. Our idea is this: depending on the amount of people who sign up, the cost of the extra tickets that have to be bought, will be split over all people who attend. So if 15 people sign up, everybody pays £3 (£9*5/15). If you are interested in coming, emailmseckington@gmail.com. This is absolutely necessary, because we’ll probably have to book tickets for a specific time slot.

Because not everyone has been to the Victoria & Albert Museum before, we thought it would be a great opportunity to also see the rest of the museum. We’ll meetup at 11:00 before the entrance in Cromwell Road. If you’re only interested in the Cold War Modern exhibition, we’ll have a second meet-up point at 14:00 inside the musuem in the hall before the exhibition. 

When: Sunday, December 14th
Time: 11:00 for main museum, 14:00 for Cold War exhibition only
Where: Victoria & Albert Museum
Nearest Tube: South Kensington
Activity: Museum exhibition
Cost: Food and coffee on buy your own basis, tickets depending on how many people sign up (won’t be more than £7 per person though)

Sign up by sending an email to mseckington@gmail.com.

I love how this one turned out, with the in-focus poly-what-ya-ma-call-it in the front and the other nice and fuzzy in the back:

Check out more of my photos on Flickr.