Profile for The Hedgehog From Hell:
Hello! If you like things I have done on here, would you be interested in reading a book which I squeezed out of my brain?
You can buy it in electronic format here or as a paperback here.
Twitter (which I rarely even look at): @hellhedgehog
(220kb)
Gosh-darned nuclear goldfish keeps laserin' mah carp
Farm pests: fire leopard, ice owl, water crocodile, earth lobster, wind anteater, lightning chipmunk, magnet crab, nuclear goldfish, razor mantis, mallet badger, electric bear, acid snail, alchemist robin, telekinetic ferret, Apache sparrow, windmill squirrel.
I like spoonerisms.
(86kb)
The great tinfoil hat thread
... on a vaguely related note, Redsushi made me this:
2 Can Chunder awarded me this in the Jan Moir sub-thread:
Less recent front page messages:
Hush.
(Tue 12 Feb 2008, 12:53, More)
Extremely small gladiators!
(Tue 29 Apr 2008, 16:07, More)
Only if I can stick this here.
(Wed 7 May 2008, 23:34, More)
now with added CFB
(Sat 24 Jan 2009, 15:18, More)
Theft detection app for iPhone
(Wed 17 June 2009, 22:28, More)
(Wed 9 Sep 2009, 20:37, More)
KICK HIM OUT
with apologies to Carl Heinrich Bloch
(Fri 25 Sep 2009, 13:11, More)
TOO SOON
(Mon 16 Nov 2009, 13:02, More)
cf.
(Thu 28 Jan 2010, 2:39, More)
Meanwhile, in the sewer
(Thu 26 Aug 2010, 12:18, More)
I doubt this is the first time anyone's done this
(Thu 9 Sep 2010, 14:53, More)
Sir Robert William Askin was the 32nd Premier of New South Wales
(Sun 3 Oct 2010, 19:25, More)
cfb
(Tue 4 Jan 2011, 23:40, )
Birds have souls too, you know.
(Thu 13 Jan 2011, 13:15, More)
Recent front page messages:
Best answers to questions:
[read all their answers]
- a member for 7 years, 3 months and 8 days
- has posted 42143 messages on the main board
- (of which 24 have appeared on the front page)
- has posted 5718 messages on the talk board
- has posted 497 messages on the links board
- (including 16 links)
- has posted 72 stories and 392 replies on question of the week
- They liked 2531 pictures, 199 links, 147 talk posts, and 134 qotw answers. [RSS feed]
- Ignore this user
- Add this user as a friend
- send me a message
Hello! If you like things I have done on here, would you be interested in reading a book which I squeezed out of my brain?
You can buy it in electronic format here or as a paperback here.
Twitter (which I rarely even look at): @hellhedgehog
(220kb)
Gosh-darned nuclear goldfish keeps laserin' mah carp
Farm pests: fire leopard, ice owl, water crocodile, earth lobster, wind anteater, lightning chipmunk, magnet crab, nuclear goldfish, razor mantis, mallet badger, electric bear, acid snail, alchemist robin, telekinetic ferret, Apache sparrow, windmill squirrel.
I like spoonerisms.
(86kb)
The great tinfoil hat thread
... on a vaguely related note, Redsushi made me this:
2 Can Chunder awarded me this in the Jan Moir sub-thread:
Less recent front page messages:
Hush.
(Tue 12 Feb 2008, 12:53, More)
Extremely small gladiators!
(Tue 29 Apr 2008, 16:07, More)
Only if I can stick this here.
(Wed 7 May 2008, 23:34, More)
now with added CFB
(Sat 24 Jan 2009, 15:18, More)
Theft detection app for iPhone
(Wed 17 June 2009, 22:28, More)
(Wed 9 Sep 2009, 20:37, More)
KICK HIM OUT
with apologies to Carl Heinrich Bloch
(Fri 25 Sep 2009, 13:11, More)
TOO SOON
(Mon 16 Nov 2009, 13:02, More)
cf.
(Thu 28 Jan 2010, 2:39, More)
Meanwhile, in the sewer
(Thu 26 Aug 2010, 12:18, More)
I doubt this is the first time anyone's done this
(Thu 9 Sep 2010, 14:53, More)
Sir Robert William Askin was the 32nd Premier of New South Wales
(Sun 3 Oct 2010, 19:25, More)
cfb
(Tue 4 Jan 2011, 23:40, )
Birds have souls too, you know.
(Thu 13 Jan 2011, 13:15, More)
Recent front page messages:
Best answers to questions:
» Evil Pranks
A message from God
My lab partner at university was a kind soul, with a heart of gold. Unfortunately he was also the most incredibly gullible person on the planet. I shall not mention his name, because it would be unfair.
So anyway, Tanvir came from an extremely insular Pakistani community in Glasgow. Quite how he got into 4th year of a pharmacy degree thinking that babies came out of a woman's anus is surely an indictment of the Scottish education system. [N.B. this is not a lie, his flatmates had to sit him down and explain it to him.]
I am a very patient person, and became the one who had to explain to Tani what was happening all the time. I quickly learned not to use sarcasm. We were doing an experiment with the Karl Fischer apparatus, Tani sidled across to me and indicated the only piece of hardware on the bench.
"Is that the Karl Fiss-cher apparatus, the Karl Fiss-cher apparatus?" he asked me. I replied "No, Tani, the Karl Fischer apparatus is broken so today we'll be using the James Smith apparatus instead". Five minutes later I realised he was going through his notes and crossing out every incidence of the words "Karl Fischer" and replacing them with "James Smith".
That is not the story, though. One night I was venting about his denseness to my flatmates (one lapsed Protestant, one Hindu) and in a flash of incensed inspiration I said "I bet his password on the computers is his name!"
The next day we were using the spreadsheets, and he was sitting beside me. I looked out of the corner of my eye as he typed in his password with one finger.
T - A - N - V - I - R
Feeling pleased with my deduction being proved so accurate, I confided in my flatmates that I was correct about his password. They decided to put a message on his screen. I was not involved in the creation of the message. Honest.
The following week in the computer lab (bear in mind this was 1996, computers didn't grow on trees like they do now) I made sure I was sitting behind where he was. I watched as he typed in his password, and strange text filled the screen. "Huh?" he said, and started reading. The two girls sitting beside him noticed his confusion and started reading as well:
"Hello Tanvir, this is Allah.
I have been watching you, and I am pleased with your progress. Soon you will make your family proud.
Remember to abide by your Muslim principles, and continue to resist the temptations of alcohol and women."
(At this stage, the two girls were giggling, and Tani was chuckling in a puzzled manner. His chuckling stopped abruptly and he slapped his hands over the screen as he read the next sentence.)
"So remember: no drinking, no women, and no jerking off in the toilet when you think I can't see you."
The girls started asking him what it said. He made a high-pitched, strangled noise, and shook his head rapidly. He risked taking one hand off the screen to slap it randomly on the keyboard. The text vanished from the screen, so he took his other hand away. Half a second later, it reappeared and he slapped both his hands on the screen again.
Once the offending text had been removed, the tutor asked Tani if he had told anyone his password. "No!" he barked like a dog, shaking his head again.
I do feel bad about it, but we did all genuinely like him (to an extent) and got him to come out of his shell. We even cast him as a unicorn in the pantomime, after he believed another classmate who told him that scientists had captured a unicorn trotting through Duthie Park in Aberdeen.
I'm still not making any of this up.
(Wed 19th Dec 2007, 0:38, More)
A message from God
My lab partner at university was a kind soul, with a heart of gold. Unfortunately he was also the most incredibly gullible person on the planet. I shall not mention his name, because it would be unfair.
So anyway, Tanvir came from an extremely insular Pakistani community in Glasgow. Quite how he got into 4th year of a pharmacy degree thinking that babies came out of a woman's anus is surely an indictment of the Scottish education system. [N.B. this is not a lie, his flatmates had to sit him down and explain it to him.]
I am a very patient person, and became the one who had to explain to Tani what was happening all the time. I quickly learned not to use sarcasm. We were doing an experiment with the Karl Fischer apparatus, Tani sidled across to me and indicated the only piece of hardware on the bench.
"Is that the Karl Fiss-cher apparatus, the Karl Fiss-cher apparatus?" he asked me. I replied "No, Tani, the Karl Fischer apparatus is broken so today we'll be using the James Smith apparatus instead". Five minutes later I realised he was going through his notes and crossing out every incidence of the words "Karl Fischer" and replacing them with "James Smith".
That is not the story, though. One night I was venting about his denseness to my flatmates (one lapsed Protestant, one Hindu) and in a flash of incensed inspiration I said "I bet his password on the computers is his name!"
The next day we were using the spreadsheets, and he was sitting beside me. I looked out of the corner of my eye as he typed in his password with one finger.
T - A - N - V - I - R
Feeling pleased with my deduction being proved so accurate, I confided in my flatmates that I was correct about his password. They decided to put a message on his screen. I was not involved in the creation of the message. Honest.
The following week in the computer lab (bear in mind this was 1996, computers didn't grow on trees like they do now) I made sure I was sitting behind where he was. I watched as he typed in his password, and strange text filled the screen. "Huh?" he said, and started reading. The two girls sitting beside him noticed his confusion and started reading as well:
"Hello Tanvir, this is Allah.
I have been watching you, and I am pleased with your progress. Soon you will make your family proud.
Remember to abide by your Muslim principles, and continue to resist the temptations of alcohol and women."
(At this stage, the two girls were giggling, and Tani was chuckling in a puzzled manner. His chuckling stopped abruptly and he slapped his hands over the screen as he read the next sentence.)
"So remember: no drinking, no women, and no jerking off in the toilet when you think I can't see you."
The girls started asking him what it said. He made a high-pitched, strangled noise, and shook his head rapidly. He risked taking one hand off the screen to slap it randomly on the keyboard. The text vanished from the screen, so he took his other hand away. Half a second later, it reappeared and he slapped both his hands on the screen again.
Once the offending text had been removed, the tutor asked Tani if he had told anyone his password. "No!" he barked like a dog, shaking his head again.
I do feel bad about it, but we did all genuinely like him (to an extent) and got him to come out of his shell. We even cast him as a unicorn in the pantomime, after he believed another classmate who told him that scientists had captured a unicorn trotting through Duthie Park in Aberdeen.
I'm still not making any of this up.
(Wed 19th Dec 2007, 0:38, More)
» Redundant technology
Sony NW-A3000
In 2006, I decided to take six months off work and go around the world. CDs were a stupid, bulky and inefficient way to transport lots of music with me, so I decided to get an MP3 player.
Ipods were everywhere, but the Sony one had a good battery life, and it was available in purple. Purple is my favourite colour. Also, the text appears in white letters on the front of the device, as if by magic.
It suffered from the usual Sony curse of good hardware but lousy software. The Connect software that came with it caused my (new) computer to crash, and Sony soon disowned it and went back to their older SonicStage software. I transferred all my CDs into my computer, and stuck them on the little purple thing. They all fitted onto the 20gb hard drive with room to spare.
The long battery life was a godsend. It survived days on planes, trains and buses without needing to be charged.
It survived being dropped on the dock of Ha Long Bay in Vietnam, it shrugged off getting soaked in seawater on dinghys between the Whitsunday Islands in Australia, it lasted through freezing temperatures at night on Fraser Island. I bought a car in New Zealand and installed a stereo which took a headphone input, and it saved me from hours of religious radio stations in the south island.
Three years later, I decided to go off around the world again. The choice I had was either to replace it, or to stick with it. The battery was almost dead, and didn't hold a charge anymore.
All the music on my computer was in ATRAC format, which was not supported by any newer equipment. I could have re-ripped all my CDs, but that would have taken ages. Far simpler to buy a replacement battery on Amazon, take the thing apart and put the new battery in.
It had a couple of hairy moments. It conked out on a bus in Peru at about 4500 metres above sea level, but I borrowed a hairpin from someone and stuck it in the "reset" hole, and it worked fine after that. It survived the altitude and freezing temperatures on a mountain trek in Nepal. Higher up the mountains, it cost 10 rupees to plug it in and recharge it, but it was worth it.
It's been dropped more times than I can remember, frozen, baked, scratched, soaked, almost lost - the time when I thought I'd lost it in New Zealand, I would seriously have considered cutting my trip short and going home early.
It's been with me during most of the defining moments of my adult life. It has survived everything it's been put through, and it still works perfectly. OK, so it's old, and it takes ages to go through the menu screens, but it works.
And... it plays songs without a gap between tracks, which other contemporary MP3 players were not able to do. This may seem an odd thing to celebrate, but when you're playing an album on which the songs run into each other, it's important.
I've got it plugged into my amp right now, it's randomly cycling through songs I've given a 5-star rating and playing them on the 5.1 speakers. Sure, the sound quality isn't as good as you'd get from a CD, but I defy any normal human to actually give a shit enough to be able to tell the difference.
When it dies, I'll throw it out. Right now, though, it's giving every indication that it intends to live forever.
(Sat 6th Nov 2010, 23:41, More)
Sony NW-A3000
In 2006, I decided to take six months off work and go around the world. CDs were a stupid, bulky and inefficient way to transport lots of music with me, so I decided to get an MP3 player.
Ipods were everywhere, but the Sony one had a good battery life, and it was available in purple. Purple is my favourite colour. Also, the text appears in white letters on the front of the device, as if by magic.
It suffered from the usual Sony curse of good hardware but lousy software. The Connect software that came with it caused my (new) computer to crash, and Sony soon disowned it and went back to their older SonicStage software. I transferred all my CDs into my computer, and stuck them on the little purple thing. They all fitted onto the 20gb hard drive with room to spare.
The long battery life was a godsend. It survived days on planes, trains and buses without needing to be charged.
It survived being dropped on the dock of Ha Long Bay in Vietnam, it shrugged off getting soaked in seawater on dinghys between the Whitsunday Islands in Australia, it lasted through freezing temperatures at night on Fraser Island. I bought a car in New Zealand and installed a stereo which took a headphone input, and it saved me from hours of religious radio stations in the south island.
Three years later, I decided to go off around the world again. The choice I had was either to replace it, or to stick with it. The battery was almost dead, and didn't hold a charge anymore.
All the music on my computer was in ATRAC format, which was not supported by any newer equipment. I could have re-ripped all my CDs, but that would have taken ages. Far simpler to buy a replacement battery on Amazon, take the thing apart and put the new battery in.
It had a couple of hairy moments. It conked out on a bus in Peru at about 4500 metres above sea level, but I borrowed a hairpin from someone and stuck it in the "reset" hole, and it worked fine after that. It survived the altitude and freezing temperatures on a mountain trek in Nepal. Higher up the mountains, it cost 10 rupees to plug it in and recharge it, but it was worth it.
It's been dropped more times than I can remember, frozen, baked, scratched, soaked, almost lost - the time when I thought I'd lost it in New Zealand, I would seriously have considered cutting my trip short and going home early.
It's been with me during most of the defining moments of my adult life. It has survived everything it's been put through, and it still works perfectly. OK, so it's old, and it takes ages to go through the menu screens, but it works.
And... it plays songs without a gap between tracks, which other contemporary MP3 players were not able to do. This may seem an odd thing to celebrate, but when you're playing an album on which the songs run into each other, it's important.
I've got it plugged into my amp right now, it's randomly cycling through songs I've given a 5-star rating and playing them on the 5.1 speakers. Sure, the sound quality isn't as good as you'd get from a CD, but I defy any normal human to actually give a shit enough to be able to tell the difference.
When it dies, I'll throw it out. Right now, though, it's giving every indication that it intends to live forever.
(Sat 6th Nov 2010, 23:41, More)
» Travel
I was a Scot living and working in Bournemouth
for about 14 months in 1998-1999. At this time, a long-forgotten airline was doing cheap-ish flights between Bournemouth and Edinburgh/Glasgow, and advertising them incessantly on STV.
I was walking through the city centre one day in the summer, and the female half of a fat Glaswegian couple accosted someone walking the other way and asked "'scuse me, where's the beach?"
"Ah dunno, just got off the plane mahself" replied the equally Weegie questionee.
These worthless, weekend-tripping fat-sacks were skimming the surface of Bournemouth's rich culture for a couple of days while I was living and working in the local community. Unless you've done that, you have no right even to claim you've been somewhere. You haven't experienced a damn thing of the place, and the locals have utter contempt for you - unlike those of us who truly travel somewhere and contribute something of ourselves.
Those fucking tourists made me want to vomit with disgust.
(Tue 23rd Apr 2013, 21:10, More)
I was a Scot living and working in Bournemouth
for about 14 months in 1998-1999. At this time, a long-forgotten airline was doing cheap-ish flights between Bournemouth and Edinburgh/Glasgow, and advertising them incessantly on STV.
I was walking through the city centre one day in the summer, and the female half of a fat Glaswegian couple accosted someone walking the other way and asked "'scuse me, where's the beach?"
"Ah dunno, just got off the plane mahself" replied the equally Weegie questionee.
These worthless, weekend-tripping fat-sacks were skimming the surface of Bournemouth's rich culture for a couple of days while I was living and working in the local community. Unless you've done that, you have no right even to claim you've been somewhere. You haven't experienced a damn thing of the place, and the locals have utter contempt for you - unlike those of us who truly travel somewhere and contribute something of ourselves.
Those fucking tourists made me want to vomit with disgust.
(Tue 23rd Apr 2013, 21:10, More)
» Worst Band Ever
Kings of Leon
Last Christmas, I was stuck in Kathmandu for a week. There are lots of bars in Thamel, the tourist district, and there are lots of covers bands playing in them.
I got talking to the bass player in one of these bands (and the Nepalese equivalent of Bez, but that's another story) and he confirmed what I already suspected: that the bands all know each other, and the line-ups are pretty fluid. Everyone has pretty much played in everyone else's band at some point.
Consequently, all these bands play all the same cover versions, in pretty much the same order.
I have always utterly bemused by the Kings of Leon's widespread appeal. I had quite a few discussions with other people about them, usually women, and it seemed to boil down to them being cute. Fair enough, if you like tone-deaf howling hairy inbreds, but I don't listen to Cheryl Cole's musical output because she's attractive.
So I hated Kings of Leon already, but after enduring repeated power cuts at night, and then hearing "WAAaaaaAAAAAH THEEES ECKS izz un FAAAAAYAAAAAAAAH" reverberating repeatedly from one covers band after another after another after another from all the nearby bars, I learned to truly loathe them.
Purveyors of lumpen, unimaginative, growly stodge, the musical equivalent of cheap supermarket sausages. Seven months later, I heard that they'd been forced to leave the stage after a bunch of pigeons shat on them from the rafters. I had never realised that pigeons had any taste.
(Thu 30th Dec 2010, 17:35, More)
Kings of Leon
Last Christmas, I was stuck in Kathmandu for a week. There are lots of bars in Thamel, the tourist district, and there are lots of covers bands playing in them.
I got talking to the bass player in one of these bands (and the Nepalese equivalent of Bez, but that's another story) and he confirmed what I already suspected: that the bands all know each other, and the line-ups are pretty fluid. Everyone has pretty much played in everyone else's band at some point.
Consequently, all these bands play all the same cover versions, in pretty much the same order.
I have always utterly bemused by the Kings of Leon's widespread appeal. I had quite a few discussions with other people about them, usually women, and it seemed to boil down to them being cute. Fair enough, if you like tone-deaf howling hairy inbreds, but I don't listen to Cheryl Cole's musical output because she's attractive.
So I hated Kings of Leon already, but after enduring repeated power cuts at night, and then hearing "WAAaaaaAAAAAH THEEES ECKS izz un FAAAAAYAAAAAAAAH" reverberating repeatedly from one covers band after another after another after another from all the nearby bars, I learned to truly loathe them.
Purveyors of lumpen, unimaginative, growly stodge, the musical equivalent of cheap supermarket sausages. Seven months later, I heard that they'd been forced to leave the stage after a bunch of pigeons shat on them from the rafters. I had never realised that pigeons had any taste.
(Thu 30th Dec 2010, 17:35, More)
» Midlife Crisis
As a ssssnake, you learn to think of each year asssss a new life.
You emerge from hibernation, sssslither out into the warming sssspring air, and ssssstart to feed. Asssss the height of ssssummer approachessss, you feel yoursssself grow as a persssson: ssssspiritually, and physsssically.
Then the time comessss to be reborn. You sssslough off your old sssskin, and emerge from the battered, plassssticky hussssk of what ussssed to be you; now you are a new sssssnake.
The elasssssticity of your new sssskin allowssss you go expand physically, so you fill yourssssself with tassssty morssselsss, ready for the next hibernation. Then you ssssleep, and when you wake it isss assss if life hassss begun again.
My favourite part of thissss yearly processsss of life issss undoubtedly the midpoint: the point when I shed.
(Fri 3rd May 2013, 19:34, More)
As a ssssnake, you learn to think of each year asssss a new life.
You emerge from hibernation, sssslither out into the warming sssspring air, and ssssstart to feed. Asssss the height of ssssummer approachessss, you feel yoursssself grow as a persssson: ssssspiritually, and physsssically.
Then the time comessss to be reborn. You sssslough off your old sssskin, and emerge from the battered, plassssticky hussssk of what ussssed to be you; now you are a new sssssnake.
The elasssssticity of your new sssskin allowssss you go expand physically, so you fill yourssssself with tassssty morssselsss, ready for the next hibernation. Then you ssssleep, and when you wake it isss assss if life hassss begun again.
My favourite part of thissss yearly processsss of life issss undoubtedly the midpoint: the point when I shed.
(Fri 3rd May 2013, 19:34, More)