I think this little one likes being petted.

You’ve got to love it when randomly browsing the web, you come across a company who have named themselves after the exact thing you are trying to achieve. Step forward Underground Living Ltd. It looks like they do one thing, but they try and do it well. It’s more of an addendum to a house, rather than a complete underground living area, but the gallery and the animation on the site look lovely and clean and tidy.

Another tiny quote from Mr M: We were the fastest on track again this year. We didn’t steal this. Same car, same team, same results - the only difference was the rain! Last year’s race clearly affected him more than it appeared!

I’ve been getting more and more dissatisfied with Wordpress, and although I still maintain it is an excellent place to set up your first blog and start getting published, it’s limitations were beginning to get to me. In point of fact, all I wanted to do was to change the font on my template. Typekit fonts are a bit ahead of their time, whilst the Custom CSS function was not really accessible on the template I was using.

It looks so good in HD. When you compare it with the terrible trailer, the difference is stunning. If only you could buy movies in HD from iTunes, I would snap up all three of them. I love that I am watching this film for about the fiftieth time, and I am still noticing things. Like the ice cold car, and the pink bits on Doc’s radiation suit. LOVE IT.

Here it is, then, the final header of our second batch. We’ve reached our twentieth design, which honestly blows my mind a little bit. This one came from the background texture, which was a kind of wallpaper, I think. I wasn’t keen on it being wallpaper, so I tried the stripy filter to sort of bring it to life a bit. It could almost be a curtain, with ripples in, except they are a bit too regimented, and a bit too diagonal as well. Once again, I was playing around with the text, as that is somewhere I really need to concentrate my efforts.

Franck, along with Sarrazin and Lamy, won the 2010 Petit Le Mans yesterday. I didn’t watch it but all I’ve seen suggests it was a great race, interesting throughout, and it wasn’t until the final couple of hours that Peugeot seemed to have it in the bag. They took up two steps of the podium with Allan McNish for Audi in third. A snippet from the Autosport report: …the Audi R15 of Allan McNish/Dindo Capello/Tom Kristensen had a very real chance of winning, while the second 908 of Anthony Davidson/Marc Gene/Alex Wurz was waiting in the wings on the lead lap.But when Capello was briefly blinded when his balaclava slipped over his eyes, causing him to concede the lead to Montagny and then to pit out of sequence and thus drop off the lead lap, the cars fell perfectly into Peugeot’s hands.

Time for a change. This site is moving from Wordpress to Squarespace, and that means you’ll need to update your feed subscriptions and suchlike. Please visit: http://www.mrschristine.com for the new site. I’ll be waiting. (This will remain for a while, until I point Smarter Than at the new place.) A change is as good as a rest!

I got to have a peek at the brand new Kindle today, and although I was expecting to want to steal it from my brother - who is the proud owner of the device - it actually turned out that I wasn’t that keen on it. I love the device from a distance, I love people that have a Kindle, and I encourage people to get one if they want one, but here are five reasons I wasn’t keen.

Finally, Kenton and Kathi have split up! Who else is completely and utterly relieved? It started at that golf club dinner thing, when Kenton was doing his best, as per usual, and Kathi was being annoying, as per usual. She told him she didn’t need any help, then complained when he didn’t help her. Granted, he did punch her boss, and when he moved out, he immediately got drunk and arrested, but still, her claims that he was childish and unreliable still seemed unfair.

Instant Search has been out and about for a while now, and I can’t see that it’s made my life any better, but I don’t particularly hate it either. I’ve been catching up with some TWiT podcasts, and Leo has talked extensively about why they would choose to implement something like this and what purpose it serves. It’s an interesting subject, because search is so very fundamental to the way I use the web. My brain is incapable of storing information and now with Google, I don’t have to.

I completed a couple more runs and they were at my usual level of about 45 minutes. I went about my normal routine, but on one outing, the My Tracks app got stuck halfway round. I know I completed the distance but it told me otherwise. Far from being annoyed, it was an excellent way to break the cycle and I suddenly started thinking about what I was doing. After stressing out so much last time, it occurred to me (plus Steven said so) that I was being far too hard on myself. This was only ever meant to be a crazy hobby. I didn’t even start running to get fit, it was just something to get me out of the house, to be a bit of a challenge, and because, surprisingly, it was fun.

A few weeks ago, I stumbled upon the new Tumblr account for Sesasme Street. I’m not exactly a huge Sesame Street fan, although of course I watched it as a kid. I was more interested in the fact that it was an official account, using YouTube and in-house videos to show snippets from the show. I looked around a bit more and found they also have a regularly updated podcast with the same kind of content. They’re on Facebook, they have many apps, they’re on Twitter. I love a company that is happy to put their stuff out there. There are so many routes to Sesame Street now, that the intro song makes no sense!

Back to a bit of simplicity, I found these brushes that seemed to me like twigs and sticks rather than brush strokes, so I went with a sort of tree theme. I was also testing out filters on the text to try and make things stand out a bit more. Made with: Pixelmator Brushes: Brush Pen marks Filters: Motion Blur Font: STFangsong

Not a lot, but at least it is something: I want to win at least one race with the 908 this year! But I’m going to have to hurry, because there are only two races left! I would especially like to win Petit Le Mans because the atmosphere is so special. It’s unique, and I like that!

He has seemingly disappeared completely. Still no word on his official site, he’s not in the news for any rumours, and he’s definitely not participating in Superleague - Girondins de Bordeaux went and found another driver instead. Silly people. I miss him. He will be back though! He is on the entry list for Petit Le Mans, which takes place next week - the race itself on the 2nd October.

You know, I do not remember this episode at all. I must have seen it, and yet nothing stands out in my brain. Although, that isn’t at all surprising. It’s not a particularly good episode, when it comes down to it. The first historical character new Doctor Who introduces, Charles Dickens no less, and it’s a bit of a let down.

It certainly wasn’t the film I was expecting, because whilst a romance, there was so much underlying tension and story that it wasn’t just about them. I couldn’t quite understand the motives behind the woman… I’ve forgotten her name already. There’s also the fact that the film made me feel cold throughout. I wouldn’t watch it again, but it was an okay way to spend two hours.

There was far too much swearing, and it was all a bit gross for me, but even so, I would watch it all over again for two reasons. 1) The Hot Tub Time Machine moment. I could watch that all day. 2) The moment when I realised it was George McFly. I can’t believe I didn’t know until the end, and when I realised, it totally blew my mind. Not a great film, but moments of brilliance and certainly worth watching, if you can cope with it.

After a conversation on Sidepodcast, I remembered that I still own the one and only autograph I ever got. My friend and I were taken to see Michael Rosen, and I think he must have been doing a talk, or reading some poetry aloud or something. I know that I liked whatever it was he was doing, and afterwards, my friend hurried forward to get an autograph. I was sort of close behind her, although far too embarrassed to ask for it myself.

I have just discovered this rather handy tool from the Good Run Guide - the RoutePlanner - where you can map out a track and find the correct distance. This is really useful when Google Maps only wants to give you directions and distances for the road routes or more obvious pedestrian areas. I figured it was not just for runners but would actually come in handy for measuring any distance that you need, and if you create an account, you can save your work and revisit it whenever you want.

I stumbled across some brushes that show off city skylines, and I was intrigued. Admittedly, most of the hard work for this one was done for me, but I still think it’s a lot of fun. My only question is, which city is it?? Made with: Pixelmator Brushes: Famous City Skylines Font: TW Cen MT Filters: Sunbeam and cloud generator

A romantic comedy that was both awful and brilliant at the same time. The Irish guy was really, really awesome and likeable despite his grumpiness. The situations they found themselves in were completely unreasonable, and made no sense. She had loads of time to get there and made life harder for herself. But otherwise they wouldn’t have fallen in love, so who can argue?

This was a lot more psychological than I’d thought it was going to be - a lot more about the control and relationship between Judy and Cate, rather than the relationship with the boy. Which is a good thing, because that is a lot more interesting than a silly scandal. Also, it was based on a book which is now added to my Kindle wish list.

It was an interesting film, but it seemed to be a direct rip-off of Good Will Hunting. Some kids, from the wrong side of town, one of them really smart, meets a smart girl but upsets her, one of the friends gets involved with some dodgy dealings. It was all very familiar, and only some good chemistry between the friends meant it was worth watching.

I’m not going to lie, there was a lot of this that went over my head. Far too much pontificating about things and quoting literature that I don’t know. That’s kind of what you get with plays, of course. That aside, the film was great and I liked it’s subtle, understated nature. Sometimes it’s nice to have watch something calm and intellectual (even if you don’t get all of it).

After a rather long week, Mr C and I decided to retire from our desks early last night and take to our respective books for reading. It was fun. Mr C is currently enjoying Joe Saward’s latest book - The Man Who Caught Crippen. At the moment, it is only available in paperback, and it’s the first physical book we’ve ordered from Amazon in a long time (and it may well be the last). Meanwhile, I am suffering through the final book of the Dragon Tattoo trilogy, via my Kindle app.

This definitely was a crazy idea. But still, sponsor me, won’t you? Lots of very kind and lovely people have sponsored me already, and I am very grateful. Although that does mean the pressure is on. The numbers are moving in the right direction, but it is still quite rubbish. T minus 30 days Total distance - 5.02km Total moving time - 45:49 Average moving speed - 6.57km/h Really terrible run. Didn’t feel energised and legs hurt almost straight away. Also appear to have injured something in my right ankle. Still, it’s my third official 5k distance.

For Giggles and Joe and anyone else who is having a bad day. Credit: { just jennifer } / Flickr

The last few attempts at running have been a little difficult, and I must admit to have been getting a bit dispirited by this whole 5k thing. That race that seemed so very far away is now looming closer and closer, and I am still being overtaken by people taking their dogs for a walk. Last night, I had a dream about the race and it was a bit of a revelation. I thought these kind of dreams only happened to religious types, but there you have it.

I was browsing around the interwebs, as you do, and came across the company Cavallini & Co, who make some good-looking stationery, with a vintage twist. I found two particular favourites: These rather good Sticky Notes come in a fancy tin and cover every eventuality. From a simple to-do list, to a reminder, and even a day by day note. They look quite small, but I love the variety. Sadly, they are out of stock, or I would have been quite tempted.

Once again, I wasn’t expecting much and was completely surprised by what I saw. Yes, it was the standard rom-com, and yes they did start out hating each other and ended up loving each other but I was very impressed by the ratio of comedy to romance. I couldn’t stop laughing for ten minutes at a time. Loved it.

It’s not the best, I’ll admit, but it certainly wasn’t as bad as I remembered. Wallace and Gromit can make anything amusing, and I do love the cute little rabbits. I just wish Wallace wouldn’t fall in love so easily, he could quite happily fix people’s problems without being in love with the woman with carrot hair.

I wasn’t sure to start with, how interesting a film could be about two mis-matched robbers failing to rob a bank. But it was really very good. The partnership between Bruce and Billy-Bob developed really well, and whilst I wasn’t that keen on the relationship with the woman, she did bring Bonnie Tyler into the film, so I am happy with that.

All I can say is this is my favourite header that I’ve ever done, I think. Made with: Pixelmator Font: Rockwell Filters: Just a bit of motion blur on the text

The minute this episode started, we got to see more fearless attitude from Rose. As the Doctor was busy trying to impress her, and take her futher and further forward into time, she was happy to say: “Fine by me, let’s go further,” without actually seeing any of the things they were passing. She trusted that he was doing what he said, and she was happy to wait for the better deal.

LEG! Credit: San Diego Shooter/Flickr So fluffy.

Last month, I blogged about a new show starting on Revision3 - Dan 3.0. It seemed like a great idea, Dan was already an established video blogger with a good fanbase, and he was intending to turn his life over to the viewers. You’d get to suggest and vote on things for Dan to do with his life - and the project was set to last a whole year. It seems to have fizzled out already.

So, this is how the BBC brought back Doctor Who - to a skeptical viewing public. At the time, it was ever-so-slightly ruined by a certain Graham Norton, but now, watching it back having purchased the series on iTunes, it’s as it should be. It’s fun watching things with the benefit of hindsight, but I tried to go into this with an open mind.

I have a question. I’ve been thinking I should really graduate from running about in tatty t-shirts, as it worked wonders on my feet when I treated them to some proper equipment. So… when did sports wear become quite so complicated? I haven’t been in an actual shop yet (that’s a whole other bridge to try and cross), but browsing about online, I found this very pretty vest. I don’t intend to wear a vest, I’m all about the long sleeves, but this looks like standard running wear to me.

Excellent film. It starts off very in-your-face and loud and a little off-putting, but if you stick with it, and get to know the characters (there are quite a lot of them), it certainly rewards you. Drew Barrymore does make a lot of difference, as well, providing some light relief when it could be all about bruises and pain. Their attitude towards being second best really is inspiring. We’re number 2, we’re number 2!

It’s a bit long, for a start, but the story is just about good enough to hold it for that long. The songs are good, as expected, but I really wasn’t a fan of all the coloured filters and things. I don’t need a purple sky to be convinced that Bali Hai is a special place to visit, and I certainly don’t need a yellow screen to believe these two are in love. Why yellow?

LibriVox is an organisation with a simple goal - to make all public domain works accessible in audiobook form. I’ve been involved for a long while now, part of an enormous group of volunteers who record chapters, poems and entire books to attempt to reach this goal. To take a break from the Grace Harlowe world, I picked a travel book called - British Highways and Byways from a Motor Car. The book journals the travels of an American visiting our small island with the luxury of a car - having previously been frustrated by visiting via train. He covers a lot of the country, up to Scotland and through Wales, London and the South and plenty more.

I’ve been going through a bit of an obsession with the stripe effect, and this is another one that began with that. A couple of brushes, and for the first time I played around with the edges to make it not quite as rectangular and full of straight lines. Made with: Pixelmator Brushes: Floral Decor Art Brushes Font: Party LET Filter: Stylize / Edge Work

Ignore everything I said in the previous post about Superleague in Italy. Franck is not racing there this weekend. Supposedly the team withdrew because of financial difficulties. Probably a mixture of that and a rather annoyed FKM after the last race they did manage to attend. What a mess.

I really enjoyed the film, and it raises some excellent and interesting questions - searching for aliens, what to do when you’ve found them, whether to build what they send you, etc. etc. However, the bit where she actually goes through wormholes and ends up on a clearly weird and fake beach ruined it. They could have skipped that whole bit, had a much shorter film, and I still would have believed it thanks to the 18 hours of static. Still, Matthew took his top off, so this will get no less than four marks out of five.

It’s an interesting concept, but I’m not 100% sure the story held up throughout. I would be more intrigued to find out how the world continued with everyone blind - how did they survive, how did they go about bringing up the non-blind youngsters? How did the people get off the lighthouse island to send word about the sea water? Anyway, good but not great.

They have recommissioned Sherlock! Fabulous news, although I don’t think anyone expected any different. The intriguing part of the announcement is that it is to be another batch of three episodes, and they will each continue the format of a 90 minute sitting. After the second episode of series 1, I felt that 90 minutes was drawing things out a little, but if it helps them to tell the story, then we will have to trust them. Whilst I would like more than three episodes, I can understand why it is necessary to limit the stories. They must be quite tricky to write, and Moffat will be fitting it in between two bits of Doctor Who (more on that in a moment). Good things come in small packages, apparently. Talking of the man who has taken over the BBC, Moffat says:

This post is specifically for Amy, because she asked for more stationery. Reluctantly, eh-hem, I am obliging. It is such a wrench to scour the web for this stuff, you know? Monopoly Game Board Planner I hate the idea of someone throwing away Monopoly, because… why would you? But if you’re going to get rid of your board games, it makes sense for them to be turned into something useful, doesn’t it? Also available: Scrabble and Trivial Pursuit!

I really don’t know anything about poker, but I was keen to read this after realising just how fabulous Ms Coren is. Although it is all about the game, it’s not hard to read. Even when going into details about particular hands, you only have to have a basic grasp of deal, raise, and fold, which is the extent of my knowledge. It’s a tale of how one person can do what they love and do it well, and a chronicle of how poker has grown and changed but still retains its essence. The most important lines in the book circle around: It’s not about the money.